#no not a versus battle thats weaksauce

[animatedminds]

An Animated Mind, High On Gear 5

As a fanatic for both Western animation and anime, more than one person in my every life. I've more than once heard the comparison to Tom & Jerry, as it's the one the creator gave, which is interesting. Tom & Jerry animation didn't often look like that, but that's what Oda states as his primary reference so he would know (I really need to start reading the manga). At least when it comes to how Toei chose to animate it, what this really did remind me of was Fleischer, especially that "fluid noodle people" reference, and it's a shame that's not an name on people's lips more regarding this. This is pretty much exactly how I would imagine an anime Popeye adaptation would look when it really got going. With a little bit extra: Gear 5 is like a glorious mix of Fleischer and Tex Avery with classic shounen (One Piece being one of the last examples, design wise, of a very strong traditional artistic style), and it's wonderful. Which actually leads me to single animator and era this kept reminding me the most of. Crazy as it is to say, the whole time I was thinking of John K, and late 80's animation in general. That drive to merge classic animation designs and styles with modern animation techniques was pretty much the font of up and coming animators during that time, and when there was a serious budget behind it? And also Richard Williams, because I'm like 80% sure there was a bit in that sequence (the part where Kaido gets burnt up) that was directly inspired by the Thief and the Cobbler. Actually, I'm changing my answer of "being reminded the most of." The more I remember of Richard Williams' work, the more this feels at least in part like a love letter to one the masters, Williams included. I'm hearing about people giving the animation choices crap just because of what it chose to reference, which imo is silly. As if watching, loving, being amazed and learning from all the animation you can and being driven to build new and astounding things on top of it hasn't been the origin story of nearly every animator all over the world. Are anime fans really still out here seriously believing that there's only one region in the world anyone who's anybody actually pays attention to?

Because the people who actually make anime and manga have never, ever believed that. Art is universal.

#gear 5 luffy #gear 5th #monkey d. luffy #Eiichiro Oda #Megumi Ishitani #tex avery #fleischer studios #tom & jerry #luffy meets popeye when? #no not a versus battle thats weaksauce #john kricfalusi #richard williams #watch the thief and the cobbler people #toei animation #so this is where all of toei's animation budget goes #anime #animation #animatedmindsforanimatedtimes