Note 01/01/2026 03:23:26

In my standards (long ass list incoming!!!): - Online buzz (including hate) ≠ well-known or successful irl. Success is measured by sales, views, and worldwide acclaim, not by posts and illegal viewing on virus-infested sites. Anyone can spam or fake these. Well-known or established anime or manga ≠ peak cinema or a masterpiece. - Obscure, lesser-known, has a smaller fandom ≠ [inherently] superior. They can either be hidden gems or _germs_ that should stay hidden, though. - Big, divided fandom ≠ the subject, creator, themes, or content is terrible and "overrated." Separate the three (but it could depend because some creators can be bigoted, messy, subtly encourage it if they have online platforms, or downright unpleasant with weird fantasies). Remember (me as well), a lot of fandoms are from different countries and cultures coexisting together with differing priorities and values. · · ────── ꒰ঌ·✦·໒꒱ ────── · · Commercialized, trendy formulas and genres won't fully satisfy everyone and will pale in comparison to their predecessors or those who popularized them since the animanga industry is oversaturated with the great, good, average, bad, and awful. Same as the Kpop market, same as the video games market, same as the American pop market, and so on. Overconsumption and consumerism go brrr. Underappreciated (or not talked about actively in recent years) ≠ underrated [aka not rated highly enough; this is subjective] or unrecognized. If it had even 50k views or sales somewhere with records and numbers as solid proof at a point in time, then it was known and hyped during that era, but it's just not as relevant anymore and it failed to keep up, got overshadowed by more mainstream releases or had strong competitors in an oversaturated industry, or it simply wasn't worth it to begin with. Just bc you didn't witness it, doesn't mean it's an all-time forgotten flop.  · · ────── ꒰ঌ·✦·໒꒱ ────── · · Cult classics (of ~2015 and prior) are best enjoyed as... iconic cult classics. No need to bring _everything_ back. No need for 12 modern adaptations/reboots/LA movies and whatnot. Universal cultural values dissonance and social change, competitiveness, and audiences' nitpicking won't guarantee that the work will be well-received, have the same essence and execution as originally, or be well-accepted with its themes nowadays. No, Ouran High School Host Club doesn't need a remake, no Utena doesn't either. Some things were fair for their day and aren't progressive or timeless now plus they just can't be replicated easily with the same impact and essence. Respectfully, let it go or just go rewatch and make fan content, girl. That's the point of fandoms. Support the creators and authors of these classics in branching out and in their latest creative outputs. ("Needing" implies that the source material wasn't enough, btw). · · ────── ꒰ঌ·✦·໒꒱ ────── · · - Don't go read or view a manga or animation written by a traditional, heterosexual Japanese guy for a traditional, heterosexual young male audience expecting it to be LGBTQ friendly, representative, or give visibility to minorities. Sorry, but many of you are like Western tourists looking at Eastern art in a museum and thinking, very Anglocentrically and in a Westernized lens, "it represents me and my values obviously. This piece of work with differing values and themes is clearly catering for everyone!1!!" YOU are not the primary target audience, and you're completely misaimed. Discarding and undervaluing the generally conservative Japanese culture, customs, societal norms, themes, and characteristics that permeate their content IS your mistake from the beginning. Many of these creators try to push against limitations to add LGBTQ characters even as background characters or try to release and license LGBTQ-centered media but yall would rather self-project and hallucinate the yaoi, LGBTQ, etc. narratives between the two males who have distinct female love interests, womanizers or have the most macho hypermasculinity in straight fiction. _Look up, support, appreciate, buy, and hype fiction that's marketed and intended as queer media with queer themes and exploration instead of harassing these overworked and stressed creators._ Yall don't give media labelled clearly as BL, GL, Shounen ai, and Shoujo ai the same attention and push for them to be more mainstream, then wonder why they're underrepresented. You're looking in all the wrong places by reading outside of your demographic and genres; that's why. If you want respectful black characters, blasians, bipoc, and queer themes read OELs and webtoons written by the same culture. · · ────── ꒰ঌ·✦·໒꒱ ────── · · - Attack on Titan will never be overrated or overhyped, sure it has its flaws, but the lack of sexism + stereotyping + objectification + with the realistic depiction of war and depth of the characters will always make it a top 5. It's for the history books 20 years from now. - Not everyone can be called an author or a creator, as not everyone who holds a brush automatically becomes a painter; the creative vision and original worldbuilding are lacking in many, but that doesn't justify blatant harassment or entitlement on their social accs or in fan meetings. Just drop it and move on to something else. - The same but salvaged by great lore, themes, and/or worldbuilding = automatically minus 4 points with skipping or watching it off edits. - Repackaged rose-tinted male fantasies aimed at impressionable young female audiences are on thin ice, depending and the lore, execution/interesting takes on female characters, and art style (True Beauty and OTL are big no). - Seinen or graphic and gory ≠ superior. No, tragically gory or trauma porn don't make it tougher or highbrow than shounen. No need to act like an elitist. It's entirely subjective and particularly thought-provoking, horror, hardcore, or challenging shounen exist without the mcs getting tortured every arc to galvanize them into being cynical, depressed or revenge machine. - Peak female writing doesn't mean only girlboss and strong independent women. The character could be shy or girly and not have aura moments, but she's still complex, has different sides, fleshed out/well-rounded and has enough focus to form opinions on her. Being shy and girly or away from action and assertion isn't a bad thing, and feminine characters are never inherently bad or boring unless femininity is portrayed as a weakness, which is a distasteful type of plot.