is a well known Japanese anime director and the founder of the animation studio Bee Train. Since the creation of the studio, Mashimo directed or otherwise participated in (nearly) all its works, for example, as a member of art or sound department. The anime OVA Murder Princess was the first Bee Train production since 1999 which he had no involvement in.

Biography

Kōichi Mashimo was born on June 211952 in Tokyo, Japan and from his early years showed interest in photography, admittedly under the influence of his father. Mashimo studied jurisprudence at Sophia University and during his fourth university year, he participated in the making of several television ads. However, this was a rather disappointing experience, and on November 61975, he applied for a position of Hiroshi Sasagawa's assistant director in Tatsunoko Production. The first anime series he worked on was Time Bokan (1975-76).

In the mid-80s, while still working for Tatsunoko, Mashimo survived a severe alpine skiing accident. During his stay in an intensive care unit, he came up with an idea of a "hospital for animators", an animation studio whose primary goal would be fostering and self-actualization of talented artists rather than commercial success and money. Some time after that, he founded a small freelance studio called Mashimo Jimusho that was mainly producing in-between animation for larger companies. In 1997, Mashimo presented his studio-as-hospital concept to Mitsuhisa Ishikawa, the president of Production I.G, who was so impressed with it that he immediately agreed to sponsor Mashimo. The new subsidiary has become known as Bee Train and in February 2006, it ended its relationship with I.G and became independent.

Approach and style

Mashimo generally storyboards all the anime he directs. As one of the leading and only regular on-staff directors at Bee Train, most series are fully directed by him. One exception being the anime series Tsubasa Chronicle which had several episode directors.

Mashimo is known for frequently hiring Yuki Kajiura to compose for his projects. Their first project being Eat-Man, then going onto Noir, as well as .hack//Sign, Liminality, and Tsubasa Chronicle. Besides Kajiura, many Mashimo and Bee Train's projects bring back seiyūs and crew members. Some noted cast members include: Maaya Sakamoto (Blade of the Immortal, Tsubasa Chronicle), Sanae Kobayashi (Madlax, .hack//Roots, .hack//Liminality), as well as noted crew members such as character designer Minako Shiba, Koji Sawai, and Hiroyuki Kawasaki.

Mashimo's approach to music is to have the music play a key role in the series. He feels music and animation should work and push each other to new heights all the time, and it should be seen as more than simple background.

Some of Mashimo's major projects have featured strong female protagonists. The famous "girls with guns" trilogy (Noir, Madlax, El Cazador de la Bruja) have all featured female characters in lead roles. One of his earlier films, The Weathering Continent, also featured a young woman who takes matters into her own hands to save her people. Some have also been known to contain subtle hints at lesbian relations, most notably in Madlax.

Filmography

Year	Anime	Job
1970s
1975	Time Bokan	assistant director
1978	Kagaku Ninja-Tai Gatchaman II	director
1979	Kagaku Ninja-Tai Gatchaman F	director
1980s
1985	Night on the Galactic Railroad	script
1986	Ai City	director
1987	Dirty Pair: Project Eden	director, general superintendent
1988	F	director, script
	Dominion: Tank Police	director, script
1989	Dragon Warrior	script
1990s
1990	Robin Hood no Daiboken	director
1992	The Weathering Continent	director, script
1993	The Irresponsible Captain Tylor	director, script, supervisor
1996	Sorcerer Hunters	director
1997	Eat-Man	director
1998	Xenogears	animation movie producer
1999	PoPoLoCrois	director, script
	Wild Arms: Twilight Venom	director, planning
2000s
2001	Noir	director, storyboard, sound director, music director
2002	.hack//Sign	director, script, sound director, soundtrack supervisor
	.hack OVAs: .hack//Intermezzo, .hack//Unison, .hack//Gift	director
	.hack//Liminality	director, soundtrack supervision, animation director
2003	Avenger	director
	.hack//Legend of the Twilight	director, general superintendent
	Immortal Grand Prix	director, script
2004	Madlax	director, script, storyboards
	Ginyuu Mokushiroku Meine Liebe	director, script
2005	Tsubasa Chronicle (first season)	director, story boards
2006	Ginyuu Mokushiroku Meine Liebe wieder	director
	.hack//Roots	director, supervision, soundtrack supervision, consulting producer
	Spider Riders	director, supervision
	Tsubasa Chronicle (second season)	director (co-director: Hiroshi Morioka)
2007	El Cazador de la Bruja	director
	Spider Riders: Yomigaeru Taiyou	director
2008	Blade of the Immortal	director
	Batman Gotham Knight: Field Test	segment producer

Trivia

• Mashimo once remarked that he'd like to have personally met the photographers Richard Avedon, Jeanloup Sieff, and Helmut Newton and film directors John Ford and Alfred Hitchcock. However, by the time the interview has been published, four of these were already dead and Avedon died later that year.
• Mashimo is particularly fond of the French movie Les Aventuriers (1967, IMDB) and has even named a character in Madlax after the protagonist of that film.

References

External links

• Kōichi Mashimo at the Bee Train Fan Wiki
• Koichi Mashimo at Anime-Wiki