Forum - View topicINTEREST: Mamoru Oshii: Today's Anime Is Driven by Otaku, Merchandise
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vashfanatic
 Posts: 3492 Location: Back stateside |
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Oh heavens, not this BS. I'm sorry, yes, Disney definitely was inspired by some of the imagery from Jungle Emperor Leo (standing on the cliff, etc.) but the plots are nothing alike. If The Lion King is a "copy" of anything, it's freakin' Hamlet. Now, with that out of the way.... There's still a lot of creative anime out there... that typically doesn't do very well. And while it's great to tout the awesome titles of the past, the Buried Garbage articles here on ANN were a monument to all the crap that got licensed back in the day. Heck, wasn't one of Mike Toole's first columns on all the ripoffs of Astro Boy? You don't get much more "this has always been the case" than that. I think the biggest issue today is not a lack of creative titles (they exist), copying (always been around), or a focus on merchandising (this has long been the case), but the otaku focus. Otaku are a small, marginal group in Japan. They may spend a TON of money on the anime industry and have helped it keep going through the bubble burst, but catering more and more to them and them alone is only going to continue the marginalization of anime as well as its lack of creative (most otaku want familiarity in their work). I'd also be interested in seeing how Oshii's work is different from the massive number of similarly-themed works out there. Or has he just decided "f*** it, this is what they want, I have bills to pay!"? |
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Kikaioh
 Posts: 1205 Location: Antarctica |
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Well now, you were the first to say that you didn't "think it would be a huge exaggeration to say that we're usually only taking the tip of the iceberg into account", and you haven't provided any information whatsoever to substantiate your impressions. I at least have Japanese magazines from the time period to bolster my personal impressions, along with 15 years of studying anime culture and history as a hobby, as well as studying the Japanese language and culture for 3 years in college and traveling throughout Japan on various occasions for both language study, homestay and travel over the past 8 years. In a lot of ways, I have a strong bias towards my personal experiences and impressions, and at least have some form of information to substantiate them. It's hard to swallow your opinions because you haven't presented anything to bolster your claims, or at least to suggest that your impressions are driven by something more than a gut feeling. Can you let us in on your experience as it relates to classic anime, and what drives you to the impressions that you have? Regardless, ultimately you're right in saying that without statistics nothing can really be said for certain in either direction (that's the scientist inside me talking over my experience  ). I do think it would be a fascinating case study to compare the progression and tonal differences between eras past and present, and if you're actually interested in doing that kind of research, I know that Wikipedia conveniently lists anime by release year from the 1910's up to the modern day. I've no sense for how thorough the listings are of course, but it's probably amongst the best options and I would love to see what the findings are.
But I don't think any old-school anime fans would say that everything released back in the 80's and 90's was "uninterrupted greatness spanning an entire decade." Maybe you're getting the wrong message from people's complaints about anime in the modern day compared to days past. For me, my personal complaint is that there isn't as much variety these days as there was back in the 80's and 90's (and there certainly seem to be a lot less mature titles aimed at older audiences as well, since anime these days seem to favor the younger demographics). I don't believe that all of the anime back in the day was an unending stream of greatness ~ I was falling asleep through Odin: Photon Sailer Starlight, and it seems very few enjoyed Tomino's Garzey's Wing. I even think that anime in the modern age is much more polished and detailed than in years past, albeit I personally feel the technical quality of the animation is rarely quite as accomplished as it was in the OVA era. Older anime had it's high and low points, but it certainly seemed to cover a broader variety of genres, characterizations, art styles and age groups than anime in the modern day, which seems deadset on fashionable teens and moe girls that appeal to otaku. Which is really what mostly disappoints me about anime in the modern day --- the sheer focus on teenagers and moe. I don't think that the production or story-telling quality has necessarily worsened, just that the subject matter has become significantly more limited. It used to feel like an all-embracing artform, but now it feels a lot more like a business. I have severe doubts that anime like Cat Ninden Teyandee or Riding Bean could be made in the modern day, and to me that's a sign of the times I don't like seeing. |
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maaya
Posts: 976 |
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Indeed. If nobody else buys anime, then the sponsors will simply sponsor only the otaku shows. Noitamina tried to create animes for a regular audience, and many of their shows did not sell well. Now they're also aiming at the otaku audience ... it's sad, but nothing is for free and creating an anime series costs money.
Mmh, for me it wouldn't make much of a difference anymore. I watch maybe 1 or 2 series each season, because I simply can't stand the rest oO; I think what is needed are more shows that combine "otaku audience" with actual content, that normal people can also enjoy ... like Madoka or Tiger & Bunny (which I suppose gets lots of sales from Fujoshi) f.ex. |
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Banden
 Posts: 140 |
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Chiming in agreement with nightjuan on this one: There's a much simpler way to reveal that nostalgia filter of yours for what it is. You can find the ANN Encyclopedia's Anime Top 10, as voted by ANN users, here. If there was any objective truth of what you say about past eras of anime being creatively superior, and the current generation being artistically compromised commercial schlock, it seems reasonable to assume we would find that reflected somewhere in the mathematical breakdown of viewer ratings, does it not? However, as we can see from the Encyclopedia statistics, the numbers speak radically to the opposite. The oldest series on any of those lists is Evangelion, from 1995, which happens to have had a recent reboot. A huge proportion of the titles listed fall more narrowly in a 2009-2011 timespan. MyAnimeList and AniDB corroborate the trend. Major respect to you as a long time anime fan but, everything you're saying is just like, your opinion man. 
