- What was the cultural impact of Akira (1988), and why does it occupy a key place in the canon of anime greats?
Despite the fact that in today’s time there is an endless list of anime, some which hold more prevalence than others. That being said, amongst this vast list of given anime there is nothing more critical in means of popularity as well as the strong basis of foundation for good and classic means of anime particularly in terms of entertainment to the turn of events and notoriety of the class than Akira (Otomo, 1988). A baseline explanation concerning why Akira built up itself as one of the greats in the anime group is the manner by which it has remained socially pertinent even 32 years after its creation. This is because of the powerful concepts and aspects of symbolism in Akira taking after a great deal of the constant battles that individuals face against degenerate government frameworks. The faction following that Akira obtained was generous thinking about how obscure anime was toward the western world gaining over $80 million worldwide in VHS deals alone. Set forth plainly, Akira demonstrated to the western world that the factor of animation other than the typical western, generic products existed, that this concept of such animation in Japanese style existed. Akira is on the list of one of, if not the most significant anime manifestations. It was that one film that had further uncovered numerous western crowds to the universe of Japanese liveliness and thus, the social effect of Akira was undoubtedly massive and growing. Akira’s visuals, soundtrack, story line, and different perspectives were not normal in terms of any concepts and aspects for anything the western crowds would have seen up until that point. Asides from such factors, Akira also indicated to western crowds an enlivened film that didn’t wander away from what would actually be considered to be realistic portrayals of brutality, the concepts of visual violence as well as the following ideas of sexuality. This was something that was basically never observed until the approach of Akira. Akira was firm in such a manner and is another motivation behind why it had an enormous social effect. This factor of popularity is also most likely due to one of the facts that before the (western) world came to know of Akira, the basic basis of animations lay within cartoon such as disney and children at the time only knew of such visuals of animation. So when they came to know of Akira, the visuals and such would have been exceptionally in a different style, a different presented tone of work. They would have been stunning yet however unusual, as it was fundamentally not the same as what they would have been presented to, what they had actually been used to. This can be backed up by the fact that “Its complex storylines challenge the viewer used the predictability of Disney … while its often dark tone and content may surprise audiences who like to think of ‘cartoons’ as ‘childish’ or ‘innocent’.” (Naiper, 2005, p. 9). Akira also further then influenced the growth and creation of sub genres, such as for example cyberpunk. Overall, without the foundations of Akira other prevalent and influential anime would not be produced. Because of the fantastic as well as engraved and long lasting social effect of Akira, it has established itself as a key film in the incredible standard of anime close to numerous other extraordinary works of anime.
References
Napier, S. (2005). Anime: from Akira to Howl’s Moving Castle. Hampshire: Palgrave/ Macmillan.
Otomo, K. (Director). (1988). Akira [Film]. Tokyo Movie Shinsha.
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