Some ADV New Releases Now 'Suspended Indefinitely'

We've been keeping on top of ADV regarding the 6/24, 7/1, and 7/8 releases. As of today both the Shattered Angels 2 and Kanon 6 DVD's have missed the street dates. A couple of weeks ago we got the word that these releases would probably be shipping late due to 'replicator problems', however late last week the status was changed to 'on hold'. Since then I've been following up with ADV daily.

I just got the word this morning from ADV that the following new releases have been 'suspended indefinitely':

Shattered Angels , Vol #2 DVD
Shattered Angels , Vol #2 DVD w Art Box
Kanon, Vol #6 DVD
Tokyo Majin , Vol #4 DVD
Welcome to NHK, Vol #5, 5th Conspiracy DVD

I did not inquire about releases out past 7/8. This is just a quick post, and I'm currently working to get some clarification on what's going on.

UPDATE: FYI, a small number of NHK 5 did ship - mostly to Best Buy - but others may have gotten a few copies as well. ADV had a special ongoing promotional arrangement in place with Best Buy for NHK, and they did seem to get a small pressing out to them before they had to pull the plug (for reasons still unclear). I can't comment right now on the other titles.

UPDATE 2: It's been difficult to get anymore hard info from ADV this afternoon, but I'll post more as it comes in - but only news I've been able to verify with at least two sources at ADV and that always takes time. If nothing else, ADV should shed some light on what has happened at their Anime Expo panel this coming Friday afternoon. The 'deer in the headlights' deal we went through back in February isn't going to cut it this time.

UPDATE 3: Just wanted to make a note that any copies of the above titles that we are able to obtain would strictly have to go to fill existing pre-orders.

UPDATE 4: Following up on more e-mails that have come in. This posting does not mean that ADV is out of business, but it does mean that they are still experiencing serious business problems. We've been quietly accumulating extra inventory of their thin-paks for the last few weeks 'just in case'. As of now they are still shipping the new thin-paks and restocks to us. We received the new Divergence Eve thin-pak today, and the FUMOFFU re-issue arrived a couple of days ago. I think we'll be taking things day by day with them for now, and again, their panel at Expo should be very interesting.

UPDATE 5: 'Suspended Indefinitely' means exactly that - their words, not mine.

UPDATE 6: It's defiantly a licensing issue - again. Our sources at ADV confirmed this morning that any retailer who might have received a few copies of any of the above titles got them strictly by mistake as "they are no longer allowed to ship those titles".

UPDATE 7: At the ADV Sneak Peak panel at Anime Expo on Thursday afternoon Matt Greenfield let us know the deal - ADV has officially separated from its Japanese licensing partner Sojitz. He said this means that the status of 'recent titles' are now "fate undetermined". That's industry speak for 'we're probably screwed'. We're working to get a full list of actual names in place of 'recent titles'. As a bright spot, he did say that they are negotiating for 23 new titles. How nice for them.

So the question is: 1) can they actually afford to license new material, and, if so 2) do they still have the resources to produce it - and lastly 3) will the fan base ever trust them to finish any series that they start. I mean, they had to sell the desks and chairs to buy Matt a plane ticket out to AX...

...come on, you know I'm just kidding about that... :-)

...but I don't say any of this stuff lightly. We're going to loose ten of thousands of dollars in business due to the cancellations, much of which was booked in advance. You have to wonder how much ADV management knew about when this deal would end while they still continued to rush these volumes out the door. I had always felt it was very peculiar that they had scheduled Shattered Angels 2 and 3 only 3 weeks apart (6/24 and 7/15) - seemed like they were in a awful hurry to get them on the street before ? what ?. Thanks Matt, enjoy AX - you guys really screwed us again.

Sorry guys, I'm a like cranky this afternoon. It's been a long day. I hope you all have a great long weekend!

UPDATE 8: Funimation answers all. See my post here.