Tag: Thoughts

Hello all you wonderful people! It’s me, Alexie, and I’m back with another post for the Panda Gang! If you haven’t realized yet, I like lists. They’re simple, and usually a summary of the points in the list is good enough to get people to know what I’m talking about. This will be another one of those lists, because why not?

So, as the title says, what are some novel series I would love to see as anime (or cartoons, whatever)? Within the realm of anime being based off manga and light novels, I do think that it’s a bit of a shame that what we almost always get are series from Japan. Okay, obviously that’s going to happen, but outside of Japan, in the West, there are some fantastic series that I think would actually work better as anime/cartoons (I know they’re different…maybe animated is a better word?) than live-action adaptations (like all the Marvel series on Netflix, or whatever else). Let’s get into this list!

 

The Night Angel Trilogy, Brent Weeks

Yep, this is a trilogy that is based on a medieval Europe, with ninjas and a neat magic system that doesn’t make a ton of sense until pieced together through the trilogy (but in the end it actually makes a tone of sense), and a huge amount of political intrigue that rocks the world and its boundaries. Plus, the world that the Night Angel trilogy takes place in has an awesome name: Midcyru. If you want to know more about this trilogy and what it’s like I highly recommend reading it if you’re into fantasy novels or you can just visit the author’s website (brentweeks.com) and check some other stuff out. There’s also a graphic novel of the first book in the trilogy, so what’s to say an animated adaptation is impossible?!?

NAT

The Lightbringer Series, Brent Weeks

Okay, okay, I know…I have a thing for Brent Weeks, obviously, but the man hasn’t won the top fantasy novel award for nothing (he got a damn axe!—it’s the David Gemmell Legend award if you’re curious). This series has a magic system based on color, which is super cool. The magic users are called Drafters, and each color of the spectrum we know as the visible spectrum has metaphysical properties–there are some other “draftable aspects, too. Also, there’s a picture below showing properties… The cool part is whatever color your eyes are is the color you can “draft,” but some people have multi-colored eyes and can draft multiple colors (red/green, green/blue, you get the point). There’s also one person in the world called The Prism, who can draft every single color of the spectrum…even…well, I’d rather not go spoiling anything, so I’ll leave that as it is. There’s also massive political intrigue on a scale I haven’t read in any fantasy before, which is super cool, and a cast of characters that is large, but not too large to not know who is who right off the bat.Lightbringer seriesLightbringer series drafters spectrum

The Ancestor Trilogy, Mark Lawrence

This is a trilogy I have yet to complete, since I have paperback versions of the first two novels and I’m waiting for the paperback version of the final installment to release. I’m weird. If I start hardcover I get all hardcover and if I start paperback I get all paperback for a more uniform look to the novels. The Ancestor trilogy by Mark Lawrence is a cast full of females. The lead is female, the supporting characters are female, and they’re all badass! They’re a convent of nuns, but they’re assassins and magic users and healers and users of medicine. They’re also awesome as all hell. We start with a younger girl named Nona, and it’s her story of becoming who she is, a badass. The magic system is a bit confusing unless you’re reading the story, but with the political intrigue, power of the cast, and magic system, this trilogy would be great to see animated.Ancestory trilogy

Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer

I seriously don’t remember anything about this series since it’s been around fifteen years since I read any of the novels, but in all honesty I think seeing it as an animated series would be awesome. There’s magic and elves and a twelve-year-old criminal mastermind as the main character (Artemis Fowl II), but yeah. I would love to see this series animate because I think the colors and characters would be great to see on a screen and it wouldn’t work as a live-action adaptation. Animate it and you can get all of what you want out of this series. While it is a series aimed at younger readers, I still believe it would be an enjoyable series.Artemis Fowl series

And that does it for my post today. Are there any series you would love to see animated? If so, I would love to know!

Thanks for reading!

Alexie 🙂

   Imagine this, a high school boy is underneath a sakura tree. Its petals flutter through the air as a small breeze blows. A cute high school girl in front of him. He confesses his love for her. The girl steps back and holds her hands to her face and she blushes furiously. Or imagine this scene. A young man and a young woman are sitting on a blanket. He is wearing comfortable streetwear and she is wearing a beautiful yutaka. Fireworks light the night sky. The guy holds the girl’s hand and she blushes a little. They lean in together and kiss as a big firework goes off lighting up their faces. 

