Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Furtuka]

New Zoids things is being teased. No confirmation on what the nature of said things actually is, but it looks pretty badass whatever it turns out to be.

[Neonivek]

Yeah so Mob Psycho 100 is an amazing show... the writer of it has so far shown he is a genius when it comes to this.

Mob Psycho 100 is also oddly... almost anti-anime.

[Cruxador]

I don't get people who think Goku looks American:

Some people claim they seen an American when they look at Goku. I'm really not seeing that at all. Which parts of him look specifically caucasian? The skin tone is light, and not the cliche "tan/yellow" that people associate with Asians. I get that, but Japanese are pretty far north, it snows in the Japanese islands, and plenty of them have skin as pale or paler than the average American, so skin tone can't be the thing. Sure, in some shots his eyes look bigger/rounder than others, but that's not even how Japanese depict people to indicate race: westerners don't actually have giant round eyes like a cartoon: the cliche is that asians have slanty little eyes, but that's just a cliche, so since it's not really true, Japanese don't use the opposite trope of "round eyes" to indicate a foreigner.

It's not "specifically Caucasian" so much as "specifically American", or going even further, specifically Yankee. The eyebrows and jawline are the main thing there, I think.

New Zoids things is being teased. No confirmation on what the nature of said things actually is, but it looks pretty badass whatever it turns out to be.

Looks almost like a video game.

Yeah so Mob Psycho 100 is an amazing show... the writer of it has so far shown he is a genius when it comes to this.

Mob Psycho 100 is also oddly... almost anti-anime.

You're doggone right about that. Only two anime adaptations so far, but every one has been a major hit. I wonder what'll come next, besides OPM s2. Maybe Old Man of the Underworld? It would be great as a series of shorts. His one-shots would all make good OVAs but there's not much financial incentive in that.

I'm not sure exactly what you mean by anti-anime, but ONE definitely does logical and thoughtful approach to things rather than just following conventions. You don't see this as much in OPM, since it goes faster and emphasizes the shounen aspect and fights, so a lot of the focus on the ennui is lost. A re-cut version with OVA content intermingled might get some of that back. But it's also an artifact of the fact that they only adapted the beginning, from when ONE was still getting on his feet as a writer, and it doesn't shine through as much in the original work either, compared to later. MOB went full-on with that series' themes of isolation, and really gets into it thoroughly, and every bit of it comes through in the adaptation. Not a lot of anime do that, and it feels more literary than most mass-market fiction (indeed, it reminds me a bit of 20th century American literature, which also focused a lot on isolation) and not a lot of anime cares to go there.

[Neonivek]

Well Mob Psycho 100 did a few things that go contrary to how anime often handles things.

Basically it runs counter to the power fantasy that anime typically uses. Its premise is basically that
a) Power doesn't make you special, in fact it being the pillar of your self is more of a sign of being pathetic.
b) Violence shouldn't be met with more violence

It is the only anime that has ever suggested running away, or leaving, a fight... and not because you can't win or the enemy is too pathetic...

Not that these elements haven't shown up in anime... But it is weird given that Pacifist characters in anime tend to be the sort of "I shall beat you up! With Pacifism!"

[Frumple]

Oh, certainly not the only one. Particularly if you step into the written/drawn stuff. It's not common but a character that avoids fights they could win just to avoid fighting (for whatever reason... probably the most common ones I've seen are too much effort or too costly, even when victory's fairly assured) shows up often enough it's not really a major departure from applicable genre norms.

... just don't ask me to recall any, at the moment. Most of the ones I've encountered recently were in LNs, and those kinda' blur together some most days. Still, definitely a non-negligibly existent thing. Think I actually see it relatively often particularly among wuxia patterned stuff -- it's a possible characteristic of cunning-styled character archetypes.

[Reelya]

It's not "specifically Caucasian" so much as "specifically American", or going even further, specifically Yankee. The eyebrows and jawline are the main thing there, I think.

That's what I mean about seeing your own no matter what is there. Nobody except an American would see that stock photo of Goku as representing the concept "American". When I said "Caucasian" I was being perhaps too generous to people being logical , but to say you actually see the nationality American in that picture staggers belief.

[Cruxador]

Well Mob Psycho 100 did a few things that go contrary to how anime often handles things.

Basically it runs counter to the power fantasy that anime typically uses. Its premise is basically that
a) Power doesn't make you special, in fact it being the pillar of your self is more of a sign of being pathetic.
b) Violence shouldn't be met with more violence

It is the only anime that has ever suggested running away, or leaving, a fight... and not because you can't win or the enemy is too pathetic...

Not that these elements haven't shown up in anime... But it is weird given that Pacifist characters in anime tend to be the sort of "I shall beat you up! With Pacifism!"

On further reflection, it occurs to me that it's sort of "anti-anime" in that it's pretty anti-otaku. The whole "you're not special, grow up and don't isolate you from society" was a very mainstream Japanese moral and is pretty counter to the usual narrative we see in shounen, which actively rejects that, though doesn't really do so actively or make a point of it like American "You're special, have some self esteem!" cartoons.

Oh, certainly not the only one. Particularly if you step into the written/drawn stuff. It's not common but a character that avoids fights they could win just to avoid fighting (for whatever reason... probably the most common ones I've seen are too much effort or too costly, even when victory's fairly assured) shows up often enough it's not really a major departure from applicable genre norms.

