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Assassination Classroom

The world of Assassination Classroom is fairly ridiculous: a giant yellow octopus that will destroy the world unless a class of middle school students assassinate him while he is the teacher. But, it does have some realistic elements.

The most prominent theme is the discrimination Class E receives from everyone else in the school. Class E is physically separated from the main campus, and the building is of much poorer quality compared to the main building. The chairman of the school even contributes to sustaining this system because he believes that allowing for the other students to look down at Class E will motivate them to do better than them.

However, the role that Class E is forced to take up does not actually correlate to their actual potential. It is only when Korosensei helps to bring out each student’s potential that they begin to perform at the same level as the other classes, eventually overtaking them. This reminds me of Eden of the East where society prevents NEETs from being motivated to be productive through needless degradation of NEETs. It is not until Takizawa that unleashes the potential of the NEETs to save Japan from destruction, similar to Korosensei. Likewise, the school system only facilitates the mindset of being failures in Class E. Also, in order to be recognized by society (the school), Class E is forced to produce results that are dissonant with its assigned role. In this show, the victims of discrimination are responsible for changing their perceived image.

The mission of assassinating Korosensei reinforces the tradition of hegemonic masculinity. Assassination can not happen without violence. We can only hope that the hegemonic masculinity Class E has to embrace will not endure and help perpetuate the system of hegemonic masculinity. In addition, I find it interesting how the government are relying on the younger generation to take care of critical mission that may result in the end of the Anthropocene.

angel-is-not-creative

I also made the connection between the NEETs and the way that the students of Class-E are treated. They are treated as less than others when it is clear that they are just people who were left behind in the schooling system and were not given a fighting chance to reach their full potential. We get to see Class-E start to reach this potential once they have a teacher who is actually willing to believe in their abilities and spend time honing them.

beefmastersblog

I really like what you brought up about the NEETs and the fact that they are often looked down upon by society due to a “lack of potential”. I really liked what Eden of the East did at the end with it, showing that if you give them the opportunity, they can be useful, and I think the same thing is being said in this anime: if you give them a good teacher, and invest resources into their education, even students that might not seem like they would be able to be successful are able to find success. I think that is a really important message, and I am glad that you compared the two shows.

animeenjoyer2

When looking back at Class E as an idea, it does follow the idea of ganbaru as the class is practically forced to try their best to fight against the discrimination that they face because they had inadequate teachers prior to Korosensei. So it is pretty similar to the NEETs in Eden of the East.

Assassination Classroom

Haven’t watched this one in a long time, and can confidently say that I do not remember many of the details in this series and only really remember the premise and the ending.

Outside of the whole idea of superbeing teacher and assassinating him, episode 1 definitely had the theme of societal rejection when it came to everyone from Class E as it showed how Nagisa felt as many of those from the “main school” or even those outside of the school that looked down on Nagisa and the rest of the students as they never really lived up to the expectations academically, thus being put into the reject classroom. It seemed like the only person who cared was someone who actually accepted them no matter what they did as he seems like he felt similar in a way that no one accepted him (I am guessing except for the previous teacher, which is why he decided to become a teacher). Even in episode 5, the main school cares so little about this classroom, that even when the government got involved with Class E, they did not even dare to help them. Then we can see that they even instill these ideas for the betterment of the rest of the students and to boost their credibility. While this can definitely be a little pushing it, I guess you can relate this to the critique of society that those that do not do well will stay there due to there being many things that keep them there and there is not much that helps them rise from their social class.

But one thing that can definitely be seen is that the anime talks about how much influence one’s environment can have on a person, especially at a younger age. As all of the students are in junior high (middle school I think?) we can clearly see the dichotomy between the students in Class E and the rest of the school where the former is clearly being influenced positively and the latter being influenced negatively through the way they instill academic values on the students.

Honestly, the whole time I was trying to figure out why they banned this series from schools in the US, and when watching the series, it is pretty obvious that they want to ban it because of the guns at school thing (and I searched it up but there is also explicit content with some of the students, I honestly do not remember but I am not saying this did not happen, I just don’t remember much of the series at all). While it is understandable as to why they would do such a thing, I just think it's very interesting that they decided to ban a series, whose animated counterpart has existed since 2014 and the manga since 2012, where they somehow pinpointed this series to be a cause for violence thus banning it. It is as if #1, there are no important things out there that actually are the reasons for things like school shootings happen and #2, there is no such thing as these types of acts of violence happening before the manga was ever released.

“CLASS E IS THE WORST THING IN THE ENTIRE PLANET, DO NOT BE LIKE THEM”

jmalegni

Cyberpunk Edgerunners

Never thought that we would be watching something that I have actually seen before, pretty awesome.

Edgerunners is quite the heavy show, themes of addiction, class divide, crime, dystopian levels of capitalism, and family. I will begin with the addiction that is rampant in Night City. Whether it's drugs, sex, or cybernetic implants, it seems everybody in the city has some kind of horrible vice. They know it is not good for them but they continue doing it because they either need them to survive or they are the only source of "happiness" in this world. David's death is the best example of this, he adopts more and more cybernetics to keep up with the crew and to survive, but no matter how many he gets it ends up killing him in the end, just like addiction in the real world it starts with one but you need more and more until it eats up your entire life.

The reason David felt like he needed to start getting cybernetics is because of a brutal level of capitalism that Night City is built on. Every single thing is commodified to the point that first responders will leave you to die if you haven't purchased the right package from them. And that is exactly what happens, David's mother dies and he is left with all the burden of catching up on all kinds of expenses while his only family just died. For Christ's sake she was cremated in a vending machine and spit out like a can of soda. The point here is that David felt like he had nowhere to go in his current life and when an opportunity to improve his life through crime, he took it. If he never would have lost his mother and they weren't behind on their payments, I would like to think it is unlikely he would have accepted Lucy's offer.

