Category Archives: anime

Ishiguro

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Last week saw the passing of one of the greatest anime directors of all time, Ishiguro Noboru. I’m not an expert on Ishiguro, so I don’t think it’s appropriate to talk as if I am keenly aware of his entire history. Instead, I would like to just talk about his impact on a more personal level.

Ishiguro’s list of influential works is almost second to none, and I know from personal experience that his finest works stand the test of time in a way that few can. Back in 2004, I was a college student who finally managed to get all of the original Super Dimensional Fortress Macross. The show was so utterly engrossing that I managed to finish all 36 episodes in two nights. During that time, I felt myself moving from cheering for Minmay to cheering for Misa; the way the show had developed and grown its characters amidst the backdrop of pop-songs-as-simple-ideals and war made it feel like I might  never experience that kind of thrill burning through a show again. Then came late Autumn 2008, and Legend of the Galactic Heroes.

At a daunting 110 episodes, it wasn’t a show that was really possible to marathon in a short period, but I still found myself often unable to stop. This wouldn’t have been any sort of a problem except at the time I was also studying for my Level 2 Japanese Language Proficiency Test. Was it worth it to cut into my study time so much? Well, the fact that I managed to pass probably colors my reflection, but again I was treated to one of the most well-crafted, intelligent, and hopeful pieces of fiction I’ve ever had the privilege to enjoy. I know Macross and LOGH aren’t Ishiguro’s only works, and there are even people who hold them far more dear than I do, but together they shape much of my views of the man.

I first had the opportunity to talk to Ishiguro as part of a press conference at Otakon 2009, and asked him a question about Nagahama Tadao, director of Combattler V, Voltes V, and Daimos. The way I framed my question was that since Nagahama had passed away decades prior, the only way to really know about him was to ask those who had worked with him, which included Ishiguro. Reflecting on this question, I realize that I had mentally placed the idea of Ishiguro dying far away from Nagahama’s own passing.

Then at Otakon 2011, I attended a panel which had both Ishiguro and Shinkai Makoto (5cm per Second, Place Promised in Our Early Days), and seeing the significant age gap between the old veteran and the newer talent and how that difference also meant the difference between cel and digital animation, I asked if Shinkai had any advice for Ishiguro. I caused a fair amount of light-hearted controversy for suggesting that the younger Shinkai could advise Ishiguro on the craft in which he made his name, but Ishiguro was more than open to it. For a man who was still looking for his next anime to work on, the hierarchy of age didn’t matter to him.

One question about the past and the old, one question about the future and the young, both assuming the man would live for many more years to come. Funny how things work.

I hope Angel Scandies makes it somehow.

Superhero Comics and Being Sexy on an Individual Basis

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Introduction

When it comes to the controversial approach to sexuality in superhero comics, probably nothing is more exemplary than the oft-seen exaggerated pose where a female character twists her torso such that both her butt and her breasts are facing at the reader directly. Known as the “brokeback,” the pose is frequently the target of criticism as an example of sexualization gone wrong. Generally, the criticisms concern the fact that, as action-based stories, the pose is a completely impossible and extremely impractical thing to do in fighting. The idea is that, by showing them as such, comics communicate the idea that when it comes to female characters the T&A is more important than their identities as heroes or characters in general.

The point at which I might diverge from other opinions is that I believe strongly in freedom of artistic expression and think that such works have a right to be drawn and a right to be enjoyed by readers on a sexual level. While I think that the disparity in idealization between genders can definitely be too much, something has to be said for the fact that the visual arts in general can make the impossible happen in the first place. If people are literally physically incapable of contorting themselves into the “brokeback” pose, then mediums such as comics are the only places where it is possible at all.

I also think people have the right to admire a character while simultaneously desiring her or the pose that she’s taking. Again, the fact that forms of fiction such as comics make it more than possible for the portrayal of a female character to be an effective fighter while doing the least physically sensible thing possible is not an inherent negative, as long as we’re being honest about the fact that it is indeed done for sex appeal. No matter how much we’re able to point out that those contorted positions would shatter someone’s spine, or that other poses come straight out of pornography, they successfully generate sexual attraction. Individual tastes may vary, but they’re also called “porn poses” because they work, and at the end of the day pornography drawn or otherwise does not automatically turn people into misogynists.

But while the act of making or consuming such products causes no harm in and of itself, when the brokeback pose becomes the default method for portraying sexual attractiveness, it creates two major problems in particular. First, while anyone has the right to enjoy any type and degree of sexualization, if the goal is to try and attract a larger female readership, then no one should be surprised when such portrayals lessen their desire to pick up superhero comics. Second, and what will be the primary concern in this article, is that by having that style of sexualization be so ubiquitous, it creates a singular image of how a female (character) is supposed to look when they’re being “sexy.”

