AnimeTwineowa 2021

Today is the start of the best weekend of the year, because you're at AnimeIowa! This is your favorite convention of all time, and you can't wait to get started with convention activities. The only thing that could make it better is the chance to meet the Buu-chan himself—but best not to get ahead of yourself; after all, there's plenty of other things to do here before then! It's about 11:00am, with an hour left before the convention itself starts. What do you want to do? [[Get your badge]] [[Go to a panel]] [[Go to the Video Rooms]] [[Volunteer]]

You make your way to the Registration area. There are two sets of tables there, each with a long line. One of the table areas is for people who registered for a badge ahead of time; the other is for people who still need to register. Between the two of them is what appears to be a Help Desk. Did you pre-register? [[Yes]] [[No]] [[I don't remember...]]

Unfortunately, there are no panels going on right now. Maybe you should do something else? [[Go to the Video Rooms]] [[Volunteer]] [[Get your badge]]

It seems like no videos are showing yet. Maybe you should do something else? [[Go to a panel]] [[Volunteer]] [[Get your badge]]

After waiting in line for about twenty minutes, a perky volunteer is able to find your name in the registration books, directs you to the program books at the end of the table, and wishes you a happy convention! [[Check the Program Book]]

After waiting in line for about thirty minutes and filling out some paperwork, a perky AnimeIowa staffer gets you set up with a badge, directs you to the program books at the end of the table, and wishes you a happy convention! [[Check the Program Book]]

After waiting in the pre-reg line for about twenty minutes, the volunteers and staff are unable to find you in the registration books; luckily, the staff is sympathetic to your plight and won't make you wait in a second line! They skip you to the front of the Register At The Door line where you fill out some paperwork, a perky AnimeIowa staffer gets you set up with a badge, directs you to the program books at the end of the table, and wishes you a happy convention! The entire process takes about ten minutes. [[Check the Program Book]]

You thumb through the program book to find out when events start; there's a whole lot of interesting things going on this weekend. You take a look at the video room schedule as well; AnimeIowa always shows some cool titles. [[Video Room Schedule]] [[Friday Noon Events]]

You take a look at the panels and videos that are about to start. These seem to be your choices: Panel: [[BJD Mania]] Panel: [[Guardian Treasures Fans Unite!]] Panel: [[Lifeswap Alliance]] Watch: [[Wanbon-chan Goes to School]] Watch: [[Heartbeat Rhythm Magic]] Volunteer: [[Friday Noon Volunteering Opportunities]] Exhibit Hall: [[Friday Noon at the Marketplace]] Check the [[Friday Noon Video Room Schedule]]

''Video Room One Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: [[Wanbon-chan Goes to School]] - A slice-of-life anime about a puppy starting kindergarten or preschool in an anthropomorphic world. One of the most popular characters is Tarou, a wheely dog; another is Naoko, a cat who's pretending to be a dog to go to puppy school. Friday Afternoon: Crave - Story of Chiharu, a vampire who was adopted by humans and has no idea she's not also human. A series of super weird coincidences has kept the discovery from happening until she's in junior high or high school, when she begins craving blood. She becomes aware of other supernatural creatures when she discovers her own nature. All of her friends team up to make sure she gets however much blood she needs on a regular basis (which, at least while she's still young, isn't too much yet). Friday Evening: Sunset Eyes - Hikari has been cursed with a devilish appearance (horns, wings, tail, red-gray skin) and skin that burns anyone who touches her; the curse can only be reversed when someone who loves her with all their heart looks into her eyes at sunset. After meeting Hikari, Nadeshiko vows to fall in love with her and break the curse. After all, the curse doesn't say anything about Hikari having to love the person back, and there are a lot worse things to Nadeshiko's way of thinking than people thinking she likes girls "like that"—and one of those is being cursed never to touch your real true love, right? Friday Night: ohayo gozaimasu, it’s early - A school comedy about a kid, Kei (written with the character for "firefly"), who is always too tired for morning classes, but struggles to be at school anyway. Stories range from typical school stories trying to involve a kid who's either half or entirely asleep most of the time (and yet somehow gets good grades!), to his classmates trying to figure out why he keeps missing so much sleep, and how they can help (every time they try to find out it's something different, and all of their efforts so far have failed; it's doubtful Kei has noticed them in the first place). Saturday Early Morning: The Life and Times of a Background Character - Yamada Kenichi is a young adult who has a million part-time jobs and is constantly witness to major scenes from everyone else's stories. From the meet-cutes at the coffee shop, to the superpower-granting mix-ups at the lab, and even that one time the villain had an epiphany and a change of heart, Kenichi has a constant, unwitting, and even unwilling hand in them. Saturday Morning: Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! - Rika ends up being reborn as the heroine of an otome game. The problem is that she never had much interest in the game's canon love interests, but really liked drawing fanart of Hitomi, one of the 'rival' characters... who's even more stunning in person! Saturday at Noon: All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine? - Nicknamed WorldsOther by the fandom, this is a high fantasy series inspired by a series of light novels. The heroine of the story is Bremby, a sorceress who's lived under the threat of the Demon King's hordes for years, but the local temples promise that one day the Chosen One will be summoned from another world to set things right. Well, the day is here, and there seem to be at least four 'chosen ones'—who all claim to be from other worlds, argue about the details, and seem to be more interested in dating than actually doing what they're supposed to and stopping the Demon King. Fine; if their absurd powers are going to waste, maybe Bremby can just save her country herself... Saturday Afternoon: Ghost Girlfriend - High school boy Yoshida Mamoru moves into a house in a new neighborhood; turns out it's haunted by the ghost of a teenage girl! Tsubomi has an absolutely enormous crush on him, but he is absolutely oblivious. The twist? Her ghost status is under Little Mermaid/Beauty and the Beast rules: If someone falls in love with her and truly loves her to the point where they confess their feelings and mean it, she'll get to restart her life as a human—but only if they confess first! Tsubomi is constantly fighting to keep her hopes from getting too far up, and also has resolved not to tell Mamoru any of the details in case he would feel pressured into trying to develop feelings for her. Meanwhile, absolutely everyone around is trying hardcore to matchmake them. Saturday Evening: Clockwork Under City Lights - An OVA adapted from a webcomic. The interconnected stories of a dozen tiny magically-powered, steampunk-ish self-aware constructs created in the shape of large insects, miniature forest animals, non-humanoid mythological creatures, and so forth, set loose in a big and bustling city somewhere on a world just to the left of our own; life can be beyond interesting as well as startlingly mundane when you're a metal and stained glass griffin the size of a teacup. Saturday Night: Fantasy Hero Mech - When war threatens, the denizens of the world of Sylvania have come together to summon the hero who was prophesied to come in their hour of greatest need; meanwhile, Takeshi is just a low-ranking grunt in the Unified Space Forces, working to repair a hyperspace transport gate. Right when he flips the switch to test it out, he and his repair mech are sucked through it into Sylvania, where the people on the other side of the gate assume he has arrived to save them. Sunday Early Morning: Guardian Treasures - When Earth is threatened by alien forces, Japan’s Three Treasures rise again in the form of giant mechs; three high school boys, Ryuu, Heiji, and Touya, are chosen by the mechs as pilots to defend Earth. With help from engineering and folklore student Asuka, they will work together to drive off the invaders and protect the world. But there’s a dark secret about the invaders that could threaten to tear apart the bonds they’ve formed, and endanger Earth in the process… Sunday Morning: Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams - It's the year 21XX, and being a Magical Girl is now a viable career option. Unfortunately, despite her own significant magical powers, Arika Izumi is much more interested in being an accountant or a programmer. Her relief when she learns that the experts at Mahou Gakuen, the most prestigious magical girl academy in the area, think she wouldn't be a good fit for the program is short-lived; when she arrives home after learning the results, she sees that her mother has not only already assumed she would pass, but told all of her own friends that Arika would be attending Mahou Gakuen. Luckily, Arika got accepted to a different high school that's not very far from Mahou Gakuen; with the help of her new friends in the Drama Club, and a little programming magic, Arika is set to fake the heck out of being a Mahou Gakuen student. Sunday at Noon: Nobunaga and the Warring States - A Hetalia-esque historical cartoon featuring Oda Nobunaga and other historical figures, and the personified States. Nobunaga has to constantly break up petty squabbles between the States. He is accompanied by his constant companion, fan favorite Piyo the nightingale, who is usually found perched on his shoulder or head. He is still waiting for her to sing. Sunday Afternoon: Tech Wizard - Garret Smelter has an absurdly good reputation for repairing spells and stuff; turns out he's been using mundane methods the entire time, but no one will believe him. Told from the POV of Hans, Garret's new apprentice, as Garret and his his "familiar" (a well-trained but mundane ferret named Lefty) go about the work of keeping the city of Archdale running on actual engineering. ''Video Room Two Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: [[Heartbeat Rhythm Magic]] - Koharu is practicing with a hoop for rhythmic gymnastics club when suddenly, a strange monster made of stadium seating attacks the gym! Koharu is then found by a small, pink, hamster-like creature that tells her she is to be the leader of a team of magical girls who use the tools and skills of rhythmic gymnastics to defeat monsters and keep the evil Judge Malice from throwing off the rhythm of the world and using the power of hearts beating out of sync to take over the universe. Together with her teammates Natsuki, Akiko, and Fuyumi, Koharu will overthrow Judge Malice and restore the world's rhythm! Friday Afternoon: Bridge Over Dragon Run - A slice-of-life/drama with a fantasy twist. Seventh grader Sachie is having a rough time in middle school; none of her friends from grade school are going to the same school she is, and a number of the girls she does go to school with have chosen her as a target for bullying. She's retrieving her school bag from where some of the girls have thrown it into a creek when she comes across a large egg. The egg hatches when Sachie touches it, and a small dragon topples out, instantly bonding with her. Knowing instinctively that the tiny creature is now her responsibility, Sachie takes it home and attempts to hide it from her mother and younger brother, with decidedly mixed results. Friday Evening - DCLXVI: Margaret the witch has found a mysterious egg and a piece of ancient parchment with instructions for a ritual to hatch it, but no other information. Incredibly curious, Margaret decides to perform the ritual and see what’s inside. Just then, the angel Tenshi and the demon Koakuma show up to try and stop her; according to them, the egg actually contains a beast that will devour the world! Unfortunately, they're too late; the ritual has completed, and the egg hatches into a tiny golden dragon-like creature with a crimson mane. Knowing that they'll be punished if they go back with this bad news, Tenshi and Koakuma decide to team up with Margaret and raise it; maybe if they do everything right, it won't want to devour the world after all! It worked in that one British book/radio play/TV miniseries, after all... Lots of yuri subtext/moments. Friday Night: His Majesty's Guard - A harem anime. Ordinary Japanese high school student Genta learns that he's actually the heir to a vaguely European-ish country. Since the previous ruler was assassinated, Genta has been assigned a full team of highly trained guards, each specializing in a different weapon and/or fighting style, and each head-over-heels for Genta. His Majesty's Guard has gained a fair amount of attention for one of Genta's guards being a male character (Thomas), even if they are not expected to be the endgame ship. Saturday Early Morning: A Sprinkle of Love - A romantic comedy about a young engineering woman named Yuki who enters a baking competition with no grand prize besides the title of Best Baker. She meets the other competitors and gets along except for that one grumpy young man named Ken. Due to a misunderstanding, they get off on the wrong foot, but during the course of the competition they get to know each other better. It's not long before these feelings turn to love, but at the end of the competition nears and they are the only two left standing, can their love survive the heat? Saturday Morning: Where Is My Master? - A very fanservicey title about a dog named Pochiko who saves the life of a witch and is turned into a busty young woman as a reward. Pochiko is delighted, but her human master, Akihiko, is a lot more conflicted—especially because Pochiko still acts so much like a dog! Despite Akihiko trying his best to set her up with her own life as a human, Pochiko is determined to stay by Akihiko's side through thick and thin. Saturday at Noon: Alien Lifeswap - One day out of the blue, a space alien abducts ordinary teenage boy Noboru and takes his place in order to study humans and help make a decision about whether they should be introduced to the wider galactic alliance. The show follows both the alien in its attempts to pass as Noboru, and Noboru in a special not-quite-classroom with aliens from at least four other species who are undergoing basically the same trial, plus a teacher from the species that is taking the his place. Shenanigans ensue. Saturday Afternoon: City Heist - A recently released movie. The gem powering the technology of the village where Adorina lives has broken; the townsfolk can keep the town running for a time with human power alone, but this cannot be maintained for more than a few months. The only place to get replacement gems is the Eternal City, but the city's ruler guards them fiercely and charges outrageous amounts for replacements. Knowing her town can never afford the cost of a new gem, Adorina recruits retired master thief Antono, fighting and arms expert Rubena, and recently fired city guards Luksa and Johano to help her steal not only the gem she needs to help her village live on, but the technology to create new gems—just as Eternal City's ruler once stole it from Adorina's grandmother. Saturday Evening: Bolt Turners In The Sky - A century and a half ago, the world fell to a disaster known only as the Hungry Earth. No longer able to survive on the planet's surface, humanity fled to the skies. There, people live out their lives on city-fleets of assorted air vehicles - dirigibles, single-engine planes, helicarriers, and more. The series focuses on the Bolt Turners: a group of technicians who travel from vessel to vessel, fixing mechanical issues to keep the fleet flying. With art reminiscent of Studio Ghibli and a full cast of interesting, well-developed characters, the anime has fans hooked across the globe. Saturday Night: Inherit the Flame - A critically acclaimed movie, heavy with symbolism and artistically stunning. Legend says that anyone who sleeps at the foot of the mountain Cadair Idris will end up dead, mad, or a poet. Would-be poet Matthew goes to test this one night and ends up taken into another world, where his heart is removed and put in a cauldron of flame. Matthew instantly find that his skills as a poet have increased a hundred fold, and he joins a party of dozens of other artists who have come to challenge their skills over the years. As the night wears on, however, he meets Isabel, a fiddle player who misses her home, and he realizes that he, too, wants to go back to where he came from. Together, the two of them put their skills to the ultimate test to call their hearts back from the cauldron and return home. Sunday Early Morning: Rue 63rd - The story starts when Rokuro (whose name means "sixth son") and Sango (whose name means "third child") meet and commisserate that the other has the life that they want for themselves. Deciding to swap places, the "boy" (now going by Kuroko) and "girl" (now called Hanzo) slowly discover that part of the reason their new lives feel so right is because they are, in fact, transgender. The two of them need to navigate not only their new school lives as a gender they'd never thought they'd be yet are coming to realize is right, but also their home lives and interactions with each other, as they come to terms with their gender identities and what they want for the future. Sunday Morning: Swept Away - After nine-year-old Katsuo's puppy is saved from a frozen-over pond by a practicing curling team, he and his friends Hiraku and Minato become obsessed with the sport. When they reach high school, a teacher from Canada arrives, and they finally have an advisor for their curling club (with Katsuo's now grown dog to be the mascot). Unfortunately, they're one club member short. Katsuo sets his sights on Hajime, the younger brother of the boy who saved Katsuo's puppy. The problem? Hajime is completely uninterested in curling! Sunday at Noon: Hanako's School Days - A school drama about a fat girl named Hanako and her experiences in junior high and high school. A very sympathetic look at a fat girl character, who has been given a cute character design, and how she deals with the bullying and microaggressions she faces in everyday life. Sunday Afternoon: Isekai Bus Tour - Aiko is walking home from school one day when a bus comes barreling down the street right at her! Convinced that these are her last minutes alive, Aiko is astonished when, in a huge burst of light, the tour bus vanishes. Meanwhile, Youta and Miyu have been working together for years to get their new Akihabara tour bus up and running, and have just started their first tour! A combination of a horribly annoying passenger and a newspaper getting caught on the windshield has Youta losing control of the bus; right when he's about to hit a teenage girl, the entire bus is transported to another world—one that a passenger recognizes! The main storyline follows Youta and Miyu, with their mysterious new skills of Bus Driver and Tour Guide, as they hop from world to world with a full passenger list, hoping each new portal Miyu directs them to will be the one to bring them all back home. The post-episode clips, meanwhile, follow Aiko as she investigates the mysterious "hit-and-run" bus, leading to wilder and wilder conspiracy theories as she goes. [[Friday Noon Events]]

This is a sort of 101 panel for Ball Jointed Dolls; a lot of people here are showing off their dolls and fashions, and talking about where to get them. You are in awe of the amazing craftship on display. Is that a deer-centaur? Does that doll have butterfly wings? Is that a perfect BJD replica of Hikari from Sunset Eyes?! This. Is. //Amazing//. [[Friday Afternoon Events]]

It's not the most creatively named panel, you admit, but the enthusiasm of the fans more than makes up for it. While there are a lot of very passionate shippers, the moderators manage to keep things civil and mostly on-topic. You learn some really cool facts about the actual Three Treasures that throw elements of the show into new light. [[Friday Afternoon Events]]

Oh! It's Wanbon-chan's first day at school! Naoko-chan doesn't show up until the next episode, but the Wanbon-chan is already sitting next to Tarou-chan. [[Friday Afternoon Events]]

That was fun! Let's see what there is to do next... Panel: [[Lolita Fashion for Beginners]] Panel: [[In Another World at the Convention]] Panel: [[Cosplay 101]] Watch: [[Crave]] Watch: [[Bridge Over Dragon Run]] Volunteer: [[Friday Afternoon Volunteering Opportunities]] Exhibit Hall: [[Friday Afternoon at the Marketplace]] Check the [[Friday Afternoon Video Room Schedule]]

You've been somewhat interested in Lolita Fashion for a while; this seems like the perfect time to learn more. Entering this panel, you find yourself in a world of frills and lace. It's incredible! Everyone here is very polite, and there's a very informative slideshow about the history of Lolita Fashion in Japan. You learn, to your relief, that it actually has nothing to do with the book, and is entirely about self-expression and empowerment. [[Friday Evening Events]]

The cosplay guest of honor is here! Together with a couple of assistants, they go over the basics of costume making, some easy and important tricks for you to pick up, fabric types, all sorts of things. After a quick run-down, they take questions. You end up learning a whole lot about the basics of sewing and costume-making. [[Friday Evening Events]]

Oh, this is a good one! Chiharu's friends helped her figure out that she's a vampire, now she's just figuring out that one of her clubmates, Yuriko, is a werewolf! [[Friday Evening Events]]

Looks like there's only one panel going on right now: Opening Ceremonies. That's always a blast! Buu-chan is usually there, and the Master of Ceremonies always introduces all the Guests of Honor. But there's some anime you really like showing as well... Panel: [[Opening Ceremonies]] Watch: [[Sunset Eyes]] Watch: [[DCLXVI]] Volunteer: [[Friday Evening Volunteering Opportunities]] Exhibit Hall: [[Friday Evening at the Marketplace]] Check the [[Friday Evening Video Room Schedule]]

All other panels are shut down while Opening Ceremonies takes over the main ballroom. You're delighted to see Buu-chan on stage in a battle of wits with his nemesis, the Pit Master! It seems like the Pit Master has Buu-chan on the ropes, when a hippo twirls on stage in a pink tutu. The hippo is introduced as Buu-chan's new friend Millie, and the two of them force the Pit Master to retreat, his vows for revenge echoing over his shoulder. Millie and Buu-chan fistbump, then Millie leaves the stage while Buu-chan takes his place backing up the Master of Ceremonies and helping to introduce the Guests of Honor. [[Friday Night Events]]

Looks like it's the beginning of season two; Nadeshiko has just found out Hitomi's favorite food and is looking up recipes for it. The ending of this episode is kind of bittersweet... [[Friday Night Events]]

Looking at the events for Friday night, you see that the Formal Ball is starting soon. On the other hand, there's a panel that's all about tasting Japanese snacks. And it seems like there's always something great on in the viewing rooms... Panel: [[Formal Ball]] Panel: [[Japanese Snack Tasting]] Panel: [[Witch Hazel]] Watch: [[ohayo gozaimasu, it's early]] Watch: [[His Majesty's Guard]] Volunteer: [[Friday Night Volunteering Opportunities]] Exhibit Hall: [[Friday Night at the Marketplace]] Check the [[Friday Night Video Room Schedule]]

Now this is a treat! It’s kind of like if AnimeIowa had its own prom. You’re tickled to see the different cosplayers dancing together, in setups that are both very canon, and very, very not. Just walking into the room, you passed Mamoru and Tsubomi from Ghost Girlfriend dancing together, while across the room is Bremby in the arms of the Demon King, and to your left you see a Heiji from Guardian Treasures holding his hand out to an Oda Nobunaga. You yourself end up taking a turn around the room with a Rika from Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! Definitely one of your favorite events so far. [[What now?]]

You have to admit, you're curious about Japanese snacks. You've seen all sorts of items in Asian grocery stores, but have no idea what to get, and your budget is sadly limited. Luckily, the moderators of this panel have you covered: Not only do they have a very nice spread of various Japanese snacks, they take the time to talk in detail about each one of them, including bits of trivia and history, and are fully prepared to answer questions about the ingredients—and potential allergens—in each one. Phew! [[What now?]]

Ha! This is the first one one where Kei's friends have come over to his house to try and figure out why he loses so much sleep; they're in for a long night as a fire happens at the end of the block, sirens and alarms going on and off from eleven at night to three in the morning. [[What now?]]

You are just... really, really wiped out after all of that. You think you'll go to bed so you'll be nice and refreshed tomorrow. [[Go to bed]]

Zzzzz... [[Wake up]]

Wha... huh? Oh! It's the second day of AnimeIowa! Better get back to the convention. [[Saturday Early Morning Events]]

You made it! And there's plenty to do here already... Panel: [[Heartbeat Gymnastics]] Panel: [[Plushie Madness]] Panel: [[Crave That Anime: A Crave Fan Panel]] Watch: [[The Life and Times of a Background Character]] Watch: [[A Sprinkle of Love]] Volunteer: [[Saturday Early Morning Volunteering Opportunities]] Exhibit Hall: [[Saturday Early Morning at the Marketplace]] Oh! It looks like Saturday has photoshoots as well! Photoshoot: [[Ghost Girlfriend Photoshoot]] Check the [[Saturday Early Morning Video Room Schedule]]

Turns out this is a panel on basic plushie construction. Two of the panelists sew, and one of them crochets amigurumi. The three of them talk about their different styles of work and the process of pattern-making, and you get to see some examples of what they've made. You especially love the plushie of Lefty the ferret from Tech Wizard that one of them made. [[Saturday Morning Events]]

There's not as much emphasis on shipping in this panel as you expected; instead, most of the discussion focuses on the mystery surrounding Chiharu's birth parents, and whether the anime will ever introduce them. Chiharu's been learning a lot with the help of her friends, but there are still a lot of questions she has that another vampire would be best equipped to answer, and a family member would be even better. [[Saturday Morning Events]]

This is one you haven't seen before; Kenichi picks up a ten yen coin that's continually causing him trouble: Falling into his shoe, getting dropped on the ground, a vending machine refusing to accept it... Meanwhile, the Main Characters trip over the bag he set down to fish the coin from his shoe, slip on the coin when it rolls away from him, and end up getting sprayed by a soda can that was horribly shaken up when Kenichi tried to get the machine to accept the coin. [[Saturday Morning Events]]

Well, what's next on your agenda, then? Panel: [[Morning Maid Cafe]] Panel: [[Super Idol Hero]] Panel: [[Coslplay Curling]] Watch: [[Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess!]] Watch: [[Where Is My Master?]] Volunteer: [[Saturday Morning Volunteering Opportunities]] Exhibit Hall: [[Saturday Morning at the Marketplace]] Photoshoot: [[Clockwork Under City Lights Photoshoot]] Check the [[Saturday Morning Video Room Schedule]]

You're so glad you signed up for this! The storyline this year has the Maids delivering messages to different tables, including a series of mystery messages from an unknown sender! You're absolutely delighted when the responsible party is revealed to be none other than Buu-chan! The maid at your table is Himawari, who's a little shy at first, but warms up quickly to compliments. [[Saturday Noon Events]]

Oh, you love this manga! The teen superstar trying to balance their Idol responsibilities while hiding a double-life as a superhero, with all the identity shenanigans involved? Love it. Apparently you're not alone! The panel is hosted by two of the Guests of Honor, and you spend the entire time geeking out over the manga with them and at least three dozen other fans. [[Saturday Noon Events]]

This looks like the part where we learn Ryou's tragic backstory. The way Hitomi deals with him when he tries to use it as an excuse for being a jerk definitely makes the episode. [[Saturday Noon Events]]

There's still so much to do today! Panel: [[Noon Maid Cafe]] Panel: [[Social Justice Otaku]] Panel: [[Advanced Cosplay]] Watch: [[All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine?]] Watch: [[Alien Lifeswap]] Volunteer: [[Saturday Noon Volunteering Opportunities]] Exhibit Hall: [[Saturday Noon at the Marketplace]] Photoshoot: [[Swept Away Photoshoot]] Check the [[Saturday Noon Video Room Schedule]]

You're so glad you signed up for this! The storyline this year has the Maids delivering messages to different tables, including a series of mystery messages from an unknown sender! You're absolutely delighted when the responsible party is revealed to be none other than Buu-chan! The maid at your table is Sakura, who is very sweet and energetic, though maybe a bit clumsy. [[Saturday Afternoon Events]]

Hosted by the cosplay Guest of Honor, this panel takes you through some of the finer details of constructing foam armor, making frankenlace, putting together props, and costume construction. There is a lot of information here, and you've started taking notes in the back of your program book. [[Saturday Afternoon Events]]

This looks like the part where the other four "heroes" have just figured out that Bremby has left on a quest to fight the Demon King without them. Boy, they sure are sheepish! You do love a good petard-hoist. [[Saturday Afternoon Events]]

There's some really interesting stuff going on; while Ghost Girlfriend and Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! are some of your favorite titles, learning about something new sounds fun, too. Panel: [[A Taste of Love]] Panel: [[Moth and Friends Meetup]] Panel: [[The Villainess Path]] Watch: [[Ghost Girlfriend]] Watch: [[City Heist]] Volunteer: [[Saturday Afternoon Volunteering Opportunities]] Exhibit Hall: [[Saturday Afternoon at the Marketplace]] Photoshoot: [[His Majesty's Guard Photoshoot]] Check the [[Saturday Afternoon Video Room Schedule]]

You haven't heard of this one, but it seems interesting; it's hosted by one of the voice actor Guests of Honor, too. At the panel, you learn it's a 4-koma webcomic about, well, a moth and the friends she hangs out with around a lamppost. There have been a few webisodes developed, and rumors are flying that it might be picked up by a major studio soon that all of its fans are very excited about. You think you'll keep an eye on it; it seems like a cute series. [[Saturday Evening Events]]

You are completely unsurprised when this panel devolves almost instantly into gushing over Hitomi. You're with Rika on this one; despite the anime's (honestly pretty good) efforts to make the male characters from the rejected romance paths more interesting, Hitomi is still clearly the best. [[Saturday Evening Events]]

This looks like the part where Mamoru's class is setting up a haunted house for the school festival, and Tsubomi recruits some of her supernatural friends to try and make it more authentic! It is hilarious and beyond cute. [[Saturday Evening Events]]

Hmm; Photoshoots are over, and the Marketplace is closed. Looks like there's only one panel going on tonight, too: The big dance. You've had a lot of fun at that before, but you're also pretty tired. There's also a couple of viewing rooms still going, and there's almost always work for volunteers. Panel: [[The Big Dance]] Watch: [[Fantasy Hero Mech]] Watch: [[Inherit the Flame]] Volunteer: [[Saturday Night Volunteering Opportunities]] Check the [[Saturday Night Video Room Schedule]] [[Get some sleep]]

You've been looking forward to this all year! Loud music, lots of dancing, glowsticks and lights, awesome outfits—you love it all! Thankfully you have someplace safe to stash your things while you dance, and can spend the night dancing away without a care. You end up decked out in glowsticks from head to toe. [[Get some sleep]]

Zzzzz... huh? A dream? Buu-chan and Millie the hippo... playing hopscotch with the Pit Master and his minions... hahaha... zzzzz... [[Get up]]

Urgh, you don't want to get up! [[Get up anyway]] [[Go back to sleep]]

Fine, fine, you'll get up; there is more AnimeIowa left, after all... [[Sunday Early Morning Events]]

Zzzzz... haha, that's right, get 'em, Millie and Buu-chan! That'll... do... the trick... zzzzz... [[Get up for real now]] [[Just five more minutes...]]

Phew, you made it on time for the first panels! The Marketplace won't be open for a little while yet, but there's still stuff to do. Panel: [[Welcome to Underton]] Panel: [[Tea Ceremony]] Panel: [[Oyasumi Nasai: An ohayo gozaimasu, it's early Panel]] Watch: [[Guardian Treasures]] Watch: [[Rue 63rd]] Volunteer: [[Sunday Early Morning Volunteering Opportunities]] Check the [[Sunday Early Morning Video Room Schedule]]

Urgh, fine. I guess it's time... ...Wait, there's still one day left of AnimeIowa! Shoot, you've gotta get going; you're missing stuff! [[Sunday Morning Events]]

You watch from the audience as a tall man in a kimono and hakama goes up on stage. He begins to explain the finer points of Japanese tea ceremony, including how the role played by guests is just as important as the host’s. The guests for his demonstration include a Yamada Kenichi from The Life and Times of a Background Character, an Asuka from Guardian Treasures, and one of the convention’s guests of honor. [[Sunday Morning Events]]

This is both the perfect time and the perfect name for a panel about an anime whose main character is chronically sleep-deprived. (Frankly, right now you can relate.) The moderator is wearing a perfect Kei costume, and has even brought a pillow to pretend to sleep on! It's more of a wake-up than you were expecting. [[Sunday Morning Events]]

They're showing the first few episodes, where the viewers get to meet Hans and learn through him that all of Garret's tricks are completely mundane. It's a really fantastic reveal; sometimes you watch it on bad days to get a pick-me-up, to see Hans start to appreciate solving fantastic problems through ordinary means. [[Sunday Evening Events]]

Shoot, it's gonna be hard to pick between these options... Panel: [[Wanbon-chan Goes to AnimeIowa]] Panel: [[A Brief History of the Warring States Period]] Panel: [[Isekau Bus Tour Route]] Watch: [[Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams]] Watch: [[Swept Away]] Exhibit Hall: [[Sunday Morning at the Marketplace]] Volunteer: [[Sunday Morning Volunteering Opportunities]] Check the [[Sunday Morning Video Room Schedule]]

It may be a show for Japanese kindergartners and first graders, but Wanbon-chan is pretty cute and has some genuinely wholesome messages. The panel covers the basics of the plot and premise to start out with, then delves into a closer examination of Wanbon-chan's friends and friendship with Tarou and Naoko. [[Sunday Noon Events]]

With Nobunaga and the Warring States rapidly rising in popularity, it's easy to see why people would be interested in the actual history of the period. The moderator, one of the Guests of Honor, goes over the basics with everyone, and has a short list of recommended books for anyone who wants to learn more. A stuffed nightingale is pinned to their shoulder the entire time, and "sings" the closing theme melody when the moderator squeezes it to end the panel. [[Sunday Noon Events]]

Oh, here's Arika catastrophising with the Drama Club over what to do about her mom! You love the part where they come up with their plan, almost as much as the part where they try it out for the first time. Lucky for you, that's in the very next episode! [[Sunday Noon Events]]

You feel a pang as you realize there are only a few panels left this year... Panel: [[Japanese Language Basics]] Panel: [[AnimeIowa Background Characters]] Panel: [[Haunted Hearts: A Ghost Girlfriend Panel]] Watch: [[Nobunaga and the Warring States]] Watch: [[Hanako's School Days]] Volunteer: [[Sunday Noon Volunteering Opportunities]] Exhibit Hall: [[Sunday Noon at the Marketplace]] Check the [[Sunday Noon Video Room Schedule]]

A panel for fans of The Life and Times of a Background Character. The writing for this show is just plain bonkers in the best way, and it seems like the moderators (including the guest of honor who plays Kenichi in the English dub) and the other fans at the panel agree. You all very easily while away the entire panel discussing the absolutely incredible Butterfly Effect-esque twists that come about and cause Main Character Plot Points, just because of Kenichi being Kenichi. [[Sunday Afternoon Events]]

Okay, this panel is pure glee. Ghost Girlfriend is one of the cutest shows airing right now, possibly ever, and you are just plain overjoyed to talk to people about it in real life. (Well, more people; you may have worn off the ear of a friend or two already.) There are a bunch of people here you've seen elsewhere at the con, all of them chatting excitedly about their favorite parts of the series and whether Mamoru will ever confess to Tsubomi. [[Sunday Afternoon Events]]

Nobunaga is chastising one of the States for doing something horribly petty and ridiculous. Which is the plot of pretty much every episode, but you still love it. [[Sunday Afternoon Events]]

Gotta squeeze as much fun as you can from the rest of the convention! Panel: [[Mahou Gakuen Politics]] Panel: [[Clockwork Under Convention Lights]] Panel: [[So You Want to Join AnimeIowa Staff]] Watch: [[Tech Wizard]] Watch: [[Isekai Bus Tour]] Volunteer: [[Sunday Afternoon Volunteering Opportunities]] Exhibit Hall: [[Sunday Afternoon at the Marketplace]] Check the [[Sunday Afternoon Video Room Schedule]]

Finally, a chance to really dive into the political aspect of Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams. The series starts out lighthearted enough, but before long, Arika's magical girl persona starts to get a reputation for being an actual Magical Girl of the pre-Academy type, doing the best she can without government oversight; her antics prompt all sorts of philosophical questions amongst the students and staff of both schools, and you’re eager to really get into the juicy details with fellow fans. [[Sunday Evening Events]]

The Clockwork Under City Lights panel is everything you hoped for. The panel is dedicated about half to fanart and fancraft, and half to worldbuilding speculation, including when in each episode you can catch a glimpse of the silver-and-emerald snail. A lot of the people at the panel have brought their own miniatures, both official and homemade, and the sight of tiny metal-and-stained-glass creatures cradled in arms or standing on the front table takes your breath away. [[Sunday Evening Events]]

This is the movie that just aired in spring; Touya and Asuka have been kidnapped by the invading aliens, and Ryuu and Heiji are on their own to rescue them! Oh, your favorite part is about to start, too! Better get settled in... [[Sunday Morning Events]]

The panels have all ended, the video rooms are all shut down; you can still volunteer, but other than that, there's only one thing left to do... Volunteer: [[Sunday Evening Volunteering Opportunities]] Panel: [[Closing Ceremonies]]

And now at last is the final panel of this year’s AnimeIowa. You’re more than a little melancholy when you join other attendees in bidding the guests of honor good-bye, and listening to the Pit Master’s rants of how he will absolutely get Buu-chan next year (while Buu-chan and Millie the Hippo shake their heads at him). You join everyone in applauding the efforts of the staff and volunteers who helped make this year’s convention a success, hiccups and all. And when the Master of Ceremonies announces the dates for next year’s convention, your record them immediately on your phone; it’s only been over for a few minutes, but you already can’t wait for next year’s AnimeIowa. [[Credits]]

Written by Megan Daly Fake anime concepts by: CallMeDale and Socchan: - Crave - ohayo gozaimasu, it's early - Tech Wizard - Isekai Bus Tour CallMeDale: - Witch Hazel - Welcome to Underton ghostly hamburger and Socchan: - Wanbon-Chan Goes To School - Fantasy Hero Mech - Guardian Treasures Alex Conall: - Sunset Eyes Alex Conall and Socchan: - DCLXVI - Inherit the Flame - Bridge Over Dragon Run CheshireMadd: - The Life and Times of a Background Character eastofthemoon: - A Sprinkle of Love eastofthemoon and Socchan: - Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! Gullwhacker: - All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine? (AKA WorldsOther) - Bolt Turners in the Sky Gullwhacker and Socchan: - Swept Away Socchan: - Ghost Girlfriend - Nobunaga and the Warring States - Heartbeat Rhythm Magic - His Majesty's Guard - Where Is My Master? - City Heist - Alien Lifeswap - Rue 63rd - Hanako's School Days - Moth and Friends - My Experiences as a Universe Administrator's Intern chanter1944: - Clockwork Under City Lights Arcomage: - Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams norakwami and Socchan: - Super Idol Hero Thank you for playing! See you at AnimeIowa! Would you like to [[Play Again]]?

