¡Rábanos Radiactivos! ... es no.1764

Written by Fred Patten, and printed on a Xerox photocopier, March 4th, 1999. Intended for Apa L, 1,764^th Distribution, LASFS meeting N^o 3212, March 4^th, 1999. Address: 11893 West Jefferson Boulevard, apt. 2, Culver City, California, 90230-6322. Telephone: (310) 827-3335.

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Arrrgh! I have become a victim of one of those editorial atrocities like unto Harlan Ellison's articles where the editors change "s-f" to "sci-fi" throughout his manuscripts.

Five years ago, I wrote a brief essay on the growing popularity of anime in America, and how consideration of the reasons for its popularity could be advantageous to the American animation industry. This was published in The Complete Guide to Animation and Computer Graphics Schools, by Ernest Pintoff (Watson-Guptill Publications, 1995), along with similar essays on aspects of the industroy by about fifty other professionals ranging from William Hanna on TV animation to Noel Blanc on voice-acting to Stan Lee on the potential for animation of popular comic-book characters.

Pintoff has just authored a similar book for aspiring animation artists / writers / voice actors, Animation 101, by Ernest Pintoff (Michael Wiese Productions, 1999). He asked for permission to reprint my essay from his previous book, and I said okay. I assume that he did the same with all the other writers.

I just got my contributor's copy of Animation 101. it turns out that Pintoff did not just reprint my essay, he decided to update it himself by adding a new sentence. After my paragraph ending, "Many of the leading Japanese cartoon directors, such as Hayao Miyazaki, Rin Taro, Katsuhiro Otomo and Yoshiaka Kawajiri, are studied by the new animatiors in the cartoon industry," he tacked on, "And after Hayao Miyazaki's animated feature, Ghost in the Shell earned highly favorable responses from industry professionals and critics, Walt Disney announced his acquisition of worldwide distribution rights to Miyazaki's most recent films."

But Miyazaki did not make Ghost in the Shell. It's by Mamoru Oshii, another very popular director. So the effect of that additional sentence is equivalent to saying that it was the success of James Cameron's popular Star Wars trilogy that got him the prestige to direct Titanic; or talking about Walt Disney's popular Bugs Bunny cartoons. That is hardly a comment that any movie expert would want attributed to him! I am going to be spending a lot of time assuring anime fans and professionals that I did not write that addition to my earlier essay. I have not had time yet to compare the other essays in Animation 101 with Pintoff's earlier book to see whether any others have had similarly outrageous additions.

-- Comments On Last Week's Distribution:

Oh, All Right!!! -- (Lembke) I feel guilty about missing the memorial for Gary Louie, but I had Deadlines last weekend. I have articles or reviews in four different current animation/movie magazines, which is the most that I've ever been published in at one time; and this doesn't count the fanzines like Yarf! or five apas. In fact, I'm behind schedule in turning in my next column to Yarf! because I haven't had time yet to finish reading the books to be reviewed because I've got so many new anime-article deadlines. It sounded at last week's meeting like his memorial was going to be crowded.

SFFAM #374 -- (Merrigan) Ulp! It's hard to argue that 15 years isn't really too long to serve as O.C. But the talent pool for a new O.C. is pretty dry these days.

Texting the Text Editor v.2 #8 -- (Zeff) If you like Spike Jones, have you gotten the CDs of Raymond Scott's 1930s six-man swing "quintet"? His music is best known anonymously because Carl Stalling, the Warner Bros. cartoon composer, was a big fan of his and kept using it for mood music in the WB cartoons. Scott's "Powerhouse", the famous WB cartoon "industrial" theme may be the best-known, but Stalling used motifs from over a dozen of Scott's pieces like "Dinner Music for Hungry Cannibals". Some animation historian tracked Scott down on his deathbed in the late 1980s, and got all of his carefully-packed recordings and permission to release them on CD just before he died. I don't know whether the CDs are still in print or not. They have the advantage of being Scott's complete songs, rather than just the fragments in the WB cartoons; and the distadvanatage of being Scott's arrangements for just a six-piece band rather than Stalling's re-arrangements for WB's full orchestra.

Vanamonde #302 -- (Hertz) Speaking of Yeats, he is the central character in the current issue of DC/Vertigo's The Dreaming (#35), a literary horror/fantasy comic. I'm not sure how comprehensible the story will be to anyone who has not been following it regularly, although the Yeats references themselves will doubtlessly be better appreciated by those familiar with his life and poetry than by The Dreaming's regular readers. (Yeats, the character, is completely bewildered and assumes he is having a nightmare.) ## Animation Magazine spread my "The 13 Top Developments in Anime, 1985-1999", which should have fit onto two pages, over five pages due to arty layout. The developments are thematic rather than ranked chronologically or in order of importance. 1, Robotech. 2, The Internet. 3, Conventions. 4, Anime Specialty Companies. 5, Theatrical Distribution. 6, Video Distribution. 7, Video Games. 8, Popular Culture Specialty Magazines. 9, Public Awareness. 10, TV Programming. 11, Manga. 12, Collectibles. 13, Disney and Miyazaki.