Sex as Character

Over the month of February, comics news and editorial site Comics Alliance published a series of articles on sex in comics. One of the articles discussed Adam Warren’s Empowered, where writer David Brothers argues that, even though Empowered is more sexually explicit and has more overt fanservice than regular superhero comics, it still approaches the topic of sex in a much healthier and more mature fashion.

Although a majority of commenters have voiced their understanding of David’s points and explanations, there are a few dissenting responses which I found interesting for what they imply. The recurring criticism, which not only appears in David’s article on Empowered but also many of the other posts, basically calls out the writers for having a double standard, praising the portrayal of sex in indie comics, while lambasting the presence of sexuality in superhero comics, in something of a high art, ivory tower, porn vs. erotica-type argument. Another criticism leveled at Empowered in particular, is that its crass displays of actual sexual content and juvenile-sounding dialogue make it worse than the other superhero comics to which David compares it.

I think David actually addresses this well in the article itself when he describes the primarily sexual relationship in Empowered, that of the main heroine, Emp, and her ex-henchman boyfriend, Thugboy:

Empowered‘s eponymous heroine is a superhero with issues. Her costume is too skintight and ineffectually fragile, and neither her teammates nor her nemeses respect her. She gets tied up way too often for her liking.

…

They both get different things out of the relationship, aside from just sex. Thugboy clearly loves Emp, and expresses that in a way that’s both a little paternal and a lot touching. He gets her issues with her body and career, and when she doubts herself, he’s there to point out how wonderful she is. He supports her, and the reverse is true, too.

More important than that, though, is the fact that she’s comfortable expressing her insecurities to him.

The thing to take away from their relationship is that when Emp has sex, it’s not simply a display of sex but rather shows the specific scenario of “sex with Emp.” It takes all of the various bits and pieces of her characterization and doesn’t forget them even during moments of titillation. The trouble with how sexuality is frequently visualized in superhero comics then, assuming the goal is to show female characters in a sexual manner in the first place, is that this level of specificity doesn’t exist in most portrayals. Rather than a female character making a sexy pose, it becomes a female character conforming to a sexy pose template, no matter her personality, history, or quirks. When combined with the way that superhero comics can grow and reinforce bad ideas, we end up in the current situation where this approach to sexuality generates an entrenched position that causes people to staunchly defend it as if it is simply the way that comics communicate “sexy,” as if there is little alternative.

The issue of posing isn’t confined to just “bad” artists, as the above example from Jim Lee demonstrates. Taken from his famed X-Men run in the 90s, the image is well-drawn and the women are idealized without necessarily going off the deep end, but aside from Jubilee (front) all of them are taking the same sexy stance. Psylocke (left), Rogue (center), and Dazzler (right) all have very different backgrounds and personalities, so it seems strange that they would all be in the same pose. This goes double when you compare them with all of the male characters, each of whom showcase their individuality in the way they’re standing or sitting, or Jubilee once more, whose “attitude” comes across in her slouched position.

Again, there’s nothing wrong with showing attractive girls in exaggeratedly attractive poses in and of itself, nor is there any fault in enjoying them, but superhero comics are in the business of creating unique, iconic characters. This is why they have different origin stories, different costumes, and different powers. The goal is to be able to see how a particular character stands out from the rest, and if sexuality is involved, then comics can benefit from making sure that the erotic is also made to fit the characters.

Alternatives from Anime and Manga

I’m going to steer away from superhero comics and take a look at anime and manga, a territory I’m much more familiar with, and one which I find provides some strong examples of works where the sexuality of their characters is both emphasized and individualized. This is not to say that anime and manga are devoid of sexism, or that any of the examples shown below are perfect in their portrayal of women. Instead, I want to show how these works go out of their way to portray their characters’ sexuality in ways which also reflects their unique characteristics, and to point out how the issue with pushing just one type of sexuality can be an issue even when the goal is to portray characters in a sexual fashion.


Senjougahara Hitagi (above) and Kanbaru Suruga (below) from Studio SHAFT’s Bakemonogatari/Nisemonogatari

The first title is Bakemonogatari (and its sequel Nisemonogatari), which features a number of attractive and highly-sexualized female characters. The characters depicted above are both the same age and both attracted to the main character. However, Senjougahara’s seductive body language is fed by her sardonic personality, whereas the athletic Kanbaru, a self-admitted pervert and an exhibitionist, shows a more forward and aggressive approach. What isn’t as clear from these screenshots is that the show banks on their sex appeal being highly individualized down to the very way that conversations happen.

