Maiden Japan licenses Patlabor OVAs

[WTK]

via PR...

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

MAIDEN JAPAN ANNOUNCES LICENSE OF
PATLABOR OVAS!

HOUSTON, January 15, 2013— Maiden Japan today announced its acquisition of the classic police action-comedy PATLABOR. The original 7 episode OVA series is directed by Mamoru Oshii (Ghost in the Shell) with scripts by Kazunori Ito (Dirty Pair), character designs by Akemi Takada (Kimagure Orange Road), mechanical designs by Yutaka Izubuchi (Mobile Suit Gundam: Char’s Counterattack) and music by Kenji Kawai (Vampire Princess Miyu).

Drunk drivers are bad, but put a drunk driver in a giant robot called a Labor and you’ve got a disaster waiting to happen. And when REAL criminals get their hands on those same giant robots, the cops need giant robots of their own just to maintain the status quo, right? Well, in any case, that’s the logic behind the development of the Patlabor program and special Labor Crime units like Japan’s Section 2. But what logic fails to take into account is where to find police officers who’re equally conversant with both robots and the regulations? And THAT’s where the motley crew of Section 2, Division 2 comes in! With ridiculously perky tomboy Noa Izumi and gun-happy madman Isao Ohta as primary Labor pilots and the impossibly laid back Captain Goto in what passes for command, SV2 is ready to hit the streets with their twenty ton feet! But will they be taking a byte out of crime or have they bitten off more than they can chew? The law of the land and the laws of robotics are about to collide in MOBILE POLICE PATLABOR!

Maiden Japan will be distributing PATLABOR in conjunction with home video distributor Section 23 (Clannad, High School of the Dead, Appleseed,) with the original OVA series to be released in bilingual English DVD, BD and digital formats.


About Maiden Japan:
Maiden Japan is a new and upcoming distributor of Japanese animation in North America, with a rapidly growing roster of releases that includes such hot new titles as POLYPHONICA CRIMSON S, HIMAWARI!, RAY and PAPILLON ROSE. A sister company to live action Shock film specialist Switchblade Pictures (ATTACK GIRLS SWIM TEAM VS. THE UNDEAD, ZOMBIE HUNTER RIKA, SULTRY ASSASSIN: NINJA BRAINWASH), Maiden Japan’s programs can be found on home video distributed by Ingram Entertainment, Baker & Taylor, Section23Films, The Right Stuff and other good and fine distributors. Digital product offerings may be found at iTunes, Hulu, Netflix, Amazon, Zune Marketplace, Anime Network, Playstation Network and YouTube.

About Section23 Films:
Section23 Films provides home video marketing and distribution services for a variety of companies, including Sentai Filmworks, Switchblade Pictures, Maiden Japan and AEsir Holdings. With its special focus on genre entertainment, Section23 Films distributes some of the very best anime, martial arts, and horror titles on the market today.

[MelancholicMariya]

I wonder if this does well they'll get the TV series.

[touma]

I have the CPM release and I see nothing in the PR to indicate that this will be different, so I almost certainly will not be getting this. But I do like the OVA and would recommend it to anybody who thinks that he might like an action, comedy, cop, mecha show.

The only way that this release would be of interest to me would be if it renewed interest in Patlabor enough that somebody would license rescue The New Files and dub all of it. And I don't think that it is going to happen.

[WTK]

Originally Posted by MelancholicMariya

I wonder if this does well they'll get the TV series.

I think they will. I had a hidden suspicion that the OVA (and also TV series) was license rescued by someone. Madman Ent. had announced their OVA & TV license a while back and has been holding on to it (without much information). I didn't think the North American licensor would be Maiden Japan (and also the OVA series getting Blu-ray treatment). I guess it's wait and see for the TV series to see if it will really materialize.

[chronoclast]

Originally Posted by touma

I have the CPM release and I see nothing in the PR to indicate that this will be different, so I almost certainly will not be getting this. But I do like the OVA and would recommend it to anybody who thinks that he might like an action, comedy, cop, mecha show.

Since this is going to be on BD, I think it's safe to say they're going to use the new HD masters from Japan. Even on DVD the video quality will be a huge improvement over CPM's crappy composite DVDs.

[Ingraman]

Originally Posted by touma

I have the CPM release and I see nothing in the PR to indicate that this will be different, so I almost certainly will not be getting this.

Does putting it on Blu-ray help (which wasn't covered in the first post)?

If ADV's BD release is near the quality of the Japanese BDs, I'll ???-dip. ???-dip? Just how many times have I bought Patlabor?

1st original OVA on Japanese VHS (nearly my first anime purchase, period, picked up in Little Tokyo, Los Angeles, long, long ago)
P-series TV/OVA LD singles (16 of 'em)
P1 LD
P2 LD
OVA LD box
TV LD box 1
TV LD box 2
New OVA LD box
Movies 1&2 LD box
P2 R2 DVD (in LD-sized box)
CPM TV (& OVA?) VHS tapes
ME movie 1 & 2 VHS
CPM OVA, TV, New OVA DVDs
ME movie 1 & 2 DVDs
Pioneer's WXIII R1 DVD box (only vaguely Patlabor)
BV/Honneamise R1 movie 1 & 2 DVD boxes
movie 1 & 2 Blu-ray (regular singles, not original-release versions)
OVA BD box
TV BD box 1
TV BD box 2
New OVA BD Box

Yeah, I never imported the R2 DVDs, aside from P2. Maybe I just wasn't enough of a fan? More likely, the lack of a decent R2 DVD player... ;_; Fortunately, that's not a problem with LD or BD! ^^

But I do like the OVA and would recommend it to anybody who thinks that he might like an action, comedy, cop, mecha show.

I'd really recommend it, too. They're good stories with great characters.

The only way that this release would be of interest to me would be if it renewed interest in Patlabor enough that somebody would license rescue The New Files and dub all of it. And I don't think that it is going to happen.

That would be unlikely. It was only the first few New OVAs that were dubbed, right? Or was it all but the last few? ... /me goes and looks. Ah, it was just the first disc of OVAs that got bilingual audio. So, then, they released the first disc as a single, and then gave up on the singles, to release the three discs as a full set? That sounds about right, at the moment.

Because of CPM's release patterns, I was skipping the DVD singles, and just waiting for the cheaper box that came out every few volumes.

[Nagato-san]

I'll buy this no doubt about it. I loved the TV series but I've only gotten a few episodes of the OVA (it was a VHS copy that I bought on clearance I think). Nice to know that blu-ray's are coming out for it.

[touma]

Originally Posted by Ingraman

Does putting it on Blu-ray help?

No, not for me, unless it has some content that CPM did not have.
If I did not already own it and I had to choose between DVD and BD I would pay a little extra for the BD. But since I do own it I am not going to pay the price of a BD just to make it look better. The video quality is just not that important to me. I would rather use the money to buy something that I do not already have.
This is almost enough to make me wish that I had not bought it before, but then I would not have been able to watch it four or five times already.

[Ingraman]

Originally Posted by touma

No, not for me, unless it has some content that CPM did not have.
If I did not already own it and I had to choose between DVD and BD I would pay a little extra for the BD. But since I do own it I am not going to pay the price of a BD just to make it look better.

Maybe you can find someone to buy your DVDs for a price at/near what the BDs will cost. ^^;

[Rhodes]

this a combo release? I hope not, I don't do combos.