[LMB] Anime?? (Re: SP: TSK is a Big Fat Greek Wedding

[Azalais Aranxta]

On Thu, 7 Dec 2006, Victoria L'Ecuyer wrote:

> From: Azalais Aranxta
> Huh.  Ranma 1/2 is sure popular but I really don't see why anyone
> thinks it is good...
>
> I think Ranma 1/2 has some of the vilest gender politics
> ever,  [snip specifics] YMMV, and clearly does  :)
>
> ~malfoy
>
> Me, again;
>
> Of course our mileage may vary. Actually, I'd be shocked if it didn't.
>
> You, as far as I can tell from things mentioned here, are a
> kinda-sorta insider to the culture. As such you will have
> allergic reactions to things that I won't. I have my own set of
> angry kneejerk reactions about gender roles, but they're
> directed to "traditional family values" here in the US.

I'm kind of on the liminal edge, more than an insider.  But yeah,
more insiderish than most Americans who read manga.

But what I really think matters is that I've seen a lot more
manga and anime than most people have.  Ranma penetrated the
American market early and well.  Not that it wasn't popular in
Japan, because it was, hugely so, and in China as well.  But it's
one of the few things almost everyone has seen.

> I'm looking at "Ranma 1/2" as a total outsider to the culture.
> I have a handful of Japanese friends of various
> ages/generations, so my view of day to day Japanese culture is
> either muddled or fractured, depending. I see "Ranma 1/2" as a
> culture making fun of itself. Ranma has to deal with being both
> a Big Deal (aka male child with martial skill) and Second Class
> Citizen (aka: anything female).

Mostly, I think it's my awareness that Ranma is SUCH a Japanese
boy fantasy.

> In short, the series is in the same general group as Terry
> Pratchett and his brand of satire, but different. Pratchett has
> his characters taking on recognizable organizations created for
> a specific purpose where "Ranma 1/2" takes on cultural
> assumptions in general and shoots for quick punch lines rather
> than one, big payoff.

That's interesting, because I don't like Pratchett much either.
Too many puns.  Too many bad puns.  Too much obvious contrivance
in the setting, too many gears and wires showing--I can almost
never forget I'm reading a book that someone made up out of whole
cloth, rather than being told a story about people who might
really exixt in a world that might also, somewhere else.

As a general rule I don't like 'comedy'.  Lois is probably the
English language author who makes me laugh the most; in Japanese,
particularly in manga, it would have to be Nasu Yukie.  (Koko wa
Greenwood skewers gender assumptions way better than Ranma does,
and is hilarious; but it doesn't assume that the mere possession
of boobies is funny, or that the readers will think so.)

I get this about myself, and I know it makes me weird even in SF
fandom.  But the thing about Ranma is that so much of the
physical comedy strikes me as really demeaning to women.

> It's also why I prefer "Initial D" to "Ranma 1/2". I get cars.
> I get driving as a status thing vs. driving as a chore thing. I
> get the whole coming of age thing by mastering something others
> only dream of. That limites set of "I get it" gives me a better
> handle on how the average Japanese teen/adult views the same
> topic.

Which is odd, because unless you live in the countryside you
never have to drive in Japan!  My friends in Saitama have a car,
but they only use it out in Saitama.  They go to Omiya and then
to Tokyo by train.


****************************************************************
Azalais Aranxta (~malfoy)
ataniell93 on LiveJournal and Vox
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/malfoymadness

"I know the true world, and you know I do. But we needn't let it
think we all bow down." --Christopher Morley