Forum - View topicThis Week in Anime - Reheating Anime Leftovers
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tintor2
 Posts: 2134 |
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I grew up with both Nippon Hunter x Hunter and Deen Kenshin so sometimes I wonder what series did something better. For example, Hunter x Hunter 99 took some liberties with Killua's early characterization as if he can't trust Gon to the point he talks to himself in the mirror. The gore was more notable too in the 90s to the point Madhouse had to put the heart of an enemy inside a bag.
In general Madhouse toned down a lot the most gruesome parts but least adapted the Chimera arc and gave it a good ending. Sadly, my favorite arc of the Hunter x Hunter series was never finished and even today in the manga Togashi hasn't made Kurapika continue his fight with the Spider even if they are like five feet from each others. Shaman King's remake was way too fast with adapting material already seen before which Mizushima tried being more original by transforming tournament fights into street fights. Sadly, while the visuals of the Oversouls Don Yoh and other developed were good, the battles were disappointing. Kenshin's remake didn't seem to take some liberties so far other than telling a prequel chapter about a random Western doctor Kenshin met before reaching Tokyo. [/img] |
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Kicksville
 Posts: 1250 |
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I rewatched Hellsing TV 2001 recently and really enjoyed it. I didn't like the second half back in the day (before Ultimate was announced) and was surprised I was really into it this time. I think it's way better than Ultimate in a number of respects.
There was hostility toward its imperfections people often blamed on it not being like the manga (even if they hadn't read it), which ballooned into cartoonish hatred after the OVA was out. You'd never realize Hellsing got popular in places like the US on the back of that first anime. ...but, looking around now, it seems like there's more appreciation for it again now that it doesn't have to compete with the idea that it forever deprived us from a manga accurate version. I feel like that increased retroactive appreciation can extend as a result of other "accurate" remakes. The original Ranma got trashed for being too long, too fillery, too flat looking - now people are looking at it more closely again. And not just in GIF form. |
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tintor2
Posts: 2134 |
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Something that appears to have affected Ranma's popularity too is how Deen did not adapt the actual ending and had to come up with original episodes which made the main couple a bit toxic. Inuyasha had a similar problem with the main love triangle to the point even Adult Swim made fun of. Sunrise had to put some original episodes that went nowhere but when the minisequel came, there was so much material to adapt that Inuyasha and Kagome looked loveable. |
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Greed1914
 Posts: 4640 |
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It is interesting to think about it in terms of how we got things like Brotherhood and Ultimate. If those first series had been some kind of disaster that resulted from doing their own thing once they ran out of manga, there isn't much chance of such quick new versions showing up. It's fine to prefer the second attempt, but the attitudes towards the first was overblown. Then again, Aniplex seems content to act like Brotherhood is the only FMA that exists now, so there's that, I guess. |
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FishLion
 Posts: 243 |
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I think that video games are a special case because usability is such a factor. When you compare games like the Resident Evil remakes to their originals, they are different games altogether. Despite the similarities it is different enough you couldn't call it Quality of Life improvements, it is a different journey treading the same trail. Then you have cases like Final Fantasy I, the NES game is technically the same game as the GBA version square by square, but many functions were glitched and sometimes entire stats lost usability due to programming errors. Even if the NES is the original FFI experience and still has a unique vibe and history, the one that is fully functioning properly could be said to be truer to designer intent. As long as it isn't essentially the original thrown in an emulator, the product of a game remake is the modern game design being applied to old stories.Video games are always game environments powered by computers, but computers change so rapidly in a way that alters what is possible that despite their shared history it is hard to think of games from the NES days as technically equivalent to modern games. They share history and design sensibilities, but it is not the same type of product the way painters from the past and present shared the same basic parameters of a surface covered in paint.
