I’m very lukewarm when it comes to hype and anticipation. Sure I get excited about new shows coming out, but every season the past 3 or so years my behavior has been uncannily consistent: I end up trying out up to eight or so shows and dropping pretty much all but two or three. I almost never watch previews. Charts in the chartfag tradition? I rarely go into those, as they’re never really helpful for me. I used to read season previews (I actually still participate in T.H.A.T. Anime Blog’s efforts), but I find these exercises really stupid, as they’re just excuses for assholes to flaunt their biases and casually hate on shows.
But this post isn’t about hating on these blog and fan activities. They’re fun for some people and I wouldn’t keep them from their fun. Rather, I’m going into a direction that the complaints naturally lead to: what do people really want to see? If whatever’s showing is so bad, what kind of new show do you want to see? I don’t want to hear shit about how shows were so much better back in some fictitious golden age. I’ve been watching anime since the ‘70s. There were good shows, but even those shows had lots of stupid crap in them.
So no, no pure nostalgia shit. I want you to be creative. Give me something you really want to see. I remember love all the time, but there are great ways to do it, and stupid cheap ways as well. Now is the time to show us what kind of anime your taste can come up with. So here are the parameters: The shows must be for TV. I’m not hung up on episode count, but it will be good if you can indicate how long the show will run. I’m not hung up on studios and directors and production superstars, but you can mention them as long as you can provide context. Pure name-dropping doesn’t do anything for me. So don’t just say: “lkuhara and Nagai team up to make the next PreCure.” Give me why this is a good idea, give some kind of story synopsis, and other elements that will make this show awesome. Also, don’t just regurgitate stuff you’ve read from somewhere else. I know people want to see “Band of Brothers (in Zakus),” but think of something else. Then let’s all comment on each others’ shows. Let’s see who has the hopes and dreams that can light lives and set fire to loins, etc.
Here’s mine:
I want a historical re-imagining of the Crusades at the height of Saladin’s power, with robots. Yeah, I want something like Ridley Scott’s Kingdom of Heaven but instead of knights, cavaliers, foot soldiers and catapults, I want mechanized armies. Think Escaflowne without the flying machines. Think Broken Blade without the guns. I want the robots themselves to be more like powered armor than mobile suits. I want them smaller than Code Geass’ Knightmare Frames or VOTOMS’ Armored Troopers. Appleseed or Ghost in the Shell type suits are more like it.
What powers them? FAITH, yeah the religious kind. Since war is hell, no religion really wins: the flowers of each other’s armies (Jews, Catholics, Muslims) all perish in the madness of Jerusalem. It will be glorious. In a 26-episode format, there are only 2 or three big set-pieces. Let the episodes buck formula. There’s no need for a fight in every episode. Let there be talking, governance, politics, farming, and lots and lots of religion. If you’re going to cut corners and pan over stills, let the background artists paint lush desert landscapes. Let the dust bite into our very eyes.
Since I am a Catholifag, I want a Catholic point of view. I don’t care how fail their story is. I like it like that. Let the fail stand out in all its glorious failure. I don’t like Catholicism because of its rightness, I love it because of the utterly beautiful failures in its long, bloody, and disgusting history.
Will this be GRIMDARK? Fuck yes. Will there be comic relief? Fuck no. Any humor will be black. Let the episodes bore the infidels. I don’t care. The fanservice here will be for history nerds and robot fags. There won’t be female knights. There weren’t any back then and there won’t be in this fantasy. Maybe a Queen or two can supply some strong woman characterization, but the show can do without women. They won’t be objectified because they’re just never around to be objectified. Men didn’t give a shit about them in this show. The romance will all be about God. God and land holdings. Oh fuck yes.
Will there be teenaged characters? Sure. They leave Europe as teens and arrive in the Holy Land as men. No emo teens in the story proper. If there were, they must have left Europe as children. Doesn’t make sense. Are you excited yet? No? That’s okay because this show will never get made. But it was fun to think about it.
Now it’s your turn.
We Remember Love 
Dude, I wanna watch that show you described!!
