How do you follow this stuff anyway?

It used to be, following anime meant you had to wait for a series that a distributor in your home country deemed worthy of subtitling or dubbing and importing, in the form of video tapes or DVDs. All that changed when anime fans began to take advantage of the internet, and now you can watch series that are currently airing on TV in Japan.

The "problem" with this, though, is one of having too many choices. Any given season can see dozens of titles being released, and it can undoubtedly be a little overwhelming, especially as you just start out. Take heart, though - it's really not that hard to start following anime, if you know how to use available resources.

First of all, if you're completely new to the medium, you might want to start by checking out some of the greats. A good intro into this would be Anime News Network's rating page. It's pretty comprehensive, and clicking on individual titles gives a plot summary and detailed credits (which are important to keep in mind, as we'll see). Go through the top titles, read the summaries, and check out the stuff that you think might appeal to you.

Everyone has a different personal code with regards to if or when they "drop" a series, but as a general rule of thumb, if the series hasn't sold you by at least episode three, you might want to consider letting it go.

Of the series that you do like, pay attention to things like the name of the director and the studio. Look into other works these people have done - you might find gems that, while not rated high by the general viewing public, are suited quite well to your personal tastes.

But let's say you already have a good idea of what you like, or at least what you're looking for in a series, and you want to jump right in and start following series being aired in Japan right now. Where do you start?

Well, there are a number of blogs who compile lists of upcoming series for the new season and make them into easy-to-read charts, replete with summaries and studio names. A good resources for this is the unfortunately-named blog Chartfag. Go through the chart for the new season, and make a note of series that look like they might be promising. When release dates are revealed, make a note of those, too.

So you've got your list of series you want to follow and the dates they begin airing. Where can you go to watch them?

Here you have two options: streaming sites or downloading. Streaming is actually a good option to go with if you're unsure about a series, and you can find plenty of such sites out there. One reliable site for streaming anime is Crunchyroll. Beyond that, Google is your friend - a search for "watch anime online" is going to yield many results.

If you want to go right to downloading, again, there are a number of site out there that can help you with this, as searching "download anime" attests. Personally, I use Animetake, but really, any site that provides reliable, high-definition (i.e., at least 720p.) episodes in a timely fashion from multiple download mirrors will do.

It should also go without saying that if you do follow a series all the way to the end, you might as well show your support for the artists who produced your beloved series and buy the DVD, when and if it comes out. These can usually be found on Amazon, but you can also check with the aforementioned Anime News Network for how to purchase.

And that's basically it. With time you'll find your tastes becoming more exact, narrowing your choices some, and you'll also accumulate some favorite studios and directors. Pretty soon you might end up being one of those people who cannot stop raving about your favorite series on any number of anime forums out there, or to anyone you know in real life who will humor you.

What Is Fanservice?

Many anime fans are reluctant to admit that they enjoy the medium, because of the misconceptions that arise from it. Admittedly, part of the reason why I created this blog was to clear up some of them. Anime, after all, is a medium; not a genre. You can no more generalize about what anime is like than you can generalize about what film or painting or music is like.

However, I'll be the first to admit that most anime is crap.

OK, let me rephrase that. Most anime is stuff I don't like, and some of it is crap. For example, I'm not a big fan of mecha (giant flying robots and such), or at least haven't been since I was 12, when shows like Battle of the Planets and Voltron were favorites of mine. I'm also not a big fan of "moeblob" anime - shows featuring largely shallow and one-dimensional characters who act ridiculously cute for a mostly plotless episode. I can appreciate these genres in their own right, however, as having a time and place. Sometimes you want to see giant flying space robots battling for the fate of Earth. Sometimes you want to see four high school friends sitting around a table and eating cake. I can dig it, even if it's not what I look for when checking out a new season.

What I can't abide, and sends me running for the hills, is fanservice, a.k.a. the reason why anime fans don't talk about anime with people who don't watch anime.

Fanservice is the pointless use of cleavage shots, panty shots, breasts that defy several laws of physics, and basically every sort of slapstick sex gag you can cram into the story. Fanservice is what many people who don't watch anime think all anime is about.

Not that I'm crying "prejudice" here or anything. And the occasional sex gag now and then in an episode is certainly forgivable, potentially even funny. But still, a great many series do make these cheap gags take precedence over the story, and employ fanservice to attract eyeballs and sponsors.

Some otherwise good series that showed real potential have been ruined by the excessive use of fanservice. Case in point: High School of the Dead. This gorgeously drawn, sharply written and fast-paced series showed a lot of promise in the genre of horror anime. But then they peppered episodes with crap like this:

Why is this here? What does it do for the story, really? I don't object to sex and sexuality used in art, but scenes like the image above are quite transparently shoehorned into the episode because someone decided, hey, let's have some titties flopping around every two and a half minutes to keep the audience from getting bored with the story.

And that's one of the big problems with fanservice. Not that it fosters misconceptions about anime, but that it insults the attention span and the intelligence of the audience. It makes plot and character development secondary to the panty shot. The actual story is there to prop up a string of unimaginative and empty boob jokes. And this is before we get into the entire issue of objectification of women in these series, which is another big problem in anime (I intend to do a list of anime series that feature powerful women - and trust me, there are many - but that's for another article).