Left to right: Ran, Madoka, and Muginami, from Rinne no Lagrange by Studio XEBEC/Production IG

Next is the recent Rinne no Lagrange. The three main characters depicted above are all clearly meant to be attractive, but in addition to having varying styles of dress which set them apart at the same time that they emphasize their figures, the three girls also literally sit differently. Just having them relaxing on chairs in unique manners suggests the differences (as well as differences in physical appeal) between them, and I might even go so far as to say that a person could get a rough idea of their personalities based on this image alone.

What of the brokeback itself, then? Is the pose forced to contain only one connotation, such that it cannot become a characterization factor? I believe the answer is that any way of posing a character, even the brokeback, does not automatically void its own potential to be a factor in showing a character and their particulars. The easy answer here is that if some seductress character wanted to stand that way to entice men sexually (and I’m assuming heterosexuality here mainly because that is the site of this debate), then it would make sense, but it doesn’t require that the character herself to be hypersexual, provided that it does not take over her overall portrayal or the view of sexuality in the comic itself.

Akashi Kaoru (right), heroine of Zettai Karen Children by Shiina Takashi

In these pages from Zettai Karen Children, we have its main heroine Akashi Kaoru standing in a way that emphasizes both her chest and her rear. It’s in the context of “stretching for a run,” which lends some practicality to it, but as I said in the introduction, I find arguing from a point of realism as if to say that once you undermine the physics of the pose, you break its spell to be a flawed one, somewhat like arguing that Superman shouldn’t fly with one arm out because that would just create unnecessary wind resistance. Instead, the reasons I see Kaoru’s pose as being be different on some level compared to the typical broke back are that first, the twist of the torso isn’t quite as exaggerated, and second, it is shown to be just one pose among many within these two pages, let alone the rest of the book. Her stance is neither the primary display of athleticism nor the primary display of Kaoru herself, and on top of that she contrasts with the other girls shown.

To re-emphasize, my goal with these examples isn’t to assert some kind of general superiority of manga over American comics, but to say that the problem with having the brokeback and what it represents be the default for comics in general is problematic for more reasons than simply “sexism.” Comics and other media don’t necessarily have to go so far as to possess the highest quality of characterization, nor do they have to be the most tasteful or thought-out. Rather, if the goal is to create unique characters, then that uniqueness shouldn’t be subsumed by some generic template, sexual or otherwise.

Conclusion

The topic of poses and how they emphasize female sexuality in certain ways almost inevitably leads from the action of the body to the body itself. That is, the idea of “defaults” and “templates” can also encompass specific body types, and even a cursory glance at superhero comics shows that certain proportions on women are far more prominent than others. To address the issues of “body” and “body image” would make for an entire essay (or several) in and of itself, so I won’t touch on it except to acknowledge it, and to state that, like the brokeback for poses, the “big-breasted porn star” look isn’t inherently valueless, but it can be abused. Instead, the real problem lies not in the porn poses or the porn star bodies in and of themselves, but in their sheer ubiquity, as the singular image of sexuality that they create winds up narrowing the overall perception of beauty and idealization in comics. However, by broadening the approach to sexualization and showing that different forms of “erotic” exist, it is possible for even female characters with extremely similar bodies to show a greater degree of variety as characters, and can help to expand the number of ways a woman’s sexuality can be portrayed.

Peter Parker, Make a Contract with Me

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Have you read Spotted Flower? It’s a comedy manga by Genshiken creator Kio Shimoku, about an otaku and his pregnant wife. Actually, the premise isn’t that important for this post, other than to say that it made me realize something recently.

Let’s look at this page from Chapter 4:

Pretty funny and bizarre moment. But let’s modify it a bit.

Basically, thanks to Spotted Flower, I realize now that all of the girls’ names inMadoka Magica are unconventional in that they’re actually two first names strung together, a convention that I primarily associate with American superhero comics.

That’s all, really. Maybe I’ll actually talk about Spotted Flower some other time.

Meal, On-hand-to Eat: Strike Witches Rations

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I like food, and I like shameless advertising involving food, but it’s often hard for the two to make sense. Sure, there was the Saki Tacos promo, but rarely do the components of edible promotion actually line up so well, instead usually involving some logos or stickers slapped onto the wrapping of a biscuit. Luckily, we now have Strike Witches rations, so that you can simulate the feel of being a teenage girl with propellers strapped to your feet fighting a war.

Japanese blog “Kyou no Gogo kara Honki Dasu” has a photo review of the product, which appears to come with “biscuit bars” and some kind of jelly to go with it. According to the reviewer, the biscuits are absurdly sweet, though I don’t know by what criteria he’s judging it (American candy tends to be sweeter than Japanese desserts for instance).

I’ll be honest, unlike Saki I don’t really know much about Strike Witches. I’ve only seen two episodes, but even so, I still feel compelled to buy this product, if only because it really exists.

