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House of 1000 Manga - Bunny Drop


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Mohawk52



Joined: 16 Oct 2003
Posts: 8202
Location: England, UK
PostPosted: Thu May 15, 2014 4:30 pm Reply with quote
I preferred Aishiteruze Baby, by Yoko Maki, and the anime that went with it. It's very similar to Usagi Drop, but without the ick.
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Cecilthedarkknight_234



Joined: 02 Apr 2011
Posts: 3819
Location: Louisville, KY
PostPosted: Thu May 15, 2014 5:13 pm Reply with quote
Mohawk52 wrote:
I preferred Aishiteruze Baby, by Yoko Maki, and the anime that went with it. It's very similar to Usagi Drop, but without the ick.


High five for one reason, I thought I was the only one who read and watched the anime for that series.
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insert name here



Joined: 27 Jul 2011
Posts: 84
PostPosted: Thu May 15, 2014 5:27 pm Reply with quote
Say what you will about the ending, but at least it gets a reaction out of people. I'd rather a work of art be infuriating than boring.
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Spleen



Joined: 29 Jun 2012
Posts: 56
PostPosted: Thu May 15, 2014 5:49 pm Reply with quote
Bunny Drop wasn't boring in its "good" phase, though.

Jesus, that's an eye-opener. I loved Bunny Drop - the anime - and it's not the kind of thing I usually like. If it wasn't an absolutely excellent series - touching, funny and beautifully drawn - I wouldn't have been interested. And I had no idea the source material went in this direction. I doubt that I'll be able to watch it again now knowing that the whole thing is a set up for some old-fashioned cryptopaedophilia.
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Errinundra
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Joined: 14 Jun 2008
Posts: 6516
Location: Melbourne, Oz
PostPosted: Thu May 15, 2014 5:52 pm Reply with quote
I think it's important that a counter view be provided whenever the anti-Bunny Drop ending chorus rings out. So here goes...

There is a rhetorical argument being made throughout the manga and the ending is entirely consistent with it: in Japanese society people's choice are constrained by social norms and expectations, particularly for women and especially for single mothers. The first four volumes treat this playfully for the most part but a more serious tone is presented in the funeral and with Haruko. Daikichi's situation is all the more poignant for him being thrust into the role of being a mother, where he discovers the constraints that women must face.

At the end Rin makes a choice that most of us wouldn't approve of, however it is her choice - a legal one and a legitimate one. The challenge that Yumi Umita is throwing out to us is a choice of our own: are we going to support women having more choice? or are we going to reinforce social norms that constrain us? From what I read here and in other threads, most people clearly fall into the second camp. Freedom to choose doesn't mean the freedom to make choices we like only.

The problem with Bunny Drop isn't the ending. The real problem is that, after such an engaging first four volumes, it becomes yet another highschool story, one that the intriguing and challenging conclusion fails to rescue, not because it is "skeevy" but because what precedes it is so mundane. (Though I agree that it's a cop-out that Daikichi and Rin aren't actually related - it would have been much better had their blood relationship stood.)
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Melanchthon



Joined: 02 Oct 2010
Posts: 550
Location: Northwest from Here
PostPosted: Thu May 15, 2014 5:57 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
But the supposed revelation that they're not related by blood is meaningless: the #1 reason parental incest (should) squick people out isn't (1) your children might be a little mutated or even (2) the age difference. Its that it's a bad idea to have a sexual/romantic relationship with a parent or guardian who raised you and has power over you.

This is my big problem with the whole 'we're not blood related, so it's okay if I boink my sister' trope. The taboo is not one genetics (I find the whole retard baby thing generally resolves itself) insamuch a social taboo that you don't keep it all in the family.
Quote:
There's a scientific theory called the Westermarck Effect that proposes that people who were raised together are naturally disinclined to view each other sexually, and even though there's a sort-of counter-theory, Genetic Sexual Attraction, that applies mostly to relatives who didn't live together in childhood and meet up the first time when they're adults (and besides, that's a whole 'nother manga!)

Genetics is a little hobby of mine, so it's cool to see this here. Genetic Sexual Attraction is the attraction one has to people of similar genetics (duh), natural selection chooses for it to increase the chance of positive recessive genes coming out on top. This can be bad in the long run, as it dilutes the gene pool, so a lot of people are attracted to exoticness as well. The Westermarck effect overrides Genetic Sexual Attraction, which is why you don't what to tap your sister but fantasize about that hot cousin you only see one a year (um, not that I'd know anything about that). Since so many Japanese are single children, I'm guessing they don't really get the Westermarck thing. At least, that's my theory.
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Sam Murai



Joined: 01 Dec 2006
Posts: 1051
PostPosted: Thu May 15, 2014 6:07 pm Reply with quote
I'll tread carefully because I have never read the manga and have only seen the anime (which, yes, was great) but I heard some rumblings about the latter parts of the manga, and was slack-jawed for a good couple of minutes once I read about the ending (I really, truly mean it when I say I never saw it coming--and not in a "that was bold/(good) 'wow'" way, either).

The column pretty much summed up my feelings on the story. Though as much as I'd like to pretend that the rest of the story never happened spoiler[(see: Gundam SEED Destiny, R.O.D. -The TV-, The Big O II, Vandred: The Second Stage, Kikaider-01, ef: a tale of melodies., the last episodes of VOTOMS, Shootfighter Tekken, and A Certain Scientific Railgun S etc.)], I still have to take it for what it was as a whole. In the end, it is a real shame that such a good story like Bunny Drop's was ruined by something that seemed so completely incongruent with what was established. I can see the progress to that sort of ending, but that doesn't mean it was necessarily a good or smart move to make, either.

Mohawk52 wrote:
I preferred Aishiteruze Baby, by Yoko Maki, and the anime that went with it. It's very similar to Usagi Drop, but without the ick.