   Does this make you feel a little warm. Like a slight fluff in your heart. Why? How does anime make us feel that? That fluff in our heart. Why do we feel love in anime romances and get so passionate about fictional characters. Cus it’s very common in our otaku community. This isn’t a deep analysis on romance, just my take on it. 

   So what’s my opinion on romance in anime. I love it and hate it. I love it cus it makes my heart go doki doki and feel fluffy inside. I only hate it cus it makes me feel jealous. As someone who is gonna die alone, I get depressed. But that’s me being a bitch. I mostly love it greatly. Even though I just got into it recently. 

   I just rewatched After the Rain, My Little Monster, and Love, Chunibyo & Other Delusions. Which are great romance animes. My Little Monster was my very first one. And lets say I kinda got hooked on the genre. Made me wish that I could find love someday. Who doesn’t want that kind of romance to bloom. Be in school and be confessed to by a cute girl under a sakura tree or to be together with a girl and spend time under some fireworks. We are social beings and look for that kind of things. Even if are just watching 2d people going through a romantic journey, we place ourselves in that because we want that for ourselves. We self project ourselves to these characters. And when a homewrecker starts flirting with one of the members in the relationship, we flip out and yell at our screens. Unless that’s just me.

   Other good romance anime to watch is Love Lab. Which is my guilty pleasure anime ( cus I’m a horror writer that loves cute things). And another amazing one is Kaguya-sama: Love is War. This anime is soooo fucking good and extra in the right places. If you haven’t seen them, you should. Love Lab is about these student council girls trying to learn to get a boyfriend. Kaguya-sama: Love is War is about President and Vice President if the student council trying to make each other confess their feelings for each other.

  Sorry for being late and not posting last week, I got busy with life. So as a gift of apology, I’m gonna write y’all a short romance story. A KawaiiPaperPandas exclusive romance story. Look forward to it in a few days. And I am looking for some more romance anime, if you know any, comment down below. Thanks so much for reading and have a great day.  Love you all. IMG_20190802_174423

   So as you may have noticed, my title is a lil different. I am trying some new things. There will be recommendations coming soon. I’ll have in the future different themed saturdays based on what I’m talking about. Might make a schedule later on. Anywho, let’s get to the blog.

   How do I put this, the best way to put it is to say that I am an idiot. Why would you say that about that yourself you may ask? Well here is why. I rewatched something that many people feared and memed. It’s quite infamous and before you ask, yes I’ve seen this before. I will go over this story. It’s a tale from my past when I was in college. So here it is. 

   When I was in college, I wasn’t the smartest person. A very chill person who went with the flow. So I made friends with this emo stoner chick. One day we smoked several bowls and she told me, “wanna watch some hentai with me?” You knew my answer, but can you blame me, a cute emo girl wanting to watch some hentai with me when i was sky high. So we ditched yoga class and laid in a field in the college and she brought up a vid on her phone. She looked at me and said, “Boku no Pico is my favorite hentai, have you heard of it?” My brain was dead, so it didn’t click. So we ended up watching the whole first episode. I thought it was futa when I was high, boy I wish it was. When I was somber I looked up what I watched and boy oh boy I was put into shock. IMG_20190816_095705

    But this week I got a crazy idea. Why not watch it somber and see if it’s truly as bad as it seems. That’s a smart idea, I thought, I could do a fun blog on it. So I watched the entire first episode. The results, hauntingly nothing. It’s just yaoi hentai, that’s all. The only disturbing thing is that Pico seems to be underage. But other than that, just your average hentai, just with two males. So why is so infamous, that when people watch it their eyes bleed and they go blind for life. Is it cus when it first came out, gay sex was frowned upon. During the era where people hide their sexuality cus a lot of people were insensitive. That’s my guess. Cus nowadays you have a bunch of guys liking traps ( guys dressed like girls). Which is what Pico was. Time changed where liking male on male is more accepted. It’s just that negative mentality of Boku no Pico made it that  infamous meme to this day. 

   There is more mind scarring works out there, like Euphoria, Shindo L’s Emergence/ Metamorphosis, and Mai-chan no Nichijou. These works are disturbing ranging from a guy pooping in a girl’s mouth to an innocent girl becoming a druggie rape doll to an immortal girl who gets tortured. And there is still more fucked up shit I’ve read that I’m not covering.

