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Cartoon Network Serves Up More Anime
E-Rock-23 writes "Anime News Network has the scoop on more Anime series Cartoon Network plans to bring to the Adult Swim block next year. Witch Hunter Robin (2) has been confirmed for a February run. On the "Probably" list are Wolf's Rain in April and Ghost in the Shell in July, though they didn't specify if it'd be the Mamoru Oshii film or the Stand Alone Complex TV series. Either way, the latter will most likely have to be rather heavily edited for TV. Looks like I have a few more reasons to stay up past my bedtime..." Or get a tivo. Witch Hunter Robin & Wolf's Rain are both really excellent shows- it's very cool to see them hit mainstream TV.
...when we're going to get past this dubbing thing and see some subs.
Looks like I have a few more reasons to stay up past my bedtime..." Or get a tivo.
;P
*upper lip trembling* you mean there are poor souls out there that actually lack this essential technology?
Seriously, if it weren't for Tivo I'd never catch my fix of Twilight Zone reruns and Enterprise. I do Tivo Anime Crash on TechTV, but some of the Anime they show is a little esoteric for my tastes. So, a lot of that gets deleted before I have a chance to watch it.
My friend Mike got slashdotted recently pointing out that Time Warner cable is rolling out Tivo to their users for something on the order of less than $10 a month...and at no cost to the subscriber for the box!Pretty sweet deal considering that I paid slightly over $400 for the Sony DirctTV/Tivo combo box. That particular combination is a pretty sweet deal. I guess I could regret having shelled out that much money in light of Mike's cable deal. But...naaahhh. How can you regret shelling out for such a life-affirming technology?
I just checked with my registrar and it looks like tivoaid.com is still open. I think I may buy that domain to start a worthy cause....
Quod scripsi, scripsi.
The market for subbed-only anime is still very small, that's why studios work hard to ensure all the DVD releases have a dub track (preferably a good one). Trying to put subbed-only anime, even on late night, isn't going to keep enough people watching to pay the advertising dollars.
Ita erat quando hic adveni.
It's such a shame that they refuse to play Ranma 1/2... though I don't know how the censors would react to a half-guy, half-girl character who somehow always has his, er, her chest exposed.
Well, I happen to know the guy who does/did the Japanese-English translation for GITS:TV (yes, it will be the tv). He also did it for Big-O, Tenchi in Tokyo and a few others, he works freelance, including a VERY sweet looking 'dieselpunk' fantasy series called Last Exile.
From all impressions I get, editing won't be too bad. But the creepiest thing is that the series has 3 experimental spider-tank characters, who supposedly start out as a 'hive mind', but begin to develop individuality over the course of several episodes. So you have all these heavily armed, near-sentient battle robots, and THEY ALL HAVE SQEAKY JAPANESE TEENAGE GIRL VOICES! *SHUDDER* They even wave their hands around like children, very bizarre, and probably fits in well with the "feel" of the series.
b10hazrd
I know Taco loves his Anime but I'd also just like to send a big shout out to Cartoon Network for the great stuff they have been doing with the other part of Adult Swim.
The new SpaceGoasts CTC have been great as well as all of the other ones. (Sealab2021, ATHF, Brak Show)
Even after the death of Harry Goz (1932 - 2003),voice of Captin Murphy on Sealab 2021, the show has bounced back imo and did a good new ep.
Thanks Cartoon Network. I'm not a big fan of Anime (Cowboy Beebob as one of the BIG exceptions.) but you still have given me a reason to stay up late every night.
Really, I know what I'm doing...Ohhhh, look at the shiny buttons!
The show was made for japanese TV viewing, whose standards aren't all that different from those of american TV. As such, the show features little of the gore and nudity of the feature film while still presenting plenty of action and musings about the ramifications of future technology. And besides, Bandai wants this on Adult Swim so they can sell plenty of shiny DVDs in preperation for the show's second season.
Ita erat quando hic adveni.
It was Cartoon Network's airing of Cowboy Bebop that soured me on Enterprise. After witnessing the gritty exploits of Spike, Jet, Faye, Ed and even Ein, I could no longer stomach the goody two-shoes of Enterprise. All I could remember was Captain Puss^H^H^H^H Archer curling up into a little ball as a bunch of Andorans stole his lunch money or something.
I own the DVD boxed set of Bebop (and the movie, which was a better SF film than any recent Trek, Star Wars or Matrix film). Don't think I'll be owning any Enterprise.
And, actually, I commend TechTV for showing some of the odder stuff, like Serial Experiment Lain, that CN might shy away from. The Starz Action Channel shows some anime as well, and it's completely uncut there. They just ran through Hellsing and Bubblegum Crisis 2040 both of which I liked more than I expected to.
--- Ban humanity.
I don't think the Ghost in the Shell Standalone Complex TV series would have to be edited too much for US TV. I have all but the last DVD (imported from Taiwan), and I think most of the episodes are free of anything that might cause US TVs to melt down in a fit of self-righteous indignation.
