Is Anime really more mature than Western cartoons?

[Canadamus Prime]

Well "Mature" isn't exactly the word I would use... and that's for either.

Edit: ...oops I didn't realize I'd already posted on this thread.

 

[IamQ]

I'd say yes. There are some mature western cartoons, but japan wins by having more of them. They might not be more mature, perhaps they are just as mature as the western ones are, but you can't deny that there are more.

 

[MasterChief892039]

I have never heard that anime was supposed to be more mature than Western animation. Are you sure you're not confusing "mature story" with "mature content"?
Considering the big-titted character design that's so common in anime, I'd have to question it's maturity.

 

[Jonny The Kay]

This is a case by case question.

 

[Therumancer]

Am I the only one that doesn't get why Anime is considered more mature than Western cartoons? Sure, Anime may be more likely to have mature content (gore, sex), but the stories themselves still seem to be pretty shallow and juvenile. Maybe this is just because I live in Japan and I get to see all the cruddy Anime that never even gets torrented on fansub sites, but it just seems to me like the percent of genuinely thought-provoking Anime is roughly the same as what it is with Western cartoons.

Any thoughts? I'd rather not have this thread turn into an Anime bashing thread, but is anyone else as confused as I am with the supposed "maturity" of Anime?

Both basically come down to an art style and land of origin more than anything, and encompass huge ranges of products and generes directed at all kinds of differant audiences. Both Anime and Western animation have produced utterly banal kiddie fare, and attempts at serious storytelling for adults, with most of the material being somewhere in between.

Now to be honst, back before Anime went fairly mainstream and started creating huge numbers of "weeaboos" there was some arguements that could be made for Anime being more mature on average by the western audience. This is because comparitively few things were brought over, and the people doing it were being pretty selective with it, and the audience they were targeting. As time went on however we got to see more and more of Anime as a whole and reality hit, and we started getting hit with giant truckloads of utter garbage, with every series that was for sale/import being snapped up for translation by someone looking for a quick buck. By definition any pop culture medium that heavily trafficed is going to have far more misses than hits.

When you look at things like "Dragon Ball Z" and "One Piece" it's hard to argue anything about maturity because those shows REVEL in being banal and immature, that's part of the entire appeal to those who follow them. That's why I don't "get it" when people make these arguements about the genere as a whole being mature. Truthfully most of the stuff is aimed at teenagers, any pretensions of maturity that come with that only exist because most Western animation is still aimed at a pre-teen audience. I think teens and pre-teens are equally immature, it's just teens are more intellectually developed about it.

 

[Lazy Kitty]

Some are, because all western cartoons seem to be made for kids...

 

[Nouw]

I'd prefer Spongebob to Hentai anyday.

I whole heartedly agree.

They're both equal in maturity and immaturity, end of story.

 

[blankedboy]

Well compare Ergo Proxy or Higurashi to almost any Western cartoon on the market. The contrast is pretty obvious.

(who keeps reviving these threads? -.-)

 

[Shadu]

I don't think they are any more mature than western cartoons, but the perception of that comes from the overall cultural view. The fact is that western cartoons, for a very long time, consisted mainly of cartoons geared specifically towards children whereas anime has targeted a much broader audience for almost as long.

It's becoming more accepted now that cartoons aren't just for children, but while the west still sort of sticks to cartoons must be for children, Japan sees them as just another way to tell a story. In that way, they are a bit more mature.

And, even through the sexual tones and gore, most anime have a good theme or plot whereas western cartoons tend to lack that. Not saying I hate western cartoons since I was raised on them and love them, I'm just saying that until recently, they were very shallow in that area.