Zzzzz... Oh, what's that? Buu-chan is the hero they've been waiting for in WorldsOther? Makes perfect sense... zzzzz... [[Wait, it's WHAT time now?!]]

Holy smokes, it's almost //noon//? How did it get so late?! You've gotta get moving, there's only half a day left of the convention! [[Sunday Noon Events]]

There's some pretty big stuff about to start right now... Panel: [[Cosplay Masquerade]] Panel: [[The Great Debate]] Watch: [[Clockwork Under City Lights]] Watch: [[Bolt Turners In The Sky]] Volunteer: [[Saturday Evening Volunteering Opportunities]] Exhibit Hall: [[Saturday Evening at the Marketplace]] Photoshoot: [[The Life and Times of a Background Character Photoshoot]] Check the [[Saturday Evening Video Room Schedule]]

One of the most popular and hyped events of any anime convention, the AI Cosplay Masquerade is no exception! You watch in awe as walk-on performers strut their stuff, impressed by a full Fantasy Hero Mech mech suit, dazzled by the cosplayer who took Hitomi’s cursed appearance from Sunset Eyes and turned it up to eleven, and blown away by Garret Smelter and his animatronic Lefty puppet. Next is an intermission, where Buu-chan and Millie derail the Pit Master’s attempted takeover of the masquerade; the whole audience cheers when they boot him off the stage! Following the break are skits; you melt into a puddle at the Ghost Girlfriend performance that has two of Tsubomi’s ghost friends confessing to each other, and the sketch where Chiharu the vampire’s human friends planning a heist of extra rare beef has you in stitches. Everyone applauds uproariously when Buu-chan and Millie hand out the prizes at the end, and you stick around as long as you can afterwards to gush over the contestants. [[Saturday Night Events]]

Held opposite the Masquerade so people have something else to do if they can't get in or just don't care for the spectacle, this turns out to be something of an improv event. Contestants from the audience face off against one another to answer absurd audience-generated questions with even more ridiculous instructions, all to win the title of Master Debater. You laugh until your sides hurt at the one where they have to do weird dance moves while answering. [[Saturday Night Events]]

This looks like the episode where Takeshi's mech starts running out of fuel, so he and the other residents of Sylvania have to rush to find a fantasty replacement. [[Get some sleep]]

''Video Room One Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Wanbon-Chan Goes To School - A slice-of-life anime about a puppy starting kindergarten or preschool in an anthropomorphic world. One of the most popular characters is Tarou, a wheely dog; another is Naoko, a cat who's pretending to be a dog to go to puppy school. Friday Afternoon: [[Crave]] - Story of Chiharu, a vampire who was adopted by humans and has no idea she's not also human. A series of super weird coincidences has kept the discovery from happening until she's in junior high or high school, when she begins craving blood. She becomes aware of other supernatural creatures when she discovers her own nature. All of her friends team up to make sure she gets however much blood she needs on a regular basis (which, at least while she's still young, isn't too much yet). Friday Evening: Sunset Eyes - Hikari has been cursed with a devilish appearance (horns, wings, tail, red-gray skin) and skin that burns anyone who touches her; the curse can only be reversed when someone who loves her with all their heart looks into her eyes at sunset. After meeting Hikari, Nadeshiko vows to fall in love with her and break the curse. After all, the curse doesn't say anything about Hikari having to love the person back, and there are a lot worse things to Nadeshiko's way of thinking than people thinking she likes girls "like that"—and one of those is being cursed never to touch your real true love, right? Friday Night: ohayo gozaimasu, it’s early - A school comedy about a kid, Kei (written with the character for "firefly"), who is always too tired for morning classes, but struggles to be at school anyway. Stories range from typical school stories trying to involve a kid who's either half or entirely asleep most of the time (and yet somehow gets good grades!), to his classmates trying to figure out why he keeps missing so much sleep, and how they can help (every time they try to find out it's something different, and all of their efforts so far have failed; it's doubtful Kei has noticed them in the first place). Saturday Early Morning: The Life and Times of a Background Character - Yamada Kenichi is a young adult who has a million part-time jobs and is constantly witness to major scenes from everyone else's stories. From the meet-cutes at the coffee shop, to the superpower-granting mix-ups at the lab, and even that one time the villain had an epiphany and a change of heart, Kenichi has a constant, unwitting, and even unwilling hand in them. Saturday Morning: Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! - Rika ends up being reborn as the heroine of an otome game. The problem is that she never had much interest in the game's canon love interests, but really liked drawing fanart of Hitomi, one of the 'rival' characters... who's even more stunning in person! Saturday at Noon: All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine? - Nicknamed WorldsOther by the fandom, this is a high fantasy series inspired by a series of light novels. The heroine of the story is Bremby, a sorceress who's lived under the threat of the Demon King's hordes for years, but the local temples promise that one day the Chosen One will be summoned from another world to set things right. Well, the day is here, and there seem to be at least four 'chosen ones'—who all claim to be from other worlds, argue about the details, and seem to be more interested in dating than actually doing what they're supposed to and stopping the Demon King. Fine; if their absurd powers are going to waste, maybe Bremby can just save her country herself... Saturday Afternoon: Ghost Girlfriend - High school boy Yoshida Mamoru moves into a house in a new neighborhood; turns out it's haunted by the ghost of a teenage girl! Tsubomi has an absolutely enormous crush on him, but he is absolutely oblivious. The twist? Her ghost status is under Little Mermaid/Beauty and the Beast rules: If someone falls in love with her and truly loves her to the point where they confess their feelings and mean it, she'll get to restart her life as a human—but only if they confess first! Tsubomi is constantly fighting to keep her hopes from getting too far up, and also has resolved not to tell Mamoru any of the details in case he would feel pressured into trying to develop feelings for her. Meanwhile, absolutely everyone around is trying hardcore to matchmake them. Saturday Evening: Clockwork Under City Lights - An OVA adapted from a webcomic. The interconnected stories of a dozen tiny magically-powered, steampunk-ish self-aware constructs created in the shape of large insects, miniature forest animals, non-humanoid mythological creatures, and so forth, set loose in a big and bustling city somewhere on a world just to the left of our own; life can be beyond interesting as well as startlingly mundane when you're a metal and stained glass griffin the size of a teacup. Saturday Night: Fantasy Hero Mech - When war threatens, the denizens of the world of Sylvania have come together to summon the hero who was prophesied to come in their hour of greatest need; meanwhile, Takeshi is just a low-ranking grunt in the Unified Space Forces, working to repair a hyperspace transport gate. Right when he flips the switch to test it out, he and his repair mech are sucked through it into Sylvania, where the people on the other side of the gate assume he has arrived to save them. Sunday Early Morning: Guardian Treasures - When Earth is threatened by alien forces, Japan’s Three Treasures rise again in the form of giant mechs; three high school boys, Ryuu, Heiji, and Touya, are chosen by the mechs as pilots to defend Earth. With help from engineering and folklore student Asuka, they will work together to drive off the invaders and protect the world. But there’s a dark secret about the invaders that could threaten to tear apart the bonds they’ve formed, and endanger Earth in the process… Sunday Morning: Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams - It's the year 21XX, and being a Magical Girl is now a viable career option. Unfortunately, despite her own significant magical powers, Arika Izumi is much more interested in being an accountant or a programmer. Her relief when she learns that the experts at Mahou Gakuen, the most prestigious magical girl academy in the area, think she wouldn't be a good fit for the program is short-lived; when she arrives home after learning the results, she sees that her mother has not only already assumed she would pass, but told all of her own friends that Arika would be attending Mahou Gakuen. Luckily, Arika got accepted to a different high school that's not very far from Mahou Gakuen; with the help of her new friends in the Drama Club, and a little programming magic, Arika is set to fake the heck out of being a Mahou Gakuen student. Sunday at Noon: Nobunaga and the Warring States - A Hetalia-esque historical cartoon featuring Oda Nobunaga and other historical figures, and the personified States. Nobunaga has to constantly break up petty squabbles between the States. He is accompanied by his constant companion, fan favorite Piyo the nightingale, who is usually found perched on his shoulder or head. He is still waiting for her to sing. Sunday Afternoon: Tech Wizard - Garret Smelter has an absurdly good reputation for repairing spells and stuff; turns out he's been using mundane methods the entire time, but no one will believe him. Told from the POV of Hans, Garret's new apprentice, as Garret and his his "familiar" (a well-trained but mundane ferret named Lefty) go about the work of keeping the city of Archdale running on actual engineering. ''Video Room Two Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Heartbeat Rhythm Magic - Koharu is practicing with a hoop for rhythmic gymnastics club when suddenly, a strange monster made of stadium seating attacks the gym! Koharu is then found by a small, pink, hamster-like creature that tells her she is to be the leader of a team of magical girls who use the tools and skills of rhythmic gymnastics to defeat monsters and keep the evil Judge Malice from throwing off the rhythm of the world and using the power of hearts beating out of sync to take over the universe. Together with her teammates Natsuki, Akiko, and Fuyumi, Koharu will overthrow Judge Malice and restore the world's rhythm! Friday Afternoon: [[Bridge Over Dragon Run]] - A slice-of-life/drama with a fantasy twist. Seventh grader Sachie is having a rough time in middle school; none of her friends from grade school are going to the same school she is, and a number of the girls she does go to school with have chosen her as a target for bullying. She's retrieving her school bag from where some of the girls have thrown it into a creek when she comes across a large egg. The egg hatches when Sachie touches it, and a small dragon topples out, instantly bonding with her. Knowing instinctively that the tiny creature is now her responsibility, Sachie takes it home and attempts to hide it from her mother and younger brother, with decidedly mixed results. Friday Evening: DCLXVI - Margaret the witch has found a mysterious egg and a piece of ancient parchment with instructions for a ritual to hatch it, but no other information. Incredibly curious, Margaret decides to perform the ritual and see what’s inside. Just then, the angel Tenshi and the demon Koakuma show up to try and stop her; according to them, the egg actually contains a beast that will devour the world! Unfortunately, they're too late; the ritual has completed, and the egg hatches into a tiny golden dragon-like creature with a crimson mane. Knowing that they'll be punished if they go back with this bad news, Tenshi and Koakuma decide to team up with Margaret and raise it; maybe if they do everything right, it won't want to devour the world after all! It worked in that one British book/radio play/TV miniseries, after all... Lots of yuri subtext/moments. Friday Night: His Majesty's Guard - A harem anime. Ordinary Japanese high school student Genta learns that he's actually the heir to a vaguely European-ish country. Since the previous ruler was assassinated, Genta has been assigned a full team of highly trained guards, each specializing in a different weapon and/or fighting style, and each head-over-heels for Genta. His Majesty's Guard has gained a fair amount of attention for one of Genta's guards being a male character (Thomas), even if they are not expected to be the endgame ship. Saturday Early Morning: A Sprinkle of Love - A romantic comedy about a young engineering woman named Yuki who enters a baking competition with no grand prize besides the title of Best Baker. She meets the other competitors and gets along except for that one grumpy young man named Ken. Due to a misunderstanding, they get off on the wrong foot, but during the course of the competition they get to know each other better. It's not long before these feelings turn to love, but at the end of the competition nears and they are the only two left standing, can their love survive the heat? Saturday Morning: Where Is My Master? - A very fanservicey title about a dog named Pochiko who saves the life of a witch and is turned into a busty young woman as a reward. Pochiko is delighted, but her human master, Akihiko, is a lot more conflicted—especially because Pochiko still acts so much like a dog! Despite Akihiko trying his best to set her up with her own life as a human, Pochiko is determined to stay by Akihiko's side through thick and thin. Saturday at Noon: Alien Lifeswap - One day out of the blue, a space alien abducts ordinary teenage boy Noboru and takes his place in order to study humans and help make a decision about whether they should be introduced to the wider galactic alliance. The show follows both the alien in its attempts to pass as Noboru, and Noboru in a special not-quite-classroom with aliens from at least four other species who are undergoing basically the same trial, plus a teacher from the species that is taking the his place. Shenanigans ensue. Saturday Afternoon: City Heist - A recently released movie. The gem powering the technology of the village where Adorina lives has broken; the townsfolk can keep the town running for a time with human power alone, but this cannot be maintained for more than a few months. The only place to get replacement gems is the Eternal City, but the city's ruler guards them fiercely and charges outrageous amounts for replacements. Knowing her town can never afford the cost of a new gem, Adorina recruits retired master thief Antono, fighting and arms expert Rubena, and recently fired city guards Luksa and Johano to help her steal not only the gem she needs to help her village live on, but the technology to create new gems—just as Eternal City's ruler once stole it from Adorina's grandmother. Saturday Evening: Bolt Turners In The Sky - A century and a half ago, the world fell to a disaster known only as the Hungry Earth. No longer able to survive on the planet's surface, humanity fled to the skies. There, people live out their lives on city-fleets of assorted air vehicles - dirigibles, single-engine planes, helicarriers, and more. The series focuses on the Bolt Turners: a group of technicians who travel from vessel to vessel, fixing mechanical issues to keep the fleet flying. With art reminiscent of Studio Ghibli and a full cast of interesting, well-developed characters, the anime has fans hooked across the globe. Saturday Night: Inherit the Flame - A critically acclaimed movie, heavy with symbolism and artistically stunning. Legend says that anyone who sleeps at the foot of the mountain Cadair Idris will end up dead, mad, or a poet. Would-be poet Matthew goes to test this one night and ends up taken into another world, where his heart is removed and put in a cauldron of flame. Matthew instantly find that his skills as a poet have increased a hundred fold, and he joins a party of dozens of other artists who have come to challenge their skills over the years. As the night wears on, however, he meets Isabel, a fiddle player who misses her home, and he realizes that he, too, wants to go back to where he came from. Together, the two of them put their skills to the ultimate test to call their hearts back from the cauldron and return home. Sunday Early Morning: Rue 63rd - The story starts when Rokuro (whose name means "sixth son") and Sango (whose name means "third child") meet and commisserate that the other has the life that they want for themselves. Deciding to swap places, the "boy" (now going by Kuroko) and "girl" (now called Hanzo) slowly discover that part of the reason their new lives feel so right is because they are, in fact, transgender. The two of them need to navigate not only their new school lives as a gender they'd never thought they'd be yet are coming to realize is right, but also their home lives and interactions with each other, as they come to terms with their gender identities and what they want for the future. Sunday Morning: Swept Away - After nine-year-old Katsuo's puppy is saved from a frozen-over pond by a practicing curling team, he and his friends Hiraku and Minato become obsessed with the sport. When they reach high school, a teacher from Canada arrives, and they finally have an advisor for their curling club (with Katsuo's now grown dog to be the mascot). Unfortunately, they're one club member short. Katsuo sets his sights on Hajime, the younger brother of the boy who saved Katsuo's puppy. The problem? Hajime is completely uninterested in curling! Sunday at Noon: Hanako's School Days - A school drama about a fat girl named Hanako and her experiences in junior high and high school. A very sympathetic look at a fat girl character, who has been given a cute character design, and how she deals with the bullying and microaggressions she faces in everyday life. Sunday Afternoon: Isekai Bus Tour - Aiko is walking home from school one day when a bus comes barreling down the street right at her! Convinced that these are her last minutes alive, Aiko is astonished when, in a huge burst of light, the tour bus vanishes. Meanwhile, Youta and Miyu have been working together for years to get their new Akihabara tour bus up and running, and have just started their first tour! A combination of a horribly annoying passenger and a newspaper getting caught on the windshield has Youta losing control of the bus; right when he's about to hit a teenage girl, the entire bus is transported to another world—one that a passenger recognizes! The main storyline follows Youta and Miyu, with their mysterious new skills of Bus Driver and Tour Guide, as they hop from world to world with a full passenger list, hoping each new portal Miyu directs them to will be the one to bring them all back home. The post-episode clips, meanwhile, follow Aiko as she investigates the mysterious "hit-and-run" bus, leading to wilder and wilder conspiracy theories as she goes. [[Friday Afternoon Events]]

''Video Room One Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Wanbon-Chan Goes To School - A slice-of-life anime about a puppy starting kindergarten or preschool in an anthropomorphic world. One of the most popular characters is Tarou, a wheely dog; another is Naoko, a cat who's pretending to be a dog to go to puppy school. Friday Afternoon: Crave - Story of Chiharu, a vampire who was adopted by humans and has no idea she's not also human. A series of super weird coincidences has kept the discovery from happening until she's in junior high or high school, when she begins craving blood. She becomes aware of other supernatural creatures when she discovers her own nature. All of her friends team up to make sure she gets however much blood she needs on a regular basis (which, at least while she's still young, isn't too much yet). Friday Evening: [[Sunset Eyes]] - Hikari has been cursed with a devilish appearance (horns, wings, tail, red-gray skin) and skin that burns anyone who touches her; the curse can only be reversed when someone who loves her with all their heart looks into her eyes at sunset. After meeting Hikari, Nadeshiko vows to fall in love with her and break the curse. After all, the curse doesn't say anything about Hikari having to love the person back, and there are a lot worse things to Nadeshiko's way of thinking than people thinking she likes girls "like that"—and one of those is being cursed never to touch your real true love, right? Friday Night: ohayo gozaimasu, it’s early - A school comedy about a kid, Kei (written with the character for "firefly"), who is always too tired for morning classes, but struggles to be at school anyway. Stories range from typical school stories trying to involve a kid who's either half or entirely asleep most of the time (and yet somehow gets good grades!), to his classmates trying to figure out why he keeps missing so much sleep, and how they can help (every time they try to find out it's something different, and all of their efforts so far have failed; it's doubtful Kei has noticed them in the first place). Saturday Early Morning: The Life and Times of a Background Character - Yamada Kenichi is a young adult who has a million part-time jobs and is constantly witness to major scenes from everyone else's stories. From the meet-cutes at the coffee shop, to the superpower-granting mix-ups at the lab, and even that one time the villain had an epiphany and a change of heart, Kenichi has a constant, unwitting, and even unwilling hand in them. Saturday Morning: Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! - Rika ends up being reborn as the heroine of an otome game. The problem is that she never had much interest in the game's canon love interests, but really liked drawing fanart of Hitomi, one of the 'rival' characters... who's even more stunning in person! Saturday at Noon: All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine? - Nicknamed WorldsOther by the fandom, this is a high fantasy series inspired by a series of light novels. The heroine of the story is Bremby, a sorceress who's lived under the threat of the Demon King's hordes for years, but the local temples promise that one day the Chosen One will be summoned from another world to set things right. Well, the day is here, and there seem to be at least four 'chosen ones'—who all claim to be from other worlds, argue about the details, and seem to be more interested in dating than actually doing what they're supposed to and stopping the Demon King. Fine; if their absurd powers are going to waste, maybe Bremby can just save her country herself... Saturday Afternoon: Ghost Girlfriend - High school boy Yoshida Mamoru moves into a house in a new neighborhood; turns out it's haunted by the ghost of a teenage girl! Tsubomi has an absolutely enormous crush on him, but he is absolutely oblivious. The twist? Her ghost status is under Little Mermaid/Beauty and the Beast rules: If someone falls in love with her and truly loves her to the point where they confess their feelings and mean it, she'll get to restart her life as a human—but only if they confess first! Tsubomi is constantly fighting to keep her hopes from getting too far up, and also has resolved not to tell Mamoru any of the details in case he would feel pressured into trying to develop feelings for her. Meanwhile, absolutely everyone around is trying hardcore to matchmake them. Saturday Evening: Clockwork Under City Lights - An OVA adapted from a webcomic. The interconnected stories of a dozen tiny magically-powered, steampunk-ish self-aware constructs created in the shape of large insects, miniature forest animals, non-humanoid mythological creatures, and so forth, set loose in a big and bustling city somewhere on a world just to the left of our own; life can be beyond interesting as well as startlingly mundane when you're a metal and stained glass griffin the size of a teacup. Saturday Night: Fantasy Hero Mech - When war threatens, the denizens of the world of Sylvania have come together to summon the hero who was prophesied to come in their hour of greatest need; meanwhile, Takeshi is just a low-ranking grunt in the Unified Space Forces, working to repair a hyperspace transport gate. Right when he flips the switch to test it out, he and his repair mech are sucked through it into Sylvania, where the people on the other side of the gate assume he has arrived to save them. Sunday Early Morning: Guardian Treasures - When Earth is threatened by alien forces, Japan’s Three Treasures rise again in the form of giant mechs; three high school boys, Ryuu, Heiji, and Touya, are chosen by the mechs as pilots to defend Earth. With help from engineering and folklore student Asuka, they will work together to drive off the invaders and protect the world. But there’s a dark secret about the invaders that could threaten to tear apart the bonds they’ve formed, and endanger Earth in the process… Sunday Morning: Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams - It's the year 21XX, and being a Magical Girl is now a viable career option. Unfortunately, despite her own significant magical powers, Arika Izumi is much more interested in being an accountant or a programmer. Her relief when she learns that the experts at Mahou Gakuen, the most prestigious magical girl academy in the area, think she wouldn't be a good fit for the program is short-lived; when she arrives home after learning the results, she sees that her mother has not only already assumed she would pass, but told all of her own friends that Arika would be attending Mahou Gakuen. Luckily, Arika got accepted to a different high school that's not very far from Mahou Gakuen; with the help of her new friends in the Drama Club, and a little programming magic, Arika is set to fake the heck out of being a Mahou Gakuen student. Sunday at Noon: Nobunaga and the Warring States - A Hetalia-esque historical cartoon featuring Oda Nobunaga and other historical figures, and the personified States. Nobunaga has to constantly break up petty squabbles between the States. He is accompanied by his constant companion, fan favorite Piyo the nightingale, who is usually found perched on his shoulder or head. He is still waiting for her to sing. Sunday Afternoon: Tech Wizard - Garret Smelter has an absurdly good reputation for repairing spells and stuff; turns out he's been using mundane methods the entire time, but no one will believe him. Told from the POV of Hans, Garret's new apprentice, as Garret and his his "familiar" (a well-trained but mundane ferret named Lefty) go about the work of keeping the city of Archdale running on actual engineering. ''Video Room Two Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Heartbeat Rhythm Magic - Koharu is practicing with a hoop for rhythmic gymnastics club when suddenly, a strange monster made of stadium seating attacks the gym! Koharu is then found by a small, pink, hamster-like creature that tells her she is to be the leader of a team of magical girls who use the tools and skills of rhythmic gymnastics to defeat monsters and keep the evil Judge Malice from throwing off the rhythm of the world and using the power of hearts beating out of sync to take over the universe. Together with her teammates Natsuki, Akiko, and Fuyumi, Koharu will overthrow Judge Malice and restore the world's rhythm! Friday Afternoon: Bridge Over Dragon Run - A slice-of-life/drama with a fantasy twist. Seventh grader Sachie is having a rough time in middle school; none of her friends from grade school are going to the same school she is, and a number of the girls she does go to school with have chosen her as a target for bullying. She's retrieving her school bag from where some of the girls have thrown it into a creek when she comes across a large egg. The egg hatches when Sachie touches it, and a small dragon topples out, instantly bonding with her. Knowing instinctively that the tiny creature is now her responsibility, Sachie takes it home and attempts to hide it from her mother and younger brother, with decidedly mixed results. Friday Evening: [[DCLXVI]] - Margaret the witch has found a mysterious egg and a piece of ancient parchment with instructions for a ritual to hatch it, but no other information. Incredibly curious, Margaret decides to perform the ritual and see what’s inside. Just then, the angel Tenshi and the demon Koakuma show up to try and stop her; according to them, the egg actually contains a beast that will devour the world! Unfortunately, they're too late; the ritual has completed, and the egg hatches into a tiny golden dragon-like creature with a crimson mane. Knowing that they'll be punished if they go back with this bad news, Tenshi and Koakuma decide to team up with Margaret and raise it; maybe if they do everything right, it won't want to devour the world after all! It worked in that one British book/radio play/TV miniseries, after all... Lots of yuri subtext/moments. Friday Night: His Majesty's Guard - A harem anime. Ordinary Japanese high school student Genta learns that he's actually the heir to a vaguely European-ish country. Since the previous ruler was assassinated, Genta has been assigned a full team of highly trained guards, each specializing in a different weapon and/or fighting style, and each head-over-heels for Genta. His Majesty's Guard has gained a fair amount of attention for one of Genta's guards being a male character (Thomas), even if they are not expected to be the endgame ship. Saturday Early Morning: A Sprinkle of Love - A romantic comedy about a young engineering woman named Yuki who enters a baking competition with no grand prize besides the title of Best Baker. She meets the other competitors and gets along except for that one grumpy young man named Ken. Due to a misunderstanding, they get off on the wrong foot, but during the course of the competition they get to know each other better. It's not long before these feelings turn to love, but at the end of the competition nears and they are the only two left standing, can their love survive the heat? Saturday Morning: Where Is My Master? - A very fanservicey title about a dog named Pochiko who saves the life of a witch and is turned into a busty young woman as a reward. Pochiko is delighted, but her human master, Akihiko, is a lot more conflicted—especially because Pochiko still acts so much like a dog! Despite Akihiko trying his best to set her up with her own life as a human, Pochiko is determined to stay by Akihiko's side through thick and thin. Saturday at Noon: Alien Lifeswap - One day out of the blue, a space alien abducts ordinary teenage boy Noboru and takes his place in order to study humans and help make a decision about whether they should be introduced to the wider galactic alliance. The show follows both the alien in its attempts to pass as Noboru, and Noboru in a special not-quite-classroom with aliens from at least four other species who are undergoing basically the same trial, plus a teacher from the species that is taking the his place. Shenanigans ensue. Saturday Afternoon: City Heist - A recently released movie. The gem powering the technology of the village where Adorina lives has broken; the townsfolk can keep the town running for a time with human power alone, but this cannot be maintained for more than a few months. The only place to get replacement gems is the Eternal City, but the city's ruler guards them fiercely and charges outrageous amounts for replacements. Knowing her town can never afford the cost of a new gem, Adorina recruits retired master thief Antono, fighting and arms expert Rubena, and recently fired city guards Luksa and Johano to help her steal not only the gem she needs to help her village live on, but the technology to create new gems—just as Eternal City's ruler once stole it from Adorina's grandmother. Saturday Evening: Bolt Turners In The Sky - A century and a half ago, the world fell to a disaster known only as the Hungry Earth. No longer able to survive on the planet's surface, humanity fled to the skies. There, people live out their lives on city-fleets of assorted air vehicles - dirigibles, single-engine planes, helicarriers, and more. The series focuses on the Bolt Turners: a group of technicians who travel from vessel to vessel, fixing mechanical issues to keep the fleet flying. With art reminiscent of Studio Ghibli and a full cast of interesting, well-developed characters, the anime has fans hooked across the globe. Saturday Night: Inherit the Flame - A critically acclaimed movie, heavy with symbolism and artistically stunning. Legend says that anyone who sleeps at the foot of the mountain Cadair Idris will end up dead, mad, or a poet. Would-be poet Matthew goes to test this one night and ends up taken into another world, where his heart is removed and put in a cauldron of flame. Matthew instantly find that his skills as a poet have increased a hundred fold, and he joins a party of dozens of other artists who have come to challenge their skills over the years. As the night wears on, however, he meets Isabel, a fiddle player who misses her home, and he realizes that he, too, wants to go back to where he came from. Together, the two of them put their skills to the ultimate test to call their hearts back from the cauldron and return home. Sunday Early Morning: Rue 63rd - The story starts when Rokuro (whose name means "sixth son") and Sango (whose name means "third child") meet and commisserate that the other has the life that they want for themselves. Deciding to swap places, the "boy" (now going by Kuroko) and "girl" (now called Hanzo) slowly discover that part of the reason their new lives feel so right is because they are, in fact, transgender. The two of them need to navigate not only their new school lives as a gender they'd never thought they'd be yet are coming to realize is right, but also their home lives and interactions with each other, as they come to terms with their gender identities and what they want for the future. Sunday Morning: Swept Away - After nine-year-old Katsuo's puppy is saved from a frozen-over pond by a practicing curling team, he and his friends Hiraku and Minato become obsessed with the sport. When they reach high school, a teacher from Canada arrives, and they finally have an advisor for their curling club (with Katsuo's now grown dog to be the mascot). Unfortunately, they're one club member short. Katsuo sets his sights on Hajime, the younger brother of the boy who saved Katsuo's puppy. The problem? Hajime is completely uninterested in curling! Sunday at Noon: Hanako's School Days - A school drama about a fat girl named Hanako and her experiences in junior high and high school. A very sympathetic look at a fat girl character, who has been given a cute character design, and how she deals with the bullying and microaggressions she faces in everyday life. Sunday Afternoon: Isekai Bus Tour - Aiko is walking home from school one day when a bus comes barreling down the street right at her! Convinced that these are her last minutes alive, Aiko is astonished when, in a huge burst of light, the tour bus vanishes. Meanwhile, Youta and Miyu have been working together for years to get their new Akihabara tour bus up and running, and have just started their first tour! A combination of a horribly annoying passenger and a newspaper getting caught on the windshield has Youta losing control of the bus; right when he's about to hit a teenage girl, the entire bus is transported to another world—one that a passenger recognizes! The main storyline follows Youta and Miyu, with their mysterious new skills of Bus Driver and Tour Guide, as they hop from world to world with a full passenger list, hoping each new portal Miyu directs them to will be the one to bring them all back home. The post-episode clips, meanwhile, follow Aiko as she investigates the mysterious "hit-and-run" bus, leading to wilder and wilder conspiracy theories as she goes. [[Friday Evening Events]]

