:;()$&@"\The Anime Pub/:;()$&@"

I'm just awed that a thread from 5 years ago has remained active all this time, regardless of the topic. It makes me wonder what I was watching in 2013. I was thinking maybe Code Geass, but that was apparently 10 years ago. Jesus, time flies.

"

鬼殺し wrote:

just saw myself on page 2. wow. 2013

I'm seeing you on the first page, the 6th post

I didn't post until 2016(page 21), mainly because i had been posting in a few on other sites and they just went to shit.

"

鬼殺し wrote:

Sooo i just reread. The. Whole. Thread.


Wow.

But... why?

"

North2 wrote:

You are not doing anyone a favor by not watching Schindler's List to see a part of the horrors of the Holocaust.

it is a freaking movie.
the horror of systematically murdering 6 million people cannot be visualized. and if it could be, it would break you.
this is simply something that overchallenges perception. that doesnt mean we shouldnt try to understand it. but dont act like you knew misery when you just dont.

"

North2 wrote:

You're simply choosing to remain neutral by trying your hardest to not be exposed to it. It's just turning your head the other way and pretending it didn't exist.

no, all i am saying is that entertainment-media are a sub-optimal approach to serious topics.
exposure is exactly the right word: peole want to think they cared about the miserable, that they were empathic.....BY STARING AT A FICTIONAL WORK ON A SCREEN that can be turned off and on at a whim.
look at the news: genocide, war, sports, the stockmarket, the weather - it is all the same.

"

North2 wrote:

What these shows do is it exposes varius problems to many people that they didn't know existed.

i have read my share of psychological literature, i know what the ICD 10-5 is and how to use it.
lets just be brutally honest here: why isnt there any movie that empathically portraits the misery of a pedophile? being pedophile isnt a moral choice, these people are mentally ill. but thats not really a mind that you would want to get into, hm?
same with histrionics: completely ignored and untouched by entertainment-media.

"

North2 wrote:

Here's an example that's maybe easier to understand. If there was just one person that watched Angel Beats and became an organ donor, then that's a positive for society.

and by that same logic "evil" media make people do evil things.....but i guess your argument only works in one direction, in the morally positive direction.
if someone needs a freaking movie or series to awaken their morals and tell them to do a good thing....thats the same utterly stupid argument as claiming: "without the 10 commandments wed still be living in anarchy and raping and murdering each other!".



edit: i wont reply to any replies to this, at least not in this thread. if you want to genuinely understand what a "symbol" or "medium" is in the year 2018 - read baudrillard, mcluhan etc.

to de-derail this and get back to eva, to anime: poets have managed to evoce with a handful of precise words what eva dabbles at with 26 episodes.
a poet only uses words. and every single word is full of meaning and is there for a reason.
an anime uses visuals, words and music. and that is exactly where and why any "text" is lost. it simply isnt as precise.

the fundamental question that so many critics miss and that constitutes whether something is trully a work of art or just a piece of entertainment is this: could this have been done in any other medium?
triggers or ghiblis anime only works as an anime.
koyaanisqatsi only works as a film.
poems and music cannot be transferred to any other media and are therefore te highest forms of art.

evas story could be told better in a novel.
its symbolism could be expressed better by poetry.
the animation in this _anime_ is nothing special.
the whole thing could be done as a real-film - and what exactly would be lost?

"

鬼殺し wrote:

Gf has picked nichijou next.

That's an absolutely awesome series. I only watched a little bit of it, since I only watch episodes from it when I NEED some light hearted comedy. Mostly after I watched a really sad or depressing show. Last time I needed some Nichijou was after I finished Shinsekai Yori.
I'm pretty sure you'll like it. They really did some... interesting stuff with their animation budget.

Oh, Re zero... it's been a while. Pretty much the only series that had some sort of time travel in it that I enjoyed. It's also one of those series a certain someone in this thread would not enjoy that has people mentally breaking down in them.

"

PaoloPinkel wrote:

"

North2 wrote:

Here's an example that's maybe easier to understand. If there was just one person that watched Angel Beats and became an organ donor, then that's a positive for society.

and by that same logic "evil" media make people do evil things.....but i guess your argument only works in one direction, in the morally positive direction.
if someone needs a freaking movie or series to awaken their morals and tell them to do a good thing....thats the same utterly stupid argument as claiming: "without the 10 commandments wed still be living in anarchy and raping and murdering each other!".

I'll start with this part since the rest of it can pretty much be summed up with this. Why does all of your arguments only work in the morally negative direction? You're beginning to sound like someone who watches too much news and believes there's nothing but terrible things in this world.

In all the movies I've seen where evil guys do evil things, it all encourages people NOT to do it. Even in movies where the evil guy wins, it leaves the viewer thinking, "Well now what?" to show how hollow of a victory that was. It leaves me thinking, "Sure I suppose he won, but I would not want to live that way".

Then there's a whole bunch more non-serious media that portrays evil people doing evil things that's clearly not meant for anyone to make any moral judgment for. GTA V and American Psycho comes to mind.

Slightly back to the topic of the thread, let's look at slice-of-life anime. The only thing these shows work off of is allowing people to emphasize with the characters, and it just feels good to sort of be there. No moral to the story, no end plot, nothing. They let us emphasize with the happier feelings in life. Are you going to dismiss these shows as well? If so, why?

