Is Anime Healthy?

[michael87cn]

For me the appeal of anime is that it can tell stories that live action never can (or will).

The visuals, too, are usually out of this world different, and that makes them interesting to me.

Healthy? Unhealthy? How could it be unhealthy? I suppose, maybe, if you forced yourself to watch it for a very long time, without actually enjoying it, that could possibly be unhealthy. But... yeah? That doesn't happen imo.

 

[mjharper]

thanks toonami!!! New anime fans will never really understand the artform, because it is next to impossible for people to truly learn about the medium without making some pretty outrageous assumptions.

I'm so glad I discovered Japanese anime during the 80s and 90s. The Networks show shows from one genre and people assume that ALL anime shows/movies/OVAs is like this ONE show from this ONE genre. Fucking outrageous!!!

To be fair, a lot of the imported anime of the 80's was also responsible for a generation's assumptions about anime.

I'd rather have people assuming I watch drawn out spectacle fights than, um, tentacle monsters

 

[Julius Terrell]

thanks toonami!!! New anime fans will never really understand the artform, because it is next to impossible for people to truly learn about the medium without making some pretty outrageous assumptions.

I'm so glad I discovered Japanese anime during the 80s and 90s. The Networks show shows from one genre and people assume that ALL anime shows/movies/OVAs is like this ONE show from this ONE genre. Fucking outrageous!!!

To be fair, a lot of the imported anime of the 80's was also responsible for a generation's assumptions about anime.

I'd rather have people assuming I watch drawn out spectacle fights than, um, tentacle monsters

Hey! Someone has got to defend Urostukidoji: Legend of the Overfiend and La Blue girl. I'll take up that crusade!!

 

[mjharper]

I'd be inclined to also bring up the excellent romance anime/manga Nana, but the fact that it was never finished makes me reluctant.

Well, the manga is unfinished as well... I haven't yet watched beyon the end of the third box set because of a certain even and wanting to slap a certain person; but it's definitely a good show

Of course as people said, shorter stuff works too. A lot of more adult oriented anime can be very tasteful (there's too many shows that overuse gore at a ridiculous level to try and feign maturity), look at the low-key but fascinating Mushi-Shi. A tough anime to watch for some because of it's slow pace and episodic format, but every episode is a really fantastic story ranging from happy ones to heart breaking. It's the kind of anime you can watch without feeling like a manchild and still stays tasteful. Also look at Planetes, a sci-fi story about garbage men in space. It has a fantastic cast of characters you're grow to love in an really cool setting (space).

Completely agree on this as well.

 

[mjharper]

thanks toonami!!! New anime fans will never really understand the artform, because it is next to impossible for people to truly learn about the medium without making some pretty outrageous assumptions.

I'm so glad I discovered Japanese anime during the 80s and 90s. The Networks show shows from one genre and people assume that ALL anime shows/movies/OVAs is like this ONE show from this ONE genre. Fucking outrageous!!!

To be fair, a lot of the imported anime of the 80's was also responsible for a generation's assumptions about anime.

I'd rather have people assuming I watch drawn out spectacle fights than, um, tentacle monsters

Hey! Someone has got to defend Urostukidoji: Legend of the Overfiend and La Blue girl. I'll take up that crusade!!

Ooh, this should be fun

Even just a few years ago, my gf assumed this was all anime was about. So we watched Haibane Renmei, Kino's Journey, Tokyo Godfathers, and some Miyazaki. She still doesn't like anime, but at least she no longer thinks I might be into THAT stuff

 

[Mr.Savage]

As others have said, most of the stuff you've been watching is just...It's positively drivel (In my opinion, of course). Yu-Gi-Oh, Pokemon, and shows like it are literally just 20 minute commercials. The show was made for the sole purpose of selling a separate product, with telling a meaningful story being an afterthought. They're essentially Japan's version of G.I.Joe.

By openly asking for recommendations, you'll be getting them up the ying-yang like crazy, probably overwhelming you with choices. And I'm not going to help with that, in fact, I'm gonna make it worse.

Animes that I think are worth watching:

Black Lagoon

Already been recommended by most here, but I must repeat it. This is an excellent show, and I highly recommend watching the first couple episodes. Get the English dub if you can, it was really well done.



Spice & Wolf

A very obscure show, that is done in almost a western fashion. No inappropriate goofy-ness, no fan service, just an incredibly interesting story, with very realistic characters. Also has a stunningly good dub.

Now, on to the premise. It's about a traveling merchant in a medieval world, who encounters a strange girl. With smatterings of medieval economics, action, and the best romance I've ever seen in any medium EVER. I of course recommend it fully. It has a slowish start, so give it at least until episode 3 before you give your final opinion.

