ADV put out their word too, which doesn’t tell us anything new really, but I did notice…

…ADV says it has “withdrawn plans” to do distro for Geneon, and Geneon says that THEY have “withdrawn [the] appointment” of ADV to do distro…

…Doesn’t it read kind of like a “I dumped you!” “No, I dumped YOU!” argument? Just a little? Hey, this could be better than all those Ross/Rachel twists on Friends!

So Dentsu has posted a press release announcing that Geneon has withdrawn their “appointment” of ADV as their sales/distro manager. It reads like the reason is because a bunch of Japanese companies (Sojitz Corporation, Development Bank of Japan, and KlockWorx) are investing in ADV, which apparently lead to some conflict between ADV and Geneon USA that couldn’t be resolved.

I’m going to guess that one of these companies has an issue with Geneon Japan; presumably from Klockworx, who does anime production. While Klockworx-related series seem to have been licensed all over the board in Japan, it definitely looks like ADV has most of them– Maburaho, Full Metal Panic, etc. The Sojitz Corporation is one of those companies whose business is other businesses, and ditto for the Development Bank of Japan, so I’m going to stick with the Klockworx theory.

The press release also notes that Geneon is going to “focus mainly on management of its works portfolio” starting October 1st, which to me reads “anime broker” (a la Kadokawa Pictures– they license stuff and then hire other companies to do production, distro, etc).

ANN has announced that the deal that Geneon USA had with ADV, giving the latter the sales and distribution responsibilities for the former, has now been cancelled. They also claim that Geneon USA was planning on closing its in-house production by the end of this year.

So, Geneon USA minus anime production minus sales and distribution equals…what, exactly? At best, some kind of anime broker; at worst, it equals zero. But of course, now that the ADV deal is dead, that leaves everything in limbo. Including the status of Geneon’s titles, like Hellsing. Eep.