The Wistful Allure of Anime

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I couldn't post it the normal way just as it's own post, so I will post my article as a google docs link. I would appreciate anyone who'd like to read it and give feedback, I worked pretty hard on it-

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1P2_ ... p=drivesdk

Thanks

It is hard to tell if your article is intended as a tutorial "in a nutshell" on the Anime phenomenon or if you intended it as a simple review of "Weathering With You".

The TVTropes website has This Webpage devoted to "Weathering With You".

Weathering is just the example I used, but it's moreso about the reason I think so many people like anime, including myself.

I like to think of myself as one of this site's big anime nerds, so I would like to think that I could offer something to this discussion. First, a personal annoyance, the plural of anime is still anime, I only ever use "animes" if I am trying to be self degrading, not big but some people will take you less seriously.

Second, do you offer quite a definition of what an anime is? I know that you are unlikely doing this as a paper, you meant it as just a post, but I think that it worth discussing. Anime is simply the Japanese word for animation or cartoon, and in the West we have mostly used it to refer to animation done in Japan, but more and more cartoons are being made elsewhere in the world that people seem willing to call anime, such as RWBY.

As for offering a possible explanation of why anime may have this wistfulness as you explain it, I could possibly offer a theory. Japan is a very ordered society, from what I know it can be very reserved and have stricter hierarchies over the likes of America, where they bow to their teachers and have a host of social rules in the workplace. I think that a lot of times anime works as a semi escapism or fantasy away from the strict social expectations, and that is why it can be so wistful. You also have a host of creative minds that seems to have made up the anime industry and can focus on various themes and the like, sometimes they can be shallow and escapist in general, other times they can be allowed to do much deeper themes under the surface. As someone whos main hobby is watching anime and reading into any underlying themes, I can attest to complexity.

I have not seen Weathering With You, it would be ridiculous to make any conclusions without watching it, but based off of what you wrote about it I wonder if there are themes about depression. Certain aspect about someone's view of everything constantly raining unless they kill themselves. Or perhaps it is about a somewhat comforting element of a reclusive lifestyle, that has to be given up for freedom and sunshine. Just an example of the sort of thing I can expect to be read into anime.

A particular subgenre that exploded in the last decade or so is the Isekai genre, which is basically about being transported to another realm, which I could hardly describe a more wistful genre. Wishing for things that are impossible, and often by audiences by which such fantasy of themselves has passed.

The screenshots look like 1920s German expressionistic cinema with the use of lighting, kind of like _Metropolis._