''Video Room One Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Wanbon-Chan Goes To School - A slice-of-life anime about a puppy starting kindergarten or preschool in an anthropomorphic world. One of the most popular characters is Tarou, a wheely dog; another is Naoko, a cat who's pretending to be a dog to go to puppy school. Friday Afternoon: Crave - Story of Chiharu, a vampire who was adopted by humans and has no idea she's not also human. A series of super weird coincidences has kept the discovery from happening until she's in junior high or high school, when she begins craving blood. She becomes aware of other supernatural creatures when she discovers her own nature. All of her friends team up to make sure she gets however much blood she needs on a regular basis (which, at least while she's still young, isn't too much yet). Friday Evening: Sunset Eyes - Hikari has been cursed with a devilish appearance (horns, wings, tail, red-gray skin) and skin that burns anyone who touches her; the curse can only be reversed when someone who loves her with all their heart looks into her eyes at sunset. After meeting Hikari, Nadeshiko vows to fall in love with her and break the curse. After all, the curse doesn't say anything about Hikari having to love the person back, and there are a lot worse things to Nadeshiko's way of thinking than people thinking she likes girls "like that"—and one of those is being cursed never to touch your real true love, right? Friday Night: [[ohayo gozaimasu, it's early]] - A school comedy about a kid, Kei (written with the character for "firefly"), who is always too tired for morning classes, but struggles to be at school anyway. Stories range from typical school stories trying to involve a kid who's either half or entirely asleep most of the time (and yet somehow gets good grades!), to his classmates trying to figure out why he keeps missing so much sleep, and how they can help (every time they try to find out it's something different, and all of their efforts so far have failed; it's doubtful Kei has noticed them in the first place). Saturday Early Morning: The Life and Times of a Background Character - Yamada Kenichi is a young adult who has a million part-time jobs and is constantly witness to major scenes from everyone else's stories. From the meet-cutes at the coffee shop, to the superpower-granting mix-ups at the lab, and even that one time the villain had an epiphany and a change of heart, Kenichi has a constant, unwitting, and even unwilling hand in them. Saturday Morning: Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! - Rika ends up being reborn as the heroine of an otome game. The problem is that she never had much interest in the game's canon love interests, but really liked drawing fanart of Hitomi, one of the 'rival' characters... who's even more stunning in person! Saturday at Noon: All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine? - Nicknamed WorldsOther by the fandom, this is a high fantasy series inspired by a series of light novels. The heroine of the story is Bremby, a sorceress who's lived under the threat of the Demon King's hordes for years, but the local temples promise that one day the Chosen One will be summoned from another world to set things right. Well, the day is here, and there seem to be at least four 'chosen ones'—who all claim to be from other worlds, argue about the details, and seem to be more interested in dating than actually doing what they're supposed to and stopping the Demon King. Fine; if their absurd powers are going to waste, maybe Bremby can just save her country herself... Saturday Afternoon: Ghost Girlfriend - High school boy Yoshida Mamoru moves into a house in a new neighborhood; turns out it's haunted by the ghost of a teenage girl! Tsubomi has an absolutely enormous crush on him, but he is absolutely oblivious. The twist? Her ghost status is under Little Mermaid/Beauty and the Beast rules: If someone falls in love with her and truly loves her to the point where they confess their feelings and mean it, she'll get to restart her life as a human—but only if they confess first! Tsubomi is constantly fighting to keep her hopes from getting too far up, and also has resolved not to tell Mamoru any of the details in case he would feel pressured into trying to develop feelings for her. Meanwhile, absolutely everyone around is trying hardcore to matchmake them. Saturday Evening: Clockwork Under City Lights - An OVA adapted from a webcomic. The interconnected stories of a dozen tiny magically-powered, steampunk-ish self-aware constructs created in the shape of large insects, miniature forest animals, non-humanoid mythological creatures, and so forth, set loose in a big and bustling city somewhere on a world just to the left of our own; life can be beyond interesting as well as startlingly mundane when you're a metal and stained glass griffin the size of a teacup. Saturday Night: Fantasy Hero Mech - When war threatens, the denizens of the world of Sylvania have come together to summon the hero who was prophesied to come in their hour of greatest need; meanwhile, Takeshi is just a low-ranking grunt in the Unified Space Forces, working to repair a hyperspace transport gate. Right when he flips the switch to test it out, he and his repair mech are sucked through it into Sylvania, where the people on the other side of the gate assume he has arrived to save them. Sunday Early Morning: Guardian Treasures - When Earth is threatened by alien forces, Japan’s Three Treasures rise again in the form of giant mechs; three high school boys, Ryuu, Heiji, and Touya, are chosen by the mechs as pilots to defend Earth. With help from engineering and folklore student Asuka, they will work together to drive off the invaders and protect the world. But there’s a dark secret about the invaders that could threaten to tear apart the bonds they’ve formed, and endanger Earth in the process… Sunday Morning: Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams - It's the year 21XX, and being a Magical Girl is now a viable career option. Unfortunately, despite her own significant magical powers, Arika Izumi is much more interested in being an accountant or a programmer. Her relief when she learns that the experts at Mahou Gakuen, the most prestigious magical girl academy in the area, think she wouldn't be a good fit for the program is short-lived; when she arrives home after learning the results, she sees that her mother has not only already assumed she would pass, but told all of her own friends that Arika would be attending Mahou Gakuen. Luckily, Arika got accepted to a different high school that's not very far from Mahou Gakuen; with the help of her new friends in the Drama Club, and a little programming magic, Arika is set to fake the heck out of being a Mahou Gakuen student. Sunday at Noon: Nobunaga and the Warring States - A Hetalia-esque historical cartoon featuring Oda Nobunaga and other historical figures, and the personified States. Nobunaga has to constantly break up petty squabbles between the States. He is accompanied by his constant companion, fan favorite Piyo the nightingale, who is usually found perched on his shoulder or head. He is still waiting for her to sing. Sunday Afternoon: Tech Wizard - Garret Smelter has an absurdly good reputation for repairing spells and stuff; turns out he's been using mundane methods the entire time, but no one will believe him. Told from the POV of Hans, Garret's new apprentice, as Garret and his his "familiar" (a well-trained but mundane ferret named Lefty) go about the work of keeping the city of Archdale running on actual engineering. ''Video Room Two Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Heartbeat Rhythm Magic - Koharu is practicing with a hoop for rhythmic gymnastics club when suddenly, a strange monster made of stadium seating attacks the gym! Koharu is then found by a small, pink, hamster-like creature that tells her she is to be the leader of a team of magical girls who use the tools and skills of rhythmic gymnastics to defeat monsters and keep the evil Judge Malice from throwing off the rhythm of the world and using the power of hearts beating out of sync to take over the universe. Together with her teammates Natsuki, Akiko, and Fuyumi, Koharu will overthrow Judge Malice and restore the world's rhythm! Friday Afternoon: Bridge Over Dragon Run - A slice-of-life/drama with a fantasy twist. Seventh grader Sachie is having a rough time in middle school; none of her friends from grade school are going to the same school she is, and a number of the girls she does go to school with have chosen her as a target for bullying. She's retrieving her school bag from where some of the girls have thrown it into a creek when she comes across a large egg. The egg hatches when Sachie touches it, and a small dragon topples out, instantly bonding with her. Knowing instinctively that the tiny creature is now her responsibility, Sachie takes it home and attempts to hide it from her mother and younger brother, with decidedly mixed results. Friday Evening: DCLXVI - Margaret the witch has found a mysterious egg and a piece of ancient parchment with instructions for a ritual to hatch it, but no other information. Incredibly curious, Margaret decides to perform the ritual and see what’s inside. Just then, the angel Tenshi and the demon Koakuma show up to try and stop her; according to them, the egg actually contains a beast that will devour the world! Unfortunately, they're too late; the ritual has completed, and the egg hatches into a tiny golden dragon-like creature with a crimson mane. Knowing that they'll be punished if they go back with this bad news, Tenshi and Koakuma decide to team up with Margaret and raise it; maybe if they do everything right, it won't want to devour the world after all! It worked in that one British book/radio play/TV miniseries, after all... Lots of yuri subtext/moments. Friday Night: [[His Majesty's Guard]] - A harem anime. Ordinary Japanese high school student Genta learns that he's actually the heir to a vaguely European-ish country. Since the previous ruler was assassinated, Genta has been assigned a full team of highly trained guards, each specializing in a different weapon and/or fighting style, and each head-over-heels for Genta. His Majesty's Guard has gained a fair amount of attention for one of Genta's guards being a male character (Thomas), even if they are not expected to be the endgame ship. Saturday Early Morning: A Sprinkle of Love - A romantic comedy about a young engineering woman named Yuki who enters a baking competition with no grand prize besides the title of Best Baker. She meets the other competitors and gets along except for that one grumpy young man named Ken. Due to a misunderstanding, they get off on the wrong foot, but during the course of the competition they get to know each other better. It's not long before these feelings turn to love, but at the end of the competition nears and they are the only two left standing, can their love survive the heat? Saturday Morning: Where Is My Master? - A very fanservicey title about a dog named Pochiko who saves the life of a witch and is turned into a busty young woman as a reward. Pochiko is delighted, but her human master, Akihiko, is a lot more conflicted—especially because Pochiko still acts so much like a dog! Despite Akihiko trying his best to set her up with her own life as a human, Pochiko is determined to stay by Akihiko's side through thick and thin. Saturday at Noon: Alien Lifeswap - One day out of the blue, a space alien abducts ordinary teenage boy Noboru and takes his place in order to study humans and help make a decision about whether they should be introduced to the wider galactic alliance. The show follows both the alien in its attempts to pass as Noboru, and Noboru in a special not-quite-classroom with aliens from at least four other species who are undergoing basically the same trial, plus a teacher from the species that is taking the his place. Shenanigans ensue. Saturday Afternoon: City Heist - A recently released movie. The gem powering the technology of the village where Adorina lives has broken; the townsfolk can keep the town running for a time with human power alone, but this cannot be maintained for more than a few months. The only place to get replacement gems is the Eternal City, but the city's ruler guards them fiercely and charges outrageous amounts for replacements. Knowing her town can never afford the cost of a new gem, Adorina recruits retired master thief Antono, fighting and arms expert Rubena, and recently fired city guards Luksa and Johano to help her steal not only the gem she needs to help her village live on, but the technology to create new gems—just as Eternal City's ruler once stole it from Adorina's grandmother. Saturday Evening: Bolt Turners In The Sky - A century and a half ago, the world fell to a disaster known only as the Hungry Earth. No longer able to survive on the planet's surface, humanity fled to the skies. There, people live out their lives on city-fleets of assorted air vehicles - dirigibles, single-engine planes, helicarriers, and more. The series focuses on the Bolt Turners: a group of technicians who travel from vessel to vessel, fixing mechanical issues to keep the fleet flying. With art reminiscent of Studio Ghibli and a full cast of interesting, well-developed characters, the anime has fans hooked across the globe. Saturday Night: Inherit the Flame - A critically acclaimed movie, heavy with symbolism and artistically stunning. Legend says that anyone who sleeps at the foot of the mountain Cadair Idris will end up dead, mad, or a poet. Would-be poet Matthew goes to test this one night and ends up taken into another world, where his heart is removed and put in a cauldron of flame. Matthew instantly find that his skills as a poet have increased a hundred fold, and he joins a party of dozens of other artists who have come to challenge their skills over the years. As the night wears on, however, he meets Isabel, a fiddle player who misses her home, and he realizes that he, too, wants to go back to where he came from. Together, the two of them put their skills to the ultimate test to call their hearts back from the cauldron and return home. Sunday Early Morning: Rue 63rd - The story starts when Rokuro (whose name means "sixth son") and Sango (whose name means "third child") meet and commisserate that the other has the life that they want for themselves. Deciding to swap places, the "boy" (now going by Kuroko) and "girl" (now called Hanzo) slowly discover that part of the reason their new lives feel so right is because they are, in fact, transgender. The two of them need to navigate not only their new school lives as a gender they'd never thought they'd be yet are coming to realize is right, but also their home lives and interactions with each other, as they come to terms with their gender identities and what they want for the future. Sunday Morning: Swept Away - After nine-year-old Katsuo's puppy is saved from a frozen-over pond by a practicing curling team, he and his friends Hiraku and Minato become obsessed with the sport. When they reach high school, a teacher from Canada arrives, and they finally have an advisor for their curling club (with Katsuo's now grown dog to be the mascot). Unfortunately, they're one club member short. Katsuo sets his sights on Hajime, the younger brother of the boy who saved Katsuo's puppy. The problem? Hajime is completely uninterested in curling! Sunday at Noon: Hanako's School Days - A school drama about a fat girl named Hanako and her experiences in junior high and high school. A very sympathetic look at a fat girl character, who has been given a cute character design, and how she deals with the bullying and microaggressions she faces in everyday life. Sunday Afternoon: Isekai Bus Tour - Aiko is walking home from school one day when a bus comes barreling down the street right at her! Convinced that these are her last minutes alive, Aiko is astonished when, in a huge burst of light, the tour bus vanishes. Meanwhile, Youta and Miyu have been working together for years to get their new Akihabara tour bus up and running, and have just started their first tour! A combination of a horribly annoying passenger and a newspaper getting caught on the windshield has Youta losing control of the bus; right when he's about to hit a teenage girl, the entire bus is transported to another world—one that a passenger recognizes! The main storyline follows Youta and Miyu, with their mysterious new skills of Bus Driver and Tour Guide, as they hop from world to world with a full passenger list, hoping each new portal Miyu directs them to will be the one to bring them all back home. The post-episode clips, meanwhile, follow Aiko as she investigates the mysterious "hit-and-run" bus, leading to wilder and wilder conspiracy theories as she goes. [[Friday Night Events]]

''Video Room One Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Wanbon-Chan Goes To School - A slice-of-life anime about a puppy starting kindergarten or preschool in an anthropomorphic world. One of the most popular characters is Tarou, a wheely dog; another is Naoko, a cat who's pretending to be a dog to go to puppy school. Friday Afternoon: Crave - Story of Chiharu, a vampire who was adopted by humans and has no idea she's not also human. A series of super weird coincidences has kept the discovery from happening until she's in junior high or high school, when she begins craving blood. She becomes aware of other supernatural creatures when she discovers her own nature. All of her friends team up to make sure she gets however much blood she needs on a regular basis (which, at least while she's still young, isn't too much yet). Friday Evening: Sunset Eyes - Hikari has been cursed with a devilish appearance (horns, wings, tail, red-gray skin) and skin that burns anyone who touches her; the curse can only be reversed when someone who loves her with all their heart looks into her eyes at sunset. After meeting Hikari, Nadeshiko vows to fall in love with her and break the curse. After all, the curse doesn't say anything about Hikari having to love the person back, and there are a lot worse things to Nadeshiko's way of thinking than people thinking she likes girls "like that"—and one of those is being cursed never to touch your real true love, right? Friday Night: ohayo gozaimasu, it’s early - A school comedy about a kid, Kei (written with the character for "firefly"), who is always too tired for morning classes, but struggles to be at school anyway. Stories range from typical school stories trying to involve a kid who's either half or entirely asleep most of the time (and yet somehow gets good grades!), to his classmates trying to figure out why he keeps missing so much sleep, and how they can help (every time they try to find out it's something different, and all of their efforts so far have failed; it's doubtful Kei has noticed them in the first place). Saturday Early Morning: [[The Life and Times of a Background Character]] - Yamada Kenichi is a young adult who has a million part-time jobs and is constantly witness to major scenes from everyone else's stories. From the meet-cutes at the coffee shop, to the superpower-granting mix-ups at the lab, and even that one time the villain had an epiphany and a change of heart, Kenichi has a constant, unwitting, and even unwilling hand in them. Saturday Morning: Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! - Rika ends up being reborn as the heroine of an otome game. The problem is that she never had much interest in the game's canon love interests, but really liked drawing fanart of Hitomi, one of the 'rival' characters... who's even more stunning in person! Saturday at Noon: All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine? - Nicknamed WorldsOther by the fandom, this is a high fantasy series inspired by a series of light novels. The heroine of the story is Bremby, a sorceress who's lived under the threat of the Demon King's hordes for years, but the local temples promise that one day the Chosen One will be summoned from another world to set things right. Well, the day is here, and there seem to be at least four 'chosen ones'—who all claim to be from other worlds, argue about the details, and seem to be more interested in dating than actually doing what they're supposed to and stopping the Demon King. Fine; if their absurd powers are going to waste, maybe Bremby can just save her country herself... Saturday Afternoon: Ghost Girlfriend - High school boy Yoshida Mamoru moves into a house in a new neighborhood; turns out it's haunted by the ghost of a teenage girl! Tsubomi has an absolutely enormous crush on him, but he is absolutely oblivious. The twist? Her ghost status is under Little Mermaid/Beauty and the Beast rules: If someone falls in love with her and truly loves her to the point where they confess their feelings and mean it, she'll get to restart her life as a human—but only if they confess first! Tsubomi is constantly fighting to keep her hopes from getting too far up, and also has resolved not to tell Mamoru any of the details in case he would feel pressured into trying to develop feelings for her. Meanwhile, absolutely everyone around is trying hardcore to matchmake them. Saturday Evening: Clockwork Under City Lights - An OVA adapted from a webcomic. The interconnected stories of a dozen tiny magically-powered, steampunk-ish self-aware constructs created in the shape of large insects, miniature forest animals, non-humanoid mythological creatures, and so forth, set loose in a big and bustling city somewhere on a world just to the left of our own; life can be beyond interesting as well as startlingly mundane when you're a metal and stained glass griffin the size of a teacup. Saturday Night: Fantasy Hero Mech - When war threatens, the denizens of the world of Sylvania have come together to summon the hero who was prophesied to come in their hour of greatest need; meanwhile, Takeshi is just a low-ranking grunt in the Unified Space Forces, working to repair a hyperspace transport gate. Right when he flips the switch to test it out, he and his repair mech are sucked through it into Sylvania, where the people on the other side of the gate assume he has arrived to save them. Sunday Early Morning: Guardian Treasures - When Earth is threatened by alien forces, Japan’s Three Treasures rise again in the form of giant mechs; three high school boys, Ryuu, Heiji, and Touya, are chosen by the mechs as pilots to defend Earth. With help from engineering and folklore student Asuka, they will work together to drive off the invaders and protect the world. But there’s a dark secret about the invaders that could threaten to tear apart the bonds they’ve formed, and endanger Earth in the process… Sunday Morning: Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams - It's the year 21XX, and being a Magical Girl is now a viable career option. Unfortunately, despite her own significant magical powers, Arika Izumi is much more interested in being an accountant or a programmer. Her relief when she learns that the experts at Mahou Gakuen, the most prestigious magical girl academy in the area, think she wouldn't be a good fit for the program is short-lived; when she arrives home after learning the results, she sees that her mother has not only already assumed she would pass, but told all of her own friends that Arika would be attending Mahou Gakuen. Luckily, Arika got accepted to a different high school that's not very far from Mahou Gakuen; with the help of her new friends in the Drama Club, and a little programming magic, Arika is set to fake the heck out of being a Mahou Gakuen student. Sunday at Noon: Nobunaga and the Warring States - A Hetalia-esque historical cartoon featuring Oda Nobunaga and other historical figures, and the personified States. Nobunaga has to constantly break up petty squabbles between the States. He is accompanied by his constant companion, fan favorite Piyo the nightingale, who is usually found perched on his shoulder or head. He is still waiting for her to sing. Sunday Afternoon: Tech Wizard - Garret Smelter has an absurdly good reputation for repairing spells and stuff; turns out he's been using mundane methods the entire time, but no one will believe him. Told from the POV of Hans, Garret's new apprentice, as Garret and his his "familiar" (a well-trained but mundane ferret named Lefty) go about the work of keeping the city of Archdale running on actual engineering. ''Video Room Two Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Heartbeat Rhythm Magic - Koharu is practicing with a hoop for rhythmic gymnastics club when suddenly, a strange monster made of stadium seating attacks the gym! Koharu is then found by a small, pink, hamster-like creature that tells her she is to be the leader of a team of magical girls who use the tools and skills of rhythmic gymnastics to defeat monsters and keep the evil Judge Malice from throwing off the rhythm of the world and using the power of hearts beating out of sync to take over the universe. Together with her teammates Natsuki, Akiko, and Fuyumi, Koharu will overthrow Judge Malice and restore the world's rhythm! Friday Afternoon: Bridge Over Dragon Run - A slice-of-life/drama with a fantasy twist. Seventh grader Sachie is having a rough time in middle school; none of her friends from grade school are going to the same school she is, and a number of the girls she does go to school with have chosen her as a target for bullying. She's retrieving her school bag from where some of the girls have thrown it into a creek when she comes across a large egg. The egg hatches when Sachie touches it, and a small dragon topples out, instantly bonding with her. Knowing instinctively that the tiny creature is now her responsibility, Sachie takes it home and attempts to hide it from her mother and younger brother, with decidedly mixed results. Friday Evening: DCLXVI - Margaret the witch has found a mysterious egg and a piece of ancient parchment with instructions for a ritual to hatch it, but no other information. Incredibly curious, Margaret decides to perform the ritual and see what’s inside. Just then, the angel Tenshi and the demon Koakuma show up to try and stop her; according to them, the egg actually contains a beast that will devour the world! Unfortunately, they're too late; the ritual has completed, and the egg hatches into a tiny golden dragon-like creature with a crimson mane. Knowing that they'll be punished if they go back with this bad news, Tenshi and Koakuma decide to team up with Margaret and raise it; maybe if they do everything right, it won't want to devour the world after all! It worked in that one British book/radio play/TV miniseries, after all... Lots of yuri subtext/moments. Friday Night: His Majesty's Guard - A harem anime. Ordinary Japanese high school student Genta learns that he's actually the heir to a vaguely European-ish country. Since the previous ruler was assassinated, Genta has been assigned a full team of highly trained guards, each specializing in a different weapon and/or fighting style, and each head-over-heels for Genta. His Majesty's Guard has gained a fair amount of attention for one of Genta's guards being a male character (Thomas), even if they are not expected to be the endgame ship. Saturday Early Morning: [[A Sprinkle of Love]] - A romantic comedy about a young engineering woman named Yuki who enters a baking competition with no grand prize besides the title of Best Baker. She meets the other competitors and gets along except for that one grumpy young man named Ken. Due to a misunderstanding, they get off on the wrong foot, but during the course of the competition they get to know each other better. It's not long before these feelings turn to love, but at the end of the competition nears and they are the only two left standing, can their love survive the heat? Saturday Morning: Where Is My Master? - A very fanservicey title about a dog named Pochiko who saves the life of a witch and is turned into a busty young woman as a reward. Pochiko is delighted, but her human master, Akihiko, is a lot more conflicted—especially because Pochiko still acts so much like a dog! Despite Akihiko trying his best to set her up with her own life as a human, Pochiko is determined to stay by Akihiko's side through thick and thin. Saturday at Noon: Alien Lifeswap - One day out of the blue, a space alien abducts ordinary teenage boy Noboru and takes his place in order to study humans and help make a decision about whether they should be introduced to the wider galactic alliance. The show follows both the alien in its attempts to pass as Noboru, and Noboru in a special not-quite-classroom with aliens from at least four other species who are undergoing basically the same trial, plus a teacher from the species that is taking the his place. Shenanigans ensue. Saturday Afternoon: City Heist - A recently released movie. The gem powering the technology of the village where Adorina lives has broken; the townsfolk can keep the town running for a time with human power alone, but this cannot be maintained for more than a few months. The only place to get replacement gems is the Eternal City, but the city's ruler guards them fiercely and charges outrageous amounts for replacements. Knowing her town can never afford the cost of a new gem, Adorina recruits retired master thief Antono, fighting and arms expert Rubena, and recently fired city guards Luksa and Johano to help her steal not only the gem she needs to help her village live on, but the technology to create new gems—just as Eternal City's ruler once stole it from Adorina's grandmother. Saturday Evening: Bolt Turners In The Sky - A century and a half ago, the world fell to a disaster known only as the Hungry Earth. No longer able to survive on the planet's surface, humanity fled to the skies. There, people live out their lives on city-fleets of assorted air vehicles - dirigibles, single-engine planes, helicarriers, and more. The series focuses on the Bolt Turners: a group of technicians who travel from vessel to vessel, fixing mechanical issues to keep the fleet flying. With art reminiscent of Studio Ghibli and a full cast of interesting, well-developed characters, the anime has fans hooked across the globe. Saturday Night: Inherit the Flame - A critically acclaimed movie, heavy with symbolism and artistically stunning. Legend says that anyone who sleeps at the foot of the mountain Cadair Idris will end up dead, mad, or a poet. Would-be poet Matthew goes to test this one night and ends up taken into another world, where his heart is removed and put in a cauldron of flame. Matthew instantly find that his skills as a poet have increased a hundred fold, and he joins a party of dozens of other artists who have come to challenge their skills over the years. As the night wears on, however, he meets Isabel, a fiddle player who misses her home, and he realizes that he, too, wants to go back to where he came from. Together, the two of them put their skills to the ultimate test to call their hearts back from the cauldron and return home. Sunday Early Morning: Rue 63rd - The story starts when Rokuro (whose name means "sixth son") and Sango (whose name means "third child") meet and commisserate that the other has the life that they want for themselves. Deciding to swap places, the "boy" (now going by Kuroko) and "girl" (now called Hanzo) slowly discover that part of the reason their new lives feel so right is because they are, in fact, transgender. The two of them need to navigate not only their new school lives as a gender they'd never thought they'd be yet are coming to realize is right, but also their home lives and interactions with each other, as they come to terms with their gender identities and what they want for the future. Sunday Morning: Swept Away - After nine-year-old Katsuo's puppy is saved from a frozen-over pond by a practicing curling team, he and his friends Hiraku and Minato become obsessed with the sport. When they reach high school, a teacher from Canada arrives, and they finally have an advisor for their curling club (with Katsuo's now grown dog to be the mascot). Unfortunately, they're one club member short. Katsuo sets his sights on Hajime, the younger brother of the boy who saved Katsuo's puppy. The problem? Hajime is completely uninterested in curling! Sunday at Noon: Hanako's School Days - A school drama about a fat girl named Hanako and her experiences in junior high and high school. A very sympathetic look at a fat girl character, who has been given a cute character design, and how she deals with the bullying and microaggressions she faces in everyday life. Sunday Afternoon: Isekai Bus Tour - Aiko is walking home from school one day when a bus comes barreling down the street right at her! Convinced that these are her last minutes alive, Aiko is astonished when, in a huge burst of light, the tour bus vanishes. Meanwhile, Youta and Miyu have been working together for years to get their new Akihabara tour bus up and running, and have just started their first tour! A combination of a horribly annoying passenger and a newspaper getting caught on the windshield has Youta losing control of the bus; right when he's about to hit a teenage girl, the entire bus is transported to another world—one that a passenger recognizes! The main storyline follows Youta and Miyu, with their mysterious new skills of Bus Driver and Tour Guide, as they hop from world to world with a full passenger list, hoping each new portal Miyu directs them to will be the one to bring them all back home. The post-episode clips, meanwhile, follow Aiko as she investigates the mysterious "hit-and-run" bus, leading to wilder and wilder conspiracy theories as she goes. [[Saturday Early Morning Events]]

''Video Room One Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Wanbon-Chan Goes To School - A slice-of-life anime about a puppy starting kindergarten or preschool in an anthropomorphic world. One of the most popular characters is Tarou, a wheely dog; another is Naoko, a cat who's pretending to be a dog to go to puppy school. Friday Afternoon: Crave - Story of Chiharu, a vampire who was adopted by humans and has no idea she's not also human. A series of super weird coincidences has kept the discovery from happening until she's in junior high or high school, when she begins craving blood. She becomes aware of other supernatural creatures when she discovers her own nature. All of her friends team up to make sure she gets however much blood she needs on a regular basis (which, at least while she's still young, isn't too much yet). Friday Evening: Sunset Eyes - Hikari has been cursed with a devilish appearance (horns, wings, tail, red-gray skin) and skin that burns anyone who touches her; the curse can only be reversed when someone who loves her with all their heart looks into her eyes at sunset. After meeting Hikari, Nadeshiko vows to fall in love with her and break the curse. After all, the curse doesn't say anything about Hikari having to love the person back, and there are a lot worse things to Nadeshiko's way of thinking than people thinking she likes girls "like that"—and one of those is being cursed never to touch your real true love, right? Friday Night: ohayo gozaimasu, it’s early - A school comedy about a kid, Kei (written with the character for "firefly"), who is always too tired for morning classes, but struggles to be at school anyway. Stories range from typical school stories trying to involve a kid who's either half or entirely asleep most of the time (and yet somehow gets good grades!), to his classmates trying to figure out why he keeps missing so much sleep, and how they can help (every time they try to find out it's something different, and all of their efforts so far have failed; it's doubtful Kei has noticed them in the first place). Saturday Early Morning: The Life and Times of a Background Character - Yamada Kenichi is a young adult who has a million part-time jobs and is constantly witness to major scenes from everyone else's stories. From the meet-cutes at the coffee shop, to the superpower-granting mix-ups at the lab, and even that one time the villain had an epiphany and a change of heart, Kenichi has a constant, unwitting, and even unwilling hand in them. Saturday Morning: [[Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess!]] - Rika ends up being reborn as the heroine of an otome game. The problem is that she never had much interest in the game's canon love interests, but really liked drawing fanart of Hitomi, one of the 'rival' characters... who's even more stunning in person! Saturday at Noon: All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine? - Nicknamed WorldsOther by the fandom, this is a high fantasy series inspired by a series of light novels. The heroine of the story is Bremby, a sorceress who's lived under the threat of the Demon King's hordes for years, but the local temples promise that one day the Chosen One will be summoned from another world to set things right. Well, the day is here, and there seem to be at least four 'chosen ones'—who all claim to be from other worlds, argue about the details, and seem to be more interested in dating than actually doing what they're supposed to and stopping the Demon King. Fine; if their absurd powers are going to waste, maybe Bremby can just save her country herself... Saturday Afternoon: Ghost Girlfriend - High school boy Yoshida Mamoru moves into a house in a new neighborhood; turns out it's haunted by the ghost of a teenage girl! Tsubomi has an absolutely enormous crush on him, but he is absolutely oblivious. The twist? Her ghost status is under Little Mermaid/Beauty and the Beast rules: If someone falls in love with her and truly loves her to the point where they confess their feelings and mean it, she'll get to restart her life as a human—but only if they confess first! Tsubomi is constantly fighting to keep her hopes from getting too far up, and also has resolved not to tell Mamoru any of the details in case he would feel pressured into trying to develop feelings for her. Meanwhile, absolutely everyone around is trying hardcore to matchmake them. Saturday Evening: Clockwork Under City Lights - An OVA adapted from a webcomic. The interconnected stories of a dozen tiny magically-powered, steampunk-ish self-aware constructs created in the shape of large insects, miniature forest animals, non-humanoid mythological creatures, and so forth, set loose in a big and bustling city somewhere on a world just to the left of our own; life can be beyond interesting as well as startlingly mundane when you're a metal and stained glass griffin the size of a teacup. Saturday Night: Fantasy Hero Mech - When war threatens, the denizens of the world of Sylvania have come together to summon the hero who was prophesied to come in their hour of greatest need; meanwhile, Takeshi is just a low-ranking grunt in the Unified Space Forces, working to repair a hyperspace transport gate. Right when he flips the switch to test it out, he and his repair mech are sucked through it into Sylvania, where the people on the other side of the gate assume he has arrived to save them. Sunday Early Morning: Guardian Treasures - When Earth is threatened by alien forces, Japan’s Three Treasures rise again in the form of giant mechs; three high school boys, Ryuu, Heiji, and Touya, are chosen by the mechs as pilots to defend Earth. With help from engineering and folklore student Asuka, they will work together to drive off the invaders and protect the world. But there’s a dark secret about the invaders that could threaten to tear apart the bonds they’ve formed, and endanger Earth in the process… Sunday Morning: Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams - It's the year 21XX, and being a Magical Girl is now a viable career option. Unfortunately, despite her own significant magical powers, Arika Izumi is much more interested in being an accountant or a programmer. Her relief when she learns that the experts at Mahou Gakuen, the most prestigious magical girl academy in the area, think she wouldn't be a good fit for the program is short-lived; when she arrives home after learning the results, she sees that her mother has not only already assumed she would pass, but told all of her own friends that Arika would be attending Mahou Gakuen. Luckily, Arika got accepted to a different high school that's not very far from Mahou Gakuen; with the help of her new friends in the Drama Club, and a little programming magic, Arika is set to fake the heck out of being a Mahou Gakuen student. Sunday at Noon: Nobunaga and the Warring States - A Hetalia-esque historical cartoon featuring Oda Nobunaga and other historical figures, and the personified States. Nobunaga has to constantly break up petty squabbles between the States. He is accompanied by his constant companion, fan favorite Piyo the nightingale, who is usually found perched on his shoulder or head. He is still waiting for her to sing. Sunday Afternoon: Tech Wizard - Garret Smelter has an absurdly good reputation for repairing spells and stuff; turns out he's been using mundane methods the entire time, but no one will believe him. Told from the POV of Hans, Garret's new apprentice, as Garret and his his "familiar" (a well-trained but mundane ferret named Lefty) go about the work of keeping the city of Archdale running on actual engineering. ''Video Room Two Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Heartbeat Rhythm Magic - Koharu is practicing with a hoop for rhythmic gymnastics club when suddenly, a strange monster made of stadium seating attacks the gym! Koharu is then found by a small, pink, hamster-like creature that tells her she is to be the leader of a team of magical girls who use the tools and skills of rhythmic gymnastics to defeat monsters and keep the evil Judge Malice from throwing off the rhythm of the world and using the power of hearts beating out of sync to take over the universe. Together with her teammates Natsuki, Akiko, and Fuyumi, Koharu will overthrow Judge Malice and restore the world's rhythm! Friday Afternoon: Bridge Over Dragon Run - A slice-of-life/drama with a fantasy twist. Seventh grader Sachie is having a rough time in middle school; none of her friends from grade school are going to the same school she is, and a number of the girls she does go to school with have chosen her as a target for bullying. She's retrieving her school bag from where some of the girls have thrown it into a creek when she comes across a large egg. The egg hatches when Sachie touches it, and a small dragon topples out, instantly bonding with her. Knowing instinctively that the tiny creature is now her responsibility, Sachie takes it home and attempts to hide it from her mother and younger brother, with decidedly mixed results. Friday Evening: DCLXVI: Margaret the witch has found a mysterious egg and a piece of ancient parchment with instructions for a ritual to hatch it, but no other information. Incredibly curious, Margaret decides to perform the ritual and see what’s inside. Just then, the angel Tenshi and the demon Koakuma show up to try and stop her; according to them, the egg actually contains a beast that will devour the world! Unfortunately, they're too late; the ritual has completed, and the egg hatches into a tiny golden dragon-like creature with a crimson mane. Knowing that they'll be punished if they go back with this bad news, Tenshi and Koakuma decide to team up with Margaret and raise it; maybe if they do everything right, it won't want to devour the world after all! It worked in that one British book/radio play/TV miniseries, after all... Lots of yuri subtext/moments. Friday Night: His Majesty's Guard; harem anime. Ordinary Japanese high school student Genta learns that he's actually the heir to a vaguely European-ish country. Since the previous ruler was assassinated, Genta has been assigned a full team of highly trained guards, each specializing in a different weapon and/or fighting style, and each head-over-heels for Genta. His Majesty's Guard has gained a fair amount of attention for one of Genta's guards being a male character (Thomas), even if they are not expected to be the endgame ship. Saturday Early Morning: A Sprinkle of Love - A romantic comedy about a young engineering woman named Yuki who enters a baking competition with no grand prize besides the title of Best Baker. She meets the other competitors and gets along except for that one grumpy young man named Ken. Due to a misunderstanding, they get off on the wrong foot, but during the course of the competition they get to know each other better. It's not long before these feelings turn to love, but at the end of the competition nears and they are the only two left standing, can their love survive the heat? Saturday Morning: [[Where Is My Master?]] - A very fanservicey title about a dog named Pochiko who saves the life of a witch and is turned into a busty young woman as a reward. Pochiko is delighted, but her human master, Akihiko, is a lot more conflicted—especially because Pochiko still acts so much like a dog! Despite Akihiko trying his best to set her up with her own life as a human, Pochiko is determined to stay by Akihiko's side through thick and thin. Saturday at Noon: Alien Lifeswap - One day out of the blue, a space alien abducts ordinary teenage boy Noboru and takes his place in order to study humans and help make a decision about whether they should be introduced to the wider galactic alliance. The show follows both the alien in its attempts to pass as Noboru, and Noboru in a special not-quite-classroom with aliens from at least four other species who are undergoing basically the same trial, plus a teacher from the species that is taking the his place. Shenanigans ensue. Saturday Afternoon: City Heist - A recently released movie. The gem powering the technology of the village where Adorina lives has broken; the townsfolk can keep the town running for a time with human power alone, but this cannot be maintained for more than a few months. The only place to get replacement gems is the Eternal City, but the city's ruler guards them fiercely and charges outrageous amounts for replacements. Knowing her town can never afford the cost of a new gem, Adorina recruits retired master thief Antono, fighting and arms expert Rubena, and recently fired city guards Luksa and Johano to help her steal not only the gem she needs to help her village live on, but the technology to create new gems—just as Eternal City's ruler once stole it from Adorina's grandmother. Saturday Evening: Bolt Turners In The Sky - A century and a half ago, the world fell to a disaster known only as the Hungry Earth. No longer able to survive on the planet's surface, humanity fled to the skies. There, people live out their lives on city-fleets of assorted air vehicles - dirigibles, single-engine planes, helicarriers, and more. The series focuses on the Bolt Turners: a group of technicians who travel from vessel to vessel, fixing mechanical issues to keep the fleet flying. With art reminiscent of Studio Ghibli and a full cast of interesting, well-developed characters, the anime has fans hooked across the globe. Saturday Night: Inherit the Flame - A critically acclaimed movie, heavy with symbolism and artistically stunning. Legend says that anyone who sleeps at the foot of the mountain Cadair Idris will end up dead, mad, or a poet. Would-be poet Matthew goes to test this one night and ends up taken into another world, where his heart is removed and put in a cauldron of flame. Matthew instantly find that his skills as a poet have increased a hundred fold, and he joins a party of dozens of other artists who have come to challenge their skills over the years. As the night wears on, however, he meets Isabel, a fiddle player who misses her home, and he realizes that he, too, wants to go back to where he came from. Together, the two of them put their skills to the ultimate test to call their hearts back from the cauldron and return home. Sunday Early Morning: Rue 63rd - The story starts when Rokuro (whose name means "sixth son") and Sango (whose name means "third child") meet and commisserate that the other has the life that they want for themselves. Deciding to swap places, the "boy" (now going by Kuroko) and "girl" (now called Hanzo) slowly discover that part of the reason their new lives feel so right is because they are, in fact, transgender. The two of them need to navigate not only their new school lives as a gender they'd never thought they'd be yet are coming to realize is right, but also their home lives and interactions with each other, as they come to terms with their gender identities and what they want for the future. Sunday Morning: Swept Away - After nine-year-old Katsuo's puppy is saved from a frozen-over pond by a practicing curling team, he and his friends Hiraku and Minato become obsessed with the sport. When they reach high school, a teacher from Canada arrives, and they finally have an advisor for their curling club (with Katsuo's now grown dog to be the mascot). Unfortunately, they're one club member short. Katsuo sets his sights on Hajime, the younger brother of the boy who saved Katsuo's puppy. The problem? Hajime is completely uninterested in curling! Sunday at Noon: Hanako's School Days - A school drama about a fat girl named Hanako and her experiences in junior high and high school. A very sympathetic look at a fat girl character, who has been given a cute character design, and how she deals with the bullying and microaggressions she faces in everyday life. Sunday Afternoon: Isekai Bus Tour - Aiko is walking home from school one day when a bus comes barreling down the street right at her! Convinced that these are her last minutes alive, Aiko is astonished when, in a huge burst of light, the tour bus vanishes. Meanwhile, Youta and Miyu have been working together for years to get their new Akihabara tour bus up and running, and have just started their first tour! A combination of a horribly annoying passenger and a newspaper getting caught on the windshield has Youta losing control of the bus; right when he's about to hit a teenage girl, the entire bus is transported to another world—one that a passenger recognizes! The main storyline follows Youta and Miyu, with their mysterious new skills of Bus Driver and Tour Guide, as they hop from world to world with a full passenger list, hoping each new portal Miyu directs them to will be the one to bring them all back home. The post-episode clips, meanwhile, follow Aiko as she investigates the mysterious "hit-and-run" bus, leading to wilder and wilder conspiracy theories as she goes. [[Saturday Morning Events]]

