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ominous-meme · 2 years

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DigiFes Frontier Cast Talk event!

@citrus-cactus here it is, finished just in the nick of time before the archive is removed! Enjoy!

(It is literally 23:50 rn, and the archive disappears at 23:59 lmao)

Once again, please excuse any translation errors, as I’m still working on my Japanese skills! I’ve noted down whatever I could understand and keep up with under the cut!

Warning: THIS IS VERY LONG. A brief summary: everyone thinks they’re the only normal person in a cast of weirdos.

Talk event begins after the drama reading, with an MC named Ohashi coordinating the event

Cast introduces themselves: everyone delivers the “Spirit Evolution!” line with their character’s human spirit name…except for Hiroshi Kamiya (Kouji’s VA)

Cast introduction: Junko Takeuchi (Takuya), Hiroshi Kamiya (Kouji), Sawa Ishige (Izumi), Michael Shitanda (Junpei), Kumiko Watanabe (Tomoki), Kenichi Suzumura (Kouichi)

SuzuKen: *laughs and hesitates before delivering his Spirit Evolution line*

MC: “Is it okay for Kamiya-san to not do that line delivery?” Kamiyan, immediately: “YUP! It’s fine!”

Takeuchi (who has goggles with her): *teasing Kamiyan and telling him to do it* “You can’t run away~”

MC: *trying to convince him*

Kamiyan, eventually: “I’m Hiroshi Kamiya, who played Kouji Minamoto”

Takeuchi: “That really is Kouji-like behaviour, isn’t it” (everyone else: *agrees*)

Takeuchi: “this is the first time we’ve gathered together for this kind of event - I’m excited and nervous!” Kamiyan: “Can’t believe this is the first time we’re doing it in 20 years”

MC: “what kind of atmosphere are we getting today?” SuzuKen: “a fun atmosphere” *everyone laughs* “back then we said a lot of things, but today we want to express things we didn’t say as well”

Kamiyan calls Kumiko Watanabe “Ku-san”

Lots of banter between Ku-san and Kamiyan about what went down between the group in the dressing room before the event

Everyone: “It feels so nostalgic, doesn’t it? Nothing’s changed”

The themes of the anniversary talk are based on survey responses received from fans - the first theme being: “something impressive”

First topic within the theme: “not normal”

Ishige-san volunteers to speak: “this is my personal experience, but when Digimon Frontier began, I was still a newcomer…the person who voiced Bokomon (Sugiyama), told me: “Sawa-chan, you are a normal person, but when we’re chatting, you don’t seem normal, so please focus on the performance” I was so shocked that my super-senior was telling me this, and it’s an impressive incident that stayed in my mind.”

More banter, and then Ishige-san says “Compared to the rest of them, I’m actually normal!” (Possibly referring to her character Izumi in this situation) Takeuchi: “That’s not true!” Ku-san: “you do have a bit of a deceitful image, I think”

Some discussion on whether the twins are actually the “normal” ones

Kamiyan: *not sure whether or not he wants to or is going to get a word in*

Ku-san: “Is this Kouichi o’clock ?” Ishige-san: “It’s not one o’clock, it’s (presumably about to say Kouichi o’clock, since ichi means one in Japanese) hang on, this is something I want to talk about all night!”

Ku-san: “Let those two (Kamiyan and SuzuKen) talk for a bit, it’s pitiful” Kamiyan: “What’s pitiful? Who is pitiful?”

Ku-san: *says something about lines on the forehead that needs to be scanned like they’re a barcode* Kamiyan: “what are you on about lmao”

Ku-san: “no no, the lines on your forehead are so deep because you’re thinking”

Kamiyan: *fucking losing it rn*

Ku-san: “you looked so sad when you had those lines”

Takeuchi: “enough about that, already!”

MC: “Nobody is really ordinary, are they?”

