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Hey, Answerman! [2009-02-06]


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Anime World Order



Joined: 05 May 2006
Posts: 390
Location: Florida
PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 10:34 am Reply with quote
Dear N.R. Lopez: please show me the seinen anime clique. Unless you were referring to "moe seinen" then I firmly maintain that such a thing simply does not exist. To my regret, there is no collective seinen fandom in America the way there is for shonen, shojo, yaoi, etc.

I for one welcome our new wall-of-text overlords, as the average word count for anything I post is about 800. That said, here was my response to the question. Several of the other responses contained elements of this, but I'm pasting it here anyway since I was kind of interested in discussing the "why" of it all:

Quote:
Honestly? I don't really feel any sense of overarching community whatsoever, not even at conventions. The notion that "we're all united in our love for Japanese animation" is a colossal lie, and the reasons for this while numerous have a lot to do with the nature of the Internet combined with what Japan has been making for the last several years.

It's the same story whether you're in the US or Japan. In the formulative days of "anime fandom" the anime interest of fans was generally in conjunction with something else: usually SF film or literature on account that anime conventions and gatherings are an offshoot of SF fandom. If you wanted to meet or talk to other anime fans, you had no choice but to interact with the diehards for various other pursuits as well. But now we have our own communities, both online and offline. You can be a fan of just anime--like I largely am--without having to deal with other fandoms. There's no need to have to deal with things unrelated to your sphere of interest.

In and of itself, there's no problem with this; in fact, it's beneficial! But in the realm of anime fandom it's happened so many times that everything's sub-factioned into isolation. Things that were once casual sub-interests under the greater umbrella of "anime fandom"--cosplay, AMVs, fanart, fanfiction, you name it--now have their own dedicated communities where one can choose to reside in all the time exclusively with other people who share your same interests. What was once a side pursuit becomes a primary one. There's nothing necessarily WRONG about this, but it doesn't exactly foster a sense of overarching community. Indeed, there are several entire communities dedicated to single titles and the like such that the statement "I'm an anime fan" no longer implies any sort of common ground whatsoever; it's the equivalent of saying "I watch television" or "I watch movies." You might say this is a sign of anime's growing acceptance as an entertainment medium among English speakers, but I think the effect is more than just that.

In Japan, most of the anime that gets made is targeted towards the otaku market. But since the same thing is happening in Japan and there are so many interests becoming progressively more focused and specific, the otaku-targeted titles being made nowadays must now cater to those ever-narrowing interests, often at the expense of appealing to people without said interest. The most popular shows now have to be carefully constructed in a manner that they appeal to multiple distinct otaku groups at once (as a basic example, giant robot shows that also have fujoshi-targeted character designs...which itself encompasses multiple things of increasing specificity). The end result is that there's little sense of community even among fans who like the exact same show. The only real sense of community to be had is found within one's own Internet faction.

The only shows that don't universally follow this "gotta make sure to have something for everyone to latch onto" approach are the remakes of older titles, the fans of whom are now themselves a splinter faction of the whole. And even some of those have to update themselves in a grab for more viewers. So sure, without the Internet I never would have found thousands of other people that share my admittedly minority interests. But thanks to it, I might also actually be more isolated from other anime fans than ever before.


Agree? Disagree? Scrolled past without reading because "that's a wall of text and all I see is blahblahblahblahblah"? In any case, I think it's far better to discuss the responses to the most-recently answered Answerfans question rather than the current one.
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billyarnie



Joined: 03 Dec 2007
Posts: 190
Location: San Antonio, TX
PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 11:20 am Reply with quote
enurtsol wrote:
Greed1914 wrote:
I think Brian is right that Ranma probably wouldn't have made much of a difference. It's also true that because the demographic watching anime was wrong from the advertisers view, Adult Swim basically said, "Thanks for watching, but we don't value you that much." Which is extremely irksome when I'm in they're beloved 18-34 male demographic.


I may be misconstruing, but what they don't have use for is the 12-17 demo, not yours. Besides, Ranma 1/2 is not their type of show anyways, despite many viewers' calls for it early in AS' life. It's not enough of a hardcore action they want, nor the teenage-crush situational --and as Viz (in)famously put it-- sex comedy as the type their AS comedy viewers like.

