Otome VIllainess Anime defy a certain common narrative.

I’ve done a post on why I technically have beef with the starting premise of the genre, and another where I explain why I do enjoy some of these shows regardless of that. 

But today I want to discuss how the history of this sub-sub genre goes against certain common narratives about the relationship between trend setters and trend followers. It’s a conventional wisdom I often personally disagree with, but I can usually still see why the OG is viewed as above the rest.

Once one big hit is followed up by a bunch of shows doing something similar, it's common to see a lot of talk about how most if not all of the imitators missed the real point of why the original worked. With the implication being that what makes them different from the original makes them more generic or less artistically interesting or "deep".  I'm often a contrarian on that, but I can still generally see why it can seem that way.

The Otome VIllainess genre started with My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! Sometimes called HameFura for short. I liked it, well I liked season 1 and never finished season 2. But it’s hard for me to imagine even people who love it much more than I do, who may personally still like it the most of them, being able to argue in all seriousness that it has a depth its imitators have hollowed out, that by default they are more shallow. No matter how much you love it, HameFura is objectively the most shallow take on this premise.

I stand by my conviction that it was never common for Otome Games or Shoujo Manga to treat an OjouSama character as a completely unsympathetic one dimensional villain. But there is still legitimate social commentary that could be made by exploring this hypothetical archetype. Or even without touching on the politics, just many interesting ways to play around with it. 

HameFura is the show least interested in doing that. When Katerina’s memories of her Japanese life awaken her “villainess” personality is just completely overwritten, there is no engagement with asking the question of why that person became a “villainess” or if she were really as one note as she seemed.  The story is solely about the Japanese High School Girl who unintentionally stole her life with no acknowledgment of how existentially terrifying that is. 

The strictest definition of this genre is it being the Villainess who the reincarnator reincarnates as. Of those, the one I like the most is definitely I’ll Become A Villainess Who Goes Down in History, commonly shortened to Rekiaku from Fall 2024. 

I’m The Villainess, so I’m Taming the Final Boss aka Akulas from Fall 2022 is a show where I liked the first three episodes, but then episode 4 felt liked it rushed to the end of the first LN when this arc should have had six episodes like the adaptations of the first LNs for Haruhi and Index. 

Both those shows have in common how in different ways the MC embraces the Villainess role becoming a sort of Antiheroine rather than just being comedically the opposite of who she was supposed to be. 

Then there's The Heretical Last Boss Queen where the protagonist is morally unlike the original Villainess characters but has a fear she could become like her anyway. 

The other two of my personal big three for this trend are adjacent examples where the villainess isn’t the person who's a reincarnation of a player of the Game but completely still herself. 

I’m in Love with The Villainess shortened to WataOshi from Fall 2023 (it seems like the gems kept dropping in Fall, yet I didn’t catch any in 2025). It’s a Yuri and is great, it’s the one I most hope gets a season 2. 

The third is MobuSeka which I talked about in one of those prior posts. Its second season is about to come out and I know enough spoilers to know things are getting pretty interesting.

The best year of future Anime.

I have a couple posts on this blog made this year arguing the best year in Anime history is either Gregorian 2006 or April 2006-March 2007. 

So I decided ask the question, what about other Mediums of Otaku Entertainment from that timeframe?

I already talked about one 2006 Visual Novel in those posts, but that's because Summer Days also counts as an Anime. And in my Yandere post I talked about how the Future Diary Manga started in January 2006.

Thing is I've come to think the best era of Visual Novels, and the broader Bishoujo Game category into which they are a part, as being 1991-2005.  Summer Days may be one 2006 VN I prefer to the most comparable VN from 2005, it's predecessor School Days, but that has a lot to do with my personal biases where that franchise is concerned, School Days is more fleshed out and coherent in what it's trying to say. 

And that Yandere post is also about how Future Diary's most defining character is an archetype built by prior works. And to some extent so are the other core features of Future Diary. 

2004 may be for the source materials of future Anime what 2006 is for Anime. Death Note started at the tail end of 2003 and continued into early 2006, similar with Higurashi and Pluto and Baccano! and Lucky Star and Nana.  Fate/Stay Night and Clannad both dropped in 2004 as did the first LNs for A Certain Magical Index and Durarara!! and The Familiar of Zero.  And then the Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya LN as well as Endless Eight. 

When you add to that how 2004 was perhaps a better year for Original Anime then 2006, and it could be considered a pretty peak year for Otaku Culture. 

Anime from 2001 turns 25 this year.

Given the 2000s are my favorite Decade of Anime, we’re entering a period when what turns 25 a given year might start interesting me more then what turns 20. But of course I might become more nostalgic for the late 00s and early 2010s as they turn 20.

For these 25 year anniversary posts I want to start including some discussion of material in other mediums that became source material for future Anime, or haven’t yet but should. But my knowledge on those subjects is not as deep as my knowledge of Anime, which is itself far from comprehensive or complete. 

Type-Moon’s first Visual Novel Tsukihime was initially released at Comiket at the very end of 2000 but I feel it’s safe to say 2001 is when it really spread. The proper founding of Type-Moon as a company is considered to be in 2001. And January 21st 2001 was the release of Tsukihime Plus-Disc which included the first four chapters of the Kara no Kyoukai LN series. 

For Detective Conan this year opens with an episode that was at the time celebrating the show’s 5th anniversary and is now one of the Episodes with a new English Dub on Netflix, the last episode of the Rivals collection. Episode 219 The Gathering of the Detectives! Shinichi Kudo vs Vaitou Kid.  The show during winter went on to have some Heiji appearance I might have seen, 226-227 The Battle Game Trap which introduced an important recurring character and 228-229 The Murderous Pottery Class which is one of the show’s Columbo Episodes and perhaps among the best of them.  

There is no TV Anime to start in Winter 2001 I’ve watched to completion yet. Arjuna I’ve seen a few episodes of and keep considering watching more of, my feelings on it are mixed. For notable stuff I haven’t seen there’s Tales of Eterinia The Animation which I should check out since I’ve liked other Tales Of series Anime but there seems to be no Dub. And Ojamajo Doreme, a notable Nakayoshii/Toei Magical Girl series airing in the future PreCure timeslot, switched from its 2nd to 3rd series. 

The Manga being serialized in the Nakyoshi magazine during 2001 were Mink, Ojamajo Doreme, Little Cute, Tokyo Mew Mew, Zodiac PI, Instant Teen: Just Add Nuts and Musume Monogatari.  Elsewhere the Manga for Nana was also running this year. 

February 2001 had the Light Novel Boogiepop Paradox: Heartless Red.  None of the Boogiepop Anime or other adaptations have gotten this far, I have no idea what happens in it. Later in December was Boogiepop Unbalance: Holy & Ghost. 

In the OVA department March had the last episode of FLCL which is probably my “I don’t care for The Godfather” Anime opinion. But also the first episode of Puni Puni Poemii which wasn’t as funny as I was hoping it’d be, it’s 2nd and last episode was in December. 

