Attention Australians! Ikue Ohtani to be at Animania! OVER + Coverage

[Winged Psychic]

This event has finished. Scroll to second post to see coverage!

It has come to my attention that Ikue Ohtani, the voice of Pikachu, Tony Tony Chopper, Konohamaru from Naruto, Gash from Gash Bell and Merle from Escaflowne will be at the Sydney Animania Festival on the 17th and 18th (Not so sure about Brisbane). It almost makes the overpriced entry fee, food and merchandise worth it!

I thought I'd post this in case any Australian fans of want to be able to meet her. I hadn't seen any news sites reporting this yet and I had to choose between having a sure fire chance to get Ohtani san's autograph or the double edged sword that is telling everyone about her visit to Animania Australia, resulting in a very long line and a higher chance that Ohtani san may get a hand cramp, causing her to be unable to sign anything by the time I reach her in the aforementioned long ass line. In the end I bitterly went with my conscience. I hope you're all happy, Bulbagardeners.

You can get a photo as well as an autograph. Sunday usually has less traffic so you might have a better chance of not having to wait in line forever. Although, if everyone had that mindset then Saturday would be the day to go.

She'll be performing a live dub of Tony Tony Chopper on the Saturday (17th) from 3.40 - 4.15pm

She'll have a special guest seminar on Sunday(18th) from 12- 1pm where the audience will be able to ask her impromptu questions. There will be a translator to translate. (Obviously.)

Autograph and Photo Prices + Times

Cost
$15 per item signed (Items can be purchase at Animania Stall)
$15 for a photo with the guest (BYO camera)
$25 for one signed item + photo (combo)
SATURDAY 12.00 - 1.00pm | 2.00 - 3.00pm | 4.30 - 5.30pm
SUNDAY 10.30 - 11.30am | 2.00 - 3.00pm | 3.30 - 4.30pm

Animania announcement

Animania Website

Link to the event PDF with event times, costs and other things Ikue Ohtani related.

Last year they got Rica Matsumoto out to Animania and I managed to get an autograph (or two). It was amazing seeing the voice of Satoshi in person. She did some of her lines from the anime and talked about how she performs the voice of Satoshi. She also sang a couple of songs which was pretty cool. I posted a blog post of what happened last year along with some answers Matsumoto gave at a panel. I was still reeling from the after glow of seeing the voice of a childhood icon at the time so I sounded a bit hyper in the blog post.

I would have posted this in the Pokemon in Australia thread but I thought this was big enough news to post on it's own.

How about we think of some interesting questions to ask her for the panel on Sunday? Last year when Rica Matsumoto did the panel I felt like there could have been more interesting questions asked by the audience but I think it was kind of sprung on us and most of the audience didn't have anything prepared beforehand. Not to mention the language barrier changed the meaning of some questions.

You can expect her to say "Pika Pikachu" in her Pikachu voice. I guarantee it.
Not actually a guarantee.

 

[Winged Psychic]

Copied and pasted from my blog:

Yesterday, I got to see the voice of Pikachu and Tony Tony Chopper! I got an autograph and managed to tell her through her translator that I had been watching her since I was 10 (Although now that I think of it it I was probably younger) and that I thought she was amazing. She asked me how old I was now and she was like whoa when I told her I was 17 and she facetiously said she was 20 and I almost fell for it but she told me that she had two kids already.

And now to the highlights from the panel! These are answers or replies to questions that were asked:

