The state of anime in the UK
Whenever two or more anime fans gather together, a topic that invariable
comes up is that "things aren't as good as they used to be" and that anime
is falling in popularity in this country. Although that might be true in
some cases, nostalgia does tend to paint a rather rosy picture and many people
seem confused on some of the basic facts and hold expectations of the UK
anime industry that I'd say are wholly unrealistic. So, I've decided to put
fingers to keyboard in this, the first of an irregular series of articles
I'll be adding to the site.
General preconceptions about anime
For much of the early to mid 90s the abiding horror of most anime fans was
that the image of the whole medium was tarnished by the small number of highly
prominent "tentacle porn" titles such as Urotsukidoji and Adventure Duo that
were hitting the headlines in the newspapers. The activities of the BBFC
(censoring or banning the most extreme titles) soon put a stop to that end
of the market for better or worse (well, the anime distributors lost a very
profitable market sector if nothing else) however and it's fairly safe to
say that the spectre of this is truly dead and buried now in the overwhelming
amount of other anime that's been released since. A sci-fi/horror/fantasy
tag is far more likely to be placed on that side of things than anything
more derogatory now. Not that the sci-fi/horror/fantasy tag isn't seen as
a derogatory one for the fans with tastes elsewhere, of course...
However, the situation now seems to be flipping over the other way. Due
to the popularity of Pokemon, and other similar shows, far from being an
"adults only" medium anime is seen as a "just for kids" one with anything
aimed above the early teens being a small niche in comparison.
Whilst we'd all prefer to see our own particular ideas of anime represented,
that's unlikely to happen. A balance of popular titles from a variety of
genres aimed at some different age groups would be the best we could realistically
hope for.
Anime on video
Although a lot of people say that the market for anime on video has declined
significantly in recent years, I'd say that's far from the case myself. Looking
at the market in the early 90s there was steady growth from a handful of
titles that were released in 1991-92 up to the stage where five or six titles
a month would typically get released in early 1995. However, much of this
growth came in the form of the output of short lived companies like Western
Connection and East 2 West which flooded the market with often inferior (particularly
in the case of Western Connection's subtitling and video mastering) product.
There was a genuine trough in the years following though. Manga Video
cut back their output a lot in 1997, concentrating on quality over quantity
with just a few major releases a year instead of a regular output of filler
titles. Anime Projects slipped away after deals with first AnimEigo and AD
Vision were ended. Kiseki largely fell silent and perhaps the biggest blow
was dealt by Pioneer pulling out of the UK market entirely last year.
However, it's not all been one-way traffic. AD Vision have steadily upped
their output to the stage where they now release three titles a month. Kiseki
resurfaced lately with re-releases of much of their back catalogue. MVM and
Mollin both came into the market with some distinctly fan oriented releases.
Most significantly though, has been the arrival of Fox and Warner adding
a previously unheard level of hype with the Digimon and Pokemon titles respectively.
Looking at what we've been getting for the first half of this year, the market
has already returned to something approaching 1995 levels, with a rather
more sustainable look to it as well.
Another thing though is the apparent death of subtitled releases. Although
many hard core anime fans prefer to watch in that format, there's never
been enough demand to justify subtitled releases for most titles, especially
when there's a dub available. (Given that almost all anime released in the
UK has previously been dubbed for the US market, that's just about always.)
However, there's some hope even there in the form of DVD which can handle
both subtitled and dubbed versions on the same disc. This leads us on nicely
to the next section...
Anime on DVD
The market for anime on DVD is an emerging one, that only appears to be
developing at a painfully slow pace especially when you compare it to the
market in North America. Still, given the previous poor support for high
end formats in the UK (there were only a few token Video CD releases at launch
and nobody would touch LD with a barge pole) even this is encouraging.
Kiseki have been leading the way with many DVD releases, but most of them
haven't exactly been taking the full advantages of the format. Instead of
high quality remastered video and audio we appear to be getting the same
masters they used for the VHS release. Instead of a choice of English
dub, Japanese with subtitles or without we're invariably getting just a dub
or a hard subtitled version. Not getting these very basic things right, let
alone using the more advanced features, isn't doing them any favours, with
many fans choosing to import US DVD releases instead. I feel that a little
less haste and a little more quality would serve them better in the long
run.
Manga Video have done rather better with their releases so far, although
mastering problems with the early Ghost in the Shell DVDs set them back a
bit too. Alas, it seems like most of their forthcoming UK-only releases on
the format will be dub only. Of particular concern is the release of Akira.
The US will be getting a remastered and redubbed version with many extras.
Quite what the UK release will comprise is hard to say as of the moment. Still,
releases of future titles that are coming out in both the US and UK markets
seem likely to continue to be fully featured.
Support for the format elsewhere has been rather thin so far. AD Vision
releases of Sonic and Tekken were basically just rebadged US DVDs, but they
appear to have a few more titles lined up for the near future and they may
well be remastered PAL versions. Mollin are releasing Battle of the Planets
too, although given the nature of the English adaptation, putting a subtitled
Japanese version on is not going to be possible there. Then there are the
obligatory Digimon and Pokemon movies from Fox and Warner. Finally, there's
news that Disney may finally be releasing the long awaited Princess Mononoke
over here.