Spring 2001 has a number of great shows, starting with Noir, my absolute favorite Anime of all Time.  Also Pretear, which I consider one of the most underrated classic Magical Girl shows, it was directed by Junichi Sato who was the Series Director for the best era of Sailor Moon. Angelic Layer might be my favorite of every proper Clamp Anime I’ve seen.  Comic Party which I consider the Lucky Star of the early 00s.  Sister Princess is a great forgotten Gem and Galaxy Angel was also a fun comedy. For shows I haven’t completed, SoulTaker is a notable Akiyuki Shinbo Anime which looks neat.  And SuperGals is an underrated Shoujo Anime I intend to watch more of, it’s currently streaming for free on Nozomi Entertainment's YouTube Channel.  

The 5th Detective Conan movie, Countdown to Heaven, came out in April. I still consider it one of the 4 best movies, and I know some consider it the absolute best.  Metropolis came out in May, it’s a movie I have mixed feelings on but ultimately recommend people check out. 

Back to the Detective Conan TV Anime.  April has 230-231 The Mysterious Passenger which is the formal start of the Vermouth Arc and among the episodes you can watch both Dubbed and Subbed on Netflix. This is what I still consider the best era of the show, so much of 2001 has I'm confident pretty good episodes even though I haven’t seen most yet. Metropolitan Police Love Story 4 and The Man From Chicago are also from 2001. 

In June was Lupin III: Alcatraz Connection this year’s annual TV Special.  I haven’t seen this one since it doesn’t have a Dub and I’ve chosen to be strictly Dub only with Lupin. But I know from asking about the topic once that it’s the first of the specials to be Digital Animation rather than Cell Animation. So it’s an important artifact of this transitional period that people researching should check out.  The same studio, Toho, wouldn't fully switch to digital for Detective Conan till the following year. 

For Pokémon this year was deep into the Johto Era, which for the TV Show I don’t have as much nostalgia for as other eras.  But it was the US release of the 3rd movie Spell of the Unown which I still consider the best Pokémon movie, as well as Mewtwo Returns which is a personal favorite of mine..  In Japan this year’s movie was the Celebi movie known to the West as 4Ever which is flawed but still good, and the Legend of Thunder special which was neat. 

What was different for the Western Fandom is something I need to keep reminding myself to get into more when making these kinds of posts.  Pokémon was usually a year behind, but some shows we didn't get till five years later.  It was in 2001 that Toonami finished Dragonball Z and started Dragonball.  Sailor Moon was also still broadcasting its Cloverway Dub era material S and SuperS. Gundam fans got both the 08th MS Team and 0080 War in The Pocket. Also The Big O and more Tenchi Muyo. 

I literally haven’t even started any TV Anime from Summer 2001.  Something like this seems to happen most often with Winter and Summer.  I think back when multiple Cour shows were still more standard those were the seasons getting fewer new Shows because so many slots were filled by second cours. But one of those Spring shows I talked about was single Cour. It looks like the most popular Anime from Summer 2001 was Fruits Basket which is a Shoujo. 

In the VN department July had the full release of Air, the second Key Visual Novel. And in August Age’s Rumbling Hearts was released. Both produced some very good Anime later, but Rumbling Hearts I’d recommend more strongly.

In the OVA realm August had the preview episode of the upcoming TV Anime version of Clamp’s X which was interesting but I don’t think necessary. 

Also the first episode of the non Hentai OVA series for One Kagayaku Kisetsu e.  I found this 4 episode series garbled and confusing, the Hentai version is legitimately a better presentation of the story. It’s based on a 90s Visual Novel the Key founders made before they started Key. 

Another OVA from August was Jikuu Ihougin Kyoko: Chocola ni Omakase! (it has no official localization but that seems to translate to Time Stranger Kyoko: Leave it to Chocola).  It’s interesting, I checked it out once because it's the only other Anime based on a Manga from the same author as Kamikase Kaitou Jeanne. 

The two episodes of the Pure Mail Hentai OVA that I talked about before came out in September and December of 2001. They are in the same universe as School Days. 

And Fall 2001 has the TV Anime version of Clamp's X which I recall really liking but I can’t describe it right now. The original Hellsing Anime which I still prefer to Ultimate aesthetically.  Mahoromatic and Najica Blitz Tactics. I’m also just now realizing as I write this that I had neglected to add Kirby Right Bat At Ya to any of the database websites even though I have watched a few episodes of it. 

One of the last things to come out this year was the Overflow Bishoujo Game Snow Radish Vacation!  It’s the chronologically first game of the universe that School Days and Pure Mail take place in. 

I finally watched Majuu Senshi Luna Varga and it was pretty good.

This is the OVA that Trixie The Golden Witch once described as revolving around the protagonist's Vagina transforming into Godzilla.

I initially suspected that she might have been exaggerating how much the creature actually looks like Godzilla.  Then the first time I looked at clips from it I went "yeah Toho could probably have sued them".

Now finally watching the OVA proper I'm back to thinking maybe it isn't quite that identical to Godzilla.  In episode 4 another Kaiju shows up, they are called Varuga, and it in some ways looks more like Godzilla and in some ways less.

All that was just the matter of if these Varugas look like Godzilla.  I was not expecting episode 4 to also possibly imply some Lore that makes the Godzilla resemblance perhaps thematically relevant.

BookTuber reviewing classic Fantasy Novels.

The name of the YouTube Channel is The Everyman Reads.

The idea is he's going to review 500 major Fantasy Novels in the order they were written.  He's still very early in the project having just reviewed George MacDonald's Lilith.  And it's a very good video everyone should watch it. 

In this video he defines how he divides Fantasy into 6 Eras. He's probably about right in what his divisions are, but the Pedantic in me can't help but be annoyed by the labels he chose, the point of naming eras after precious Metals is to repeat the Greek Mythological format, Gold then Silver then Bronze and then Iron.  His timeline goes Bronze, Silver, Classic, Golden, Modern and the current recently started but not definitively named era.  Which is the other pedantic complaint, Modern is by definition current, if we aren't in the same era as 2005-2020 anymore then that era needs a new name. 

Now as I said when talking about Eras of Anime The Golden Age is the first full era of greatness, but there can be a proto or pre history. So I would call his Bronze Age the formative years, then his Silver Age The Golden Age, then his Classic age the Silver Age and his Golden Age the Bronze Age and his Modern Age the Iron Age.

The 500 books he's selected are naturally biased towards the English speaking canon. And that's fine actually, there is a lot to cover just there. I just want to use this framing as a jumping off point for mentioning some foreign works I feel deserve more credit and attention.  Because what foreign language country's fiction I'm interested in changes depending on the era. 

The first two eras line up well with my Froncophilic interests I hold thanks to CoolFrenchComics.com and BlackCoatPress.

Paul Feval wrote only one book I'm confident can be considered Fantasy enough to definitely count, La Ville Vampire translated into English by the late Brian Stableford as Vampire City, first serialized in the 1860s.  Stuff straddling that early transitional line would include some of the works in Anne of The Isles. Some of his books set in modern Paris I would draw inspiration from when writing Urban Fantasy though they wouldn't actually count since the Supernatural element is always left ambiguous if present at all, The Vampire Countess, Revenants, Knightshade and The Blackcoats saga whose 6th volume The Companions of The Treasure is in my view the most Tolkienesque thing written before Tolkien. 

