Charles Solomon

Editor

Internationally known animation historian and critic, Charles Solomon has written over 15 books books including Enchanted Drawings: The History Of Animation, The Art of Disney’s Frozen, The Making of Peanuts Animation, and Tale as Old as Time: The Art and Making of Disney Beauty and the Beast .

Articles By Charles Solomon

Anime

The rollicking comedy-adventure Outlaw Star began as manga by Takehiko Ito and the artists at Morningstar Studios, who also made the animated series. In the distant future, interstellar space is divided between Pirates and the Space Forces. The self-proclaimed Outlaws scratch out a living in the odd spaces unoccupied by the two powers. Like a […]

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Anime

Based on the manga by Yuji Iwahara, Dimension W is an oddly uneven series, alternately intriguing and muddled. The story takes place in 2036, after the discovery of a fourth Euclidean dimension solved all of Earth’s energy problems. Power flows from this little understood dimension through a series of huge stations to individual battery-receivers called […]

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Anime

The simplified, Art Deco-influenced designs in the mecha adventure The Big O give the series a look that’s closer to Warner Bros.’ old animated Batman than Gundam. Originally concieved as 26-episode adventure, The Big O premiered in October, 1999, in Japan, but was cancelled after only 13 episodes due to poor ratings. The English language […]

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Anime

The parvenu father in Thomas Mann’s short story “The Blood of the Walsungs” tells his future son-in-law that the secret to enjoying life is never to get used to anything, to be constantly surprised. He would have loved anime. No matter how many series or features you watch, there’s always something new and unexpected. And […]

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Anime

Although it aired as a stand-alone broadcast special a week before the opening of the theatrical feature One Piece Film: Gold (2016), the two-hour One Piece: Heart of Gold (2016) is essentially a lengthy introduction to the film. Both adventures were written by Tsuomu Kuriowa and take place shortly after the “Dress Rosa” story arc […]

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ANIME REVIEW: “All Wishes Come True!”

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