Cuddling and watching anime is amazing!!!
Moving this to general discussion since it does not appear to have anything to do with pro cuddling.
Oop. They've gone.
Indeed, I like anime. Spirited Away is a great anime movie to watch while cuddling. Very wholesome.
@Travismo, what’s the difference between anime and animated film? Is any animated film considered anime? Or is anime specifically Japanese animation? Spirited Away is one of my absolute favorite films. Good story, visually beautiful, imaginative.
Sword art online and sailor moon are also good
@Babichev it depends on who you ask, really. The (English) dictionary definition states that '[anime is] a style of animation originating in Japan that is characterized by stark colorful graphics depicting vibrant characters in action-filled plots often with fantastic or futuristic themes.' (Merriam-Webster) whereas in Japan anime literally refers to all animated works, regardless of theme, style or origin. The word 'anime' is short for 'animation', rather than being a Japanese language word. Hope that helps!
I can’t delete but I posted a new one
I once did it with a professional on Cuddlist. We watched one of my all-time favorites Ronin Warriors.
I typically use it to refer to any animation originating in Japan, but it’s definitely a loose definition. Some western shows feel like anime, like the original Teen Titans for example, but I wouldn’t call them anime.
@Travismo very true. As long as you don't end up like the dirtbag in this video.
Nothing puts me in the mood for cuddling like Berserk.
Have yet to find a cuddler that likes anime, tho I think ill be very distracted than paying attention 😭
Here is all the anime I have watched!
Will no one watch Ouran Host Club with me?!🥺
Thanks for the definitions of anime vs. animation. Now I don’t feel quite so ignorant.
What threw me off was referring to Spirited Away as anime because it doesn’t fit my personal idea of anime stylistically. I did see one definitely anime film but I don’t recall the name or it or anything about it. It was your typical good vs. evil with good winning in the end, of course. There were girl fighters as well as boys. All the characters are young. It’s the style - which I don’t know how to define - that says “anime” to me.
Does anyone remember AstroBoy? It was a Japanese cartoon that was on TV in the 60s, not in my city but I would see it when I visited relatives in New Jersey. I would describe it as early anime. I did not care for it too much because it was really flat, devoid of any fluidity of movement. I would watch it anyway because that’s what was available.
I’ve always loved good animation, especially from the early days of animation. If we can include that, I’d like to share one of my all time favorites. Betty Boop did three cartoons with Cab Calloway. It was made in 1933 during the Depression. People found some relief through these entertaining films. They were all hand drawn black and white. Cab Calloway was rotoscoped - they filmed him dancing and then drew over him to make the cartoon character. In this one, my favorite, he sings St. James Infirmary. The background is kind of illustrating the story. The way the characters and elements keep morphing from one thing to another leaves me wondering what they were smoking. Very creative.
I love anime, though admittedly not as caught up as I used to be! I had one cuddle session where I was introduced to Jojo's Bizarre Adventure and thought it was amazing!
To @Babichev's point about Betty boop, that is incredible that the animations were done with rotoscoping an actual person dancing! That must have taken so much painstaking work! I also wonder what the animators must have been smoking. LOL must be good stuff!
Curiosity got the better of me and I looked up AstroBoy. Apparently it’s considered the first anime. It started out as a Japanese manga strip and debuted in Japan in its anime form in 1963. It ran for 4-5 years, got picked up in the U.S., got resurrected in 1980 and then again in 2003 and later 2019. (I think I’m getting this right.) Here’s a little history of AstroBoy.
I looked at the first episode in another episode and was surprised at how much the style still resembled early U.S. cartoons. I would have been watching a few years after that and I think by then it had developed a different visual style but I could be wrong. I could be remembering the things about it that were different from what I was accustomed to and did not notice that which was familiar. At any rate, I can see there is much about the style that set the stage for later anime.
There was a trend going on in animation that stripped things down (she mentions this in the AstroBoy history) that made production less expensive and I gravitated towards older animation that was more detailed, lush, and creative. That’s one of the things I loved about Spirited Away. It was visually beautiful and a very good story told well. I love cell animation and don’t care for most CGI.
