10 overused cliches in Anime

[Vexx]

Oh.... I don't think flashbacks are peculiar to anime. They're a budgetary fudge and I've seen them insultingly used in almost every form of entertainment.

Flashbacks are less insulting when they're doing something like, for example, reshowing a scene but from *another* character's viewpoint.

I won't even bother with the OP's list because it sounds like he was just executing a one-inch deep superficial stereotype attack. Half the list could apply to almost every form of entertainment, almost all of them are basic story components. The art is in making them seem fresh.
And lets see..... it is animated art made in Japan: there's a good chance it'll be JAPANESE-centric, ya think? Counter-example: how many american television shows or movies are set in another country based on that country's culture and about that country?

Talk about a moment of d'uh.....

Also a d'uh for whomever resurrected this conversation from the year 2004. Many of those posters may have gone on to evolve entirely different opinions about anime.
edit: looks like the last resurrection was in Oct 2007 til nekoman awakened it last week. People should check the dates of posting for jumping into a long dead conversation unless they actually have new information to add to it. Threads about specific anime and manga usually benefit from such updates, other threads often don't.

[MikoKikyo]

Originally Posted by Vexx

Oh.... I don't think flashbacks are peculiar to anime. They're a budgetary fudge and I've seen them insultingly used in almost every form of entertainment.

Flashbacks are less insulting when they're doing something like, for example, reshowing a scene but from *another* character's viewpoint.

Agree with your second statement. As for your first statement, I'm pretty well aware that flashbacks are not peculiar to anime. My issue wasn't with flashbacks per se, but with the way they're overdone = there's not need to flashback to scene X when the viewer remembers exactly what that is, and gets the reference to scene X without having to see it over again. They also often take up much longer screentime than necessary. This overuse of flashbacks is characteristic of certain animes I have watched. I have personally never seen this problem in any other art form, at least not in such a blatant way.

[Xhokhusmak]

LOL flashbacks... oh god that reminds me of this one episode of One Piece... it was in that snow continent arc, where in the last 2-3 minutes of the episode there was a scene of Luffy saving some creature's baby and walking away. In the very next episode, there was a flashback in the beginning, showing that again, the entire 2minute scene AGAIN... my gosh -_-

And as for what I am talking about, I don't think this has anything to do with Japanese culture. Just, I guess some writers had a writer's block and couldn't add anything new to say. Ok, even though these two animes weren't the reason I brought this up in the first place, but I'm going to name the two biggest and annoying culprits: Inuyasha and Fushigi Yuugi. Argh!!

Think about it, Japanese culture? No way. This happens a lot in anime: A character goes through some sort of meaningful speech involving morales/love/whatever. Meanwhile, there's always going be a 1-2 second cut to another character's face. And what does that character say? "[insert first character's name here]...".
Can you imagine this happening in real life? If any of you are from Japan, please give input, because at the moment for me, this seems ridiculous.

[stelok]

Originally Posted by molotov_sp

9.Japanese: The ultimate survivors ..... errr, not really!
Japanese manga writers are thoroughly convinced that in case of holocost, alien invasion, or demonic invasion, japan will be the only country left standing. Sure they got alotta pluck holding their islands as they showed us in WWII but mostly it was a lost cause. GET OFF YOURSELVES ALREADY! enjoy some new vistas! You dont even need to kiss up to the evil Americans! Here are 3 nations that got some REAL grit.
Russians: They stopped 2 megalomaniacs from taking their country. First Napolean, then Hitler. They didnt even win through tactical genius or superior technology. They won through blood spent, pure and simple.
Britain: Showed us that Quality always beats quantity by spanking two great "Armadas" first in sea when faced up against the spanish armada, then in the air by stopping the German Luftwaffle in the greatest air battle in history. Always outnumbered, never out spirited.
Arabs: Did you know that the middle east used to be green untill wars raveged the landscape permanently? Well the people still live there, and for the most part, they are still fighting.

Greatest Culprit in Recent Memory: Gunparade March (the world tries nukes on aliens then promptly expires except for japan)

!

