Fans Of Romantic Comedy Anime example essay topic

The Anime Invasion Megan Wolfson Advanced Composition, 2nd Period January 18, 2002 Research Essay: Revised for Portfolio Thesis Statement: The popular onset of Princess Mononoke and Pokemon enabled anime, once limited to an underground movement populated by teenage males, to enter mainstream American film entertainment, resulting in the backlash on violence, gender issues, and sexuality. I. Overview A. Motivator B. Definition of anime 1. Examples of anime 2. Anime and its consumers. Definition of manga 1. Popular American examples of manga a. Ranma 1/2 b.

Akira c. Fushigi Yugi: The Mysterious Play 2. Manga bestsellers D. Anime appeal to Americans 1. American popular entertainment reference a. Silence of the Lamb.

Perfect Blue. Thesis Statement II. Graphic violence in animeA. Violence against women 1. Women raped and brutalized: weaker sex 2. Male / female Guyver comparisons.

X 1. Explanation / plot 2. Good vs. evil themes. Violence in Princess Mononoke. Gender issues in animeA.

Women subservient to men 1. Hiding "special" abilities 2. Magical girls a. Video Girl Aib.

Urusei Yatsura. Tenchi Muyo. Ah! My Goddess! e. Sailor Moon.

Women in 1950's and 1960's sitcoms and their gender roles 1. I Dream of Jeannie 2. Bewitched C. Analysis of male fears 1. Ranma 1/2 2. Anxieties and control issues IV. Sexuality, Romantic and Pornographic, in animeA.

Romantic comedy / drama 1. Kimagure Orange Road (KOR) a. Most popular form of anime b. Consensual sex and romance.

Pornographic content 1. The Legend of the Overfiend. Rape b. Torture 2. Segregation of boys and girls in society a. Sexual referrals are present through sexual overtones b.

Sexual taboos V. Discussion A. American reactions 1. Violence 2. Gender 3. Sexuality. Thesis Statement restated C. Clincher The Anime Invasion Two samurai warriors rush at one another in a blur of motion. A young man and woman exchange a passionate embrace.

Colorful creatures face off in the battle arena. All are strong, central actions preformed in anime. In Japan, anime is more than the leading form of entertainment: it is a cultural identity. The film industry in Japan has done poorly since the 1980's, but animation has met with success since the mid-eighties. The popularity of manga, Japanese comic books, has helped to fuel interest in the US market.

Anime has reached an all-time international high, with as much "fandom" in Japan as in other parts of the world (Stanley, 1998, 1). "Anime is marked by bright, kinetic artwork, sparse dialogue, and often fantastic stories about everything from high school basketball teams to mystic warriors with superhuman powers" (Cass, 1997, 2). The wildfire popularity, in the United States, of Pokemon, a children's anime, is not, contrary to popular belief, just the lovable yellow, big-eyed rodent Pikachu, but a world of magical battling pocket monsters ("Video Business", 2001, p. 14). The cute, colorful monsters battle for Pokemon supremacy in and out of the battle arena. Intricate themes and an undefined line of good and evil permeate the complex stories of most anime; however, this is not the case in Pokemon, where good and evil is cut and dry. In the United States, anime is generated to appeal to all ages, with special emphasis placed on children.

Popular animes in the United States include Pokemon, Sailor Moon, Dragonball Z, and Mobile Suit Gundam Wing. The mech a (giant robotic fighting machines) cult-hit Neon Genesis Evangelion was widely received by teenage fans (Yamamura, & Sugiyama, 1996). Psychological thrillers such as Perfect Blue took the adult audience by storm, and Le Bleu Girl, a violent hard-core pornographic anime where young school girls in uniforms are subjected to rape and torture, make up the various genres of available anime. Unlike in the United States, however, anime, in Japan is aimed for an adult market. Ultimately all anime finds its roots in manga, or Japanese comic books. In Japan 40% of books and magazines sold are manga (Wolk, 2001, 2).

