The current state of Media Blasters...

[AbZeroNow]

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:

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

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.

[Arabesque]

They responded on Facebook

Explanation of ANN story.

For all concerned about the ANN story, MB is not out of business or closing down its operation. What happen was the following. MB filed extensions for 2009, 10 and 11. Without notice or us knowing it could happen, the Secretary of State took action. We have now finished our 2009, 2010 and filing and will get the action reversed. We already spoke with them. The company continues to run, continues to release titles. It seems during the last TAF, our competitors decided to spread this paper around which has made life difficult.

As for the article in ANN, they never contacted us nor even gave us a chance to comment.

Afterwards, John Sirabella got on the ANN thread and started losing his shit. Fun times.

Thread (jhon shows up on page 2) for those interested. Be advised, popcorn and coke is needed for maximum enjoyment.

[SeijiSensei]

I thought their porn division was keeping the company afloat. The Internet probably hasn't been too good for that side of the business either.

[Arabesque]

As for an actual answer to the thread title, it does seem that MB is indeed in trouble. Of course, how much in trouble are they in is unclear atm, but it does seem like they aren't doing so well right now.

[SeijiSensei]

Personally I don't care who called whom or whether emails were lost (see the ANN thread for context). What bothers me more is this comment from Sirabella quoted above:

Without notice or us knowing it could happen, the Secretary of State took action.

Doesn't MB have accountants and attorneys who should know things like this? How could they not think that filing repeated extensions on state taxes for multiple years wouldn't raise a few eyebrows in Albany? I think Sirabella's comment on the ANN forum to the effect of "it's my baby" says a lot for the level of professionalism involved here. It may be your baby, John, but Media Blasters is a corporation and needs to act like one. If I were one of your licensors, I'd be very perturbed by these events.

[Arabesque]

I think it's pretty clear that they are operating at a Zero Level professionalism on the thread. When everyone calling each other a lair and unprofessional, you know that you reached the lowest form of flamebaiting ...

I'm actually wondering if there are going to be any serious legal ramifications for this for MB down the line. They clearly are going to need to look for better legal aid ...

Originally Posted by SeijiSensei

If I were one of your licensors, I'd be very perturbed by these events.

Like Christopher M. had mentioned on the very thread, it's not going to be a good week for John when he has to explain this to their partners and licensors. This news could seriously damage their relationship beyond repair, and might actually put them in a worse position than before.

And I think this is where the who ''missing e-mail/no one called us'' comes into play, and how this whole fiasco over a the thread show how much John really cares for his ''baby''.

Even if we were to accept that ANN didn't try and contact someone over at Media Busters (which even by ANN's current reputation for reporting news wrongly I find hard to believe) according to the comment John made, they had been aware that such rumors had been flying around since last TAF (I believe late March) then would it really have been hard to think that a large news sources that might try and get in touch with them? And if Christopher is right and they did try and contact them for an entire week before going through with the news, then that shows a serious lack of communication on their end.

Furthermore, going on a public form and calling out the CEO of the news site as well as freaking out on everyone is something that can only be described as adding more fuel to the fire, and certainly didn't help at all making this look good for MB in any way.

[Lost Cause]

Given the fact that it is ANN and their rep for throwing gas on a fire, I would tend to listen to The guy who actually WORKS at MB!
Thing is all these companies state side are in deep water, what with Japan planning on doing there own dub/sub work over there.

[Arabesque]

I would normally agree, but it's hard to listen to him when he's been talking mad half the time and saying that the news is true anyways ...

[Solace]

Originally Posted by Arabesque

Furthermore, going on a public form and calling out the CEO of the news site as well as freaking out on everyone is something that can only be described as adding more fuel to the fire, and certainly didn't help at all making this look good for MB in any way.

Agreed completely. This should have been handled privately. Going on a public forum to "clear the air" just invites all sorts of problems, from legal liability to irreparable misunderstandings. Not to mention that his posts have no degree of professionalism at all and look like they were written by any random person. If the ANN staff weren't treating his posts as the real deal you could easily surmise this is someone trying to make the company look worse.