I guess that raises a question - is most anime cell animation i.e. a series of hand drawn stills? The little I’ve encountered appears to be cell animation to me but what do I know, I don’t keep up with these things.
@Babichev I was fascinated by Anime since I was little. In response to your question from what I know the old school Anime was hand drawn. Today's Anime just doesn't look the same. I remember seeing Astro Boy in the eighties. I also recall seeing an Anime version of The Little Mermaid when I was very little. I also remember Voltron Defender of The Universe, Robotech and Dragon Ball Z. Through YouTube I became aware of other Anime, even though I didn't get to watch much of the complete episodes, like Voltez Five which was really popular in the Philippines. In fact I like the Voltez Five English-Philipino voice over the best. I discovered Yu Yu Hakusho which was from the early nineties. It's all about Earth, Demon World and Spirit World. The English version of Yu Yu Hakusho stands as an example of excellent English voice acting, in fact many of the voice actors who were on Dragon Ball Z were the same voice actors on Yu Yu Hakusho. I also saw Ronin Warriors on YouTube, I see someone posted a clip of it above. There's others on YouTube that I have seen too.
@Lisa2476 I’d be willing to see what it’s about because I love watching different anime, but for some reason you blocked me 🤔
@Travismo All Anime is from Japan. There are western animations that got some inspiration from Anime.
@HogboblinZwei "Nothing puts me in the mood for cuddling like Berserk." Oh my goodness!
@FectionKitty: The manga's good for that too, but it's easier to cuddle while watching the anime than while juggling the big ole special editions.
(I speak as Zwei's primary cuddle buddy.)
@Babichev Rotoscoping must be the same thing that was used for the French animated series Nighthood during the overlap of the guy in the cape (character name Arsene Lupin), intro posted below. I watched this back in the late nineties when it aired on a popular channel called Y TV. It was based on the French novels about a gentleman burglar and a female New York City reporter who followed his going ons. The books were written by French author Maurice LeBlanc, who lived in Paris France if I'm not mistaken. The animated series had something like only twenty six or twenty seven episodes. There was an English and French version of the animation. The voice actor was a radio announcer from Montreal, Quebec Canada who does the voice for Arsene in both languages. Did you know that Peter Cullen who did the voice for Optimus Prime on the cartoon series Transformers is also from Montreal, Quebec?
I know the user isn't here anymore but I loved Ronin Warriors! I'd say some of my top favorite animes are Dragon Ball (all of them, yes even GT), Yu Yu Hakusho, and One Punch Man. Some others that I've enjoyed are Ranma 1/2, Soul Eater, Elfen Lied, Video Girl Ai, Detroit Metal City, Assassination Classroom as well as others.
"what’s the difference between anime and animated film? Is any animated film considered anime? Or is anime specifically Japanese animation? Spirited Away is one of my absolute favorite films. Good story, visually beautiful, imaginative."
Anime is specifically Japanese Animation. It can be a movie or a series. Animated films is a more generic term that could refer to any movie that is animated.
There are some things that almost appear to be in the Anime Style or what modern culture has decided that every anime looks like but actually not every anime even has that style. There are some older Animes that are much more realistic to natural human proportions rather than the giant eyes and colorful spiky hair we're use to with more modern shows. There are also cartoons that have that modern anime style which people assume are anime but aren't actually Japanese.
Avatar the Last Airbender, great show, at first glance it looks like a very anime sort of style but it's actually American produced.
RWBY I've even seen hard core Anime fans get this one wrong. The show was intentionally designed to look and feel like an anime but it's made by a bunch of guys based in Texas.
At least Avatar has an actual Asian as the lead show runner, he's American but of Japanese decent I believe so there's good reason why Avatar has such strong Anime influences despite not actually being from Japan. But RWBY I don't think actually has even a single Asian person on the staff, they just really like Anime... and I think trying to homage something you're a fan of is in itself not a bad thing. I'm not going to hate on them for cultural appropriate or anything like that. But it becomes bad when people start to believe that the show is an actual part of Japanese culture when it's not.
