Is Anime Dead?

Sliverbane

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I was curious about some of the anime cons I went to many years ago. I went searching over the interwebs and I found that most cons (that I was familiar with) had shut down. [Nan Desu Kan and Ushi-con] Over and over again I saw the same reason posted on their web sites for clubs and other anime oganizations: 'Because of changes in fandom'

Wow! The last time I went to a con was...in 04' I think. Ushi-con in Austin, TX. Before that I had stopped going to cons all together. Attending Comiket in Japan can kill your taste for american anime conventions really well. tee-hee...

Anyhow...that got me thinking. Has it changed that much?! Is...anime... DEAD?

To be frank, Japan is doing fine. [I was there as recently as March 08] The anime shops - events in Tokyo were running strong. There was anime all over television. The globalization of anime - the look and feel of Japanese animation has changed outside of Nippon. What do you think?

I found an article and a interesting discussion on aime on the west. What does it mean to western fans? What does the future hold?\

bateszi.animeuknews.net/2007/07/17/anime-is-dead/

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blackwinddragon

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I don't think anime is dead so much as the novelty has faded a little. Cons were originally the few places were when one could see a new anime, or csplay, or see VAs. Now that anime has exploded crating a huge market for it where pretty much makes over to the states adn what with people posting whole anime series and with anime companies advertising on youtube, the whole capmpaiging niche that cons had has kind of evaporated.

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BogusRed

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From my perspective, cons are not dying. I'm at Fanimecon this weekend and its pretty big. The cosplay is a lot better than it was back in 2000 when I first went and over the years the con has only grown and matured.

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arkillian

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Hah- I feel so behind. Anime is JUST starting to become mainstream in NZ. People no longer look at you stupidly when you talk about it here. If it's gonna die out then... huh. That's a let down

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taiyoukai-nile

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I think within the US it is more about the money factor. The economy is not that great.

Not long ago, we had a anime convention in St. Louis. I actually had to harp on the local news stations to try to cover it as it is considered a cultural event. There was actually a decent turnout. I did not get to go, but I was glad that it was covered. [smiley]

Perhaps if enough fans call up the radio stations and local news when the conventions come in...it might be something they might take interest in covering, because their viewers are talking about it. It has always worked for me in the past, especially for the St. Louis one.

I agree with Bogus Red on the cosplay... even for Halloween, I have seen more cosplay used, even in the rinky dink town I live in. In fact, I want to do an anime fan tweetup (for those also on twitter like I am) near St. Louis sometime.

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Ours get plenty of coverage, but only cause its a sci-fi convention. We barely get a floor's worth of anime / comics/ nz artists/ comic stands/ fandom. The cosplay contest gets more kudos than the anime / manga itself in NZ. IT's so underground ^^;

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Sliverbane

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Yeah, I think there's been a big Change in anime 'marketability'. Money is a big factor...the west's economy another.

I realized America has finally come full circle when I noticed I could pull up anime on-demand, sub-titled for FREE through my cable provider! A dream come true.

Very glad to know that cosplay has improved. I always wonderd why some people even bothered... But I suppose they were having fun - and that's all that matterd to them.

One thing I DON'T miss from the old cons are the outrageous prices of merchendise. $30 dollars for a 2 dollar doujinshi? $50 dollars for a poster? $15 dollars for a key chain!? I know that the dealers were trying to make a profit...however some of the prices were quadruple and quintuple the prices offered for the same readily available merchandise in Japan. It was just greedy! Since some of you have been to cons recently - has that changed? Are prices better? And what is offered at cons now?

At my last con all I observed merchandise made my fans - like Naruto head bands and gimmicky T-shirts that had sloglans from trendy anime series'. Also lots of novolty junk like Poky and Ramune. Gone were the official Movic brand merchandise released by the creators. Doujin were hard to come by. Needless to say, pickings were slim.

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BishonenMistress

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I agree with the novelty factor being gone. A lot of anime now stinks of big business and money grubbing. The article you linked mentioned the making of a movie that is -aimed- at American audiences, despite being animated in Japan. One of the reasons, I always thought, that drew the original crowd to anime, was the fact it wasn't like all the other garbled American stuff. It had a different flavor. It was another culture's take on story telling. And I liked that about it. But with the growing market and people wanting money, and knowing that America does now seem to gobble up anything 'anime', it sadly makes sense to start panning it off to American viewers.

When I was a kid... a good decade ago, there was this tiny little shop that had all this imported anime stuff. It was like, no bigger than an office cubicle. But I loved going there since it had things I couldn't find anywhere else. But now, that little shop is gone, and I can walk into the nearest WALMART and find anime.