Actually, it was the winter that saved the Russians from Napoleon and Hitler. Russia also survived through the Fall of the Soviet Union.

That is true, Afghans fought Russians and then each otherfor decades and still survived. So did the Vietnamese, who drove the French and Americans out of the country.

But you should include Israel. The Romans, and the Nazis have oppressed and tried to esterminate all the Jews yet the Jews still managed to survive and multiply like mosquitos.

Originally Posted by molotov_sp

6.Japan has the most toughest gangsters in organized school history!!!
Kind of hard to beleive considering people kill themselves over failed college exams in Japan. If there is anything we know in America, it's that little aisian kids wearing gangster colors, rapping, and swearing their heads off is only one thing: DAMN FUNNY! It was pretty novel to see rough and tough japanese kids back in the day, like in Slam Dunk, but I think the jig is up already and this particular cliche should be put to rest.
Greatest Culprit in Recent Memory: Midori no Hibi (main character beats up gangsters from other schools constantly, apprently they are all just wussbags, HEY JUST LIKE REAL LIFE)

Greatest Culprit in Recent Memory: GTO (Great Teacher Onizuka) and School Rumble.

Originally Posted by molotov_sp

5.Americans in the future are all self absorbed, insensitive, and power hungry!
Cmon I don't need you guys to kiss up to us but as an American, it's disturbing to see people think that we are gonna go the way of the Dodo in the near future. Heck we get enough flack from AMERICAN sci-fi writers as it is. If american somehow does manage to survive we are always trying to cover things up or masscring civilians. Puhleeze Japan, stop acting like the ethnic purgings in Africa are that much more bearable than our screw ups just because we are embarrased about it and they are not! (And you know in reality you love us Japan, and WE LOVE YOU!)
Greatest Culprit in recent Memory: Ghost In the Shell: Standalone Complex (the americans appear in the 1st season twice, and they both aren't glowing reviews)

Greatest Culprit in recent Memory: Blood+

Americans in the anime Blood+ are manipulative, power-hungry, treacherous and self-absorbed.

Originally Posted by molotov_sp

3.Aliens don't just look like humans, THEY ARE ALSO DAMN HOT!!
Look in live action sci-fi shows, the reason all aliens look human is because it's damn expensive to make them look like anything else. I mean in star trek it's alot cheaper to put someone in a rubber costume than make a completely computer generated or animatronic main character alien not to mention the fact that if you dont have a monstrous budget this particular character would look like complete crap next to their real life counterparts. BUT THIS IS ANIMATION. If there is any place to make cool alien characters that REALLY LOOK ALIEN, its in Anime and if it's possible ... please make the most horrendous looking one the GOOD GUY rather than the BAD GUY for a change. This is just a case of complete lapse of creativity.
Greatest culprit in recent memory:WOW i cant think of any at the moment, maybe i can have a little back up in this area, I'm pretty sure it's true though, if not, let me just say i was really grabbing at ideas by this point to reach my goal of 10!

Greatest culprit in recent memory of Hot Alien Babes: Onegai Teacher. The alien teacher is hot!
Hot Alien Chicks also have very Japanese-sounding names in Tenchi Muyo, Onegai Teacher and Girls Bravo. However the name Lum is an exception

[Amray]

You forgot;

1. The flowing waterfall crying/tears.
2. The gang of thugs. (one of which is always licking a knife.)
3. Main character with over-sized blade (sometimes gun).
4. The sexy, evil female villain with big breasts.
5. Fangs. (a favourite of mine)
6. The spunky, hyper-active, competitive, female school-teacher.
7. The pervert towards school girls. Often a father, a teacher, or some other middle-aged man.

What is more is that I adore all of them.

[SeedFreedom]

Sorry for reviving the topic, but it seems lately all of the shows either deal with an uncompromising (Nogizaka Haruka no Himitsu), uncaring (myself; yourself) or perverted (soul eater) father. Where are the cool dads?

EDIT: I forgot to add Akio from Clannad as an a exception to the rule.

