Over the weekend I was able to attend my first ever Australian convention: SMASH! Sydney Manga and Anime Show, and as someone born and raised in Australia, I was genuinely surprised.
Growing up in Rural Australia was always something different; I felt like I was surely the only person in my town who enjoyed late nights of anime, or staying up until who knows what hour of the night for that latest single to drop by my favourite Japanese band/artist. My town was known as the beef capital of Australia, we specialised in beef, and beef accessories, there really wasn’t much more to it. I guess it was because of where I grew up that I started to see the whole of Australia like this; so when I got news that I was being flown to Sydney to cover this event, I really wasn’t sure what to expect. Part of me had extremely low expectations, having just recently come back from Anime Expo in Los Angeles, I knew that it would surely be impossible for SMASH! to live up to that sort of stature; especially something in little old Australia, right?
The Positive and The Negative:
I woke up Saturday Morning and headed off to the Rosehill Gardens Race Course in the New South Wales capital of Sydney for the first day of Smash!. We managed to pick up our tickets in an absolute breeze and were supplied free on-premise parking which made things extremely convenient. I remember distinctly this odd feeling when seeing my first cosplayer of the day; not only were they cosplaying a character I knew, but it was an incredibly good cosplay too.
Once I finally wrapped my head around the concept that I was in Australia and there were other anime fans, I went into the exhibition hall. The first booth I saw was the Madman Entertainment booth, which for those who don’t know, is the official publisher of anime and manga in Australia (Think of Madman as Australia’s version of Viz Media). It was quite an elaborate setup, offering a collection of their various anime, staff in cosplay, freebies for everyone, and they managed to bring the entire Love Live! School Idol Costume Exhibition along with them which was quite interesting. I spoke to the staff at the Madman booth for a while, discussed some things that I believe we would both like to see come to Australia in the future in regards to the scene, and then I continued walking around. I think the second booth I properly visited was the Culture Japan booth; I didn’t manage to meet Danny Choo whilst at Anime Expo, so I was eager to get to see him this time. I was actually surprised that Culture Japan decided to have a presence at the convention; but unfortunately, that’s pretty much where the big name exposure ended.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m all for the little guy being front and center at a convention like this, but when there is genuinely no exposure from the big names in the industry; Fakku!, J-List, etc. I tend to envision a lot of untapped potential. But at the same time I felt like with the lack of those big names, we’re left the fundamental basis of what an anime convention really is; a gathering of fans to celebrate what it is that they really love.
However, no matter how hard I tried to push it to the side, the absence of big name support was something that made staying for even fourteen hours quite difficult, unless you had managed to completely book out your day with doing various activities, you were going to get bored quite easily (Though maybe that’s just me).
When I first committed to going to Smash!, there was one clear thing that had me hooked from the beginning. ‘Anisong x Smash’ which was something completely unheard of to me, Japanese musicians such as kz Livetune, GARNiDELiA, yanaginagi and ‘DJ Hello Kitty’ performing in Australia? There was no way I was going to miss this in the world. Within the first five minutes of seeing the ad for it, I had already printed out my ‘Platinum Class’ tickets which offered me the full package; Autograph Sessions, ‘Premium Viewing Positions’, No Long Queues, and the list went on. To me, this was a sign of something great to come; such big names performing here, surely they’re going to have to put in their all next year to top it, and from there we’ve got a chain reaction of expansion.
I saw a large mix of people at this event, and that’s what had me the most excited. Long gone is the stereotype of middle-aged men being the only people to find enjoyment in this medium. I think this convention was something that really solidified this in my mind; seeing it as somewhere for like-minded people to go out and enjoy themselves, doing what they love most.
So although I still feel as though the anime and manga scene within my rural Australian town is almost null, I now know that Australia is on the brink of something great; and I very much look forward to taking part of it every step of the way.
Akiba Weekly 