Manga also often appear as Japanese bestsellers. Rumi ko Takahashi's wildly successful Ranma 1/2 depicting the adventures of "a panda bear, an omelet cook, and a boy who turns into a girl" when splashed with water (Wolk, 2001, 2) has sold hundreds of millions of copies. Topics and variety of manga range from politics, to sports, to pornography. Often fans that do not understand Japanese read or watch entirely untranslated manga and anime. With a few exceptions, such as American releases of manga like Akira or Fushigi Yugi: The Mysterious Play, fans circulate manga and anime, either at anime conventions or fan clubs, or in some retail stores.

What makes anime and manga so appealing to American audiences is the way it so closely resembles American popular media. Many of the genres and stock characters found in Hollywood movies and American television appear in anime. Often, anime make overt references to American popular culture or feature western characters. In the anime Perfect Blue, the character Ede Och ii makes the blatant reference to Silence of the Lambs: "Mr. Yama shiro, do you have any idea why the culprit peels off the skin of his victims? ... he wants to become one... a woman" (Inoue, & Maruyama, 1998).

Although anime fans realize how similar anime and manga stories are to American stories, enthusiasts eagerly watch anime because it comes from far away, thus allowing them to feel they have a special knowledge unique to the rest of the western world. When watching anime fans have the chance to reflect on their own culture, but lets them deny doing so. While watching anime, allusions to American involvement in World War II, in the form of wastelands and barren worlds representing the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the atomic bomb drops, are made allowing fans to analyze the imperialism the US showed Japan in the Second World War. Americans further consume anime as a way of dealing with -- in a displaced form -- their investment in American popular culture. The popular onset of Princess Mononoke, a tale revolving around the theme: Save the environment, and Pokemon enabled anime, once limited to an underground movement populated by teenage males, to enter mainstream American film entertainment, resulting in a backlash on its violence, representation of gender issues, and the graphically brutal sexuality. Violence in Anime Swords flash, fists strike, and threats abound -- all are violence contained in anime.

Anime is chock-full of "robot monsters, gun battles, motorcycle chases, and violence, especially violence against women" (Solomon, 1999, 3). Often women are the victims of brutal violence in anime, be it rape or torture. In a country where women are still second-class citizens, unlike in the United States, they are seen as easy and weak targets, able to be manipulated and controlled. Violence directed at women in anime is a representation of male fears, be it the loss of control, or the need to dominate. Usually the irrational fears are presented in a skewed manner where women are brutalized, often for no better reason then the simple fact that they are women, the weaker sex. In the mech a anime, The Guyver, men who come in contact with the armor experience agony as it penetrates their skin.

Much of anime is for adults and contains large amounts of sex and violence (Atwood, 1995, 4). Women who don the armor are penetrated vaginally by its metal tentacles, stripped naked, and subjected to what appear to be orgasms as the armor envelops them. Themes of the end of the world and human extinction are also prevalent in Japan. X, is an anime "that's notable for its images of urban destruction and human extinction". The main character, 18-year-old Kamui, has the power, granted by the dragons of heaven, to save the planet from the dragons of the earth who wish to destroy it and start over (Carr, 2000, 2). "magic double-edged swords, oceans of blood, and force fields shaped like geometric forms" protect Tokyo from the warriors of the dragons of earth.

In the end Tokyo is very nearly destroyed, and Kamui is the only survivor left from both opposing sides (Carr, 2000, 3). The ever-present battle of good verses evil is a dominant theme in X, as it is in most anime. Often the evil comes in the form of the apocalypse, the very destruction of mankind. Even the number one children's show in the United States, Pokemon, is full of violence. Pokemon trainers send their Pokemon into battles against other Pokemon trainers, all for the sake of a badge. In the 2000 hit, Pokemon 2000, the evil Mew two genetically engineers evil Pokemon for the ultimate goal of destroying the world.

The success of Pokemon was the catalyst in the boost of acceptable violence in cartoons (Rutenberg, 2001, 5). Graphic violence is frequently the main staple in anime titles. "Many of the shows are imported directly from Japan, where the public's tolerance for blood and guts on TV has traditionally been much higher than it is in the United States" (Rutenberg, 2001, 5). The main character often does not live to see the end of the film, or by his own volition ends his life in a manner that is usually seen, by Americans, as a cowardly act. The ultra-violent Princess Mononoke, Japan's most popular anime of all time, was also a huge success in the American entertainment market, due to its release through Disney. Set in medieval Japan, Princess Mononoke is the story of a desperate battle between man and the environment.

