Well, here it is, the final part of my report on Manifest 2007. As you might be able to tell this is for the third and final day of the event.
My second day at Manifest started out far more smoothly since I already had a pass and didn’t need to queue up to get one. Surprisingly, there was still a huge queue to pick up passes! With a day full of events there was plenty to do and I feel that Saturday is the real start of the festival.
Today was the opening day of Manifest for 2007. There’s usually not much to do on the Friday apart from picking up tickets and watching some anime screenings and this year was no exception. What the first day is really good for is whetting your appetite for the next two days!
The Melbourne Anime Festival (Manifest) will be starting a fortnight from now, on Friday, September 14th. If you’re an otaku, or at least know what otaku means, then I heartily recommend coming along to this con. It’s held at Melbourne University so hopefully it should be easy to reach for most people living somewhere near the city. Most events, screenings, trading and general fun is to be had on the Saturday and Sunday but it’s good to come and get everything organised on Friday and see some of the early cosplay and screenings.
If you’re looking for something to fill the time until Manifest in September then you might want to check out Doujicon on July 28th at Monash University’s Caulfield campus. The convention has a special focus on local dōjinshi but also includes screenings, panels, classes and all the usual otaku convention stuff. Best of all, it’s really cheap at $5 entry fee!
Madman has semi-officially announced the impending release of the Australian release of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya. For those who don’t know, Melancholy has a number of things that are different from your typical anime. Two of these were the rather strange introduction to the series (an amateur video made by the show’s characters) and the fact that the series was broadcast “out of order”, which meant that just trying to keep up with the show was a mind trip in itself. I actually really liked this aspect of the show but, unfortunately, it seems most people do not agree with me. All DVD releases (Japan and USA) have re-ordered the series to be in chronological order, rather than the wacky broadcast order.