The aniblog discussion club: erudite thought within

[Atria35]

In the cases where the mecha are analogous to fighter pilots or weapons, I still say it's like the outgrowth of bigger and better fighting technology- but it's more like the whole car thing we have in modern society.

People (not everyone, but a lot) see their cars as an extention of self. It's what represents them, what gives off the image that they want other people to see. So it's still making the fighting personal, just in a different way than when it's in hand-to-hand combat. Cars aren't particularly special in today's society- we see them everywhere. But that doesn't make them any less personal.

So the grandeur for those mecha would still hold, since then it's like watching drag racing- the mecha represents the driver.

[Davidizer13]

But does that personalization and grandeur still hold for shows where the mecha are purely weapons or vehicles?

[...]

Also, I can see the whole hand-to-hand combat thing where the mecha acts as a superhero (like in super robot) or in cases where the pilots act as knights, but there's also the case where pilots act are analogous to fighter pilots, like in Gundam or, better yet, Macross.

I thought these were the whole point of shows like Gundam and Macross that treat mecha as mass-produced weapons instead of super powers in the form of a giant robot.

In an average super robot show, the hero and his robot fight kaiju-like monsters: huge monster thingies that just show up on Tokyo's doorstep one day (or are put there by alien aggressors). By treating mecha as weapons, as a mass-produced walking tank, you can humanize the opponents, showing that they're just like the heroes, except on the other side of the conflict. It allows the villains (who might just be on the opposite side of the conflict, rather than straight-up evil) to be more sympathetic by showing that they have a legitimate cause to fight for and a motivation besides, say, conquering Earth and getting rid of humans. This can make for much more mature stories (not that I'm saying that super robot shows are, by definition, are immature).

Meanwhile, this also humanizes the heroes: they're just cogs in a machine, expendable and replaceable. There's nothing special about them, usually; they weren't chosen by the robot's builder or anything; they're just soldiers doing their duty, and if they die/their machine is destroyed, then another soldier or mecha can take their place. They don't even have to agree with the cause they're fighting for; after all, there are soldiers in Iraq who don't think the US should've been there in the first place, but they're still doing their best to serve because that's what they've been called to do.

[Etoh*the*Greato]

But does that personalization and grandeur still hold for shows where the mecha are purely weapons or vehicles? In Geass, for instance, there's nothing particularly special about the Knightmare Frames beyond the fact that they were just better than conventional weapons. And in the first part of Geass (before we got into AU Gundam syndrome with super-powerful individual mecha flying around), the KMFs were treated as such. Or what about in 08th MS Team, which was basically guerilla warfare with mecha in South America?

Also, I can see the whole hand-to-hand combat thing where the mecha acts as a superhero (like in super robot) or in cases where the pilots act as knights, but there's also the case where pilots act are analogous to fighter pilots, like in Gundam or, better yet, Macross. The variable fighters in Macross don't have any melee combat capability. In Gundam, I can see the whole fighter ace rivalry thing going (the most famous example being between Char and Amuro), but I don't think there's any of that in Macross.

Maybe this comes from the fact that my Mecha background starts with Mechwarrior (The very epitome of 'real' mecha), but I would say that the Mecha-as-advanced-warfare line doesn't really seem to detract for me. Watching Evangelion and Full Metal Panic was just as exciting for me, if not more so, than the Super Mecha anime. I suspect that one's response to the particular "heroism" on display is going to depend greatly on one's tastes.

[blkmage]

Right, but what you're describing isn't really mecha; it's just a war story that happens to have giant robots in them rather than conventional weapons. The thing is, in most mecha shows, even if it's real robot, there is an emphasis placed on the machine itself. Look at Gundam, the progenitor of real robot. The characters are the biggest part of the show and yet, everyone's shouting GANDAMUUUUUU all the time. I think there's more to the mecha than just combat potential.

And this is where the other post I was talking about comes in. Here's Mecha as Fig Leaves, Not as Genres:

I think going down his line of abstraction is a little too much. I mean, yeah, once you boil it down a Gundam is just a projection of one’s earthly desires into heroism. Why does Superman fly? Why is Nono topless? The difference is perhaps one of idolatry versus escapist, self-insertion, and the boat floats either way you row your pickle.

But just because they both float, it doesn’t mean they are the same thing.

And I think it’s times like this we can really appreciate anime like Evangelion because it puts a face on a notion that the world has struggled with and responded (or rather, reacted to?) with great interest. It’s so very apt that Evangelion copied from Judeo-Christian and gnostic myths, because this is all very religious. And often times classic mecha anime have a sense of institution and formality to it that is not unlike some earthen religion or Hinduism.

Still, I think Daniel’s post paves the way to model the core components of a hero story. There are three core elements: the hero, the heorics, and the the audience. What makes a show tick is how the viewer relate and perceive the relationship between the hero and the heroics. What is unique about mecha from any other hero story–that separates BGC from Nanoha, let’s say–is the identity of this projection as we perceive it. What makes mecha anime different than others like it is that this projection has god-like attributes. And I don’t just mean in terms of physical powers, but also socially and in the psyche of our heroes (ie. they serve the same role as gods in the real world).

In other words, the hero is the heroics–you can’t have a mecha anime like that.

Would you pray to it? Many mecha heroes did. Some with tears, many with passionate screams, some speak the language and can reprogram really fast.

Some easy example of this are Evangelion and Neo Ranga. The mecha themselves serve not only as an extension of a will and desire for our heroes, but they are a pathway, a means, to achieve something beyond what powers might bring. In Neo Ranga’s case, it played the role from god to oracle to judge to house pet. In Eva’s case it’s not only man’s last defense, but also a road to total destruction of man…and a comfortable hole for an emo-head to hide in. It’s gooey, warm, and feels a lot like mom. Or in Xenoglossia’s case, the boyfriend you wish you had.

