entertainment

Experience a century of anime history in one video celebrating art form’s 100th birthday

12 Comments
By Casey Baseel, SoraNews24

Even as anime continues to make mainstream inroads overseas, a lot of foreign fans don’t really get sucked into the world of Japanese animation until they’re in their teens or older, making the medium as a whole feel young and new to them. But anime actually has a very long history, stretching back much farther than even the “good old days” of the 1980s that some older Western fans like to wax poetic about.

"Namakura Gatana," a silent short anime from 1917, is regarded as the oldest piece of Japanese animation with a surviving print, and using it as a starting point for the medium makes anime 100 years old. In celebration, the Association of Japanese Animations has released a 15-minute video that looks back on landmark Japanese animated works of the century since "Namakura Gatana" was released.

▼ "Namakura Gatana"

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In total, 122 works are featured (including stop-motion and claymation projects) in roughly chronological order of their release. The exponential growth in the number of anime series being produced in the modern era means that the video has reached the 1960s within its first minute, but there’s still space for 1958’s "The Tale of the White Serpent," the first full-color anime feature film.

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There’s no narration, with the video’s entire audio being the song “Those with Wings ~Not an angel Just a dreamer~”, a collaborative performance by dozens of anime vocalists and voice actors. But even without any explicit explanations, the video reveals major trends and tropes of the art form, such as:

● A fascination with science and robotics in the 1960s: "Astro Boy" (1963, 0:48 in the video), "Gigantor" (1962, 0:55), "Cyborg 009" (1966, 1:30), "Speed Racer" (1967, 1:37)

● An increasing love of sports coming with postwar economic recovery and access to mass media: "Star of the Giants" (1968, 1:58), "Attack No. 1" (1969, 2:13), "Ashita no Joe" (1970, 2:20), "Touch" (1985, 6:09)

● Magical girls going from wily individual heroines to combat teams and even darkly tragic figures: "Minky Momo" (1982, 5:32), "Creamy Mami" (1983, 6:02), "Sailor Moon" (1992, 7:35), "PreCure" (2004, 9:33), "Puella Magi Madoka Magica" (2011, 11:35)

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● Sprawling shonen action sagas becoming the industry’s template for an evergreen hit: "Dragon Ball" (1968, 6:16), "City Hunter" (1987, 6:34), "YuYu Hakusho" (1990, 7:46), "One Piece" (1999, 9:04), "Naruto" (2002, 9:22), "Bleach" (2004, 9:46)

● Franchises which became hits thanks to their extremely passionate female fanbases: "Rose of Versailles" (1979, 4:45), "Tiger and Bunny" (2011, 10:52), "Yowamushi Pedal" (2013, 11:29), "Osomatsu-san" (2015, 13:51)

● Lavishly animated and emotionally stirring feature films that resonated with audiences far beyond Japan’s shores: "Akira" (1988, 6:55), "The Girl Who Leapt Through Time" (2006, 10:12), "your name." (2016, 13:04), "In This Corner of the World" (2016, 13:12)

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● Anime that were clearly created to help drive merchandise sales, but still managed to find a special place in fans’ hearts: "Digimon" (1999, 8:56), "Yu-Gi-Oh!" (2000, 9:11), "Pokemon" (1997, 13:23)

● Life imitating art imitating life as the idol singer boom inspires idol anime, for which fans fervently buy theme song CDs and concert tickets: "Love Live!" (2013, 11:14), "The Idolmaster" (2008, 11:49)

And yet, as packed with important anime as the video is, it still doesn’t contain every watershed work. Conspicuously absent are the films of Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli, the expectation-upending "Neon Genesis Evangelion," romance-and-robots franchise "Macross," or anything from Rumiko Takahashi, who between "Urusei Yatsura," "Maison Ikkoku," "Ranma 1/2" and "Inuasha" had a hit anime on TV more or less constantly between 1981 and 2004.

