Forum - View topicDoes anybody miss the "boom" years?
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One-Eye
 Posts: 2261 |
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I think this is really dependent on location. No Walmart or Target in many places I've lived in my state carry any anime. The Best Buys within 50 mile radius of my current town including one college town have no more than one or two copies of anime on their shelves. Specifically I remember one had a Dragon Ball copy that's been there for ever, another a Dance in the Vampire Bund, a third had a copy of Sekirei and Code Geass. Local f.y.e doesn't sell any anime either.
I agree with much of what you stated in your post and I recall the thrill of discovering Media Play, when they still existed, and the rows of anime that they carried. However, I also think that people now have the opportunity to "be exposed to anime by accident" thru streaming sites like Hulu. They even have anime broken down by category now (comedy, drama, etc.) on the site. I sent a non-anime friend a copy of Ghost in the Shell movie thru iTunes and he liked it enough that he started watching the tv show on Netflix. It only took him seconds to find it, instead of driving all over town to see if someone had a copy somewhere. |
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Mesonoxian Eve
Posts: 1858 |
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I love that graph "Created v. Licensed". Really shows how much the industry has changed in 20 years. Definitely more anime now than ever before, but this is an observation comment, not a "proof" comment. In addition to my other points, and for simple FYI only, the discussion's discounting the role television plays in all this. Whether it be weekday showings of Robotech and Voltron, Cartoon Network has a hand in this "boom" as well (which is why I often refer to today's fans as the "CN Generation", since many were introduced to a different style of animation, most notably through Dragonball). They may not have known it as "anime", but fans I spoke to through the years definitely credit this show as leading them to anime. Even I found it through television, when I was living in Hawaii (which used to have 2 Japanese TV stations). I was even watching a live-action show of some dude wearing a two-color outfit riding a motorcycle and fighting monsters. 
All in all, whatever one's definition of "boom" is, one thing's for certain: it's good now. Whatever started it doesn't really matter when we're swimming in more anime than some of us can purchase. I have a nice disposable income, but sheesh, even I can't buy it all. 
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thenix
 Posts: 265 |
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I'm sure I'll sound like a douche but during the boom around me anime wasn't considered "hip" which made me like it more. (at least until around 2006ish) It was very minor and only the really open minded were into it. Cons were a very older crowd and all nice people. Anime that came out were the cream of the crop stored up from the years so everything was a hit.
After the boom it's considered hip now (around here it is) and everyone is either into it or accepted it. Con crowd ages are down by about 20 years of age. It's not really full of the accepting and open minded. But blah I can still enjoy it anyways. As far as it being dead now. I don't think it's so much dead it's just not growing. DVDs don't sell as well because there is so much to choose from, so much competition. Also the cream of the crop is already released. There are still good series coming out but not everything is a hit. Honestly if some of the crowd wants to drop out I wouldn't be upset. |
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Jose Cruz
 Posts: 1779 Location: South America |
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He included movies and OVAs while your table below only includes TV shows. In either 2005 or 2006 I think that Japan produced like 120 animated films in total. And the encyclopedia is very incomplete, though that applies mostly for pre 2000 titles.
