Forum - View topicAnswerman - How Will Netflix Producing Anime Change the Industry?
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TheAnimeRevolutionizer
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Specifically with this animefanworried, that's the kind of ammo that's needed. I've come to realize that it's going to take something very different, yet very understanding, and very spirited to properly get out a series that can be considered fully "American Anime". It's going to need to transcend all expectations, and yet yield what makes anime anime in the first place. The path which is tread still yields far beyond into this distance..... and still needs to be kept on walking. There is still a long ways to go, even for such endeavors as young as anime made elsewhere in the world. No doubt about that. |
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TheAnimeRevolutionizer
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One of my friends who is an author told me the other day that while they have the right to have choices in taste, they have no right to protest through suppression and claim their ideals are better until they are able to produce some actual creative work and constructive efforts. Until that day comes, things are not looking good for them. |
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leafy sea dragon
 Posts: 7163 Location: Another Kingdom |
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Oh, it was Disney here too, though I don't think it was an active attempt as much as something catching on WAY more than even the Disney people had expected (which, in this case, was High School Musical), though it was the 00's by that time. It created a brief trend of live-action sitcoms about teenagers aimed at kids. I mean, the Disney Channel had always been doing that, but suddenly kids in the United States were watching that instead of anime for reasons I still don't fully understand. (This is diferent in Canada though. Since dubbing voices using Canadian voice actors counts towards the mandatory domestic Canadian programming a TV station has to do, a sizable portion of anime continued to remain on Canadian television, and I think it still does.) While streaming can't easily be blocked, the content distributors can still choose to get rid of something because they consider it a waste of storage space, like what happened with Hulu a short while back. As Hulu has a very neutral stance toward anime (but does appear at anime conventions), the only reason they'd purge anime from their catalog is because not enough people were watching it to be worth the space.
As long as there are passionate people in the business, there will always be projects aimed at niche audiences, especially with lower hurdles to get your project available to the public and distributors becoming increasingly specific in their consumers. This is a pattern that I've noticed in every art form that has ever gone mainstream. You can see it most clearly in music: Genres like thrash metal and acid punk began as small gigs by musicians who wanted to do something different. When some of them caught on and became bigger, and perhaps genericized themselves for their wider audience, other bands popped up and refused to do the same, staying small in that way. You just have to know where to find them.
I think these two concepts are actually related. Anime became popular in the 90's because it was so different from anything else on American television at the time (and this goes for all countries that fall under "American"). With western animation adopting particular things that anime used and incorporating it into itself, anime was no longer that unique, and you had more people getting into anime because it's anime instead of getting into anime because it was a change of pace. I don't think this same rebelliousness applies in Japan though, where anime has always just been a thing people know about that some people watch, and those people aren't exactly rebels in the traditional sense. As for OEL manga, I'm not entirely sure what you mean. I'm certain you don't mean it in the same way as Tokyopop, but we already have a comic book industry with very recognizable characters. It's not doing as well as the manga industry, but what you describe would be simply the founding of Image Comics, only anime/manga-influenced. (Image Comics was founded by a group of artists who didn't like the executive pressure put upon them by DC and Marvel and was meant to be a company where artists could make comics and sell them without that pressure. It's now run like a normal company though, after Image nearly went out of business due to their failure to release anything on time, and those frequent delays actually killed Valiant Comics when the two wanted to make a crossover and the guys at Valiant were constantly waiting for the guys at Image to finish their part.)