"

PaoloPinkel wrote:

it is a freaking movie.
the horror of systematically murdering 6 million people cannot be visualized. and if it could be, it would break you.
this is simply something that overchallenges perception. that doesnt mean we shouldnt try to understand it. but dont act like you knew misery when you just dont.

no, all i am saying is that entertainment-media are a sub-optimal approach to serious topics.
exposure is exactly the right word: peole want to think they cared about the miserable, that they were empathic.....BY STARING AT A FICTIONAL WORK ON A SCREEN that can be turned off and on at a whim.
look at the news: genocide, war, sports, the stockmarket, the weather - it is all the same.

So it's "just a movie", comparative to what? What other media do you think shows the misery of the Holocaust better than Shindler's List? There is no amount of documentary or historical research that lets people catch a glimpse of what it's emotionally like to actually be there better than the movie.

I remember exactly how I felt when I watched Shindler's List in school. Before I saw it, I viewed the Holocaust as just another mark in history that I just learned in my history class. As I was watching the movie, I started to imagine what it's like to be there. I can see a lot of absolute dread on screen, and realized that it's just scratching the surface. I remember kids in my class crying, both boys and girls. It allows people to emphasize as much as they can, however little that can be. And as you've cynically stated, I can start to see how truly unimaginable it is because it's so far out of their ordinary lives. It's a real-life horror that's truly beyond the scope of imagination.

I would argue that there is no approach even remotely close to the media because of how well the media can emotionally touch a large number of people. Exposure is the right word, and it's the most essential first step for any given topic. The (often misused) power of all forms of media shows this very clearly.

"

PaoloPinkel wrote:

i have read my share of psychological literature, i know what the ICD 10-5 is and how to use it.
lets just be brutally honest here: why isnt there any movie that empathically portraits the misery of a pedophile? being pedophile isnt a moral choice, these people are mentally ill. but thats not really a mind that you would want to get into, hm?
same with histrionics: completely ignored and untouched by entertainment-media.

I would say it's probably because it's impossible for an audience to emphasize with a pedophile, even in a partial sense. Misery, depression, suicidal thoughts, these things can be emphasized at least partially by most people. I have no idea how I can possibly emphasize with the sexual desire to fondle a little child.

Re:Zero is a hard one to judge. It's one of those shows that I liked, but I also can't openly recommend to anyone. On the other hand, it is a pretty fun ride to go on with someone else. It was a show that was especially fun to ask, "what did you think of last week's episode?".

F * C K.
so i finished eva.
what a waste.

if anyone reading this hasnt seen it yet and intends to do so: read a summary of episodes 1-24 on the internet and endure the absolute sh*tshow that the last 2 episodes are.
ill even give them a pass on the "minimal" (thats an euphemism) style of the last two episodes, as it blends visual style with the theme at hand (still, i suspect the very simple reason was that the suits patience and money had run out).

there is nothing to be interpreted about eva. its a pretentious blend of mysticism, psycho-analysis and existentialism.
yeah, we all have a "dark spot" in our "souls". yeah, we all doubt ourselfs. no, the world doesnt rotate around you, which sucks, i mean - it should, right?

i once tried scientologies dianetics-screening on the internet just for fun. it is based on the same (easy to debunk) psychological traps as eva:
are you sometimes unhappy?
do you sometimes suspect others dislike you?
do you sometimes not want to leave the bed and sleep in?
do you sometimes get into a sntimental or sad emotional state with no apparent cause?
do you sometimes doubt who you are?
are you unhappy about decision you made in your life?
etc etc.

OF COURSE. but those are minor and (for a healthy human being) easily overcome issues. or they even are the failures from which we learn and rise even higher.
if they arent minor, if you cant handle it - go see a doctor (or join scientology, if you hate your money as much as yourself). thats all there is to it.


if you wanna loathe in melancholia....reading the basic works of freud/ jung, cioran, sartre/ camus, listening to nirvana, watching a lars van trier movie - all those take less time and costs less money than sitting through the 26 utterly pointless episodes of eva.

as i wrote above: poets have expressed the same topics in the compact format of poetry and with greater effects and impact and obviously artistic skill than eva.
noone can justify that this series drags on for 26 incoherent, pointless and at times obvious-filler episodes to do what it does in the end.
and given how abrupt the ending comes about, the shortage of money or time that shines through the "animation", the loose ends....this isnt really the end that the writer intended.

How about this...would you say Eva could have been a better show if all the characters were replaced with tropy, flashy, wonky anime characters like DBZ? Would it even be Eva if it was? You're trying too hard to find a reason to show the depression, anxiety, etc. when the only reason needed is to depict the character.

Your rant did remind me of another thing I got out of Eva when I watched it 15 years ago. It taught me, or perhaps more accurately, it got me to teach myself that being a flawed human being is okay as long as I accept who I am and strive to become better. This is something no other movie, TV show or anime I watched up to that point has even come close to exploring.

To this day, I still have no interest whatsoever to read psychology books. I did not watch Eva for a psychology lesson, but it exposed me to some of it. This is the power of entertainment media. I can justify the 26 episodes in that I personally found it entertaining, while I cannot say the same for poetry and psychology books. If you find poetry more entertaining, then that's your thing. Honestly, it took you way too long to realize that Eva is not for you if you watched through all 26 episodes.