Category Archives: anime

Watchmen is/isn’t Watchmen Enough

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In discussing the Watchmen movie, I  feel that I should first describe my own personal situation with Watchmen, as I’ve seen how a person’s level of exposure to the original comic can really color the way a person sees the movie. I read the comic once a year or two ago, and enjoyed it, but never really re-read it or looked at it again between then and the time I saw the Watchmen movie. So I am familiar with the story, and the characters, and I know how it all goes down, but particulars and small details and possibly even visual cues are things I don’t remember particularly well.

The strongest impressions I had of Watchmen were its pacing and its visual style. For the pacing, I noticed somewhere in the middle of watching that it did not feel like it had a typical three-act movie structure.  Does this mean the movie had poor pacing, if it didn’t follow what movies are “supposed to do?” I’m not sure myself, but what it boils down to is that this is definitely the result of converting a comic book directly into a movie, instead of just converting the general theme as they did with Iron Man for example.

As for the visual style, 300 already established Zack Snyder as having a keen sense of action and the glorification of violence, though it’s debatable whether or not it was appropriate for Watchmen. Many I think wanted Watchmen to stick close to the visual style of the comic, which is this sort of ugly and dirty look where characters are all pathetic in their own way, but I don’t know how well the audience would have reacted to such. We’ve seen how viewers and critics react negatively to the very blatant anime-esque feel of Speed Racer, often seemingly not even noticing it was supposed to be like pages from a manga but with real people and bright colors. I personally think the violence was just a tad overdone, but the striking and brutal nature of the fights while perhaps overly stylish I think were good for establishing how the characters were, even if it was different from the comic.

I enjoyed Watchmen, though even now I can’t get a firm grasp on my feelings on it. It was at the very least not boring, and half the actors were fantastic, especially Billy Crudup with his serene  Doctor Manhattan voice, Patrick Wilson playing up the middle-aged and insecure Nite Owl, and Jackie Earle Haley as Rorshach who captured the character to a tee. No money was wasted in seeing this movie.

Ultimately, what I feel people’s views, including my own, boil down to in regards to the Watchmen is how do you adapt a work like Watchmen? It does not have an extensive history like Spider-Man or Batman from which you could cherry pick while keeping a basic sense of what makes them effective stories. Watchmen is just one book, and its strength lies in how every part comes together from the writing to the art to the characters and their motivations to the little bits here and there and everywhere. Something has to be lost in the transition to the big screen, and there will be endless debates as to whether the choices were right, especially as people themselves prioritize different parts of the comic. And then you have those who didn’t read the comic at all, and then the debates as to whether that makes for a “better” viewing experience or not, to not be chained by the original.

Adaptations are a funny thing going from any medium to the other, and it can be difficult to tell what is a “smart” change that will help unfamiliar people get into a story, or what will be a “stupid” change that is robbing the work of its core and dumbing it down. I’m sure the people working on Dragonball Evolution didn’t go in intentionally sabotaging it. They probably thought that the parts of the manga and anime they changed were changed for the better. Who wants to see a weak girl who can’t fight in Bulma? Give her guns! Who wants an ugly old man playing Shang Tsung the Turtle Hermit? No appeal!

The funny thing about the Watchmen movie is that you have people now complaining that a superhero movie stuck too close to the original source. Years ago, people would have dreamed of being able to have a misgiving like that. The fact that we now have a Hollywood that can produce honestly decent superhero movies on a somewhat regular basis is testament to true change.

Space Battles = Easier to Blend

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If any anime company is crazy enough to do what the Zeta Gundam movies did, and combine mid-1980s cel animation with mid-2000s digital animation, please take my advice when I say that it’ll be a hell of a lot less jarring if you transition when the image is fairly dark. In this case, when battles take place in space and everything is nice and black or dark shades of blue, it’s fine. When it’s not, well…

Without video I can’t show you exactly what I mean, but here are some screen shots.

KIND OF OK

NOT OK

So basically, Initial D might have an easier time pulling this off.

“Negative Portayal” of Men

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When it comes to women in entertainment such as movies, books, and of course anime, it will sometimes be said that a work contains a “negative portrayal” of women. The finger of accusation can be pointed at many things, from having women who are too demure and helpless to women who are all too sexually promiscuous (or not promiscuous enough in some cases, a reaction against the idolization if virginity) to women who some would say are just “men with tits.” The specifics and whether or not something truly is a negative portrayal doesn’t matter here so much as the fact that the concept exists.

