When I look back on series like Voltron and Speed Racer I realize that the old anime was really badly censored and it continued on to shows like samurai pizza cats and G-Force
So I pose this question was the censorship of the anime past a necessary evil in order to get us interested in anime at an early age of our lives?
I'm never a supporter of censorship. If it's intended for older viewers, print that on the box, or don't release it at all, but don't deface the original work.
Seconded. Otherwise you get the feeling japanese are really retarded, because the story makes no more sense,...
I'm more referring to wheather we needed it in order for anime to be as popular as it is
I've never been much for localised anime.
If I was going to pay money for a DVD, I might as well order it directly from the publisher's store, fewer middle-men. Since the whole purpose of purchasing a dvd is to show your support for the company and relieve your guilt from having downloaded and burned all the episodes + soundtracks.
Don't think so,... Just show appropriate show to the target audience, instead of maiming others that should not be displayed, instead.
I can't believe there are not enough good quality anime that can be shown without censoring parts of them
It is generally not meant for older viewers. Westerners might often get the impression that the target audience for anime is older than what it really is, because Japanese TV is a little more liberal in what is considered appropriate to show to kids.
samerai pizza cats was censored?
Well what I can understand censorship if these anime are shown on TV. However if they are only for DVD or home viewing, I think it would be destructing art.
I think it was a necessary evil back then. A lot of the older anime fans grew up on that stuff, and based on what it's done for me, it's motivated them to be more aware of anime and ultimate coerce the market to releasing better quality series without the censorship and wonton script abuse.
Also, consider the following: if anime was never released stateside back then, because it was considered too rough for American audiences, the type who would watch animated shows, viewed as cartoons, watched by children, etc., Anime would probably not have made the same impact that it has in the here and now. It'd still be extremely niche, it'd be considerably harder to find fansub groups to translate it, and there wouldn't be as large a anime community to sit around and bitch about censored anime.
If no anime made it to TV, the internet would still be there, youtube would still be there. It would only have kept it underground a little longer.
I put this article on 4chan few months ago and I think this can answer your question.
The truth of anime foreign edition
1 Name: Anonymous : 2007-09-10 03:59 ID:NOumSFsX
Hi everyone,I'm a newcomer and English is not my mother tongue so please pardon me for my clumsy writing.Anyway,I want to talk about something that most anime fans seem always complaining but not many of them know the true reason.Why do foreign TV stations always do so many edit to anime before they willing to broadcast the show?For examples:according to most anime site that the episode order of Cardcaptor Sakura(cardcaptors)was rearranged because most of the viewers of that channel are male and therefore they made Li appear from the beginning.You also notice that they always make their own version of OP&ED or like Macross(Robotech) all the BGM and songs were recomposed and the story was reedited.And they also found bunch of actors to remake the drama parts of Power Rangers(same thing happened to those black and white Godziller movies).Keeping only the fighting scenes.
The conflict between anime fans and TV stations is obvious. Anime fans always prefer the original version and how come those people of the TV stations can't just simply do the dub and leave everything else alone.I saw many angry otakus swearing and ranting on many anime site or even youtube.I know exactly how they feel.When I was a teenager I had the same question on my mind.Why don't those staffs of the TV stations understand that they aren't making the show better but disgracing it.And even if you do ask them,they can still bring out lots of reasons such as the culture between Japan and their country is different,the standard of censorship is different,and so on.
However,as an adult now,I finally figured out the true reason why they are so eager to make their own version of everything. You think the staffs in charge of anime don't know what you want or what they had done was useless and meaningless?Trust me,they know exactly what you want and what they are doing. You think they really care about cultural different or censorship or even ratings?Those so-called reasons are nothing but excuse,or simply bull shit.Maybe some of you had already figured it out.And yes!The true reason is the same almighty force driving almost everything:MONEY!Think about it,you can not earn anything by doing nothing.The staffs employed by TV stations have got their education and all the expensive equipment are there.What are they supposed to do?anything instead of nothing.By doing all those unnecessary editing, script rewriting,recomposing,they just simply created a job for themselves and ask for their paycheck.This is the real world we're talking about and to them anime is nothing but a product that can make money,not huge money but enough to pay for the loan of their house,school fee of their children.And of cause they can claim to their superior that everything they've done is necessary and even get credit if the show do sucess.Or if not,they still earned their salary.After all,how many executives of TV stations are otakus?
If anyone still doesn't understand what I'm saying then let me make it simple.What they've done is just like tearing something in completely fine condition apart and reassemble it,call it a job is done and here is the bill.This phenomenon is nothing rare in our society.Just like you take your car to an auto repair shop to get the cluth fixed but those repairmen can always find dozen of other problems and claim that you should get those fixed too.I'm not asking you to forgive or even appreciate what they've done.I just feel that if you really want to hate something,you should at lease understand the cause of it.And there is always a simple answer for anything seem incomprehensible.
samurai pizza cats wasn't so much censored as completely remade into something else. in that case it was kind of a happy accident because the scripts were pretty funny.
>>13
Truth. If you watch the original japanese show(assuming you understand or can find subtitles) I think you'll find they're two entirely different shows.
"A necessary evil"? What are we discussing here, Comics Code?
Fuck censorship. They show bucketfuls of blood in shounen series already, don't they? And violence without consequence. Why would some uncensored T&A be any different?
It's not like hardcore porn anime would suddenly appear on prime time TV. (Well it might, in Japan. But then it already would, wouldn't it.)
Back in the 90's all the Evangelical Christian groups said that Pokemon was going to lead the children to immorality and unhealthy habits. At the time I did not pay much heed to them. Looking at 4chan, they were some sort of psychics.
Some shows are censored in Japan too. Just think about School Days last episode. But I think its still not so bad as in the US.
Kodomo no Jikan has it worse. Most of the reason to watch it has been censored over!
>>16
Yea right, like the one who said 1999 was the end of the world.
Maybe it was. It's just that another one started at the same time. Probably explains why I can't travel in time past that year.
It's been licensed by ADV for distribution in the US.
Censorship is the reason the US hasn't yet released Omohide Poroporo (Only Yesterday) 15 years after its original release. It's probably Takahata Isao's best movie, wtf? All because of a little menstruation.
If it weren't for the backwards dvd region laws I might be tempted to buy the Chinese, British, French, or German versions, but as it is, I must pirate, and with a sense of righteous anger. Not good business on their part I think.
>>23
Either that, or get yourself a region-free dvd player. Most of them are hackable, except for the Sony and other tight-arse models.
It just occurred to me that "having a small anus" is a japunese idiom for cowardice. Taken that way, >>24 is surprisingly insightful.
nice boat lol
nice boat lol
nice boat lol
Instead of the boat, they should have played a Rick Astley clip.