amaypatel

[amaypatel]

Erased

Erased is a series that I have heard so much about from some friends in high school and college but I never watched it because I am just lazy when it comes to watching shows. I found it a little odd that we started on episode 3 since it was a little difficult and confusing to pick up on everything that had happened in the previous episodes. Erased also touches upon some interesting themes and does a good job discussing them.

I feel like the first theme that was illustrated was the importance of a community. The main character, Satoru, has the unique ability to travel back in time before a life-deciding incident. In the beginning of the show, we see that Satoru feels guilty for not being able to stop Kayo from being kidnapped. However, when he tries to save Kayo from the kidnapping, he fails again due to the fact that he tries to stop it by himself. When he makes friendships with others, he is able to save Kayo from the kidnapping. I also think courage is a central message in this show. The show makes it seem that in the present, Satoru only spends time with his mother since he doesn’t have the courage to develop friendships. However, when he is wrapped back in time, he is forced to step out of his comfort zone and develop friendships that will help him in the future. 

In conclusion, I really enjoyed this show and I am glad that I finally watched this after countless recommendations of it. I think my favorite character in the show was Satoru because of the level of sacrifice and his willingness to do it for his friends. I know during the break, I’ll be watching this series because those four episodes were just too good. 

[amaypatel]

Cowboy Bebop

I had no idea what to expect from this show when I started watching it. None of my friends from high school have ever recommended this show so I came into this show completely blind. I thought it would be about cowboys and the wild wild west or something like that but I was very wrong. Instead, the show is more about bounty hunters in space and was much darker than I expected it to be. For some reason, this show was reminding me of Star Wars bounty hunters like Boba Fett and Cad Bane but this could be because I am a Star Wars nerd. 

I think the first thing that I found very interesting in this anime was the animation style and overall feeling of the scenes. The show has a dark color palette which can be seen in one of the scenes where a gun is held very close to the screen and it honestly feels like the gun is just a prop because it’s extremely dark and shaded. Even the background feels a little fake since the colors in the show are just really dark. The characters in the show are honestly pretty interesting too since they all have something in their past that affects who they are. Most character’s goals and determination are shown to be influenced by their past. For instance, Faye is a character who fixates a bit on her past and can’t really move on to her future. 

Honestly, I am not 100% sure if I would want to watch this anime over summer break. I do not feel like this anime was better than Parasyte but there are themes in the show that I feel more connected to, however I’ll consider watching this anime over break if I actually have nothing better to do.

[amaypatel]

Parasyte

This was quite the interesting choice for our first choice anime to watch. One of the first scenes was someone’s head being eaten off of their body and that honestly made me scared about the show. In a strange way, Parasyte reminded me of when I watched an entire season of Stranger Things in a day. Since it reminded me so much of Stranger Things, I actually really enjoyed this show and it kind of made me want Season 4 for Stranger Things to come out sooner. In addition, Parasyte does a good job with discussing some prevalent themes and messages that can be applied to current society.

One of the major messages I got from watching Parasyte is how humans do not really account for the amount of damage they are doing to Earth and the other life that also lives on it which is prevalent to society. In order to make homes or malls etc, we have to destroy part of the environment and thus destroy a local ecosystem to satisfy our needs. This reminded me of Spirited Away since one of the main messages from that movie was environmentalism and how humans pollute the environment. In one of the episodes, a character, Migi, touches on this subject and says that humans are somewhat close to demons. In episodes 23 and 24, there is also talk about how humans are overpopulating the Earth which reminded me of Malthus’s overpopulation theory and how he thought that at some point in the future, we humans would exhaust resources on the Earth. 

All in all, I am really glad I got to watch this anime and I am happy with whoever selected this anime. This anime is honestly pretty cool and it has a lot of deeper meanings in it. I will most definitely be watching this more in the future.

[amaypatel]

Sensōron

This is the first manga I have ever read before and it for some reason had a poop joke in the first few pages in it. Coming into this class, I had no idea what manga even was and didn’t understand that manga could carry out important messages and themes. However, the manga that was assigned was really strange due to the fact that I thought it was more propaganda about how the West, like America, is brainwashing Japan. In addition, I think this manga can possibly be generalized to the display of inaccurate information in our generation. 

With how our society is today, inaccurate information can easily be distributed and people have to be careful in what they choose to be right and wrong. I think this could be applied to today’s news sources like CNN and Fox News as CNN is a news network that promotes leftist ideals and Fox News is a news network that promotes conservative ideals. One thing that really made me wonder is the credibility and reliability of this manga. In the manga, it straight up denies several Japanese war crimes like the Rape of Nanking. It is almost as if Japan is trying to erase what they had done in the past in an attempt to seem like a good country. I believe the article was talking about nationalism and how nationalism creates an inaccurate portrayal of citizens who live in a country. 

