Overly Attached Anime Girlfriend

[Casual Shinji]

Because Spirited Away alone is engraved into Western mainstream media, and Hayao is just roped into the ride. That is pretty much how his films lure viewers: If Miyazaki did Spirited Away, surely his next film will be amazing without consequence.

And how is that not a completely natural response? If you liked a movie, chances are you'll be looking forward to whatever the person or team who made that movie is going to do next.

Weren't you looking forward to watching Kaguya because Takahata/Ghibli were behind it? How is that any different? Or do you expect movie audiences to just go into a movie blind, without any preconceptions or expectations?

 

[CrystalShadow]

@Shinji

He is overrated, annoyingly egotistical, but not incompetent by any means. Like I said, he makes good family films that lure in mainstream audiences, and I at least gave Kiki the highest props; I do not like his ego trip statements on an industry that is moving along nicely though. This is from the perspective of someone who has seen every Ghibli film (except Marnie), so naturally, I'll have deeper insight and thoughts into the workings of Ghibli as a studio than someone who just watched Spirited Away and be done with it.

You know, that just comes across as being incredibly smug. And seriously, how much does it really tell you to have seen so many ghibli films?

I've seen many of them (including more obscure things like 'ocean waves') - Many of them about a dozen times each, and I don't see how that somehow makes one qualified to be an expert on the subject somehow.

Sure, some of them don't hold up as well as others, especially if you see them repeatedly... But what has any of that got to do with the kind of proclamations you make about it? I have DVD's of 16 ghibli films, and have seen a 17th... Does that make me an expert on those films? Does it mean I can make grand, arrogant claims about their quality too?
How about the rest of my Anime collection, or the various series I've seen? (Some of which are brilliant, some of which... not so much)

But I... Just don't get why you feel the need to bring up something like that as though it somehow makes you some kind of Authority on the the subject above and beyond anyone else. (especially when you have no idea what the people you are talking to know by comparison)
Are you really claiming though that merely having seen these films makes you an expert somehow? Because that seems a little... Silly. (Said from the perspective of someone who has seen most of them many times over...)

 

[Kaimax]

Well that derailed fast, Also:

I love most of his work and consider him one of the pillars of anime and the medium will be considerably less bright when he eventually dies, but I can't take his word on much of anything he has to say about the anime watching community or the medium in general.

I would love to give you a cookie IRL.

And No, Miyazaki is not "The Walt Disney of Japan", It's Osamu Tezuka. Miyazaki is more like Pixar as a whole. (I honestly can't think of any other comparisons)

--------------------------------------
OT: Where did they come from?
Simple tropes, but that's what makes anime unique than most other media, because they don't stick to old conventions. About inventions they're not exclusive to Japanese anime, heck I remember Annie Wilkes from Misery is a Yandere-like female. But, Japanese anime are the ones that tries to popularize it.
The story is simple:
-Have somebody tried it yet?
-Is this combination of trope and story, Popular/well received?

Based on the characters posted alone, everyone of them is slightly wrong because this is made by a someone generalizing them based on their actions not real personality.
-Juvia, from Fairy Tail is depicted as the "Stalker girl" here, but in reality she's devoted to Gray, and slowly Gray has been responding to her feelings. Her stalker-like antics is just there for the comedy scenes.
-Nyaruko, from Haiyore Nyaruko san is depicted as the "Annoying Girl", which is true to a point but this is caused by the passiveness of the MC Mahiro, who's a male Tsundere. Meaning that the only way to get his attention is by going aggresive at him
-Kirishima Shouko, From Baka to Test to Shokanju is depicted as the "Sadist girl", which is wrong. She has been in love with the 2nd male MC Sakamoto Yuuji ever since she was small, and the only thing she doesn't like is seeing him ignoring her and him looking at other girls besides her. She's not a Sadist as she doesn't receive sexual gratification from her actions to him. So Sadist? No. Excessively cartoony Violent? Yes.
-Yuuno Gasai, from Mirai Nikki is depicted psychopath, but in reality she's all of them.
Stalker: Her Future Diary is filled with only the actions of the one she loves.
Annoying: She's aggressive towards the one she love, doing anything to keep his attention on her.
Sadist: Yes, she tied her loved on a chair and plans to keep it that way once so that he cannot escape from her while treating him like a vegetable patient, and she actually enjoys and receive sexual gratification. Go look up "Mirai Nikki Yandere Face"
Psychopath: She's a Yandere, (Crazy in love) and this is the only thing that's right about the picture.

 

[Smooth Operator]

When I look at all of them as a collective, they just look like someone who wants a girlfriend who will never leave them to the point of obsession, fight for them to the point of murder, and the fact that she never questions it, she's just an unstoppable force.

Is a girl like that desirable?

To me, god no. But she DOES make a cheap and easy conflict for a story.

Well considering anime for some odd reason always revolves around high school kids it would fit with what people at that stage believe to be good relationship markers (obviously exaggerated for cartoons). Someone who is plainly obsessed with you is most often seen as loyal and sweet, which sadly is again a concept actually adopted from popular media.
Takes years to work out that Hollywood/Disney romance nonsense is really just nonsense.

