Simmering off the Season (Durarara, Hanamaru)
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Thank Haruhi-sama for Hanamaru and Durarara!! this week. I don’t know about the rest of you, but for me anime has always been an escape. When I first started at college and took the general chemistry series from hell I received my first non-A. You can only justify your failures so many times before you start to look at your failures in a different light: When you see them as a reflection of yourself instead of just uncontrollable circumstances. To avoid this I turned to Cowboy Bebop, Darker than Black, Lucky Star, and the Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya. There’s a reason why those series appear in my blog again and again, because they were there to completely distract me from my own life when I needed it the most. Kagami’s love problems felt like a projection of my own, while the cruel world of Darker than Black reflected my own want to escape my situation. Anime is personal for me, but it also has given me a small community here of people who would dig deeper and share that same love for their own reasons.
Sure people who say “Anime is shallow!” may be right in some respects. I could defend Sailor Moon from a feminist perspective, but I know as well as anyone else that the target market isn’t looking for depth. I know Anime has been fetishiesed and some people purchase cheap tabs come to the median to fulfill their own desires. But they’re all missing out on something spectacular! I’ve watched Lelouch destroy and recreate the world; I watched Spike lose to his past and the people he left behind; I sat there in silence as Kamina (and Nia) died and smiled with remorse when Simon declared himself a nobody; I sat through the End of Evangelion, with an open mouth and fits of giggles; I sympathized with the Laughing Man who could not change the world. Anime (like other medians) has so much to offer. I both pity and envy those who have never watched the great series. I pity them because they are missing out. I envy them because I would love to experience it for the first time all over again.
As we approach the final episodes of the season we begin to ask ourselves “What did I waste my time on?”, “What was ok?”, and “What was amazing?” I’ve read other blogs. I know there are series apologists out there, and further I know some of you fell in love from the get go and have been fighting a losing battle with rationalizations ever since (I’m looking at you Jason 0.0). However, anime is personal, and I can’t tell what each of you needed at the time you watched the series. For some maybe you needed the heart pounding, reach past your limits, adrenaline rush of a shounen anime like To Aru Kagaku no Railgun. Some of you might have just needed a big helping of pr8n like Seikan no Quaesar.
I needed Hanamaru Kindergarten and Durarara!!
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Somewhere in Tsuchi’s clumsiness and Yamamoto’s denseness I got caught up in the comedy of the show. I laughed but I didn’t take much from it, until this week really. I was reminded once again of the prevailing message of Hanamaru: The importance of family. We so seldom see the families buy order discount pharm ampicilin of our heroes in anime because they are used as foils or revenging plot points. The general message being that adventures happen when the youth is left to their own devices. In Hanamaru we constantly see Anzu’s mother at work and more importantly is the relationship between Tsuchi and Anzu. Though you may not have noticed due to all of the normal wife nonsense what Sakura really did for Tsuchi this episode was provide acomplia him with a daughter that could motivate him. Single, alone, and not living his life to the fullest has left Tsuchi wanting something more. The depression this episode was justified as he just didn’t see his life ever coming to a happy ending. It was heartwarming to see the infection of Anzu’s happiness and how her just being around was able to make him have hope for the future again. Children can make an adult realize that the things they think are important really aren’t.
Durarara!! has been dancing around their message this whole time, but they didn’t really deliver until this week. They finally brought home how communities of people are constructed and why we should not lose hope in our fellow humanity. When all those people looked up from their cell phones as members of the dollars I couldn’t help but be happy. Mikado’s personal achievement is trivial in light of so many fighting to really change their environment for the better. When things are just too big to handle on your own, how reassuring to have a million strong like minded individuals at your back. Mikado was a boy who came to the city of Ibukero for change and achieved it. Durarara!! is a story about the work he did to bring the characters together to bring an end to injustice (at least the ones they can end). Mikado is a character you can emote with because like most of us he has no real power on his own, but he somehow managed to still save the day in the end: Through a more believable form of willpower.
*Hats off to Brain Base for tossing in Miria and Isaac; that was just silly.
I’m not going to go into huge detail today, because I think prying to deep will ruin the feeling I got from the shows this week. So with those few sentiments I leave you to find your own reasons for watching anime and why you loved the series you did this season. I blog about anime because I love it and that will never change.
From the desk of a Yin Obsessed Crazy Person
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9 Comments
But but but but but but D;
I don’t really think I am (an apologist). Maybe it’s just me :S
As for Hanamaru and Durarara, both have been a little bit hit and miss for me, though Durarara does strike deep chords every now and then. Then again, I haven’t gotten to the episodes you were talking about here. I absolutely empathize with you though. Both in terms of the special feelings a well placed and well chosen anime episode can bring, and in terms of anime being personal, sometimes being a therapeutic escape, and sometimes even a powerful motivation.
Great post :)
Haha, I’m sorry… I couldn’t help it, I wrote this shortly after reading your Railgun finale post :P. I mislabeled you as an apologist as you didn’t really apologize for it… Hmm, I don’t think I’ll try to correct myself though for fear of slandering you with something worse.
Thanks for the great post comment :). As I said above they’ve been a bit hit and miss for me as well. These two episodes just really brought some themes home and I pointed them out to praise the writers and recognize good work. I get to do that so seldom that it was an enjoyable experience.