The most relevant facts would be the economic size of the industry and the actual number of people who are watching anime. I think that today there are more people watching anime than in the 2004-2007 period. That's shown by the number of people who show up at conventions. Estimated number of people who showed up at Otakon: 2000 - 18,000 2002 - 30,000 2004 - 55,000 2006 - 66,000 2008 - 78,000 2010 - 87,000 2012 - 96,500 Estimated number who showed up at Anime Expo: 2000 - 9,700 2002 - 15,250 2004 - 25,000 2006 - 40,647 2008 - 43,000 2010 - 46,000 2012 - 49,400 Apparently there was a huge boom in the number of people interested in anime from 2000 to 2006 but the number of anime fans in North America continued to increase to this day. However, due to the fact that broadband internet is killing physical media sales, the economic size of the anime market has declined which lead to a decline in number of licensed titles. Like the music industry, the anime industry will have to learn how to transform the internet into a source of revenue. |
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ikillchicken
 Posts: 7272 Location: Vancouver |
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I still think that's a terribly arbitrary metric. The fact that a convention continues to grow doesn't necessarily relate to an increase in the fandom. As a con grows it attracts bigger attractions/guests and generally becomes a bigger deal. As a result, more fans, even from the same group are inclined to go. Thus, it grows even more. It's a fairly natural cycle that doesn't require the fandom actually be growing. Plus, I think you're discounting more casual fans who generally don't go to conventions as much. If you want to say there are more hardcore fans you might be right. I think the fandom has very much divided in more recent years. As anime has disappeared from TV and gone quite a while without any big, mainstream (at least relatively speaking) hits, I think it has become increasingly niche. People less heavily involved have dropped out. At this point you're either a hardcore anime guy or you have no interest in it. Back then it was a lot more fluid.
The problem with claims like this is that the big collapse in the anime market predates the diminishing of physical video media by at least a couple years. No doubt it has played a role more recently but it had relatively little to do with the collapse. |
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Matarael
 Posts: 51 |
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We should demand free anime. All jokes aside, Google makes a large portion of it's revenue from advertising alone, and YouTube operates on a similar system based on views for popular videos. As well, plenty of anime (sub and dub) is already available online for no charge, (not sure what that implies). |
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ailblentyn
 Posts: 1688 Location: body in Ohio, heart in Sydney |
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I have a serious question. Do people still listen to music? Is music as central to pop culture as it used to be, or more of a niche option? |
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Polycell
 Posts: 4623 |
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I personally haven't really treated music as anything other than background noise; I even went for months without turning my car radio without missing it, broken only to see/hear for myself a radio station had been changed and to relieve some of the boredom of waiting in the drivethrough line.
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Chagen46
 Posts: 4377 |
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UH...yes? How much have you been living under a rock? Also, forgive me, but did you just insult a medium of art that has existed since humanity began? Really? Did you just call music "worthless"? Wow. As a beginning composer...I find that insulting. |
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Sleverin
 Posts: 153 |
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Yeah, can we stop with the ukelele? I don't get why all of a sudden everyone around me has one, wielding it in public at all times, even while walking their dog, just hanging over their shoulder as if they need to bust out in a Hawaiian jam session at any moment. Other than my snarky comments, I do in fact wonder this myself. Music is of course central to popular culture, but I wonder to what capacity. I've read about art used for Progressive Rock, "Punk" Art, Hip-hop (graffiti), but I can't think about movements that have music to coincide with it in the last few years. However, this could be a fact of hardcore indie scenes resulting from massive advertising costs pushing them to the sides. The only people who may know of them are those directly involved. On top of that, every time I hear "popular" radio that my coworkers play (which I've thankfully got them to stop doing) the stations play the same set of songs for an hour. They literally repeat the same song at 15 past the hour, every hour, all day. It's completely insane. Not only that, but the songs mostly sound the same. Once they get tired of the songs they just move onto the next one. A lot