The Angel and The Sphinx from 1889 by Eduard Schure and translated by Brian Stableford.

The Enchanted City by Eugene Hennebert from 1893 including in BlackCoatPress's upcoming French Tales of Lost Worlds anthology.

In 1908 and 1909 Gustave Le Rouge wrote two novels that directly anticipate the Barsoom series, these were Translated and published together as Vampires of Mars. 

1919's L'Atlantide is like She in some ways but not in others, the author Pierre Beniot had not read She. It has had a similar if more forgotten cultural impact, for awhile being directly adapted every decade but also in the name of it's Femme Fatale Antinea influencing even more films.

As far as arguing that 1990-2004 was the best era of Fantasy Prose Novels, this wouldn't be the only time where what I call The Bronze Age is also the age I would argue is the best, that's certainly the case with Anime and kind of is for some DC characters. And that is where my Weeb interests come in.  

I haven't read these books, I haven't even seen all the Anime based on them, but I know a lot about their cultural importance.  And these are only stories that were originally prose novels which Light Novels count as, I won't be including anything that started as a Manga, Anime, Video Games or Visual Novels though they certainly have plenty of their own contributions to making this an exciting decade and a half for the Fantasy genre.  

The Heroic Legend of Arslan series started in 1987 but continued all through this era. 

Majuu Senshi Luna Varga is referred to as being based on a Light Novel but I can't find any publication dates for it, it's probably the most randomly obscure thing I'm going to list here.  The OVAs came out in 91 so it could turn out to be too soon for this era. 

Slayers started in 1990.

The Twelve Kingdoms started in 1992 and is one of the many GRRMs of Anime source materials in that it's still unfinished. 

On the subject of Urban Fantasy I'm unsure what does and doesn't count but I feel 1998 started a peak era for Japanese Urban Fantasy with Boogiepop and Others in February and the first Kara No Kyoukai in October.  I also recall Trixie The Golden Witch mentioning an anthology book of Light Novels like these from this era called Faust. 

Maybe a short story shouldn't be considered eligible for this but Kinoko Nasu's Angel Notes from 99 is pretty important. 

Scrapped Princess was from 1999 to 2003.

Legend of The Legendary Heroes started in 2002. 

2002 is also the same year as the original Web Novel for Sword Art Online, which isn't a Fantasy novel but has become undeniably important to the history of Fantasy in Japanese media.

Baccano! started in 2003 as did The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya if you count either as Urban Fantasy.

The year 2004 was the start of at least three important Light Novel sagas. 

The Familiar of Zero was very popular and a website that started as a fan site for it would go on to be the main incubation chamber for modern Isekai.

And then two more where I'm unsure if they count as Urban Fantasy for now.  Durarara!! and A Certain Magical Index.

And in December of 2004 Hakubō no Dendōshi by Gen Urobuchi was published. 

Some of the most misleadingly named Anime are the LN adaptations with really long titles.

Take for example the currently airing My Status as an Assassin Obviously Exceeds the Hero's at 5 episodes in how the Assassin protagonist compares to the Hero does not feel like remotely the point at all.  Now this could change later, but I don't see how it could ever over take everything else the show is currently about.

But for a more nuanced example let's look at my personal favorite Anime that has this kind of title, In Another World With My Smartphone.  The protagonist's Smartphone is a prominently used plot device but it's not what the show is about.  For myself and I think most other fans it's true distinctive feature is it's approach to taking the non Monogamous resolution to it's Harem.  It's no longer the only Anime or even Isekai to do that at all, but it's distinct approach to it still stands out to me as the best which I already wrote a blog post on.

Since it's so popular to insist Mecha shows aren't actually about the Giant Robots, I should be allowed to argue that the Smartphone Isekai isn't actually about either the Smartphone or even really being an Isekai.

As far as I can tell the first Anime with this kind of title was My Little Sister Can't Possibly Be This Cute, and it is indeed one of the least misleading, it conveys that the story is about the relationship between a brother and sister that may or may not go in an incestuous direction  But even then is Kirino's "Cuteness" really a deciding factor in why anything happens?

So why does this happen?  How do the stories that devote the most words to titling themselves most often get it wrong?  I can't even say this is an example of why you shouldn't prioritize plot over story in how you title something because I often don't even think they're the best descriptions of the plot.

Remembering how a lot of Light Novels started as Web Novels on certain websites, I feel like these sentence long titles were often originally and maybe still are writing prompts the author was using to get themselves started but never something meant to be all that binding to what the story became.

But it's interesting how there are Anime with single word titles where I still struggle to deduce how that word at all describes the show.  Yet none of those titles feel actively misleading in the way one of these sentence long titles that at the very least does accurately describe an aspect of the story.

Shun in Spider Isekai is NOT a Deconstruction

So I'm A Spider, So What! Is an Anime where I like all the characters, it has a great cast.  It’s currently the first time I’ve ever listed a show’s Title Character as one of my favorites on Anilist (the others I’ve considered are all Spin Offs, so main protagonists who started as supporting characters).  And it’s also now the first time I’ve ever listed any Male character as one of my favorites, much less the male lead.  Those are two different characters in this case. 

In my recent watching of YouTube videos covering this series I’ve seen at least two different people describe Shun as a Deconstruction of the Hero Archetype.  And this just shows how watered down the concept of Deconstruction is in modern Internet Discourse.

I don’t agree with people like Study of Swords that Genre Deconstruction doesn’t exist and can’t be a valid reading of any Anime. I oppose viewing Madoka Magica as a Deconstruction but I do think some Anime can be viewed that way, not this one however. 

It is not unusual at all for a Hero to make mistakes that have consequences, or for them to have spent much of the story unwittingly working for the real villains, or for other characters to chew them out for their Naive Stubbornness.  But in Anime especially, that Naive Stubbornness is often vindicated in the end, and now that I know all the spoilers for what this Anime hasn’t gotten to yet I can say with confidence that is where Shun’s story is headed. No one thinks Frieren is deconstructing Himel because of how the child Demon plot played out.

Kouki’s storyline in Arifureta especially in season 3 would be much more legitimate to describe as a Deconstruction of the typical JRPG Anime designated Hero.  But to me personally it doesn’t come off as an at all meaningful Deconstruction but more having the official Hero fail just to subvert expectations (even though it's exactly what I expected) and make the protagonists look better by comparison.  I enjoy much of Arifureta but I’m not gonna list it as a favorite. 

How inclined one is to read what happens with Shun in the Anime so far as a Deconstruction says more about the viewer than the story.  It tells me you're probably the kind of Nerd who thinks Batman’s No Kill rule is stupid and that Superman is boring and unrelatable. The kind who care a little too much about Aragorn’s “Tax Policy”. 

A lot of this obsession with reading Shun as a Deconstruction is tied to how a certain very vocal kind of Anime Fan simply doesn't like him as a character.  Indeed I maybe should have included him in my prior post about disliked Male Anime Protagonists but I’m glad I didn’t because I now have a more distinct perspective on him I want to share here. 