Ultimately, though, this crap actually sells. And as long as it sells, people will keep making it. And as long as people keep making it, people like me - who don't watch it - will forever be reluctant to admit to people that don't watch anime that they watch anime. So you see the dilemma a snob like me faces. Ah well!

(Incidentally, the image leading this article is from a two-episode series called Eiken, a towering monument of unashamed fanservice. There is barely a half minute that goes by without it, so it's hard to be mad at a show that clearly doesn't take itself seriously nor is even trying to be "sexy". If you do check it out, I have two words for you: yogurt slide. You'll know what I mean when you see it.)

Music In Anime

I wouldn't go so far as to say an anime's opening theme can make or break the series, but a lot of work is still put into one. Music careers have been launched from them. The essence of what the show is all about needs to be captured in usually a minute and a half. The most successful themes achieve this, and make you look forward to seeing what the show has to offer. Ending themes compliment this effect, bringing the episode to its emotional close, sometimes reflecting undercurrents of the story.

If I were to throw together a random selection of anime opening and ending themes that I think really stand out, it would include these titles (in no particular order):

The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, "Bouken Desho Desho?". Haruhi Suzumiya is an iconic anime character, with a forceful personality derived from a great boredom with everyday life; this is a girl who announces on the first day of school that she's only interested in meeting time travelers, aliens, or ESPers - everyone else is of little concern. Her enthusiasm for not just wanting but needing to prove these things exist make her a tornado through the lives of people around her. This song is pretty mainstream, but Aya Hirano's voice is great here. The refrain especially stands out, in that it succeeds in conveying the sense of headfirst-charging into the unknown adventure that the title character possesses.

Rozen Maiden Ouverture, "Baragoku Otome". The Rozen Maiden series was a strange bird. Two seasons of fairly straightforward, almost one-dimensional protagonists competing against a villain for a prize (in this case, we're talking about a group of sentient Victorianesque dolls that are locked in a game of kill-or-be-killed, with each other, with the one who wins getting to become a real girl). But then, right in the middle of the second season, the producers release this two-episode back story on the villain, Suigintou, that portrays her as a complex character, born good but turned evil by the circumstances of her coming into the world. This song's mournful Middle Eastern-sounding vocals and low key match the pain Suigintou is carrying through this memorable detour in the second season.

Ika Musume, "Metamerism". This light-hearted comedy isn't something you watch for anything but the amount of jokes you can get out of a squid girl deciding to invade humanity, only to get tricked into working at a beachside restaurant. This came out last fall, but of course takes place in the summer. This ending theme suits it well then; there's a bittersweet, saying goodbye to vacation feeling to it. You can quite well imagine it being strum by a campfire on the beach.

Kuragehime, "Koko Dake no Hanashi" and "Kimi no Kirei ni Kizuite Okure". Kuragehime was a nice surprise last fall, where the opening and the ending themes both revolve around the main character, Tsukimi Kurashita, a painfully shy girl with a geek's enthusiasm for jellyfish. Her story is the discovery of her own beauty, which she stumbles into charmingly with the help of a friend that Tsukimi considers beautiful herself. The opening theme has a great indie sound, and conveys both tenderness and power. The ending, with male vocals, could be said to be her friend, as the singer implores a woman to realize her beauty.

Haibane Renmei, "Free Bird". I've often thought that if Haruki Murakami were asked to script an anime series, that it would be something quite like this. There are some parallels between this anime's plot and Hard Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World - a walled, otherworldly city, the border between the interior self and the outside world, the afterlife. Slow-paced but always fascinating, we follow a new arrival to the city, Rakka, who has no memory of where she came from, as she comes to terms with her new home. This opening theme is a rare bird, having no vocals, but is a simple acoustic arrangement in 3/4 time. It suits the environment of the city, as well as the innocence of the protagonist.

Welcome to the NHK, "Odoru Akachan Ningen". This series follows a hikkikomori, Tatsuhiro Satō, in his struggle to break out of his shell of paranoia and anxiety, and maybe leave his room every once in a while. It's a fast-paced ride as we follow his emotional rollercoaster through fear, despair, rage, and occasional joy. This ending theme, which to me sounds like a rock opera on crack, does a pretty good job of letting us listen to the music of his mind.

Soredemo Machi Wa Mawatteiru, "Down Town" and "Meizu Sanjou!". Normally the words "maid café anime" would make me wince, but this series was a nice discovery. Each episode is two separate stories about the small staff of a languishing maid café, their lives away from work, and the people who know them. There is no overarching plot through these twenty-two stories - just the subtly absurd and sometimes supernatural events of the daily lives of the cast. The opener, I recently learned, was originally released in 1975 by a short-lived band called Sugar Babe, the song itself composed by Tatsuro Yamashita (here's the original). The version used for this series is a cheerful and uplifting mix of horns and strings, song joyously by Maaya Sakamoto. The ending theme is just hilarious, and the line up is related to one of the stories in the series. No one has rocked an accordion harder.

Again, these aren't in any particular order, and there are quite a few other themes that are also worth having a listen, that work very well. But I think these are some great examples of a theme fitting the series, as well as being able to stand on its own.

Obligatory Welcome Post

Thanks for dropping by. This is pretty much where I'll be geeking out about anime currently airing and finished, for the most part, with posts now and then about video games and music. This won't be comprehensive by any means. I don't follow most of the shows airing and there are even more series I've never watched. But I will be posting about what I like, so whether you're new to the medium or enjoy anime to any degree, feel free to jump in.