What are your Anime Pet Peeves?

[Dazarath]

Heh, I sat here for awhile trying to decide how to gracefully back out of the argument that I unintentionally caused. My mistake for ranting about a pet peeve that would inevitably get some people worked up. To clarify, I never said that I thought anime was PC; I don't. I actually don't think American "PCness" is very PC either, but for a different reason.

I was only referring to a single aspect of (supposed) PCness, namely the inclusion of characters from varying backgrounds, even when they are completely out of place. Maybe it's not even a trend and I've just happened to take notice recently. That's fine. It's not like I'm going to provide empirical evidence for every like/dislike I might have and attempt to show that I am objectively correct. That's probably the last I'll say on the subject, as these kind of discussions never lead anywhere, and I'm not going to derail the thread any further.

[Guernsey]

Another pet peeve of mine is actually mentioned above... And that is how shallow romance is in anime. Many times you see the relationships before the fact and how they come to fruition, however, you hardly ever see how a relationship is working out after it has started. Though I often balk at the anime Clannad, I really did appreciate this aspect of its second season, After Story, since it delved into "happily ever after" that we are supposed to just assume. And yes, I would like to see characters not always be embarrassed of their relationships and just see an actual open romance.

I would like some realistic character interaction myself, I hadn't Toradora or Clannad yet but after hearing ohowit is so unique compared to most harems/slice of life, I think I might give it a chance although I was never really into high school anime. One thing that I really wish that they utilize in anime is breakups, I am may not have had a girlfriend but my brother did and his experience he had been with several girls who broke up with him either because of circumstances or they were not his type. I want to see the protagonists deal with the drama of breaking up with their girlfriends or even writers d soemthing controversial like breakup a popular pairing but leaving hints that the relationship may be recounciled. Granted, there are anime that do this but I had yet to find them.

What political correctness does, as it pertains to entertainment, is greatly limit the sort of characters you can have. It lessens variety, and drastically so. It's great to have some strong and outspoken female characters with a sharp wit (i.e. like pretty much every female character in Buffy the Vampire Slayer), but you can have too much of any character type... and that's what PC does. You only get "acceptable" character types, and it lessens character diversity.

Inasmuch as like Joss, the feamles in Buffy are more intimidating than unique. While I enjoy outspoken characters like Haruhi, there also female characters of quiet confidence such as Tomoyo or Fate Testarossa, they may not go around beating people up but they went through a lot and are strong because of it. I am aware that they can kick my ass but their real strength comes from within themselves and not just heir fighting skills.

[0utf0xZer0]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

Perhaps a non-PC exception slips through every now and then, but you have to admit, 0utf0xZer0, that anime has more diversity in its female character types than American shows have.

I was disagreeing that American shows are completely lacking in soft characters, not that they don't use these kinds of characters less.

I wouldn't call Kaylee and River non-PC. They're probably a good demonstration of what's necessary to make "soft" female characters palatable to an American audience.

Originally Posted by Triple_R

I never watched Firefly.

You might want to correct that.

Originally Posted by Matrim

Massive plus for American TV then as far as I am concerned. If true, something which I really, really doubt.

I can see how avoiding the stock moe archetypes (ie. cowering Mikuru clone) might make very better shows, but I think there is a lot of room out there for characters more along the lines of Kotomi or Ryou.

[animeboy12]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

Why do you doubt it?

I've watched a fair number of popular North American sitcoms and TV shows, and I sure as heck don't see much diversity (as in real personality diversity) within the female casts of these shows. Mind you, the male casts often aren't all that diverse either...

Obviously non of us are experts on the field. You've watched "a lot sitcoms", I've watched "a lot of sitcoms" and I'm sure everyone else has watched "a lot of sitcoms". The biggest factor is what you've watch. Personally I both agree and disagree with your claim, there are a lot of soft spoken fe(male) characters in western media, you mentioned a series that has one however I'll agree with in that their soft-spoken tends to be viewed a flaw, which anime does as well but not to the extent western media does. Of course I don't think western media is doing it to be PC so much as that type of character is hard to keep in for extended periods of time and they make awesome fodder for character development

Originally Posted by Vexx

But on topic --- I'd like to see the anime makers get past the beat-to-death romance tropes. Every once in a while we get something like REC, Lov*Com, Toradora!, etc ... where we get a bigger picture, characters who don't quite fit the easy rut or necessarily exist only for the protagonist, or relationship exploring outside the shallow.

Yea true, I've always wondered I wish a lot of anime and manga out there wouldn't treat official coupling like the plague.

