vanilla mom discovers anime
by gail
jae’s note
We’ve always wanted Out of Depth to be a place where we can explore stories. Up until recently we’ve focused quite a bit on videos about RPG stuff and our actual play podcast. We want to tell stories but also discuss how stories have affected us.
Gail wanted to write a series of essays about her exposure to anime. I thought this was a great idea. This first piece details her absolute ignorance and her eventual appreciation for the art form.
Expertise is a kind of currency in fandoms, and often times people hide their own lack of knowledge for fear of being the target of bullies. I think Gail’s story is pretty typical among fans of all kinds, not just anime, though I doubt many would admit it.
-jae
Growing up in small-town Kentucky, my first foray into the world of Anime was a knock-off version of Beauty and the Beast. I had fallen in love with the 1991 Disney animated classic in the theaters, and counted down the days when it would be released on VHS. One day, I was headed toward the Wal-Mart checkout with my mother when we saw that fairy-tale title on sale for $5.99 on one of the store end caps. The characters on the front had similar coloring to my beloved movie - Beauty in gold and the Beast in blue - but I could tell that it wasn’t the Beauty and the Beast that I had seen in the cinema.
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So what - it had to be close, right? I begged my mom to get it, telling her I would take it out of my saved allowance at home.
Of course it turned out nothing like the Disney movie, at all. Oh sure, the basic fairy tale plot was there, but that was where the similarities ended. Even the gold-and-blue character depictions on the front never appeared in the film at all. Beauty wore a pink peasant dress and Beast was a charcoal gray reptilian-like monster instead of the brown-furred version on the cover. What was more, it appeared that the animation was in a lazy style where all the characters were drawn the same, but with different hairstyles or coloring.
I found that I didn’t hate the movie, as it helped sate my appetite until the Disney version was released, but my first-grade self decided that this “Anime” was not as complex as the animation I was used to. “That’s how some people have to make cartoons,” I thought. And that was that.
A decade later, I got a job working at the video rental store in my hometown. It was a Movie Gallery at the time, but they had bought out the local Video Vault, which was a veritable warehouse of VHS tapes. The endless supply of cassettes had spoiled my sleepy little town so much that when Blockbuster came into town, touting that they had almost limitless supplies of the latest top hits, the chain was shocked to have customers show up by the dozens looking for old movies. “We only have the latest hits,” they’d say. “Yeah, I know, but I don’t want to watch Last Action Hero,” the middle-aged customer would retort, “I want to watch Affair to Remember!” Blockbuster was doomed.
I was putting away returns one day, when I was surprised to find that there was a whole section of anime. This anime wasn’t cheap-looking or lazy, but it was not the sunny, fairy-tale animation I had seen when I was seven. These covers looked gritty, rebellious, and kinda scary. Though I was proud (and naive) enough to think that I had some understanding of what movies should be like - being an aspiring filmmaker and all - movies like Akira, Cowboy Bebop, and Ghost in the Shell were whole other worlds that I did not think I should explore. Being a Future-Film-Director was one thing, but I was also a middle-class, super-white teenage girl, who had decided on her college, major, and life at 17 and wasn’t about to look into other realms that might make me think differently.
Still, I was intrigued that there could be a whole genre of this animation style, and that it might not be as lazy as I had thought. I found myself taking note of which customers would rent from that section, eyeing what they were taking from the store and wondering what these post-apocalyptic cyberpunk films might be like. Most of the people who rented Anime were regulars - fans of all types of movies who took weekly advantage of the “5 Oldies for 5 Nights for 5 Dollars” promotion that Video Vault was famous for (and that Movie Gallery wished our town would forget, though it accounted for the majority of the store’s profits). I also noted that - despite their taste in subversive-looking films - Anime fans were rarely rude, fairly confident, and they didn’t seem to be embarrassed to wear Star Trek or comic book t-shirts (something that would get someone like me laughed at in my high school).
So when I saw that they were all renting a movie called Spirited Away, I found my interest was piqued.
The cover showed a little girl in pink (much like my knock-off Beauty and the Beast from so many years earlier), surrounded by carnival lights and - ghosts? The back cover showed colorful, sunny spaces, with a white dragon and what had to be a witch with a very large nose. It seemed to be a hopeful fantasy instead of apocalyptic science fiction. I finally asked one of the Anime Regulars if they knew anything about it. “Oh, I love it. It’s a kids movie, but it’s gorgeous.”
“Gorgeous.” That was not the term I would have used for any of the Anime I’d seen. “Cute” for the knockoff video, “intimidating” for many of the others. But “gorgeous?” I grabbed a DVD copy and took it home that night.
I’d be lying if I said I was blown away at first sight. Actually - I was more confused! All of these deep, beautiful, almost realistic backgrounds and haunting images… and they still used that weird character style! And that large-nosed witch! I didn’t know from the cover that her nose was as big as a whole person! What was up with that? Why did they draw the characters so weirdly when it was obvious there was artistic talent in the film?
