Anime vs. Cartoons

[Sourgrape]

I understand that there are different art styles in anime, but the big eyes and similar style traits in each series just get a little boring after a while in my opinion. Don't get me wrong, I have my fair share of animes that I enjoy such as Hellsing, Megaman NT warrior, Medabots etc.

I always feel that western cartoons tend to always look that bit more different from one another, and I like the sense of visual uniqueness you get that comes with each one.

[Rosewind]

Both! If it's good, I don't care what style it is.

[starswirlthebearded]

We need to have a 3rd option of "Both."

Anime tends to excel in overarching story. However, this can fall short if they try to hard or make it too long, so that the story arcs drag out (see almost any long term shonen series). Episodic anime has a very different style to that of Western episodic cartoons, with the cursory type that strives to mimic western style. Conversely, most story-centric western cartoons tend to mimic anime. (seems that both figured out that the other knows what they are doing)

This all comes from the Comic Book Alliance that kind of relegated into the minds of many Americans and western audiences the concept that cartoons and comics are for kids. Naturally, this isn't so, but that is the unfortunate view. Regardless there are exceptions and outliners. However, unfortunately the outliners in story never seem to get finished. Pirates of Dark Water and Samurai Jack are two prime examples of this phenomenon. Where as highly episodic cartoons are the only ones that are the only ones that really go on long lived, the Simpsons, South Park and Looney Toons are examples of this. The only cartoon, in recent memory that was story-centric that actually ran its course in America was Avatar: The Last Airbender and I'm sure Korra won't get axed either, but for now I'll consider that one entity. I actually can't remember a story-centric cartoon other than Avatar that actually completed in America. All the ones that did were Anime on Toonami or something of the like.

That all said... between the two, I have about the same amount top tier shows from both. By top tier, I mean shows that I could watch over and over again and never tire of, because they are just that good. Unsurprisingly I have more manga and light novels that I like from Japan that I enjoy that were not animated. However if I was going to do that, then I'd have to bring in Western literature, which is pretty unfair. I'm sorry to say, but nothing I have ever read from a Japanese manga or light novel could ever compete with what I have read from American comics and literature of similar type and scope (hard to compete with what you grew up on). If we are comparing straight Japanese literature and Western literature it becomes hard again. There are a great many fantastic Japanese authors, but it is unfortunate that the experience of Japanese is hard to translate into English and certain artifacts are lost to translation.

The final point is a no-brainier. In a contest of straight animation... Western animation wins hands down any day of the week. Yes, there ARE some well animated anime, but if you look at the ratio of well animated anime and well animated western cartoons... No contest what so ever. Anime, barely has animation as a whole. Seriously, watch it, and then look at the characters and backgrounds during most scenes. Yup, when they are talking they are barely moving and the backgrounds are entirely static (almost all the time, there are exceptions, but they are few and far between). In fact, sometimes when the person is talking they have their backs to you so they don't have to anime their mouths moving. Then you have WILDLY inconsistent animation as well. I can't tell you the amount of series where I thought "Is this scene even the same show? The animation and art are TOTALLY different." I rarely, if ever, thought that about Western Cartoons (and usually if I thought about that with western cartoons, it was a DIFFERENT EPISODE ENTIRELY and was just the art, not the animation). Western cartoons have amazing animation. I have yet to find any anime that was as well animated and the likes of the Looney Toons, Batman:TAS, the Animaniacs, among others. Something is ALWAYS going on, it always feels alive and dynamic. I never feel like I'm watching a picture with moving lips, the expressions are dynamic and fluid.

If I want to be impressed by animation, I'll go western animation almost always (with certain exceptions)

If I want to be impressed with story, I'll go with anime. (with certain exceptions)

But in the end... BOTH are enjoyable for entirely different reasons, with rare exceptions on both sides.

Oh and I'm completely disregarding feature length productions. The similarities are too great there. I'm talking on average for series.

[Rosewind]

I have to say that not all anime is created equal. Some look cheap, some look poorly animated, some look fantastic and easily put some western animation to shame.

I think my best example would be that any Ghibli movie looks fantastic. Take a lookie at, say, Spirited Away...there's always something interesting going on in the background (the same could be said about Howl's Moving Castle, Ponyo, and many others).

With stories it's a toss up -- I've encountered plenty of eastern and western stories that are captivating -- though I have to agree that anime tends to lean toward serial stories with continuity.

In either case, the medium is too widely varied with too many examples to really shoehorn anime or western animation as better than the other -- they're both distinct styles of art that borrow elements and styles heavily from each other.

[Sunwind]

Oh man this is absolutely an impossible poll for me. Further it really is debatable based on the era of what cartoons it is referring to. For me if it's talking western cartoons in the heavily disney era 80s and 90s (Gummi bears, rescue rangers and such) , and also tiny toons, animaniacs and things. Then I would lean toward western for sure.

However, nowdays most animation has taken a huge dive in quality. And most is really only entertaining for the humor. So I tend to lean more toward anime, *but only certain ones*

It's sad really, animation used to rule on high a while back. I remember when there were good cartoons coming home from school, and saturday morning was devoted to them. I loved the saturday ABC weekend special, the animation studio for that was awesome.

[Rosewind]

Hahaha they should see "The Archive."

[SuperWriter]

I love animation, anything and everything about just interests me. While I'd be lying if I called myself an anime fan, I have come across an occasional one I've enjoyed. However, I'm more into American/Canadian/European cartoons. I just feel they are faster, more entertaining, and really, just more culturally relevant to me. Because of this, my vote is on cartoons, even if anime is the same thing with different standards.

[SOStmohs]

Oooh these debates are always bloody!

Ahaha^^; Anyway, so I prefer both I guess. I used to watch a ton of anime back in 6th or was it 7th grade? In order to fit into this one clique >.> blahh I was also an emo poser with them too. My first anime was InuYasha and it was appealing to me cause of the time period it took place in and I wanted to learn a lot about my traditional culture. Well, half of my culture lol. It wasn't a perfect show but I really liked it and I still quite like it I just ignore the fanbase XD. But yes, back to middle school stuff. Sooo I tried to force myself into liking a~ lot of stuff I really wasn't that into -_-. I did find things I really liked though. Most of them, I don't really find anything interesting in anymore, but Haruhi, Tatami Galaxy, and Ranma, I'm sure I'll always like those.

Too many animes have setups like this, "Hi, my name is blah blah blah and I'm an ordinary male high school student." Ughhhh I know, ironically, my favorite novel series, Haruhi started out like that, but that series did in a different way that made it appealing to me.

It's also the fanbase that got me out of it too -_-. See, I love languages and stuff, so I am currently taking Japanese and German in school. In my Japanese class, there are basically 3 different kinds of people that can overlap each other sometimes. There are your huge anime fans which is probably half of the kids in Japanese, then there are the kids that wanted to try something new and fun and maybe they like Japanese music or something which is the second largest group, then there are kids like me who want to learn about their culture. I don't really fit in in my Japanese class cause of this....most of the time, I don't know what they're talking about and I fail to relate >.>. (Ironic that in my Japanese class, there are less Asian people than in my German class. XD In German, there are like 3 or 4 of us half Asians (No one is full Asian where I come from) one of them is a Brony )<--- Sorry, that was off topic >.> I just felt like pointing that out XD.

Ahhh but the debate >;D I haven't watched any new animes in over a year and have mostly been watching cartoons. I would say whatever is a good story with a good plot, and good characters is what I like.^^; Doesn't matter what country it's from or what the style is in the end.