On one side, it's nice having it so easily on hand. I'm a big yaoi fan and I love the boom there's been in the translation and availability of yaoi manga, for instance. But, on the other side... it has turned something that to me, and I'm sure many other fans, had been special and unique at the time, for people in America to like. And now it's just part of the rest of boring mainstream society. Anime on TV, in regular shops, on t-shirts...

I guess I'm just one of those people who always wants to be different, thus even though I enjoy the improved availablity, I also feel the whole genre has been cheapened, and now if I say I like it I am grouped in with fans who know of nothing more than Naruto or Inuyasha (and not trying to offend anyone, but most of the people I know who like these fandoms are... obnoxious and annoying. I'd rather not be grouped in with kids like that [smiley] ) since they only watch what's given to them free on TV. I had to scour and search for my anime when I was a kid... Hehe I probably sound a bit sour.

On the topic of conventions... I'm not so sure about that. I go to Otakon about every year, and to my understanding, it had been pretty steadily growing. I think I read roughly a decade or so ago the number of attendees had only been in the hundreds... and now it's in the thousands and still growing. It's possible that some of the smaller cons were dismantled because they weren't drawing enough of a crowd... while the bigger ones feasted and continued to grow.

Or it could be the crappy economy causing everyone to tighten their wallets. Between renting expensive hotel rooms and buying expensive con tickets (not to mention if you like to go shopping for merchandise) it's not exactly the most frugal hobby [smiley]

I think also with the growth of the Internet, a lot of people actually don't buy as much of the anime and manga merchandise. They can easily download episodes on YouTube or BitTorrent... download free scanlations. If I didn't feel so guilty about doing this things I'd probably do that too!

Basically back in the day, if you wanted to see anime, you had to go to cons or search for the small import stores to -buy- it. And now, ya don't...

I guess it's all just progress... changing... nothing stays the same. And wow I feel really long winded. My two cents!

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arkillian

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On May 26, 2009 10:26 am, Sliverbane said:

Yeah, I think there's been a big Change in anime 'marketability'. Money is a big factor...the west's economy another.

I realized America has finally come full circle when I noticed I could pull up anime on-demand, sub-titled for FREE through my cable provider! A dream come true.

Very glad to know that cosplay has improved. I always wonderd why some people even bothered... But I suppose they were having fun - and that's all that matterd to them.

One thing I DON'T miss from the old cons are the outrageous prices of merchendise. $30 dollars for a 2 dollar doujinshi? $50 dollars for a poster? $15 dollars for a key chain!? I know that the dealers were trying to make a profit...however some of the prices were quadruple and quintuple the prices offered for the same readily available merchandise in Japan. It was just greedy! Since some of you have been to cons recently - has that changed? Are prices better? And what is offered at cons now?

At my last con all I observed merchandise made my fans - like Naruto head bands and gimmicky T-shirts that had sloglans from trendy anime series'. Also lots of novolty junk like Poky and Ramune. Gone were the official Movic brand merchandise released by the creators. Doujin were hard to come by. Needless to say, pickings were slim.

In indy comics defence, I know that in atleast NZ, comics are EXPENSIVE to produce. You really can't compare an indy black and white comic to a commericial colour one. Colour is 3 times the price, indy comics don't usually have adverts in it, so the artist is shelling out THOSANDS of dollars for that comic. It's also pride, and supporting local art. I buy indy art, cause I like to support artists, and commercial stuff gets repetitive. If an independant is selling ANYTHING it wil gurranty to be over priced, or they're selling it at cost.

In NZ, we have printers that support our art and give us the prinitng at cost. An A3 post at COST in NZ is $1. I can't get any more than $8 for a poster yet. You think that's a mark up? It costs $50 to buy the stall, and I spend $200 on printing costs so that I have a good range of merchandice to sell at the con for eveyone's taste. How much money do I make? If I don't print much, I usually break even. If I have huge printing costs, I break even at the next con.

Please- I know for an end consumer that you see the professional stuff, so you turn your nose up at indy art, but please consider it. We put money and pride on the line to sell our ideas to inspire our audiance. Just cause free is nice, doesn't mean the artist can afford to give themselves away for free. [smiley]

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Sukaiburu

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The main problem where I'm at is MTV.

Why?

They made all Anime and Furries (I know this isn't about Furries, but they were in with the anime) look like idiots and someone that parents should not let their kids be around. There are a few anime fans at my school, but if you ask someone who is not a fan about it, they'll all give the same response: "You mean that stupid stuff that makes you look like a faggot?"

As BishonenMistress said too, I get grouped in with the Naruto and InuYasha fans that are incredibly annoying, stupid and obnoxious.

OTL I hate MTV.;

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arkillian

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What's MTV? O.o Is it a cable thing? We don't have cable in NZ

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blackwinddragon

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On May 26, 2009 7:16 pm, Sukaiburu said:

The main problem where I'm at is MTV.