Anime on TV
Throughout my youth I can remember a few anime TV series. Notably favourites
include Battle of the Planets, Ulysses 31 and Mysterious Cities of Gold.
However, it's easy to forget how few and far between these series were. We
typically got less than one a year and the occasions when several were on
at the same time were extremely rare. During the 90s this remained much the
same, with Moomin (a fairly atypical anime being a european co-production
and having a style almost entirely unlike the anime stereotype) the only series
to gain any sort of popularity.
The arrival of Pokemon has changed things around rapidly though. Both
Digimon and Monster Rancher were picked up in a flash to cash in on this,
and the emergence of digital TV opened doors for series like Sailor Moon
and Dragonball Z to finally make it beyond their Chinatown niches in the
UK. In the rush to fill in many hours of new programming a few other shows
like Eagle Riders and Kimba The White Lion crept in too. These series weren't
exactly the sort of thing that had been doing the rounds in anime fandom,
however all that changed earlier this year when three series were finally
picked up that had been huge fan favourites.
These are, of course, Escaflowne, Gundam Wing and Tenchi Muyo. To have
had any of these shown on TV in the early 90s, let alone all three, would
have been like a dream come true for most anime fans at the time. In that
sense, things have come a heck of a long way during the past decade.
However, times change and expectations rise. How dare they miss episodes
and change schedules? Will these series run and run? Will other series follow
if they get cut? Will the amount of anime on TV continue to grow? Is the
UK ready for a dedicated anime channel yet? Given that around a third of
Fox Kids programming is of (at least partly) Japanese origin, that last question
might not be quite so far fetched as it would seem.
Another factor is that Tenchi Muyo and Escaflowne both had extensive editing
done to them to make them suitable for children's TV. This isn't entirely
surprising as Japanese standards of what is suitable differ largely from
British and American ones. Also, both series were pitched towards comparatively
mature audiences in Japan. They were shown in the sort of early evening slots
that would make them the equivalents of Star Trek or Buffy rather than children's
TV. So, the question starts to arise as to why they aren't getting treated
as such in the UK? The obvious answer is that the only channels that are
showing much interest in anime at the moment are the children's ones. As
to why? Well, Pokemon is still what's largely colouring people's preconceptions
about anime.
The one major exception to this rule at the moment appears to be the Sci-Fi
channel. Anime has established it's own little niche there in the post
midnight slot on Saturday night in the form of films and OVAs that were
previously release on video. This is the opposing ghetto to the children's
one. What's needed to go forward now, is for something to establish
a middle ground. Getting something like Evangelion or Cowboy Bebop
(these are just two out of many possible candidates) shown uncut in
a post watershed evening slot is a suggestion that often gets put forward,
but what channels would take the risk? The Sci-Fi channel already have
their slot sorted out for the moment and Fox Kids and Cartoon Network are
plainly unsuitable. Candidates like the terrestrial channels or Sky
One are rather unlikely as (domestically produced programming excepted) they
tend to go for proven product first. In many ways it seems like we'll have
to wait for things to happen in the US in that department first.
Anime magazines
This is one area where things don't look so good. Back in the early 90s
there were two magazines running side by side in the shape of Anime UK (later
becoming anime FX) and Manga Mania (later becoming Manga Max) and that's
aside from short lived publications like J-Fan and AnimeX, and magazines
like Super Play and SFX that ran dedicated anime sections. With the demise
of Manga Max last year, that's left us with no UK magazine.
There's always Animerica and a number of other magazines from overseas,
but given the different natures of their home markets they're invariably
of interest to only the hard core of UK anime fandom that's interested in
importing anime from overseas. To most potential new fans that have just
picked up a video or seen something on TV on the off chance, they're not
going to be that relevant.
The internet seems to have taken up some of the slack. This web site you're
reading now has been around since 1994 making it one of the longest running,
but I'd readily admit that it's been outstripped by a number of the other
sites out there in terms of offering news and opinion. See the links page,
if you've not done so already to find some of the best. However, not everyone
has access to the internet and even those that do aren't necessarily going
to be looking in the right place. Given that the majority of web sites are
run by fans you don't always get the sort of objective and well informed
articles you get in a good magazine. For every good web site out there, there
are tens of bad ones and even the best have occasional problems of inconsistency.
As I write, I'm aware of plans to launch two new magazines, but although
I wish them well they are going to have their work cut out establishing themselves.
A circulation of 10,000 is generally what's needed to keep your head above
water in the publishing business and both Manga Mania and Anime UK had trouble
doing this even in their prime.
Conclusions
So, in a rather Zen like way, things are in some ways better than they
appear to be but in other ways they are worse. Whilst anime fans may continue
to rail for a better future of the medium, they should also take stock and
enjoy the best of the present as, all things considered, we've never had
it quite so good. Envious glances across the pond to the US market might
show there to be a lot more happening over there, but given that it's a lot
larger and has been established for far long, that's only to be expected.
Don't forget that only a meager fraction of the anime released in Japan even
makes it that far either.
This document was last updated on 25th May 2001
If you have any suggestions concerning this page, please contact:
Matt_Barber@hotmail.com