Is animé too violent?

[roguearcanis]

Okay, basically for my A Level Critical Research I have been doing anime and how there is the view that it is overly violent.
I would like your help and opinions on this. So...

'Is anime overly violent?' Discuss!

Well, firstly it totally depends on the series of anime. There are series that do not contain violence of any kind, for example Ouran High School Host Club or Lucky Star, due to the subject matter of the anime (say if it was a comedy or a romance where violence isn't really necessary)

However, there are many violent anime series. I am going to take Full Metal Alchemist as an example (seeing as it is the only series I have yet seen the entirety of...). One of the concerns of FMA is the segregation of the Ishbalans and the horrors surronding the Ishbal War. There are scenes in this anime when people are shot, stabbed, vaporised and have their heads blown open etc. This is merely showing the pure horrors of war. Yes, it is overtly violent, but I feel that due to the factor of war, this violence is well justified. I don't feel that the anime would be doing itself justice to leave out the blood and gore. I feel that by showing the horrendous suffering that characters such as the Ishbalans endure during the war scenes, it makes the anime all the more poignant, striking a resonance with the audience and drawing parallels to situations like the Iraq War. Therefore, I do feel that anime can sometimes be overly violent, but I also feel that (certainly in the case of Full Metal Alchemist) this violence is justified.

[ShurikenFire]

List of violent anime/manga.

Manga:
MPDPsycho
Franken Fran
Doubt (THIS IS . LOVE, If you read it and wanna make a bunny head and join me for pictures when i make mine i shall love you)
Skyhigh
Biomeat (For people who love watching strange animal things eating people slowly and painfully)
BR, duh
Manhole
Gantz (Extremely perverted but involves alien fighting and being killed etc)

Anime:
Serial Experiments Lain i haven't seen much of but it looks violent in terms of drug related stuff.
Sci-Fi Harry, every time the guy uses Psychic, people's heads snap.
Ergo Proxy i haven't seen much of at all, just a bit of the first episode, but it looked a little weird to me
Elfen Lied, blood and stuff
Tokko, (The darker side of Alchemy, it's better than FMA in my opinion, slaying people, i can't remember if there's monsters)


I'd say that a majority of anime is violent because people seem to like it better.
I've tried reading/watching a Shoujo before, i think Ouran's the only one i could sit through and watch. same goes for Ai Yori Aoshi Enishi.

It is becoming a bit too violent.
The Manhole manga for example, is so weird it's like, the guy's walking around and you can graphically see a scarring moving from the temple to their eye.
Some pictures i've not actually been able to look at a second time O_O.

[Lanowar]

Anime is'nt really one genre as much as the invisible pigeon-holing council might want you to believe but an umbrella from which various different genre's are lumped together. For every Azumanga Daioh there's a Berserk, it's like western TV for every Simpsons there's a South Park. To say it's too violent as a whole is perhaps true for anime translated for western auidences because everyone get's action. Japanese humour is of a certain taste, but action/fighting/violence is a universal language which makes it eaiser to sell to other countries. You might not understand the point of Lucky Star but it's pretty eaiser to get that Vegeta does'nt like Goku because he's repeatedly punching him in the face.

In short, is it too violent? No it's an over representation of the more violent shows they have to offer.

[ShurikenFire]

I think that Anime is good when it's violent, but things like Naruto when it's got some blood, that shouldn't be just censored out, i mean it does teach children that they're actually capable of dying rather than let them live in their own world.

I don't know why censor Naruto when it's pretty much only pre-teens/teenagers/adults who watch it in the first place.
It's like....why? i mean they show Naruto on Jetix which is all good but they do it late at night so you don't normally have children around 9 and 10 years old still up at that time (I'm not saying it's forcefully applied to others, it's what my mum did when i was a child myself, dam curfews F_F).

Nonetheless, i think anime should be more violent as they're just good at it, but for anime aimed at younger children containing some violence, i say they shouldn't die down the gore so much.

[Odd-One-Out]

I didn't really think about violence in anime and manga until the school book club raised the possibilities of introducing manga to the library. The librarian said that it would have to be series that contained no violence, sex, or drugs at all.

I thought long and hard.

Death Note? Murder.
Bleach? Swords.
Naruto? Ninjas.
FMA? Human transmutation and killing.
Air Gear? Naked girls.
D. Gray-Man? Monsters and killing.
Trigun? Guns.
Great Teacher Onizuka? Gangs and women.


