Nice Comment about how anime has gone "down hill" over the years

[Lord of Joshelplex]

Anime hasnt degraded, we just get more of it, and its like sitcoms here, we have the good, Seinfeld, Raymond and Drew Carey. We have the bad, Taht's so Raven, Friends, and pretty much all the new ones. We used to only get a bit of anime, and most of that little bit was good, now we get most of the crap. Perfect example, Gundam. Original Universe, Wing, X, good. Seed bad. If you want to watch an epic that is very new, Stan Alone Complaex, hell, Peacemaker and Saiyuki (bet you havem't heard of either) are excellent. Anime hasnt gone downhill, we just get the bad stuff more than the good due to the increase in interest.

[synkr0nized]

That was just one person's opinion.
In fact, any kind of post concerning the alleged quality of anime [or any entertainment medium] must be held accountable for its unavoidable bias. One might try to support the opinion with data from surveys and polls, for example, but that still doesn't create a firm foundation upon which a solid "Yes" or "No" can be built.

I don't necessarily agree. I could easily sit down and make an argument against that claim, as was done in the quoted piece in the original post. However, I could probably create an argument in agreement with that claim as easily, depending on my wording and the formulation of the argument. We could even throw in a third option -- that anime has not gotten worse but rather that it has always been bad. :P

I find that I have more "success," such as it is, when talking with people about anime when I present it as something I enjoy and as something they may enjoy for similar or different reasons. It can present an immediate roadblock when beginning with the idea that someone must or should like something. I bring this up because I imagine that those who may feel that it is degrading or whatever would do better in their argument if they were more clever in their attacks of recent anime.


Another way to look at this is from a more technical aspect.
Budgets are bigger, technology is better, and techniques have improved. Aside from personal likes and taste, I believe one would be hard pressed to claim that what is done today is inferior, at least from the visuals [stories can still plop].

[Lord of Joshelplex]

Who cares really, there's plenty of good anime coming out there, Saiyuki, Peacemaker, Stand Alone Complex, Eureka 7, FMA to name a few. Maybe ii just has to do with people likes and dislikes nowadays, maybe less of the styles or genres they like are coming out. It can go either way. The only TV that has actually gone down hill is reality TV. Bad at first, now its even worse.

[Fifthfiend]

Growly voice: "We're badasses!"

Growlier voice: "Yeah well we're even badder badasses!"

Growly voice even growlier than before "Yeah we'll we're even badderer baddasses to the Max!!!"

Defeated Voice: "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!"

This has been Every Episode of Saiyuki, Ever.

Thank you and Good Night.

[Lord of Joshelplex]

I take it your not a fan.

[Fifthfiend]

Well I've watched enough of it to be able to present Every Episode of Saiyuki Ever, so clearly I can't hate it all that hard. But it's nothing I'd really hold up as the shining example of Anime as an art form.

I shall construct thusly - if Inuyasha is Dragonball Z for girls? Then Saiyuki is Inuyasha for dudes.

Aye, it is so.

[Mirai Gen]

Heh. I like that. "Dudes". Not "Guys".

I still stand by my belief that Bleach is Dragon Ball Z for 'wiccan's and Naruto is Dragon Ball Z for that little nine year old who had a ninja costume for Halloween.

Felt the need to say that.

Does anyone have good things to say about the Viewtiful Joe and F-Zero animes?

[Magus]

No no, Kenryoku, you can't expect them NOT to edit television shows for violence. Simple television standards restrain them. However when they go above and beyond and start overconforming to American standards just to sell it to a progressively younger group is where all the trouble starts. What was edited originally to appeal to 12 year olds is suddenly starting to be edited to appeal to 5 year olds. That's all I'm saying. Perhaps I should say that anime edits used to be tolerable, not fine.

Now, obviously, if you're buying anime straight from the source it shouldn't be edited at all! For example, in the English FMA manga release they edited Greed's death so that the rock he is attached to is irregular shaped, because in the original he's attached to a cross-shaped rock (pretty much literally crucified). That's just unbridled censorship. If they can show him crucified at all, they should be able to show him crucified to a cross-shape if they want! It's a double-standard.

