Otakon Countdown 11: Peter S. Beagle

Today I'd like to shift gears and start talking about what I'm looking forward to at Otakon this year. The only guest I really need to see this year is Peter S. Beagle. He wrote "The Last Unicorn" my favorite fantasy novel. Now, what does this have to do with anime? Almost anyone at Otakon will know about the 1981 animated movie, produced by Rankin Bass. Rankin Bass is most famous for doing "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer" Christmas special and others, but they also did Thundercats. This movie was produced by a studio in Japan that would go on to become Studio Ghibli, which makes Hayao Miyazaki movies.

That being said, this is my favorite movie of all time. It's so good, I purposefully restrain myself to only watch it once a year. I'm afraid if I watch it enough to memorize all the lines, some of the magic will be lost.

And this movie has lots of magic. Two years ago I was stokes because Peter was going to be the guest, and I brought my copy of the movie for him to sign. He didn't make it. The next year, he was scheduled to be the guest again, but I figured he'd flake again so I didn't bother to bring my copy. He did show up and I was kicking myself. He did a great live performance of a Commentary on the movie. I ended up buying a picture of the Red Bull and having him sign that. That autograph is on my wall right now.

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