Forum - View topicCheesy anime of the last ten years - Your Experience.
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Obsidian451
 Posts: 19 Location: Bloomington, Indiana |
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[FWD: I discussed this with Tony K. a short while ago, he was okay with me giving this thread a go. Also, since this is focused on the past 10 years, I decided not to continue any previous threads similar to this, since they generally dealt a lot with older anime]
So... It always seems like most of the cheesy anime we know and love is from a good 30-40 years ago. Things like Dracula: Sovereign of the Damned or old sci-fi series like Space Angel tend to fall into this category. But, every so often, something released in the last five or ten years fits this bill. In celebration of the end of 2010, I'd like to hear your experiences with cheesy anime releases of about 2001-2010. So please, share your horror stories, your laughter, your attempts to gouge out your own eyeballs. WARNING: Minor Spoilers Ahead! Also, these are my opinions and nothing more, please no flaming! And that goes for any replies or any other cheesy anime! Thank you. My own experience comes from Otakon 2008. I needed to kill a few hours in the morning one day, so I headed to a screening room. The description in the Otakon pamphlet seemed so promising. Sci-Fi ! Political intrigue! Space battles! Secret identities! And then I actually sat down to watch a bit of Glass Fleet, and my hopes were shattered (no pun intended...) This show embodied virtually every anime stereotype of the last ten years. Thankfully, it was made hilarious by some laughable characters, cheesy dialogue, and some outrageously bad (read: hysterical) moments. Oh, where to begin... When building a cast of characters, I think the Glass Fleet writers didn't actually write anything, they just cherry picked their cast from every popular character type in the history of anime, and then haphazardly flung them together onto one storyboard in the hopes that it would be exciting. What I got was the anime equivalent of a Dadaist collage - it contains a lot of stuff, but doesn't really mean anything in the long run. Our main hero is a gruff, tough guy type and expert tactician, and he looks like Lintence from Chrome Shelled Regios, except that he's named Cleo. Admittedly, I sometimes did hear him telling me my fortune in Miss Cleo's voice. He's joined by Michelle, a revolutionary voiced by Laura Bailey who can't decide if she wants to recreate the French Revolution or the Russian Revolution. The screening room suddenly got very uncomfortable when we learned that the female name "Michelle" was actually the male name "Michel." The revelation, and some of the other gender ambiguity, was a bit surreal overall, but lacking the charm and humor of something like Ranma 1/2. Cleo commands a ship that's virtually unstoppable, much like your average Gundam, and it flits around like Spike Spiegel's Swordfish, except that it's made of glass (which makes perfect sense. I think... Also, not to be picky, but don't you need more than one ship before you can be classified as a "fleet"...?) His crew consists of a gothic lolita, a boy who tries very hard to be Jean from Nadia, and Ivan Drago, who apparently really needed work after losing to Rocky. The principal villain of our tale is Vetti, a dictator who might have some secret identity, which the writers hint at (about six seconds after he appears) with a nice closeup of his differently colored eyes. Thankfully, the world of Glass Fleet is about as messy as its characters. Our first episode opens with a gigantic space battle, with a bunch of CG battleships awkwardly meandering around in what I suspect are attack patterns. We have no idea who's fighting, or why they're fighting between two enormous rocks in the middle of space, or where they even are, but pretending that we know this makes it a bit more fun. (Judging from the green space clouds in the background, they might actually be in Superman 64) We're also never told why one of the fleet commanders is wearing a pirate hat the size of Nebraska. Especially since he's killed three minutes after being introduced... But the highlight of the whole ordeal has to come during the first swordfight between Cleo and Vetti in episode 4 (yes, there are swords too, which I think is ripping off... oh, I don't even know at this point). Cleo matches Vetti blow for blow, forcing the latter, panting heavily, to undo his top button and state, "You're the second man to make me unfasten my button." And Cleo's retort, which I think was supposed to sound tough: "Come at me again and I'll cut the clothes right off you." It's the kind of dialogue Ed Wood would write, and then edit out for being too bizarre. Like most other people in the screening room, I was too busy laughing my butt off to care about the fight. Eventually, it gets so heated that a burst of their combined energy throws them apart and rips both their shirts off. I'd have a joke for this, but I think it speaks for itself. Glass Fleet has some other dialogue about red stars sending messages and Cleo being "the wind" or something. Most of the time, I was beyond caring about the plot or where these people even are for that matter (which never does get revealed). But thanks to some gender bending, over the top dialogue, and stereotyped characters, I came out of it with a very special Otakon 2008 memory. If only Starship Operators had the hilariously bad moments of Glass Fleet, it might have been the greatest sci-fi anime ever. As it stands, we can only imagine what might have been. |
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PetrifiedJello
Posts: 3782 |
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I really feel sorry for this thread. Well written, but completely empty. Though, it shouldn't be surprising.