   So in the end if the day, when you want to scar a little weeblet, don’t recommend them Boku no Pico, tell them to watch Euphoria instead. And yeah, I baited y’all, making it seem like it was a comedy post where I was suffering from watching a meme, but in reality, I’m calling myself stupid cus I judged something cus it was homosexual in nature. And there is nothing wrong with yaoi or yuri. Love is equal. 

   Thanks for reading and if you have anything that you want me to read or watch to see my honest reaction to it, comment down below. 

                            -Tsubaki Kuro

Hello all you wonderful people! I’m back on KawaiiPaperPandas again! At 11am Eastern time I had no idea what I was going to write for you all today, but I think I finally figured something out. I had been thinking about what I watch as a whole and what I actually enjoy watching (as some of what I watch I don’t actually tend to enjoy all that much). Now, just because I don’t like something doesn’t mean I won’t watch it. I have a hard time dropping shows that I start because I feel like I just committed to something and I need to see it through. I will admit, though, that I don’t watch as many shows per season as most of current followers and readers on my blog (I guess that would extend to here, too) because my attention span and memory aren’t all that great. But what drives me to finish a seasonal anime?

To give you an example, during the Autumn 2018 and Winter 2019 seasons I started around sixteen shows per season. I think I finished with about five each. And that wasn’t because I didn’t enjoy the shows I started, it was simply because I forgot what days they aired, fell behind a few weeks, and then forgot about them completely until the next season started. I had a few moments where I went “Oh, X show! Wait, I never finished that did I?” I had a friend yell at me every time we saw each other because I hadn’t finished “How Not To Summon a Demon Lord” (And I still haven’t finished that…a show that aired Summer 2018. Perhaps I should finish that? Maybe…) So, with that I’ll list a few of the shows I watched during the Winter 2019 and Spring 2019 seasons (because I feel like staying in 2019) and go into why I finished a few of them.

Winter 2019:

The Rising of the Shield Hero; The Promised Neverland; Domestic Girlfriend; Kaguya-sama Love is War; Kakegurui xx; The Quintessential Quintuplets; Magical Girl Spec-Ops Asuka.

Is there anything about these shows that have anything in common, or is it a more balanced viewing on my part? While I will say that comedies aren’t on my usual watch-list, Kaguya-sama and The Quintessential Quintuplets were real treats for the comedy/slice-of-life-esque shows. Asuka was a total letdown in a vein of shows I have tried to get into over and over each year (the magical girl shows, just to analyze them) as the progression was blindly advancing with no real motive; and Domestic Girlfriend was my trashy anime for the season (which I loved! It was so odd and ridiculous I couldn’t stop watching).

However, the two shows that garnered the most response from me were Shield Hero and The Promised Neverland. Both were amazing in my eyes as we got to see true progression from the main cast of characters. There was a solid idea of what the characters were trying to accomplish, and villains that seemed to truly test our protagonists. Other than that, though, there wasn’t much in common with any of these shows that I can see of the top of my head.

Naofumi’s progression from a cast-aside, hate filled, Devil of the Shield character to someone who was one of the most compassionate, trustworthy, and well-rounded characters I’ve seen in a while was one of the main reasons I continued watching Shield Hero week after week (with some Raphtalia awesomeness thrown in there as well). And then there was Emma, Ray, Norman, and the rest of the children from The Promised Neverland. Each of them had their own skill set, each of them had brains and an ability to connect with the viewers in some way because of who they were, what they did, and how they acted. While I will say that later in the manga I didn’t like Emma’s character as much (I grew to like Ray more), this season of The Promised Neverland was well done in both the animation and art departments and the storytelling. Character progression made these two shows for me, and that’s saying something (as that’s primarily what I look for in watching shows) as they’ve only been around for a short time.

Spring 2019:

Bungou Stray Dogs; Attack on Titan; Kimetsu no Yaiba; Wise Man’s Grandson; Carole & Tuesday; Midnight Occult Civil Servants; We Never Learn; and some shorts…

The Spring 2019 season didn’t have as much going for it in my book as compared to the Winter 2019 season, but we did get some decent to good shows this time around. Attack on Titan came back with a bang and didn’t let up; Bungou Stray Dogs ramped up their second season with a thrilling third season that is looking to be my anime of the year contender (we’ll see how that plays out); the comedy show Wise Man’s Grandson was decent in a way, but eventually fell flat in my experience; Carole & Tuesday continued to impress me even though it was slower than the others I was watching; and Kimetsu no Yaiba…how can I put this…burned out after about ten episodes for me. We Never Learn was decent for what it was, but really it wasn’t what I expected it to be considering my friend was amping it up to be a great comedy (having read the manga).

