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7.34
- Total Entries70
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All Comments (24) Comments
Great to hear from you!
Thanks so much! I've watched episode 3 now and wow you really need tissues while watching, but it's GREAT so far!!
I haven't watched (completed) any anime shows (except movies) with a friends+romance theme similar to this. Almost everything in that genre are Shounen shows which come with the usual sh*t I can't bear.
I'm really happy about it. This is the first anime I'm watching since a few months ;)
So I left Ao Haru Ride dangling on my ptw list for too long it seems ;)
Take care, hope to see you soon!
Have a good trip and be safe :)
I see you've found something new you like a lot.
So... I'm also starting to watch Orange. Looks interesting!
What a great surprise :)
WELCOME BACK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Also thanks for the great post and pm, what do you think, let's continue via pm generally?
I'll go answer now :)
Really glad you're back!
I LOVED the sisterhood :D
Lots of unique characters!
So many funny lines and it was very cute too :)
I want more :p
Why are great anime always way too short? :(
Did the anime stay true to the manga, so... could someone just start reading where the anime left off?
I'd like that ;)
When there aren't any really great anime left I'll be forced to return to regular tv or read manga.
And I'll certainly read some before that, there's so much diversity that there must be a few really great titles.
Futago already was something I really liked, too bad the last chapters might take a few years to translate given how slow this has been progressing till now.
You're right, especially about the culture shock.
Still, if you think about all the fan sub groups and scanlators and how much work that must be and how many translated titles there are, I'd never think that it was so rare.
But apparently it's true... my friends and family even confuse manga with anime.
Okaaayyy, but you picked those "top 10 of the hardest", this isn't fair!! ;)
Maybe they were wrong but it made sense to me in combination with romaji at least. Phonetic patterns are quite static compared to English (or so I've heard).
I'd guess that French would be much harder in terms of pronunciation.
I hated my 2 years of French in school! :D
It's great to be able to speak the language and it's even a quite important one too and I'm a bit jealous that you're probably already capable, but still that brings back bad memories hahaha... when I started learning French (I've forgotten most of it unfortunately) I thought: great! Grammar as complex as Latin, only this time I'll have to actually speak the Language and won't have much time to think + the (for me) quite difficult pronunciation.
Japanese sounds soooooo cute. The video you linked is very nice and funny ;)
I've watched some of that series, but although this is meant to help you learn Japanese, I thought she was speaking English more slowly than Japanese... wayyy too fast for me. One time I wondered whether this wasn't more appropriate for Japanese people to learn English :D Still, fun to watch :)
Oh, I see now that was quite ambiguous :)
I was referring to Yona only.
The Kuragehime one you linked is great! Both the song + the art. It's really creative :)
And the second one is just hilarious!! :D
I'll watch this anime soon!
Yes, I liked exactly that, what you said, about Yona!
The heroine, who seemed like a typical Shoujo female MC at the beginning, growing so much combined with the not so black & white revenge arc and motivations was very nice. Hopefully they'll continue.
Thanks so much for your detailed review about Attack on Titan concerning the female characters!! This was REALLY helpful!
>During the training of the new cadets, I was happy to see that the treatment was the same to everyone.
Love it!! That this is rarely the case otherwise is something that often bothered me so I'm really glad to hear that! :)
>But even with so many amazing women, all the upper levels are held by men.
A real pity and in context of this show, with obviously so many strong women, even more illogical (as always...).
I don't get those writers...
>...Her decisions are based on what he needs...
Also a pity. If this wasn't the case, based on what you wrote, she could've been a great feminist character.
But, although this is closely tied to that negative feature in this case, I like a minor part of it: that a male MC is being protected by a female outside of stupid harem constellations.
I'm interested in that, especially because we get to see this so rarely.
Also I'm still looking for romantic relationships where the male isn't the more dominant and/or more assertive one.
If there was any romance going on between those characters, which I believe isn't(?), it looks like this could likely be the case.
Although there aren't too many, at least we have a handful of anime with great female characters who are independent and determined and strong, but when it comes to romantic relationships, there don't seem to be any feminist compatible at all (at least nothing serious). Women are always depicted as following their men, even if they appear to be "stronger" (not necessarily physically) at first. And this REALLY sucks!
I don't automatically hate it when the boy is more protective of the girl and it's more of a classical romance, this can be sweet as well (the Notebook? :p :D), but this is problematic when it's always the case and sadly it really is always the case and by now I've had enough of it!
Of course it's no question how counterproductive static gender roles generally are in the media, but it seems to me that they are even more static when it comes to romances.
I see you'll give her another chance ;) it's great that season 2 won't take too long anymore :) *fingers crossed for her*
Too bad about Zoe :/ maybe she could still change in the 2nd season? You read the manga too?!