A demon boar that is a protector of the great forest gores Ashi taka, the youngest survivor of a vanishing tribe. His wound will kill him if he can't solve the mystery of his curse. He meets Ebo shi, ruler of Iron Town, and her fiercest foe, San, or Mononoke, which means spirit. They want to use him or escape him, as the forest gods and demons rise for a showdown that everyone is fated to lose. (Corliss, Harbison, & Ressner, 1999, 11) "We had to confront the issue of violence head on", Hayao Miyazaki, the writer of Princess Mononoke, says. "Children already know all too well the violence that resides inside them and the violence that pervades the world around them" (Corliss, 1999, 11).

As proven, anime is violent in content, and often the violence is taken to the extreme, but anime is still seen as an acceptable outlet for otherwise violent tendencies and behaviors. Gender Roles and Issues Gender roles in anime are often confused and blurred. Japan has a continued investment in social values no longer widely accepted in American everyday life. Traditional gender roles in America are associated with various kinds of social oppression and prejudice.

A particular subgenre that lends itself to the matter of gender is the magical girl vein. Magical girls are most common in romantic comedies, such as Video Girl Ai, Urusei Yatsura, Tenchi Muyo, Ah! My Goddess! , and Sailor Moon. All feature young men who have romantic, but non-sexual, relationships with women who possess superhuman powers. Ai comes to life out of a videocassette (Hiroshi, W. Producer, 2001), Lum in Uresei Yatsura is an alien (Mizuo, Y, Producer, 1984), the women the Tenchi Muyo are spirits (Maki, T., Producer, 1999), Bell dandy in Ah! My Goddess! is a goddess, Kenichi, a male college student, accidentally orders over the phone from the Goddess Relief Agency (Masaya, S. Producer, 2001), and Sailor Moon, or Serena, is the modern-day reincarnation of the Moon princess from the 1000-years-past Silver Millennium (To mari, T., Producer, 1999).

Like American sitcoms of the 1960's, such as Bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie, the magical girl genre features women who are simultaneously powerful and traditionally feminine. Often jokes center around the mishaps involved in the magical girl's effort to hide her powers so that she may appear demure. The magical girl subgenre, based upon the idea that women should conceal their power, could hardly exist in the United States at this point in history, particularly since the advent of feminism and the women's rights movement. Eri Iza wa, a Japanese-American, wrote an essay on the representations of women and men in anime. He notes, "that in some anime, women and men are shown to have a 'stable and equal relationship' " (Gauntlett, 29). In Japan, feminist issues are largely unrecognized as legitimate social concerns, and their popular culture reflects this tradition.

When American fans consume magical girl anime, what they enjoy as different about the genre is precisely its historical incongruence with American mainstream culture. That is, it appears to be a new genre because its comedic exploits are based upon a set of cultural assumptions Americans are generally no longer comfortable with: specifically, the idea that women are subordinate to men and do not participate meaningfully in the public sphere. Magical girls exercise their power, like Jeannie in I Dream of Jeannie, largely in the home or in their private relationship with a young man - they do not, for example, ordinarily use their power to get work or influence outside the domestic realm. Furthermore, the idea that a powerful woman would have to be magical in the first place is an indication that the kinds of gender roles anime are joking about in romantic comedies are ones that understand female power to be itself a fantasy. In America, female public authority is an undeniable social reality. Americans consume magical girl anime partly as a form of nostalgia for the kind of comic situations made possible by traditional gender roles.

The television series Ranma 1/2, is hugely successful in both Japan and the United States. Ranma 1/2 features a magical boy, Ranma, whose special power is actually a curse -- when splashed with cold water, he turns into a beautiful, bosomy girl. Ranma's father, Genma, suffers from a similar curse, for he turns into a giant panda bear when splashed with cold water (Ijichi, K, Producer, 2001). Both return to their normal bodies when splashed with hot water. Unlike most of the romantic comedy anime, Ranma 1/2 features a gold deal of nudity and sexual ized encounters between Ranma and nearly everyone he knows. A frequent joke revolves around someone squeezing Ranma's breasts in order to believe that he has transformed into his female persona.

