19 Aug 31st–sept 6th, 2023 phoenixnewtimes.com phoenix new Times | cONTeNTs | feeDBacK | OPiNiON | NeWs | feaTuRe | NighT+Day | culTuRe | film | cafe | music | “Astro Boy” and “Speed Racer” came to the West, albeit after being redubbed, retitled and reworked as cartoons for kids. Bradley Wilson, an associate professor of Japanese language and culture at Arizona State University, says these shows were the first exposure to anime for many Americans, even if they didn’t realize it at the time. “Anime was being imported into the U.S., but it was often dubbed into English,” Wilson says. “So lots of cartoons people watched as children in the late ‘70s and early ’80s included shows like ‘Macross,’ which was retitled ‘Robotech’ in America. But few [kids] knew they were from Japan.” Fennell and his wife were avid fans of the show while growing up in Pittsburgh. “The big thing was watching ‘Robotech’ after school every day. We’d ride the bus home together and I’d get home in time to watch,” he says. “I was hooked.” By the ’90s, anime became a little more prevalent thanks to the growth of cable channels. Cartoon Network aired series like “Dragon Ball Z” and “Sailor Moon” during its “Toonami” programming block. You could also buy bootleg tapes or attend screenings at geek conventions in the Valley, according to Arizona fandom histo- rian Hal Astell. “Back when people just called it ‘Japanimation,’ anime was a sci-fi or comics convention thing where they’d have a room where you could watch anime. It was a niche interest within a niche interest,” he says. “It grew to become its own thing when anime fans didn’t want to sit in a room, they wanted a convention of their own.” They got it in 2005 when the now- defunct AniZona was launched by Valley geeks Anthony Grutta, Jason Bustard and David Hungerford. Other local nerd events of the era, including Phoenix Comicon, were featuring anime programming but AniZona’s co-founders saw the need for a dedicated convention. Fennell, who’d moved to the Valley the prior year with his wife and attended AniZona’s first few editions, says it was a “great con that just didn’t last.” “AniZona was the first true anime convention here in Arizona,” Fennell says. “We went every year and were actually going to help run some things for them, but they canceled it [in 2008] because they weren’t getting sales.” It opened the door for Saboten Con. Saboten Con steps in Within hours of AniZona’s cancelation in 2008, Phoenix Comicon founder Matt Solberg decided to split off his event’s anime content into a separate convention to fill the void. Less than three months later, Saboten Con debuted at the now-defunct Crowne Plaza Phoenix North. Fennell was tapped to oversee programming. “I was already running the anime [track] at Phoenix Comicon, so it made sense,” he says. The first year featured appearances by voice talents like Greg Ayres from “Initial D” and Laura Bailey from “Fullmetal Alchemist.” It was a smash hit. “It was crowded. We had about 1,000 people there, which was more than we expected, but it was a lot of fun,” Fennell says. “The problem was we outgrew the Crowne Plaza the first year.” And they kept growing, causing Saboten — which is the Japanese word for “cactus” — to move to a series of successively larger hotels. By 2012, they’d relocated to the Renaissance Phoenix Glendale Hotel & Spa. Meanwhile, the Fennells were making big moves of their own, buying Saboten Con from Solberg’s company, Square Egg Entertainment, and quitting their day jobs to focus on running their conventions. The roster had grown to include Kikori Con and Con-Nichiwa. Greg says turning their passion for anime into a full-time profession was a tough but necessary decision. “We realized if we didn’t hang up our hats and do this 100%, we weren’t going to make things grow as well as we could, because we couldn’t put the time into it,” he says. “So we bit the bullet.” Their gamble paid off. Saboten Con continued growing, especially after moving to their current home at the Sheraton Phoenix Downtown in 2015. Attendance topped 10,000 people in 2017. The con’s biggest turnout to date came in 2021, its first edition following a 2020 cancel- lation due to COVID-19. More than 23,000 people attended, which Fennell credits to pent-up demand during the pandemic. It wasn’t the only benefit of the lockdown. Cosplayers at Saboten Con portaying Kakashi Hatake from “Naruto” and “Sailor Moon.” (Left to right, photos by Benjamin Leatherman and Kevin Dooley/CC BY 2.0/Flickr) AniMania from p 17 >> p 21