>Another character that could be very interesting is Annie Leonhart....
Sounds exciting :) I hope she isn't dead and that's the reason she didn't have much time to show off her personality :/
>Overall, Attack on Titan has many good points: the visibility for women, the female characters as more than pretty faces, same uniform, no fanservice, no stereotypes, no weird perverted male characters, it has several feminist-friendly elements, but it’s problematic in many ways, especially the anime.
Ok, so there are numerous positive sides to it, but at the same time many disappointing elements :/
I'll definitely watch it and if it was just for some aspects of the female characters, the stereotypes free zone and the lack of stupid perverted males... not so many anime out there like that, especially in this genre I imagine.
Death Note was my very first. I've watched it many years before I started watching anime.
Back then I wasn't that sensitive, but I remember being disappointed about the female characters, although I thought that it was otherwise an intelligent, really well done series.
Hahaha funny you mention SOA. The pristine example of an extremely popular series that's just plain wrong and boring. I got it recommended multiple times because I was looking for romance anime when I joined. I finally dropped it at the time when they had their shallow marriage, but I've endured it for a whole episode longer than you :D
I really don't get it why it's so popular. Even if you don't care that it's offensive and you don't give a damn about feminism, I thought that more people would notice how very boring those characters are.
>....All you see is stereotype, slut/fat/anything-shaming, sexism, prejudice, etc....but you lose the ability to ignore certain things...
Great... this is fodder for my OCD :D
But seriously, very well said, this makes a lot of sense.
Before watching anime, there was lots that bothered me about Hollywood TV as well. Shows with little to no content that felt they had to show off and objectify women in a fanservice kind of sense, because they were lacking in good enough content (generally I'm not someone who screams "OBJECTIFICATION!!!" a lot, since I believe we humans just tend to do that, but that it's still mostly just women who are being objectified is a whole different story and a huge bad sign for our society in my opinion), shows bursting with double standards throwing their highly intellectual speeches right into your face one after another and the -mostly disappointing- portrayals of heroines.
But in anime, all of that is multiplied it seems. It's much more extreme (which was very unexpected at first) and I really think that it sensitized me a lot more.
Yes... what you said makes sense, it's the only thing you can do if you don't want to abandon entertainment or most media as a whole.
I also hope that this is going to change at least a little more before I grow old. I'm now past 30 and thinking about how little (or not at all) society and the media have changed in this regard, since I was little, makes me sad.
We need more Miyazakis and -to a lesser extent- maybe also a few more Joss Whedons :), but especially more women in higher positions inside the industry.
(great picture and text BTW)
I see you are already re-watching Kuragehime ;) maybe I'll join you.
>The "Total demon mobolization" is something exclusive to her. Fuwa annoyed her so much that the demon Kyoko reached its full power, completely out of control! Amazing!!!
:( it's embarrassing then that I didn't remember this from the anime. Sounds powerful ;)
Afterall what you said is going to happen doesn't sound uninteresting though. Please keep me updated once you know more about her character (whether we'll keep our powerful Kyouko...)
>I get a lot of weird looks because I'm a grown woman reading comic books backwards...haha...
:D :D I can only imagine!!
Isn't it weird somehow how captivating all of that is and how huge the selection of manga and anime is, but it's still so unusual in western countries that you stand out so much reading manga or watching anime? I bet it's either you're really into it -completely- or you avoid it at any cost so there's little in between... I might be wrong of course, I just have this feeling.
It's almost stigmatized, although there's enough demand for so many fan sub groups and "scanlators" to exist. The amount of manga you can read in English is still overwhelming.
Regarding spoilers, I'm not extremely sensitive myself, but it depends. When it's something tied to the future in a way that's supposed to surprise you a lot like resolutions, twists or even character deaths, I'd like to avoid them if possible ;)
There are people who can't stand the tiniest of spoilers, a friend of mine is one of them. Sometimes I'm too quick to spill something, so I'm glad about what you said that it wasn't too much :)
It seems grammar is a lot less complicated than in romance languages and pronunciation should be quite easy (only that this doesn't help us :( ), but those ~2k kanji + hiragana + katakana and the unusual way to read them must be quite a challenge :(
Although, maybe it's not that hard to get into it, to start and to get something out of it relatively quickly with a dictionary at hand (since everywhere I've looked it's mentioned that grammar would be easy). But at the very least it would be very tedious probably.
What you said about Yona makes absolutely sense and I very much hope you're right!
It's not been that long since the first season aired either, so at least time hasn't run out on us yet (thinking about what's often mentioned, that it's unlikely for sequels to appear after a 3+ year hiatus).
(my favorite opening too, btw :) + my favorite ending would be this one.