Everything before Eva can be seen as a road leading up to it. Is not Astroboy an embodiment of godhood in human society? Read much Shirow lately?

Gundam 00 played this up a notch with Setsuna’s complex, right? Silly teenage extremist. By the way I thought that was the most brilliant part of Gundam 00.

(Actually several Gundam series deal with this in a pretty amusing way. Such as when a mecha pilot put too much trust in the latest tech, only to be let down by the false god.)

What is god in the Nanoha universe? Sweat, blood, tears, lesbian undertonesnever-ending power of heart, and incremental upgrades of a deadly mix between tech and magic. Ancient prophecies, modern inventions and everything in between play a role. But none of it materializes as god. If anything, Nanoha is like Hercules; if there’s a claim to godhood, it would the worship of her (and not Raising Heart… If Daniel said Mai-Hime, however, he’d be right on). I always thought what was worshipped in the Nanoha series is a sense of ethics, of right and wrong.

Anyways, can we say the same thing about the Gurren-Lagann? Is that why the second half of the series was as hollow as it was?

And I think it gets into the divide between super robots and real robots?

And that is the difference between an age of darkness and an age of enlightenment. (Yes, yes, Mobile Suit Gundam brought upon the anime world an age of enlightenment; we all can agree on that I hope.) If we think of science and technology as the god of this age, it all makes sense? And what better symbol of modern technological advancement are there than made-in-Japan humanoid weapons? Well, maybe mutated giant tentacle monsters as an alternative (and they exist in mecha anime, even). The fiction of science went well with the fiction of god-idol-heroes; they’re peas in a pod.

What made the Evangelion so profound-seeming (to clarify my earlier point) is how it handled a duality of modern gods. Mankind has always understood deities to be both kind and cruel; but it wasn’t until the past few hundred years that we questioned their identity in an organized manner; are gods really gods? And with gods we can understand (eg. science & technology, even if it’s alien), we can make stories out of them that deal with this issue. Evangelion simply took that to a step beyond gods, to the ultimate creator of such gods–man himself. Evagelion did more than just took an axe to a tree, it took a lance and pierced the veil that separated imagination from our unconscious guilt.

Once we have understood construction of gods (as defined by real robots), we worship that faceless, personless understanding and no longer the personality which we now understand. The super robot magic is lost when this happens. In Gurren Lagann’s case, we have ourselves a real robot anime with the trapping of a super robot show (at about half way through the second arc), although by then we have a lot of pretty stuff on the screen to distract us. And will Nia be saved?

I believe the opposite perspective coincidentally, is held by Gunbuster–a proper, modern day miracle where science + heart overcomes obstacles size of stars. Of course, part of the ordeal within Gurren Lagann is one that does not have a textbook happy ending, it’s thoroughly post-Evangelion. Congratulations, Simon.

And that is why things like Turn-A Gundam are so interesting.

Maybe that is why well-adjusted teenage boys and girls watch shows like Naruto and Bleach where the focus is on interpersonal relationships, and not on why my giant robot is better than your giant robot?

[Either way, when you get old enough, you will learn to appreciate Blade Runner, and by extension, Bubble Gum Crisis. That gets to the next point: I admit, I’m pretty weak from the sentai side of things, and it helps to have a healthy understanding of that genre to talk mecha. They are close relatives after all.]

[ShiroiHikari]

I was more or less with the guy until this part right here:

Maybe that is why well-adjusted teenage boys and girls watch shows like Naruto and Bleach where the focus is on interpersonal relationships, and not on why my giant robot is better than your giant robot?

Actually, he has a good point about gods. If this guy hasn't seen Ideon, then he should.

[Hohenheim]

The guy does make quite the case. Admittedly, I have not watched very many mecha series, but sometimes it is true we turn technology into something we worship. I suppose that in a sense mecha series attempt to satisfy that part of us that crave better gadgets and gizmos. However, the stuff about Eva was hard for me to get, though that may just be the result of my not having watched it (I plan on doing so eventually, as I have read it involves existential thought, and I am into philosophical anime).

Could someone clarify what he meant when he said "Evagelion did more than just took an axe to a tree, it took a lance and pierced the veil that separated imagination from our unconscious guilt."? I would really like to glean the meaning from this statement.

[blkmage]

That statement has to do with the two paragraphs that it's sandwiched in between, talking about our understanding of the construction of gods. The tree metaphor was a callback to the first mecha post I linked, where the tree was the mecha genre. The lance is an in-joke/reference to the Lance of Longinus in Eva. So, he's basically talking about how Eva is all about examining this explicitly for the first time in the mecha genre.

[Hohenheim]

Thank you for the help. Just wanted some clarification. Also, I just want to say I love this thread. Keep up the good work!:thumb:

[ShiroiHikari]

Transcribed from something I just said in the chat because it is relevant to this thread:

Space Runaway Ideon is interesting because it plays with that "giant robots as gods" concept. The Ideon is basically a conduit for a supernatural existence. And that existence is like, "I gonna eat you humans because you **** me off." The humans think they're using the Ideon, but really it's using them.

[blkmage]

---

So it's time for some lovely weekend reading on a topic that is likely one of the more controversial ones. You may remember a thread a while back that sought to define "otaku". On one side were those who viewed it as analogous to the North American equivalent of "nerd" or "geek" with some anime-liking thrown in. The other side were those who took the Japanese understanding as someone obsessed with x to an unhealthy degree.

It turns out that both those definitions are not wrong. However, there's a lot that's missing from our understanding of what an otaku is. It isn't quite accurate to say they're nerdy fans and it isn't quite as simple to call them creepy fans. And so, behold, we have on the historical context and socioeconomic underpinings of “otaku” in japan:

It feels like there are two simultaneous definitions of “otaku”. One of them means “enthusiast”. If you freakin’ love everything about trains and model trains and trainspotting and train trips and whatnot, you would be a train otaku. The other definition defines otaku as being socially withdrawn, often creepy anime obsessives that don’t have “real lives”.