Ranma is perpetually trying to hide his female half at school; many of the slapstick routines in the series depict his efforts to avoid being splashed with cold water in public (although at home, Genma is constantly throwing him into a handy pool of water outside). Helen McCarthy, author of The Anime Movie Guide, describes Ranma 1/2 as a "formulaic and cynical play on romantic stereotypes... conservative and sexist" (Gauntlett, 7). Ranma 1/2 betrays a number of male anxieties at the heart of the romantic comedy genre, which emerge full-blown in the mech a and horror-fantasy anime. Because women are often associated, in anime, with passivity and dependence, a character like Ranma stands in for a number of male fears about losing control and power. Sexuality, Romantic and Pornographic, in Anime Romantic encounters and graphic depictions of consensual and non-consensual sex permeates anime.

"Sex and violence have been part of the genre since the 1960's... violent cartoons are seen as safe outlets for people's fantasies" (Mazurkewich, 2000, 12). As previously stated, romantic comedies are the most popular form of anime in the United States. Romantic comedies are also extremely popular among male anime fans. Male fans take pleasure in romantic comedies not because they wish they could dominate women, but so that they might experience an old-fashioned romantic story. A good romance like this is made possible to a certain degree by the Japanese practices of segregating the boys and girls in public situations and placing a strong taboo on sexuality. As a result, relationships between young men and women in romantic comedy anime are based upon sexual innuendo and deferral - that is, they are about fantasized expectations, rather than sexual consummation and its aftermath (a common theme in American romances).

In anime, romantic love is possible precisely because overt sexuality is not. This sets up, for American audiences, more innocent and intensely romantic encounters between the characters. The television series Kimagure Orange Road (KOR), which is one of the most popular romantic comedy anime with American fans, demonstrates how this works. Like the magical girl genre, many of its basic themes are, for an American audience, anachronistic. KOR is the story of high school student, Kyuosoke, who has telekinetic powers. He falls in love with fellow student, Madoka, who is not magical, but physically very strong, regularly beating up whole groups of men who menace her (Sakata, N., Fujiwara, M., Nakajima, T., & Nunokawa, Y., Producer, 1998).

Clearly, both characters are fantastical, and this aspect of the narrative is enhanced by the fact that Kyuosoke continually has fanciful romantic dreams of kissing Madoka. In America, young men and women are encouraged by their popular youth culture to experience their romantic feelings as overtly sexual. Romantic comedies in America are largely sex comedies, not comedies about emotions and wishes. Young American men become fans of romantic comedy anime because they represent a form of heterosexual masculinity, which is not rooted in sexual prowess, but romantic feelings. Anime offer to the post-sexual revolution generation romantic comedy narratives that suggest that young men and women do not need to have sex in order to experience love. Admittedly, the kind of love recommended by these anime is often based on social values that American feminism has done right to condemn.

But the Americans who consume them are also responding to -- and perhaps attempting to escape -- the hyper sexuality of their own media culture by re imaging romance as a relationship, which goes beyond the purely sexual. On the flip side is the ultra-violent, X-rated pornographic, hen tai or (kinky) genre. Hentai are usually "depictions of young girls in school uniforms being raped and tortured" (Mazurkewich, 2). The OVA (Original Video Animation) series Urotsukidojui: The Legend of the Overfiend, is one of the most unpopular anime among American fans due to its extremely pornographic and violent content. Themes of rape and violence toward women make up the graphic anime. The Overfiend is a being that has the power to unite the human world with the demon world and the man-beast world, which is discovered early on as a dangerous power because it will lead to chaos, death, and miscegenation between the beings from each world.

