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Answerman - Rabbit Ears

Tweens look for anime because it doesn't insult their intelligence as much as hyper-sanitized American "kids" fare -- characters die, bleed, cry, and go through rough patches. The characters are cool and attractive and inspiring. Their struggles are familiar, and kids who are starting to mature can relate to their struggles.

That they're cheaper, I'd bet, is why Stuart Snyder is so bent on keeping all action shows away from Cartoon Network, for instance.

Gundam Wing is not mentioned, I'm sure of it, because it did not become famous in the mainstream the way Sailor Moon, Pokémon, or Dragon Ball Z did. It was well-known among people who'd watch DBZ or Sailor Moon because it was on the same block, but it was not parodied or imitated in western media to the extent of the above three shows, nor did its popularity last after it went off the air.

Also, I was curious about TV Japan, having seen it in hotels when I travel. It seems to carry mainly NHK and news broadcasts. I don't have cable, but if I did I'd certainly look to see if it was available in my area.

Snyder isn't president of the Network anymore though his departure came 14 years too late.

BadNewsBlues wrote:

Snyder isn't president of the Network anymore though his departure came 14 years too late.

Yeah, I know he's not, but the action shows largely disappeared during his tenure, and the new person (whom I can't remember) isn't bringing them back.

There is another reason why flip-phones are prolific in current anime and that is the anime we get outside of Japan actually isn't that current. Apart from simalcasts by the time an anime is releases in Japan it's at least 4 or 5 years old in outside license, and what were the phones like in Japan back then? :wink:

I presume you meant "by the time an anime is released outside of Japan, it's at least 4 or 5 years old". Which isn't always true. I don't know what the lag time is like in Britain, but I've bought plenty of North American releases of anime on Blu-Ray only about a year after the original airing on Japanese television. Most recently, Mysterious Girlfriend X, aired from April to June 2012 and I got the Sentai Filmworks Blu-Ray release right at the beginning of July 2013. (I don't have a more recent example due to lack of money, but I'm hoping to buy the Watamote anime soon; it's already been out on physical media in North America for a couple of months and that was a summer 2013 TV series in Japan.)

Watamote uses plenty of cellphones, at least in the manga, and they're mostly smart phones (and I doubt the anime, which I haven't yet seen more than short clips of just to see if Tomoko's voice matches my imagination, would be any different).

Watamote uses plenty of cellphones, at least in the manga, and they're mostly smart phones (and I doubt the anime, which I haven't yet seen more than short clips of just to see if Tomoko's voice matches my imagination, would be any different).

Oh, interesting. So that's where the rights went.

I would still rather have the books though. I already have volumes 1 and 2. It'd bug me if some of my volumes were print and the rest were digital.

I still think the Motorola RAZR was one of the coolest-looking pieces of tech ever produced.

Top Gun wrote:

I still think the Motorola RAZR was one of the coolest-looking pieces of tech ever produced.

I remember wanting one of those as a kid...hell, I'd still take one now if I could!

The ending sequence of the anime actually revolves around Tomoko's smart phone. It's pretty clever.