[cicido]

Originally Posted by Xhokhusmak

LOL flashbacks... oh god that reminds me of this one episode of One Piece... it was in that snow continent arc, where in the last 2-3 minutes of the episode there was a scene of Luffy saving some creature's baby and walking away. In the very next episode, there was a flashback in the beginning, showing that again, the entire 2minute scene AGAIN... my gosh -_-

And as for what I am talking about, I don't think this has anything to do with Japanese culture. Just, I guess some writers had a writer's block and couldn't add anything new to say. Ok, even though these two animes weren't the reason I brought this up in the first place, but I'm going to name the two biggest and annoying culprits: Inuyasha and Fushigi Yuugi. Argh!!

Think about it, Japanese culture? No way. This happens a lot in anime: A character goes through some sort of meaningful speech involving morales/love/whatever. Meanwhile, there's always going be a 1-2 second cut to another character's face. And what does that character say? "[insert first character's name here]...".
Can you imagine this happening in real life? If any of you are from Japan, please give input, because at the moment for me, this seems ridiculous.

For the first point you mentioned, I think it's mostly there to remind people about the important events that happened on the last episode, since the TV viewers saw it a week ago and probably need some reminders.
As for the second one, I have no idea.
I suppose it's not something extremely unusual in real life.

[SeijiSensei]

Originally Posted by SeedFreedom

Sorry for reviving the topic, but it seems lately all of the shows either deal with an uncompromising (Nogizaka Haruka no Himitsu), uncaring (myself; yourself) or perverted (soul eater) father. Where are the cool dads?

Parents, and fathers in particular, are especially lacking in anime, perhaps to feed the adolescent fantasy of how wonderful it would be to live on your own. (The Tsukamoto household in School Rumble is an excellent example of this general characteristic.) I suspect the absence of fathers in anime tends to mirror life in Japan. The world of the salaryman doesn't leave much time for domestic life. You'll notice in my examples below that none of the fathers has a mainstream job.

Here are a few fathers that I've appreciated as one myself:

Oto-san in Chi's Sweet Home is a really sweet guy. (He works at home at lot as a graphic designer.)

Probably the best (step-)father I've seen in recent anime is in Shion no Ou. Yasuoka-sama loves Shougi almost as much as he loves his adopted young prodigy whom he supports throughout the show. He also seems deeply in love with his wife. (He's a professional Shougi player, so he spends lots of time at home giving lessons or preparing for competitive matches.)

Shurrei's father in Saiunkoku Monogatari looks like a total loser at times especially when it comes to doing anything in the kitchen. Nevetheless he has a lot of depth of character and hides some secrets as well. His efforts on behalf of the poor and displaced during the wars of succession before the story begins make him a quiet hero. (He's employed as the Imperial Archivist in Saiunkoku, a quiet retreat from the turmoil of war and politics.)

Haruka's parents are divorced in Noein, and her father has returned to Tokyo to continue his physics research. Yet he still loves his daughter, and maybe harbors similar feelings for his ex-wife. When he returns to Hokkaido late in the show he turns out to be a pretty nice guy.

[Irenicus]

Originally Posted by SeijiSensei

Shurrei's father in Saiunkoku Monogatari looks like a total loser at times especially when it comes to doing anything in the kitchen. Nevetheless he has a lot of depth of character and hides some secrets as well. His efforts on behalf of the poor and displaced during the wars of succession before the story begins make him a quiet hero. (He's employed as the Imperial Archivist in Saiunkoku, a quiet retreat from the turmoil of war and politics.)

Why do I get the feeling you're trying to hold back from spoiling everything on how awesome Shuurei's Number One Favorite Person really is?

He's actually one of the incredibly good fathers in anime that exist whenever mom isn't around (usually of tragic circumstances) and whenever the child is a really nice girl. Cardcaptor Sakura, for example: dad really was awesome there as well.

And he's also of the scholarly profession. A bias of the Japanese? Professors, scholars, and librarians in anime more often than not are noble, wise, and gentle people, especially if they're fathers; when was the last time you see a salaryman who can even come close?

