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Oy. It's a comic. Nausicaa is a fantastic comic, and is in a different world than She-Hulk or Archie, true, but a comic none the less.

It reminds me a little of Brad Bird's comment that "animation" is not a genre, it's a way of storytelling. If someone can't tell the difference between Scooby Doo and Haibane Renmei, that's their problem, not mine. If they end up loving "cartoon shows" HR or Cowboy Bebop, we're on the same page as far as I'm concerned.

Man, Zac must be up to tempting fate (and the ANN servers) this weekend. Good luck with the Paulbots.

Manga is a specific subclass of the general body of art-dominated print work referred to as "comics." I fully agree with Zac's usage in context and have done it that way myself when comparing it to American-style comic books, just as I have referred to anime under the broader category of "animation." Refusing to acknowledge either as such is just silly.

And honestly, I don't know why people keep pulling this argument out about how they can't trust a trailer to give them an idea of whether or not they'll like a series. Over time I have frequently relied on trailers, both in movies and with anime, to do exactly that and to this day still watch trailers for series I'm not familiar with to see if the series might suit me. (Hell, never probably would have tried out Ai Yori Aoshi if not for its wonderful trailer.) Very rarely have I gotten burned on a series by making a judgment call based on a trailer.

Ron Paul is the new Ross Perot. the 4channers just refuse to accept it and move on.

I'm with you Key. I can watch a trailer and easily make an accurate assessment of whether I will or will not enjoy the series. I'd have to say at this point I can't think of a single time I was wrong after making a judgement call from a trailer; either in anime or domestic film.

Of course, some people aren't quite that confident so I can also understand people wanting to get a bit more than 30 seconds of clips. Some trailers also tend to be a bit lacking in material in which to base your judgement off of; instead spending the 30 to 60 seconds flashing review quotes on the screen and a few short clips from the series that are too short to truly be useful. I can see where both sides are coming from and while I'm quite adept at using a trailer to decide if I want to commit or not; I don't expect everyone to do so.

What's this? My Answerfans response was printed? And what's more, printed first! Hooray! I'm important!

Terminology: to a Japanese person, I imagine, 'anime' is literally all animation, and it's only because it's a Japanese term that it means anything more specific here. That's how I see it: 'anime' means Japanese animation simply because there's no other reason to use a Japanese word, right? It's even a loan-word, although I'm not sure if it's from English or French. Manga is the same way, although it is Japanese in origin.
(wikipedia GO!!)
Quote: "Manga (漫画) is the Japanese word for comics (sometimes called komikku, コミック) and print cartoons. In their modern form, manga date from shortly after World War II but have a long, complex history in earlier Japanese art."

I agree totally with Zac's usage, not only because I am not anal retentive, but because it makes perfect sense. Using the Japanese term 'Manga', to a westernoid, implies graphic novels that are specifically Japanese. They're still graphic novels, and last I checked everybody and their mother still doesn't mind substituting 'comics' for 'graphic novels' to save time and breath.

Then again, there are people who would probably challenge Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on this issue, if they felt he was failing to properly distinguish between material published by people of different ethnicities.

On another note, I do tend to say I'm into 'Japanese animation' when I'm telling someone new about myself. I'm interested in art and animation in general, and it's clearer for people who aren't familiar with the term 'anime', but I still manage to feel a little... pretentious about it anyway, when I really think of it as anime. That's right, I actually feel that 'anime' is the less prestigious term for it. What'cha gonna do, punks?

Japan, Japan, Japan, Japanese, Japanese, Japanese language, anime,animation, animation, comics, graphic novels, graphic novels, pineapple. Sorry, I have to meet my quota.

Keonyn wrote:

I'm with you Key. I can watch a trailer and easily make an accurate assessment of whether I will or will not enjoy the series. I'd have to say at this point I can't think of a single time I was wrong after making a judgement call from a trailer; either in anime or domestic film.

