Is Anime being abused?

[Sheba]

Originally Posted by Js2756

Honestly, what I think this thread really demonstrates is that history has a really good crap filter.

Statement of the thread, and I mean it.

[Archon_Wing]

Originally Posted by roriconfan

Well, this red herring ruined the whole realism of the series. And what does "older people" means? Older than 12? Is the average anime fan 14 years old? In that sense all romances without mecha are for "mature" people.

But it has nothing to do with maturity or not; that's why it's a red herring. Maturity has nothing to with quality or realism. Unless you are assuming mature anime is free from bad writing or plot contrivances. Even assuming the ending sucked and the realism is not there, it's still irrelevant. And I already said it in the previous post, stuff on prime time vs late night stuff.

I'm actually not even claiming Clannad is mature, nor am I contesting your opinion on the ending. I just don't think your explanation has anything to do with the show's maturity.

[Vexx]

Many young people use the word "maturity" or "mature" with a very skewed notion of what it means.... meh.

[Mueti]

Originally Posted by Vexx

Many young people use the word "maturity" or "mature" with a very skewed notion of what it means.... meh.

I don't have a clue what maturity is...and I probably won't for another twenty years. But it's all good, I try to avoid using the word. That doesn't apply for everyone though, I'd imagine that there are some very mature people my age.

[animeboy12]

Originally Posted by Mueti

I don't have a clue what maturity is...and I probably won't for another twenty years. But it's all good, I try to avoid using the word. That doesn't apply for everyone though, I'd imagine that there are some very mature people my age.

Maturity takes a place in my personal top 5 most hated word, just barely edged out by mindless, and ugh...pretentious. Anyway I general define the word as exploring any subject in a sophisticated manner, but even that opens another can of worms

Originally Posted by 0utf0xZer0

I'd be interested in knowing whether the OP thinks the scene in question needs to be relegated to OVAs and would also like to take this opportunity to remind her that advancing the discussion requires that you actually respond to your critics.

something tells me the OP was looking for people to validate her opinion than any debate in the matter.

In fact I don't even understand how one goes about abusing a medium. Oh sure I can understand misusing a medium (I'm looking you, evangelion) but how does a someone go about hurting a medium?

[Archon_Wing]

Originally Posted by animeboy12

Maturity takes a place in my personal top 5 most hated word, just barely edged out by mindless, and ugh...pretentious. Anyway I general define the word as exploring any subject in a sophisticated manner, but even that opens another can of worms

I guess they are very loaded words. Especially pretentious, which can often be meant by some people "I don't want to even try to understand it"

In fact I don't even understand how one goes about abusing a medium. Oh sure I can understand misusing a medium (I'm looking you, evangelion) but how does a someone go about hurting a medium?

Umm, shoot it? But to be truthful, I held similar opinions to the OP a while ago. I still find fanservice annoying in places. I thought of much anime as "mindless fanservice moe garbage". However, I realized that my viewpoint is not the only one in the world, and people who may like I show I just denounced may just have good reasons. Perhaps it needs to be seen from another perspective. This happened to me more reading about people's thoughts here on the forum and elsewhere on the internet. I still consider the majority of shows not watching, but that applies to every medium. It is not all about me, and it can't be tailored to my needs because I am not the target audience.

So just learning to enjoy (or hate) something for what it is helped me approach matters with a more open mind. I just looked up and realized... it's just entertainment anyways.

[MeoTwister5]

The irony of the word "maturity" is that those who use it a lot don't know what it really means, while those who understood it and have attained it don't need to say it out loud because their actions are enough to show it.

[roriconfan]

Maybe using "more mature than" helps? By comparing seires you can form a scale.

[0utf0xZer0]

Originally Posted by roriconfan

Maybe using "more mature than" helps? By comparing seires you can form a scale.

If you can't get agreement on what constitutes a mature story in the first, place, I don't think you'll get agreement on where series fit on a scale. In fact I'd go as far as to say it would encourage more vicious debates, since you'd essentially be pitting various fanbases against one another.

[Theowne]

Originally Posted by 0utf0xZer0

the execution of this scene was a totally legitimate decision in a show targeting a mature audience.

First, I'm not sure what the point of saying something is a "legitimate decision" is. What does that mean? Anything can be described as a "legitimate decision". And then there's the use of the word "mature". What is mature and what isn't? I don't particularly see how emphasizing a blushing girl wearing shorts has any relation to supposedly "targeting a mature audience", since it would interest 12 year old boys as much (or probably more) than anyone else watching.

(I checked this scene on youtube for reference and don't know any background about this show...)

That's a distinction that isn't always clear....So it has some bearing on the plot as well.

It's not an "on-off" switch. Shows don't take a sudden break of plot to go into a "fanservice" scene. It can be merely an element of the scene.

[0utf0xZer0]

Originally Posted by Theowne

First, I'm not sure what the point of saying something is a "legitimate decision" is. What does that mean? Anything can be described as a "legitimate decision". And then there's the use of the word "mature". What is mature and what isn't? I don't particularly see how emphasizing a blushing girl wearing shorts has any relation to supposedly "targeting a mature audience", since it would interest 12 year old boys as much (or probably more) than anyone else watching.

(I checked this scene on youtube for reference and don't know any background about this show...)

Clannad is a seinen show. The audience for this show is mature in the sense that it consists primarily of adults and older teens.

Legitimate was probably a poor choice of words on my part. All I'm saying is that at the end of the day, it's not a scene that I look at and go "the writers and director shouldn't have included that or done it differently". I suspect that your opinion on this is probably quite different from mine, but I think it's also think it's safe to say that Clannad is not in general your kind of show.

Now, let's go back to an earlier statement in this thread:

Originally Posted by Theowne

Scenes involving sex as a storytelling element are not the same as gratuitous fanservice. See: Kare Kano. Or Honey and Clover.

If we accept the criteria that a fanservice scene is a scene written to provoke certain... "reactions" from the viewer more so than to advance the plot, than I think this actually is a case of gratitious fanservice, albeit a very tame one compared to a lot of stuff out there. At the same time, I do not that think there is a need for anime targeted at an adult audience to shy away from this kind of content, be it gratuitous or not.

In the end, it all cycles back to my dispute with the OP for this thread: typical anime fanservice scenes may make me want to bang my head on my desk, but I don't thinkthey need to be relegated to OVAs only. I actually prefer my fanservice mixed with plot.

[Theowne]

Hey - I'm not going to concern myself with people's personal tastes, as long as we tone down on the use of fuzzy terms like "mature" or "adult" as if they have some inherent connection with fanservice.

As for the second point, I don't watch dating sim anime so I don't particularly care about their use of fanservice - if that's what the fans what, I'm not going to stand in their way. I would care if it showed up in anime I take seriously or think has artistic merit like Mushishi or Whisper of the Heart, which are of course a tiny, tiny minority.

Like I said before, overall I don't particularly have a vendetta against fanservice - the kind of anime I find worthwhile rarely resort to it anyways. If we reach the point in anime-dom where all anime is forced to include ecchi scenes to be commercially viable, then I will have a problem.

[0utf0xZer0]

Originally Posted by Theowne

Hey - I'm not going to concern myself with people's personal tastes, as long as we tone down on the use of fuzzy terms like "mature" or "adult" as if they have some inherent connection with fanservice.

As I think I've pointed out, this was never really my intention. I'll try and be more careful with my terminology next time though.