Bear in mind that what I described is what's the MOST popular among kids today, not what the only thing is. What's going on right now is rapidly increasing diversification of interests among them. Kids are influenced by what they see, especially whatever makes first impressions on them, and between everything advertising to them and their parents pushing their interests on them, there's at least one group of kids into almost any given thing nowadays. It's just that the fast-forward slapstick franchises are very good at marketing and getting these kids' attention, and that's what they'll gravitate toward. There are plenty of kids into anime though, which they get either from their parents or through word-of-mouth, as there isn't really much advertisement for anime aimed at kids in the United States currently. EDIT: I put my little addendum on the wrong post. Last edited by leafy sea dragon on Sun Nov 05, 2017 2:06 pm; edited 2 times in total |
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TheAnimeRevolutionizer
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Maybe it's my nostalgia crawling up on me, but content wise, I don't think things have changed all that much since the turn of the millennium. Correct me if I'm wrong, but outside of Samurai Jack, Steven Universe, and Avatar: The Last Airbender, I've seen that a lot of animated action shows are mainly superhero based. Granted, you can say the same about shounen anime being about powerleveling and tapping into innate strengths, but I haven't exactly seen anything of that level made, well not at least yet with OK KO and Magiswords. Even then, I haven't exactly seen anything yet that quite attains what defines anime yet either in western animation. Series like Naruto, Yu Yu Hakusho, Kenichi, and Dragonball all have the narrative of a youth growing up and facing the stark harshness of maturity in the face of adversity, and unabridged with no holdbacks at that. Rurouni Kenshin, Shaman King, and Outlaw Star detailed a down to earth setting and tone yet still with fantastical and rooted in reality yet larger than life elements. One Piece goes the other way with a fantastical world and allusions to real world elements, and it proves to be great too. Even Boku no Hero Academia has the superhero genre done shounen in a very effective way. There's even sports manga and anime like Captain Tsubasa, Slam Dunk, Free, and Eyeshield 21. To many of the more teenager and young adult orientated series, they come to show more variety than what is presented to them typically. RWBY's gotten massive appeal to how they peg down these traits right. To their fans, these series appears to give them a sense of being acknowledged of growing up. I'm sure plenty are annoyed by this behavior, and believe me, it verily so is, but I can reflect on plenty of tweens and young teens feeling betrayed and dejected that western animation and comics didn't acknowledge or respect that or their intelligence. While I don't appreciate it either when they claim that western animation purely sucks because of this, I can sympathize with the fact that there are elements of western sequential media that is lacking, even to this day. Yeah, anime fans are in a niche, but there is reason why anime did grow as big as it did back then, and why we still love it. Even today, there are plenty of fans who feel the same way in that age. Even so, anime isn't just anime for being simply anime. Anime showed its fans that "yeah, you can do this with animation and comics and games". Anime broke down a lot of walls and limitations that were imposed by not just outdated standards, but stereotypes and ingrained stigmas in the States back then, and told a lot of people that "we can do this. Buzz off and stuff it." It created what it wanted to, and did so with integrity, self worth, and dignity. To me, Anime is as valuable to the experience of being an American because of what kind of freedom of expression it hailed when it crash landed into the western seaboard. Back then, you could get arrested for just drawing comics that didn't fit the status quo (I am not kidding https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Diana), and if anything Marvel and DC shot themselves blind in the foot, and stumbled recovering all the way after with riding on the Collector's Bubble, the anti hero craze, being blindsided with the Comic's Code and the Death of Superman. If you ask me, that's the kind of spirit that got people into liking anime. I even wrote a whole thesis on the DariaWiki years ago now that I can recall, if you'd like a look: http://dariawiki.org/wiki/index.php?title=Anime So it may be my experiences, my perspectives, my views giving me a different tint on the world around me. I'm not denying yours, you show a good look at the common world outside today. But with Netflix wanting to fund anime series, it's a pioneering step into frontiers that bear either misfortune or prosperity. I just hope they understand where to tread next.