Of course, perhaps the good/bad stuff is in the last few episodes I don't have. I can't seem to get the last DVD. One of my local Anime dealers told me that this is intentional - He said that the producers of these (non-US) releases don't release the last DVD until they release the whole series as a boxed set. Their plan is to force all the fools (like myself) who bought the single DVDs to buy them all again in the boxed set in order to get the last episodes.
Can anyone confirm or debunk this theory?
- Tim
I thought GitSAC was made for a Pay-per-view type service.. that's what the promotion for it said, anyway.
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
Yes, sadly it seems Bandai is waiting for the show to air on TV in America before releasing the DVD's.
Many newer series than GITS: SAC are already (partly) available on DVD, while GITS: SAC isn't even announced yet. (afaik)
The path I walk alone is endlessly long.
30 minutes by bike, 15 by bus.
Well, in the first episode, Maj. Kusanagi blows a guy's foot off, but that's about a 2-second cut.
Most of the stuff you see in GitS:SAC will, I thing, be pretty much easy for them to cut.
(And I want the shiny DVDs!)
Brazil has decided you're cute.
Just my opinion, but Wolf's Rain really quite bad. The first season was impressive. It set up a lot of potential, and the second season was a total let-down. After four episodes of re-cap, they had weak character development and dumb plot-ideas. All-in-all, it's a bad show.
Witch Hunter Robin was good right up to the end. The very last episode was a little weak, but it was not bad. It was only worse than the previous episodes in that series.
Personally, I think the best serieses deserving a run right now are "Now and Then, Here and There" and "Full Metal Panic? Fumoffu", the first being one of the best all-around stories out there, and the second being just about the funniest thing ever.
I just wish they hadn't pulled Rurouni Kenshin from the afternoon block.
--
If I actually could spell I'd have spelled it right in the first place.
There is some reason for that. Gunslinger Girl is extremely slow paced. Six eps in, it still only does backstory. It's very good, but kinda slow paced. Most Americans have very short attention spans. I assume that this is similar for the rest of the world as well, but I cannot be certain.
However, Ranma is pretty unlikely due to the excessive nudity. Of course, they can censor that stuff, but it's also kinda old.
You mean like music fans? Anime fans will always be able to nab fansubs well in advance of American TV or DVD release. If not that, they'll likely stick with subs not dubs for most things.
Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex has no nudity and virtually no gore. Only about one in every two episodes have and violence whatsoever, and much of that is not displayed in detail. The show is not about violence.
Who wants to watch raped versions anyway ? Just stick to the original DVD's for the true anime experience.
As I recall, Cowboy Bebop's Adult Swim run was less censored than its Japanese television run.
Bít, zabít, jen proto, ze su liska!
& no where to hide, as the lights come up. tell 'em robbIE?
Hey, that looks like a fansub of Witch Hunter Robin episode 4.
The path I walk alone is endlessly long.
30 minutes by bike, 15 by bus.
Only about half of Cowboy Bebop's episodes actually aired on its original japanese run. Episodes like "The Real Folk Blues" weren't shown until the second season on satellite TV. For those without satellite, the episodes went straight to video. So in this instance, american viewers got to see a lot more of the show.
Ita erat quando hic adveni.
I, for one, welcome our new Unedited Cartoon Network... err...
... like 80s Strike Back on VH1. And mix in a bit of "here's something cool you didn't know existed"... sort of like catching Most Extreme Elimination Challenge on TNT/SpikeTV. That's what anime is to American audiences... years of shows about robots and vampires, lasers and rockets and giant aliens, fast action and a "new" visual style.
Seriously, suppose Cartoon Network spun off a sister-station, and cable networks made it an optional channel to standard packages, who's purpose was to show anime in its raw form? Parents have the option for nudity and cursing on HBO & Cinemax, and they also have the control whether they want that stuff in their home or not. If you don't want it, the cable company can block it.
I'm not saying that we need a cartoon Spice channel (not that there's any shortage of hentai), just that there should be some medium for your average movie where you can catch the whole thing. The Cartoon Network has an image to keep as a channel for kids (the alternative to Nickelodeon), and they can't risk someones child staying up late and catching some unedited Vampire Hunter D.
Adult Swim has this nostalgic aura about it now (GiJoe, He-Man)
There's something that bugs me about watching a show or movie when I know that it has been edited by some middleman... The director of the project had an artistic vision and those scenes & language capture the intent. You can't express the story of the rough mafia men in the Sopranos without the occasional trip to the strip club... this is what tells the story of men making bad choices and dealing with the consequences.
Slightly off topic, but being in the U.K. and not getting to see any anime on TV, I was wondering if airing shows affects people's DVD purchases.
I'd expect that the people who'd pay for a cable channel that plays anime are hardcore enough to be downloading digisubs of shows before shelling out for DVDs anyway. So it seems the broadcasts must be aimed at non-enthusiasts in an attempt to increase the market, a development which could have good and bad consequences in my opinion.
Does this seem correct, what do people think?
You left out Blue Gender.
I generally dislike commenting on sigs, but didnt Mark Twain say that? or is that just a popular misconception?
Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.
for those who don't remember this show click HERE
Home Movies is the reason I love adult swim (well, Futurama is pretty great too). But I thought new episodes were supposed to be here by now -- does anyone know what's going on w/ this? The last ep I saw was "Castaway". The site lists a season's worth of episodes past that, but I haven't seen any.
As noted, thats not true (the TV part, at least thats what I've read), but having seen most of the series, I don't know what would need to be edited. US Cable generally has lots of violence, and thats the only 'questionable' material I can think of. Cartoon Network sometimes picks odd things to edit, and odd things not to edit.
They have been showing Blue Gender with minimal editing and FLCL with virtually none (just one word in episode 6).
And let's not forget the latest season of Inuyasha is uncut...gory demon deaths abound...
It is called ADULT Swim after all.
Anime's a medium, not a genre. There are plenty of bad and mediocre anime shows and films, but there are also some absolute gems. Rose of Versailles, for instance, is a very intelligent historical-fiction show about pre-revolutionary France, focusing on Marie-Antoinette and her fictional guard Oscar Francois de Jarjayes; it's very well-written and altogether quite remarkable. Not all anime is the same homogenous and semi-erotic pap generally made. ;b
Bít, zabít, jen proto, ze su liska!
Not for a cable channel that wants to target the 18-24 segement anyway. Adult Swim shows are some of the highest rated stuff floating around cable even though they are dubbed. Going sub is a giant risk since the ratings indicate that there are more now more than just Anime fans watching the block of programming.
In Japan they have plenty of US movies and TV shows but are they subtitled? The Japanese like hearing things in their native language which is why its in Japanese in the first place. On this side of the Pacific, the US Anime Industry has advanced pretty far. The quality of scripts have gone up since translators have access to even more material than they used to (including the production staff!!!). The quality of actors has gone up since it has been shown you can make money acting. There really is no reason to ask for a sub unless you really really really want to her you favorite actress. The casual and non-fan viewers are definately not interested in that.
I like raw shows as much as any hardcore fan but people have to realize there are many more people out there than the hardcore otaku fandom. Getting causual and non-fans to sit down and watch subtitled material is hard. Having people watch Robin and SAC is great! Its better than having these shows sit only in Anime fandom obscurity.
An AS-only channel would just be another MTV2. It'd be cool for a while before getting much worse as executives realized its audience can only be expanded so far. Oh, and I wouldn't get it from my cable provider.
If you haven't noticed, CN airs a lot of crap. Sure, the kids-home-from-school to stoned-college-students-call-it-a-night hours have mostly good stuff. If you've perused their daytime offerings for purposes of TiVoing, you'll see that it's pretty bad.
Also, while I admire the fact that they feel they should offer original programming, let's face it: Courage the Cowardly Dog, Ed Edd & Eddy, Grim & Evil, the Time whatever show... all are pretty weak. I have a soft spot for Dexter's Lab, and while I don't really like Samurai Jack and Powerpuff Girls, I can understand why some folks do. But a lot of their original series are not good. They could cut them and spend the freed resources to expand AS.
I doubt it. A lot of the anime has always gone towards a niche audience in Japan, I don't see that changing when it comes here. Some anime is more mainstream (DBZ *shudder, and Naruto for instance), so has always been a 'sell-out'. Regardless, its corporations making the anime, so the whole notion of selling-out is pretty stupid.
And really, anyone who watches anime for 'sophistication', well I guess if there is a low enough thershold for sophistication maybe. I watch anime because of the 13 or 26 episode format that allows character development and an actual overarching plot. Even before I watched anime, I always enjoyed mini-series, except for the fact that with some exception, the production value can be pretty cheap. Anime gets around that by using relatively-cheap (but nowadays at least) quality-looking animation techniques.
Cartoons are becoming more popular by making them interested to wide audiences case in point: King of the Hill, The Simpsons and Futureama among others.
Anime has the same appeal. So, whats holding the networks from making an Anime Network? Certainly, there should be enough variety and enough material to make one.
(I'm hopeing some of it has to do with the voice dubbing. Please get better English voices, or just leave the Japanese voices in with subtitles.)
90% of everything is crap. You've been watching the wrong 10%.
But, in more depth:
Anime has, in several instances, a lot more freedom than you see on American TV. The fact that it often will not pull punches when American TV does is what makes some of it more engaging.
Also, some anime attempts to make encapsulated storylines, while most all American TV attempts to make something which can run eternally. Possibly the best thing about anime is the 13 episode series. It is a different medium than I see in the US. In the US, you have Movies, TV, and Mini-Serieses. Mini-Serieses are somewhat the same, in that they allow more subplots than Movies but still have that encapsulated nature. However, they usually require that each segment fill a two-hour block.
NTHT on Cartoon Network? I think not. While not as explicit as some, it's one of the more brutal series on a psychological level. Christ man, it's got kids getting raped and beating each other to death. I'd like to see Saikano, Berserk, GTO, or Initial D, but like it or not there are limits. Maybe if AS was split off onto it's own channel with it's own age standards they could get away with it, but even then...
