Funimation
has been working hard to establish titles beyond their flagship Dragon
Ball franchise. At Ushicon, Lance Heiskell of the Fort Worth company's
sales staff announced that they're going to add two shows in the Sakura
Taisen universe to their list of releases, a signing that happened a few
days before the convention. One of the shows is the Sumire retirement musical
which was a major change in the world of Sakura Wars. When the announcement
was made that the Sumire character from the game and anime would be "retired,"
it was big news in Japan, and the decision was made to create a retirement
anime in the same way that real entertainers hold retirement shows. Along
with the Sumire retirement musical, Funimation is going to release the
English-language version of the "Ecole de Paris" OVA which is based on
the Sakura Taisen 3 game.
"Fruits
Basket" is another part of Funimation's expansion. For the DVD North American
art for the "Fruits Basket" release, Funimation will use a cover, shown
in this picture, which uses images from the original Japanese DVD release.
Heiskell said that "Fruits Basket" DVD's will hit the street on March 25
and May 27. "Yu Yu Hakusho" has DVD releases on March 4 and May 27, following
the Jan. 14 release of the box set. "Lupin III" movies also join the Funimation
family with discs released on Feb. 11 and May 20. And fresh off of its
unprecedented three-cover treatment by TV Guide, "Yu-Gi-Oh" will have disc
releases on March 16 and May 6.
Dragon
Ball's showings on the Cartoon Network have made it a hot home video property,
and Funimation is taking advantage of that exposure with some "brand extension."
Now they have three versions of Dragon Ball headed to North American home
video: the original Dragon Ball series, the Dragon Ball Z series that has
gotten so much exposure on cable TV, and the newer Dragon Ball GT.
It'll see some of the same changes that happened to Dragon Ball, including
a new rap style theme song. The GT series gets video releases on April
15 (Heiskell joked that the video hits the stores on the tax filing deadline
day) and May 20. The original Dragon Ball has new releases on Feb. 25 and
April 29, and Dragon Ball Z gets new videos on market on Feb. 4, Feb. 11,
March 4, March 11, March 25 and April 22. Add to this more Infogrames Dragon
Ball games such as the Legacy of Goku 2 game , and a new web site based
on new Funimation titles, and the company has a full plate in the winter
and spring of 2003.
Funimation
has been working hard to establish titles beyond their flagship Dragon
Ball franchise. At Ushicon, Lance Heiskell of the Fort Worth company's
sales staff announced that they're going to add two shows in the Sakura
Taisen universe to their list of releases, a signing that happened a few
days before the convention. One of the shows is the Sumire retirement musical
which was a major change in the world of Sakura Wars. When the announcement
was made that the Sumire character from the game and anime would be "retired,"
it was big news in Japan, and the decision was made to create a retirement
anime in the same way that real entertainers hold retirement shows. Along
with the Sumire retirement musical, Funimation is going to release the
English-language version of the "Ecole de Paris" OVA which is based on
the Sakura Taisen 3 game.
"Fruits
Basket" is another part of Funimation's expansion. For the DVD North American
art for the "Fruits Basket" release, Funimation will use a cover, shown
in this picture, which uses images from the original Japanese DVD release.
Heiskell said that "Fruits Basket" DVD's will hit the street on March 25
and May 27. "Yu Yu Hakusho" has DVD releases on March 4 and May 27, following
the Jan. 14 release of the box set. "Lupin III" movies also join the Funimation
family with discs released on Feb. 11 and May 20. And fresh off of its
unprecedented three-cover treatment by TV Guide, "Yu-Gi-Oh" will have disc
releases on March 16 and May 6.
Dragon
Ball's showings on the Cartoon Network have made it a hot home video property,
and Funimation is taking advantage of that exposure with some "brand extension."
Now they have three versions of Dragon Ball headed to North American home
video: the original Dragon Ball series, the Dragon Ball Z series that has
gotten so much exposure on cable TV, and the newer Dragon Ball GT.
It'll see some of the same changes that happened to Dragon Ball, including
a new rap style theme song. The GT series gets video releases on April
15 (Heiskell joked that the video hits the stores on the tax filing deadline
day) and May 20. The original Dragon Ball has new releases on Feb. 25 and
April 29, and Dragon Ball Z gets new videos on market on Feb. 4, Feb. 11,
March 4, March 11, March 25 and April 22. Add to this more Infogrames Dragon
Ball games such as the Legacy of Goku 2 game , and a new web site based
on new Funimation titles, and the company has a full plate in the winter
and spring of 2003.