In looking at all the shows I have listed here, is there any common denominator that kept me interested? I don’t see a solid genre of shows, so that can’t be it (although watching only a single genre in a season seems ridiculous). No, what I think kept me watching each of these shows was, for the most part, the progression we got throughout the weeks the shows aired. While I know some of the shows didn’t have as much progression, there was still some. The most interesting progression in my eyes came from The Rising of the Shield Hero, Attack on Titan, The Promised Neverland, and Bungou Stray Dogs.

What can we surmise from this list? Character progression is the key factor in making a show worthwhile for one or multiple seasons. Attack on Titan had great character development through its third season, giving us backstory we anime-only viewers didn’t know, connecting dots and going all the way back to the basement that had been denied us since season one. With the thunder spears leading off the second half of season three, we got a look at just how far the Scout Regiment was willing to go in order to take the threat of the titans away from humanity. We got a look at the history of Grisha Yaeger, the family history of Eren, and how this whole titan business started. Marley and Eldia, the political structure of the Marleyans (is that how it’s spelled?) and what they were doing to the Eldians.

Okay, and here, I do want to take a small tangent and talk about the historical aspect of this Marley vs Eldia thing. Yes, it is full of Nazism. It’s true. The Marleyans were subjecting the Eldians like they did the non-Aryans which included Jews–even German Jews; homosexuals;  Blacks; communists; Gypsies; Slavic peoples in the Balkan states and Russia; and Muslims. Is the inclusion of that a bad thing? People complain that Attack on Titan has hints of Nazism, and I’d say it has pools of Nazism. However, is that really a bad thing to add into a story if it progresses the story and gives it life? The Nazi regime and their persecution of the groups above was a true and terrifying thing, and I think Attack on Titan has every right to base a story line off it to show a newer generation just how terrifying such a thing can be. If we bury the past we’re sure to repeat the past, so Attack on Titan throwing these historical aspects into our faces is, in my opinion, a good thing.

With everything relating to the historical aspects of Attack on Titan, it grabbed my attention even more than it already had through almost three complete seasons. I’m a huge history nerd, and my grandfather was even forced into the German army to fight in Stalingrad (he was born in 1927, so he was 14-15 years old and was seeing a Jewish girl at the time) and then again at the Battle of the Bulge in the Ardennes in Belgium in 1944-1945, so the fact that Nazism was that prevalent in Attack on Titan grabbed my attention in a matter of seconds. (Oh, and before attack me, fuck Nazis. Fuck Nazis. They forced my family member to be a pawn in their game at a young age–which is a personal hatred–and have no moral standing in the world at all because they’re sick, twisted, and subhuman. Fuck Nazis…) I also studied the political time frame of German history between 1918-1950 in school, so it’s something I sort of enjoy.

Anyway…on a topic other than Nazism and Germany, Bungou Stray Dogs was simply one where the story continued to surprise me. The different abilities of the Armed Detective Agency and Port Mafia, the character progression in how they all used their abilities, the undermining and backstabbing that went into each group prevalent in the show, the relationships each character had with another cast member (it was almost like you could match them up with one other and be like “yeah, they’re opposites”) and having to work together to take out a common enemy? Everything about Bungou Stray Dogs made me want more as the season progressed. And let’s not forget Akutagawa working with Atsushi again…because that was epic as can be.

In Bungou Stray Dogs, I think it was the detective aspect and the way that the different groups went about trying to outsmart each other with their collective minds that sealed the deal for me. We had so many intelligent cast members vying for control of Yokohama, different plans being set in motion, and everything coming together to derail what was an uneasy alliance between two hated groups that realized if either one was going to survive they needed to work together. Plus, the fight scenes are top notch.

I will say that Bungou Stray Dogs and Attack on Titan were my favorite shows for the Spring 2019 season, and I think the reason behind that is how much progression we ended up getting. Each of the shows that I saw this last season had some progression, but none could match the depth of these two shows in their third seasons. Is that a fair metric? Probably not as the characters have been around for years while the newer anime have just started, but still. I think there’s an ability with Attack on Titan and Bungou Stray Dogs to make us care so much about the characters and their well being that none of the other shows I watched cared to dive in to.