FMP:F deserves to go on TV though, although I found the original boring and unoriginal. I never got to the end of Wolf's Rain but based on what I saw I liked. It's from the same people who did Cowboy Bebop and has top-notch animation, so it's highly likely it'll make it regardless. GITS:SAC is a no-brainer.
Witch Hunter Robin, IMHO, blows. I have no idea why anyone would find this boring unimaginative series with its gigantic-craniumed characters appealing. Except perhaps for really angsty people like goths. To which I say, you should read/watch more shoujo. (On a side note, where did this infinite castle thing come from anyway? It was in Get Backers also...) For some reason I feel like mentioning I hated Noir too. All style, no substance.
In my opinion, Cartoon Network or somebody should pick up the following shows, which are all really, really good and require little to no editing (although several need to be licensed and translated, and some would perhaps be better suited for Toonami, or better yet a non-existant mid-level block): Hajime no Ippo (rocks); Jungle wa Itsumo Hale Nochi Guu (damn funny); Naruto (duh); Hellsing (blood's OK if you've got vampires); Read or Die (Original OVA and TV); Excel Saga (insane, the logical follow-up to FLCL); Hunter X Hunter (grows on you); Last Exile (awesome); Nadia (old but good); NieA_7 (wierd); and others.
Also, if Adult Swim Anime were to stop calling itself "Action" and break out into other genres they'd have more flexibility. Onegai Teacher/Twins would draw an audience and notoriety, I guarantee it. So would Love Hina and Chobits. Some of the more crossover Shoujos might do well if given the chance and the right advertising, like Fruits Basket.
I could go on all day, but there's not that much point. Adult swim will get what their limited budget, limited influence on the production and distribution companies, limited time slots, limited late night audience, and Standards and Practices allows, and no more. I'm sure much of what we've suggested they've already thought about and either can't afford or can't clear with S&P. Hellsing comes to mind on both counts.
---If you can't trust a nerd, who can you trust?
I don't think I have been watching the wrong bit of Anime as my cow-orkers have 1000s of hours of this shit and pop it into the office DVD player at every chance. Just a short dip into the brantub comes up sticky, if you know what I mean. But you are right, the short series is cool. Maybe this is what attracts some people to shows like '24' that have different approach to their very manner of presentation.
Comparing it to Windows will be a moot point, since El Dorado is going to have a 40% larger code base than XP.
The Defense Language Institute is not a Berlitz course.
Comparing it to Windows will be a moot point, since El Dorado is going to have a 40% larger code base than XP.
Yes, it was broadcast on a per-episode PPV basis on non-network TV, so they didn't actually have to follow Japanese TV standards (which, contrary to the poster above you, are fairly lax compared to US network TV).
The anime show Great Teacher Onizuka (better known as GTO has been picked up to air on SHO Next. If you've never seen GTO, it's a hilarious show about a former street punk who takes on a job teaching high school.
The artsy fartsy, psuedo-nouveau WHR I can imagine being shown on CN, but Wolf's Rain? This is a top-notch show, but has mention been made that this is basically an anime about very pretty boys basically adoring each other and bonding in a not-altogether-nonsexual way?
Is it possible to craft a dub that leans away from the limp-pawed, disaffected bishoujo-style angsty dialogue and still maintain the essential character of this show? It really _is_ about sexily-dressed guys bonding, I don't know how well that will go over with, well, anyone...
On a positive note, the fabulous opening sequence could be kept intact, being that it's all English (thanks to Sting-wannabe doofus Steve Conte).
If I could make this sig kill you, I would.
Plot Point 1: around eps. 6-10, we come to the realization that Robin's power makes her eyes unfocus, so it's inaccurate. She needs glasses. The end.
Nope. This happens around episode 4.
Plot Point 2: around eps. 16-20, Robin finds a piece of wood which is the "Ultimate Spell". But, she already had said spell, and the piece of wood was really a Cracker Jack prize.
I believe this happens instead around episode 12.
You also fail to mention that the other episodes are mystery dramas, like a lot of American programs. I won't give away what happens (you already have, asshole), but the latter half of the series gets much more exciting than "Witch Crime of the Week."
--Stephen
Did you ever notice that *nix doesn't even cover Linux?
I don't think I have been watching the wrong bit of Anime as my cow-orkers have 1000s of hours of this shit and pop it into the office DVD player at every chance.
That doesn't necessarily mean anything. I'll bet you know lots of people who like watching "Friends," too. The reason there's so much crap out there is because, sadly, crap is good enough for most people. Even asking "So, what should I watch?" here on Slashdot will get you replies that mostly list the same popular-yet-not-that-good crap over and over.
Karma: Terrifying (mostly affected by atrocities you've committed)
Seriously.
If anything, I would like to see less anime and more adult oriented Cartoons like Aquateen Hunger Force, Sealab 2021, and especially Home Movies.
They should pickup Duckman from Comedy Central. Comedy Central only seems to want to show it at 2:00 AM.
Not really on topic, but of interest. A few weeks ago, I noticed you can buy the DVD box sets of all three Robotech series. At $35-45 each, they are pretty cheap too, especially compared with the Gundam Wing box set (which, if memory serves, is around $135).
Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.
The end. It was very very boring. They make a point of Robin not being sexy in any way; thus, whenever she shows any skin whatsoever, we would drink. I think we might have actually taken three shots to this rule in about five episodes.
OBVIOUSLY Robin isn't attractive whatsoever because she doesn't run around like a bimbo in a skimpy outfit or have extensive shower/hotspring/near-nude sequences.
Not every anime is made to fuel the sexual fantasies of teenage boys. Go watch Love Hina if you want that.
"You spoony bard!" -Tellah
There's nothing "special" about Anime. I watch it because it's different and more interesting than what's available on tv (which is boring at best and downright turgid/dumb most of the time -- not to mention these shows ALWAYS manage to get their facts wrong...even news shows and the "Discovery" channel...).
Whether the plots are incomprehensible, or have bad character development is mostly dependent on the series. I'll admit that there are a LOT of Anime out there that just plain suck. So I try to just watch the good ones. I watch the first 4 episodes and if it sucks I don't watch more.
For me it's not the "obvious" 'I-wanna-shag-Asian-chicks(girls) thing'. In the Anime I watch at least, the girls don't look asian (what race of girl has blue hair anyway?). I watch it because it looks cool. I like the animation style (at least of the newer stuff, the older [70s] stuff where only the mouths move is...not so good). I find the characters more realistic and complicated than those on mainstream american tv. Mainly I probably enjoy it because it's different from american tv, and is not afraid to challenge certain values (in a way that lets the viewer draw their own conclusions) that american shows seem to step around (like god, or fate, or the nature of existence).
As for the 'Alien Tentacle Rape stuff', I haven't seen any Anime like that (I haven't looked), the closest I've come is seeing an Anime that makes fun of the tentacle rape stuff (but that was pretty disturbing on its own) and that was with "Puni Puni Poemi Episode 2" (nasty show....but f-ing hilarious). Anyway It seems that every time someone is writing an objection to Anime they bring that up as if it typifies Anime (which is really just a red herring-- like if everytime someone brought up how much they hate american tv they'd also add, "and what of that wierd S/M stuff? Just fucking disturbing"). I would agree that if all Anime had tentacle rape stuff I would not watch it, but to discount an entire medium just because a small part (which only probably exists from my perspective) is aweful seems incredibly stupid (no offense).
I'm all for it, really. An all-Anime channel would be a godsend for both hardcore and casual fans alike. But one channel wouldn't be enough. There should be two.
It sounds a bit redundant, I know, but there's a silver lining to running things this way. Both channels would have identical broadcast schedules. Between, say, 7am and 7pm, you get TV series such as Ranma, Gundam, Tenchi, pretty much any series you'ld like to see plugged in. And with the abundance of series out there, there's a good chance that the daily schedules could differ from day to day. After 7pm, you get movies and such, like GitS, Iria, Spirited Away, etc.
Here's the catch. The one major difference between the two channels is one will be English dubs, while the sister channel remains Japanese language with English subtitles. This way the casual fan gets the shows in English, and the more discerning Anime fans can quench thier thirst for Anime in it's purest form (well, as pure as it can get without ditching the translation altogether).
Hell, there's even room for our own Rob Malda to host a show a-la A&E.
What to call these networks? Well, all I can come up with is Anime-Dub and Anime-Sub. But I'd gladly pay a few extra bucks a month for this kind of programming option. Now, if only we could successfully pitch this to a major broadcaster. Since Turner has its Williams Street crew giving up the Anime on Cartoon Network, you'ld think they'd be interested in spinning off two new networks. They could keep them seperate from the more squeaky-clean Cartoon Network and Boomerang brands.
Blog Prophyts - Right On, Man
They aren't "White" in that sense. It's probably the eyes throwing you off. The big eyes in Anime are used to designate youth and beauty, unless an artist sees fit to give the larger eyes to everyone in the series (like Dragonball or Pokemon).
Example: look at Mobile Suit Gundam. Amuro is a young kid, thus he has the larger eyes, while a character like Bright Noah has more conventional eye design.
Blog Prophyts - Right On, Man
OBVIOUSLY Robin isn't attractive whatsoever because she doesn't run around like a bimbo in a skimpy outfit or have extensive shower/hotspring/near-nude sequences.
:) In a way, she's MORE attractive BECAUSE of the mystery.
... it doesn't matter anyway. One of my friends and I decided that they figured by going the OPPOSITE route they'd end up with a winner - i.e. show no skin at all. Which worked to a point, I suppose, but my main point stands which is that the plot sucked a lot. :\
:P
:P I'm much more of a shoujo fan, possibly because I was introduced to anime with Sailor Moon. (Which is still dear to me, even though I know it's absolutely awful to the point of being funny)
I'll assume you haven't seen the series
But you can't say this because she sleeps naked, although all you see is her back (and there is a bath scene)
And, hmm... I don't remember LH actually being a big offender on the fanservice front. But since I severely dislike that series, except for the Christmas Special (and I hear LH-Again is more in line with the special) for a simple reason...
