I could almost give Naruto some slack. Love it or hate it, it was a major force in bringing anime and manga to the mainstream in the West. I mean, Gundam SEED was a massive success in Japan only for it to horribly flop in the US (in part because they censored it in order to market it to kids there like they did in Japan). Even One Piece, Shonen Jumps biggest hit, had nowhere near the same appeal in the West (likely because of censorship as well). Naruto managed to be popular, not only selling but helping sell other properties for SJ.
Note I said almost. Like, early on it was understandable. Anime was just taking off in the West like never before, manga was being published unflipped, and Japanese companies had no idea how to approach it. But Naruto ran for 15 years, times change and even the notoriously traditional Japanese companies should have seen this. The fact they were trying to get back to some faded glory days, glory days where the market they were chasing was mostly pirating it, just shows how little they actually knew about the situation.
I don't waste tears for the stupid, have better things to do with my time.
(and I swear, hearing Gundam fans say "IBO was made to appeal to the US" or wanting the upcoming Witch from Mercury to appeal to their sensibilities just says how little they understand the industry. But at least it's not the ticking timebomb that they've turned Hamefura into. I mean, they're releasing the yuri-bait anthology book when the series is going more and more hetro to the point where they're teasing Mary and Alan hooking up? Yeah, that's not going to be pretty.)
From what I've seen, Japan has always had problems understanding the Western market. When they try to make something appeal to the West they try to make it as "American" as they can, when something does succeeded whether it was intended to or not they don't really understand how it was successful, once something is successful they expect it to be constantly successful, milking it with constant sequels, if one of those sequel doesn't meet their expectation they cancel it forever, and often they would hand over IP to their Western branches expecting that they will know what to do with it; often those flop.
Not that the West is better. When they want to appeal to the Asia (China) they just get a Asian-American and go "look we got an Asian, they must know what other Asians like, right, as all Asian are liked by other Asians, since they all look alike they must all think alike too," or just do sequel of what was successful over there.
Naruto was successful while Bleach and One Piece weren't is simple. Naruto was on Toonami (a prime time program,) while Bleach was on Adult Swim (late night program,) and One Piece was on 4Kids (a children's program that did censor it but also ended/was cancelled while One Piece was running.) Naruto was also on Toonami after all the nineties era Shounen anime stop airing and had no real competition; allowing it to become the biggest show on the prime time program for years.
Also helped that part one showed off Naruto's strengths (likable relatable cast, good initial premises, great arc stories, great battles, and little filler at the beginning) and very little of its weaknesses (bloated underutilized cast, an overarching story that was shallow as it was hollow, fights slowly became generic shounen fights, the initial premises was dropped to focus on a chasing after the rival, and it became infamous for endless filler) allowing it to become the biggest anime from 2003-2014 in the West. Nothing was able to compete with it or compare to it in the West (Dragon Ball was largely inactive during this time) while it was running. It wasn't till after it was over that streaming finally took off and other anime were able to replace it before Boruto got started.
I mean, people raised a huge stink over Shield Hero and for what? That the MC is falsely accused of rape by a woman? Then they go to the director of the anime and ask him about it, only for him to say that it wasn't controversial in Japan at all?
Or even Hamefura. People make a big deal out of how Katarina's harem is mixed gender, with articles being written about how she should end up with a girlfriend in order to send a message. I mean, I ship her with Maria as much as the next guy, but considering how s2 downplays her female friends in favor of the male suitors and the fact the series isn't marketed as being yuri (and Katarina says multiple times she is straight) I think it's clear that her hooking up with Maria, Mary or Sophia isn't going to happen. Hell, I think a major reason why they haven't announced an English release of the upcoming game is because they know it would create a stink, with the female suitors not having routes and instead adding two new male suitors. They know people would complain about it, so we don't appear to be getting it as a result (I mean, even though I'm a guy I'm curious about how it plays out, what details about Fortune Lover will be released, how it's Alan and Nicol's best shot of winning...and I kinda want to hook Katarina up with the eye-patched pirate because I like his design).
Shield Hero was railed against because it went against the #metoo-#believeallwoman narrative, and anime was taking off because Western media was going into the crap.
Hamefura wasn't baiting people. If it doesn't say its yaoi or yuri then it is normally a straight relationship. The light novel is about the fantasy of a woman being beloved by all due to her quirkiness.
Edited by Bail o' Lies, 31 December 2021 - 03:15 PM.