Well, it seems like we're still Living in the 90's after all. Cue the track 
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TheAnimeRevolutionizer
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Whoops, I missed one. That's what I'm kind of worried about. Then again, there are a lot of very sensitive factors regarding that. I leave it in the hands of creators, artists, and authors. That is all. |
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Stuart Smith
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Action animation has fallen out of favor in America. It seems the mindset most networks and creators have is to let anime have that genre. You don't really see shows like Justice League or the DCAU anymore. Legend of Korra was the last one, and it was a bust. There was an infamous statement made by Loeb about Earth's Mightiest Heroes was replaced with the more comedic, easier to digest Avengers Assemble because kids dont want story or action. Action cartoons kind of became the slapstick-y, goofy kind of stuff you see these days. Low stakes and non-threatening. Spongebob and Teen Titans Go are the biggest cartoons with kids. Half of the jokes in TTG seems to be taking the piss out of people who want serious cartoons back, and making fun of all the people in their 20s and 30s getting angry over it. Maybe Loeb was right. -Stuart Smith |
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leafy sea dragon
Posts: 7163 Location: Another Kingdom |
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There's also Star Wars as a basis; there's always at least one Star Wars TV show on at a time. If you go back though, there are also Sym-Bionic Titan and the more recent Thundercats series, though neither of them were profitable and were cut short after one season. It also depends on what lines you have for an action show, as there are also a number of action-comedies that are primarily comedies (such as your aforementioned OK KO! and Mighty Magiswords, and also Legends of Chima, Sonic Boom, Kung Fu Panda: Legends of Awesomeness, and Trollhunters). All of this comes down to one thing, which I also already mentioned: Profitability. This is not to say that kids don't watch action shows--they do, but not in the quantities they used to--but that action shows are much more expensive to make than comedies, which means they have to both bring in higher viewer numbers and sell more merchandise. This was not a problem when action shows were more popular than comedy shows and stuff like G.I. Joe and He-Man and the Masters of the Universe were pretty much toy commercials, but it is a problem now when action and comedy may be about evenly split or comedy gets more viewers (as it's more accessible--I did not watch any action shows when I was little as they didn't interest me like comedies would) and governmental regulation prohibits advertisements for a show's merchandise during that show's timeslots. It's also why almost every action show is based on a pre-existing, familiar franchise: More people will go watch that show simply because they're familiar with that franchise, akin to how games based on licensed properties sell well (though the show has to be good for these people to keep watching). Said profitability is also part of why anime dropped off of western television: The licensing fees were becoming unreasonable. It became cheaper for a network to just make its own shows than to acquire new anime (and they get the bonus of controlling the rights and a bigger share of the toy profits). It's why some people are concerned anime could also disappear from streaming services: The licensing fees are rapidly climbing again. It may be why Netflix has committed to funding these anime series: As an owner of the show's rights (maybe the sole owner, maybe one of multiple owners), they don't have to worry about those licensing fees. Though they still have to pay the fees of funding these shows.
And there are definitely a lot of kids and teenagers watching anime today who are into it because of those themes. Two factors here though: The first is that there HAVE been a number of western animated programs about growing up and coming-of-age recently. I can think of Gravity Falls, Over the Garden Wall, Clarence, Adventure Time, Regular Show (well, manchildren learning to grow up), Steven Universe, and OK KO! Let's Be Heroes seems headed in that direction. The second is that anime has fallen out of the mainstream eye for so long that people have largely forgotten it exists or are unaware it's still being made. You don't see any sort of marketing or advertisement for any anime in North America that isn't already on anime-oriented media, whereas shows like Stranger Things, Veep, Teen Titans GO!, and such are heavily marketed everywhere their marketing budgets can afford. So there are probably a bunch of kdis who would connect to shows like these but are simply unaware of them. That's where I see Netflix being a game-changer too. Unlike FUNimation or Viz or Aniplex of America, Netflix is a company that IS capable of advertising these shows and bringing them to the mainstream. They can afford and are fully capable of putting up billboards, bus stop ads, images on the sides of skyscrapers, and other means to get large amounts of people to notice them. Netflix can also, of course, advertise these shows as people are visiting Netflix for unrelated content. Something I should also point out is that I have seen nothing in anime that defines western animation either. And nothing in anime that feels like western animation. The closest recent such show is Mr. Osomatsu due to its skit format and satirical sitcom-style writing. So for me, it goes both ways, which is why I watch a large amount of both. (I also feel that your typical shonen protagonist is a bit more difficult to relate to today than in earlier decades due to differences in predominant parenting styles, namely that kids today are rarely by themselves for long, so it can be difficult to relate to someone like Naruto or Luffy who begin their series alone and shunned by those around them. The steep rise in helicopter parenting may make kids yearn for the independence these shonen protagonists get, but not if the parents attempt to be their children's friends and it works.) (I also read your article regarding Daria--while I wouldn't doubt there was a strong tinge of rebelliousness that allowed anime to catch on in the United States, it's aways a matter of time before enough people consume it to stop feeling rebellious. I mean, anime is now something some of these kids' PARENTS are into.) |