I do NOT like that cliche plot device that involves "Hey, we love each other, but we DON'T! And every time it looks like we might be getting close, something stupid happens!" I have the same problem with Ranma, but since they don't harp on it as much I can tolerate it. (Ranma's actually one of my favorites...)
And yes, I'm aware that LH was designed purely to make fun of that cliche, but it still bugs me.
Don't assume that because of an aside-point, I'm the standard "DRAGON BAWL Z IS KEWL HEHE GOKU CAN KICK ANYONES ASS" idiot.
Gawd, long-windedness...
No, a lot of them have blond or light brown hair as well as blue eyes (e.g. Sailor Moon, the kids on Digimon, and a million other ones I've seen but don't know the names).
I won't give away what happens (you already have, asshole)
:P Yeah, I knew I was overexaggerating on the episode numbers (I still hold that the glasses thing was 6) but it still seemed THAT SLOW to me. (And I watched this at the rate of 6/day.) Yes, there were a couple of interesting moments before everything goes to hell (no more spoilers I promise) with a couple of the WCOTDs, but everything felt very disjointed and there really wasn't much CONTENT to the last bit. True, at least there was no Sailormoon-deadlock (where for 40 episodes you can follow the SAME FORMULA) after that, but it was either too predictable, or the *bad* kind of "WTF?"
:P)
You have just made me laugh for the first time today.
's okay. Maybe I just don't like mystery genre at all (but the friend I was with as we plowed through it in four days agreed with me) but this seemed to pale in comparison with, say, Abenobashi Mahou Shoutengai. (Gainax's take on a parody anime. Eek?
I'm still waiting for them to get to the end of that series. Ghost in the Shell would be a nice addition though.
You have obviously never seen Cowboy Bebop or Inuyasha just to name a few of the good one out there. There is alot of Anime out there you have to sift through it to find the good stuff.
The purpose of the large eyes in anime (and in many other animations like simpsons and futurama) is that eyes are very expresive. A persons eyes and how they move can tell us alot about what a person is thinking or feeling, and the eyes are a central part of a person's face (in fact it's usualy one of the first things you look at) so the eyes are drawn larger to give more freedom to display emotion and thought.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
I feel compelled to mention, now that we're on the subject of intense content, that Narutaru (AKA Shadow Star) is THE most misadvertised show, EVER, in all respects, and even more intense than NTHT in its own right. Superficially it looks like Pokemon-type kids-with-magic-monsters, it's broadcast on Kid Station, the opening is cutesy, the first few episodes are inoffensive.
Then the abuse and slaughter cuts in.
And boy, does it get nasty. By the 13th episode anyone who isn't completely dead inside will be sickened by what's happening, even if they liked the show, and appalled at how misleading the previously mentioned things are. Apparently this had to do with the manga - it wasn't doing well in its original form for elementary kids, so the authors tweaked it "a bit" for an older audience, catching the US translators and distributors unaware, among others.
I wouldn't be surprised the the TV Execs in Japan were fooled too, it happened before when they put Evangelion on at 5pm. The $64k question is will they make more anime or not?
---If you can't trust a nerd, who can you trust?
Doesn't matter. They're still basically intended to be Japanese; eye and hair colouring is just used to make it easier to distinguish between characters.
If a character's really intended to be a Caucasian, they'll have freckles and curly hair. Every time, I guarantee it.
A) There's not a big enough market for it.
B) Nobody could afford to license the TV rights for enough anime to cover a whole channel
C) Even if you had access to every anime ever produced, it still wouldn't be enough for one channel and you'd be showing stuff over and over again once you'd gone through it all.
D) What market the channel would have can't watch TV all day. Huge swaths of time would have essentially no viewership.
E) That wouldn't stop the market from trying to watch as much as possible, and they'd get burnt out and stop watching.
Bottom line - Adult Swim is actually doing the right thing here. They've got a daily time slot that keeps people coming back, and a strong brand that they can potentially expand when the time is right. Much like there is a Toonami block on KidsWB, there will probably eventually be an Adult Swim block one or two times a week on a regular channel in prime time (which is what AS needs the most), probably on the WB. In the meantime, they need to get enough of a library that they don't need to show the same things over and over again, and can do shows once a week instead of all week long to fill time.
---If you can't trust a nerd, who can you trust?
Yeah, you can never forget the sheer magnitude of crap in the world. That's for the correction.
Comparing it to Windows will be a moot point, since El Dorado is going to have a 40% larger code base than XP.
I dunno about your coworkers, but my coworkers (I live in Japan) tend to only go on about the stuff they liked as kids. It's all dreadfully boring & stupid, but then if somebody came up to me and started talking GI Joe or Transformers, I'd probably be happy as a clam. For people from their late 20's to late 30's in Japan, anime is the stuff from their childhood, not all the shojo/tentacle/whathaveyou that gets produced now.
