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The Weeb topic

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Thought it’d be interesting to see some opinions on contemporary Japanese “Otaku” media (anime, manga, visual novels, light novels, tokusatsu movies, etc) from a site where I don’t see it often talked about
Personally my favorites would be:

Steins;Gate (Visual Novel)
Cowboy Bebop (Anime)
Neon Genesis Evangelion (Anime)
Youjo Senki (Anime)
Spice And Wolf (Anime)
JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure (Manga, though I like the anime adaptation of Part 2 and 4 better than the manga, the manga is better as a whole)

I will also say, if you don’t recognize the top three, you’re lucky enough to experience them with 0 spoilers. And considering they’re some of my favorite media period even while being lightly spoiled, you’re in for a treat if you ever do watch them.

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I actually do like some anime, although there’s a lot I haven’t seen. I have seen a lot of Studio Ghibli’s filmography and other Japanese animated features in that style, but I don’t know if that counts as anime. I actually do read a good amount of manga, even for anime I haven’t seen.

Project creator and film enthusiast.

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I’m a huge Studio Ghibli fan, but most other anime I’ve watched is a mixed bag for me. I think I’m on the same page as Hayao Miyazaki vis-à-vis “otaku” culture.

“The Anarchists are right in everything; in the negation of the existing order and in the assertion that, without Authority there could not be worse violence than that of Authority under existing conditions. They are mistaken only in thinking that anarchy can be instituted by a violent revolution… There can be only one permanent revolution — a moral one: the regeneration of the inner man. How is this revolution to take place? Nobody knows how it will take place in humanity, but every man feels it clearly in himself. And yet in our world everybody thinks of changing humanity, and nobody thinks of changing himself.”

― Leo Tolstoy

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Yeah, I’m pretty much on the same page as Superweapon here. I really like 80s and 90s anime, and some 2000s anime can be pretty great too, but it’s hard for me to find an anime from the past 15 years that I can unconditionally enjoy. It’s all either cookie-cutter isekai bullcrap, or insane horniness with massive-titted women. Or both.

In my opinion, “otaku culture” crystallizing into its current, proudly degenerate form is what killed mainstream anime. It has resulted in anime moving further and further away from the interests of normal people, and more and more towards pandering to basement-dwelling masturbation addicts. There are a few shows that are still being made for a well-adjusted audience, but the vast majority is repulsive on a physical level.

My preferred Skywalker Saga experience:
I II III IV V VI VII VIII IX

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Yeah, can’t really call myself a hardcore fan of anime here either, although I’ve tried in the past. I find that my favorite anime is usually the kind that dares to differentiate from the norm (the norm either being a bunch of boys trying to fight to become the ultimate warrior or attempts to be so cute and adorable it leaves you feeling uncomfortable. Also something about friendship, I guess). Most of Studio Ghibli’s stuff is an example of going for different, as well as Akira and Grave of the Fireflies (although I’m gonna need a strong stomach to watch the latter again). I’ll also give a shout-out to Cowboy Bebop, which definitely went all the way for different as well. Lastly, and I’m not sure this counts, but I also enjoy the Shin Megami Tensei video games, more specifically the Persona franchise. Those games keep me wanting to know what happens next.

I have altered Lucas’ visions. Pray I don’t alter them any further.

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StarkillerAG said:

Yeah, I’m pretty much on the same page as Superweapon here. I really like 80s and 90s anime, and some 2000s anime can be pretty great too, but it’s hard for me to find an anime from the past 15 years that I can unconditionally enjoy.

There’s still good stuff being made and even getting theatrical releases in the US. If you’re interested I’d recommend looking into the films of Makoto Shinkai. Especially his last three films (Your Name, Weathering With You and Suzume). I’d also recommend others like A Silent Voice and The Bear and the Beast.

And while you do have a point about the flood of isekai and fan service. There are still outstanding series being made like Your lie in April. You just have to keep an eye out for it.

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Tobar said:

StarkillerAG said:

Yeah, I’m pretty much on the same page as Superweapon here. I really like 80s and 90s anime, and some 2000s anime can be pretty great too, but it’s hard for me to find an anime from the past 15 years that I can unconditionally enjoy.

There’s still good stuff being made and even getting theatrical releases in the US. If you’re interested I’d recommend looking into the films of Makoto Shinkai. Especially his last three films (Your Name, Weathering With You and Suzume). I’d also recommend others like A Silent Voice and The Bear and the Beast.

And while you do have a point about the flood of isekai and fan service. There are still outstanding series being made like Your lie in April. You just have to keep an eye out for it.

