Forum - View topicWould you step out of your comfort zone?
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Errinundra
Moderator
 Posts: 6528 Location: Melbourne, Oz |
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@Bonham,
I'd just like to make the point that having only watched seven episodes of Steins;Gate you haven't yet experienced how good it gets. Something gobsmacking happens in episode twelve and it goes into the stratosphere thereafter. Like you, I found the otaku elements extremely annoying in those early episodes and struggled to get through them. By episode eleven I would have rated the series as so-so. I ended up marathoning the series from episode twelve on and rated it as excellent. Persevere! |
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Chiibi
 Posts: 4829 |
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Can someone please explain why EVERYONE is going "This summer anime sucked so bad" when we have excellent shows like Sword Art Online and Humanity Has Declined still running!? Huh!?
Impossible. 
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Bonham
 Posts: 419 Location: NYC |
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Revisionist westerns came out in response to a lot of the kind of romanticization Americans give the old west. Given that a lot of these films came out in the 1950s and 1960s, they seem to coming with a questioning of a lot of the supposed values attached to the U.S. (individualism, civilization, justice, manifest destiny, etc.). (Something like Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian seems like an anomalie, coming out in the middle of the '80s when you had people escaping to Reagan's "shining city on a hill.") And certainly many sociologists and critics from Edward Said onward would point to Orientalism as particularly harmful. That's not even getting into issues of sexism, racism, homophobia, etc. in television, film, comics, etc. Of course, I can't say whether this view could or should be applied to Steins;Gate. I'm agnostic about such depictions of otaku. It's probably something outside of the scope of this thread (and perhaps forum).
I definitely will! I liked the first seven episodes enough to wanna check out Funimation's blu-ray release. |
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walw6pK4Alo
 Posts: 9322 |
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Because they try maybe 3 shows, look at the descriptions for the rest, and hastily conclude it's all crap without actually bothering to check it out legitimately. Every single season, every single year, some people have said "it's the worst yet." Bluntly, they're all full of shit. |
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DuskyPredator
 Posts: 15464 Location: Brisbane, Australia |
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Perhaps I am strange, but I managed to push myself to episode 13 or 14, and stopped becasue I just had enough, some may have liked it but I just was not having fun, and did not like where it was going. |
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naninanino
 Posts: 680 |
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Why'd you have to try even 3 shows? I don't see why you should force yourself to watch anything at all if you're not interested. The only legimate way is to go by your intuition and experience. Everything else is nonsense. |
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／人 ◕ ‿‿ ◕ 人＼
 Posts: 4 |
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I do not see the problem here. For the vast majority of anime fans, there are plenty of titles in the archives that provide satisfactory viewing. It is the burden of the fan to find enough anime to fill whatever his leisure time he decides to devote to anime, and if he turns to older anime because he thinks the currently airing titles are unsatisfactory, that is a perfectly legitimate choice. It is the burden of the companies to sell their titles to the anime fans. If they cannot entice a person to try their titles based on the promotional artwork and the description, then it is the failing of the companies to fail to attract viewers. I see no reason to accuse the viewer of anything if he elects to not try uninteresting seeming titles. |
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walw6pK4Alo
Posts: 9322 |
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"All these new anime are shit. I haven't researched beyond a blurb describing them and a picture, I certainly haven't even tried to watch any of the anime, but they're shit. Trust me." Yeah, no. Any opinions coming from someone like that are beyond worthless, they have no idea what they're talking about. Even the preview guides which only touch upon the first one or two episodes carry far more weight. They're not prejudging the entire anime based off of zero information, they have 20-22 minutes to go off now. I'm not going to listen to a critic talking about a movie he hasn't seen yet, and all he's basing his opinion on is the trailer, if even that. Same goes for anime. When they blanket every new season with that line of thinking, they're guaranteed to miss things. I don't care if I'm creating a strawman here, I've seen people present opinions like that about new anime. I see it every three months. The base of my argument is to do research beyond just that blurb and picture, Wikipedia it, see if there's a related manga or book. ANN doesn't cover every single show, and spotlight guide only touches maybe a third to a half of the new shows coming out, even that's not enough. The lack of effort to try annoys me. Hell, the same principles apply to old anime. Don't write a show off just at the title and picture, regardless of when it airs. I've been pleasantly surprised, most recently by Miami Guns, which is less Agent Aika and Burn Up! Scramble, which I initially though going in. It ended up being more in line with the irreverent and fast paced humor from the late nineties, but not quite as annoying as Excel Saga, closer to Galaxy Angel. It's expectation and effort. |
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ikillchicken
 Posts: 7272 Location: Vancouver |
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That's not what I'm saying. I don't think a show has to portray its setting realistically. You seem to be shifting the goalposts here. A minute ago you said:
Your contention seemed to be that these aspects in Steins;Gate were not pandering to otaku but rather a vital part of the show's Akihabara setting. That is what I was disputing.
If that is your opinion then that's fine. I don't agree though. As I said, I found it to be all very trite. Romanticism is not itself bad but in this case it just feels extremely contrived. It's not something I can even begin to buy into. |
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jl07045
 Posts: 1527 Location: Riga, Latvia |
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Dividing which elements were important for the setting and which ones weren't wasn't necessary for my original comment because Bonham adressed those elements as a whole. There are things that I didn't like either ("tuturuu" gave me a new appreciation for trains), but personally exactly because of the setting, I didn't find the rest of it trite. You on the other hand prefer a more realistic approach. I can't agree or disagree with that, it's simply what you prefer. So what I said wasn't meant as a rebuttal, but simply a comment that this can't be universalized, perhaps I could've worded that better. Those two questions in the end were meant as "challenges" if you disagreed or simply rhetorical questions if you agreed.
