Summer Wars Turns One Team Into a Sweep

The ninth fair set a new high-water mark: 132,492 visitors and 244 exhibitors at Tokyo Big Sight in March 2010, numbers the event wouldn't top again for years.

Animation of the Year went to Summer Wars, and Mamoru Hosoda didn't just win Best Director for it, he won Best Original Story too, since he wrote the thing himself. Three editions after his breakout win for The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, he'd already built himself a real streak.

The rest of the Summer Wars crew cleaned up right alongside him. Satoko Okudera won Best Screenplay, Yoji Takeshige won Best Art Direction, and Yoshiyuki Sadamoto, yes, the Evangelion character designer, won Best Character Designer, all for the same film. One movie, six trophies. That's not a sweep, that's a landslide.

Elsewhere, Hiroshi Kamiya won Best Voice Actor for Bakemonogatari, a show that was just starting to build the cult following it's known for today, and Shiro Sagisu won Best Music for Evangelion: 2.0, keeping the franchise's award streak alive through its Rebuild era.

The Merit Award for Director went to Isao Takahata, co-founder of Studio Ghibli and director of Grave of the Fireflies, Only Yesterday, and Pom Poko. Every other Ghibli win on this site's award pages traces back to a house he helped build.