 

[Lieju]

I mean, they're all the worst things to desire from a girl... Is desire the right word? I mean they're meant to be a male's fantasy, aren't they?

When I look at all of them as a collective, they just look like someone who wants a girlfriend who will never leave them to the point of obsession, fight for them to the point of murder, and the fact that she never questions it, she's just an unstoppable force.

Is a girl like that desirable?

To me, god no. But she DOES make a cheap and easy conflict for a story.

The stalker girlfriends aren't necessarily meant to be the ultimate male fantasy. They are often included in a story that also has other types of women (or girls, rather), including the pure maiden/tomboy the hero actually ends up with.

But how these types are used does depend on the story.
And in some cases, they're in a story meant for boys, and the assumption is they're not interested in reading/watching a real romance.
But having a girl express interest like this allows you to make the male character more desirable (and more of a male fantasy, because he is desirable for girls) while making fun of girls and romance in general.

 

[Jake Martinez]

A lot of arm chair gender philosophers in this thread demonstrating both a lack of understanding of the topic they are talking about as well as an amazing amount of ignorance of literary devices in general.

For instance, in the OP, all 4 stereotypes are not gender exclusive, they're present for both genders. In fact, the only real difference is how society interprets them - generally the female sterotypes except for the most extremely violent one, are played for laughs, or exaggerated for comedic effect. The male version of these sterotypes inversely are portrayed to be unsettling, with more emphasis on the deranged psychological nature in order to elicit negative emotional connotations. This of course, isn't inherently in the nature of the sterotype itself, but instead a reflection of society and how it interprets similar behavior by males and females differently, for example, a willingness to see men as violent, but a rejection of that concept when it comes to females (in fact, seeing women as violent in society is generally avoided and met with either disbelief or excessive excuses of behavior - see the recent stabbing of 8 children by a woman in Cannes, Australia). This is pretty much indisputable. Apply the appellation "stalker" to an image of a woman or a man and it will elicit different responses accordingly.

This of course, brings me to the next point - The sterotypes, or the existence of a sterotype in literature doesn't mean anything on it's own. Society or the culture at large is what gives meaning. A better way to look at it is that a literary sterotype is just shorthand for a variety of ideas, emotions and concepts that exist as memes in the conscious of the audience and they are almost always evoked in that way by an author for that explicit purpose. They are neither inherently positive nor negative, they simply exist because of their recognition in culture - this is why you can obviously have a literary sterotype that exists in one culture that makes no sense in another culture.

The final point I'd like to make is that when dealing with these sterotypes (essentially, memes), people need to be mature enough to differentiate between the individual instance or portrayal of a meme and both it's localized narrative as well as it's prevalence in the cultural meta-narrative. A great example of this when you see someone claim that a portrayal of a woman in a video game as a damsel in distress if "problematic" - this may sound correct on the surface, but it's obviously flawed. An individual portrayal of any character that runs to any type needs to be taken in both an isolated context (does this make sense for the story?) as well as in regards to it's overall prevalence in society. To wit - an individual portrayal of a woman as a damsel in a video game is not problematic. However, if the only portrayal of women in video games is as a damsel, then this is absolutely an issue - and even then, it's a much broader cultural issue that should be endemic to all media or society at large.

Frankly, any position that runs counter to what I laid out above generally just fascicle sophistry. You simply cannot eradicate memes (or ideas) nor can you pretend that they are harmful in themselves, since any sort of meme or memeplex that makes up a sterotype is subjectively relative to someones individual interpretation of society (or their own cultural idioms). A great example of this is that despite the prevalence of racist memes both currently as well as historically, there has never been a point in time where all people were racist. In fact, if anything has changed over the decades, it's been that individual interpretation of racist memes generally tends to run in a direction where people disregard them as representative of a group (sterotyping) - proving once again that it's an individuals interpretation of a meme that is important.

So, my last criticism of this thread and the discussion in it is this -

The very fact that you can look at a meme/sterotype and identify it as such means that it is not pernicious. It's also somewhat disingenuous for people to imagine that previous generations of humans didn't have the same ability to do such (otherwise, how do you even have the concept of art or literature critique? Modern day society didn't invent this) or even that young people, excepting extremely small children, are somehow so divorced from reality that they cannot identify it, or that memes themselves are formative in someones attitude - since they are essentially meaningless unless context is applied by the observer.

To put it bluntly - a persons nature and formative life experience is what provides context for their interpretation of a meme, not the other way around.

 

[lechat]

not really here for much discussion value but just wanted to add that yuno from future diary is the perfect obsessed anime girlfriend

i remember thinking how adorable it was how in love she was with yukki (for no apparent reason) and how he wanted to be with her but was too shy to say it and they would be perfect together if she just tried a bit harder.....
yeah didn't end too well but it shows how love can turn to obsession pretty well without being too much of a cliche.

 

[Dansen]

Well considering the topic I might as well throw out a question that has been bothering me. What is the deal with japan and brother sister romance? Is there some sort of precedence in their culture that allows this to slide or was this spawned by the cancerous otaku culture there?