[Master_Yoma]

Sigh its a shame that anther anime company is about to go under but it would be nice to see them around long enough to see squid girl 2 to come out but maybe it just time to take them to the back of the barn and shoot them

[Chiibi]

Noooooooooooo PLEASE HANG IN THERE MB! I LOVE you guys!!!
You gave us Princess Rouge, you gave us Rurouni Kenshin, YOU GAVE US SHINESMAN.

死んじゃだめええええ！　\（＞д＜）／

[Arabesque]

We spent the week trying to contact them. We left multiple voice mails with two senior executives (The CEO and the CFO). They didn't reply. We did our due diligence, we also researched the issue with a NY Lawyer before posting it. And finally, it's worth pointing out that nothing in the article was ever incorrect, it merely lacked MB's response. Companies stonewall journalists all the time, that's why we give them a deadline, and if they don't respond, we publish what we have (I'm not saying MB was stonewalling, I don't know if they ignored our voicemails on purpose or what... Just explaining why we don't wait forever for a reply).

Huh, it does look like this is MB screw up. ANN did everything by the book, and MB just didn't respond, either do to poor communication channels or just really careless foresight (if you had heard the rumors since TAF, you should've taken the first step and done something to quell it down).

Originally Posted by Solace

Not to mention that his posts have no degree of professionalism at all and look like they were written by any random person. If the ANN staff weren't treating his posts as the real deal you could easily surmise this is someone trying to make the company look worse.

Pretty much agreed, this really should have been in private.

And even if he was ever so inclined to bring everything out to the open (not a wise move, but maybe if he wanted to clear things himself), all it would've taken was a single post from him explaining that he never got a message for some reason, and that they should rephrase the article. Instead he went on saying things like ''having fun on my expense?'' and acting (while understandably) upset, lashing out on everyone in the thread and the news staff. I honestly couldn't believe what was I reading, and even thought it might've been a troll till I seen confirmation from several ANN staff and Chris replying to him.

Really shameful.

Originally Posted by Master_Yoma

Sigh its a shame that anther anime company is about to go under but it would be nice to see them around long enough to see squid girl 2 to come out but maybe it just time to take them to the back of the barn and shoot them

The way the article is titled, it might give that idea, but MB is still around and apparently still releasing stuff. The news just points out that they dissolved back in 2011, but that was more of a mistake on MB's part by filling too many extensions and ending with it biting it in their ass. This isn't a zombie, don't worry

[Pocari_Sweat]

Lmao at the ANN thread. That is pure popcorn alright. And lol at arguing on a public forum. It's one thing for normal members of ANN or MB to be ranting at each other, it's another issue altogether for officers of each corporation going at each other's necks.

It reminds me of this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=If1Wk...eature=related

[Chiibi]

Just had a look at page 2.

..................
OH MY.

Ryarl! *makes cat noises* Scratch scratch!

[AbZeroNow]

I am not sure what to think of this piece of Media Blasters news.

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news...enshin-berserk

I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that their license to Bakuman and Rurouni Kenshin(and Berserk) have expired.

I guess they gave up on Squid Girl season 2 based on the comments(and I didn't know that they had Moyashimon at some point).

Media Blaster also isn't going to release anything on BD, and they want to focus on DVD and "New Media" according to this Crunchyroll News story
http://www.crunchyroll.com/anime-new...anime-licenses

[SeijiSensei]

From reading the article, it sounds to me more like they intend to focus on their porn lines. Oh, and that "tax paper" Sirabella refers to in the CR story came from MB's run in with the New York State tax authorities in 2011. I notice that he has moved the company to New Jersey.

[ChibiGoku]

Originally Posted by AbZeroNow

I guess they gave up on Squid Girl season 2 based on the comments(and I didn't know that they had Moyashimon at some point).

Regarding Moyashimon, from memory, it was never officially announced. The only reason some people had known they had it is because one of their employees mentioned at a con a couple years back, saying they had plans to release it or something like that. I can't remember the details, exactly. So, it's really no surprise that you didn't know it was licensed.

[Shyni]

Does anyone know if the GaoGaiGar complete box will ever be released? If not through Media Blasters, maybe by some other company?