All in all, I had an interesting time reading the manga as it was an experience I have never had. I should probably read a manga that is way different from this to say I had a good time reading it though I do believe that this piece of manga was a unique and creative way to convey important messages to an audience. 

[amaypatel]

Your Name

I have had so many people tell me incredible stuff about Your Name and now I finally get to watch it. I’m not so sure why it took me such a long time to watch the movie but I at least did watch it and it lived up to the hype. Your Name is easily one of my favorite anime films we have watched in class and the article ties in with some of the movie's main messages. Also, the visuals in the movie are absolutely insane. 

The main character, Mitsuha, despises living in the boring and mundane town of Itomori and wishes that she could be a “Tokyo boy”. After she completes some ritual called kuchikamizake, Mitsuha is able to become a Tokyo boy, Taki. The show seems to put a good amount of emphasis on the importance of tradition. For instance, the rituals have such an instrumental impact on creating a split between the family when Mitsuha’s mother passes away. In addition, the ritual allows for Taki and Mitsuha to keep their connection going and their bond grows stronger despite Mitsuha being killed by the comet, Tiamat. 

The article really dives into power and the perception of power. From what I understand, the author, Foucault, describes how he believes that the traditional definition of power is wrong and that there exists a better definition for it. However, I am largely confused as to the discussion of a power dynamic in the movie. In the movie, it seems like there is no power dynamic between any of the characters but there is a possibility that I could be misinterpreting this. 

Overall, I thought that Your Name was a really cool watch and now I honestly wish that I had watched it in high school when people were absolutely fanboying over this movie. 

[amaypatel]

Hetalia Axis Powers

Hetalia Axis Powers was one of the most interesting anime we have watched in this class. I have never heard of this anime before and I was honestly excited to watch this anime when I was looking at screenshots of it. In addition, this show slightly reminded me of Barefoot Gen and Grave of the Fireflies. The personification of the countries was something that actually caught me off guard when I started watching. The personification of Italy for instance made it seem like Italy was dumb and that they had a weird and unhealthy obsession with pasta. However, there were some important messages that the anime conveys to its audience through the combination of world history and animation.

The story is essentially about Italy’s struggles throughout history and the show portrays Italy as immature and a bit childish. Obviously in World War I and World War II, Italy was not obsessed with making pasta, however it can be interpreted that Italy is that annoying kid who asks if you have games on your phone. The anime does a good job of detailing and making satire out of the irrational ideals that arose. Additionally, one thought I had when I was watching the show was how a country’s reputation can be changed because of a leader and their views and ideals. The reading also had some correlation to the anime with one of the main things being that “friction” has the ability to bring people together. Initially, I thought this was a contradictory point but the way the author described it made it seem that anime has a unique power to bring many people across the world together.  

All in all, I really liked how different this anime was and how the anime went about talking about World War II. It was done in such a creative way and it really made me like the anime.  

[amaypatel]

Xenoblade Chronicles 2

I was not expecting that we would be watching Xenoblade Chronicles 2 cutscenes as an assignment in this class but here we are doing that exact thing. I’ve always heard that Xenoblade has an incredible story from my friends in high school who played this game but I never thought to myself that I should watch the cutscenes to experience the story. However, I felt that the messages that Xenoblade presented aligned with some of the messages that Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind had with nature. Though this is a video game, the colorful background that every scene had really made me feel as if I was watching a movie for some reason. 

Xenoblade really touches on how humanity has impacted the world. Elysium is a weird place where things seem perfect and eventually it is revealed that it is the complete opposite. I feel like this is a tie-in to the idea that humanity has caused so much damage to the earth and to their surroundings, that what they want from the earth and nature is unattainable but humanity never realizes. Humanity’s idea to fix something usually results in destruction and something worse than if humans were to not intervene at all. It is also evident that the video game implies that some people are always chasing a life full of greed and violence and never attempt to chase a life that has peace which I believe sort of show that some humans have an inherent bad nature to them. 

All in all, I was not expecting a video game of all things to carry out such an important message that is very prevalent to our previous movies that we have watched in class and to modern society. Even though we will not be watching more of Xenoblade Chronicles 2, I am really glad that we watched this in class. 

[amaypatel]

SwampCon

The SwampCon anime convention was an amazing opportunity to see and learn more about the fandom culture. I really thought that this convention would be really small and that there would not be that much stuff to do or see but I was completely wrong. It was incredible seeing how so many people in the Gainesville area put a lot of effort and detail into their costumes and outfits. The amount of fan art and designs that were being sold in the ballrooms really caught my eye as the level of detail in them made me believe that the original artist must have really resonated with the anime or movie in a personal sense. 

