Pause The Game…
The year of 2008 marched on. Every couple weeks I’d e-mail Diana asking about how things were looking for new projects. Time and again she mentioned that they were still “in a holding pattern” and to check back again.
A month or two passed. Again, still nothing.
Then one day, Diana e-mailed me asking what my schedule was like and how much of my time could be spent scriptwriting. Well, I was still enjoying my days of unprofitable unemployment so I had all the time they could have ever needed. My suspicion was that some work had finally made its way in and, going by what shows had just recently been licensed, it was going to be a keeper…
…yeah, I’ll admit it, I thought I might have maybe gotten to work on the dub for Gundam 00. I still can’t say if that was actually the project she was thinking about, but it sure seemed logical at the time…
The logic that seemed to avoid me then, however, was that Ocean already had several scriptwriters already on call. They were undoubtedly hungry for work just as much as I was (if not more), except they were already established, dedicated members of the team. Think about it: if there is only so much work to go around and you can either give it to your tried-and-true, dedicated staffers or the newbie who wrote the test a few months back, who would you give it to?
It’s seniority. It’s only fair, really.
Months go by again, I’m e-mailing Diana far, far less than before, and the basic story is the same: nothing yet.
That summer, the Vancouver convention scene had its annual Anime Evolution convention in August. We got a “state of the industry” panel hosted by – go fig – an Ocean Group scriptwriter. It was her, us, press members, fansubbers… it was a good little group. And, sure enough and a little late to the panel, Diana Gage and another member of Ocean took a seat in the audience so they could field questions and answers. About halfway through the panel, she turned around and saw me (in full cosplay, no less) and we mouthed some quick hellos back and forth.
Well, the panel was quick, with lots of good discussion in all directions. What I really enjoyed was that there was less finger-pointing at that panel and more back and forth of what needs to change between both consumer and industry worker (and yes, online ad-funded streaming sounds like a wonderful plan, so let's do more of that). I, of course, wanted to look impressive in front of Diana and tried to speak a lot during the talk.
Naturally, other louder people got picked over me (or they just shouted out of turn anyway) and would say what I wanted to say first. Still, I got at least one nice moment in about clashing mindsets between North America and Asia. But the basic statement was there: “all the different distributors are tightening their belts for the recession and the like.” I was willing to read into that as “we can’t hire new scriptwriters right now.”
At the end of the panel I went over to Diana to more properly say hi. It was good to see her again after all those months (and half a year since last seeing her in person). We all had places to go so it was brief, but yeah. I still expressed that one day I’d love to work for her, and she, well… during the panel, she pretty much covered all the industry bits that they’re only getting so much work, that all the money they make goes straight into new shows, and that this was all absolutely an issue on both sides of the Pacific. In any case, I wished her well and wished her luck in the coming times.
