Why Do I watch Anime?

Okay this might be a little different from what my blog name suggests or what I've been writing but I've been thinking about this topic for some time, especially after some people asked me "Why do you still watch anime, you are a grown up now aren't you?". I heard this and I thought 'is anime(or any kind of drawn entertainment) just meant for kids'.

Is Anime Just for Kids

Personally I don't think so, well that is kind of the whole point why I am writing this whole thing. Actually hand drawn animations were initially meant to entertain kids but slowly as the animation techniques evolved they were used to convey stories, then over time the nature of the stories got complex. Japanese anime is one good example of that. Anime is nothing but the animated version of traditional story-boarding style called manga.

Japanese manga conveyed complex story-lines and so did anime. A part of these manga comes under the classification of shonen jump. Well it's not actually a category but a Japanese manga anthology which is targeted at young readers, and comprises of high amount of action and a soft pinch of comedy. Even so some anime's made from these manga also are very intense emotionally as I've realized in the case of the famous Naruto.

Yeah even though many people rate Naruto and it's likes as meant for young audience some themes like Naruto being alone and being hated by his own village for something that he didn't do or didn't even know about, is sometimes so deeply visualized that it actually brings tears in your eyes. Or the fact that 'shinobi are treated as mere tools', the tragic death of Jiraya sensei or the tragic sacrifice of 'Itachi Uchiha' are so deep concepts, that I have rarely seen in live action soaps and movies. Well if I keep talking about Naruto I'll go off topic, because as it is obvious by now I'm a huge Naruto fan. There are some other remarkable anime inspired from Jump, like Bleach, One Piece, Fairy Tale etc.

The Actual Adult side of Things

While I consider the emotional concepts taken up in anime like Naruto as adult, a section of anime and manga are specifically made keeping in mind the interest of adult audiences and no I'm NOT talking about HENTAI(you little perverts).I'm talking about anime that have taken up more serious, darker subjects. Right now a good example of such an anime that comes into my mind would be 'Death Note'. For those who haven't watched or read it- It's about a boy who finds a death note of a Shinigami(Japanese for Soul-reaper

Death Note

or God of death) and he realizes that, if you write a person's name on the note that person dies either within 40 seconds due to a heart attack or due to the reason the writer specifies at specified time. Now this guy decides to eradicate all the criminals from the world using the note. He now wishes to change the world and become the GOD of this new world. But not long after he starts an excellent secret detective 'L' catches on to him. Now the anime gives the viewer choice to choose sides, either support the main character who is going around killing people to fulfill his ambition, or to support 'L' who opposes the main character and believes that nobody has the right to take lives of other people no matter what. And yes the lead does kill some innocent people for his interest through the series. What I'm trying to say is that it gives you a hard choice, a dark theme and something to think about. And yes the anime is filled with some awesome action sequence and a lot of gore. Well this is just one example there are some others too like 'Darker than Black', 'Ghost in the Shell' and 'Hell Girl' etc.
And then there are some semi-realistic thrillers like Detective Conan, Black Jack etc. But some people like to say, just for the heck of it, that anime is in fact just some set of moving lines and cannot be compared live action film making. For them I would like to say that it takes a lot of people and a lot of hard-work to draw each frame of action and then put it together to produce realistic animation and it also requires a great deal of knowledge about camerawork editing and vfx just like the real life movies or serials, and as a little artist myself I'm bound to respect a form of art that can so successfully convey stories in a way that actually these live action movies and actors fail to do.

Verdict

So as I said cartoons and anime are not just some kind of tricks to keep the children busy, they are a lot more than that. They are a strong medium for conveying a message and or expressing a mentality, or just simply making people realize about some things they generally seem to ignore. 

They ask me "Haven't you a grown up now, you should stop watching this kiddish stuff!?"

I tell them "It's okay that you grew up and stopped watching anime, but to actually understand what it really means one has to grow even further beyond that limit" and actually comprehend that anime is a way of artistic expression just like live action movies and serials so instead of telling me to grow up, you try to grow up a little more..... :-)