One of the things I did recently was join up over at Ask.fm to take in random questions from various sources. Luckily, it didn’t take long to get past the silly and into some more interesting things. So every week, I’ll pull together the better questions and bring it all here to talk more about it in some cases. We’re doing a bit of catch-up first, so there’s a bit more than usual here for the first installment.
You can totally ask us questions as well here:
Disagree.
Slice of life material generally doesn’t bomb; they simply have lower expectations and generally they’re met. Lucky Star certainly didn’t do well, and I’m sure that on some level it qualifies as a bomb, but it’s worth remembering that it was a release that Bandai went big on at a time when the entire economy was in freefall and collapsing around us. There were a lot of casualties, and a good chunk of that was the buying public simply not buying anymore. That bottomed out hard that year.
But in general, there are not the same level of expectations for these kinds of shows. You don’t expect Non Non Biyori to do Highschool of the Dead or Samurai Girls numbers to be sure. So you provide it for the target audience that will buy. And as we see with a number of them, they get upgrades along the way if they prove that there’s a strong enough market for it.
Now, sports anime… there’s your shows that bomb.
While I always have hope, there’s not much. It’s the kind of thing that until it happens, there’s no real time frame to work with. It either does, or does.
And the major blocker? At this point probably mostly just ego.
You know, I keep mulling this one over but there’s really no simple answer for it. Everyone has such diverse tastes that you really have to tailor it for people. Sometimes you can just catch them unawares though. I did that to my family recently while skimming through my YouTube watch history and I had written about the first episode of His & Her Circumstances. So I tossed it onto the TV while they were there after we finished a movie and I just said, “hey, I just want you to see the first few minutes of this.”
Before they knew it, we’d finished the episodes and the kids in particular wanted to watch more.
There’s the easy gets of saying give them a Studio Ghibli movie or things more mainstream. But mostly it’s just know your potential audience and find the best and most accessible of those genres.
Admittedly, a lot of what really sticks with you the most tends to be the things with nostalgia. The shows you saw when it was all a discovery. For me, that was Robotech as my gateway when it was first broadcast while my fansub side in the early 90’s was discovering Record of Lodoss War, Ranma 1/2 and Wings of Honneamise.
Naturally, those are all ones that have stuck with me the most, with a few others that I got passionate about like Kimagure Orange Road and Wings of Honneamise. Others over time have been certain Studio Ghibli movies and a few other series here and there. Because of the sheer volume I see, a lot of it does tend to blur. But when re-releases come in, it has a great mix of experiencing it again for the first time but also revisiting that great love and remembering why I loved it so much in that place and time.
Most of my SF really comes from books, but I’m woefully out of date as my reading time is minimal. I’m a huge fan of what Peter Hamilton did with his two mainline universes at the moment with either the Commonwealth universe or the Confederation universe. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_F._Hamilton
Those books aren’t space opera, but they’re close to that than hard SF. I tend to favor hard SF a lot more. For that, it’s all about Stephen Baxter and especially his Xeelee Sequence interconnected novels. I started with Ring and was just blown away. I love stuff that occurs over huge timespans.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xeelee_Sequence
I cut my teeth on old school SF, growing up reading from my father’s collections with lots of Asimov and Heinlein. The Lazarus Long books are huge favorites as are the Elijah Bailey works and the Foundation novels in general
David Brin has some great stuff too with his Uplift Universe – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uplift_Universe
I’ve got far, far too many books waiting to be read. On the novel side, I’ve a third into the most recent Game of Thrones book, but it’s become an utter slog.
I have the most recent Peter Hamilton book and I’m itching to read that so I can get the new Stephen Baxter book as well.
On the comics side, I’ve given up on reviewing Walking Dead trades that I got behind on because the divergences between it and the show have me doing too many comparisons and too many frustrations, so I’m sticking to the show. Beyond that, I really want to dive deep into East of West some more and get further in Manhattan Projects.
Thankfully,. I largely learned years and years ago to avoid the hype train. And I try to avoid being a hypester in my writing about upcoming shows and properties. I only occasionally “fanboy” over a few shows.
I think my biggest disappoint was with Spirited Away, as I was really looking forward to it with all its acclaim and coming after Princess Mononoke. That film still bores me to tears. I’ll revisit it someday though.
I don’t know that I really get disappointed by shows, to be honest. At least in the sense that they really impact me. Partially because there’s so much to watch and choose from. And that kind of colors my reflections on it as well because I do see so much, it’s easier to forget the disappointments or ones that don’t live up to their potential.
Kyoto animation has a fair number of shows that they’re involved, but I figured the question more was to the ones they’re the main producer behind (i.e. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyoto_Animation)
While Fumoffu was probably my first experience with them, and Air not long afterward, Clannad and After Story continue to be my favorites overall because of the sheer amount of feels that are built into it over the course of its length run. Part of me wishes it was a bit more compact, but those sprawling character pieces are important for building the overall atmosphere.