That said, there is good anime, but there are also good books, good movies, and good musicians. That doesn't stop stores from being full of diet books, I Know What You Did Last Summer, and Brittney Spears. Any medium is mostly composed of crap. Anime and manga are the same. However, for a country that doesn't have this medium (well, America has cartoons, but not mature cartoons (and by mature I don't mean sex and violence, I just mean aimed at adults)), I can see the draw. It's like if you lived in a country with no movies: you'd think movies were awesome and you'd want movies to be imported. You might even be blinded to the fact that the Pluto Nash you're watching is absolute crap.
I don't know your tastes, so I wouldn't know what to recommend, but stuff that I've liked (which is not necessarily the typical alpha-geek anime/manga selection) is: Silent Service (Chinmoku no kantai) about a Japanese submarine crew which steals their sub, declares independence from Japan, and has a huge huge amount of politics (well done, in that all countries positions are understandable and realistic), Naniwa Kinyudo, about how loan sharks work (written by an ex-lawyer, and very accurate), and Nausicaa (yeah, yeah, I know, typical famous manga dreck, but unlike the horrible anime version, very complex, very long, and very interesting).
There is good stuff out there, that isn't about tentacles, junior high girls, robots, or exploding heads, but as with any medium, the majority is dreck.
Oh, and as a rule of thumb, only take anime/manga recommendations from coworkers who also recommend good movies or good books. A Japanese worker who loved Armaggedon and Speed is going to have equally horrible tastes in anime.
No. Not military. I could never pass one of their requirements that deals with "unit cohesion." Besides, I never said I was an expert. That's near impossible, but let's just say this: all the white dudes who would end sentences with ne when I was in Sapporo would immediately get pegged as Anime watching wackoffs. Why? Only women and children do this. I am a yo man myself, but I do conjugate suru. Still, I am no Toshiro Mifune, that's for sure.
Comparing it to Windows will be a moot point, since El Dorado is going to have a 40% larger code base than XP.
First half is good, second half(after the raid on the Hellsing headquarters) goes downhill IMO... That also happens to be the point in time when the animators stopped following the original comic... Character designs and plot from there on out I find better in the comic, which is actually slated for a US release...
Though, as far as the actual anime went, the animation quality was pretty good(particularly in the first few episodes), but it was the music that really made it work in my opinion.
Actually, the eyes are drawn larger because Osamu Tezuka, grandpa of anime, loved and emulated Disney, and because most Japanese animators/manga artists base their drawing style off of other artists, as opposed to drawing from real life (same as in America). The result is a feedback loop with noses getting smaller and smaller and eyes getting bigger and bigger. Expressiveness may have been Disney's reasoning, but for anime now, it's just a fortunate happenstance.
ooo...that's bad....that's like a single KKK member mistakenly walking into a Black Panther meeting....beat down (disregarding whether or not that KKK member deserved the beat down, of course)....or another analogy would be an average, whimpy guy gets put into a cell with a big buff guy named "tiny" and talks like he's sucking helium all day long.
All classic cases for the ol' cyanide pill (or a ricin pill if you're that Bulgarian assassin)
That was the whole fucking POINT of Ranma - they like each other, but whenever they start getting close, something stupid happens.
Maybe YOU need to watch more Ranma. Yes, that is a recurring element, but you might as well say that Kuno's constant idiocy is the point of the anime. Ranma is MANY things. Love Hina is more in line with what you say - the entire plot is based around it! With Ranma, there are many other things that go on; Cologne and Shampoo's constant meddling comes instantly to mind, the incessant martial arts challenges, new techniques; Ryouga is a storyline in himself! Takahashi kept it to a good level of "something stupid happens when they get close" - in season 1(JP, season 2 Viz, thank you for the wonderful re-ordering of episodes) when they're about to kiss and Nabiki ruins it, that had me laughing, but if it was taken to the level of Love Hina, I wouldn't like it as much.
As it is, they're afforded more opportunity to SHOW that they love each other (well, that's my opinion. Others think Ranma pairs better with one of the others.) than in LH. I don't mind the comedy! It's not a shoujo anime for warm and fuzzy!
Blaaah...
So is anybody who watches Western live-action movies automatically a porn addict because porn movies exist?
If the sentence says Ghost in the Shell (the movie) and GitS (The TV Series), the first one in the sentence is the former, and the latter one in the sentence is the latter.
O~ Him that studies revenge keeps his own wounds green. -- Francis Bacon
Because they dyed their hair.
Well, there's the whole episode about the guy who skins people alive. That'll need some cutting - I felt quite ill after watching it, and it takes a lot to get me there..
BBK
How about releasing the DVDs actually filled with content instead of shipping DVDs with 50 minutes of video so I need to store piles of them.
God, that irritates me. FLCL is a great series, but it's only 2 hours, 30 minutes long. It fits on a single DVD with space to spare. Why is FLCL spread out over three DVDs? Okay, so the publisher wants to be greedy and justify the $65 I'm going to have to spend on it ("Oooooh, look, I get three pieces of $0.50 plastic instead of just one"). Just gouge me the $65 and give me a single, easy to store DVD. You've got a government granted monopoly in the form of copyright, your customers are relatively price tolerant.