Character progression is the main reason I watch an anime. If there is nothing going on between the characters and the plot to drive it forward then what’s the point of watching? Characters drive plot and plot drives characters. It’s a balancing act that demands each portion’s attention. If the characters are failing but the plot is progressing and seems like it should be great, then is the anime good? If the plot is failing but characters are great and interaction between them is fantastic and enjoyable, is the anime worth watching? Some might say yes, as one can outperform the other and make for a good anime, but the truly phenomenal anime are ones were the characters and plot are driving each other through conversations, through group actions (Attack on Titan), through flashbacks (Bungou Stray Dogs), and with a villain that is pronounced and well-rounded in itself.

I do believe that without character progression a show is not worth my watching. And that’s because I’d rather not get a progressing story with a stagnant character. Now, I will be fair here and say that what I mean isn’t like the isekai genre’s level-up thing where the character progresses in skill points and abilities or whatever, but as a character. Is she a hard-ass who finds a soft spot for a younger boy and raises him to become just as badass as her? Does she free slaves and take out slave owners? Is she helping to protect a group of people from a tyrant? If the lead does not grow emotionally then I do not see a point in watching a show that could have been touted as an adventure story, or action story, or whatever.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is what drives me to finish seasonal anime. The progression of our characters.

Thanks for reading!

Alexie 🙂

 

Hello all you wonderful people! It’s another week and once again I’m back here. Let’s go!

getting people into anime

When season 3 part 2 of Attack on Titan started I had been going to my dad’s place weekly to watch the German Bundesliga matches I’d missed the previous day for a few weeks, and we both enjoyed those together. It became something we looked forward to each week, and when I wouldn’t show up on Sunday night because I had something more pressing to get done in my life, I felt a little hollow, like I was missing a piece of what made me, well, me.

And then, out of nowhere my dad started asking questions about what was happening in Attack on Titan. I tried my best to make it simple for him, but he was confused about what was going on, who was who, and where they were. I sighed, and thus began my journey into anime with my dad. After that episode of Attack on Titan (I can’t remember exactly which one it was), he got so far into the show. In the upcoming weeks, since I had a decent amount of time off where I could stay at his place a little longer than I thought most weeks, we went through every single episode of Attack on Titan. We watched season 2 in one day… It didn’t take me long to get him into the show, and he has come to absolutely love it. Oh, and HE SAW THE FINAL EPISODE OF SEASON 3 BEFORE ME! I was super excited to get to his place after work and watch that final episode with him, but I showed up about an hour after the episode aired and this was our conversation:

Me: “It’s time to finish Attack on Titan!” (yes, I can totally italicize my spoken words!)

My Dad: “Yeah, I already saw it.”

“Me: “Dammit!”

So, I succeeded right? I got my dad into anime!

Now, I’ll explain something here quick because I think this is the most important part about getting someone into anime: start with something you know they’ll have a higher chance of liking based on their personality and other aspects of entertainment they enjoy.  I know my dad likes action and comedy in his entertainment; he’s also a history nerd like myself and enjoys some sports. So, what did that tell me? Well, after binge-watching most of Attack on Titan and then watching each episode weekly until the season ended, I sort of knew what he would enjoy if he were to watch anime.

What I gathered from knowing my dad, I made a list of anime I believe he would enjoy, and we started watching more than just Attack on Titan together. Currently, because he has a hard time watching more than one show at a time (it messes with his grasp on what’s happening during each show), we are watching Black Lagoon. And he loves it. He loves Revy and how the show has progressed and how all of the characters interact. Now, I wasn’t sure what to actually try to watch with him after Black Lagoon, so I asked my friend. He asked what we’ve seen together thus far, so I told him the two above titles. I gave him some information about my dad, what he usually watches, what he enjoys (or at least what he used to enjoy before he turned 60 years old) and we went through talking about different shows, what the plots are, and how the characters interact. This is our list for my dad:

  • Black Lagoon
  • Death Note
  • The Promised Neverland
  • Psycho-Pass
  • Another
  • Darker than Black
  • Highschool of the Dead
  • Bungo Stray Dogs
  • Outlaw Star
  • Kino’s Journey (possibly…)

I know most of these are in the same vein, but I figure if I can get him to watch at least a few of these shows, I’ll be able to open him up to other genres. For this upcoming season I figured I’d try to get him into Vinland Saga, but we started watching it late last night so he fell asleep after the second episode. Which is okay, he enjoyed what he saw and we’ll be able to get back to the third episode at a later date. Perhaps I’ll try getting him into Fire Force as well, but I’m not sure yet. Should probably get through that list up there first, yeah?

