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General Products, known also as GenePro (Japanese: ゼネラルプロダクツ、ゼネプロ)[1] was a Japanese retailer, merchandise manufacturer, publisher, and event organizer active between 1982 and 1992 specializing in the science fiction and anime fan market. Originally based in Osaka, the company was established by Toshio Okada, Yasuhiro Takeda, and other staff members from the 1981 national Japanese SF convention Daicon III, the success of which inspired the founding of General Products. During its existence as an independent company, General Products would provide financing for both the amateur movie group Daicon Film and its later professional successor Gainax, while sharing staff and remaining closely associated with both studios; Gainax’s 1991 OVAOtaku no Video alludes frequently to General Products and features many of its staff in on-screen roles.[2] Described as "the first successful sci-fi specialty shop in Japan,"[3][a] General Products, operating through brick-and-mortar stores and mail-order retail, developed a product line of both original and licensed goods for the Japanese domestic fan market; in 1984 the company founded the semiannual garage kit convention Wonder Festival, an event General Products would continue to operate until 1992.
Between 1989 and 1991, General Products made various efforts to expand into the United States fan market, including publishing a translated manga anthology and opening a subsidiary firm, General Products U.S.A., with an English-language mail-order catalog. Gainax and General Products were among the co-organizers of AnimeCon in California, an event regarded as a direct precursor to Anime Expo.[5][6] By early 1992, however, both the domestic and overseas branches of General Products had ceased operations, with its remaining staff absorbed into Gainax. Although its founding president has attributed its closure in Japan to no longer serving a purpose as a separate firm, General Products' foreign executives have described its closure in the United States as based in a failure to adjust to the local fan market; both its Japanese and American administrators have stated that business management issues contributed to the company’s troubles in its later years. In the 2010s Gainax revived the General Products name in association with their merchandise sales.
Yasuhiro Takeda and Toshio Okada, who would later become the co-founders of General Products, met in April 1978 at Seto-Con, a regional science fiction convention in Kagawa, Japan. At the time, both were college students in Osaka; Takeda at Kinki University, and Okada at Osaka Electro-Communication University.[7] In August of that year, the pair, while "feeling a little bored" among the Tokyo crowd at 1978’s national Japanese SF convention, known that year as Ashinocon,[b][c] did an all-night improv routine based around science fiction films and TV shows that attracted a crowd, and led to them being invited to perform at the Ashinocon closing ceremonies. In his 2005 autobiography, Takeda described their reception: "'Sci-fi standup' they called it, and from the looks of things, no one had ever done anything quite like it before ... all of a sudden, it seemed like everyone knew our names."[11] Writing in a 2010 memoir, Okada reflected on how the roots of his later career lay in the original competitive spirit among SF fans of his generation to try to impress each other by making interesting things happen, whether works or events.[12]
Determined to hold a SF convention that would be "as fun as possible for the attendees," Takeda and Okada organized support from their fan club networks to first produce a local event in the summer of 1979[d] that included participation by Studio Nue, before securing official approval in the spring of 1980 to host the following year’s national SF convention in Osaka, to be called Daicon III.[15] To get ideas for planning the event, the Daicon executive committee attended the World Science Fiction Convention, held that summer in Boston, which made a particular impression when they witnessed how original items for fans were not only being sold, but made; Takeda was amazed to witness a metalsmith fashioning fantasy-style swords for sale right in the dealer’s room.[16] The Daicon staff produced a large variety of hand-made "trinkets" to sell at the convention, but also multiple variants of polyresingarage kits of the powered suits worn by the Mobile Infantry in Robert Heinlein’s Starship Troopers; the kits were based on the suits as illustrated by Studio Nue for the 1977 Hayakawa Bunko Japanese-language edition of the novel.[e] Upon the opening day of Daicon III in August 1981, their powered suit garage kits sold out within minutes, which gave Okada the inspiration to start up a regular business for merchandise.[20][21] In a 2003 memoir however Kaiyodo founder Osamu Miyawaki asserted that the founding of General Products[f] was a development inspired by the advent of Asahi Sonorama's magazine Uchūsen ("Spaceship") in 1980; with its coverage of contemporary and classic Japanese and foreign SFX movies, he credited the magazine for raising creative interest among young Japanese readers, including in making their own original models;[g] Miyawaki described General Products as having swiftly ushered in "a new era of craftsmanship" in modeling. Upon its 1982 launch, General Products would advertise in Uchūsen.[25]
In February 1982, the business opened[h] with a physical store located near Momodani Station in Osaka; General Products also introduced their first of several mail-order catalogues.[27] General Products had been named after the trading company run by the alien race the Puppeteers from the Known Space books of science fiction author Larry Niven; specifically, from its depiction in Niven's novel Ringworld, originally released in 1970 but not published in Japanese until 1978 through Hayakawa, its translation by Rei Kozumi winning a Seiun Award the following year. Takeda remarked that, "We received permission from Niven himself to use the term for our shop."[28][i][j] The references to Niven's fictional universe were further reflected in the title given to General Products’ members club, the Known Space Club, as well as the club newsletter, Papetteia tsūshin ("Puppeteer Bulletin"), also stylized in English by General Products as Puppeteer Press. For much of its history, General Products saw its business as directed at Japanese fans of the science fiction genre itself rather than of any particular form of media, selling not only SF anime, but novels, live-action films, as well as related merchandise.[31] Takeda related that his younger group of con organizers had planned their events with the concept that SF "was big enough to accommodate anything," although he noted a generation gap where Japanese fans older than them did not consider anime and tokusatsu to be "true" science fiction works.[32]
In a 1983 poll answered by 3508 members of the Known Space Club, the single most commonly cited fan interest was speope (space opera), followed by movies in general, kaiju, and novels in general; anime as a medium was the fifth most cited choice. The poll indicated General Products' customer base at the time to be 63% men and 36% women, with 1% declining to state a gender; the most common member age given was 17. The largest single concentration of members was local to Osaka, but responses to the survey were made from every prefecture of Japan with the exception of Hokkaido.[33] General Products continued to attend US fan conventions, including a visit to San Diego Comic-Con in the early 1980s that Osamu Miyawaki credited as influencing them to quickly develop a number of new techniques.[k] In 1984, General Products would organize a guided package tour for Japanese fans who wished to attend the 42nd World Science Fiction Convention held that year in Anaheim, California, advertising their experience attending the event on previous occasions.[36][l] Toshio Okada and Yasuhiro Takeda were both themselves members of the 1984 Worldcon,[38] where the contingent from Japan made up the largest group outside of those from the US and Canada[39] and included event support from Kodansha, who arranged the official American premiere of the anime film adaptation of E.E. Smith's Lensman, as well as The Japan Foundation, which sponsored a panel and screening of a subtitled episode of the anime TV series Aura Battler Dunbine presented by its director, Yoshiyuki Tomino.[40][m] General Products brought back American merchandise obtained at the Worldcon dealer’s room to feature in their Osaka store, and devoted two pages to US goods in their Fall 1984 catalog.[42][n]
