10 Reasons You Should Be Watching Anime (If You Aren’t Already) 1. It’s rarely cancelled There’s nothing worse than letting yourself get wholly invested in a TV series only to have the... 2. The characters are unique and interesting Anime boasts such vibrancy and diversity in its characters. People ...
Anime is one of those entertainment mediums that people seem to get a bit apprehensive about. We didn’t have a problem watching Dragon Ball Z or Sailor Moon before school in our younger years, and in fact, you probably look back on those memories with undeniable fondness.
It is a semi episodic anime, with a strange visual design (lots of rotoscoping, crazy colourful) about an eccentric psychiatrist and his patients. What sounds like a boring idea is a wonderful trip with great visual storytelling and relatable characters. However, two minor flaws prevent this show from being higher on the list: 1.
In fact, people often get anime all wrong. Anime sometimes has a stigma for people who don't watch it. Or, people make misconceptions about what anime can be, as well as assumptions about the type of people who like anime.
While it's difficult to pinpoint the exact number, estimations say somewhere between 40% and 60% of the global population watches anime. Although its beginnings date back to the 1960s, anime didn't gain its current popularity until the last couple of decades, and it's been growing ever since.
The answer would be no if you like it then you should watch as much of it as you want and if people think it makes you uncool then to hell with them. They don't know what there missing cause anime is one of the best things every created.
But globally, the percentage is no slouch either. Over 50% of global viewers engaged with anime in the last year. And that number only seems to be on the rise. This means millions of people watch anime worldwide—something we definitely love to hear.
However, anime has become more popular. Top streaming services such as Netflix have begun investing in the production of anime due to its skyrocketing popularity. According to Netflix, from October 2019 to September 2020, “Over one million households chose to watch at least one anime title on Netflix …
This means a whopping 96% of Gen Z respondents did know about anime, but the word is out on whether they are active fans. This stat is wild to see, and you can appreciate it better in context.
No, anime is not cool now that Hollywood has caught on to the growing popularity and has attempted to make live-action adaptations. The truth is, anime has always been cool, people are just simply starting to become more and more aware of that fact.
A 2020 survey conducted in the United States found that anime movies were generally more popular among men than women, with 13 percent of male respondents reporting that they found anime to be very favorable, compared to nine percent of women who said the same.
Netflix says more than 100 million households around the world watched at least one anime title in the first nine months of 2020, a 50% increase from 2019. Meanwhile, anime only sites like Crunchyroll have also seen a rise in viewers.
For many adults, anime is simply something that they grew up with, much like people who grew up reading comics or watching Star Wars. The love never goes away; fans just simply evolve as they get older. Some adults do take the path to marriage, kids, and a career and give up their old interests, but some don't.
According to the data, the first quarter of 2021 has seen demand skyrocket up to 32% higher. The report, which can be seen above, also shows the trend for all of 2020. It seems like the third quarter of last year peaked for anime, but its fourth quarter remained strong.
The Diverse Variety of Stories The wide range of genres in anime is the first reason why it is so popular. Every person enjoys a different story, genre, and style in anime! Romance, comedy, action/adventure, mystery/suspense, and horror are just a few of the many genres explored by anime plots.
There is something like this for all different demographics in Japan – and this gives anime a really broad and diverse audience. This, really, is the great achievement of specifically Japanese anime: even adults enjoy it.
Anime boasts such vibrancy and diversity in its characters. People in anime have dynamic personalities, they’re whole people (even when they aren’t human); they have dreams and goals, and beyond that, there’s just so much variance in what they are. Ghosts, detectives, ghouls, pirates, demons, high school students, office workers… the list goes on, and there’s no limit to what a character might be, or who they might be.
Perfect characters don’t exist in anime, and if they do exist, it’s usually because it’s being set up to prove a plot point. 4. Anime is relatable. Not the storylines specifically, but just because something is animated, doesn’t mean it can be realistic or relatable.
Fight scenes in particular can be spectacular, because the use of animation as a medium means that they’re limitless in a way you can’t achieve with live action.
Written by Peta Hardiman. Anime is one of those entertainment mediums that people seem to get a bit apprehensive about. We didn’t have a problem watching Dragon Ball Z or Sailor Moon before school in our younger years, and in fact, you probably look back on those memories with undeniable fondness.
If someone believes that reading manga is better than watching anime, their reasoning will be a combination of the best perks of manga and the worst aspects of anime, or a combination thereof. For example, while some anime series manage to tell the complete story of the original manga, most don't.