Crime is also just as frequent as addiction in this city. The police seem to be just exist for show or to serve the corpos. Like I said earlier, it is the nature of the city to push those at the bottom to living a life outside of the law, and with so many of these people, it has gotten to the point where it is pretty much accepted as a part of life for all. It's commentary on police corruption and societal systems that don't focus on providing avenues for stable lives for those who aren't as well of as others, i.e. education, rehabilitation, or general financial aid.

The divide between the corporations and everyone else is very stark in the world of Cyberpunk. It is what feeds this ever hungry capitalism that pushes so many people to addiction and crime. And no matter how hard you try, it is impossible to legitimately ascend to the status of corpo from where someone like David is. His mother pretty much devoted her entire life to work, to the system to try to generate enough money to get David through a nice school that would allow him to legitimately reach the top floor of Arasaka Tower. But it is impossible, those at the top have made it that way. That's why there isn't some grand plot to fight the system and bring Night City to it's full potential. Instead Lucy wants to escape. Escape as far as possible and that place is the Moon, not Antarctica, the Moon.

The last thing I will talk about is how important family is in Edgerunners. David starts by losing everything, but finds a new family in the crew. Maine adopts a father like figure, teaching David and supporting him until the end. Even though they commit all kinds of horrible violence an incredibly strong bond is formed with many of the members. David finds actual happiness when with the crew and appreciates the connections, willing to give his own life for them multiple times. I am sure he loved his mother, but it was different from what he gets from the connection with the crew.

Alright, that's it from me, awesome anime,. and I can't believe we only have one more left.

Also I am glad at least Falco survived

animeenjoyer2

I think there is even more to say about the world and its capitalism when you take into consideration the fact that Gloria, David’s mother, also got into illegal activities just to make ends meet and to try to climb out of their social class. Other than her regular job, she stole cybernetics from the bodies she gathered to sell to others, which is why David got the Sandevistan in the first place. So its as if you can not rise in social class without doing something illegal in this world.

Cyberpunk Edgerunners

While this is my second time watching the show, there were things I already noticed that the show was trying to do and narrowing it down to episodes 1, 2, 6, and 10 lets me focus on what the show may be trying to say. The beginning of the series really tries to focus on the wealth inequality aspect, which can be seen as the whole reason as to why he started his edgerunner career. Then the other themes can be seen as the concern for the future, abuse of power, and even addiction.

When it comes to wealth inequality, we can see how people treat David, see the other people around him on his commute to school, and see the general atmosphere of his apartment in comparison to where the rich school is. For example, Katsuo bullies David for being poor and not being able to afford the equipment that he is able to get. Then when Gloria, David’s mother dies, she clearly had the opportunity to be saved yet people still let her die simply due to the fact that she was not an important person. There is even the idea that was said by David that someone from the poorer areas will never rise to the top which is pretty accurate in sociology terms, since many stay in the same social class they were born in. Then when it comes for the concern for the future, we can see it with how this world has more inequality than ever before as it is set in 2077 (I don’t think they mention the year so I am guessing it is set from both the tabletop game and the video game), and as inequality is actually steadily increasing in the present, this may be some sort of commentary to say this is how bad it is going to be 50 years from now. Obviously the addiction part is how David is constantly feeling like he needs to be better, thus constantly implanting more and more cybernetics to his body until we see him absolutely destroyed by it in the last episode.

bryanschmuck

Perfect Blue

Despite the movie being only 81 minutes long including credits, and not being one of the things I voted for, I'm actually really glad it was chosen because this movie was a banger.

I've always sorta been a fan of psychological thriller type movies, even though I think some of them get a little too into the psychological part where it ends up making no sense unless you bend over backwards and jump through some hoops. But this movie was perfectly fine, and I found it to be super entertaining. The ending was really wild and I actually loved the twist ending.

As for analysis, I think that it's pretty clear the movie is taking a look at celebrity/pop idol culture and exposes some of the stresses involved with it as well as some of the problems celebrities face. We can see that Mima's psyche deteriorates over the course of the entire film, which causes her to not only hallucinate about committing murders, but also not be able to discern from filming her TV show and reality. The movie does a pretty good job of this, and while sometimes it can get a little confusing, I felt that overall it was done in a way that was still pretty easy to somewhat understand what was going on. A lot of psychological thrillers will have a scene towards the end of the movie where it shows what was really happening while the main character was hallucinating, but I've never really liked those except for very rare circumstances.

We can also see that relevant to some of our class discussions, the film comments on obsessive fan culture and the dangers of it. We can see in the film that there are multiple characters that are obsessed with Mima, being the one rapist character (I forget his name), and the main antagonist of the movie, Rumi. I believe that the film tries to show the audience the danger of becoming too obsessed with a specific celebrity, as it can cause you to literally do things that end up negatively affecting the celebrities own psyche. While Rumi clearly has some sort of mental disorder that causes her to act this way, I think it's still interesting that the film decides to deal with it.

Lastly, a large part of the film is about blurring the lines between fiction and reality. Throughout the movie, we are unable to tell if some parts are real or not, which shows us the true psychological impact that the stresses of work life are having on Mima. I think it's a very effective way of storytelling, and I thought it was done well in this movie.

Pretty good.

bluelockholytrinity-jpt1311

I agree that the film blurs the line between reality and fantasy. I was confused about which scenes were part of Mima's hallucinations and which were happening in reality. I guess that means the film did what the scenes were supposed to be.

beefmastersblog

I think this movie does a great job of exploring the dangers and stresses that come along with celebrity culture. It's interesting to see how Mima's psyche deteriorates over time as she is unable to discern between her TV show and reality, which really demonstrates the impact of being in the public eye. The blurring between fiction and reality was definitely an interesting form of storytelling as well.

animeenjoyer2

Mima not being able to tell what was fiction and reality was something that really made me have to double back on what just happened in the movie, especially when Rumi was revealed to be the main culprit. For example, the pizza delivery murder scene made me really question who killed the photographer. Was it actually just a dream? If Rumi has access to her room, then she can easily frame her with the bloody clothes. But then how would she have experienced it in a “dream” if it was not her? Was it due to her hatred for the photoshoot and the photographer that made her dream of it? Really made me question a lot of things in the movie and I could not tell if it was a plot hole or just up for interpretation.

