Why is anime special? Expert finally at bluray.com forums

 

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Why is anime special?

Part of that, I think, is because you’re not watching someone act, so it’s easier to identify with the animated character because part of your brain isn’t always focused on “Oh, that’s [fill in an actor’s name here]”.

Also, the animation is often more expressive because it uses anime-shorthand. Is a character acting childish? Suddenly they’re presented as chibi. Are they steaming over something? Suddenly smoke is pouring out of their heads, or that ominous purple haze. You couldn’t get away with this kind of thing in live-action. It would look silly. In anime, it’s par-for-the-course.

And animated characters don’t age, as humans do. No one is ever going to see Lum or Inuyasha with a bad face-lift, trying to look 25 years younger than they are.

In addition, things can be animated that simply can’t be achieved with special effects, no matter how sophisticated they are. In a live-action film, if what we’re seeing gets too far away from reality, it gives away the game and you think “oh, it’s special effects. Yawn.” In anime, nothing is real, so nothing stands out as less real than anything else – ironically, making things easier to accept as a viewer.

You can also portray things in anime that, because we’re always aware that it’s not real, you couldn’t get away with in a live-action film. The scene with Riko’s arm in Made In Abyss, for example, would be too intense for live-action – and can you imagine a live action Strike Witches? No, no, no. Don’t even try.

Finally, there’s the sheer artistry of the images put before us that (when they’re at their best) beat anything a live-action film can offer. Just imagine a live-action Monogatari … I sure can’t. The art is an integral part of watching anime, and our appreciation of the artwork is part of the overall aesthetic appeal, quite different than the appreciation of the cinematography of a live-action film.

I feel Anime in the 70’s-80’s with a 50/50 hit and miss from 90-94ish was special…mostly everything that has been pumped out since sucks…I think the version of Anime they have today along with stuff like Pokemon is more geared towards people who are not that great at drawing so they put out extremely easy to draw art with over simplified structures so that it’s more inclusive for a less creatively inclined youth…current anime (at least what i’ve seen advertised since the late 90’s and on) seems extremely sex filled and fetish driven. I personally much prefer Unico, Akira, Blue Force, and Ghost in the Shell style artwork. New stuff like say Avatar (not James Cameron) is excellent so the genre isn’t a complete waste but man oh man is the anime landscape a stark desert of craptacular pencil work.
Japan for decades has been showing what animation is truly capable of and how certain things work because they’re animated. Interestingly, they did at first view animation similarly to the west where it was seen as something for children, but then things changed (From the booklet included with the first Patlabor movie DVD LE.). Granted, Japanese animation has its own limitations (Ex: Adult casts are rare, high school is a very common setting), but it’s not as limited in scope as what is done in the west, especially theatrically (Ex: Kids CGI movies is all you get in theaters most of the time, we lost the option of 2D in the 2000s, which is a shame)

There’s also of course the crazy and interesting plots and characters in stuff, the tropes, as well as the infusion of Japanese culture in lots of works.