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Death to the fanboys

(UPDATE: 18 August - I have been been informed that the actual spelling, technically, is “Animé.” Well, I guess that means your precious “Animé” is both shitty and pretentious.)

A work of animation involves animation. If work of animation has little or no animation, then the work is just nothing more than an over-glorified slideshow with techie sound-effects.

Sound redundant? Apparently, fanboys don't think so.

Well what about the fantastic, brilliant storylines in anime? How can you compare the themes of urban anxiety and self-identity as seen in Akira to the lovey-dovey, happily-ever-after bullshit of Snow White?

I DON'T GIVE A FLYING FUCK.

The vast majority of “anime” are just over-glorified slideshows. Here's my proof:

The following is the gist of 98% of all the animation that is produced in Japan. Notice the use of cels - there are three layers. One layer is the scene, one layer are the words, and one layer is the actual animation. Notice that the actual animation takes up less than 1% of each scene. Notice that even though Japanese 'animators' and fanboys may consider the following as 'animation,' the entire gist of the following can be achieved just as effectively in the form of comic book panels.

In Case of any Confusion,

ANIME SUCKS

ANIME SUCKS

ANIME SUCKS BALLS

Animation as Art?

Akira was originally a comic book, or “manga,” if you will. Hence or otherwise, the subsequent movie has an unmistakably comic book feel.

Having the ability and talent to draw the complex, epic scenes in Akira means that you would make for a great comic book illustrator. This talent has very little bearing on your ability to animate.

Snow White has so little storyline, that less than half the movie is actual talking - it's all about animation - nearly two hours of unreasonably cute bunnies and Protestant dwarves hopping around.

The drawings of the birds in Snow White would make John Audubon shit himself (in the bad way). But if Johnny saw the way these birds flew from branch to branch, or the way they “whistled” while they worked, he would sooo shit himself (in the good way).

Art is about trying to achieve something artistic through some artistic medium, in an artistic manner. Sound redundant? Fuck you. In order to accomplish your artistic goals effectively, you must do so with the most applicable medium. That's why sculptors don't paint paintings, painters don't write poetry.

Don't get me wrong - I love Akira. But if I were to rate Akira solely on its animation, I wouldn't have much faith in this movie.

I love Evil Dead III: Army of Darkness, in spite of its shitty special effects. (Actually, the B-quality special effects of Army of Darkness only add to its appeal.) I love the special effects of Matrix Revolutions even though I think the movie sucks. Is my point making sense yet?

Japanese Animation Sucks

I'm not talking about all those strange fetishes in anime (virginal schoolgirls getting raped by engorged tentacles, or gigantic, phallic robot 'mechas' crushing gigantic, phallic buildings). I don't care. There are plenty of websites devoted to the depravity of anime. However, we as a society are no better than Japan - America still allows Jane Fonda to roam free inside its borders. I am just talking about the “animation” aspect of anime.

Disney movies have very little storyline and its appeal lies (or should lie) mostly in its animation. Their movies would make for some very shitty comic books. At any rate, Disney animation is the greatest animation on earth. Before you tell me that some other animation studio is better than Disney, realize that many of the founders of these studios came from Disney - Art Babbitt, Ken Harris, Richard Williams, Chuck Jones, Chris Sanders, Tim Burton, and yes, even Walt Disney. (Where do you think Tim Burton learned how to do stop-motion animation?)

But Japanese 'animators' neither do much animation in their movies, nor do they know how to animate. Don't believe me? For demonstrative purposes, let's start with the letter A: Disney's Aladdin versus Japan's The Animatrix. There is more emotion, more expression, MORE ANIMATION, more sensation, more convincing, realistic movement, more of everything in the Disney movie. Whenever Jasmine plays one of her manipulative bitch games, her subtle devious smiling, shoulders shrugging, and hair fluttering are miles beyond the talent and ability of any Japanese 'animator.'

In order to express emotion, a Japanese 'animator' will just change the size of your eyes, the position of your brows, and the shape of your mouth. Um yeah, the robot in Short Circuit could do those things as well, but were you convinced?

The very first lesson taught to many animators is how to animate a bouncing ball. You learn things like physics and dynamics - the ball moves faster at the bottom of the bounce and is essentially motionless at the top. You also learn how to animate deformities - the ball squishes when it hits the ground. Thirdly, you learn that convincing animation also necessitates exaggerated movement, like how actors in plays exaggerate their emotions.