Hehe yeah I knew there’d be one other guy who’d like a show like this. But more importantly, what would you like to see?
I’ll write a post about it when I have a chance.
Looking forward to it.
I must admit your story sounds pretty exciting.
I have this idea about a lawyer from Kobe…
…who should’ve advised Kobe to have a pre-nup made.
Your idea kicks ass & balls. I hope it will have a level of violence on par w/ Berserk.
It will be hard to follow up your idea since mine is such a polar opposite.
It will have massive carnage. The set pieces will be insane. I don’t mind 3G, as long as it’s cleverly presented. I want scale for the the big fights.
I’m not competing with anyone here, I just shared what I want to see. Now share yours.
I’ve always floated around various ideas for shounen material in my head. Including one that is somewhat similar to how Gundam AGE is structured. But my dream scenario for an anime is much different.
Personally, I’ve always craved a really realistic, heatfelt romance anime. Perhaps I’m craving a complete Kare Kano anime, or a somewhat bolder Toradora, but I really crave a series that deals not only with working towards a relationship (on the high school level), but being in a relationship. So much of what I want to see is ruined by harem tropes or tragically dependent on the chase. I want it to be 26 -39 episodes. I want the series to deal not only with being in the relationship, but the threats of cheating, of being pulled apart my goals and family. I want a good realistic high school romance. And don’t let the gay characters be damn stereotypes either. If there’s a “flamer” or “butch” then so be it, but have someone who isn’t extroverted.
There! I confessed it! I could have asked for a GRIMDARK Gundam that spans 75 episodes of pain, and angst and mass murder; I could have pitched Samurai Champloo 2, I could have pitched my shounen battle manga that spans 5 generations, aliens, large scale battles and intimate duels; but a stellar high school romance that spans their high school career is what I want! DKJ is a big softy.
LOL why high school though? It’s just so limited an age and open to all sorts of creepy problems.
I don’t know. I suppose I could say college, but that would open me up to 101 people recommending I just watch Honey & Clover, which I just couldn’t get into. Also, everything’s set in high school (or middle school), so it’s only mildly creepy on the Japanese creepy scale (a dubious scale I will admit).
Or Moyashimon!
I’d hit it –
I’d take just about any format show set in Sumer during the reign of Sargon the Great provided it was historically accurate.
But what would that show be like? Slices of life at court? In the fields? City builders?
Sorry for the late response but answering your question took on something of a life of it’s own over at Altair and Vega and if you have a moment to read it I’d be honored.
FUND IT.
Personally, I’d really love to see what initially appears to be a standard battle shonen, albeit with a heavy sci-fi flair and a lot of technical pseudo-science detail in the superpowers, a la Fullmetal Alchemist or early JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure. But then as it develops it slowly becomes clear that the entire cast is effectively part of a government conspiracy weaponizing their abilities, and the entire cast ends up on the run from the government. Heaps and heaps of Big Brother is Watching will be involved.
Also, Anyone Can Die.
Thanks.
How long will this show run? Seems like a long one, not that it’s a bad thing. 64 episodes for Brotherhood feels right.
As long as it needs to, really. Something in the area of Brotherhood’s length sounds about right.
I really liked Kingdom of Heaven, even if the theatrical cut made little sense. Good job. Somehow I want to hear Shuichi Ikeda giving voice to Saladin. HYPE. Let someone like Mikimoto or Nagano handle the character designs, and I’m set.
Here’s mine:
I want to watch a sci-fi anime set far, far away from Earth, with 90% of battles happening in space. I want the combat to be more like an epic-scale Starship Operators (mobile, furious and utterly deadly) than, say, Heroic Age (punching robot-titans vs space bugs), Toward the Terra (lol espers) or even Legend of the Galactic Heroes (fleet slugfest). No sound in space. No hugging robots. Spacecraft would be preferable to humanoid robots, and they should look more practical than cool.
So. Space is a hostile place. The human race is fighting aliens of different shapes and sizes. Why? It’s to carve out our rule throughout the galaxy. Kill and subjugate the xenos, because they can’t be reasoned or bargained with. Take the fight to them, before they take the fight to us. I guess it means jingoism?
