Japanese anime fandom is completely into fanzines, with vast swarms of otaku converging upon huge events like Comiket and retail stores like Comic Toranoana selling doujinshi year 'round. It's pretty great, and I speak as someone who once wound up attending Haru Comic City along with tens of thousands of fangirls. But, what about American fanzines?
Recently, there has been a resurgence of interest in American fans putting out honest to goodness physical fanzines. Okay, so by resurgence I mean three titles:
The Last American Fanzine - A couple of years ago the awesomely curmudgeonly folks at Colony Drop decided that it was time to resurrect the tradition of anime fanzines in America one last time. ANN gives a quick rundown of the pleasures inside here; I particularly liked the article about the pain of playing the Bubblegum Crisis game for the PC Engine and the Riding Bean fanfic. Yes, I said Riding Bean fanfic.
The Last American Fanzine 2: The Quickening - Okay, so TLAF wasn't the last zine after all. The just released TLAF2:TQ may not have a catchy acronym but it does have some great writing, with pics of vintage swag, not nearly enough Patlabor discussion, and a full length analysis of the Cream Lemon OVA "Pop Chaser". Yes, that Cream Lemon. No, seriously. It's even more awesome than the first fanzine.
Royal Space Force: 25th Anniversary - No one loves Wings of Honneamise more than Carl Horn. For that matter, no one may love Gainax more than Carl Horn either; I once attended a room party he threw at AWA that involved posters of Gunbuster mecha designs interspersed with posters of a 1960s Playboy interview with Sinatra, gin and tonics, and Gunbuster playing on a tiny B&W TV perched on top of a vintage typewriter set up for attendees to leave their comments. But I digress. The important thing is that Carl Horn loves Honneamise so much he put together a really terrific fanzine analyzing the film in honor of it's twenty-fifth anniversary. Dave Merrill gives a better description of the 'zine than I could here. If you're a fan of Honneamise or old school anime fandom, it's a must read.
So, yeah, zines are back and you should check them out. The latest issue of The Last American Fanzine did well enough that they're planning on releasing a third zine focused on Patlabor, so that completely rules and provides another reason to keep living. And, who knows, perhaps the folks at the Carolina Otaku Uprising will release another issue of Animosity one of these days...
FnordChan
Edit - Whoops, I meant to throw this into Off-Topic instead of Off-Topic Community. Ah well, most of NeoAnimeGAF hangs out in the OT season threads, so close enough.
Recently, there has been a resurgence of interest in American fans putting out honest to goodness physical fanzines. Okay, so by resurgence I mean three titles:
The Last American Fanzine - A couple of years ago the awesomely curmudgeonly folks at Colony Drop decided that it was time to resurrect the tradition of anime fanzines in America one last time. ANN gives a quick rundown of the pleasures inside here; I particularly liked the article about the pain of playing the Bubblegum Crisis game for the PC Engine and the Riding Bean fanfic. Yes, I said Riding Bean fanfic.
The Last American Fanzine 2: The Quickening - Okay, so TLAF wasn't the last zine after all. The just released TLAF2:TQ may not have a catchy acronym but it does have some great writing, with pics of vintage swag, not nearly enough Patlabor discussion, and a full length analysis of the Cream Lemon OVA "Pop Chaser". Yes, that Cream Lemon. No, seriously. It's even more awesome than the first fanzine.
Royal Space Force: 25th Anniversary - No one loves Wings of Honneamise more than Carl Horn. For that matter, no one may love Gainax more than Carl Horn either; I once attended a room party he threw at AWA that involved posters of Gunbuster mecha designs interspersed with posters of a 1960s Playboy interview with Sinatra, gin and tonics, and Gunbuster playing on a tiny B&W TV perched on top of a vintage typewriter set up for attendees to leave their comments. But I digress. The important thing is that Carl Horn loves Honneamise so much he put together a really terrific fanzine analyzing the film in honor of it's twenty-fifth anniversary. Dave Merrill gives a better description of the 'zine than I could here. If you're a fan of Honneamise or old school anime fandom, it's a must read.
So, yeah, zines are back and you should check them out. The latest issue of The Last American Fanzine did well enough that they're planning on releasing a third zine focused on Patlabor, so that completely rules and provides another reason to keep living. And, who knows, perhaps the folks at the Carolina Otaku Uprising will release another issue of Animosity one of these days...
FnordChan
Edit - Whoops, I meant to throw this into Off-Topic instead of Off-Topic Community. Ah well, most of NeoAnimeGAF hangs out in the OT season threads, so close enough.