The Genderbending of Haruhi Suzumiya [Spoilers Aplenty]

[unmoldedtruck]

"Grin and bear it", not "bare".

[yggdrasil325]

Personally, I don't care if someone's a lolicon when they're watching anime. I just don't want them to act on those interests on actual children.

[shaoron]

mmm... breast size...
serious business

Spoiler for something slightly off topic... and maybe NSFW:

now that i added fuel to the ever increasing flame...
*runs away*

[C.A.]

It was in the boobs discussion in the General anime section.

Boobs are a good source for discussion.

[unmoldedtruck]

WHO DO YOU THINK WE ARE!? WE'RE SEITENKAN!

Kyonko wins, 5975 out of 11374 votes, 52.5%.

Originally Posted by yggdrasil325

Personally, I don't care if someone's a lolicon when they're watching anime. I just don't want them to act on those interests on actual children.

I'm mainly interested in 2D. My RL interests only go down to 11 or 12.

[C.A.]

Honestly I believed Kyonko already booked her place in the finals, right from the start.

[yggdrasil325]

Originally Posted by shaoron

mmm... breast size...
serious business

Spoiler for something slightly off topic... and maybe NSFW:

now that i added fuel to the ever increasing flame...
*runs away*

So the ones who like small breasts actually like them impossibly huge, and the big-breast enthusiasts like them relatively small...
This is about as shocking and ground-breaking of a revelation as "Pirates = Ninjas".

[Roger Rambo]

Originally Posted by beanbrew

I'm mainly interested in 2D. My RL interests only go down to 11 or 12.

I don't think you're helping yourself Beanbag...

Originally Posted by shaoron

mmm... breast size...
serious business

Spoiler for something slightly off topic... and maybe NSFW:

now that i added fuel to the ever increasing flame...
*runs away*

Suddenly Lolicon makes sense. They're on crack.

Alternatively, this kind of thinking is exclusive to Japan, and was caused by radiation.

[Jintor]

Like ghouls.

[Nanao-kun]

Originally Posted by Roger Rambo

Alternatively, this kind of thinking is exclusive to Japan, and was caused by radiation.

That explains alot.

EDIT: Wait, if that's true, does that mean it's America's fault?

[besieger]

Originally Posted by HikariNiwa

That explains alot.

EDIT: Wait, if that's true, does that mean it's America's fault?

No. F**king. DUH.

[otai]

Their 200 year old tentacle porn tells me the Japanese were weird long before the USA set them up the bomb. They were probably natural lolicons; based on the design of the kimono, they were probably trying to make all breasts look flat.

The radiation and CIA mind control during their occupation simply expanded their interests to include large breasts.

PS. Besides, everybody knows you measure breasts by the pound.

[GuidoHunter_Toki]

Originally Posted by otai

Their 200 year old tentacle porn tells me the Japanese were weird long before the USA set them up the bomb. They were probably natural lolicons; based on the design of the kimono, they were probably trying to make all breasts look flat.

The radiation and CIA mind control during their occupation simply expanded their interests to include large breasts.

PS. Besides, everybody knows you measure breasts by the pound.

Actually tentacle porn wasn't really created due to some fetish they had for it, but it was used to avoid breaking the law. Japanese artist Katsushika Hokusai, who was famous for erotic woodcarvings created what most could call the first "Tentacle rape" art piece. "The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife" was the name of the wood carving. There was literally no sexual tentacle material until about a century later thanks to Toshio Maeda.

Maeda intended to create an animated porn movie, but Japanese law forbade anatomically explicit creations of a sexual nature, which basically translated to animated penises. So Maeda had to find a way to dodge it, thus Maeda looked to Japanese painter Katsushika Hokusai for inspiration. And after careful thought, Maeda replaced penises with large octopi. Problem solved!

[dkellis]

Originally Posted by Ithekro

For those of you not working on the project (and perhaps those that are as well), could you define "why is Kyonko moe?" and "How to explain to others what is special about this character that draws people to her?"

There are two facets to this question that I'd like to explore.

Firstly, "what makes Kyonko moe?" The "gut" aspect of moe, the sort which allows pictures of original characters to be classified as "moe" without any background, is in the appearance: Kyonko is defined to be short and petite, lending her an advantage. The ponytail appeals to those who like that sort of thing: I count myself in that group, although I'm not fanatical about it or anything. It also gives her a distinctive appearance: in the simplified art style of most manga, anime, and derivatives, characters are often differentiated by their costumes or their hairstyles, which is why a lot of the impractical varieties we see in pop culture come from or are inspired by anime. (The other is in superhero comic books, where costumes have great importance as well, since the whole "secret identity" thing often means anonymity in masks and such.)

Therefore, Kyonko's appearance lends itself to moe, but is not a guaranteed moe. She's generically cute, especially since she's usually seen in a school uniform (itself a feature of moe) and the usual methods of enhancing that (enlarging the eyes, squishifying the face, changing head-to-body proportions) work as well.

Which brings us to the second facet of the question, and the one I think is the actual one: what makes Kyonko interesting?