While acknowledging that General Products was not the first store in Japan to specialize in science fiction fan merchandise, Takeda maintained that the company's success came from what he described as the innovative practice of prioritizing sales of their own original goods designed for and directed at the Japanese fan market, as opposed to other SF stores that placed their emphasis on selling imported items. General Products obtained licenses to make items based on properties owned by prominent Japanese media companies such as Toho and Tsuburaya.[44] Takeda asserted that previous to General Products, only "established manufacturers" of toys and models had been able to obtain such licenses, and that it had been "unthinkable for a small garage kit company to even ask."[o] He described the appeal to fans of such "small-lot licensed model products" as "[making] the things we wanted ourselves, because we just weren't satisfied with the range of products manufactured by big-name modelers;" an example given was General Products' replicas of items and equipment appearing in the EnixDragon Quest games such as swords and keys. Takeda recalled that the licensing contact at Enix had assumed at first General Products wanted product rights to the characters appearing in the games, and that no one had ever approached them before asking for rights to the equipment items instead.[47]
General Products 1/35 scale garage kit of the space capsule from Royal Space Force.[48][p] In 1988, Star Trek: The Next Generation design artist Rick Sternbach reviewed the kit, contrasting its style of packaging in a plain white cardboard box with a photo of the finished model attached to "the flashy full-color boxes usually seen surrounding plastic hobby kits." Sternbach praised its workmanship: "This kit ... is what is termed a 'garage kit,' although the quality is far above what the name implies. I know I couldn’t make this in my garage without a lot of help…The resin parts are solid and show a good clear detail ... The white metal pieces are equally clean and nicely detailed."[51]
By 1985, General Products had created over 50 garage kits for sale, ranging in size from 50 to 560 mm and made using a variety of different methods, including vacuum-forming, resin casting, metal casting, and also papercraft. Most kits were based on Japanese tokusatsu and kaiju series under license from studios such as Tsuburaya, Ishimori Productions, Toho, and Daiei Film, with a few licensed from American SF series and films such as Star Trek, Lost in Space, Land of the Giants, and Dark Star. General Products also carried garage kits made by other Japanese labels, including Inoue Arts, Billiken, Skunk Factory, TVC15, Akkun & H Enterprise, and Mono Craft,[q]tie clips and buttons referencing Japanese SF as well as the German series Perry Rhodan, and a selection of doujinshi including early works by Shirow Masamune and Kenichi Sonoda and fanzines for Minky Momo and the works of Stephen King.[53]
A large TV set in the Osaka store was used for screenings;[54] a schedule for the 1984-85 winter holiday included films such as The War of the Gargantuas, The Mysterians, 2001: A Space Odyssey, and Barbarella.[55] A corner of the store was partially walled off in glass as a section called "Cafe SID."[r] Promoted by General Products as "a place where SF fans can converse," Cafe SID served food and drink, opening in 1984 with nine counter seats, and further expanded by 1985 to include five tables.[58][59] In addition to selling directly to consumers, General Products distributed their goods through other outlets; in April 1985, 106 retailers in 35 Japanese prefectures were listed as carrying General Products merchandise.[60]
General Products proposed using their prior experience as convention planners to organize a con for the garage kit community, "getting everyone together for some kind of direct-sales event ... What we came up with was Wonder Festival."[61] The first Wonder Festival was held as a "pre-event" at General Products' store in Osaka on December 22-23, 1984 with 10 dealers and 700 attendees, followed on January 13, 1985 by an event held on the third floor of the Tokyo Metropolitan Industrial Trade Center in Hamamatsuchō, Tokyo attracting 60 dealers and 2000 attendees. Wonder Festival remained in Tokyo and became a biannual event, by December 1989 expanding to take up the entire Trade Center building, with 11,000 attendees and 250 dealers.[62] Takeda recalled that while General Products felt itself to be in "a perpetual state of event planning,"[s] Wonder Festival "brought back the party-like atmosphere we had first experienced during the preparations for the [1979] Sci-Fi Show," noting that Wonder Festival's staff included volunteers who had also worked on Daicon.[64] Takeda further credited Wonder Festival with expanding the garage kit industry through a system where the convention would negotiate on behalf of amateurs who wished to sell models based on a license holder's IP to obtain a single-day license, allowing them at the event to "compete on equal ground with the major manufacturers ... providing an opportunity for both pros and amateurs to show off their wares side by side."[65]
In October 1987, General Products opened a second store, located in the Kichijōji neighborhood of Musashino City in Tokyo; the company also transferred its headquarters from the Osaka store to the new Tokyo location.[66] In his 2003 memoir, Osamu Miyawaki of Kaiyodo recalled 1987 as a time where "the rise of garage kits," had upended the hobby world to a point where the scene seemed "about to explode;"[t] in this competitive environment, he described General Products as both "good at business and good at publicity ... a worthy rival to which we were constantly being compared."[69] Takeda, however, had himself described the Tokyo move as a consequence of an "ever-worsening state of affairs at General Products," remarking that while the company had some hit merchandise, such as a soft vinyl[u]Kamen Rider mask, "General Products items weren't doing very well in the marketplace." The decision to move was further influenced by the fact the companies that owned the rights to General Products' licensed character goods were located in Tokyo, as was Wonder Festival, which was "rapidly becoming the store's primary source of investment capital." Although the Osaka store remained in business, several of its staff who were asked to transfer to Tokyo declined and left the company; Takeda noted that after the move only "about ten employees" remained at General Products.[73]
Following the move to Tokyo, General Products embarked on a licensed publishing venture with Cyber Comix, a monthly manga anthology released in wide-ban tankobon format. The initial concept for Cyber Comix was for a magazine to be "filled with nothing but Gundam manga," a proposal by Hiroshi Ueda, a veteran of doujinshi circles who had previously been an in-house editor at General Products. Using contacts made during the production of Royal Space Force, Cyber Comix was pitched successfully to Gundam rights-holder Bandai.[74] The first issue of Cyber Comix, with a cover illustration by Kenichi Sonoda,[75] made its debut in the spring of 1988.[76][v] Contributors to the magazine included Kazuhiko Shimamoto, Taku Kitazaki, Katsu Aki, and Takami Akai.[78] Although Cyber Comix did feature manga set in the background of the UC Gundam universe,[79] it also included series unrelated to Gundam such as Dark Whisper by Ikuto Yamashita[80] and manga inspired by Gainax's own anime Gunbuster.[81] Takeda recalled that "the editorial framework that was set in place was rather lacking ... books were constantly published behind schedule. And given that Bandai had money invested in this venture, it's safe to say they were none too pleased with the results. Finally, our contact ... stated that [Cyber Comix] would be continuing without the services of General Products.[w] Takeda assessed of the publishing venture that, "It was the greatest failure in our attempt to expand the scope of our company ... In the end, the editorial department offered the company nothing more than a larger circle of contacts," citing as an example Ikuto Yamashita,[85] later to become the lead mecha designer on Gainax's TV series Neon Genesis Evangelion.[86]
During its ten years in existence as a company between 1982 and 1992, General Products remained a separate organization from the amateur filmmaking studio Daicon Film and its later professional spinoff studio Gainax; Takeda however described a close business relationship between them that included financing as well as shared personnel and facilities.[87]
Daicon Film formally established spring 1982 (Takeda 68-69, 107) [therefore Daicon III not technically a Daicon Film, although Takeda includes it 107]
The last year of Daicon Film's activity as a studio overlapped with the first year of Gainax's. Gainax was professionally incorporated in December of 1984 and began their debut project Royal Space Force while work was still ongoing on what Taekda described as Daicon Film's "swan song," Orochi Strikes Again, which would not be completed until December of 1985.