The first definition often gets conflated with the second definition in English. This is what leads to people outside of Japan labeling themselves as otaku because they like anime a lot. They are fans of anime, and in the same way that they would call themselves fans of a band or a sports team or a movie, they call themselves fans of anime. The tinges of the second definition come in when the term gets used a bit as a badge of pride, since many of the same descriptions are stereotypically applied as well to “nerds” or “geeks”, however those concepts in America are not remotely as negative. This lack of negativity with the seemingly equivalent English words like “nerd” and “geek” arise from radically different social and economic conditions in both American and Japan, which are what I will outline in this post.

As I’m sure you all know from watching Annie May, most of your potential for future success in Japan is decided early on in your life. If you didn’t pass your exams to get into the “right” middle school, you probably won’t be able to get into the “right” high school, and in turn the “right” college (LIKE TOKYO UNIVERSITY LIKE IN LOVE HINA! And which is often ironic in that Japanese colleges are often treated like a vacation compared to the rigor of high school and the entrance exams to get into those colleges), and in turn get a full-time job upon graduation as a full-time (seishain) salaryman (which is English for “sarariiman”). Otherwise, you’re going to be a freeter stuck with an endless stream of low-wage, temporary, part-time jobs. If you’re lucky, you’ll be a permatemp at an office job with no job security and get paid a fraction of what you’re worth.

This whole system of going to the “right” schools and whatnot makes it so that Japanese otaku can’t do what American nerds/geeks do where they can just show an employer their mad skillz and turn that into a job at some interweb company like Google or whatever. After all, as explained above, in Japan they really didn’t even learn much of anything in school so it’s not like there are any skillz to show in the first place! It’s all about the networking. I’ve even read stories where people in Japan couldn’t do basic business things like order a shipment of computers for their company without first cultivating a deep enough business relationship with the sales rep at Dell first.

So you’ve graduated from college, but the only job you have right now is working 12 hours a week or so at a Lawson or something. Or maybe you got one of those anime in-betweener jobs. Regardless, you might not even be making $1,000 a month. If an apartment costs more than that (and let’s not forget all the insane fees that you have to pay when you sign your lease!), obviously you can’t live on your own. We haven’t even accounted for other essentials like food, utilities, clothing, and transportation yet! Hopefully, you’re part of that 50% or so of the country that lives in or around Tokyo/Yokohama, Osaka/Kyoto/Kobe, or Nagoya so that you can just live at home with your parents, rather than ending up as one of those net cafe homeless.

Remember, the Japanese economy has been in pretty bad shape for almost 20 years now. It’s also worse than the numbers appear. In America, we’re pretty happy when the unemployment rate is around 5%. In Japan, that’s a bad number. Part of the reason is that that 5% number doesn’t consider underemployment, which is a huge issue in Japan. In America, we have the U-6 unemployment number to calculate underemployment. It’s at 17.5% right now for America. Furthermore, also remember that women aren’t really supposed to work in Japan, especially if you’re married. That in turn also massively decreases the number of people looking for work, and in turn the unemployment rate. Combine that with living at home (meaning that living expenses for many are nonexistent, allowing for lower wages), and it becomes easy to see just how much worse the economy there is.

But now there’s a kind of a bind. Yes, you probably have next to no living expenses now, but you still don’t make remotely enough to live, for lack of a better term, “real” lives. In a sense, it could very well cost them basically all of your income to live a facsimile of a “real” life by doing things like dressing well and whatnot. Yet even though you look the part, it’s still basically pointless, so why bother trying to be part of society? Might as well at least attempt to have some kind of a simulacrum (whoa! things are gettin’ kind of pomo in here!) of a “real” life through your anime obsession. Maybe you can fill that gaping hole in your soul with some consumer goods? Americans love doing that too! Not only do girls know that you don’t have a future, you couldn’t even pretend to even if you wanted to. Looks like you’ll just have to settle for your waifus instead. Nene Anegasaki only requires a one-time cost of $50!

Yes, that sounds sexist on the surface. Oh, those meaaaaaaaan girls only care about money! Well, women are even worse off economically. They may have been in the same situation as you where they didn’t get on the right track in 6th grade, so they’re stuck working at 7-11 or at best, being an OL. Even if they got one of those real full-time jobs, Japanese society is so sexist that women are still really not “supposed” to work. Just look cute, be clumsy enough that you will appear simultaneously non-threatening to men and so that a man (maybe he’ll be that special someone!) can come over and fix things for you (making him feel more masculine!) and hopefully he’ll decide that he wants you to be all dependent on him forever and ever.

I remember a story earlier this year, for example about a woman who sued her company for firing her because he had a baby. Their reasoning? You need to take care of the baby, and you couldn’t possibly be able to take care of it properly while still working. And of course, if the women is one of those top candidates that IS able to have a real career and a real life, she can have her pick of men. So basically, their options are either to end up like you (living at home and spending all their money on expensive consumer goods) or to marry someone with more potential than you.

What’s the point of this wall of text here? It’s to make the distinction that while being an otaku outside Japan is a choice, in Japan it’s often more of something thrust upon you, or of trying to make the most of a bad situation. As an alternative lifestyle, it’s basically all or nothing. Just as the otaku can’t buy both dakimakuras AND non-990Y jeans from Uniqlo (assuming of course that their parents aren’t buying their clothes for them), those on the rat race treadmill don’t have time to camp out overnight in Akiba in between working long hours, then drinking with colleagues, then working out, and so on. Nor perhaps, would they even want to partake in that socially debased lifestyle when they could be living the societal ideal. Perhaps even with their own harem of 3D women, paid for by their keiretsu!

P.S., don't get my thread locked like the last one kthx

[TheSubtleDoctor]

A most interesting read, magey.