of people call songs or albums "really old" at anytime over a year ago. I would say that anime and music (and probably including a lot of other things I don't actively observe) have reached a high level of commoditization. In an attempt to sell as much as possible, the form has reached a point of a sort of singularity where things become generally the same and to get into things that people consider "good" or at the very least not mainstream you have to research things in your own time. It's an interesting issue that can go on and on for the longest time but I would say that music, and art relating to it, are still a large part of our culture. However, since not all of it is marketable to large amounts of people, it's harder to notice and find. I'm not trying to say that, "All corporations are evil bro, we need to drop out and make our own society! WOOOO! *massive bong rip*", but it is something that we need to address as a people. |
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ikillchicken
Posts: 7272 Location: Vancouver |
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Literally nowhere in ailblentyn's post does the word "worthless" appear. And there's nothing whatsoever insulting about criticizing popular music, the current state of music, music as a business, or discussing music's diminished importance as an element of popular culture. That's not even remotely the same as criticizing all music's objective worth. Last edited by ikillchicken on Sun Jun 09, 2013 3:25 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Joe Carpenter
 Posts: 503 |
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I don't think main stream acceptance was an illusion, it was a possibility, anime was growing in popularity, it was the "next big thing" to use a metaphor anime was Godzilla rising from the depths of the sea on his way to Tokyo, he wasn't there just yet, but damn it, he was on his way! and those attentive enough could see he was on his way, but then things happened to knock him off course and he turned tail and crawled back into the sea I do believe that if anime stayed on the trajectory it was on in the first half of the 2000's it would be about as mainstream as Doctor Who or whatever is now, it's a fantasy I like to have anyway |
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Alan45
 Village Elder Posts: 9875 Location: Virginia |
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@ Joe Carpenter
I suppose we could argue whether anime could have been mainstream or not, but the fact remains that it didn't. In that sense the bubble burst. I personally feel that anime is too Japanese specific to have become acceptable to the general public, but that is what many of us like about it. It is possible that bad business decisions by ADV, Geneon caused it, but it was probably a combination of factors, many discussed above. Usually when a bubble bursts, you lose more than you would have had if there had been no bubble. The US comic book industry is still recovering. Fortunately, things seem to have worked out well for anime enthusiasts. For what it is worth, the only advantage I can see to mainstream acceptance would be some recognition from family and friends of just what your hobby is. I'm not sure that is worth it. Recognition is a two edged sword. I would prefer certain types did not become aware of anime. In addition, when something becomes popular in this country, the money involved tends to corrupt the source. I would hate to see Japan make a great deal of anime intended to appeal to Americans and American dollars. I suspect it would lose those features that appeal to me. |
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Joe Carpenter
Posts: 503 |
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it's certainly true that something can be harmed by becoming too mainstream, but anime was never gonna become mainstream to the point where it could be detrimental to it because at the end of the day, being of Japanese origin is always gonna keep a lot of Americans away, it's just too foreign
but it's like a Goldilocks thing, you want it "juuuuuust right" and I feel that anime is too obscure these days, it was in a pretty good place in the boom years and it's a shame that that momentum didn't last, is all still, if you think about it, the internet age we live in has made everything extremely fragmented, there's not really such a thing as "mainstream" for anything anymore, everything is a niche now take video games for example, I myself am a huge gamer, but I'm not a fan of the Call of Duty series at all, which to some gamers is the be all end all game series, so even within the world of video games there's segmented niches or look at reality tv garbage like "keeping up with the kardashians" or "here comes honey boo boo", nobody I know be they friends or family or even aquatinces on the internet actually watches that tripe and yet clearly somebody is so I suppose that given the current cultural climate, anime is doing ok |
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YUSUKE URAMESHl
Posts: 2 |
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I too miss the "boom" years. And as much as most won't want to admit it, I think Naruto was in part to blame for that.
