Anime Boston 2024 – My experience
Jameson Kendrick / Emertainment Monthly Staff Writer
Over the weekend of March 29, 2024 I attended a convention called Anime Boston. This was a new experience for me as I haven’t been to a convention since I was a teenager and this was my first time attending a convention as an adult. I really had the chance to truly explore the convention. In the past my convention experiences had me with my parents and siblings which prevented me from really getting to know the convention and such. I didn’t have that restriction this time because I was attending the convention with my friend, so we often saw panels and screenings together. The highlight of the convention was attending the Raj Rayyama and Lotus Juice concert. Raj did the music for the Cowboy Bebop movie and Lotus did the music for Persona 3 which is one of my favorite RPGs. Seeing them performing live was a blast even if I wasn’t fully familiar Rajs work outside Cowboy Bebop and Lotus work outside Persona 3. In addition to the concert I attended screenings for anime I like including Trigun, Death Note, and Attack on Titan. Aside from screenings and the concert it was a lot of fun meeting fellow cosplayers. I even met a few Doctor Who cosplayers which was great since I wasn’t expecting since it was an anime convention. Overall Anime Boston was a great experience and I highly recommend attending if you’re an anime fan in the Boston area.
TRANSCRIPT:
Over the weekend of March 29th to March 31st 2024 I attended the convention anime boston and…
Que doctor who intro I made visually and crummy midi (note Im crediting myself in the intro as anomaly source since Im gonna be uploading this to my personal channel as well. I’ll have a seperate version crediting myself as jameson for emertainment)
Anime Boston is not my first convention experience but it is my first one as an adult and in cosplay.
What that means is that while yes I have been to cons before as a kid and teenager this is my first time doing it on my own without my family and while having my own money.
As for the cosplay I chose to dress as the Eleventh Doctor.
I chose him because he’s my favorite version of The Doctor and Doctor Who is my favorite show right now.
Now onto the actual con experience.
Arriving at the con at around 9:30 my friend and I walked around until we saw a large line forming.
This line was for the opening ceremony.
Naturally we got in line and waited 15 minutes until we entered the auditorium.
At the ceremony they announced the special guests
Now despite being at an anime convention I wouldn’t really call myself a die hard anime fan.
Yeah I like Dragon ball, fullmetal alchemist, Code Geass, etc but I don’t actively keep up with new big shows.
Show list of anime Ive watched.
I have no idea what a oshi no ko, spy x family, or zom 100 are.
This is not meant to be an attack on their quality. I’m sure they are good shows. I just haven’t had time or interest in them.
Most of the special guests were from shows I wasn’t familiar with.
The only voice actress I knew was Malie Flanagan and funnily enough it wasn’t because she voiced Naruto.
Flanagan played the recurring character Principle Perry in my favorite Disney XD show LabRats.
That is exclusively where I know her from so while everyone was cheering about the voice actress of Naruto being here I was just like “oh she’s principle perry in lab rats I loved that show as a kid.”
In addition to announcing the guests at the convention they also played a video in tribute of Akira Toriyama the legendary manga writer who created Dragon Ball Z.
This tribute was done because Toriyama passed away earlier in march.
The video was a montage of his work not just on dragonball but also games like chronotrigger and dragon quest.
After the opening ceremony my friend and I went over to the autographs and gaming hall.
My friend decided to get in the autograph line while I checked out the gaming stuff.
They had a bunch of retro and modern consoles set up for attendees to play.
I spent some time playing goldeneye and some other games before continuing to walk around the convention.
I spent most of my time walking around places like the dealers room until 1 when I went to cosplay deathmatch.
Cosplay deathmatch is an event where two participants go on stage in cosplay and the audience cheers for who they like more. The winner then pretends to kill the loser.
I watched it for a bit before going to a screening of Trigun.
Trigun is an scifi western about the misadventures of gunslinger vash the stampede.
I haven’t seen all the episodes but I’ve watched a few and I consider myself to be a very casual fan of the show.
I watched trigun for about an hour then I continued walking around.
I walked past a huge group of Hazbin Hotel cosplayers.
I’ve been a fan of Hazbin since the original pilot so seeing it represented at the con was nice to see.
Once my friend finished getting autographs we walked around together.
In the dealers room there was a large section selling manga so I bought 3 in one set of the first 3 volumes of fullmetal alchemist.
After that I picked up a gurren lagann flag from a different vendor.
From there my friend and I went to a deathnote screening where we stayed until we returned to the dorms.
Majora’s Mask Day 2
The second day was the biggest day for the convention.
That is because on Saturday night there would be a concert by musicians Raj Ramayya and Lotus Juice.
Raj is best known for doing music for the Cowboy Bebop movie and Lotus Juice is best known for doing the music for the JRPG Persona 3.
I spent most of the day walking around getting photos with people and attending screenings.
Given this was my first time doing cosplay at a convention there were some things I noticed and thought were odd.
The major thing I noticed was there would be occasions where people would ask to take a picture of just me.