Perfect Blue

Alright definitely....an interesting watch. So as the movie started I really started to question why it was considered an R rated movie, but as it continues, you can see that it critiques some parts of real life in the movie.

While I could definitely be wrong, it felt as if there was a big topic within fan culture and how toxic it can be, to the point where it is literally dangerous (granted this can be a very exaggerated showcase of such a thing). This can be seen with the one security guy (Me-Mania) who had a very big obsession with Mima to the point where he sexually assaulted her and was going to kill her for not being the perfect “idol” that he envisioned. Then we see that it was the same with Rumi at the end of the movie where she wanted to kill Mima for not being the idol. For what I am about to say, I do not mean the previous examples as a direct correlation nor am I using this to insult idol fans but, from the few instances I have seen on the internet where people get irrationally furious for idols not being the “perfect idol” in their mind I think the movie is trying to critique these fans but in a VERY exaggerated way. Like while this can just be a very popular rumor (I do not know since I am not super engrossed in idols, whether it be Japanese or Korean), I have also heard that idols are not allowed to date according to their contracts since it will result in worse sales. This then makes me think it's the same idea as dating would break the “perfect pure idol” that people envision in their mind. Then there can be a critique on how this obsessive fan culture can affect another person, which is what happens to Mima as she questions if she is her true self.

Also it was funny that they said that the idol industry was dying, and while I am not sure about the Japanese idol industry in the 90s, that is the complete opposite case in the present-day.

Then there is a critique on the idol/celebrity industry as her manager would constantly put her in roles that she clearly would be uncomfortable with due to it being the “only way” for her to get famous. I think Oshi No Ko being released this season and us choosing this was a very big coincidence

jmalegni

Sensoron

Who doesn't love a classic revisionist history manga that pretty much is just super conservative propaganda. But seriously this was a very interesting read in the aspect that I haven't ever seen what revisionist history looks like for any country other than the U.S.

The author of Sensoron seems to be a person who is fed up with "Japanese apologists" and the "brainwashing" of new generations into believing that Imperial Japan was evil. Now I will admit, I am not very familiar with the history of Imperial Japan during the Sino-Japanese wars and the Russo-Japanese war, so I cannot directly disprove some of the authors claims of certain event not happening or downplaying Japan's role in the suffering of many Asians in the period. What I can do is point out some very clear fallacious generalizations that are made. The first of these being the few photos that he "proves" are false or misattributed to make Japan look bad. He at least provides some references for his claims on the falsity of the photos (I am not going to go fact check them) but he generalizes those few examples to all of media trying to brainwash the Japanese into becoming mindless western puppets. There is obvious unfair generalization, hyperbole, and bias here. The author also depicts this as a specific attack on the Japanese, when in reality every country is targeted by not so fair media portrayal. I am sure that in Russia the U.S. is painted in a very negative light using all kinds of doctored documents. But that is just reality, Japan isn't necessarily unique in this sense.

Taken out of the Japanese victimization context, there is a rare piece of good advice from the author. Always validate your sources, especially as technology develops and new methods evolve for propaganda purposes.

Anyway, this guy is totally off his rocker though. Saying the Rape of Nanking was some Chinese soldiers dressed as Japanese. And including Korea and Manchuria along the with Japanese Islands when referencing Japan is just blatant revisionist history. I do not think he necessarily has malicious intentions though. He legitimately believes that the Japanese are becoming western puppets and is scared that Japan will become a doormat for other nations. I find it pretty sad but it puts this manga into perspective.

What a great first manga.

animeenjoyer2

Definitely agree that the author probably had the right intentions (as they wanted the best for their country in the manner they thought was best), but the claims they made were put to the extreme. While I agree that (I also did not fact check the picture’s origins) if you are able to prove that the pictures gave the wrong context then it should not be used, the claims he made about the Nanjing Massacre was absurd. It felt as if they were avoiding information to fulfill their own point.

Sensoron

Definitely an interesting read to say the least. Most of the time I was sitting there trying to figure out what the author was trying to do and how wrong they could be. There was a part that said they were giving 10 minutes for the toilet for each person for democracy, but then it's not even democratic it's more of socialist?? But then it goes over the Tokyo War Crimes trials which then gave the whole viewpoint of the author, where I viewed them to be pretty conservative. Second chapter was more of how it says not to trust pictures, and not to trust any source of information. Honestly this part was giving the vibes of anti-vaxers but what is more interesting was the idea that even schools are not to be trusted. While I do agree to not put full trust into information, and go on more of a search for the information instead, I feel as if some of the claims the author makes is a little far fetched.

For example, it depicts this picture as the way that children would act due to this “brainwashing,” but the way they react is more of a pro-war, conservative ideology that I do not think anyone else would think of except the person writing the manga. What is even more interesting is the fact that the author tries to only include the information that falls more onto their points. There was a clear obsession with the Nanking Massacre, then it shows how the picture is wrong which then is supposed to discredit another country and in turn give others a better view of Japan. But then it just completely ignores the history of what happened in the Nanking Massacre and the atrocities that Japan committed.

