My foray into anime...

[int 21h]

The mention of Ghost in the Shell: SAC in another thread sort of reminded me of some thoughts and questions I had in regard to this series. And funny enough, yesterday I had already updated my avatar to express my new interest...

First of all, realize that I would not consider myself a fan of anime really, but the miracle that is Adult Swim introduced me to Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex late one night while I was coding. I remember the first episode I saw was The Man That Lurks in the Darkness of the Net: CHAT! CHAT! CHAT!. After that episode I immediately added it to my MythTV schedule, and I was pleasantly suprised when each episode after that seemed to grow increasingly better. There are/were several things that stick out to me about SAC that kind of go against the preconceived notions I had about Anime (Granted the anime I am talking about is stuff like Full Metal Alchemist, DBZ, & Pokemon).

The voices and mouth animations are pretty well synched. There doesn't seem to be a lot of mismatched dubbed stuff that characterizes alot of anime that I've seen in the past
Much of the artwork itself is stunning... seemingly more complicated in design than I've seen in the past
The plot... some of the episodes are just random plots establishing the world, but the episodes dealing with the Laughing Man are like a season long plot
The music is like nothing I've ever heard in an animated feature
The action... some of the animated action in this show is more entertaining than some big budget stuff I've seen from Hollywood


So.. time for my questions: The first season is now being repeated on Adult Swim... does anyone know if Adult Swim is going to show the second season? Is the second season already out in Japan? What other anime would I likely enjoy if I am a big fan of this? I've been told that the Ghost in the Shell movies are pretty good as well? Are the R1 DVDs (published by Anchor Bay Entertain) of SAC good quality (I've read enough over the years to know most anime is of notoriously suspect quality)?

Thanks in advance for the patience to answer an anime newbie :)

[Sirber]

Is the second season already out in Japan?
Yes!

http://www.animenfo.com/animetitle,1287,ybqqoe,ghost_in_the_sh.html

[Shinigami-Sama]

the dvds are out too, the highest I;ve heard of is the ep 21 on dvd but I'm not suer and don't feel liek looking :D
it;s definatly one of the better animes these days :)

[Joe Fenton]

If you thought GITSAC was good, you'll be blown away by Paranoia Agent. That starts tonight on Adult Swim.

Japanese animation is where it's at. :cool:

[Shinigami-Sama]

to bad I don't like 99
% of liscanced aniem and seeing as how I live in canada I don't get CN or adultswim:rolleyes:

[Mug Funky]

the music is by Yoko Kanno. she's done a few other series (cowboy bebop, arjuna). pretty good stuff.

as far as the quality of the R1 DVDs, the R4 ones are better, and can be ordered online. progressive PAL and downscaled from HD masters. beautiful to look at (shameless plug! shameless plug!). UK discs are similar, but with a much lower bitrate due to DTS sound. unfortunately not all of series 1 is out here yet.

english dubs are generally in better sync than japanese dubs. yanks just care more about that stuff i guess. one thing you might find is that the first few eps have better lipsync than the rest of the series. this is because the animation budget starts off high, and peters out a bit depending on how well the series goes. the last few episodes of His and Hers circumstances are barely animated at all - they're more like scanned manga.

paranoia agent is some scary stuff. haven't seen much of it, but just the intro sequence gives me the willies (WHAT THE HELL ARE THEY LAUGHING AT??).

@ Shinigami-Sama:

do you realise how snobbish that sounds? :D j/k

[edit]

btw, i don't get adult swim either. just free-to-air TV and teh intarnets for me.