But yes, near-perfect parents are rare in anime, so are near-perfect families; good-natured but clumsy is a little more often, but writers probably find the Freudian trauma of bad parental-child relations too juicy to hold back, hence the horrid level of parenting failure displayed in anime. No wonder they all want to blow the world up!

As a side note, one of the more extremely annoying things about shoujo manwha is that the ratio of good and bad parents (or older relatives of any kind) is at about 1:100; I'm still wondering why South Korea hasn''t collapsed in the weight of the generational catastrophe already if it even has a grain of truth considering how terrible these Korean parents in manwha are.

If it's America they'd all be in jail. Or not. Our social services aren't the most proficient.

[Cartoon]

In order to have a deep conversation or confrontation in anime you must:
- Be on a rooftop
- Stand in front of the moon (which just so happens to be full and ridiculously huge)
- There must be a breeze so your hair flows perfectly in the wind.

[Flame-X]

-Rainy scene on emo moments.

[Tasdern]

My absolute favorite is this.

If in school you sit in the desk in the second row from the back along the window.
Second worse place to sit is the back row in the middle.


Most annoying cliche: The boody nose on a guy when he gets sexually aroused.

[jillybutt]

Originally Posted by Tasdern

My absolute favorite is this.

If in school you sit in the desk in the second row from the back along the window.
Second worse place to sit is the back row in the middle.


Most annoying cliche: The boody nose on a guy when he gets sexually aroused.

Hahaha very true!! But I actually like the bloody nose thing
The sakura pedals falling gracefully through the scene is used very often, but that's more of a Japanese beauty thing, isn't it? And I never get sick of sakura in animes hehe.

[othera]

Originally Posted by Kensuke

12) In harem/fanservice anime, there is always a beach or onsen (hot spring) episode.

Heh, every single one ive watched except like 2 have had a single episode just put in to show of swimsuits.


Cliche's i hate are:
The shy girl with a crush on the main character, but he doesnt notice.(And more then likely, when the girl FINALY builds up courage to tell him directly, since he is to stupid to realise someone else starts talking and interupts her in some way and she doesnt tell him )

And the harems like in OMG, the guy gets 4 sexy chicks at his house and what does he do? Nothin.

But hey, if someone made an anime without any of the stuff people said there sick of here, who would watch it?

Though the things above dont realy effect if i do watch an anime one thing does
the fighting...
Well i cant stand "IM CHARGING UP MY ATTACK"
"oh my god i could prob shoot him in the head right this second but i must think of a way to kill him either as he does his super attack or after he does it"

EDIT:

Also when some guy survives a HUGE explosion or something, then gets punched and goes cry.

[Tasdern]

How about this one:

Not matter how cold it is, no matter how severe the snow storm, a girl in the most shortest of school uniforms will be completely ok as long as she has some sort of scarf on. Her bare arms and legs are no problem as long as she has that scarf!

[Tasdern]

Originally Posted by Amray

You forgot;

1. The flowing waterfall crying/tears.
2. The gang of thugs. (one of which is always licking a knife.)
3. Main character with over-sized blade (sometimes gun).
4. The sexy, evil female villain with big breasts.
5. Fangs. (a favourite of mine)
6. The spunky, hyper-active, competitive, female school-teacher.
7. The pervert towards school girls. Often a father, a teacher, or some other middle-aged man.

What is more is that I adore all of them.

God yes, I'm a sucker for those pointy eye-teeth!

[Crontica]

1. The main character will have fluctuating power levels as a consequence of development.

2. If the character is a brilliant bastard everything within a 10 mile radius will be set upon making him cry.

3. If the main character is a 8 year old kid. Well then he just owned everyone. The spineless wimp to the magnificent bastard is left biting dust as the 4th wall audience cheers.

4. 80% of the time Females will be subjected to shameless fanservice to the point im waving death threats at the author.

5. The chances of the irritating spineless smut becoming the main character is 82%...

6. The chances of the main character permanently dying is as ridiculous as dividing by zero.

7. Anime where millions of digimon cards are falling into the earth, gundams raining from the sky, kids running amok with dangerous artifactcial weapons will get the most awesome character cast possible than your average run of the mill show.