I’m not even interested in politics in the slightest, but some of the takes this guy made were so bad. He just tunnel-visioned and decided to generalize practically every single person on the planet, then ignore points such as how there are literal history books and accounts of many people about history.

kaiojustin

Your Name

This was such a beautiful movie that I've been meaning to watch for a long time. I really enjoyed how unpredictable the movie was and the absolutely gorgeous artwork. It represents a few societal problems that are relevant to the modern world. First, it represents the issue of distance and disconnection in modern society. Taki and Mitsuha, despite living in the same country and being of the same age, are initially strangers to each other. They come from different backgrounds and have different experiences, yet they are able to connect through their shared experiences of body-swapping. The movie reminds me of how technology, while making communication easier, can also create distance and disconnect between people. It shows how meaningful connections can be made when people take the time to understand and empathize with each other. Additionally, the movie involves the theme of memory and the importance of preserving it. The comet that the town is preparing for is said to wipe out all memory of the town and its people. It shows how the loss of memory can lead to the loss of culture, history, and identity. This shows the importance of preserving and passing down memories, stories, and traditions to future generations. Finally, the movie demonstrates the issue of gender roles and expectations in modern society. Mitsuha, who lives in a traditional, patriarchal family, is expected to fulfill the role of a daughter and carry on her family's traditions. However, she longs for more independence and freedom to pursue her own dreams. The movie shows her struggle to break free from gender roles and expectations. This can also be seen when they swap bodies and behave differently than they normally do. While they normally act in their stereotypical way for their genders, they act opposite while being swapped. This causes people to think they are weird, when in reality, them acting masculine or feminine should not dictate whether they are weird or not. This was a really fantastic movie and I am very glad this course gave me the motivation to finally watch it.

animeenjoyer2

Technology definitely makes it easier to talk to others but as you said, it also makes it harder to truly connect with another. For example, whenever Taki was searching for Mitsuha, even though he was able to talk to them through body swapping (which I can view simply as talking through tech), he still did not know where she lived, even after experiencing so much of her personal life.

Your Name

Second time rewatching it, I finally understood it. When I initially watched it, I was flying for 12+ hours by then and was practically sleep deprived and could not understand anything that was happening. While I am not 100% sure how this correlates to Foucalt’s “Method,” maybe we can relate the power they mention to be the power within Your Name, and how it seems to have this continuous variation while at the same time is connected to something, somehow. Granted I will say that I did not understand the reading much.

What was interesting was comparing the way people viewed both Taki and Mitsuha whenever they switched bodies. For example, we see that Taki had a crush on Okudera and nothing really progressed in their relationship until Mitsuha took control, and even though Mitsuha was not really interested in anyone initially, Taki practically made it so that more people were. While I am not sure if this was just a comedic point, I think that it was very interesting to see how acting like a different gender (such as how Taki in Mitsuha’s body would not care about their skirt or Mitsuha in Taki’s body knowing stitching which can be seen as traditionally feminine) leads to people to view them in a more positive light. Then when Taki was on the date with Okudera, he absolutely fumbled the bag (he’s just like me fr) because he was not this feminine-like character that attracted Okudera or even Tsukasa (when he called him cute).

One funny thing though was Mitsuha’s reaction to seeing the prices at cafe’s, which could be due to the fact that she was from 3 years in the past or due to prices in certain areas of the world varying. On one end, if it was due to her being from the past it could be some sort of small scene about inflation and how absurd it is to see the prices of things going up. On the other hand, it can show the inequality between different parts of the world, in which one part of the world may be extremely cheap to buy things and in the other, the same exact item is insanely expensive.

angel-is-not-creative

Hetalia

I cannot rate this with a good conscience ❤

I have autism and Hetalia is my special interest so this is literally 3k words long and I have absolutely no regrets. I could have gone on longer but I wanted to remain relevant to the class. If you don't reply to me I will cry.

I'm gonna break this into a few sections so you can skip around. I'm going to try and stick to just season 1 with this discussion, which won't be too hard cause it's the most insane one. Also, I just want to say that I wrote this all before I read the attached article and I'm now seeing that I literally could have written that article because I know everything about Hetalia.

When do we cross the line between stereotyping and just straight-up racism?

Hey, why are we idolizing WWII Germany?

Oh, we are portraying war as silly and funny, okay cool.

Is this Japanese Nationalism? (a surprisingly controversial argument)

The Sub and the Dub are 2 totally different shows

The Fandom (and linking back to other class-related terms)

Okay I'll name one good thing

Alright, let's get started.

A lot of people will argue that Hetalia is not racist at all because they are making fun of everyone. If you are portraying all of the countries as their most common stereotypes then it evens out in the end. I would argue that this is in fact, not the case. Especially when you set your show during WWII. I will give Himaruya credit in that he mostly focuses on European countries to make fun of, making a lot of the stereotypes less so targeted at minorities. However, a lot of these jokes are still highly insensitive and frame some countries in a worse light than others

Just look at the difference between how Northern Italy is portrayed as opposed to Germany or Japan. Or how France is a predator, Belarus is into her literal brother, and Spain is seen as a creep. It is often times mocking an entire country's intelligence, appearance, or personality. While it is not always that serious, it does lead me to the second point.

When you personify a country and mock it, you aren't just mocking a piece of land, you are mocking an entire population of people. These jokes may seem harmless but they can still be hurtful. While I don't believe that liking Hetalia translates to your actual views on world events, it can unconsciously impact your real-life thoughts and behaviors.

(also why does Britain see imaginary magical creatures, what is that referencing? According to the wiki, it is some popular folklore story of a rabbit who lives on the moon but like.. what? If Himaruya was doing this much research into these countries' cultural backgrounds why is he portraying them like this?)

This show portrays WWII Germany in too positive of a light for my liking. I've noticed a trend in anime where they seem to love Germany (or Germanic aesthetics) a lot (AOT I'm looking at you). Now I'm not well-versed in the interpersonal relationships between Japan and Germany, but the idolization is not it. The way that Japan in this show is portrayed as being literally obsessed with Germany is the biggest example (Italy is also shown having an immense appreciation for Germany and is often gushing about his positive qualities, even writing him a song while he was being kept prisoner). But I mean look at how Germany is portrayed, even his stereotypes are mostly positive, he is hardworking but helps out his fellow allies, makes great food, and is super strong. His only negative trait is that he sometimes doesn't understand social scenarios and that makes him very awkward. However, he will always go out of his way to try and better understand his friends (like Italy) by purchasing books to try and help him learn the appropriate way to act in scenarios).