Back before it came out, anime was constantly getting merchandise. (Without having to buy online, or get magazine subscriptions). More retailers (many of which are now gone) also helped, such as Media Play, Sam Goodie, Circuit City, and Boarders. However I remember back in 1997 how DBZ wasn't even a Toonami hit yet, it was on Fox and was called a "Action Cartoon". Sailor Moon and DBZ brought Toonami much of its success and marked the way for America to make the business move of buying the licences of more animes. As Toonami added more, it was a hit after hit. Dragonball/Z/GT, Sailor Moon, Tenchi Muyo/Universe/Tokyo, Yu Yu Hakusho, Rurouni Kenshin, Trigun, Cowboy Bebop, Inuyasha, Samurai Champloo, FLCL, Gundam, Big O, Voltron, etc. were some hits. Some did better than others, and would get their chance at the spotlight. Look at Dragonball Z for example: between 2000-2005 it was at its peak, it had several deals at Burger King, with Kraft Cheese Singles, tons of games on all different platforms, it had VHS, DVD, CD, Figures, Plushes, Toys, 5 card games, clothing, accesories, magazines, comic books, graphic novels, Hummer Tours, Big Con Events, and was slapped on everything from Party favors, to bed sheets, to boxers lol. DBZ was everywhere, then it took a quiet back seat of no merchandise and maybe 1 game a year. Other animes got to shine too. Sailor Moon, Yu Yu Hakusho, and Inuyasha all had card games, Yu Yu Hakusho and Inuyasha's were successful, went numerous sets, and covered start to finish of shows. They got video games, along with things like Samurai Champloo, Gundam, and Bleach. They all got toys, figures, plushes, clothing, and merchandise. However around 2008 things started to die out. Cons do still have members, and now in recent years its growning. (But with that is the amount of nonanime fans who cosplay more Comic Book hero, video game characters, cartoon characters, etc. as its caught on as more of a "Pop Culture Convention". Naruto was the last one to get lots of video games, it killed Toonami (even Steven Blum the voice of TOM admitted that at a con). It then flopped on Disney's anime block, and its card game flopped after a few sets and went under. All those ones that I mentioned were a hit had been shown over and over from start to finish. Bleach and Death Note were big too, but both have ended Bleach at 366 Episodes, and both are now far less merchandise. Naruto however still pumps out episodes at 539 and ongoing, and still doing games, even having to steal Goku's costume in the most recent title to try to milk sales, it was the last anime that got the spotlight. Before it, was Full Metal Alchemist, before that FLCL, before that Inuyasha, before that Yu Yu Hakusho, etc. even video games look dried up since then, Afro Samurai got a game....one game. What other big titles come out? Bleach got 2 when bleach first came out, and one a couple years ago for a total of 3 in the US. Compare that to how popular and how many titles things like DBZ had in the day. Cons are picking up again, Sailor Moon got brought back with merchandise, Code Name Sailor V, newly remade graphic novels, merchandise, etc. Rurouni Kenshin just got a Live Action Movie, DBZ is doing the 2nd half to DBZ Kai, and just had Battle of the Gods movie. Things are coming back, voice actors are signing more lately (I was at a DBZ reunion lately at Shutocon) and while merchandise is smaller, its made a slight comeback. Retailers are mostly FYE, Hot Topic, and Barns and Nobles. And while good animes have been made in recent years, few come to America (Look at Toonami's lineup, most are older) Toonami came back from their April Fool's 2012 Midnight Run of things like DBZ, YYH, Tenchi, Trigun, etc. yet no naruto that night lol. Recently naruto was put back on Toonami, but its now in its 3rd attempt. Inuyasha wasn't pulled for years, and ran from start to finish now how many times and was on before Naruto was brought back on, and is still on lol. Point is, you don't see animes at BK or Mcdonalds anymore. You don't see Voltrons, DBZ, Sailor Scouts, etc. at Toys R Us. Turn on a TV and you won't see too many new animes (maybe a handful if that like Soul Eater). They aren't having American made toys, card games, and video games like every anime used to get. Merchandise is now maybe a TShirt, a Poster, maybe maybe a plush, thats about it. Anime is still big in japan, toys, cards, games, merchandise, promotions, etc. however you don't see that stuff in the US as much anymore. The US doesn't do Hummer Tours anymore, they aren't making "Pikachu Mobiles" DBZ Bounce Houses, Lugia 2000 PT Crusers, you don't find the merchandise constantly in your face like before. No more Shonen Jumps at every single store even Walgreens. Today you gotta go online, get netflicks, go to a con, or order Japanese merchandise imported, or sub for Anime magazines. The popularity has really died down on anime. Its still around, but none get the spotlight like they used to. |
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