Due to international production delays, please note that the VEXILLE BLU-RAY (MMA3015) has been bumped from NOVEMBER 18th to Q2 2010.

Existing orders will be canceled and this title will be re-solicited to all customers in 2010.

Madman apologises for any inconvenience this delay causes.

Congratulations to the winners of our August PONYO competition! We received a huge response and a wonderful batch of entries.

The Major Prize consisted of:

ART OF PONYO
PONYO picture book
The huge Studio Ghibli DVD range
Double Passes to PONYO

Congratulations to the major prize winner - Caleb Wong

Meanwhile 10 Runners up winners received:

Double Passes to PONYO
A DVD copy of My Neighbor Totoro

Congratulations to

Gwynedd Spicer-Wensley
Hannah Cooper
James Marshall
Diana Ozelis
Andrew Rauch
Venessa Turnbull
Khy Blizzard
Cheryl Lin
Kim Fuentes
Helen Macpherson

For more information on PONYO visit The official site and to enter more free competitions check out the Fanzone link below!

This Sunday on Dateline, East Timor confronts an episode from its past on the silver screen.

The movie BALIBO, which has been dubbed into the local language Tetun has been touring Timor's villages, playing on an inflatable silver screen, and reporter Mark Davis was there to capture the emotional response.

Davis also uncovers more evidence regarding the death of journalist Roger East at the hands of Indonesian troops.

Dear fans,

Originally we had advertised that REEL Anime would be taking place this year, however this is not the case. We anticipate that it will be back on for 2010 and apologies for any confusion this may have caused.

Just a small note to mention there is a slight delay by a couple of days with Afro Samurai Resurrection DVD & Bluray.

We will endeavor to have stock into stores by Friday 11th September.

If you have any queries, please don't hesitate to contact your account manager.

Strap yourselves in Australia cause TNA Wrestling is coming to town! Former world heavyweight Champion Jeff Jarrett will be appearing on ROVE LIVE this Sunday night at 8:30pm.

That's not all though as other members from the TNA family will also be in town including Jeremy JB Borash and TNA Knockout - Christy Hemme.

Tune in for some very exciting announcements!

TNA Wrestling DVDs will be available from October. Pre-order today!

Debbie Guest | August 23, 2009
Article from: The Australian

THE Shire of Broome has bowed to international pressure and voted to suspend ties with a Japanese city that annually slaughters thousands of dolphins.

At an emergency meeting held yesterday, councillors unanimously voted to suspend its sister city relationship with the Japanese whaling port town of Taiji. The suspension will continue for as long as Taiji continues its horrific slaughter of around 23,000 dolphins a year.

The council said it would 'respectfully advise' Taiji that Broome would not be able to continue the sister city relationship while dolphins were killed.

The council's decision comes after a new documentary, THE COVE, revealed the extent of the slaughter to international viewers.

Following the film's release, the council was inundated with letters and emails from Australia and the world urging it to end the relationship.

Yesterday's decision was welcomed by Broome whale researcher Richard Costin who had threatened to leave the town if the council did not act.

"This is a really good decision by the Broome shire. They've been mindful of the links between Broome and Taiji and the establishment of the pearling industry." Mr Costin told The Australian.

He said the decision left the door open to discussions between the Shire of Broome and Taiji because the relationship could be resumed if the slaughter stopped.

But he said Taiji was unlikely to act. "At the end of the day Taiji won't take much notice of what Broome does." he said.

The council also agreed to help Taiji establish other industries so that the town could survive economically if it abandoned the hunting of whales and dolphins.

Please note the following changes to our manga schedule, effective immediately;

- Naruto Vol. 46 from December to November (yes, early!)
- Re:Play Vol 3. from December to March 2010 (this was previously delayed from November)
- Warcraft: Dragons of Outland from December to February 2010
- Twinkle Stars Vol 1. from November to Q1 2010

In June we celebrated the release of our Classic 80's Toons range as Complete Collections, featuring the likes of the original and the best TRANSFORMERS series on DVD and the movie on Blu-Ray.