Originally Posted by Dazarath

I was only referring to a single aspect of (supposed) PCness, namely the inclusion of characters from varying backgrounds, even when they are completely out of place. Maybe it's not even a trend and I've just happened to take notice recently. That's fine. It's not like I'm going to provide empirical evidence for every like/dislike I might have and attempt to show that I am objectively correct. That's probably the last I'll say on the subject, as these kind of discussions never lead anywhere, and I'm not going to derail the thread any further.

well, at the very least some example would be nice so I can know what you're talking about

Originally Posted by 0utf0xZer0

I can see how avoiding the stock moe archetypes (ie. cowering Mikuru clone) might make very better shows, but I think there is a lot of room out there for characters more along the lines of Kotomi or Ryou.

Oh sure there's room, I dunno about a lot of room but there's room. Unless it's a case like hinata from naruto or Sawako from Kimi ni Todoke were the character constantly trying to improve themselves, I've never really cared for the soft-spoken type. Quite frankly I even go as far to say I'd take a cookie-cutter action girl or Lois lane over a decently written soft spoken character any day of the week but that's just me.

Originally Posted by animeboy12

If this topic extends to the fandom as well, which by the way is probably my biggest pet peeve, I'll take 0utf0xZer0's Anti-moe zealots slant and apply it to anything anti as far as anime goes. Anti-moe, anti-ecchi, anti-shoujo, anti-shonen,etc etc, I don't care their opinions are all equally Shitty. It's fine not to like a certain genre or series, but I hate how people go on a silly tirade about how there's "too much" of a genre (LIES), asking blatantly obvious questions "How come *insert anime series* got a sequel and *insert other anime series* didn't"(profit, no sequel hook, Why don't you wait?). People need, or better yet should understand that less anime is not the solution to your problem.

You know I said this a while and you know, I kinda I kinda take some of it back. It's perfectly ok to hate a genre or theme in anime to the point where you resent it's existence regardless of whether or not it appeal to you and no you're opinion any anime in that felid is not shit. No, that's not being fair to the value of shit. However, I know that the anime industry is in a bad position as of lately but this whole arm-ceo-I-have-the-master-plan-to-save-the-anime-industry has really got to stop, no one has the number or evidence to back most of these claims up.

[Ansalem]

Originally Posted by animeboy12

well, at the very least some example would be nice so I can know what you're talking about

I understand what Dazarath is talking about, although I'd have to disagree to a certain degree. I'll get to that part at the end.

It is a pretty fairly common phenomenon in American television where every show has a cast that seems perfectly diverse.

For example, a crime drama I enjoy is Criminal Minds. This show is about FBI agents who investigate serial murderers and other unsightly criminals. Here are statistics for the FBI employment. 75% white, 56% male.

In this show, the cast consists of three white men, one black man, two white women, and one woman of Hispanic descent. The FBI chief for their section is a woman. When one female cast member took short leave from the show, she was filled in for by a black woman. When one woman left the show, she was replaced by another woman. This almost perfectly represents the actual percentages of women and minorities in the FBI.

It is certainly completely reasonable to think that there might be a team consisting of such a group of people. After all, the percentages match up. On the other hand, they could have made a show of all white male FBI agents, which would also be as reasonably realistic a group of FBI agents as the diverse cast. After all, in an organization with 75% Caucasians and 56% men, surely there could be teams that could be all white men? Or for that matter, all Asian women. Or half black women and half Hispanic men. Any combination. However, these (especially the all white male version) would almost certainly never be made, because it would be politically incorrect. If you look at most American television, the casts are carefully designed to be perfectly diverse.

I'd disagree with Dazarath that there is a trend of inclusion of people whose backgrounds don't fit the show. Maybe occasionally, but I haven't noticed such a phenomenon. Generally, I don't have any issue with the backgrounds, sexes, or races of the cast members. They tend to fit the show fine and be completely reasonable. However, casts certainly tend to be just diverse enough, in every show.

It also follows that anime does not have this picture perfect diversity. However, since the Japanese population is 98.5% Japanese, there's also less of a need to represent diversity to be politically correct. Even so, I sense somewhat of a lack of need in Japanese shows to be diverse compared to what is socially required in American television. For instance, there are five or six important police officers in Death Note, and all of them are men. I don't have statistics for Japanese police, but I know that there are women in the police force in Japan. If Death Note were an American show, at least one of those detectives would undoubtedly be a woman. Otherwise, it would assuredly be decried by someone as political incorrect. Just as a quick example. Also keep in mind this mostly applies to shows in a realistic, modern setting, as opposed to things like fantasy and sci-fi, which tend to generally be more diverse in general.

