Forum - View topicAnswerman - Is Hollywood Pillaging Anime And Manga For Material?
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ninjamitsuki
 Posts: 633 Location: Anywhere (Thanks, technology) |
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I'm still on the fence.
On one hand, I am appalled at how Asian-American actors are treated and it's fucked up that an adaptation from a Japanese work can't even include them... On the other hand, unlike a lot of other anime Hollywood films, this looks like it has potential to actually be a good movie, and even if it doesn't I like a good trainwreck (the Speed Racer movie was hilarious, for the wrong reasons). If it does well, it could open the door to more anime adaptations, and eventually one that's actually good. I do wish they would adapt an anime that already has caucasian leads (Fullmetal Alchemist, Attack on Titan, Hellsing, Trigun, Cowboy Bebop (RIP), Black Butler, etc). That would be fun for everyone. ^^ Maybe we'll get those if this does well, then all we'd have to worry about would be whether or not the movie is good. Last edited by ninjamitsuki on Fri Apr 29, 2016 12:26 am; edited 1 time in total |
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jsieczkar
Posts: 139 |
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Oshii has said that he set the film nowhere to make it more open to anyone. The architecture for the series is based on South East asia and western Chinatowns. |
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Naiera
 Posts: 42 Location: Denmark |
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And yet at least the manga and SAC very clearly take place in a fictional Japanese city.
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Guile
Posts: 595 |
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I'm against Hollywood adapting anime and manga just because I've seen how it ruins fan bases. You can't really talk about A Song of Ice and Fire anymore without people referring to the Game of Thrones TV show exclusively, or all the superhero movie stuff that has ruined comic books for that matter. It'd be a shame if we lived in the world where the first thoughts that Naruto or One Piece brings to mind are white American actors. I always hate it when fictional characters are tied to real actors.
Reading some of the excuses for whitewash casting doesn't make much sense to me. Saying a story isn't necessarily Japanese shouldn't be an issue. There's not really any kind of story that has to be tied exclusively to a certain race. Using that kind of logic there's no reason Chihayafuru can't star a white senior citizen playing gin rummy because the themes don't have to revolve around a Japanese girl playing karuta if you're going to boil it down to relationships and competitiveness which are 'universal'. Just like Superman could be a black transgender woman because themes of heroism are universal. If you're going to boil stories down to the most basic components you can use that excuse for anything, and you may as well make your own story. The reason people like these stories are because of specific characters, art, and writing. |
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BadNewsBlues
Posts: 6267 |
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Which are notoriously divisive?
Takei likely doesn't know what it is and he really isn't really in any position to be criticizing works considering his most well known role is from an incredibly tacky, cheesy, and outdated sci-fi show from the 1960's.
Someone better ring up Beat Takeshi and tell him that his proud japanese status has been revoked.
To paraphrase Jerry Seinfeld "there's no such thing as Fun For Everyone" especially where adaptations are concerned.
And yet whenever this movie comes up all anyone ever seems to focus on is how the movie is going to bomb because the main character who's race can be pretty much whatever they want it to be, is being played by a white woman who's well more known instead of less well-known but supposedly racially appropriate options. |
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Paiprince
 Posts: 593 |
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Because all Japanese operate under a hive mind and possess this so called "collective guilt" right? It's always the people who don't have actual Japanese friends who spout nonsense like this thinking they're all under this spell. The hypocritical ignorance is real. Regarding the Live Action GiTS controversy, I don't really have a set position to take on this. On one hand, Hollywood's continual shafting of Asians in their movies is a well known disease that they've been plagued with and is something that should be dealt with, but on the other there's something off about how over the top and petulant these naysayers have regarding this problem. It's like this has been added in the ever growing ocean of internet outrage culture. And what's even more ironic is that the Japanese, who these people claim to support their representation, are generally okay with the casting choices. Yeah, sure you can chalk it up to them just being "polite" and hiding their true feelings, but that just speaks more to yourself carrying suspicions on an entire group. |
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leafy sea dragon
 Posts: 7163 Location: Another Kingdom |
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Oh, that sort of thing's always happened ever since Hollywood's been in the entertainment business. (And Brooklyn prior to that.) After a while, the original fanbase just kind of gives up. No one cares anymore that there was no Sneezy or Dopey in the original version of Snow White, that Count Dracula spent decades practicing English so he could sound like a native speaker, or that Dorothy was supposed to be elementary school age when she first traveled to Oz. And personally, a fanbase that's that hurt over adaptation displacement is a fanbase not worth keeping. Throw out the new minority that's holding them back and bring in the new, happier, more numerous one, I say. Adapt to the times or die. |
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AkaRed
 Posts: 411 |
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I think this video can answer a part of what Japanese people think of this situation
https://youtu.be/2DhoBuU1Dtc Check it out. |
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salahwam
Posts: 2 |
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I was going to go on a rant and say how there are plenty of Japanese actresses who speak English (plenty are found on The Wolverine), but then I saw that youtube video, and I figure if the Japanese people don't care, then neither should I 
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silentjay
Posts: 304 |
