Let me tell you guys a little story. Yeah, it’s going to be one of those posts…
I don’t know if I have talked about this on here but I’m not great with kids. I don’t dislike them at all but I’m not the type that will start fawning over children just because they’re children. I guess I’m sort of neutral toward kids. I figure that if I ever bake my own, that might change but it also might not….
This is the context you have to keep in mind as I tell you my story.
I was babysitting. Yes, that’s how it starts. I can count on one hand the number of times I have babysat in my life. Most of those times were decades ago. Let’s just say I’m not exactly up on what the cool kids do for fun nowadays. Bock socials? They hang out at the malt shop? True story, I thought malt was a metal for years.
Despite all the red flags, the evening went quite well and we had fun both together and independently. At some point, I decided I needed some personal entertainment and decided to try out a new manga. Get ready for the interrogation princess. It’s extremely cute. The manga is a series of comedic vignettes set in a fantasy world featuring a valiant princess getting interrogated in a bunch of pleasant or adorable ways and giving out information almost instantly. I’m not explaining it well but trust me, it’s quite sweet. It made me smile and even giggle out loud a few times. And on one of those occasions, the kid asked me what was so funny.
We’re getting to the point here. I actually described the premise and the specific vignette I was reading and got a half confused half mildly disappointed reaction. It seems my enthusiasm was not shared. It was too cutesy and silly for more sophisticated tastes.
The thing is, the parent loved it…
You see, I am on occasion asked about my opinion on whether a manga or anime would be good for someone’s kid or niece or something. And it happens regularly that I will say they might be *too young** for something. Almost invariably the comeback is no they love violent stuff you should see the horror movies they watch, or it’s OK, they’re used to all the sexy stuff in anime… that’s great for those kids but it’s pretty much never what I mean. Some things just need a few years under your belt to be appreciated.
For instance, I really love both Land of the Lustrous and Acca 13. Neither is particularly violent, at least not in the traditional way and I think Acca has a coffee date scene once and it’s as far as it goes for the salacious stuff. They’re also beautiful to look at. But I would probably never recommend you have your 11-year-old watch these. One is a surreal critic of organized religion and mysticism while the other is an understated political intrigue told through procedural administration. These shows are not for kids because most kids would be bored to death by them.
I wonder if I am going to get a dozen comments telling me how wrong I am and that ACCA is their 10-year-Olds favorite anime. I almost hope so. It’s a great show. The point remains that a mature story is about way more than just is there sex and or violence in it.
But that’s kind of obvious, right. Penguindrum isn’t going to resonate with you until you’ve gotten a pretty solid understanding of loss. But what about something like interrogation… or even Dragon Goes Househunting. Ok, maybe it’s more fun if you have dipped your toes in the real estate market at some point but still. It’s a cute fantasy shoe full of cute characters and therein lies the problem if you ask me.
On paper, Interrogation, and Dragon Goes Househunting are both ideal family entertainment. They are adorable and full of easy and lighthearted humor with a few nods that will appeal to an older crowd without ever getting raunchy or in bad taste. They should be the perfect sort of thing to enjoy with the kids around you. And yet, in my case, both were met with resounding disinterest and mild disdain from a variety of young folks and I have decided that it’s because they are too young for these titles and possibly too old at the same time.
There’s this period you go through when you want to shed childish things as a right of passage to adulthood. At least I think here is, I’m pretty sure I have heard of it. I’m not looking forward to going through it though, I love childish things! Anyways, most people go through a time in their lives when they don’t want to be seen as a kid anymore. And part of that is not being seen enjoying things that are for kids.
With their cutesy characters, goofy humour, and innocent storylines, I think stories like Interrogation… and Dragon Goes Househunting fall right into the category of seeming too childlike while the more tongue-in-cheek elements and references that will resonate with adults are too subtle or unassuming to get properly picked up by teens and tweens leaving them in a limbo.
Tricky isn’t it? And obviously, it’s hardly a universal rule. I’m sure there are teenagers out there that enjoyed both of these titles and plenty more in the same vein. But it’s still a pattern that I noticed.
And so, whenever I get asked for recommendations for younger viewers I freeze up and go into this series of complicated calculations. I mean I wouldn’t want to seem uncool! That would be the worse!
Ironically, sex and violence are one of the last things I consider when trying to figure out what the appropriate age of an audience s for any given show. I will tell the parents something along the lines of it’s very well made and has great pacing, I think your kid will love it but it is quite violent if there are any issues there, and let them figure it out!
What I’m saying is that our current rating system is hokum! Growing up is not about becoming horny and violent. Not only about that…at least not for everyone! And we should widen our appraisal of media a bit.
Did you think this is where I was going with this diatribe? Kind of a sharp left turn, isn’t it.
Ok, so here’s the second point of this post, Interrogation… is really fun and cute. It’s a great way to cheer yourself up if you’re having a bit of a bummer day or to just spend a few minutes and smile!