Requesting anime fans quote their cheesy anime from the past 10 years is impossible, given the following reasons: -Many haven't been fans for 10 years -Many haven't seen anything older than 5 years (give or take) -Many have forgotten what they've seen in those 10 years I fall into the latter, unfortunately. I've seen so much anime that I can no longer recall titles or plots. With so much under the belt, it's just impossible to do. But don't feel too bad. It's like this for most entertainment. I'm quite confident most people can't recall every movie they've seen, or ever song they've heard, but every so often, they'll be watching/listening to something and go "I remember this!" As far as cheesy goes, I can only relate with one title, and that's Cyberteam of Akihabara. This is only because it was recently re-released, but when I started watching it, scenes started popping into my head. At first, I was a bit perplexed because I had absolutely no memory of ever having seen the series, but as it progressed, it was evident I had. I even remember how the series ended, about 3/4 through the viewing. Why this series is cheesy comes down to the entire premise, and that's when a few toys had the ability to transform into Divas, protector guardians against... yeah, going into spoiler territory now, especially when the ending isn't expected. CiA came out in '98, so it's probably not fair to include it, but alas, I can't really think of any cheesy anime in the past 10 years. The industry really has changed from the 80s, 90s, and even early 00s. I could list Nuku Nuku (both versions), but again, we're back into the 90s, which I believe was the last decade for real cheesy anime. I will have to say the stuff coming out of Japan in the 2000s really seemed cheese-less. I'm sure there were a few titles here and there, but it's definitely not what it was like in the 80s and 90s, that's for sure. Truth is, I really miss them. Sure, I enjoy much of today's anime, but they come across as McD's fries today. To those who remember, McD's used to have the best damn fries on the planet and now, no restaurant has good fries like the old days. 
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Kruszer
 Posts: 7994 Location: Minnesota, USA |
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Well, when I think of cheesy (but still highly entertaining) anime, I think of shows like Scryed, Needless, and Buso Renkin. They have a lot of over the top action, and drama and are generally just pure fun to watch.
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naninanino
 Posts: 680 |
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There is something that is nearly on par with Dracula. It's called Hametsu no Mars. It can be found subbed in Youtube and it's certainly a work of art if you like this sort of stuff.
Then there is always Gundoh Musashi, but its hard to find it anywhere and subs are non-existent. Most anime aim to be mediocre so it's hard to come by with that kind of enjoyment. While I could name some other shows that I found pitifully laughable, they would be too polarizing to serve as a coherent example. |
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HaruhiToy
 Posts: 4118 |
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I'm not clear on the accepted definition of "cheesy."
It could be bad drawings and animation: Air Master comes to mind. It could be lame, overuse of fan service. Too many to list. It could be saccharine dialog. That can happen. Sister Princess has endless repetitions of the words "onee-chan" because every line of dialog from female characters has that in it. There can be cheesy elements of what otherwise would have been an excellent anime. The Third is a good example -- whoever wrote the narration or for that matter put the narrator in there should be shot. |
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garfield15
 Posts: 1533 |
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Yakitate Japan. Full stop.
Literally, the cheesiest thing I have ever seen and I loved every minute of it.[/quote] |
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Obsidian451
Posts: 19 Location: Bloomington, Indiana |
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Okay, I'm definitely tempted to check out a couple of these titles, now. Some of them sound too good to be true.
@PetrifiedJello - I appreciate your reply. However, I'm involved in multiple fandoms - video gaming, anime, movies, Star Trek, Star Wars, and others - and in general, in spite of all the media out there that we digest, there's always something that just pops out as either remarkably good, or remarkably bad. If I mention Superman 64 to a video game fan or "Shades of Grey" to a Star Trek fan or "Battlefield Earth" to, well, most anyone...  ...I'm probably going to get a strong response along the lines of "Oh, THAT. How in the world could they have thought that was a good idea?!?"
And it's not just older stuff - Superman 64 was 1999, which prompted the Angry Video Game Nerd to state, "Didn't they have some kind of quality control by then or something??" Anime is no different, methinks. There are certain episodes of series that I saw years ago that still stand out, for whatever reason. And Glass Fleet definitely qualifies. There are just so many cliches, so many absurd lines of dialogue, and everyone's taking it all so seriously. However I will look into Cyberteam of Akihabara, since the premise alone sounds pretty out there. I'll get back to you on that. @HaruhiToy - Well, I don't think there is a single accepted definition.  Honestly, I think "cheesy" can refer to lots of elements, including bad drawing that's just unbelievably poorly made. It's in the same vein, I think, as Kirk fighting the Gorn in that classic Star Trek episode, "Arena." They're taking it really seriously, but the choreography is pretty terrible. But in my opinion, the real "high calorie cheese" is the stuff with ludicrous plot points or dialogue. Plot and character and other story elements can be so far fetched, or bizarre, or just poorly put together, that there's no way I can possibly engage with it.
