Forum - View topicDifferentiating gender/age/different characters
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fokkusuhaundo
 Posts: 346 Location: San Diego ♥ ☼ ▓ |
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This is sort of a parody of "Big Breasts" and "Rainbow hair/eyes ruining anime" threads.
One problem that I sometimes have that occurs a lot in anime is when I'm unable to determine at all the gender and/or age of a character unless it is explicitly stated. Where do you draw the line between a bishounen and a guy that looks and dresses like a girl? Usually you'd have to look at the character's body or listen to their VA to determine sex but age is not that obvious. Additional lines may be drawn on their face to show that a character is middle-aged or older but for both male and female younger characters the same character face design can be used for all of them. I guess it is just easier to just copy and paste the same face for every character, leaving you with only the characters' bodies, outfits, and hairstyles to help you tell the differences between them. Then there are the young boy characters that are voiced by women that sound more like women than young boys, adding more to the confusion. Mushi-shi is a show that I had many of these problems in although it wasn't enough of a problem to detract any of my enjoyment from it. I know it's more important to have characters remembered for their role in the show's story and plot but memorable facial features can also be important and add to their character. Maybe what anime needs is more ugly people. |
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abunai
Old Regular
 Posts: 5463 Location: 露命 |
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Okaaayyy..... well, see, I have no problem with a thread that is a parody of an existing thread, assuming the new thread produces some worthwhile discussion/insights. But a parody of a parody? No, come on... I'm going to leave this open, for the moment, but unless it develops into a stellar-class thread, it will be locked. - abunai |
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Kruszer
 Posts: 7994 Location: Minnesota, USA |
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Well, if you're looking for some real distinction I'd suggest the likes of Madhouse animated works like Black Lagoon, and Monster. Race and nationality are represented fairly well and not everyone could win a beauty contest.
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fokkusuhaundo
Posts: 346 Location: San Diego ♥ ☼ ▓ |
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I realize now what it sounds like when I say its a parody of "rainbow hair/eyes" when that was already said to be a parody of "big breasts", but I still think that this whole "I can't tell who's who" or "what's what" that happens a lot with character design can make for good discussion. 
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abunai
Old Regular
Posts: 5463 Location: 露命 |
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So do I, which is why it wasn't locked out of hand. It has promise. Now, let's see you make it happen. - abunai |
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sykosteve
 Posts: 356 Location: columbus, ga |
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One series that i know i had this problem with frequently was the Flame of Recca manga. I never watched the anime, but the girl in the ninja clan towards the end of the series i could have sworn was a dude.
Then there were at least a couple of male characters that I coulda sworn were chicks...and good looking chicks at that -_- Though, I think when the line is that hard to tell, i'm pretty sure it's done intentionally. |
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Zin5ki
 Posts: 6680 Location: London, UK |
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For the first half of Haibane Renmei I thought both Kuu and Kana were male. I probably could have avoided the mistake if I'd been paying attention to the personal pronouns in the subtitles, but those characters certainly didn't dress effeminately.
I propose that all gender confusion issues such as this be prevented in future using fanservice! (I jest) |
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zawa113
 Posts: 7358 |
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I have two off the top of my head:
The first is Kurapika from Hunter X Hunter. He just looks sooo feminine compared to everyone else that it took me a few volumes to finally determine he's a guy and not just a very flat chested female. The next is Shun from Here Is Greenwood. Of course here they did this on purpose as a joke spoiler[In the OVA, it was half the focus of the first episode, seeing how long it takes the main character who is Shun's roomate, to find out that Shun is a guy (he also has an extremely feminine younger brother)]. But since Greenwood does this as a joke, its also funny so it doens't actually annoy me. |
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Veoryn87
 Posts: 808 |
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I thought they were male too. I even thought the voices were provided by younger male actors with high pitched voices. =P |
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DonQuigleone
 Posts: 154 Location: Dublin, Ireland |
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Gender's usually fine (though most of us thought tieria Edre of Gundam 00 was a girl). Age is a bigger problem, it's night on impossible to know a character's age from their appearance (except for old people, but 12 and 45 there's almost no way of being sure)
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Randall Miyashiro
 Posts: 2451 Location: A block away from Golden Gate Park |
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The actual animation is also often overlooked when describing a character and a talented director should be able to convey age and gender via movement. A good example would be Jet, Faye, and Ed from Bebop since in general their movements were dramatically different from each other, and it would be odd to see Jet walk like Ed does. Ginko from Mushishi seems to move like an older man, which makes me think he is actually at least in his late 30s, despite having fairly ambiguous features. Likewise both Kikunoji (Samurai 7) and Alphonse Elric come across as boys by their animation. This however goes beyond age and gender since even the Azumanga girls (imagine Sakaki moving like Tomo) have fairly distinctive animation despite being the same age and gender.