While this essay didn't strike me as particularly surprising or controversial, I did want to disagree with one point. Although the otaku lifestyle certainly is thrust upon some people, isn't it still, more often than not, brought about by an individual's choices early on in life? Since, according to our poster, whether or not you live the "societal ideal" or stay at home and watch anime hinges upon getting into the right school at three different stages, if you choose not to adequately prepare for the entrance exams, then you are ultimately choosing the fast-track to the otaku lifestyle (whether you are aware of it at the time or not).

I do understand the point the author is making: in the U.S. "otaku" is a subculture among subcultures, something we pick off of the cultural buffet, like, say, being a skater; however, in Japan otaku is the result of a much different, and graver, sequence of events. I just wanted to be picky and point out that the idea that most people have zero percent control over whether or not they end up as otaku is inaccurate. I'm sure you had a different discussion in mind though blkmage, so I'll just get outta the way...

Also: this does shed a more negative light, for me, on some of the comments made on ANN Cast lately.

[blkmage]

The problem isn't that there are three points or whatever where you decide your destiny. That's a symptom of the problem, which is that Japanese society is very strong on conformity. For instance, your assumption that there are three points; there is actually one point, since getting into the right university is dependent on getting into the right high school, which is dependent on getting into the right middle school, and so on.

And it isn't as simple as that either. Like I said, it's all about societal conformity. I've read a bunch of stuff that basically talks about how the culture in Japan is really hostile to things like startups, while in North America, tech startups thrive. It's the same thing that's mentioned in the post. And in fact, Eden of the East touches on this too, where you have really smart and talented individuals who can't or won't find a full time job because of their unwillingness to conform to Japan's corporate culture. Saying that those people should just work harder is misunderstanding the Japanese cultural context.

His point wasn't that otaku have zero control over whether they become one, but that that class of people exists because of very specific cultural and socioeconomic conditions. I mean, even if you end up off the societal norm track in life, that doesn't mean you automatically become an otaku. But, societal pressures do make it a much more attractive proposition.

[ShiroiHikari]

But Japan is magicalhappyland! Everything is onigiri and rainbows there!

>_>

Seriously though, that article actually made me sad. Not because it crushes my dream of GLORIOUS NIPPON or something ridiculous like that, but because it reminds me of just how much we take for granted here on Western shores.

However, a lot of us 80s kids in the US are also stuck living with parents or in roommate situations. Some of us live on our own, but still have to rely on family or credit cards for anything important that costs more than a couple hundred dollars (i.e. unexpected car repairs! :|). A lot of us went to college, but some didn't. Some of us don't even have jobs for whatever reason, be it not being able to find one or just being tired of looking.

It kind of makes me wonder if I chose this sort of path from the beginning by choosing to be a "nerd", or if my nerdiness and financial situation are completely unrelated. Are there other people with "lives" that are in the same boat as myself and those like me?

[TheSubtleDoctor]

Saying that those people should just work harder is misunderstanding the Japanese cultural context.

See this:

Although the otaku lifestyle certainly is thrust upon some people

I put that qualifier there in order to illustrate that I realize that one can't make a universal claim like "For all J-peeps, you can avoid otaku-fate if you work reel hard!!" Many people, for various reasons, don't have a chance of entering the right middle school, no matter how hard they might work. But, I understand that you think I have missed the point of the whole article.

His point wasn't that otaku have zero control over whether they become one, but that that class of people exists because of very specific cultural and socioeconomic conditions.

See this:

I do understand the point the author is making: in the U.S. "otaku" is a subculture among subcultures, something we pick off of the cultural buffet...however, in Japan otaku is the result of a much different, and graver, sequence of events.

I don't think I said anything contradictory to your point here. I know his main claim isn't about choice but about what he sees as root-level societal problems. Because I didn't really see any other issue there to be argued about, I wanted to point out what I feel is an inaccuracy. Said inaccuracy doesn't invalidate his main argument.

[blkmage]

But Japan is magicalhappyland! Everything is onigiri and rainbows there!

>_>

Seriously though, that article actually made me sad. Not because it crushes my dream of GLORIOUS NIPPON or something ridiculous like that, but because it reminds me of just how much we take for granted here on Western shores.

However, a lot of us 80s kids in the US are also stuck living with parents or in roommate situations. Some of us live on our own, but still have to rely on family or credit cards for anything important that costs more than a couple hundred dollars (i.e. unexpected car repairs! :|). A lot of us went to college, but some didn't. Some of us don't even have jobs for whatever reason, be it not being able to find one or just being tired of looking.

It kind of makes me wonder if I chose this sort of path from the beginning by choosing to be a "nerd", or if my nerdiness and financial situation are completely unrelated. Are there other people with "lives" that are in the same boat as myself and those like me?

It's interesting because the guy who wrote this post is also in that demographic. Also, Solanin, awesome manga, talks about post-grad malaise.

See this:I put that qualifier there in order to illustrate that I realize that one can't make a universal claim like "For all J-peeps, you can avoid otaku-fate if you work reel hard!!" Many people, for various reasons, don't have a chance of entering the right middle school, no matter how hard they might work. But, I understand that you think I have missed the point of the whole article.See this:I don't think I said anything contradictory to your point here. I know his main claim isn't about choice but about what he sees as root-level societal problems. Because I didn't really see any other issue there to be argued about, I wanted to point out what I feel is an inaccuracy. Said inaccuracy doesn't invalidate his main argument.

And I'm saying that he didn't make that inaccuracy.

You said he implied this:

the idea that most people have zero percent control

He actually said this:

it’s often more of something thrust upon you, or of trying to make the most of a bad situation

I mean, I can kind of see where you might derive that idea from, but at that point, it kind of gets into pedantry. And even if you read it that deeply, remember that even at that point, the person still has options. It's just that none of them are particularly attractive.

[blkmage]

---

Alright, this week we're going to take a look at what anime looked like in 2009. I think when we get to talking about what's changed in the landscape of the anime industry and what we'd like to see in the future, we need to take a step back and check to see if we, being outsiders, really understand the state of the market.

