Opinions about deep anime/manga

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To start off I’m a really big fan of the artist/writer Kaori Yuki.
One of my favorite titles by her is the series Angel Sanctuary.
This series is a beautiful piece of artwork and plot intertwined together going from beautiful to dark issues. In the case of the story God and faith are questioned many times or potrayed in a radically different way.

God is portrayed as an evil character, some devils/demons play heros or voices of reason, etc

What are your feelings about this manga or other anime/manga that deal with dark or deep issues?

Do believe it corrupts the minds of young people?
 
sorry anime/manga and deep dont go together

bloo
pro life brown haired troll
 
bloo said:
sorry anime/manga and deep dont go together

bloo
pro life brown haired troll
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Clearly you’ve never read Death Note.

To OP: Kaori Yuki’s work I treat as crack rather than serious stuff. I haven’t read Angel Sanctuary, but I’ve read scans of Ludwig Kakumei and I’m most of the way through Godchild (her Earl Cain series is crazy stuff). Yuki-sensei obviously isn’t taking herself very seriously in those, so even though I’ve heard Angel Sanctuary is deep, I wonder if that’s the case.
 
To bloo actually a lot of it can be. What is your experience with anime/manga?
Nevarlander said:
Clearly you’ve never read Death Note.

To OP: Kaori Yuki’s work I treat as crack rather than serious stuff. I haven’t read Angel Sanctuary, but I’ve read scans of Ludwig Kakumei and I’m most of the way through Godchild (her Earl Cain series is crazy stuff). Yuki-sensei obviously isn’t taking herself very seriously in those, so even though I’ve heard Angel Sanctuary is deep, I wonder if that’s the case.
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May I ask as to why you treat her as crack rather than serious and what you mean exactly by she isn’t taking herself seriously?
 
Mika said:
To bloo actually a lot of it can be. What is your experience with anime/manga?

May I ask as to why you treat her as crack rather than serious and what you mean exactly by she isn’t taking herself seriously?
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First, have you read the ones I have in scans or in the tankobon that Shojo Beat puts out?

Do you read her author’s notes at the beginning of every chapter? She squees about Cain and Mary and “Lui” like a fangirl. It’s fairly obvious that she takes the drawing the pictures seriously, but the stories are just fluffy fun for her. Even if you don’t read the author’s notes, the plots and characters are so over-the-top that I can’t take her work as serious literature. I love them because watching aristocrats being pervy is one of my guilty pleasures (why hello there Byakuya/Rukia), but they’re very very silly books.

But like I said, I haven’t read Angel Sanctuary, but somehow I get the sense it’s like Earl Cain with angels.
 
Nevarlander said:
First, have you read the ones I have in scans or in the tankobon that Shojo Beat puts out?

Do you read her author’s notes at the beginning of every chapter? She squees about Cain and Mary and “Lui” like a fangirl. It’s fairly obvious that she takes the drawing the pictures seriously, but the stories are just fluffy fun for her. Even if you don’t read the author’s notes, the plots and characters are so over-the-top that I can’t take her work as serious literature. I love them because watching aristocrats being pervy is one of my guilty pleasures (why hello there Byakuya/Rukia), but they’re very very silly books.

But like I said, I haven’t read Angel Sanctuary, but somehow I get the sense it’s like Earl Cain with angels.
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I have read both american published man including GodChild which was published in Shojo as well as scanlations and yes I do read the author’s notes. However, despite her lighted hearted comments and squeeness ((lol)) I don’t take it as her not taking her writting serious. I do know the fact that she loves her characters to a great extent. Also the author’s notes aren’t a real good thing base an opinion of her literature off either since most Manga-ka use the author’s notes section to introduce themselves as not to remain a faceless author, as filler to help meet their required pages, and a section to get giddy about their creation.

If the plot and characters weren’t as over the top as you have mentioned I doubt that any of her series would hold the same draw for me. On one hand the purpose of manga is to entertain so that certainly takes precedence. But I think if she had told the story/s with any less of an imagination it just wouldn’t work as well and certain emotions/ideas/points wouldn’t have been conveyed.