And it is a slow starter (as notoriously were long series of its era, for various reasons), even almost got cancelled after the first season. And this coming from someone, as mentioned here before, whose Ranma 1/2 videos hooked an anime-oblivious dormhall (yeah, the same demographics AS covets, but they walked in during mid-season and tracked back only much later). So it wouldn't have worked out.

Bold italics mine. Also, Ranma 1/2 supposedly had too much of one quality... Fan Service. Kim Manning, [adult swim]'s Anime Acquisition person... or she used to be... once said great storytelling was more important than fan service, but that she didn't object to fan service. With Code Geass, I guess she doesn't object to fan service... but I wouldn't call CG great storytelling. Good but not great...

I was also screaming for [as] to get Witchblade... good storytelling, fights & fan service, at least in the 1st half. Storytelling stayed good, but fights & fan service eased off in the 2nd half. Either way, [as] passed & IFC picked it up.
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AnimeAngel00



Joined: 06 Jun 2006
Posts: 22
PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 11:48 am Reply with quote
That new answer man banner looks nice. What anime/manga is that from?
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Mistypearl



Joined: 03 Oct 2008
Posts: 517
PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 12:05 pm Reply with quote
AnimeAngel00 wrote:
That new answer man banner looks nice. What anime/manga is that from?


Correct me if I'm wrong, but it was drawn by "Phillip" himself in the likeness of the photo that was put up for inspiration for the banner. It's an original drawing, not any anime or manga.
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ANBUx3



Joined: 13 Oct 2006
Posts: 187
PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 12:29 pm Reply with quote
Nice new banner!

The game I want most is a Naruto MMO. Choose your home village, create your own character, do missions, etc. etc. Even hold tourneys to become the kage of your village. I guess this would have to be set after the events of the manga, or as an alternate universe-type thing.
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ex_mutants



Joined: 25 Sep 2003
Posts: 54
PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 12:29 pm Reply with quote
You know some people want to make comics. Just because they only have skill in writing means they should only have the choice of being a novelist. For me I grew up on manga and comics and I love to make comics. Sure I like writing, but I don't "love" novels.

So I would suggest to the author of that letter to go to places like Digitalwebbing.com or Mangapunk.com and talk to people there. There's plenty of people looking to team up with other creative people to make comics.
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evilnekohilda



Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Posts: 166
Location: Wichita, KS
PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 12:48 pm Reply with quote
Forgive me for my moment of picky-ness...

It's "Dir en grey" not "Dir en Gray" :x

And they've also never played an anime con...

Okay, I'm done now XD;;;

Personally, I'm sooo grateful for anime cons bringing over bands.

Otakon allowed me to be front row at a L'Arc~en~Ciel concert, something that could otherwise never be accomplished even in my wildest dreams!!

They've also introduced me to artists that I'd never heard but now love. A-Kon's introduction of Psycho le Cemu and D'espairsRay (well, that was more loosely affiliated) immediately come to mind.
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Myaow



Joined: 20 Dec 2007
Posts: 1068
PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 12:54 pm Reply with quote
What is Matt Kamen's Answerfans response from last week doing in this week's?
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TatsuGero23



Joined: 18 Nov 2008
Posts: 1277
Location: Sniper Island, USA (It's in your heart!)
PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 1:46 pm Reply with quote
Ah Adult Swim. How you have become the ghetto of rejected MTV cartoons... Hang in there Family Guy and Robot Chicken. Hang in there. May you find better company in the future.
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Zac
ANN Executive Editor


Joined: 05 Jan 2002
Posts: 7912
Location: Anime News Network Technodrome
PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 2:09 pm Reply with quote
Myaow wrote:
What is Matt Kamen's Answerfans response from last week doing in this week's?


My bad, fixed.
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fighterholic



Joined: 28 Sep 2005
Posts: 9193
PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 2:47 pm Reply with quote
Alien1375 wrote:
Also, a Lucky Star RPG (based on the OVA) would be heaven.....