[Matrim]

I can see how avoiding the stock moe archetypes (ie. cowering Mikuru clone) might make very better shows, but I think there is a lot of room out there for characters more along the lines of Kotomi or Ryou.

True but then again I meant the extreme moe archetype anyway. Maybe I should have actually watched more than few episodes of KyoAni's moe filled shows that were referred in the post I quoted before commenting boldly.

Any character type gets tiresome after awhile.

The wisecracking, strong and outspoken Lois Lane-esque female character type is no exception.

And as I already pointed out even in the one American show you pointed as an example not all female characters fit that mold, namely Tara and early Willow. I don't really follow many current US shows so I can't really talk about the trends but anime has many restraints of its own. Something like 90% of the main characters are teenagers, for instance. Which (hello, topic!) happens to be a big pet peeve of mine. I dislike shows where it makes precious little sense for the characters to be teens - say most mecha shows where the majority of the ace pilots are about 16 years old. Or shows with teenage detectives.

Another pet peeve - annoyingly prolonged battles. Everyone describes his special moves, trash talks seemingly for hours, etc. I'd rather have a beautiful, well animated 30 seconds duel than one episode of crappy trash talk and description of superpowers.

[Triple_R]

I think that I inadvertently gave a couple wrong impressions. I'm going to try to clear that up now...

1) For the most part, I liked Buffy the Vampire Slayer; Season 3 especially. The Mayor was an awesome villain. However, sometimes the Buffy cast had too much of a feeling of "sameness" to it for me. For example, almost everybody was a zinger machine... the zingers were typically good and poignant, but because there were so many of them, it started to make the dialogue feel a bit forced and unnatural to me.

Overall, I liked the show, but it could have benefited from a bit more diversity in its cast and dialogue.


2) I actually dislike it when characters are as weak as Mikuru Asahina is. I listed her only because she was a good example of the sort of non-PC character that I was talking about, because she's well-known, and because I would think that she has her fans, even if I'm not one of them.

On a personal level, it's characters like Kotomi, Nagisa, and Ryou that I think are great characters that I would miss if anime went PC.

Originally Posted by 0utf0xZer0

I was disagreeing that American shows are completely lacking in soft characters,

"Soft" wasn't the only qualification I gave.
I also included "very sweet".

Early Willow and Tara are soft, but I don't know if I'd call them "very sweet". Besides, early Willow kind of says it all, don't you think? The clear implication being that early Willow wasn't Ok the way she was.


Look, my main point is just that there are certain anime character types that you don't see an American equivalent to at all... and that's part of anime's distinctive charm.


Also, I don't think that "being palatable to an American audience" has anything to do with it at all. It's just that North American TV show production companies are totally hung up on political correctness; much moreso than their actual audience is.

North American audiences aren't demanding for their entertainment to be PC; if they did, the very politically incorrect Transformers 2 wouldn't have been the blockbuster that it was. Now, I'm not defending Transformers 2's particular sort of political incorrectness... but it does demonstrate that a North American TV show/movie doesn't have to be politically correct in order to be commercially successful.


With this in mind, suppose that you added a Kotomi-like character to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and a Ryou-like character as well.

Do you honestly think that would drive fans away?


I don't. I really don't. In fact, you might broaden the fanbase, imo.

Originally Posted by Matrim

Something like 90% of the main characters are teenagers, for instance. Which happens to be a big pet peeve of mine.

This I agree with you on. It would be nice to see more adult main characters in anime.

[Matrim]

Early Willow and Tara are soft, but I don't know if I'd call them "very sweet".

I would. In fact, Willow keeps pretty much all of her cute mannerisms to the very end of the series

Spoiler for Buffy the Vampire Slayer:

She even manages to be all cute when she tells Wesley how she tried to destroy the world.

. When I said "early" I meant when the show was actually good and had real characters not merely tools for Joss to preach his ideas non-stop. I didn't mean that all the characters grow up and become much better people and Willow gets rid of her "moeness", quite the opposite in fact. And Tara is quite similar to anime characters like Fumi from Aoi Hana.

And I am rapidly going into off-topic territory but I need to say that Buffy is not exactly a paragon for PC overall. It has absolutely zero racial diversity in its main cast, it has entire episodes which mock political correctness quite explicitly - in one Willow feels bad about a Native Indian spirit and gets this reply:

Spoiler for Buffy:

"You won. All right? You came in and you killed them and you took their land. That's what conquering nations do. It's what Caesar did, and he's not going around saying, "I came, I conquered, I felt really bad about it." The history of the world isn't people making friends. You had better weapons, and you massacred them. End of story."

.