Next topic: handwritten script

Takeuchi: *raises hand before MC is even done reading the topic*

SuzuKen: *joins in, explaining about some legend involving the scriptwriting company*

Takeuchi talks about having to read the handwriting and formatting in the script or something like that (didn’t fully catch the discussion here), and concludes with “the script is a really important treasure for us, you know”

Next topic: mischief

Kamiyan: “Who is it, who is it~” Everyone else: “Bro it’s literally you”

Talking about the anticipation for next episode’s script, and learning about how “Kenichi-kun” will have his character become a warrior on the side of justice

Kamiyan: “So Ku-san and I took a pen and replaced all mentions of Kouichi with Kouji and Kouzou” (implying the existence of a TRIPLET lmao)

Ku-san: “Huh? Me?”

SuzuKen apparently freaked out, and wondered wtf had happened to Kouichi in the story, and had to check with the staff “This is Kouichi, isn’t it? It was correct in everyone else’s scripts, but in mine it was written Kouji or Kouzou - and this happened, like, EVERY WEEK”

Next topic: Hospitalisation

Person involved: SuzuKen

MC: “So this is when Kouichi becomes Kouzou—” SuzuKen: “To hell with Kouzou”

Apparently, during his initial attempts to record his first “Spirit Evolution!” line, SuzuKen threw out his back. Hoping his pain wouldn’t get noticed, he tried moving, but did not work out - he couldn’t even stand - seems like he had to SQUAT the whole time. Everyone asked him if something was wrong, and he was like “nope, all good!” Eventually he had to admit that he couldn’t move, and had to go to hospital; how he admitted it was hilarious: he said, “Apologies, but I can’t move” (he used the term “Sumimasen,” which is a catch all phrase used in Japanese to say “Sorry” “Excuse me” and sometimes even “Thank you” in a way that conveys the speaker apologising for any inconvenience). He managed to hobble over to the car and got taken to the hospital

APPARENTLY THIS INCIDENT MADE IT TO WIKIPEDIA? (could not verify this, unfortunately, but if anyone else reading this post is good at Japanese, please let me know if it’s mentioned on his Japanese Wikipedia!)

Kamiyan: “Him not moving was Part A, going to the hospital was Part B, but then after that, we were so worried that we called his manager and asked if he was ok; manager was like ‘at the moment, he feels kinda guilty’” (SuzuKen loses it at this part)

Some more banter, then the new theme: “What would you say to yourself from 20 years ago?”

Topic 1: “Please, stop!”

Ku-san raises her hand: apparently this was an incident that had her heart thumping. They were taking a break from recording (possibly for the drama CD?), she felt really off inside, and this seemed to have impacted her voicing Tomoki (she said it was a “black voice,” not sure what that means). Then it seems she got a letter stating that Tomoki would not do something like this! Because she really cared about the character Tomoki, she didn’t push herself (I think that’s what she said; I didn’t understand some parts of the story). Letter-writer was anonymous, but Ishige-san pretended to search for the culprit among the cast for a few seconds (so cute!)

Topic 2: “I’m sure you’ll find it!”

Shitanda goes for it: The story is about his bonds with the rest of the cast, and how he wasn’t as close with them at first, especially since many of them were his senpais; he may have also mentioned that he lacked confidence. He then mentioned something about working hard and possibly talked about finding that confidence in himself, especially since the MC mentioned him feeling lost 20 years ago and how worried he must have felt during that period

Takeuchi-san: “you worried a lot, right? Not knowing which way to go; Kamiya-san, what did you think?” Kamiya: “I didn’t have any thoughts” *everyone laughs* “well, we did have fun - it was too much fun” (then he says something about it being so much fun to be so reckless at the time, and something happening on Wednesday mornings)

Final theme of the talk event: “20-year self-evolution chart”

Each main cast member was rated by survey respondents on 5 parameters on a scale of 0-100: Thinking Power, Sociability, Acting Ability, Adventure (Dream), Economic Power

Takeuchi-san “They’re strange (parameters), right?”