The pilots will all be girls in their early-mid teenage years. A two-girl team in each small fighter craft, acting as pilot and co-pilot, but they can reverse roles when the craft descends down a planet for air/ground combat. And no, romantic/sexual relationships aren’t required. The POV would go to these characters. They’re like the Abh, in the sense that they’re genetically engineered for space combat, and fight with the incentive of being given the privilege to pass down their genetic code to sterile humans. This might require some further thought.
The pilots, while being killing machines, may come to question if what the human race is doing is The Right Thing. This doesn’t mean that they stop doing their jobs or rebel against The System. It’s more about understanding the horrors of war and why they have to keep on doing their jobs. GRIMDARK? Probably. Mortality rate will be a bit high. No one should be safe.
As for the look and feel of the show. I want a clean, modern-looking character design, not really moe. The humans have fairly normal hair colors. The pilots will all have white hair and gray eyes. Aliens will be all sorts of things. CG will be there, but only for ships and spacecraft (like Macross Frontier). The OP will be done by KOKIA, in the style of her Broken Blade song. I want the score to be orchestral, epic and flowery, like the unholy offspring of Crest of the Stars and Simoun scores.
I’m thinking of giving three cours for this show, four maximum. What do you guys think?
I like this, particularly the lack of romantic/sexual relationships. We need more space shows that have fresh elements, so I think that would be cool. Combat and action are awesome ways to keep the viewer into things, and I think there is a lot to explore in terms of combat concepts. The key here for me is limiting the similarities to other space battle stories, primarily in conflict and combat, but that’s just me.
KOKIA is wonderful.
Thanks, Ikeda as Saladin sounds great. I’m fine with Nagano as his designs look like anime without looking like anime if you know what I mean.
Why all girls?
I get the rest of what you’re going for, but for all the hard SF you seem to be going for, why all girls?
I mean, I thought Simoun was unfuckingwatchable.
That’s the only real conceit I want! Genetically-engineered teenage girls are more interesting to me than the bulk of adult male sci-fi protagonists I’ve read. Not that I’ve read a whole lot, but classic sci-fi is too dry.
Simoun was rather ugly, but I quite liked the coming-of-age theme it had. Would you believe that some of the girls would follow their own path, and others abandon their own?
No, I can’t hang with this conceit. If I wanted to fap, I’d watch pr0n. Put in a lot of girls, sure. Make them awesome sure. But a meltrandi fantasy? No.
Silly jiji, it’s not as if we’re trying to make you fap to it!
Why do the conceit then?
Because I like cute girls. I like cute girls doing cute things, and murderizing the shit out of others. So you have that, and put it IN SPACE, with the type of fighting I really like, and that’s the anime I’d really like to see.
Also there are men in the story, like the regular crew. I want them to have normal human contact too, so they don’t become as stunted as one might think.
Uhhh, okay. It’s about what you want to see anyway.
“FUND IT.”
I concur. 4c, for example, is very susceptible to gaijin money and scripts. Although their tv series are pretty much trash.
I’d love to see a techno-magic war chronicle series. Portals to Hell open all over the land, and hordes of supernatural magical creatures stream into our world. First a few, some strange murder victims are found, a special police squad is created to combat the threat, and then a full scale invasion begins. Werewolves and orcs in glowing armour, vampires and dragons, pour through, capturing city after city. Then POV is switched to the random soldiers, as armies of the world keep retreating and giving up land. The key point is that humans never do learn any magic themselves, they keep fighting the monsters with firearms, bigger and better, but ultimately simply guns.
Thanks.
I’d watch that show you just shared. Sounds depressing. I like shit like that too.
I particularly like the fact that there is no Jesus character who figures out magic, or no Prometheus who steals the magic from the aliens and teaches it to the humans. Prometheus, Jesus, Eve, whatever.
If somebody could adapt Basara into fifty or sixty episodes, with a pretty good budget, that would be enough for me.
Actually, there’s a TON of manga that need to be turned into anime. The Lucifer and Biscuit Hammer? Certainly. All of Shin Angyo Onshi? Yes please! The entirety of Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, with an OVA level budget? I can dream, right? Onani Master Kurosawa on Noitamina? Unlikely, but probably awesome if done right.