First episode, if you're intrigued:

Spoiler

Steamboy

Anime movie made with incredible production value, about a boy inventor in a steampunk world. Excellent movie, and it even has Patrick Stewart in the english dub!

Trailer, if you're interested:

Spoiler

Sword Art Online

Pretty decent anime with a romance tone...Just don't watch the second season, and pretend it ended with the first one.

Attack on Titan

Also a decent show, but it does have some filler episodes.


So...Yeah, diversify your anime viewing habits.

Also, you say you've seen the bebop movie, have you seen the TV series as well?

 

[Richard Dubbeld]

Seems like your beef is mostly with long running anime shows, which makes sense, because they suck.

Other than that, many animes centered around relationships, for instance, are no different from soap operas. Just shallow 'will they, won't they' story lines that keep getting rehashed.

Yeah on-going anime is often no better than soaps with action.

Usually anime that is around 50-60 episodes long or anime that is OVA only are the best.

Examples: FMA Brotherhood and Wolfs Rain.... oh the ACTUAL feels.

And anything by Hayao Miyazaki.

 

[Richard Dubbeld]

YuGiOh Abridged is amazing, the source material is the perfect target for parody and LittleKuriboh is the best in the Abridging business.

 

[Richard Dubbeld]

Try easing into anime with shorter series like Cowboy Bebop and Trigun (Both under 30 episodes + each have a movie). Full Metal Alchemist/FMA:Brotherhood are longer, but still really good. If you're sick of Naruto, try giving Soul Eater a watch. The character Black Star is basically Naruto in terms of personality, but the other character take the piss out of his obnoxious attitude at every opportunity.

Couldn't agree more on all fronts.

 

[Arcanist]

The best anime shows are generally 26 episodes in length. That's the magic number really. The limit is 40 to 50 episodes - anything after that tends to be crap by default.

Normally, I'd agree, but there are a few standouts that break that rule pretty hard - namely Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood, which runs at 64 episodes and is one of the best bits of animation to come out of Japan in the last few years.

 

[infohippie]

There are some excellent suggestions in this thread for OP to try out (I'm particularly pleased to see he is enjoying Madoka Magica), and I have a few suggestions that nobody has touched on yet. Girls und Panzer has an odd premise, but plays it straight, Clannad (and After Story) is excellent if you want something that will stomp you right in the feels, and Mushishi is another great series which follows a traveling shaman of a sort in his wanderings through late Edo/early Meiji Japan.

 

[Nieroshai]

Consider. The. Source.

Japanese social interaction is far different from Western social interaction, and certain focuses on story telling differ as well.

In Western story-telling, a 'fight' is usually just a means to resolve a plot conflict or introduce a new paradigm (i.e.: a character dies, a new weapon is revealed, etc.) in Japanese culture -which is heavily steeped in the practice and study of fighting (i.e.: Karate/Judo/Martial Arts)- the fight itself *is* part of the story. A character's mastery of his circumstances is defined by his mastery of technique.

In terms of social interaction: I remember having to present several reports and presentations to a Japanese audience and received no social cues whatsoever. No laughter, no frowning, just an occasional nod and a question or two. I wouldn't know what their honest feedback was until days later. For all I know it's completely normal in the Japanese culture to bottle up how you really feel about a person.

I've never been to Japan so I wouldn't know. But their entertainment bores me to tears. Over here, it's scandel that drives our love plots.

American Romance: Jon and Lilly know they like each other but Jon already has a girlfriend and Lilly has an over protective father who wouldn't let her date anyway. But then they kiss at a part and OH NO, that **** sara saw them. So she blackmails both of them in exchange for keeping her mouth shut by forcing them to do her homework and chores. But while Lilly is cleaning out sara's locker, she finds a letter from sara's doctor about a 'condition' that needs to be discussed immediately. Lilly confronts sara about it and threatens to expose sara unless she lets Jon and Lilly go free. Little does Lilly know, Sara has been using John for sexual favors and threatens to tell both Lilly and Jon's girlfriend that he slept with Sara unless Jon shuts Lilly up. So Jon bribes his older brother to 'scare' Lilly into submission but it turns into attempted rape! Jon feels horrible but can't admit he's involved to Lilly. Traumatized, Lilly has to find out who her attacker was and Jon's brother gets nervous when she starts closing in so he...!

Anime: Sakuri likes Nabayaki but is too shy to tell him...