You could try and make the same argument for animation as video games in that it has become very different in a technical sense, but it is always a visual display. If we can't take our massive chest of tools and top the past classics then we should really consider why we are remaking things. That said, if someone wants to take a second crack at a series or remake a series that deeply inspired them, I'm not going to judge them, more power to them. My main issue is when it feels cynically motivated for profit as opposed holding a deep love for the original. I think that when something feels like it swings for the fences like Devilman Crybaby, it is easier to say they definitely had an original vision that they wanted to make in this world, even when technically retreading old ground. The more an anime is trying to be the animation version of an remaster with updated graphics and not do anything new, the more likely I am to skip it. |
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Joe Mello
 Posts: 2312 Location: Online Terminal |
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I've probably said this before (ironic!) but the proliferation of streaming and FAST channels show that audience want old things. Of course, the audience also doesn't actually know what they want until they're made to want it, but you can't farm data from things that don't exist, so executives will reboot things because that means they can get money 2 ways from the same place. Also, reboots insulate executives from perceived harm. If a reboot fails, it's the franchise's fault; if a new series fails, it's the executive's fault.
One other thing in regards specifically to CLAMP and Takahashi that I've been thinking of is that they aren't getting any younger. This is more speculative, but it is possible that they're all at or nearing the end of their careers and they want to get one last bag of money before full retirement. |
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Jenog
Posts: 24 |
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I'd be delighted if they did a reboot of “Future boy Conan”... I have fond memories of this almost fifty-year-old anime. I still remember sitting in front of the TV every Saturday watching more antics of Conan, his friend Lana and their half-wild friend Jinsi. And it was only much later that I became aware that it was one of Hayao Mayasaki's first works.
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LukaTheLancer
Posts: 82 |
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In terms of anime getting remakes i think it is a case by case, something like The One Piece is one i would say is needed because with how bad the pacing in mondern One Piece. And i think show that never got to be told in full like Spice and Wolf i can see it make sense.
To answer the other question about older anime, the only pre 2000's anime i have seen for the first time over last 10 years are Rurouni Kenshin, One Piece, NGE, Berserk 1997, Mobil Suit Gundam and Cowboy Bebob. I think what make a lot of people me included a bit on edge of seeing older anime is the pace and the feel. (i wanna clarify i have nothing again older meida i am a big movie collector and love movies from all over the world anf time) The Pace says it all. i they are many shows i from the 90's and 80's i would love to dig my teeth into but a 100+ episode count is not something i just can do on a whim. And it is funny 2 of my biggest wishes of Anime remakes would end up ar least 100 episode for a propper adaptation those are Hayate The Combat Butler and Umineko 2 shows that was never finished and suffered for bad pacing, Hayate was too slow (or at least 2 first was, have not not seen the 2 seasons of anime only) and in Umineko case too fast. |
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Tenchi
 Posts: 4547 Location: Ottawa... now I'm an ex-Anglo Montrealer. |
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I'm not someone who would really complain about remakes but, at the same time, if it's a remake of a series I liked just fine the first time around, I don't bother watching them. It's fine, I'm getting older, I realize that I'm no longer within the target demographic the remake is meant to appeal to and I just let the remake exist without me having to watch it.
The exception I'd make where I would watch a remake of an anime would be for full season remakes of OVAs that ran for only a couple of episodes but which were based on much longer manga where the OVAs really only scratched the surface of the story. I'm looking at you, Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou, and also you, Gunsmith Cats. |
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BadNewsBlues
Posts: 6316 |
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By many accounts and depending on who you ask One Piece has had pacing problems (manga & anime) since at least the Alabasta or the Skypiea arc. People I guess are now more cognizant of the pacing because they’re reading/watching it week to week instead of how many of us followed at first which was by reading everything there was out at the time and catching up to current chapter/episode. |
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Dr. Wily
Posts: 383 |
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You joke, but as someone who basically grew up on InuYasha, I'd be down to watch it. At least it'd help me forget Yashahime ever happened... |
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That Little Rapscallion
Posts: 61 |
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Full Metal Alchemist Brotherhood still remains the model remake that others strive to be and none can ever seem to obtain. All the stars seemed to align for it. As much as I'd love a Soul Eater or Gash Bell remake I feel like they would go more in the way of Shaman King. Kenshin so far is not bad but I don't think it's Brotherhood level.