To provide a brief look, let's read What anime actually looked like in 2009. Hint: it's probably not what you're expecting.
[quote]

Negibōzu no Asatarō, Yatterman, Battle Spirits: Shonen Toppa Bashin
Yes! Precure 5 GoGo!, Fresh Pretty Cure, Net Ghost PIPOPA

Metal Fight Beyblade, GeGeGe no Kitaro, Dragonball Kai
Inazuma Eleven, One Piece, Onegai My Melody Kirara

Jewel Pets, Zettai Karen Children, Cross Game
Live On Cardliver Kakeru, Gundam 00, Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood

Chibi Maruko-chan, Sazae-san, Golgo 13 Best Selection
Natsume’s Book of Friends Season 2, Soul Eater, My Three Daughters

BLEACH, Naruto Shippuden, Yu-Gi-Oh 5D’s
Gintama, Kaasan – Mom’s Life, Stich!

Pokemon: Diamond & Pearl, Anpanman, Doraemon
Kirarin Revolution, Crayon Shin-chan, Blue Dragon: Tenkai no Shichi Ryuu

MAJOR, Gokujō!! Mecha Mote Iinchō, Shugo Chara
Sgt. Frog, Hitman Reborn, Atashin’chi

Detective Conan, Beast Player Erin, Shin Mazinger
Yumeiro Pâtissière, Battle Spirits: Shōnen Gekiha Dan, Fairy Tail

Tamogotchi, Thriller Restaurant, Gokyoudai Monogatari
Letter Bee, Animal Detective Kuruminzoo

So what is my point?

Well, I wanted to illustrate that if you ignore the shows that air after midnight or on satellite, the sort of content that makes up anime on television hasn’t really changed all that much in the last 30 years. The shows up there are pretty much occupying the same slots that existed for anime before the 1997 late night boom, in some cases literally the same slots (more on that in an upcoming post).

When you are comparing the anime of today to the anime of the past, you’ve got to compare like for like and people often fail to do that. A lot of the shows that get the most fervent defenders and attackers belong to a section of the market that is less than 15 years old, so it’s spurious to compare them to shows that were never aimed at the same hardcore audience. I know I’ve done it plenty of times myself.

So what has changed?

Well there’s one big change if you compared this to a listing from the 80s – the lack of robot shows.

Despite what some writers would have you believe, robot shows haven’t been edged out by the otaku pandering shows that air late at night. Those shows are going out in time slots that were never occupied by the classic robot shows.

Robot shows were edged out by the videogame, toy and card game shows. Though there’s also an argument to be made that they simply evolved into them. The anime industry chases the money, and for over a decade now, rather than in shows that sell toy robots, the money has been in shows that follow the Pokemon formula, be that for the purposes of selling monster fightin’ videogames, collectable card games or rev-em-up vehicular beetles. This means we’re probably due a “matureâ€

[blkmage]

I've noticed a lot of people reading this and then leaving without saying anything, so I guess it's my fault that I didn't direct the conversation a bit more with such a general topic.

Essentially, if this is new to you, it should raise a few questions. There's been a lot of talk about what the industry needs to do to fix itself and that's been based on a lot of our assumptions as to the makeup of the content that's been airing. Knowing the actual composition of shows and the demographics and stuff like timeslots, how has your perception about the state of the industry changed? Does it still need fixing? How do your strategies for solving the industry's problems change? Is it reasonable to expect more shows of type x to be made? What kinds of shows would you expect to see? How does this affect the international side of things?

[Etoh*the*Greato]

I think at least on my part, the concern was that I wouldn't be able to add anything meaningful to the conversation.

I actually had no idea that Evangelion had led to such a tightening of regulations in television over there. I suppose it makes sense, but considering that Eva was still airing exactly when I got into Anime I didn't have the point of reference to say "Material was more mature before, but is not any longer."

[uc pseudonym]

What this reinforced for me is how much of a niche market anime is. I don't follow the industry in the same way as I do something like the US/UK book industries, and I realize that I was carrying some of those assumptions over onto anime. 53 series is not really that many, considering how many genres and age brackets the listings cover.

As with any other industry, the majority of it isn't to my taste. The difference is that the anime industry isn't all that large, so all the markets are gathered as one instead of rising or falling on their own. There are about ten that I would be interested in, but I'm following the manga version of all those. The way I read has skewed my sense of anime in general, but I should have expected that mainstream tastes would look something like the series represented there.

So in other words, I don't have all that many thoughts on the subject.

[blkmage]

Remember that these are not all of the shows that aired in 2009. These are the ones that aired that aren't in late-night timeslots. Off the top of my head, I'd say that once we include those we might get about double the number above. And, like the writer mentioned, it's the late night shows that are the majority of what we watch through fansubs. And about Eva, it's not that the material is less mature now, it's that the shows have all been pushed to late-night stuff.

This is important because late-night stuff is not mainstream, so this post is really about mainstream shows. After all, who would stay up until 1:30 to catch Durarara!!? Not most people. And the assumption that most people on this side of the Pacific are working under is that it's these types of shows that are the norm. If you're really interested in seeing if your favourite show is considered mainstream, look up its timeslot for when it airs.

[Yamamaya]

[quote="blkmage (post: 1394278)"]---

So it's time for some lovely weekend reading on a topic that is likely one of the more controversial ones. You may remember a thread a while back that sought to define "otaku". On one side were those who viewed it as analogous to the North American equivalent of "nerd" or "geek" with some anime-liking thrown in. The other side were those who took the Japanese understanding as someone obsessed with x to an unhealthy degree.