Let's take a side tangent to look at Mikuru. Haruhi recognizes that she's moe, and Kyon definitely does as well. She fits all the usual moe stereotypes, in appearance and in personality. It is abundantly clear that she is meant to be The Moe Character, satirized or otherwise. Even detractors name her the "moe-blob".

The problem Mikuru faces as a character is that compared to Yuki and Haruhi and Kyon, she's not interesting enough. The only character in the main SOS Brigade arguably less interesting is Itsuki, who nevertheless gets less flak, possibly because he gets to infodump. Also, I am of the opinion that the fanbase has something to do with Mikuru's demonization compared to Itsuki: the "moe-blob" is prevalent in a lot of male-oriented anime recently, which may explain the "but Itsuki's ambiguous gay-ness is not as cliche" comments I've heard: Itsuki's character type can be seen in plenty of shoujo manga, although I cannot comment on the recentness.

Anyway. The point I'm making is that the question shouldn't be "what makes Kyonko moe?" as much as "what makes Kyonko popular?" In a comparison of moe-ness, I'd place Mikuru above Yuki every time, but in a comparison of liking the character, Yuki wins hands down.

So, what makes Kyonko interesting? The obvious one is that she's a version of the audience surrogate that is Kyon. That's instant audience sympathy right there: Kyonko is One Of Us. Everything the audience is thinking, or at least the snarkier portion of the audience, Kyonko also thinks, and occasionally vocalizes. She also manages, like Kyon, to put it in a dry, ironic, waspish manner, leading to something that is surprisingly rare in both fiction and Real Life: Kyonko, like Kyon, has a well-honed and sharp sense of humour.

Kyonko also obtains, from the genderswap, the worries, or at least the worries as seen through a predominantly male fanbase, of a teenage girl. Chest size, height, chest size, appearance compared to others around her (read: Itsuko), chest size... we've seen plenty of it in other shows, but Kyonko deals with it in the manner we recognize most from Real Life: she doesn't let it rule her interactions with others, but she doesn't dismiss it as completely trivial either. Kyonko is "realistic", in the simulated sense that a fictional character can be: realistic as we believe a "realistic character" is, rather than actual realism.

There are also plenty of bizarre things happening around Kyonko, the self-avowed Normal Average High School Student. Some of them are even amusing in themselves without Kyonko's commentary (bunnygirls et al). There is the concept in comedy of what TVTropes calls The Unfunny (if you want to read a more in-depth description), which is when a character not known for explicit humour is placed into a humourous or strange situation. (The example most often given is Batman.) It's a matter of dissonance: the situation is fantastical and unreal, but Kyonko's reactions and narration brings it down to "normality".

Taken as a raw bundle of personality, Kyonko already has enough traits to make her a favoured and popular character. Now throw in the eye candy of her baseline-moe appearance, and I think one can understand how Kyonko became so popular: she's different from Kyon, in that the female portion of the fanbase can now treat her as the audience surrogate, while the male portion can see her as a Separate Character suitable for "Mai Waifu" declarations.

... or I could just be talking out of my arse.

[Tyabann]

......Wow.

[unmoldedtruck]

Since when the hell is Mikuru moe? More to the point, I'm going to say that moe is completely subjective and that you can't actually say that someone is moe without attaching a person to it. For example, when dkellis says that Mikuru is moe, he means that certain people find her moe, like Kyon or Haruhi. I think Mikuru is some sort of disgusting spawn of Satan that is lower than the centipede that I crushed a few weeks ago. I accept that she's meant to be the moe character, but... Holy pancake on a stick skewered with rats.

And it's not just the breasts. I'm okay with Tomoyo and Rider, I'm just turned off by their breasts, but with Mikuru... I really hate her. I have no idea why, but... Why am I talking about this?

[Roger Rambo]

Because you're a pedophile.

[Tyabann]

Don't worry, I hate Mikuru too.

Though I hate her because she's useless and uninteresting and her only point in the series is to provide fanservice, facilitate further sexual tension, and make sure Kyon doesn't think about Haruhi too much.

What a bitch.

Her older self, on the other hand, is so much more interesting, given that she's like much darker and not nearly as useless. Unfortunately, she only shows up in, like four books.

I hope Kyon and Haruhi get together eventually, thus driving Mikuru to Kaede-levels of despair and insanity, and culminating in her angstful escape back to the future, where she spends several years transforming into her older, more awesome self. That would be badass.


Also, yeah, moe is inherently subjective and thus has no true definition. The nearest we can come to one is by identifying moe archtypes, thus explaining why those kind of traits are moe to many people, although we will never have a universal definition.

Also, Anime Koizumi may be uninteresting, but I still think Novel Koizumi gets much more development and is awesome. And he's bi, not gay.

[Jintor]

You people put way too much thought into this kinda thing.

Go with your instincts.

[Tyabann]

My instincts say that, being short, cute, tsundere, and ponytailed, Kyonko is hot.

My instincts, ergo, are awesome, and deserve a raise.