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That's why I try to establish that I'm just not an anime person generally

Yeah but I don't even think it's "an anime thing". It's just "a fiction thing".

 

Anime is like everything else. There's a massive fuckload of it, spanning tons of different genres with tons of different audiences. And like everything else, the majority of it caters to the mainstream, because that's what makes money. The mainstream in Japan trends toward dudes being rad and cute girls being all up on said dudes. Which, well, I don't think is all that different from the mainstream in Western stuff, either, it's just that the cute girls are cute in a different way and the rad dudes are rad in a different way.

 

You could go watch Princess Jellyfish, which is completely unlike anything you've mentioned, or asked for, about a bunch of college-age women living together and some stuff happens that's a bit goofy and a bit touching and a bit other. You could also watch the previously mentioned Kids on the Slope (but the ending sucks still no matter what anyone else says!). You could turn a different direction and watch tons of different sports anime, from volleyball to basketball to a competitive card-slapping game, and they'd all feel significantly different, while also still having the same overall arc of a bunch of kids loving a sport and being obsessed with it. Or an old-timey ridiculously goofy take on a fireworks ban in Japan where a fireworks-expert rebel tries to help an alien get back into space? I dunno, a darker-toned gambling anime, in which case you could go with Kaiji or maybe One Outs if you like a baseball gambling angle? 

 

 

 

 

Maybe you like a chill atmospheric supernatural mystery-solving weird fiction anime, in which case

 

mushishi cos it's best ever always

 

I guess a good question would also be: what do you like in other things that aren't anime?

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Mostly a joke. Xenosaga was very fond of incredibly heavy handed biblical references, but used entirely superficially, they signified nothing. I never got past the first game, but I could easily imagine it ending up with space-Jesus piloting a mech.

 

Oh man, so much potential for mech piloting space Jesus. He could even give matter mass!

 

Yes I know what I said is really cheesy.

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Man, I'm totally a sucker for "You are a chosen one with a magical gift for piloting these mechs, you are Earth's last hope, you must save Earth with your magical mech piloting powers."

 

:(

 

Yeah, I especially love Evangelion for being "You are the chosen one because your mom and dad were scientists working for an apocalyptic death-cult, and trying to both live up to the role they built for you and save the Earth in the process will drive you to multiple nervous breakdowns." Eva becomes much less interesting if there isn't a "chosen one" framework in place to represent the emotional and psychological burden of social expectations, but if I talk too much more about it Twig will complain like he's complaining about Kids on the Slope.

 

Yeah but I don't even think it's "an anime thing". It's just "a fiction thing".

 

Anime is like everything else. There's a massive fuckload of it, spanning tons of different genres with tons of different audiences. And like everything else, the majority of it caters to the mainstream, because that's what makes money. The mainstream in Japan trends toward dudes being rad and cute girls being all up on said dudes. Which, well, I don't think is all that different from the mainstream in Western stuff, either, it's just that the cute girls are cute in a different way and the rad dudes are rad in a different way.

 

I agree wholeheartedly. Disliking the "chosen one" trope that is a staple of shounen and seinen anime is mostly the same as disliking the "rugged individualist" trope that is a staple of American dramatic television. It takes a bit of effort to look past all the Walter Whites and Rick Grimeses out there, but it's definitely not the end-all and be-all of the medium. Echoing Twig, yet again, what sort of stories do you like in your media?

 

Also, I'm working off the assumption that the presence of the "chosen one" trope invariably ruins an anime for you, but man... Akira and most of Miyazaki's works have it in spades, so I don't know. Actually, it's bummed me out in recent years how I've started to feel some discomfort at the in-universe fetishization of the character Nausicaa from the eponymous movie. I still love it, to the point that it's probably my favorite of Miyazaki's works, but it's begun to grate a little.

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Oh man, so much potential for mech piloting space Jesus. He could even give matter mass!

 

Yes I know what I said is really cheesy.

 

In true anime fashion, he will be co-piloting a giant mech (code name: Holy Ghost) with his father, God, whom he dislikes intensely. 