I don't think that's the creator's fault, I just think people are too lazy to actually look up what an Anime is and where certain shows actually come from.
ANYWAY... I really like Fullmetal Alchemist both versions. They're both good in different ways, there's certain things I prefer in one series over the other but not enough to say that either one is over all the best version. Brotherhood is suppose to be more accurate to the Manga but I never read that.
I also like Death Note. A lot of people hated the Netflix movie. I didn't mind it, it's not the best version of Death Note, I understand why people don't like it but it's not the worst Death Note movie out there. I've seen "L, Change the World" which doesn't even have the Death Note in the movie. The plot of that film... well this is purely coincidence before the movie came out well before Covid happened but it's a global pandemic movie, that's basically what it is. N is introduced in that movie but he's not like N from the Anime, he doesn't talk and he's important to the plot because for some reason he's naturally immune to the virus going around. At least the Death Note Netflix movie is actually about the Death Note. The only reference to it in L, Change the World is that in the previous movie in the trilogy L had written his own name in the Death Note alone with that he would die after X amount of time had past and the 3rd movie is basically just L living out his final days before he's about to die and there are a few flash backs to that scene in the previous movie. Honestly it's not needed... there's nothing interesting that happens here, it's a boring movie, that feels like they're just slapping random characters names from the anime on characters who are nothing at all like the anime.
Apparently there's now a 4th movie that was made at the same time as the Netflix version and a live action TV series which I haven't seen yet. Not sure if there are even English dubs available of those. Speaking of which the dubbing in those live action movies is actually impressive. I don't know how they managed to match English dialog to live actors who were originally speaking in Japanese. English dubs of Japanese movies are usually terrible just cause the lip movements don't line up. The Death Note movies on the other hand performed some kind of miracle to make that work I don't know.
Anyway... I've seen a few other Animes but I never got into as much as those two. I also still kind of like Digimon but it depends on the season. The Gimmick of Frontier kind of turned me off at first but that kind of ended up being one of my favorites. Data Savers, like the new Agumon line, like the fact that the main character doesn't have those dumb goggles on his head, hate the fact that he's an idiot that runs up to giant monsters and tries to punch them. Dude you're a bug to them, stop punching them. That's what your Digimon partner is for. I like his design but that is just the dumbest character I have ever seen in any show ever.
All that said... if anyone wants to recommend something to watch while cuddling I'm open to other Anime suggestions. Though maybe not things like Elfin Lied cause if there's nudity in it I think I'd prefer to watch it by myself... I'll still take the suggestion if you know any good ones with actual plot but not something I want to cuddle to.
It really does depend on who you ask. 日本人なら、ファミリーガイはアニメだよ.
That said, I tend to think of anime as any animation created by Japanese people or done in the style of the Japanese animation we typically see in the West. Live action adaptations (or musicals!) are not anime.
This isn't anime either.... ...but it is good stuff.
Nice to meet a fellow fan, @CuddleForDID!
"Live action adaptations (or musicals!) are not anime."
I never said they were. I only mentioned live action adaptation because I was talking about Death Note, one of my favorite animes which happens to have several live action adaptations. Obviously if it's live action it can't be an Animation. (Except for Ryuk who is a CGI character but I'd hesitate to include a Japanese movie just because of one character who happens to be animated.) Of course we live in a world with a "Live Action" Lion King that is fully CGI animation so the lines between animation and live action have been some what a little bit blurred in recent years. Personally I call it the CGI version not the live action version. The Jungle Book is more live action at least the boy is a real person but again I'm not entirely sold on calling that live action based on a single character.
Also what musical? There's a musical? I didn't know about any musical adaptations, tell me more... Maybe PM me though so we don't get too far off topic.
@CuddleForDID:
I admit I mentioned the live action adaptations (while noting that they're not the subject of this thread, strictly speaking) because your mention of them reminded me of the musical, and it seemed like a good jumping off point for shoehorning the songs in.
...I'm such a dweeb. Adorable! But a total nerd.
Anyway! The Death Note musical has never been performed in English (so far as I know), but the songs have been translated, sung, and are available to listen to on YouTube!
Here's the playlist (click this sentence).