Am I the only one who would find the example you gave for Western romance painful and hard to watch? Maybe it's just my background, but I can't possibly enjoy a story where I'm supposed to root for infidelity, or support a coward who can't at least dump his current girl before banging another behind his back. That and, if I was just indifferent of those things instead of abhorrent of them, that story just sounds boring. In context of Japanese culture, I don't wanna bore you with explanation but there is SO much more going on than what's simply on the surface when "Sakuri likes Nabayaki but is too shy to tell him." First tidbit though, in many ways Japan is STILL an extremely patriarchal culture in which a woman being forward is highly uncouth and women are expected to do what men tell them but not gratify themselves, even if--ahem--the activity at hand would accomplish both.

 

[lucky_sharm]

snip

Attack on Titan doesn't really have filler episodes but certain arcs are stretched out to compensate for time. The pacing is all over the place, but it's not something you notice when you're binging through the entire series.

Regardless, it's a must watch nonetheless. They are airing Attack on Titan May 3rd every Saturday. Here's the commercial for it:

 

[Therumancer]

I grew up watching anime. I remember my favorite show being Tenchi Muyo and having an affinity for sailor moon and outlaw star. Looking at beautiful people fall in love with other beautiful people while looking at the occasional beautiful transformation and beautiful fight scene was enough for me. I cried when Nephlite died in a sailor moon for me (He was my Edward). But, as I grew up, stories went from cute to tedious and, even as a child, I wondered why it took 3 seasons for a character to admit they liked or didn't like another character. As I grew and learned more about people and emotions, anime turned immature to me. Every social problem they had (which usually boiled down a girl liking a guy but not wanting to admit it so she treats him like shit and gets mad at him when another girl hugs him or kisses him or wants to be with him)) there was an obvious easy solution: for them to sit down and TALK for 5 minutes!

Seriously, the relationships in Anime seem so unhealthy. Naruto is freakin' scary. The girls are nuts and I can't sit through it. But it's not just these love stories (which they almost always have) but the filler. Ooohhh the filler. How the good guy makes a 5 minute speech about his super duper move but then the bad guy grins, counters his super duper move and then explains how he counters it for another five minutes. So, after thinking for ten minutes and relaying all of his thoughts to the audience, the good guy calls upon another super move that he didn't use originally for some reason and, although this hurts the bad guy, he dusts himself off, congratulates the good guy on his efforts, and then whips out yet ANOTHER super duper move and explains EXACTLY HOW IT WORKS!

"Oh no! What will our hero do? Find out next episode! Sike! Try three episodes from now!"

Fight scenes drag on and on until the hero digs deep down and unlocks a god power after discovering what true friendship/love/honor/family/bravery means and blows the bad guy away...for now (dun dun duuuun!).

By high school, I was over it, but it concerns me how Anime has such an adult following when seems so empty. The relationships are never healthy and the fights are slow. I think it was Yu Gi Oh that made me throw in the towel and give up trying to watch anime on tv. I hated those battles. At least Pokemon battles were quick (although I hated team rocket for fuckin' shit up and slowing shit down). Every now and then, I see something fun like Vampire hunter D, Miyazaki's older stuff, and the cowboy B bop movie but honestly, why is Anime so popular among adults? What's it do for them/you? Why am I the only one who thinks anime and JRG's are retarded and redardING?

It's important to note that most anime is intended for teenagers, not for an adult audience. It also recycles a lot of the same stuff that works for the intended audience because rather than expecting a regular audience of people that watch Anime it expects each generation of teenagers to watch the shows that are around when they are the right age, and then presumably move on as they grow up. Serious fanboys are viewed much the same way in Japan as they are in the US. My guess is that your simply more "normal" than you are a hard core "nerd" and have simply outgrown material largely intended for a younger audience.

That said part of the appeal of this stuff, and part of what sold it in the US, including to an older audience, is that Anime frequently plays around with science fiction and fantasy concepts that you generally don't run into outside of novels or very specific geeky media. Seeing some of this stuff represented visually and doing things can be quite interesting all on it's own. What's more to a lot of geeks, simply the idea of say fighting demons using robots or a vampire duking it out with space aliens, is bizzare and fantastic enough to warrant attention.

One thing you'll notice among a lot of anime fans that tend to be older is that they tend to hate the characters and focus more on the concepts. This is less the case with the younger viewers. This is why you see so much "I hate so and so" or going off about how much people loathe predictable social story arcs, or are (sometimes) pleased to see a predictable formula mixed up a bit and characters not go in the direction intended.