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A. ScarJo is ridicuously bankable in Asia, especially Japan. She's more bankable than Rinko Kikuchi. who seems to be everybody's big choice because she's the only Japanese actress that's in a nerd favorite underdog movie. (And likely the only Japanese actress many of them have even heard of.) She's the Japanese Chiwetel Ejiofor, who if you're to believe people, can apparently play any possible black male part ever. . B. The added scenes in China were a flop, and pissed off audiences who felt they were being pandered to. (Which, surprise, they were!) What the big studios learned from trying to cater to audiences in Asia, is that audiences in Asia don't want to be catered to, they just want to see big Hollywood movies with big Hollywood stars in them, and not some local schmuck who makes three domestic movies a year. If they want to watch movies with Asian actors, they watch the plethora of actual home grown Asian movies. What Hollywood is doing now, is funding local productions, and pumping more cash into them than domestic studios had previously. |
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Stuart Smith
 Posts: 1298 |
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I'd like to first point out that anecdotal evidence should never be used to try to generalize a country's opinion, but this doesn't really affect Japan at all so it's not surprising if most of them don't care. Whitewashing only concerns Asian Americans, not actual native Japanese. They have tons of their own movies where as Asian Americans have to rely on Hollywood for representation. It's the same way why you hear about people wanting minority representation in video games yet most Japanese games featurr Asian characters. It only counts if it's Asian-American representation, not pure Asians. Though Japan doesn't really seem to care about American adaptions in general. Well, except for those Resident Evil movies. They seem to be a bizarre exception. Maybe if GITS turns out to be schlocky action it could get a following there. -Stuart Smith |
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toyNN
 Posts: 252 Location: Seattle, WA |
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A GITS live action movie....? In general I don't think these anime translate all that well for a live-action movie or to a western audience. Plus won't the studio dumb-down the storyline so much as to loose everything that makes these shows interesting.
A sequel for Blade Runner is more appealing for me and that's been talked about too. |
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Guile
Posts: 595 |
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That only goes so far as your own personal enjoyment of the product until it happens to something you like. If you're only going to look at it in terms of profit then Michael Bay is the savior of Transformers and Ninja Turtles and Shyamalan is the hero of The Last Airbender all the complainers are just babies who should be left behind. And I'm very confused why someone would care about finances over fan expectations unless they had a monetary investment into the property. Maybe I'm a bit jaded as an anime fan because anime adaptions tend to be very faithful and usually panel-to-panel from manga. Americans are focused on reboots and reimaginings all the time, and the American stuff I'm a fan of have never had proper adaptions and pretty much never will |
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leafy sea dragon
Posts: 7163 Location: Another Kingdom |
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Do you think I'd automatically be unhappy if there was an adaptation of something I like that becomes more popular than the original thing? I'd actually be quite happy that it means there are more people liking something in that franchise. I am a fan of Dr. Seuss, for instance, and I love that the live-action version of How the Grinch Stole Christmas! sparked renewed interest in the book, and in all of Dr. Seuss in general, even if I think the live-action movie wasn't all that good (and that interest will be sustasined for as long as the Universal Studios theme parks have Grinchmas every year). Don't make assumptions about how I would react to certain things. In any case, a fanbase has a very strong potential to become toxic if it sticks around for too long or if it gets a cult following that's too big. I am a Sonic fan, for instance, and I know how toxic the Sonic fanbase can be. I personally think SEGA's biggest mistake is repeated attempts to pander to these fans because they'll never be happy whereas non-fans seem to be happy, even with stuff like Shadow the Hedgehog and Sonic 4. I also personally think much of Capcom's troubles can be traced to bending over to please its fans too much while ignoring the mainstream it received from games like Street Fighter IV. A franchise's financial well-being is its life. For a franchise to continue to exist, it has to at least turn a profit. If the core fans are too small in number or too persnickety to spend any money, then that fanbase is doing more harm than good. (I've mentioned it elsewhere, but companies like Apple and Pepsi ditch their old fans in favor of new ones all the time.) But maybe this line of thinking is because I like to think big, and I don't like it when things I like are niche; I'd rather they be mainstream, even if compromises have to be made to reach it. Or maybe it's because I've seen too much vile, disgusting things coming from people who call themselves fans who get preferential treatment over people who, well, actually enjoy the product. |
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Stuart Smith
Posts: 1298 |
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A lot of these series are mainstream in Japan so being mainstream in America is not the same thing. In Japan an animated version can be popular and mainstream but not so here. It's really more for problem with the American mainstream market who are very close-minded in what they like. So technically a lot of these series are mainstream, just not here. That's why Hollywood always have to do live action adaptions because animation is looked down upon here. Just the very nature of the market leads to these franchises being ruined. In terms of Western adaptions I used to work at a comic/hobby shop back in the lates 90s and early 00s so I would read comics during my downtime. Fast forward to when that Teen Titans cartoon came out there was no interest for me in it since it was for kids and wasn't anything like the comics. Then fast forward a bit later when there is that big outcry about Starfire being sexualized in the comics by people who have clearly never read the comics and only watched the kids cartoon. Perhaps some form of justice came when Teen Titans Go came out when fans of the previous cartoon were outraged that a franchise they liked was dumb down and ruined. To comic book fans that's just old news at this point. -Stuart Smith |
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