... just don't ask me to recall any, at the moment. Most of the ones I've encountered recently were in LNs, and those kinda' blur together some most days. Still, definitely a non-negligibly existent thing. Think I actually see it relatively often particularly among wuxia patterned stuff -- it's a possible characteristic of cunning-styled character archetypes.

Yeah but that's not really the same as "it's okay to run away, because you're a kid and not comfortable fighting" and the MC actually taking that advice rather than being hot-blooded under pressure.

It's not "specifically Caucasian" so much as "specifically American", or going even further, specifically Yankee. The eyebrows and jawline are the main thing there, I think.

That's what I mean about seeing your own no matter what is there. Nobody except an American would see that stock photo of Goku as representing the concept "American". When I said "Caucasian" I was being perhaps too generous to people being logical , but to say you actually see the nationality American in that picture staggers belief.

I don't think he really looks super American, but I can see the features that might lead other people to connect his looks to those of other people they've encountered in real life. Simplifying that into race or nationality is, while generally a politically popular thing to do, probably not useful in understanding why people make that connection. It's not like people are looking at this anime character with a dichotomous key.

[JoshuaFH]

I'm glad that I got to see the end of Mob, twas a great show.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Though the fact that the ending is almost (but not all the way) a cliffhanger and the series will probably be continuing is both kinda a letdown, and at the same time kinda hype-tastic.

I'm still curious if that one scene where Reigen and Mob are scaring the con artists, and then the room shakes and things start shattering is still alluding to Reigen having psychic powers, cause Mob ostensibly didn't do it and there was nobody else that was able to do that.

[Cruxador]

Here's a little clip from the finale.

I'm glad that I got to see the end of Mob, twas a great show.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Though the fact that the ending is almost (but not all the way) a cliffhanger and the series will probably be continuing is both kinda a letdown, and at the same time kinda hype-tastic.

I'm still curious if that one scene where Reigen and Mob are scaring the con artists, and then the room shakes and things start shattering is still alluding to Reigen having psychic powers, cause Mob ostensibly didn't do it and there was nobody else that was able to do that.

If you want the actual answer, from someone who read the manga:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

It was just evil spirits. Reigen doesn't have psychic powers and anyone telling you he does was just lying in order to build up the ending for you.

[Neonivek]

The anime actually answers the question of how he did that.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Reigan, unknowingly, took on the curse of one of his clients and passed it onto the crooks believing he was just giving them a fake curse.

[JoshuaFH]

Dangit, I completely missed that.

[JoshuaFH]

In Psycho Pass, it is weird that the main characters are basically Dystopian Fascist Thought Police, that have instant access to anyone and everyone's personal details from corporations to citizens, including every small minutiae of their daily lives and even their innermost thoughts, using weapons that can explode people on a glancing blow, and they're not afraid to use them on unarmed, fleeing, harmless, nonthreatening, injured, or otherwise unconfirmed perps, giving them no chance at anything even vaguely resembling justice... Am I supposed to be rooting for these protags? Because nearly every non-police person is very justified in being scared utterly shitless of our cute waifu heroine.

Also, for what is seemingly a totalitarian police state, the actual police force is... very small. There's only something like seven or eight people in its entirety it seems, which I suppose makes sense cause Jesus Christ would you want to work with these guys?

[IronyOwl]

In Psycho Pass, it is weird that the main characters are basically Dystopian Fascist Thought Police, that have instant access to anyone and everyone's personal details from corporations to citizens, including every small minutiae of their daily lives and even their innermost thoughts, using weapons that can explode people on a glancing blow, and they're not afraid to use them on unarmed, fleeing, harmless, nonthreatening, injured, or otherwise unconfirmed perps, giving them no chance at anything even vaguely resembling justice... Am I supposed to be rooting for these protags? Because nearly every non-police person is very justified in being scared utterly shitless of our cute waifu heroine.

Also, for what is seemingly a totalitarian police state, the actual police force is... very small. There's only something like seven or eight people in its entirety it seems, which I suppose makes sense cause Jesus Christ would you want to work with these guys?

I mean, like you said, it's basically Japanese Judge Dredd. I assume it's supposed to be a combination of justified, unjustified, and just plain terrible at their jobs.

They do get into how they wound up in that state later on, though, which doesn't really help if the show up until that point isn't working for you.

[JoshuaFH]

No, it's actually pretty interesting when shows aren't from the perspective of the person who's the moral superior of everyone else, it just creates this dissonant situation where the characters are the instigators of these utterly tragic and unjust situations, and then the characters have no introspective moment where they realize they've done something monstrous, instead they just shrug it off and go on about their day. I suppose that's just a natural repercussion of growing up in a society like that though, where it's obvious to the audience, but the characters are fully drunk on the fascist koolaid, so to them it just seems obvious that it's OK and wholly justified to be the judge, jury, and executioner. Like, "God it would just be so inconvenient if citizens had rights or if there were restrictions on the behavior of law enforcement, how would justice ever get done?"

I'll keep on watching, because the show is obviously going somewhere, those were just my thoughts on the show as I was having them.

[Tack]

I think cute waifu heroine gets kinda messed up about the various little injustices which happen (and the massive injustices).
I personally really liked the fact that things got to her Just Enough (That I can remember, I can't remember it well). I really don't like protags who go fully hysterical whenever things go wrong.