''Video Room One Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Wanbon-Chan Goes To School - A slice-of-life anime about a puppy starting kindergarten or preschool in an anthropomorphic world. One of the most popular characters is Tarou, a wheely dog; another is Naoko, a cat who's pretending to be a dog to go to puppy school. Friday Afternoon: Crave - Story of Chiharu, a vampire who was adopted by humans and has no idea she's not also human. A series of super weird coincidences has kept the discovery from happening until she's in junior high or high school, when she begins craving blood. She becomes aware of other supernatural creatures when she discovers her own nature. All of her friends team up to make sure she gets however much blood she needs on a regular basis (which, at least while she's still young, isn't too much yet). Friday Evening: Sunset Eyes - Hikari has been cursed with a devilish appearance (horns, wings, tail, red-gray skin) and skin that burns anyone who touches her; the curse can only be reversed when someone who loves her with all their heart looks into her eyes at sunset. After meeting Hikari, Nadeshiko vows to fall in love with her and break the curse. After all, the curse doesn't say anything about Hikari having to love the person back, and there are a lot worse things to Nadeshiko's way of thinking than people thinking she likes girls "like that"—and one of those is being cursed never to touch your real true love, right? Friday Night: ohayo gozaimasu, it’s early - A school comedy about a kid, Kei (written with the character for "firefly"), who is always too tired for morning classes, but struggles to be at school anyway. Stories range from typical school stories trying to involve a kid who's either half or entirely asleep most of the time (and yet somehow gets good grades!), to his classmates trying to figure out why he keeps missing so much sleep, and how they can help (every time they try to find out it's something different, and all of their efforts so far have failed; it's doubtful Kei has noticed them in the first place). Saturday Early Morning: The Life and Times of a Background Character - Yamada Kenichi is a young adult who has a million part-time jobs and is constantly witness to major scenes from everyone else's stories. From the meet-cutes at the coffee shop, to the superpower-granting mix-ups at the lab, and even that one time the villain had an epiphany and a change of heart, Kenichi has a constant, unwitting, and even unwilling hand in them. Saturday Morning: Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! - Rika ends up being reborn as the heroine of an otome game. The problem is that she never had much interest in the game's canon love interests, but really liked drawing fanart of Hitomi, one of the 'rival' characters... who's even more stunning in person! Saturday at Noon: [[All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine?]] - Nicknamed WorldsOther by the fandom, this is a high fantasy series inspired by a series of light novels. The heroine of the story is Bremby, a sorceress who's lived under the threat of the Demon King's hordes for years, but the local temples promise that one day the Chosen One will be summoned from another world to set things right. Well, the day is here, and there seem to be at least four 'chosen ones'—who all claim to be from other worlds, argue about the details, and seem to be more interested in dating than actually doing what they're supposed to and stopping the Demon King. Fine; if their absurd powers are going to waste, maybe Bremby can just save her country herself... Saturday Afternoon: Ghost Girlfriend - High school boy Yoshida Mamoru moves into a house in a new neighborhood; turns out it's haunted by the ghost of a teenage girl! Tsubomi has an absolutely enormous crush on him, but he is absolutely oblivious. The twist? Her ghost status is under Little Mermaid/Beauty and the Beast rules: If someone falls in love with her and truly loves her to the point where they confess their feelings and mean it, she'll get to restart her life as a human—but only if they confess first! Tsubomi is constantly fighting to keep her hopes from getting too far up, and also has resolved not to tell Mamoru any of the details in case he would feel pressured into trying to develop feelings for her. Meanwhile, absolutely everyone around is trying hardcore to matchmake them. Saturday Evening: Clockwork Under City Lights - An OVA adapted from a webcomic. The interconnected stories of a dozen tiny magically-powered, steampunk-ish self-aware constructs created in the shape of large insects, miniature forest animals, non-humanoid mythological creatures, and so forth, set loose in a big and bustling city somewhere on a world just to the left of our own; life can be beyond interesting as well as startlingly mundane when you're a metal and stained glass griffin the size of a teacup. Saturday Night: Fantasy Hero Mech - When war threatens, the denizens of the world of Sylvania have come together to summon the hero who was prophesied to come in their hour of greatest need; meanwhile, Takeshi is just a low-ranking grunt in the Unified Space Forces, working to repair a hyperspace transport gate. Right when he flips the switch to test it out, he and his repair mech are sucked through it into Sylvania, where the people on the other side of the gate assume he has arrived to save them. Sunday Early Morning: Guardian Treasures - When Earth is threatened by alien forces, Japan’s Three Treasures rise again in the form of giant mechs; three high school boys, Ryuu, Heiji, and Touya, are chosen by the mechs as pilots to defend Earth. With help from engineering and folklore student Asuka, they will work together to drive off the invaders and protect the world. But there’s a dark secret about the invaders that could threaten to tear apart the bonds they’ve formed, and endanger Earth in the process… Sunday Morning: Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams - It's the year 21XX, and being a Magical Girl is now a viable career option. Unfortunately, despite her own significant magical powers, Arika Izumi is much more interested in being an accountant or a programmer. Her relief when she learns that the experts at Mahou Gakuen, the most prestigious magical girl academy in the area, think she wouldn't be a good fit for the program is short-lived; when she arrives home after learning the results, she sees that her mother has not only already assumed she would pass, but told all of her own friends that Arika would be attending Mahou Gakuen. Luckily, Arika got accepted to a different high school that's not very far from Mahou Gakuen; with the help of her new friends in the Drama Club, and a little programming magic, Arika is set to fake the heck out of being a Mahou Gakuen student. Sunday at Noon: Nobunaga and the Warring States - A Hetalia-esque historical cartoon featuring Oda Nobunaga and other historical figures, and the personified States. Nobunaga has to constantly break up petty squabbles between the States. He is accompanied by his constant companion, fan favorite Piyo the nightingale, who is usually found perched on his shoulder or head. He is still waiting for her to sing. Sunday Afternoon: Tech Wizard - Garret Smelter has an absurdly good reputation for repairing spells and stuff; turns out he's been using mundane methods the entire time, but no one will believe him. Told from the POV of Hans, Garret's new apprentice, as Garret and his his "familiar" (a well-trained but mundane ferret named Lefty) go about the work of keeping the city of Archdale running on actual engineering. ''Video Room Two Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Heartbeat Rhythm Magic - Koharu is practicing with a hoop for rhythmic gymnastics club when suddenly, a strange monster made of stadium seating attacks the gym! Koharu is then found by a small, pink, hamster-like creature that tells her she is to be the leader of a team of magical girls who use the tools and skills of rhythmic gymnastics to defeat monsters and keep the evil Judge Malice from throwing off the rhythm of the world and using the power of hearts beating out of sync to take over the universe. Together with her teammates Natsuki, Akiko, and Fuyumi, Koharu will overthrow Judge Malice and restore the world's rhythm! Friday Afternoon: Bridge Over Dragon Run - A slice-of-life/drama with a fantasy twist. Seventh grader Sachie is having a rough time in middle school; none of her friends from grade school are going to the same school she is, and a number of the girls she does go to school with have chosen her as a target for bullying. She's retrieving her school bag from where some of the girls have thrown it into a creek when she comes across a large egg. The egg hatches when Sachie touches it, and a small dragon topples out, instantly bonding with her. Knowing instinctively that the tiny creature is now her responsibility, Sachie takes it home and attempts to hide it from her mother and younger brother, with decidedly mixed results. Friday Evening: DCLXVI - Margaret the witch has found a mysterious egg and a piece of ancient parchment with instructions for a ritual to hatch it, but no other information. Incredibly curious, Margaret decides to perform the ritual and see what’s inside. Just then, the angel Tenshi and the demon Koakuma show up to try and stop her; according to them, the egg actually contains a beast that will devour the world! Unfortunately, they're too late; the ritual has completed, and the egg hatches into a tiny golden dragon-like creature with a crimson mane. Knowing that they'll be punished if they go back with this bad news, Tenshi and Koakuma decide to team up with Margaret and raise it; maybe if they do everything right, it won't want to devour the world after all! It worked in that one British book/radio play/TV miniseries, after all... Lots of yuri subtext/moments. Friday Night: His Majesty's Guard - A harem anime. Ordinary Japanese high school student Genta learns that he's actually the heir to a vaguely European-ish country. Since the previous ruler was assassinated, Genta has been assigned a full team of highly trained guards, each specializing in a different weapon and/or fighting style, and each head-over-heels for Genta. His Majesty's Guard has gained a fair amount of attention for one of Genta's guards being a male character (Thomas), even if they are not expected to be the endgame ship. Saturday Early Morning: A Sprinkle of Love - A romantic comedy about a young engineering woman named Yuki who enters a baking competition with no grand prize besides the title of Best Baker. She meets the other competitors and gets along except for that one grumpy young man named Ken. Due to a misunderstanding, they get off on the wrong foot, but during the course of the competition they get to know each other better. It's not long before these feelings turn to love, but at the end of the competition nears and they are the only two left standing, can their love survive the heat? Saturday Morning: Where Is My Master? - A very fanservicey title about a dog named Pochiko who saves the life of a witch and is turned into a busty young woman as a reward. Pochiko is delighted, but her human master, Akihiko, is a lot more conflicted—especially because Pochiko still acts so much like a dog! Despite Akihiko trying his best to set her up with her own life as a human, Pochiko is determined to stay by Akihiko's side through thick and thin. Saturday at Noon: [[Alien Lifeswap]] - One day out of the blue, a space alien abducts ordinary teenage boy Noboru and takes his place in order to study humans and help make a decision about whether they should be introduced to the wider galactic alliance. The show follows both the alien in its attempts to pass as Noboru, and Noboru in a special not-quite-classroom with aliens from at least four other species who are undergoing basically the same trial, plus a teacher from the species that is taking the his place. Shenanigans ensue. Saturday Afternoon: City Heist - A recently released movie. The gem powering the technology of the village where Adorina lives has broken; the townsfolk can keep the town running for a time with human power alone, but this cannot be maintained for more than a few months. The only place to get replacement gems is the Eternal City, but the city's ruler guards them fiercely and charges outrageous amounts for replacements. Knowing her town can never afford the cost of a new gem, Adorina recruits retired master thief Antono, fighting and arms expert Rubena, and recently fired city guards Luksa and Johano to help her steal not only the gem she needs to help her village live on, but the technology to create new gems—just as Eternal City's ruler once stole it from Adorina's grandmother. Saturday Evening: Bolt Turners In The Sky - A century and a half ago, the world fell to a disaster known only as the Hungry Earth. No longer able to survive on the planet's surface, humanity fled to the skies. There, people live out their lives on city-fleets of assorted air vehicles - dirigibles, single-engine planes, helicarriers, and more. The series focuses on the Bolt Turners: a group of technicians who travel from vessel to vessel, fixing mechanical issues to keep the fleet flying. With art reminiscent of Studio Ghibli and a full cast of interesting, well-developed characters, the anime has fans hooked across the globe. Saturday Night: Inherit the Flame - A critically acclaimed movie, heavy with symbolism and artistically stunning. Legend says that anyone who sleeps at the foot of the mountain Cadair Idris will end up dead, mad, or a poet. Would-be poet Matthew goes to test this one night and ends up taken into another world, where his heart is removed and put in a cauldron of flame. Matthew instantly find that his skills as a poet have increased a hundred fold, and he joins a party of dozens of other artists who have come to challenge their skills over the years. As the night wears on, however, he meets Isabel, a fiddle player who misses her home, and he realizes that he, too, wants to go back to where he came from. Together, the two of them put their skills to the ultimate test to call their hearts back from the cauldron and return home. Sunday Early Morning: Rue 63rd - The story starts when Rokuro (whose name means "sixth son") and Sango (whose name means "third child") meet and commisserate that the other has the life that they want for themselves. Deciding to swap places, the "boy" (now going by Kuroko) and "girl" (now called Hanzo) slowly discover that part of the reason their new lives feel so right is because they are, in fact, transgender. The two of them need to navigate not only their new school lives as a gender they'd never thought they'd be yet are coming to realize is right, but also their home lives and interactions with each other, as they come to terms with their gender identities and what they want for the future. Sunday Morning: Swept Away - After nine-year-old Katsuo's puppy is saved from a frozen-over pond by a practicing curling team, he and his friends Hiraku and Minato become obsessed with the sport. When they reach high school, a teacher from Canada arrives, and they finally have an advisor for their curling club (with Katsuo's now grown dog to be the mascot). Unfortunately, they're one club member short. Katsuo sets his sights on Hajime, the younger brother of the boy who saved Katsuo's puppy. The problem? Hajime is completely uninterested in curling! Sunday at Noon: Hanako's School Days - A school drama about a fat girl named Hanako and her experiences in junior high and high school. A very sympathetic look at a fat girl character, who has been given a cute character design, and how she deals with the bullying and microaggressions she faces in everyday life. Sunday Afternoon: Isekai Bus Tour - Aiko is walking home from school one day when a bus comes barreling down the street right at her! Convinced that these are her last minutes alive, Aiko is astonished when, in a huge burst of light, the tour bus vanishes. Meanwhile, Youta and Miyu have been working together for years to get their new Akihabara tour bus up and running, and have just started their first tour! A combination of a horribly annoying passenger and a newspaper getting caught on the windshield has Youta losing control of the bus; right when he's about to hit a teenage girl, the entire bus is transported to another world—one that a passenger recognizes! The main storyline follows Youta and Miyu, with their mysterious new skills of Bus Driver and Tour Guide, as they hop from world to world with a full passenger list, hoping each new portal Miyu directs them to will be the one to bring them all back home. The post-episode clips, meanwhile, follow Aiko as she investigates the mysterious "hit-and-run" bus, leading to wilder and wilder conspiracy theories as she goes. [[Saturday Noon Events]]

''Video Room One Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Wanbon-Chan Goes To School - A slice-of-life anime about a puppy starting kindergarten or preschool in an anthropomorphic world. One of the most popular characters is Tarou, a wheely dog; another is Naoko, a cat who's pretending to be a dog to go to puppy school. Friday Afternoon: Crave - Story of Chiharu, a vampire who was adopted by humans and has no idea she's not also human. A series of super weird coincidences has kept the discovery from happening until she's in junior high or high school, when she begins craving blood. She becomes aware of other supernatural creatures when she discovers her own nature. All of her friends team up to make sure she gets however much blood she needs on a regular basis (which, at least while she's still young, isn't too much yet). Friday Evening: Sunset Eyes - Hikari has been cursed with a devilish appearance (horns, wings, tail, red-gray skin) and skin that burns anyone who touches her; the curse can only be reversed when someone who loves her with all their heart looks into her eyes at sunset. After meeting Hikari, Nadeshiko vows to fall in love with her and break the curse. After all, the curse doesn't say anything about Hikari having to love the person back, and there are a lot worse things to Nadeshiko's way of thinking than people thinking she likes girls "like that"—and one of those is being cursed never to touch your real true love, right? Friday Night: ohayo gozaimasu, it’s early - A school comedy about a kid, Kei (written with the character for "firefly"), who is always too tired for morning classes, but struggles to be at school anyway. Stories range from typical school stories trying to involve a kid who's either half or entirely asleep most of the time (and yet somehow gets good grades!), to his classmates trying to figure out why he keeps missing so much sleep, and how they can help (every time they try to find out it's something different, and all of their efforts so far have failed; it's doubtful Kei has noticed them in the first place). Saturday Early Morning: The Life and Times of a Background Character - Yamada Kenichi is a young adult who has a million part-time jobs and is constantly witness to major scenes from everyone else's stories. From the meet-cutes at the coffee shop, to the superpower-granting mix-ups at the lab, and even that one time the villain had an epiphany and a change of heart, Kenichi has a constant, unwitting, and even unwilling hand in them. Saturday Morning: Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! - Rika ends up being reborn as the heroine of an otome game. The problem is that she never had much interest in the game's canon love interests, but really liked drawing fanart of Hitomi, one of the 'rival' characters... who's even more stunning in person! Saturday at Noon: All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine? - Nicknamed WorldsOther by the fandom, this is a high fantasy series inspired by a series of light novels. The heroine of the story is Bremby, a sorceress who's lived under the threat of the Demon King's hordes for years, but the local temples promise that one day the Chosen One will be summoned from another world to set things right. Well, the day is here, and there seem to be at least four 'chosen ones'—who all claim to be from other worlds, argue about the details, and seem to be more interested in dating than actually doing what they're supposed to and stopping the Demon King. Fine; if their absurd powers are going to waste, maybe Bremby can just save her country herself... Saturday Afternoon: [[Ghost Girlfriend]] - High school boy Yoshida Mamoru moves into a house in a new neighborhood; turns out it's haunted by the ghost of a teenage girl! Tsubomi has an absolutely enormous crush on him, but he is absolutely oblivious. The twist? Her ghost status is under Little Mermaid/Beauty and the Beast rules: If someone falls in love with her and truly loves her to the point where they confess their feelings and mean it, she'll get to restart her life as a human—but only if they confess first! Tsubomi is constantly fighting to keep her hopes from getting too far up, and also has resolved not to tell Mamoru any of the details in case he would feel pressured into trying to develop feelings for her. Meanwhile, absolutely everyone around is trying hardcore to matchmake them. Saturday Evening: Clockwork Under City Lights - An OVA adapted from a webcomic. The interconnected stories of a dozen tiny magically-powered, steampunk-ish self-aware constructs created in the shape of large insects, miniature forest animals, non-humanoid mythological creatures, and so forth, set loose in a big and bustling city somewhere on a world just to the left of our own; life can be beyond interesting as well as startlingly mundane when you're a metal and stained glass griffin the size of a teacup. Saturday Night: Fantasy Hero Mech - When war threatens, the denizens of the world of Sylvania have come together to summon the hero who was prophesied to come in their hour of greatest need; meanwhile, Takeshi is just a low-ranking grunt in the Unified Space Forces, working to repair a hyperspace transport gate. Right when he flips the switch to test it out, he and his repair mech are sucked through it into Sylvania, where the people on the other side of the gate assume he has arrived to save them. Sunday Early Morning: Guardian Treasures - When Earth is threatened by alien forces, Japan’s Three Treasures rise again in the form of giant mechs; three high school boys, Ryuu, Heiji, and Touya, are chosen by the mechs as pilots to defend Earth. With help from engineering and folklore student Asuka, they will work together to drive off the invaders and protect the world. But there’s a dark secret about the invaders that could threaten to tear apart the bonds they’ve formed, and endanger Earth in the process… Sunday Morning: Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams - It's the year 21XX, and being a Magical Girl is now a viable career option. Unfortunately, despite her own significant magical powers, Arika Izumi is much more interested in being an accountant or a programmer. Her relief when she learns that the experts at Mahou Gakuen, the most prestigious magical girl academy in the area, think she wouldn't be a good fit for the program is short-lived; when she arrives home after learning the results, she sees that her mother has not only already assumed she would pass, but told all of her own friends that Arika would be attending Mahou Gakuen. Luckily, Arika got accepted to a different high school that's not very far from Mahou Gakuen; with the help of her new friends in the Drama Club, and a little programming magic, Arika is set to fake the heck out of being a Mahou Gakuen student. Sunday at Noon: Nobunaga and the Warring States - A Hetalia-esque historical cartoon featuring Oda Nobunaga and other historical figures, and the personified States. Nobunaga has to constantly break up petty squabbles between the States. He is accompanied by his constant companion, fan favorite Piyo the nightingale, who is usually found perched on his shoulder or head. He is still waiting for her to sing. Sunday Afternoon: Tech Wizard - Garret Smelter has an absurdly good reputation for repairing spells and stuff; turns out he's been using mundane methods the entire time, but no one will believe him. Told from the POV of Hans, Garret's new apprentice, as Garret and his his "familiar" (a well-trained but mundane ferret named Lefty) go about the work of keeping the city of Archdale running on actual engineering. ''Video Room Two Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Heartbeat Rhythm Magic - Koharu is practicing with a hoop for rhythmic gymnastics club when suddenly, a strange monster made of stadium seating attacks the gym! Koharu is then found by a small, pink, hamster-like creature that tells her she is to be the leader of a team of magical girls who use the tools and skills of rhythmic gymnastics to defeat monsters and keep the evil Judge Malice from throwing off the rhythm of the world and using the power of hearts beating out of sync to take over the universe. Together with her teammates Natsuki, Akiko, and Fuyumi, Koharu will overthrow Judge Malice and restore the world's rhythm! Friday Afternoon: Bridge Over Dragon Run - A slice-of-life/drama with a fantasy twist. Seventh grader Sachie is having a rough time in middle school; none of her friends from grade school are going to the same school she is, and a number of the girls she does go to school with have chosen her as a target for bullying. She's retrieving her school bag from where some of the girls have thrown it into a creek when she comes across a large egg. The egg hatches when Sachie touches it, and a small dragon topples out, instantly bonding with her. Knowing instinctively that the tiny creature is now her responsibility, Sachie takes it home and attempts to hide it from her mother and younger brother, with decidedly mixed results. Friday Evening: DCLXVI - Margaret the witch has found a mysterious egg and a piece of ancient parchment with instructions for a ritual to hatch it, but no other information. Incredibly curious, Margaret decides to perform the ritual and see what’s inside. Just then, the angel Tenshi and the demon Koakuma show up to try and stop her; according to them, the egg actually contains a beast that will devour the world! Unfortunately, they're too late; the ritual has completed, and the egg hatches into a tiny golden dragon-like creature with a crimson mane. Knowing that they'll be punished if they go back with this bad news, Tenshi and Koakuma decide to team up with Margaret and raise it; maybe if they do everything right, it won't want to devour the world after all! It worked in that one British book/radio play/TV miniseries, after all... Lots of yuri subtext/moments. Friday Night: His Majesty's Guard - A harem anime. Ordinary Japanese high school student Genta learns that he's actually the heir to a vaguely European-ish country. Since the previous ruler was assassinated, Genta has been assigned a full team of highly trained guards, each specializing in a different weapon and/or fighting style, and each head-over-heels for Genta. His Majesty's Guard has gained a fair amount of attention for one of Genta's guards being a male character (Thomas), even if they are not expected to be the endgame ship. Saturday Early Morning: A Sprinkle of Love - A romantic comedy about a young engineering woman named Yuki who enters a baking competition with no grand prize besides the title of Best Baker. She meets the other competitors and gets along except for that one grumpy young man named Ken. Due to a misunderstanding, they get off on the wrong foot, but during the course of the competition they get to know each other better. It's not long before these feelings turn to love, but at the end of the competition nears and they are the only two left standing, can their love survive the heat? Saturday Morning: Where Is My Master? - A very fanservicey title about a dog named Pochiko who saves the life of a witch and is turned into a busty young woman as a reward. Pochiko is delighted, but her human master, Akihiko, is a lot more conflicted—especially because Pochiko still acts so much like a dog! Despite Akihiko trying his best to set her up with her own life as a human, Pochiko is determined to stay by Akihiko's side through thick and thin. Saturday at Noon: Alien Lifeswap - One day out of the blue, a space alien abducts ordinary teenage boy Noboru and takes his place in order to study humans and help make a decision about whether they should be introduced to the wider galactic alliance. The show follows both the alien in its attempts to pass as Noboru, and Noboru in a special not-quite-classroom with aliens from at least four other species who are undergoing basically the same trial, plus a teacher from the species that is taking the his place. Shenanigans ensue. Saturday Afternoon: [[City Heist]] - A recently released movie. The gem powering the technology of the village where Adorina lives has broken; the townsfolk can keep the town running for a time with human power alone, but this cannot be maintained for more than a few months. The only place to get replacement gems is the Eternal City, but the city's ruler guards them fiercely and charges outrageous amounts for replacements. Knowing her town can never afford the cost of a new gem, Adorina recruits retired master thief Antono, fighting and arms expert Rubena, and recently fired city guards Luksa and Johano to help her steal not only the gem she needs to help her village live on, but the technology to create new gems—just as Eternal City's ruler once stole it from Adorina's grandmother. Saturday Evening: Bolt Turners In The Sky - A century and a half ago, the world fell to a disaster known only as the Hungry Earth. No longer able to survive on the planet's surface, humanity fled to the skies. There, people live out their lives on city-fleets of assorted air vehicles - dirigibles, single-engine planes, helicarriers, and more. The series focuses on the Bolt Turners: a group of technicians who travel from vessel to vessel, fixing mechanical issues to keep the fleet flying. With art reminiscent of Studio Ghibli and a full cast of interesting, well-developed characters, the anime has fans hooked across the globe. Saturday Night: Inherit the Flame - A critically acclaimed movie, heavy with symbolism and artistically stunning. Legend says that anyone who sleeps at the foot of the mountain Cadair Idris will end up dead, mad, or a poet. Would-be poet Matthew goes to test this one night and ends up taken into another world, where his heart is removed and put in a cauldron of flame. Matthew instantly find that his skills as a poet have increased a hundred fold, and he joins a party of dozens of other artists who have come to challenge their skills over the years. As the night wears on, however, he meets Isabel, a fiddle player who misses her home, and he realizes that he, too, wants to go back to where he came from. Together, the two of them put their skills to the ultimate test to call their hearts back from the cauldron and return home. Sunday Early Morning: Rue 63rd - The story starts when Rokuro (whose name means "sixth son") and Sango (whose name means "third child") meet and commisserate that the other has the life that they want for themselves. Deciding to swap places, the "boy" (now going by Kuroko) and "girl" (now called Hanzo) slowly discover that part of the reason their new lives feel so right is because they are, in fact, transgender. The two of them need to navigate not only their new school lives as a gender they'd never thought they'd be yet are coming to realize is right, but also their home lives and interactions with each other, as they come to terms with their gender identities and what they want for the future. Sunday Morning: Swept Away - After nine-year-old Katsuo's puppy is saved from a frozen-over pond by a practicing curling team, he and his friends Hiraku and Minato become obsessed with the sport. When they reach high school, a teacher from Canada arrives, and they finally have an advisor for their curling club (with Katsuo's now grown dog to be the mascot). Unfortunately, they're one club member short. Katsuo sets his sights on Hajime, the younger brother of the boy who saved Katsuo's puppy. The problem? Hajime is completely uninterested in curling! Sunday at Noon: Hanako's School Days - A school drama about a fat girl named Hanako and her experiences in junior high and high school. A very sympathetic look at a fat girl character, who has been given a cute character design, and how she deals with the bullying and microaggressions she faces in everyday life. Sunday Afternoon: Isekai Bus Tour - Aiko is walking home from school one day when a bus comes barreling down the street right at her! Convinced that these are her last minutes alive, Aiko is astonished when, in a huge burst of light, the tour bus vanishes. Meanwhile, Youta and Miyu have been working together for years to get their new Akihabara tour bus up and running, and have just started their first tour! A combination of a horribly annoying passenger and a newspaper getting caught on the windshield has Youta losing control of the bus; right when he's about to hit a teenage girl, the entire bus is transported to another world—one that a passenger recognizes! The main storyline follows Youta and Miyu, with their mysterious new skills of Bus Driver and Tour Guide, as they hop from world to world with a full passenger list, hoping each new portal Miyu directs them to will be the one to bring them all back home. The post-episode clips, meanwhile, follow Aiko as she investigates the mysterious "hit-and-run" bus, leading to wilder and wilder conspiracy theories as she goes. [[Saturday Afternoon Events]]