If not for Clannad, Nichijou would be my favorite of the KyoAni works. It’s a freakin’ travesty that this show has not been given a proper release yet.
I didn’t get to watch as much as I wanted to, largely because I find myself revisiting things too much as so much get licensed. So my simulcast viewings have slimmed down since I’ll end up marathoning it a year later on DVD or BD.
Fall 2014 had some fun stuff though. I really like I Can’t Understand What My Husband is Saying.
I’m totally digging Cross Ange as a big, sprawling and silly kind of show with beautiful animation and moments to it.
Orenchi no Furo made me smile a whole lot.
Beyond that, it was just my ongoings I kept up with such as One Piece and Naruto. I did finally get to see the rest of Encouragement of Climb during that season, which was great.
The short answer? It’s not the comic.
Days of Future Past is, for a good generation of X-Men fans, the holy grail storyline because of what it did. But it had so much foundation in so many other things that are not in the films that it ends up being undercut. We had largely pointless time in the future when it should have been more focused there, but the film naturally had to focus on the younger cast.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I liked a lot of things about it. First Class is my favorite of all the X-Men films. But for me, Fox hasn’t handled the films right from the get go and First Class was the first time I thought they got a lot of the tone right, and the 60’s aspect gave it something more. Here, Singer brought in all the original cast for one last hurrah, fixed the problems of X3 and then has it so it can go forward.
There’s great stuff and some fun performances, but it’s just another weak part of the overall series of films for me. Even with all that, it’s still my second ranked film in what’s been produced.
I don’t know about going too deep down the well for actors and directors, but there are a few things I’m hopeful for, foolishly knowing they’ll never get made.
The big one for me, strangely enough, is the 31st century Guardians of the Galaxy team. I’d love to see “my” Guardians get their due out in the world. But most space based ones would be fun in general since many came from the 70’s and are just damn quirky.
I’d love to see what a really thoughtful Machine Man feature film could do, especially off the Barry Windsor-Smith stuff.
My real pie in the sky dream is for the old Micronauts books and ROM to finally gain a new life, because damn those books were fun.
I’d also love to see the original Magik miniseries and character provide for a solid mutant/horror spinoff that could be fascinating for FOX to work with.
Some of it sucks. Certainly not to the level of the early or mid days of DVD releases. Video enthusiasts have plenty of legitimate complaints and there are always issues to be dealt with. For the vast majority of people that watch? They’ll never even see the problems, even if they’re pointed out to them. A lot of people can’t tell the difference between HD and SD anyway. I used to go through that problem with my father all the time.
If you want JP quality, that’s what you have to buy. it comes at a price though is all. For most people, they get close – or close enough – that they’re fine. That’s not to mean we should just accept things as are, but every release is its own series of problems and issues to be dealt with, especially with so many companies involved in the whole process, especially for older shows.
The complaints are outsized compared to those that are satisfied, but it’s easier to find people complaining (legitimate) than not.
1) I want Legend of Galactic Heroes to get a big, full, beautiful Blu-ray release at an affordable price for all (and bilingual).
2) I want the Macross legal issues resolved so that the original works can be released here.
3) I want Kodomo no Jikan to be released in North America just to watch the complete freak out of so many people.
I’ve been buying anime since the mid 80’s. First it was my exposure to the Macross movie in subtitled form after being a fan of Robotech. I bought all the Palladium VHS releases of Robotech and when out in my local comic book shop, I started to see the early AnimEigo releases, like Bubblegum Crash (my first purchased official licensed release outside of Robotech) and I got into Streamline’s stuff and it was all downhill from there.
I had a hard time buying anime when it was on VHS in the old Suncoast days with two episodes per tape and thirteen volumes of that for a lot of series – and not bilingual of course. I got into DVD a whole lot more since it offered more episodes, better quality and over time a far lower price overall.
Oh man. I don’t know that I actually “waste” time. 😀
I’m a child of the 80’s so I grew up on sitcoms. What I tend to do in the evening/late night period is when everyone is off in bed, I watch various new sitcoms and favorites of somewhat older shows. They’re like palate cleansers for me in a way. I get to laugh, I don’t have to think/be critical much and I can just enjoy without any huge investment. Getting the time to just enjoy doing nothing like this is my favorite at the moment.
I very rarely import from Japan on most anything these days. I used to do a bit more about a decade ago when there were some English subtitled releases, and some Ghibli movies I thought would never come over. But beyond that, it’s just a very rare thing. I think the last thing I got was the Macross: Do You Remember Love import because I adore that movie. This year I only have plans for the Urusei Yatsura: Beautiful Dreamer Blu-ray simply because I know it’ll never get picked up again.