Every episode they will put aside their differences in order to save the planet from things like Death Metal or Dancing.

Sometimes they will team up with Giant mechs from other religions including Shiva, Odin & Osirus.

The phase 'Holy Ghost: Trinity Formation!' will be yelled in unison often.

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I would watch this Jesus anime just to hear people calling him "king of king"... one of my favorite Japanese borrowed English phrases.

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if I talk too much more about it Twig will complain like he's complaining about Kids on the Slope.

You rang?

 

welp that's a new page for ya

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Wheeljack joked about suggesting Azumanga Daioh but I dunno, maybe Patrick would like it

 

It doesn't have a chosen one in it!!!

 

Full disclosure: it's about schoolgirls.

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I would watch this Jesus anime just to hear people calling him "king of king"... one of my favorite Japanese borrowed English phrases.

Hopefully, at one point somebody would call Jesus "the Satan of mech piloting" for his incredible skill.

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I'm aware I'm generalizing but when literally all I've seen of anime (television) is 90% magic chosen one stuff and also Cowboy Bebop, that's all I really have to work with, so all I can say is "I'm not an anime person, but..."

 

lso, I'm working off the assumption that the presence of the "chosen one" trope invariably ruins an anime for you, but man... Akira and most of Miyazaki's works have that in spades, so I don't know. Actually, it's bummed me out in recent years how I've started to dislike the in-universe fetishization of the character Nausicaa from the eponymous movie. I still love it, to the point that it's probably my favorite of Miyazaki's works, but it's begun to grate a little.

 

There are plenty of Miyazaki/Ghibli movies that don't have chosen one stuff. Spirited Away, Kiki's Delivery Service, Whisper of the Heart, Castle of Cagliostro, The Wind Rises, From Up On Poppy Hill...

 

Akira doesn't feel like chosen one stuff to me (I thought Akira and Kaneda sort of stumbled into the whole situation accidentally), though I could be misremembering details as it's been 5 or so years. At any rate, "chosen one" stuff is a little more tolerable in films than it is in TV series that demand more of my time.

 

I am cool with schoolgirls (love Whisper of the Heart) but am not cool with super sexualized school girls or super silly Japanese humor. 

 

Speaking of which, I forgot I've also seen a handful of episodes of High School of the Dead. No chosen one stuff! Lame story and fan service stuff. 

 

I would love to see a really scary anime. Also mushishi sounds like it's my jam.

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Maybe Patrick would like Infinite Ryvius? It's about a spaceship, and has stupid teen angst and political stuff in it, but I don't think anybody is particularly special (disclaimer: I didn't watch much of it because I didn't really care for it).

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Hopefully, at one point somebody would call Jesus "the Satan of mech piloting" for his incredible skill.

Oh man, Space Satan.

 

Well, that's next Halloween covered.

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In true anime fashion, he will be co-piloting a giant mech (code name: Holy Ghost) with his father, God, whom he dislikes intensely. 

Every episode they will put aside their differences in order to save the planet from things like Death Metal or Dancing.

Sometimes they will team up with Giant mechs from other religions including Shiva, Odin & Osirus.

The phase 'Holy Ghost: Trinity Formation!' will be yelled in unison often.

First of all, this really made my day.

 

Secondly. Are we sure this doesn't exist already? It really really seems like it would exist already.

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Also I'm gonna go back a bit and second the Planetes maybe-recommendation. It's hard sci-fi, near future, when we've got a lunar base and a bunch of space debris and basically it follows a space debris clean up crew trying to make the space stations safer. (I don't actually remember much about it, it's been a long while, but I remember absolutely loving it.)

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Secondly. Are we sure this doesn't exist already? It really really seems like it would exist already.

 

Mecha-Shiva was a throwaway joke in an episode of Venture Bros once.

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First of all, this really made my day.

 

Secondly. Are we sure this doesn't exist already? It really really seems like it would exist already.