These aren’t necessarily deliberate snubs, though. The Association of Japanese Animations had two major criteria for inclusion in the video: historical significance and permission to use the footage. As such, if your favorite anime isn’t part of the retrospective, it might be because of a rights issue, or simply because even as long as the video is, there’s still not enough space for every great anime of the past 100 years.

Source, images: YouTube/アニメNEXT_100

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© SoraNews24

©2024 GPlusMedia Inc.

12 Comments
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My favorite decades are 60s, 70s and 80s. During the 80s I was a child, and I grew up with Japanese cartoons from those decades. Also today, I think they are generally the best. In the video miss so many of my favorite anime, anyway I am happy to see "Creamy Mami", one of my childhood's most loved heroines. "Pampulu pimpulu parimpam pun, pimpulu pampulu parimpam pun!" This was her magical spell in the Italian dub. ^^

2 ( +2 / -0 )

Science Ninja Team Gatchaman was my favorite as a kid. Although we knew it as Battle of the Planets circa '78-'89.

It had been heavily sanatised for us in the west but the adventures of G-Force was still a blast and quite a change from the usual Hanna Barbera fare. Not to knock the old classics (Tom & Jerry, Warner Bros Looney Tunes etc) but this was so different and exciting.

There was also Marine Boy when I was even younger but I can only remember the red suit, a dolphin and possibly a mermaid?

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Ach!

Circa '78-'80 for BotP.

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@Toasted Heretic: Your description of "Marine Boy" sounds like the anime known in Italy like "Toriton"

Is this one?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHseeIlmZc0

2 ( +2 / -0 )

Such a pity that in the video they didn't put "Candy Candy". The popularity of this series was HUGE in Italy during the 80s. Italian people of every age were in love with it, to the extent we created two cinema movies, editing the episodes from the series.

The Italian song is a big classic:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJMM87_Wkrw

The credits are written in French in this video, oh well.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

And what about "Remì"? So moving. ;__;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aemmQKHUrSU

As one of the comments under the video says, Japanese people showed a lot of respect and love towards European culture during those years. I was able to know many classics of European Literature thanks to Japanese animation. Thanks Japan, for those beautiful and unforgettable childhood's days.

Oh, another series very, very popular is "Ai Shite Naito", known in Italy like "Kiss me Licia", based on a shojo manga.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DmEb_D8Z9K4

Italians were so crazy about this series, to the extent we made THREE live actions based on it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEXsmDscP24

Honestly these live actions were horrible, but they became very popular in Italy anyway...Lol.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

During the 80s I was a child, and I grew up with Japanese cartoons from those decades.

Yep same here. Captain flam/future, Captain Tsubasa (Olive & Tom), Tom Sawyer, Candy, dragon ball and yes, goldorak, were absolutely massive back then. I think it was mostly a euro thing though.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

@Alex80

Looks similar but it's this one I watched, an earlier version, perhaps?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9HqSkY4vtVY

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I think it was mostly a euro thing though.

Yeah, I am sure in America, but also in UK, the situation was different. In Countries like Italy, Spain, France and Germany, Japanese animation was immensely popular, at mainstream level.

In my opinion, today Japanese producers' main mistake is that they are producing mainly late night shows for otaku, while during the 60s, 70s and 80s, there was plenty of family oriented shows. These series made Japanese animation so popular in Europe. I like some Japanese series for an adult audience, like Erased or similar stuff, but Japanese companied shouldn't forget the children.

Looks similar but it's this one I watched, an earlier version, perhaps?

Yeah, they look pretty similar! I watched on Wikipedia, and Marine Boy is older than Toriton.

Toriton is based on a manga by Osamu Tezuka, while Marine Boy looks an original series produced by Minoru Adachi. Despite the apparent similarities, i guess the stories were different.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

companies*

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Toriton is based on a manga by Osamu Tezuka,

Great talent, that man. Must read his Buddha graphic novels. I have several of them, knocking about somewhere.

Ever read Lone Wolf and Cub by Kazuo Koike? Very different vibe but the sheer cinematography of the series is amazing and influential.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Loved Starfleet/X-Bomber puppet animation, Brian May & friends soundtrack.

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