Articles

Report: Anime Evolution 2004 part 3 - 7/9/04
By: Jesse Betteridge

Sunday

They probably figured that holding the long awaited VA panel with Michael Dobson and Scott McNeil first thing in the morning wasn't going to stop people from coming and... they were right. As early as 10am, the entire room was packed with fangirls (and a guy or two), anxiously awaiting the non-stop wit and hilarity that these guys have pretty much obligated themselves to provide. Obviously it rubs off, because there was one girl there who was actually cosplaying as Scott McNeil. That provoked a lot of cheering.

The ultimate cosplayer

The only real highlight on Sunday (for me, anyway) was The State of Anime in Canada panel. To ease my anticipation, I quickly went through the dealer's room again to pick up a Super GALS DVD and Ghost in the Shell 2 figure (both at half price). The panel started at 2:30pm, which was the exact same time that the Fullmetal Alchemist panel and the second Anime Improv show were both being held. Considering that even I wanted to attend both of those, I wasn't expecting anyone to show up, but was pleasantly surprised to see enough people in attendance to carry on a long and very intriguing discussion. The panel was run by Editor and Anime Knight from the AE forums, and they provided enormous insight not only concerning anime in Canada, but about the history of the anime industry in general. The panel was only scheduled for one hour, but wound up going on for nearly two-and-a-half!

The closing ceremonies were delayed, unsurprisingly. We had to line-up as they were getting ready, but they managed to fit all of the remaining attendees in. At the closing we were treated to an encore of the Mazinger Z theme, as well as the winners of the AMV contest. Just before the end, it was announced that AE 2004 had over 2000 attendees - an increase of 800 from last year!

Apart from the fact that Jerry Chu couldn't make it over to run the Bandai panel again this year, I really had a blast at Anime Evolution 2004. I have a feeling that this is quickly going to grow into one of the biggest anime conventions in Canada.