I remember when I was around twelve or fourteen or so, I was shopping with my parents and we were at a larger tech store. Of course I went to the games section and lingered over the games there, since at that time the mini-booths set up to play select games on them for the parents to do their business and have their children be at some fixed place already were no longer, unfortunately (and there was no bookstore nearby). So when they got around to collect me there was a mother with her (older than me) son nearby who somehow asked me for recommendations for her son for his PSP (perhaps I instigated a discussion back then, I can’t remember). So I prattled a little bit about games I considered fun and good in general, amongst which were “LocoRoco”(+2), “Patapon”, “Tokobots”, “Echochrome” before coming to a realisation and adding that he might not enjoy them since he probably was too cool for them.
He looked like the later-to-be “Never have I been so insulted by something so true” meme.
As for recommending manga and anime titles in general – since I hope to be able to at least partially rightfully claim to be good at that – I usually first ask what music, films, books and gamdes the person in question enjoys to then map out a few things in a similar style. Of course, there’s things like “Cowboy Bebop” (and its sister “Samurai Champloo” for those not liking jazz and blues, those monsters) or the best weeb gateway drugs ever – Ghibli and Kon – but there’s got to be something for almost everyone, I think.
Not having had to recommend stuff to kids yet, though. That’s very brave! 😀
(Those Rinis are super cute!)
You may be thinking of the C.S. Lewis quote “When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to appear very grown up.” — I certainly was when reading this!
There’s definitely something to the idea that true maturity is when you can embrace something regardless of how it might appear on first impressions. I’m 42 and I love tons of cutesy stuff, regardless of whether or not it has a more “dark” or “adult” core. There’s value to just pure fluff, too, and recognising that and not being ashamed of enjoying it is an important part of growing up.
I’m not sure when “mature” started to specifically mean “horny and violent”, but you’re right — it’s so much more than that.
So very much this! It even has become more apparent when media is advertised “with adult themes” instead of simply “adult” in the meaning Irina described in the post.
There was a moment when someone in my vicinity actually said “Anime? Ah those cartoons are all gore and tits, aren’t they?” and only later have I learnt that the only aware contact they’ve had with the medium was a cover of “Elfen Lied”. Yes, it was actually that clichéd.
Yet separating conceptual and thematical from descriptive and illustrative content as well as messages seemed until not that long ago to be able to be applied only to more classical media. Is this a sign more for the adolescence of a media (in a given country)? Or is that a human error from the start, since to this day many a one puts SciFi and fantasy into the children’s book corner.
Part of what you describe there relates to how anime first came west — I don’t know how it was elsewhere in the world, but certainly here in the UK, some of the most high-profile, noteworthy anime series that came over first were the most violent and/or sexual, which of course led to a lot of people’s first encounters with anime in the early ’90s being with those violent and/or sexual series.
Cute Girls Doing Cute Things came a little later — though I’m sure Sailor Moon was present in some form or another Back In The Day, I don’t remember ever seeing her back then. Perhaps I was too much of a Boy to look at something so obviously “girly” at the time.
My own first contact with anime was through a combination of a feature in PC Zone magazine that focused on the “adult” side of things (it coincided with a couple of companies bringing over 18+ Japanese PC games with explicit anime-style artwork, such as Cobra Mission, Metal and Lace and suchlike) and my brother (who worked on PC Zone at the time) bringing home a huge box of promotional VHS cassettes from Manga Video, who were just starting a big marketing push.
Being a teen at the time, naturally I was drawn to the 18-rated ones first… and so it was that one of the first anime I ever saw was Urotsukodoji: Legend of the Overfiend. I think I’ve just about recovered from that now.
There’s a lot that never gets an English dub, especially for younger viewers. So what’s the age where they read well enough to follow a sub? OTOH, that might be an encouragement to up their reading skills and comprehension.
Also the most interesting things get localized away.
There’s also the issue that Japan doesn’t shelter kids from serious topics in anime. I’m currently watching DoReMi Sharp, with 3rd grade characters. DoReMi’s mom explains that she was planning to kill herself after an accident ended her career as a pianist. Aiko’s mom tells her that having a miscarriage was a major factor in her divorce. And the kids pour sake for their parents.
I think this is complicated thing because of how each good is different and is going to respond to different media in unique ways from each other. Also, it goes with parenting too and they allow the kids to consume without thinking about it.
For instance, my parents never knew that I read a book about adventures going to Mars where characters murdered others and had sex in zero gravity amongst other things in elementary school. There are some kids who have been exposed to media like that while others are more protected , but I think some kids can handle some heavier things.
Some of this I hadn’t really thought about before, but it clicked with me when you mentioned “wanting to shed childish things.” There are so many anime from my younger days that I had to go back to because I was too self-conscious to actually enjoy them.
I loved the ACCA “date” scene. So much wasted shipping potential! Ahem… Anyway, I like what you’re saying here, which sounds to me more or less “Big people problems and experiences require big people to appreciate them.”
FWIW, my kids loved ACCA 13, but they’re hardly typical munchkins. (And now one of them is driving AAAAH!) I’ve kind of raised them on anime, letting them watch things I enjoyed and providing commentary when needed. So… maybe it’s been educational for them? 🤔