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Primus
 Posts: 2814 Location: Toronto |
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You're right that Canadian television channels do have to air a certain amount of domestically produced content (though, that number seems to decrease every year) and you're right that a Canadian dub of a foreign show counts as part of that. However, you're unfortunately very wrong about anime's presence on Canadian television. The vast majority of Canadian-produced anime dubs have never aired on TV here and that'll likely continue to be the case. There is no Toonami equivalent in Canada. All older youth oriented shows were yanked off TV in early 2010. Since then, with the exception of last year's run of the Ironman anime, we've exclusively had children's merch shows. As of early September, that's been reduced to just Pokemon: Sun & Moon (dubbed in NYC), Yu-Gi-Oh! Arc-V (ditto), Beyblade Burst Evolution (dubbed in Vancouver and Calgary), and Turning Mecard (dubbed in Hong Kong, and it's really just a Korean show). |
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TheAnimeRevolutionizer
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You know, I can't exactly tell if you imply this is a good thing, or a bad thing. I do get that there is a major edge in your statements that there is the matter of money to be involved. And yes, that is a major factor. Anime is very obviously a business where money needs to be pushed around to pay and hire talent. That's the thing however. As much as there isn't all that much of a presence in advertisement and exposure these days, somehow this site and Crunchyroll still is around. Anime is still here, isn't it? But that's the other thing about business. As much as all products and pitches run on both exposure and luck, it's also about why people need it. It's about the reason why it sells and creating the need for it. That is what got anime to sell here in the States. If anime wasn't the hellraiser it was, you can bet that we'd not be here. And in the face of everything that is the uncertain future, again, this is where everything stands at the front of the unknown along with everything of the past has accumulated to keep pushing it on. To understand why anime is important in the States, and no matter how small, how possibly minuscule we are as a fandom, that's the one of the main keys to Netflix not flopping hard if they want to tap into not just funding overseas local projects, but the probability if they want to make Anime that will be big in the States. Again, it's going to need to be something so different, and yet so familiar and still so in spirit with what Anime portrays and burns passionately with. It's going to require such talent and imagination that to create something beyond everyone's expectations and yet still meet them. I don't know what it will be, but it's going to need to hit all of the right chords. Moreover, as much as big and numerous as the advertising campaigns for those shows have, well, all I can say is, "So what?" As the times have shown, TV's dying. As much as CN is thriving still for the internet and will possibly survive beyond, as Justin said in the article, streaming is extremely hot and anime is very much in. Viewership is high and while Japan is still with an anime industry, the future will possibly seem them also go for hiring talent who do want to make anime and manga and will go that distance due to their unfortunate but necessary shrinking of the population. And not to take potshots at current shows on US TV and the box office, but everything's on Netflix, and it's only time when the Marvel Cinematic Universe and its franchise will see a burn out. Even Star Wars has received a mildly favorable to average reception upon its reboot. And as much as Teen Titans Go is for its demographic, I don't know how its children viewerbase will take it when they grow up. Granted, I don't even watch Netflix, and while TTG is not for me, and I was more of a Justice League fan, but if that was shown when I was growing up, that would have only propelled my angsty dumb bias in my tweener years looking back on it, I'm just saying. Granted, with rising licensing fees on anime, I don't know where things will go, but that's for me to look up further in my time. |
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leafy sea dragon
Posts: 7163 Location: Another Kingdom |
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Not only that, but money needs to come in to keep these businesses alive. That's true for every business, of course, and it's something many fans forget (not just anime, but in every fandom I've observed and been a part of). Working in anime is not volunteer work, after all. It's a full time job done by many people, and they need to pay the bills (among a lot of other things, like food, transportation, shelter, etc). At one of my previous jobs, I worked for a store run by a nonprofit organization. I've had a few people ask me why they have to pay for things in the store and where the money goes, so I tell them that while we were nonprofit, we still had a LOT of expenses, such as gas, electricity, Internet, phone, rent, water, security, insurance, legal help, maintenance and repairs, and equipment. In short, it's easy to overlook that money needs to come in to sustain something being made. For that reason, if I see someone doing something that otherwise doesn't make sense, I try to think about if money may be the reason behind it. (And if money can't explain it, 99% of the time, it's politics.)