So basically I don't think PC is stopping American shows from doing this or that in most cases. It's not PC to mock overweight people but Friends had plenty of rude fat jokes and a very recent episode of How I Met Your Mother was pretty much one extended joke about fat people.

Look, my main point is that there are certain anime character types that you don't see an American equivalent to at all... and that's part of anime's distinctive charm.

And there are widely American character types that are extremely rare in anime. Say 30-something successful professional women as main characters. Or even such male characters although they are a bit more often. It's all about target demographics, IMO.

[Sinestra]

-Plot holes
-Blatantly obvious bad writing combined with lazy writing and what seems to be no motivation to actually put effort into an actually plot and then it drags on.
-Shock and awe to progress the story with no build up whatsoever
-Ecchi at the wrong times when its not needed.
-Breast so massively proportioned that they look they should small moons orbiting around them.
-males lead who make random decisions (bad ones) when all evidence to not make that decision is staring right at them.
-Harem animes where the winner is apparent from the 1st episode but we have to sit though 12 to 24 episodes to just to see them confess to one another while the man character is oblivious to the other girls feelings around him.
-Character motivations that dont make sense.
-Cosmic reset and or it was all a dream.
-Every now and then an anime for some reason will use random english words that have nothing to do with the context of conversation going on and makes No sense whatsoever.
-School days and anything that has to do with it and Dragonaut oh for the love of god Dragonaut it took me months to recover from that one.
-anything that shows abuse (such hitting a woman) in a golden light and makes it seem like she was asking for it.
-sexism
-on occasions some sterotypes from different races pop up in anime it doesnt happen often but when it does i feel its really tasteless.
-Loli's (this one is not really a pet peeve im just not really a fan of them)

[SuperSaiyanOver9000]

at least Pia Carrot was only 3 episodes lol
AND it had funny plot twists

yes loli's are scary
and the breast thing is stupid too (they would have back pain lol)

[animeboy12]

Originally Posted by SuperSaiyanOver9000

yes loli's are scary
and the breast thing is stupid too (they would have back pain lol)

most women with huge breasts ala girls from dragonauts, witchblade, tsunade, bleach girls, and list goes on could kill ten men with their pinky finger.

[SuperSaiyanOver9000]

yeah thats a little boring
I saw 1 character with like small ones in anime (who was over 18)

[lubczyk]

My problem with the whole anime medium as a whole is that there is usually the male/female ratios are way off. I know it makes sense sometimes, like in a girl's club to have mostly girls and the military to be mostly male, but on the most part, it's usually one or the other. Most anime seem to involve some sort of harem and so the show is shewed either to have a cast of either 90% female or 90% male. It really throws the whole suspension of disbelief off.

Like Saint Knight's Tale. 90% female. Okay, this is obviously some guy's wet dream.

Angelique is like a fangirl's fantasy.

My problem with this is that thus romances seem forced and unnatural, like in Clannad. Tomoya is like 1 of 4 guys surrounded by like 10 girls. All the guys are losers to make Tomoya look good by comparison. It feels artificial and fake. Even the romance and interactions since the viewer is forced to default to Tomoya with no other viable male character around.

I just find it lazy writing and not true romance. Very few anime has believable rom romances for this reason alone.

[Ak3mi]

My pet peeve in anime is usually that shows that are ecchi or giant robot or shounen that get all the budget.

Totally agree, I have watched a few Animes with a bit of ecchi and it just seems pretty pointless And also I watch most of my Anime with my girlfriend and it kinda seems strange when we watch it lol :P

Also I really dislike when Animes have really stupid misunderstandings which arn't funny and take up like half of the shows episode.

The thing that annoys me the most is NARUTO FILLERS I hate them so dam much I don't mind Bleaches fillers or Fullmetal Alchemist fillers, but Naruto's fillers just get to me I dont know why

[Oppius]

Originally Posted by lubczyk

My problem with the whole anime medium as a whole is that there is usually the male/female ratios are way off. I know it makes sense sometimes, like in a girl's club to have mostly girls and the military to be mostly male, but on the most part, it's usually one or the other. Most anime seem to involve some sort of harem and so the show is shewed either to have a cast of either 90% female or 90% male. It really throws the whole suspension of disbelief off.

Like Saint Knight's Tale. 90% female. Okay, this is obviously some guy's wet dream.

Angelique is like a fangirl's fantasy.

Quoted for truth.

Back to the topic one thing I hate in almost every shows are the portrayal of female characters. In most female-oriented shows, nearly all female characters beside the heroine herself are villains. Sometimes they can get unrealistically evil. As an example a hero tell the heroine his childhood. He was bullied by his older sisters, not stepsisters or half-sisters. There are some "better" examples than that one but it is the worst thing I ever saw in all shoujo shows.

