The State of American Animation

[JoeGKushner]

So Joshua, have you checked out Berserk yet in anime or manga? Non-silly, not aimed at kids, European style fantasy anime. Good stuff.

 

[Mallus]

Ever see Exo-squad?

Thanks for reminding me that I'm still angry they didn't make another season of that show...

Talk about a cliffhanger... aliens kidnap the 10th planet (and half the series regulars, am I remembering that right??)

 

[Mad Mac]

Exo-squad? Cliffhanger? Oh, tell me about it...I was so mad when that happened. Too young to know better, I kept waiting for them to show the next season instead of starting over after the cliffhanger episode, again and again...

Speaking of old cartoons, am I the only person on earth who used to watch the american Street Fighter cartoon? I remember it having really good animation for it's time, and was pretty decent, despite a couple of nagging issues. (Primarily inconsistancy, poor utilization of minor characters, and a tendancy to make every bad guy except Bison worthless)

On the other extreme was the old Mortal Kombat show, which was trash on almost every level. "Lets make Stryker a major character!" "Lets try to precisely emulate the painfully stiff combat of the video game!" Or am I the only guy who got up early to watch obscure cartoons based on fighting games.

I should also say that hating tripe like Yu-gi-oh, (recently spoofed on CN as "Stu-pi-do") and Pokeman (Ash must die!) is a cause we can all get behind.

As far as pacing issues, ect, I can understand that point as well. I mentioned Ranma 1/2 earlier as an anime I liked, when it would be more accurate to say that I love Ranma 1/2 , an awesome comic book, and was largely disappointed by the anime adaption. Pacing issues were especially a problem, in fact.

It's also interesting that no one has yet mentioned how much Japans animation industry is driven by it's comic book industry, which is also hugely different than the american one.

 

[WizarDru]

Yeah, that's about right. Man, I miss that show. Written much better than it had any right to be, even if it was shoved into a kids spot. Incidentally, that was a cliffhanger for the third season, not the second. The first season was a typical 13-episode trial run. The show went just long enough to become syndicated, and then disappeared.

DANG.

 

[Chain Lightning]

I agree with both assessments, for the most part. With the caveat that there's some darn good stuff coming out of American mainstream studios in terms of pushing the art too. The Incredibles was a great example of good animation, with a good script (that crosses the line between a "kids show" and having situations that no kid would relate to) and great voice acting. Heck Treasure Planet was, if nothing else, a visual masterpiece.

Ah Pixar.....how I love thee.

Thank whatever diety for Pixar. They do great stuff. In fact, I often point to them as the "model" on how most animation productions should be run. Unfortunately, there's only one company that's like Pixar....and that's Pixar. Okay, given that a couple of other companies have managed to squeeze out the occasional cool show too, but the hit ratio on Pixar is much higher. But it seems (unfortunately) that instead of other companies looking at Pixar and saying , "Hey, they must be doing something right....let's examine their methods", they still insist on running things their old way. *shrug* ah well - - I guess that's just something I should expect from all aspects of humanity eh?

Most of all the American animation shows/movies we end up liking share very similar leadership/production method. But for some reason, no matter how often that method of producing a show works, it isn't adopted. Toy companies and network big wigs still insist on doing it their way. Which...granted, sometimes works out okay. But often doesn't.

If not, then apparently every studio is equally poorly managed, it seems. If you're well-run animation shop is only a theoretical utopia, then the actual ground floor situation, as bad as it may appear to be, is the only one that will really matter.

Not every studio. For the most part - especially tv shows, most studios get a lot of mileage out of the amount of money they spend on their project. But feature animation is a whole other ball game. For some reason, most feature projects have huge amounts of wasteful spending. Most but not all. Ok, I don't 100% for sure...but I think "Iron Giant" ran smoothly without waste. Unfortunately, WB marketing dropped the ball on the marketing...but that's whole other story. TV animated series are usually underfunded. But despite this, a lot of shows are able to bring some good stuff to the table regardless of that handicap. Now imagine if they had half the money the feature guys were spending....

In which case the market just needs to mature. Not every show can be a Pokemon or Yu-Gi-Oh (oh, how I hate both of those... mostly because my kids have loved them.) In a mature market, people are looking at filling the niche demand as well. Sounds like we may be moving that direction. Eventually.

Yah, I'm not a big fan of Pokemon and/or Yu-Gi-Oh either. More dislike toward Yu-Gi-Oh than Pokemon.

So Joshua, have you checked out Berserk yet in anime or manga? Non-silly, not aimed at kids, European style fantasy anime. Good stuff.

