For day two of Anime Boston, the Scarlet Rhapsody team decided to go as classic anime characters. Eri Kagami would be Minmay from Macross later in the day and Jared would be going as Johtaro Kujo from Jojo's Bizarre Adventures. It took about 10-15 minutes via Lyft to get to Anime Boston from where we were - beats taking the MBTA in costume for double the time! We got to the con center as things were starting up. Entering on the Boylston Street side of the convention center was a quick and easy check in - no hassle at all.

Lolita Fashion 101 by Eri Kagami
Every year, there's always a Saturday morning Lolita panel. The New England communities come together to put on a fashion show to showcase different styles of Lolita fashion. This year, the Lolita introduction panel was hosted by Boston community veterans Kiki and Tegan. Both covered the origins of Lolita fashion in Japan. They also covered different styles of Lolita. The panel concluded with a fashion show in which different styles were shown - sweet, over the top sweet, classic, over the top classic, handmande, etc. I was really happy to see the creativity behind the handmade Lolita sets - it inspired me to someday make a handmade skirt or jumper skirt. The panel was followed by questions from the audience. People asked about what makes a Lolita coord work and how plus sized Lolitas can get into the style.

Italians in Anime by Jared
This was a strange topic that one would not have expected to see as Italian characters do not seem very common in anime. Yet, this panel covered several series that feature Italian characters and didn’t even mention Giorno Giovanna from Jojo’s Bizarre Adventures. The panel looked at less popular series such as Panzer Girls, Porco Rosso, and Gunslinger Girl. The panel also looked at the accuracy of the portrayals and put some of the stories into historical context. It was an interesting panel and it was a refreshing shift from the usual fan panel.

30 Years of Robotech by Jared
One of the series that helped popularize anime in the US was Robotech, a series made up of three different mecha anime series. Now three decades later the series is being adapted into a movie, releasing classic books and comics, and even producing a new table top game. It was surprising how much news there was about this older series. It was great to see how many fans, both young and old, attended the panel. The future of Robotech looks interesting and time will tell how well everything will work out.

Love Live Cosplay Meet Up: Lessons in Planning by Eri Kagami
This year, I decided to host the Love Live: School Idol Festival meet up. Usually, these meetups are set in the Love Live Cosplayers Facebook group. Since the usual people who run these meetups don't usually attend Anime Boston, I stepped up to host it. Typically, Love Live meet ups run on both Fridays and Saturdays in the early part of the afternoon. Once the master list for cosplay meetups was open, I had the Love Live meet up claim the third floor by room 313. Because I found out the master list is NOT moderated by Anime Boston staff, we found out on the day of that that area was double booked with the Final Fantasy cosplay meet up. Because their group was larger, we had to find another open area for photos. Finding an open area for photos at the Hynes is tough! Luckily, we did find a space where we can get photos, but I felt bad for the group because I really did want to make people happy and I hated to upset fellow Love Live cosplayers from moving around.

We did get some shots of our group and it was nice meeting people who were also into Love Live. However, as a note to whomever is the moderator on the Anime Boston forums for cosplay meet ups and photoshoots - make sure no one double books a venue!

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