Command & Conquer

ummm...I was expecting a diffrent picture...

Like any pop culture, Anime is reflective of the society it originates from. A lot of the older 80's anime were pretty hopeful, which makes sense considering the tremendous progress Japan was making at the time. You'll see a lot of shows that deal with giant robots and advanced technology all set as recently as the late 90's to the early and mid 2000's.

Then as the decade drew to a close, and especially after the Japanese economy lost steam, it all started to become more somber, and more realistic. Then it fell into a creative slump where everything is a sequel, or there's practically no plot.

Just look at a series like Patlabor, and the movies that came out for it. The first ones released in the 80's, were set in the late 90's, with storylines about a massive artificial island, being built with advanced piloted robots, mechs in the military, hover tanks entering service, and Japan bumping shoulders with the brightest scientists and engineers of America in MIT, etc.

The last Patlabor movie was set in the 2000's, where the military had no new equipment, the artificial island in the first film was left unfinished due to lack of funds and NIMBY political fighting, a conspiracy plot about a mother who abused her job as a geneticist to toy with cells from her dead daughter, and America exploiting the chaos in Japan to enforce a bigger military presence.

But I'd still prefer that more somber vision to the endless stream of moe stuff that we get now.


So this article seems like a part of a bigger picture of Japanese decline, which is evident in the subject matter, even without the numbers to back it up.

IMO i think they will take on a more, serious path, but yes will we still have some of the more cheerful media, but there will be more that is more realistic and such, such as that pic and perhaps we will have more media based more on real aspects this time round.

Moe is funny, up to a point, but I agree with you guys, we need more serious stuff.

A Modern Warfare or BlackOps anime will be awesome by the way.

I honestly don't mind moe stuff so long that the show itself is entertaining. Art style doesn't bug me if it isn't contradicting to the theme of the show. I mean if a show like Cowboy Bebop looked like Lucky Star, then that's where I would have a problem. But Lucky Star looks like Lucky Star and it works for that show... so I really don't mind it. In fact, I kind of enjoy it.

Oh hey, the discussion is moving into a "Merits of Moe" kind of mode. I'm fine with it. Just so long as it- omg, Gundam Age.


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...So yeah, I'm fine with it. I liked Lucky Star, that succubus show, and, oh wait, moving into different lands now.

Well, the anime industry is slowly converting all of it's products into moe... so I don't really see how it's diverting the topic. Moe sells... so if more moe is being made then it means that less stylistic shows are starting to dwindle.

I don't know if I'm reading too much into your usage of the word "convert", but here what it made me think.

Since moe is just a catch-all for fetishes, and Moe shows capitalize on fetishes, rather than a new plot. So looking at the new crop of shows this year, it's not so much franchises are being converted, than they're simply being pushed aside.

What I mean is that when you look at the anime market as a whole, you're as of recently seeing more moe shows than anything else. So, the anime market, in general, is slowly converting from a diverse artistic catalog to just simply moe.

I didn't mean it as older shows getting sequels with new moe art direction.

About the topic diversion, it sort of is, since the original post referred to a report on the financial situation of the Anime industry. Moe, and other trends are certainly related to the state of the industry, and what's arguably a stagnation, but don't really hit at the root, which has more to do with the outsourcing, outdated business models incompatible with new media distribution trends, and even new legal attention from the Japanese government against, "morally questionable" material, however they define it.

EDIT:
Guess it was my fault for bringing up moe at all. That one last line sort of framed everything prior to it, lol. I didn't mean for it to.

EDIT 2:
Ah, understood.

I read Japans current national debt is 228% of their GDP, it's good to remember back during the great depression America was still capable to produce comics, which may hint the possible survival of the anime industry in these times.

Something interesting about that is most of that debt is what the government owes to the Japanese people. It's weird, but it means that Japan is really in debt to itself.

As if this was not evident due their laboral ethics hehehe.

Anyway, it will be wonderful to see some of the 90s early 2000s stuff back coming back for good, I feel during that time is where anime really got mature as a media capable to bring shows both for adults and kids.

The only possibility to the continuation of modern warfare anime is in 3D. All the good Japanese and other countries of their anime have disappeared. Why? No one seems to be watching and reading cartoons anymore, except in 3D. People are getting desperate. Pretty soon, all the national local channels in the US won't be showing good cartoons anymore and will be replaced with somewhat comedy shows. I quit watching cartoons after the main YugiOh series ended. At least YugiOh and Pokemon are still pretty much alive these days.