One of Fanime’s signature events is the Fanimaid Café. I was going to make reservations later that day, but unfortunately, they do not take reservations. While I would have liked to enjoy the aristocratic afternoon tea basking in Victorian tradition, but waiting in a long line is not my cup of tea. However, we did experience the Fanimaid Live! at Stage Zero performance in the early afternoon. The event drew many (male) attendees. We were treated to a mix of song and dance numbers. Even Guest of Honor, Halko Momoi was happy to join the Fanimaids on stage.

Though we were not able to make it to the maid cafe, Jared had this to say about why maids are awesome. (Note: One must be able to read sarcasm upon viewing.)

After watching the maids sing and dance, we went to Artist Alley and found more cosplayers.

Jared went to the The Dojo while I went to the Cosplay Spectacular. Stan and Deb were performing in their World Ends with You sketch. There was much praise for this year’s Cosplay Spectacular. Participants agreed that the performances and sketches were superior to that of last year’s. A sketch set to the Pokemon theme won a standing ovation.

I stayed around for the opening acts – Ranka Lee (Yukie Dong), Melanie O'Conner (karaoke contest winner), and a few martial arts demonstrations before returning to the convention center. Yukie Dong’s Ranka Lee performance was vibrant and cute. Her performance truly set the stage for the cosplay show. We were not being entertained by someone dressed up as Ranka Lee, but rather, being entertained by Ranka Lee herself.

And here’s the part where Jared writes stuff:

The martial arts are most closely associated with the East Asian cultures. However, Fanime was the first convention I went to that actually had a room dedicated to the marital arts and other forms of battle. The dojo provided a place for supervised horse play and professional demonstrations of hand to hand and armed combat.

The demonstrations were very well run, even when the audience was brought in to participate safety was the primary concern and the martial artists made sure that no one would be harmed in the process of teaching different movements and techniques. One of the most standout of the presentations on stunts, especially the panel on Real fighting vs. Movie Fighting. The group that ran the presentation showed how to pull off movie style stunts and even performed a quickly thrown together battle at the end of the presentation.

An interesting surprise was the Amtgard presentation that introduced people to Live Action Role Play as part of a nationwide organization. This presentation was made up of a complete introduction to classes, weapons, and events. There were weapons on display and several Amtgard members put on a mock battle. As a person who has never done LARP, it did make me somewhat interested in the hobby, especially when it is done via an organized group.

One of the more unique panels at Fanime was the “Your Anime Sucks” Panel. This is a panel where the members of Panda Cubed come up with reasons why any anime mentioned by the audience sucks. The audience is free to shout out any titles they want and in return the panelists give reasons why the anime sucks. The range of shows that are mentioned range from cheesy series (i.e. Dragonball, Pokemon) to fan favorite series (i.e. Evangelion, Cowboy Bebop). It is a very light hearted panel that mocks the shows that have been entertaining us for years.

/end

We wandered around the concourse stopping by karaoke and Asian Film. The karaoke room, unfortunately, does not allow Disney songs.

We also wore our Pokemon cosplay on the later part of Saturday. Jared was cosplaying as Giovanni and I was cosplaying as a gijinka Persian.

The Cosplay Spectacular was starting to let out. The participants were congregating in the main hallway in the convention center. While I did not stay around for the entirety of Cosplay Spectacular, we started giving out fake awards to people who were in the show. It takes immense effort to please the Fanime audience, therefore everyone should feel like a winner.

Cosplay Hell won The Big Penis Award.

This group won The Sparkle Sparkle Razzle Dazzle Award.

This group won Best Use of Color.

This group won Best Use of Mokona.

And our Scarlet Rhapsody press team (entered as We’re Not Twins Cosplay & Friends) won Best Use of Underpants. And it was off to celebrate Saturday night shenanigans with Nando and Katie, until the fuzz came in and busted it down.

The highlight of the night? The Fanime convention center started to play "Never Gonna Give You Up" by Rick Astley. Jared and I started dancing to this 1987 hit that it drew some attention that a few kids wanted hugs. This was only a warm up to Sunday's ballroom dance.

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