“Smile Precure!” Transformations Are Widescreen as Hell

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Smile Precure! began this month, and it’s bringing back the five-man team back to the Precure franchise. Incidentally, Yes! Precure 5 was also the first Precure to use a widescreen perspective, and when you compare Smile to Yes 5 and its other widescreen predecessors, Smile’s transformation scenes really stand out in terms of how they utilize screen space, particularly with the individual transformations.

Let’s take a look at the old ones first.


Cure Dream, Yes! Pretty Cure 5


Cure Dream, Yes! Pretty Cure 5 Go Go


Cure Peach, Fresh Pretty Cure


Cure Blossom, Heartcatch Precure!


Cure Melody, Suite Precure

Now here’s Smile Precure!‘s heroine, Cure Happy.

Cure Happy’s pose fills the screen in a way that I very rarely see in any sort of transformation sequence, whether it’s Precure, mahou shoujo, anime in general, or even live-action tokusatsu. Happy is not only shot closer, but her body is also slightly angled with both her arms and her hair spread out wide. This makes it so that her body is contact with all four sides of the screen while also occupying the majority of the space in between.

Then we have Cure Sunny, who doesn’t take up quite as much space as Happy does, but still has a body which cuts the shot in half diagonally almost perfectly, again emphasizing the length of the screen.

Granted, not all of the transformation poses in Smile Precure! are done in this manner, as can be seen by Cure Peace above. But whereas the previous series in the franchise stuck to the single figure in the middle of the screen as almost a rule of thumb, the large amounts of empty space on either side of her becomes more of an individual character flourish, and is perhaps even an indicator of her personality. Though I’m not 100% on this, I get the feeling that leaving that much space around Peace has the effect of emphasizing her clumsy, crybaby personality. In contrast, Happy’s personality is the kind that can fill an entire room just as her image fills the screen during her pose.

I actually think there’s a practical reason for this change, and that is the fact that Japan is finally going to switch over (almost) entirely to digital TV in about a month. Older series had to take into account a large amount of people with analog signal TVs, whereas now they can rightfully assume that most of their viewers will be watching in widescreen.

The Adventures of Tsunacon 2012 ~New Wings~

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This year was my second time at the Dutch anime convention known as Tsunacon. As a one-day event I won’t have a ton of things to say about it, but there were some significant differences this year, not least of which is the move from the town of Sliedrecht over to the more well-known city of Rotterdam to make room for the ever-growing con attendance numbers.

Naturally, the first difference was transportation. Whereas last year required me to transfer to a rather small and adorable train, Rotterdam is one of the largest cities in the country and so took only one train to get there (getting back was a different story, but more on that later). This also means that for other people living around the country, there is a far likelier chance that the trains will be relatively more convenient for them as well. But unlike in Sliedrecht where it took only a short walk from the station to the convention, going to the new location required an additional bus or tram. Well, you could still walk but it would probably take you over an hour, and if you’re like me and European cities and streets confuse you, then it would take you about twice that amount. The trams and buses are both very close to the train station though, so it isn’t really a hassle.

The actual site of the convention this year was the Social Sciences building of Erasmus University, and it was, as promised, significantly larger than the old place. With three floors available as opposed to just one, and a significant amount of space per floor, it seemed just the right size for the convention, providing enough room for people to move around, but not being so spacious as to dwarf the crowd and make the place seem barren. Cosplayers were naturally everywhere, and as is common here, the dealer’s room is combined with the artists’ alley, with dealers and artists all mixed together. Overall, the university was lacking some of the charm of the old location in terms of its coziness and warmth, but I think it was a fair (and of course necessary) trade.

One major difference with the new location was the way in which food was handled. The spot in Sliedrecht was something of a fitness and recreation center, so it had both a small bar in the main area, as well as a bar with seats where karaoke had taken place. One of the most vivid memories for me at my first Dutch con was seeing a fairly large crowd chowing down on cup noodles like they were the best thing ever made (a claim that is supported to some extent by the fact that it has its own museum). This year however, cup noodles were practically a thing of the past, as Tsunacon saw it fit to serve actual bentou and bowls of ramen straight out of Naruto (with signs saying “Ichikaru Ramen” hanging above the serving area). Though the lack of a bar limited the food options (no bitterballen or Japanese beer as far as I could tell), this did not seem to bother the patrons at all, because the line was gigantic.

Even though I passed by the line repeatedly over the course of many hours, not once did the line ever die down, as if the people’s desire for ramen was insatiable. Honestly, I can relate, because unless you live in Den Haag, Rotterdam, or Amstelveen, it can be quite difficult to get a half-decent bowl of Asian noodle soup in the Netherlands, whether it’s ramen, wonton noodles, or pho. I know it’s a hunger that never fully dies down, and maybe on a different day I would have joined them.

There’s some obvious advice for you: serve Japanese food at an anime convention and you’re sure to be a smash hit. Think Pocky is the talk of the town? Why not hit them with some udon?