[Shinigami-Sama]

Originally posted by Mug Funky
the music is by Yoko Kanno. she's done a few other series (cowboy bebop, arjuna). pretty good stuff.

as far as the quality of the R1 DVDs, the R4 ones are better, and can be ordered online. progressive PAL and downscaled from HD masters. beautiful to look at (shameless plug! shameless plug!). UK discs are similar, but with a much lower bitrate due to DTS sound. unfortunately not all of series 1 is out here yet.

english dubs are generally in better sync than japanese dubs. yanks just care more about that stuff i guess. one thing you might find is that the first few eps have better lipsync than the rest of the series. this is because the animation budget starts off high, and peters out a bit depending on how well the series goes. the last few episodes of His and Hers circumstances are barely animated at all - they're more like scanned manga.

paranoia agent is some scary stuff. haven't seen much of it, but just the intro sequence gives me the willies (WHAT THE HELL ARE THEY LAUGHING AT??).

@ Shinigami-Sama:

do you realise how snobbish that sounds? :D j/k

[edit]

btw, i don't get adult swim either. just free-to-air TV and teh intarnets for me.
I thikn english dubs rape the artist intent, when hte conloquilize the speach to teh point wher I translate it better is shamefull, especilay seeing as how I only know about a 100 Japanese words...
and I agree with hte quality of animation, lookit IY for instance, it started out as having a good animation, but quicklky became like 2d-cgi that was palleted to look like cell animation, atleast that what it looked like to me, thouhg I'm not parial ot IY that has little to do with it
and R2<Japan> dvds pwn your R2 ones IMHO atleast, authenticity is the key for me

[manono]

Another plug for the music of Yoko Kanno. Although she and her crew have done the music for many anime series, I think that Cowboy Bebop and GITS-SAC are her best works, but it's all very good. There are many, many soundtrack albums out of her work.

In R1, 6 of the 7 planned DVDs of GITS-SAC are out, up through episode 23 of 26. Even NetFlix, which doesn't carry a lot of anime, stocks them.

The original Ghost In The Shell is a very important anime film, and should be seen by everyone that has the least interest in anime. If all you've seen before is the DBZ/Sailor Moon type garbage, then it'll prove to you that good anime is for adults. Ghost In The Shell 2 is also worth seeing, but I don't think it's in the same class as the original.

Are the R1 DVDs (published by Anchor Bay Entertain) of SAC good quality

They are hybrids, with the opening song and other small parts scattered throughout the episodes done at 30fps progressive. But even the film parts are encoded as interlaced as well. If viewing the DVDs on an HDTV, depending on the player you have (flag reader=bad, cadence reader=good), you may have trouble with them. There won't be any problems viewing on a standard interlaced TV set. But other than that, they are top quality.

[Mug Funky]

shinigami-kun :) : yeah, english dubs are quite bad. voices suck and dialogue is corny. but it does tend to be in better sync... i personally don't watch the dubs unless i'm so hungover i can't read (which happens from time to time).

worse still is when they colloquialise the subs. FUNimation are probably the worst for this, but the subs in GITS SAC have a lot of deliberately inserted "cop-show" cliches in them as well. ADV subs are actually pretty good as far as readibility, even if they're quite wrong sometimes (i know less than 50 words of japanese i think... and even i find myself correcting the subs).

the discs that come out here will have subs that are a shade better than the amercian releases - we basically fix spelling and grammar, but leave everything else as it was (so long as it makes sense).

[Neo Neko]

@Int

You classify FMA as being in the smae group as pokemon etc? I just don't see it. For the most part the animation on FMA is worlds better. And the voice acting is not bad. And the story line is way more mature. Pokemon Yugioh and Dragonball * generally are prime examples of crapimation made solely to sell merchandise. But FMA is a bit to mature for the kiddies.

If you liked GITS SAC then of course you would like the movies. Akira is also a good one. You might also like Jin-roh. Hopefully once you watch some more you might hopefully expand your viewing horizons. Anything by Rumiko Takahashi or Shiniche Watanabe are usually excelent. IIRC Samurai Champloo is one of Watanabe's more recent works now airing on CN. If you like insane comedy Excel Saga and Puni Puni Poemi are also some really good works he has done. Rumiko OTOH is the master of twisted and complex love storries. Inuyasha is a good example. But I preffer Ranama 1/2 or Urusei Yatura. There is a whole world open to you if you are open to it.

@Everyone else.

