Anime Inspired American Content

Western Cartoons that are marketed or promoted as being "Anime Inspired" or "like an Anime" or even according to some actually counting as Anime, never work for me, they don't feel Authentic, there are too many tells.  Same with attempts at Western Manga.  Even having actual Anime studios work with them doesn't help.

It's not like I even require there to be nothing that an actual Japanese Otaku wouldn't do.  It's about the spirit, I want stuff that feels like it was made by American Otaku, not being "Anime Style" as a marketing gimmick.  Much of what I think of as the Core of Anime are values that certainly do or should exist independent of it.

The Western stuff I do sometimes say I like for similar reasons to why I like Anime, were not trying to do that, a lot of it is actually Live Action media and even they are not indistinguishable.  Some of it is old enough that if there is a connection it's that it influenced some Anime, even if indirectly.  Was The Princess Bride popular in Japan?  The Anime I like to compare it to are all younger, they begin with Slayers basically.

However there is one exception, and that's the recent trend of American Visual Novels.  Avatar and Castlevania I will never consider even honorary members of The Council, but Doki Doki Literature Club manages to earn the rank of Master.  So why do they succeed where actual Animators fail?

Maybe it's because Visual Novels as we think of them are an inherently Japanese Concept.  People making a Cartoon no matter how much imitating Anime is the starting thesis can't help but still also be influenced by the trends of American Cartoons.  Even if they did watch some Anime as kids they probably watched it alongside other stuff, on Toonami, or Kid's WB, or Adult Swim.  But with Visual Novels even if you want to draw inspiration from more then just Japanese Dating Sims and Porn Games, you can't because other options literally don't exist.

Or maybe it's because these Visual Novels happen to be more independently produced.  They were, going back to what I said above, not just made by people who like Anime but are what they were inspired to make because of their experiences of being an Otaku.  While what you see on Netflix and Cartoon Network are executives who don't watch Anime trying to appeal to what they think Anime fans like.

Or maybe my sample size is just too small.  My knowledge of Japanese Visuals Novels is mostly the ones popular enough to get Animated Adaptations.  And my experience with their American imitators are ones that became infamous online because 4Channers Memed them.

Maybe some of you feel my lack of satisfaction with certain Anime Inspired Cartoons is because the Anime they are trying to be like are simply not the ones I'm into.  Avatar is trying to fit in with Shonen Jump and Castlevania with Edgys 90s OVAs.  While I'm clearly someone who only cares about Waifu trash.

However I'm also into Magical Girls, and there have been attempts to create Western versions of that genre as well.  Some are shows with loyal cult followings to this day, for good reasons I'm sure.  But I can just tell by looking at them that they are off the mark of at least what I like the genre for.  Because they were made when Sailor Moon was all the west had really seen, and since Sailor Moon is still not the genre fully formed it's easy to learn the wrong lessons from it.

Lindsay Ellis's argument for what makes certain shows and YA Novels "Avatar inspired" is mainly what she calls "the Zuco".  Even in the Anime most like Avatar in both Genre and intended audience demographic, "the Zuko" is still only babymode.  Good Shonen Anime give us more then just telegraphed in advance redemptions arcs.  They will make a character we met as a dangerous Antagonist into a protagonist we're rooting for by the end without their ideology or ethics or goals even changing at all, by expanding the context.  I wanted to call this "the Scar" referencing Fullmetal Alchemist but that character name can easily be confused with others.  I suppose that also describes Vegeta, kinda.  But the thing is FMA is more similar in concept to Avatar then then any Battle Shonen.

Update May 2023: And I've since I first wrote learned of those who do interpret Zuco as having never actually been a villain.  And the thing is that take on Zuco makes him basically just Fate Testerosa of the first season of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha but needlessly dragged out.