The larger space also allowed for something new this year: panels. Whereas last year the closest thing you could get to a panel was a cosplay/AMV competiton or an arts and crafts workshop or two, Tsunacon dedicated a room to the endeavor. Seeing as the panels were in Dutch, I couldn’t exactly get the most of them, but I did attend the one panel I could actually follow along with: Name that Anime. Divided into categories such as “openings,” “action scenes,” and “traps” (yes, that kind of trap), the panelists showed footage from a large variety of anime. As far as I could tell, most of the anime were from the last decade or so, with a sprinkling of Ghibli as the primary representation of anime 20 years and older. As I wasn’t sure of the exact nature of the panel going into it, I didn’t participate for fear that my inability to speak or comprehend Dutch would hold me back, but I might try next year. Overall, the panel was 90 minutes, which might either be too much or not enough for this kind of “game show,” but it seemed like it was on a good track to improvement for next year.

The last thing I did at the con was go to the karaoke room, as anyone who knows me is aware of the fact that I enjoy singing anime songs even though I can’t sing. It’s also fun to see people really get into the songs they love, which ranged from Vocaloid tracks to the popular shounen titles to the English Pokemon theme, which seems to be universally popular among singing anime fans. I spoke about this last year, but the people responsible for karaoke at Dutch cons have an entire fancy system set up to mimic a proper set. With a monitor displaying words in-sync with the song, just about anyone can follow along if they know the basics of the song, something that not even Otakon has. As for myself, I recognized a lack of burning passion in people’s selections, so I went with the go-to song for both me and one Astro Toy columnist: Kanjite Knight. Though quite off-key, the crowd was still nice enough to applaud my endeavor.

When I look at the attendees at these conventions in the Netherlands, I get the feeling that, while tastes are largely similar between the US and Dutch fans, there seem to be some major differences as well. Most notably, One Piece seems to be more well-loved among the Dutch anime fans. Does anyone else get this impression? People sang One Piece songs at karaoke, One Piece merchandise seemed to be popular in the dealer’s room, and I even saw a Garp cosplayer, which is something I have never seen at an American con (though I may have just not been paying attention). How popular is Monkey D. Luffy and his merry band of pirates among Dutch otaku, anyway?

In any case, cosplay:


(To the cosplayers above who asked me to send you this photo, my apologies as I seem to have lost your card!)


The famous combo of Chii & Stocking

I would have stuck around longer, but by 4pm noticed that it had began to snow. As I have learned during my time here, snow + Dutch trains = not fun, and what was once a 30-minute trip turned into 2 hours. Obviously, that’s no fault of the convention itself, and in hindsight I can only imagine how much worse the delays would have been going to and from Sliedrecht. In spite of those troubles, it was overall a fun convention where people just enjoyed being anime fans.

More Powerful than Freeza and Aizen Put Together

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Manga and anime can be known for having some plot arcs that seem to go on forever.

Namek? Probably the most notorious long arc ever in anime and manga.

Soul Society? Hueco Mundo? Also pretty long.

But none of them are any match for Akagi‘s “Washizu Mahjong.”

For those of you who’ve never read the manga or watched its anime adaptation, Akagi is the story of a genius/psycho who risks his life in high-stakes games of mahjong, where his superior gambling ability, keen perception of the psychological, and his blatant disregard for his own life make him a legend from as young an age as 14. Eventually, he ends up playing an extremely wealthy and sadistic man named Washizu Iwao, pitting his own blood (literally) against Washizu’s vast fortunes. To top it all off, the game is played with 75% of the tiles transparent. Imagine playing Poker or Yu-Gi-Oh! with 75% of your hand showing at all times.

The anime devotes its entire second half to Washizu. That’s 13 episodes, or 1/4 of a year. When you look at the manga though, the Washizu arc began in 1997, and it still hasn’t concluded even to this day. That’s 15 years on the Same. Exact. Opponent.

While it’s easy to call this filler, it’s probably not so simple. One rumor I’ve heard is that Akagi is so popular that it’s the main reason the magazine it runs in (Kindai Mahjong, home to many, many other mahjong-related titles) is able to stay afloat.  Also, when your long arc is one and a half decades, it goes from being a stalling tactic to probably what the readers actually want.

Now what I find kind of amazing about this is that Akagi actually does quite a good job of keeping the Washizu mahjong interesting. It probably shouldn’t, but like Akagi and the magical sands of hell, it can reverse fortune in an instant. And I think the reason why it’s able to stay readable far longer than any single arc probably has any right to is that the manga can rely on the rules of mahjong (albeit modified with transparent tiles) to keep it grounded in some sense.