''Video Room One Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Wanbon-Chan Goes To School - A slice-of-life anime about a puppy starting kindergarten or preschool in an anthropomorphic world. One of the most popular characters is Tarou, a wheely dog; another is Naoko, a cat who's pretending to be a dog to go to puppy school. Friday Afternoon: Crave - Story of Chiharu, a vampire who was adopted by humans and has no idea she's not also human. A series of super weird coincidences has kept the discovery from happening until she's in junior high or high school, when she begins craving blood. She becomes aware of other supernatural creatures when she discovers her own nature. All of her friends team up to make sure she gets however much blood she needs on a regular basis (which, at least while she's still young, isn't too much yet). Friday Evening: Sunset Eyes - Hikari has been cursed with a devilish appearance (horns, wings, tail, red-gray skin) and skin that burns anyone who touches her; the curse can only be reversed when someone who loves her with all their heart looks into her eyes at sunset. After meeting Hikari, Nadeshiko vows to fall in love with her and break the curse. After all, the curse doesn't say anything about Hikari having to love the person back, and there are a lot worse things to Nadeshiko's way of thinking than people thinking she likes girls "like that"—and one of those is being cursed never to touch your real true love, right? Friday Night: ohayo gozaimasu, it’s early - A school comedy about a kid, Kei (written with the character for "firefly"), who is always too tired for morning classes, but struggles to be at school anyway. Stories range from typical school stories trying to involve a kid who's either half or entirely asleep most of the time (and yet somehow gets good grades!), to his classmates trying to figure out why he keeps missing so much sleep, and how they can help (every time they try to find out it's something different, and all of their efforts so far have failed; it's doubtful Kei has noticed them in the first place). Saturday Early Morning: The Life and Times of a Background Character - Yamada Kenichi is a young adult who has a million part-time jobs and is constantly witness to major scenes from everyone else's stories. From the meet-cutes at the coffee shop, to the superpower-granting mix-ups at the lab, and even that one time the villain had an epiphany and a change of heart, Kenichi has a constant, unwitting, and even unwilling hand in them. Saturday Morning: Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! - Rika ends up being reborn as the heroine of an otome game. The problem is that she never had much interest in the game's canon love interests, but really liked drawing fanart of Hitomi, one of the 'rival' characters... who's even more stunning in person! Saturday at Noon: All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine? - Nicknamed WorldsOther by the fandom, this is a high fantasy series inspired by a series of light novels. The heroine of the story is Bremby, a sorceress who's lived under the threat of the Demon King's hordes for years, but the local temples promise that one day the Chosen One will be summoned from another world to set things right. Well, the day is here, and there seem to be at least four 'chosen ones'—who all claim to be from other worlds, argue about the details, and seem to be more interested in dating than actually doing what they're supposed to and stopping the Demon King. Fine; if their absurd powers are going to waste, maybe Bremby can just save her country herself... Saturday Afternoon: Ghost Girlfriend - High school boy Yoshida Mamoru moves into a house in a new neighborhood; turns out it's haunted by the ghost of a teenage girl! Tsubomi has an absolutely enormous crush on him, but he is absolutely oblivious. The twist? Her ghost status is under Little Mermaid/Beauty and the Beast rules: If someone falls in love with her and truly loves her to the point where they confess their feelings and mean it, she'll get to restart her life as a human—but only if they confess first! Tsubomi is constantly fighting to keep her hopes from getting too far up, and also has resolved not to tell Mamoru any of the details in case he would feel pressured into trying to develop feelings for her. Meanwhile, absolutely everyone around is trying hardcore to matchmake them. Saturday Evening: [[Clockwork Under City Lights]] - An OVA adapted from a webcomic. The interconnected stories of a dozen tiny magically-powered, steampunk-ish self-aware constructs created in the shape of large insects, miniature forest animals, non-humanoid mythological creatures, and so forth, set loose in a big and bustling city somewhere on a world just to the left of our own; life can be beyond interesting as well as startlingly mundane when you're a metal and stained glass griffin the size of a teacup. Saturday Night: Fantasy Hero Mech - When war threatens, the denizens of the world of Sylvania have come together to summon the hero who was prophesied to come in their hour of greatest need; meanwhile, Takeshi is just a low-ranking grunt in the Unified Space Forces, working to repair a hyperspace transport gate. Right when he flips the switch to test it out, he and his repair mech are sucked through it into Sylvania, where the people on the other side of the gate assume he has arrived to save them. Sunday Early Morning: Guardian Treasures - When Earth is threatened by alien forces, Japan’s Three Treasures rise again in the form of giant mechs; three high school boys, Ryuu, Heiji, and Touya, are chosen by the mechs as pilots to defend Earth. With help from engineering and folklore student Asuka, they will work together to drive off the invaders and protect the world. But there’s a dark secret about the invaders that could threaten to tear apart the bonds they’ve formed, and endanger Earth in the process… Sunday Morning: Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams - It's the year 21XX, and being a Magical Girl is now a viable career option. Unfortunately, despite her own significant magical powers, Arika Izumi is much more interested in being an accountant or a programmer. Her relief when she learns that the experts at Mahou Gakuen, the most prestigious magical girl academy in the area, think she wouldn't be a good fit for the program is short-lived; when she arrives home after learning the results, she sees that her mother has not only already assumed she would pass, but told all of her own friends that Arika would be attending Mahou Gakuen. Luckily, Arika got accepted to a different high school that's not very far from Mahou Gakuen; with the help of her new friends in the Drama Club, and a little programming magic, Arika is set to fake the heck out of being a Mahou Gakuen student. Sunday at Noon: Nobunaga and the Warring States - A Hetalia-esque historical cartoon featuring Oda Nobunaga and other historical figures, and the personified States. Nobunaga has to constantly break up petty squabbles between the States. He is accompanied by his constant companion, fan favorite Piyo the nightingale, who is usually found perched on his shoulder or head. He is still waiting for her to sing. Sunday Afternoon: Tech Wizard - Garret Smelter has an absurdly good reputation for repairing spells and stuff; turns out he's been using mundane methods the entire time, but no one will believe him. Told from the POV of Hans, Garret's new apprentice, as Garret and his his "familiar" (a well-trained but mundane ferret named Lefty) go about the work of keeping the city of Archdale running on actual engineering. ''Video Room Two Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Heartbeat Rhythm Magic - Koharu is practicing with a hoop for rhythmic gymnastics club when suddenly, a strange monster made of stadium seating attacks the gym! Koharu is then found by a small, pink, hamster-like creature that tells her she is to be the leader of a team of magical girls who use the tools and skills of rhythmic gymnastics to defeat monsters and keep the evil Judge Malice from throwing off the rhythm of the world and using the power of hearts beating out of sync to take over the universe. Together with her teammates Natsuki, Akiko, and Fuyumi, Koharu will overthrow Judge Malice and restore the world's rhythm! Friday Afternoon: Bridge Over Dragon Run - A slice-of-life/drama with a fantasy twist. Seventh grader Sachie is having a rough time in middle school; none of her friends from grade school are going to the same school she is, and a number of the girls she does go to school with have chosen her as a target for bullying. She's retrieving her school bag from where some of the girls have thrown it into a creek when she comes across a large egg. The egg hatches when Sachie touches it, and a small dragon topples out, instantly bonding with her. Knowing instinctively that the tiny creature is now her responsibility, Sachie takes it home and attempts to hide it from her mother and younger brother, with decidedly mixed results. Friday Evening: DCLXVI - Margaret the witch has found a mysterious egg and a piece of ancient parchment with instructions for a ritual to hatch it, but no other information. Incredibly curious, Margaret decides to perform the ritual and see what’s inside. Just then, the angel Tenshi and the demon Koakuma show up to try and stop her; according to them, the egg actually contains a beast that will devour the world! Unfortunately, they're too late; the ritual has completed, and the egg hatches into a tiny golden dragon-like creature with a crimson mane. Knowing that they'll be punished if they go back with this bad news, Tenshi and Koakuma decide to team up with Margaret and raise it; maybe if they do everything right, it won't want to devour the world after all! It worked in that one British book/radio play/TV miniseries, after all... Lots of yuri subtext/moments. Friday Night: His Majesty's Guard - A harem anime. Ordinary Japanese high school student Genta learns that he's actually the heir to a vaguely European-ish country. Since the previous ruler was assassinated, Genta has been assigned a full team of highly trained guards, each specializing in a different weapon and/or fighting style, and each head-over-heels for Genta. His Majesty's Guard has gained a fair amount of attention for one of Genta's guards being a male character (Thomas), even if they are not expected to be the endgame ship. Saturday Early Morning: A Sprinkle of Love - A romantic comedy about a young engineering woman named Yuki who enters a baking competition with no grand prize besides the title of Best Baker. She meets the other competitors and gets along except for that one grumpy young man named Ken. Due to a misunderstanding, they get off on the wrong foot, but during the course of the competition they get to know each other better. It's not long before these feelings turn to love, but at the end of the competition nears and they are the only two left standing, can their love survive the heat? Saturday Morning: Where Is My Master? - A very fanservicey title about a dog named Pochiko who saves the life of a witch and is turned into a busty young woman as a reward. Pochiko is delighted, but her human master, Akihiko, is a lot more conflicted—especially because Pochiko still acts so much like a dog! Despite Akihiko trying his best to set her up with her own life as a human, Pochiko is determined to stay by Akihiko's side through thick and thin. Saturday at Noon: Alien Lifeswap - One day out of the blue, a space alien abducts ordinary teenage boy Noboru and takes his place in order to study humans and help make a decision about whether they should be introduced to the wider galactic alliance. The show follows both the alien in its attempts to pass as Noboru, and Noboru in a special not-quite-classroom with aliens from at least four other species who are undergoing basically the same trial, plus a teacher from the species that is taking the his place. Shenanigans ensue. Saturday Afternoon: City Heist - A recently released movie. The gem powering the technology of the village where Adorina lives has broken; the townsfolk can keep the town running for a time with human power alone, but this cannot be maintained for more than a few months. The only place to get replacement gems is the Eternal City, but the city's ruler guards them fiercely and charges outrageous amounts for replacements. Knowing her town can never afford the cost of a new gem, Adorina recruits retired master thief Antono, fighting and arms expert Rubena, and recently fired city guards Luksa and Johano to help her steal not only the gem she needs to help her village live on, but the technology to create new gems—just as Eternal City's ruler once stole it from Adorina's grandmother. Saturday Evening: [[Bolt Turners In The Sky]] - A century and a half ago, the world fell to a disaster known only as the Hungry Earth. No longer able to survive on the planet's surface, humanity fled to the skies. There, people live out their lives on city-fleets of assorted air vehicles - dirigibles, single-engine planes, helicarriers, and more. The series focuses on the Bolt Turners: a group of technicians who travel from vessel to vessel, fixing mechanical issues to keep the fleet flying. With art reminiscent of Studio Ghibli and a full cast of interesting, well-developed characters, the anime has fans hooked across the globe. Saturday Night: Inherit the Flame - A critically acclaimed movie, heavy with symbolism and artistically stunning. Legend says that anyone who sleeps at the foot of the mountain Cadair Idris will end up dead, mad, or a poet. Would-be poet Matthew goes to test this one night and ends up taken into another world, where his heart is removed and put in a cauldron of flame. Matthew instantly find that his skills as a poet have increased a hundred fold, and he joins a party of dozens of other artists who have come to challenge their skills over the years. As the night wears on, however, he meets Isabel, a fiddle player who misses her home, and he realizes that he, too, wants to go back to where he came from. Together, the two of them put their skills to the ultimate test to call their hearts back from the cauldron and return home. Sunday Early Morning: Rue 63rd - The story starts when Rokuro (whose name means "sixth son") and Sango (whose name means "third child") meet and commisserate that the other has the life that they want for themselves. Deciding to swap places, the "boy" (now going by Kuroko) and "girl" (now called Hanzo) slowly discover that part of the reason their new lives feel so right is because they are, in fact, transgender. The two of them need to navigate not only their new school lives as a gender they'd never thought they'd be yet are coming to realize is right, but also their home lives and interactions with each other, as they come to terms with their gender identities and what they want for the future. Sunday Morning: Swept Away - After nine-year-old Katsuo's puppy is saved from a frozen-over pond by a practicing curling team, he and his friends Hiraku and Minato become obsessed with the sport. When they reach high school, a teacher from Canada arrives, and they finally have an advisor for their curling club (with Katsuo's now grown dog to be the mascot). Unfortunately, they're one club member short. Katsuo sets his sights on Hajime, the younger brother of the boy who saved Katsuo's puppy. The problem? Hajime is completely uninterested in curling! Sunday at Noon: Hanako's School Days - A school drama about a fat girl named Hanako and her experiences in junior high and high school. A very sympathetic look at a fat girl character, who has been given a cute character design, and how she deals with the bullying and microaggressions she faces in everyday life. Sunday Afternoon: Isekai Bus Tour - Aiko is walking home from school one day when a bus comes barreling down the street right at her! Convinced that these are her last minutes alive, Aiko is astonished when, in a huge burst of light, the tour bus vanishes. Meanwhile, Youta and Miyu have been working together for years to get their new Akihabara tour bus up and running, and have just started their first tour! A combination of a horribly annoying passenger and a newspaper getting caught on the windshield has Youta losing control of the bus; right when he's about to hit a teenage girl, the entire bus is transported to another world—one that a passenger recognizes! The main storyline follows Youta and Miyu, with their mysterious new skills of Bus Driver and Tour Guide, as they hop from world to world with a full passenger list, hoping each new portal Miyu directs them to will be the one to bring them all back home. The post-episode clips, meanwhile, follow Aiko as she investigates the mysterious "hit-and-run" bus, leading to wilder and wilder conspiracy theories as she goes. [[Saturday Evening Events]]

''Video Room One Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Wanbon-Chan Goes To School - A slice-of-life anime about a puppy starting kindergarten or preschool in an anthropomorphic world. One of the most popular characters is Tarou, a wheely dog; another is Naoko, a cat who's pretending to be a dog to go to puppy school. Friday Afternoon: Crave - Story of Chiharu, a vampire who was adopted by humans and has no idea she's not also human. A series of super weird coincidences has kept the discovery from happening until she's in junior high or high school, when she begins craving blood. She becomes aware of other supernatural creatures when she discovers her own nature. All of her friends team up to make sure she gets however much blood she needs on a regular basis (which, at least while she's still young, isn't too much yet). Friday Evening: Sunset Eyes - Hikari has been cursed with a devilish appearance (horns, wings, tail, red-gray skin) and skin that burns anyone who touches her; the curse can only be reversed when someone who loves her with all their heart looks into her eyes at sunset. After meeting Hikari, Nadeshiko vows to fall in love with her and break the curse. After all, the curse doesn't say anything about Hikari having to love the person back, and there are a lot worse things to Nadeshiko's way of thinking than people thinking she likes girls "like that"—and one of those is being cursed never to touch your real true love, right? Friday Night: ohayo gozaimasu, it’s early - A school comedy about a kid, Kei (written with the character for "firefly"), who is always too tired for morning classes, but struggles to be at school anyway. Stories range from typical school stories trying to involve a kid who's either half or entirely asleep most of the time (and yet somehow gets good grades!), to his classmates trying to figure out why he keeps missing so much sleep, and how they can help (every time they try to find out it's something different, and all of their efforts so far have failed; it's doubtful Kei has noticed them in the first place). Saturday Early Morning: The Life and Times of a Background Character - Yamada Kenichi is a young adult who has a million part-time jobs and is constantly witness to major scenes from everyone else's stories. From the meet-cutes at the coffee shop, to the superpower-granting mix-ups at the lab, and even that one time the villain had an epiphany and a change of heart, Kenichi has a constant, unwitting, and even unwilling hand in them. Saturday Morning: Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! - Rika ends up being reborn as the heroine of an otome game. The problem is that she never had much interest in the game's canon love interests, but really liked drawing fanart of Hitomi, one of the 'rival' characters... who's even more stunning in person! Saturday at Noon: All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine? - Nicknamed WorldsOther by the fandom, this is a high fantasy series inspired by a series of light novels. The heroine of the story is Bremby, a sorceress who's lived under the threat of the Demon King's hordes for years, but the local temples promise that one day the Chosen One will be summoned from another world to set things right. Well, the day is here, and there seem to be at least four 'chosen ones'—who all claim to be from other worlds, argue about the details, and seem to be more interested in dating than actually doing what they're supposed to and stopping the Demon King. Fine; if their absurd powers are going to waste, maybe Bremby can just save her country herself... Saturday Afternoon: Ghost Girlfriend - High school boy Yoshida Mamoru moves into a house in a new neighborhood; turns out it's haunted by the ghost of a teenage girl! Tsubomi has an absolutely enormous crush on him, but he is absolutely oblivious. The twist? Her ghost status is under Little Mermaid/Beauty and the Beast rules: If someone falls in love with her and truly loves her to the point where they confess their feelings and mean it, she'll get to restart her life as a human—but only if they confess first! Tsubomi is constantly fighting to keep her hopes from getting too far up, and also has resolved not to tell Mamoru any of the details in case he would feel pressured into trying to develop feelings for her. Meanwhile, absolutely everyone around is trying hardcore to matchmake them. Saturday Evening: Clockwork Under City Lights - An OVA adapted from a webcomic. The interconnected stories of a dozen tiny magically-powered, steampunk-ish self-aware constructs created in the shape of large insects, miniature forest animals, non-humanoid mythological creatures, and so forth, set loose in a big and bustling city somewhere on a world just to the left of our own; life can be beyond interesting as well as startlingly mundane when you're a metal and stained glass griffin the size of a teacup. Saturday Night: Fantasy Hero Mech - When war threatens, the denizens of the world of Sylvania have come together to summon the hero who was prophesied to come in their hour of greatest need; meanwhile, Takeshi is just a low-ranking grunt in the Unified Space Forces, working to repair a hyperspace transport gate. Right when he flips the switch to test it out, he and his repair mech are sucked through it into Sylvania, where the people on the other side of the gate assume he has arrived to save them. Sunday Early Morning: [[Guardian Treasures]] - When Earth is threatened by alien forces, Japan’s Three Treasures rise again in the form of giant mechs; three high school boys, Ryuu, Heiji, and Touya, are chosen by the mechs as pilots to defend Earth. With help from engineering and folklore student Asuka, they will work together to drive off the invaders and protect the world. But there’s a dark secret about the invaders that could threaten to tear apart the bonds they’ve formed, and endanger Earth in the process… Sunday Morning: Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams - It's the year 21XX, and being a Magical Girl is now a viable career option. Unfortunately, despite her own significant magical powers, Arika Izumi is much more interested in being an accountant or a programmer. Her relief when she learns that the experts at Mahou Gakuen, the most prestigious magical girl academy in the area, think she wouldn't be a good fit for the program is short-lived; when she arrives home after learning the results, she sees that her mother has not only already assumed she would pass, but told all of her own friends that Arika would be attending Mahou Gakuen. Luckily, Arika got accepted to a different high school that's not very far from Mahou Gakuen; with the help of her new friends in the Drama Club, and a little programming magic, Arika is set to fake the heck out of being a Mahou Gakuen student. Sunday at Noon: Nobunaga and the Warring States - A Hetalia-esque historical cartoon featuring Oda Nobunaga and other historical figures, and the personified States. Nobunaga has to constantly break up petty squabbles between the States. He is accompanied by his constant companion, fan favorite Piyo the nightingale, who is usually found perched on his shoulder or head. He is still waiting for her to sing. Sunday Afternoon: Tech Wizard - Garret Smelter has an absurdly good reputation for repairing spells and stuff; turns out he's been using mundane methods the entire time, but no one will believe him. Told from the POV of Hans, Garret's new apprentice, as Garret and his his "familiar" (a well-trained but mundane ferret named Lefty) go about the work of keeping the city of Archdale running on actual engineering. ''Video Room Two Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Heartbeat Rhythm Magic - Koharu is practicing with a hoop for rhythmic gymnastics club when suddenly, a strange monster made of stadium seating attacks the gym! Koharu is then found by a small, pink, hamster-like creature that tells her she is to be the leader of a team of magical girls who use the tools and skills of rhythmic gymnastics to defeat monsters and keep the evil Judge Malice from throwing off the rhythm of the world and using the power of hearts beating out of sync to take over the universe. Together with her teammates Natsuki, Akiko, and Fuyumi, Koharu will overthrow Judge Malice and restore the world's rhythm! Friday Afternoon: Bridge Over Dragon Run - A slice-of-life/drama with a fantasy twist. Seventh grader Sachie is having a rough time in middle school; none of her friends from grade school are going to the same school she is, and a number of the girls she does go to school with have chosen her as a target for bullying. She's retrieving her school bag from where some of the girls have thrown it into a creek when she comes across a large egg. The egg hatches when Sachie touches it, and a small dragon topples out, instantly bonding with her. Knowing instinctively that the tiny creature is now her responsibility, Sachie takes it home and attempts to hide it from her mother and younger brother, with decidedly mixed results. Friday Evening: DCLXVI - Margaret the witch has found a mysterious egg and a piece of ancient parchment with instructions for a ritual to hatch it, but no other information. Incredibly curious, Margaret decides to perform the ritual and see what’s inside. Just then, the angel Tenshi and the demon Koakuma show up to try and stop her; according to them, the egg actually contains a beast that will devour the world! Unfortunately, they're too late; the ritual has completed, and the egg hatches into a tiny golden dragon-like creature with a crimson mane. Knowing that they'll be punished if they go back with this bad news, Tenshi and Koakuma decide to team up with Margaret and raise it; maybe if they do everything right, it won't want to devour the world after all! It worked in that one British book/radio play/TV miniseries, after all... Lots of yuri subtext/moments. Friday Night: His Majesty's Guard - A harem anime. Ordinary Japanese high school student Genta learns that he's actually the heir to a vaguely European-ish country. Since the previous ruler was assassinated, Genta has been assigned a full team of highly trained guards, each specializing in a different weapon and/or fighting style, and each head-over-heels for Genta. His Majesty's Guard has gained a fair amount of attention for one of Genta's guards being a male character (Thomas), even if they are not expected to be the endgame ship. Saturday Early Morning: A Sprinkle of Love - A romantic comedy about a young engineering woman named Yuki who enters a baking competition with no grand prize besides the title of Best Baker. She meets the other competitors and gets along except for that one grumpy young man named Ken. Due to a misunderstanding, they get off on the wrong foot, but during the course of the competition they get to know each other better. It's not long before these feelings turn to love, but at the end of the competition nears and they are the only two left standing, can their love survive the heat? Saturday Morning: Where Is My Master? - A very fanservicey title about a dog named Pochiko who saves the life of a witch and is turned into a busty young woman as a reward. Pochiko is delighted, but her human master, Akihiko, is a lot more conflicted—especially because Pochiko still acts so much like a dog! Despite Akihiko trying his best to set her up with her own life as a human, Pochiko is determined to stay by Akihiko's side through thick and thin. Saturday at Noon: Alien Lifeswap - One day out of the blue, a space alien abducts ordinary teenage boy Noboru and takes his place in order to study humans and help make a decision about whether they should be introduced to the wider galactic alliance. The show follows both the alien in its attempts to pass as Noboru, and Noboru in a special not-quite-classroom with aliens from at least four other species who are undergoing basically the same trial, plus a teacher from the species that is taking the his place. Shenanigans ensue. Saturday Afternoon: City Heist - A recently released movie. The gem powering the technology of the village where Adorina lives has broken; the townsfolk can keep the town running for a time with human power alone, but this cannot be maintained for more than a few months. The only place to get replacement gems is the Eternal City, but the city's ruler guards them fiercely and charges outrageous amounts for replacements. Knowing her town can never afford the cost of a new gem, Adorina recruits retired master thief Antono, fighting and arms expert Rubena, and recently fired city guards Luksa and Johano to help her steal not only the gem she needs to help her village live on, but the technology to create new gems—just as Eternal City's ruler once stole it from Adorina's grandmother. Saturday Evening: Bolt Turners In The Sky - A century and a half ago, the world fell to a disaster known only as the Hungry Earth. No longer able to survive on the planet's surface, humanity fled to the skies. There, people live out their lives on city-fleets of assorted air vehicles - dirigibles, single-engine planes, helicarriers, and more. The series focuses on the Bolt Turners: a group of technicians who travel from vessel to vessel, fixing mechanical issues to keep the fleet flying. With art reminiscent of Studio Ghibli and a full cast of interesting, well-developed characters, the anime has fans hooked across the globe. Saturday Night: Inherit the Flame - A critically acclaimed movie, heavy with symbolism and artistically stunning. Legend says that anyone who sleeps at the foot of the mountain Cadair Idris will end up dead, mad, or a poet. Would-be poet Matthew goes to test this one night and ends up taken into another world, where his heart is removed and put in a cauldron of flame. Matthew instantly find that his skills as a poet have increased a hundred fold, and he joins a party of dozens of other artists who have come to challenge their skills over the years. As the night wears on, however, he meets Isabel, a fiddle player who misses her home, and he realizes that he, too, wants to go back to where he came from. Together, the two of them put their skills to the ultimate test to call their hearts back from the cauldron and return home. Sunday Early Morning: [[Rue 63rd]] - The story starts when Rokuro (whose name means "sixth son") and Sango (whose name means "third child") meet and commisserate that the other has the life that they want for themselves. Deciding to swap places, the "boy" (now going by Kuroko) and "girl" (now called Hanzo) slowly discover that part of the reason their new lives feel so right is because they are, in fact, transgender. The two of them need to navigate not only their new school lives as a gender they'd never thought they'd be yet are coming to realize is right, but also their home lives and interactions with each other, as they come to terms with their gender identities and what they want for the future. Sunday Morning: Swept Away - After nine-year-old Katsuo's puppy is saved from a frozen-over pond by a practicing curling team, he and his friends Hiraku and Minato become obsessed with the sport. When they reach high school, a teacher from Canada arrives, and they finally have an advisor for their curling club (with Katsuo's now grown dog to be the mascot). Unfortunately, they're one club member short. Katsuo sets his sights on Hajime, the younger brother of the boy who saved Katsuo's puppy. The problem? Hajime is completely uninterested in curling! Sunday at Noon: Hanako's School Days - A school drama about a fat girl named Hanako and her experiences in junior high and high school. A very sympathetic look at a fat girl character, who has been given a cute character design, and how she deals with the bullying and microaggressions she faces in everyday life. Sunday Afternoon: Isekai Bus Tour - Aiko is walking home from school one day when a bus comes barreling down the street right at her! Convinced that these are her last minutes alive, Aiko is astonished when, in a huge burst of light, the tour bus vanishes. Meanwhile, Youta and Miyu have been working together for years to get their new Akihabara tour bus up and running, and have just started their first tour! A combination of a horribly annoying passenger and a newspaper getting caught on the windshield has Youta losing control of the bus; right when he's about to hit a teenage girl, the entire bus is transported to another world—one that a passenger recognizes! The main storyline follows Youta and Miyu, with their mysterious new skills of Bus Driver and Tour Guide, as they hop from world to world with a full passenger list, hoping each new portal Miyu directs them to will be the one to bring them all back home. The post-episode clips, meanwhile, follow Aiko as she investigates the mysterious "hit-and-run" bus, leading to wilder and wilder conspiracy theories as she goes. [[Sunday Early Morning Events]]

''Video Room One Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Wanbon-Chan Goes To School - A slice-of-life anime about a puppy starting kindergarten or preschool in an anthropomorphic world. One of the most popular characters is Tarou, a wheely dog; another is Naoko, a cat who's pretending to be a dog to go to puppy school. Friday Afternoon: Crave - Story of Chiharu, a vampire who was adopted by humans and has no idea she's not also human. A series of super weird coincidences has kept the discovery from happening until she's in junior high or high school, when she begins craving blood. She becomes aware of other supernatural creatures when she discovers her own nature. All of her friends team up to make sure she gets however much blood she needs on a regular basis (which, at least while she's still young, isn't too much yet). Friday Evening: Sunset Eyes - Hikari has been cursed with a devilish appearance (horns, wings, tail, red-gray skin) and skin that burns anyone who touches her; the curse can only be reversed when someone who loves her with all their heart looks into her eyes at sunset. After meeting Hikari, Nadeshiko vows to fall in love with her and break the curse. After all, the curse doesn't say anything about Hikari having to love the person back, and there are a lot worse things to Nadeshiko's way of thinking than people thinking she likes girls "like that"—and one of those is being cursed never to touch your real true love, right? Friday Night: ohayo gozaimasu, it’s early - A school comedy about a kid, Kei (written with the character for "firefly"), who is always too tired for morning classes, but struggles to be at school anyway. Stories range from typical school stories trying to involve a kid who's either half or entirely asleep most of the time (and yet somehow gets good grades!), to his classmates trying to figure out why he keeps missing so much sleep, and how they can help (every time they try to find out it's something different, and all of their efforts so far have failed; it's doubtful Kei has noticed them in the first place). Saturday Early Morning: The Life and Times of a Background Character - Yamada Kenichi is a young adult who has a million part-time jobs and is constantly witness to major scenes from everyone else's stories. From the meet-cutes at the coffee shop, to the superpower-granting mix-ups at the lab, and even that one time the villain had an epiphany and a change of heart, Kenichi has a constant, unwitting, and even unwilling hand in them. Saturday Morning: Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! - Rika ends up being reborn as the heroine of an otome game. The problem is that she never had much interest in the game's canon love interests, but really liked drawing fanart of Hitomi, one of the 'rival' characters... who's even more stunning in person! Saturday at Noon: All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine? - Nicknamed WorldsOther by the fandom, this is a high fantasy series inspired by a series of light novels. The heroine of the story is Bremby, a sorceress who's lived under the threat of the Demon King's hordes for years, but the local temples promise that one day the Chosen One will be summoned from another world to set things right. Well, the day is here, and there seem to be at least four 'chosen ones'—who all claim to be from other worlds, argue about the details, and seem to be more interested in dating than actually doing what they're supposed to and stopping the Demon King. Fine; if their absurd powers are going to waste, maybe Bremby can just save her country herself... Saturday Afternoon: Ghost Girlfriend - High school boy Yoshida Mamoru moves into a house in a new neighborhood; turns out it's haunted by the ghost of a teenage girl! Tsubomi has an absolutely enormous crush on him, but he is absolutely oblivious. The twist? Her ghost status is under Little Mermaid/Beauty and the Beast rules: If someone falls in love with her and truly loves her to the point where they confess their feelings and mean it, she'll get to restart her life as a human—but only if they confess first! Tsubomi is constantly fighting to keep her hopes from getting too far up, and also has resolved not to tell Mamoru any of the details in case he would feel pressured into trying to develop feelings for her. Meanwhile, absolutely everyone around is trying hardcore to matchmake them. Saturday Evening: Clockwork Under City Lights - An OVA adapted from a webcomic. The interconnected stories of a dozen tiny magically-powered, steampunk-ish self-aware constructs created in the shape of large insects, miniature forest animals, non-humanoid mythological creatures, and so forth, set loose in a big and bustling city somewhere on a world just to the left of our own; life can be beyond interesting as well as startlingly mundane when you're a metal and stained glass griffin the size of a teacup. Saturday Night: Fantasy Hero Mech - When war threatens, the denizens of the world of Sylvania have come together to summon the hero who was prophesied to come in their hour of greatest need; meanwhile, Takeshi is just a low-ranking grunt in the Unified Space Forces, working to repair a hyperspace transport gate. Right when he flips the switch to test it out, he and his repair mech are sucked through it into Sylvania, where the people on the other side of the gate assume he has arrived to save them. Sunday Early Morning: Guardian Treasures - When Earth is threatened by alien forces, Japan’s Three Treasures rise again in the form of giant mechs; three high school boys, Ryuu, Heiji, and Touya, are chosen by the mechs as pilots to defend Earth. With help from engineering and folklore student Asuka, they will work together to drive off the invaders and protect the world. But there’s a dark secret about the invaders that could threaten to tear apart the bonds they’ve formed, and endanger Earth in the process… Sunday Morning: [[Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams]] - It's the year 21XX, and being a Magical Girl is now a viable career option. Unfortunately, despite her own significant magical powers, Arika Izumi is much more interested in being an accountant or a programmer. Her relief when she learns that the experts at Mahou Gakuen, the most prestigious magical girl academy in the area, think she wouldn't be a good fit for the program is short-lived; when she arrives home after learning the results, she sees that her mother has not only already assumed she would pass, but told all of her own friends that Arika would be attending Mahou Gakuen. Luckily, Arika got accepted to a different high school that's not very far from Mahou Gakuen; with the help of her new friends in the Drama Club, and a little programming magic, Arika is set to fake the heck out of being a Mahou Gakuen student. Sunday at Noon: Nobunaga and the Warring States - A Hetalia-esque historical cartoon featuring Oda Nobunaga and other historical figures, and the personified States. Nobunaga has to constantly break up petty squabbles between the States. He is accompanied by his constant companion, fan favorite Piyo the nightingale, who is usually found perched on his shoulder or head. He is still waiting for her to sing. Sunday Afternoon: Tech Wizard - Garret Smelter has an absurdly good reputation for repairing spells and stuff; turns out he's been using mundane methods the entire time, but no one will believe him. Told from the POV of Hans, Garret's new apprentice, as Garret and his his "familiar" (a well-trained but mundane ferret named Lefty) go about the work of keeping the city of Archdale running on actual engineering. ''Video Room Two Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Heartbeat Rhythm Magic - Koharu is practicing with a hoop for rhythmic gymnastics club when suddenly, a strange monster made of stadium seating attacks the gym! Koharu is then found by a small, pink, hamster-like creature that tells her she is to be the leader of a team of magical girls who use the tools and skills of rhythmic gymnastics to defeat monsters and keep the evil Judge Malice from throwing off the rhythm of the world and using the power of hearts beating out of sync to take over the universe. Together with her teammates Natsuki, Akiko, and Fuyumi, Koharu will overthrow Judge Malice and restore the world's rhythm! Friday Afternoon: Bridge Over Dragon Run - A slice-of-life/drama with a fantasy twist. Seventh grader Sachie is having a rough time in middle school; none of her friends from grade school are going to the same school she is, and a number of the girls she does go to school with have chosen her as a target for bullying. She's retrieving her school bag from where some of the girls have thrown it into a creek when she comes across a large egg. The egg hatches when Sachie touches it, and a small dragon topples out, instantly bonding with her. Knowing instinctively that the tiny creature is now her responsibility, Sachie takes it home and attempts to hide it from her mother and younger brother, with decidedly mixed results. Friday Evening: DCLXVI - Margaret the witch has found a mysterious egg and a piece of ancient parchment with instructions for a ritual to hatch it, but no other information. Incredibly curious, Margaret decides to perform the ritual and see what’s inside. Just then, the angel Tenshi and the demon Koakuma show up to try and stop her; according to them, the egg actually contains a beast that will devour the world! Unfortunately, they're too late; the ritual has completed, and the egg hatches into a tiny golden dragon-like creature with a crimson mane. Knowing that they'll be punished if they go back with this bad news, Tenshi and Koakuma decide to team up with Margaret and raise it; maybe if they do everything right, it won't want to devour the world after all! It worked in that one British book/radio play/TV miniseries, after all... Lots of yuri subtext/moments. Friday Night: His Majesty's Guard - A harem anime. Ordinary Japanese high school student Genta learns that he's actually the heir to a vaguely European-ish country. Since the previous ruler was assassinated, Genta has been assigned a full team of highly trained guards, each specializing in a different weapon and/or fighting style, and each head-over-heels for Genta. His Majesty's Guard has gained a fair amount of attention for one of Genta's guards being a male character (Thomas), even if they are not expected to be the endgame ship. Saturday Early Morning: A Sprinkle of Love - A romantic comedy about a young engineering woman named Yuki who enters a baking competition with no grand prize besides the title of Best Baker. She meets the other competitors and gets along except for that one grumpy young man named Ken. Due to a misunderstanding, they get off on the wrong foot, but during the course of the competition they get to know each other better. It's not long before these feelings turn to love, but at the end of the competition nears and they are the only two left standing, can their love survive the heat? Saturday Morning: Where Is My Master? - A very fanservicey title about a dog named Pochiko who saves the life of a witch and is turned into a busty young woman as a reward. Pochiko is delighted, but her human master, Akihiko, is a lot more conflicted—especially because Pochiko still acts so much like a dog! Despite Akihiko trying his best to set her up with her own life as a human, Pochiko is determined to stay by Akihiko's side through thick and thin. Saturday at Noon: Alien Lifeswap - One day out of the blue, a space alien abducts ordinary teenage boy Noboru and takes his place in order to study humans and help make a decision about whether they should be introduced to the wider galactic alliance. The show follows both the alien in its attempts to pass as Noboru, and Noboru in a special not-quite-classroom with aliens from at least four other species who are undergoing basically the same trial, plus a teacher from the species that is taking the his place. Shenanigans ensue. Saturday Afternoon: City Heist - A recently released movie. The gem powering the technology of the village where Adorina lives has broken; the townsfolk can keep the town running for a time with human power alone, but this cannot be maintained for more than a few months. The only place to get replacement gems is the Eternal City, but the city's ruler guards them fiercely and charges outrageous amounts for replacements. Knowing her town can never afford the cost of a new gem, Adorina recruits retired master thief Antono, fighting and arms expert Rubena, and recently fired city guards Luksa and Johano to help her steal not only the gem she needs to help her village live on, but the technology to create new gems—just as Eternal City's ruler once stole it from Adorina's grandmother. Saturday Evening: Bolt Turners In The Sky - A century and a half ago, the world fell to a disaster known only as the Hungry Earth. No longer able to survive on the planet's surface, humanity fled to the skies. There, people live out their lives on city-fleets of assorted air vehicles - dirigibles, single-engine planes, helicarriers, and more. The series focuses on the Bolt Turners: a group of technicians who travel from vessel to vessel, fixing mechanical issues to keep the fleet flying. With art reminiscent of Studio Ghibli and a full cast of interesting, well-developed characters, the anime has fans hooked across the globe. Saturday Night: Inherit the Flame - A critically acclaimed movie, heavy with symbolism and artistically stunning. Legend says that anyone who sleeps at the foot of the mountain Cadair Idris will end up dead, mad, or a poet. Would-be poet Matthew goes to test this one night and ends up taken into another world, where his heart is removed and put in a cauldron of flame. Matthew instantly find that his skills as a poet have increased a hundred fold, and he joins a party of dozens of other artists who have come to challenge their skills over the years. As the night wears on, however, he meets Isabel, a fiddle player who misses her home, and he realizes that he, too, wants to go back to where he came from. Together, the two of them put their skills to the ultimate test to call their hearts back from the cauldron and return home. Sunday Early Morning: Rue 63rd - The story starts when Rokuro (whose name means "sixth son") and Sango (whose name means "third child") meet and commisserate that the other has the life that they want for themselves. Deciding to swap places, the "boy" (now going by Kuroko) and "girl" (now called Hanzo) slowly discover that part of the reason their new lives feel so right is because they are, in fact, transgender. The two of them need to navigate not only their new school lives as a gender they'd never thought they'd be yet are coming to realize is right, but also their home lives and interactions with each other, as they come to terms with their gender identities and what they want for the future. Sunday Morning: [[Swept Away]] - After nine-year-old Katsuo's puppy is saved from a frozen-over pond by a practicing curling team, he and his friends Hiraku and Minato become obsessed with the sport. When they reach high school, a teacher from Canada arrives, and they finally have an advisor for their curling club (with Katsuo's now grown dog to be the mascot). Unfortunately, they're one club member short. Katsuo sets his sights on Hajime, the younger brother of the boy who saved Katsuo's puppy. The problem? Hajime is completely uninterested in curling! Sunday at Noon: Hanako's School Days - A school drama about a fat girl named Hanako and her experiences in junior high and high school. A very sympathetic look at a fat girl character, who has been given a cute character design, and how she deals with the bullying and microaggressions she faces in everyday life. Sunday Afternoon: Isekai Bus Tour - Aiko is walking home from school one day when a bus comes barreling down the street right at her! Convinced that these are her last minutes alive, Aiko is astonished when, in a huge burst of light, the tour bus vanishes. Meanwhile, Youta and Miyu have been working together for years to get their new Akihabara tour bus up and running, and have just started their first tour! A combination of a horribly annoying passenger and a newspaper getting caught on the windshield has Youta losing control of the bus; right when he's about to hit a teenage girl, the entire bus is transported to another world—one that a passenger recognizes! The main storyline follows Youta and Miyu, with their mysterious new skills of Bus Driver and Tour Guide, as they hop from world to world with a full passenger list, hoping each new portal Miyu directs them to will be the one to bring them all back home. The post-episode clips, meanwhile, follow Aiko as she investigates the mysterious "hit-and-run" bus, leading to wilder and wilder conspiracy theories as she goes. [[Sunday Morning Events]]

