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Hey, Answerman! - Deadline Hollywood

I've come up with is that the actual medium of animation itself is what does it for me. As strange as it seems, I almost feel like animated characters come across as more real to me than their live-action counterparts. I mean, when you look at any live-action production, you're always going to see the actual people playing their roles, and I think I usually tend to think along the lines of something like, "Oh hey, there's George Clooney and Matt Damon!" It takes a very very rare performance, something like Gregory Peck in "To Kill a Mockingbird," to make me see the actor as the character. In contrast, the characters in an animated work are originally created to take on their specific roles, and even though you may recognize the actors voicing them, there's always that additional level of separation that enables you to look at them as literally embodying their roles. I'm not sure if that sounds weird to anything else, but I originally got into anime as a general fan of animation, and it's that sort of thought process that lets me enjoy things like slice-of-life that I'd have no patience for in a live-action format.

As an anime fan since the mid-90s I think it's a bit safe to say that back then you kinda had to be open to trying new genres or ones that you didn't like in Western media with anime or you just didn't watch much anime as the selection was pretty lacking.

Nowadays I do have my preferred genres in both Western and Japanese media but if something has enough buzz around it I'll give it a shot at least.

The reason in my mind for the willingness to give things a fair shake is actually quite simple. That is that unlike many US works most anime defies genre norms.

At the video rental store you can always pick a genre and find a film you will enjoy based upon genre. With anime it is not that simple, directors will often change content. Many anime cross genre boundaries or even hop them, constantly switching genre. Take Gurren Lagann, do you class it as action? Then what about the drama, romance etc? More recently Tatami Galaxy, where do you even begin with that one? Gosick which is just beginning, well it's a sort of period drama/romance maybe?/ detective/magical/fantasy thing? Another beginning Fractale, well it's sci fi/fantasy of course but then how do you class the rest of it? Hourou Musuko/Wandering Son, another I don't really want to take a stab at.

Put simply there is less of a genre constriction in anime, and shows to a large degree go where they want. Perhaps somewhat due to the fact that so many of them are based on written products manga/novels, unlike US works which are usually made for the format.

Editor's Note: This column is being published on January 14th, 2011, exactly 10 years to the day of the very first Answerman column's publication.

I was honestly surprised how many good questions came in - I was expecting a few zillion “When is (blank) DVD coming out?” questions.

[first question is essentially when is the Cowboy Bebop movie coming out]

The thing with anime fans, that I've noticed, is that we are, for the most part, accepting of the things about anime we don't like. We give them a fair shake. We will at least give a title a fair shot, even if it's part of a sub-genre that isn't usually our cup of tea. Because it's still anime, and we like anime.

well, that and Elf Princess Rane

fingerpointing [sic] over issues