Fan of Hana Yori Dango? Maybe a few of creator Youko Kamio’s other works? How about the romantic drama Cat Street? Yes? Good news for you! It’s being developed into a live-action drama.

For those of you who have no clue what the series is, it’s about a 16-year-old girl named Keito Aoyama who used to be a child star. Aimless and goal-less, she finally finds herself enrolled in a school called El Liston, a school for students like her, who have no place where they belong. Along with her only remaining childhood friend and a group of new classmates, Keito has to learn how to grow up normal-style.

Sounds cute, if not terribly unique, so we’ll see how it goes.

Ataru Kadida’s manga Mitsurugi Haruka Kiki Ippatsu! (”Haruka Mitsurugi In the Nick of Time!”) is being developed into a drama, according to Ultimatum. The manga is serialized in Comic Valkyrie and follows a girl named Haruka who has to protect her school’s campus from delinquent demons. She has a rival named Kanata who challenges her to a competition, which leads to Haruka being whisked off to some kind of tournament…and that’s all I can really translate on the plot. But there is mention of some amount of interactivity in the manga, like maybe they let readers vote on what happens next? I’m not 100% sure on that though.

Anyway, no date on the drama yet.

Original source: Comic Valkyrie
Secondary source: Ultimatum

According to Canned Dogs, Takeru Nagayoshi’s manga Sumire 16!! is getting made into a live-action TV drama. The manga follows a high school girl named Sumire who is actually a puppet being carried around by a creepy old man. It’s actually a sequel to Nagayoshi’s Sumire 17, which I’m guessing is similar in plot.

Original source: Daienjou
Secondary source: Canned Dogs

Lazy bum. We can’t open presents until he’s up and moving. *grumble*

• So Ken Hirai– my favorite Jpop artist, for the record –is going to sing the theme for the new Honey and Clover drama, says TokyoGraph. Damn, now I’ll have to actually watch it. (Yes, I’m a heathen and I could never really get into H&C.)
• About.com manga lists Mushishi as 2007’s Best New Manga, and I’m inclined to agree with that assessment. ♥ Good pick Deb!
• For us perverts who want to see what Kodomo no Jikan is like without all that nasty censorship, Japanator spotted a video on Moetron that provides a batch of the previously-censored scenes uncut from the DVD. Some of the scenes seem silly to censor, but a few I have a hard time being upset over.
• ComiPress Backstage has a feature on Anime News Service, a long-running but often-on-sabbatical news site. (It hasn’t updated since September at the moment, but in all likelihood it’ll pop back into constant updates for a few months in the near future before dropping back out.)

That’s it! Happy holidays, everyone. ♥

I’ve been workin’ on the railroad non-anime type work today (I do have to, y’know, make money to pay my rent and whatnot), hence why it’s been so quiet here in spite of the MASSIVE amounts of news. So, here we go:

• Yasuo Fukuda is now Japan’s Prime Minister. He offered a Cabinet position to Taro Aso, who said something like “screw you bitchezzz I resign!” instead. So much for the “otaku Prime Minister,” eh?
• The makers of the School Days game are going to host a special screening of the anime adaptation’s finale, according to Canned Dogs, which would be cool except that people can only get in if they have an unopened copy of either the School Days or Summer Days game. Which is kind of retarded.
• The first promo image for the live-action Blood: The Last Vampire movie is now online, if not terrilby exciting. Twitch also has word of Asian Oscar contenders.
• Last but not least…well, no, it’s probably least. But anyway, TokyoGraph reports that UVERworld (who you probably recognize from Bleach soundtracks, and/or Blood+ and/or Terra E) is going to do the theme song for the new live-action TV adaptation of Moyoco Anno’s manga Hataraki Man.

I’ve got a commentary post I’m about to do, but I’ve also got more work and a meetup tonight, so sorry if you miss me ;o

So according to Manga Jouhou, a Korean drama adaptation of the Nodame Cantabile manga picked up three awards at the Seoul Drama Awards this year, including Best Miniseries.

TokyoGraph also notes the winners of the Seiun Awards, a prestigious award for sci-fi writers– Toki wo Kakeru Shoujo won the award for the “Media” category, and it’s also worth noting that Yoshitaka Amano (of Vampire Hunter D and Final Fantasy fame, you heathen!) picked up the Art award.

Have I mentioned that I’m in Atlanta at the moment?

Yesterday people were reporting on the Maple Story anime adaptation. I’m pretty sure it’s actually somewhat old news, but I could be wrong, so there you have it.

Also announced today: a mainstream adaptation of the eroge Ayakashi, which seems to rip off Allen’s arm from D.Gray-Man (’cause they were totally the first to have a character with a mutated arm!) and also make use of a mech-lookin’ monster that wears a scarf…which somehow makes me think of Dix-Neuf from Gunbuster 2. (Dix-Neuf didn’t wear a scarf, but Nono did, so I guess that’s why.)

Also, a buttload of live-action adaptations: BL manga Ai no Kotodama (a.k.a. Words of Devotion, courtesy of Juné) gets a live-action movie, while Fuma no Kojiro and Prince of Tennis get TV dramas…although PoT’s is in China.

ADV Films has seen fit to ruin all of my bookmarks by relaunching their website, which now looks somewhat fancier but is really obnoxious to use in Opera, because they have ads that take over the whole screen until you close them. Boo, ADV. BOO I SAY. And now I have to adjust my RSS feeds, too. Bah!

Oh yeah, and Illumitoon has given the license to air Bt’x and AM Driver to ADV’s Anime Network. Mm, quality “proframming,” eh, Advanced Media Network?

Meanwhile, I’m waiting on my BIG FAT package from Amazon.co.jp with Newtype, Animage, Animedia, Megami, and Comptiq. I ordered late this month T_T

Seriously, if there’s a TGIF, there should be an OGISN: “Oh God, It’s Sunday Night*.”