96
legal entity Although future Bandai Visual president Shigeru Watanabe would later bring Gainax into the professional anime industry through arranging for Bandai to co-produce their debut work, 1987's Royal Space Force,[88][89] his original involvement with their staff had been through General Products, which Watanabe described in a 2004 interview as "the predecessor of Gainax."[90] Watanabe first met Okada and Tanaka in 1982[x] during an SFX convention held in Suginami Public Hall. At the time Watanabe was involved with product planning for Bandai's "Real Hobby Series" figurines[92] and recalled "General Products had a booth at the event selling garage kits. I learned a lot from the products they were selling there."[93]
some from Daicon Film live-action and anime
GP and Yamata Orochi (Takeda 95-96)
In his 2005 memoir, Takeda described Gainax's 1984 incorporation as having used two million yen in startup capital supplied by General Products;[94] in 2017, Yamaga related a different startup figure of six million yen, which he characterized as having come personally from Okada: "Ever since Daicon III, his position has always been a client."[95]
GP capitalized Gainax and registered it (91-92)
GP organized screenings of Daicon Film works (see Puppeteer Press)
Daicon sales as informal predecessor of OAV (Clements)
Puppeteer Press “What’s Gainax?” Puppeteer Press Vol. 04 No. 13 (in GP folder) Vol. 05 No. 16 (in print)
General Products made merchandise based off Daicon Film works from the beginning of the company; the very first issue of Puppeteer Press, published the same month as the opening of the original Osaka store, offered a mug featuring the schoolgirl protagonist of Daicon III.[96]
The Daicon III opening animations was made on a floor of a warehouse owned by what was then General Products' legal owner, Toshio Okada's family business, Okada Embroidering[97] Daicon IV at Hosei Kaikan (Takeda 80-81, 109)
[ONV Commentary B] In part two, there is a scene where Tanaka-kun is making a garage kit, but Okada-san himself has never made one. He would have things made and sell them as his products. In that sense, things were a little different from Kaiyōdō (a figure creator and manufacturer). Clearly, he was presenting “concepts” and his focus was not actual products. His products were images (ideas). That’s the difference between Okada-san and the characters here. I don’t know whether it was a request or an actual job order, but it was fundamentally the same way in the case of anime production. He came up with the initial vision and asked Yamaga-san, Anno-san, and Akai-san to make anime based upon it. He might inspire them to make things in a certain way, or he might tell them to produce in a certain way. The order of the process might vary. Kubo-kun is making a decision here in Otaku no Video, he’s saying something like: “I’m going to do it!” But he is not a creator. [LAUGHS]
and had directed the opening anime films for Japan's 1981 and 1983 national science conventions, Daicon III and IV,[98] which through their sale to fans on home video through General Products were regarded as informal precursors of the OVA concept later to become a major element of the anime industry [refine this reference re Clements’ book].[99]
Made contact with Shigeru Watanabe through General Products [ref RSF article]
Akai and Anno as GP catalog artists (Anno back cover 1985) Anno created MacArthur T-shirt 1985
Gainax moves to Kichijoji-Manami Mar 1987 (Takeda 14)Unmarried male staff from both Gainax and GP used a shared house as their living space in Tokyo (Takeda 118) Only four GP employees in Tokyo (120) GP and Gainax move back to Kichijoji-Higashi where RSF was made; three times size and GP began to expand (Takeda 121)
Dragon Quest merchandise led to Gainax's Dragon Quest Fantasia Video [103]
GP profitable, Gainax's anime not; more people hired at GP, "go where the profits were" Takeda 138:
Although by 1989 Gainax had made the successful Gunbuster,[104] the studio's physical presence remained smaller than that of General Products itself; Takeshi Mori, later to direct Otaku no Video, recalled that while he was inspired after watching Gunbuster to pay a visit to Hideaki Anno in order to work on his upcoming series for NHK, Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water, he was uncertain at first if he had actually found Gainax, as he described the anime studio at that time as being located "in a corner of the General Products shop in Tokyo."[105]Jean-Jacques Beineix and Jackie Bastide's documentary for French television Otaku: fils de l'empire du virtuel ["Otaku: Sons of the Virtual Empire"] contained a segment with Takami Akai on the development of Gainax's game Princess Maker 2 filmed at the Tokyo General Products store;[106] footage of store manager Hiroki Sato[107] building garage kits appeared in its introduction.[108]
The anime segments of Otaku no Video were separated from each other by ten live-action "Portrait of an Otaku" segments, shot in the style of a documentary interview with subjects whose voices were altered and faces Pixelization
In the 2006 director's commentary, Hiroki Sato remarked that all but one[y] of the interview subjects in the live-action segments of Otaku no Video were General Products employees.[110] This included the only foreigner interviewed, the third and final
although she agreed that the Japanese interview subjects were also portrayed in an unflattering fashion.[111][z]
Both the Known Space Club and Puppeteer Press would eventually undergo a name change in August 1989, to the G.P. Club and G.Press respectively;[115] this change was later explained as reflecting that club members' interests had by then "broadened to the point where we couldn't express it with only the word science fiction."[116]
General Products U.S.A. and later years of the company
Patten gives paragraph summary of GP USA history [117]
Around April of 1989,[118] comics creator Lea Hernandez, who had been assisting with lettering manga at Toren Smith's firm Studio Proteus, was informed by Smith that Okada and Takeda were interested in opening an American branch of General Products in San Francisco; he recommended Hernandez to them as a person knowledgeable in anime and business who could be their representative in the United States. Smith was acquainted with Takeda and Okada, having lived in a Tokyo residence known as "Gainax House" not long after GenePro's 1987 move to the city; originally rented out to provide living space for the staff of Royal Space Force, after the film's completion it was instead occupied by many of the single male employees of General Products.[119][ab] Hernandez had an initial meeting with Takeda and Okada in May 1989 at BayCon in San Jose, CA, a science fiction convention known as an important early venue for US anime fans;[ac] BayCon had hosted an influential anime program by Toren Smith in 1986.[124] Hernandez first did advance promotion of General Products USA at that year's Dallas Fantasy Fair, followed by a table run together with Okada and Takeda at the 1989 San Diego Comic-Con.[125] The table was across from that of guest of honor Syd Mead; Hernandez recounted bringing over to him General Products' licensed garage kit of Mead's Spinner from the film Blade Runner and introducing Mead[ad] to her Japanese co-workers.[127]
Cover of the 1989-90 General Products U.S.A. catalog, featuring an original illustration by Haruhiko Mikimoto depicting a collection of anime characters and mecha, including Daicon Film's own Daicon IV bunny girl. The specific figures appearing on the cover were selected based on General Products Japan querying the vice president of their American division, Lea Hernandez, on which anime were the most popular with American fans at the time: "I didn't realize that's what they were doing with the information until I saw the cover."[128]
