Binge-Watching Japanese Anime on Netflix
Aug. 12th, 2018 09:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkat1. Torrential rain storms this weekend, no thunder or lightening to speak of..yesterday it was one heavy rain storm after another. The sky would suddenly open up and drop a gallon of water. Stop. Then do it again. Lots of flooding, although nothing near me -- I'm not near water, sort of on hills, and in the third floor of a 7 story apartment building, with drains and good groundwater saturation. But New Jersey got hit hard...one car dealership ended up losing all their jeeps and SUVS...they floated out of the parking lot and down the river.
Went grocery shopping, robot vacuumed (which amuses my mother to no end -- she doesn't see it, she lives far away, but has talked to me on the phone while I've chased around after it), and did laundry. Wickedly humid, and arthritis flared up, so didn't do a lot of walking about.
2. Been binge watching innovative Japanese cartoons...or anime via Netflix. I find them comforting and great escapist fodder. Also, I'm that rare human who LOVES animation. [My brother's best friend from high school, last I heard, was teaching animation at the Kansas City Art Institute, and heads up their animation division. While another one of his former friends, who he used to draw comic book characters with, is an animator for Disney. And two other college pals were animators on Tim Burton's Nightmare Before Christmas.]
BTW -- there's a ton of this stuff on Netflix and Hulu. There's so much that it is hard to figure out what to watch. I sort of just jumped about. Netflix has about 900 scripted television series. And about 100 or so anime.
(Honestly, when I think of how I had to hunt this stuff down in the 1970s,80s,90s and early 00s.. SMH. All I had in the 1970s was Speed Racer and Kimba. In the 1980s, I found Battle of the Planets and I think an early version of Voltron. In the 1990s, I found Ghost in the Shell, Sailor Moon, Akira, and a bunch of horror anime, also Lupin III. In the 00s, I found more Lupin, Cowboy Beebop, Princess Monokoe, My Neighbor Totoru, Howl's Moving Castle, and Spirited Away. Disney started distributing it. Most of the anime I found was about nuclear war and it's after effects. I love anime. Prefer it actually to Western animation, it's more varied, the art is better, and it's a lot more subversive. But it was really hard to get my hands on until recently. I had to comb cult video stores. Blockbuster didn't have it. But the cults video stores did. In the back section under science fiction. Most of the stuff I found was science fiction. Also used to have to hunt for magna, now Barnes and Noble has an entire row of shelves dedicated to it. LOL! ]
Me: Been watching Japanese Cartoons or Anime
Mother: Are they with subtitles
Me: No dubbed in English. I can't watch cartoons with subtitles, gives me a headache. The words blur into the animation.
Mother: I wondered -- couldn't see how you watched them. I'd think that would be a problem.
Me: It is. I just watch the ones that have been dubbed.
* Ouran High School Social Club (see previous post) - it's 26 episodes and only one or rather two seasons combined. Available on Netflix with English dubbing.
* The Devil is a Part-Timer (also available on Netflix with English dubbing) -- it's just 13 episodes. The set-up? Satan and his general escape from a holy war in their realm, Ente Isle, where the hero of the realm, a half-angle/half-human named Amelia, defeated them. She follows them to earth. But alas, they lost their powers and are turned into twenty-somethings. Realizing he has to make money, Satan takes a job at the local McRonalds (McDonalds) in a city in Japan. He works his way up to shift manager. While Amelia takes a job as a customer call support. It's insanely subversive. Satan and his general set up house, with his general cleaning Satan's laundry and keeping house. It's a one room apartment, where they sleep on the floor. Amelia has a wonderful high rise apartment.
Also, at one point they end up taking in Lucifer who is 18 and a computer hacker. Satan is actually really nice, nicer than the hero, who is a bit of a whiny jerk. Actually all the holy, angelic characters from Ente Isle aren't that nice, while the demonic ones are. LOL!
* The Seven Deadly Sins (has two seasons available on Netflix and is dubbed in English). It's about a princess of Britannia (during King Arthur's time) who hunts down seven deadly warriors to help her save her kingdom and her family from the order of the Holy Knights who have gone rogue. The warriors are called the Seven Deadly Sins. But they aren't what you think, and each has a cool and interesting back story. We have Captain Melodius - Dragon Sin of Wrath, a master swordsman, who looks like a fifteen year old boy and isn't all that tall, but built, Ban -- Fox Sin of Greed, a thief who is immortal, and is seven feet tall, white blond hair and leanely muscled, King -- Grizzley Sin of Sloth -- really Halequin, King of the Fairies, Lady Diane - Serpent Sin of Envy --- she's a giantess who can control the earth, creating boulders or sand...and there's a pet talking pig called Hawk. Also they travel in a tavern that's transported by a giant green pig.
It's subversive too. Also vulgar in places...so not exactly for kids. Melodious is always groping Elizabeth's boobies, and ass, he also steals her undies at one point. The men are shirtless and shown with great abs. (The sex humor is sort of reminiscent of The Family Guy, except with better art and more attractive characters). And violent -- but cartoon violence. Lots of blood and gore. But Japanese anime is sort of known for that. Again not exactly for the kiddies. Although, I'm willing to bet the main audience is the under eighteen crowd.