It turns out that both those definitions are not wrong. However, there's a lot that's missing from our understanding of what an otaku is. It isn't quite accurate to say they're nerdy fans and it isn't quite as simple to call them creepy fans. And so, behold, we have [url=http://jphinano.wordpress.com/2009/12/01/on-the-historical-context-and-socioeconomic-underpinings-of-otaku-in-japan/][B][I]on the historical context and socioeconomic underpinings of “otakuâ€

[mechana2015]

I actually found an interesting picture forming of the anime industry... and a rather different one that I had in my head. I hadn't realized that Sgt Frog was still running, or Yu-Gi-Oh, for example. This brings an interesting question to mind. If these shows (and detective Conan) are still running, and in all cases as far as I know, still US licensed, why haven't I heard about them? I'm starting to see that the US market issues might be also related to it's marketing plan (or lack thereof). The only reason I still watch any of this anime is finding out by word of mouth or working MYSELF to discover new shows. Some markets can do this, but frankly, anime can't. The way to strengthen anime is to grow the market for the product, and use the market growth, either through ad revenue or DVD sales to make the industry monetarily successful, and having little to no marketing is not the way to do this.

My thought resulting from this is that the industry needs to possibly lay off dubbing the late night slot shows, unless it really makes sense (Baccano made sense due to setting), and acknowledge that a majority of these shows will get the same amount of attention without the dub. Then they can take the saved money and use it to market entry level shows better, namely the shows from the time-slots listed above, including reminding people that certain shows are still running, and offering both a way to continue watching the show, and a way to ease entry into a long running show so new eyes can be added to the market.

They also need to get back to marketing new shows better to the existing anime community, and interacting with it. I'm quite aware that there was an economic disaster in the last year or so, but to have almost every major industry company not show up at one of the largest anime conventions in the US was really bad (Anime Expo... it's possible that the staff of the convention had something to do with it but...). They cut themselves off from the convention fanbase at least at this convention and lost all the word of mouth they could have gained for new shows with some effort.

This information proves that there is still long running marketable shows for all generations avaliable, and that there are some serious missteps happening that could, if fixed, help BOTH industries, since an expanded US audience with proper revinue streams could trickle cash back to the Japanese market.

[blkmage]

So that previous post was actually a follow up post to this next post, which is poorly named This post is basically the opposite of twitter. He basically examines in slightly more detail the "mainstream" shows.

Be warned. This is long and rambling and may not arrive at a point. It was originally a completely different post and has ended up somewhere else. And yes, I ignore animated feature films, as I am want to do.

Kidfenris asked on twitter today:
Question for the anime crowd: what’s the worst T&A fan service you’ve seen in an otherwise mainstream, please-take-this-seriously anime?

Response to this question highlighted a frequently made misconception, that please-take-this-seriously anime is mainstream. On the rare occasion it is, but for the majority of the time it’s as much about otaku decadence as any other late night anime. They aren’t sticking a show full of tired old sci-fi or cyberpunk cliches on TV on Sunday afternoon any time soon. And chances are they won’t break through late at night either. Plus, if you’re a non-sci-fi, non-fantasy serious minded manga, you’ll probably get a live action adaptation before an anime one anyway. And chances are you’ll get higher ratings than a cartoon.

The fact is that the mainstream is mainly made up of shows that don’t want you to take them particularly seriously – namely kids shows and family comedies. Of the shows that broke the Top 10 anime in Japan last year you’ve got just three shows made for primarily adult audiences. Two of them were from the successful noitaminA slot, namely Eden of The East and Dezaki’s The Tale of Genji adaptation. The other was the final episode of Shin Mazinger. I’ll let you argue whether any of them were begging you to take them seriously.

Obviously noitaminA has been a success in finding an elusive adult audience, both in the ratings and that we’ve seen Fuji TV try and recreate the success with Noise and other networks have taken note too (TV Tokyo’s Power of Anime). I do wonder though if the live action Moyashimon due in the slot later this year will prove a death knell should it get better ratings than anime in the same timeslot.

Now, a short diversion to what this post originally started out as. Back in January Tim Maughan was complaining about the number of kid protagonists in anime, and I questioned if that was really the case – producing this list over at one of my 15 or so tumblr accounts.

I then thought that it was perhaps skewed a little by shows people weren’t actually watching in any great numbers, so made another list from all the shows that Anime News Network listed in the weekly top 10 anime charts over the whole of 2009.

It broke down as follows:

ADULTS 29.4%
TEENAGERS 17.6%
CHILDREN 23.5%
ADULT ALIEN FROGS 2.9%
CURIOUS PRIMATES 2.9%
DIGITAL PETS OF INDETERMINATE AGE 2.9%
GENETICALLY ENGINEERED ALIEN BIOWEAPON 2.9%
MICE 2.9%
LIONS 2.9%
RABBITS 2.9%
ROBOT CATS 2.9%
TEENAGER TRAPPED IN CHILD’S BODY 2.9%
YOKAI 2.9%

I only took the main protagonist, had I averaged the age of the main casts it would probably have had more adults due to parents in some shows being in the main cast, and the fact One Piece now has an 88 year old living skeleton as part of the cast. On the flipside, some shows are basically about children, even if their leads are technically not kids.

It’s those same shows that I’m looking at today when I take a look at what the mainstream is. Back to the issue at hand!

[blkmage]

Did you know posts were capped at a length of 10000 characters? I didn't! And that's why this post is in two pieces.

So what is the mainstream?

Well, the biggest TV anime hit last year, as it almost always is, was the Lupin III TV special. This time boosted by being a crossover with another mainstream anime show – Detective Conan. It’s light adventure fare, not really asking the viewer to take it any more seriously than an episode of The Avengers or The Saint would. With an aging (and in some cases, increasingly frail) cast, I’m wondering if Lupin III will remain as popular once the inevitable cast changes have to made. While it survived its lead actor changing in the 90s, it definitely took a while to find its feet again. I should really look at how Doraemon was effected when it went through with its wholesale cast change a few years ago.

