Orphan presents the theatrical (widescreen) version of the 1997 OVA Ultra Nyan: Hoshizora kara Maiorita Fushigi Neko (Ultra Nyan: The Cat Descended from the Starry Sky), This is encoded from a Japanese laserdisc and is letterboxed. Therein lies a tale.

Ultra Nyan: Hoshizora kara Maiorita Fushigi Neko was shown in theaters on a twin-bill with a widescreen live-action Ultraman movie, so it had to be widescreen as well. It was drawn with Open Matte. In this system, the movie was shot (or the anime was drawn) full-frame and then matted to widescreen in the movie projector. Home video releases on VHS tape or laserdisc could be either full-frame or letterboxed widescreen (Ultra Nyan: Hoshizora kara Maiorita Fushigi Neko was not released on DVD). The laserdisc version of Ultra Nyan was widescreen; the much later streaming release, used in Orphan’s first version of the show, was full-frame. For more information, see the blog entry.

Which is right? Actually, they both are. Theatergoers saw the matted, widescreen version; streaming viewers saw the full-frame version. You can choose which you like better.

This release, and all Orphan releases, are available for direct download from IRC bot Orphan|Arutha in channels #nibl or #news on irc.rizon.net.