Media Blasters has had a bad year, and it seems it just gets worse for them. A few months ago, they had announced layoffs, and they also announced delays on several of their licensed shows. Recently, Sentai Filmworks got
Queen's Blade Rebellion instead of them, and now, it appears they have some tax problems with New York state
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news...-of-april-2011
I wasn't sure if the headline ought to be something like "Is Media Blasters Gonna Survive the Year?" or "RIP Media Blasters?" or even something like "New York lists Media Blasters as inactive" or a generic "Is Media Blasters in trouble?". I figured at least as this story develops and more information gets released, we can analyze it and form our own conclusions if Media Blasters will be able to come back from this or whether Media Blasters will join Bandai Entertainment and Geneon as companies that are now defunct as far as releasing new anime.
EDIT: quoted some of the ANN article too as far as timeline and stuff:
Quote:
Media Blasters commented on its Facebook page last week that the company is "Still here, still selling anime. Yeah [Sentai Filmworks] got [Queen's Blade] but we will be getting out Fushigi Yugi soon. Hard to survive in this new anime world." The company also revealed in March that TOHO has approved for Media Blasters to release a "barebones" version of the film Godzilla vs. Megalon. Since April 2011 Media Blasters has announced that it has acquired the home video rights to Fushigi Yugi, as well as several other anime and films including Squid Girl, the live-action Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky film, the first two seasons of Bakuman, and Kite.
Media Blasters had laid off 60% of its staff in January 2012. CEO John Sirabella had told ANN at that time that the company would ask former staff members to continue to work on a freelance basis. Sirabella also noted at that time that he expected the company to continue releasing the same number of titles as before the layoffs. In February, Media Blasters put its DVD releases of Bakuman and Ikki Tousen: Great Guardians on indefinite hold, and it also revealed in March that it has dropped its release plans for the Record of Lodoss War video anime series and the Record of Lodoss War: Chronicles of the Heroic Knight television anime sequel.
The North American retailer Right Stuf also revealed on Friday that the following Media Blasters anime and live-action titles are being delayed:
Queen's Blade 2: The Evil Eye DVD Complete Series — delayed to June 5
Fushigi Yugi Season 1 DVD Collection — delayed to June 12
Bakuman Blu-ray Part 1 — delayed to June 26
Kite Blu-ray — delayed to September 11
Kanokon: The Girl Who Cried Fox TV + OVA DVD Collection — delayed to September 11
Last Breath Blu-ray — delayed to September 11
Psychotica Blu-ray — delayed to September 25
Lady Ninja Kasumi DVD Collection 1 (Movies 1-3) — delayed to September 25
Gamera the Brave Blu-ray — delayed to September 25
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Personally, I have only bought two shows that Media Blasters has licensed:
Gaogaigar and
Squid Girl. This news makes me wonder if I ought to secure the shows that I was looking at buying from Media Blasters before they go Out of Print(OOP). I wonder what everyone's reaction to this latest news about Media Blasters.