It's apparently very popular, has two films planned. And a third season on the way.
Only problem with these cartoons, is there are times I want to smack the characters upside the head. The women characters also have high-pitched whiny voices in some of them. Which can be grating.
Went grocery shopping, robot vacuumed (which amuses my mother to no end -- she doesn't see it, she lives far away, but has talked to me on the phone while I've chased around after it), and did laundry. Wickedly humid, and arthritis flared up, so didn't do a lot of walking about.
2. Been binge watching innovative Japanese cartoons...or anime via Netflix. I find them comforting and great escapist fodder. Also, I'm that rare human who LOVES animation. [My brother's best friend from high school, last I heard, was teaching animation at the Kansas City Art Institute, and heads up their animation division. While another one of his former friends, who he used to draw comic book characters with, is an animator for Disney. And two other college pals were animators on Tim Burton's Nightmare Before Christmas.]
BTW -- there's a ton of this stuff on Netflix and Hulu. There's so much that it is hard to figure out what to watch. I sort of just jumped about. Netflix has about 900 scripted television series. And about 100 or so anime.
(Honestly, when I think of how I had to hunt this stuff down in the 1970s,80s,90s and early 00s.. SMH. All I had in the 1970s was Speed Racer and Kimba. In the 1980s, I found Battle of the Planets and I think an early version of Voltron. In the 1990s, I found Ghost in the Shell, Sailor Moon, Akira, and a bunch of horror anime, also Lupin III. In the 00s, I found more Lupin, Cowboy Beebop, Princess Monokoe, My Neighbor Totoru, Howl's Moving Castle, and Spirited Away. Disney started distributing it. Most of the anime I found was about nuclear war and it's after effects. I love anime. Prefer it actually to Western animation, it's more varied, the art is better, and it's a lot more subversive. But it was really hard to get my hands on until recently. I had to comb cult video stores. Blockbuster didn't have it. But the cults video stores did. In the back section under science fiction. Most of the stuff I found was science fiction. Also used to have to hunt for magna, now Barnes and Noble has an entire row of shelves dedicated to it. LOL! ]
Me: Been watching Japanese Cartoons or Anime
Mother: Are they with subtitles
Me: No dubbed in English. I can't watch cartoons with subtitles, gives me a headache. The words blur into the animation.
Mother: I wondered -- couldn't see how you watched them. I'd think that would be a problem.
Me: It is. I just watch the ones that have been dubbed.
* Ouran High School Social Club (see previous post) - it's 26 episodes and only one or rather two seasons combined. Available on Netflix with English dubbing.
* The Devil is a Part-Timer (also available on Netflix with English dubbing) -- it's just 13 episodes. The set-up? Satan and his general escape from a holy war in their realm, Ente Isle, where the hero of the realm, a half-angle/half-human named Amelia, defeated them. She follows them to earth. But alas, they lost their powers and are turned into twenty-somethings. Realizing he has to make money, Satan takes a job at the local McRonalds (McDonalds) in a city in Japan. He works his way up to shift manager. While Amelia takes a job as a customer call support. It's insanely subversive. Satan and his general set up house, with his general cleaning Satan's laundry and keeping house. It's a one room apartment, where they sleep on the floor. Amelia has a wonderful high rise apartment.
Also, at one point they end up taking in Lucifer who is 18 and a computer hacker. Satan is actually really nice, nicer than the hero, who is a bit of a whiny jerk. Actually all the holy, angelic characters from Ente Isle aren't that nice, while the demonic ones are. LOL!
* The Seven Deadly Sins (has two seasons available on Netflix and is dubbed in English). It's about a princess of Britannia (during King Arthur's time) who hunts down seven deadly warriors to help her save her kingdom and her family from the order of the Holy Knights who have gone rogue. The warriors are called the Seven Deadly Sins. But they aren't what you think, and each has a cool and interesting back story. We have Captain Melodius - Dragon Sin of Wrath, a master swordsman, who looks like a fifteen year old boy and isn't all that tall, but built, Ban -- Fox Sin of Greed, a thief who is immortal, and is seven feet tall, white blond hair and leanely muscled, King -- Grizzley Sin of Sloth -- really Halequin, King of the Fairies, Lady Diane - Serpent Sin of Envy --- she's a giantess who can control the earth, creating boulders or sand...and there's a pet talking pig called Hawk. Also they travel in a tavern that's transported by a giant green pig.
It's subversive too. Also vulgar in places...so not exactly for kids. Melodious is always groping Elizabeth's boobies, and ass, he also steals her undies at one point. The men are shirtless and shown with great abs. (The sex humor is sort of reminiscent of The Family Guy, except with better art and more attractive characters). And violent -- but cartoon violence. Lots of blood and gore. But Japanese anime is sort of known for that. Again not exactly for the kiddies. Although, I'm willing to bet the main audience is the under eighteen crowd.
It's apparently very popular, has two films planned. And a third season on the way.
Only problem with these cartoons, is there are times I want to smack the characters upside the head. The women characters also have high-pitched whiny voices in some of them. Which can be grating.