Here are shows that made up the mainstream for much of 2009:

Sazae-san
Chibi Maruko-chan
Crayon Shin-chan

These three are on a plateau above everyone else in terms of being mainstream. Sazae-san is arguably another step above everyone else too. They’re all family comedies and when you take into account the success of Mainichi Kaasan last year and the occasional charting of ATASHIn’CHI, it suggests that family comedy is the true mainstream TV animation in Japan. Just as it is everywhere else in the world.

Doraemon

Another evergreen title, though one that doesn’t quite fit the family comedy mould of those other three. Given that parents grew up with the character and now have kids of their own, its continued success makes a lot of sense. That, and the fact the character is both a work of genius and a true icon.

Detective Conan
MAJOR

Shonen Sunday still proves a strong source of anime. Conan’s been running for over decade on TV now, and each MAJOR season proves successful with their return. The inevitable Rin-ne adaptation is pretty much guaranteed to be the next big Shonen Sunday anime hit.

One Piece
Dragonball Kai
Naruto Shippuden
Gintama

The Shonen Jump gang. One Piece and Dragonball Kai are the massive successes of the group, the other two dipping in and out of the top 10. While aimed at kids, One Piece and Dragonball Kai have cross over appeal due to being based on two of the biggest manga of all time. Gintama is an odd one, for reasons we’ll get to later. Dragonball Kai also has nostalgia appeal like another recent success…

Yatterman

The revival of Tatsunoko Pro’s classic kids show was a massive success to begin with, but it started to trail off last year. However it was still far more popular than the majority of anime produced last year.

Battle Spirits
Pokemon
Inazuma Eleven
Beyblade
Tamogotchi

Toys and games still put kids in front of the telly. For better or worse, these are pretty much the giant robot anime of modern times. Too often the sci-fi elements are attributed to being the reason for old giant robot shows’ success, rather than their toyetic nature. And modern shows in the Pokemon mould do that toyetic thing far better than modern giant robot shows do. Talking of which…

Mobile Suit Gundam 00
Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood

The various Gundam, Fullmetal Alchemist & Code Geass series have been alternating in and out of a shared time slot for years now. Currently it’s Sunday, 1700 on TBS, which they’ve had since mid-2008 (Geass R2, then Gundam 00 season 2, then FMA Brotherhood). They’re pretty much guaranteed to slip into the low end of the top ten a few times a year with that slot. Before that they had the 1800 slot on Saturday since 2002 (when Gundam SEED took over from Ultraman Cosmos), where they performed much stronger in the ratings. I think some analysts have judged this a sign of them not being as popular, not taking into account the timeslot change from their earlier incarnations.

Shugo Chara!! Doki-
Whatever two Pretty Cure shows aired in 2009

The twin giants of magical girl shows. Well one giant – Pretty Cure – Shugo Chara was sort of bubbling under and snuck in the chart once. That there were only two shows aimed at specifically at girls has less to do with the shows themselves, and more to do with the unisex nature of the other shows. Particularly the toy based shows like Pokemon, where the toys & games they are based on are no longer just for boys as the robot toys of yore were marketed. When you do market them like that, you tend to fail, as the makers of Kabuto Borg VxV are probably all too aware.

GeGeGe no Kitaro
Thriller Restaurant

Supernatural shows for kids! And their parents. And adults who grew up reading/watching the originals. The latest Kitaro revival ended last year after another successful run, and the successful Thriller Restaurant storybook series got an equally successful anime.

Stitch!
Curious George

Stitch is the Madhouse version of the Lilo & Stitch TV series (sans Lilo)for Disney, but Curious George is the US series. Both performed well. In fact shows with cute animals / genetically engineered monsters tend to do well.

Tale of Genji
Eden of the East
Shin Mazinger

Eden of the East is the most consistent performer of these, Dezaki’s Genji show charted early, but later ones didn’t. Personally I think the expectations from the name value of the story and director weren’t really met. Shin Mazinger’s finale was a bizzarely high jump in the ratings. It was doing fine throughout for a late night show, but certainly spiked with that last episode.

There’s a few specials I’ve not mentioned – most of which involved talking animals. Plus Sgt Frog scraped the chart once or twice too, along with Sanrio’s Onegai My Melody Kirara. But that should give you an idea of what the “mainstream” is in terms of eyes in front of TV sets. It’s really not all that different from cartoons elsewhere in the world, save for a few things like that TBS slot for Gundam etc. and noitaminA. There’s just more of them.

But what of DVD & Blu-ray?

What of it, indeed…

It’s clear from the sales figures that in 2009 Blu-ray was the domain of the Otaku. Shows like Bakemonogatari & K-on, which didn’t set ratings on fire on TV, tore it up in the Blu-ray sales chart, but didn’t see those sales matched on DVD. In fact they outstripped sales for similar shows, pre-Blu-ray. It’s like that hardcore otaku niche finally had a medium that matched their obsession with detail. Or that before they were shunning DVD in favour of hanging onto hi-res HDTV rips. Probably a bit of both.

Shows like Gundam 00 and Code Geass, which had enjoyed something akin to mainstream TV success, had similar sales on both media, but couldn’t match the overall sales more niche shows enjoyed.

However, the bulk of niche shows released in 2009, and there were a lot of them, did absolutely nothing of note. If the business plan is that the late night TV acts as an advert for the BD or DVD, then it looks like its failing an awful lot of shows, even if it works great for a handful of shows.

One interesting trend is the success of Gintama. While outperformed by many shows on TV, it’s currently a bigger hit on video than its Shonen Jump peers (well, at least until the latest One Piece movie hits video). I’ve not watched any of it myself, is it tapping into an otaku audience more inclined to drop money on it than the audiences its peers get? I’ve noticed it trends higher in Google than Naruto, despite selling less manga volumes. I suppose I should really watch some and figure it out for myself.