For what is right now still most of my life I saw myself as a Cis-Het Male, and even after I started seriously questioning my Gender Identity I remained only attracted to Women or at least very Femme Presenting individuals. But in the last couple of years I have come to realize that my orientation may be just as fluid as my identity, that I can be attracted to certain men in a very Androphilic way, or at least certain male Anime Characters. 

So any claim that it’s inexplicable or unbelievable how many girls like Shun will not fly with me because I am attracted to Shun, I like his personality and how he looks (in the Anime the LN art I’ve seen of him isn't the most flattering) and I specifically like him over any of the other Cis-Male characters in this series or most from other series more conventionally considered the Hot Guys of Anime. And I’m attracted to him in a very Feminine way, I don't fantasize about being a Seme bending him over I fantasize about being his Oneesan Mommy Dom (Which is conveniently a role none of the Girls in his canonical Harem fill).

Individualism in Anime

Japan is a much more Collectivist culture than The United States of America is at its baseline, a fact that is indeed relevant to understanding entertainment media made in Japan.

But people with a Collectivist ideology (in both its Right Wing and Left Wing forms) do exist in America and do sometimes make art to reflect those values.  So I have no doubt there are likewise Individualists in Japan.

So I do think people analyzing Japanese Media in the West make a mistake in assuming by default it’s always intended to be read as Collectivist and refusing to consider even the possibility that one could be Individualist. 

Anime, or more so the mediums that are the frequent source material of Anime, are very Niche even in Japan.  And Niche in a way that makes them attractive to a variety of different people outside the norm of Japanese culture in different and sometimes mutually exclusive ways. 

Make no mistake, most Anime is still presenting an ultimately Collectivist worldview, especially the Anime that are among my favorites like Robotics;Notes and the entire Magical Girl Genre.  If I'm recommending something as an expression of my Leftist ideology it's safe to assume I read it as collectivist.

However I have spotted the occasional Anime I think does have an Individualist Message in rebellion against the Collectivist norms of Japanese society.  Interestingly they mostly seem to be Light Novel adaptations.  Not all LN adaptations however, Durarara!! Has a very Collectivist ethos as do most that got an Anime even before it did.  

It’s mostly in those very LN trends that have dominated LN based Anime since like 2014 or so. Isekai, Magical Academy shows and so forth.  Not even all of them ultimately, maybe not even most, but enough that I find it notable.

Take the 2011 show Ben-To which I found very fun but did notice a few points where it’s moral seems to come from that “if everybody wins then nobody wins” mentality.  Shield Hero I know has appealed to the Randian Objectivists in the Anime Community and Log Horizon has also been described as preaching Libertarian ideology.  C: The Money of Soul and Possibility Control is an even more economically Libertarian Anime but it's not a LN adaptation though.

Another interesting, indeed to me annoying, trend in Isekai is how whenever its premise involves an entire classroom being Isekaied it’s always initially about the MC being separated from the rest for much of the story.   I really want to see one that’s from the start about the entire Class working together without there even needing to be a singular protagonist.

This is paralleled by how those Magic Academy shows always star a main character whose special ability completely dwarfs everyone else or fundamentally breaks the world's magic system.  The very aspect of the _____ ______ formula one would expect a more Collectivist Culture to remove or at least downplay they instead double down on. 

Among Americans who strive to be Collectivists there are still elements of Individualism that passively remain in our thinking because of that being our culture’s baseline.  A lot of Internet Leftist Infighting is Leftists accusing other Leftists of being Individualists while being blind to the Individualisms in our own thinking.

And the same frequently happens in these Anime I have alleged to be ideologically individualist.  Anime named for a single Chosen One protagonist often wind up doing better at depicting teamwork then American Superhero films named as being about a Superhero Team.

I am aware that not all forms of Collectivism are good (Fascism is a collectivist ideology though many Breadtubers are in denial about that), and a lot of Japanese Collectivism can be very Conservative in nature.  So critiquing that isn't inherently incompatible with Leftism.  It's a tricky subject. 

Those entire classroom Isekai premises I complained about before do inevitably reunite the Protagonist with the rest of the class, how long that takes varies.  The recent Loner Life in Another World that I’m watching the currently airing Dub of on HIDIVE is perhaps the most subversive of this trend as much of the comedy is the protagonist being prevented from fulfilling his desire to be left alone.  In fact at times it seems like its thesis is that a “Loner” is the best mediator between the various Cliques. (Actually the most surprising thing about the show is how it opens on a whole “break down of all the High School Cliques” scene that I usually only expect in American High School Dramas.)

A similar idea is at play in Detective Conan.  We have the typical trop of the official law enforcement agencies investigating the Black Organization being hesitant to work together.  But since Conan is trusted by everyone as an informal ally he's able to be the mediator between them. 

And then there is Classroom of The Elite, a Light Novel series with a contentious Anime Adaptation.  Long before I had any of the other thoughts I’ve based this post on, I've suspected that the key to understanding Classroom of The Elite may be that it is exploring the tension between Japanese Collectivism and Capitalist Individualism.

I have something against the Otome Villainess Genre

I enjoy some of these shows, but there is still an issue I have with the premise at its core.

I remember in one Lindsay Ellis video she said she couldn’t enjoy Frozen because she fundamentally disagreed with its perceived critique of prior Disney Princess films.  The problem is the message that you shouldn't rush into marriage with someone you just met is objectively a good one to teach young people, it doesn’t need to be some metatextual commentary on prior works in the same genre or from the same corporate brand to work, it simply does, it's a plot that will make sense even to people watching it centuries from now divorced from it's original Pop Cultural context.

However that same defense can’t be made of this Reincarnated as an Otome Villainess genre, and its other variants. As a subgenre of modern Light Novel Gamer Isekai the perceived commentary on prior works of fiction is explicit in the Text not mere Subtext.

Is there a single actual Otome Game that fits the generic framework all the hypothetical Otome Games imagined by this Genre share?  A Magic School in a Victorianish setting where the protagonist is the only commoner attending and her romantic options include The Crown Prince and her Ojousama Rival usually experiences some horrific Bad End alongside the Heroine’s Happy Ending?

I admit I’m pretty Anime Only when it comes to all these Genres, but none of the Anime I’m aware of that are adapted from real Otome Games are at all like this.  There is usually not both a Reverse Harem and a Romantic Rival to the protagonist, that’s a bit too complicated for a truly generic Dating Sim to handle.

I feel this is a cynical perception of not just Otome Games specifically but Shoujo media in general held by Men and NLOGs who've never actually consumed any of it directly, or what they have they've chosen to remember through a biased lens.

Classic Shoujo Anime and Manga are in fact always by default very sympathetic to the Romantic Rival and/or Ojousama character (they aren’t always or even usually the same person), and so I refuse to believe an accusation that Otome Games made for the same demographic were ever any different.  

