The value of a good genre piece
As a generalization, critics tend to prefer titles that do something different, when it comes to genres. That could be trying to mix two or more genres in a way that hasn’t been done before, subvert commonly used tropes or start out with an unconventional premise. Suzumiya Haruhi is one of the more prominent recent examples of a simply bizarre genre mix that (many) critics went wild for… although, this genre mix is the exact same reason why it divided audiences. But there’s value to a really well executed genre piece. An overt sense of ambition is always good, but it’s certainly not impossible to make a compelling anime series that doesn’t really do anything that’s genuinely new, let alone something that hasn’t been seen time and again before. In this post I’ll be presenting a short list of anime that play well within the boundaries of their respective genres, and probably have a list of tropes as long as my sister’s Christmas wishlist (zing), but still turned out to be (to varying extents) better than the average anime in their respective genres. Feel free to add your own titles to this list.
Minami-ke
Azumanga Daioh popularized the moe slice-of-life comedy genre, while Lucky Star launched it into the otaku age. Minami-ke came out just a bit after Lucky Star, but I’ve made no secret about which I found funnier. There’s very little ambition to Minami-ke, and while it has a few references here and there, they don’t get the emphasis they do in Lucky Star. Much like Azumanga Daioh, Minami-ke‘s jokes tend to be about the characters. But there’s very little that’s new in Minami-ke, and it’s stylistic similarities to Ichigo Mashimaro are obvious. But, unlike Ichigo Mashimaro, Minami-ke was consistently funny. One could maybe make the argument that Ichigo Mashimaro had funnier jokes, but Minami-ke did a better job at delivering laughs on a regular basis, IMO. It’s simply a better executed comedy series.
Lamune
Lamune is what would happen if you took something like To Heart and slowed it down to a crawl. The anime itself is pretty firmly entrenched in the renai game adaptation genre, along with the likes of Da Capo, Gift and Wind: A Breath of Heart, but it’s much more grounded in realism, which aids believability to no end. The characters are a lot more charming than what tends to come out of similar series and while something actually happening in a given episode is entirely probabilistic, it’s simplicity is what ultimately makes it sweet and enjoyable. It’s a standout in a genre that’s too often plagued with unlikable characters and melodramatic storylines. (But, be that as it may, I certainly wouldn’t call it “outstanding”.)
Claymore
When you go into Claymore, and read the premise or watch the first episode, and come to learn that it’s a Medieval-esque fantasy/action tale about half-monster females that fight demons with swords, you pretty much know what to expect, atmosphere- and style-wise. Claymore‘s value is that, despite this, you still have no idea what’s going to happen, story-wise. Claymore is filled with the super powers, unrealistic sword techniques and bouts of training (with lots of monster killing along the way) of the brand that one would likely expect, and would probably be familiar with if you’ve seen Berserk and while I’d in no way imply that this is as good as the anime based on Miura Kentarou‘s epic, Claymore has a competent grasp of atmosphere and storytelling (Madhouse Studios‘ strengths) that makes it compelling and keeps its audience on their toes.
Nagasarete Airantou
I’ve always thought that the problem with many harem series is that they take themselves seriously. I mean, yeah, there are many that just aren’t funny at all to begin with, like ToLoveRu, but there are the occasional harem series that do a decent job at supplying low-brow laughs, such as Rosario + Vampire. The problem with a lot of such series is that they have some sort of serious turn in the plot near the end towards something darker and more serious, which makes for a jarring change in mood, and is utterly impossible to take seriously given what’s gone before it. Nagasarete Airantou is one of the few anime that forgoes that, and remains consistently enjoyable and light-hearted right to the end. I’m not sure what it is about Nagasarete Airantou, in all honesty I hated it at the beginning but it really grew on me as the episodes passed. It is just another mindless harem series, but it’s a strangely amusing and enjoyable one.
Natsume Yuujinchou
It’s probably wrong to say Natsume Yuujinchou is unambitious and does nothing new, since at the episodic level, it has quite a few quirks and a healthy bout of originality and I’d be highly surprised if anyone really called it “cliched”. But it is a genre piece, one could almost say the examplar iyashikei anime. In the past, I called it a travelling anime with no travelling. But, certainly, it shares a lot of elements with titles like Mushishi, Kino’s Journey and Mononoke (yes, I still haven’t seen this last one, but it’s high on my to-see list), and while these titles could be seen as the trailblazers of the genre, Natsume Yuujinchou was happy to follow their established path. But there’s very little in it that’s executed poorly and it has the same handle of pathos, emotion and humanity that lends the genre to be, in general, highly critically regarded.
So, genre pieces. What are your favourites?
*Finally bumps into the staff blog
I see myself as a critic – and not a fan – but I don’t exactly “prefer” titles that do something differently; they just catch my attention often. In fact, I have no specific criteria to select what titles to watch; mostly they are selected because they look interesting enough for me to take them up, although a number of them have turned out disappointing. Also, I tend to take up anime titles that people speak about; rarely-mentioned titles tend to slip away from my attention.