Bleach can come up with an ultra final bankai, and Yu-Gi-Oh! can make up cards on the spot with never-before-seen abilities. There’s no such thing as inventing new hands in mahjong. Akagi can play somewhat fast and loose with how the game turns out due to the luck factor (just like when Yugi pulls out the Black Magician at the right moment), but he can’t pull out something which doesn’t exist in the game of mahjong, otherwise it would ruin the integrity of it. Keep in mind though that this is the type of “integrity” where cheating is A-OK, as I think that also explains the appeal. Even in a never-ending game of mahjong, the thrill of Akagi the deceiver is still ripe.

Manga and Women in Refrigerators

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Introduction

If you were to ask an avid and informed fan of superhero comics about controversies surrounding the portrayal of women in the cape-and-mask genre, you might get answers having to do with the male gaze, or the number of female protagonists, or perhaps even whether or not comics need to do more to attract female readers. In every case though, the focus can potentially lead to the phenomenon known as “Women in Refrigerators.”

Coined in 1999 by comics writer Gail Simone (probably most famous for her work on Birds of Prey, a series starring a team of female superheroes), “Women in Refrigerators” refers to a tendency for female characters in superhero comics to be either killed, abused, raped, or depowered in what seems to frequently be a move to anger or inspire a male superhero into action, or to intensify the hatred between the hero and his nemesis. Named after the Green Lantern character Kyle Rayner depicted above (who not only literally finds one of his girlfriends in a fridge but has also lost a number of significant others in his career), WiR has been an on-going discussion among comic fans for the past 12 years. In spite of the age and scope of the topic though, the conversation has not really penetrated the realm of anime and manga.

Given arguments over things like moe and lolicon and how Japanese society treats women, what of “Women in Refrigerators in Manga?” Furthermore, whether they’re informed or ignorant, with the number of people who have spoken or written about WiR in the superhero comics community, what would happen if they all focused their attention more towards manga?

Casca from Berserk, a strong female character horribly traumatized by brutal rape

When initially thinking about the topic, a number of questions came to mind. Would they look at manga and find it to be more sexist than superhero comics? Is the lack of a similar phrase or concept in manga a potential problem for it and any movements towards improving manga? However, I soon realized that WiR and its surrounding discourse are very much shaped by the superhero genre itself; evidence of this includes the whole idea of being “depowered,” something which holds a lot more weight in a setting where super powers are the x-factor in the story.

Of course, comparing one genre to the entirety of manga makes things quite unfair, but even when you narrow it down to, say, shounen fighting and action series, or even a single magazine such as Shounen Jump, the setup of superhero comics has particularly unique consequences.

Conceptual Paradox in the Superhero Genre

The basic superhero (of which Superman is probably the most well-known example) is someone who is somehow stronger, faster, and overall better than the average human, and this allows them to right wrongs. Where the regular authorities falter, the superhero-as-vigilante can come in and thrash the bad guys and make the world a better place. These settings rely on an environment fairly close to our own, one grounded in a similar default reality so that we can compare the ideal of the superhero to the everyday, but it also makes for a world that can start to unravel if the concept is pushed too far.

Adding a superhero to an otherwise normal world can transform it entirely, and when you begin to really question the effects a particular superhero can have on his environment,  you wind up with questions like “If Mr. Fantastic is so smart, why hasn’t he found a cure for cancer?” While there are comics which do explore in detail the influence superheroes can have on society (Watchmen, for instance), and the Mr. Fantastic question isn’t some magic contradiction that destroys the superhero genre, it does point to the idea that a typical superhero story has to set its boundaries if it doesn’t want such questions jumping out at its readers.

The idea of boundaries isn’t limited to superheroes, as just about any story which adds something “superhuman” while wishing to maintain a semblance of normalcy has to draw the line somewhere. The tricky thing with superhero comics, however, is that the manner in which they have developed over the years encourages readers to find those limits through the prominent usage of a shared universe. When a comic is just about Batman, you can see how he fights crime and strikes fear into the seedy underbelly of Gotham City. When you cross him over with Superman though, suddenly Batman is put in contrast with a near-omnipotent alien who can outclass him fifty different ways. The reason to join them together is not to just make Batman look bad but rather to afford both heroes sufficient respect, so it requires Batman to have something extra to make up for it.

Where once he could just be a clever and ingenious individual, Batman is now the smartest man on Earth, armed with the most complex contingency plans ever conceived by man, all to make him Superman’s equal. In manga terms, this would be the equivalent of putting Monkey D. Luffy and Son Goku in the same universe and having to find a way for Luffy to be as powerful and influential as the Dragon Ball protagonist, like saying that Luffy’s rubber body makes him more resistant to ki blasts or something. As Marvel and DC actively promote their shared universes, this type of comparison becomes almost inevitable, and when you’re comparing, then the superhero universe comes under at least a certain degree of scrutiny.