When I hear those songs I almost can't hold myself to start re-watching it hehe)
About Yona, I didn't think at first that she was that independent and strong (and she wasn't of course, the whole story doesn't allow for that) and at first I just looked at some scenes and didn't think that I'd be interested seeing her being protected and saved all the time from male characters. But that was a mistake obviously and I think it's especially nice to see how she uses her support to get stronger herself rather than just stay the little princess as it's often the case. So much that it even qualifies as something feminist. I hope we'll see her real power (especially personality) in the next season or in the continuation of the manga, which I'll definitely read should there be no season 2 (and maybe even then).
Thanks for the hints and this nice guide!
It will definitely help :)
And your "too much to watch" picture is hilarious :D
Vitamin D hehehe, funny you mention that because I recently found out that I really had a strong deficit :D
I see you're watching Attack on Titan and judging from your rating so far you like it a lot.
Although I noticed it's listed as a club relation in the feminist fangirls club, how great are the female characters really in your opinion?
I fear that after watching anime with great women, I won't be interested in most of the "normal" anime anymore.
I don't know why that is exactly, since there are many forms of sexism I don't experience in the same way as women do in real life. But it makes me so mad! I guess I just find weak heroines very boring and I hate double standards and sexism so much (against both genders) that truly strong female characters have almost become a requirement for me in order to enjoy a series. They destroy common, classic gender roles and prejudice, which become more and more painful to watch.
But I'm afraid that there won't be much left sooner or later :/
Sorry for the long post :/
I also think it's good to get more background about her, there was too little of it in the anime, but I'm not so thrilled about hearing that Ren almost vanishes. I thought he was a more interesting character and he made for some hilarious confrontations with Fuwa.
I won't read it. I'm (still) not very used to reading manga and there is too much out there I'd be interested in and Skip Beat in this form doesn't sound THAT amazing anymore :/
Hmmm, I can only imagine how much better a physical copy must be. I don't think I could buy them in a local shop over here, but probably Amazon. But what about all those unlicensed or unfinished ones with just fan translations available... I was thinking about buying a big enough e-book reader for that with a high enough resolution that might work, but the currently available devices -while not so bad- are still not ideal.
Ohh, I'm glad you aren't mad, because afterwards I was worried that I might have spoiled too much and the timeout for editing the post had already expired.
Now that I've finished season 2, I can spoil even more :D just kidding, but there's still something I'd like you to know:
1. I was hooked after episode 1. (Although it's a more serious show overall) it was too funny and exciting at the same time that I couldn't wait to know what's next.
2. The finale: for me it wasn't one of those where you'd regret starting with the story in the first place, it was really okay for the most important story threads and didn't leave you hanging in the middle of something (for the most part), but it will leave you wanting for much more, definitely. And this time around you can't escape that by reading the manga which doesn't cover more of the story either.
The Light Novel it's based on hasn't been officially translated and only roughly 50% made it into the anime or manga.
If you are okay with "fanlations" though, there are summaries for all volumes/chapters available and often quite a lot of fully translated scenes and sometimes even whole chapters: http://saiunkoku.livejournal.com/265940.html
All in all, watching the anime was absolutely great and I'd watch it again, but I'd have loved to know more about the future of a certain kind of relationship + I wanted to see a more powerful Shuurei (female MC) and judging from comments around the net, the greatest parts were still to come which makes me feel a little disappointed and wanting to be able to read Japanese ;)
I did the very same thing with my PTW list. I added everything I thought might be interesting at first. There's too much available to look at every single title closely when all of it comes at once. I still have to sort mine out as well.
So daaaamn powerful!!! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGAqNbGNm1Q
I'm glad about what you said about Yona!
It really sucks that there's no season 2 yet.
I'm worried. Have you seen this? http://myanimelist.net/news/45211828
While it's nice to see something new, it's kind of strange to release OVAs of so much later chapters.
I have no experience with this and know nothing of the industry, but it doesn't sound too great what the users are posting there...
I've looked into the manga yesterday, thanks for the tip with volume 9!
I often have troubles finding out who says what in many scenes in manga though :D pathetic, I'm already wondering whether it's some kind of sport or part of the fun to figure that out yourself hahaha. Of course it's often possible by context and in many cases you can't mix up the speech bubbles, but far too often it feels ambiguous to me, even to know what's being said aloud and what isn't is a hurdle for me still.
About a title in your PTW list:
Regarding great heroines, almighty Amberleh also suggested Hanasakeru Seishounen and I wanted to tell you that I thought that this one was amazing too :)
I've watched it right after Saiunkoku.
Both women (Saiunkoku's Shuurei and Hanasakeru's Kajika) are quite different.
Kajika seems to be the emotionally stronger, more independent/strong-willed one of the two at first glance. She's among the most strong-willed female characters I've seen anywhere.
But when you look at them as a whole and consider their very different environments, I don't think that Kajika is truly stronger than Shuurei.