Of course, some people aren't quite that confident so I can also understand people wanting to get a bit more than 30 seconds of clips. Some trailers also tend to be a bit lacking in material in which to base your judgement off of; instead spending the 30 to 60 seconds flashing review quotes on the screen and a few short clips from the series that are too short to truly be useful. I can see where both sides are coming from and while I'm quite adept at using a trailer to decide if I want to commit or not; I don't expect everyone to do so.

One of the things I've noticed more than once is that companies will have a section for trailers on their DVDs, and it'll be little more than the opening credits for the series. That can be very helpful or just be confusing.

However, if you think the series looks promising thanks to the trailer, there's plenty of legit places to look for additional opinions. It's not like the Internet or the bookstores are bereft of reviews.

While in some c`ases a 30 second may or may not be enough to judge a show, in terms of if it will appeal to you or not, but that combined with this old classic idea of actually READING up on the title should be. I mean seriously, if you took the time to read the synopsis of the story that alone should tell you if you're going to like the show or not since you'll know what it's about. If however you are on the ropes and not sure either way after that then a 30 second clip should be enough to sway you either way. And by clip I do mean it has some parts of the actual show in it as a real preview should, not just the opening credits.

Mm. I find that a trailer can (though that's not to say it necessarily does) provide a sample some of the things that are most important to me- how the art looks when it's actually, y'know, animated, the general attitude of the voice acting, and the atmosphere the show is trying to give off. That said, there's little assurance that it's a representative sample of the show as a whole, nor that it is even representative at all.

Regardless, I have had nearly the opposite experience from Key and Keonyn (what's with the similar names? Kenotic, too) in that I don't think I've ever seen a trailer for an anime I've liked before the anime itself. In the case of trailers for things I haven't seen, I am almost universally put off by it, and often either don't see the show or don't like it when I do. In the case of shows I already know and love, I occasionally see the trailer afterwards, and usually go 'oh, that's a pretty good trailer'.

So I, too, feel that I can get a good feel for a show based on the trailer, but it's never helped me.

Finding new shows that I really like is always a matter of 1) chance, 2) reviews read, 3) artwork seen, 4) recommendations from friends, 5) previous knowledge about a director/studio/author/etc., 6) music heard / previous knowledge of musicians involved, and 7) guesswork/ chance.

EDIT: note to psycho101: most or many of my favorite shows tend to have poor, misleading, or inaccurate descriptions, even from reliable sources. Not that I blame them- but a plot synopsis can only convey so much, and when the show itself has more to say than can be explained in one or two paragraphs, that's usually when I've found a hit. It's then that, for the purposes of this discussion, one turns to a trailer to try and judge the general quality of the show.
Fortunately I find that quality execution and quality storytelling tend to go hand-in-hand.

manga... comics... as long as we understand each other, right? Very Happy

I think getting the idea across is more important than the technicalities of words. But I imagine articles and other print items, it matters a great deal. I think it was nice for someone to be helpful, but he was awfully rude about it. And I agree with Zac's reasons for choosing which particular term to use.

The only place I hear about Ron Paul is on the internet... you've brought up a very good point. I wonder why this is.

As for music, I prefer DEEN. Anime smile

Kenotic wrote:

One of the things I've noticed more than once is that companies will have a section for trailers on their DVDs, and it'll be little more than the opening credits for the series. That can be very helpful or just be confusing.

Yeah, that is definitely true. The trailer I saw for Haibane Renmei was actually nothing more than the opening sequence. That was all I needed to see though as I knew right away it was the kind of series I would enjoy. Sure enough, it's sat at my #1 spot ever since I bought it and will likely remain there for quite some time.

That said; I still don't rely on trailers alone. While I don't download fansubs generally, unless I'm really questioning just how much I'd like something, I still do my research online on forums and review sites/blogs to get a feel for a series. I've only purchased off trailer alone a few times. I always do my homework on a series first.

Meccanica wrote:

(what's with the similar names? Kenotic, too)

Key is our hero so we all want to be just like him.

The first question sounded like a candidate for the "Flake;" very elitist. What I always find funny about people who try to separate manga from comics, especially those who read only manga, is that they don't seem to realize that manga was born from American comics. But the elitism gets in the way.