This is 10x worse in the dub but we will get there. When one of your main characters, the one you are portraying in the best light, is a literal war criminal hot anime boy, you can understand why I would be concerned. I mean they gave him the whole blonde hair blue eyed appearance like come on. Now I'm not going to go into depth on fandom or anything here but Hetalia knows that its demographic is young tweens (primarily girls) so how can you be surprised when this portrayal of Germany leads to WWII fanfics sympathizing with Germany and 14 y/o girls in German military uniforms doing questionable things. (also Germany becomes a canonically gay character in Hetalia in like season 4 or something and that just makes me so mad, like yeah, of course, the gay character is WWII Germany that so cool) (okay, I would like to clarify that technically Sweden is the only confirmed gay character. Sweden is bad representation though because he has one-sided feelings for Finland and makes him uncomfortable by constantly referring to him as his wife)

I mean yeah, obviously this isn't going to be an accurate portrayal of history but some of this is just totally misinformation.

Austria invading Germany is literally just Austria annoying him in his house for a really long time. But also there's like actual wars... and like all of the events of WWI are canon... and like there are some really serious episodes

Also, we literally see a bunch of countries going to war personally, like fighting on the frontlines. Which to me confirms that these people are all literal murderers, like mass murderers lowkey.

Do you know how many weird USSR jokes there are throughout this? So many. Lithuania is pretty much just in a running gag where he keeps getting manipulated by Russia into coming back to live with him. (Yeah, there are so many USSR fics as well).

ALSO! why is the American revolution portrayed as the saddest thing to happen thus far, the storyline is stretched out from episodes 16-20 and it is all drastically different from the tone of the rest of the show. Britain is literally on his knees crying saying that he can't shoot America (which also implies these countries can physically harm/kill each other). Like that is the war you wanted to make all sad and sentimental? Why? Is this how Japanese people think that we view the Revolutionary war? Because that is a pretty inaccurate view.

Anyways back to the original point. Some historical events should not be played for laughs sometimes. It is incredibly disrespectful for actual victims of these tragedies to portray these events as funny or goofy.

Though I will give credit because Himaruya does make all sides of the war look like idiots who have no clue what they are doing, which is a sentiment I can get behind.

As a both non-Japanese and non-Korean person I can not really give my opinion on this however I can share with you both sides of the argument. This is mostly in relation to the original comic strip, but has some relevance to the anime as well. I just wanted to bring it up because it is interesting to me. (This is briefly mentioned in the article but I wanted to expand on the argument).

You may or may not have noticed that there is no South Korea character in this show, however, there was in the original comic. In the comics, South Korea is a pervert who is constantly touching Japan and he also takes credit for the inventions of other countries. Now I'm obviously not going to go into the past history of these 2 countries because that would be incredibly long but the South Korean National Assembly reviewed Hetalia and determined that it was a "crime against South Koreans, akin to slander". So yeah, South Korean people were not happy with this portrayal and the character was inevitably removed from the anime before release. (This is a real picture of the South Korean National Assembly reviewed Hetalia, the corner shows South Korea groping Japan inappropriately)

There are two opposing views to the Japanese Nationalism take and I'll link them both (Belittling Japanese Nationalism Hetalia: Axis Powers is the title of the first one)

The first one pretty much argues that Hetalis is not Japanese nationalism because it paints Japan in just as negative of a light as all of the other countries, no one is left out of being made fun of. Japan is seen as socially awkward, emotionally repressed, and obsequious.

The second argues that Japan is often shown to be more intelligent than other characters as well as often being of the voice of reason (especially compared to China) and most of his negative attributes are not nearly as harmful as some others in Japan’s case, even his “negative” stereotypes are inoffensive, as they pose no threat of meiwaku.

I think we see in the dub that Americans are a little more willing to make fun of themselves. Though there are a few good Japan self digs, like the capitalism joke in one of the first episodes.

Oh boy I've been waiting for this.

The dub is 10x more offensive than the sub. Most people consider it a crack dub.

So many of the jokes are rewritten that it is practically a different show. The sub is from a Japanese perspective and the dub is from an American perspective.

First of all the accents in the dub are so bad like it is actually atrocious. Japan is really annoying because not only is his voice stereotypical but he always says 'nani?' instead of 'what?' as if that is a normal thing that people do. The narrator is the best part of the dub and she is hilarious.

So I don't really feel comfortable even typing out the jokes here so if you want to hear them I included the time stamps for the three nazi jokes I remember in season 1 (the last two being worse).

Episode 1 (1:35:1:38)

Episode 7 (2:13-2:19)

Episode 48 (1:28-1:31)

Those are just a few examples and it gets worse. The dub literally had no reason to include these jokes because there is not even an insinuation of them in the sub and it makes literally everything a million times worse.

I will give the dub some credit for being so utterly ridiculous that it's funny. I will provide a few timestamps for the funniest jokes that only appear in the dub from the first 19 episodes (but I really recommend looking up Hetalia dub funny moments on youtube because some of them are really priceless):

Episode 13: (1:45-2:05)

Episode 14: (1:12-1:22)

Episode 17: (0:59-1:15) (2:06-2:11)

Now I've had this post typed up for a bit and originally I wasn't going to talk about the fandom but after reading the article that he assigned (and going through the fandom unit), I see that there is a lot of reference to fandom in particular so I want to at least mention it.

Not the 2 biggest problems with the Hetalia fandom are racism and the fetishization of gay men.

As mentioned in the article, there have actually been multiple fan incidents of them dressing up in WWII German military uniforms Germany/Prussia cosplay, and standing in front of temples with fake guns or doing nazi salutes in convention photos (If we want to bring racism and fetishization of gay men together there were two people who kissed in a holocaust memorial museum in Italy and Germany cosplay... there is no picture of this so it might be a rumor but it was well-known so it is worth mentioning). There were also a lot of people using imperialist Japan flags in cosplay/fanart and writing incredibly inappropriate fanfiction about real-life events.