Sometimes they are way more sympathetic to Bully characters than a lot of Western fans can handle.  Take Peach Girl who’s “Villainess” is the Trope Namer for the Wounded Gazelle Gambit, even she is given an arc and becomes a good person by the end.  In Pretear the Ojousama character is mostly comic relief but shows her own heroic qualities in the climatic episodes.  There are even Shoujo where the Protagonist outright admires her Rival and actively ships her with the Prince she has a crush on like Princess Tutu and Shattered Angels, I would critique those examples on their unwillingness to go for a Poly Resolution not how they present the rival.

There are also Shoujo Manga as old as the 2000s where the Spoiled Rich Girl is the Protagonist like Pink Innocent. 

I talk a lot about how part of what I love about Otaku Media is how often Saving even the Villain is explicitly the goal.  Well that’s a Value modern Otaku Media inherited from Classic Shoujo, it comes principally from the Magical Girl Genre.

One YouTube Video I watched on this Villainess trend says it’s a “dead unicorn trope” which he thought meant it may have been a thing in the past but isn’t anymore.  But I doubt even those old ones ever treated these characters so unfairly. In actuality “dead unicorn trope” means it never existed unironically, like "The Butler did it". 

Amelie Doree has a video on a Game that can be considered the Ur Text of the Otome Game genre called Angelique.  And while it does have somewhat of a proto Ojousama Rival character she is not treated as a “Villainess” at all.

Magic and “Science” are not actually different in the ToAru Universe

My knowledge of ToAru lore beyond what’s been directly revealed in various Anime is mostly via watching videos on the Aeon of Horus YouTube Channel.  I feel the need to make that clear up front.

I haven’t even seen all of what’s Animated btw, I’ve so far been strictly Dub only with these franchises so all the OVAs and Specials that the Dub has ignored I still haven’t seen.

A detail revealed in the first Arc of A Certain Magical Index that I used to forget about because I generally rewatch later arcs more is when Index reveals that Magick began as Mages trying to mimic what Esper could do.  But if Espers have existed for longer then why are they now so firmly associated with this less than a century old futuristic city-state?  

Well that’s where the Gemstone distinction the Anime has never gotten into comes in. 

Gemstones are the naturally occurring Espers whose powers do not in origin have anything to do with Academy City’s curriculum.  While the term and concept of Gemstones hasn’t been properly explained in the Anime yet two Gemstone Espers have been seen, Aisa Himegami whose ability is called Deep Blood and Sugita the 7th ranked Level 5.

Paradoxically however these Natural Gemstone abilities seem the least Scientific, they seem like the highly magical superpowers someone would have in the Nasuverse.

Academy City’s Espers are the products of an attempt to artificially recreate what the Gemstones are, they are doing the same thing the Mages are just with an aesthetically different method.  

Academy City was, after all, founded by one of the most infamous of Mages.

The core of how Academy City tries to scientifically explain what Espers are draws on the Schrodinger's Cat thought experiment, just like many Visual Novels.  That’s why there is all the “personal reality” talk.  But the way Mages' powers work also has a similar mind over matter quality to it, remember the villain in the Deep Blood arc was defeated by his own lack of belief in what he could do.  

The simple fact that Touma’s right hand can cancel out both feels like proof that they aren’t that different.  And that ability is called Imagine Breaker.

Like the Gigalomaniac powers in Chaos;HEad and Chaos;Child both Magic and Esper powers in ToAru seem to have their roots in the Transcendental Idealism of Immanuel Kant.

Academy City produces Espers whose powers seem like SciFi rather Magical abilities because the kinds of minds drawn to and bred by Academy City can only imagine in Scientific sounding terms.

The Remotes Misaki Shoukuhou uses are normal TV remotes, not things specifically designed for her, they are just a tool to help her imagination.  In a way that’s not at all unlike a Magic Wand.

We’ve seen plenty of Magical Abilities that would not at all be hard to imagine as Esper Abilities with only superficially different framing, like Style’s fire elemental powers.

Then there’s how the entire description of what a Level 6 is supposed to be reminds me of the Kwisats Haderach from Dune.

Anime was always Seasonal in Japan

In the Anglophonic Anime Fandom an interesting subgenre of "things aren't as good as they were back in the day" discourse is complaining about the nature of Seasonal Anime Discourse where shows people were so hyped about all season are seemingly instantly forgotten when the new hot shows drops.

The structure of how Anime broadcasts was always seasonal like this in their home country.  But overseas fans were always behind and often getting what we did get in big chunks rather then one episode a week consistently for 12-26 weeks.

So whatever old show an Anituber is currently trying to sell you on while complaining about this was also being talked about in Japan a lot less when it wasn't currently airing anymore.  However it's easy to look back now with the hindsight of knowing what shows did "stand the test of time" and find the documentation that they were indeed still being talked about by a loyal fan base.  But guess what so are plenty of these modern seasonal shows on their own dedicated subreddits or discord servers or even on regular social media apps when you seek their Tags specifically.

The other thing that's different now is the nature of Social Media making what we used to call "water cooler conversation" more amplified and documented.  But you can still find the evidence that what I'm claiming is true.

Ghost Stories did NOT flop in it's original Japanese Broadcasts, a few Anitubers have already debunked that myth.  But part of the reason the myth seemed so believable is because it didn't stay popular, it topped polls in Anime magazines for the year it came out but it never became a permanent staple of 2channel culture.  Unless it did, I don't know.

Mother's Basement thought Classroom of The Elite was one of those forgotten seasonals and then when season 2 dropped he sought out and found the vibrant fan community that had been hiding in plain sight the whole time.  And that's only one of a number of 2017 seasonals to suddenly get a new season in recent years.

Thing is plenty of old shows that didn't "stand the test of time" also had active loyal fanbases for awhile or even to this day.

Yuno Gasai and the Yandere timeline

Yuno Gasai from the Anime/Manga Mirai Nikki aka Future Diary is the single most well known Yandere, or at least she was when I fully joined the Anime Community in the mid to late 2010s, so much so that Gigguk’s Yandere video could make a Joke out of pretending she’s the only one who matters.

But unlike most characters who have become virtually synonymous with their Archetype she is not the first or even the first really popular one, or even really among the first.  I would dare say by the time of her creation the Yandere was already becoming an overplayed Cliche.

Now when I started researching this thesis I was shocked how much older Mirai Nikki’s source material is, I’m not used to popular Manga taking over 5 years to get an Anime.  But it was still not old enough to destroy this premise.  It started publication on January 26th 2006.

Now I’m someone who is fairly strict in how I even define a Yandere, I talked about elements of it in a post I made earlier this year.  So for example the character from Shuffle who some call a Yandere (I’ve heard she’s more of one in the Anime then in the original VN) I’m iffy on counting.  But if we count her then Shuffle’s Anime ended on January 6th 2006.

Amelie Doree has a video on the 2003 Visual Novel Cross Channel, from it I can conclude it has a character who can be considered a Yandere.

Most of Higurashi was released by the end of 2005 including the two most Yandere relevant chapters.  Getting back to the relative strictness with how I define a Yandere, Sonozaki I consider a Yandere even if atypical in some ways, while Ryugu is not a Yandere, when she acts Crazy it has nothing to do with romance, apparently she's considered a Yangire a term I know less about.

The original School Days Visual Novel was released in 2005.  And in my opinion Kotonoha is still the best Yandere.