 

[Barciad]

Depends really, on where you look and how you define 'mature'.
In the last 20 years The West has produced a string of cartoons delivering flawless Bill Hicks/Blackadder humour (i.e. highbrow satire mixed in with toliet gags).
The Simpsons, Beavis and Butthead, Southpark, and Family Guy are all as good as any show to come out recently.
Now the question is, how does it compare to the best that anime has to offer? This is a very tricky thing to do since western animation never really does 'serious'. For example, take animes like 'Monster', 'Now and Then, Here and There', or 'Infinite Ryvius'. Neither children's series nor things that you could ever consider laugh-a-minute. Yet, they are good, very, very good in fact. Western animation has never done anything comparible.
Conversely, Japan has produced some good animated satire, but nothing really on a par with the above. The best that I can think of is 'Crest of the Stars', 'His and Her Circumstances', and 'The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya'. All decent works to be sure, but it is quite unfair to compare them with the above.
So what we are looking at here is apples and oranges. The west does superior satire, but Japan does better serious stuff.
Though I would also add that the quality of animation in modern Japanese series is of a far higher quality than anything the west puts out. Yes, if we were talking in terms of simple quality of production, Japan would indeed win hands down. Just like it has for the past 15 years.

 

[Purplecoyote]

As it's been said before in this thread, there are both very mature and more childish Anime out there, just as there are mature and childish western cartoons.

It really depends on the studio that makes it. And if it originates from one,the writer/artist of the manga, novel or game that the anime bases it's story on. Of course dubs and bad animation studios can completely ruin the point of it's original material and so make it seem more childish that it was originally meant to be. See for example, Yu Gi Oh. You should also keep in mind that cartoons, both Japanese and western, can get a lot more ratings if it's kept juvenile, same reason there are so many really bad romcom and teen movie comedies around.

Also if you want to see some great, mature anime, try Texhnolyze, Serial Experiments Lain, Monster, Shiki and Gunslinger Girl. Also of course the Miyazaki movies.

 

[boholikeu]

My thread... it's alive... ALIVE!

Anyway, a lot of people here seem to think that I don't think there are any mature anime. I know there are, I just don't think there are more mature anime than western cartoons (when taken as a whole).

What did you watch, Slayers and Pokemon?

Death Note. Full Metal Alchemist. Clannad. Orphen. Cowboy Bebop. Samurai Champloo. Kanon. Darker than BLACK.

These are just a few that have incredibly mature stories. Not shallow at all. Even Japanese kid's shows, like Digimon Tamers, have stories that put the vast majority of American cartoons to shame. Even the much-hated Naruto (the Halo of anime: everyone hates it for no other reason than "it's popular") has incredibly deep and well-developed characters.

History lesson. During the rise of Hollywood, Japan wanted to do something about film, but they didn't have the money at the time to actually do anything to the degree that America was. So they drew cartoons.

You have to realize, this is the origin of cartoons in Japan: it was their film. No one said, "Well, I want to make a girtty, dark crime drama, but I guess I can't because I can only do cartoons." They worked with what they had. To this day, American cartoons are mostly influenced by things like Loony Toons, whereas Japan's origins of cartoons involved the comedic, the kid-oriented, and the mature dramas.

Watch any one of the shows I listed, and try to say that anime isn't mature. It is.

EDIT: Though it should be noted that anime is not a genre, it is a medium. Thus, you have both the shallow comedies and the intense dramas. The difference is that America's standard for animated quality has an irritating tendency to be Spongebob or Family guy (unbridled stupidity or dirty adult comedy). The Japanese actually care about plot, character, and drama.

My point is that for every Death Note and Cowboy Beebop there are hordes of pokemon style anime shows. Most people in the US don't realize this because they only translate the cream of the crop.

If you really want to see how much more mature Anime is than cartoons, just look at each version of PowerPuff Girls.

They turned an award-winning social deconstructive cartoon into an Anime where, in one episode, the PPG make a truce with Mojo in the middle of battle to eat fucking ice-cream with him. And his evil plot of the episode was to keep candy away from children.

I don't even know who they are, but I really fucking hate the studio that made that shit.

Man, I didn't even realize there was a Japanese version... The clips on Youtube were so bad...

