Kung Fu fighting
Group opens genre to video-lovers
By Meghan Youker
Skiff Staff

Tokyo may be attacked, crushed, bombarded or stomped into the ground at any time. But freshman vocal performance major Carolyn Brewer says she never worries.

“Tokyo can be blown up 50 times,” she said. “But somehow they always manage to rebuild it.”

Brewer, a member of TCU’s Anime/Kung Fu Movie Association, said destroying Tokyo is a popular theme in both anime movies and series.

This type of Japanese animation, in addition with Kung Fu movies, may be “the greatest movies you’ve never seen,” said John Kerl, president of the association.

Kerl, a sophomore economics and finance major, said anime is just another interesting form of entertainment that is either subtitled or dubbed from Japanese into English. It covers a wide variety of topics and incorporates various types of the American mainstream media, so most people can relate to it in some way, he said.

Vice President James Stark said he compares anime to American cartoons, with series containing an overall feel and sequence that can also be molded to appeal to “big-kid audiences.”

“Watching an anime series is like watching a cartoon that ends in ‘to be continued ...’ every time,” said Stark, a junior business management major. “Every single episode seems to trail into the next.”

Senior e-business major Benny Nguyen started the movie association in October 2001 because he said it would be a great way to meet people of “like mind and interest” and to introduce others to the anime and Kung Fu movie genres.

“We aren’t all anime nuts,” Stark said. “We want to show people that anime is another legitimate form of entertainment.”

To do this, Stark said the association either shows one movie or holds a “sampler night” at meetings to introduce certain members to the first few episodes of an anime series.

Stark also said members talk a lot during and after the movie and that the group has plans to post movie reviews on the Internet in the future.

Secretary Andrea Troxel, a senior biology and English major, said meetings are always small and informal and that the association is really more of a group of friends than an organization.

Troxel said the club does have small dues but the money is used to rent movies and pay for excursions similar to last year’s trip to the movie “EscaFlowne” at a theater in Dallas.

To join the Anime/Kung Fu Movie Association or get any additional information, students can e-mail Kerl at (j.f.kerl@tcu.edu) or stop by one of the meetings at 7 p.m. every Wednesday in Moudy Building South, Room 279.

Meghan Youker