''Video Room One Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Wanbon-Chan Goes To School - A slice-of-life anime about a puppy starting kindergarten or preschool in an anthropomorphic world. One of the most popular characters is Tarou, a wheely dog; another is Naoko, a cat who's pretending to be a dog to go to puppy school. Friday Afternoon: Crave - Story of Chiharu, a vampire who was adopted by humans and has no idea she's not also human. A series of super weird coincidences has kept the discovery from happening until she's in junior high or high school, when she begins craving blood. She becomes aware of other supernatural creatures when she discovers her own nature. All of her friends team up to make sure she gets however much blood she needs on a regular basis (which, at least while she's still young, isn't too much yet). Friday Evening: Sunset Eyes - Hikari has been cursed with a devilish appearance (horns, wings, tail, red-gray skin) and skin that burns anyone who touches her; the curse can only be reversed when someone who loves her with all their heart looks into her eyes at sunset. After meeting Hikari, Nadeshiko vows to fall in love with her and break the curse. After all, the curse doesn't say anything about Hikari having to love the person back, and there are a lot worse things to Nadeshiko's way of thinking than people thinking she likes girls "like that"—and one of those is being cursed never to touch your real true love, right? Friday Night: ohayo gozaimasu, it’s early - A school comedy about a kid, Kei (written with the character for "firefly"), who is always too tired for morning classes, but struggles to be at school anyway. Stories range from typical school stories trying to involve a kid who's either half or entirely asleep most of the time (and yet somehow gets good grades!), to his classmates trying to figure out why he keeps missing so much sleep, and how they can help (every time they try to find out it's something different, and all of their efforts so far have failed; it's doubtful Kei has noticed them in the first place). Saturday Early Morning: The Life and Times of a Background Character - Yamada Kenichi is a young adult who has a million part-time jobs and is constantly witness to major scenes from everyone else's stories. From the meet-cutes at the coffee shop, to the superpower-granting mix-ups at the lab, and even that one time the villain had an epiphany and a change of heart, Kenichi has a constant, unwitting, and even unwilling hand in them. Saturday Morning: Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! - Rika ends up being reborn as the heroine of an otome game. The problem is that she never had much interest in the game's canon love interests, but really liked drawing fanart of Hitomi, one of the 'rival' characters... who's even more stunning in person! Saturday at Noon: All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine? - Nicknamed WorldsOther by the fandom, this is a high fantasy series inspired by a series of light novels. The heroine of the story is Bremby, a sorceress who's lived under the threat of the Demon King's hordes for years, but the local temples promise that one day the Chosen One will be summoned from another world to set things right. Well, the day is here, and there seem to be at least four 'chosen ones'—who all claim to be from other worlds, argue about the details, and seem to be more interested in dating than actually doing what they're supposed to and stopping the Demon King. Fine; if their absurd powers are going to waste, maybe Bremby can just save her country herself... Saturday Afternoon: Ghost Girlfriend - High school boy Yoshida Mamoru moves into a house in a new neighborhood; turns out it's haunted by the ghost of a teenage girl! Tsubomi has an absolutely enormous crush on him, but he is absolutely oblivious. The twist? Her ghost status is under Little Mermaid/Beauty and the Beast rules: If someone falls in love with her and truly loves her to the point where they confess their feelings and mean it, she'll get to restart her life as a human—but only if they confess first! Tsubomi is constantly fighting to keep her hopes from getting too far up, and also has resolved not to tell Mamoru any of the details in case he would feel pressured into trying to develop feelings for her. Meanwhile, absolutely everyone around is trying hardcore to matchmake them. Saturday Evening: Clockwork Under City Lights - An OVA adapted from a webcomic. The interconnected stories of a dozen tiny magically-powered, steampunk-ish self-aware constructs created in the shape of large insects, miniature forest animals, non-humanoid mythological creatures, and so forth, set loose in a big and bustling city somewhere on a world just to the left of our own; life can be beyond interesting as well as startlingly mundane when you're a metal and stained glass griffin the size of a teacup. Saturday Night: Fantasy Hero Mech - When war threatens, the denizens of the world of Sylvania have come together to summon the hero who was prophesied to come in their hour of greatest need; meanwhile, Takeshi is just a low-ranking grunt in the Unified Space Forces, working to repair a hyperspace transport gate. Right when he flips the switch to test it out, he and his repair mech are sucked through it into Sylvania, where the people on the other side of the gate assume he has arrived to save them. Sunday Early Morning: Guardian Treasures - When Earth is threatened by alien forces, Japan’s Three Treasures rise again in the form of giant mechs; three high school boys, Ryuu, Heiji, and Touya, are chosen by the mechs as pilots to defend Earth. With help from engineering and folklore student Asuka, they will work together to drive off the invaders and protect the world. But there’s a dark secret about the invaders that could threaten to tear apart the bonds they’ve formed, and endanger Earth in the process… Sunday Morning: Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams - It's the year 21XX, and being a Magical Girl is now a viable career option. Unfortunately, despite her own significant magical powers, Arika Izumi is much more interested in being an accountant or a programmer. Her relief when she learns that the experts at Mahou Gakuen, the most prestigious magical girl academy in the area, think she wouldn't be a good fit for the program is short-lived; when she arrives home after learning the results, she sees that her mother has not only already assumed she would pass, but told all of her own friends that Arika would be attending Mahou Gakuen. Luckily, Arika got accepted to a different high school that's not very far from Mahou Gakuen; with the help of her new friends in the Drama Club, and a little programming magic, Arika is set to fake the heck out of being a Mahou Gakuen student. Sunday at Noon: [[Nobunaga and the Warring States]] - A Hetalia-esque historical cartoon featuring Oda Nobunaga and other historical figures, and the personified States. Nobunaga has to constantly break up petty squabbles between the States. He is accompanied by his constant companion, fan favorite Piyo the nightingale, who is usually found perched on his shoulder or head. He is still waiting for her to sing. Sunday Afternoon: Tech Wizard - Garret Smelter has an absurdly good reputation for repairing spells and stuff; turns out he's been using mundane methods the entire time, but no one will believe him. Told from the POV of Hans, Garret's new apprentice, as Garret and his his "familiar" (a well-trained but mundane ferret named Lefty) go about the work of keeping the city of Archdale running on actual engineering. ''Video Room Two Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Heartbeat Rhythm Magic - Koharu is practicing with a hoop for rhythmic gymnastics club when suddenly, a strange monster made of stadium seating attacks the gym! Koharu is then found by a small, pink, hamster-like creature that tells her she is to be the leader of a team of magical girls who use the tools and skills of rhythmic gymnastics to defeat monsters and keep the evil Judge Malice from throwing off the rhythm of the world and using the power of hearts beating out of sync to take over the universe. Together with her teammates Natsuki, Akiko, and Fuyumi, Koharu will overthrow Judge Malice and restore the world's rhythm! Friday Afternoon: Bridge Over Dragon Run - A slice-of-life/drama with a fantasy twist. Seventh grader Sachie is having a rough time in middle school; none of her friends from grade school are going to the same school she is, and a number of the girls she does go to school with have chosen her as a target for bullying. She's retrieving her school bag from where some of the girls have thrown it into a creek when she comes across a large egg. The egg hatches when Sachie touches it, and a small dragon topples out, instantly bonding with her. Knowing instinctively that the tiny creature is now her responsibility, Sachie takes it home and attempts to hide it from her mother and younger brother, with decidedly mixed results. Friday Evening: DCLXVI - Margaret the witch has found a mysterious egg and a piece of ancient parchment with instructions for a ritual to hatch it, but no other information. Incredibly curious, Margaret decides to perform the ritual and see what’s inside. Just then, the angel Tenshi and the demon Koakuma show up to try and stop her; according to them, the egg actually contains a beast that will devour the world! Unfortunately, they're too late; the ritual has completed, and the egg hatches into a tiny golden dragon-like creature with a crimson mane. Knowing that they'll be punished if they go back with this bad news, Tenshi and Koakuma decide to team up with Margaret and raise it; maybe if they do everything right, it won't want to devour the world after all! It worked in that one British book/radio play/TV miniseries, after all... Lots of yuri subtext/moments. Friday Night: His Majesty's Guard - A harem anime. Ordinary Japanese high school student Genta learns that he's actually the heir to a vaguely European-ish country. Since the previous ruler was assassinated, Genta has been assigned a full team of highly trained guards, each specializing in a different weapon and/or fighting style, and each head-over-heels for Genta. His Majesty's Guard has gained a fair amount of attention for one of Genta's guards being a male character (Thomas), even if they are not expected to be the endgame ship. Saturday Early Morning: A Sprinkle of Love - A romantic comedy about a young engineering woman named Yuki who enters a baking competition with no grand prize besides the title of Best Baker. She meets the other competitors and gets along except for that one grumpy young man named Ken. Due to a misunderstanding, they get off on the wrong foot, but during the course of the competition they get to know each other better. It's not long before these feelings turn to love, but at the end of the competition nears and they are the only two left standing, can their love survive the heat? Saturday Morning: Where Is My Master? - A very fanservicey title about a dog named Pochiko who saves the life of a witch and is turned into a busty young woman as a reward. Pochiko is delighted, but her human master, Akihiko, is a lot more conflicted—especially because Pochiko still acts so much like a dog! Despite Akihiko trying his best to set her up with her own life as a human, Pochiko is determined to stay by Akihiko's side through thick and thin. Saturday at Noon: Alien Lifeswap - One day out of the blue, a space alien abducts ordinary teenage boy Noboru and takes his place in order to study humans and help make a decision about whether they should be introduced to the wider galactic alliance. The show follows both the alien in its attempts to pass as Noboru, and Noboru in a special not-quite-classroom with aliens from at least four other species who are undergoing basically the same trial, plus a teacher from the species that is taking the his place. Shenanigans ensue. Saturday Afternoon: City Heist - A recently released movie. The gem powering the technology of the village where Adorina lives has broken; the townsfolk can keep the town running for a time with human power alone, but this cannot be maintained for more than a few months. The only place to get replacement gems is the Eternal City, but the city's ruler guards them fiercely and charges outrageous amounts for replacements. Knowing her town can never afford the cost of a new gem, Adorina recruits retired master thief Antono, fighting and arms expert Rubena, and recently fired city guards Luksa and Johano to help her steal not only the gem she needs to help her village live on, but the technology to create new gems—just as Eternal City's ruler once stole it from Adorina's grandmother. Saturday Evening: Bolt Turners In The Sky - A century and a half ago, the world fell to a disaster known only as the Hungry Earth. No longer able to survive on the planet's surface, humanity fled to the skies. There, people live out their lives on city-fleets of assorted air vehicles - dirigibles, single-engine planes, helicarriers, and more. The series focuses on the Bolt Turners: a group of technicians who travel from vessel to vessel, fixing mechanical issues to keep the fleet flying. With art reminiscent of Studio Ghibli and a full cast of interesting, well-developed characters, the anime has fans hooked across the globe. Saturday Night: Inherit the Flame - A critically acclaimed movie, heavy with symbolism and artistically stunning. Legend says that anyone who sleeps at the foot of the mountain Cadair Idris will end up dead, mad, or a poet. Would-be poet Matthew goes to test this one night and ends up taken into another world, where his heart is removed and put in a cauldron of flame. Matthew instantly find that his skills as a poet have increased a hundred fold, and he joins a party of dozens of other artists who have come to challenge their skills over the years. As the night wears on, however, he meets Isabel, a fiddle player who misses her home, and he realizes that he, too, wants to go back to where he came from. Together, the two of them put their skills to the ultimate test to call their hearts back from the cauldron and return home. Sunday Early Morning: Rue 63rd - The story starts when Rokuro (whose name means "sixth son") and Sango (whose name means "third child") meet and commisserate that the other has the life that they want for themselves. Deciding to swap places, the "boy" (now going by Kuroko) and "girl" (now called Hanzo) slowly discover that part of the reason their new lives feel so right is because they are, in fact, transgender. The two of them need to navigate not only their new school lives as a gender they'd never thought they'd be yet are coming to realize is right, but also their home lives and interactions with each other, as they come to terms with their gender identities and what they want for the future. Sunday Morning: Swept Away - After nine-year-old Katsuo's puppy is saved from a frozen-over pond by a practicing curling team, he and his friends Hiraku and Minato become obsessed with the sport. When they reach high school, a teacher from Canada arrives, and they finally have an advisor for their curling club (with Katsuo's now grown dog to be the mascot). Unfortunately, they're one club member short. Katsuo sets his sights on Hajime, the younger brother of the boy who saved Katsuo's puppy. The problem? Hajime is completely uninterested in curling! Sunday at Noon: [[Hanako's School Days]] - A school drama about a fat girl named Hanako and her experiences in junior high and high school. A very sympathetic look at a fat girl character, who has been given a cute character design, and how she deals with the bullying and microaggressions she faces in everyday life. Sunday Afternoon: Isekai Bus Tour - Aiko is walking home from school one day when a bus comes barreling down the street right at her! Convinced that these are her last minutes alive, Aiko is astonished when, in a huge burst of light, the tour bus vanishes. Meanwhile, Youta and Miyu have been working together for years to get their new Akihabara tour bus up and running, and have just started their first tour! A combination of a horribly annoying passenger and a newspaper getting caught on the windshield has Youta losing control of the bus; right when he's about to hit a teenage girl, the entire bus is transported to another world—one that a passenger recognizes! The main storyline follows Youta and Miyu, with their mysterious new skills of Bus Driver and Tour Guide, as they hop from world to world with a full passenger list, hoping each new portal Miyu directs them to will be the one to bring them all back home. The post-episode clips, meanwhile, follow Aiko as she investigates the mysterious "hit-and-run" bus, leading to wilder and wilder conspiracy theories as she goes. [[Sunday Noon Events]]

''Video Room One Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Wanbon-Chan Goes To School - A slice-of-life anime about a puppy starting kindergarten or preschool in an anthropomorphic world. One of the most popular characters is Tarou, a wheely dog; another is Naoko, a cat who's pretending to be a dog to go to puppy school. Friday Afternoon: Crave - Story of Chiharu, a vampire who was adopted by humans and has no idea she's not also human. A series of super weird coincidences has kept the discovery from happening until she's in junior high or high school, when she begins craving blood. She becomes aware of other supernatural creatures when she discovers her own nature. All of her friends team up to make sure she gets however much blood she needs on a regular basis (which, at least while she's still young, isn't too much yet). Friday Evening: Sunset Eyes - Hikari has been cursed with a devilish appearance (horns, wings, tail, red-gray skin) and skin that burns anyone who touches her; the curse can only be reversed when someone who loves her with all their heart looks into her eyes at sunset. After meeting Hikari, Nadeshiko vows to fall in love with her and break the curse. After all, the curse doesn't say anything about Hikari having to love the person back, and there are a lot worse things to Nadeshiko's way of thinking than people thinking she likes girls "like that"—and one of those is being cursed never to touch your real true love, right? Friday Night: ohayo gozaimasu, it’s early - A school comedy about a kid, Kei (written with the character for "firefly"), who is always too tired for morning classes, but struggles to be at school anyway. Stories range from typical school stories trying to involve a kid who's either half or entirely asleep most of the time (and yet somehow gets good grades!), to his classmates trying to figure out why he keeps missing so much sleep, and how they can help (every time they try to find out it's something different, and all of their efforts so far have failed; it's doubtful Kei has noticed them in the first place). Saturday Early Morning: The Life and Times of a Background Character - Yamada Kenichi is a young adult who has a million part-time jobs and is constantly witness to major scenes from everyone else's stories. From the meet-cutes at the coffee shop, to the superpower-granting mix-ups at the lab, and even that one time the villain had an epiphany and a change of heart, Kenichi has a constant, unwitting, and even unwilling hand in them. Saturday Morning: Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! - Rika ends up being reborn as the heroine of an otome game. The problem is that she never had much interest in the game's canon love interests, but really liked drawing fanart of Hitomi, one of the 'rival' characters... who's even more stunning in person! Saturday at Noon: All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine? - Nicknamed WorldsOther by the fandom, this is a high fantasy series inspired by a series of light novels. The heroine of the story is Bremby, a sorceress who's lived under the threat of the Demon King's hordes for years, but the local temples promise that one day the Chosen One will be summoned from another world to set things right. Well, the day is here, and there seem to be at least four 'chosen ones'—who all claim to be from other worlds, argue about the details, and seem to be more interested in dating than actually doing what they're supposed to and stopping the Demon King. Fine; if their absurd powers are going to waste, maybe Bremby can just save her country herself... Saturday Afternoon: Ghost Girlfriend - High school boy Yoshida Mamoru moves into a house in a new neighborhood; turns out it's haunted by the ghost of a teenage girl! Tsubomi has an absolutely enormous crush on him, but he is absolutely oblivious. The twist? Her ghost status is under Little Mermaid/Beauty and the Beast rules: If someone falls in love with her and truly loves her to the point where they confess their feelings and mean it, she'll get to restart her life as a human—but only if they confess first! Tsubomi is constantly fighting to keep her hopes from getting too far up, and also has resolved not to tell Mamoru any of the details in case he would feel pressured into trying to develop feelings for her. Meanwhile, absolutely everyone around is trying hardcore to matchmake them. Saturday Evening: Clockwork Under City Lights - An OVA adapted from a webcomic. The interconnected stories of a dozen tiny magically-powered, steampunk-ish self-aware constructs created in the shape of large insects, miniature forest animals, non-humanoid mythological creatures, and so forth, set loose in a big and bustling city somewhere on a world just to the left of our own; life can be beyond interesting as well as startlingly mundane when you're a metal and stained glass griffin the size of a teacup. Saturday Night: Fantasy Hero Mech - When war threatens, the denizens of the world of Sylvania have come together to summon the hero who was prophesied to come in their hour of greatest need; meanwhile, Takeshi is just a low-ranking grunt in the Unified Space Forces, working to repair a hyperspace transport gate. Right when he flips the switch to test it out, he and his repair mech are sucked through it into Sylvania, where the people on the other side of the gate assume he has arrived to save them. Sunday Early Morning: Guardian Treasures - When Earth is threatened by alien forces, Japan’s Three Treasures rise again in the form of giant mechs; three high school boys, Ryuu, Heiji, and Touya, are chosen by the mechs as pilots to defend Earth. With help from engineering and folklore student Asuka, they will work together to drive off the invaders and protect the world. But there’s a dark secret about the invaders that could threaten to tear apart the bonds they’ve formed, and endanger Earth in the process… Sunday Morning: Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams - It's the year 21XX, and being a Magical Girl is now a viable career option. Unfortunately, despite her own significant magical powers, Arika Izumi is much more interested in being an accountant or a programmer. Her relief when she learns that the experts at Mahou Gakuen, the most prestigious magical girl academy in the area, think she wouldn't be a good fit for the program is short-lived; when she arrives home after learning the results, she sees that her mother has not only already assumed she would pass, but told all of her own friends that Arika would be attending Mahou Gakuen. Luckily, Arika got accepted to a different high school that's not very far from Mahou Gakuen; with the help of her new friends in the Drama Club, and a little programming magic, Arika is set to fake the heck out of being a Mahou Gakuen student. Sunday at Noon: Nobunaga and the Warring States - A Hetalia-esque historical cartoon featuring Oda Nobunaga and other historical figures, and the personified States. Nobunaga has to constantly break up petty squabbles between the States. He is accompanied by his constant companion, fan favorite Piyo the nightingale, who is usually found perched on his shoulder or head. He is still waiting for her to sing. Sunday Afternoon: [[Tech Wizard]] - Garret Smelter has an absurdly good reputation for repairing spells and stuff; turns out he's been using mundane methods the entire time, but no one will believe him. Told from the POV of Hans, Garret's new apprentice, as Garret and his his "familiar" (a well-trained but mundane ferret named Lefty) go about the work of keeping the city of Archdale running on actual engineering. ''Video Room Two Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Heartbeat Rhythm Magic - Koharu is practicing with a hoop for rhythmic gymnastics club when suddenly, a strange monster made of stadium seating attacks the gym! Koharu is then found by a small, pink, hamster-like creature that tells her she is to be the leader of a team of magical girls who use the tools and skills of rhythmic gymnastics to defeat monsters and keep the evil Judge Malice from throwing off the rhythm of the world and using the power of hearts beating out of sync to take over the universe. Together with her teammates Natsuki, Akiko, and Fuyumi, Koharu will overthrow Judge Malice and restore the world's rhythm! Friday Afternoon: Bridge Over Dragon Run - A slice-of-life/drama with a fantasy twist. Seventh grader Sachie is having a rough time in middle school; none of her friends from grade school are going to the same school she is, and a number of the girls she does go to school with have chosen her as a target for bullying. She's retrieving her school bag from where some of the girls have thrown it into a creek when she comes across a large egg. The egg hatches when Sachie touches it, and a small dragon topples out, instantly bonding with her. Knowing instinctively that the tiny creature is now her responsibility, Sachie takes it home and attempts to hide it from her mother and younger brother, with decidedly mixed results. Friday Evening: DCLXVI - Margaret the witch has found a mysterious egg and a piece of ancient parchment with instructions for a ritual to hatch it, but no other information. Incredibly curious, Margaret decides to perform the ritual and see what’s inside. Just then, the angel Tenshi and the demon Koakuma show up to try and stop her; according to them, the egg actually contains a beast that will devour the world! Unfortunately, they're too late; the ritual has completed, and the egg hatches into a tiny golden dragon-like creature with a crimson mane. Knowing that they'll be punished if they go back with this bad news, Tenshi and Koakuma decide to team up with Margaret and raise it; maybe if they do everything right, it won't want to devour the world after all! It worked in that one British book/radio play/TV miniseries, after all... Lots of yuri subtext/moments. Friday Night: His Majesty's Guard - A harem anime. Ordinary Japanese high school student Genta learns that he's actually the heir to a vaguely European-ish country. Since the previous ruler was assassinated, Genta has been assigned a full team of highly trained guards, each specializing in a different weapon and/or fighting style, and each head-over-heels for Genta. His Majesty's Guard has gained a fair amount of attention for one of Genta's guards being a male character (Thomas), even if they are not expected to be the endgame ship. Saturday Early Morning: A Sprinkle of Love - A romantic comedy about a young engineering woman named Yuki who enters a baking competition with no grand prize besides the title of Best Baker. She meets the other competitors and gets along except for that one grumpy young man named Ken. Due to a misunderstanding, they get off on the wrong foot, but during the course of the competition they get to know each other better. It's not long before these feelings turn to love, but at the end of the competition nears and they are the only two left standing, can their love survive the heat? Saturday Morning: Where Is My Master? - A very fanservicey title about a dog named Pochiko who saves the life of a witch and is turned into a busty young woman as a reward. Pochiko is delighted, but her human master, Akihiko, is a lot more conflicted—especially because Pochiko still acts so much like a dog! Despite Akihiko trying his best to set her up with her own life as a human, Pochiko is determined to stay by Akihiko's side through thick and thin. Saturday at Noon: Alien Lifeswap - One day out of the blue, a space alien abducts ordinary teenage boy Noboru and takes his place in order to study humans and help make a decision about whether they should be introduced to the wider galactic alliance. The show follows both the alien in its attempts to pass as Noboru, and Noboru in a special not-quite-classroom with aliens from at least four other species who are undergoing basically the same trial, plus a teacher from the species that is taking the his place. Shenanigans ensue. Saturday Afternoon: City Heist - A recently released movie. The gem powering the technology of the village where Adorina lives has broken; the townsfolk can keep the town running for a time with human power alone, but this cannot be maintained for more than a few months. The only place to get replacement gems is the Eternal City, but the city's ruler guards them fiercely and charges outrageous amounts for replacements. Knowing her town can never afford the cost of a new gem, Adorina recruits retired master thief Antono, fighting and arms expert Rubena, and recently fired city guards Luksa and Johano to help her steal not only the gem she needs to help her village live on, but the technology to create new gems—just as Eternal City's ruler once stole it from Adorina's grandmother. Saturday Evening: Bolt Turners In The Sky - A century and a half ago, the world fell to a disaster known only as the Hungry Earth. No longer able to survive on the planet's surface, humanity fled to the skies. There, people live out their lives on city-fleets of assorted air vehicles - dirigibles, single-engine planes, helicarriers, and more. The series focuses on the Bolt Turners: a group of technicians who travel from vessel to vessel, fixing mechanical issues to keep the fleet flying. With art reminiscent of Studio Ghibli and a full cast of interesting, well-developed characters, the anime has fans hooked across the globe. Saturday Night: Inherit the Flame - A critically acclaimed movie, heavy with symbolism and artistically stunning. Legend says that anyone who sleeps at the foot of the mountain Cadair Idris will end up dead, mad, or a poet. Would-be poet Matthew goes to test this one night and ends up taken into another world, where his heart is removed and put in a cauldron of flame. Matthew instantly find that his skills as a poet have increased a hundred fold, and he joins a party of dozens of other artists who have come to challenge their skills over the years. As the night wears on, however, he meets Isabel, a fiddle player who misses her home, and he realizes that he, too, wants to go back to where he came from. Together, the two of them put their skills to the ultimate test to call their hearts back from the cauldron and return home. Sunday Early Morning: Rue 63rd - The story starts when Rokuro (whose name means "sixth son") and Sango (whose name means "third child") meet and commisserate that the other has the life that they want for themselves. Deciding to swap places, the "boy" (now going by Kuroko) and "girl" (now called Hanzo) slowly discover that part of the reason their new lives feel so right is because they are, in fact, transgender. The two of them need to navigate not only their new school lives as a gender they'd never thought they'd be yet are coming to realize is right, but also their home lives and interactions with each other, as they come to terms with their gender identities and what they want for the future. Sunday Morning: Swept Away - After nine-year-old Katsuo's puppy is saved from a frozen-over pond by a practicing curling team, he and his friends Hiraku and Minato become obsessed with the sport. When they reach high school, a teacher from Canada arrives, and they finally have an advisor for their curling club (with Katsuo's now grown dog to be the mascot). Unfortunately, they're one club member short. Katsuo sets his sights on Hajime, the younger brother of the boy who saved Katsuo's puppy. The problem? Hajime is completely uninterested in curling! Sunday at Noon: Hanako's School Days - A school drama about a fat girl named Hanako and her experiences in junior high and high school. A very sympathetic look at a fat girl character, who has been given a cute character design, and how she deals with the bullying and microaggressions she faces in everyday life. Sunday Afternoon: [[Isekai Bus Tour]] - Aiko is walking home from school one day when a bus comes barreling down the street right at her! Convinced that these are her last minutes alive, Aiko is astonished when, in a huge burst of light, the tour bus vanishes. Meanwhile, Youta and Miyu have been working together for years to get their new Akihabara tour bus up and running, and have just started their first tour! A combination of a horribly annoying passenger and a newspaper getting caught on the windshield has Youta losing control of the bus; right when he's about to hit a teenage girl, the entire bus is transported to another world—one that a passenger recognizes! The main storyline follows Youta and Miyu, with their mysterious new skills of Bus Driver and Tour Guide, as they hop from world to world with a full passenger list, hoping each new portal Miyu directs them to will be the one to bring them all back home. The post-episode clips, meanwhile, follow Aiko as she investigates the mysterious "hit-and-run" bus, leading to wilder and wilder conspiracy theories as she goes. [[Sunday Afternoon Events]]

[[Welcome to AnimeIowa!]]

This is the fourth episode of the series. Even the characters can't believe it took them this long to start talking about a name for the beast! There's a contentous battle betwen the three humanoid main characters between the names Pochi, Tama, Beast-chan (B-chan for short), Gigi (short for Gigigi, "because the number 6 looks like the letter G!"), Roku, and Orochi. In the end, the beast chooses a name for itself, though you don't learn what it is until the next episode. [[Friday Night Events]]

Oh, this is cute! This episode is about a golden giraffe with dragonfly wings trying to steal an orange. [[Saturday Night Events]]