Animation is pretty much one of the few ways people can do really wild, high-concept science fiction and fantasy that might not have a lasting appeal (since a lasting appeal isn't usually a requirement). The US doesn't use animation, so as a result you see it stick a lot more to the handful of concepts and tropes it knows can possibly work with a more expensive to produce live-action show. As a result those who are big time nerds looking for a sci-fi and/or fantasy fix or want to see odd concepts played out, are going to gravitate towards anime.

Oh and it should also be noted that adults generally tend to lose their interest in fantasy and science fiction and gravitate towards the practical. It's part of growing up. Those that don't are unusual and become "nerds" or "geeks" throughout life. Indeed one of the things that has the media reeling right now is that "geek has become cool" at least for the moment, leading to the explosion of things like super-hero movies. The bubble not bursting as quickly as it has before has thrown a lot of things into an uproar, and indeed you have a lot of well respected, serious film makers relatively out in the cold, hoping that the audience gets bored with all of this "unreality" before too long. One of the things that also seems to be moving people away from Anime is that at least for the moment there are more alternatives to Anime than there have been in a long time for that kind of material, and a lot of those alternatives are of a higher quality than some show intended to entertain teenagers for 30 minutes in the afternoon or evening.

 

[franticfarken]

I prefer the old or "classic anime's" over these new ones despite the fact of me being in the target audience of these new anime's.

I'm finding them now just so much more creepy, it's not as obvious over-sexualisation (in a sense) but the teenage girls just seem like a joke with their several lines being about boys and high pitched laughs. Compared to the older anime's where they had more of a character, was more bad-ass etc etc. Some exceptions are here such as Mikasa where her creation isn't purely for eye candy.

When the older anime's were both eye candy and more relevant.

 

[Zeke63]

it trains you to be heroic and get all the girls by not being a masculine jerk so yes very healthy.

 

[CloudAtlas]

(...) but honestly, why is Anime so popular among adults? What's it do for them/you? Why am I the only one who thinks anime and JRG's are retarded and redardING?

Having had Japanese classes, I've had the dubious pleasure to experience the effects that consuming too mutch Japanese media can have on people. Adult men and women mimicing how Anime characters talk, move and dress, that's just weird. Especially the women behaving like little Anime girls... well if you're into that, go for it, I guess... at least I don't have to endure it anymore.

 

[Chromatic Aberration]

I like how this starts out as a "relationships in shitty series seem shitty" thread and instead of recommending a romance series people go "OMG MADOKAAAAAAAAA."

...and that is how it should be.

ALL HAIL MADOKA!​

Berserk is, frankly, the most sophisticated and subtle fantasy epic ever written. In terms of scope, only Tolkien really compares. Martins Game of Thrones doesn't even compete. If you like Epic fantasy, this is as good as it gets. Not in anime. Anywhere. The character relationships are very well done. (Disclaimer: this is a tragedy, and a brutal one. Not for people who don't like dark material).

Heh. That reminds of Legend of the Galactic Heroes, which is frankly the most sophisticated space opera I've seen up until now. Won't go so far as to say anywhere given my lack of experience in terms of Sci-Fi as a literary genre but it beats the hell out of any kind of space-opera'ish TV show or anime anywhere in terms of scope and depth.

Anyhow now as to answer to the OP's query: what I personally like about anime as an adult watcher best is it's topicality - there are many great animes out there that are much more than simple entertainment, or rather couple that with some serious social commentary or a philosophical discussion about fundamental questions and treat it as an integral part of their story, too. For instance, I've yet to see more than a handful of western TV series[footnote]Note that I specifically excluded movies here[/footnote] that so fundamentally tackle issues such as identity (Kaiba, Ghost In The Shell), Political Systems, societies and the meaning of history (Legend Of The Galactic Heroes, Kino's Travels) or the dangers of Escapism (The 12 Kingdoms, Welcome To The NHK, The Tatami Galaxy) as the mentioned animes do.

If you'd ask me why that is, I suspect that it's due to a lot more creative freedom the creators enjoy in comparison to Western TV-movie makers - perhaps due to the quirks of the media or the general standing it has in Japanese society. Overall, I think it's more fair to compare a deep anime series to an experimental movie than a TV-show or a Hollywood production in that regard while it still retains a lot of production quality of the former two. Plus, the fixed length of mostly a dozen or a couple of dozen episodes in many cases (i.e. you can't overeat on it) , the fact that a lot of shows are based on manga series with a proper ending (i.e. it simply can't have 20 seasons due to a lack of material and they know where to take the show eventually) and the medium itself which makes experimentation easier and is assumedly easier to control (no need to keep the actors on wait for a dozen of seasons and make up bullshit reasons if one becomes unavailable) also contributes a lot of the, in my book, higher-density storytelling and depth that animes offer to me.