• The translator began scratching his calf 5 minutes into the panel and never stopped. Since the table was elevated the audience could see it all. He pulled his trouser leg up to his knee. Very distracting. I think he was nervous.
• Ikue originally wanted to be the role of meowth but was asked to be pikachu. This reminded me of last year when Rica Matsumoto said that she originally wanted to be the Shigeru character
• I asked her if she could show us how she would perform Meowth if she were voicing him and she did an awesome "Nyaa (Japanese Words)" but petered out towards the end because she couldn't think of what to say. She tried again and said something which the translator translated into "What am I doing here in this big ol' place in front of all these people?" Memory is fuzzy on exact wording.
• She did some Pikachu noises and Tony Tony Chopper lines. It is about as awesome as you would expect it to be. I tried hard not to have a dopey look on my face and writhe in joy.
• She said she found it hard to get back into her Tony Tony Chopper character after not voicing him for two years which is understandable.
• Said something about her role in influencing the Detective Conan series where she made her character sound like they was making out. She did it inbetween takes and then it went into the anime because whoever was in charge liked it. Eventually the mangaka adopted it as well.
• Between takes she likes to play around and do other characters
• She was asked what her favourite pokemon was besides Pikachu. When she played the games her favourite pokemon was the charmander line, but currently, her favourite pokemon is a fish pokemon that doesn't move. I'm sorry the name escapes me but it's a Unova pokemon. She said in english "It doesn't move!" Who's that pokemon?
• She doesn't have any sempai she looks up to because she doesn't want to put herself down behind some other person. She wants to be her own star and reach the world globally. This is evident because her english and accent is surprinsgly good. (Understandable, grammatically correct, cute, although maybe rehearsed) She did some lines as Tony Tony Chopper speaking english. "Hello everyone! My name is Tony Tony Chopper! How are you? It's nice to meet you!" (Memory fuzzy on how the exact line went)
• She originally wanted to be a stage actor but got into being a voice actor
• She eventually wants to voice a normal older female character (the japanese voice of Stephanie from the japanese dub of Full House being the oldest character she's done at 6 years old). Ikue Ohtani is typecast into being the mascot character frequently so her want to spread her character types is understandable.
• I asked her if she get's recognised on the street as any of her character and she replied that she does. She'll be at a store and say something like "sugoi" and the kids will come up to her and meekly say "You..you're chopper?" and she'll become self concious and look at herself and be like "What? Do I look like chopper?"
• Ohtani Ikue said that in the first movie she voiced Pikachu as unaware of what death was which was why her portrayal of Pikachu was confused when Ash died. Which is why in the later movies where Ash dies, Pikachu is fully aware of what death is and Ohtani Ikue tries to convey that. I just remembered that Mewtwo wiped their memories so I don't know how that works out.

And that's all I can remember at the moment!

Some videos: (None are mine)

Ikue on Sat doing Pikas
[video=youtube;S1oPW-Sl1Wc]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1oPW-Sl1Wc[/video]

Longer Ikue on Sat with worse audio doing other stuff
[video=youtube;-Bn9UnoGN4g]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Bn9UnoGN4g[/video]

Ikue Ohtani doing the Meowth voice! As well as Mime Jr!
[video=youtube;692XBrYl9lE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=692XBrYl9lE[/video]

All in all it was a good but tiring day.

 

[Aestivate]

I am ridiculously, utterly, green with envy.
SO JEALOUS.

Ah, Ohtani and Rica are adorable! And to think that Rica used to want to be Shigeru!

 

[Musashi]

I really want her to play a talking Nyasu now. It could be a rival to the Rocket one.

 

[Playerking]

I really want her to play a talking Nyasu now. It could be a rival to the Rocket one.

And maybe this Meowth can be cuter than Team Rocket's and Cilan could get it.

Darn, too bad I live in a different state. That seemed like fun to see her talking in those different voices. I love her Meowth voice, I guess she could have picked up a thing or two from listening to Inuko Inuyama playing Meowth.

 

[Musashi]

Did anyone else find it funny how people were going crazy when she did Pikachu? I swear she could've done that the entire time and everyone would've been happy. XD

Also, I miss Manene. :-(

And maybe this Meowth can be cuter than Team Rocket's

Not possible.

 

[Playerking]

Did anyone else find it funny how people were going crazy when she did Pikachu? I swear she could've done that the entire time and everyone would've been happy. XD

Also, I miss Manene. :-(



Not possible.

Maybe it's because most of them there probably wouldn't have seen her in real life saying Pikachu before, I still find it weird hearing Pikachu's voice coming from her. I mean, she hardly ever comes to Australia(Not sure if this was the first time or...).

What would differ Team Rocket's Meowth from another walking and talking one? Plus I'm used to Meowth's evilness, so I think if there were another one it might be cuter. But that's just my opinion.

 

[Dogasu]

You can definitely hear Chopper in her Nyasu voice.

 

[Joshawott]

So wait, Rica wanted to be Gary and Ikue wanted to be Meowth?

So no one actually wanted to be the twerps at first? =3

 

[Kip]

Ah, she seems cute.

Did anyone else find it funny how people were going crazy when she did Pikachu? I swear she could've done that the entire time and everyone would've been happy. XD

Haha, I probably would have been. I would love to see her do Pikachu.

 

[Jukain]

XD I've seen a vid of her saying Pikachu before, although that one blows your mind because she's talking normally at first, and then just automatically goes into the Pika voice. It's uncanny. She's not bad at Meowth, but it's noticeably higher than the real one.

 

[33Whimsicott33]

Her favorite pokemon is... a fish that doesn't move? From Unova?

5th generation was probably the generation that was least addicted to water. What could it be...?

Basculin? Alomomola? Eeletrik? Stunfisk?

 

[H.M]

I have a feeling it's Stunfisk. I guess since it's usually laying flat on the ground, not really moving.

It's odd for me to see the person behind the voice of the characters, but also it's super neat. Ikue sounds like a sweetheart. :3

 

[WatcherMark]

For some reason, I'm imaging (when Ikue does her Nyarth voice) that's what Pikachu would sound like if he learned to talk.