Albany, New York  Jan. 28, 2010 –  Join us at 200 select Suncoast, F.Y.E., Sam Goody and Saturday Matinee locations Saturday, January 30 to celebrate everything anime. The event will feature a Cosplay contest, costume swap opportunities, trivia games, prizes and buy one get one half off everything anime.

This was a very fun amoral little series. It was a bit different than I thought it would be. Actually it was exactly what I expected it to be, only more awesome. I remember getting a flyer for it at Tokyo’s yearly new anime fair. I shrugged and thought it was another “girls running around in skimpy clothes with guns for guys who like that sort of thing” story. A few years later a friend made me watch the first episode because it was “the best thing ever." I don’t know if I would call it the best thing ever (Monster already has that place in my heart) but it was certainly entertaining!

I love ghost stories. I’ve loved them ever since I was a little girl and would make my father tell me plots of horror movies as bedtime stories. I also like stories about stories, so when I heard about Ayakashi, I assumed I would fall in love with it. Unfortunately my final verdict was that I was very disappointed in it. Well, most of it, I should say. It wasn’t a total loss, as I’ll explain in a moment.

This is one of the rare shows aimed at children that even adults can enjoy. The story flows like a fairytale often following fairytale logic as well- probably because the whole theme of the show is ballet. It does a great job of showing the dreamlike stories and mythos of ballet, while often poking fun at the more ridiculous bits and at us for having to suspend our disbelief so often. They also use classic ballet songs as background music and do so very skillfully, while blending it wonderfully with the plot.