Anyway, that’s what I’ve got my dad going through right now. But what is it about getting people into anime that seems like such a hard task? I know firsthand that some people throw anime out the window completely because they’re animated. Well, duh, but seriously. Anime is entertainment, so why not find shows that you think they’ll like and try? If somebody enjoys stand-up comedy, or likes to laugh often, why not show them comedy anime. I’ve come across some people who absolutely love comedy, so I figured I’d show them some of my favorite comedy anime. And they laughed like mad! I don’t know if they continued watching any anime, but at least I was able to get them to laugh and have a good time.

Sports are another genre that I think would be easy to get people into anime if they’ve done some sport before. Are they runners? Why not try showing them Run with the Wind? Volleyball players? Obviously Haikyuu!!…oh, and on that note, I had a friend once who called me out on how I spell Haikyuu!!, and it was a shocker. It’s a friend who I had no idea even watched it in his life or knew anything about it, so that was a treat.

Now, there are people who would simply say that all anime is for kids because they’re basically cartoons, and that’s fine, but I figure you can at least try to get them to see something more if you’re adamant enough. Maybe I’m just too stuck in my ways of trying to get people into a medium I enjoy so I have more people to talk to about what I enjoy and what they’ll also hopefully enjoy, but the nuances of anime are a more concrete point. How do the characters interact? What are their personalities and what do they enjoy? Is there tension between characters? What about how the story progresses in itself? Is it gripping or stagnant? Does the story make you think? Some anime that I’ve seen were so intense I couldn’t stop thinking about them for days after! Oh, and there’s the talk of art style, animation quality, music, and the sub/dub aspect.

Honestly, I think the initial talks of getting people into anime can be tricky, because a lot of people see anime as cartoons, like I said before, but I do believe that there is some way to get them into it. Anime can be thought-provoking, intense, humorous, and much more, so what’s the harm in trying? If trying to get someone into anime doesn’t work it doesn’t work. That’s all there is to it. But, I don’t see any problem in trying. I will say that I almost got someone into anime based on music alone. I played a few OPs for one of my friends a while back without telling him where they came from, and hours later he said, “I haven’t stopped listening to these songs. Where did you find them?”

And with that, I told my friend this: “Anime. Seriously, they were opening and ending credit songs for anime shows. “found & lost” by Survive Said the Prophet is from a show called Banana Fish; “Hikari Are” by BURNOUT SYNDROMES is from Haikyuu!!; and “Touch Off” by UVERworld is from The Promised Neverland.” I don’t know if he started watching anime, but at least I got him to listen to some music, so I call that a win. I think there’s a part of the anime watching experience that starts with the OPs. If the OP catches the viewer’s attention, I think they’ll be more inclined to give the show a chance. I know that’s what happened when I started Vinland Saga with my dad.

However, if somebody isn’t used to watching anything in Japanese and isn’t used to reading subtitles, perhaps watching in a dubbed format would be an easy gateway into getting them to enjoy it. That’s what I’ve done, and slowly I’ve started watching things with subs if the English version isn’t available. It’s all been quite enjoyable, though.

I also think anime movies are a decent starting point, but I won’t really talk about that here. There’s many anime movies, and the dubs are actually quite wonderful (especially the Ghibli films) that could be a gateway for many people, so why not try?

With everything, I do think that getting people into anime can be a grueling experience, but sometimes it pays off. In short, I think it all comes down to what that person’s interests are and how they think. Are they into sports and camaraderie? Maybe showing them sports anime could interest them. Are they into psychological, thought-provoking things? Maybe something that deals with the human condition, or mentality and free will could work. I see it as a game of chess, with meticulous planning going into what the other person’s brain would enjoy and trying to find something that will grab them from the start. Then you can slowly branch out with them, or maybe they’ll do it themselves. Who know!

 

And that’s all I have for this post! How would you go about getting people into anime? Have you ever gotten someone into it and all of a sudden you had a monster on your hands that wouldn’t stop talking about it or watching?

 

Thanks for reading!

Alexie 🙂

(WARNING: This post may contain small spoilers from Banana Fish. Read at your own discretion.)