8. Females chances of attaining magical power are 70%. If a Male attains magical power, it will ether be ridiculously unstable or his screen time will be non existent.

9. Chances of characters parents dying are 95%. If they are not dead they are dysfunctional / dense / missing / absent / abandonment.

10. In tournament mode the chances of the main characters cast losing is like trying to freakin' divide by zero. If the series is freestyle mode however highly unlikely expect conspirational losing that will not drop them out of the tournament.

11. If a character has a flashback: Airtime's kryptonite. If a character has a flashforward: Someones going to die.

[Crontica]

Originally Posted by Tasdern

And the biggest cliche of all time.... Inuyasha - that guy is over 500 years old and still hasn't been to second base with Kagome.

At least he has a dam good reason not to. I mean God Dam Man. Its ether Kiyo'gome or Kag'ome. They're the same person but reality is a bitch. He'd rather pick Kiyo but she has turned into a angsty idiot, and Kagome is literally threatening him to pick her.

[Traece]

I've seen some pretty interesting ones here.

Spoiler for Long Explanations:

I hate to state a cliche that's already been stated a couple hundred times already as well, but remember when main characters were adults? Oh wait, they never were. Now, I'm a hardcore Gundam fan and personally I don't find Macross as interesting, but at least Macross has main characters that aren't twelve. Even if the main character is in his late teens that's just fine, as long as he acts decently mature. But when you get in to the low teens or so young they aren't even teenagers at all, you're really pushing it.

Now on another note, I understand that having the main character be by comparison as weak as he was in the first episode, in the 200th episode. It's entertaining for some to see him get his ass handed to him over and over again and keep coming back. However, it's just so damned inconsistent. I mean look at Bleach, where all the "strong" characters that Ichigo eventually beats come back and beat the people who are beating him. I'm not kidding it really happens! Sorry but a main character who never loses is more appealing to me than a main character who never wins until he's come back so many times from being beat enough to break every bone in his body and worn out the enemy. Now granted those characters who aren't weak tend to also be cold and driven by personal revenge and such, but hey who isn't?

Lastly, can the main character please fall in love with someone besides the first female character to be introduced as a possible love interest? Now a lot of you might disagree, and that's fine. But still you can always tell which girl will end up with the main character in the long run just because they're best friends or she gets more screen time. I wont lie I can perfectly understand how going from best friends to lovers makes complete and total sense but ffs there are other women in the anime. They're almost always either considerably better not just in looks but in personality (why is the love interest always violent too? That's for another time though) but sometimes they even understand the main character better than the person the main character ends up falling in love with.

By the way Tasdern, that's brilliant. It never occurred to me but the main character always does sit in the second to last seat by the window doesn't he? Now that you've mentioned it, I really don't understand why it's that prevalent as well. I'm trying to think of an anime where they don't and honestly I just can't think of one. Sure enough if they have a typical classroom with desks in rows and columns, they always get the window seat.

As obvious of a cliche as it is, I would like to see an anime where characters are acutely aware of the fact that there's weather. No there's something even WORSE than the fact that nobody has any sense of temperature! Why does a character get sick from having WATER splashed on them? Is the water extracted from sick people or something? Disgusting visual maybe but let's be serious about this and consider just what it takes to get sick. Last year I slipped and fell on the ice taking the trash out and hurt myself, and got pneumonia, after having already had some minor symptoms of a cold to begin with. Now if it takes me being slightly sick, and then hurting myself on an iced over surface in the middle of Winter to get really sick, would it really be too much to ask that an anime character get sick after standing out in freezing cold rain for awhile with regular clothes and no umbrella or something like that? They wont get sick from the freezing downpour but should they so much as get hit by a little drip of room temperature water, it's in bed with a fever for a whole week.

I'll tell you what, if an epidemic hits Animated Japan, they're all dead. Fail.

[Tasdern]

Yes, anytime someone gets drenched in rain, expect a cold. Male characters may get life threatening colds.