WTH ADV?

(Warning: Links aplenty!)

Man what’s up with ADV lately? They’ve cut ties with NewType, canceled the Anime Network and their Anime Advocates club program, and suddenly a bunch of stuff that was recently licensed has gone missing and we aren’t sure when they’ll be back.

Yikes? End of the world right? Let me tell you about a story about ADV’s Manga division…

You see in ADV’s case, I think it’s more that their eyes got way bigger than their collective head. In the early 2000’s anime was starting to receive press and looked like it was going to be the next big thing and ADV was in on it big time. At the end of 2002 the launched the Anime Network, and in 2003 came ADV Manga, ADV Music, ADV Toys, and ADV Kitchen Sink. Er, I mean a Live Action Eva Movie. ADV was ready to take on the world! Like, say… ADV Manga! They licensed everything under the sun that they could, eventually having “100 multivolume manga series” and plans to “publish about 600 titles over the next few years.” Is it any wonder that in late 2004 and in 2005 that they started dropping like flies? Wait… What did that article say? Did I say 100, 600? Okay so I meant 1,000.

Well ADV at least liked to think big. But in the end it’s no longer doom and gloom, as ADV Manga is still around and in fact still sells stuff. Sure it’s not a gazillion books or anything, but they are getting stuff out and looks like they’re making money. So don’t fret, chances are ADV is just scaling down their operations and will be fine if the past is any indication. Of course, it helps that manga sales are up 10%. Although the same article also points out that anime DVD sales are down are continuing to go down.

Oops.

So stay tuned for the next installment of The Chocogaz Blog, where I speculate why that might be! If you know, I ever get around to it.