Kimurah said:Domsa said:
I can see where you're coming from, but this is not a psychological thriller or anything among those lines. That guy being a nice person instead of a Perfect Blue-like stalker brings so much more value to the series imo. It does a great job regarding PTSD portrayal (for the medium that is), for it is a disease because it manifests itself as an irreverent, non-discriminatory fear, not a valid one. How do you imagine her making a first step towards overcoming that fear in this scenario if that guy was a creep indeed and this took a really dark turn? I mean... yeah, sure, he's a bit 'peculiar', but considering he's so out of touch with the real world and afraid of people and the one person that gave him hope was cancelled because of him (from his pov), how do you expect him to react considering he still has this wish to become better and still stans Ai?
It's fiction aimed at younger girls and I've thought that this approach is quite appropriate. Moreover, how do you expect him to know that Ai wasn't worried about it before he started stalking her? The same action can be perceived in different manners if you change the recipient and his is a plausible take on what could have happened after that unfortunate event, considering his backstory, and he'd dealt with it as he had seen fit. Also, people are equally cringe and make fools out of themselves in real life too and that's ok (being cringe I mean).
Edit: not rhetorical questions, I'm really curious how your optimal, gritty approach would look like or what you would have expected to happen for it to be good. (I'm not saying it's a flawless show by any means, but I didn't find those to be the biggest problems regarding it. Might be wrong tou vOv)
You are partially right, this isn't a psychological thriller, but my personal gripe is that it just pussyfoots the more touchy subjects by adding a lot of comedic values for respite manner, wich makes it quite unbalanced imho. I also have this same problem with a lot of battle shounen that just tries to look cool by being dark and edgy, but it falls flat and brakes immersion with cheesy uncalled comedy.
I would certainly had prefered if the otaku element was played like in Perfect Blue rather than becoming a red herring. But sadly a lot of writers just don't have the balls to taint the otaku, specially when they are the biggest consumers of their product, hence why the whole PTSD and lack of social awareness of that guy feels more like a cheap shoutout and pandering from the author towards a big portion of their customers.
Regarding your subject of Kitaouji not knowing that he wasn't the actual catalyst for Ai to leave the GPX group feels more like a tool to put stalking in a cute light hearted perspective, but in reality both men & women that have suffered from stalkers just won't sit with this very rose tinted glasses perspective, specially if it's released in what you already stated as a series for younger girls. My biggest gripe against Kitaouji is his obsessive apologetic stance that drives him to stalking Ai, common sense would just dictate of him moving on with his life after he found friends with common interests and a steady job. It just feels like a very overused anime cliche and it clashes when the show tries to be serious in other subjects imho.
I'm not a writer and my input on a hypothetic scenario of Ai taking the initial step towards accepting men won't matter (specially in a community like this that immediately jumps on you because we're not published authors) But I can give you this, I certainly would have not introduced a threat like Kitaouji if I wasn't planning on it being an actual threat.
RobertBobert said:
I think the problem is that your opponent used a typical false dilemma, saying that shows should either be as serious as possible with their content, or be as lighthearted and as innocent as possible. But anyway,
I do not understand why Western viewers are obsessed with the idea that any show that touches on real issues should immediately turn into the most serious educational content.
Right, because it's easier to throw in a strawman rather than engage in an actual debate. But there really isn't anything to debate on gatekeepers that immediately scorn
"baka gaijin" for having their own line of thought that doesn't align with their obviously superior and "right way" of consuming fiction.