In male-oriented shows thing aren't getting better either. They can be annoying heroine or very exploiting moeblobs. While does not belong to either two which I mentioned, Revy from Black Lagoon suffered from 'action girl' stereotypes.

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by lubczyk

My problem with the whole anime medium as a whole is that there is usually the male/female ratios are way off. I know it makes sense sometimes, like in a girl's club to have mostly girls and the military to be mostly male, but on the most part, it's usually one or the other. Most anime seem to involve some sort of harem and so the show is shewed either to have a cast of either 90% female or 90% male. It really throws the whole suspension of disbelief off.

Like Saint Knight's Tale. 90% female. Okay, this is obviously some guy's wet dream.

Angelique is like a fangirl's fantasy.

My problem with this is that thus romances seem forced and unnatural, like in Clannad. Tomoya is like 1 of 4 guys surrounded by like 10 girls. All the guys are losers to make Tomoya look good by comparison. It feels artificial and fake. Even the romance and interactions since the viewer is forced to default to Tomoya with no other viable male character around.

I just find it lazy writing and not true romance. Very few anime has believable rom romances for this reason alone.

Those are fair points, though I will say that I liked Clannad a lot, and that the adult males in the show keeps Clannad's gender ratio somewhat realistic.

Your point in general is well-made, though.


If an anime's setting is a school, and it's not focused on something like an all-boys or all-girls club, then there probably should be a fairly close to even gender ratio.

[Full Metal Coast]

Originally Posted by lubczyk

My problem with the whole anime medium as a whole is that there is usually the male/female ratios are way off. I know it makes sense sometimes, like in a girl's club to have mostly girls and the military to be mostly male, but on the most part, it's usually one or the other. Most anime seem to involve some sort of harem and so the show is shewed either to have a cast of either 90% female or 90% male. It really throws the whole suspension of disbelief off.

Like Saint Knight's Tale. 90% female. Okay, this is obviously some guy's wet dream.

Angelique is like a fangirl's fantasy.

My problem with this is that thus romances seem forced and unnatural, like in Clannad. Tomoya is like 1 of 4 guys surrounded by like 10 girls. All the guys are losers to make Tomoya look good by comparison. It feels artificial and fake. Even the romance and interactions since the viewer is forced to default to Tomoya with no other viable male character around.

I just find it lazy writing and not true romance. Very few anime has believable rom romances for this reason alone.

i think any situation where 90% of the people are female and are hot is every guys wet dream. but that brings me to my next point.

why is almost every guy in a romance/harem/comedy completely clureless, dense and such a pansy. i hate it when you get male characters like Natsuru Senou who is borderline re-tard.

[lubczyk]

Originally Posted by Full Metal Coast

i think any situation where 90% of the people are female and are hot is every guys wet dream. but that brings me to my next point.

why is almost every guy in a romance/harem/comedy completely clureless, dense and such a pansy. i hate it when you get male characters like Natsuru Senou who is borderline re-tard.

Otaku can't relate to a competent protagonist or a supporting cast that is three-dimensional. They want shows that pander to well-worn and easy archetypes and stereotypes.

[Chiibi]

why is almost every guy in a romance/harem/comedy completely clureless, dense and such a pansy. i hate it when you get male characters like Natsuru Senou who is borderline re-tard.

Heh, every girl in reverse-harems aren't usually anything to write home about either but it's for the same reason: these characters are just ordinary (bordering on lame) so the viewer is like "Oh he/she's just like me...this is my fantasy!!"

I think it really fails sometimes though because they go overboard.

Harem leads I DO like: Inuzuka Koushi, (Sumomomo) Takeya (DearS) Sorata (Mouse) Kazuki (Maburaho) and Negi (Negima)

Koushi's smart. Takeya's not a huge push-over, Sorata...well he's timid...but I find him oh so cute, plus he's an artist w00t XD. Kazuki's the nicest guy in the world who is also damn brave, and Negi...he's adorable and he's a child so he's permitted to be clueless.

[lubczyk]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

Those are fair points, though I will say that I liked Clannad a lot, and that the adult males in the show keeps Clannad's gender ratio somewhat realistic.

Your point in general is well-made, though.


If an anime's setting is a school, and it's not focused on something like an all-boys or all-girls club, then there probably should be a fairly close to even gender ratio.

Shoot, the girls don't get jealous and the guy never competes for their attention. It's bullshit, as far as I'm concerned. Oh, the twins cry over their loss for 30 seconds in an episode, yet act for the rest of season 1 and season 2 as if nothing has happened. There's really no real relationship building in harem anime. It's static.