Revenge is often slow moving and slow burning. It may take years for a characters revenge plot to be fulfilled, but that doesn’t make the results any less sweeter. Most often than not characters design revenge schemes in order to destroy the recipient; either psychically, emotionally or sometimes both. Whether it is served piping hot or cold-revenge is one dish I can’t get enough of in anime.

The definition of revenge has a multitude of meanings. The first one is described as “the action of inflicting hurt or harm on someone for an injury or wrong suffered at their hands“and the second one is “the desire to inflict retribution.” You can think of the first definition as the famous saying, “an eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, hand for a hand, a foot for a foot.” Revenge often serves as a reminder to others that you should not be trifled with. Revenge provides a way to keep order in a society where the rules of law are weak and malleable, but at the end of the day revenge always comes at a price.

One character that is comfortably familiar with revenge is Yut-Lung Lee from the anime Banana Fish.

Considering that revenge is a human response, it isn’t surprising that Yut-Lung would seek out revenge in the show. The emotion of revenge often stems from the feelings of hatred, anger, or hurt that was once portrayed as love or desire. It is generally a result of something you might have always wanted but was ripped away from you, or someone you always loved not being with you anymore. Once this specific thing/someone is forever wiped away from existence in your life you might think you need to seek retribution. This feeling implies that whatever it was that you held closest to you still in fact matters deep down. Seeking revenge on someone means that you are still affected by whatever was done to you.

Yut-Lung Lee sought out revenge not only on Ash and Eiji in the series, but his own brothers as well. Yut-Lung is the youngest of seven children, and his parents died when he was just six years old. That is when he started living with his aunt and uncle. But where does the revenge plot come in you may ask? Well, I’ll tell you. Later on in the series we find out that Yut-Lung’s mother was a street vendor’s daughter and became his father’s mistress when she was just 10 years old. His father was 65. When his father died, his half brothers came in and raped/killed his mother as they despised her and Yut-Lung of being their father’s favorite mistress and child. Thus seeing Yut-Lung as a threat for the inheritance. They raped/killed his mother and made him their weapon to keep him from gaining power.

Yut-Lung grew up hating himself and vowed that he would bring the Lee family to extinction with his own hands. He would kill his own brothers and family to make them pay for their crimes against him and his mother. A perfect leeway for a revenge plot am I right? The right thing for Yut-Lung to do would be for him to let it go, forgive and move on but that’s not how this works in anime! Nope. Revenge is another key to why Yut-Lung despises Ash and Eiji so much.

Yut-Lung believes that he and Ash are like Yin and Yang. His feelings towards Eiji are amicable at first but then they slowly turn towards hatred later on in the series. He believes that Eiji will drag Ash down and likely be his downfall. He also despises Eiji because of how much he means to Ash, viewing him as this undesirable weakness. This was really prevalent in episode 18 when Ash didn’t hesitate to shoot himself in the head for Eiji when Yut-Lung as him to.

In a few episodes towards the end of the anime series Blanca states that Yut-Lung feels like this because he desires the sort of connection Ash and Eiji have. A pure unrequited love for one another, something that Yut-Lung never got to experience. This is due to his mother being raped/killed by his own brothers and his father being a POS pedophile. Yut-Lung never got to feel the emotions of love, security, affection because those emotions were replaced with loneliness, heartache, and affliction. Something no child at the age of six should have to experience.

In a lot of ways Yut-Lung still shows signs of being a child on the inside. Throughout the series we see him display signs of selfishness, whining, and crying/throwing tantrums when he doesn’t get his way.

To me, this shows that Yut-Lung missed the opportunity to really be a child because of his past experiences. He grew up not knowing what true happiness/love felt like and was completely consumed by the thoughts/idea of revenge. I can’t imagine the type of toll that took on him. I should probably also note that Yut-Lung was also used like a sex toy much like Ash was in the series. I am sure this also played into his feelings of wanting to be loved by someone. The desire to want to be loved unconditionally by someone is eats at you like a parasite. Yearning for something you want but cannot have will break your soul little by little. And that is exactly what Yut-Lung was in the series…a broken young boy pretending to be a man. Blanca knew this from the moment he met Yut-Lung and Sing confirms this in the last episode of the series.

