Toon Zone has a report on the CMX panel at San Diego. Apparently it has sunk in that censoring Tenjho Tenge was a public relations disaster, especially as the crowd was somewhat hostile. One wonders if people showed up just to complain. CMX seems to have gotten the message:
However, they came with a tone of amends, mentioning that even if they wanted to do an uncut after the edited version finished, the licence would run out before they could complete it anyway. They also mentioned that in future they will focus on getting titles they know they can handle without any alteration. Add to that news that Emma will be uncut and rated to ensure that it can be uncut from the get go, and they seemed to have run the crowd over a little (maybe).
It sounds like they’re giving up on mature manga. That would be no loss, IMHO, as companies like Del Rey and Digital Manga seem to be happy to pick it up and do a good job with it.
Here’s the list of new titles:
Go Go Heaven by Yamada Keiko
Time Garden by Tamao Ichinose and Daimurou Kishi
Canon by Shiomi Chika
Apothecaries Argentum by Yamashita Tomomi
Key to the Kingdom by Shitou Kyoko
Orfina by Tennouji Kitsune
Variante by Ikura Sugitomo
Dorothea by Cutie
I can’t find much on any of these but the folks at the Anime on DVD forums are way ahead of me anyway. Here’s a thought: Maybe the publishers could, you know, have descriptions and covers ready to post on their websites, and press releases ready to be e-mailed, as soon as the announcement is made at the panel. On second thought, that would take away the element of audience participation that makes the manga world so … interesting.
(In all fairness, I did get a lovely press release from Dark Horse, but none of the titles on it look like manga.)
In other CMX news, volume 5 of Megatokyo is scheduled for March 2007. And I thought this was rather droll:
On the topic of synergy between CMX and the rest of Time Warner (TW), the TW general company line is that synergy doesn’t exist.
UPDATE: CMX has cover scans up, and ICv2 has more info.
I’ll read up more on exactly what happened with the Ten Ten stuff but I am willing to forgive and forget depending on how much regret they show and if they have learned from their mistake. I hope Ed was taping this panel.