But what about the other side? What about “negative portrayal” of men? Personally, it’s something I never hear about. Sure, there’s “Shinji is a whiny baby,” or “Keitarou is completely lacking in any real personality,” but rarely do I see “This yaoi is offensive to men,” or “This is not how a man should be portrayed.” Keeping in mind that I’m talking about multiple cultures though primarily the one I live in (America), is this simply a product of a male-dominated society, that no matter the portrayal of a guy it never really leads back to how he stands up to men in the real world? Even my own thinking makes it difficult for me to really bring up any examples, while it would be much easier to do so on topics of race or class. Could it be that when it comes to gender, only one side has some goal to reach with their portrayal in media while the other perhaps already crossed that finishing line millennia ago? Or are there actually negative portrayals of men in entertainment and that finding them is even more difficult due to the way in which we were brought up?

Incredible America: Genshiken and the Accidentally Accurate Portrayal of Americans

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In Volume 1 of Genshiken, Ohno’s character profile states that her favorite game is Samurai Spirits. “Well that makes perfect sense,” you might think, seeing as how Ohno lived in America for many years, and how that very game was released in the US under the name Samurai Sho-down, but a later comment in the Genshiken Official Book reveals something interesting. It turns out that Kio Shimoku had no idea whether or not Samurai Spirits was ever released in America, and most likely picked it for Ohno due to the game having multiple old/burly types such as Earthquake.

So what we have here is what seems to be a surprisingly decently researched aspect of the American video game/anime fandom from the 90s but instead is just a lucky coincidence. Of course, Ohno and her preferences aren’t the most “American” aspect of Genshiken. That title naturally belongs to her friends Angela and Sue. And when you look at Angela and Sue across their incarnations (anime, manga, drama cd), you get the feeling that Kio Shimoku and the staff of the anime ended up portraying American fangirls with surprising accuracy, but based on the Ohno-Samurai Spirits Revelation there is the very real possibility that this too was also one huge coincidence.

Much of the portrayal of Angela and Sue can boil down to “HAHA AMERICANS ARE SO MUCH MORE DIRECT THAN JAPANESE,” but there is a grain of truth to that, and I think the result is that this “fictional” portrayal is about as realistic as the portrayals of the actual Genshiken members. Sue may possess a knowledge of anime far beyond your typical female otaku, but keep in mind that her otakudom was fostered by a Japanese fujoshi, so it might not be surprising for her to reference, say, Saint Seiya. Sue’s got a fairly abrasive personality, a general lack of manners, and you often cannot tell if she’s being awkward or devilish. Her frequent and loud reciting of anime quotes in lieu of real Japanese is definitely a trait you can find in fangirls (though she eventually becomes comfortable enough with the language to actually start speaking it fluently, albeit with an accent).

Then there’s Angela, who loudly declares to Sasahara that she may in fact be bisexual, which Sasahara despite his limited English ability seems to get the jist of. It might be somewhat stereotypical to brand Angela as very open when it comes to sex and sexual relationships, i.e. very AMERICAN, but it’s not like this is unprecedented even if you ignore anime cons and the fact that they are places where sex occurs in less than small amounts. Not that I’m saying she’s a slut or anything, merely that she is possibly about as sexually experienced as Saki, maybe more. I can also totally see Angela attending an anime club in America and being the center of attention among male members, but maybe I’m reading too much into it. As an aside, I sometimes wish there would be a Genshiken AMERICA spinoff starring Angela and Sue and seeing the interactions between characters in that respect. Maybe this could be a fanfic or a fancomic, I don’t know.

Sue is either young-looking for her age or actually young (her age is never given, only loosely implied), and we already know that the anime fans are getting younger and younger, so this makes plenty of sense. Angela meanwhile has a dynamite figure which some might say isn’t terribly realistic for a nerd girl, but I speak from experience (no not that kind of experience) when I say that this is not an impossibility. There are geek girls who look that good. You might see them cosplaying.

Though I think what stands out to me most about Sue and Angela and their American-ness is a scene in the Drama CD “Road to Ikebukuro,” where together they recite the famous line that so many female anime fans in the US have tied to their very histories: “In the name of the moon, I’ll punish you!” Granted, it’s said in Japanese, but I know that plenty of Sailor Moon fans are familiar with the Japanese catch phrases. And Sailor Moon was popular in Japan too (Love Hina creator Akamatsu Ken mentions it as the inspiration for him getting into doujinshi), but that doesn’t take away from the fact that Sailor Moon is arguably one of the most significant shows in American fandom history.