In a 2014 interview with Anime News Network, Hernandez recalled that an ambitious set of business objectives had been discussed at the initial 1989 BayCon meeting. Beyond merchandise sales, General Products U.S.A.'s future goals had included organizing a fan convention of their own in the United States, as well as producing "some good dubbed translations of anime, because up until that point they hadn’t really been very good at all," and publishing transated manga directly to tankobon format at a USD $10 sales price, an approach that would become popular in the US manga industry when it was adopted a decade later.[ae] Hernandez compared GP U.S.A.'s ambitions to release both anime and manga in English to the later development of Viz Media, which began as a manga publisher in 1987, and in 1993 expanded into releasing anime on home video;[130] she remarked that her advocacy to Takeda and Okada of releasing translated manga in a USD $10 tankobon format was based on that being the price American fans were used to paying for imported copies of Japanese-language manga tankobon.[131]
Retailers or distributors in the US carrying General Products kits in early 1990 included Horizon and Pony Toy Go-Round in Los Angeles, and New Type in San Francisco.[132]
The catalog was itself advertised in fall 1989 on the inside back cover of the early English-language anime magazine Animag.[139][af]
Hernandez noted that General Products existed in an era when there was often of a time lag of years between the release of an anime in Japan and the diffusion and growth of its fan base in the US, and that the Japanese office couldn't grasp why American fans would want, for example, merchandise from the 1985 TV series Dirty Pair, as from their perspective it was "so over;" instead they wished to push General Products' garage kits based off of the 1989-91 OVA series ARIEL despite it still being unknown at the time to US fans.[143][ag]
Mega Comics, which contained a publiction date of September 1, 1991, listed an address for General Products U.S.A. in the Bank of America Building in downtown Oakland, California for placing mail orders or to join the General Products club; however, a P.O. box in Austin, Texas was listed as "the address for letters of impressions" to "G.Press U.S.A./GAINAX."[150]
A retrospective review in 2007’s Manga: The Complete Guide argued Mega Comics displayed a contrast between its "high production values" and its "sometimes decent but often comically broken English…The dissonance is all the more sharp considering the book's boldly declared purpose ('This is the book you desired earnestly, and would brought you a great impressions!'), which was to present itself as an authentic voice straight from Japan on the subject of anime and manga, but whose actual core seemed to be a membership form within offering $25 annual memberships in the 'General Products Club,' in exchange for exceedingly vague-sounding benefits."[151][ai]
Mega "consulting editor" Yoshimi Kanda--this is pen name of Hiroshi Ueda (Takeda 190)
The Cal-Animage contingent of AnimeCon '91's staff would return to the same venue the following year to organize what would become the first Anime Expo in 1992, forming for the purpose the nonprofit entity SPJA (Society for the Promotion of Japanese Animation);[153] contemporary fan coverage noted the continuity between the two events.[aj]
^The distinction that General Products was the first such successful shop in Japan to specialize in science fiction goods (as opposed to having been the first such shop to exist in Japan) was asserted by General Products co-founder Yasuhiro Takeda in his 2005 memoir; Kaiyodo founder Osamu Miyawaki remarked in 2003 that the Starlog Shop, associated with the Japanese edition of the magazine of the same name, had opened "a little earlier" in Harajuku, Tokyo.[4]
^ The national Japanese SF convention was originally inspired by Worldcon, and also uses Worldcon’s custom of having a local name based on the host city, which differs from year to year. 1981’s Daicon III would be the 20th annual national SF con in Japan, but the third occasion on which it had been hosted in Osaka, and was therefore called "Daicon III;" Dai is an alternate reading of the kanji pronounced as O in Osaka’s name. Takeda would later cite their resentment towards the Tokyo fan scene as a specific reason behind their work to bring the convention once again to Osaka: "…we didn’t have the purest of motivations for hosting the event. We didn’t like Tokyo fans…and we sure as hell weren’t going to stand for defeat at the hands of a bunch of Tokyoites," whom he felt had a superior attitude towards other fans, based on their closer proximity in Tokyo to SF creators and media companies. Takeda reflected that, "In retrospect, I think maybe the fans themselves–us included—were just childish," remarking that the people in his group who organized Daicon III "felt excluded as newcomers, even among the other Kansai fans…from an outside perspective, we probably seemed like troublemakers. We certainly didn’t mean any harm, but looking back, I have to say we did have a little chip on our shoulders."[8]
^ Okada likewise characterized 1981’s Daicon III as their "great grudge match," not only against the Tokyo fan scene, but against the older generation of fans in Osaka, for whom he had resentment after an earlier attempt in 1979 by Okada’s circle to host the national SF con fell through. Okada recalled vowing at the time that he would die before he turned 30, and also noted the irony that among the Tokyo fans he supposedly "hated so much" were people such as Hiroaki Inoue, a future co-founder of Gainax, and Studio Nue,[9] whom Takeda described as being "a great 'big brother' studio" over the years to both Gainax and General Products. Inoue and Studio Nue provided support to Okada and Takeda after their attempt to host the 1979 national SF convention fell through, by helping them to stage a rival event, the 4th Japan Sci-Fi Show, held in Mielparque Osaka Hall, the venue they had already reserved for their failed bid at the national con.[10]
^ The programming of the 4th Japan Sci-Fi Show was centered around stage entertainment, including a screening of the launch scene from Moonwalk One, a costume show, and "sci-fi themed ballet." Although Takeda recalled being "quite pleased" with how the event turned out, and that the show "had been the perfect dress rehersal for [Daicon III],"[13] Okada later remarked that as the Sci-Fi Show was not officially recognized by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of Japan, few professional authors came, and he remembered a humiliating experience that summer trying to boost the show’s attendance, as in the end only 130 people showed up to the event, held in a hall sized for 700.[14]
^Heinlein was profiled in November 1982 within one of the very first issues of General Products' newsletter Puppeteer Press, which described him as among "the greatest writers of science fiction in the world". The author himself had in fact visited Japan just the month before, where he met many Japanese SF writers, as well as Osamu Tezuka, who "told [Heinlein] his books had spurred him on for forty years," while attending the wedding reception of Go Nagai as a guest of Heinlein's Japanese publisher, Hayakawa.[17] The Puppeteer Press profile was illustrated with a drawing by Hideo Azuma of Heinlein, dressed in hospital pajamas and with stitches on his head, ripping pages out of his own books as a fan tackles his leg. The illustration made reference to Heinlein’s 1978 brain operation to bypass a blockage in his carotid artery,[18] after which, the profile claimed, Heinlein declared that "'Everything I've written thus far has been crap,' destroying all his books and releasing a new one called The Number of the Beast"; General Products suggested that fans "wait patiently for Tetsu Yano's translation" of the novel, which would be published in Japan in February 1984. The profile also facetiously advised Japanese fans who only knew Heinlein for Starship Troopers to "immediately run to a bookstore and yell out an order for 'Hayakawa's 281 and 340'" [their catalog numbers for Orphans of the Sky and Glory Road respectively], a demand which, the profile suggested, would startle the clerk sufficiently to enable the fan to then whip out a knife and rob the cash register.[19]
