Memes about this show are so hard to avoid. After a week of seeing like 4-5 a day I said fuck it and watched a synopsis of the series. The ending seemed insanely contrived which put me off but for some reason I ended up downloading the show and starting it. I got the point where I personally thought they should have ended and then I stopped watching the show.

I’m still confused as to why the hell I watched it in the first place. I mean, it wasn’t a waste of my time. Was rather quite enjoyable. At least I can get the fuckin’ memes now. Hasn’t really changed my opinion on anime (nothing negative, just not really for me 9 times out of 10) but I’m still just… why the hell did I watch that?

Anything you’ve watched for reasons that you can’t quite place? Whether you loved it or hated it?

  • CaptDust@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    4·
    10 days ago

    I saw Perfect Blue on top anime lists over and over again for literal years. The synopsis had no appeal to me at all, as I am not really into jpop or celeb culture or anything like that. I knew it existed, but assumed it wouldn’t be for me.

    Earlier this year I just decided to dive in on it. I didn’t quite understand everything about the culture presented, but I still found myself engrossed, loving the story and basking in the visuals. Then the final act sealed it as one of my favorite animes, too. Wild ride of a film.

    Edit- I agree with you regarding ending death note “where it should have ended”, after that moment just feels like half assed trying to recreate the magic between Light and L.

      • countrypunk@slrpnk.netEnglish
        2·
        10 days ago

        I’ve seen both. Paprika was cool but I definitely preferred perfect blue. Paprika being more trippy than perfect blue was its weak point, IMO. It was a lot harder to follow the story and feel an emotional impact from Paprika because they leaned too hard into it being trippy. Perfect blue had a good balance of story and trippiness.

      • CaptDust@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        2·
        10 days ago

        Ah we wanted to watch that too, but couldn’t find a eng dubbed version anywhere! I know, I know - absolute heresy - but dubbed is the only way I can convince my partner to watch foreign lang films with me haha.

        If I ever find one though definitely plan to give it a go.

    • Stamets@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
      1·
      10 days ago

      I will consider it. Death Note snuck by me largely for reasons unknown but I can nail down a couple. One is that it was very head-y with not much in the run of visual action. One of the things that puts me off about Anime is that it can be extremely flashy. Not a complaint, again, just a thing that personally puts me off. Like a lot of stuff happening a lot on screen is visually overwhelming for me. Battle sequences in space in like Trek or Star Wars also I struggle to get through. Sometimes they’re some of my favorite things but I have to push through it because I get overstimulated really easily. Death Note just… wasn’t that. Barely any visual action and it was primarily a battle of wits.

      Yeah… I quit after Watari sends a signal to an orphanage. At that point I just went “Well the rest of this is idiotic. This seems like a great point to stop.”

      • dragontamer@lemmy.worldEnglish
        3·
        10 days ago

        Go watch OddTaxi. Masterpiece of the 2020s era IMO.

        It’s about a murder. The Taxi Driver (main character) has all the knowledge because he remembers all of his customers. And a set of his customers is related to the murder.

        https://youtu.be/jX-Ry1VxeDQ

        The episodes are formulaic:

        1. New customer gets picked up

        2. Minutes of talking in the Taxi.

        3. A side note from another characters perspective (nurse, Pop Idols, comedians on the radio, etc. etc). Kinda random, but it’s surprisingly helpful context for the murder mystery.

        You’ll find that the Seinen genre is low key and more emotionally mature. Sienen are made for adults after all. Death Note is still a Shonen at the end of the day (Teenager Anime)

        • Stamets@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
          2·
          10 days ago

          I cannot stand anthropormophized characters. I don’t know what it is and well aware that it’s a personal thing but it drives me absolutely insane. That also feels way too… cutesy. Death Note I liked because it’s dark. Whether its for teenagers doesn’t matter so much to me as the tone of it. All the shows that I watch are usually pretty darker in tone, mysterious as hell, and with a plot that you’ve gotta figure out. Stuff like Severance, Westworld, Hannibal, The Expanse, even How to Get Away with Murder. Character driven stories that have a mystery with wits being involved more than strength but that also are dark. Death Note surprised me because it managed to hit every single one of those things but with the added benefit of something I’m always looking for but can rarely find. The main character being the bad guy. I am so overwhelmingly bored of the good guy winning, especially when it doesn’t reflect reality. I like stuff that subverts expectations to an extent and the expectation for me is good always triumps over evil.

          • dragontamer@lemmy.worldEnglish
            1·
            10 days ago

            If you want a more standard grimdark about bad guy main character pillaging and conquering with his army of Demons, I guess Overlord is for you.

            I found OddTaxi to be far more emotionally mature than Overlord though. But Overlord hits at the more immediately obvious bad guy wins tropes.

            I don’t consider Overlord to be of masterpiece quality. But it does scratch the itch

            https://youtu.be/vci9YwpFFcA

            I still say OddTaxi is worth it. It’s probably darker than you think it is. I’d argue that most of the characters in OddTaxi were smarter and better written than Death Note even (the intelligence level of Death Note was basically ‘I know something you don’t know’. Meanwhile in OddTaxi, the flaws of each perspective makes far more sense and nuance)

            Overlord purposely flips the script. Every new arch a new set of heroes is introduced and then BRUTALLY MURDERED by the demons / in the glory of Ains Opal Gown. You watch the steady progress as this group of villains takes over the new world under the name of the God of Death, Overlord of Undeath.

            The joy of Overlord for me is how hard the author reverse engineers villainous monologues or other stereotypical effects. Ains places gold at the top of his base to test the greed of the heroes. They took the money yet continue to explore, clearly they’re greedy pigs and liars who must be destroyed. If they were only invading his home dungeon for the money, they should have been satisfied with the riches on the first floor yet they explore deeper. They must be punished.

      • missingno@fedia.io
        2·
        10 days ago

        Sounds like you’re specifically describing battle shounen. Keep in mind that anime isn’t a genre, it’s a medium, and there’s such a wide variety of all kinds of shows and movies that happen to be animated.