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Sacto0562
Posts: 288 |
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(getting on soapbox)
I think the issue of very dramatic changes in Japanese demographics is why I think anime itself has changed a lot in the last 20 years. As such, "manly" characters in anime are are rapidly disappearing. Can you imagine what Hiro Mashima's manga series Fairy Tail would have been like if it was produced 20 years ago? spoiler[I could see see the major male leads--Natsu, Grey, Makarov--with far stronger and dominating roles.] As such, Oshii became famous at the time when characterizations in anime was very different in terms of characterization. Because of that, I think Oshii sounds a tad too nostalgic for his halcyon days in the 1980's with his success on the Urusei Yatsura TV series (plus the first two movies) and the Patlabor TV series. This is why any show that can break out of that "artistic rut" Oshii describes stands out prominently. It's small wonder why Puella Magi Madoka Magica is such a great show and why I've enjoyed Tiger & Bunny--both shows are quite a bit different than most of the anime on TV nowadays. (getting off soapbox) |
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Anymouse
 Posts: 685 |
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I am inclined to say the same. The children's market itself has dramatically shrunk from what it once was. David Marx wrote a good article describing the mid 70's Youth Culture in Japan.http://neojaponisme.com/2007/06/04/massing-demographics-and-the-beginnings-of-japanese-pop-culture/
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enurtsol
 Posts: 14818 |
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Why now is Oshii complaining? Heck, American TV has been doing this for years, and not only is it thriving but nobody is complaining anymore!
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dtm42
Posts: 14084 Location: currently stalking my waifu |
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Banden, as the wise old man Anymouse once said, popularity is no indication of quality. There are many, many reasons why every ranking system seen thus far are flawed, but I have neither the physical stamina nor the mental vigour to go into detail.
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Banden
Posts: 140 |
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If you really believe that, go ahead and pick a show from the Worst 10 list and sell us on its unrecognized "quality"? I'd love to read that review, the mental gymnastics alone are bound to be hilarous! Popularity is hardly a reliable indication of quality, but it is SOME indication. Anime that don't get remembered, for the most part aren't remembered for good reason. If you seriously believe that
posses some artistic value superior to more recent anime, by some measure other than your own personal nostalgic attachment, I'm afraid I have to ask you to demonstrate its existence somehow? Because objectively, by the numbers, from three different websites, I'm not seeing anything to suggest that anime fans - yourself excluded - continue to choose those anime you just named over more recent shows that you don't like as much. All objective indications point to the diametric opposite: Recent hits are what most people want to see, and older shows are being squeezed out of the collective anime-fan consciousness. The last sentence of my previous post was the key one: If nobody else is top-rating 80's and 90's anime and you still are, then that's just, like, your opinion. There's no objective truth there. Objective truth requires some kind of objective measure, which Encyclopedia ratings are. Being supremely confident in your opinion that older anime is better anime doesn't actually make it so; it just makes you supremely nostalgic. |
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nightjuan
 Posts: 1473 |
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I apologize for the inconvenience, but please keep in mind I did type "copy" instead of copy, which indicates I wasn't literally suggesting they were identical in every way, shape or form...aside from the fact I don't necessarily see any real or perceived similarities as a bad thing, which was my main point. I'm not complaining. There have also been additional comparisons in other websites and even previous posts in this forum, but the presence of two or more sources of inspiration doesn't change that we probably wouldn't have The Lion King in its current form, or maybe not even at all, without the existence of Jungle Emperor Leo. You can certainly question the true extent of said influence, but it's still something that reduces the originality of the production...even if it doesn't affect the resulting quality of the film, which is an outcome that I actually find to be quite fortunate and welcome.