''Video Room One Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Wanbon-Chan Goes To School - A slice-of-life anime about a puppy starting kindergarten or preschool in an anthropomorphic world. One of the most popular characters is Tarou, a wheely dog; another is Naoko, a cat who's pretending to be a dog to go to puppy school. Friday Afternoon: Crave - Story of Chiharu, a vampire who was adopted by humans and has no idea she's not also human. A series of super weird coincidences has kept the discovery from happening until she's in junior high or high school, when she begins craving blood. She becomes aware of other supernatural creatures when she discovers her own nature. All of her friends team up to make sure she gets however much blood she needs on a regular basis (which, at least while she's still young, isn't too much yet). Friday Evening: Sunset Eyes - Hikari has been cursed with a devilish appearance (horns, wings, tail, red-gray skin) and skin that burns anyone who touches her; the curse can only be reversed when someone who loves her with all their heart looks into her eyes at sunset. After meeting Hikari, Nadeshiko vows to fall in love with her and break the curse. After all, the curse doesn't say anything about Hikari having to love the person back, and there are a lot worse things to Nadeshiko's way of thinking than people thinking she likes girls "like that"—and one of those is being cursed never to touch your real true love, right? Friday Night: ohayo gozaimasu, it’s early - A school comedy about a kid, Kei (written with the character for "firefly"), who is always too tired for morning classes, but struggles to be at school anyway. Stories range from typical school stories trying to involve a kid who's either half or entirely asleep most of the time (and yet somehow gets good grades!), to his classmates trying to figure out why he keeps missing so much sleep, and how they can help (every time they try to find out it's something different, and all of their efforts so far have failed; it's doubtful Kei has noticed them in the first place). Saturday Early Morning: The Life and Times of a Background Character - Yamada Kenichi is a young adult who has a million part-time jobs and is constantly witness to major scenes from everyone else's stories. From the meet-cutes at the coffee shop, to the superpower-granting mix-ups at the lab, and even that one time the villain had an epiphany and a change of heart, Kenichi has a constant, unwitting, and even unwilling hand in them. Saturday Morning: Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! - Rika ends up being reborn as the heroine of an otome game. The problem is that she never had much interest in the game's canon love interests, but really liked drawing fanart of Hitomi, one of the 'rival' characters... who's even more stunning in person! Saturday at Noon: All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine? - Nicknamed WorldsOther by the fandom, this is a high fantasy series inspired by a series of light novels. The heroine of the story is Bremby, a sorceress who's lived under the threat of the Demon King's hordes for years, but the local temples promise that one day the Chosen One will be summoned from another world to set things right. Well, the day is here, and there seem to be at least four 'chosen ones'—who all claim to be from other worlds, argue about the details, and seem to be more interested in dating than actually doing what they're supposed to and stopping the Demon King. Fine; if their absurd powers are going to waste, maybe Bremby can just save her country herself... Saturday Afternoon: Ghost Girlfriend - High school boy Yoshida Mamoru moves into a house in a new neighborhood; turns out it's haunted by the ghost of a teenage girl! Tsubomi has an absolutely enormous crush on him, but he is absolutely oblivious. The twist? Her ghost status is under Little Mermaid/Beauty and the Beast rules: If someone falls in love with her and truly loves her to the point where they confess their feelings and mean it, she'll get to restart her life as a human—but only if they confess first! Tsubomi is constantly fighting to keep her hopes from getting too far up, and also has resolved not to tell Mamoru any of the details in case he would feel pressured into trying to develop feelings for her. Meanwhile, absolutely everyone around is trying hardcore to matchmake them. Saturday Evening: Clockwork Under City Lights - An OVA adapted from a webcomic. The interconnected stories of a dozen tiny magically-powered, steampunk-ish self-aware constructs created in the shape of large insects, miniature forest animals, non-humanoid mythological creatures, and so forth, set loose in a big and bustling city somewhere on a world just to the left of our own; life can be beyond interesting as well as startlingly mundane when you're a metal and stained glass griffin the size of a teacup. Saturday Night: [[Fantasy Hero Mech]] - When war threatens, the denizens of the world of Sylvania have come together to summon the hero who was prophesied to come in their hour of greatest need; meanwhile, Takeshi is just a low-ranking grunt in the Unified Space Forces, working to repair a hyperspace transport gate. Right when he flips the switch to test it out, he and his repair mech are sucked through it into Sylvania, where the people on the other side of the gate assume he has arrived to save them. Sunday Early Morning: Guardian Treasures - When Earth is threatened by alien forces, Japan’s Three Treasures rise again in the form of giant mechs; three high school boys, Ryuu, Heiji, and Touya, are chosen by the mechs as pilots to defend Earth. With help from engineering and folklore student Asuka, they will work together to drive off the invaders and protect the world. But there’s a dark secret about the invaders that could threaten to tear apart the bonds they’ve formed, and endanger Earth in the process… Sunday Morning: Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams - It's the year 21XX, and being a Magical Girl is now a viable career option. Unfortunately, despite her own significant magical powers, Arika Izumi is much more interested in being an accountant or a programmer. Her relief when she learns that the experts at Mahou Gakuen, the most prestigious magical girl academy in the area, think she wouldn't be a good fit for the program is short-lived; when she arrives home after learning the results, she sees that her mother has not only already assumed she would pass, but told all of her own friends that Arika would be attending Mahou Gakuen. Luckily, Arika got accepted to a different high school that's not very far from Mahou Gakuen; with the help of her new friends in the Drama Club, and a little programming magic, Arika is set to fake the heck out of being a Mahou Gakuen student. Sunday at Noon: Nobunaga and the Warring States - A Hetalia-esque historical cartoon featuring Oda Nobunaga and other historical figures, and the personified States. Nobunaga has to constantly break up petty squabbles between the States. He is accompanied by his constant companion, fan favorite Piyo the nightingale, who is usually found perched on his shoulder or head. He is still waiting for her to sing. Sunday Afternoon: Tech Wizard - Garret Smelter has an absurdly good reputation for repairing spells and stuff; turns out he's been using mundane methods the entire time, but no one will believe him. Told from the POV of Hans, Garret's new apprentice, as Garret and his his "familiar" (a well-trained but mundane ferret named Lefty) go about the work of keeping the city of Archdale running on actual engineering. ''Video Room Two Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Heartbeat Rhythm Magic - Koharu is practicing with a hoop for rhythmic gymnastics club when suddenly, a strange monster made of stadium seating attacks the gym! Koharu is then found by a small, pink, hamster-like creature that tells her she is to be the leader of a team of magical girls who use the tools and skills of rhythmic gymnastics to defeat monsters and keep the evil Judge Malice from throwing off the rhythm of the world and using the power of hearts beating out of sync to take over the universe. Together with her teammates Natsuki, Akiko, and Fuyumi, Koharu will overthrow Judge Malice and restore the world's rhythm! Friday Afternoon: Bridge Over Dragon Run - A slice-of-life/drama with a fantasy twist. Seventh grader Sachie is having a rough time in middle school; none of her friends from grade school are going to the same school she is, and a number of the girls she does go to school with have chosen her as a target for bullying. She's retrieving her school bag from where some of the girls have thrown it into a creek when she comes across a large egg. The egg hatches when Sachie touches it, and a small dragon topples out, instantly bonding with her. Knowing instinctively that the tiny creature is now her responsibility, Sachie takes it home and attempts to hide it from her mother and younger brother, with decidedly mixed results. Friday Evening: DCLXVI - Margaret the witch has found a mysterious egg and a piece of ancient parchment with instructions for a ritual to hatch it, but no other information. Incredibly curious, Margaret decides to perform the ritual and see what’s inside. Just then, the angel Tenshi and the demon Koakuma show up to try and stop her; according to them, the egg actually contains a beast that will devour the world! Unfortunately, they're too late; the ritual has completed, and the egg hatches into a tiny golden dragon-like creature with a crimson mane. Knowing that they'll be punished if they go back with this bad news, Tenshi and Koakuma decide to team up with Margaret and raise it; maybe if they do everything right, it won't want to devour the world after all! It worked in that one British book/radio play/TV miniseries, after all... Lots of yuri subtext/moments. Friday Night: His Majesty's Guard - A harem anime. Ordinary Japanese high school student Genta learns that he's actually the heir to a vaguely European-ish country. Since the previous ruler was assassinated, Genta has been assigned a full team of highly trained guards, each specializing in a different weapon and/or fighting style, and each head-over-heels for Genta. His Majesty's Guard has gained a fair amount of attention for one of Genta's guards being a male character (Thomas), even if they are not expected to be the endgame ship. Saturday Early Morning: A Sprinkle of Love - A romantic comedy about a young engineering woman named Yuki who enters a baking competition with no grand prize besides the title of Best Baker. She meets the other competitors and gets along except for that one grumpy young man named Ken. Due to a misunderstanding, they get off on the wrong foot, but during the course of the competition they get to know each other better. It's not long before these feelings turn to love, but at the end of the competition nears and they are the only two left standing, can their love survive the heat? Saturday Morning: Where Is My Master? - A very fanservicey title about a dog named Pochiko who saves the life of a witch and is turned into a busty young woman as a reward. Pochiko is delighted, but her human master, Akihiko, is a lot more conflicted—especially because Pochiko still acts so much like a dog! Despite Akihiko trying his best to set her up with her own life as a human, Pochiko is determined to stay by Akihiko's side through thick and thin. Saturday at Noon: Alien Lifeswap - One day out of the blue, a space alien abducts ordinary teenage boy Noboru and takes his place in order to study humans and help make a decision about whether they should be introduced to the wider galactic alliance. The show follows both the alien in its attempts to pass as Noboru, and Noboru in a special not-quite-classroom with aliens from at least four other species who are undergoing basically the same trial, plus a teacher from the species that is taking the his place. Shenanigans ensue. Saturday Afternoon: City Heist - A recently released movie. The gem powering the technology of the village where Adorina lives has broken; the townsfolk can keep the town running for a time with human power alone, but this cannot be maintained for more than a few months. The only place to get replacement gems is the Eternal City, but the city's ruler guards them fiercely and charges outrageous amounts for replacements. Knowing her town can never afford the cost of a new gem, Adorina recruits retired master thief Antono, fighting and arms expert Rubena, and recently fired city guards Luksa and Johano to help her steal not only the gem she needs to help her village live on, but the technology to create new gems—just as Eternal City's ruler once stole it from Adorina's grandmother. Saturday Evening: Bolt Turners In The Sky - A century and a half ago, the world fell to a disaster known only as the Hungry Earth. No longer able to survive on the planet's surface, humanity fled to the skies. There, people live out their lives on city-fleets of assorted air vehicles - dirigibles, single-engine planes, helicarriers, and more. The series focuses on the Bolt Turners: a group of technicians who travel from vessel to vessel, fixing mechanical issues to keep the fleet flying. With art reminiscent of Studio Ghibli and a full cast of interesting, well-developed characters, the anime has fans hooked across the globe. Saturday Night: [[Inherit the Flame]] - A critically acclaimed movie, heavy with symbolism and artistically stunning. Legend says that anyone who sleeps at the foot of the mountain Cadair Idris will end up dead, mad, or a poet. Would-be poet Matthew goes to test this one night and ends up taken into another world, where his heart is removed and put in a cauldron of flame. Matthew instantly find that his skills as a poet have increased a hundred fold, and he joins a party of dozens of other artists who have come to challenge their skills over the years. As the night wears on, however, he meets Isabel, a fiddle player who misses her home, and he realizes that he, too, wants to go back to where he came from. Together, the two of them put their skills to the ultimate test to call their hearts back from the cauldron and return home. Sunday Early Morning: Rue 63rd - The story starts when Rokuro (whose name means "sixth son") and Sango (whose name means "third child") meet and commisserate that the other has the life that they want for themselves. Deciding to swap places, the "boy" (now going by Kuroko) and "girl" (now called Hanzo) slowly discover that part of the reason their new lives feel so right is because they are, in fact, transgender. The two of them need to navigate not only their new school lives as a gender they'd never thought they'd be yet are coming to realize is right, but also their home lives and interactions with each other, as they come to terms with their gender identities and what they want for the future. Sunday Morning: Swept Away - After nine-year-old Katsuo's puppy is saved from a frozen-over pond by a practicing curling team, he and his friends Hiraku and Minato become obsessed with the sport. When they reach high school, a teacher from Canada arrives, and they finally have an advisor for their curling club (with Katsuo's now grown dog to be the mascot). Unfortunately, they're one club member short. Katsuo sets his sights on Hajime, the younger brother of the boy who saved Katsuo's puppy. The problem? Hajime is completely uninterested in curling! Sunday at Noon: Hanako's School Days - A school drama about a fat girl named Hanako and her experiences in junior high and high school. A very sympathetic look at a fat girl character, who has been given a cute character design, and how she deals with the bullying and microaggressions she faces in everyday life. Sunday Afternoon: Isekai Bus Tour - Aiko is walking home from school one day when a bus comes barreling down the street right at her! Convinced that these are her last minutes alive, Aiko is astonished when, in a huge burst of light, the tour bus vanishes. Meanwhile, Youta and Miyu have been working together for years to get their new Akihabara tour bus up and running, and have just started their first tour! A combination of a horribly annoying passenger and a newspaper getting caught on the windshield has Youta losing control of the bus; right when he's about to hit a teenage girl, the entire bus is transported to another world—one that a passenger recognizes! The main storyline follows Youta and Miyu, with their mysterious new skills of Bus Driver and Tour Guide, as they hop from world to world with a full passenger list, hoping each new portal Miyu directs them to will be the one to bring them all back home. The post-episode clips, meanwhile, follow Aiko as she investigates the mysterious "hit-and-run" bus, leading to wilder and wilder conspiracy theories as she goes. [[Saturday Night Events]]

It looks like Koharu, Fuyumi, and Akiko are recruiting Natsumi to be the fourth magical girl on their team! Meanwhile, one of Judge Malice's head minions, a rope user, is getting some interesting character development, adding fuel to the rumors that she's destined to be the team's fifth member... [[Friday Afternoon Events]]

This is a pretty suspenseful part! Sachie has broken one of her mother's favorite mugs while trying to sneak the baby dragon into their apartment, and her younger brother, Taiki, is getting suspicious. [[Friday Evening Events]]

There's a lot of shippy action in this episode! Genta is spending a lot of time with Erica, his 'main' guard and a bladed fan wielder, in this episode; meanwhile, knife user Alicia and spear wielder Mary are growing closer together while investigating a potential threat to Genta's life in a city on the country's border, and Thomas has just learned that one of the knights, Raoul, has a bit of a crush on //him//. It's looking more and more like the series is going to end with at least two same gender couples, even if they won't be the main canon ship. [[What now?]]

Oh, this is a major turning point in the series! Ken ruined his icing and has to make it again from scratch, and Yuki comes over to help him make a new batch. [[Saturday Morning Events]]

You arrive about half-way through the first episode; Pochiko has just dragged the witch out of an overflowing drainage ditch, and the witch has offered Pochiko a magical reward as thanks. Pochiko reveals that her dearest wish is to be able to help her master even more with the things he worries about, like bills and finding a girlfriend, a request that the witch interprets in an interesting way. [[Saturday Noon Events]]

Noboru's alien classmates have roped him into a plot to play a prank on their teacher. Meanwhile, back on Earth, Noboru's alien doppelganger has just been confessed to by one of his high school classmates; misunderstandings abound. [[Saturday Afternoon Events]]

This is a really dramatic part of the movie: The team's plan to steal the new gem and related technology has just gone spectacularly south. Having failed to convince her cohorts to help her try again, Adorina announces that, if they're not going to help, she's going to try again on her own; you hold your breath as she starts to walk away and, one by one, her cohorts decide to help her again. [[Saturday Evening Events]]

In this episode, Wren, a little person in her sixties who has been a Bolt Turner for decades, is leading Tori, a twelve-year-old girl with a lightweight prosthetic leg, through the basics of jumping from place to place with a safety line; Wren takes time to emphasize how, in their line of work, being smaller and more lightweight than average can be a real asset, no matter the reasons. [[Saturday Night Events]]

This is pretty near the beginning of the movie; the Fae queen has just invited Matthew to throw his heart into the cauldron of flame, which will ignite the artistry within him. It's a pretty powerful scene. [[Get some sleep]]

You watch as Kuroko tries painting her nails for the first time, and Hanzo gets a new haircut for his new sense of style; that's weird, when did your eyes get so wet? [[Sunday Morning Events]]

Katsuo is trying once again to convince Hajime to join the curling club, this time by introducing him to the dog his older brother saved: Broom, who is set to be the club mascot. [[Sunday Noon Events]]

This episode is super heartwarming! After a humiliating outing over spring break where Hanako was turned away from adult-size rides at an amusement park for being too big or too heavy, her friends Jun and Sumire found a different theme park that accommodates people much heavier than Hanako and took her on a surprise trip there. Hanako almost cries when they tell reveal the surprise to her and tell her that they never want to leave her on the sidelines again. [[Sunday Afternoon Events]]

This is the second episode of the series; the passenger that made Youta swerve the bus and almost hit Aiko has been causing even more trouble, not the least of which was making the tour bus miss its first chance to get through a dimension-hopping portal. After a lot of work to find a new portal, Miyu and the well-behaved passengers conspire to leave the troublemaker stranded in a swamp while the rest of them travel through the portal to the next world. [[Sunday Evening Events]]

AnimeIowa is always in need of volunteers, even before the convention really starts! You see a busy AI staffer and rush over to help; together, you manage to get the Torii gate they were carrying maneuvered into place. "Thanks!" says the staffer. "You were a huge help." They hand you a rectangular red ribbon with a peel-and-stick section at the top; it says 'Kokoro Ninja' in gold lettering. "I'm pretty sure Registration is open now," the staffer tells you. "If you go and get your badge, you can stick that on the bottom of it to show off!" That sounds pretty cool, actually. Smiling and waving to the staffer, you wander off to do something else. [[Go to a panel]] [[Go to the Video Rooms]] [[Get your badge]]

AnimeIowa has barely started, and it seems like the AI staffers could still use some help getting things set up! You spend some time helping set up booths in the Marketplace (and get a peek at some of the merchandise while you're there...) At the Volunteers booth, you trade in your points for a romantic poster featuring the main characters from "Help! I'm Falling In Love With the Villainess!" [[Friday Afternoon Events]]

The Volunteers department directs you to Registration, where they're still dealing with the start-of-con rush and are near desperate for help. They welcome you gratefully, and you get to help someone dressed as Koharu from Heartbeat Rhythm Magic to check in. When you turn in your points at the Volunteers station, there's an absolutely stunning wall scroll for Clockwork Under City Lights. You exchange your points without a second's hesitation. [[Friday Evening Events]]

Seems like the Info Desk is pretty slammed right now, so that's where the Volunteers department sends you. You help direct an Adorina from City Heist to the Marketplace, with a warning that it's going to close pretty soon. From the Volunteers station, you pick out WorldsOther light novel volume 1 translated into English. You've been meaning to read this for a while! One other thing caught your attention; while you were helping out at the Info Desk, you directed people who asked and donated a certain amount of money to someplace interesting in the Marketplace: Apparently there's a small Japanese garden set up there, with several sculptures of youkai and a tiny, working Inari shrine. There's also a secret you can unlock there by following certain steps. You admit that you're tempted to check it out. [[Visit the Japanese Garden on Friday Evening]] [[Friday Night Events]]

One of the booths has the most adorable plush of Broom, the dog from Swept Away; and it's reasonably priced, too! You were a little worried about spending too much early on at the convention, but it looks like you've managed to escape that fate so far. Tucked into a corner of the Marketplace is a small Japanese garden of sorts. You're tempted to investigate, but there's still a whole lot to do at the convention. [[Friday Afternoon at the Japanese Garden]] [[Friday Evening Events]]

Oh dear, looks like the Marketplace doesn't open until later. You could wait in the already forming line, but there's so many other cool things to do right now; you think you'll just stop by later instead. [[Friday Noon Events]]

At a stall in Artist's Alley you find a small clockwork griffin figure from Clockwork Under City Lights. The bronze-and-enamel workings glitter in the light. You feel almost like a magpie when you buy it. Tucked into a corner of the Marketplace is a small Japanese garden of sorts. You're tempted to investigate, but there's still a whole lot to do at the convention. [[Friday Evening at the Japanese Garden]] [[Friday Night Events]]

Turns out Rangers always need a helping hand! After a quick tutorial on radio protocols, you're headed out to the hallways. With help from your co-ranger, you manage to contain a fight that's about to break out. Back at the Volunteers station, you collect your prize: An enamel pin of Mahou Gakuen's school insignia from "Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams". [[What now?]]

Whoops! Looks like the Marketplace is closed for the day. You check the schedule in the program book; it says the Marketplace opens again around mid-morning tomorrow, then closes before the big dance. You make a mental note, then go check what else is going on. [[Friday Night Events]]

Registration is already in full swing, and there's a fresh crowd eager to get in as much fun as they can today. Among the people you help are a small family who have never been to a convention before; you can already tell that they're going to have a blast! Back at Volunteers, you decide to spend the points you earned on the first volume of a manga called Moth and Friends. [[Saturday Morning Events]]

Oh right, the Marketplace isn't open yet. Well, it's AnimeIowa; there's almost always something else cool going on! [[Saturday Early Morning Events]]

With the Marketplace open again and a fresh round of people having gotten their badges, the Info Desk is really hopping this morning! You direct some cosplayers in curling gear to where the Swept Away photoshoot will be taking place at noon. From the prizes at the Volunteers booth, you pluck The Life and Times of a Background Character light novel, volume 1. One other thing caught your attention; while you were helping out at the Info Desk, you directed people who asked and donated a certain amount of money to someplace interesting in the Marketplace: Apparently there's a small Japanese garden set up there, with several sculptures of youkai and a tiny, working Inari shrine. There's also a secret you can unlock there by following certain steps. You admit that you're tempted to check it out. [[Visit the Japanese Garden on Sunday Morning]] [[Saturday Noon Events]]

Nice! This vendor has Fuyumi's transformation item from Heartbeat Rhythm Magic! You've //gotta// have it. Tucked into a corner of the Marketplace is a small Japanese garden of sorts. You're tempted to investigate, but there's still a whole lot to do at the convention. [[Saturday Morning at the Japanese Garden]] [[Saturday Noon Events]]

Registration has quieted down quite a bit since you picked up your own badge barely twenty-four hours ago. When someone's name turns out to have been typo'd in the database, they don't even end up skipping ahead of anyone when they're directed to their //new// correct pickup line. At the Volunteers desk you see a plush of the beast from DCLXVI; you buy it with your volunteer points without a second's hesitation. [[Saturday Afternoon Events]]

Half hidden on the bottom shelf in a small industry booth is the Guardian Treasures model kit for Ryuu's mech. Hot dog, you've been looking for this //forever//! Tucked into a corner of the Marketplace is a small Japanese garden of sorts. You're tempted to investigate, but there's still a whole lot to do at the convention. [[Saturday Noon at the Japanese Garden]] [[Saturday Afternoon Events]]

This photoshoot is just. Plain. //Gorgeous//. Most of the people here are dressed in steampunk gear and carrying intricate figurines of various creatures from the show, but some have articulated puppets, and several people are actually cosplaying as humanized versions of the tiny metal-and-stained-glass creatures themselves! You're in awe of the person dressed as a silver-and-sapphire kelpie. [[Saturday Noon Events]]

The Ghost Girlfriend photoshoot is teeming with fans! There's plenty of Mamoru and Tsubomi cosplayers (with the latter fawning over the former, who collectively pretend not to notice), as well as more than a handful of Mamoru's school friends and Tsubomi's supernatural friends. It's delightfully crowded, and the photo scenarios the organizer and the other fans come up with are all a lot of fun. [[Saturday Morning Events]]

While there's naturally a lot of people cosplaying as Katsuo's team and coach, there are more than a few representing rival schools, as well as Hajime's older brother and his friends, and even a Broom cosplayer! A lot of the shots here are action and sports poses, but there are a fair few that are more shippy or celebratory. [[Saturday Afternoon Events]]

While working a volunteer shift at the Info Desk, a young woman cosplaying Aiko from Isekai Tour Bus comes up and asks in character if you have any information on the Akihabara tour bus that disappeared after almost hitting her. You respond that you sadly do not, but there's a panel on Sunday that might be able to help. You then ask //her// for a photo, which she happily agrees to, holding up a sign with a picture of the titular tour bus and the text, "Have you seen this bus?" From the Volunteer prizes, you pick out a Tech Wizard poster, featuring Hans, Garret, and Lefty in dynamic poses against a backdrop of gears and spells. One other thing caught your attention; while you were helping out at the Info Desk, you directed people who asked and donated a certain amount of money to someplace interesting in the Marketplace: Apparently there's a small Japanese garden set up there, with several sculptures of youkai and a tiny, working Inari shrine. There's also a secret you can unlock there by following certain steps. You admit that you're tempted to check it out. [[Visit the Japanese Garden on Saturday Afternoon]] [[Saturday Evening Events]]

Woah, is that enamel pin the school crest from "Help! I'm Falling In Love With the Villainess!"? The colors and linework are perfect! Tucked into a corner of the Marketplace is a small Japanese garden of sorts. You're tempted to investigate, but there's still a whole lot to do at the convention. [[Saturday Afternoon at the Japanese Garden]] [[Saturday Evening Events]]

His Majesty's Guard is a series with a wide array of cosplay possibilities, so you're not surprised to see it got a photoshoot. What you //are// surprised by is the number of people cosplaying Thomas, Genta's male love interest. There are four of them that you can see, and even someone dressed as Raoul, the royal knight who has a crush on Thomas! They're outnumbered by people dressed as Genta's female love interests, and even by Genta himself, but not by nearly as much as you would have expected. [[Saturday Evening Events]]

After the Volunteers desk directs you to helping the Rangers, you end up coordinating to clear a path to the front row of the Masquerade seating for a wheelchair user cosplaying as Natsuki from Heartbeat Rhythm Magic. Once your shift is over, you collect your prize: Ghost Girlfriend manga volume one in English. [[Saturday Night Events]]

Displayed prominently is the full box set for Rue 63rd. You had no idea this had been released yet! You make the transaction quickly and cuddle the box close to your chest; it's finally yours! Tucked into a corner of the Marketplace is a small Japanese garden of sorts. You're tempted to investigate, but there's still a whole lot to do at the convention. [[Saturday Evening at the Japanese Garden]] [[Saturday Night Events]]

The Background Character cosplayers have clearly pulled out all the stops. Kenichi cosplayers are there, it's true, but many of them have chosen a particular episode to reference with their costumes, and almost every reocurring side character is represented as well, with a few one-off characters to boot! You are seriously impressed. [[Saturday Night Events]]

Volunteers has you joining the Rangers, and you end up keeping a lost child company while your comrades locate their parents. Five minutes doesn't break the "reunited family" record for AnimeIowa, but it's pretty good timing in your book! From the prizes at the Volunteer desk after, you pick out Alien Lifeswap DVD number one. [[Get some sleep]]

You're not sure why you expected Rangering early on Sunday morning to be quiet, but you were wrong; you and your compatriots break up a fight started between a couple of hungover Alien Lifeswap cosplayers. When your shift is over, you pick out a Fantasy Hero Mech gashapon figure from the Volunteer prizes. [[Sunday Morning Events]]

Your wallet is now lighter, but in your hands is a brand new limited edition Inherit the Flame deluxe DVD/Bluray combo: On the cardboard slip cover, Matthew and Isabel are facing one another; they might be dancing except for the walking stick in Matthew's hand. On the DVD cover under that, Matthew and Isabel are in the same pose, but their faces in three-quarters view instead of profile, so it's like they're looking at you, and Matthew's staff has grown into the trunk of an apple tree with branches from all four seasons. It's bundled with the soundtrack and a double-sided poster of the same art from the cardboard slip cover and DVD cover. Worth. Every. Cent. Tucked into a corner of the Marketplace is a small Japanese garden of sorts. You're tempted to investigate, but there's still a whole lot to do at the convention. [[Sunday Morning at the Japanese Garden]] [[Sunday Noon Events]]

Info Desk Prize: His Majesty's Guard wall scroll [[Sunday Noon Events]]

While Registration seemed to be winding down yesterday, it's picking back up again with the first option to buy a badge for next year's convention starting now. While you can't take money, you //can// help make sure that everyone fills out their registration forms without any problems, which will be a huge help to the Reg team in the coming year. In the Volunteers prize pile, you find the first volume of the Super Idol Hero manga, and gleefully tuck it away in a bag. [[Sunday Afternoon Events]]

You almost walk past a limited edition figuring of Erika from His Majesty's Guard, but her dazzling fans with the kingdom's royal crest catch your eye. It'll be the perfect addition to your collection! Tucked into a corner of the Marketplace is a small Japanese garden of sorts. You're tempted to investigate, but there's still some other things to do at the convention. [[Sunday Noon at the Japanese Garden]] [[Sunday Afternoon Events]]

Volunteering at the Info Desk on the last day of the con, most of your time is spent asking people to fill out a feedback form for AnimeIowa, which the staff can use to hopefully improve the event next year; the rest of your time is largely spent answering questions about the dates of next year's convention, where and how to register for next year, and that sort of thing. It's a lot of information! Back at the Volunteers desk, you pick out the first Crave DVD from the prize bin. One other thing caught your attention; while you were helping out at the Info Desk, you directed people who asked and donated a certain amount of money to someplace interesting in the Marketplace: Apparently there's a small Japanese garden set up there, with several sculptures of youkai and a tiny, working Inari shrine. There's also a secret you can unlock there by following certain steps. You admit that you're tempted to check it out, and there's hardly anything else left to do at the con now. [[Visit the Japanese Garden on Sunday Afternoon]] [[Sunday Evening Events]]

Oh, sweet! (Haha, you think to yourself.) It's the Sprinkle of Love recipe book, translated into English! It looks like the recipes have been listed in both Metric and Imperial, so you shouldn't have too much trouble following them. You hope, anyway... Tucked into a corner of the Marketplace is a small Japanese garden of sorts. You're tempted to investigate, but there's still a few other things to do at the convention. [[Sunday Afternoon at the Japanese Garden]] [[Sunday Evening Events]]

Teardown Prize: ??? Registration for next year? [[Credits]]

You see a group of people dressed as the four "heroes" who claimed to be from another world in WorldsOther; they look fantastic together! When you ask, they agree to pose for a group photo. You also catch a glimpse of AnimeIowa's beloved mascot, Buu-chan! He seems to be headed to Registration to help out. Maybe you can ask for a picture when he's less busy... [[Friday Afternoon Events]]

Cosplay [[Friday Evening Events]]

Cosplay [[Friday Night Events]]

Cosplay [[What now?]]

Cosplay [[Saturday Morning Events]]

Cosplay [[Saturday Noon Events]]

Cosplay [[Saturday Afternoon Events]]

Cosplay [[Saturday Evening Events]]

Cosplay [[Saturday Night Events]]

cosplay [[Get some sleep]]

cosplay [[Sunday Morning Events]]

cosplay [[Sunday Noon Events]]

cosplay [[Sunday Afternoon Events]]

cosplay [[Sunday Evening Events]]

cosplay [[Credits]]

You see a teenager dressed in a pretty fancy suit and a domino mask. They explain that they're cosplaying the lead character from a manga known as Super Idol Hero, and that there's a panel for it on Saturday if you want to learn more. You make a mental note, compliment their costume, and move on. [[Volunteer]] [[Go to the Video Rooms]] [[Go to a panel]] [[Get your badge]]

''Video Room One Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Wanbon-chan Goes to School - A slice-of-life anime about a puppy starting kindergarten or preschool in an anthropomorphic world. One of the most popular characters is Tarou, a wheely dog; another is Naoko, a cat who's pretending to be a dog to go to puppy school. Friday Afternoon: Crave - Story of Chiharu, a vampire who was adopted by humans and has no idea she's not also human. A series of super weird coincidences has kept the discovery from happening until she's in junior high or high school, when she begins craving blood. She becomes aware of other supernatural creatures when she discovers her own nature. All of her friends team up to make sure she gets however much blood she needs on a regular basis (which, at least while she's still young, isn't too much yet). Friday Evening: Sunset Eyes - Hikari has been cursed with a devilish appearance (horns, wings, tail, red-gray skin) and skin that burns anyone who touches her; the curse can only be reversed when someone who loves her with all their heart looks into her eyes at sunset. After meeting Hikari, Nadeshiko vows to fall in love with her and break the curse. After all, the curse doesn't say anything about Hikari having to love the person back, and there are a lot worse things to Nadeshiko's way of thinking than people thinking she likes girls "like that"—and one of those is being cursed never to touch your real true love, right? Friday Night: ohayo gozaimasu, it’s early - A school comedy about a kid, Kei (written with the character for "firefly"), who is always too tired for morning classes, but struggles to be at school anyway. Stories range from typical school stories trying to involve a kid who's either half or entirely asleep most of the time (and yet somehow gets good grades!), to his classmates trying to figure out why he keeps missing so much sleep, and how they can help (every time they try to find out it's something different, and all of their efforts so far have failed; it's doubtful Kei has noticed them in the first place). Saturday Early Morning: The Life and Times of a Background Character - Yamada Kenichi is a young adult who has a million part-time jobs and is constantly witness to major scenes from everyone else's stories. From the meet-cutes at the coffee shop, to the superpower-granting mix-ups at the lab, and even that one time the villain had an epiphany and a change of heart, Kenichi has a constant, unwitting, and even unwilling hand in them. Saturday Morning: Help! I'm In Love With The Villainess! - Rika ends up being reborn as the heroine of an otome game. The problem is that she never had much interest in the game's canon love interests, but really liked drawing fanart of Hitomi, one of the 'rival' characters... who's even more stunning in person! Saturday at Noon: All The Worlds Are Other To Me: Why Can't I Just Be The Heroine? - Nicknamed WorldsOther by the fandom, this is a high fantasy series inspired by a series of light novels. The heroine of the story is Bremby, a sorceress who's lived under the threat of the Demon King's hordes for years, but the local temples promise that one day the Chosen One will be summoned from another world to set things right. Well, the day is here, and there seem to be at least four 'chosen ones'—who all claim to be from other worlds, argue about the details, and seem to be more interested in dating than actually doing what they're supposed to and stopping the Demon King. Fine; if their absurd powers are going to waste, maybe Bremby can just save her country herself... Saturday Afternoon: Ghost Girlfriend - High school boy Yoshida Mamoru moves into a house in a new neighborhood; turns out it's haunted by the ghost of a teenage girl! Tsubomi has an absolutely enormous crush on him, but he is absolutely oblivious. The twist? Her ghost status is under Little Mermaid/Beauty and the Beast rules: If someone falls in love with her and truly loves her to the point where they confess their feelings and mean it, she'll get to restart her life as a human—but only if they confess first! Tsubomi is constantly fighting to keep her hopes from getting too far up, and also has resolved not to tell Mamoru any of the details in case he would feel pressured into trying to develop feelings for her. Meanwhile, absolutely everyone around is trying hardcore to matchmake them. Saturday Evening: Clockwork Under City Lights - An OVA adapted from a webcomic. The interconnected stories of a dozen tiny magically-powered, steampunk-ish self-aware constructs created in the shape of large insects, miniature forest animals, non-humanoid mythological creatures, and so forth, set loose in a big and bustling city somewhere on a world just to the left of our own; life can be beyond interesting as well as startlingly mundane when you're a metal and stained glass griffin the size of a teacup. Saturday Night: Fantasy Hero Mech - When war threatens, the denizens of the world of Sylvania have come together to summon the hero who was prophesied to come in their hour of greatest need; meanwhile, Takeshi is just a low-ranking grunt in the Unified Space Forces, working to repair a hyperspace transport gate. Right when he flips the switch to test it out, he and his repair mech are sucked through it into Sylvania, where the people on the other side of the gate assume he has arrived to save them. Sunday Early Morning: Guardian Treasures - When Earth is threatened by alien forces, Japan’s Three Treasures rise again in the form of giant mechs; three high school boys, Ryuu, Heiji, and Touya, are chosen by the mechs as pilots to defend Earth. With help from engineering and folklore student Asuka, they will work together to drive off the invaders and protect the world. But there’s a dark secret about the invaders that could threaten to tear apart the bonds they’ve formed, and endanger Earth in the process… Sunday Morning: Please Don't Tell My Mom I Flunked My Magical Girl Academy Entrance Exams - It's the year 21XX, and being a Magical Girl is now a viable career option. Unfortunately, despite her own significant magical powers, Arika Izumi is much more interested in being an accountant or a programmer. Her relief when she learns that the experts at Mahou Gakuen, the most prestigious magical girl academy in the area, think she wouldn't be a good fit for the program is short-lived; when she arrives home after learning the results, she sees that her mother has not only already assumed she would pass, but told all of her own friends that Arika would be attending Mahou Gakuen. Luckily, Arika got accepted to a different high school that's not very far from Mahou Gakuen; with the help of her new friends in the Drama Club, and a little programming magic, Arika is set to fake the heck out of being a Mahou Gakuen student. Sunday at Noon: Nobunaga and the Warring States - A Hetalia-esque historical cartoon featuring Oda Nobunaga and other historical figures, and the personified States. Nobunaga has to constantly break up petty squabbles between the States. He is accompanied by his constant companion, fan favorite Piyo the nightingale, who is usually found perched on his shoulder or head. He is still waiting for her to sing. Sunday Afternoon: Tech Wizard - Garret Smelter has an absurdly good reputation for repairing spells and stuff; turns out he's been using mundane methods the entire time, but no one will believe him. Told from the POV of Hans, Garret's new apprentice, as Garret and his his "familiar" (a well-trained but mundane ferret named Lefty) go about the work of keeping the city of Archdale running on actual engineering. ''Video Room Two Schedule:'' Friday at Noon: Heartbeat Rhythm Magic - Koharu is practicing with a hoop for rhythmic gymnastics club when suddenly, a strange monster made of stadium seating attacks the gym! Koharu is then found by a small, pink, hamster-like creature that tells her she is to be the leader of a team of magical girls who use the tools and skills of rhythmic gymnastics to defeat monsters and keep the evil Judge Malice from throwing off the rhythm of the world and using the power of hearts beating out of sync to take over the universe. Together with her teammates Natsuki, Akiko, and Fuyumi, Koharu will overthrow Judge Malice and restore the world's rhythm! Friday Afternoon: Bridge Over Dragon Run - A slice-of-life/drama with a fantasy twist. Seventh grader Sachie is having a rough time in middle school; none of her friends from grade school are going to the same school she is, and a number of the girls she does go to school with have chosen her as a target for bullying. She's retrieving her school bag from where some of the girls have thrown it into a creek when she comes across a large egg. The egg hatches when Sachie touches it, and a small dragon topples out, instantly bonding with her. Knowing instinctively that the tiny creature is now her responsibility, Sachie takes it home and attempts to hide it from her mother and younger brother, with decidedly mixed results. Friday Evening - DCLXVI: Margaret the witch has found a mysterious egg and a piece of ancient parchment with instructions for a ritual to hatch it, but no other information. Incredibly curious, Margaret decides to perform the ritual and see what’s inside. Just then, the angel Tenshi and the demon Koakuma show up to try and stop her; according to them, the egg actually contains a beast that will devour the world! Unfortunately, they're too late; the ritual has completed, and the egg hatches into a tiny golden dragon-like creature with a crimson mane. Knowing that they'll be punished if they go back with this bad news, Tenshi and Koakuma decide to team up with Margaret and raise it; maybe if they do everything right, it won't want to devour the world after all! It worked in that one British book/radio play/TV miniseries, after all... Lots of yuri subtext/moments. Friday Night: His Majesty's Guard - A harem anime. Ordinary Japanese high school student Genta learns that he's actually the heir to a vaguely European-ish country. Since the previous ruler was assassinated, Genta has been assigned a full team of highly trained guards, each specializing in a different weapon and/or fighting style, and each head-over-heels for Genta. His Majesty's Guard has gained a fair amount of attention for one of Genta's guards being a male character (Thomas), even if they are not expected to be the endgame ship. Saturday Early Morning: A Sprinkle of Love - A romantic comedy about a young engineering woman named Yuki who enters a baking competition with no grand prize besides the title of Best Baker. She meets the other competitors and gets along except for that one grumpy young man named Ken. Due to a misunderstanding, they get off on the wrong foot, but during the course of the competition they get to know each other better. It's not long before these feelings turn to love, but at the end of the competition nears and they are the only two left standing, can their love survive the heat? Saturday Morning: Where Is My Master? - A very fanservicey title about a dog named Pochiko who saves the life of a witch and is turned into a busty young woman as a reward. Pochiko is delighted, but her human master, Akihiko, is a lot more conflicted—especially because Pochiko still acts so much like a dog! Despite Akihiko trying his best to set her up with her own life as a human, Pochiko is determined to stay by Akihiko's side through thick and thin. Saturday at Noon: Alien Lifeswap - One day out of the blue, a space alien abducts ordinary teenage boy Noboru and takes his place in order to study humans and help make a decision about whether they should be introduced to the wider galactic alliance. The show follows both the alien in its attempts to pass as Noboru, and Noboru in a special not-quite-classroom with aliens from at least four other species who are undergoing basically the same trial, plus a teacher from the species that is taking the his place. Shenanigans ensue. Saturday Afternoon: City Heist - A recently released movie. The gem powering the technology of the village where Adorina lives has broken; the townsfolk can keep the town running for a time with human power alone, but this cannot be maintained for more than a few months. The only place to get replacement gems is the Eternal City, but the city's ruler guards them fiercely and charges outrageous amounts for replacements. Knowing her town can never afford the cost of a new gem, Adorina recruits retired master thief Antono, fighting and arms expert Rubena, and recently fired city guards Luksa and Johano to help her steal not only the gem she needs to help her village live on, but the technology to create new gems—just as Eternal City's ruler once stole it from Adorina's grandmother. Saturday Evening: Bolt Turners In The Sky - A century and a half ago, the world fell to a disaster known only as the Hungry Earth. No longer able to survive on the planet's surface, humanity fled to the skies. There, people live out their lives on city-fleets of assorted air vehicles - dirigibles, single-engine planes, helicarriers, and more. The series focuses on the Bolt Turners: a group of technicians who travel from vessel to vessel, fixing mechanical issues to keep the fleet flying. With art reminiscent of Studio Ghibli and a full cast of interesting, well-developed characters, the anime has fans hooked across the globe. Saturday Night: Inherit the Flame - A critically acclaimed movie, heavy with symbolism and artistically stunning. Legend says that anyone who sleeps at the foot of the mountain Cadair Idris will end up dead, mad, or a poet. Would-be poet Matthew goes to test this one night and ends up taken into another world, where his heart is removed and put in a cauldron of flame. Matthew instantly find that his skills as a poet have increased a hundred fold, and he joins a party of dozens of other artists who have come to challenge their skills over the years. As the night wears on, however, he meets Isabel, a fiddle player who misses her home, and he realizes that he, too, wants to go back to where he came from. Together, the two of them put their skills to the ultimate test to call their hearts back from the cauldron and return home. Sunday Early Morning: Rue 63rd - The story starts when Rokuro (whose name means "sixth son") and Sango (whose name means "third child") meet and commisserate that the other has the life that they want for themselves. Deciding to swap places, the "boy" (now going by Kuroko) and "girl" (now called Hanzo) slowly discover that part of the reason their new lives feel so right is because they are, in fact, transgender. The two of them need to navigate not only their new school lives as a gender they'd never thought they'd be yet are coming to realize is right, but also their home lives and interactions with each other, as they come to terms with their gender identities and what they want for the future. Sunday Morning: Swept Away - After nine-year-old Katsuo's puppy is saved from a frozen-over pond by a practicing curling team, he and his friends Hiraku and Minato become obsessed with the sport. When they reach high school, a teacher from Canada arrives, and they finally have an advisor for their curling club (with Katsuo's now grown dog to be the mascot). Unfortunately, they're one club member short. Katsuo sets his sights on Hajime, the younger brother of the boy who saved Katsuo's puppy. The problem? Hajime is completely uninterested in curling! Sunday at Noon: Hanako's School Days - A school drama about a fat girl named Hanako and her experiences in junior high and high school. A very sympathetic look at a fat girl character, who has been given a cute character design, and how she deals with the bullying and microaggressions she faces in everyday life. Sunday Afternoon: Isekai Bus Tour - Aiko is walking home from school one day when a bus comes barreling down the street right at her! Convinced that these are her last minutes alive, Aiko is astonished when, in a huge burst of light, the tour bus vanishes. Meanwhile, Youta and Miyu have been working together for years to get their new Akihabara tour bus up and running, and have just started their first tour! A combination of a horribly annoying passenger and a newspaper getting caught on the windshield has Youta losing control of the bus; right when he's about to hit a teenage girl, the entire bus is transported to another world—one that a passenger recognizes! The main storyline follows Youta and Miyu, with their mysterious new skills of Bus Driver and Tour Guide, as they hop from world to world with a full passenger list, hoping each new portal Miyu directs them to will be the one to bring them all back home. The post-episode clips, meanwhile, follow Aiko as she investigates the mysterious "hit-and-run" bus, leading to wilder and wilder conspiracy theories as she goes. [[Friday Noon Events]]

