You Don’t Need a Map to Know Where You’re Going

I think a lot about anime (obviously), and also about the way in which I consume it, as should be evident by my earlier post regarding my totally-not-superhuman ability to watch a lot of it in a short amount of time. Years of reading reviews and lurking on message boards, as well as trying and failing to participate in message board discussions without getting into weird, unintended arguments, has told me that my way of thinking about anime (and other storytelling media, by extension) is probably kind of strange and a little contrary to the norm. This isn’t a “look at me, I’m such a special snowflake” statement, just an acknowledgement that I recognize my critical eye has some… astigmatism.

I hear people chatting all the time about an anime’s “plot.” Where the plot is going, what should happen next in the plot, is this or that thing that happened indicative of a plot hole (don’t get me started on that one)… examining this structural aspect of an anime series is very important to a lot of people, and certainly one broad way of discussing and interpreting media in general. In the modern anime fandom, this type of discussion is a huge part of participating in that fandom, and writers ranging from amateur-level bloggers (for example, myself) to professional staff writers for bigger anime and fandom websites post recaps and dissections of weekly episodes from their favorite (or occasionally obligatory) series all the time. This is awesome for people like me who are put off by certain things and might want to seek out more details about certain kinds of content (for example, I needed to be sure that After the Rain was not actually a romance between its two protagonists before I was willing to invest the time to finish it).

However, speaking as someone who’s written them, the downside of weekly recaps is that one can feel compelled to pick at every last detail with a fine-toothed comb and analyze every single action of the characters and movement of the story, because otherwise a half-hour episode of your typical anime series can be exceedingly difficult to write about at length. With a word count to reach and a deadline to meet, what’s the easiest thing to write about? What happened, who it happened to, and where they might be going, that’s what. There are writers who are definitely better than I am at this, but I only read these types of reviews piecemeal and occasionally so I can’t really call out the “good” ones. I personally have a lot of trouble with that format because it’s just not the way I feel comfortable interacting with media and I don’t gain much pleasure from it. At best, it can be a satisfying way to go back and examine something I’ve already watched or read once I’m familiar with it.

It wasn’t until fairly recently that I got a better handle on my beef with this line of thinking. Maybe this is more a function of being a woman in internet fandom circles, or maybe it’s that I tend to be emotional and sensitive in general as part of my nature, but I’ve had several run-ins with people during which I’ve been criticized for having a strong feeling about something, instead of basing my opinions on some sort of measurable “logic.” Man, almost nothing rankles me like someone telling me that pure, unfeeling logic is somehow superior to emotion-based reactions. Never mind the fact that “pure logic” almost always seems to actually mean “cherry-picked realities that align with my own emotional investment in the topic that I refuse to acknowledge as being emotional,” the simple truth is that our lives are informed every single day by the facts and realities of daily life and emotional fallout from our many ways of perceiving them. And sometimes the things that people say and do, or the things that happen, just don’t align with some nonexistent grand logical scheme running the universe. Our lives are full of dead-ends, poor decisions, standalone moments of extreme elation, fruitful conversations, wasted time… we’re a mess. Society is a mess. The stories we tell are sometimes (always) just an extension of that.

That’s why I don’t really care that much to pick-apart plot. It’s true, there are some stories that are entertaining to me just because they’re what I’d call “page-turners” (each episode ends in a cliffhanger, and the show doesn’t seem to have a super-deep message – Attack on Titan is one of these types of series I’ve really liked), there are so many more I find enjoyable because they provide a window into a character’s life, or create a fascinating new world, or speak to some truth about being human. Sometimes these series might initially imply a certain story arc but start to turn in a different direction, or sometimes there’s not really a grand story to tell in the first place. I’m more than willing to let a show with a fascinating premise carry me where it wants to go and I’ll then consider the whole package, even if it’s not where I expected to be going. I’m also on-board when an anime exists to cultivate an emotion, rather than drag me along to some concrete destination where a person does a thing because of reasons.

Whenever I start mulling over this topic, I inevitably start thinking of examples of anime that I really liked for the above stated reasons, which anime fandom as a whole was cold towards. The Perfect Insider is one of those shows that I really loved (and wrote weekly recaps of… whoops), but which the larger fandom and many other reviewers just did not like at all. The series is a tough nut to crack, not only because of some of its subject matter (murder, statutory rape, the nature of genius, etc.), but because it (wrongfully, in my opinion) markets itself as a murder mystery tale. Contrary to first impressions, the point of story has more to do with deciding whether the type of intellectual existence Saikawa-Sensei and Dr. Magata strive towards has any value and less to do with figuring out the identity of the murderer. It’s also a snapshot of the consequences of nourishing and celebrating a gifted, precocious intelligence without also encouraging (or insisting upon!) normal, age-appropriate emotional development. There were a lot of critics and fans who seemed to be frustrated over the series as they watched its final few episodes, not just because of the ways in which the “mystery” resolved itself, but even more so because the enigmatic figure at the center of it all, the striking young genius Dr. Magata, was ultimately motivated by a set of rules and standards that were perceived as illogical and ridiculous.

To me, The Perfect Insider was a real punch in the gut, though I’d be hard-pressed to provide a concrete reason. I think I connected with it because it reaffirmed for me that, as much as humankind worships the notion of transcending the limitations of its basic meat-based form and reaching some higher plane of mental existence (as Dr. Magata ostensibly has done and Saikawa-sensei wishes like hell he could figure out how to do), what defines them is their infallible passion, pain, joy, feeling as represented by Nishinosono Moe, who is highly intelligent, but not an intellectual the way that Saikawa or Magata are portrayed. I didn’t care so much about the details of how the perpetrator overwrote the lab’s security camera footage (though that was neat, too!), or how a second person arrived in Dr. Magata’s locked room without anyone realizing it (that was easy to figure out after a certain point). What I connected with was the story of Nishinosono’s past and her passionate devotion to bringing Saikawa back to reality time and again (two things that are actually related), as well as Dr. Magata’s truly tragic life, the sadness of which I don’t think many people must have realized.

I have too many examples of these types of anime experiences to list here, but I hope this one helps to at least explain what I look for in a viewing experience. Watching anime, to me, isn’t like clutching a map in one hand and a compass in the other, marking off landmarks as I make my way from A to B. Watching anime is more like hiking to the top of a tall hill and breathing the crisp, clean air as the sun warms my face, or a summer storm drops rain suddenly, or fog drifts by below. If I decide I’m where I want to be, then I can be open to almost anything that happens (unless it’s that one-in-a-million time that a bird flies by and poops in my mouth – I’m looking at you, Gangsta.). As my husband likes to say, some of the best series out there are those with the lowest stakes; shows in which no demon king needs defeating, no items need to be obtained, and no damsels/dudes/cute animals need rescuing from the clutches of evil. Sometimes it’s better to stop anticipating the next step and just enjoy the way that life unfolds around us. Or to just accept that anime series don’t always cater to our own expectations, and maybe being passive and open in the face of the unexpected is okay, too.

We all consume media in our own way – this is just an explanation of mine. And heck, it’s served me well for years. What’s your favorite way of enjoying the shows you like? Let me know in the comments!