Well, more than anything I’m waiting for your dtb gaiden episode 2 review. :razz:
From the desk of an Another Yin Obsessed Crazy Person.
I’ll watch and review it soon :)!
I feel the same way about anime as you. I don’t think it’s for losers who don’t have lives. For me, anime/manga series are a release for me. When I’m stressed or when I need something to make me feel better I turn to anime. I think anime is a great Anti-Drug although it may run up your electric bill. I personally connect with these characters because I see a lot of myself in these characters so I’m glad to see that someone appreciates anime and loves it as much as me.
Also I love Dustin. :smile: Whenever I have love problems it makes me feel better when someone says I love you. So I love you.
:P! Lol, thank you very much, the words are much appreciated and the intention even more so :)!
Having lives or not aside, I heard a good witticism today: “Most people think other people’s hobbies are boring.” I couldn’t have agreed more with the line, but I think theres something we can draw from the more general statement. When people turn to hobbies for one reason or the other it’s because they’re passionate about that thing for whatever reason. For model builders maybe it’s the peace of mind and the accomplishment of a cool looking task. When I play the piano it’s to do nothing but listen as my hands follow along. As you say “Anime is a great Anti-Drug” because it relieves deep psychological cravings that we have. It itches that little spot in your brain that has been tickling for so long. Now does everyone come to anime with that intention? I’m fairly sure that extremes of anything are bad. To go out and claim that “Naruto X Sasuke is the deepest relationship I have ever seen and I’m going to stop living because I can’t even come close ++ All other anime is crap.” would be bad. People can take it too far by becoming complete escapists and start to think that anime girls and guys are much better than the real thing. Though that may be true on some level it’s important to remember that they aren’t real (Don’t give up on humanity!) In my opinion anime is really good at playing out unrealistic scenarios to their fullest. They explore the profundity of Kamina trapped below the surface not wanting anything less than to propel Simon into the heavens. Meeting Yin in real life would be incredibly sad for me. Can you imagine someone with that hard and messed up of a life? On some level it plays to my wanting to be a knight in shining armor, but on another I’m glad that we don’t have to be all the time. Stable relationships are built on mutual need while being respectively independent. If the girl was no longer a damsel in distress and the guy no longer a knight in shining armor would they be happy? Can Hei ever step off the dramatic world domination stage or would he just rush to the next girl in need of saving? In many ways the relationship was always doomed, because the very allowing of it would be the source of its ruin.
Thanks for the comments as always :). I hope my response wasn’t too long ;)!
Very true. Everyone has their own opinions with regards to what they invest their time and energy in anyway. I’ve also met people with the bigoted view that hobbies such as playing video games or watching TV are nothing but time-wasters compared to reading or playing sports for example. Activities don’t necessarily have to be beneficial or exciting for them to be worthwhile hobbies. To quote you, people have their own hobbies because they’re passionate about them. Why waste time and energy doing something beneficial when you don’t get satisfaction from it, right? You might as well don’t do it in the first place ;). People have asked me about my reasons for having an interest in Anime and manga before, and I always tell them the same thing – “It’s because I love them and I find them fun”. And that’s why I always want more. I remember coming to like MangAnime for the initial reason of finding them entertaining and grew to appreciate the worlds they create which sometimes reflect our own. The scenarios played out by the characters are more often than not based on real life interactions anyway, even though some of them are depicted in extreme settings but hey, that’s fiction for you. Like Cece, I find MangAnime a good escape from stress in the midst of a hectic work lifestyle. There’s something appealing about looking forward to a good show at the end of every busy day. Speaking of which, I think it’s about time I set myself a free slot to catch up on my bloated backlog. Been too occupied to watch anything ever since Railgun ended more than two weeks ago. :p
Sorry to hear about the drastic increase in your workload (both here and on your blog). It’s a bummer for you and for me because I always look forward to your comments. I think this season might be pretty good with entries like Angel Beats! and Arukawa Under the Bridge. Then again I guess those are my preferences. I haven’t seen anything yet that quite addresses your yuri-fascination/needs ;).
I think the expression you’re looking for is “restorative” in terms of hobbies that restore your mental capacity to face the challenges ahead. I definitely agree that we all need something to bring us back to fighting shape otherwise going to work everyday could drain you past all hope of recovery. We use anime the way some people use physical activity: Sure we might turn off our brains, but that’s the part of it we like. We don’t necessarily want to think and if we do it will be about stuff that’s fairly different from our own day to day lives. Thinking about new things (like people get from books) is part of the process of recovery for making our trip back to the salt mines new and interesting. Of course this isn’t true for every case, but it looks like at least the few of us here do get something from the experience (not just purely escapism).
I’ll always be fond of shows like Cowboy Bebop. For me anime series (that sum up after 13-24 episodes) is as close to a book as we’ll ever get from T.V. They actually have enough time to explore the intricate developments while concluding in a timely fashion. Movies on the other hand are almost always rushed and never as good as the book. I liked Haruhi because it gave us the best of the light novel and so much more.
Oh well, Anime has its faults too (but when it’s good it is sooo good).