You walk through the Torii gate and into the garden, a backdrop of sakura trees mysteriously in full bloom despite the time of year, and take note of your surroundings: As you enter, there's a sign welcoming you to the AnimeIowa Inari Shrine, and advising you not to taunt or feed the youkai. To the right is a small fountain with the black head of a youkai poking up through the water. Another sign cautions you not to touch the Umi-Bouzu or give it any sort of assistance. To the left is a Japanese shrine with two fox statues guarding it... or perhaps they're kitsune who have disguised themselves as stone! A third sign gives you directions on Shinto shrine prayer protocol: Place your donation in the offering box Bow deeply twice Clap twice Silently offer your prayer Bow deeply one more time The sign also says that all donations will be going to this year's charity, the Iowa Asian Alliance. There's also an additional bit of cryptic information: "Are you ready to receive the resident youkai's special blessing? Visit the AnimeIowa Info Desk and ask for the secret to call upon the hidden guardian of the shrine!" You have to admit that it's caught your attention, but you're still undecided about whether to go. [[Visit the Info Desk on Friday Afternoon]] [[Friday Evening Events]]

You talk to the friendly Info Desk volunteers, who relays an interesting rumor to you about the appearance of a mysterious youkai at the shrine. They want to tell you more, but say it might be dangerous, and only those who prove their conviction can receive the information. They then look pointedly at the charity bucket sitting on the table in front of them. After slipping a three dollar donation into the charity bucket, the Info Desk volunteer furtively hands you over a lucky five yen coin, and whispers the special steps that will allegedly call upon the true guardian spirit of the shrine. With the five yen piece in hand, you return to the shrine. The advice from the Info Desk leads you to discover the real purpose of the five yen coin you received, and you boldly test your theory. Instantly, you're startled by a clap of thunder! You see twinkling lights start to swirl around the elaborate altar inside the shrine, and you hear faint music. To your surprise, all of this results in a cute youkai appearing before you. It's Amabie, a Japanese spirit that can foretell of abundant harvests and offer protection from pandemics! Amabie says, "Greetings! Thank you so much for waking me! *yawn* It seems like I’ve been asleep for so very, very long. I apologize that I’m still a bit groggy Ah! You’ve left a gift! Thank you so much for your generosity!! May I offer you my blessing? Be safe, be well, and may the fickle winds of fortune favor you! I hope that we’ll meet again, perhaps on another day as beautiful and exciting as today! But until then… *yawn* maybe I’ll go back to sleep... for just a bit longer..." Amabie winks at you a final time, then vanishes once again. Wow! To think that you'd meet a real, live youkai at AnimeIowa! You're telling ''everyone'' about this! [[Friday Evening Events]]

You talk to the friendly Info Desk volunteers, who relays an interesting rumor to you about the appearance of a mysterious youkai at the shrine. They want to tell you more, but say it might be dangerous, and only those who prove their conviction can receive the information. They then look pointedly at the charity bucket sitting on the table in front of them. After slipping a three dollar donation into the charity bucket, the Info Desk volunteer furtively hands you over a lucky five yen coin, and whispers the special steps that will allegedly call upon the true guardian spirit of the shrine. With the five yen piece in hand, you return to the shrine. The advice from the Info Desk leads you to discover the real purpose of the five yen coin you received, and you boldly test your theory. Instantly, you're startled by a clap of thunder! You see twinkling lights start to swirl around the elaborate altar inside the shrine, and you hear faint music. To your surprise, all of this results in a cute youkai appearing before you. It's Amabie, a Japanese spirit that can foretell of abundant harvests and offer protection from pandemics! Amabie says, "What’s this? A generous donation!? Marvelous! Is this from you? Thank you so very much! You’ve earned the gratitude and blessing of Amabie! Yes, silly, that’s me! What? You were expecting one of those foolish Inari foxes? *laugh* I think not! But regardless, you’ve shown me the true nature of your kindness, as you so often share it with others. It makes you much more special than you realize! Keep this in your heart, and the joy and peace you deserve will find you. Safe travels to you, until we meet again!" With a final wink, Amabie vanishes once again. Wow! To think that you'd meet a real, live youkai at AnimeIowa! You're telling ''everyone'' about this! [[Saturday Noon Events]]

You walk through the Torii gate and into the garden, a backdrop of sakura trees mysteriously in full bloom despite the time of year, and take note of your surroundings: As you enter, there's a sign welcoming you to the AnimeIowa Inari Shrine, and advising you not to taunt or feed the youkai. To the right is a small fountain with the black head of a youkai poking up through the water. Another sign cautions you not to touch the Umi-Bouzu or give it any sort of assistance. To the left is a Japanese shrine with two fox statues guarding it... or perhaps they're kitsune who have disguised themselves as stone! A third sign gives you directions on Shinto shrine prayer protocol: Place your donation in the offering box Bow deeply twice Clap twice Silently offer your prayer Bow deeply one more time The sign also says that all donations will be going to this year's charity, the Iowa Asian Alliance. There's also an additional bit of cryptic information: "Are you ready to receive the resident youkai's special blessing? Visit the AnimeIowa Info Desk and ask for the secret to call upon the hidden guardian of the shrine!" You have to admit that it's caught your attention, but you're still undecided about whether to go. Still, this could be your last chance... [[Visit the Info Desk on Sunday Afternoon]] [[Sunday Evening Events]]

You talk to the friendly Info Desk volunteers, who relays an interesting rumor to you about the appearance of a mysterious youkai at the shrine. They want to tell you more, but say it might be dangerous, and only those who prove their conviction can receive the information. They then look pointedly at the charity bucket sitting on the table in front of them. After slipping a three dollar donation into the charity bucket, the Info Desk volunteer furtively hands you over a lucky five yen coin, and whispers the special steps that will allegedly call upon the true guardian spirit of the shrine. With the five yen piece in hand, you return to the shrine. The advice from the Info Desk leads you to discover the real purpose of the five yen coin you received, and you boldly test your theory. Instantly, you're startled by a clap of thunder! You see twinkling lights start to swirl around the elaborate altar inside the shrine, and you hear faint music. To your surprise, all of this results in a cute youkai appearing before you. It's Amabie, a Japanese spirit that can foretell of abundant harvests and offer protection from pandemics! Amabie says, "Greetings! Thank you so much for waking me! *yawn* It seems like I’ve been asleep for so very, very long. I apologize that I’m still a bit groggy Ah! You’ve left a gift! Thank you so much for your generosity!! May I offer you my blessing? Be safe, be well, and may the fickle winds of fortune favor you! I hope that we’ll meet again, perhaps on another day as beautiful and exciting as today! But until then… *yawn* maybe I’ll go back to sleep... for just a bit longer..." With a final wink, Amabie vanishes once again. Wow! To think that you'd meet a real, live youkai at AnimeIowa! You're telling ''everyone'' about this! [[Sunday Evening Events]]

You talk to the friendly Info Desk volunteers, who relays an interesting rumor to you about the appearance of a mysterious youkai at the shrine. They want to tell you more, but say it might be dangerous, and only those who prove their conviction can receive the information. They then look pointedly at the charity bucket sitting on the table in front of them. After slipping a three dollar donation into the charity bucket, the Info Desk volunteer furtively hands you over a lucky five yen coin, and whispers the special steps that will allegedly call upon the true guardian spirit of the shrine. With the five yen piece in hand, you return to the shrine. The advice from the Info Desk leads you to discover the real purpose of the five yen coin you received, and you boldly test your theory. Instantly, you're startled by a clap of thunder! You see twinkling lights start to swirl around the elaborate altar inside the shrine, and you hear faint music. To your surprise, all of this results in a cute youkai appearing before you. It's Amabie, a Japanese spirit that can foretell of abundant harvests and offer protection from pandemics! Amabie says, "Oh, my! Hello! I had no idea anyone would be stopping by today. How delightful! And what’s this? You’ve given a donation! You have a kind heart! Did you know that there’s no such thing as a small act of kindness? That’s right! EVERY act of kindness creates a ripple that keeps expanding and inspiring others! *giggle* But this is not the time to be so serious! You have my blessing, and it’s time to enjoy the day! Thank you for your kindness, and for taking time to visit me today! Be safe and be well!" With a final wink, Amabie vanishes once again. Wow! To think that you'd meet a real, live youkai at AnimeIowa! You're telling ''everyone'' about this! [[Sunday Afternoon Events]]

You talk to the friendly Info Desk volunteers, who relays an interesting rumor to you about the appearance of a mysterious youkai at the shrine. They want to tell you more, but say it might be dangerous, and only those who prove their conviction can receive the information. They then look pointedly at the charity bucket sitting on the table in front of them. After slipping a three dollar donation into the charity bucket, the Info Desk volunteer furtively hands you over a lucky five yen coin, and whispers the special steps that will allegedly call upon the true guardian spirit of the shrine. With the five yen piece in hand, you return to the shrine. The advice from the Info Desk leads you to discover the real purpose of the five yen coin you received, and you boldly test your theory. Instantly, you're startled by a clap of thunder! You see twinkling lights start to swirl around the elaborate altar inside the shrine, and you hear faint music. To your surprise, all of this results in a cute youkai appearing before you. It's Amabie, a Japanese spirit that can foretell of abundant harvests and offer protection from pandemics! Amabie says, "Hello! You called for me? And you recognize me? Yes, indeed! I’m Amabie! It feels nice to be remembered doesn’t it, and it’s very important to me! So thank you so much! And I see you’ve left a donation? Oh, that’s so wonderful and thoughtful of you! In return for your gift and remembrance, please accept my blessing, and with it my sincere wish for the good health and safety of you, your friends, and your loved ones. Now go and enjoy this wonderful day! Be well... and farewell!" With a final wink, Amabie vanishes once again. Wow! To think that you'd meet a real, live youkai at AnimeIowa! You're telling ''everyone'' about this! [[Sunday Noon Events]]

You talk to the friendly Info Desk volunteers, who relays an interesting rumor to you about the appearance of a mysterious youkai at the shrine. They want to tell you more, but say it might be dangerous, and only those who prove their conviction can receive the information. They then look pointedly at the charity bucket sitting on the table in front of them. After slipping a three dollar donation into the charity bucket, the Info Desk volunteer furtively hands you over a lucky five yen coin, and whispers the special steps that will allegedly call upon the true guardian spirit of the shrine. With the five yen piece in hand, you return to the shrine. The advice from the Info Desk leads you to discover the real purpose of the five yen coin you received, and you boldly test your theory. Instantly, you're startled by a clap of thunder! You see twinkling lights start to swirl around the elaborate altar inside the shrine, and you hear faint music. To your surprise, all of this results in a cute youkai appearing before you. It's Amabie, a Japanese spirit that can foretell of abundant harvests and offer protection from pandemics! Amabie says, "Greetings! Thank you so much for waking me! *yawn* It seems like I’ve been asleep for so very, very long. I apologize that I’m still a bit groggy Ah! You’ve left a gift! Thank you so much for your generosity!! May I offer you my blessing? Be safe, be well, and may the fickle winds of fortune favor you! I hope that we’ll meet again, perhaps on another day as beautiful and exciting as today! But until then… *yawn* maybe I’ll go back to sleep... for just a bit longer..." With a final wink, Amabie vanishes once again. Wow! To think that you'd meet a real, live youkai at AnimeIowa! You're telling ''everyone'' about this! [[Saturday Night Events]]

You talk to the friendly Info Desk volunteers, who relays an interesting rumor to you about the appearance of a mysterious youkai at the shrine. They want to tell you more, but say it might be dangerous, and only those who prove their conviction can receive the information. They then look pointedly at the charity bucket sitting on the table in front of them. After slipping a three dollar donation into the charity bucket, the Info Desk volunteer furtively hands you over a lucky five yen coin, and whispers the special steps that will allegedly call upon the true guardian spirit of the shrine. With the five yen piece in hand, you return to the shrine. The advice from the Info Desk leads you to discover the real purpose of the five yen coin you received, and you boldly test your theory. Instantly, you're startled by a clap of thunder! You see twinkling lights start to swirl around the elaborate altar inside the shrine, and you hear faint music. To your surprise, all of this results in a cute youkai appearing before you. It's Amabie, a Japanese spirit that can foretell of abundant harvests and offer protection from pandemics! Amabie says, "What’s this? A generous donation!? Marvelous! Is this from you? Thank you so very much! You’ve earned the gratitude and blessing of Amabie! Yes, silly, that’s me! What? You were expecting one of those foolish Inari foxes? *laugh* I think not! But regardless, you’ve shown me the true nature of your kindness, as you so often share it with others. It makes you much more special than you realize! Keep this in your heart, and the joy and peace you deserve will find you. Safe travels to you, until we meet again!" With a final wink, Amabie vanishes once again. Wow! To think that you'd meet a real, live youkai at AnimeIowa! You're telling ''everyone'' about this! [[Saturday Evening Events]]

You talk to the friendly Info Desk volunteers, who relays an interesting rumor to you about the appearance of a mysterious youkai at the shrine. They want to tell you more, but say it might be dangerous, and only those who prove their conviction can receive the information. They then look pointedly at the charity bucket sitting on the table in front of them. After slipping a three dollar donation into the charity bucket, the Info Desk volunteer furtively hands you over a lucky five yen coin, and whispers the special steps that will allegedly call upon the true guardian spirit of the shrine. With the five yen piece in hand, you return to the shrine. The advice from the Info Desk leads you to discover the real purpose of the five yen coin you received, and you boldly test your theory. Instantly, you're startled by a clap of thunder! You see twinkling lights start to swirl around the elaborate altar inside the shrine, and you hear faint music. To your surprise, all of this results in a cute youkai appearing before you. It's Amabie, a Japanese spirit that can foretell of abundant harvests and offer protection from pandemics! Amabie says, "Hello! You called for me? And you recognize me? Yes, indeed! I’m Amabie! It feels nice to be remembered doesn’t it, and it’s very important to me! So thank you so much! And I see you’ve left a donation? Oh, that’s so wonderful and thoughtful of you! In return for your gift and remembrance, please accept my blessing, and with it my sincere wish for the good health and safety of you, your friends, and your loved ones. Now go and enjoy this wonderful day! Be well... and farewell!" With a final wink, Amabie vanishes once again. Wow! To think that you'd meet a real, live youkai at AnimeIowa! You're telling ''everyone'' about this! [[Saturday Afternoon Events]]

Tucked into a corner of the Marketplace is a small Japanese garden of sorts. You walk through the Torii gate and into the garden, a backdrop of sakura trees mysteriously in full bloom despite the time of year, and take note of your surroundings: As you enter, there's a sign welcoming you to the AnimeIowa Inari Shrine, and advising you not to taunt or feed the youkai. To the right is a small fountain with the black head of a youkai poking up through the water. Another sign cautions you not to touch the Umi-Bouzu or give it any sort of assistance. To the left is a Japanese shrine with two fox statues guarding it... or perhaps they're kitsune who have disguised themselves as stone! A third sign gives you directions on Shinto shrine prayer protocol: Place your donation in the offering box Bow deeply twice Clap twice Silently offer your prayer Bow deeply one more time The sign also says that all donations will be going to this year's charity, the Iowa Asian Alliance. There's also an additional bit of cryptic information: "Are you ready to receive the resident youkai's special blessing? Visit the AnimeIowa Info Desk and ask for the secret to call upon the hidden guardian of the shrine!" Luckily, you already know the secret, and made a donation at the Info Desk to get the item that unlocks it. Testing the information you were given, you're instantly startled by a clap of thunder! You see twinkling lights start to swirl around the elaborate altar inside the shrine, and you hear faint music. To your surprise, all of this results in a cute youkai appearing before you. It's Amabie, a Japanese spirit that can foretell of abundant harvests and offer protection from pandemics! Amabie says, "Hello! You called for me? And you recognize me? Yes, indeed! I’m Amabie! It feels nice to be remembered doesn’t it, and it’s very important to me! So thank you so much! And I see you’ve left a donation? Oh, that’s so wonderful and thoughtful of you! In return for your gift and remembrance, please accept my blessing, and with it my sincere wish for the good health and safety of you, your friends, and your loved ones. Now go and enjoy this wonderful day! Be well... and farewell!" With a final wink, Amabie vanishes once again. Wow! To think that you'd meet a real, live youkai at AnimeIowa! You're telling ''everyone'' about this! [[Friday Night Events]]

You talk to the friendly Info Desk volunteers, who relays an interesting rumor to you about the appearance of a mysterious youkai at the shrine. They want to tell you more, but say it might be dangerous, and only those who prove their conviction can receive the information. They then look pointedly at the charity bucket sitting on the table in front of them. After slipping a three dollar donation into the charity bucket, the Info Desk volunteer furtively hands you over a lucky five yen coin, and whispers the special steps that will allegedly call upon the true guardian spirit of the shrine. With the five yen piece in hand, you return to the shrine. The advice from the Info Desk leads you to discover the real purpose of the five yen coin you received, and you boldly test your theory. Instantly, you're startled by a clap of thunder! You see twinkling lights start to swirl around the elaborate altar inside the shrine, and you hear faint music. To your surprise, all of this results in a cute youkai appearing before you. It's Amabie, a Japanese spirit that can foretell of abundant harvests and offer protection from pandemics! Amabie says, "Oh, my! Hello! I had no idea anyone would be stopping by today. How delightful! And what’s this? You’ve given a donation! You have a kind heart! Did you know that there’s no such thing as a small act of kindness? That’s right! EVERY act of kindness creates a ripple that keeps expanding and inspiring others! *giggle* But this is not the time to be so serious! You have my blessing, and it’s time to enjoy the day! Thank you for your kindness, and for taking time to visit me today! Be safe and be well!" With a final wink, Amabie vanishes once again. Wow! To think that you'd meet a real, live youkai at AnimeIowa! You're telling ''everyone'' about this! [[Friday Night Events]]

Tucked into a corner of the Marketplace is a small Japanese garden of sorts. You walk through the Torii gate and into the garden, a backdrop of sakura trees mysteriously in full bloom despite the time of year, and take note of your surroundings: As you enter, there's a sign welcoming you to the AnimeIowa Inari Shrine, and advising you not to taunt or feed the youkai. To the right is a small fountain with the black head of a youkai poking up through the water. Another sign cautions you not to touch the Umi-Bouzu or give it any sort of assistance. To the left is a Japanese shrine with two fox statues guarding it... or perhaps they're kitsune who have disguised themselves as stone! A third sign gives you directions on Shinto shrine prayer protocol: Place your donation in the offering box Bow deeply twice Clap twice Silently offer your prayer Bow deeply one more time The sign also says that all donations will be going to this year's charity, the Iowa Asian Alliance. There's also an additional bit of cryptic information: "Are you ready to receive the resident youkai's special blessing? Visit the AnimeIowa Info Desk and ask for the secret to call upon the hidden guardian of the shrine!" Luckily, you already know the secret, and made a donation at the Info Desk to get the item that unlocks it. Testing the information you were given, you're instantly startled by a clap of thunder! You see twinkling lights start to swirl around the elaborate altar inside the shrine, and you hear faint music. To your surprise, all of this results in a cute youkai appearing before you. It's Amabie, a Japanese spirit that can foretell of abundant harvests and offer protection from pandemics! Amabie says, "Greetings! Thank you so much for waking me! *yawn* It seems like I’ve been asleep for so very, very long. I apologize that I’m still a bit groggy Ah! You’ve left a gift! Thank you so much for your generosity!! May I offer you my blessing? Be safe, be well, and may the fickle winds of fortune favor you! I hope that we’ll meet again, perhaps on another day as beautiful and exciting as today! But until then… *yawn* maybe I’ll go back to sleep... for just a bit longer..." With a final wink, Amabie vanishes once again. Wow! To think that you'd meet a real, live youkai at AnimeIowa! You're telling ''everyone'' about this! [[Sunday Noon Events]]

Tucked into a corner of the Marketplace is a small Japanese garden of sorts. You walk through the Torii gate and into the garden, a backdrop of sakura trees mysteriously in full bloom despite the time of year, and take note of your surroundings: As you enter, there's a sign welcoming you to the AnimeIowa Inari Shrine, and advising you not to taunt or feed the youkai. To the right is a small fountain with the black head of a youkai poking up through the water. Another sign cautions you not to touch the Umi-Bouzu or give it any sort of assistance. To the left is a Japanese shrine with two fox statues guarding it... or perhaps they're kitsune who have disguised themselves as stone! A third sign gives you directions on Shinto shrine prayer protocol: Place your donation in the offering box Bow deeply twice Clap twice Silently offer your prayer Bow deeply one more time The sign also says that all donations will be going to this year's charity, the Iowa Asian Alliance. There's also an additional bit of cryptic information: "Are you ready to receive the resident youkai's special blessing? Visit the AnimeIowa Info Desk and ask for the secret to call upon the hidden guardian of the shrine!" Luckily, you already know the secret, and made a three dollar donation at the Info Desk to get the item that unlocks it. Testing the information you were given, you're instantly startled by a clap of thunder! You see twinkling lights start to swirl around the elaborate altar inside the shrine, and you hear faint music. To your surprise, all of this results in a cute youkai appearing before you. It's Amabie, a Japanese spirit that can foretell of abundant harvests and offer protection from pandemics! Amabie says, "Oh, my! Hello! I had no idea anyone would be stopping by today. How delightful! And what’s this? You’ve given a donation! You have a kind heart! Did you know that there’s no such thing as a small act of kindness? That’s right! EVERY act of kindness creates a ripple that keeps expanding and inspiring others! *giggle* But this is not the time to be so serious! You have my blessing, and it’s time to enjoy the day! Thank you for your kindness, and for taking time to visit me today! Be safe and be well!" With a final wink, Amabie vanishes once again. Wow! To think that you'd meet a real, live youkai at AnimeIowa! You're telling ''everyone'' about this! [[Saturday Evening Events]]

You make it right on time to the Marketplace, with half an hour before it closes to the public. Tucked in a corner of the room is a small Japanese garden of sorts. You walk through the Torii gate and into the garden, a backdrop of sakura trees mysteriously in full bloom despite the time of year, and take note of your surroundings: As you enter, there's a sign welcoming you to the AnimeIowa Inari Shrine, and advising you not to taunt or feed the youkai. To the right is a small fountain with the black head of a youkai poking up through the water. Another sign cautions you not to touch the Umi-Bouzu or give it any sort of assistance. To the left is a Japanese shrine with two fox statues guarding it... or perhaps they're kitsune who have disguised themselves as stone! A third sign gives you directions on Shinto shrine prayer protocol: Place your donation in the offering box Bow deeply twice Clap twice Silently offer your prayer Bow deeply one more time The sign also says that all donations will be going to this year's charity, the Iowa Asian Alliance. There's also an additional bit of cryptic information: "Are you ready to receive the resident youkai's special blessing? Visit the AnimeIowa Info Desk and ask for the secret to call upon the hidden guardian of the shrine!" Luckily, you already know the secret, and made a three dollar donation at the Info Desk to get the item that unlocks it. Testing the information you were given, you're instantly startled by a clap of thunder! You see twinkling lights start to swirl around the elaborate altar inside the shrine, and you hear faint music. To your surprise, all of this results in a cute youkai appearing before you. It's Amabie, a Japanese spirit that can foretell of abundant harvests and offer protection from pandemics! Amabie says, "What’s this? A generous donation!? Marvelous! Is this from you? Thank you so very much! You’ve earned the gratitude and blessing of Amabie! Yes, silly, that’s me! What? You were expecting one of those foolish Inari foxes? *laugh* I think not! But regardless, you’ve shown me the true nature of your kindness, as you so often share it with others. It makes you much more special than you realize! Keep this in your heart, and the joy and peace you deserve will find you. Safe travels to you, until we meet again!" With a final wink, Amabie vanishes once again. Wow! To think that you'd meet a real, live youkai at AnimeIowa! You're telling ''everyone'' about this! [[Sunday Evening Events]]

This Alien Lifeswap panel seems to have a particular focus on the nature of the galactic alliance and the roles the various alien species that have appeared so far play in it, as well as what reasons the alliance may have for being interested in Earth and the planets Noboru's alien classmates have come from; there's more than a little evidence that the alliance isn't the benevolent force they claim to be, and there's growing rumors that this will be discovered as part of a larger plot in the series itself. [[Friday Afternoon Events]]

A panel about the recent surge in the isekai ("alternate world") genre. Up for discussion are titles you're familiar with, such as WorldsOther and Isekai Bus Tour, Fantasy Hero Mech, and Help! I'm Falling In Love With the Villainess!, but the presenter also talks about a light novel series called "My Experiences as a Universe Administrator's Intern"; the series pokes fun at the typical trope of a character dying by accident and God transporting them to another world by having the character survive a universe administrator's accident, but be shunted out of their body and end up working for the same universe administrator while the administrator works to make the human's body habitable again. It sounds kinda hilarious. [[Friday Evening Events]]

A panel about an OVA series of the same name that you somehow haven't heard of before. The story takes place in a world where magic is real, but rare; the main character is a witch named Hazel who is attempting a vigilante routine when the police finally track her down. She's forced to hide in the wilderness and ends up discovered by the counselors at a camp that teaches kids beginner-level magic. The series continues with Hazel hiding out in disguise as a new camp counselor and saving the campers from wild monsters, pranks from rival camps, and blowing themselves up with their own magic. It sounds like a real hoot! [[What now?]]

A Heartbeat Rhythm Magic panel hosted by a Judge Malice cosplayer, dedicated in part to discussing the sport, and in part to learning the dance moves in the closing credits. The rules of the sport are more in-depth than you'd realized from just watching the show, and some of the dance moves are super catchy. [[Saturday Morning Events]]

This panel starts indoors, where the hosts, dressed as Swept Away characters, explain the basics of curling for anyone who isn't familiar with the sport already. They then explain the modified rules for Cosplay Curling, which sound a little like a field curling variant—is field curling a thing? You have no idea. The panel then moves outside to the patio, where a curling court has been set up in tape lines, and a cosplayer of the coach from Swept Away is standing by as a referee. It looks like they got permission to sprinkle some sand on the patio to simulate rough ice, and the stone is actually on wheels. There's not enough time for a full game, but everyone who showed up gets a chance to try both major team positions for this variant, and you leave with a new appreciation for the sport. [[Saturday Noon Events]]

This panelist is very clearly doing their best to pack a whole lot of very important issues into a limited time slot. They talk about things like various bigotries in Japan and how they differ from what you encounter in the United States (such as discrimination against Koreans, Okinawans, and the Ainu, differing Japanese stereotypes of queer people, how representation of Black people in anime still sometimes mirrors the early 1900s in the US), as well as how anime fandom as a whole treats marginalized fans (racism against non-white fans, fetishization of Japan and Japanese people in particular and probably East Asians in general, ablism in general and at conventions in particular, body shaming of fat cosplayers and slimming down of fat characters in fan art, and so forth). They also talk about some of the positive progress they've seen in anime and anime fandom over the past few years, such as the entire cast of City Heist having skin in various shades of brown and Adorina in particular dressing modestly and wearing a head scarf; the disabled and atypically built characters in Bolt Turners in the Sky and Inherit the Flame; the casual queer representation in Inherit the Flame and His Majesty's Guard, and the more seriously treated queer representation in Sunset Eyes and Rue 63rd; and the kindness fandom as a whole has been showing the titular character of Hanako's School Days, as well as the growing acceptance of fat fans as a result. The presenter shares several links at the end with more information, including drawing tutorials for darker skin and mobility aids; you snap a photo of the links and promise yourself you're going to check them out later. [[Saturday Afternoon Events]]

Oh, how cute! This panel is hosted by cosplayers of Ken and Yuki from A Sprinkle of Love; they're doing the whole thing in character as they put on a mini cooking show with a recipe for no-bake cookies. They have free samples and recipe cards available at the end, and you take one of each. Yum! [[Saturday Evening Events]]

Turns out this one is about a new-ish manga series called City Beneath, featuring a dystopian underground city that descended more-or-less intact into a sinkhole some forty years prior, and that the rest of the world pretty much assumes was spontaneously destroyed. The main character fell into the sinkhole when parachuting and is now stuck there, trying to navigate the strange social customs that developed while also trying his best to find a way home. [[Sunday Morning Events]]

An Isekai Tour Bus panel hosted by cosplayers of the driver and tour guide, Youta and Miyu. Miyu talks about some of the worlds the bus has visited in the show so far, pointing out bits of trivia viewers may have missed or that wasn't included in the anime adaptation from the novel series, and Youta chimes in with various extant anime and manga titles the worlds may be inspired by, and the evidence he bases these on. You're surprised to learn how deep the rabbit hole goes for some of the worlds the show visits! [[Sunday Noon Events]]

A quick introduction to learning Japanese, something most otaku can appreciate if they don't already know it! The host mostly goes over grammar structures, not having a lot of time to get into vocabulary, and suggests that learning verb endings can be one of the quicker tricks to picking up the language, along with watching a //lot// of subtitled anime. [[Sunday Afternoon Events]]

Well, you're not really sure you want to join, but it can't hurt to at least learn a little more about it, right? The panel turns out more fun than you thought! In addition to several AnimeIowa staffers, convention mascot Buu-chan, his friend Millie the hippo, and the Pit Master are hosting! The staffers talk about things like staff requirements (working a certain number of hours at the con) and how the near-monthly staff meetings end up feeling like convention panels in themselves. The Pit Master mostly talks about the opportunities that being on staff would afford him to get closer to capturing Buu-chan. Buu-chan, like most mascots, has selective mutism, so the AI staff members have to do a lot of talking for him, and point out the various ways the Pit Master's plans have or would fail. All in all, you learned a good deal about the work the staff members put into making AnimeIowa work, and leave with a greater appreciation for them. You're still not sure if you want to join yourself, but the way one of them talked about no longer getting post-con drop after joining has certainly made the idea more tempting. [[Sunday Evening Events]]