My Life In Fandom: Tamashii Nations 2020 (& Tie-Ins)

This weekend was the Tamashii Nations 2020 exhibit, which had a significant online component. Stream archive here.

It's here. Almost over, so catch it while you can.

In addition to some new figure debuts, Bandai took the opportunity to put up some old classics on their YouTube channels. I'm embedding some below.

There's plenty more. Bandai's Global channels (like Gundam Info) are where you'll find the stuff, with ENG subs on the CC track (so turn them on). There's non-mecha and newer stuff also.

But--and this is key--Bandai's doing its very best to replicate the TV model here; they push the merch good and hard, and I do not fault them for doing so. Anime, for most of the corporations, are loss-leaders for the Home Video and Merchandise sales they hope to rake in. Yes, "glorified commercial" is very much the point, but that doesn't mean you can just phone in the narrative work; you have to satisfy audience expectations or they won't buy the merch that lets them associate with the show's brand away from the screen.

You can see this with how fast Gundam course-corrects when an offering underperforms. Other franchises (e.g. Dragon Ball) do this too.

Now, I said yesterday that Japan perceives a need to reach out to foreign audiences to compensate for the drop off of domestic demand. This is one way that's being done, but it's a short-term solution; you can only milk a legacy IP so long before it runs dry, so it either has to be refreshed with faithful--i.e. audience-satisfying--additions (including remakes; this is how Space Battleship Yamato relaunched a decade or so ago) or those spiritual successors we all talk about but few actually hit with the audience.

And that's before legal fuckery. (*shakes fist at Harmony Gold*)

It's interesting to see the major corporations in Japan attempt to adjust their existing model to face the challenges before them. They are very risk-averse and conservative, but not blind; they know what's going on, and once they get a man to rally behind they can and do commit- see Nintendo rally around the Switch.

Crunchyroll and others may think they can buy their way to control, but don't count out the Japanese yet.