Regardless, the film stuck with me. I watched it two more times before I had to return it. I kept thinking about how annoying and unlikable the main character Chihiro was at the beginning, to the point where I kept asking myself why Haku would even help her, and then surprised by how much I liked her at the end after she had matured and overcome all of her obstacles. I was amazed and horrified at the gluttony of No-Face. I was fascinated by Yubaba’s huge head. I found myself shaking my head sometimes, thinking of the amazing story with this absolutely confounding animation.
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A year or so later, I left for college, ready to dig into my aspirations at filmmaking. I felt a little risky one day and wore a maroon Gryffindor shirt to class. Harry Potter would be considered nerdy and childish in my hometown, but the shirt was subtle enough that anyone who hadn’t read Harry Potter wouldn’t know what it was. And so it was that a girl named Cara pointed at me in one of my classes and said “Is that a Harry Potter shirt? That’s awesome!”. I had taken a cue from the Anime fans by showing off my nerdyness - and found a friend.
So of course it makes sense that, when I went to hang out in Cara’s room one day, I noted that she had a Spirited Away poster. “You’ve seen that?” I asked. “Oh yeah,” she said, “I’ve seen all of the Studio Ghibli films - well, all that they’ve released in the States.”
“All of the Studio Ghibli films?” I vaguely recalled that Studio Ghibli was one of the logos at the beginning of the film, but they had made more? I asked Cara about them, and she gushed about movies that I needed to immediately watch like Kiki’s Delivery Service, My Neighbor Totoro, and Princess Mononoke. Princess Mononoke seemed familiar - a more samurai-like cover arose from the depths of my Video Vault memories - but the others were unknown to me. “You can’t get them on DVD here,” Cara sighed, “but they sometimes get released in movie theaters.”
The void of Ghibli DVDs and VHS tapes would soon be filled - Spirited Away would win the Oscar for Best Animated Feature film later that year, beating out Dreamworks, Fox Studios, and not one but TWO Disney films. It was the first (and, as of this writing, still the only) hand-drawn animated film and non-English-language film to win in that category.
So the rest was history. Disney would go on to distribute the Studio Ghibli films in the US, ensuring that not only Cara’s suggestions, but Porco Rosso, Grave of the Fireflies, Castle in the Sky, and many others could be seen by American audiences. And it was then, when I was able to see so many of the films, that I finally began to understand my fascination them.
You see, I had been watching Studio Ghibli films through a very Westernized lens. Most of the American films I had seen featured charismatic (and sometimes very two-dimensional) protagonists that ran around resolving a complex plot. Jason Bourne, Danny Ocean, Beatrix Kiddo - they all had distinct looks, but very little history or growth of character. The reason you watch their movies, though, is the mystery of The Bourne Identity, the heist of Ocean’s Eleven, and the absolute violence and kookiness of Kill Bill. The look of the protagonists and the intricate plots of the movies are the true stars of most western films.
But Studio Ghibli films centered around the setting of the film and the growth of the characters as the focus of their films. A protagonist’s looks are secondary to their actual personality and development, and their flaws are more prized than their sleek good looks and charm. The plot is a tool to this character development, not the focus and device for entertainment. Ghibli films allow the audience to experience the people in the story, not the series of events they encounter.
I can see now why this attracted people like me, who wanted to be appreciated for more than looks and surface charisma. We also lived lives that weren’t filled with huge plot elements like giant aliens or overpowered government agencies. Our lives were made up of small events that could make or break our days - the cute barista continuing to get our name wrong on our coffee, the struggles of a new job, or the need for something more fulfilling in life. We were not looking for action and battles (at least not all the time), but for connection and a better understanding of who we are, flaws and all.
Spirited Away’s main character, Chihiro, is annoying and whiny. I didn’t like her and I didn’t want to empathize with this pathetic protagonist. But Chihiro is a reminder that we are all pathetic at times, and we’re even allowed to be when things get rough. But we have to come out of that childish behavior and be thankful for what we have and what we have yet to find. By doing this, she finds that her antagonist is not such an evil witch after all - but a person, with the same feelings as her. So her enemies become allies, and it’s much easier to solve a problem with some help.
Another element of Anime, particularly Studio Ghibli films, is the amazing settings and background. The sparkling sun on water as Porco Rosso flies above the ocean, the Spirit Train taking Sen and No-Face across the flooded plains to Zeniba, Satsuki racing across the countryside to find her sister as the sun sets behind her. These are scenes that one cannot forget once you’ve seen them. These stunning, magical places led to a whole Studio Ghibli theme park being erected without rides - just settings from the movies! While the plot in Anime is a tool, the setting is not. The setting is what inspires our characters. It is almost a character itself, like Howl’s Moving Castle, encouraging our protagonists to keep going. Watching these movies certainly reminds the viewer that it is important to step outside and enjoy life and the beauty of nature.
And so, with Studio Ghibli films, I was finally able to understand my fascination with Anime, or at least one aspect of the genre, and venture forth on to other titles, like Akira.
But that’s a story for another time…
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