Otherwise: an adaption of the Mistborn trilogy by Brandon Sanderson, produced by Studio BONES. There’s martial arts, creative use of magic, ancient gods, ridiculous plot twists…it’s already post-apocalyptic Gurren Lagann, basically. If it were given enough episodes and had the right people handling it, it could be pretty great.
Goudere Bishoujo Nagihara Sora should be turned into a short ova(due to it currently having like… 10 chapters), its use of ecchi jokes is the best, I still smile whenever I remember one of those pages.
I love the Basara manga, though I haven’t seen the anime adaptation, having heard that I will end up gnashing my teeth in bitter rage.
The Nausicaa manga turned into a full anime would be a dream come true for me. However, I don’t think it’s appropriate to put it as TV anime. I don’t see it working out, given the time and budget constraints involved. It’s really OVA material.
I had an idea.
An island nation is in war with another nation, halfway through the war, the island nation was hit by a nuclear bomb, totally annihilating it. However, an unknown force revives several people of that island, with each person having a power that reflects which human aspects they represent and their previous occupation. Each person would represent a positive aspect and a negative aspect, for example, a soldier may represent bravery and hatred. This anime would deal with their ideals(Will they kill each other due to different ideals?), doubts(Who resurrected them? God?), their wishes(Will they use their powers to destroy the other nation? or will they forgive the other nation?) and also their conflict with the other nation.
Grimdark? Probably
Very seinen.
I dig GL’s idea quite much, being a history fag and loving Escaflowne
Thanks, but what would you like to see for yourself?
Well, I just want my Mahou Shoujo Ranka spinoff Kawamori was being half-serious about ;___;
if that doesn’t cut it I might think something up….
Of course it cuts it. I’d watch that shit… as if I’d ever be able not to.
But sure, go ahead and fire away. Join the fracas of ideas.
I was thinking it should be original idea to count (and that isn’t mine)
I used to have so many “great” ideas in the past and now I can’t come up with anything easily
Before I start, someone ones told me: “Everything below the sun has been created. It is not about trying to invent a new wheel, it is about making an old wheel look cool”.
Now, about your idea ghost, I will fund it, but I will say to add more women. A queen or two is ok, but add a few prostitutes here and there as informants, spies, and even “biological weapons” or even “anti-morality weapons”. And a few refugee or innocent girl here and there to creat moral conflicts.
About Schneider idea: Maybe add a few elements here and there about “new mutations or cognitive/independent thinking”. That the main character not only thinks about “hey, it is the right thing?”, but also thinks like “hey, why don´t i leave everything and make my new race?” or “hey, why i don´t conquer my masters?”.
Now, about my ideas, I will appreciate your feedback.
1) I want to see a new Macross, but not your typical “Macross using San Francisco/Miami in a peaceful place”. In fact, I want it more like a Starship Troopers/Space:Above and Beyond meets Macross. Yet, instead of bugs, I want the Galatic Empire of the Supervision Army, with royalty/nobility included and a few princes/princesses fighting for the crown.
The main cast will be a VF-19 squadron of young mid-20s soldiers with different backgrounds (a pure soldier, a girl that only wanted the NUNS to pay for Med-School, a girl that wanted to pull a Basara, etc). Mix that with Macross Miramar commanded by Rear Admiral Isamu Dysen, who was thrown as a sacrifice to help his superiors escape the battle, but instead Lady Luck saved Miramar escape and got stuck deep in enemy territory.
About saving cash, you can take old yet good military marches here and there, and even recicle some of the Macross Plus songs. Also, no need for a battle every episode, but to explain how politics are at work at both sides, give maintenance to the valkryies, and lots of training and simulaation. Five episodes like that and then a 2 episode big scale battle (a battle type and 4 quarters vs a full yet slow fleet)
I will say a 25 episode, and I want a season finale with Miramar sinking, and Dysen ordering what remains of his fleet to escape, as Myun (using Sharon Apple AI to control several ghosts and Miramar) and Isamu goes in a suicide attack in a VF-29, with Information High epic-remix as background.
