Kawaii-Kon 2012

Sentai Filmworks Industry Panel

The Sentai Filmworks panel at Kawaii-Kon wound up being rescheduled, but company representative, voice director and guest of honor David Williams was still there to answer the audience's questions. The following is a transcription of the questions asked and the answers Williams gave.

Q: "Is there any interest in releasing more of the Gintama TV anime?"

The Gintama movie will be released on DVD and Blu-ray and will have an English dub, and depending on the sales of the movie, they will decide whether or not to release future volumes of Gintama, and if those volumes will be dubbed. It was not stated whether this means they will redub the previous DVDs, or only dub newly-released episodes.

Q: "Was there any problem getting the license for the Gintama movie, since it is owned by Warner Brothers Japan, and Warner Brothers has a branch here?"

They purchased the license directly from Warner Brothers Japan, so there was no problem at all.

Q: "Tell it straight- Is the anime industry going up or down (in terms of success)?"

Sideways. There are some areas that are going down, but some places that are slightly going up.

Q: "If you made all the decisions in the industry, what adjustments would you introduce to make it more successful?"

He said that he would make the Japanese anime industry produce something not about high school girls (this was met with much applause). He explained that the Japanese anime industry is so worried about selling enough DVDs and merchandise that it plays it safe, and therefore only makes anime about high school girls.

Q: "Are there any plans on licensing the later Macross series (like Macross Frontier)?"

If it is possible, he would love to, he said.

Q: "Is there a dub planned for InuxBoku Secret Service?"

Only if there are high view rates on the streaming, which signals interest. This applies to all series that are streaming before their DVD/Blu-ray release.

Q: "Would Sentai be interested in licensing yaoi titles?"

We'll release anything if people want it.

Q: "What are your top 5 anime?"

In no particular order, Dirty Pair, D.N.Angel, Castle in the Sky, Macross, and City Hunter.

He stated, however, that he doesn't personally like Gantz due to its excessive gory violence (once the head started flying through the air in the first episode, he felt like he couldn't watch anymore). However, he admits it is a good series overall, and he had recommended that ADV license it back in the day.

Q: "Why was Zettai Karen Children's name changed to "Psychic Squad"?"

The reason it was changed to "Psychic Squad" was, in fact, a direction given by the Japanese licensing company, not Sentai Filmworks. Although rumors flew around that the translated title of Zettai Karen Children (Absolutely Lovely Children) sounded like a porn title and therefore got changed, this is untrue.

Williams proceeded to pass out DVDs to people who could answer trivia questions, most not related to the anime itself (one was whoever can raise their hand the fastest gets the DVD/Blu-ray). The final question was, "Which two guests from a past Kawaii Kon got married? The answer: Travis Willingham got married to Laura Bailey. Also, as a free piece of trivia, we were told that Luci Christian is pregnant with her second child.