In a vision of the post-Overfiend future, a burning city filled with humans copulating quite graphically with beasts and demons is shown. When the Overfiend begins to manifest itself, the gods of earth discover his power is linked to sexual reproduction. Nagumo, the Overfiend's human father, first experiences his supernatural powers when engaged in intercourse. His penis becomes so large that it causes his partner's body to explode; then it grows to the point where it bursts out of the roof of the building he is in and destroys the city in a flaming burst of sperm (Nishizaki, Y., Producer, 1989). The one-hour anime feature, Kite, is a film of "teenage killers traumatized by twisted men". As the anime opens a young "girl in a blue school uniform" is shown being molested by a "famous actor in an elevator".

Unfortunately for the actor, "the girl is a trained assassin, driven into her deadly profession after being viciously raped by a kidnapper". The scene is "so disturbing", not because of the "pornographic element, but the distress on the face of the female character". Hentai entertain 'through fear and humiliation' " (Mazurkewich, 6). The predominate viewers of hen tai are men who have irrational fears of women, and have a need to dominate them through the means of rape, and physical, mental, or emotional torture. Because anime is seen as an expect able outlet for violent fantasies, the genre has continued to become increasingly violent and demeaning to women.

Rape, brutality, and derogatory content is forcefully directed at women, making the art form less acceptable in a society where women are equal to men. Discussion Anime, the main form of popular entertainment, in Japan, is quietly invading American popular culture through the infiltration of Pokemon and Princess Mononoke. The unique style of storytelling and filmmaking has slowly, but with rising interest, captured the attention of the US market. In the United States, where animation and film are separated mediums, in Japan they are one in the same. The cinematography and further elements of professional filmmaking are all used in the animated films that are created in Japan. Unlike the United States, which is due to public perception that animation is for children, anime, in Japan, is made for all types of audiences including children, adolescents, and adults.

There are categories of anime and manga for girls, boys, young girls, young boys, adolescent girls, and adolescent boys, conservative adults, and non-conservative adults. The subjects of anime range from history (past and future), to fantasy, dramatic, science fiction, popular culture, cyder-reality, adult, action, romance, political, and sports. In other words, for every category that there are live action films, one for anime also exists. One of the major differences between anime and US animation is the quality of storytelling and level of understanding at which the story develops. Though things are changing in the United States, the majority of animation is geared at young minds and is actually almost insulting to those young minds in the treatment of the story. Anime expands upon the regions once only explored by live action film, by incorporating heavy themes of drama, powerful emotional conflicts, character development, and relationships.

In certain types of anime people do die, and people do suffer from those losses. Violence, rape, brutality, corruption, and realism are also evident in anime. Sex is often incorporated into anime; twisted perceptions of pleasure and pain, mixtures of fantasies and hellish retribution. Often in anime love and loss are a real and driving force; great struggles and moving passions; realizations of ones self-worth and commitment to the family structure. There are powerful women who are simultaneously strong, but struggle to appear weak. Anime is replete with religious connotations, powerful speeches about humanity, the future of technology, and politics.

All of these elements and more can be found wrapped up in some of the most amazingly artistic, detailed, and revolutionary animation ever seen. American fans of anime often refer to themselves as o taku (in Japan o taku is a derogatory word meaning fan-boy). Fans take their obsession with anime into the convention circuit, which are held semi-annually in such metropolises as New York City and San Francisco. Attendance is in the thousands, with more fan participation every year as the genre is more widely heralded to the American public.

In many ways anime is also a state of mind; a state of understanding that many Americans have trouble achieving. The realization that anime is an acceptable medium for dramatic storytelling (that is not meant only for children and political satire), is a concept that the American public may never reach which is one of the main reasons why anime has not struck powerfully, yet, in the United States. The other main reason is that the media has a twisted perception of anime believing that anime is all sex, violence, and discrimination against women. These critics have not expanded their reach into the truth about the fascinating realm of anime. Because of these misinformed perceptions and lack of cooperation amongst anime fans, anime has been kept very much an underground genre, until Pokemon and Princess Mononoke achieved success at the national level.

What it comes down to is this. See it. All of it. Not just the sex and the violence. Not just the science fiction and the sword and sorcery.

Not just the heavy drama or historical accounts. See it all. Experience it all as much as possible in both subtitled and dubbed format. Experience the Japanese language and the English adaptations. That is the only way to truly discover the possibilities and realities of anime.

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