Knave of Hearts, a Pandora Hearts TV anime event was held last Saturday here in Tokyo. I’ve never won any of these “stick a magazine coupon on a postcard and enter” type of events, but this time I got lucky (*^^*) My entry number was 36, so I was up right in the middle of hall, second row.
Before the event started, there were the usual announcements (Thank you for coming, no smoking in the hall, etc.) done by Gilbert and Break.
The MC was Toriumi Kosuke (Raven). He insisted he wasn’t cosplaying, but he was dressed just like Raven, and even had his hair done in the “seaweed head” style. The other guests were Minagawa Junko (Oz), Kawasumi Ayako (Alice), Hanazawa Kana (Shalon), and Ishida Akira (Break). The cheers and screams when Ishida-san appeared on stage was several times larger than the other casts.
Digests of up to Chapter 6 was shown, with the cast making various comments (like, “look at the way Alice is riding Oz when they kiss!”). A little bit of future episodes was shown too.
3 new casts were announced. They’re (1) Cheshire Cat – Yamaguchi Kappei (2) Vincent – Fukuyama Jun (3) Reim – Suwabe Junichi.
The feature I enjoyed most was the live script reading of a special version of “Pandora Haachu” that Mochizuki-sensei had written and drawn. In the story, because a festival is having a cross-dressing contest, Gil, then Break ends up being dressed up as ladies, and Break even gets cat ears put on by Shalon.
There was also a feature where each cast had to come up with a new chain. Three of them were parodies of existing characters (Pooh, Ponyo, Doraemon). Toriumi-san’s explanation was that copyright infringement was allowed that day since the event wasn’t being taped. The audience clapped to decide which chain you’d want to enter a covenant with.
The loser was Minagawa-san, and she was supposed to drink this horrible-tasting juice. But she turned to Gil and said “Hey, I’ve got Gil!” and then Toriumi-san kneeled and said the “I still want to be your valet” line. The other four started to eat cakes, when Toriumi-san said to Ishida-san “You’re not going to eat it in one bite like Break?” He tried, and spilt about half the cake (^^;;)
savage genius and FictionJunction both appeared to perform the theme songs. Composer Kajiura Yuki played keyboards for Parallel Hearts, and mentioned that the song is written completely from Oz’s point of view, and that she’s hoping for a happy ending for all the characters.
Last was some present giveaways, and after the curtain closed, the ending announcements were again given by Gilbert and Break.
Cameras were prohibited at the event.
This flyer at the entrance was the only clue that the event was being held here:
And flowers from the GFantasy department of course:
