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Monday, 09-Nov-2009 17:27:44 CST
History
of Anime in the U.S.
The Early US Companies
 Word
has it that AnimEigo approached a venture capital company in Manhattan
for help in negotiating their early deals. This company, run by
an ex-executive from Sony Video, had significant contacts in Japan
and therefore was a natural for this kind of work. The next surprise,
however, came when a new division of this company (US Manga Corps)
formed and announced that it too was going to enter the US anime
market. The fates, however, were not kind to US Manga Corps early
on ... a US version of Minna Agechau (I Give My All) was to have
been the first release from the company. Debuting this product at
AnimeCon 1991, USMC was besieged with news crews all wanting to
know about this new wave of "Japanese Pornography".
There were probably more pictures taken of the Minna Agechau box
(and the pink Sony paper panties that were included) than of any
other aspect of this groundbreaking event. Fox TV news and the LA
Times certainly did no one a favor with their coverage: pressure
backed up the line and became intolerable to Sony US. In a negotiated
deal, all copies of this title were purchased by the original licensor
and were presumedly destroyed (Still, it would be interesting if
copies of this title were to see the light of day). That it's Shakespeare
no one will claim, but it's interesting to see what all the fuss
was about. And, no one can doubt that it's tamer than many general
circulation titles are now.
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