The reputation of Gainax is one that looms large among anime fans. The studio’s iconoclastic origin story and the meteoric rise of Hideaki Anno, its star creator, have become the stuff of legend. But there are still pockets of Gainax history that remain largely unexplored.
The shop that launched GAINAX first opened its doors on Valentine’s Day in 1982.
The shop that Daicon III built spent ten years selling garage kits, posters, t-shirts, and doujinshi to the otaku generation.
Written by Toshio Okada and Yasuhiro Takeda in 1983, this translated article reveals the haphazard, amateur production of the anime short that made history.
