Back to a Popular Question
Mar. 18th, 2018 04:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
krpalmerA famous-for-being-famous celebrity (as far as I know, having to admit to steering clear of the reality shows and gossip reports that build that kind of fame) making a perhaps vague social media comment about anime but including artwork of a character from a new series now streaming raised a flurry of discussion among already identified anime fans. I took my own time contemplating some of the things said, but consider them I did. They did have me bumping back into the latest answer I'd slid into for a long-standing and perhaps important question.
Having watched anime for as long as I have, with people I'd once noticed on message boards and weblogs vanishing along the way and at times with bitter proclamations of burnout, and aware how anime watched and manga read adds up to a personal entertainment diet that could seem by many measures unbalanced, I have grown to think it would help to articulate reasons why I keep enjoying it. In just the past few years, I did start wondering if it might have something to do with it being to some measure "fantastic" (with even the "slice-of-life" titles I do take in managing to qualify in their own way), but not quite dwelt on by the current general discussion of things domestic and live-action in that genre, discussions I'm afraid to admit can set my teeth on edge. The "therefore" there would seem to be "if anime really does become 'popular,' does that mean it would then be discussed in such a way that some unconscious, inescapable contrarianism drives me away at last, leaving me with stacks of unopened DVDs and Blu-Rays potential had collapsed into reproach for and, I don't know, maybe plumbing 'obscurity' by puzzling over 6502 assembly language or something?"
All of that felt serious enough that I did try rewinding back through other answers to my question. I know I'd managed to get past the boosterism recalled from when I was just becoming aware of anime, which might have pushed on from both "interest in animation" and "interest in 'the fantastic.'" Eventually, though, I might have decided from constant exposure that while "dreams can be drawn," having to draw them over and over can hit their own walls of scope, and yet I managed to cope both with that and a possible different narrowness of scope in characters and settings, without quite being seduced by new claims that "manga went places more commercial anime productions couldn't." The controversies over manga being retouched to eliminate things that might have seemed objectionable over here could have had something to do with that. When that controversy faded to where I at least wasn't noticing it and I realised my manga intake had picked up anyway, it didn't seem to have displaced my interest in anime. The rise of "continuity" in TV shows over here seemed to meet the demands of some people even as occasional comments were made that anime series had "once" been different for having that continuity, but I might have already just noticed complaints about how as series ran longer the potential fans had fixated on so often seemed to collapse into something specific and unsatisfying. In an odd way, I might have got to thinking anime series were long enough to offer "continuity" without their own accusations of unappealing endings amounting to "too much time blown on them."
After all of that, though, I did begin to think "the variations on themes to the way anime looks appeals to me." It was simple, and at least tangential to familiar accusations of "2D complexes," and yet it had seemed to work. When I revamped my home page a few years ago, when I might not have been dwelling quite so much on standard discussions of genre, I did mention it; it just might be worth holding in mind again.
With all of that said, there were other things about the discussion I had got to thinking about. The concern others had shown about "if anime becomes popular" seemed to include "it'll start being tailored at the source to our market, and all the things that used to be hacked out for the 'broadcast dubs' won't be there to begin with; I won't find it interesting any more." I suppose I can't offer a solid refutation to those fears, but I could find myself remembering certain complaints insisting that once upon a time anime series had been intended for larger audiences (even if "audiences in Japan" that were comfortable with some of the things that made anime "other than cartoons" for people in North America), as much as I can't escape wondering if those older series just happened to have been "formative and therefore uncriticized" for those making the complaints.
In any case, I did remember some "once upon a time" moments myself from over a decade ago, when I'd taken genuine interest in apparent signs of the increasing popularity of anime and manga over here. (For one example, I clipped an ad from a newspaper for an online DVD store that just happened to emphasise anime discs.) When hopes of an expanding market were pushed too far, though, and things tottered and just about collapsed at the end of that decade, I know I might have started thinking "this stuff appeals to a narrow audience, but perhaps in acknowledging that there can still be a certain kind of success"; ever after that, however, I admit any intimation anime and manga might have some wider popularity even in Japan does catch my attention. I did find it strangely compelling, too, to get an impression that Attack on Titan might even have been something like the "breakout hits" that used to be talked about (even before it got its own Monopoly version). As well, I suppose I get a bit leery of the stance some seem to take that anime and manga ought to be held up as artifacts of a foreign land, uncompromising in their need to be studied to be understood; I'm conscious, though, that unlike some I don't really seem to have moved on to live action works from that country, which only points out certain thoughts about "drawing styles that can make a wide variety of people identify with them, if so long as their skin's in a certain range of shades." On the other hand, that might have some bearing after all on not quite being as into "live-action" works from over here as others.