I agree subs are generally the way to go. Especially fan subs. THey are about the best way to avoid having to watch a butchered work.

[Shinigami-Sama]

Originally posted by Mug Funky
shinigami-kun :) : yeah, english dubs are quite bad. voices suck and dialogue is corny. but it does tend to be in better sync... i personally don't watch the dubs unless i'm so hungover i can't read (which happens from time to time).

worse still is when they colloquialise the subs. FUNimation are probably the worst for this, but the subs in GITS SAC have a lot of deliberately inserted "cop-show" cliches in them as well. ADV subs are actually pretty good as far as readibility, even if they're quite wrong sometimes (i know less than 50 words of japanese i think... and even i find myself correcting the subs).

the discs that come out here will have subs that are a shade better than the amercian releases - we basically fix spelling and grammar, but leave everything else as it was (so long as it makes sense).
you'r the second person to ever call me "-kun" even when I wen't to Japan it was always "-san'
anywyas back on topic<ish>
I only ever use hte dubs if my player is fighting me or who ever I'm watching it with bi.. complains about the Japanese
I plan on waiting for the new dvds to come whichever they may be to get hd-GITS :) among a few other, notably NGE<good as long as you don't mind small amounts of loli-ness>
I have yet to see the GITS localy, watched with a friend a while back over in the big city<Vancouver>, but they were outa stock ;_;
GITS is pain to translate seeing as how they use such complicated dialouge that 80% of Japanese people have a hard time following it, a popular<only?> GITS fansubber takes nearly 5 days to translaet a single episode IIRC, thats jsut translating, now imagen those horrid anime-corp's trans team straching their heads looking as the script, thats why theres that "cop-show" talk, theres not realy an engrish translation so they throw something like in ;)
then again I'm also the type of trans-whore that would rip fan-subs to on my hd-disks, I hate to see butched anime like 4kids, dic, and one other I can't ermmber waht it was, do to anime.

[int 21h]

Thanks for all the great suggestions.

I agree on the dub vs sub thing, but when I'm watching something on TV, its not like I can just toggle it to subbed :-p

[Neo Neko]

Originally posted by int 21h
Thanks for all the great suggestions.

I agree on the dub vs sub thing, but when I'm watching something on TV, its not like I can just toggle it to subbed :-p

I know and that pisses me off a bit as there is something that can be done about it. Transform subtitles into closed captioning and broadcast the original language audio track as a secondary audio program(SAP). Then those of us that preffer subs with the original language can have it as well. We have the technology. Nobody uses it. Not even Anime Network does IIRC. All dubs.

[Shinigami-Sama]

it jsut shows how stupid people are..
or how easly amused they are, and I can even see adding a dollor a moth for the service but no they won't let us have it ;_;
oh and if you want another good licanced anime look for "gall force" it;s got some swearing nudity, but hell what doesn't these days?

[Joe Fenton]

They do a better job these days with dubbing, some better than others. For example, I really don't see anyone complaining about the dub the did for Cowboy Bebop. That said, I prefer subbed as well. Good example here is Paranoia Agent. They aired the first episode last night on CN, and while they seem to have done a good job, it really isn't as good as the sub. Especially in scenes where they are reading papers or computer screens where the fansub has subbing for the paper and computer. The dub doesn't and you lose part of the story.

If you don't get Cartoon Network, that's a shame. On Saturday, they're now running Samurai Champloo, Paranoia Agent, and S-Cry-Ed back to back to back. Talk about a nice chunk of anime. :)

Japanese anime is like any other media - a lot of junk with a few good titles. The thing is, the Japanese make SO MUCH anime that the small percentage which is good or great is a much higher number than American animation for example. You have at least a few new series each season which are excellent.

By the way, if you're watching PA, it's a little slow and you have to pay attention. It's a psychological thriller series. Pay attention to EVERYTHING and keep an open mind. It really starts to pay off a few more episodes in. It's even better if you can watch each episode several times. That's another good thing about having the DVD.