Hmmm I wouldn’t say AS is like a Cain with angels. The plot and characters is obivously better drawn out then in some of her other works for the reason that it spans over 20 books. The first few might be a little confuzing at first but everything falls into place as the story continues. When approached with an open AS makes you think and question.
 
The great thing about Japanese anime/manga is that they do not hold to the linear belief of the west that animation or comics have to for some specific mold of storytelling. I bought this one manga called “in the clothes named fat” It’s a very sad story about an overweight japanese woman who develops an eating disorder. She goes from emotional binge eating to bulimia. Her life falls apaart. Her boyfriend is abusive and eventually leaves her and after starving herself for so long, she ends up in the hospital. After that she decides to start over and try to live a healthier life, albiet alone and jobless.

Now, that particular novel is more for the teen/adult crowd, not children. A great Manga novel for children would be YOTSUBA&!
It’s a series about a years old green haired little girl who has four pigtails(youtsuba means 4 leaf clover). It had me in stitches. It’s basically about her learning all the new things around her in her world. Kind of like rugrats but waaay more funny and alot cuter.

If you want to see something Dep in Anime. ANYTHING by Satoshi Kon namely *Tokyo Godfathers *which is about three homeless people who find an abandoned baby on Xmas eve. It’s really really good. If you want to be in tears, may I suggest *Grave of the Fireflies *which is about Japan when they got fire bombed and many orphaned children starved to death including the Protagonist’s young sister.

Tokyo Godfathers
youtube.com/watch?v=xxCvrzVBuXw

An AMV of Grave of the Fireflies
youtube.com/watch?v=Er4fw5HJUC0

Paprika: also based on a Japanese novel
youtube.com/watch?v=NclRSeV4pBA&feature=related

So don’t tell me there are no Deep and serious anime. Many of these movies are based on japanese literature. It’s simply more practical to animate a movie then to spend so much money on live action adaptations.
 
Have to say Death Note’s not deep; it raises a bunch of issues and then ignores them. It’s complex, but lots of people are good at chess and still philosophical simpletons.

There are few shows for grown-ups that are deeper than (non-filler) Naruto. My little brother’s gonna be the only sixth grader who understands existentialism, thanks to the orange ninja.

GunXSword, for all its silliness, is seriously deep–show me one American story that’ll concede that sometimes revenge is legitimate, while still showing that it’s often self-destructive? Plus both Ray’s and Van’s “dreams” were just married love and a normal, humdrum life: it’s like Chesterton wrote it (possibly not a coincidence that Van’s Armor is “of Thursday”).

Trigun, especially the manga, is very deep, as is Gungrave–they’re both about redemption, while not ignoring the need for justice (again, not a concept any American show would dream of).

The Korean manhwa Chi U Under Heaven, or Heavenly Executioner Chi Woo, ought to be required reading before one’s allowed to have an opinion about the death penalty–it’s about an executioner (who’s also a shaman who “plays well” with Saja, the Korean shinigami) who forgives people’s sins by executing them.

Everything by CLAMP ('cept Miyuki-chan in Wonderland, I’ll admit) is pretty deep–xxxHolic’s like a mini-course in purity-based religions. ‘X’ is a fascinating exploration of the idea of an apocalypse, of course, but even moreso it’s about the idea of destiny, and cheating destiny. If CHOBITs doesn’t make you think long and hard about what a person is, and what love is, then…actually you probably just got distracted by how cute Chii is ;).

Peacemaker Kurogane, Gensoumaden Saiyuki, heck even Gundam WING: those are pretty darn deep stories. I didn’t understand Zen until I tried to wrap my mind around Sanzou’s recitation of the Buddha-killing teaching of the Rinzai sect (actually I needed to read the Life-giving Sword by Yagyu Munenori to really understand Zen, but Sanzou sure helped).
 
I’m about as inexperienced as anyone can get when it comes to anima/manga, but have had the pleasure of reading a little of Sailor Kenshin’s YYH fanfic. Codename Moron (shortfic) and Idiot Beloved have great storylines and the writing is nothing less than superb. Has anyone else read either of these? Although I wouldn’t recommend leaving any “Catholic” comments on the fanfic website (don’t want to turn off any prospective readers 🙂 -remember Jesus said to be innocent as doves, but …) I really enjoy the symbolism.
 
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