When I first walked into the Reitz, I was shocked at the amount of people cosplaying as their favorite characters. The amount of people dressed up as their favorite characters from Demon Slayer, Spirited Away, and other animes that I’ve never heard of was extremely cool. I even saw a R2 unit rolling around with someone and wondered how that unit was even working. Was there a person in it or am I missing something? There were definitely some people I saw who were very confused, especially on the ground and first floor, about why there were so many dressed up in costumes and I thought that was pretty funny. If I had not taken this class and had walked into the Reitz, I too would have been really confused as to why so many people invest their money, energy, and time into these costumes. Now I understand the fact that people do this because it allows them to creatively show their connection or appreciation of a character or series. I even asked a person who was dressed up as No-Face about why they chose to dress up as them and they provided an amazing answer about him that related to society today. There was also a panel about cosplaying, which was pretty interesting since the person talking spent time discussing the reason why people spend a lot of their time and energy for cosplaying competitions. 

In general, I felt that the Reitz had provided a fantastic atmosphere for people to express their love for an anime. I saw many cosplayers complementing each other for their costumes and saw many people take pictures with one another. It definitely reminded me of Genshiken in which the Reitz was like a safe space and that the atmosphere the Reitz had was welcoming to “strange interests”. Walking around in some of the ballrooms on the third floor was really cool as there was so much art and merchandise that really showed the creator’s creativity. The creators spent a lot of their time and energy perfecting their art and had a great place to display it at SwampCon. 

The one thing I wished I could have explored was the Maid Cafe. The Maid Cafe seemed really interesting and cool as the people in the maid costumes would dance to some songs but the line outside of it was so long. For fun, one of my friends and I decided to go around the convention and asked people if they knew the definitions of what certain terms we have learned in class. The results were pretty interesting as most people we asked knew what “otaku” was but some of the more obscure terms we’ve learned, most people did not know what they were. 

Overall, I had a really fun time walking around the Reitz and seeing people cosplay and show off their art in some of the rooms. The events they had there were really neat and I feel like I learned more about the culture by walking around and observing. 

[amaypatel]

Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind

Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind was an amazing film to watch. The distinct atmosphere and unusual plot that slightly remind me of the Cold War made me more invested into the film than I had originally anticipated. In essence, there are two sides to this “war”: the environment and the humans. The main character, Nausicaa, is the only person in the film to have the idea that in order to stop mass destruction from occurring from both sides, she needs to find a way where both sides can co-exist. 

At first, the film tries to portray the enemy as the environment since we as humans are used to the view that we are the only thing on the earth that should be able to advance. In addition, the film discusses how the Sea of Decay has spores that require the humans to wear a mask to survive since the spores have toxins that are poisonous and the Seven Days of Fire essentially destroyed the environment. However, this viewpoint is quickly rejected because we fail to account for the fact that everything else on the earth will flourish, with or without humans. 

The pacifist approach that Nausicaa had in the film has to be acknowledged because the approach shows that the two sides should work together to create a “cohesive” atmosphere instead of getting rid of one or the other to enjoy whatever benefits that arise. In the film, she sacrifices herself for the greater good of the Ohms. Additionally, the character of Nausicaa is pretty interesting as she’s the one who fulfills the wishes of Obaba, making it seem more that she is a god-like character. In conclusion, Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind does a fantastic job of depicting the message of promoting pacifism and coexistence amongst societies.

[amaypatel]

Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken was an interesting watch because it is essentially an anime that thoroughly discussed the process of making animes. The show really details the characters making the animes themselves and slightly reminded me of Genshiken. Honestly, a lot of the shows that we have watched in the class have not really paid much attention to the process despite having interesting artistic choices in the show so it was a nice change of pace to see an anime really focus more on the underrated process of creating animes.

The one scene that really resonated with me and my college experience has to be when the characters decided to pull an all-nighter to complete their project. This is me whenever I had to do a massive programming project in one day last semester. It was cool seeing a scene that is incredibly relatable to most college students' experiences when it comes to procrastinating massive projects and finishing them in a day. Also the amount of dedication and passion that goes within every animation inside of an anime is a theme that is very emphasized in this anime. The characters in the show have to combine their different strengths to create products that they will be happy with. In the reading, there is mention of the hand and brain and the importance between both of these aspects. There is emphasis that the brain is limitless since the brain has no physical limitation on the imagination however the hand has limitations because the hand can not mimic every imagination that comes to the brain.

