Forum - View topicThe Joy Of The Everyday: Emotional Intimacy Between Women in Slice-of-Life Anime
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SciasSlash
Posts: 120 |
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[EDIT: Condescension removed. -TK]
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jagerlach
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It has always confused me to see A Place Further Than the Universe classified as slice of life. Going to Antarctica is hardly a mundane, everyday activity
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FuzzyDave
 Posts: 63 |
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Yeah, especially given spoiler[how hard the HUGE emotional wallop hits in the second half!] It always felt more like a coming-of-age drama with some light comedy in the beginning than a Slice-of-Life David |
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TsukasaElkKite
 Posts: 4032 |
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This article was excellent.
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kotomikun
Posts: 1205 |
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Slice of life is such an ill-defined term, especially in anime where it apparently gets conflated with iyashikei, or "cute girls doing cute things," or as it probably should be called in most cases, hobby anime with cute girls. Crunchyroll's slice-of-life section is absolutely bizarre, with a random mix of harem, isekai, sports, fantasy, and barely anything that makes any sense. MAL's list is mostly magical realism (slice-of-life with supernatural elements), like Mushishi or Natsume's Book of Friends, plus some iyashikei. Nobody seems to have a good idea what goes in this category. Which is weird, because it's not like anime invented this concept. It seems like there's just not a lot of "pure" slice-of-life with no other major themes. Yurucamp, DIY, Cycling Club, Encouragement of Climb (I'll never get over how weird that sounds translated literally), etc. are also promoting a specific hobby and/or casual sport. A Place Further Than The Universe throws in some drama and adventure. Aquatope is pretty close, but still has some mysterious magic and frequent nerding out about marine wildlife. So, generally it's going to be a component, rather than its entire reason for existing. Flipping it around, a lot of anime have slice-of-life elements in between drama/violence/etc.; Spy Family, for example. |
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Piglet the Grate
 Posts: 802 Location: North America |
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How about A-Channel, Akebi's Sailor Uniform, Asobi Asobase, Azumanga Daioh, Chronicles of the Going Home Club, Flying Witch, Nichijou, Non Non Biyori, Squid Girl, Three Leaves, Three Colors, YuruYuri, and Yuyushiki? |
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Heishi
 Posts: 1357 |
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For me, the whole yuri subtext thing is a major problem I have with alot these "cute schoolgirl type" shows., especially if they are from Manga Time Kirara that is NOTORIOUS for this sort of thing,
They like to claim that this is all "oh, they just friends" nonsense but you can't help but roll your eyes when they try to jerk people around with their yuri baiting. It's so incredibly irritating. Either just make them lesbian or quit jerking us around with the subtext crap. |
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Piglet the Grate
Posts: 802 Location: North America |
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Every show mentioned in the article is very good to excellent. |
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kotomikun
Posts: 1205 |
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Flying Witch is magical realism (witches). Nichijou, Squid Girl, and Asobi are unhinged/surreal comedies (the last one is a deliberate bait-and-switch), and arguably Azumanga as well. YuriYuri is, well, yuri. Akebi's Sailor Uniform... based on the trailers, it appears uncomfortably suggestive, and therefore not something I'd count as wholesome slice-of-life, though that could be a misinterpretation on my part. The remaining few probably count, but I didn't say there were none at all, only that it's uncommon. Anime are mostly TV series, after all, so they usually need some kind of hook/theme/gimmick beyond just "calm and charming" to stand out and keep people watching. |
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yuricon
 Posts: 147 |
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There are definitely a lot of stories that I could have added, no doubt. Some of them hit my criteria, some did not. Many of the stories you mention don't have the characters challenging themselves in any way AND there were series I watched - especially sports series - where the criteria were met, and I simply did not include them. The idea was that I expanded my watching and, hopefully, others will too. 
Thank you for reading it! |
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psh_fun
 Posts: 102 |
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Sometimes it's just fun to see two cute girls do stuff like that without it really meaning anything. A form of fanservice if you will. Don't think it should be an all or nothing type deal. Plenty of shows do that teasing with guy/girl couples a lot too without making them being a couple either. |
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yuricon
Posts: 147 |
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It's very important for anime and manga to normalize friendship. Not every relationship is or must become a romance. We need friends and peers, as well.
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SciasSlash
Posts: 120 |
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The thing is, it's not really 'jerking people around.' A lot of the authors in Manga Time Kirara used to do yuri manga, or do yuri doujins on the side. It's not really about 'cowardice' or 'baiting,' it's more just the authors enjoying that kind of thing and encouraging people to play in that space themselves. |
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dm
 Subscriber Posts: 1480 |
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Sorry about the Covid, but kind of happy it gave you the chance to go deep on these series and see some of the commonalities and themes that might elude someone seeing these series in isolation.
It’s not hard to see how a series like Aria fits into your grouping—friendship, challenge, development (though both the challenges and the development are pretty laid-back and comfortable in that series of series). |
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Piglet the Grate
Posts: 802 Location: North America |
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The drama of romantic attachments would ruin the iyashikei aspect of most of these shows, so it is odd that some viewers always want to "ship" characters together. |
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