If you would like to see any of these incidents feel free to look up "Hetalia the Boston Incident" I don't really wanna include the photos here.

The fetishization is not unique to the Hetalia fandom, but it is amplified to the max. Obviously, within Hetalia, there are almost no female characters, so this leaves only male characters to be shipped with one another. Now suddenly Germany is an uwu gay bean and not an actual war criminal. At the moment of writing this Hetalia has 32105 M/M fics on ao3 which is only one of the three fanfiction sites, with ao3 not even becoming popularized until after the peak of the Hetalia fandom. (the most popular ship being America/England who refer to each other as brothers in the show as England raised America, showing another problematic part of the fandom). I would argue that Hetalia has one of the gayest fandoms (My Hero Academia is giving it a run for its money though) and I agree with the article that it is inaccurate to say that this is only done by straight cis women. The fact of the matter is a lot of queer teens used Hetalia as an outlet to express their own sexuality through these characters. The straight women that do fetishize BL are likely only doing so because anime creators suck at writing good female characters.

I think that the "level of gayness" turns straight fans away from watching the show (again MHA is the same way today) as it is hard to interact with the fandom without seeing some yaoi content. However, many people view this as something wrong or cringy, when in reality it is a normal part of fandom culture. When gay people have such little content that is actually gay, you cannot blame us for creating our own through characters that we like/relate to. Again, I think the only issues that arise here are the problematic ships that give young people a bad impression of relationships (abusive, incest, pedophilia, etc) or the arguable problematic ones like China/Russia or Lithuania/Russia as again these are real countries with real political relations. (However, I will never forget the time that there was Russia/China fanart on the news, maybe they approve and I shouldn't be complaining)

The thing is, Hetalia only seems so bad because the fandom is so large and so young. A lot of shows have fandoms that sexualize the characters and have kinda problematic fans, but the sheer volume makes things seem worse. This is something that we covered when we watched Genshiken, but there is a lot of negative stigma behind this fandom in particular, but it is just a loud minority that gets a lot of news coverage between fandoms.

It also raises the question "Is a show responsible for the response of its fans?"

Because while Himaruya has no control over what people do with his characters or how they interpret a plot, if a majority of people are leaving your show spouting vaguely racist rhetoric and interpreting your show one way, isn't there some validity in that interpretation? I think a creator has to be aware of their audience, which in this case is a very young and impressionable audience who might not understand how offensive some of the things they are doing really are. They don't hold the same ability to separate fiction from reality.

That being said Hetalia had a large impact on fandom culture as a whole, largely starting things like 'ask a character' panels (along with like homestuck but we don't talk about her). If you go to any convention you will probably find a Hetalia cosplayer, and if you watch any dub there is probably a voice actor from Hetalia there.

I also want to mention Hetalia is also a fandom full of cultural capital, If you don't know every niche fact, you're not a real fan, If you haven't read Auf Wiedersehen Sweetheart you haven't even met the entry-level requirements to be a fan. There are also no characters that are too sacred to be altered within the fandom. If you want to put Germany in a maid dress have at it, if you want to see all the characters as girls you're in luck cause Himaruya literally drew them. Fanfictions can take place anywhere from WWI to the present day and you can put any characters in any scenario and make it believable. There are thousands of pieces of fanwork, fan art, fangames, and fan AUs. These characters are malleable to fit your personal preference and there is really no way you could be mad at this as Himaruya does this himself, with no real established canon.

a Hetalia fan once said, "No one cares if Hetalia was written by a Japenese Imperialism apologist when you're 31 chapters deep into a human Au soulmate fic about Austria inviting Prussia to see his boyband perform in Berlin"

Himaruya is also the king of moe characteristics because he turned these Hetalia men into any cute thing he could think of, Chibi versions (Chibitalia), female versions (Nyotalia), and cat versions (Nekotalia). He has no reservations about drawing the characters in a dress or in cat ears. He gave the characters human names to allow for more standardized human AU's and made a DS dating game. He encourages fans to take his characters and use them in their fanworks as they see fit, canon is up to interpretation itself. I think Himaruya himself was a huge part of fandom culture (not that I could tell you cause no one knows anything about the guy) and saw how the female characters were often treated by fans and turned it on its head, allowing for females to sexualize the males this time.

Also, none of the male characters in this show resembles a Hegemonic form of masculinity. Even the most masculine character in the show (Germany) can be seen doing more "feminine things" like wearing a dress or proposing to a man. Which, you know, I guess is a good diversion from things you would typically see in an anime of this nature (but again there are a lot of instances of characters being feminine being played for laughs, like a man being girly is something inherently funny). Feat. Germany proposing to Italy with a tomato ring.

I am Hetalia's biggest hater, however, I cannot deny the impact that it has had on my life and how much I love to talk about it. Hetalia is what introduced me to anime and fandom (and tumblr) for the first time. I met a lot of people I still talk to today because of this show. It encouraged me and a lot of other people to actually get interested in history. Thanks to this show I can identify every country in Europe, and it was a lot easier to remember historical facts if I just imagined the Hetalia characters. Also, Auf Wiedersehen Sweetheart is a literary masterpiece and there is a reason it almost has a five-star rating on goodnotes (https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/22064556) I love you George DeValier I hope you're doing good wherever you are.

I would like to make it abundantly clear that despite everything I've said that might make me sound like a woke blue-haired liberal, I don't really think this show is some horribly racist show or that the people who enjoy it are racist. I just wanted to provide a deeper outlook on the impact a seemingly dumb show can have on real people. I can't really blame the show for the terrible response of the fandom and it did honestly get better in later seasons that are not focused on WWII.

Despite all the bad stuff, it is a relatively funny little 5-minute watch, and you can really just jump in at any point you want to. If you don't take it as seriously as I do you might even enjoy it a little.

If you actually read this far I have major respect for you, I'm really excited to see what the general consensus on this show is.

Prussia and South Italy were my favorites in case anyone cared

If you're wondering why I didn't do my presentation on Hetalia despite my extensive knowledge, it is because I would be incredibly biased and I would go off the rails I think.