Many modern anime series have excellent animation techniques, such as the popular Attack on Titan and Vinland Saga. Others have just mediocre or notoriously bad animation, such as The Seven Deadly Sins, which has inspired some unflattering nicknames such as "the seven deadly frames."
Anime streaming platforms such as Crunchyroll and Funimation are excellent sources of anime, along with Netflix and Hulu. Still, some series are never streamed because certain platforms simply don't have the rights to them. Some series, such as Wotakoi and Grand Blue Dreaming, are barely streamed anywhere at all in the West.
In general, people read words much faster than they can speak, which means an anime show or TV show will deliver its content more slowly than any comic book, novel, or manga volume. A sentence that can be read in two seconds might take eight or more to speak aloud in anime.
A particular downside to being an anime fans is the fact that many solid manga series never got an anime at all, so an anime-only fan is locked out of these stories entirely. Some anime fans won't mind, but others will realize just how much they're missing out on.
Granted, some manga series do have fairly simple art that is easy to adapt into a lovely anime series, and a few manga series are actually improved this way. But the reverse is more common, and that works in any manga fan's favor. Some art simply cannot be animated.
Not everyone has the budget or the room at home to collect dozens or hundreds of manga volumes, but it is a wonderful hobby to have for those who do. Some people love to collect physical items, and manga fans can buy a few bookshelves and stock them up with every volume of their favorite series.
Udon no Kuni no Kiniro Kemari (Poco’s Udon World) This anime takes the concept of a single dish and turns it into a family drama. So if you enjoy your anime served with plenty of drama, Udon no Kuni no Kiniro Kemari is for you.
If you are an anime buff, you have probably heard of “Serial Experiment Lain.” Coming from the same artist, “NieA Under Seven” offers a unique and original take on aliens and their existence or purpose in our universe. In this world, aliens have been inhabiting the earth for some time, and are seen as second-class citizens by most. Mayuko, a studious and poor cram school student allows (“allows” being a generous term), one such alien to inhabit her tiny apartment. Thus begins their dysfunctional yet touching friendship.
Moyasimon is perfect for viewers looking to walk away from a series feeling satisfied , as though they were watching the Discovery Channel rather than an anime.
This story is about Yuuko Okonogi, a young girl who is adjusting to a world that has incorporated augmented reality and high-tech gadgets into everyday life. She joins her grandmothers’ “Investigation Agency,” which solves neighborhood virtual hacking and virus problems. Though the characters are ridiculously cute while dealing with their pre-teen drama, the story is complex and has plenty of substance for viewers of all ages.
Tonari no Seki-kun (My Neighbor Seki) This show is composed of short skits, meaning there are plenty of laugh-out-loud moments to enjoy, without having to commit to a whole feature-length film. Adapted from a graphic novel, this story tells the odd happenings of Yokoi’s seat neighbor, Seki, at school.
Not to be confused with the box office hit, “ Mononoke Hime ” (Princess Mononoke), Mononoke still deals with demons and spirits, but focuses on the folklore and cultural significance of Japanese culture. The nameless “Medicine Seller” totes his magical wares throughout feudal era Japan in search of “Mononoke,” which are powerful ayakashi (spirits). To exercise these spirits, he must find their Form, Truth, and Reason before being able to wield his exorcism tools, so each episode features a new Monoke and a mystery to solve.
Ten Things People Get Wrong About Anime. Anime might be popular in nerd culture, but that doesn't mean people always understand what anime is all about. In fact, people often get anime all wrong. Anime sometimes has a stigma for people who don't watch it. Or, people make misconceptions about what anime can be, as well as assumptions about ...
Anime did not always sell itself on its Japanese identity, because that makes it less marketable. Early anime was sold to audiences outside of Japan, but only if anything overtly tying the anime to Japan could be scrubbed out. So: references were changed, names were changed, locations were changed.
One early anime show, Kimba The White Lion, for example, had Americans pushing to get black people off the show—which, by the way, takes place in Africa. They settled on letting the show depict Africans, but "only if they were good.". Later, Disney purchasing Miyazaki films also influenced how some anime was depicted.
Violence and sex weren't always a subject anime felt comfortable depicting. That changed with the advent of video, which could bring programs to specific audiences that wanted the content, without having to worry about conforming the content to television standards.
In fact, people often get anime all wrong. Anime sometimes has a stigma for people who don't watch it. Or, people make misconceptions about what anime can be, as well as assumptions about the type of people who like anime. Though it's a couple of years old, a very informative lecture from an event called AnimeFest has started making ...