Having watched anime for as long as I have, with people I'd once noticed on message boards and weblogs vanishing along the way and at times with bitter proclamations of burnout, and aware how anime watched and manga read adds up to a personal entertainment diet that could seem by many measures unbalanced, I have grown to think it would help to articulate reasons why I keep enjoying it. In just the past few years, I did start wondering if it might have something to do with it being to some measure "fantastic" (with even the "slice-of-life" titles I do take in managing to qualify in their own way), but not quite dwelt on by the current general discussion of things domestic and live-action in that genre, discussions I'm afraid to admit can set my teeth on edge. The "therefore" there would seem to be "if anime really does become 'popular,' does that mean it would then be discussed in such a way that some unconscious, inescapable contrarianism drives me away at last, leaving me with stacks of unopened DVDs and Blu-Rays potential had collapsed into reproach for and, I don't know, maybe plumbing 'obscurity' by puzzling over 6502 assembly language or something?"
All of that felt serious enough that I did try rewinding back through other answers to my question. I know I'd managed to get past the boosterism recalled from when I was just becoming aware of anime, which might have pushed on from both "interest in animation" and "interest in 'the fantastic.'" Eventually, though, I might have decided from constant exposure that while "dreams can be drawn," having to draw them over and over can hit their own walls of scope, and yet I managed to cope both with that and a possible different narrowness of scope in characters and settings, without quite being seduced by new claims that "manga went places more commercial anime productions couldn't." The controversies over manga being retouched to eliminate things that might have seemed objectionable over here could have had something to do with that. When that controversy faded to where I at least wasn't noticing it and I realised my manga intake had picked up anyway, it didn't seem to have displaced my interest in anime. The rise of "continuity" in TV shows over here seemed to meet the demands of some people even as occasional comments were made that anime series had "once" been different for having that continuity, but I might have already just noticed complaints about how as series ran longer the potential fans had fixated on so often seemed to collapse into something specific and unsatisfying. In an odd way, I might have got to thinking anime series were long enough to offer "continuity" without their own accusations of unappealing endings amounting to "too much time blown on them."
After all of that, though, I did begin to think "the variations on themes to the way anime looks appeals to me." It was simple, and at least tangential to familiar accusations of "2D complexes," and yet it had seemed to work. When I revamped my home page a few years ago, when I might not have been dwelling quite so much on standard discussions of genre, I did mention it; it just might be worth holding in mind again.
With all of that said, there were other things about the discussion I had got to thinking about. The concern others had shown about "if anime becomes popular" seemed to include "it'll start being tailored at the source to our market, and all the things that used to be hacked out for the 'broadcast dubs' won't be there to begin with; I won't find it interesting any more." I suppose I can't offer a solid refutation to those fears, but I could find myself remembering certain complaints insisting that once upon a time anime series had been intended for larger audiences (even if "audiences in Japan" that were comfortable with some of the things that made anime "other than cartoons" for people in North America), as much as I can't escape wondering if those older series just happened to have been "formative and therefore uncriticized" for those making the complaints.
In any case, I did remember some "once upon a time" moments myself from over a decade ago, when I'd taken genuine interest in apparent signs of the increasing popularity of anime and manga over here. (For one example, I clipped an ad from a newspaper for an online DVD store that just happened to emphasise anime discs.) When hopes of an expanding market were pushed too far, though, and things tottered and just about collapsed at the end of that decade, I know I might have started thinking "this stuff appeals to a narrow audience, but perhaps in acknowledging that there can still be a certain kind of success"; ever after that, however, I admit any intimation anime and manga might have some wider popularity even in Japan does catch my attention. I did find it strangely compelling, too, to get an impression that Attack on Titan might even have been something like the "breakout hits" that used to be talked about (even before it got its own Monopoly version). As well, I suppose I get a bit leery of the stance some seem to take that anime and manga ought to be held up as artifacts of a foreign land, uncompromising in their need to be studied to be understood; I'm conscious, though, that unlike some I don't really seem to have moved on to live action works from that country, which only points out certain thoughts about "drawing styles that can make a wide variety of people identify with them, if so long as their skin's in a certain range of shades." On the other hand, that might have some bearing after all on not quite being as into "live-action" works from over here as others.