Not only that but the likes of Voltron (Lion Force and Vehicle Force in one package), HE-MAN, SHE-RA and STAR BLAZERS in one collection. It's like going back to your lounge room, circa the best times of your life.

In that light we held a huge competition to win the ENTIRE range of complete collections, plus TRANSFORMERS toy goodies from HASBRO and the new game from ACTIVISION.

After much deliberation we are proud to announce our winners!

GRAND PRIZE WINNER

Congratulations to Jonathan Torn

A small planetoid of DVD collections, games and Transformers toys including the 25th Anniversary original Optimus Prime are on their way!

RUNNERS UP WINNERS

Each win the complete collection of their choice, a Transformers Voyager figure and Revenge of the Fallen game.

Abby Jameson
Joshua Penney
Stephen Schulze
Tanya Thomas
Scott MacMillan

Thank you to all our entrants, keep your eye on the Madman Fanzone for more competitions!

Karl Quinn, THE AGE
August 18, 2009

IN LESS than two weeks, an annual event that environmental activist Ric O'Barry calls a genocide will begin. By the time it ends in March, as many as 23,000 dolphins will have been ''harvested'' in Japan.

The lucky few will be shipped off to aquariums around the world, to spend the rest of their lives performing. The unlucky ones will be brutally slaughtered, their carcasses butchered for sale in Japan - often deliberately mislabelled as whale meat - or merely dragged out to sea and left to rot.

This grim scenario is laid bare in a documentary, The Cove, which follows the efforts of Mr O'Barry and his colleagues to reveal what goes on at the Japanese fishing port of Taiji.

Mr O'Barry will present the film at a special screening in Melbourne tomorrow night, having just shown it in Broome, which is Taiji's sister city.

He is hoping to persuade the West Australian town to suspend that relationship until Taiji stops the annual slaughter, which begins on September 1.

The documentary ends with gruesome scenes in which the eponymous cove fills with blood as fishermen hack into the trapped dolphins with harpoons and knives. ''That's nothing. That's the Disney version of what we captured,'' Mr O'Barry insisted yesterday.

In the eyes of the Japanese fishing authorities, the slaughter comes under the heading of ''pest control'' - reduce dolphin numbers and you increase the fish catch. ''It's really about genocide. The Government wants to kill the competition,'' Mr O'Barry says.

While some environmental activists have known about the slaughter for a decade or so, most people in Japan and beyond remain oblivious to it.

Mr O'Barry, 69, has been campaigning on behalf of dolphins for 40 years. After five years in the US Navy, he became a trainer at the Miami Seaquarium in 1960. Three years later, he landed a job on the TV series Flipper, training dolphins.

He made a good living from the show, but midway through his seven-year stint he had an epiphany: ''I realised dolphins are self-aware, and from there I soon realised it was wrong to keep them in captivity.''

He became an activist the day after his favourite dolphin, Cathy - one of six who played Flipper - died. She had become miserable in captivity, and one day swam into his arms and simply stopped breathing.

''She committed suicide. There's no doubt in my mind,'' Mr O'Barry says.

He is convinced the ''dolphinarium'' harvest is an important economic factor in the slaughter. ''Captures are the economic underpinning. They only get about $500 for a dead dolphin. They get $150,000 for a performing dolphin.''

Trevor Long, director of marine sciences at Sea World on the Gold Coast, says his park is vehemently opposed to the dolphin harvests and Sea World has been a signatory to protests directed at the Japanese Government. ''We totally condemn the slaughter,'' Mr Long says.

He says none of the 31 dolphins at Sea World are from Japan - 60 per cent were born at the park.

Despite the likely impact of The Cove, Mr O'Barry is convinced the argument in Japan will not be won on economic or environmental grounds.

Ultimately, it will come down to safety. The film includes a claim that tests have revealed mercury contamination of up to 2000 parts per million.

In Japan, the maximum allowable level in fish is 0.04 parts.

Mercury poisoning causes serious birth defects.

There will be a preview charity screening of The Cove at Cinema Europa, Southland, tonight at 6.30, followed by a question-and-answer session with Ric O'Barry. Tickets are $20.