ADV assets under new ownership

Wow, what a week of news.  Anime News Network brings word that ADV is shuttering, at least in name.  All its assets (and apparently most of its staff) have been transferred to other companies which will continue to keep those properties available.  Anime Vice has some additional research here and points to this Anime Corner Store conversation with now former Head of Sales at ADV, Chris Oarr.  Oops, that should be Mike Baliff.  My bad.

So… are any of those new companies interested in reviving ADV’s manga efforts, or has the ship sailed on that one far too long ago?

Edit: Anime on DVD/Mania has a tribute.  But it’s really more of an autopsy.

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This pair of Tokyopop interviews at Anime Vice and ICv2 are substantively similar… perhaps doing some damage control after seeing the comments the first press release generated online, Tokyopop insists in both interviews that the company was “prepared” for this outcome, but nevertheless disappointed.  The company also reiterated that it does not know what Kodansha’s reasoning or future plans are, at least officially.

In boxing, the saying goes that the punch that hurts you most is the one you don’t see coming.  Losing all the Kodansha licenses was definitely a flush left, but TP did see it coming.  It would be almost insulting to TP to think otherwise.  The company is much leaner, such that should the upcoming Priest movie become even a modest hit, their financial future would be secure for quite some time.

I would also dispute the perception that Kodansha pulled the rug out from under TP.  Consider how long it has been since the TP Germany licenses were pulled, and the fact that Kodansha USA’s first releases are scheduled for next month according to Amazon, it seems to me like Kodansha gave TP all the time it could.  Hey, TP got Fruits Basket.  That’s probably more important than all the rest of their backlists combined.

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Having had a chance to go through the posts about Disney’s $4B offer for Marvel (although there is yet more to digest here), the most indispensable reads are The Comic Reporter’s initial impressions (also included is a transcript of a Marvel conference call), and this post by Marvel’s former Editor in Chief, Marv Wolfman, whose unique insight calls upon his experiences at both companies.

Honestly, as someone who does not read superhero comics on a regular basis, I’m not going to lose sleep over editorial pressures/constraints Disney could place upon Marvel, although for the sake of both fans and creators I do hope Disney has learned the benefits of maintaining creative freedom from its dealings with Pixar.  What would intrigue me though is the potential for Disney to leverage Marvel’s expertise to give new life to their own characters, classic and new, in the direct market, filling the void left by Gemstone.  But let’s be blunt here… Disney’s primary interest in Marvel is movies, and secondly, video games.  Print comics isn’t even a tertiary concern; that would probably be original animated programing for their cable channels to counter DC’s very popular offerings on Cartoon Network.  But it’d sure seem a colossal waste if Disney doesn’t create an imprint or two for their own comics, wouldn’t it?