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This Week in Anime - Asobi Asobase is the Filthiest Comedy of the Season




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FackuIkari



Joined: 31 Dec 2013
Posts: 411
Location: Argentina
PostPosted: Wed Aug 08, 2018 11:19 am Reply with quote
So the show is transphobic because it had a skit in where they kinda find out that one their classmates, in an all girls highschool, could actually be a guy and they want to find out if that's true or not? really?
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Gurren Rodan



Joined: 04 Jan 2018
Posts: 263
PostPosted: Wed Aug 08, 2018 12:02 pm Reply with quote
This show was nowhere on my radar, but with one recommendation and one episode, I'm fully aboard right now.
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fathomlessblue



Joined: 28 Mar 2012
Posts: 340
Location: Manchester, UK
PostPosted: Wed Aug 08, 2018 1:06 pm Reply with quote
FackuIkari wrote:
So the show is transphobic because it had a skit in where they kinda find out that one their classmates, in an all girls highschool, could actually be a guy and they want to find out if that's true or not? really?


And the whole way through they present the situation as a dire threat, as if Aozora was a wolf in the henhouse in need of being literally exposed, despite already being established as interested in men. I mean there are actual lines translated to “She’s definitely among us, like an alien" & “Hanako's animalistic sense of danger kicked in". This wasn't just Kasumi playing up her fear of guys; all three reacted this way. The whole scene was just a slight variation of the typical 'gay panic' jokes you see in Japanese media.

Look, if it doesn't bother you, fine, but to completely ignore any semblance of context or framing to promote overreaction on the writers parts seems either wilfully ignorant or straight up disingenuous to me. Like Nick & Micchy, I'm still a big fan of the show, but I also feel that when the focus moves from individuals to actual groups, the tone morphs from light-hearted personal mockery into more encompassing cruel and judgemental societal attitudes. It was extremely shitty with the gyaru last week, and it wasn't much better here.

So yes. Really.
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halo



Joined: 11 May 2004
Posts: 356
PostPosted: Wed Aug 08, 2018 2:05 pm Reply with quote
My take on the 'transgender' skit was they were supposed to come off as their usual asshole selves while their target had some fun with their obvious transphobia. I think the joke just bombed. That's the hard part about trying to do jokes like that, when they fail you look like a hater. I don't think there was any ill intent, or at least any more than other Japanese depictions of transgender situations. Unfortunately, the Japanese audience probably saw it as a good gag.

I disagree with the column in regards to slut shaming of the ganguro girl. I thought that one worked pretty well once it turned out she was way better at their games then they were. But that's just me.
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RangerDanger





PostPosted: Wed Aug 08, 2018 3:07 pm Reply with quote
@halo Not to mention that the girls themselves admitted that she was a very nice person.

I mentioned this before and I’ll repeat it; I find it not fair accusing the show of shitting on a group when in that segment, after the girl runs away from her boyfriend, he still says he loves her no matter what. The main girls are young and I don’t expect them to know everything and keep being unknowledgeable about certain things when they’re adults. I did not sense that the show was pushing something and I agree with halo in that the joke simply did not deliver, but it was very hard to do so anyway. I still greatly enjoy the show though and if it can keep up the good work, something that I can recommend.
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DigitalScratch





PostPosted: Wed Aug 08, 2018 3:33 pm Reply with quote
The one thing that stuck out to me when reading this entire article is that in the screenshot with the “declining birth rates” line, someone photoshopped Hiro and Zero Two’s faces on those dolls. A part of me really wishes that was legit.
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Shay Guy



Joined: 03 Jul 2009
Posts: 2091
PostPosted: Wed Aug 08, 2018 8:52 pm Reply with quote
To some of the people in this thread... how exactly do you think trans viewers might feel about a segment like the one described?
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v1cious



Joined: 31 Dec 2002
Posts: 6199
Location: Houston, TX
PostPosted: Wed Aug 08, 2018 10:13 pm Reply with quote
Sounds like Misudomoe. I might have to watch a few episodes.
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GhostD



Joined: 07 May 2016
Posts: 998
PostPosted: Thu Aug 09, 2018 2:38 am Reply with quote
This is almost like the opposite of Grand Blue. On one hand we got a trio of middle school girls with spewing out blue humor and toilet jokes while the anime distorts iits own drawing style. On the other hand we got some college frat boys who drink ungodly amounts of alcohol while doing stupid things and trying their damndest to make their faces resemble a titan's when they do stupid stuff and act crazy.
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Daizo



Joined: 03 Feb 2009
Posts: 139
PostPosted: Thu Aug 09, 2018 7:04 am Reply with quote
Quote:
I'd also be remiss if I didn't give a shoutout to the translation team working on this show's subtitles because they consistently knock it out of the park.

