2.25.2013

Junjou Romantica Suzuki-san Plushie

Readers, you know I love BL.  I love "Junjou Romantica". I love teddy bears, and the Bear of Bears for this BL lover is none other than Suzuki-san.  Imagine as I weep over having yet another JR goody dangled before me but unable to reach across the giant pond to Japan so I can grasp and hug the stuffing out of it.


Here I present to you the Suzuki-san plush, one of the many treasures to come from Shungiku Nakamura's series and its honoring at the Animate Cafe (you can read my news about the event held back in July 2012 and my hunger pains here.  Sitting at a tall 23 inches and sporting a red plaid bow to compliment his round ears, face & body, Akihiko "Usagi" Usami's best bear from England will cost you 8,500 yen from Korder.com.

He's soft. He's adorable.  He should be in my home.

2.22.2013

Oh My Goddess Belldandy with Holly Bell PVC Figure

Long, long ago I was a lonely Otaku in high school. The year of this story isn't important but let's just say that I was only aware of 150 Pokemon, I was buying fansubs on VHS from Canada with my unused lunch money and my game console of choice was Nintendo 64. Anyway, I had a Business Communications class with an assigned seat in the back of the room next to a color laser printer. Not only was it convenient to print out all of my daily classwork, but it also allowed me to print out all those lovely Anime and Manga images from the Internet for me to cut out and tape onto my books and walls at home, swiping them from the printer tray before anyone was the wiser.

Included among those pictures were all the figures and statues I highly desired but could not have. After all, most of my money went to helping my family, and even if having a personal credit card wasn't just a dream on the horizon, access to obtaining these items was few and far between (anyone else out there remember loving Yahoo Auctions USA back in the day as much as me?!). Even if I managed to go the more affordable route and obtain the garage kits to build and color myself, I didn't have the tools or mad skillz to make them as impressive as they're displayed on the boxes. One of these long desired beauties of mine was the Belldandy with Holly Bell statue from the "Oh My Goddess!" (or if you prefer, "Ah! My Goddess") series. Several years and failed auctions later I could only settle for the 1000 Edition art print; lovely in its own right but not the same as the 360 degree view I always wanted. Well, prepare for a second chance as Max Factory, who is celebrating it's 25th anniversary, is bringing to us a re-release!

Though made of PVC instead of resin, the amazing top-to-bottom detail of our heavenly ladies stands in 1/10 scale from Holly Bell's sweeping blond hair and enveloping angel wings to Belldandy's flowing and swirling orange gown, all upon a black base of scroll work and blue stones. To ensure its collectible status each figure is stamped with a unique serial number. If you are oohing and aahing over this for the first time or exactly like me and muuuust haaaave thiiis nooow, you can pre-order from CD Japan or Hobby Search today for around $190.00, but you'll have to wait August 31, 2013 before it ships. I've waited this long. What's a few more months?