That was the first series that popped up in my mind when I first read BD's synopsis. The anime, at least, was a pretty good one that thankfully avoided those potholes, while still being clean and enjoyable (though I wonder if that was also a product of it being made in the pre-"incest bubble" era…).

insert name here wrote:
Say what you will about the ending, but at least it gets a reaction out of people. I'd rather a work of art be infuriating than boring.


All controversies/risk-takings/twists are not created equal, much less meted out or executed equally or competently. Simply doing something that will get people talking doesn't make that action or work automatically great or successful. Doing something just for that alone smacks of lazy storytelling/artistry more often than not. Personally, I'd rather a work of art be good and work before it is simply just infuriating or boring.
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dtm42



Joined: 05 Feb 2008
Posts: 14084
Location: currently stalking my waifu
PostPosted: Thu May 15, 2014 6:25 pm Reply with quote
Errinundra, this isn't about women's rights, this is about a teenager who wants to marry the parental-figure who has single-handedly raised them for the last decade. It's just a twist on wife husbandry, and having the younger party want to marry the older party does not make it more palatable.

Did we not just have a thread about how a middle-aged man was arrested for having sex with a sixteen-year-old female student of his, and there was a general consensus that people in positions of authority should not be having relationships (especially sexual ones) with their charges?

It may be legal in Japan for someone to marry their foster parent (heck, it might be legal in lots of places), but you can't blame people for being squicked, disappointed and appalled in the direction that the manga went. Not to mention betrayed. Especially when the story started out as a simple tale about family and parenthood.

Sam Murai wrote:
I'll tread carefully because I have never read the manga and have only seen the anime (which, yes, was great) but I heard some rumblings about the latter parts of the manga, and was slack-jawed for a good couple of minutes once I read about the ending (I really, truly mean it when I say I never saw it coming--and not in a "that was bold/(good) 'wow'" way, either).


I remember the thread for the anime's promo video and someone mentioned the spoiler. Even though it was tagged a lot of people (including myself) were curious and looked under the tag, and we were crestfallen and shocked to say the least.

animenewsnetwork.com/bbs/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=267250


Last edited by dtm42 on Thu May 15, 2014 6:36 pm; edited 1 time in total
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Zac
ANN Executive Editor


Joined: 05 Jan 2002
Posts: 7912
Location: Anime News Network Technodrome
PostPosted: Thu May 15, 2014 6:30 pm Reply with quote
I think there are people who are just fans of taboo. It doesn't really matter how it's executed or if the story's any good, it only matters if it's "shocking" or against socially accepted attitudes.

Then they can totally blow your mind by how open-minded they are.
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Fronzel



Joined: 11 Sep 2003
Posts: 1906
PostPosted: Thu May 15, 2014 7:00 pm Reply with quote
melmouth wrote:
Part of the charm, and economic draw, of manga is that it inserts somewhat-transgressive bits in even the blandest stories in order to keep the readers stirred up and interested. That's been going on in Japanese visual media since the Edo period, and I hope the USA doesn't manage to change it.

You make it sound like pulp clumsily spiced with cheap thrills. Not exactly a compliment.
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Meygaera



Joined: 28 Apr 2011
Posts: 324
Location: Maryland
PostPosted: Thu May 15, 2014 7:06 pm Reply with quote
Zac wrote:
Then they can totally blow your mind by how open-minded they are.


*currently being mind-blown by this revelation*
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nargun



Joined: 29 Mar 2006
Posts: 924
PostPosted: Thu May 15, 2014 7:13 pm Reply with quote
Zac wrote:
I think there are people who are just fans of taboo. It doesn't really matter how it's executed or if the story's any good, it only matters if it's "shocking" or against socially accepted attitudes.

Then they can totally blow your mind by how open-minded they are.


Philosophy in the bedroom.
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Hellwarden



Joined: 10 Aug 2013
Posts: 321
PostPosted: Thu May 15, 2014 7:13 pm Reply with quote
*reads the first part of the review*

Huh, well it seems like a light-heated tale, a little twist of gender norms, some introspection of what it really means to be a parent, how could they mess it up?

*reads the rest of the review*

Oh....oh.....ohhhh man....


...It get super creep, huh?
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GVman



Joined: 14 Jul 2010
Posts: 729
PostPosted: Thu May 15, 2014 7:21 pm Reply with quote
Zac wrote:
I think there are people who are just fans of taboo. It doesn't really matter how it's executed or if the story's any good, it only matters if it's "shocking" or against socially accepted attitudes.

Then they can totally blow your mind by how open-minded they are.


I think this is probably the smartest thing you've ever said.
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vashfanatic



Joined: 16 Jun 2005
Posts: 3489
Location: Back stateside
PostPosted: Thu May 15, 2014 7:40 pm Reply with quote
errinundra wrote:
At the end Rin makes a choice that most of us wouldn't approve of, however it is her choice - a legal one and a legitimate one. The challenge that Yumi Umita is throwing out to us is a choice of our own: are we going to support women having more choice? or are we going to reinforce social norms that constrain us? From what I read here and in other threads, most people clearly fall into the second camp. Freedom to choose doesn't mean the freedom to make choices we like only.

And I'm going to say this like I do every time you bring up this ridiculous argument, but "women making choices = feminist" is the lamest excuse ever. It's the same one Stephanie Meyer made to justify writing a book where she portrays a teenage girl engaging in reckless and suicidal behavior after her boyfriend dumps her as romantic.

Rin is choosing to marry a man in an unreasonable position of power over her and take up a life of domesticity with him when she's only sixteen. There's a reason that we don't "like" that choice - because it's a horrible one. It's not feminist, it's not empowering, because making choices is not the same thing as empowerment.
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