It is, but it's one of those things that I refer to as "just below the mainstream." It's got large followings online and a lot of dedicated fans, is a multimillion dollar industry in the United States, and advertisement is focused on them. However, there isn't much of an effort to reach out to more people than there currently are (either that, or the current marketers aren't very good at it), and the main way westerners get into anime nowadays is through word of mouth or stumble-across. Currently, anime localization is also increasingly geared toward the hardcore fans, with an expectation that the viewer understands enough about Japanese culture that they don't need to adapt it, or in some cases, provide explanations. This Answerman column's very existence is partially due to that. This is something that's pretty concerning, because it means anime is also becoming increasingly inaccessible to a non-fan. The more inaccessible something is, the less fresh blood there will be. I commonly hear fans (not just anime fans, but all fans) say that they can take the time to learn it, and anyone who doesn't want to commit to that effort shouldn't be a part of it, but to me, that's an elitist "No True Scotsman" argument, in that certain people don't deserve to be fan or that there ought to be some kind of initiation test to get in. That never works. You shouldn't weed people out of something. (Of course, there's also the hardcore vs. casual vs. non-fan butting of heads.) As an example, I am also a pinball fan. If you wanted to get into serious pinball, here is the Internet Pinball Database glossary for mechanical and industry-wide terms, with the Fun with Bonus New Pinball Dictionary for terms used in competitions and recent terms. These are NOT easy to get into or easy to understand to someone who isn't already into pinball. Yet the fans consider all this to be easy, basic information, and you also hear the whole "If they want to get into it, they should commit the time to learn this information" argument on sites like Pinside too. I think this is where Netflix will change things. I mentioned it already, but Netflix is in a position to advertise to large groups of people who have been out of anime for a long time or who have never been a part of it, and since Netflix is a western company, they will pick and choose projects they feel westerners would have an easy time understanding.
Indeed, Netflix is going to have to do this right, and there are many ways it can go wrong. Of course, I'm not a prognosticator, and I don't work for Netflix, so I don't know what's going to happen or what they intend to do. There is no precedent for this either.
