The Anime/Manga thread

[The Batlord]

Just bought the new Berserk movie Golden Age Arc II. Aside from some dodgy CG animation that looked a bit video gamey at times it was pretty fantabulous. Supposedly the next installment, about the Eclipse, is even more disturbing than the manga. Stoked. The anime was great, but the manga was so much better, so if the new movie can top the manga version of the Eclipse I'll probably crap my pants. And then they claim that they're going to continue the movies to finally get into the rest of the series. Stoked, stoked, stoked.

So am I the only Berserk fan here? Along with Hellsing and Evangelion it's pretty much the best anime since sliced bread though I still have yet to finish the manga series, which is pretty much Dragonball length.

[Paul Smeenus]

^ seeing as I'm still waiting for season 2 of Attack On Titan I'll peep it out

[Anteater]

Originally Posted by The Batlord

Just bought the new Berserk movie Golden Age Arc II. Aside from some dodgy CG animation that looked a bit video gamey at times it was pretty fantabulous. Supposedly the next installment, about the Eclipse, is even more disturbing than the manga. Stoked. The anime was great, but the manga was so much better, so if the new movie can top the manga version of the Eclipse I'll probably crap my pants. And then they claim that they're going to continue the movies to finally get into the rest of the series. Stoked, stoked, stoked.

So am I the only Berserk fan here? Along with Hellsing and Evangelion it's pretty much the best anime since sliced bread though I still have yet to finish the manga series, which is pretty much Dragonball length.

Berserk has never really gotten the anime adaptation it's deserved, but the manga is pretty much regarded as Japan's #1 dark fantasy export and one of the biggest selling "seinen" demographic mangas of all time. Its still ongoing by the way...

What I like most about Berserk though is its a direct descendent (thematically atleast) of all that classic sword n' sorcery / dark fantasy pulp literature that guys like Robert E. Howard and Ashton Clark Smith wrote back in the 1920's through the 40's, not to mention the cosmic indifferentism that H.P. Lovecraft pioneered during that period in his own stories. There's a lot of other influences too of course - Miura is a huge heavy metal fan, so that bleeds through into the narrative and overall aesthetic.

But yeah, you aren't alone in your Berserk fandom, lol.

[The Batlord]

Originally Posted by Paul Smeenus

^ seeing as I'm still waiting for season 2 of Attack On Titan I'll peep it out

You need to. The anime and the movies (or at least the second one which is the only one I've seen so far) are great, but the true Berserk experience is the manga. Anyone interested can read the entire series at this site (along with a good amount of every other manga ever made too). I guess for copyright reasons or something they can't use the actual English release, so it's all fan translated and the quality can dip at times, but in general it's perfectly readable. In general.

Originally Posted by Anteater

Berserk has never really gotten the anime adaptation it's deserved, but the manga is pretty much regarded as Japan's #1 dark fantasy export and one of the biggest selling "seinen" demographic mangas of all time. Its still ongoing by the way...

What I like most about Berserk though is its a direct descendent (thematically at least) of all that classic sword n' sorcery / dark fantasy pulp literature that guys like Robert E. Howard and Ashton Clark Smith wrote back in the 1920's through the 40's, not to mention the cosmic indifferentism that H.P. Lovecraft pioneered during that period in his own stories. There's a lot of other influences too of course - Miura is a huge heavy metal fan, so that bleeds through into the narrative and overall aesthetic.

But yeah, you aren't alone in your Berserk fandom, lol.

I'm up to chapter 299 and still have about thirty more to go. Kinda depressed that I'll be finally running out of Berserk to read/watch. Especially since it's still not done and Miura apparently releases infrequently these days.

I love the Lovecraft influences too. I can't think of another anime/manga with the same kind of demon art design, or that has such a nihilistic view of it's "religion". As far as I'm concerned Berserk is one of the very best fantasy stories ever told in any format. Too bad a lot of the crazy fantasy nerds that make all the "Best of" lists seem to look down on anime in general so it never really gets it's due outside of anime circles.

[gunnels]

These AoT mock twitter accounts kill me. (I made sure these were all spoiler free.)

Spoiler for long post:

[Paul Smeenus]

[bulbasaur]

who's going to rewatch serial experiments lain with me

edit: no one

[The Batlord]

This is a response to a post in another thread that I'm trying not to derail.

Originally Posted by Black Francis

I see what you mean but i meant anime as whole, as in, in the anime universe everything goes..

And even regular series that are not hentai there is mature subjects brought up like incest and pedophilia, you got otakus watching some series simply because they have a loli obsession

Even action series or mecha series are ecchi as well and even though they are supposed to be for a mature audience, that mature audience tends to be 12 to 13 yrs kids who are now used to seeing all the crazy **** anime exposes without even flinching.

And yes they do have a standard but it's not the same as the american standard, their culture is different and so are they fetishes and anime exposes those fetishes without much censorship.

But that's not really about boundaries, that's about different cultural standards. Most anime is still pretty formulaic and tired. I used to love anime, but these days I can only care about a very small amount of it. I mean how many times can I see the next Pokemon(anime)/Yu-Gi-Oh/Naruto/One Piece/etc/etc/etc clone and still be bothered with them? They might have more quasi-nudity and fan service in anime, but it tends to all conform to the same tropes, just like everything else in the majority of anime.

And I think a lot of the Western obsession comes from the fact that we probably don't see the hordes of duds that get buried in cancellation just like the hordes of terrible cop shows that get cancelled after a season over here. If all people had to go on were Lost, Heroes, Buffy...I'm having trouble thinking of any more, etc then they might actually think that American network television was absolutely fantastic. So really, the majority of anime is probably even more crap than any of us realize.

[Paul Smeenus]

^ I'm not anything close to an anime buff, I honestly don't know the first thing about Pokemon, for example, but from the first minutes of Attack on Titan I was totally spun out. I don't know if it's been done before or if it's formulaic, but it's good horror. I can't wait for season 2.

[The Batlord]

Originally Posted by Paul Smeenus

^ I'm not anything close to an anime buff, I honestly don't know the first thing about Pokemon, for example, but from the first minutes of Attack on Titan I was totally spun out. I don't know if it's been done before or if it's formulaic, but it's good horror. I can't wait for season 2.

I keep hearing how good it is. I'll have to check it out at some point. But...lazy.