Shuurei has to be smarter (and have more endurance) than most male characters in order to succeed in a very sexist, misogynistic environment, whereas Kajika doesn't have to deal with (much of) that, so she doesn't have to hold back.
About Hanasakeru Seishounen:
It took me a few episodes to get 100% hooked (as it's the case for me with most shows)
The premise looks like a default reverse-harem, but it's much more and you won't have much of an idea what this truly is about until you get further into the story.
It gets fast paced and almost thriller like. The story I thought was well done and very exciting and the characters are more interesting than they might seem at first. The female MC is just WOW! She really kicks ass! She's supposed to be 14 at the beginning, but she doesn't act like that. She could very well be 18.
That's it. I apologize that the post got far too long, it's awful, I sometimes can't manage to keep it short :/
Thanks for telling me!
Hmm if the story continues down that path, I guess we should be glad that it stopped before that!
So the anime version did something better than the manga... it's more common the other way around I'd imagine.
I really don't want her to seek -especially Ren's- approval. It should be the other way around!
"What I liked about the show, besides following her revenge, was to see her struggling with herself, trying to get rid of that behavior shaped by the expectations others had of her."
It's the same for me! I loved this kind of character growth and how she managed to reach her goals.
Agreed, a romance developing would have been nice to see (I was a little disappointed), but not when it means that she looses her independence somewhat and that she tries to gain his attention -again. Before that, in the anime at least, it looked like the opposite... that he started to regret a lot and get interested in her.
If you continue with it, I'd really like to know how this develops.
Just search for skip beat mymangaonline and you should find a site with most or even all chapters. :)
Since you mentioned Yona, but also generally, I see you don't have Saiunkoku Monogotari in your PTW list.
When I asked @Amberleh if she knew anything remotely similar to Yona, Moribito or Juuni Kokuki (those 3 aren't that similar, but they all have female characters outside of classic gender roles in fantasy settings and are empowering).
The first one she suggested, Saiunkoku Monogatari, also has some elements of Yona, but those are even stronger in this case (I thought).
The show is truly AMAZING!
I couldn't stop watching. I finished the 39 episodes of season 1 in 3 days :D
Maybe you'd like it too.
It's about an -at first- 16 year old girl in a very patriarch society in ancient, fantasy China, who strives to become an official in the government in order to change the country for the better.
But -of course, how could it be any different- females aren't allowed to become part of the government.
The misogynistic elements fuel your anger constantly, so that it's even more rewarding watching certain characters get what they deserve, but much more watching her grow from a highly intelligent young girl, who's not THAT self-confident yet and still vulnerable, into a very powerful woman with authority, surprising everyone with what she's capable of.
It's a very difficult and dangerous path and along the way there's immense character growth!
Also, reaching her goals is the most important, not getting married and she doesn't let any romances interfere either!
There's intrigue, betrayal, great friendship and also romance (not sure how much yet though, there's a reverse harem a bit similar to Yona in scale).
It's not a dark show though, there's quite a bit of hilarious comedy too :)
If you are unsure whether you'd like the setting, just give the first episode a try, it might surprise you :)
It's funny how motivating it is! I really loved it. And I agree it was a bit disappointing how quickly it ended, although the finale isn't bad enough to warrant a lower rating or to not watch it at all. If I really get used to reading manga, I'll also definitely read it.
I wish there was more like it. Sure there are some shows focusing on showbiz, but that's not what made Skip Beat so great.
"I want to watch a show with a strong female protagonist making something great, but without romance or her being just the princess or inspiration and actually fighting for it. "
Then I'd not wait too long with watching Skip Beat! which I see is in your PTW list.
She is AMAZING! And it's possible that you're like me and won't be able to stop watching after a few episodes :)
I have to say though that especially in this case I think it's particularly personal.
The show isn't bad at all I'm sure. And there's still a lot to like about it I think.
I just found out that it wasn't really what it seemed to me at first and what I was looking for.
The female MC appears to be completely independent, *very* strong (-willed) and is generally an interesting character.
She isn't intimidated easily and has authority.
But I was very disappointed that she still ended up taking a submissive role when it came to the male MC + depending on him (in his case it develops like it does with your typical tsundere).
This happens all the time unfortunately and because I was so much looking forward to a show where this is done differently, it was the main reason for me to drop it.
To tip it off I don't like it when shows take topics around rape (talk, attempted, suggested, whatever) lightly (not saying that the show was full of that or that someone got raped in the end).
I also don't like it a lot when random young boys are depicted to think nothing of it, as if they were willing to go through with something like that just as casually as eating breakfast.
But I wouldn't drop a show just because I hate something that's taking a few minutes in 1-2 episodes only.
There's still lots of content to like about it otherwise :)
Just wanted to tell you in case I gave you the wrong impression.