Different strokes for different folks. Whatever the case, the demand for good storytelling hasn't changed, and will never change for the foreseeable future. Good storytelling has been in high demand since ancient times, and the shift from TV to streaming is so far only a change in distribution and presentation. The content of the TV programs themselves are still exactly the same, as are the expenses required to produce them. I do foresee increased narrowcasting, however, as streaming now allows people to just watch what they want and thus the content producers can aim at increasingly specific groups. (Remember when Star Trek was taken off the air due to low ratings? Then, the concept of demographics came about and it was discovered that the relatively small number of Star Trek viewers came from a pretty small demographic range but LOTS of people in that group tuned in to watch.) Perhaps you have a different experience than I do, but I've been seeing a lot of hype offline, and I mean a LOT, for the recent Star Wars movies, with Rogue One being the only one people really felt disappointed about. I hear talks about The Last Jedi all the time, and I'd see coworkers on their lunch breaks watching videos, official and fan-made, about these movies. Box office numbers are going down, but there are always a few big standout movies each year--there are simply fewer of them. There's no denying the success of the 2017 version of It, for example. The bigger issue there I think is that there is less risk being taken in Hollywood, as it was impacted by the Great Recession, and they're trying to recover from it. The large amount of remakes and sequels points towards that: They want to take fewer chances, albeit with bigger budgets in an arms race. (Then again, the series of sexual harassment incidents brought to light may create big upheavals in the system--the firms that specialize in mitigating negative press are having problems doing it on the social media front, which don't play by celebrity journalism rules.) Something to always consider is that if attention to something is declining, that means attention to something else is increasing. If fewer people are watching movies, then what are they watching? If you ask me, I think it's new programs, domestically produced. Stuff like Orange Is the New Black, Veep, Stranger Things, and House of Cards. These are bringing in enough money as to get budgets more akin to movies than TV shows. |
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Gatherum
 Posts: 773 Location: Aurora CO |
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And maybe we have bigger problems about which to worry than your taste in trash? I mean, if were gonna talk about selfishness... If your perception of the uniqueness of the medium hinges on whether or not there is a prevalence of shows featuring perverted man-children with no veritable character arc drowning in oceans of tits, or feasting upon the panties of their awkwardly-sexualised little sisters, I feel like there's some soul-searching to be done. I said before that I am not in a hurry to see fan service expunged from the medium entirely, but moaning about Netflix sticking their hands in to the production process primarily over the idea that it will lead to less smut (and blood) really kind of drives home the toxicity in this fandom. I enjoy a raunchy romp now and then myself, but this is just ridiculous. Of all the reasons to be sceptical about this... |
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strawberry-kun
Posts: 306 |
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Nope, clearly the people who whine and cry about people liking shows other than what they like are selfish. That's not me. There's plenty of shows that I don't like, but I don't throw little temper tantrums that they shouldn't exist like certain individuals in this thread have.
You might want to work on that reading comprehension there before you throw your little tantrum. I wasn't even specifically talking about fanservice when I was talking about the uniqueness of anime. Also, cry more about anime you don't like. I love tasting the delicious tears of people like you. Guess what? There's gonna be more anime made that you don't like! THE HORROR!
There's more worries than that. But continue with your strawman. Also, feel free to leave the fandom. We won't miss you. |
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Gatherum
Posts: 773 Location: Aurora CO |
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It says something that your arguments seem to stem from this assumption that media which appeals to women must be completely sanitised in order to do so, and that this is bad because it puts all the poor men and their hobbies on the defensive. That so much toxic content drops in to the market and appeals so well to a male audience is a problem because it indicates a normalisation of that content and reinforces yet more toxic behaviours and perceptions--like #MeToo being a witch hunt--which in turn encourages the production of more toxic content to cater to them, and so on. It's a cultural fire that consumes itself. Heaven forbid that women--people, even--decide that certain people in the film industry and elsewhere shouldn't just be getting away with their predatory antics any more, and want to foster an environment where-in they can speak out about the people who have assaulted or attempted to assault them, as well as their experiences in coping in a culture that insists that none of it is "real". Sexual assault allegations are just a smoke-and-mirrors tactic employed by girls who don't know what they want, except that they are starved for attention, right? This. Is. What. We're. Talking. About. |
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Gatherum
Posts: 773 Location: Aurora CO |
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No. I think I'll stay right here. Cry more about people who will call you on your trash taste and the resulting state of the industry. I love tasting the delicious tears of people like you. Guess what? There are gonna be more people coming around to call you on your trash taste! The horror! |
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strawberry-kun
Posts: 306 |
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Awww, poor little baby throwing a tantrum can’t even think of a response and has to copy and paste! How cute! You realize that I said I like trashy shows, right? As in I know they’re trashy? So you’re not accomplishing anything that I don’t know by saying that I like trashy shows. The only thing I remotely agree with you on is the whole MeToo thing not being a witch hunt and that there are legitimate problems within the TV and movie industry. I do disagree with basically everything else. |
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