Anime Music Covers #1 -Slam Dunk

So from time to time I hop around Youtube looking for covers of Anime theme music and on a few occasions I have found videos of interest. This first one is of a Young Woman doing a percussion cover to Slam Dunk's OP theme song.  Out in public

Here is the redirect link  to "view on Youtube.com"

I believe the rough translation of the song title is "I want to shout I love You!" The first op song for a Basketball/Sports Anime.

SDF Macross - Those skull Squadron markings are real!

So I was watching a 1980s movie called "The final Countdown" (read my post here) which is about a US Aircraft Carrier. Majority of the fighter jets seen in the film were F-14 tomcats. Every Super Dimensional Fortress Macross fan knows that the VF-1 transforming units have a mode called Fighter where they take on the form of advanced F-14 fighter jets that can move in outer space.     

During one part in the movie a whole bunch of fighters were launching and I noticed the Black, gold and skull markings on some of the fighters.  The Final Countdown came out in 1980 while Macross was aired in 1982 in Japan. I did some research on the net and the US Squadron is the VFA-103 aka "Jolly Rogers". This squad has been in service since the 50s although I don't know then they started using the Skull and crossbone markings. Kind of cool to know that the Japanese Anime production team was inspired by a real and active fighter jet squadron 

There's actually more live-action Great Teacher Onizuka

Sometimes simply called "GTO" Teacher Onizuka was originally a Manga or Japanese comic about a tough, biker guy who dreams of being a School teacher.  The Manga originally began in the late 1990s and a 43-episode Anime was made soon after.  I did watch the Anime way back in the mid 2000s. I remember enjoying the story and characters.   Sadly it ended prior to the Manga being completed. In 2012 A live-action, abbriged, adaptation aired in Japan. Now it's 2014 a short 4-episode sequel or side story.

GTO Taiwan stars "Akira" of Exile in the titular role. By the time you read this post all episodes can be seen on Crunchyroll. The video streaming site. Just a heads up to any of you GTO fans out there.

Anime Still Airing on Local Broadcast TV in 2014

As far as my local TV stations are concerned. For better context I should say which area I live in.  I live in a suburb outside of Chicago, Illinois. We have local channels from 2 to 32. plus or minus if you add the digital sub-channels.

Well on channel 9/9.1 (WGN/CW) there is Anime shown on Saturday morning. A mix of older shows and newer shows. The Block is called "Vortexx" None of the titles will surprise you...




All times are in Central United States time and the shows are aired English-dubbed


Sonic X  8:00 AM
Yugioh 11:00 AM
Dragon Ball Z Kai  10:00 AM
Yugioh Zexal 11:30 AM
Digimon Fusion 10:30 AM