Unlike the United States and the Western world ingeneral, anime and manga in Japan are enjoyed by almost everyone (because there is a genre for everyone, unlike western comics that only target a select few: namely children or super hero fans). You can see businessmen on their way to work reading manga on the bullet trains all the time. You will hear about housewives reading homoerotic Boy's Love mangas while their husbands are away (lol).

As someone who lives in Japan I can tell you that this is simply not true. Adults that read manga/watch anime are just as ostracized in Japan as they are in the US (perhaps even a bit more).

I think the main problem with this arguement is that I have NEVER seen a mature western cartoon.

Pixar doesn't count? That changes things.

Pixar is mature?

Pixar is very mature. There's more maturity in the first five minutes of Up than there is in entire seasons of some of the more explicit anime.

hell yes, anime is more mature.
typical mature anime: Fullmetal alchemist, death note, Hellsing
typical mature western cartoon:Family guy (which I hate by the way), Metalocalypse, Aqua Teen Hungerforce
any questions?

Actually, if you are going by sheer numbers, your "typical" mature anime would be a bit more pornographic than the titles you list above.

I'd say yes. There are some mature western cartoons, but japan wins by having more of them. They might not be more mature, perhaps they are just as mature as the western ones are, but you can't deny that there are more.

I agree that there are more, but there are also a LOT more immature titles too. The actual percentage seems to be roughly the same as what it is in the West.

considering it has anything to do with sexual topics....its far more mature than the west.

The concept of "fan service" would like to have a word with you.

Depends really, on where you look and how you define 'mature'.
In the last 20 years The West has produced a string of cartoons delivering flawless Bill Hicks/Blackadder humour (i.e. highbrow satire mixed in with toliet gags).
The Simpsons, Beavis and Butthead, Southpark, and Family Guy are all as good as any show to come out recently.
Now the question is, how does it compare to the best that anime has to offer? This is a very tricky thing to do since western animation never really does 'serious'. For example, take animes like 'Monster', 'Now and Then, Here and There', or 'Infinite Ryvius'. Neither children's series nor things that you could ever consider laugh-a-minute. Yet, they are good, very, very good in fact. Western animation has never done anything comparible.
Conversely, Japan has produced some good animated satire, but nothing really on a par with the above. The best that I can think of is 'Crest of the Stars', 'His and Her Circumstances', and 'The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya'. All decent works to be sure, but it is quite unfair to compare them with the above.
So what we are looking at here is apples and oranges. The west does superior satire, but Japan does better serious stuff.
Though I would also add that the quality of animation in modern Japanese series is of a far higher quality than anything the west puts out. Yes, if we were talking in terms of simple quality of production, Japan would indeed win hands down. Just like it has for the past 15 years.

The West does serious stuff as well - Batman TAS, Gargoyles, Waking Life.

Though I would agree with you that the West is generally better for satire and Japan is better for drama.

 

[Logic 0]

I think anime is seen as more mature because western animation is content as a children's medium while anime has the appearance of trying to appeal to adults.

 

[drwow]

nope, sex doesn't automatically make anything more mature.
that doesn't even make any sense, could someone explain that to me.

 

[triggrhappy94]

It depends. Some animes are better dramas, but Some western cartoons are more topical and sattirical.

 

[II2none]

No but the content of both are different in my opinion anime is way more over the top (as in ridiculous) with story, humor and sexuality.The last one is questionable but not problematic.

American cartoons can be just as mature as or over the top as anime.

examples

The boondocks
Family Guy
Futurama
Afro samurai
Samurai Jack
Batman/Batman beyond/ all batman cartoons in general
Young Justice
teen titans
Justice leauge
etc,etc,etc.

So I don't see why we (american teens-young adults)say that anime is more mature. I think in the sense of "mature" people go for is cursing, blood, nudity. But I don't see why that's a must have to to appeal to so-called mature audiences. A story is still mature just the same, small rant over.

 

[II2none]

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