First the results of them from 20 years ago: Takeuchi-san doing great on Adventure, not so great on Economic Power, Acting Ability (which is hilarious given that this was before her big break in Naruto), and Thinking Ability; score is bad on Sociability

Kamiyan fared much worse: Adventure rating was 100 points, but all others were below 40

But Ishige-san had the lowest scores: 0 for everything except Sociability (100) and Economic power (10-ish)

Shitanda-san scored average or good on everything except Economic Power, which was below 50

Ku-san had highest scores: 70 or above in everything except sociability (around 60). Acting Ability was at least 80

SuzuKen scores were also low: only Thinking Power and Adventure went beyond 50; all other parameters were 50 or below

Everyone amazed at Ishige-san’s scores; Ku-san: “Sawa-chan’s (chart) looks like a radar or something!”

MC: “Junko-san, Suzumura-san, Michael-san all have a good balance on their scores”

Next comes the scores for the present day:

Junko-san: Acting skills…STILL THE SAME?? sociability, thinking, economic power gone up, adventure gone down

Kamiyan: literally everything crosses at least 60, with thinking almost at 100 and adventure gone slightly down to about 80

Ishige san: her chart literally looks like a clock lmao, with sociability and adventure at 100, thinking and economic power just under 25, and acting replaced by…art? (Still very low)

Shitanda-san: adventure went down to about 50, but everything else is 75+!

Ku-san: adventure is the same, sociability is around 90, everything else reduced to 50

SuzuKen: adventure and economic power at 100, everything else in the 50-75 range

Takeuchi-san: “HANG ON”

Kamiyan: “Sawa-chan’s is—!”

Ku-san: “Ishige-san’s looks like a boomerang!”

Kamiyan, very straightforwardly: “7:15” (like on the clock)

Everyone: *loses it*

Ishige-san: “Maybe my scores are predicting something/making me a prophet!”

MC: “It’s also looking like half-past two lol”

Kamiyan says something about a cat, everyone’s like “huh?” or agreeing

Ishige-san protesting wildly at the results

Everyone else then goes in then to analyse the change in their individual scores, with lots of banter in between (it got a bit technical, so I couldn’t keep up with some bits)

Everyone giggling during the discussion of Ku-san’s results

The discussion goes to how Ku-san is strange, and SuzuKen says “All the strange people are sitting close together over there! Us interesting people should come sit here!”

Discussion about how some of SuzuKen’s scores have exploded and that he’s famous now; Kamiya: “and you’re rich! Yeah, that’s right!”

SuzuKen: “I don’t have THAT much money, but when you compare me and Hiroshi, the money I have is easy to hold!” (Either that, or he said something about who pays when they go to izakayas and wondered why that person was paying; I couldn’t tell)

Kamiyan: *dying of laughter*

SuzuKen: “We used to go play pachinko after work lmao”

Ku-san apparently said that these two used to sit in the studio corner playing Gameboy on CARDBOARD? Like, they used to pretend the cardboard was a gameboy???

Ku-san: “That’s not normal, are you guys ok”

Takeuchi-san, Ishige-san, Ku-san agreeing that it’s cute, like a bunch of elementary schoolers

The person whose scores are being discussed gets to choose the next person in line, so SuzuKen says “My Pachinko Partner from that time, Hiroshi Kamiya”

Kamiyan’s discussion is relatively straightforward, where he just reflects on that time and what he thought and did and wished for

Kamiyan: “Kenichi-kin and I were hella broke at the time”

Says something about SuzuKen, and the others advise him to “lower your voice lol” (the discussion seemed to be about their current finances)

Next person: Shitanda-san, who finishes his discussion too quickly and reflects on his skills 20 years ago

Then Takeuchi-san, who says that everyone else in the cast is just plain weird and that there were too many weird guys in the cast while she was the only normal/decent person (audience loses it)

Kamiyan: “She’s terrible! In the end when all the legendary warriors come together to become Susanoomon, they were trying to figure out who will voice the character.” Apparently Junko-san volunteered and he was like “HUH? You’re already in the leading role! Give it a rest alreadyyyy! She’s mean! Why is she doing it?” (SuzuKen agrees)

Takeuchi-san: “Well, I heard…” Kamiyan: “Ha?”Takeuchi-san: “Kamiya-kun’s speaking ability, picture, and being the star, well…” Kamiyan: “LIKE YOUR SPEAKING IS ANY BETTER” (translation of this bit to be rechecked shortly)

SuzuKen: “Junko-san really hasn’t changed” (everyone agreeing)

Takeuchi-san gives the closing speech for the talk event (not the whole fest, since there was a 02 event that I didn’t see)

“I may be considered the lead, but the true lead was…Kouji! Okay, Kamiya-kun, over to you!” Kamiyan: “What?“

MC: *makes a joke about him being the potential voice for Susanoomon*

Kamiyan: *wondering what to say* “Well, it was really fun, working together every week” *mentions other cast members* “That one year was a really fun period. Coming together today after so long, nothing has changed, I felt at ease.”