^Kaiyodo, like General Products, was based in Osaka and had originally been founded in 1964 as a store selling commercial model kits; Takeda noted that Toshio Okada had been a regular customer, and that Kaiyodo "entered the garage kit market at about the same time General Products did."[22] Takeshi Kudo, curator of the Aomori Museum of Art, in an essay featured within Woodrow Phoenix's 2006 book Plastic Culture: How Japanese Toys Conquered the World, likewise positions Kaiyodo as a contemporaneous origin point of garage kits as a business: "A group of young people who used to gather at Kaiyodo in those days started to make reproductions of characters from old anime, manga, and special-effects movies. They made the casts for these models and distributed them amongst themselves. In 1981, a studio was set up in the Kaiyodo store building to facilitate these activities, and by 1982 Kaiyodo started to sell these models, known as "garage kits," to the general public. These products were made by otaku for otaku, and garage kits became established as a part of otaku culture in Japan."[23]
^ Takeda remarked that General Products was originally formed as a division of Okada's family business, the Okada Embroidering Corporation. This relationship with Okada Embroidering continued until December 1984, when both General Products and Gainax were incorporated as independent companies.[26]
^ Kozumi relayed a letter from Niven which was excerpted in Puppeteer Press: "A name like 'General Products' can be used by anybody...Best wishes to you in your venture. The science fiction specialty shops do very well in the United States, and I hope you will have the same success in Japan." The staff were reported as having been delighted to receive the letter from Niven, whom they declared to be the "godfather" of General Products.[29]
^Okada remarked that although he found various stores in the US selling SF posters, books, and toys, he personally was unable to find any shops that specialized in science fiction goods per se. While making a trip to the 1982 Worldcon to acquire American SF goods that General Products' customers had requested that they import to Japan, Okada commented on the greatly increased prices he observed in the US for Japanese goods manufactured by Bandai, giving as examples a Yamato originally sold in Japan for 100 yen being sold in the US for the equivalent of 1250 yen, or a model kit of the Interceptor from the TV series UFO that had been 500 yen in Japan but which had an American price equivalent to 7000 yen. Okada also witnessed the video room at the Worldcon playing Lupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro and Voltes V, remarking that "Japanese animation is invincible."[30]
^Miyawaki refers to San Diego Comic-Con as a science fiction rather than a comics convention;[34] Comic-Con has however considered itself to be also a SF fan event since its first show in 1970: "From the beginning, the founders of the show set out to include not only the comic books they loved, but also other aspects of the popular arts that they enjoyed and felt deserved wider recognition, including films and science fiction/fantasy literature."[35]
^ General Products’ ad for their Worldcon tour favorably contrasted the American SF fan experience, pitching the trip to those Japanese fans who had become "tired" of the con scene in "narrow" Japan, which was described as being "a year behind on movies," and where it took "ten years to translate a novel." Even the dealer’s room at Worldcon was described as "a deluxe version of Comic Market."[37]
^ Tomino’s interpreter for the event was Frederik L. Schodt, whom the 1984 Worldcon program book noted as the author of the then-recent Manga! Manga! The World of Japanese Comics. A special room in the convention exhibits area was dedicated to Japanese visual expressions in science fiction, including toys and models; the program book remarked, "The Japanese SF community is active and inventive, combining images and media in striking and unusual ways. Japanese SF artists have been pioneers particularly in the use of animation, with results that do not fit all Western categories."[41]
^Miyawaki remarked that while the practice of making what became known as garage kits originated at Kaiyodo, the actual term "garage kit" (「ガレージキット」）itself, originally foreign, was only later popularized in Japan by Uchūsen editor Saki Hijiri, who spread information on American SFX trends; he described Hijiri as having been a major promoter of garage kit culture.[45] Takeda himself commented that although in 1981 the powered suit models sold at Daicon III "pretty much ... were" garage kits, "We weren't calling them 'garage kits' yet ... "[46]
^General Products made the only contemporary model kits for Gainax's debut work Royal Space Force; in a retrospective article, editor and writer Tetsuo Daitoku had noted his surprise that although the anime had been co-produced by Bandai, whose biggest corporate strength was as a toy manufacturer, Bandai had developed no products based on the film.[49] In an earlier interview with Gainax, Daitoku had expressed the view that many people would have been interested in buying toys and making models based on the film's designs; its director Hiroyuki Yamaga replied that the enthusiasm for them was on the part of the model buidling fans, rather than the model makers. Planner Toshio Okada commented that other garage kit makers praised the designs, but were unsure if they would actually sell as products; assistant director Takami Akai explained that as Royal Space Force's mecha were designed as a natural part of the film's world, like "the buildings and the mountains," they lacked the "character personality" associated with mecha toys; Yamaga remarked that even the rocket whose struggle to build and launch is central to the film's narrative was not given such a "lead role" as a mecha.[50]
^Takeda recalled having been pleased that other fan-oriented modelling firms had entered the market in the wake of General Products: "When new garage kit makers started popping up, the last thing on our mind was accusing them of being copycats ... After all, we finally had friends on our block!"[52]
^General Products explained that the name arose from an inability to decide whether to name the cafe for SID (the Space Intruder Detector satellite in UFO), for Dune, or for Nebula Mask; instead the three were mixed together by declaring that "SID" would also stand for the phrase "Seiun Kamen ["Nebula Mask"] in Dune." The conceit was carried further by the matchbooks available at Cafe SID (General Products sold a popular original branded ashtray with artwork by Hideaki Anno, although the catalog noted that as it was a shame to dirty the picture, some did not use it for its intended purpose),[56] which bore the phrase on the back, "A man from Planet Ivy [the homeworld of Nebula Mask's protagonist] has landed upon a world of sand. All he asks for is a cup of coffee..."[57]
^In addition to Wonder Festival, General Products also organized in association with Bandai's hobbyist and fan magazine B-Club the multi-year JoyCon, featuring garage kits, panels, and screenings of anime from Bandai's labels Emotion and C.Moon; the 1987 event was a touring convention held for one day each in Osaka, Nagoya, and Tokyo during late March and early April of that year.[63]
^Building garage kits is satirically portrayed as having become an actual mainstream social fad in Japan during the late 1980s in what manager of the Tokyo General Products store and later Gainax producer Hiroki Sato described as the deliberately over-the-top[67] second part of Otaku no Video, although author Toru Sano noted that the General Products shop did in fact receive some coverage at the time on Japanese TV programs.[68]
^Although a claim was made in their 1989-90 catalog that General Products' 1/6-scale Daicon IV bunny girl was "the first soft vinyl kit to hit the garage kit market,"[70] Hiroki Sato, former manager of the Tokyo General Products store, expressed in 2016 the belief that the first such soft vinyl garage kit had been made by Kaiyodo, based on Masami Yuki's character Birdy the Mighty. Sato further remarked that soft vinyl (in Japanese sofubi for short) models predated the garage kit industry, having been used by mainstream toy companies for such merchandise as monster figures, but that until the advent of garage kits, soft vinyl had not been adapted for use in bishōjo figures, owing to problems with the material shrinking after being cast; Hiroyuki Yamaga recalled the first Daicon IV bunny girl kit as having distorted facial features.[71] Takeda explained the significance of soft vinyl for the garage kit industry as that it "drastically lowered garage-kit prices—depending on the type of vinyl, its cost can range from one-third to one-half that of epoxy resin."[72]