Oh, and I should mention MTV’s Usavich. Always seems to be overlooked when discussing successful, mainstream Japanese animation. Probably because it doesn’t fit people’s expectations of what Japanese animation should look like.

If you enjoy this sort of thing, he's doing a series of posts called PAST MY BEDTIME where he examines a particular late night timeslot (like noitaminA or TokyoTV's late night offerings) and looks at what shows have aired there. I'm not going to take any posts from there because it's a lot more detailed than what I've been highlighting here, but it's definitely good if you want to see trends over the past ten to fifteen years.

[blkmage]

---

So with our look into the divide between actual mainstream anime and the shows we watch, the author of the above articles notes that mainstream anime hasn't changed that much. But obviously, something has changed, and so we'll be capping off this week's series with the post we'll be looking at over the weekend, How Has Anime Changed Over the Past 15 Years?
[quote]Ask John the same question, and you can read his answer.

It is a tough question to tackle, so I felt it was unfair to criticize him behind his back. Rather, I want to supplement his survey of the last 15 years of anime by pointing out some key changes that JP and I (mostly I) felt that was too important to be left out of John’s answer. There are also some erroneous bits, but I’m going to ignore them for now (ie., LOL moe and tsundere in anime predates 1995 kkthx).

Japan, now online: Between 1995 and 2010, cellular phone penetration has skyrocketed in Japan. If you recall Makoto Shinkai’s 5 cm/s, that was a key plot device in the first segment, especially coming into the film as a generation who find their cell phones second-nature. I presume this is how most modern Japanese teens and young adults feel about cell phones. Of course, Japan is this weird place where more people go online and do their internet stuff via cell phones than with their personal computers, so that also means places like 2ch is really a socially important thing today. Let’s not even go into how important 2ch is for anime fans of Japan. And 2ch didn’t officially exist until 1999.

The impact of 2ch on anime is hard to point and cite authoritatively, even if I’m sure we could cite to a bunch of stuff. It is, however, notable as a way for industry folks to gauge and interact with fans. Leaks to 2ch is almost like a marketing tool nowadays. (Kanatagatari’s leak is widely thought of as on purpose, for example.) We have anime and manga made about the Train Man story, which is essentially a national-cultural nod to 2ch. Obviously 2ch gets referenced in anime and manga, too. Still the real impact of 2ch has on anime is on the fans, on the fan industries (read: doujin market), and as a social hub that can make or break a work. Gurren Lagann episode 4 anyone?

And that’s just 2ch. Blogging; Mixi; online stream sites like Nico and Youtube, DTO sites, paid-streams, even the likes of Crunchyroll and foreign-operated licensees all play a notable role in the evolution of anime especially in the latter part of this decade. Pixiv and similar communities fostered growth of talents, even if only in part. It also presented a fan-facing revenue stream, complemented that whole “Comic Marketâ€

[blkmage]

That 10k character limit strikes again.
[quote]Viva la Revolución (sort of): This loose collection of fans who are interested in a wide variety of different things are now brought together (congealing?) under the same banner of “otakuâ€

[TheSubtleDoctor]

We know that anime consumption in the west was a driving factor to a degree as far as business decisions made domestic to Japan when it comes to anime production. Creatively, they really never catered to the west (there are just a handful of exceptions), but it doesn’t mean they don’t budget in oversea licensing revenue when they contract for committee profit sharing!

If this is right, then a lot of people are wrong.
---
Really informative post. Thankees, blkmage! Obviously, there is a lot of misinformation concerning the state of anime that is being bandied about in various places.

[blkmage]

If this is right, then a lot of people are wrong.
---
Really informative post. Thankees, blkmage! Obviously, there is a lot of misinformation concerning the state of anime that is being bandied about in various places.

I'm interested in what you've read out of that quote/section.

I've taken that to mean that in drafting the budget for a given show, at the height of the bubble, production committees were going 'hey, we can push this onto <R1 distributor> for $x, so we have an additional $x to work with' not necessarily considering the viability of the title in the R1 market (as indicated by the preceding sentence about catering to R1 audiences).

[TheSubtleDoctor]

I'm interested in what you've read out of that quote/section.

I've taken that to mean that in drafting the budget for a given show, at the height of the bubble, production committees were going 'hey, we can push this onto <R1 distributor> for $x, so we have an additional $x to work with' not necessarily considering the viability of the title in the R1 market (as indicated by the preceding sentence about catering to R1 audiences).

According to the last bit I bolded, it appears as if R1 sales were factored in as part of the budget. Perhaps some companies were counting on titles doing certain numbers over here, and, who knows, maybe the projected revenue was enough to turn someone's head? Certainly the going-story that "When J-peeps do anime, they don't care about yoo stoopid Americans!!!" is false if this guy's claim is true. That's what I meant when I said a lot of ppl are wrong b/c I have heard many, many folks basically say that we are invisible to the Japanese. Don't get me wrong, I'm not reading into it that all anime companies=Gonzo; however, this blog seems to be saying that, at one time, Japanese companies could count on R1 revenue, and, as any good business would do, began factoring it into their budget. The final sentence, I think, is meant to imply that they don't count on it at the moment.

[blkmage]

In that case, no, that's not what he meant.

Remember that the time he's talking about was the height of the anime industry's bubble and that R1 licensors would grab any title in a mad craze. What he's saying the Japanese are considering is not R1 sales revenue but R1 licensing revenue. The Japanese knew they could demand any price for whatever crap license they could come up with and it'd get sold. That is the money that they were budgeting for. The initial licensing fee is a very hefty sum and isn't impacted at all by how well a title does.

Read the preceding clause.

Creatively, they really never catered to the west (there are just a handful of exceptions), but it doesn’t mean they don’t budget in oversea licensing revenue when they contract for committee profit sharing!

If they cared about sales and if they cared about the North American market, you'd see a lot more catering of tastes to western audiences.

So no, generally, they have not and continue to not care about anything beyond their domestic market.