And again, all of this could just be happy coincidence! Kio Shimoku could have simply said, “I have no idea what American anime fans are really like so I’ll just make them however.” Which is to say, Kio Shimoku is a frightening man.

Why I Like Ogiue, Part 6: The Fight Continues

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As I mentioned in a previous post, I’ve decided to help Ogiue through a contest on the Megatokyo Forums. Below is my post in support of her in this second round. It is also a reply to some comments that Genshiken females are wish fulfillment character.

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Ogiue strives forward. I am here to help her along.

I have no particular fondness for tsundere, or fujoshi, blunt characters, or any other basic, isolated aspects of Ogiue aside from her striking eyes. I did not have a checklist which Ogiue managed to fulfill the majority of. What happened instead was that Genshiken presented a character who was so rich and full of personality and hang-ups and smiles and tears with such weight in her actions and words that she became my favorite. It is because of Ogiue that I like her qualities, and not the other way around.

The vital difference between the wish fulfillment aspect of a Genshiken female and that of many other anime girls is that they don’t fall neatly into the viewers wishes. Instead, what they do is that they convince YOU that how they are what you want, exactly the way they are.

It’s like having your attraction to someone grow over time. At first they look okay, but over time as you get to know them and their personality better, they start looking more and more beautiful until you can’t help but smile while thinking of them. Your emotions affect how you view that person. This is what happens with Ogiue. The more you get to know her the more beautiful she becomes.

Vote for beauty that comes from the heart. Vote for beauty that comes from being all-too-human. Vote for Ogiue.

The Potential Return of Anime Clubs

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Note: I had published this on Sunday the 8th but it apparently did not go through. I am dating it as such.

We’ve got a suffering economy that’s impacting the anime industry and its viewers in a number of ways. People have less disposable income. Anime dvd sales have been declining on top of fewer people buying dvds in general. Some internet providers are limiting bandwidth while others have plans to do so in the near future. This affects not only torrent downloads but also streaming sites such as Crunchyroll and Youtube, especially as the quality of  video streaming gets better and better. This even affects simple file transfers over instant messenger programs. This can force anime fans to explore other methods of exchanging anime, such as good ol’ “actually walking up to someone and giving it to them.” Be it downloaded anime stored on an external hard drive or usb drive, or purchased legitimate dvds or even high-quality streamed episodes, people will have a reason to gather in order to minimize bandwidth and money usage.

At this point, you wouldn’t really call these gatherings “anime clubs,” as it’d just be a bunch of friends who already know each other, but isn’t that pretty much the way clubs start off? The major difference would be that while there might be a disparity in amount of anime possessed by a single person, it wouldn’t be the case where one person has all the power, especially when it comes to downloadable anime. Exchanging files (and let’s not forget you can officially download some shows now for a nominal fee so “files” is not inherently an illegal word) would be like trading tapes or having vcr parties, only much much faster. In time, maybe people will want to watch it together or talk about the shows they’re trading.

Nothing like necessity to force nerds who might normally curl into a ball to go out there and talk to people to get some more of that precious anime stuff. Not saying this is a guaranteed chain of events, but I feel like there’s a decent possibility this might happen.

Riding Forward

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7 episodes in, Rideback has so far been a very enjoyable experience. There’s many reasons for this, but I want to talk about one in particular: unpredictability. As someone who has not read the manga (and is not planning to in the near future), I have very little idea about where the story is headed, and that’s a quality I admire a lot.

I think it has to do with how difficult it is to peg Rideback in any sort of genre. It has a lot of elements people might associate with anime, associations that can be both positive and negative, but it never feels bound by them. Is it a political story? Is it about a girl’s new lease on life? Is it about the use of robot-like machinery in war and in daily life? It’s all of this and none of this, and the result is that I am unable to get a feel for what will happen to Ogata Rin.

The story is not entirely unpredictable. I do not expect them to break Rin’s legs, for example, as they put so much effort into showing her talents. However, everything else is up in the air, doing a grand jeté.

Sunday vs Magazine, or WAKE UP ATTACK, JOOOEEEEEE!