They do have a date sim type game out for Lucky Star for the PS2. Although the game was made in 2005, which was before they got the cast of the anime and possibly after they made the drama CD, because the voices for the game and the drama CD differ. Also in the game Konata's voice was a little more obnoxious.
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dabura16



Joined: 31 May 2004
Posts: 18
PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 3:04 pm Reply with quote
ok, it's time for the batty J-rock fan's two cents.
Frankly, with the exception of Otakon, the bands they bring over are the only reason I go to any of these cons. The fanbase has been building for years and it's bigger than most people believe it to be. One major problem with the bands is that many of them seem to, if at all, only tour the likes Europe outside of Japan and coming over to the states is a rarity in many cases/ IF we get them, the US is the last. So if we have to go to a con to see them, we will, and the convention itself is making extra money from admission by pulling us in, who wouldn't normally go to these events. The bands themselves are also trying to expand their fanbase and performing at a con is the way to reach new fans, since doing their own tour might not pull in the same number of people. Yes, there are exceptions and bands that have done tours outside of cons like D'espairsray and Mucc, but that's AFTER they played at cons. And btw, it's spelled Dir en grey not "gray" (figured I'd be the jackass to point that out Smile ).

-also like to mention that I'm not one of the aforementioned "teeny bopper" j-rock fans. I'm a 24 year old MALE who takes the shows seriously; I don't go and act like an immature 12 year old like many within the scene; it really gives us a bad name.


Last edited by dabura16 on Fri Feb 06, 2009 3:21 pm; edited 1 time in total
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RyoShin



Joined: 19 Jan 2002
Posts: 83
Location: Michigan
PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 3:11 pm Reply with quote
Wait, wait, WAIT. People go to cons to have sex? Shit, I've been going to all the wrong cons, then.

Quote:
Putting it simply, cons need to have the J-Rock fans show up, no matter the expense.
I disagree. In fact, I would argue that having the J-Rock show up props up the "teenage party fest" trend.

If J-Rock is truly done to bring in those crowds, I say go ahead and stop it. Cons save what is surely a tidy sum by not dealing with the band, the lack of a band means that attendance by teeny-boppers decreases (everything has a terminal size limit, so the slower the increase the better), and the lack of teeny-boppers means that the overall con attitude increases.

It's a good thing.

As for Ranma 1/2, aside from ratings I think there are two other reasons Adult Swim had to say no before even being asked:
1) There's a fair deal of upper nudity that would have to be bikini'd. It's like every sixth episode, and is usually short (except for the hot springs episode... mmm...), but is still a nuisance.
2) Ranma is Inu-Yasha length; when it comes to shows that are good, [AS] seems to refuse anything that doesn't have a set end point now and then, as it makes it harder for them to suddenly cancel it. This is why they still have Venture Bros., a good show which generally has a good wrap up at the end of every season, and Tim & Eric, a shit show that can be watched in reverse with no adverse affect (and may, in fact, enhance the show).

Considering how much they seem to hate anime, and that they love showing four hour blocks of Family Guy, it makes one wonder why they even bother getting new anime. Why not just run what you have, get rid of ACTIN, and let all the anime fans just go watch Sci-Fi?
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fighterholic



Joined: 28 Sep 2005
Posts: 9193
PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 3:22 pm Reply with quote
RyoShin wrote:
Wait, wait, WAIT. People go to cons to have sex? Shit, I've been going to all the wrong cons, then.

Hell, I can give you an example of how people think they can get it there. In the days building up to AX 2007, one of my roommates was bragging about how he was going to pick up one or two girls and how he might need to "borrow" the room for a while. It was pretty obvious. Although it should be noted that a lot of the girls we saw at AX 2007 looked like jailbait, and he ended up not "getting any" as they say.
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evilnekohilda



Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Posts: 166
Location: Wichita, KS
PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 4:07 pm Reply with quote
RyoShin wrote:
Wait, wait, WAIT. People go to cons to have sex? Shit, I've been going to all the wrong cons, then.


Unfortunately, it's more likely than you might think*.

I know for a fact that there are often many instances of teenage girls either reporting being raped or their friends reporting guys who picked them up. Cons themselves aren't that dangerous, but what goes on in the actual hotel can be problematic. Con staff doesn't really have much control over what goes on in rooms... With room parties, there's usually quite a bit of alcohol going around too... One thing leads to another and suddenly you've got a serious situation on your hands.

So yeah, there's a lot of sex at cons... but probably not the kind you want :/

* - yeah, I was highly tempted to make a centipede joke there.
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