^ Writing in his 2002 memoir, Takeda gives a different date of October 1989 for the first issue of Cyber Comix.[77]
^Bandai would continue to publish Cyber Comix on their own until its final issue, #47, in October 1992.[82] Takeda does not give an exact date for General Products' dismissal from the project, although a May 1991 Cyber Comix collection dedicated to Gunbuster stories, while listing Bandai's president Makoto Yamashina as publisher and Satoshi Kato from Bandai's B-Club magazine as editor, continues to credit General Products' Hiroshi Ueda and others for "editorial assistance,"[83] whereas in a March 1992 Cyber Comix collection of manga based on the anime series Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water, General Products was absent from the credits, despite Nadia having been a production of their affiliated anime studio, Gainax.[84]
^A 1987 chronology of Royal Space Force gave a different date of August 1983 for this first meeting.[91]
^The exception was the person playing the role of a cel thief, Gainax producer Shoji Murahama, who left the studio after Otaku no Video together with animator Mahiro Maeda and scriptwriter Hiroshi Yamaguchi to form Studio Gonzo.[109]
^ As an example, Hiroki Sato said of his depiction as a garage kit maker in the first live-action segment of the 1985 portion of Otaku no Video, "I really hate seeing myself here," referring to it as an "embarrassing scene" that he would "rather not watch," and that it "made it look like I only made girl figures 24/7." He remarked that although the scene was shot in his actual residence, the filmmakers "brought in extra stuff and made me make piles all over the place."[112] These "sets" arranged for the live-action segments were credited to Hideaki Anno, with camerawork by Shinji Higuchi.[113]
^ The official catalog name of the item term used "space battleship" in quotes 所属 shozoku may be used in Japanese as a suffix after the name of a military force to indicate that a certain vehicle or item of equipment is owned by that force, but it is not necessarily required as an element when translated into English; for example, a bilingual US Forces Japan 2015 press release regarding a H-60 helicopter mishap utilized shozoku[114]
^Jonathan Clements in his 2013 obituary for Toren Smith details his precarious financial circumstances during this period;[120] Okada had offered Smith shelter in Gainax House after he had run out of money while on a stay in Japan during which he established the manga industry contacts that would eventually underlie Studio Proteus.[121] Hernandez's successor at General Products USA, Shon Howell, recalled in 1993, "He didn't have any real [business relationship] with Gainax or General Products; he was just a really good friend of the initial core group. I don't know ... his relationship with them seemed to deteriorate a little bit, because when I was with the company, we were pretty mad at him a lot of the time. To his credit, they expected him to do things that I didn't think were really his responsibility. Running AnimeCon and coordinating General Products USA were not his job. Toren tried to make this point to them several times, saying, in effect, 'Look, I'm your friend, but I don't work for you. I've got my own fish to fry running Studio Proteus.' So things were kind of rough for a while there. They smoothed out eventually."[122]
^In a 2004 paper for MIT, Sean Leonard asserted that the 1989 BayCon was also the origin point of the Ranma Project, which Leonard credits as producing the first widely-distributed anime fansub, that of episodes 1 and 2 of Ranma 1/2[123]
^Mead had attended an event previously together with Okada when he was an invited guest at the February 19, 1987 showing of "Star Quest," a screening intended to help build publicity in Japan for Okada's film Royal Space Force[126]
^A September 2000 article in Pulp detailing the release of vol. 1 of a new English edition of Lone Wolf and Cub from Dark Horse Comics described its USD $9.95 "300-page pocketbook monthly" format as "never before seen here", comparing it to the then-common practice of releasing English-translated manga in a 24-page comic book format; Pulp argued that one reason manga were a mass-market entertainment format in Japan in a way comic books were not in America was due to their release format, and speculated that by adopting a Japanese release style for Lone Wolf and Cub, Dark Horse's new "presentation" for manga could set an example to follow for the US comics industry.[129]
^Animag, described by upon its debut in July 1987 as "the closest American version yet of a professional quality Animage-style magazine," was a Bay Area-based publication that produced a total of 15 issues before its operations ceased in early 1993; the editor for most of Animag's run, Trish Ledoux, would in turn become the founding editor of [140]Viz'sAnimerica;[141] in 2022 Otaku USA editor in chief Patrick Macias commented that Animag was "the first professionally printed US anime magazine I ever saw."[142]
^ARIEL was in fact the very first section in the GP USA catalog, before even the kits for Gainax's own "Gunbuster"; while Dirty Pair kits were also featured in the catalog, they were listed on p. 69.[144]. In his 2002 memoir, Takeda recalled an effort by General Products in partnership with Asahi Sonorama to produce ARIEL Comic, another manga anthology along the lines of Cyber Comix, as having been another "disaster" in their attempts to expand into the publishing industry: "The editorial staff had taken to literally locking themselves in their apartments, and one time, we even had to climb in through the windows and drag them out to talk."[145]
^Howell remarked that "she was thoroughly sick of the job for a lot of personal reasons. The guys [General Products] didn't treat her well because she was a woman."[147] Hernandez however stated in her 2001 Pulp interview that although "There were a lot of things they didn't understand, how anime fans and business worked over here," "They were all very polite, though. They were all really nice people."[148]; when asked by Anime News Network in 2014 about her experiences as a woman working in the industry during the late 1980s, Hernandez compared her Japanese job favorably to the sexism she had encountered in the American comics industry: "I never had a single problem ... they were always gentlemen, and I was just another person in the office."[149]
^Members were to receive the quarterly G.Press newsletter, 10% off mail order prices, an advance discount on General Products events (AnimeCon was given as an example), and participation in a planned annual Christmas sale to occur "as soon as the Japanese head office’s back log of prior comittments has been cleared up." The annual, non-refundable memberships were noted as only being valid for one calendar year at a time (in the example given in the membership rules, if a person were to join in June, their membership would expire that December, rather than in the following June); persons wishing to quit the club were required to report the reason, and to return their members' card to the "G.P.C.U.S.A. secretariat."[152]
^ The US magazine Animag viewed Anime Expo '92 as a direct continuation of the previous year's event: " ... on the Fourth of July weekend, 1992 ... America's largest all-anime convention, Anime Expo '92, launched into its second year." Animag described as the "one major change" of the 1992 event the departure of its Japanese organizers: "this year's con was created, managed, and run entirely by Bay Area animation fans ... "[154] Likewise, the British magazine Anime UK wrote of Anime Expo '92 that "important lessons had been learned from last year. Generally, things ran more smoothly ... " yet also saw the 1992 event as an "unexpected offspring" of AnimeCon '91, rather than its "sequel." "Con President Mike Tatsugawa and his crew had barely six months to build a convention from scratch, so it was something of a miracle that it existed at all."[155]
Kubooka, Toshiyuki (1991). "Toppu wo Nerae! Dennō gakuen no tsurai riyū [Aim for the Top! Why Cybernetic Hi-School is So Hard]". In Kato, Satoshi (ed.). Komikku Ganbasutaa 2 [Comic Gunbuster Vol. 2]. Tokyo: Bandai. ISBN4-89189-110-6.