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A while back we heard news from the land of the rising run that the Jump Stars series of fighting games was getting a rival. Not only would it be comprised of heroes from manga serials that are decidedly not Shounen Jump, but they would even appear on the Nintendo DS’s rival handheld gaming device, the PSP. Well now the trailer’s been released, and I don’t think I gotta say this but I will anyway: Game looks DYNAMITE ON FIRE.

So here we have Sunday vs Magazine Shuuketsu! Choujou Daikessen! or roughly, The Sunday vs Magazine Gathering! The Greatest Ultimate Battle, and it looks to be a very different fighting game from Jump Ultimate Stars. It uses 3d graphics, seems to be more of a traditional 1-on-1 fighter, and of course the roster is way different.

Yeah they announced some characters a while back, and most of them are really awesome, particularly Ippo and Mechazawa, but then they started pulling out the big guns: Yabuki Joe! Devilman! Tiger Mask! CYBORG 009! This game means serious business, and is reaching hard and deep to fulfill its destiny.

There’s definitely going to be hidden characters, mark my word. There’s no way a game as big as this would forget everyone’s favorite age-regressed bowtie-wearing detective.

I’ve talked about how important it is for a crossover to FEEL like a crossover even if a person has never heard of most or any of the properties involved, and this trailer pulls it off with astounding success. Who would not be stoked, really? And even if you hate a character, then here’s your opportunity to Cross Counter their face in!

Hey Ladies, Check Me Out I’m the Pitcher

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So ladies who read Ogiue Maniax, I have a question for you: Has the One Outs opening worked on any of you or any girls you know?

So we have this show whose full title is One Outs – Nobody wins, but I! It is, to sum it up, “Akagi + Baseball.” And it’s a rad show full of tests of will and strategy with an indomitable central character. It’s the kind of show made for guys.

But try to convince someone to watch the show based on the opening, and some people, generally the kind that are weak to the girlier aspects of anime, are likely to shy away. A similar thing happens with Ouran High School Host Club.

Clearly the opening to One Outs – Nobody wins, but I! (it entertains me to use the full title) is some kind of girl or fujoshi eye candy designed to draw them into watching a show they might normally avoid.

So once again I ask, any girls who’ve been taken in by Tokuchi Toua’s smooth abs and beady eyes?

Dragon Ball Kai and the “Sacred Original”

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Dragon Ball Kai, if you haven’t heard, is the newly redone, newly voiced, high-definition re-airing of the Dragon Ball Z anime starting April 5, 2009. And this time, according to Toei, they’re going to cut out the filler to make it more like the original manga.

There’s a certain level of importance placed on the “original” in anime, manga, and of course art and entertainment in general. Walter Benjamin’s “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” discussed the changes mass production could influence upon art and the concept and authenticity of an “original.”Star Wars is already a massed-produced work, but fans cry foul whenever George Lucas decides to revise the original trilogy, whether it’s deciding who shot who first, who appears in the sky as a ghost, or whether the Death Star should meet its end with many tiny explosions or one giant shock wave. Fans will argue that the plastic, rubbery look and the decisions made then, seen perhaps as weaknesses by some, are actually strengths of the movie. Originals, for better or worse, are often considered to be “sacred.” But what does one consider the “original?”

I bet a lot of people are fine with editing down Dragon Ball Z to remove a lot of the filler which bogged down the pacing of the series, and I am among them. In one sense, it is not the “original” because there’s a manga to base it on, a vision of what should have been. But what if Dragon Ball Kai was not a revision of Dragon Ball Z but the entire original manga retraced and made to look better than ever with “unnecessary filler” cut out? We know that Toriyama originally wanted to end the series at multiple junctures: the defeat of Piccolo, Jr. at the Tenkaichi Budokai; the death of Freeza; the death of Cell. Is the original his intended plan which never was carried out due to Shounen Jump editors wanting to keep making money hand over fist? If so, then surely the manga would have a huge chunk of its content cut out.

Now I’m not arguing against the concept of Dragon Ball Kai and its desire to tighten up the anime and remove the excess. I’ve established myself as being in support of the idea. However, when you sit down and try to consider what the “original” could be, it opens up a whole can of worms.

Today’s homework assignment is that I want you to think over the following two things. First, is the idea that the original creator(s) may not necessarily know what’s best for his own story, and that external factors which seem like limitations may sometimes produce better results (see First Gundam). Second, is taking the concept of “cutting out the boring and unncessary” parts and comparing it to dubbing practices of the 80s and 90s.

Have fun, though. That’s what’s most important.