The first Durarara!! Light Novel came out in 2004 and the second came out in 2005.  They feature even by my strictest definition multiple Yanderes.  And if you loosen the definition it might just be possible to argue this is a saga where (almost) everyone is a Yandere.

And that’s the key to my thesis really, it is particularly the role Yanderes play in Durarara!! that even in these early novels makes it feel like it’s already a cliche, like the author is on a Meta level joking about how arguably overused this character type is.

All that and I still have a hunch none of these is where the Yandere trend began.  It’s difficult to research because characters who technically qualify have always existed, with some even suggesting the first Anime Yandere was a character from Uresei Yatsura or Ranma1/2 or something like that, or even Jojo.  And Gaijin Goomba of course wants to connect it to some pre-modern Japanese Folk Tale.

But when I ask who the first Yandere is I mean the beginning of this trend in Otaku oriented Visual Novels and Light Novels of the early 2000s which may have actually began in the mid to late 90s.  There may not be a definitive single first one, but I get the sense that even the oldest of the ones I’ve discussed above were already part of a trend.

But let’s return to the mystery of why Yuno Gasai was able to steal the spotlight from all these predecessors.  Is it because she’s the best?  I already said I consider someone else the best.  But this is one of those tropes where so many people want to argue why the one they like is the only one who was written with a complex Psychological profile that makes their insanity not truly only about the person they are romantically fixated on, but the truth is they were all written with depth.

Maybe why Yuno overshadows the rest is because of the Anime adaptation, because of how well she was performed by Tomosa Murata and later in the English Dub Brina Palencia?  

Glass Reflection I remember said in his Future Diary review that he didn’t like Brina as Yuno and that ticked me off.  One of Brina’s unique talents is to sound vocally more "normal" then most Anime characters even while still having an eccentric personality.  And for the Bipolar quality that a good Yandere is supposed to have that kind of voice is actually perfect.  

Cross Channel still doesn’t have an Anime, but besides that all those Pre-Yuno Yandere also made their Anime debut before her.  Mirai Nikki started airing in the Fall of 2011.  School Days technically was an Anime in its source material but got its TV Anime in 2007.  Higurashi had its Yandere Arcs in its first season in 2006.  And both of the first two Durarara!! LNs were covered in the first season of its Anime in the first half of 2010. And they all had good VAs who did a great job bringing their character's Insanity to life.

It honestly might be more that Yuno was the LAST notable Yandere as far as actual Japanese media goes.  The shows that copy everything else about Future Diary make their female lead very much not a Yandere. Instead for the terminally online the Yandere has been kept alive by a perpetually in-development American Indie Video Game and ASMR videos.  And maybe there's some V-Tubers who's gimmick is that they're a Yandere I wouldn't know.

So when Anitube as we currently know it started Yuno was the freshest Yandere in everyone’s memory.  And for plenty of newer Anime fans she may have been the only Yandere recent enough for them to have seen in action when she was new.

Update February 13th 2026: I recently learned of a 2000 Visual Novel called Silver that has who can perhaps be considered the first Yandere of VNs named Sasai Yuuna.

The Light Novel Age of Anime

In my post about the Ages of Anime last year I suggested that 2011 was the start of our current Age and then that maybe we could call this Age of Anime the Light Novel Age because even though plenty of Anime based on LNs happened before it feels like only in this era have LNs truly rivaled Manga as a Source Material for Anime.  While at the same time trends we associate with LNs have become prevalent even in shows that didn't start there, based on how it was structured I was genuinely shocked to learn that Dress Up Darling was a Manga not a Light Novel.

I decided to take a slightly closer look at the Winter 2011 season on MyAnimeList referred to as MAL for short going forward.  

The first show that comes up that season both when organizing by most members and when organizing by highest scored in Puella Magi Madoka Magica which was not a Light Novel adaption however it's writer Gen Urobochi was already notorious as an author of both LNs and Visual Novels. I'm not making this post to argue Madoka is in addition to everything else it's infamous for secretly a partial cause of the LN take over.  But if I didn't acknowledge the biggest show of that season someone might accuse me of deliberately ignoring it.

The second, third and fifth shows of that season ranked by most members were each LN adaptations.  (Winter 2010 did have at least as many LN Anime but not as congregated towards the top of this list.)  Those 3 are IS: Infinite Stratos, Is This A Zombie and Gossik with Gossik being the second when ranked by score.

But Infinite Stratos is perhaps the most important for my argument.  In one of my Isekai posts I suggested that In Another World With My Smartphone is no where near the first modern Isekai but is arguably the first to fully fit what we typically mean by a generic disposable Isekai.  Well Infinite Stratos I think has a similar role in the history of the Magic Academy genre.  The show Mother's Basement keeps calling the first of this genre of Anime doesn't in my view have the right Vibes to really qualify at all.  Infinite Stratos has the right visual look, basic set up and tone to clearly feel like part of this genre, only that it's technically Mecha rather then Magic is an issue, but they're all Newtypes which is basically Magic.

Spring 2011 had Ground Control to Psychoelectric Girl who's Japanese title is slightly misleading since it does not have the vibes that Visual Novel YouTubers are thinking of when they talk about Denpa.

The thing about the history of Light Novels and Anime adapted from them is that what kinds of stories we most stereotypically associate with the medium also changed.  Stuff like Twelve Kingdoms, Slayers, Boogiepop and Others, Kara no Kyoukai, Kino's Journey, Baccano!, Strawberry Panic and Legend of The Legendary Heroes seem like very different beasts.  While the genres we associates with LNs today are still fairly varied, they are connected to each other by how they tend to be Otaku Media at it's most Meta Self Indulgent, and that largely started with The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya in 2003.

So basically among all the LN based Anime made prior to Winter 2011 only three maybe four franchises I'm familiar with at all feel like the modern LN vibe.  The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, A Certain Magical Index and OreImo, the maybe Zero no Tsukaima, and all of them got animated during the last 5 years of what I call the Bronze Age of Anime.  And there are no shows that weren't LN based I would mistake for one, rather the opposite most LN based Anime were ones that seemed not much different from the Manga based ones.

Manga has by no means ceased to be important if for no other reason then that these Light Novels always get a Manga Adaption first before the Anime, I'm not currently aware of any exceptions to that.  Even Sword Art Online had a Manga as early as 2010 yet no one ever talks about it, all that discourse surrounding that franchise including changes between versions yet no one seems to even be aware of the Manga.

Light Novels should be adapted as Movies rather then TV Shows more often

I say this as someone who is in general biased for more serialized modes of storytelling and in fact that bias has played a role in why I like Anime so much to begin with.

But the Anime that embody the strengths of serialized story telling are usually Original TV Anime (and some OVAs and ONAs), and Manga adaptations.  And a lot of Visual Novel or Video Game adaptations work being adapted into a more serialized format because their structure is often like something serialized so that the player can be given convenient places to take a break.

LNs however are kind of the Japanese equivalent to YA novels or airport novels except shorter in length, their original narrative structure is usually much more similar to Movies then to a TV Series. And the Light part of term implies it's pretty rare for there to be too much for a single movie. 