Then again arguably if you cut out the blood from someone getting kicked in the face it's arguable that if you can show someone getting kicked in the face then you can show the blood flying. But then we're back to TV standards. Personally we can be thankful for Adult Swim which is fairly limited to swearing edits, I believe. And probably some fairly stupid things like the above mentioned cross reference (though the ending of GITS: Stand Alone Complex still had Battou busting the Major out with a cross-shaped girder and NGE still had it's numerous cross references so maybe that's not an issue with Adult Swim's producers).

Anyway, which is better? Not be able to watch the show at all (on television), or to have it edited (within tolerable limits)? I prefer being able to watch it if I can.

And for the records I thought Slayers had pretty decent animation (episodes 1-12 are all I've watched), so don't think my standards are too high.

[Kenryoku_Maxis]

Originally Posted by synkr0nized

Another way to look at this is from a more technical aspect.
Budgets are bigger, technology is better, and techniques have improved. Aside from personal likes and taste, I believe one would be hard pressed to claim that what is done today is inferior, at least from the visuals [stories can still plop]. [/B][/FONT][/SIZE][/COLOR]

Actually, because of how the Anime industry is right now and BECAUSE technology is better, budgets are actually a lot smaller than they were in the 90s. And because many Anime studios are in financial distress or just not making as much as they were 5+ years ago, they are following formulas. And the popular formula as of late is make as many low budget, 13 episode shows with similar design and time put behind them as a studio can. Then for whichever ones are lucky enough to become popular, extend them until the public is so sick of them they are petitioning for them not to be made anymore.

Before recent times, the idea of making a show less that at least 20 episodes was pretty out there and meant the show would probably suffer from lack of fans. Now adays its like we're hard pressed to even fine one series that isn't a Major Shonen Jump or CLAMP series that first comes out planned to be more than 14 episodes. I was shocked when the show Utawarerumono ended up being announced as 26 episodes. And even then, the show had a DISMALL art budget because of their choice to make it like that. Even when you can tell the art got way better in later episodes, it was because of the artists taking time and effort into drawing the scenes and not that the show gained any extra money. And it suffered from a few episodes where you could tell they scraped by with minimal movement of anything on screen. And most of the show has lots of repeating animations.

Not that the show is bad. Its Suikoden + Tail and owns all. I'm just saying its a good example of how Anime companies are hard pressed to put large budgets on shows now adays. BONES, CLAMP, Shonen series, GONZO and IG shows get a lot of money most of the time. But they really are also the ones getting 90% of all the fans and money in the Anime industry right now.

----

To Magus:

Eh...I've just been watching Anime for too long and know what I'm missing. And besides the obviously stupid edits, if a show isn't fit to be aired on TV, then they shouldn't show it. Or show it at a different time. Japan does this. They show Anime series not suitable for 12 year olds at night. They showed Cowboy Bebop at 1 in the morning. I'd rather have that and be able to see the whole thing than be able to watch it at 8 PM with a quarter of the material edited for whatever little thing is wrong with TV standards.

But the main reason I say this is, once you allow a company to edit something, they do what they 'have' to. Then they look it over and go "you know...we don't HAVE to, but I think we should change this. And you know, this too. And why not this. And I never liked this scene so let's alter it a little. And hey how about..."

See.

But ultimately, I don't think anything should be edited. And as people who know me here will know, that means also the original language and all that.

[Magus]

Yeah, I'd prefer for them not to edit anything too. I don't think Adult Swim needs to edit at all, even swearing (why IS swearing considered worse than violence? So crazy), because it's on in the middle of the night. Comedy Central started showing non-edited versions of movies at one in the morning, it seems entirely plausible for Adult Swim to do so.

It probably simply comes down to adult shows being catered towards kids because adults aren't into "cartoons", and so for them to be successful here they edit them. The trend SHOULD disappear, since Adult Swim is so popular. Hopefully.