Anime's influence can be found in every corner of American media, from film and television to games and graphic arts. And Fred Patten is largely responsible. He was reading manga and watching anime before most of the current generation of fans was born. In fact, it was his active participation in fan clubs and his prolific magazine writing that helped create a market and build American anime fandom into the vibrant community it is today. Watching Anime, Reading Manga gathers together a quarter-century of Patten's lucid observations on the business of anime, fandom, artists, Japanese society and the most influential titles.
Part I - Anime Fandom First Manga Ad in USA; Graphics Story World; Fans in America (Japanese); Animedia; San Diego Comic-Con '84; Convention brochure; What's Wrong with Japanese Animation?; StarQuest #3; Anime Fandom Timeline; Ch. 4 of Complete Anime Guide, 2nd Ed., by Trish Ledoux & Doug Ranney; Letters; 'Anime' as Pejorative; ProtoCulture Addicts #49; Best of Anime CD liner notes; Kid Rhino/Rhino Entertainment, Inc.; Who Knows 'Best'?; Manga Max; Anime in the United States; Ch. 3 of Animation in Asia and the Pacific by John Lent; Event Report: Academy of Motion Picture Anime Event; Protoculture Addicts #69; An Interview with Fred Patten; Anime-Tourist.com; Fred Patten: Anime Man; VideoScope #43; Anime Expo '03; Conventions Enter Adolescence; Animation World Magazine; Anime Archive; Terminology: 'Anime' vs. 'Japanimation'; Newtype USA.
Part II - Business of Anime All Those Japanese Animation Soundtracks; CinemaScore #15; Japanese Anime: The Cult Grows Up; Animation Magazine; Anime Licensing Grows Up; Animation Magazine #46; World's Biggest Animation Home Video Market; Animation World Magazine; Anime "Porn" Market; Animation World Magazine; Go to JAILED; Manga Max #3; The 13 Top Developments in Anime 1985/1999; Animation Magazine #75; By the Numbers; Manga Max #8; Anime 2000: Money Talks; Manga Max #14; Anime Theatrical Features; Animation World Magazine; This Month in Anime History; First anime fan magazine, Animage, published July 1978 Tokuma Publishing"; Newtype USA; Simba vs. Kimba; in The Illusion of Life II: More Essays on Animation, edited by Dr. Alan Cholodenko, University of Sydney's Power Institute; Simba/Kimba Redux? The Nadia vs. Atlantis Affair; Unpublished; Part III - Artists The Dynamic World of Go Nagai (Afterword in Mazinger book); First Publishing, Inc.; Osamu Tezuka Obit/Tribute in 18th Annie Awards program book; ASIFA-Hollywood; Osamu Tezuka: A Memorial to the Master; Animation News Service; Shotaro Ishinomori: A Profile in Introduction in Vol. 1 of The Skull Man by Kazuhiko Shimamoto and Shotaro Ishinomori; TOKYOPOP; Hayao Miyazaki's Spirited Trip to U.S.; Animation World Magazine.
Part IV - Japanese Culture in Anime TV Animation in Japan; Fanfare #3; Mangamania!; Comics Journal #94; Japan + Animation = Japanimation! Part 1; Starlog #105; Japan + Animation = Japanimation! Part 2; Starlog #106; A New Wind from the East; Amazing Heroes #118; Full Circle: Japanese Animation from Early Home Studios to Personal Workshops for Home Video; WittyWorld #1; Japan's Anime; Animation Magazine; Capsule History of Anime; Animation World Magazine; Anime: Subliminal Lessons in History; The Right Stuf Catalog introduction; Anime Archive; Refighting WWII; Newtype USA; Anime Archive; Less, or More, Than Human; Newtype USA; Part V - Titles Dawn of the Warrior Robots; Fangoria #4; Force Five; Fangoria #8; Gigantor; Fantastic Films/Rhino Home Video; RoboTech: Japanimation Invades Comics with Trio of Comico Titles; Amazing Heroes #75; Speed Racer Still in the Lead; Animation Magazine #22; Momotaro's Gods-Blessed Sea Warriors: Japan's Unknown Wartime Feature; Animation World Magazine #7; Prince of Something; Manga Max #2; Astro Old & Astro New; Manga Max #18; Pokemon: Ready for its next success; Animation Magazine; Is Digimon Movie Destined for Success?; Animation Magazine; Vampire Hunter D: The Next Anime Hit in America?; Animation World Magazine; Blood: The Last Vampire; Anime's First Digital Feature; Animation World Magazine; Retro-Future Metropolis; Animation World Magazine; A Winning Spirit; Anime Invasion #4.