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Soundmonkey44
 Posts: 1243 |
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well Time Magazine did call Y2k the Decade from hell, and although it was for diffrent reasons, I agree, Televised Media so far over the past decade has been mostly dissapointing for me.
Sure on the Anime side we had Pro's like Samurai champloo, Paranoia agent, & more recently Black Lagoon & Five Leaves. But we also had a rediculous amount of genaric fanservice shows. On the Native front, the Majority of U.S. TV was just, well either not good, or not that fun to watch, sure the Early seasons of smallville were good, Monk was funny, shows like House, Lie to me & Supernatural are all still great to watch, but 85% of the LA shows on TV over the last decade to today are pretty much passable. And then theres the toons, sure we started out fine but from 2005-2008 there was probably what maybe 1 good U.S. toon made, I'm glad to see that at least this is changing though, CN is making/airing some good stuff again, Can't wait for the New Thundercats or Young Justice shows next year. and Finally, I can never forgive Disney for destroying their name with those gawd aweful sitcoms. (Walt shall rise from the grave & kill them all! lol.) but getting BOT finally, Anime was better then many aspects of my Native Television at least, so I guess i would give the last decade a C+ or a B- just for that.
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RHachicho
 Posts: 897 Location: Essex, UK |
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Well I guess about the biggest leap in logic i had to make was when I heard of a show called "Midori no Hibi" I mean for gods sake some weird thing happens and all of a sudden some girl has to be some guy she has a crush on's hand!
And you know what the worst thing is. I watched the damn show (Admittedly more out of morbid curiosity than actual interest) but hell I even liked it a bit. /shame |
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Ggultra2764
 Subscriber Posts: 3961 Location: New York state. |
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I guess if we're grinding cheese, I guess I'll have to say both seasons of Code Geass took the cake for me with cheesiness. Over-the-top melodrama (more in the case of R2), silly-looking facial expressions in response to said melodrama (spoiler[Nina and Lelouch's reactions to the FLEJIA bomb]), fan service at the most inopportune moments (spoiler[Euphemia and Lelouch's heart-to-heart in the first season while the girl's nude waiting for her clothes to dry]) and some ridiculous looking clothing and hair designs for the characters (Charles' hair, spoiler[Lelouch's attire as Britannia's new emperor]). Code Geass is one big narm train to the point where it has its own section of Narm listed on TV Tropes.
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nightjuan
 Posts: 1473 |
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Limiting this to newer shows reduces my options a bit, given my irregular viewing habits, but perhaps Afro Samurai and its sequel would tend to qualify as being among the "worst" examples of cheese from the last decade as far as I'm concerned. Just thinking about either of those makes me cringe.
But you see, in all honesty...I'm not exactly lactose intolerant to begin with. 
The presence of cheese, as vaguely defined as the concept is, in any number of the previously mentioned shows can be generally accepted without too much trouble...the question is whether or not it's a source of charm, indifference, disinterest or annoyance. All of those are completely subjective reactions because they depend on the audience's mindset, tolerances and expectations, unwarranted or otherwise. In other words: our individual levels of suspension of disbelief. Personally, I usually don't mind cheese as it is a relatively common element present in most anime...that is, as long as there's still something interesting or entertaining in any given show. It would be absolutely impossible for me to enjoy both Shiki and Super Robot Wars OG: The Inspector, to name two currently airing shows, if I were to lash out at everything that is intentionally or unintentionally cheesy in them. In my opinion, it's always better to take the vast majority of anime only half-seriously, at best, and this goes both for those shows that are obviously meant to be lighthearted as well as those that happen to be melodramatic. What's more, absolute ridiculousness and seriousness can co-exist in any given series. Let's take Higurashi, for example. Both seasons but particularly the second one are full of cheese on both a visual and topical level. Was I fully aware of that? Yes. Did it actually make me stop for a moment and chuckle? Occasionally, but not in any lasting negative manner that irreparably hurt my appreciation for the rest of the show. I'd still count it as a flaw, from a critical perspective, just not a fatal one. After a while, you could say I simply adapted to it and stopped making a big deal out of that. There were still some effective dramatic scenes, perhaps more because of their surrounding implications than anything else, that worked quite well as I remained focused on the basics of the plot and/or characters in spite of the hilarious facial expressions involved or how goofy large parts of the resolution seem like in retrospect. You could even say this is also, give or take a few details, how I feel about the aforementioned Code Geass and the ridiculously long list of "narm" which one would think supposedly makes grown men die laughing or pulling their hair off. Half of it I can understand, but the rest...seems rather baffling. Such is, I guess, the subjective nature of "cheese" and "narm" as seen by different people. |
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naninanino
Posts: 680 |
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I guess I'll add some more that I initially left out as being a bit polarizing.