Why?

They made all Anime and Furries (I know this isn't about Furries, but they were in with the anime) look like idiots and someone that parents should not let their kids be around. There are a few anime fans at my school, but if you ask someone who is not a fan about it, they'll all give the same response: "You mean that stupid stuff that makes you look like a faggot?"

As BishonenMistress said too, I get grouped in with the Naruto and InuYasha fans that are incredibly annoying, stupid and obnoxious.

OTL I hate MTV.;

I don't get it /that/ all that often; correction, never have. But people usually go "anime?, that stupid Pokemon/Yugioh thing?!" and leave it like that. I have one friend who hates anime because of what it looks like and some of the stupid stuff like pokemon and yugioh give a bad rap, so she refuses to watch even good anime, like Hayo Miyazaki films (and COME ON its Miyazaki! The man is a genius [/rant] ). ALso, a lot of cons aren't strictly anime anymore, there's other fandoms getting into as well, some belong, some do not. For example, I do believe Twilight had a panel at the San Diego con or some other equivalent. As much as like Twlight, I personally do not think it should have been there. Things like Star Trek, or say, Firefly, and the sci-fi kind of thing (heck even DC and Marvel should be there), but they relate -- there's that nerd community, that awesome energy of being a fan. These people usually stand apart. With something as massive as Twilight, I say nay, it doesn't fit into that nerdy niche.

And yeah, Arkm MTV is a cable thing -- it used to be an awesome channel for music videos, now its full of reality tv crud.

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selphiroth

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Late to the discussion but... MTV manage to make a subgroup look even more idiotic than their core audience?! Whoa, I'm actually sort of impressed. I didn't know that was possible.

Personally, I think it's more a case of the fads are dying down rather than anime being dead outside of Japan. If anything I think things will get better now that the market's saturated and the more loud and wannabe sector of fad-of-the-week kids are off else where, we can enjoy what we like again.

A bit like, everything else really.

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On May 27, 2009 7:09 pm, blackwinddragon said:

ALso, a lot of cons aren't strictly anime anymore, there's other fandoms getting into as well, some belong, some do not. For example, I do believe Twilight had a panel at the San Diego con or some other equivalent. As much as like Twlight, I personally do not think it should have been there. Things like Star Trek, or say, Firefly, and the sci-fi kind of thing (heck even DC and Marvel should be there), but they relate -- there's that nerd community, that awesome energy of being a fan. These people usually stand apart. With something as massive as Twilight, I say nay, it doesn't fit into that nerdy niche.

IThere has been a lot of cross over, such as with video games. And I think video games is an ok cross over but I don't think sci fi has much place at an anime convention. I agree with the Twilight point too. That doesn't really fit. I also see disney stuff too which I think is appropriate since it's also animated and Kingdom Hearts brought a lot of the Disney characters into the video game/anime world.

But, one time I saw a guy dressed like a cat from the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical Cats. Now THAT has nothing to do with Anime!

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arkillian

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Heh- Awesome cosplay! It looks like it could be anime. Or Thunder cats [smiley] I think cosplaying at all is an snime enough thing.

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Sliverbane

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Wait, I have a really good one. [smiley]

At the Colorado Renaissance Festival I saw a group of KLINGONS. So, um...yeah. Some fandom does NOT mix.

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arkillian

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Were they epic Klingons? Epic Klingon cosplays fit ANYWHERE. I'd cosplay more often if I didn't look so unique >.>

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Sliverbane

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They were epic dorks from where I was standing.

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Sekah

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Actually, Connecticon, which I attended this summer, was about double the size of what it had been the first time I went, three or four years ago. It was a pleasant surprise.

The unpleasant surprise came when I tried to buy doujinshi - maybe the convention organizers specifically asked for this, but there were none! I was very disappointed. Doubly so because the few doujinshi that were there were practically smuggled in, and didn't contain a single volume of Yu Yu Hakusho. That's a big change from even two years ago, when I attended - I think it was animazement, I'm not sure. I found bunches then. I used up all my money just on doujinshi at that con, and spent the rest of the time in the manga lending library and hanging out with my friends, laughing every time Jesus walked by.

Of course, YYH is dying out, so don't listen to me ramble and whine about it. What I'm saying is just that the explosions of Hetalia and Kuroshitsuji seem to say to me that anime is alive and well in the states, even if people don't quite have the luxury to spend money on it right now.

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I've never been able to get my hands on a doujinshi. of course i never think to look when i'm at a con. Do you think maybe that con wasn't allowing doujinshi because it infringes on copyright laws?

My local con, FanimeCon is pretty huge and they have an artists row where artist sell fanart. It's still copyright infringement but they allow it.

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Is Anime Dead?

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