Hmmm...that's tricky. Not sure if Joshua will like it. The animation is fine, but it isn't a good example of the best of recent anime animation. (like Cowboy Bebop) There are times where the animation art looks like 80's anime and not 90's anime. But story wise...man, I like it more than Cowboy Bebop (but that's me). I know this is gonna sound like blasphemy, but I like Cowboy Bebop but I don't love it. I don't think its as sweet as some people say it is. But it is pretty good at times anyways.

Joshua, I don't know what you've tried so far. I'm not sure if you've only seen stuff that Cartoon Network shows. Or you'll only seen stuff like "Burn Up W", "Love Hina", "Dragon Ball Z", and "Yu-Gi-Oh". And if you've only seen the badly dubbed versions. But there is some good anime out there.

It is hard to get certain people to start "liking" anime. Obviously if you're trying to convert someone, you wanna start off by showing him/her the BEST one. But it kinda depends on the person and his/her tastes in stories too.

Then there's weird combinations like "Berzerk". Animation is obviously on a small budget, but the series is good. And when you're into D&D like me. To heck with "Record of Lodoss War", its all about "Berzerk". Then there's clever writing like in the original 6 episodes of "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure". If only you can convince the viewer to get pass the odd names and odd outfits people are wearing. The whole thing about those "stands" and how their users use their powers is great stuff.

Then there's the new "Appleseed" cgi movie. Man that thing is sweet as heck. But there's just one small flaw. At one point during some exposition dialogue, its kinda unclear about who's doing what. But I might attribute that to the poor Hong Kong subtitles.

My favorites to recommend are:

-"Laputa: Castle in the Sky" : anything by Miyaziki is great for both kids and adults, but this one is my favorite. "Spirited Away" is a close 2nd. But I think this one's pacing and storytelling is closer to western tastes than Spirited Away was.

-"Memories" : a colletion of 3 stories, each with its own seperate director and art team. I like showing this one to people who think all anime is big eyes and small mouths. The first story "Magnetic Rose" is drawn with realistic proportioned humans. The Japanese do have differenst styles. The "iffy" part is maybe the third story. Its ponderous like a lot of anime. Its the most abstract. But artistically, again it shows that the Japanese have different styles too. Not all big eyes small mouths. The third story is done very much in the same kind of style you see in European comic books.


-"Macross Plus": this might qualify as over melodramatic soap opera stuff, but where its done in an annoying way most elsewhere....I kinda like it here. Or is because I'm just a huge fan of the original series and enjoy this latest slicker more polished story set in the same universe? This was one of the first OVAs where I first took notice of Yoko Kanno. She does the music for this. Is not just some high pitched teen girl screaming. It could easily fit in the indy alternative section. In fact, when I have it playing in my house or car, no can tell its from an anime show. They always ask, "Hey what group is that?" Then they're always shocked when I say "Oh...its a soundtrack from a Japanese cartoon."

-"Berzerk" : Again, may not be the flashiest animation, but if you play D&D, you gotta watch it. Plus, I think it'll appear to the same type of people that like "The Black Company" I showed it to a friend who isn't into anime at all. But he does read a lot of fantasy books. He watched this series when I loaned him the DVD set. At first, he just thought it was just okay. I mean, I can see why. At first glance and in the beginning......its got the earmarks of certain things most people don't like in anime. The main character is a cool fighter type, but another major character is your usual semi-androginous pretty boy type. You think "oh here we go....." But the series gets better and better as you watch it. Nice build up. Yeah....the last disc makes you go "F**K!!! Oh my .....gawd......" But I think in a good way. Plus I hear they're about to start releasing the episodes that come after that.

Also, a little less Euro looking, but still very fantasy . . there's "Twelve Kingdoms". I really don't like anime like Slayers and the goofy fantasy. I like the serious stuff more. And yes, the whole story about someone from our Earth getting transported to a fantasy land is old and been done...."Twelve Kingdoms" does it fairly solidly. I didn't like the "Guardians of the Flame" books by Joel Rosenberg. Yah, when I was young it satisfied my need to vicariously live through the character's adventure of being transported to your own gaming rpg world...but ......didn't quite do it well enough for me. I've only seen the first 2 discs of this series, but so far so good. I'm not voting it the best looking anime, but its solid enough to get by and not distract me while I'm watching.

-"The Cockpit": I actually don't own this. I saw a friend's laser disc copy. But I've been looking for it ....for a long time. Its a series of stories all told during WWII. Each story revolves around aviation or a pilot. Has heart and also has great animation.

-"Ninja Scroll" : not the tv series...(that's garbage), the original movie. Although one particular scene may make you think its a perv movie....the movie is a great ninja flick. Solid story, solid pacing, great animation, good design work.