Typically it involves a younger sister having somewhat unrequited feelings for their older super cool brother, (see Sword art online). But the opposite can be true with an older brother obsessing over a much younger(typically moe) sister. It just strikes me as really gross and twisted. In order to cover that up, its usually used as comic relief, but it is usually awkward and out of place in most shows. Example: i was watching the first episode of a show show where magic had become weaponized and talented magic users had to go to a military academy, the overall show seems rather serious, but that is all shattered because the MC has a younger sister has a very obvious crush on her brother, demonstrated by her perpetual blush when she is near him.

 

[Kaimax]

Well considering the topic I might as well throw out a question that has been bothering me. What is the deal with japan and brother sister romance? Is there some sort of precedence in their culture that allows this to slide or was this spawned by the cancerous otaku culture there?

Meh, then stop watching anime. I don't feel like answering seriously when someone generalizes a group negatively.

 

[Dansen]

Well considering the topic I might as well throw out a question that has been bothering me. What is the deal with japan and brother sister romance? Is there some sort of precedence in their culture that allows this to slide or was this spawned by the cancerous otaku culture there?

Meh, then stop watching anime. I don't feel like answering seriously when someone generalizes a group negatively.

Sorry if it came off that way, didn't mean to insinuate it was the entirety of Japan that thought this way it was just hyperbole. Im honestly just curious as to how this trope(am I using this word correctly?) got started. It just baffling to me as to why it exists cause it completely takes me out of a show, knowing that this kind of relationship was deliberately put in there to appeal to someone out there.

 

[Kaimax]

It just baffling to me as to why it exists cause it completely takes me out of a show, knowing that this kind of relationship was deliberately put in there to appeal to someone out there.

First and foremost, the relationship between Shiba Tatsuya and his sister Shiba Miyuki in Mahouka koukou no Rettousei is very complicated. The anime itself cannot explain it well enough because it would take a whole episode to just get the background story of those 2. Point is, because of "spoilery things", Tatsuya doesn't have any emotion besides his familial love to her. He doesn't see himself as a lover but more of a tool to her as he's the assigned guardian for her. So, the actual "relationship" is one sided even though He acts and puts his sister on top of everything else.

The "sibling complex" (Bro/sis) is just another trope, and not surprisingly is not exclusive to just anime as many movies has this trope even older ones. Heck, mythology is filled to the brim with this trope.
It's just that some anime uses that trope as their main theme only differing on the level of actual closeness of the siblings. From being comedic where one of them rejects them heavily to actual incest. So the Japanese didn't start it, they're just better on running with it.

Why? Same with my answer on the topic, because they can. Anime doesn't stick to conventional norms and doesn't shy itself away from socially rejected thoughts. If you want a better answer you might have to conduct a nationwide survey.

If you're uncomfortable with the topic then just stop watching, that just means you prioritize your discomfort than actually focusing on the main story of the series.
Personally I don't have any strong discomfort to any socially rejected tropes as it's just fiction, so I can enjoy pretty much anything.

To me this trope is just very interesting to explore as a story, and this is coming from a guy who actually has a sister who's only a year younger.

 

[Riot3000]

Well I think it just stereotypes and tropes like others have said. They are interesting and you could find the male opposite equal to them and with the same kind of questioning of motives.

snip

Thanks man you summed it up longer than what I wanted.

 

[Fox12]

Not to bash Miyazaki too much, the guy's got a golden touch for most of his projects, but remember this is also the same guy that said that Hideki Anno was the future of anime when he hasn't done much of anything but cash in on one project for the last twenty years that has gotten everything from "pretentious crap that doesn't have near the depth it likes to think it does", to things like it completely changing someone's life. In comparison, you've got The Urobutcher and Watanabe constantly working on different projects with diverse themes and styles over the same time period, all with pretty much glowing reviews from critics and the community at large for all of it.

I think that's just a case of Japanese loyalty. Anno was there at the beginning of Ghibli and worked on Nausicaa too. And I seem to remember that it was actually Ghibli that called Anno "the future of anime", not Miyazaki himself. So in that regard it's just Miyazaki/Ghibli being on good terms with Anno. Why else would he cast him as the main character in his "last" movie? Have you seen The Wind Rises...? Yeah, Anno can't voice act... at all.

I love most of his work and consider him one of the pillars of anime and the medium will be considerably less bright when he eventually dies, but I can't take his word on much of anything he has to say about the anime watching community or the medium in general.

Miyazaki is absolutely right here though. Anime is stuck in a spiral of geek regurgitation.

OT: Honestly, I haven't seen the overly attached anime girlfriend trope much at all. Tenchi Muyo suffered a great deal of it, but that's really the only one I can think of.

Yeah, this trope is a little worrying. When studio shaft literally starts parrodying the trope (by having a stalker stalk a stalker who is, herself, a stalker) then you know it's bad. It's literally a conga line of stalkers.

Why is it popular? I don't think there's a 100% surefire answer, but I agree that geek pandering is probably at least part of it. Women in anime tend to be clingy as a result of being written by otaku for otaku.. I'm sure there are cultural differences that play into it as well.