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| Hideyuki Kurata - Anime Convention
Personality of the Week - Aug. 25, 2002 |
 Hideyuki
Kurata may have done more to overcome cliches and repetitive settings in
anime series than any other writer. He's created the scripts for
two shows that have become North American fans favorites with little more
than word of mouth from people who watched the shows and spread the word
about their imaginative stories that break the patterns of typical tales.
Kurata is best known anime U.S. fans as the person who took craziness to
a new level when he wrote the Excel Saga, which has won acclaim for its
unyielding approach to making sense while not making sense. All Kurata
did was to take other existing genres and joyfully tear them to shreds
with the madness of the irepressable Excel. Then Kurata took the cliches
he hadn't damaged in Excel Saga and finished them off in Read or Die. This
series turns most action-show patterns inside out - its hero is a bookish,
non-athletic librarian, it's more interested in paper and books than in
spaceships, and the great heroes of history are transformed into villains.
"I like books, and I wanted a character that liked books and moved around
in books," Kurata explained at Anime Expo in 2002. "Yomiko Readman is my
ideal woman." |
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| At Anime Expo... |
...with the Read or Die team |
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| Introduced in Long Beach... |
...with Maria Kawamura |
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