My problem with the broadcast order of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya is that it butchered the structure of the original LN which actually is a good stand alone work of art on it's own even if it had never gotten sequels.  The chronological first 6 episodes of Haruhi are the adaptation of that LN and I kind of wish someone would just fan edit them into a movie (both a Subbed version and a Dubbed version).

Sword Art Online was actually adapted similarly to Haruhi in this regard except in that case the inserted short stories written later to flesh out the original arc made the Anime more chronological then the source material rather then less.

The fact that some LNs are short story collections is perhaps the counter point to this thesis.  I suppose the short stories could be adapted as OVAs or ONAs.  But some movies are made as collections of shorter stories rather then one feature length story.

We've already seen success in adapting LNs as movies rather then TV shows.  The Live Action Boogiepop and Others movie, the Kara no Kyoukai films, the SAO Progressive movies of which only one I've gotten to see currently.  Aura: Koga Maryuin's Last War which I think is a pretty underrated entry in the Chunibyo genre.  And most successful of all The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya.

But I also think about the niche examples where the serialized format combined with wanting to make a lot of progress in one season has hurt a story structurally.  I'm The Villainess, So I'm Taming The Final Boss rushing to the end of the first novel in only the 4th episode killed my initial enthusiasm for that series.

There are exceptions, Fate/Zero and Fate/Apocrypha are LN adaptations and I don't see how they'd work as a string of movies.  Some LNs do seem to be written from the start with the idea of being adapted into a TV Anime.  However more often then not in Japan the Anime is glorified marketing for the source material not the other way around.  But sometimes whether it gets adapted or not a first novel can seem more like set up for future stories then a satisfying story on it's own.  Maybe it's mostly older LNs this is true for.

The point I'm making is perhaps most proven by the Raildex franchise and the popular discourse around it.  

A Certain Magical Index's first LN was also written to originally stand alone if no sequel was greenlit, that is the plot of the first 6 episodes and they too feel like they could've been a movie.  I enjoy the Index Anime just fine but I'm a notoriously easy person to please, and I can definitely see how every arc that is given only 3 episodes or less (Deep Blood, Tree Remnant, Crystal Fleet, all of season III) could have used more screen time to flesh everything out.

A Certain Scientific Railgun was serialized from it's inception and so the Anime is able to improve upon the Manga in the same way many past Anime based on Manga have from Sailor Moon to DBZ to the original FMA Anime by adding much needed episodic filler episodes and the occasional filler arc that is just as peak fiction as the Manga yet purists hate on them anyway.

Railgun works as a series because the source is also a serial, Index would have been better as movies.

It is true that sometimes even the LNs will split an arc across more then one LN.  SAO started doing this as early as Fairy Dance, and Boogiepop did it back in the 90s with Vs Imaginator, and Index has indeed done it a few times.

So those being adapted as a movie per LN can at first glance be mistaken for those misguided times Hollywood has split the last novel of a YA saga into two movies.  However Across The Spiderverse was pretty universally praised in-spite of ending on a Cliffhanger.  And in the world of Anime we have prior precedent for this with the Nanoha Reflection and Detonation movies being one story split across two films, and then the latest Prisma Illya movie also ended on a cliffhanger.

Maybe 20 years ago the idea of devoting a 20+ novel saga to movies rather then TV would have seemed unthinkable.  But now we live in a post MCU world where Cinema itself can be a little serialized.

Update November 2024: In the slightly over a year since I wrote this I've now finally seen Durarara! and Baccano!

Durarara! works surprisingly well as a TV series, I wouldn't change anything about it or recommend doing anything different if more season of the Anime are made.  It can be another lead counter example to my thesis.

Baccano! also worked very well as a miniseries, but I do think what Baccano! pulled off is likely to only work as a one season gimmick, I'm skeptical a second season could do the same thing with another 4 LNs.  It helped that the Flying Pussyfoot story was a two parter and that they could use Isaac and Miria as the main glue connecting the different stories.

If Baccano! gets more Anime, and I very much want it to, I would suggest just making movies out of as many of them as possible.

Perhaps some of you think too many individual Light Novels are not "Epic" or "Cinematic" enough to warrant a movie.  But I like plenty of small scale low stakes movies, from random Lifetime Original movies I've watched to old movies set in very isolated settings.  Not everything needs to be about the potential end of the world or destruction of an entire city to be film worthy.

Update September 20025: After reading up on what happens in the So I'm A Spider, So What LNs, I'd have the to say the first 5 volumes jumping around between time period would have made them more difficult then usual to work as films.  But that aspect of the story is done going forward and Volumes 6 and 7 which pick up where the Anime leaves off  but only on the earlier part of the time would each make very epic awesome and fairly stand alone movies. 

The Golden, Silver and Bronze Ages of Anime.

I notice a lot of online Anime Discourse, at least back in 2016-2017, talking about what was the Golden Age of Anime treating that term as just meaning whatever is the best when that's not actually what the concept of a Golden Age means.

The Golden Age of something is it's first era of greatness, some stuff can have came before but they're basically Pre-History in the grand scheme of things.  No fan of Western Superhero Comics actually thinks the Golden Age had a higher baseline level of quality then fully developed modern comics, or that most of the absolute best Comics ever made were made then, but they call it the Golden Age anyway.

Likewise I am going to say the Golden Age of Anime began with the premier of Astor Boy in 1963 and ended with the final episode of Lupin III Part II (Red Jacket) in 1980 even though I am personally into very little from that era.  

I will then define the Silver Age as spanning 1981 through 1994 and maybe even the first season of 95.  

The Bronze Age is then 1995-2010 (or maybe it wouldn't be completely wrong to include the Fall of 94) while the current Modern Age began with 2011 and is still going on as I write this. 

Significantly over 50% of all the Anime I've completed on MAL is Modern in this definition.  Partly because how much Anime gets made each year keeps increasing, but also because it was a few years into the Modern Era that Anime became a full time interest of mine.

However I would have to say the Bronze Age is probably the age I currently like the most, it contains most of the few Anime I actually do have Childhood or YA Nostalgia for.  And there are so many interesting kinds of Anime I feel were only made then.

Now my definition for the Golden Age is perhaps the most self explanatory.  That it ends right before Millennials begin being born makes it easy for us to see it as the Antiquity of Anime History.  

The Silver Age is then contemporary with the earliest Millennials growing from Babies to starting High School.  But I'd also say the key 1981 milestone to kick off this age was Urusei Yatsura while the swan song of the Silver Age was Sailor Moon S the last season of that Anime with Tomita, Yanagikawa and Sumisawa on the writing staff.

I already have a Post on this Blog about Anime in 1995 showing what a game changing year it was. But the argument for starting the Bronze Age in Fall of 94 would be Macross 7 & Magic Knight Rayearth and how DNA seems ahead of it's time as an absurd Harem premise. And I also already have a post on 2011 Anime showing how it launched many of the trends that define modern Anime Culture.  And even in that post I had not yet accounted for Psycho-Pass or some other shows I watched more recently, or how for Detective Conan the Holmes' Revelation Case can definitely be considered the start of the Modern Era for that show and Movie 15 the first movie to truly feel like modern Detective Conan movies.