Anime fans are a small niche compared to the wider number of people who sometimes buy hentai. But, anime fans are the ones that will take all the blame for the misconception.
Of course, when people use the word, they often mean something like "animation from Japan," but arguably, that's not all of what anime encompasses. Anime is not always high-quality. Anime shows often take a lot of shortcuts, so they can fill the 30 min episode format while saving money.
But studios can get away with the meager pay in part because there is a nearly limitless pool of young people passionate about anime and dreaming of making a name in the industry , said Simona Stanzani, who has worked in the business as a translator for nearly three decades.
The workers who make the Japanese shows the world is binge-watching can earn as little as $200 a month. Many wonder how much longer they can endure it. Tokyo’s Akihabara district, a center of anime culture. The industry’s boom has only widened the gap between profits and wages.
That’s happening to some extent at the business’s highest levels. Median annual earnings for key illustrators and other top-line talent increased to about $36,000 in 2019 from around $29,000 in 2015, according to statistics gathered by the Japan Animation Creators Association, a labor organization.
Sugawara believes, the industry may one day collapse, as promising young talent drops out to pursue work that can provide a better life. That was the case for Ryosuke Hirakimoto, who decided to quit the industry after his first child was born.
In the first episode of “Shirobako,” an anime about young people’s efforts to break into the industry, an illustrator collapses with a fever as a deadline looms. The cliffhanger ending hinges not on her health but on whether the show she is drawing will be finished in time to air.
A second season is quite an elusive beast in the world of anime, at least, when it comes to most series. While some cannot move past a single cour of 13 episodes, others seem to last for years on end, producing hundreds upon hundreds of chapters.
If A Certain Magical Index ended after its second season, it would just about earn itself a recommendation. Unfortunately, the third season does such an awful job of adapting one of the light novel's most crucial storylines that it retroactively diminishes the value of the entire series.
The Monogatari series is the definition of an acquired taste and should be tried by anyone looking to experience a different type of anime. An adaptation of Nisio Isin's light novel series, Monogatari is split into separate seasons revolving around Koyomi Araragi's run-ins with supernatural-themed cases typically involving high school girls.
With over 350 episodes, Gintama is quite a massive undertaking, especially since it does have a somewhat slow start. However, this is one journey that is worth taking. Even when the anime begins to focus more on action rather than comedy, Gintama remains fantastic.
Split into six seasons lasting roughly 13 episodes each, Natsume's Book of Friends is a quaint supernatural slice of life anime that centers around the titular boy's attempts to free the spirits who are subservient to The Book of Friends.
However, things pick up significantly after approximately 20 episodes, specifically once the Large-Scale Invasion Arc commences. From there, World Trigger just gets better and better.
Updated June 18th, 2020 by Mark Sammut: Anime is a medium that never rests. With each season welcoming a few dozen new shows and a couple of continuations, audiences should nearly always be able to find something that suits their needs.
And in 2018, the non-Japanese market for anime exceeded $9.5 billion. Netflix’s Canon Busters, an action anime by South Bronx native LeSean Thomas, is maybe the most emblematic of Netflix’s anime project: financed by British and Taiwanese companies, produced by a Japanese studio, and inspired by an American comic book.
It makes sense. Only 3 million of Netflix’s 195 million subscribers are Japanese. And in 2018, the non-Japanese market for anime exceeded $9.5 billion.
When Sakurai joined Netflix in 2017, it was his dream from the get-go to unite anime creators and build an international anime movement. If anyone has the pedigree to do it, it’s him. When he was nine, he began attending school in England, where his father moved for work at a life insurance company.
To be sure, the suits licensed their shonen, but over the last three years, Sakurai has indeed produced anime for Netflix, all prefaced with the words, “A Netflix Original Anime Series.”. They are, to be blunt, super weird.
Netflix is an American tech company. Anime is a Japanese artform. Netflix executives could just drop a stack of cash on licensing a well-liked shonen or two and call it a day. “I found out after I joined that they were serious about it,” Sakurai says.
Some were led to believe Netflix would continue releasing anime too edgy to fit neatly anywhere else. It wasn’t so. Although Devilman was a cannonball leap into the adult end of an acid-laced swimming pool—entirely too “mature” and “artsy” for, say, Crunchyroll’s roster—what followed trended in the opposite direction.
Also, some is plain corny. As Japanese anime analyst and journalist Tadashi Sudo puts it to me over the phone, “There are clearly a number of anime that are made with the Western or American audiences in mind. And they are such that, for Japanese people, they wouldn’t even be considered anime.”.