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This weekend I went to the "Wizard World" comic book convention here in Chicago over the weekend. I've been going to the convention for over 10 years now. Last year I help a vendor sell videos and I didn't get to see much that year. Which took some of the magic out of it. I helped set up and later took apart the booth and help him move his product by giving recommendations. Which left me little time to actually look around the convention that year. That's why I was excited to go this year. As always I went for movies but found they're selection very disappointing. Every year is the same films: Storm Riders, A Man Called Hero, Versus, Alive. It's as if they don't know about all the other good films Asian cinema has to offer. Two movies that I picked up were Hero and Princess Blade. I already had them before but only on video and VCD, I thought it was time to get them on DVD. I did ask if anyone had the new Japanese movie Dororo (どろろ) but everyone said it wasn't out yet. I told them that it was and I knew it for a fact. They quickly replied that it wasn't distributed here yet,

I knew that, just because it wasn't out here yet doesn't mean that it's not out. That's because they were bootleggers and only bought Chinese disk or Thai disks, burned them and sold them again. Buying a Japanese’s disk for $50 bucks would be too much for them. Then they tried to say that most of this stuff isn't licensed here in America so they had to sell the Chinese imports. I had to bust them out by pointing to videos like The Host which i know is out in America distributed by Magnolia, along with other like Alive, Versus, which is releases by either Tokyo Shock or Media Blasters. OldBoy, Sympathy for Lady Vengeance by Tartaran. But as anyone knows when you go to a convention or buy off of e-bay more than likely it’s a boot. I also found the second season of Hana Yori Dango (花より男子), but the vendor was selling it for $35 bucks. I said no way because I knew I could buy it off the next for at least $20 cheaper and it would be the very same disks.

I also bought a “Son of Godzilla” t-shirt, and a few other movies. Over the last few years I noticed a drop in Japanese toys being sold at the convention. I think one of the main reasons is that lots of comic books are being made into films again. Such as Punisher, Fantastic Four, and I mean again because if you know films you know that those films were made in the early 80’s and are still just as bad as they were then. Other movies already out are X-men (1 – 3), Spider-Man, Superman Returns, Batman Begins, etc.
You get my point. Also Japanese toys were always expensive and still are.
Nobody sold J-pop, which really surprised me. Only anime soundtracks, but I’ve never been big on too many animes.

Just in case you guys want to know what else I bought here’s my list:
Concent, Gun Crazy, Gun Crazy 2, Ghost in the Shell (SA.C.) 2nd GIG, Jade Warrior, Sazer X, Swordman 2, Time and Whispering Corridors.