If you wanted a picture of someone at a convention wouldn’t you want to take a picture with them?
I can understand taking pictures of someone in cosplay if their cosplay is really impressive or large.
For instance I saw people taking photos of 3 silent hill cosplayers together. That makes sense because their cosplays were really impressive and well done.
Maybe taking pictures of cosplayers by themselves is normal and I’m just new.
On the topic of cosplay I actually ran into people cosplaying the doctor as well.
Specifically I ran into a 4, 6, 10, 12, and a 13 who I didn’t get a photo with.
Anyway my friend and I walked around and attended the fan parodies screening.
The fan parodies in question were episodes of abridged series.
An abridged series is an intentional comedic rewriting of an anime series by fans.
For instance here is a clip from Dragon Ball Z abridged.
Alongside clips from DBZA they also showed Clips from JoJos bizarre adventure abridged, None Piece, and Code Ment which is my favorite.
By the time fan parodies were done it was time to get in line for the concert.
It was 7:15 and the concert didn’t start until 8 but there was already a long line.
In line we were right behind some Persona 3 cosplayers.
I got a photo with them and eventually we all entered the ballroom where the concert was being held.
Raj Ramayya was the first to perform singing songs from Cowboy Bebop, Pokemon, Dragon Ball Z and many others.
Hearing everyone singing the pokemon and dragon ball z themes was beautiful.
After Raj finished Lotus came out to do his set.
There was a significant shift in energy from Raj performance to Lotuses.
Raj was much more laid back playing acoustic music while Lotus was playing electronic rap and techno.
I’d describe it as going from a coffee shop to a rave.
Lotus was great at playing into the energy, singing songs not just from his Persona work but also his work on anime like JOJOs bizarre adventure.
What made the audience go crazy though was when he took off his overshirt revealing he was wearing a shirt covered in Jack Frosts from Shin Megami Tensei and Persona.
Naturally everyone knew what that meant.
After playing his remix of Backside of the TV from Persona 4 Lotus finally played his most well known song.
MASS DESTRUCTION from Persona 3.
Needless to say the audience and myself lost our collective mind.
The thing with mass destruction is that there are two singers in it.
That meant Lotus would sing his part while the audience sang the other part.
Everyone sang along and had a good time.
When Lotus finished his set Raj came back out and the two performed some covers one of which was Walk this Way by Aerosmith.
When that was done the night was over and everyone left.
Overall it was a great time seeing Lotus and Raj live.
Majoras Mask Day 3
On the third day of the convention I went by myself since my friend felt he had seen enough.
I on the other hand still had panels I wanted to attend and stuff I wanted to buy.
When I arrived the first thing I went and did was buy a Doctor Who mystery box.
I was dressed as the 11th Doctor; it only made sense. I had intended to buy it the day before but the dealer’s room closed earlier than I thought.
Inside the mystery box was
An art print of a cyberman, weeping angel, and silence.
A doctor who pen with a little dalek inside.
A sticker sheet
A Mug made to look like the 8th doctor.
A mug based on the tardis.
A cup also based on the Tardis.
A vinyl figure of the 10th Doctor.
A 4th Doctor sonic screwdriver.
And 4 figures.
In order they are:
The 12th doctor.
Missy.
Amy Pond.
And a hologram of the 10th Doctor.
Overall decent stuff.
I spent a lot of time on Sunday in the gaming and autograph hall.
Although it wasn’t set up on Friday I saw a box of rock band stuff.
Rock Band is my favorite series of music games.
Saturday and Sunday Rock Band 4 was set up with the video games.
I spent a lot of time playing guitar to Avenged Sevenfold and singing David Bowie.
Around 1 I went to a panel about Digimon in America.
Digimon is an anime series I hold close to my heart having it be one of the first anime I saw alongside Pokemon.
People often write it off as a pokemon rip off but I really like it.
Digimon sadly has had a bad history when it comes to american releases.
Many games and even full anime series were never localized over here because there isn’t much demand for it.
This panel went over the complicated history of the anime and game releases in America.
There was a gap of over 8 years between the release of major digimon games in the US from 2007 to 2016.
Even when digimon games are released in the US such as Digimon Story: Cyber Sleuth and Digimon: Survive the games are not given an english voice dub.
There just isn’t a market here for digimon.
This was all really interesting to learn about at the panel.
After the panel I went to the closing ceremony for the convention.
At the closing ceremony the organizers came out and thanked everyone for coming.
Berkleys anime club then came out and performed Rumbling from Attack on Titan to close out the convention.
I haven’t been to many conventions so I can’t rank it or give it a real review but I had a great time at Anime Boston.
Meeting fellow nerds is something I love doing.
I highly recommend attending if you’re an anime fan in the Boston area.
Even if you aren’t an anime fan there are plenty of things to do there that make it worth attending.
If you do attend I recommend using the guidebook app to find panels, screenings, and meetups.
That app was really useful for me.first time I recommend seeing cosplay deathmatch and finding panels, screenings, and concerts that interest you.
I will certainly be going next year.