Isamu dying like how Guld Goa Bowman(which word should I call him?) did, disengaging the limiters and crashing into the enemy flagship’s bridge would be awesome.
I’m still ambivalent about having women in the show.
About your Supervision Army… if I remember correctly, the SA is a mixture of miclones and Zentrans who were zombified by the Protodevlin. Good luck making that something viewers can take seriously.
The Miramar/Isamu angle however is very intriguing. I like it.
I am not big on history or mech, but I would probably watch that because it has a sturdy focus and the religious twist is edgy. It may be too serious for some viewers, but I feel it would fit a niche the industry is lacking.
My concept is something I’ve wanted for the last year or so, a slice-of-life story centered about the flight industry, Delta, Pan-am, etc. There would be focus on both pilots and staff (attendants, ground crew, executives) and the balance between them for a single airline, with other airlines mixing. This fits something equivalent to Aria’s undine companies, but a less fantastic. It could also be phrased as “Top Gun-lite” or “Soft Gun” because there wouldn’t be a military focus, at least not at first. Military is fair game in the skies and can affect the airline industry. This would be part of the world-building. Airports, cockpits, and window seats give way to great sky shots, giving a feeling of distance. The background art would need to be pro, but character designs could be something unique or Ghibli-esque, but not childish or overly cute.
There could be romantic elements, but like schneider, I don’t think pairing romance would be essential, because the focus truly is time and distance, or a fleeting feeling. At first we would create this through the day-to-day conflicts of characters and interactions, along with the scenery. People changing jobs, competition between airlines and pilots, casual trash-talking, corporate tensions (job cuts, bankruptcy) are all valid points, but I wouldn’t want it to be social commentary. The “final boss” (if I can give it away) is the timing of this setting. This is not sci-fi, but the story takes place just at the end of an era for “atmospheric flights.” Eventually we learn that looming on the horizon are a host of companies (or governments) who have lobbied their way into “orbital travel,” which has a massive advantage of being faster than conventional flying. The characters we see and connect with all face a questionable future. This can all be set off by simple things like, a pilot retiring. That kind of thing affects us, like when a good friend gets married (and we’re still single) or they have a child (and we don’t).
I could probably include one experience I had last year, when I was on a pilots final flight before retirement into Orlando. The fire department serenaded the plane with water canons just at sunset. It was super surreal and I can’t imagine what it must have been like for the pilot. In this story, I would imagine one of the primary characters is copilot during that scene, and it has a strong affect on them. And these kind of things lead up to the final part of the story, conflicting a “change of times” a loss of “romance” (flying through the clouds).
So anyway.
the focus truly is time and distance, or a fleeting feeling… the end of an era for “atmospheric flights”… these kind of things lead up to the final part of the story, conflicting a “change of times” a loss of “romance” (flying through the clouds).
What beautiful images – I’d watch it. 😉
That would be nice, especially if the styling took it’s cues from the Golden Age of Jet Travel (the 60s) or something like 2001: Space Odyssey, because that would fit in the time era you described.
I may be able to watch this show on the strength of that retirement scene alone.
This sounds like a great anime.
Love of flight is a great theme that has been with anime a long time (a lot thanks to Miyazaki and Matsumoto, I think), and it’s definitely one that I think could use a show of it’s own.
I want a school romantic story set in “college”.
The college setting would change every dynamic that has been hashed and rehashed from every highschool-based anime, and make it a more mature and realizable story. Make the protagonist a female high school graduate, preferably three of them with equal screen time. I think 52 episodes will be enough to flesh them out. Give them male suitors but do not go overboard with the love-polygons. Keep just one love-triangle, one one-true-pair couple, and one career girl who doesn’t desire love. I want some realistic arcs like “thesis time”, getting and balancing part-time jobs, and having one senior character graduate college and land (or not land) a job. Finally, I want the college to be a characterized place, much like how Aria romanticizes Neo-Venezia.
Really, the only thing remotely similar to this is Genshiken. But I want this as a shoujo-style story, that’s why I had girls for lead characters.