I would definitely disagree on the sub team "consistently knocking it out of the park" with this show. Yeah, there's some nice lines for sure (but that should be the baseline expectation - a comedy show should be funny when translated), but then you get all these other lines that just leave you scratching your head because the sub team seemingly didn't even try to get them to make sense in English. That linked one is probably the most egregious one so far, but there's been a lot of other issues as well. Like if there was some additional joke in the "ohhtecouture" thing, that was completely lost. There's also just generally stuff left half-translated all over the subs, like "I get 1seg on my phone" which also could have been easily localized to something like "I have a receiver on my phone" etc.

In any case, since you saw fit to actually comment on the quaity of localization for once, I look forward to reading about your thoughts on the quality of localization on Revue Starlight when this column gets around to it!
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BodaciousSpacePirate
Subscriber



Joined: 17 Apr 2015
Posts: 3017
PostPosted: Thu Aug 09, 2018 9:47 am Reply with quote
I don't think Asobi Asobase's creators want people to shut their brains off when they watch their show, especially since it's a comedy. I used to hang out with a lot of people who considered themselves "comedians", and there wasn't a single one who wanted their audience to just "laugh and be happy" without thinking about what their jokes meant.


{Edit}: I edited your post and the part that was in response to a post that was removed. ~ Psycho 101
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TheOtakuX



Joined: 16 Jan 2014
Posts: 344
Location: Wooster, Ohio
PostPosted: Thu Aug 09, 2018 2:25 pm Reply with quote
Why do these chat-style reviews always make the reviewers come off as not-so-nice-people?

Quote:
To some of the people in this thread... how exactly do you think trans viewers might feel about a segment like the one described?


It's not like we're a hive mind. I personally think it sounds funny.
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Merida



Joined: 21 Feb 2012
Posts: 1945
PostPosted: Fri Aug 10, 2018 2:30 pm Reply with quote
As far as "Filthiest Comedy of the Season" goes, Chio's School Road is definitely giving this show a run for its money...
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Yuvelir



Joined: 06 Jan 2015
Posts: 1529
PostPosted: Sun Aug 12, 2018 7:52 pm Reply with quote
Shay Guy wrote:
To some of the people in this thread... how exactly do you think trans viewers might feel about a segment like the one described?

I odn't think "trans viewers", or "trans" at all, is a term that ever crossed the author or the director's minds.
At any rate, everything is always potentially offensive to someone, specially when it comes to humor. "Someone might be offended at this" is not the best gauge to accurately measure if something is going too far, there are other things to consider.
-
The movements for the LGBTI+ collective is a great and necessary fight and pray that I never use hate-loaded terms such as "Shonen Jump Weekly". [<-EDIT: haha gotta love that censor/filter]
But some people get so invested in this that they eventually fail to realize that others... aren't. Without being their opponents.
Something that I've observed from defenders of the collective, specially those based in America, is that their fight and goals have become the prism through which they watch the world. And that's fine, but they also expect everyone else to use the same prism.

But unfortunately, the world is very complicated and there's a lot of wrong going on that makes a lot of people suffer. And so different people have different opinions on what constitutes a higher priority that requires more delicacy since nobody can burden themselves with absolutely every social issue.
The LGBT movement is much weaker in Japan than it is in America and so it ranks at a low priority in the minds of creators, and that is not necessarily wrong - they may be more concerned about other equally valid reasons, and those who are of the same opinion will probably not be concerned by said scene either.

For instance, the show opened up by joking about foreigner stereotypes in Japan when there are some serious social issues in Japan with foreigner based ontheir hair color. But nobody bats an eye. Likewise they also had a couple of gags about poverty, which is an issue that causes a lot of suffering and is an unending source of discrimination all around the world. But nobody cared about that either.
Instead, it's schoolgirls wanting to sate their curiosity that get people triggered. Because for Americans transphobia ranks higher in the list of social issues than poverty or Japan-immigration.

These are things that might be worth considering when analizing a work and singling out moral issues.
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Closet_Weeb



Joined: 03 Aug 2018
Posts: 6
PostPosted: Sun Aug 19, 2018 11:33 pm Reply with quote
Guess they should've waited until episode 7 before talking about thow this anime is transphobic. Just saying.
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