Also, my biggest fear is current Hetalia fans finding this and killing me, that might seem irrational but the Gundam fans found me last time so I wouldn't put it past them.

animeenjoyer2

Very fun read. Honestly, when I was watching it, I already had a pretty decent understanding of history and random facts when it came to the countries participating in WWII but when taking into account how you said that the fandom is relatively young, it is pretty worrying to have this as a first exposure of history. With my history knowledge, it made the references seen in the show entertaining, but I picture that if one had little to no knowledge of this topic (whether it be due to age or just not learning about it) I think this has a potential to be somewhat volatile in terms of where the viewers can misconstrue history in a very wrong direction (I searched up the Boston incident). So with this being said, I think the series CAN be entertaining but the topic itself (as for episodes 1-19) is something that I would definitely tread carefully on, as history is (usually) taught by trained experts so people can avoid the wrongs in the past, rather than glorifying it.

Hetalia Axis Powers

In Hetalia Axis Powers, each country’s military is personified to be one person which embodies their culture but more of their stereotypes.

What was interesting was that there were many historical references when it came to the interactions with the countries. For example, in episode 3 Germany was working to pay France as a reference of them losing WW1 and they had to pay reparations to many of the countries. Even Italy joining Germany in WW2 is a very obvious reference as it happened in real life, but what was really interesting was the fact that they made Italy look like this harmless airhead who can’t really do anything right, assuming that they are personifying their military. While this characterization of Italy may seem like a random comedic thing to do, it is actually historically accurate as (from what I remember from previous history classes and my memory can be incorrect) Italy in WW2 was literally one of the most incompetent countries in the war, where they would lose nearly every battle and to save face they decided to take control of a random country in Africa that had no significance in the war but in this effort to do so, they almost lost (or they did lose, I forget) against people who had worse weaponry than them. While this may be looking too far into it, Russia wearing a scarf can also be seen as a reference to how they used their winters to their advantage, where in WW2 Germany tried to invade Russia but lost due to Russia being smart with their military strategies that uses their desolate land in the winter.

Now, there are times in which the personification of the countries is not strictly about their military, but rather the country itself and its stereotypes. For example, with Italy the first thing we see him say is “pasta,” Japan is seen as reserved, America eats hamburgers, Germany with potatoes and sausages, etc. While I do think that stereotypes can be offensive at times, in relation to this anime I think if you separate the military side and the cultural stereotype side of the countries, it is not as offensive.

jpt1311-blog

Xenoblade Chronicles 2

As I am presenting on this set of videos for the game Xenoblade Chronicles 2, I won’t give away too much of the information being talked about tomorrow. I will be talking about one of the themes which is the delusions of grandeur. In the 24th video of the playlist, we start off with seeing a room of scientists and analysts attempting to regain balance from the war waging outside the station. It then cuts to the professor who is experimenting on the Conduit talking about how creating a new universe and new life is something only a god could do but now he will be able to achieve the same. This seemingly is pushing his human agenda of wanting to have the ultimate power and wanting to play the role of god. Towards the end we see however that this professor regrets doing what he did as it caused suffering for all his people and it brought to light just the vastness of the universes and how even by creating what he did there was no way to escape the overwhelming power of who or whatever is out there in the great beyond. We can see this coming into play in the real world all to often with many powerhouse countries and wealthy people feeling as though they have the ultimate power and decision over life and death of the vast majority of people. Without getting political we can see countries building nukes and waging war in order to fulfill the idea that they deserve to be in control of everyone when in reality they are just someone filling a spot in the grand timeline of the world’s lifespan. Overall we have seen world leaders attempt to play the role of god and we know that with humanity being built the way it was, no one person should hold all the power as no single person has the best intentions for everyone. In the reading when talking about alchemy and the role it can play we read “It shows how alchemy in its many forms was just as empirical in its orientation as the mechanical or materialist forms of science that eventually triumphed. The main difference was that practitioners of alchemy believed that the secrets of nature represented an underlying divine unity that was manifest in the material world. Mechanical science was equally theological, but it posited that God was distant from nature, denying that nature itself might hold meaning." Overall now I want to play the game....

animeenjoyer2

The professor was definitely someone who wanted power and play this role of God, and obviously regretting it, but then I feel like many of the characters in the world seems to want as much power as possible while not really taking into consideration of the consequences either. For example, with the Drivers and Blades, I feel as if there are many who wanted more power yet did not understand the consequences of doing so. Whether it be the death of those around them or the death of Titans.

Xenoblade Chronicles 2

While there were many themes within this series, I think that the most important to look at through these cutscenes was the idea of human greed in relation to the environment.

I actually liked to see the Blades and Titans as a metaphor for nature itself, where they were a part of their own cycle of life as we can see with how the Titans would hold the crystals which would turn into Blades which would ultimately go back to Titans and repeat. But then we can see how humans sort of interfere with both Titans and Blades for their own agendas. For example, there was Jin, Malos, and their whole group who wanted to get the Aegis or Pyra/Mythra in the beginning of the cutscenes, where we learn that they ultimately wanted to use it for their own agenda no matter the cost. Then I remember there was another group of people (I think is a nation) that wanted to invade another nation and to do so was preparing through the use of gathering Drivers and Blades. So in both situations, it was humans who had their own agendas that was going to use Blades, or nature itself, to fulfill whatever they wanted no matter the cost. Then there was the incident where they had found a dead Titan that either was dead due to an accident or something attacking it, and as Titans hold the crystals for Blades, it follows the same idea in which humans do anything to fulfill their own agenda, where even if these Titans are there to help humans and are also dwindling, they would still attack Titans to get more weaponry (when you assume that it was attacked).