Now, it could be that you'll not like any of these....but I think they're pretty good. If you know someone who owns them. Maybe borrow one and check it out. Be interested in hearing your thoughts.

 

[mmadsen]

But, it seems American animation is lagging behind, all that is produced now is comedy shows like Family Guy or The Simpsons, it seems there is very little serious american animation out there.

I don't want to totally hijack the thread, but I thought I'd list some good, recent animated series from American studios:

Batman
Superman
Justice League
Gargoyles
Star Wars: The Clone Wars
Samurai Jack

And, of course, most of the animated movies from Disney and all of the CGI movies from Pixar have been excellent -- along with Brad Bird's Iron Giant.

Then we have a number of live-action shows that hit the same market as anime: Hercules, Xena, Buffy, Angel, Smallville, Alias, Battlestar Galactica, etc. With cheap CGI effects, they can do anime via live-action.

 

[Chain Lightning]

I don't want to totally hijack the thread, but I thought I'd list some good, recent animated series from American studios:

Batman
Superman
Justice League
Gargoyles
Star Wars: The Clone Wars
Samurai Jack

And, of course, most of the animated movies from Disney and all of the CGI movies from Pixar have been excellent -- along with Brad Bird's Iron Giant.

Agreed. I wish we'd make more. I love "Iron Giant". And even though most people don't like it all that much, I have a guilty pleasure kinda thing going for Dreamwork's "Sinbad".

I liked "Beauty and the Beast" and the classics, but I was kinda either so-so or let down on Disney's latest offerings. I didn't like "Treasure Planet" and "Atlantis" all that much. "Lilo and Stitch" is good though.

 

[Desdichado]

I'll have to check out Berzerk, then. In fact, just added it to my Netflix queue. I might even move it up to the top next week when my wife's out of town.

I guess I mispoke earlier; there is one anime I can think of that I actually liked quite abit; the Street Fighter movie. I've been also very interested in picking up the Fatal Fury stuff.

But that's because I love the source material.

I also thought the Ranma 1/2 episodes I saw were OK, but not great.

I saw about 10 minutes of the Cowboy Bebop movie, then turned it off to watch something else. The whole "save the convenience store from being robbed by my crack team of urban commandos" routine, and then when the old lady asked him who he was, and he just turned around trying to look all cool and said, "I'm just a bounty hunter," my "this is really stupid" meter went off and I took the DVD out and never ended up putting it back in.

I also thought "Ghost in the Shell" wasn't bad, though. A lot of folks had also recommended to me "Fist of the North Star" but that one blew chunks.

 

[JoeGKushner]

Based on what you like or what I'm reading here, Berserk may be up your alley. If you're looking for more D&D style anime, Record of the Lodoss Wars would probably be more up your alley as it has magic and elves and spellcasters. Berserk is more 'historical' or 'gritty' than fantasy but like Conan, there are some terrible things out there in the night.

I've also heard good things about Full Metal Alchemist, but I'm one of those people who don't bother with a series until it's finished.

Last Exile is another good one that's heavy on story and is serious, but is more of a far future type deal.

 

[WizarDru]

I saw about 10 minutes of the Cowboy Bebop movie, then turned it off to watch something else. The whole "save the convenience store from being robbed by my crack team of urban commandos" routine, and then when the old lady asked him who he was, and he just turned around trying to look all cool and said, "I'm just a bounty hunter," my "this is really stupid" meter went off and I took the DVD out and never ended up putting it back in.

I also thought "Ghost in the Shell" wasn't bad, though. A lot of folks had also recommended to me "Fist of the North Star" but that one blew chunks.

The Fist of the North Star movie, I assume? It doesn't make a hell of a lot of sense, without the context of the series, not unlike the Bebop movie. It was made for the fans of the show...and that doesn't necessarily mean it was actually that good. Mind you, I'm not going to try and defend Fist of the Northstar, because it's not necessarily the deepest material...but I will say that the original series was a highly influential work, both in breaking down barriers and style. The story is actually much better than the movie, which is a great big mess. Mind you, I don't think you'd dig the 80s animation. The appeal of the movie was that it was a pretty-looking summary of the first two seasons of the show...horribly, horribly condensed. Lots of characters appear with virtually no introduction, the story jumps around and I hear the English voice-cast was terrible.

For that matter, I'll go against popular opinion and say that the Ninja Scroll movie is only good in parts, and that the action sequences are great, but bordered by a weak story, IMHO.

Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex is an excellent series, and more interesting to me than the original movie. I haven't watched the second movie, yet.