I often get annoyed when studios rely on lipstick, large breasts and long eyelashes to define gender on every single female character. It feels like a big crutch for animators who lack talent. |
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dtm42
Posts: 14084 Location: currently stalking my waifu |
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I don't think that this is a parody thread. It covers a topic worthy of discussion.
Now, I'm surprised that no-one has mentioned Le Chevalier D'Eon, if only because of the lead. Essentially, spoiler[Lia and D'Eon were the same person, but the use of hair and lips defined the two characters physically, while Lia at court was very demure (when she needed to be)]. When talking about the ages of characters, I think we need to look at H Games*. Yes, they are not considered Anime, but they are drawn in Anime style. The thing is, you will find on the packaging a disclaimer, which states that all female characters depicted in the game are 18 years or older. And yet, on that very same packaging (let alone the game itself), you see a schoolgirl who looks about thirteen or younger. Sometimes I wonder if it isn't the players who cannot tell the ages of characters, but the production staff. Also, I have noticed that many of the Bleach characters do not look the age they are supposed to be. spoiler[Ichigo looks 20, Ishida looks even older (he could pass for mid 20s, even 30), Orihime looks (and acts) like a 13 year old (ignoring her oversized breasts, of course). To confuse matters further, in casual clothing she looks like she is 30 and married. Chad could be 45 (triple his actual age), and Rukia by all accounts should belong in Karin's class (how she managed to pretend she is fifteen is beyond me). Yuzu looks and acts sixteen, fifteen at the lowest. I actually thought she was Ichigo's MOTHER upon seeing her at the dinner table in episode 1, and wondered why Karin called her by her first name. It is also weird how Karin and Yuzu are supposed to be twins, but hey.] I will say though, that this has not lessened my enjoyment. I just noticed it. *I have never played an H Game, merely heard what people have had to say about them. So, consider the information given with a grain of salt. |
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fokkusuhaundo
Posts: 346 Location: San Diego ♥ ☼ ▓ |
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Ahh I have to admit that is something I've forgotten about. It's easy to be confused with the gender and age of a character upon first glance but seeing them in motion in an anime or even in manga artwork can really shape your perception of them. I wasn't exactly able to tell Ginko's age at first but he definitely felt like a man who had experienced a lot of things in his young life, more than most would experience in their lifetime. This was shown not just by how his movement was animated but also through dialogue and his voice acting(seiyuu and English VA).
I think that a lot of hentai and h games involve high school age girls, but when they are licensed and localized in the US all the licensors do is put a disclaimer saying that all the characters are 18 or older, changing them from high school students to college students(not saying that I've played any h games either).
I gave up trying to guess what age the characters were spoiler[after seeing what Chad looked and sounded like.] |
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NocturnalUX
 Posts: 448 Location: Portugal |
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I, for one, greatly enjoy gender ambiguous characters in anime. It is one of the things that I find most fascinating in the medium. Then again this might have something to do with the fact that I am something of a yaoi fangirl at heart (and I admit it, too
 ) and a lot of uke boys are borderline girls (which could very well defeat the whole point of yaoi. But that is a whole different discussion).
I especially like how some anime deals with gender ambiguity (or gender roles in general) as a main theme. I am thinking about Revolutionary Girl Utena: while Utena does not look like a boy (not in her series' incarnation, at least. In some scenes of the movie she does seem one and is even mistaken for a boy) she clearly is doing some gender reversal in the way she dresses and in how she yearns to become a prince. So does Juri, in a way. Miki, for example, looks so much like a girl that the first time I saw him I thought that he was indeed one and it plays marvellously well once his twin sister is introduced. And then there is Haruka from Sailor Moon who is mistaken for a boy by virtually all people at first and who remains one of my all time favourite characters. I suppose it is odd but I find gender ambiguous characters to be fascinating and many of them highly attractive. |
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