Anime Expo 2010

Geneon Universal Industry Panel

Presiding at the first Geneon Universal Anime Expo panel are Black Lagoon and Hakuōki producer Mitsutoshi Ogura and Geneon Universal representative Suisei.

The panel opens with a string of short previews for Geneon Universal's 2010 lineup, consisting of Black Lagoon: Roberta's Blood Trail, Hellsing, Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works, Toaru Kagaku no Railgun, Hakuōki, and High School of the Dead. After the previews, Suisei1 introduced the history of Geneon Universal, which was originally founded as Pioneer Entertainment in 1981. In 2003 they were acquired by Dentsu and became Geneon Entertainment, and in 2009 they merged with Universal Pictures Japan to become Geneon Universal Entertainment Japan.

After this history, a series of longer trailers for the 2010 lineup was shown, in the same order as listed above.

Black Lagoon: Roberta's Blood Trail retains the same staff as the original two TV seasons, including the opening by MELL, and will consist of five episodes.

Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works was reportedly the top-selling item on Amazon Japan for several weeks and drew over 20,000 viewers in Japanese theaters.

Geneon followed up the trailers with information about their music artists. Under their music label "I've" are MELL, KOTOKO, Mami Kawada, and others; other artists not under the I've label managed by Geneon Universal include fripSide, ELISA, and Maon Kurosaki. After the list, a series of promotional videos for anime themes performed by artists MELL (Black Lagoon), fripSide (Toaru Kagaku no Railgun), and ELISA (Toaru Kagaku no Railgun) were shown.

Several anime themes by these artists will be made available on iTunes in the United States, as follows:

MELL:

• "Red Fraction" (Black Lagoon)
• "Proof, no vain" (Hayate the Combat Butler)
• "Rideback" (Rideback)
• "Kill" (from the film Kill

KOTOKO:

• Opening theme from Shana
• "Chercher" (Maria-sama ga Miteru)
• "Hayate no Gotoku!" (Hayate the Combat Butler)

Others:

• Yoko Ishida: "Akano Seijaku (Shana)
• Yoko Takahashi: "Yoake Umarekuru Shoujo" (Shana)
• Sachi Tainaka: "Itoshii Hitoe" (Fate/stay night)

Black Lagoon, Hellsing, and Toaru Kagaku no Railgun will all be released by FUNimation in the United States, the latter of which is the only new announcement. High School of the Dead will be announced "sometime at this event," but when exactly is a "secret."

During the Q&A it was revealed that High School of the Dead will be 12 episodes long. A project based on the final story arc of Fate/stay night, called Heaven's Feel, was hinted at as a possibility after Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works.