WisperG

I’ve never been bullied for liking anime, but I have had some strange looks from people and some awkward conversations about certain shows and I used to get some snarky comments from my dad whenever he’d see me watching, well, anything from Japan.

I don’t consider any of that bullying though, but I still never liked dealing with it. Because of this I’ve slowly turned into a bit of a closet anime fan over the years. Unless it’s something I’m watching with my siblings (DBZ, select Toonami shows, etc.) I try to only watch anime when I’m alone (whether it’s a show I wouldn’t want others to see me watching or not) and unless I’m among other anime fans I rarely talk openly about my hobby unless I’m asked.

DAY 25

For a long time I felt like Shinji was basically an anime version of me in my teenage years. I wasn’t messed up and depressed like he is, but his quiet/shy/wishy-washy/I-don’t-know-how-to-deal-with-this-situation personality was basically like mine. I’ve made a number of changes for the better over the past few years though, so these days I’d probably say I’m similar to a less awkward, less naive approximation of Mikado from Durarara.

As for who I wish I was like, well, I’m gonna go with Mikado again. Not his personality though (since I’m already like that), but his situation I guess you could say. Living in a new place with friends, getting to meet a bunch of unusual, but interesting people (especially headless bikers and busty, bespectacled babes, of course 😉), even being involved in some weird supernatural goings-on. The kind of life where something interesting is always right around the corner, for better or worse. Seems like that’d be pretty fun.

My favorite Ghibli film is definitely Nausicaa. It was my first, and so it holds a special place in my heart. I saw it back in the day on Toonami. It’s also one of Ghibli’s only sci-fi films, which most people here know I’m a huge fan of, so that really appealed to me in a way their other films (as fantastic as they are) didn’t.

I’m gonna echo Nobu and Snow with Tenchi Muyo as my favorite harem. No surprise there.

As for reverse harems, I have not seen many shows like this, and even fewer that were actually good. The one that stands out to me is Hakuoki. I haven’t seen much of the anime, but I have played the PSP visual novel and it is fantastic. With it’s focus on samurai, supernatural goings-on in old Japan, and surprisingly bloody action for an Otome game, it’s a series that can easily be enjoyed by guys despite technically being targeted at a female audience.

DAY 22

I’m perfectly fine with both, but I do prefer dubs. I tend to get more enjoyment out of shows when I hear them in a language I can understand. It’s really not about quality, or whichever one is supposedly “better” than the other for me. It’s just an observation I’ve made. So if I have the option, 9 times out of 10 I’ll go with the dub, but if a show I want to watch doesn’t have a dub then I’ll watch it subbed. No big deal, unless it’s part of an ongoing franchise where I’m already familiar with the dub voices (or vice versa). In which case I might wait for the opportunity to watch the other language, depending on the circumstances.

Although I used to watch dubs almost exclusively in my earlier years of being an anime fan, these days I probably watch more subs if I’m being honest, but mostly when streaming. This is because over the last year or two I’ve started following significantly more simulcasts than I have in the past, but I buy very few sub-only shows aside from must-own, personal favorites. There’s less incentive to buy them when I can stream most for free, which isn’t always the case with dubs. My stream watching is probably about 80-85% subs, while DVD is more like 95% dubs.

Hopefully the recent trend of broadcast dubs can balance things out a bit, although that may not happen as long as FUNi continues to keep things behind a paywall. Aniplex is the only company streaming theirs for free.