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Otaku no Video

"If you're into playing tennis, that's fine.
But if you like to watch anime, you're weird.
Why?!"
-- Kubo

Meet Kubo and Tanaka, two fans of anime (one translation of the slang term otaku is 'obsessed fan') that set out on a mission to "Otakunize" the world by starting their own anime company in the Gainax studio's Otaku no Video. Meet the Gainax studio, started by fans of anime and went on to become one of the greats themselves (with works such as The Wings of Honneamise, Nadia: Secret of the Blue Water, Neon Genesis Evangelion, and others listed elsewhere on these pages as well).

It certainly doesn't hurt to have designs from a favorite character designer of mine, Sonoda Kenichi, who also designed characters and mecha in the original Bubblegum Crisis, and created both Riding Bean and Gunsmith Cats.

"Normal folk just don't understand us."
-- Tanaka

The show starts with Kubo practicing tennis, meeting his girlfriend at a local diner, and other "normal" things. But one day, leaving his tennis-club friends to their drinking night out in order to get some rest for an upcoming match, he stumbles upon a group of anime fans led by his old high-school friend Tanaka.

While the fandom circle that he joins seems strange to him at first (quite normal to me, but then, I've obviously already been "otakunized"), his habits change. He winds up quitting the tennis team and spending most of his time with the anime club; his girlfriend leaves him. Fed up with the discrimination of Anime/SF fans, he decides to drop everything and become the biggest otaku ever -- "Otaking". He and Tanaka set out to "otakunize" the world. . . .

"Otakuland...
Oh, it's all so dear to me."
-- Kubo

More studio in-jokes, other-anime references, and Japanese pop-culture links in two 50-minute videos than some other shows have in an entire series. See how many you can recognize. . . .

Otaking lives!

Otaku no Video (OVA)

More Otaku no Video (OVA)

Otaku no Video
Distributed by AnimEigo
(Translated quotes Copyright (C) AnimEigo.)

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