Hacker Cinema
Chainsaw Man
チェンソーマン
2022 · TV series · 24 min episodes · 1 season
AnimationActionAdventureScience FictionFantasy
Denji has a simple dream—to live a happy and peaceful life, spending time with a girl he likes. This is a far cry from reality, however, as Denji is forced by the yakuza into killing devils in order to pay off his crushing debts. Using his pet devil Pochita as a weapon, he is ready to do anything for a bit of cash.
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3 comments on Hacker News
this is a good point about stock characters. a very lively and thriving art form can rely on these (as theater, movies, novels have at various times).
that’s not all of what bothers me though. if you look at Frieren, every main character is going through some kind of lonely attachment thing, even the ones that follow other stock character archetypes. it’s the whole show. It’s also the main drama in Spy x Family (another show that’s good on the merits).
I recently watched the first episode of “Wind Breakers”. They set you up for 5 minutes to think it will be about a strong guy fighting his way to the top. Surprise! It’s actually about belonging and finding friends who care about you.
Fine to have works of art about lonely people coming together and finding belonging. But it really is weird how much of a dominant theme this is, seemingly in the majority of new anime and manga.
“Chainsaw Man” is interesting because it sets up and subverts this at every possible turn, over and over.
I’m not sure if I agree with the articles thesis. There have always been bleak anime.
There’s so much more out there now. Some of it is whimsical and hopeful. Some that come to mind from the last decade:
- Yuri on Ice - A Place Further than the Universe - Your Name - Sasaki and Miyano - Given - The last Evangelion movie (which was a real holy shit moment for me) - Gargantia on the Verdurous Planet - This one is an odd pick but the Cyberpunk anime Netflix came out with last year was so so good. I know it undercuts my point given how it’s set in a dystopia but I felt like humanizing these characters that are criminals in a broken world and showing how they still have hopes and dreams and love… I found it very touching. - The Stranger by the Shore
Also Chainsaw Man is really really good, though it is dark and gory.
This is a great discussion and a great starting point for interesting discussions.
It’s quite interesting that Japan anime are adding more movie-like look and feel by adding complex scenes & backgrounds (see, e.g., a Dec 2022 anime series, Chainsaw man), whereas Netflix goes the other way around. It’s said that animes are trying to gain more mainstream recognition in overseas markets this way, although it’s adversarial to the relatively low budget in an anime as well as the way they are created.
I think Netflix vs traditional movie has something do do with expectations on the screen size to watch, TV vs in cinema. It’s about information density. There are media specifically tuned to be watched on smaller screens, i.e., phones.
I used to advocate simplicity in artmaking, largely influenced by East Asian art style and also tech advertising and interface design at the early 2010 era. But as I grow up, I started to appreciate complexity, texture, imperfection especially after I moved to NYC. This has become so much so that a empty-esque room makes me uncomfortable, not organic, not homecoming. Wonder if this has something to do with age and audience also.
The Netflix are tuned to the younger generation vs traditional movie tuned to the older. And there is also that Netflix tuning to overseas markets that are unfamiliar to American audiences.
There is much to be discussed under this topic, but here are some sporadic thoughts of mine.