All in all, the anime was incredibly cool as it really detailed the process of creating animes and seeing how people utilize their imagination to create masterpieces. I really hope we continue watching more of this anime because I want to learn more about the process.

[amaypatel]

Wandering Son

Wandering Son was an anime that I heard from some of my friends in high school but I never really had the drive to watch it until it was assigned in this class. However, the show was definitely a good watch that deals with a lot of serious and societal themes. It was interesting seeing an anime really focus on the struggles and overall experience of a person who does not identify with the gender that they were biologically born into. 

The first thing that must be noted is the distinct artistic style that is consistent throughout the anime. It feels like something that was painted with watercolor on a canvas board but it fits well with the show and the messages that come with the show. The actual story is about Nitori Shuichi, who is born as a guy but does not really identify as a guy. One thing that really stood out to me was when Nitori came to school dressed in a girl’s uniform and the students in the school had a  much different reception. Nitori was brought to the school nurse as if they were suffering from a condition and had to be brought home. Their sister also called them “sick” for dressing how they wanted to and their mother blames the sister for being a “bad” influence on them. However, when Takatsuki and Sarashina came to school in a boy’s uniform, there was a completely different reception towards them for what they had done. Takatsuki actually received compliments about how they looked and someone even asked them out. The show does a great job of highlighting the treatment of a transgender male and a transgender female. 

Overall, I believe the anime does a fantastic job of detailing the struggles that some members of the LGBTQ+ community have and I hope that we continue to watch this show in the future. 

[amaypatel]

Aggretsuko

When I first started watching the anime, I was shocked since it is not similar, in artistic manners, to the other shows we have watched in this class. I actually thought I was not watching the assigned show for the reading because of its very distinct artistic style that oddly reminded me of Bojack Horseman since characters are shown as animals. However, the different artistic style did not stop me from enjoying this anime as it does a great job of orchestrating its themes and messages. 

First the anime focuses on the themes of inequality at the workpace and other forms of mistreatment. One thing that really stood out to me is how the boss, Ton, makes Retsuko do some extremely menial jobs such as getting him drinks and cleaning his desk which makes it seem that Retsuko has no skills that he deems good. That was one point on the show where that had a line similar to “that’s your job here as a woman”. To cope with the pain she deals with at the accounting firm, she goes out to a karaoke bar and screams death metal. She even reports Ton, which backfires on her, because she is forced to tell her boss that she was the one who complained about him in front of the company. The second season focuses on a new employee Anai, who is a male employee that has “traditional” feministic qualities such as having the ability to cook and spends a good amount of time fixating on how the attacks he is experiencing is attacking his character. 

In conclusion, I really enjoyed how the anime talked about societal issues that are present today such as inequality at the workplace and sexism. I am looking forward to watching the next episodes for the show as these episodes were a fun watch. 

[amaypatel]

Sailor Moon

Sailor Moon was an interesting anime to have watched since all I watched during spring break was Friends. Going into this anime, I was not sure what to expect since it’s been a while since we have watched anime in the class and we were heading into a new topic. However the concept of a girl being a regular child during the day and being a superhero during the night was one I was not expecting. The theme of female empowerment was very clear from this show and was well orchestrated in my opinion.

The writers of the show show that the idea of woman empowerment can be represented in multiple ways. It shows that empowerment is being able to stand up for your beliefs and for what is right for the common good. It attacks the common idea that empowerment is being a strong and independent person. All people in the world can eventually succumb to pressure and become weak and being independent is not necessarily a positive skill even in the real world. 

However there was one scene that confused me a little. The gym scene did not make so much sense to me since Sailor Moon is attempting to fit into the slim body physique. It takes the talking cat, Luna, to make Sailor Moon give up on this because Luna tells her that fighting will make her lose weight. However, in real life, one of the most apparent issues is that in order for a woman to look pretty, they have to have that “slim body” so it feels like the show is making Sailor Moon’s character conform to societal pressures. All in all, this show was definitely a very interesting watch despite having some controversial or strange events in it. It feels like some of the scenes contradict the message that is trying to be portrayed. 

[amaypatel]

Genshiken 2

These episodes were definitely much better than the last set of episodes we watched since I felt that it was just more interesting. Unlike the last set of episodes we watched which had some “interesting” moments in it, I thought these episodes were more humorous and a little heartwarming at some points. These episodes deal with a grown up version of the characters and it shows that though they were Otakus when they were younger, this does not make them any less human. This overarching concept is illustrated throughout the episodes. 

First, the character of Hato is definitely a call to society for accepting those who do not conform to society’s norms. Hato is actually a boy but dresses as a girl which I believe is 100% a call to society to not judge those who choose to do and follow this action. The show definitely shows the challenges Hato faced throughout the episodes which can be seen when they were told to use the men’s restroom and one of the members in the club telling them to dress as a man. 