And so on.

[Jake Bullet]

is anime too violent? well is tv too violent, are games too violent?its a form of media where you get extreme to extremes. theres anime with violent mutilations, some have gross sexual scenes and some have very controversal themes. then again you get some none violent ones, again its a case of, if this media can portray it, some one will somewhere. it may seem violent but anime isn't inherently violent, just as games and tv isn't inherently violent.

[ShurikenFire]

I didn't really think about violence in anime and manga until the school book club raised the possibilities of introducing manga to the library. The librarian said that it would have to be series that contained no violence, sex, or drugs at all.

I thought long and hard.

Death Note? Murder.
Bleach? Swords.
Naruto? Ninjas.
FMA? Human transmutation and killing.
Air Gear? Naked girls.
D. Gray-Man? Monsters and killing.
Trigun? Guns.
Great Teacher Onizuka? Gangs and women.


And so on.

xD The first manga i read was in my school library titled 'Iron Fist Chinmi' it was like a mangafied version of 'The Karate Kid'

[kyonkyonsocks]

After looking around, the general stereotype for anime is that it is either ridiculously violent or extremely pornographic. However, this is often the veiw of someone who has not seen many anime. I think that hentai and gore fests are often the most well known as they are the most shocking/controversial, but there are loads and loads of sereis out there that contain niether, I dont watch hentai and i'm not a fan of gore, and I dont find finding new and interesting animes a huge problem.
I think overall that anime is often no worse than regular TV shows, and that there is a huge diversity of shows that you can watch and manga you can read that contain no violence in them at all!

[sjbonnar]

I didn't really think about violence in anime and manga until the school book club raised the possibilities of introducing manga to the library. The librarian said that it would have to be series that contained no violence, sex, or drugs at all.

I thought long and hard.

Death Note? Murder.
Bleach? Swords.
Naruto? Ninjas.
FMA? Human transmutation and killing.
Air Gear? Naked girls.
D. Gray-Man? Monsters and killing.
Trigun? Guns.
Great Teacher Onizuka? Gangs and women.


And so on.

xD The first manga i read was in my school library titled 'Iron Fist Chinmi' it was like a mangafied version of 'The Karate Kid'

I loved the one where he fought the guy that battled by spinning really fast ^_^ It's amazing how something would happen that would teach him how to fight these people...LOL

OH! And the guy with the steel wires...was fun LOL

ANYWAY

Do I think Manga is too violent? I don't believe so. It's certainly no worse than anything you can find in an action movie. The reason that the attention is drawn to it in such a way is that it is drawn. A lot of people, especially in Western societies, seem to think that if it is a drawing or an animation it is designed for children. Then, when they see animé with violence in it, they are appauled at the idea as it's drilled into their minds that children will be watching these "cartoons".

If you watch an animé that revolves around people battling to the death, you will see violence. If you watch an animé about a kid at high school, it's a lot less likely. It's about genre as well as style.

[ShurikenFire]

I didn't really think about violence in anime and manga until the school book club raised the possibilities of introducing manga to the library. The librarian said that it would have to be series that contained no violence, sex, or drugs at all.

I thought long and hard.

Death Note? Murder.
Bleach? Swords.
Naruto? Ninjas.
FMA? Human transmutation and killing.
Air Gear? Naked girls.
D. Gray-Man? Monsters and killing.
Trigun? Guns.
Great Teacher Onizuka? Gangs and women.


And so on.

xD The first manga i read was in my school library titled 'Iron Fist Chinmi' it was like a mangafied version of 'The Karate Kid'

I loved the one where he fought the guy that battled by spinning really fast ^_^ It's amazing how something would happen that would teach him how to fight these people...LOL

OH! And the guy with the steel wires...was fun LOL

That was the one i read xD, him breaking a big vase, him learning how to do it by spinning in a whirpool, and then fighting the guy who Chinmi had to learn 'Catch his breath' in order to get a hit in, i was like, obsessing at the librarian to find the other chapters but they didn't have them ><

[Adziu]

That's like saying, 'Is cinema too violent?' With numerous genres, of course you get some that go to extremes and many that lack violence altogether. It's also worth noting the use of exaggerated violence for comedic effect in anime - getting kicked off into the distance etc.

