Night one of Anime Expo 2026 was, as the kids say, a movie. And what better way to capture how wild that night was than documenting Kodansha House‘s swanky The Ghost in the Shell party from behind the lens of my trusty and underutilized (until now!) Fujifilm X-T100? Kodansha threw a party at its Los Angeles Kodansha House location in honor of The Ghost in the Shell‘s imminent premiere on Prime Video on July 7.
Naturally, io9 got to swing by to check out the digs and took some photos of the cool things we saw when we crossed the threshold and entered otaku heaven.
While the main reason folks attended the party and lined up around the block was to get a chance to get signed posters from director Mokochan and the character design/executive animation director Shuhei Handa, the first thing that caught our eye—or more appropriately, our ears—was the live DJ set playing cyberpunk-themed tunes while trailers for The Ghost in the Shell looped behind him. The vibes were immaculate.
But for those of a slower tempo and in dire need of being a wallflower like yours truly, the front of the house also had some good decompressing vibes in its shelved manga on display featuring such choice titles as Princess Jellyfish, Fire Force, and Vinland Saga.
By far my favorite part of this room in Kodansha House was its display walls showcasing special artwork from mangaka and stills from anime like Fairy Tail, Blue Lock, and That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime.
As if to tell me that there’s even more behind the veil, I was quickly put on to the fact that there’s a quieter, more museum-like experience on the other side of the house. After exiting the partying tunes of TGITS (gonna be weird getting used to that acronym) party, I gotta say they vastly undersold it. The other side of Kodansha House is a pretty close approximation to an introvert’s version of an amusement park.
After entering what I’ll dub the cooler side of Kodansha House, I saw my queen, Motoko Kusanagi. Both literally and figuratively. I quite literally ran into the English voice cast of TGITS: Kusanagi (Suzie Yeung), Batou (Bill Butts), Saito (Tony Weaver), and Togusa (Nick Apostolides). It was kinda wild. I was too shy to say hey to Yeung despite interviewing her at Kotaku for playing Chainsaw Man‘s Makima, but I dapped up and shot the shit with my president, Butts, so we’re counting that as a win. Anyways, my figurative meeting with Kusanagi was through a cool digital display of her key visual near the entrance. I, too, failed to capture a picture to prove I met her, but I snapped a shot of Fuchikoma, which more than makes up for my willful posting of my Ls.
Moving right along to things that make my heart swell with pride was Kodansha House’s Witch Hat Atelier display. Alongside a zoo-like enclosure of a delightfully cluttered room littered with papers and spells, and a flatscreen TV displaying Qifrey (goals), was a spell book with a tablet embedded on its right side, where folks could practice drawing magic circles with their fingers and watch the spells they created come to life. While I’ve played these games before on my phone (and failed miserably), I can say those were the purest of Johns because my circle at Kodansha House made a nice ice spell.
The next room, and by far the most popular, was a smorgasbord of anime wish fulfillment. Key among them was Kaneda’s bike from Akira, which visitors not only got to sit on, but also pantomime the patented “Akira slide” with documented proof of how cool they look in front of an LED screen. Just around the corner, connected by arcade machines from Initial D, was a Blue Lock cageball where visitors could show off their inner egoist by taking shots at different targets around a goalie. Going off of the guy I was watching, it’s way harder than the anime makes it look to kick a ball and thread the needle around moving obstacles. Luckily, the staff member behind him was giving him helpful pointers to get better height off his kicks. Unluckily, his name did not slap the leaderboard proudly displayed on the adjoining side of the Blue Lock attraction. Better luck next time.
Last, and certainly not least, was Kodansha House’s Attack on Titan attraction. In this room was a diorama of Wall Maria, where attendees could play the bad guy by emerging from the other side of the wall like the Colossal Titan. As you can see in the hero image that leads you to this point in this blog and in the photo below, I had a lot of fun.
But wait, there’s more. My making silly faces, wherein I asked a really kind gent standing behind me to shoot me on my Fujifilm (he took a lot of shots in landscape and portrait, cheers), weren’t just for the photo op. The Kodansha House staff were cueing my imminent destruction of Wall Maria for a video. After snapping a shot of a QR code, I was able to see what it would look like had I unmade Eren Yeager, and I’ve gotta say, I’ve got good timing.
Fun was had. #KodanshaHouse pic.twitter.com/lPjAWXpCDj
— Isaiah D. Colbert is on Bluesky (@ShinEyeZehUhh) July 3, 2026
If there were a thesis statement to tie a bow on the above, it’s that even low-key manga and anime destinations can be a lot of fun.
io9 is on the ground at Anime Expo 2026. We’ll be bringing you updates on all the biggest panels, screenings, and announcements, plus exclusive one-on-one interviews with the people behind some of the best and most popular anime around. You can check out all of io9’s Anime Expo coverage here.
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