Next, everyone in the show has definitely moved out of the Otaku culture and have become a normal person in society. I think this refutes the claim that Otakus never really mature and that they will always be absorbed into the culture. The Miyazaki incident definitely resonates with some people but the show is attempting to show people that Otakus will eventually grow out of the culture and can be a normal person in society. 

Overall, I felt that I enjoyed the second season of Genshiken more than the first second of it. These last episodes talked about themes that I feel more interested in than the other episodes however I still feel that I would not recommend this anime to any of my friends. It was definitely hard watching some of the scenes in the show at times. 

[amaypatel]

Genshiken Part 2

I won’t lie. I did not believe these next episodes were as good as the last four episodes we watched. It felt like a drag when I was watching the episodes and I feel like I did not learn that much from watching the episodes. I honestly felt that the reading was much more interesting than the episodes even though I hate reading. 

The reading starts off interesting by having an entire paragraph italicized about the Otakus. The paragraph feels like an analysis on why someone would not like the Otakus. However, I feel that the author included the paragraph in because they most likely believe that this analysis is laughable and unjustifiable and plan to make satire from this paragraph. A little bit later after this, the author starts to defend the Otaku culture by individual aspects which refutes some of the claims made in the satirical paragraph. 

The show connects somewhat to the reading. First, Ogiue definitely has a pessimistic view on the Otakus because she has shown signs of violence towards them. However, she can’t escape the fact that her interests are similar to those of Otakus and it just feels like she doesn’t like the idea of being perceived as an Otaku and develops some sort of hatred towards them. She’d rather be a lowkey Otaku than be officially recognized as one. 

The show also attempts to show to its viewer that Otaku are normal people by showing scenes of them working at a job and going to class. I believe that this is an attempt to show viewers that Otaku are no different from normal people since normal people have to go to a job or attend class. 

In the end, I did not find these episodes to be interesting or have anything special but the episodes did have some connections to the reading. 

[amaypatel]

Genshiken

At this point, it’s tradition for me to say that I had no clue what I was getting myself into when I start watching these shows. I will say that I feel like I had no connection to these anime and that I was just learning more about the elusive Otaku culture. Genshiken is a fairly interesting anime that explores more of what was discussed in the previous reading regarding Otakus and their unique culture. It does a nice job of showing that the Otaku culture is something that should not be frowned upon. 

In the reading, there is some talk about how there’s a relationship between an industry and its fanbase. The industry provides the fanbase with media and products to satisfy the fanbase but the fanbase can “retaliate” the industry by refusing to buy products or by creating their own fan-made products to oppose the original products. 

The actual show of Genshiken introduces us to Sasahara, a freshman at college who wants to be a part of the college atmosphere. It is rather interesting that Sasahara is actually in denial about being an Otaku and has second thoughts about joining the club. Eventually, he does overcome this obstacle and decides to embrace the inner Otaku that is in him and joins the club. 

What I found to be an interesting moment in the episodes was when Kasukabe reads a couple of volumes in a manga in a sitting. She is directly partaking in Otaku culture but she doesn’t consider herself to be an Otaku. I feel that this event in the anime was a call to belief that it is not weird to be a part of the culture and that the Otaku culture is a normal culture. All in all, it was an interesting anime to watch but I probably wouldn’t recommend any of my friends to watch it. 

[amaypatel]

The reading for this week was fairly confusing and it actually took me a while to process what I was reading. I feel like every time I read a paragraph or two in the reading, I would have to reread it because it did not process with me. Though it was a difficult and confusing reading, I believe I have some idea of what the main idea of the reading was about. 

I believe that simulacra is touched upon in this reading and the main point is that simulacra is starting to emerge in cultures all around the world but more specifically in Japan. In class, a simulacra is a simulation representing another simulation. However, I believe the author is talking about how people are distancing themselves from reality through the use of simulations and simulacras by stories that have been written already. This makes the creativity of these stories become clouded and lost. In addition, the manga and anime that are spun off by the original story are being created by those who are known as “Otaku”. The Otaku have created their own simulacra because these spin offs have risen to nearly the same amount of importance as the original. However, with the rise of importance of the simulacra, the original media has lost some importance due to the fact that it is “underneath” all of the simulacra that exists. 

There is also some discussion about the “Database Model”. From what I got from the text, it seems to how information can be connected to other information that may not be related to it originally to create a narrative that is far from reality. 

All in all, this reading was pretty confusing for me. I was able to understand some points that the author made but could not completely understand their point.