Ledoux, Trish, ed. (Spring 1990). "Horizon, Pony Toy Go-Round, New Type". Animag. No. 10. Oakland: Pacific Rim Publishing.
Leonard, Sean (April 29, 2004). Progress Against the Law: Fan Distribution, Copyright, and the Explosive Growth of Japanese Animation (Thesis). Cambridge: Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Lu, Alvin, ed. (August 2001). "Interview: Lea Hernandez—The Curse of Urusei Yatsura". Pulp. San Francisco: Viz Media LLC.
Matsui, Kazuo, ed. (September 1991). "Hello! Nice to meet you! We are G.P.C.". Mega Comics. Tokyo: General Products.
Matsushita, Kazumi, ed. (1987). Ōritsu Uchūgun Seisaku Kirokushū [Royal Space Force Production Archives]. Tokyo: Movic. ISBN978-4943966074.
McLennan, Jim (October–November 1992). "Anime Expo '92". Anime UK. Vol. 1, no. 4. London: Peter Goll.((cite magazine)): CS1 maint: date format (link)
Miyawaki, Osamu (2003). Tsukuru mono wa yozōra ni kirameku hoshi no kazuhado mugen ni aru—Kaiyōdō monogatari [The Things to Make Are As Infinite As the Stars Twinkling in the Sky—The Story of Kaiyodo]. Tokyo: Kodansha. ISBN978-4062118736.
Society for the Promotion of Japanese Animation (July 2020). "Our Story". SPJA. Corona: Society for the Promotion of Japanese Animation. Retrieved June 19, 2022.
Sonoda, Kenichi (April 1985). "Kore ga kūsō kagakusenmon-ten Zeneraru•Purodakutsu da~tsu! [This is General Products, the Science Fiction Store!]". Genepuro saishin katarogu [General Products: Latest Catalogue]. Osaka: General Products.
Sternbach, Rick (July 7, 1988). "Wing of Honeamise Space Capsule Kit Review". Anime Stuff. No. 7. Dayton: Midori Communications.
Sternbach, Rick (September 25, 1989). "Japan's General Products Building First U.S. Outlet". Anime Stuff. No. 11. Dayton: Midori Communications.
Ueda, Hiroshi, ed. (April 1985a). "Bakyūmufōmukitto, Pēpātoi, Metarukitto, Taipin, Kyasutokitto, Deforume•Masukottoshirīzu, Bajji, Garējikitto, Dōjinshi [Vacuum form kits, Paper toys, Metal kits, Tie pins, Resin cast kits, Deformed Mascot Series, Badges, Garage kits, Doujinshi]". Genepuro saishin katarogu [General Products: Latest Catalogue]. Osaka: General Products.
Ueda, Hiroshi, ed. (April 1985b). "Genepuro shōhin toriatsukai-ten (3 tsuki 31-nichi genzai) [Stores Selling General Products Merchandise (As of March 31)]". Genepuro saishin katarogu [General Products: Latest Catalogue]. Osaka: General Products.
Ueda, Hiroshi, ed. (1988a). "What is General Products?". General Products '88-nen nendo-ban sōgō katarogu [General Products 1988 Edition General Catalogue]. Tokyo: General Products.
Ueda, Hiroshi, ed. (1988b). "Ōritsu uchū-gun shozoku • yūjin hikō kapuseru 'Uchū senkan' [Royal Space Force Manned Flight Capsule 'Space Battleship']]". General Products '88-nen nendo-ban sōgō katarogu [General Products 1988 Edition General Catalogue]. Tokyo: General Products.