Soul Link: While this show actually takes a step at being more than your usual eroge adaption, the story is bad. It basically turns from ecchi into somekind of space survival. Some not so great things happen like spoiler[the main couple have a child, who kills the antagonist by simpy touching her with her bare hands.] It doesn't actually sound that bad, but it just didn't work out that well, at least in anime form. Steel Angel Kurumi and it's sequels: I don't know how does this kind of extremely mediocre writing gets made into anime. It sells itself as some kind of romantic action drama and seems to contain a lot of ecchi at first (but it doesn't). By the end of the day, it's just gynoids busting mechs with extremely generic designs. The sequels, or remakes, either rehash this in an alternative setting or take a total drama direction, which is not uniform with the rest of the series. There isn't anything in these shows that can't be found done better elsewhere, even amongst the cheapest ecchi comedies. Zombie-Loan: This show actually shows some promise at one point, but an abrupt end and ridiculous character dynamics made it into travesty in my eyes. Demonbane: This is a really bad apple. I have no idea why every anime based on the works of Lovecraft turn out to be something entirely else. Here the mythos is used as an excuse for mecha battles. Mecha battles with bad CG and ecchi that is. Things aren't very coherent and a lot of stuff is made up just for the cool factor, which in here produces an adverse effect instead. For example, before the hero pilots his robot, he transforms into a wizard, but there is no sense of self-parody like in Star Driver. Naruto movie 3: It's Naruto looking after kids and animals. This made the fillers in the show look like a work of art. There are also shows that are extremely pointless like Nabari no Ou (pointless ninja war in a present setting) and Peacemaker (Daily life of the Shinsengumi). |
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Sanosuke_Inara
 Posts: 1662 |
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Obsidian451
Posts: 19 Location: Bloomington, Indiana |
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Haha, I suppose this is what naninanino meant by "polarizing"?
@naninanino - I've heard Demonbane get discussed in conversation, come to think of it. Bad CG can kill an anime, though, and it can up the absurd factor a ton. However, I did sit down with some friends yesterday to watch Hametsu no Mars, and... I, I have no idea. Neither did my friends. It's an absolute mess, we were just plain stunned. On the one hand, it really rips off a ton from Neon Genesis Evangelion. Because the whole "father forces his unwilling son to put on power armor and fight supernatural beings" plot apparently needed to be redone... On the other hand, though, this features some of the dullest fight sequences I've ever seen in an anime. It's like they animated the fight scenes, and then slow motioned the footage just to lengthen the OAV to the 20 minute mark. The good guys are also pretty pathetic here; their whole fight strategy equates to them confronting bad guys, followed by them standing and waiting for the bad guys to shoot at them. And don't get me started on the "big twist ending"... In the end, it introduced so many ideas and characters (spoiler[including a cameo from Doc Brown from Back to the Future?!? Say WHAT?!?]) in rapid succession, that all we were left asking was, "Wait, who are you again?" or "Where'd all of this come from" or "What's going on?!?!?" Man alive... Heck, this might have been more interesting if they'd stretched it out into an hour-long OAV. As it stands, it just looks like a really, REALLY rough draft! Does anyone know if it was supposed to be turned into a series, and this was just their "test run" or something? |
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OldCharlieStoletheHandle
 Posts: 1288 Location: Mastic Beach, NY |
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I had an experience somewhat like the opening post at my first con, which was AnimeNext 2004. After registering on Friday morning the only events available were a couple of viewing rooms, so both were packed. Someone walking by the room I was in and hearing the gales of laughter might have made the mistake of thinking what was being shown was something great, but had they looked closer they would have realized we weren't laughing because the show was funny, we were laughing at how many stupid cliches were raining down on us. What was being shown was Gravion, and anyone studying the reactions of the audience would have noticed the groaning, the facepalms, and the looks of total disbelief on our faces. Yeah, anime doesn't come much cheesier, and we're not talking finely aged cheddar here, we're talking a big smelly pile of runny camembaert that even a starving cat wouldn't eat.
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