The second major lesson is how to animate a person walking. The basic physical movements involved in something as simple as walking can be daunting, but what is even more challenging is the sensation of gravity and weight. Drawing legs and arms that merely swing back and forth won't convince anyone.

On that note, why do anime characters have such large heads, eyes, hands and feet? It's a trick developed during the old days of American animation - these body parts are most significant in expressing emotion and movement, and the best way to highlight them is simply to make them larger. While American animators have advanced beyond this technique, such that the expression of emotion relies less on cheesy shortcuts and more on the animation of body language, Japanese 'animators' are still trying to compensate with even larger eyeballs and larger boobs.

Prove it. Show Me Some Frames as Examples.

I can't, and that's the point. Animation should be about animation, and if animation is truly about animation, then a couple of still-frames or screenshots won't do any justice. You might as well ask me to show you some photographs of sculptures. You have to watch a Disney movie or a Richard Williams commercial, in order to appreciate animation.

But I sure as hell can show you still-frames of Japanese animation. There is so little animation in anime, and of the animation that does exist, it is so shitty that I can make a few .gif animations as cels and paste them on top of a cel of a violated nun.

But What if the Lack of Animation in Anime is Just a Stylistic Choice?

That's a bullshit excuse. The lack of animation in anime just proves that anime is not animation. Lick my balls.

Minimalism in animation can be a stylistic choice. Consider the most popular minimalist animation right now - South Park. It's nothing more than moving construction paper. But there's more animation in a five-second sequence of South Park than a whole episode of Dragonball Z. The South Park animators also know how to animate mouths moving to voices too, something Japanese 'animators' have never done and obviously don't know how to do. Minimalist animation is not an excuse not to animate.

But The Animatrix Has so Much More Detail in Every Scene! And the Storyline is so Much More Complex!

Who the fuck cares? It's not an animation - it's a high-budget 'Power Point' presentation.

Nearly every scene in The Animatrix is breathtaking. Nearly all the animation in The Animatix is crap. A camera panning around a 3-D computer-rendered scene is easy - I learned how to do that in my first-semester computer graphics class - but animating characters running around with samurai swords is is very, very difficult.

Look at the opening scene of that opening short, “The Final Flight of the Osiris.” Each of those characters, the color of their skin (do you have any idea how hard it is to map a skin surface?), the little pores, and beads of sweat - Christ Almighty. But was anyone convinced when they were running around in their training simulation? Did they look like puppets on strings?

The ability to animate convincing human movements with 3-D animation may not exist yet, but it does exist elsewhere: 2-D animation and live-action filming. I understand that Squaresoft was showing off, but they should have left that 3-D shit where it's best suited - in their video games.

The best short in that movie was most definitely “World Record.” Such exaggerated perspective, unique distortion, and stylized expressions are almost never seen in anime. This animation embraced all the potential and possibilities of animation, by accomplishing things that cannot be done with either live-action filming or CGI. Oh that's right - “World Record” was the only short in The Animatrix that didn't use CGI.

CGI has its limitations. Get over it. And fuck you, Michael Eisner, for shutting down Walt Disney Features Animation in favor of Pixar.

Fuck you, Michael Eisner. Fuck you.

What about Spirited Away? It Won the 2002 Academy Award for Best Animated Feature!

It sure did. And “otaku” fanboys everywhere rejoiced in a simultaneous, world-wide, rapturous ejaculation of crusty semen, all over their keyboards and mousepads.

Watch that movie - those slanty-eyed 'animators' can't even animate something as simple as a mouth moving to words, or even a character walking back and forth. How can you compare the piece of shit, no-talent 'animation' of Spirited Away to one of its 2002 contenders, Lilo and Stitch? Watch Lilo, running around Hawaii with her little waddle and flowing dress, watch her talk - her facial movements are so convincing that you can press the mute button and read her lips. That's talent. I don't care if Spirited Away might have a better storyline - it's not animation.

Or even something like Alice in Wonderland: this movie is the best demonstration of personification in animation. Making a flower move about with the mannerisms of haughty British upper-class country club women takes talent. Alice in Wonderland was made in 1951; Snow White was made in 1936. It's been 70 years, and Japanese 'animators' still don't know how to animate a bouncing ball.

Why bother making an animation if you're not going to embrace the medium and potential of animation itself?

Anime is all about the money shot. Anime is all about the splash page. Anime sucks. Anime sucks.

ANIME SUCKS

And Spirited Away is a giant, steaming pile of chunky shit.

Written by Dinah Cheshire
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