Greedy, customer hating, fscking publishers.
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It's just the original Full Metal Panic, without most of the serious stuff. For those who doesn't know, the original Full Metal Panic had Sagara Souske, a professional solider/teenager (with absolutely -zero- common sense and social skills) assigned to protect Chidori Kaname from the Russians because she is one of the 'Whispered', people who are born with 'Black' technology. Sagara is part of Mithril, a self-appointed military division. (Taken from animenfo.com)
Full Metal Panic 2 (Also known as Full Metal Panic : Fumoffu) is more about Sagara and Chidori than about the whole Mithril thing. I mean, he blows up his shoebox with plastic explosives because he found a hair in front of his shoebox and thought that someone sent him a mailbomb, when in fact it was a love letter.
One of my favourite episodes was the Rugby one (ep 10), and it was aired just before the World Cup started. Turning a team of pansies into killers... bwahahahahahhaa
Anyhow, FMP2 is a great series and I suggest you check it out while it's still unlicensed. Also, FMP3 is rumored to be in the planning and will focus more of the military-side of things. Which I find very interesting as well. And if I didn't mention it eariler, FMP contains mecha called Arm Slaves (AS), and Souske is a good pilot of it. FMP2 contains a mechanized teddy bear costume named 'Bonta-kun', that Sousuke made himself after he stole the costume from a theme park, and he absolutely kicks ASS!
Founder of Mirror Moon - Tsukihime Game Trans
when will they bring it back?
why isn't it available (in its entirety) on dvd?
sigh.
La via sola al paradiso incommincia nel inferno
Now if only Teletoon and/or Space would catch on and start showing some more Anime! YTV has always been anime-friendly but they appear to be restricted to their Youth format and only show such things as Dragonball, Inuyasha, Cardcaptor Sakura, Beyblade, Pokemon, etc.
Space, on the other hand, has been claiming in their FAQ for the past 4 years that they've tried showing Anime before on a weekly basis but that it didn't make much of an impact in ratings. I think it's about time they reevalutated their stance, however. Spirited Away won an Oscar, and the Animatrix is awesome bridge between the (often overlapping) realms of Sci-Fi and Anime. Meanwhile, shows like Cowboy Bebop, Outlaw Star, and movies like Ghost In The Shell exist squarely within Space station's format and I for one think that they deserve a chance at proving themselves on Canadian cable television.
Feh. The real danger is that those who like Anime just for the sake of liking something that other people don't will have to move further into the fringe, which means the naughty tentacle stuff. That stuff makes me want to claw my eyes out.
For those of us who genuinely like quality Anime (rather than just saying "Oooh, it's Japanese! Pretty!"), we'll simply be overjoyed to be able to buy our favorite series in Wal-Mart instead of having to hunt for months and pay silly prices for 20 minutes of a bad pirate copy, and happy that we are now able to share our enthusiasm with our friends.
Happiness is relative, Based upon the way we live.
because the japanese think that pale skin is more beautiful than darker or tanned skin, unlike americans who tans
Anime characters have big eyes because they are regarded as a sign of beauty. Asians are obsessed with their eye sizes. In Japan and especially Korea, many women get their eyes enlarged. (Doesn't happen in China as often because Chinese people have pretty big eyes already)
So if you ever wanna compliment that asian chick your class, tell her she has big, beautiful eyes.
~~
TV Tokyo helped fund the series; it didn't broadcast it.
hhehehehe
Eat at Joe's.
It should have been www.witchhunteronline.com. Warning - you need flash to view it.
Does it matter? Nope... none of it does until they bring Furi Kuri back!
"Come on, let's go drink till we can't feel feelings anymore."
You're quite right, American entertainment conglomerates are afraid to make their audiences do any work. Like read subtitles. Or follow complicated plots. Or deal with moral ambiguity....
1. The laws of physics need not apply. This can make for some rather funny situations (granted, hollywood special effects are catching up here) 2. It is easy(cheap) to create fantastic settings. 3. It is possible to create some amazing costumes. 4. The director has more "control" over everything, making it easier to create a certain "feel".
I give it high marks for style, but the rest wasn't exactly stellar. Then again, sometimes style is all you need :)
While most of the episode doesn't require editing, some requires major surgery. In the episode "Jungle Cruise", Boutu of Section 9 confronts his past as a CIA operative who conducts psyop warfare on a gurella forces. One of his former comrad went insane himself, and took that technique to Japan in an attempt to get Boutu to kill him. The psyop warfare technique involves skinning a women, while keeping her alive to be found by her people. I just don't see how they're going to get around the issue of skinning.
Yeah, I could hardly believe the "bare-assed antics" either (especially when you realize the result is that Naota pops wood).
Neither could this woman (she obviously doesn't understand the concept of "Adult" Swim).
So, you'ld rather watch the same 6 episodes of FLCL over and over again as opposed to 26 episodes of a new series? Don't get me wrong, I like FLCL and Cowboy Bebop, but damn! There are only so many repeats a guy can take! And I, for one, and ready for some new series that I haven't seen yet...
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wuss
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
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