@socketwench - Akira really comes across as ground breaking animation and hugely influential in the US, but like you said, had a so-so reaction in Japan.

Japan had had cinematic animation for a while by the time Akira came out. The Macross and Dirty Pair movies are lovely to watch (And a few of the Urusei Yatsura movies, while not as detailed, had been out a half decade before all these). So when Akira released, for them "it was Tuesday."

For us, though...Streamline took a chance releasing Akira theatrically, and while it was critically panned, it at least showed the US audience that "animation for adults is a thing, and it can be great looking if you you put money into it."

I know those of us in the C/FO were celebrating Streamline's release in the US. Sadly, I think it was the failure of Akira in the US Box Office that kept Troma's (absolutely straight) dubs of the Studio Ghibli movies from being released outside of a few test runs in Austin. We had an almost ten year way before Disney would pick up that thread.