Cowboy Bebop: The Movie . . . At Last; Animation World Magazine; Animatrix review; FPS Magazine; Animatrix: Anime Reloaded; Animation World Magazine; This Month in Anime History: Sept. 1963; Astro Boy Premiers in America; Newtype USA; Millenium Actress: The Struggle to Bring Quality Animation to Theaters; Animation World Magazine; Perfect Blue; Animation Magazine.
It's a shame more anime and manga fans don't buy this book!
5/5
Amazon
Courtland J. Carpenter
(Fort Wayne, Indiana United States)
To be honest with my title, had I seen this in a bookstore, I probably would have passed. Essays and collected reviews from one person too often give you a slanted point of view, and often not much real information. I like history, and that was the big selling point on this book for me. Too often we buy what's popular, what we know (are exposed to), or from listening to the suggestions of our friends. I'm not speaking of this book purchase now, but of the act of collection, reading, and watching of anime. It's really nice to know the history behind it.
By rights, maybe this book should be four stars instead of five, but I couldn't resist because it filled in a point of interest for me I've wondered about for years. I wrote an Amazon review a few years ago on the anime classic, Spirited Away. In the review I compared the movie to a life changing animated film I had seen as a boy. I've never been able to recall the name, and because of the era, I thought it American or perhaps a Chinese production. I've always looked for it to show up on TV, or in video, hoping I'd recognize the title or the plot. I knew little more than the type of film, plot, and name of the main character.
My dad took me to the film, and I thought it must have been because he was interested in its philosophy. My dad had visited China, and India during WWII as a Cryptographer. After the war, he brought home some items from China, and a good deal of Eastern Philosophy. What I didn't realize is that the movie he took me too, was in reality one of the earliest anime shown in the United States. It was a dubbed film called Magic Boy, that was shown in a limited release in Fort Wayne, Indiana, in June of 1961. Strangely enough, it was another limited release anime, Princess Mononoke, that sparked me to begin collecting anime and manga in 1999. Little did I know that my childhood had been influenced greatly by the earliest film of the anime genre to hit the US. Perhaps I was destined to become an anime lover!
My point here is that this book helped me find out that fact. When I read in the book about the early anime films, I suddenly realized they were from the era when I saw that film. There were three titles, released in the US about then. I looked up the pictures, plots from the web, and got a dead-on match with the film, Magic Boy! As I've read further in this book I find more things I knew little about, milestones that brought about the popularity of anime and manga. As a kind of a time-line, (based on the dates of the articles collected in the book) you can see the growth of anime and manga in the US. You can see as well why there is still a great deal of resistance to it's becoming mainstream, even today.
Just to speak to that issue, inject a little of my own philosophy to a theme expressed in many of the books articles. The answer I speak of is that viewing anime, and reading manga, is justified by the main reason many avoid it. It's new, and its different! While many anime and manga are generic SciFi or Fantasy, often they contain elements of the Japanese culture. If you've watched one too many episodes of some reality show, the same rehashed episode of a sitcom for the 50th time ,you know you too long for something new. Despite cultural differences, most anime stories are easy enough to relate to, we're all humans and many of our goals are the same regardless of culture.
One more thing on the book, this is a good read to put somewhere (you know where I mean) to read in small bursts, periodically. Since it's a collection of anime reviews and small articles, you can read one or two at a time, and pick it back up later. It's not a book you have to read in long sittings.
Fred Patten's Watching Anime, Reading Managa: 25 Years Of Essays And Reviews reports on the anime culture in America, gathering articles on Japanese animation and comics and examining both its fan world and the business of its production. Chapters cover everything from individual anime artists to overall licensing and theatrical issues and features, anime pornography, Japanese anime and manga culture, and more. The range of issues and considerations come from an active participant in fan clubs and writings over the years and will prove a 'must' for anime followers.
Fred Patten's Watching Anime, Reading Managa: 25 Years Of Essays And Reviews reports on the anime culture in America, gathering articles on Japanese animation and comics and examining both its fan world and the business of its production. Chapters cover everything from individual anime artists to overall licensing and theatrical issues and features, anime pornography, Japanese anime and manga culture, and more. The range of issues and considerations come from an active participant in fan clubs and writings over the years and will prove a 'must' for anime followers.
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