We can then see the same idea when it comes to the backstory behind the world and Klaus. The world back then was clearly in war and even though we do not know exactly why (or I may have forgotten), we can assume that this conflict/war is due to a group of humans’ agenda, which usually is the case in these situations. This then caused people to do whatever they wanted, such as Klaus practically creating a new world.

dahstev

Miyazaki – Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind

The film heavily focuses on the ecological aspect of the pollution caused by industrial civilization. The world is in a post-apocalypse state where people are now living in a pre-industrial society except that there are still modern weapons such as guns, tanks, and planes. It shows the conflict and struggles between nature and humans, and that nature always prevails. Many bodies of nature are named after the effects of pollution such as “Acid Lake” and “Sea of Decay.” The film revolves around the Sea of Decay, which is filled with toxic spores dangerous for humans to breathe in and continue to spread in size. Most of society has turned a blind eye towards nature and considers it as an enemy rather than understanding its actions of helping the planet. The whole purpose of the Sea of Decay was to contain all the pollution in one area generated by mankind and to cleanse it by filtering it underground. But instead of solving the root of nature’s problems, humanity would go with the easier route by using weapons of mass destruction such as the least Giant Warrior to stop nature.

The protagonist is Princess Nausicaa from the Valley of the Wind, where she has a strong affinity for nature and is a woman in STEM. She’s able to communicate with nature through insects and understands how the environment fundamentally works. In her secret underground lair researching with the supposedly “toxic” plants, she learns that nature (the plants in this case) is absorbing and sacrificing itself to clean the environment which causes the toxic spores. Compared to the older generation of society, it shows that their mindsets are still ignorant of the environment and have no obligation to protect it. This brings up the discussion from class of how the younger generations are repairing the damages done by the older generations.

animeenjoyer2

The effects of pollution is for sure displayed within this movie (granted they are using planes to commute and that is the complete opposite of environmentally friendly). Like when you realize that the plants are not actually toxic, and that they are just protecting people by holding the pollution then the reason as to why its spreading is due to it needing to grow to handle the pollution that is constantly growing. Also the animosity towards the Sea of Decay makes you question what is causing this hatred?

Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind

This movie had aspects that makes you question “how did things become this way?” while at the same time displaying the idea of environmentalism.

The Sea of Decay is described to be this dangerous place that can even kill you from breathing in the air without a mask for five minutes while at the same time having insects that can attack and kill you. However, we see this not truly the case when it comes to Nausicaa and how she interacts with this ecosystem. She seems to respect the ecosystem, as she does not attack any of the insects even if they are violent, she seems to take samples of spores just for research, and she seems to communicate to the wildlife in a friendly manner. For example, even if an Ohm was violent, Nausicaa tried to calm it down through whatever manner possible, or even with her hidden garden she used to fully understand the plants in the Sea of Decay and how they are not actually dangerous.

But what was actually really interesting was the fact that there seems to be a clear message when it comes to how people view nature. On one hand there is Nausicaa who respects the environment and the Sea of Decay which leads to her reaping the benefits of this character of Nature. Then on the other hand there is the Tolmekians and Pejites who want to destroy parts of the Sea of Decay due to the idea that they cannot coexist, which leads to the Sea of Decay attacking them. For example, the first Tolmekians we see is on the ship that was being attacked by insects or even with the Pejites whos country was destroyed by insects even though they are only aggressive when provoked. So Miyazaki seems to have this message that there needs to be some respect with nature and that people need to live harmoniously with it as it can both harm and help humanity.

SwampCon 2023

(Sorry I forgot to take a picture at the convention so I instead have two pics to help show that I did attend)

Even though I have been engrossed in the anime or manga culture for a little over a decade, this was the first convention that I participated in so it was a little interesting to see the change in western ideology of this culture, and the convention more or less confirmed this change.

I went there with some of my friends on Sunday and ended up seeing the costume contest, the Naginata panel, the artist corner, and the other area with merchandise (I forgot what they called it). I actually did not expect to see that many cosplays as for some reason I thought “since it is a university convention and not a widely known convention there probably won’t be as many people cosplaying there.” Obviously, I was proven wrong as I instantly saw many people cosplaying multiple sources of media, whether it be characters from video games such as Gerudo Link from BoTW or Trilla from Fallen Order, characters from anime/manga such as various characters Chainsaw Man, characters from (what I believe to be) web series, and even someone dressed as the Pope. Cosplay contest definitely exceeded my expectations in terms of the quality of cosplay they had, granted I thought there would be way more people in the contest due to me seeing other people that cosplayed but did not participate in the contest.

Even though my friends and I really wanted to see some sort of action at the Naginata panel, we did not and instead learned about the deep culture behind a singular weapon in Japanese history, and some history of Japanese war and eras.

The artists’ corner and the merchandise that I saw was definitely something that aligns with the idea of otaku culture and Genshiken but without the 18+ doujinshi. When it came to the merchandise area, there were various different items, whether it be clothing, tabletop game equipment, charms, jewelry, and even figurines. Now, I knew that they were pretty expensive, so I did refrain from purchasing anything from this area as I knew that there are definitely places I could buy the same product for cheaper. But while this area was for more of these items, the artists’ corner is something that can be seen to align more with Genshiken and the idea of a database model as people create their own art works of characters in different ways that they know works within the database. The artists’ corner can be seen with posters, stickers, or even keychains of characters that are posing in a way that gets more attention. Technically even the figurines in the merchandise area can do something similar to this. For example, as Chainsaw Man got pretty popular due to the Fall 2022 season of anime, I saw a lot of merchandise for Pochita as according to the database, it is a very popular character.

What was interesting was seeing how many people are interested in so many different fandoms. While I recognized a good amount of the sources of where the cosplay or merchandise originated from, there were some that I had absolutely no clue where they were from. So it made me really understand that unlike the years of around 2012-2016 where enjoying anything seen at these types of conventions in the Western world, (at least on the part of the internet I was a part of) was seen as odd and was highly stereotyped, the current era of this culture is more or less the opposite. People enjoy whatever they enjoy and are more open to express their love for a fandom or series in comparison to the “closet weebs” of years prior.

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