But 2010 as the end of an Era is also interesting to break down.  War on Geminar was the last real OVA saga, since then OVAs have almost only been for bonus episodes of TV shows and Hentai.  Oreimo season 1 was the last real Otaku Rights show before Otaku culture became too tolerated for such a premise to feel relevant anymore (with that element being downplayed even in future Oreimo Anime).  White Album and Yosuga no Sora were the last Anime adaptations of retro Visual Novels made before modern Anime styles got in the way of such adaptations feeling Retro (I love YU-NO's 2019 Anime but I do wish it could looked more like a 90s Anime).  For Pokémon Diamond and Pearl is the last generation I personally feel can be considered a classic gen.  Legend of The Legendary Heroes was the last major Fantasy Anime before the influence of SAO and LN Isekai took over (a few shows and movies with the vibes of these kind of Fantasy still get made but they get drowned out).

For both Superhero Comics and Anime the change from Golden to Silver is shockingly clean, with if anything a brief gap that feels like neither rather then a transitional period that feels like both.  With Anime it's only the change from Silver to Bronze I consider debatable at all, Fall of 94 and Winter of 95 can each go either way.  I similarly do consider the transition from Silver to Bronze for Comics the most stylistically complex (other transitions are only debated more by DC nerds because this is the only one where the continuity didn't change).  None of the shows airing in both Fall 2010 and Winter 2011 I consider defining shows of either era.

What to call the era that follows the Bronze Age after it's no longer Modern is what isn't so standardized.  For DC Comics it's the Post-Crisis era, I'm of the generation of DC fans who grew up with the Post-Crisis era being the current Modern Era.  But when did the Post Crisis era end?  During the early-mid 2000s we felt like it was still the Post-Crisis era but in hindsight a lot of what was special about the Post-Crisis era to many who consider it their favorite era of DC comics was already being eroded by 2002, I consider the reviving of Oliver Queen in the Quiver arc from 2001 a key turning point.

So with about 15 years seeming to be the average, we Anime fans may well be near the end of our current era, which is perhaps what a lot of people tired of certain current Anime trends are hoping for.  But we probably won't notice the change as it happens just as DC fans didn't and just as I don't think we noticed the huge shifts happening in 2010-2013.  Madoka Magica was a big deal immediately, but how soon did people realize just how much it had changed the game for it's Genre?  Maybe the upcoming Madoka movie will help end the very same era the original show helped start?

But what will we call this era?  DC fans were lucky being given a convenient name early on, though it was originally used to denote continuity changes more so then an era.  We have been using some terms to describe the modern state of Anime, but they tend to refer to specific subgenres of what's going on now rather then all of it.  What do Dark Magical Girls, Isekai, VRMMOs, Magic Academies, endless Fate/ Spin Offs, and Battle Royal/Death Games all have in common?

I know sometimes the Post Crisis era is also called the Dark Age of Comics because of Watchmen/DKR influence.  And indeed some of those Anime trends are Dark but not all of them, Isekai is usually the opposite and plenty of classic style Mahou Shoujo have coexisted with the Madoka Clones.

Maybe "The Light Novel era" works.  LNs were a thing during prior eras and they portably will still be in future eras just as the Edgy Anti-Heroes of 90s Comics didn't just disappear.  But it does feel like this is an era where even some things that aren't LN based often seem like they are because of how pervasive their influence is.

Update: One could just continue the Greek Mythological inspiration and call the 4th age the Iron Age.

Magic Academy Light Novels/Anime owe nothing to Harry Potter.

I know that sounds absurd at first, but it really isn't.  

Otaku Media is a niche subculture in Japan, and their relationship with taking influence from the west is complicated. In the formative years of the subculture in the 70s and 80s a lot clearly was taken and that's why Star Wars and Superman references never feel out of place in Anime.  But by the late 90s the culture started becoming increasingly insular, the thing Miyazaki said that got mistranslated and misquoted as "Anime was a Mistake" was all about how annoyed he is at modern Anime refusing to be influenced by stuff other then prior Anime.

Harry Potter did not invent the concept of fantastical magic themed Schools or using one as the setting for a Fantasy story.  Western Fantasy Novels with such a concept can be traced back to the 50s.  The late 90s saw an increase in such concepts because using even normal school as a setting only became it's own genre in the prior decade.

But since some of these Magic Academy Anime are technically not Magic at all but nominally some sort of SciFi ability, I could add the X-Men comics to the list of things that were kinda this Genre long before Harry Potter.

The one Anime that I do view as maybe explicitly Harry Potter influenced I like is, Little Witch Academia, but maybe not even LWA since two of the Pre-Potter magic School franchises from that video were about specially All Female Witch Schools.  Still LWA is distinct from the Light Novel trend I'm principally talking about.

My agenda here is NOT about trying to destroy the legacy of Harry Potter because of the now exposed bigotry of She-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named.  I'm not even a fan of this genre of Anime, I've yet to get through a full cour of a single show where this is it's main genre.  However I will recommend while on that subject Chivalry of a Failed Knight since it has an explicit Trans character. 

Rather the agenda of mine this post does fit into is my desire to draw attention to how much modern Anime has it's roots in a lot of obscure forgotten 90s Media that was popular within this subculture in Japan but didn't get localized for the West or directly adapted into Anime till 10-20 years later if at all.  Like YU-NO: A Girl Who Chants Love at The Bound of This World.  

And while I still am far from an expert on that subject I've already found one such piece of hidden Otaku Media that is in fact a Magic School setting before Harry Potter.  Lunar: Sanposuru Gakuen (Lunar: Walking School) released in Japan in January of 1996, almost a year and a half before the first Harry Potter book was published.  This instalment didn't get a Western Release but it was part of an already popular series.

Even before that there was a Shoujo Manga/Anime series called Akazukin Chaka.

However these kinds of hidden pieces of the puzzle of Anime History are not of interest to Mother's Basement when he makes multiple videos on this genre calling them "Anime Harry Potter knockoffs" for clicks.  He's even aware of the differences like the Academy and Magic's existence not being an in-universe secret, and the lack of anything like the house sorting system.

However there is another piece of this puzzle that even these more Normie observers of Anime have less of an excuse to have missed.  Final Fantasy VIII released in February of 1999 but was in production already before Final Fantasy VII was even fully released yet and thus also before Harry Potter.  And just look at it's early Cut Scenes.  It's a Fantastical Academy and the unforms are clearly way more similar to what we've come to expect from LN based Magic Academy Anime then the more generic Harry Potter robes.  

Meanwhile the Japanese Translation of the first Harry Potter book wasn't published till December of 1999, Final Fantasy VIII was almost a full year earlier.

Update July 30th:  Low and behold like right after I made this Reign of The Seven Spellblades starts airing, a show seemingly calculated to make this post age poorly.  But it really only proves my point more, that's what Anime actively trying to evoke Harry Potter looks like, it exposes how not like HP at all the swarm of shows preceding it truly are, all while still managing to be better then Harry Potter in the way only an Anime version of it's premise could be.