^「顔がつぶれるといえば、僕たちの腹わたが煮えくりかえる事件が、DAICON III の二年前に起きていました。二年前の七九年、僕たちは大阪でSF大会をやりたいと、一度立候補していたんです。引き返しがつかないように会場まで予約したのに、「経験がないから」とやらせてもらえなかったのです。。。その二年後の八一年、ようやく大阪の順番がまわってきたわけです。DAICON IIIは、僕らにしてみれば、一大復警戦だったんですよ。大阪で先輩風ふかしている三十代の憎い大人たち！とか、SF作家の近くにいるというだけで業界風を吹かす、東京の勘違い野郎ども！とかに対するね。。。「三十過ぎたら、人間、あんなに頭が固くなるんだ。オレは三十歳になる前に死んでやる！」とか公言してたんですから、あのころの僕って、なんと若かったことか。あんなに嫌っていた東京のファンというのが、後であんな仲良くなるスタジオぬえの人たち。。。だったり、一緒にガイナックスを始める井上さん(博明。一九五六～)だったりするんですから、いま思うと、人生はなんとおもしろいことでしよう。」Okada 2010, p. 19
^「SFショーというのは、要するにSF作家クラブの先生方公認じゃないイベントということです。大阪での開催の上、公認じゃないわけですから、作家の先生もほとんど来てくれず、結局七百人の会場にお客さんが百三十人入っただけの大赤字。夏休みの間中、言い出しっぺの僕ともう一人で、ひたすらバイトをして赤字を埋めるという屈辱的な夏を過ごしました。」Okada 2010, p. 19
^「『宇宙船』という特撮専門のような季刊誌が朝日ソノラマ社から発行され、アメリカなどの特撮映画の紹介を始めた。それは新しい創りへの胎動となって、全国的に知られるようになっていた。時代の変わり目にはおかしな現象が起こり始め、わたしにもなにかが起こりそうな予感があった。「ゴジラ」「サイクロプス」「ノーチラス号」「ギャオス」「ナウシカ」「アマゾンの半魚人」「バルタン星人」……などを作りたいという若者が増え、それぞれがレジンキャストのような特殊造型素材を使って好きなモノを作って持ち込むようになり、それらを中心にして「造型狂」という仲間が増え始めていた。。。『宇宙船』に触発されるように、大阪にゼネプロという不可解な会社ができたりして、新しいモノづくりの時代へと一気に突入していった。」Miyawaki 2003, pp. 184, 185
^「パペッティア通信の1号で紹介したラリイ•二—ヴン氏から、翻訳家の紫野拓美氏を介してゼネプロ宛に手紙がつきました。それがこの上の祝辞で、『「ゼネラルプロダクツ」の様な名称は誰が使ってもいいと思います。』という前置きののち、次の様に文章を寄せてくれました。。。ゼネプロの名付け親から祝辞をいただき、店員一同おお喜び。『同様な成功』をおさめるベく、努力！」Ueda 1982b, p. 7
^「アメリ力へ行つたのだ。ゼネプロがもーかって、もーかって、しょーがないのでアメリカへ行ったのだ。。。どーやってアメリ力行ったかってローンですよ、 ローン)友人からアメリカへ行けば SFショップが山ほどある、と聞いて何か参考になればと思っていったんですがね、これがも一、全くのウアイテムが積まれ、目がくらんでしまった。。。ま、これはいーとして、私は大変な事を目撃したのだ。何とバンダイの百円ヤマトが5ドル！1250円 ！五百円のインターセプターが7000円！。。。ポスタ—や本のコレクション•ショップはあるし、オモチャのスーパーマーケットみたいな巨大卜イショップはあるんだけど「SFショップ」なーんてのは全く無かつた。ま、かわりに世界SF大会のデックのコスチュームがウロウロする。 VTRルームではカリオストロとボルテスVをやっている。いや、日本 のアニメは無敵なのです。」Ueda 1982b, p. 6-7
^「ガレージキットを創始したのは海洋堂ホビー館であるけれど、ガレージキットなる言葉を流行らせたのは『宇宙船』の編集者、聖咲奇氏といえるだろう。彼がガレージキットづくりに果たした役割は 大きく、造型狂たちの煽動者というか、先導者的存在でもあった。時々ホビー館に取材を兼ねて現れる聖氏は、東京の風やアメリカの特撮情報を運んできてくれるだけではなく。。。」Miyawaki 2003, p. 203
^「ただし僕が疑問に思ったのは、作品論的な問題よりも、映画を公開に至らせるまでのバックボーンのことであった。バンダイが直接にアニメ映画製作に乗り出すことは喜ばしいとしても、なぜオモチャ会社としての最大のメリットである商品展開を抜きにした作品を第１作目として製作したのだろうか？」Daitoku 1988, p. 73
^「『 大徳: あのメカたったらオモチャがはしいとか、プラモデルを作りたいという人が多いと思うんですが。』『山賀: モデルメーカーじゃなくて、 モデル愛好者、モデラーでは結構いましたけど。』『岡田: ガレージキットメーカーが声をそろえて言うには、自分は好きなんだけど、これが売れるかどうか自信はない、と。』『赤井:「オネアミス」の中では、メカは自然に溶け込んでいて、キャラク夕ーとしての人格みたいなものを持ってないんですね。建物や山と同じように、そこに当然あるものとして飛んでたり走ってたりするわけです。』『山賀: 。。。それに合わせて言えば、うちはワキ役メカに撤して、主役メカなんていらないよって感じで作っちゃったところがありますから、主役メカってひとつもないんですよね。あのロケットでさえ主役メカではないんです。』」Daitoku 1987, pp. 20–21
^「店内TVR上映リスト。。。25日（火）サンダ対ガイラ。。。30日(日）地球防衛軍 。。。４日(金）2001年宇宙の旅。。。５日（土）バーバレラ」Ueda 1984d, p. 12
^「AT001 ゲネプロオリジナル。。。庵野秀明イラスト『絵を汚すのがモッタイない。』と、灰皿 として使わない人もいるようで...。好評を博しているオリジナルトレイです。」Ueda 1985, p. k harvnb error: no target: CITEREFUeda1985 (help)
^「喫茶コーナーの名前は「SID」。と聞くと「あぁ、『謎の円盤UFO』のコンピュータ衛星の名前をとったんダナ。」と思ろでしよう！？ところがSpace Intruder Detecterではないんですネェ。この喫茶コーナー、命名するときにどんな名前がいいかでもめまして、最終的に「SID《これは『UFO』です》」、「DUNE」それに「星雲仮面（！！）」、の3つが候補として残りました。「SID」と「DUNE」はそのカッコよさが、「星雲仮面」はまあ、何というか。そのあまりの意外性が良くて甲乙つけがたい。どれにしよ～～～～と思案したんですが、どうせなら全部くっつけて取り入れてゴチャマゼにしたらどうだろうということになりました。つまり、Seiunkamen in Dune. デューンにいる星雲仮面、略してSIDでどうだろう、あぁ素晴らしいそれはいい、それにしようと相なったのです。（みよ、このゼネプロらしさ！）もしゼネプロに来られることがあって、SIDのカウンターに座ったなら、SIDのマッチを手にして下さい。マッチの裏には “砂の惑星に降り立ったアイビー星の男。彼が求めるのは一杯のコーヒー......”とかナントカ適当なことが害いてあって（たぶん）笑えるでしょう。」Ueda 1984c, p. 18
^「ゼネプロは店内の一角に喫茶コーナーがあります。９席ほどの力ウンター式で、コーヒー紅系にトースト、ケーキ、サンドイッチなどを描えてなかなかのこ好評をいただいております。」Ueda 1984c, p. 18
^「店の奥半分は喫茶「SID」が大きく拡張され、5つのテ—ブルが付きました。SFファンの語らいの場としてけっこう利用されているようです。」Sonoda 1985, p. a1
^「『誰もバンダイが映画をオリジナルでつくれるなんて思わなかった。ノウハウだってまったくなかったし。しかし、だからこそ面白いと思ったんです。いや、正直に言うと、自分自身でも「そんなことができるわけがない」と思った瞬間もありましたけど。しかし社長の岡田さんも、監督の山賀さんも、とにかく「ちゃんとプロとしてアニメをつくって、世に問いたいんだ」と、強烈に考えていた。プロデューサーの井上博明さんもそうで。。。武田さんも同じ気持ちだった。僕も同じくらいの年でしたから、そうしたいろんな人の熱意の流れのなかに入って。。。」Hotta 2005b, p. 426