Another Genvid scoop for you tonight. I've taken a look through a Japanese book called the "Licensing Character Directory 2007," published by Nikkei, which is one of Japan's premiere business media sources. I present my findings to you below.

A bit of background: This book is an industry tome, weighing in at 900+ pages and costing over $700 per copy. I don't have the kind of money to buy something like this myself; I looked through the copy available at the Tokyo Central Library in Arisugawa Park. I also don't have a scanner in Japan so I'm afraid we'll have to make do with digital photographs of copies that I took.

Today there was yet another Sailor Moon doujinshi event in Kawasaki that I attended, and here are some pictures and highlights.

This is the third Happy Halloween event, the sequel to the one we attended a year ago. I was there with Onur who runs a Turkish Sailor Moon website as well as Brad from http://www.moonkitty.net. Jared, who attended the Ochakai event last June was also set to go with us this time, having spent a lot of time preparing a Sailor Mars costume.

Yesterday there was a Sailor Moon doujinshi event in Kawasaki that I attended, and here are some pictures and highlights.

Coming a mere two months after the last Ochakai, there was less activity at this one. But what was there was interesting enough.

I have a couple of comments to get through before moving onto today's long editorial.

First off, just regarding Sailor Moon news in general, apart from the minor updates to Sailor Moon Channel, there's been nothing (that comes to mind) to discuss. If there was any breaking series-related news to be had, we'd certainly have it up here as we did with the Lohan rumor. There's going to be a doujinshi event here in Tokyo again on Sunday, so at the very least, I'll have more pictures and stories from that next week.

There's been an update at Sailor Moon channel and I've translated the small notice on the top left.

Finally, the Asakusa district's rainy season has begun to clear. We dropped by our friends at Banpresto and held a fireworks viewing party along the Sumida river which Takeuchi-sensei attended.

It had this wonderful "Ah, it's summer!" type feeling to it. This month we here at Sailor Moon Channel are working together to see a fortune-telling page get made. Please look forward to it.

Banpresto's HQ is in Taito-ku, not too far from where I live. The Asakusa district is a famous old entertainment center about twenty minutes from my apartment, and is well known for its opening and closing of the Sumida river ceremonies, where fireworks are lit on the river that runs alongside Asakusa. You can see some pictures of Asakusa at the WoL Tour page, since we went there on Day 2.

There's a new remix cover of Moonlight Densetsu out. The singer is called Nana Kitade, the CD is Cutie Bunny, and Moonlight Densetsu is track two on the CD (released by Sony.)

Here's a link to the Japanese CD, which came out on the 12th. We've made available a 30-second sample here.

Tofu Records released a different CD of hers (her first in the US) on the 11th. She'll be performing at Otakon in Baltimore in a few weeks, and will be in New York, Boston, and San Francisco in the next month.

Thanks J. Mays for the info.

Once again, myself, Yosenex (WoL's photographer), and Brad from MoonKitty went to a Japanese doujinshi event together. This time it was called "Amichan no Ochakai" which translates to "Ami's Tea Party" and was located in Akihabara. Pictures in this article were taken by Yosenex (except when they're of him.)

We also had a fourth person in attendance, a friend of Yosenex's named Jared, who came cosplaying for the event. He drew crowds in the main "Electric Town" entrance of Akihabara, with everyone from tourists to the girls in maid costumes that hand out flyers asking to take photos.

With a can of Chu-Hi in hand, anyone can become a sailor senshi,
and wind up having that permanently recorded in internet form.

UPDATE: ANN has noted the Lohan interview.

It seems that the Lohan rumor continues. Both we and AnimeNewsNetwork pointed out that there was nothing in Animage. Keep in mind, though, that that is ALL we have stated, that it was not in Animage. FYI, from this interview:

The people behind the upcoming big-screen adaptation of the Japanese manga series "Sailor Moon" have sent her some materials to look at, she said, and fans have begun lobbying hard for Lohan to play the titular character, a rail-thin blonde known for her strong powers and sexy costumes.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Apr. 20, 2006 - (Royal Palm Beach, FL) Genvid L.L.C. is proud to announce that its "Sailor Moon" based reality tour, the "Warriors of Legend Tour of Tokyo" has sold out. The tour is based on sites described in Genvid L.L.C.'s book "Warriors of Legend: Reflections of Japan in Sailor Moon."

The Warriors of Legend Tour of Tokyo is a for-fans, by-fans tour which promises devotees of the blockbuster series an inside look at the life of the characters in a way seldom experienced by even Japanese otaku. The ten tour attendees are flying into Tokyo from cities around the globe, from San Francisco and New York to Toronto, Sydney, Okinawa, and Bagdad, for a 4 night, 3 day adventure of a lifetime.

Before we begin, let me mention that we've filled 9 of the Warriors of Legend Tour's 10 slots, and will be closing the tour for registration within the next few days. The level of commitment from Sailor Moon's fans blows me away and I'm honored to be guiding this group.

If everything goes well, when the tour concludes on June 30th, 2006 (Usagi's birthday), I'll be writing a letter to Takeuchi, explaining what we did on the tour and including some photographs of those in attendance. I think she will be absolutely thrilled by it.