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The Anime Business: Stu Levy Discusses TOKYOPOP's Rise, Fall & Rebirth

Stu Levy discusses TOKYOPOP's history in the latest episode of The Anime Business, which tells the story of the anime industry in the US.

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Article Summary

  • Stu Levy discusses TOKYOPOP’s journey, highlighting its rise, struggles, and current resurgence in manga publishing.
  • The Anime Business series delves into the origins of US anime and manga, featuring pioneers and industry insights.
  • TOKYOPOP introduced hit titles like Sailor Moon and pioneered publishing standards such as right-to-left manga formatting.
  • Episodes of The Anime Business are available on YouTube, exploring the evolution of anime in North America.

AnimEigo premiered Episode 7 of The Anime Business, a documentary series featuring interviews with various pioneers of the Western anime industry. The latest installment features a wide-ranging chat with Stu Levy, the founder of TOKYOPOP. TOKYOPOP was founded in 1997, and Levy published scores of hit titles that included Sailor Moon, Fruits Basket, Battle Royale, Chobits, Gakuen Alice, D.N.Angel, and Gravitation. He helped bring manga to major retailers like Waldenbooks and Borders. He pioneered many aspects that are now publishing standards, such as the right-to-left format, a brand bar on the spine, and the use of original Japanese sound effects.

Levy also pushed boundaries by bringing J-Pop music and anime soundtracks to U.S. fans and dove into anime with Initial D, G.T.O., Marmalade Boy, and Rave Master. He also developed several manga-inspired projects with top U.S. entertainers such as Hanna Montana and Courtney Love. He made early inroads into Korean comics, aka manhwa, with titles such as I.N.V.U., Priest, and Ragnarok.

the anime business
Still: AnimEigo

Pressure for profitability from TOKYOPOP's venture capital investors strained the company, and a confluence of factors at the start of the 2008 global financial crisis, including many retailers going out of business, ultimately led to TOKYOPOP going dormant for a time. However, Levy was resilient, and TOKYOPOP reemerged and remains active in the North American manga market, as well as in Germany, where he now resides.

The Anime Business is a first-of-its-kind series featuring a wide range of entrepreneurs and visionaries who helped pioneer and shape the North American anime and manga industries. It is produced and hosted by industry veteran Justin Sevakis, who is also the founder of MediaOCD and AnimEigo CEO.

All episodes of The Anime Business will be available in English. Japanese subtitles will also be available via a special grant from the Kleckner Foundation. Additional episodes and interviews are in production now.  AnimEigo and MediaOCD invite fans who would like to help support and crowdfund future episodes of The Anime Business.

Episodes 1-6 of The Anime Business are also now available to stream on the AnimEigo YouTube channel. It's an invaluable series about the history of anime's arrival in the US, warts and all.

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Adi TantimedhAbout Adi Tantimedh

Adi Tantimedh is a filmmaker, screenwriter and novelist. He wrote radio plays for the BBC Radio, “JLA: Age of Wonder” for DC Comics, “Blackshirt” for Moonstone Books, and “La Muse” for Big Head Press. Most recently, he wrote “Her Nightly Embrace”, “Her Beautiful Monster” and “Her Fugitive Heart”, a trilogy of novels featuring a British-Indian private eye published by Atria Books, a division Simon & Schuster.
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