Ask John: One of the reasons anime is popular is how relatable the characters and narratives are. We are empathetic and sympathetic due to them drawing upon real-world parallels. However, is there a limitation to this relation? No matter how fantastic, live-action entertainment features real people. Animation has an extra barrier to overcome, as no human looks like an anime character. I will use the horror genre as an example. Horror appeals to us because of our instinctual mortality. However, anime characters are voiced drawings. So it has two barriers to overcoming our suspension of disbeli ..read more

Having watched a lot of anime, I prefer to define any given year’s best works by recognizing the most creative, interesting, unique, and new titles. So I particularly try to de-prioritize sequels and new seasons of older shows. Fan favorite series including Chainsaw Man, Kaguya-sama wa Kokurasetai -Ultra Romantic-, Mob Psycho 100 season three, and SPYxFAMILY are overly obvious contenders for best of the year, and for various reasons I’m inclined to look beyond them. I counted 221 “new” broadcast and streaming anime released in 2022. My count excludes new seasons that continued episode numberi ..read more

Question: Do you know why there are so few serious anime that focuses on the Yakuza and Burakumin? Answer: As a foreign observer, I can only speculate, so guess I shall. Although never as common in anime as within Japanese live-action, yakuza have appeared prominently, albeit occasionally, in anime since the early 80s. Even in recent years yakuza have been prominent in the Kumichou Musume to Sewagakari, Saezuru Tori wa Habatakanai, Chuukan Kanriroku Tonegawa, and Hinamatsuri anime. Although not so prominent, yakuza also are a primary theme in the Gokushufudou & Gokudolls anime. And yakuza ..read more

On Saturday & Sunday, January 7-8, 2003, I’ll have a dealer table and present two anime panels at the St. Pete Comic Con in downtown St. Petersburg, Florida. In advance of the comic show, I made a large purchase with Mandarake of Japan for convention goods and also items for my personal, permanent collection. Here’s the first of three videos revealing my purchases ..read more

Japanese fantasy light novels typically fall into either the sci-fi or hard fantasy genres. Stories usually revolve around aliens and advanced technology, such as Yoshiki Tanaka’s Legend of the Galactic Heroes, Hiroyuki Morioka’s Crest of the Stars, and Haruka Takachiho’s Dirty Pair, or revolve around swords and sorcery, such as Ryo Mizuno’s Record of Lodoss War, Fujino Omori’s Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon?, and Kumo Kagyu’s Goblin Slayer. Hybridizations of hard sci-fi and hard fantasy in Japanese media such as Leda: Fantastic Adventure of Yohko and Magic Knights Rayearth ..read more

Toho yesterday released its latest official Godzilla short film, Godzilla vs. Gigan Rex. The six-minute short has selectable English subtitles ..read more

In a society that values politeness above nearly everything else, little white lies are commonplace in Japan. Polite or considerate lies are like the oil that keeps the machine of Japanese society running smoothly. Whether true or false, ordinary people accept polite sentiments as social courtesies. Sixteen-year-old Kanoko Urabe, however, is not an ordinary person. Unlike most people, Kanoko can hear the difference between truth and lie. Any deliberately spoken mistruth has a distinctive ring in her ears. As a young child, she doesn’t understand how to use this distinguishing talent of hers ..read more

The sub-genre of Japanese “isekai” fantasy light novels, stories about characters either transported to alternate worlds or reincarnated in alternate worlds, is so populated with titles and series that readers may easily and quickly tire of the trope. In the afterword of his first published novel, author Densuke explains the origin of his isekai novel series The Death Mage by saying, “I decided to write this book because I couldn’t find the exact kind of story that I myself wanted to read.” That singular statement largely sums up the nature of the first Death Mage novel. “Death Mage Who Doesn ..read more

Kugayama Reki does a fine job of creating a manga adaptation of author Kurokata’s 2014 light novel The Wrong Way to Use Healing Magic. The story introduces three high school teens abruptly teleported to a fantasy kingdom to defend the realm from the advances of the Demon Lord. However, only two of the students were targeted by the summoning spell. Poor Ken Usato merely happened to be next to them and got sucked up by the spell accidentally. However, while his classmates Kazuki and Suzune are imbued with combat magic, Usato learns that he’s a rare exception granted powerful healing magic. So h ..read more

The nature of Japanese light novels is to be simple, easy-reading, disposable literary entertainment. By design, light novels are only barely more literary than manga comic books. Moreover, light novels are typically rapidly written first drafts featuring the barest minimum of editing. Thus light novels frequently contain errors in narrative continuity, technical composition errors, and other minor flaws. What they lack in literate, artistic substance they compensate for with creativity and entertainment value. The “isekai” sub-genre, stories about characters whisked away to unfamiliar new wo ..read more