If you then add the on-going saga aspect that is “continuity” to that mix, then the world of the hero can be scrutinized not just in terms of space, but also time. Superhero comics encourage a long-term view of its characters, where the events build on top of each other to create a loose history. And given the longevity that some of these characters possess, an action 30 years ago can continue to be associated with that character. In a comic from 1981, Avengers character Hank Pym hit his wife Janet , and it became a recurring topic all the way up until she died a few years ago. If they were to just ignore it and have the two characters act like nothing had ever happened, then it would have been perhaps silently condoning spousal abuse. However, because they kept it, it wound up defining the characters in certain respects. Although one can argue that this enriched their characters, it also meant that once it was done, neither of them could return to what they were prior to it. And while things are re-written or counteracted on a somewhat regular basis in superhero comics, this shared universe setup means that just one bad decision by one creator can potentially define a character to the point that no amount of reboots or retcons can undo its influence.

One Woman, One Refrigerator, One Universe

Let’s go back to manga for a little bit and pick a title that most definitely has female characters that are WiR candidates: Fist of the North Star. Now I love this series and consider it among my all-time favorites, but its female characters range from essentially cheerleaders to useless. Going in the style of the original Women in Refrigerators post, I’m going to list them with a list of ways they’ve been “fridged.”

Yuria (above) abused, forced to become Shin’s lover, kills herself (not really), contracts a fatal illness from long-term radiation exposure

Mamiya turned into a sex slave, her lover Rei dies, stops fighting entirely

Lin almost forced to have Kaioh’s baby, brainwashed into falling in love with another man

And so on and so forth.

Women are kind of a non-factor in Fist of the North Star no matter what they say about love and no matter how many women nobly sacrifice themselves. But at the same time, the fact that Fist of the North Star ran in Shounen Jump doesn’t mean that its portrayal of women exists in the same environment as One Piece or Toriko or City Hunter. Misogyny can exist, and it can even exist in multiple titles from the same publisher in the same magazine to the extent that you could call the whole thing sexist, but there is less of a risk of the comics congealing into an entrenched, constantly self-reinforcing “super misogyny.”

With superhero comics and their long continuity and shared universes, it can be incredibly easy to permanently “poison the well.” In this environment, a single instance of a WiR does not stand alone in its own conceptual space, but ends up existing in a greater universe, and then stays there in the timeline potentially forever. While this is not inherently a bad thing, it means that more innocent and simplistic stories and concepts have a harder time maintaining that innocence. If someone said The Cat in the Hat and Schindler’s List occupied the same continuity, it would be very hard for Dr. Seuss’s characters to be quite the same when the idea of genocide hangs over them.

This can even apply to the degree to which women are sexualized in comics. Somewhat like how “Hollywood Ugly” requires you to believe that the attractive celebrity in baggy clothes and glasses is meant to be homely, if you take a title where the aesthetic portrayal of women is geared primarily towards the sexual gratification of men and put it in the same world as a comic where the attractiveness of women is depicted in a more neutral fashion, then there is bound to be a conceptual clash, especially if the two were to cross over directly. Either the overt “butt and breasts out” poses would have to be acknowledged directly with respect to how a woman would normally pose herself (accounting of course for stylistic flourish), or the more neutral design would have to be subsumed by the overtly erotic aesthetic. If respect is supposedly afforded to both portrayals, then there winds up being a compromise, much like Superman and Batman’s situation, that generates at least a certain degree of schizophrenia.

It can also be easy to poison the well of a shared universe because once that idea takes root in one corner of the world, it becomes easier for it to spread to other parts as well, and I think this is what ends up really shaping Women in Refrigerators in terms of the superhero genre. While I may be assuming things too much, I think it’s far easier to corrupt an innocent idea than it is to make a corrupted idea turn innocent, and so every time another woman gets killed or raped or depowered, it means less and less of a chance for that whole thing to be turned around entirely, which means the rate at which the universe becomes “darker” winds up being far faster than the rate at which it becomes “lighter,” unless deliberate steps are taken to work against it.

Given everything I’ve said about the danger of a shared universe, does this mean that any sort of shared universe will lead to similar problems? Not necessarily, but I think that regardless of which direction that universe goes, compromise is almost inevitable. When Neon Genesis Evangelion with its emphasis on psychological turmoil enters the crossover environment of the Super Robot Wars games, its story and characters end up less traumatized overall. When Lupin III meets Detective Conan, his role is more of a lovable scamp than a hardened thief. Even taking darker series and making them lighter to fit in another work is a form of compromise. However, neither of those bother to maintain their continuities for prolonged periods. Moreover, while a shared universe does not guarantee Women in Refrigerators, the way that superhero comics have turned out means that it is constantly poised to do so, and as far as I can tell, the discussion surrounding WiR is very much about a concerted effort to turn things around, to deal with what may very well be a case of inertia.