As far as re-imaginings go they tend to be hit or miss. Yatterman Night and SSS Gridman were nice re-imaginings that I felt respected the original while doing their own thing but stuff like Trigun Stampede was not for me, especially not with the CG animation and removing a lot of the stuff I liked of the original.
Stranger of Paradise is technically Final Fantasy 1 reimagining in that regard but I'll take the PSP and GBA remakes for FF1 any day of the week. Remakes did seem a lot more faith in the pre-HD gaming era. Ironically there's a bit of a return-to-form in the smaller indie scene with games like Double Dragon Gaiden and Shredder's Revenge where they're modern 2D pixel art games more in line with the SNES era. The crown jewel of modern remakes I feel is Star Ocean The Second Story R. It's just the original game but with all the stuff from the PSP enhancement and then even more content. I generally skip video game remakes a lot as well. In a lot of cases they suffer from the same issues that anime remakes do in being dumbed down a lot more or censored because times have changed. In the rare cases they do hit it out of the park like Star Ocean though I enjoy being proven wrong. Otherwise I don't see a reason to play them over the original since they're usually inferior versions much like anime remakes outside the rare exception. Final Fantasy 7's Remake and Rebirth are like that too with being very simplified story-wise but they're at least different enough gameplay wise that it's a new experience. Although I ended up skipping most of Rebirth's side content due to how monotonous it was. I'll still take the OG FF7 anyday though. The mention of Lunar is funny because Silver Star Complete was already a remake of the original Sega CD version of the game. A pretty good one at that. I think the remaster is going to remove a lot of stuff though. |
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Fluwm
 Posts: 1038 |
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Comparing anime remakes to games is definitely a bit of an apples-and-oranges thing. Video game technology has evolved so much in the past few decades that there's a lot of value in modernizing classic games (there are PC games out there so old they don't have tooltips; that don't even support mouse input, But there are also a lot of cases where newer games are remade, in which case... the question is very much, "What's the point?" if they don't change very much... or "What's the point?" if they change too much. This week's TWIA brings up Final Fantasy VII Remake as if it's a good example of a radically different remake to an original, but I can't really agree with that framing. The Remake games have their own themes that are sometimes in direct conflict with the themes of the original game, and pretty much all of the deviations from the original story have been... highly contentious among fans. At best.
Anyway, with anime, I think there is still some small similarity when it comes to modernizing things. Older anime tended to be a bit more loosey-goosey with pacing and filler. The big selling point of the Ranma and Urusei Yatsura remakes, I think, is less "thing new" and more "thing shorter." Those original series were looooooong. And would often take liberties (I say, knee-deep in my watch-through of Sailor Moon, a series that takes a lot of liberties with the original manga... and one that got its own remake a few years ago). I think there's also room here to talk about the handful of series that are less remakes and more complete reimaginings, or reboots. The recent-ish Lupin the Third series, for example (I want to say... series 5?) did a lot to modernize the franchise and make it feel "new" and "modern." Likewise, the Space Battleship Yamato 2199 makes a lot of changes to the details while telling the same basic story, almost all of which improve things imo. |
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BadNewsBlues
Posts: 6316 |
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Which isn’t unusual when you remake something that people liked in it’s original form. Even if that version had a myriad of legitimate problems that remake would be better off without even if some swore by the alleged charm these flaws had. This extends of course to anime remakes/recuts. |
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Fluwm
Posts: 1038 |
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I honestly haven't seen very many faithful video game remakes with contentious receptions. Unless we're conflating remasters and ports with remakes, most gamers are pretty happy to lionize whatever the shiny new thing is, even if there are good arguments to be made for it being inferior to the original (as is the case with the recent Silent Hill 2 Remake, and the preceding Resident Evil Remakes).
To an extent, there's also some of that in the anime fandom, too, but it's much more common to see folks recommending the older stuff over remakes -- I've certainly seen that often enough with Sailor Moon, Gundam, Fullmetal Alchemist, Legend of the Galactic Heroes, etc. |
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