I get what you mean. When I bemoaned the current state of anime, I was referring to TV shows more than movies. If anything, anime movies have leaned much more into the “prestigious art film” thing after the massive success of Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli.

As for the stuff you mentioned though, I’ve heard of most of them (with the exception of Bear and the Beast, I’ll have to look into that), and they don’t really do much for me. Pretty much all of Makoto Shinkai’s stuff is the exact same movie repeated over and over again: a depressed teen/college-age boy has no reason to live, until he meets a Manic Pixie Dream Girl with some sort of quirk and/or magic power, and they fall madly in love over a beautiful Technicolor backdrop while indie rock music plays in the background. Same thing with A Silent Voice and Your Lie in April. It’s probably someone else’s jam, but I have different tastes.

My preferred Skywalker Saga experience:
I II III IV V VI VII VIII IX

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StarkillerAG said:
It has resulted in anime moving further and further away from the interests of normal people, and more and more towards pandering to basement-dwelling masturbation addicts. There are a few shows that are still being made for a well-adjusted audience, but the vast majority is repulsive on a physical level.

Its even worse when something actually fantastic is adapted and then has a bunch of pandering to degenerates forced into it, degrading the product as a whole. I’m still mad at what whitefox did to Steins;Gate with the anime, taking a story that literally made fun of this type of audience and then pandering to them with suggestive gags and dialogue, blatant ass and boob shots and taking an entire character and reducing him to “XD FUNNY TRAP” (When the character canonically got groomed might I add).
There are still some good animes being made, but for quality stuff you’d be better off reading Manga, Light Novels and Visual Novels these days.

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Don’t consider myself a Weeb. But i like Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex season 1 and 2, and Cowboy Bebop and Outlaw Star. I liked Soul Eater quite a bit, and Samurai Champloo but the ending was kind of meh.

I really liked the first season of Fireforce and the second season less so. But its not Soul Eater good. And the amount of fan service can distract from the overall story.

Liked the First season of Demon Slayer as well.

One Punch man was good for a few laughs.

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Glad a lot of people here share my distaste of modern anime. The majority comes across as too cookie cutter for me. Especially the isekai takeover.

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Steins;Gate is amazing! I’ve been trying to find more of that type VN/Anime to give me the same feel but alas. Recommendations welcome though!

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JemenRoad said:

Steins;Gate is amazing! I’ve been trying to find more of that type VN/Anime to give me the same feel but alas. Recommendations welcome though!

A late response, but if you have not played it, I recommend the spinoff VN Steins;Gate: Linear Bounded Phenogram. It talks about different possible realities and ways the story could have played out, with every chapter being from the perspective of a different character. Every chapter has a different writer, so there is a slight inconsistency in the quality of writing (most are great though, and even the ones by new writers can be great supplementary stories to the original, with the only chapter I ended up really disliking being the Lukako chapter), but the chapters for Okabe, Daru, and the final chapter are written by the original writers of the first game and are all fantastic. My biggest complaint is that you cannot buy the English version on its own and need to buy Steins Gate Elite to get it, which in my opinion is BS.
There are also the drama CDs, which vary in quality; some have no writer credited and are terrible enough to make me question how they got published in the first place but others can be very good. For example, I do like the Character Series CDs as they are written by Hayashi Naotaka, who was the main scenario writer for the first game. The stories themselves are quite short and inconsequential, but they still have the charming writing of the original game and their short lenghts are remedied by each ending featuring absolutely kickass songs for every character in the cast, which are all worth listening to. The composer for these songs was not one of the composers from the game to my knowledge (Takeshi Abo is listed but for the background music present in the stories, and Chiyomaru, who usually did the openings, is not credited here as a composer), but he knocks it out of the park, and the songs are extremely varied and fun to listen to, with Okabe’s song being a favorite of mine. The translations are quite easy to find on Youtube, and I recommend giving them a listen. There is also the alpha-beta-gamma trilogy of drama CDs that Hayashi wrote, the beta CD actually having a really cool translation with VN-style animations:

https://youtu.be/TZk9Y1EiNP4

Sadly, the guy who made these stopped uploading; I’d have loved to see him do the full trilogy. Also, sadly, I can’t recommend most of the other CDs he animated, as most were done by uncredited writers and, in my opinion, aren’t that great.
And Steins;Gate 0 VN if you haven’t played it, of course. (I wouldn’t recommend the anime as it mashes together two timelines that are meant to play out separately on two replays in the game and is a bit of a train wreck.)