People have to learn how to filter all the information they get bombarded with as well as understand how the brain works. Otherwise we're just dealing with the consequences. Then any idea can be put into perspective and loses the harm associated with it. Revisionism inside an artistic medium is thus a good thing, because it is akin to a discussion and it helps this task. I'd welcome that in anime, but that is what I personally wish. We can argue that the works made for otaku are indeed insular and lack self-evaluation, but that is not necessarily a problem unless there is nothing (like real life experiences and self-awareness, which at least 4channers tend to show for the most part) to counter that. Imo people tend to overemphasize the influence escapist works have on a reasonably healthy mind. I'll shut up now. |
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naninanino
Posts: 680 |
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That is mostly if you're interested in watching stuff in order to share opinions and not because you want to enjoy it. No, anime is not about sharing opinions or critique for most watchers. Most don't even write on any forums and even those who do, don't have similar reasons to do so. Some people are kind of stuck in a general viewing mindset, where everything is equal until you've given it a chance. Or alternatively they just really enjoy everything a lot, which totally is not what most people either can or should be doing. But really, it's not about old and new anime, or moe or fanservice, blah blah blah etc. It is about priorization, using time wisely and above all listening and respecting the most important person: yourself. Lets say, you don't like shows with ultragore and violence. Lets say it makes you feel disgusted and make you lose your sleep. If you know what that kind of thing does to you, then a wise person would avoid shows like that and yes, not even give them a chance. There is a difference in being ignorant and having a reasonable bias. This is where you can use your experience and knowledge properly as unlike people like to pretend, anime is fairly easy to judge in terms of content. Having preferences is not a sin. The real purpose of broadening your views is to find those preferences and not just watch everything because of some rule you made up. Oh, and you can apply this outside anime too. And no, I'm not giving out opinions of any specific shows here. There are other threads for that. I'm just saying how I managed to keep watching and enjoying anime feeling the same way as the topic creator did. Basically, my advice was the same as yours. Although I could add that I watch less, but I supplement that with playing japanese games, reading some manga and watching asian live-action. That gives me alternate ways to keep in touch with the subculture. As for recommendations, I only give them to people who have some kind of idea what they want and not make favorite lists to prove how everything is so good and no one is allowed to disagree. |
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dragoneyes001
 Posts: 873 |
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you do realize what the OP was talking about don't you? existing or remake series includes prequels and sequels: its an existing quantity that has a known fan base. they know its safe to use it to make money. I get what you want to say its not a Hunter X hunter remake but I meant it was a remake of the series in the sense of the OP's question. no risk to the production company re-use of an existing quantity. |
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Animegomaniac
Posts: 4084 |
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I have to point out here you just said that it's ok to broaden your views in order to narrow them. It makes sense, it just doesn't sound right. "You really won't know what you like and don't like until you try everything." Ok, fair enough...
And then you said this. Well not then, before. Watch first, make judgments later. Not the whole thing, that's crazy but a few episodes in order to make a decent value call rather a "It all sucks" kneejerk response. I didn't think I'd like romance anime until I started watching them. I didn't think I'd like K-On until I saw a bit of the second season and then "got" it. {It's not Slice of Life, it's fantasy...} I'll try anything and I like most of it; It's just that the stuff I don't like, I really don't like and I can make long lists why but it's never a genre, a theme or a style {but I'd love it if people could tell the three apart}; It's always a specific show I've seen if not all then at least five to ten episodes. Also, I have low standards plus I know that it's an industry based on producing new shows/seasons every three/four months so obviously a lot of it will not meet expectations. Should I mention that it's also intended to be somewhat disposable? |
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Bonham
Posts: 419 Location: NYC |
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I wish you wouldn't! It's an interesting subject, and it's nice to have a perspective like yours that isn't as pessimistic. But at the same time, I'm hesitant to continue, if only because it's probably way off-topic at this point... |
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naninanino
Posts: 680 |
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You should read it in the proper context. It was an answer, which was meant to say that there is absolutely no reason why you'd have to watch some magical number of new shows every season. Nor is there a magical number of episodes you need to watch to decide whether it is worth your time or not. Those are all personal preferences and of course everyone thinks they have a perfect system down. Not that my system is perfect either as it relies on people to already have a vast amount of watching experience beforehand and I can't assume everyone has it, or that they even should. I'm just saying that if you do have it, there might be a more efficient way to do things.
It is not like "it all sucks" or "I hate it". That's just how people like to read internet responses, or how some overemphatize their words. In reality, it is more along the lines "it doesn't matter". And I for one don't appreciate people shoehorning something random as an example of an exception, as if the same thing would apply to everyone (most notorious are the "I thought it was gonna be an ordinary ´insert genre´, but I actually liked it!"). Sure I've had many shows, even top favorites that turned out to give me more than I could even dare to ask, but even then there was some incentive for me to pick them up in the first place and something to motivate me to keep up with it. Nothing really comes out of the left. Anyway, I think I'm just repeating myself or just suck at explaining what I meant, so I won't discuss this matter further. |
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