Comments on: Memories of a Comicbook Store Guy

By: Charles Gray

Charles Gray — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 01:30:57 +0000

Carl was also my original source for Anime, and for the longest time, Carl Macek’s Gallery was the “go to” place for anime books and material unless you were willing to make the trek into LA to hit Little Tokyo. It’s kind of hard to believe, living today where you can get more anime then you can shake a stick at from your local Barnes and Noble, but back then Anime was this really odd thing and Manga was something that you hardly ever saw.

I also remember Carl showing the first 90 minute “special” for Robotech: The Sentinels at a convention in Orange County at the Doubletree hotel. He was full of enthusiasm for it, although sadly the sentinels would become a project that was destined to never be a series. He always had enthusiasm for his projects, and that was something that impressed me.

But still, both in terms of the direct influence, the robotech books, articles, and interest, and the indirect, an entire generation of artists and writers who had their first experience of anime at the hands of robotech, Carl had a tremendous impact on the popular entertainment media, one that we still see today.

RIP.

By: Brian Henderson

Brian Henderson — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 15:48:18 +0000

Oops, one other thing I wanted to bring up as a “correction” of sorts. Back when Carl’s comic shop was in the Orange Circle, it was called “Carl Macek’s Gallery”, it didn’t turn unto “21st Century” until Carl was no longer directly involved. It always had a small second floor, but that didn’t expand into a full art gallery-style thing until they moved down the street and out of the Circle entirely. In the original store front, upstairs was more storage than anything, but he did have some comic-related artwork hanging on the wall and over the balcony.

Strange what you remember when you’re reminded of something in the past.

By: Brian Henderson

Brian Henderson — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 15:17:42 +0000

Yeah, I remember hanging out with Carl back in his comic days, he had a TV and VCR up by the register and a bunch of us would go in with tapes of anime to show him. As far as I know, I’m the one that introduced him to shows like Yamato, Macross and Dunbine, he ended up borrowing a lot of tapes from my collection so he could watch them at home. He also called me and told me to turn on the TV the day Robotech premiered. I also remember Lensmen, he almost dragged me down to the theater with a couple of other people in tow to see it. That’s just how things were in the early anime community though, it was so small and insular that people just got to know each other, “big” names or not. There were no superstars or celebrities, there were just fans.

Oh, and I was one of those fans in the back of the room at the Creation Con doing the shoveling. If nothing else, Carl was great at self-promotion and taking credit for the work of others. I really don’t remember it being good natured at all, to be honest, it was our opinion at what he was spewing on stage. Somebody had to keep him honest, at least in the early days. Don’t get me wrong, he was a good guy, I count him as a friend and he got some things done in the anime community that probably needed doing, I just don’t necessarily agree with his intentions or with what he did, at the time that he did it.