About the comparison between Lucky Star and Minami-ke, it’s no surprise which I find to be funnier (Hosaka is a genius!) but the only similarity between them is that they’re slice-of-life. Their brand of humor however, are different: Lucky Star pokes fun on general human behavior while Minami-ke is based on their character idiosyncracies. Many of Lucky Star’s humor fall flat because the punch line is rendered useless if you don’t “share” the current gag. It’s like this: When a particular episode focuses on dating sims, and if you do play date sims, then you will find it amusing. If you don’t, then it’ll fall flat. It didn’t work most of the time for me.
Minami-ke focuses on the eccentricity of their characters, which rubbed me the wrong way initially (I had the wrong impression on the series at first if anyone can remember) but it grew on me. More significantly, the material is more consistent, and they delivered it a lot better than Lucky Star. In short, their punch line packs more “punch”.
As for genre pieces, I have no specific genre that I target… although cyberpunk titles do catch my attention occasionally. Perhaps it’s because of how I usually associate cyberpunk with great visuals and a complex plot (not always true, of course). The only common pitfall for cyperpunk is the characterization where Vexille and the GITS movies couldn’t avoid.
While I have in no way enough knowledge on the finer points of animation to call myself a critic, I think it’s too easy to dismiss Lucky Star’s problems as people not knowing the references. But that’s an old topic done a million times before, so few of my favourite genre pieces are…
Yuri – Simoun
Iyashikei – Aria Natural/Origination (not counting travelling anime)
Gothic – Le Portrait de Petite Cossette
Cyberpunk – Serial Experiments: Lain (not entirely sure if I can classify Kaiba as Cyberpunk)
Moe Mystery/Horror – Higurashi no Naku Koro Ni
Super Robot – Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann (OMG OMG OMG SO EPIC SO MANLY ROW ROW FIGHT DA POWA).
Bit tempting to list Love Hina as my favourite Harem piece, but I’m starting to suspect that it’s because of nostalgic value. Maybe Ouran High if it counts.
The thing about calling Higurashi a genre piece is that the moe/mystery/horror mix was a novel one when it first came out. Ouran High is the pretty archetypal reverse harem, though, but it was probably a lot more self aware than any of the reverse harems that came before it.
I rue to call ARIA a genre piece as well. I mean, stylistically it starts out very similar to YKK, but it’s very different and ultimately its own unique story. I was very tempted to put Sketchbook on the list, though. It did a lot of what ARIA did, but in a much more familiar setting. Certainly, Sketchbook is a very well executed anime, but I wouldn’t say it’s better than the latter two ARIA series.
And obviously Love Hina is the archetypal harem. It was basically seen as the bar for other harem series for a very long time. These days it’s considered passe, but I can see why it was popular at the time. (Hell, it started me on fansubbed anime).
In that case I’ll just list Minami-ke, Natsume Yuujinchou and TTGL, which all do very well within the constraints of the genre without trying to be ground-breaking. Minami-ke and Natsume Yuujinchou aren’t flawed per se, just that they play very safe and fail to affect me at the deepest level. TTGL on the other hand, is a strange beast in that it does nothing new (at least according to mecha aficionados) compared to its predecessors, but somehow still managed to competely sweep me away.
Just chiming in to say that Love Hina was just as horrible and unoriginal when it first came out as it is now and everyone of taste agrees.
~toodles~
Well, Lova Hina did debut conveniently around the same time as fansubbed anime so despite it sucking big time, it naturally is an anime with nolstagic value (even to me). That and One Piece too.
Speaking of One Piece, it’ll list it as my favorite genre piece of shounen anime. As for harem… Rosario+Vampire?
I find it really hard to think of truly memorable genre pieces because most of the anime that come off the top of my head don’t like to stay within the confines of its respective genre. I do realize that most anime are really fusions of many, many genres, but who is to say that one combination is original enough to be called a genre piece while another escapes the label? For instance, I wonder how well something like Claymore falls into the shounen action category. Yes, the show does work with some of the tropes of the genre but the heavy fantasy element, the dearth of fight scenes, and the lack of pronounced special attacks makes me wonder if it really should be put in a category where the baseline is Dragonball Z. Also, would something like Code Geass be considered a genre piece since it is technically just a conglomeration of Gundam SEED, Mai Hime and Death Note?
Anyways, here is a few that I can think of…
Shounen Action: Hunter X Hunter (manga)
Harem: Zero no Tsukaima
Moe: Bamboo Blade
Super Robot: Gurren Lagann
Real Robot: Gundam 0080: War in the Pocket
I think that most titles that are great are due to the fact that they are not genre pieces. For instance, Code Geass is a mix of everything from mecha to psychological cat-and-mouse game. The only way to classify Code Geass is under shounen, which is still debatable.
When I mull over it, even Natsume Yuujinchou isn’t completely a genre piece – I can also see it a iyashikei anime with comedy and slice-of-life on the side. The only way to classify them is through generalization and through simple reasoning.
I don’t know whether it is true, but it seems that every genre can be a subset of another genre i.e. mecha can be viewed as a subset of shounen but shounen can also be viewed as a subset of mecha.