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A Discussion of Anime Tropes (& Anime More Generally)
Malcolm and Simone have a thought-provoking discussion analyzing some of the most common anime tropes and what they reveal about Japanese culture and desires. They explore the prevalence of high school settings, "isekai" fantasy worlds, unusual relationships, slice of life, and more. The hosts share their own theories on how these tropes represent escapism, surrogate parenting instincts, and a cultural lack of meaning in adulthood. They also recommend their favorite anime series and studios.
Simone: [00:00:00] Hello, gorgeous.
Malcolm: I know, same time. Well, hello, Simone. So we were talking about something and you spontaneously had this idea. Which just enchanted me because I think you might be right. And sometimes when we're looking at the world, there's these little nagging questions which persist beyond reality.
Where it's like, what on earth is going on here? You know? You're talking about a big one with sexuality. I'd say is, why is it that... Gay males and straight males are more likely to find the opposite gender repellent than gay versus straight females.
That's where we can say something is going on here and we can use these sorts of persistent differences or unusual patterns to suss out deeper things that are going on within a population.
Now [00:01:00] in anime, there are actually many of. And in Japan, there are many of these, so our audience may not know this, but my wife was born in Japan, and she spent a lot of her childhood going to Japan to trips and stuff like that, you know, for her, it was sort of like her home away from home, and her middle name is actually Haruko so even has a Japanese middle name and, bye. One, so we're going to go over a few different questions that we've seen sort of persistently in anime, and I'll go over the three that I know we're going to cover, and then we might come up with some others. The first one is, why are, hmm, what's the way to say this that won't get the video?
Why do females who phenotypically present as youth appear in specific situations within anime where if they were [00:02:00] presenting that way in live action within most Western countries? Everyone would literally immediately be arrested. Yeah, it would be super illegal. Why is this such a normalized thing within anime?
Would you like to know more?
Malcolm: That is question number one. And I would point out that
As time has gone on I have seen this more and more within high production anime.
To the point now where it's just almost totally normalized. Mainstream. Where it would be almost a little weird if it didn't appear even once in an anime. It, it would be like an anime without a, an episode where they go to the, Beach or onsen. The onsen, or the hot springs, or the, a beach episode, you know?
It's just a thing, right? If I, if I saw a harem comedy and one of the characters wasn't, Ooh, you know, I'd be like, okay, what's going on here? Oh, note here. A harem comedy is anime where a number of [00:03:00] women are all interested in one man. It does not surprise me why anyone would find that interesting, but that's, that's nothing.
anime?
take place in high schools? This is a very interesting question because you do not see any other art form across any other culture I'm aware of. Almost all of it only takes place during one stage of an individual's life. Right. Yeah. And, and especially none where it's their high school age. And then the final question is What is going on?
This actually came from an a comment. I, I personally wouldn't find this to be that interesting a question, but it may have interesting answers. What is going on with all the Eizoukei anime? That's anime where people are transported to another world. Why is this a popular genre right now? Alright, so let's go to the first question.
You had an idea that sprung to you one day, and I
Published on 2 years, 2 months ago