[Yamakaze]

I'd even go as far to say that the violent series are getting less and less bloody. Take Bleach for example. The Byakuga fight against Renji had that last image of Renji literally sparying a fountain of blood. Now in the more recent fights (Ichigo vs Grimmjaw) there's very little blood at all.

One case of anime censorship going to the extreme was 4Kidz version of One Piece. They did stuff like replacing guns with hammers on springs/water guns and rum with milk.

[Adziu]

Bleach emphatically is not a violent series. It's adapted from a shounen jump manga, whose target demographic is around ages 9-15.

Of recent anime I've seen, the most violent has probably been Higurashi...

[Adziu]

O RLY?

[FreeHugsRule!]

some animes hav pretty violent stuff in them but one of the worst has to b Hellsing... i was watching it with a mate and she didnt even wanna watch it, so some animes are kinda too violent but i think the violence adds to the greatness of the animes... i dont think that ppl shuld stop wid the violence... that would make it boring lol

[Adziu]

some animes hav pretty violent stuff in them but one of the worst has to b Hellsing... i was watching it with a mate and she didnt even wanna watch it, so some animes are kinda too violent but i think the violence adds to the greatness of the animes... i dont think that ppl shuld stop wid the violence... that would make it boring lol

Heh, Hellsing is far from the worst you can see if you really dig. A lot of the 80s anime movies got really extreme with the gore.

[FreeHugsRule!]

some animes hav pretty violent stuff in them but one of the worst has to b Hellsing... i was watching it with a mate and she didnt even wanna watch it, so some animes are kinda too violent but i think the violence adds to the greatness of the animes... i dont think that ppl shuld stop wid the violence... that would make it boring lol

Heh, Hellsing is far from the worst you can see if you really dig. A lot of the 80s anime movies got really extreme with the gore.

well i watched that recently so i just thought of that... to b honest i dont reli wanna no any more violent ones... but can u giv me a few that u no of... thanks

x

[KageKimasu]

Off course anime isn't too violent. Teens shouldn't have any probs and kids are too young to appreciate it. So I don't see the prob. But I guess in some anime it is taken a bit over the top. Especially the original Pokemon manga that was said to be really violent. (Cute little animals killing each other its like Happy Tree Friends all over again).

[Exias]

In my opinion, it's not too violent, at all. If anything, it's been toned down in recent years. The days of End of Eva style eye-stabbity deaths are far and few between.

[ChibiYaoiOtaku]

One word for you...Mnemosine. Watch the first episode and it should answer your question.

Open hole, close hole, open hole, close hole, stuff spiked chain up the uterus before ripping it out then bludgioning someone over the head with a lead pipe...and repeat (and this was from the same animation studio as shaman king)

[MeowMeow15]

I think that some anime's are too violent.

Anime's such as Lucky Star, OHSHC and Chobits have basically no violence at all

But Ghost in a Shell, for example - no offence to anyone who likes it, it's just my opinion - is a bit too much x_x I was told to watch it by a friend, and within the first minute or two I had to stop watching because someone has their ankle shot quite graphically.

Also, I couldn't look at the part in FMA when they try to re-create their mother using alchemy. I'm pretty squimish, so things like that I can't handle.

However, I think that, like films, anime should be allowed to contain violence and gore, so long as it's made clear to anyone who is planning to watch them what it may contain ^_^

[neko_riddles]

After looking around, the general stereotype for anime is that it is either ridiculously violent or extremely pornographic. However, this is often the veiw of someone who has not seen many anime. I think that hentai and gore fests are often the most well known as they are the most shocking/controversial, but there are loads and loads of sereis out there that contain niether, I dont watch hentai and i'm not a fan of gore, and I dont find finding new and interesting animes a huge problem.
I think overall that anime is often no worse than regular TV shows, and that there is a huge diversity of shows that you can watch and manga you can read that contain no violence in them at all!

I dont think this is too negative of a stereotype tbh. But then again i would count myself as abit of a /b-tard

It all depends on where you look. I read once that the number of violent or hentai anime series out there far outnumber the more commercial releases, but then these hentai series normally only last 1-2 episodes, so there tends to be far less then people imagine.

And lucky star has got violence, i point out the scene where konata beats up guile sf2 style