As the phrasing of my original statement and subsequent posts should make clear by this point, I'll freely admit that the basic gist of my argument is based on personal opinions stemming from both experience and logic, as part of a rational process shaped by my access to a limited but far from indisputable collection of facts. I'm actually quite open to the possibility of being proven partially or completely wrong. If you want me to provide formal credentials in order to carry out a casual forum discussion, then I certainly don't have any real problems acknowledging that I haven't studied the Japanese language nor culture in any academic sense. Nevertheless, I have also been an anime viewer for over 15 years myself and thus have no lack of experience dealing with classic anime from the period under consideration, particularly since my interest in the informal study of the industry and rational reflection based on publicly available information has steadily increased during recent years. I am willing to respect your academic experience and superior access to Japanese sources. I wouldn't even pretend to match any of those. However, I believe we shouldn't reduce this discussion to a simple debate where the only outcome is to resolve the matter by appealing to a real or perceived position of authority. Expertise usually needs to be demonstrated in practice through rational argumentation, after all, and even the worst of anime neophytes should have the right to ask questions or outright criticize those who enjoy the benefit of speaking from a far more comfortable vantage point. You've provided more concrete information, by all means, but I still don't think the sample is giving us the complete picture. In that sense, I'd like to know your answer to some of the issues and considerations I've already brought up, which haven't been addressed yet. For example, the possible limitations of magazine coverage vs. the total output of anime. I wouldn't claim to enjoy full access to the pages of NewType on a regular basis, let alone any reasonable understanding of the Japanese language, but my limited experience with the physical magazine itself and, in greater depth, with other relatively similar publications from the Western entertainment industry leads me to believe that it could not possibly provide equivalent coverage of "all anime, all the time." If you can prove such isn't the case, then so be it.
Leaving aside the previous considerations, I'm at least glad we can apparently come to an understanding as far as this important point is concerned. Both opinions and experiences are inevitably subjective and selective in scope, respectively, while dealing with actually comprehensive data would easily lead us down a far more productive and objective path. Is Wikipedia enough? Most certainly not, but it could be a good starting point when used in combination with other sources and additional research. That would be a rather time consuming process for any single individual, however, not something which would produce definitive results from one day to the next. I'd imagine a collective effort would be more reasonable in practice.
Personally speaking, the fact that I can actually appreciate and enjoy a very respectable number of classic anime, even to this day, means I wouldn't significantly disagree with either opinion in principle. In fact, my own knee-jerk reaction, under different circumstances, would have probably been to simply nod after reading your original post and stay quiet. Of course, I don't find it physically impossible to like some of the new stuff, for better or for worse, but I'll admit that variety seems to be lacking and sometimes I may even prefer to watch little or nothing from a given season these days and check out something from the recent or not-so-recent past. In the end though, I'm simply a little skeptical about the exact figures or proportions involved and how much we should stress this point, when there are still worthwhile projects being made from time to time. If you want to put it another way, I don't necessarily need to have all the answers myself in order to raise conflicting points or ask these and other questions. In fact, I'd welcome a rational counter-argument of their content. Last edited by nightjuan on Wed Nov 23, 2011 12:54 am; edited 2 times in total |
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Anymouse
Posts: 685 |
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And technically it isn't nostalgia if you didn't start watching Japanese animation until you were 14 in 2005.
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tuxedocat
 Posts: 2183 |
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This is pretty much exactly what I was thinking. It also seems like there was more diversity of subject matter to choose from back in the bubble days simply because there was more anime being produced overall. |
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enurtsol
Posts: 14818 |
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Japan needs an AFI version of top anime shows. User rankings don't work because there would be more users who watched the recent stuff than the old stuff because they weren't old enough yet.
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Kikaioh
Posts: 1205 Location: Antarctica |
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Am I missing something? Rurouni Kenshin: Trust and Betrayal was a 1999 OVA, and Cowboy Bebop was even earlier, debuting in 1998. You Can Not Advance is ostensibly a re-imagining of the 1995 Evangelion series, which also happens to appear in the Most Popular list. You make it sound as though older anime aren't appearing on the list and yet... there they are. 
But every rhyme has it's reason, and every set of data can be correlated to various conclusions. Whether it's the rise of the Internet, market exposure, age statistics for internet usage, or the general history of the penetration of anime into the United States, there are various reasons to explain why top ten lists reflect what they reflect. Popularity, after all, isn't necessarily an indication of quality. It's easy to jump on the "nostalgia filter" bandwagon, but try to understand: I'm not at all comparing the story-telling ability or production quality of older anime titles against newer ones. Older anime titles have their positive points, as do newer ones. I am, however, lamenting the fact that the market has become more and more otaku and teen-centric, and that the vast variety of art styles, character designs and stories that were once being told have long since started falling to the wayside. It's a common lament echoed by other fans who have the experience to compare the two eras, and it's a point worth understanding (for me this isn't about "old stuff is better than new stuff" this is about "I'm not a teenager, I'm not an otaku, and a lot of anime these days is made for those two groups, which wasn't always the case"). |
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Parse Error
 Posts: 592 |
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It is the indication of quality for any title intended to make a profit. Although there are occasional exceptions, most anime are produced for exactly that purpose. Early on this thread actually gave me some hope for the anime fandom, but alas it's just deteriorated into the typical Sankaku Complex inspired "Haruhi ruined anime forever" attitude I've become so accustomed to and expected at the outset. Back in my day, nostalgia was awesome, but now it's nothing more than people ignoring the bad stuff from the past while refusing to even look for good stuff in the present, and washed up directors who want to complain about moe shows while trying to profit from them. I see Yamakan is busy rolling in money from Fractale, so hopefully the same attention-getting strategy will work just as well this time around. |
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