 

I am going off of pretty limited experience but Space Dandy was the closest I've seen to Space Jesus. Maybe not the most apt comparison but 

he was offered the position of god at the end. And I think the only person God would be willing to let take over would be Jesus.

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I'm aware I'm generalizing but when literally all I've seen of anime (television) is 90% magic chosen one stuff and also Cowboy Bebop, that's all I really have to work with, so all I can say is "I'm not an anime person, but..."

 

Well, I think you're at a disadvantage for disliking the "chosen one" stuff, because that's how most non-Japanese people get into anime, whence they can discover works of greater depth. It's like something I wrote a few weeks back about Excel Saga being this really intensive multi-level deconstruction of dozens of subgenre works, but when it was licensed for American audiences, it was sold as "random and wacky anime bullshit" instead, probably because it's easier to market that, and so most non-Japanese people hold it to be a really shallow dead-end of a show, because it was superficially appealing but required a lot of media literacy to really get it. Having an awareness of the medium is hard, even for someone who's watched hundreds of shows like me, and knowing whether something is representative of anything else is just as hard. It's been crushing in the past for me to enjoy Revolutionary Girl Utena or Oh! Edo Rocket, then discover that they're totally unique works that didn't directly influence anything else.

 

Anyway.

 

I would love to see a really scary anime.

 

There are not many good horror anime. Shiki eventually picks up, but it's solidly at a B-movie register. I'm a huge fan of Another, which is a short twelve-episode series that moves fairly quickly, but I know it has many detractors for a supposedly unsatisfying mystery and peremptory ending. The only other big one is the massive Higurashi franchise, which I haven't seen and can't comment upon.

 

Also I'm gonna go back a bit and second the Planetes maybe-recommendation. It's hard sci-fi, near future, when we've got a lunar base and a bunch of space debris and basically it follows a space debris clean up crew trying to make the space stations safer. (I don't actually remember much about it, it's been a long while, but I remember absolutely loving it.)

 

If Patrick has a tolerance for the goofy antics that characterize the early parts of Trigun, then I'm much less trepidatious about recommending Planetes. Usually, I have to worry about people getting through the first six or seven episodes to discover that it's actually an anime about the enormous human cost of spaceflight and about the reasons that we pay it anyway. It's got well-formed characters too, with no messiahs, just regular people.

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I am going off of pretty limited experience but Space Dandy was the closest I've seen to Space Jesus.

 

Well, thematically, sure, but I'm talking about literal mecha-space Jesus, with Turn-The-Other-Cheek Shield and Spear of Longinus (a laser cannon, obv) and SHEPHERD PUUUUUUNCH!

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Well, thematically, sure, but I'm talking about literal mecha-space Jesus, with Turn-The-Other-Cheek Shield and Spear of Longinus (a laser cannon, obv) and SHEPHERD PUUUUUUNCH!

 

We're talking about Reign: The Conqueror, but for Jesus of Nazareth instead of Alexander the Great, right?

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There are not many good horror anime. Shiki eventually picks up, but it's solidly at a B-movie register. I'm a huge fan of Another, which is a short twelve-episode series that moves fairly quickly, but I know it has many detractors for a supposedly unsatisfying mystery and peremptory ending. The only other big one is the massive Higurashi franchise, which I haven't seen and can't comment upon.

I think I liked Ayakashi. If nothing else, it's very pretty.

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I think I liked Ayakashi. If nothing else, it's very pretty.

 

Wow, an anime of which I genuinely have no awareness whatsoever. What do you mean by "if nothing else"? Is it not very good as a horror anime?

 

That reminds me, I should also put Hell Girl on that list, even though it's more ghost stories than straight-out horror.

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Oh! Edo Rocket

Also just for the record this is one of the ones to which I was referring in my rambly paragraph. It's great and actually you know what I might just rewatch it sometime soon...

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If nothing else just meaning I don't remember it that well. I believe I only saw the last story (Bake Neko), which was in fact very creepy,

 

Huh, just realized that apparently Mononoke (which I think is more readily available today) was spun off that story.

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