End of Frontier Talk Event.

There was a 02 event after this, followed by a rendition of the various songs from Frontier and other seasons, sung by different artists associated with the Digimon Franchise (event opened with Fire). Singers present were AiM, Ayumi Miyazaki, Mazano Oda (?). In the end, all the singers and Frontier + 02 cast attending the event came on stage and sang Fire together!!

I hope you enjoyed my attempt at detailing the Frontier talk event! Apologies for any translation errors and misinterpretation! I’d love to chat more about Digimon with all of you, so please feel free to drop in my ask box to chat about the show!

#digimon frontier #Digimon #digifes 2022 #DigiFes

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recentanimenews · 4 years

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An Archdemon’s Dilemma: How to Love Your Elf Bride, Vol. 9

By Fuminori Teshima and COMTA. Released in Japan as “Maou no Ore ga Dorei Elf wo Yome ni Shitanda ga, Dou Medereba Ii?” by HJ Bunko. Released in North America digitally by J-Novel Club. Translated by Hikoki.

As this series has gone on and become a reasonable success, the author has sensibly decided to widen its brief. As such, the “will they actually do anything?” parts get smaller and less relevant as time goes on. This is not to say that they’re absent, however, and we do get possibly the funniest moment in this volume when Zagan thinks that he and Nephy are literally cursed to never get closer to each other rather than, as everyone else around them can see, just being two socially awkward dorks in love. Still, at least the two of them share a honeymoon suite. That’s progress? And they sleep in each other’s arms, and call each other (as they are under cover) as “honey” and “dear”. But yeah, that’s all you’re going to get. Honestly, even Chastille and Barbatos make more progress in this book than Zagan and Nephy, who are adorable but really should grow up the teensiest bit. That said, they’re ahead of Shax, Mr. “I had your underwear in my pocket for a reason”.

The main thrust of the plot sees everyone converging on the Holy City for various reasons. That’s where Azazel’s Staff is, which is highly important to every single faction in the series. So we get the Angelic Knights, who don’t know much about it but know it should not fall into the wrong hands; Bifrons and Shere Khan, who have sent two minions to destroy the holy treasure room to get it; and Zagan and Nephy, who are actually there to try to find Orias, who might be able to help her cure Kuroka’s blindness, but end up looking for the staff as well. As you might imagine, there’s a lot of fighting towards the end of the book, mostly involving everyone attacking Zagan and his mopping the floor with them. That said, in the final battle against one of the stronger Angelic Knights, he has to use martial arts, rather than sorcery, to win. He regards this as a loss. Everyone else thinks he’s simply ridiculously overpowered.

It is amusing to see how many of the characters are leading double lives. There’s a traitor among the Angelic Knights, and you might briefly be worried for Chastille, but everyone agrees her alliance with Zagan is far too open and honest; she’s not tricky enough to be the real traitor. Then there’s Michael, who is secretly an Archdemon, but is also not the actual traitor. We also continue to get more insight on Alshiera, who continues to stay true to the course of “blond underage vampire mistress” in modern Japanese works, i.e. she’s pretending to be an irredeemable bad guy but really fits the caring mentor role better. And props to Foll, who is growing powerful enough to take on Bifrons and deal him actual damage. Our little dragon girl is growing up.

We’ve now caught up with Japan, as the 10th volume came out there two weeks ago, so it might be a bit till we get it here. Till then, though, this is a good, solid entry in the series, provided you don’t care that Zagan and Nephy are the most awkward couple ever – still.

By: Sean Gaffney

#Anime #News #Manga Bookshelf

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