Towards Methods for Manga?

A quote from Gail Simone in 1999 clarifies one of the original purposes of Women in Refrigerators:

My simple point has always been: if you demolish most of the characters girls like, then girls won’t read comics. That’s it!

This is not as much of a problem for manga, even titles and magazines designed for boys, as many publishers in Japan have learned ways to court a female audience. Some titles in Shounen Jump are especially known for their sizable female readerships: Saint Seiya, Katekyou Hitman REBORN!, and The Prince of Tennis, to name a few. Granted, most of these titles have primarily male casts and so the portrayal of female characters is not the primary draw, but that is also getting into another more complex issue of gender-based character identification. I’ll leave this as something of an aside for the sake of not going too off-course, but will say that this might mean that it doesn’t take outstanding portrayals of women to attract a female audience, but at the very least ones that won’t make them feel uncomfortable to be women.

As it is, the “Women in Refrigerators” discourse is especially suited for the superhero genre. Its concerns and the manner in which it can quickly spread to other stories are at least partly predicated on the structure set out by decades of development. If WiR is to be applied to manga, or even a certain genre or magazine/publisher, then it likely needs to be modified to fit a very different history, both in terms of manga itself and the Japanese culture surrounding it. Personally, I’m not entirely sure what changes need to be made. It’s probably an endeavor that is too big for one post, but I can throw out some possible directions.

I think the killing, rape, and abuse aspects probably translate adequately as is, but to go back to the “depowered” aspect of WiR as something very particular to superheroes, perhaps it would be a good idea to find something that is not quite so specific. If we’re dealing with a genre like shounen action, your Dragon Ball‘s and Naruto‘s and such, then maybe it’s not so much a matter of depowering as it is being quickly outclassed or made irrelevant. A lot of characters in these works often get some kind of improvement to their abilities, but that is made obsolete by the fact that every other hero gets stronger at a quicker rate. While this is not exclusive to female characters, it may be something worth tracking among female characters to see how they’re made to be functionally useless.

If we’re looking more at sexually-charged (but not necessarily pornographic) titles, maybe it would be wise to keep an eye out for degradation or humiliation. For example, how often are characters made to do something or wear an outfit that not only embarrasses them, but sexualizes them in the process? What of humiliation as a sexual tool, even when it’s meant to be light-hearted prodding and not something more extreme like torture?

Maybe it would also be a good idea to take a look at one popular title and to note where the female characters are mistreated solely to advance the male characters’ stories. After that is done, the next step would be to look at works that may have come about as the result of its popularity, whether it was because there was a clear influence, there was a blatant attempt at riding the wave, it was the next title readers flocked to, or even if there was some kind of editorial mandate to feature more of those stories. Do some of those WiR-esque ideas and portrayals still exist? Are they getting weaker or stronger? This may be a way to track things across one magazine or one genre without having the shared universe of superhero comics.

Of course, this is all assumes that WiR is not an issue when the female readership has been established and sustained sufficiently, but what about the possibility that the phenomenon not only exists in shoujo and josei, but that such events might occur in greater numbers compared to manga geared towards male readers?

What I’ve provided in the ideas above would not comprise a complete framework, but then again neither did the original list of Women in Refrigerators. There is a distinct possibility that with each genre of manga, even if you were to narrow it to titles somehow similar to superhero comics, that it would require its own adjustments be they subtle or broad. It may even be the case that in the end, we find out that WiR cannot be applied to manga no matter how many modifications are made, but I think it would still be a worthwhile endeavor to figure that out in the first place. I’m sure we’d learn something along the way.

The Fujoshi Files 36: Hina

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Name: Hina (ひな)
Alias: N/A
Relationship Status: Single
Origin: Tonari no 801-chan

Information:
Hina is a junior high school student and younger sister of 801-chan. Relatively inexperienced as an otaku, let alone a fujoshi, Hina often makes rookie mistakes such as shortsightedness when it comes to the history of things. She has even gone so far as to believe that Aslan from The Chronicles of Narnia had his name based on Athrun Zala from Gundam SEED. For this reason, Hina can often get on her older sister’s nerves.

More generally, Hina is at the perfect age to suffer from Chuunibyou, the delusional illness that comes from being a junior high student otaku and thinking that a number of things are fantastically cool and deep. Like her sister, she is fond of the Prince of Tennis, but has differing tastes otherwise.

Fujoshi Level:
Although one might suspect that her older sister’s influence is responsible for Hina becoming a fujoshi, this is not the case. Hina was able to reach that mindset entirely on her own, even while 801-chan was trying to hide that aspect of her own life.

The New and Improved Fate/Zero Opening

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Though they got a little confused about past and future.