As Alex over on Watch JoJo (in 2017) says, “No one does revenge stories quite like Japanimation.” Revenge stories in anime tend to give us the best tortured and diverse characters. I couldn’t agree more. Yut-Lung’s story of revenge was one of the best plot points in Banana Fish. I was captivated by him, not only by how beautiful he was, but also by how tormented he was a young man. Lost, angered, jealous, bitter, but also endearing in some ways. When Yut-Lung showed his weak points he was utterly helpless and that made me feel for him. I wanted to reach out and hold him. I knew deep down that he was still a young boy crying out for attention/love. And that is what a good story should do. It should make you feel something when watching/reading/consuming it. That means the creator/author did their job (*as I have stated many times on my blog before).

Yut-Lung’s character in Banana Fish was one of my favorite things about the show. I definitely find myself often thinking about him and how he felt throughout the series. I feel like we can all relate to him on some type of level. My hopes for Yut-Lung in the aftermath of Banana Fish would be for him to find himself, love himself, forgive himself, and be able to overcome his sense of self-deprecation. Ash and him both deserved better, but they only knew how to survive the hand they were dealt. I would want Yut-Lung to find inner and outer peace. As Yut-Lung says, “Nothing is born from history.”

Other shows that also contain revenge themes are 91 Days, KILL la KILL, Psycho Pass, Castlevania, Berserk, Claymore, Afro Samurai, Code Geass, Dante’s Inferno and Terror in Resonance. Of course there are tons more but I don’t have all day to name them all XD

Disclaimer: All imagery and photos come from searching for them on the internet. I have no claim or right to them. If I find any links I will always post them (this usually entails fan art or any other work affiliated with an artist)

 

(Disclaimer: Today’s blog is a Throwback Thursday post I wrote in May of 2017. I figured since I have a larger audience now you guys might enjoy this content!)

I wanted to have a little chat with you all today on the topic of what makes an anime truly great.

We all have our likes and dislikes, our favorites and least favorites, characters we love to hate and hate to love, our best wifu’s, and even which OP’s and ED’s we decide to watch every time a new episode is on or should we choose to skip over the song(s) just to get to the opening scenes. But with everyone’s personal taste being just that, personal, how do we really know when an anime is great?

Is it the characters or how they are drawn?
Is it the plot/story-line?
Is it the animation or art style?
Is it the music/soundtrack(s)?
Does it have to be unique or can it be done over and over again with a different perspective?
Or is it simply because you can immerse yourself into that world because the mood or atmosphere draws you in?

These are all very logical and rational questions when it comes to breaking down an anime series.

Yin DTB Art

For me it’s a combination of all the questions I just asked. It is a jumbled mix of art style, design, story premise, music, character development/progression, and the ability to be drawn into an anime within a matter of minutes.

Now I do have to admit I am not the harshest critic out there. I tend to go easy on anime I love, while others tend to tear it apart. I feel like I am that audience member that is easy to please. But I also feel like my way of processing anime (and other media) is way more open than others. I really enjoy anime (and movies) that have no real concept or meaning. I like things that have no “true” ending. A good example of this is the anime Glasslip. This was a pretty typical romance anime until the very end. Many people were disappointed because it made zero sense when it ended, but here I am saying that I liked it. I wasn’t mad that it veered off in a completely different direction than what I thought it was going to be originally. I think I was more so wondering why they didn’t explain things more thoroughly? It needed that little extra edge for it to make more sense.

Glasslip

I think in order for an anime to be truly great it has to leave some sort of lasting impression on you. It has to have some meaningful impact that you can connect with on a “personal” level. Those are the anime’s that tend to stick with you throughout your life time. Even if the story or the characters are cliche, if there is something within that anime that resignates with your soul then that anime has done its job.

Being unique and different are just plus side effects of making an anime that is simply special.

I would like to call this feeling “emotional impact.”

My favorite anime’s tend to make me cry or they have me on the edge of my seat. Those are the anime’s that I love the most. I love the feeling you get when you are so hyped up on watching a certain scene that you just can’t help but squeal with excitement. You are so enthralled with what is going on that you don’t  even dare to blink. Memories are usually forged with these “emotional impacts” and these are what allow anime’s to stick with you forever.

I want to know your thoughts on what makes an anime truly great. Is it some of the topics I mentioned above or is it something else entirely? Do you have any likes and dislikes about certain anime? Let me know in the comments section ❤

Disclaimer: All imagery and photos come from searching for them on the internet. I have no claim or right to them. If I find any links I will always post them (this usually entails fan art or any other work affiliated with an artist).