Best Japanese band: The Black Mages. Nobuo Uematsu's compositions played with a full rock band; what's not to love? Oh, and there's almost no vocals, it's all instrumental save for a few songs. But I'd have to say aside from that there've been few other Japanese bands that have impressed me enough.

I prefer an involved trailer with some kind of narration. A trailer can be misleading at times, but opening credits are far more misleading, and to have them as a trailer is lazy and useless.

The greatest line this column?

Answerman wrote:

It's like saying Disney should show Pirates of the Caribbean 4: Please God Make It Stop...

Ahahha! When I can innocently read a sentence. Think about what I've read. Find that what I've just read isn't meant to be truth, but rather well ingrained sarcasm. Stop again. Think. Then start laughing before my eyes finish the sentence when comprehension strikes? Oh yeah. That's good material.

Meccanica wrote:

Quote: "Manga (漫画) is the Japanese word for comics (sometimes called komikku, コミック) and print cartoons.

While "manga" is a general term, it is more inclined to serializing ones; comic or komikku is almost exclusively reserved for tankōbon, a term now rarely used to refer collectively bound volumes of graphic novels. The term tankōbon is now usually reserved for novels.

Last edited by The Xenos on Fri Jan 18, 2008 4:01 am; edited 1 time in total

halo wrote:

It's not "Japanese cartoons" dude... it's Japanamation!

Ha. Very good point. Yeah, there are much worse things than calling them cartoons. Though I think Japanese animation is even better than Japanese cartoons. Meanwhile, calling manga comics isn't quite as bad as calling manga cartoons. Though certainly graphic novel sounds more sophistiacatedacle.

I got nothing against comic book. Though comic book does tend to refer more to the floppies. Comic strip of course refers to the classic model of the newspaper strip. Though most web comics are online comic strips.

Personally, I think most of these American books should just be graphic novels anyway because of their full volume format, unlike most manga which are collected periodicals. We already have a nice term, why call them manga? Though that's a whole other can of worms.

Still, the manga you see sold in America, save for like Shonen Jump, are graphic novels. Only one other term works well in the mix, and that's trade paperback. We already have words for these books, why not use them?

Of course there's one term that we can use for all of these. Books.

dormcat wrote:

Meccanica wrote:

Quote: "Manga (漫画) is the Japanese word for comics (sometimes called komikku, コミック) and print cartoons.

While "manga" is a general term, it is more inclined to serializing ones; comic or komikku is almost exclusively reserved for tankōbon, a term now rarely used to refer collectively bound volumes of graphic novels. The term tankōbon is now usually reserved for novels.

Really?! That's very interesting to know. I debate about these terms till I'm blue in the face. Very interesting. So the trades are sometimes called comics and tankōbon are just for novels or graphic novels?

Quote:

Ron Paul is a racist libertarian lunatic

Well.. I'll take libertarian and lunatic. Racist? I'd say moreso that he didn't stomp out a bad racial comment someone in his campaign made. Which, I guess you could argue is just as bad. Certainly a dumb move on his part. Though at least he didn't say it himself, like whoever it was that had that macaca incident.

Also, the asshat who sent that mail in is an idiot. Paul isn't pro-anime. That's overstating things. If anything one could argue that Paul is for free speech and thus for virtual child pornography. One of two who voted against that new bill. Him and Kucinich, who's like the left version of Paul. Both are libertarian, but one's economically right and the other's left. And hey, they both get shut out of their party's debates.

Meanwhile, I like his crazy constitutionalist comments. Hell, I voted for Dean last time. Though that was more a media put on. I like the crazy vote. I'll take the crazy guy over the shiny polished Washinton regular. Also.. he's a doctor! Not only is he a real doctor, but he's a dashing special agent with a PhD in KICKING YOUR ASS! Or, you know.. just at least a doctor. Meanwhile I'd just as wlel see McCain or Obama. Hell, I'd love to see McCain vs Obama so I'd like both candidates for a change.

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