You may wish to try out Honey & Clover if you haven’t already, there’s some overlap there.
I second Hachimitsu to Kuroba as an example of what you’re asking for. Have you really not seen this show yet?
An anime with a rivalry like the one in Hikaru no Go or Hajimme no Ippo. Fuck I love a good rivalry.
So it would be a sports anime about any teamsport. More characters, more development etc The rivals could be on the same team and then on different teams or whatever. Just don’t make the supporting cast useless. Have them develop their skills over time and compete with the characters from other teams. Kinda like eyeshield 21 but with less focus on the central character and not so much over the top elements. Obviously the focus will be on one of the rivals. Lots and lots of training sequences. In fact matches should be not happening that often. Lots of science or pseudoscience about the sport. And lots of people commenting on the games.
Then a shonen anime which will be like the second arc of HxH (Genei Ryodan). The protagonists against an organisation of super-powered dudes with clear power-rankings, internal politics and badass and mysterious boss with an up and coming rival within the organisation. I don’t care about the specifics. I just want all the episodes focused on the struggle against the organisation. Fighting shonen.
Mecha anime. Foundation + BSG (not the robots or aliens just the focus on politics) + Mobile suits + 20 year old soldier as a protagonist + a concept like newtypes (that could be used for fighting in and out of mobile suits) + ‘There’s no need for a fight in every episode’ + excellent animation = Perfection.
Team sports eh?
Slam Dunk was a great/terrible show (great because the love for basketball and fundamentals shone through/terrible because of shounen style pacing). Lots of great rivalries there.
As for your mecha anime… I can’t say I know BSG well enough to agree with your suggestion. Apart from it, it sounds like a Gundam OVA.
Maybe that’s why I like all Gundam OVA better than the series!
I just want the politics more complicated than what you see in a typical Gundam OVA or series. Something more than the typical, good federation ship-bad main earth federation forces-opressed spacenoids who have good intentions but use genocidal tactics, dynamics of a Gundam OVA. Add something more, shift the focus somewhat to the impact of war to the economy, to the simple people but not have the show’s story told through their eyes. Just add another layer and show how this type of unified global government and the space colonization has affected society and economy. Elements of this can be seen in Gundam Unicorn and 00.
The OVAs are targeted at olderfags after all. The first one was War in the Pocket, and that shit was transcendent.
However, TV series are the meat, they’re the things you can expect to see every week and not twice a year like Unicorn. That’s why I called for TV shows, as it’s the definitive anime experience.
So…no Gundam side-story ideas then? ‘Cause I had several of those 😦
I mean, I had some others too, but I just wanted to clear up that first part…first.
Side stories are for OVAs. TV shows are for new main stories.
How true. I was gonna go back to my idea about mobile suit racing during the middle of one of the many wars in UC history, but I see what you’re saying. In this case, I suppose I’ll have to go back to the drawing board.
I used to read season previews (I actually still participate in T.H.A.T. Anime Blog’s efforts)…
I dunno, Ghosty; I think some might question the level of ‘participation’ apparent in comments such as, ‘Nope, not interested’. 😛
Well, I’m no mechatard, but your idea sounds good; I like the historical period and the intensity and dark humour you envisage… Says the shoujo-loving fangirl, I know, but I recently started watching (amongst other things) Beserk for the first time, so I guess I’m more open to gory battle sequences and epic bromances than I thought, heh.
My ideas… Tbh, I’ll watch anything that has gorgeous animation and interesting characters who get up to interesting things (it gets bonus points if it has bishies and people talking about their feeeelings). However, to be more specific: I like shows with ensemble casts, with a mixture of strong females as well as males, with a focus on Slice of Life themes such as the passage of time and how fleeting/ precious ‘the moment’ and relationships are. I also like some mystery/ supernatural/ magical-goings on (the ‘light’ or atmospheric kind, as opposed to an intense thriller or horror), with romance being another bonus but not necessary, and a solid personal growth or rights of passage story at the heart of things. I guess a university setting would work, otherwise the idea of following a small group of young adults who are just starting their careers, working out what they want to do with the rest of the lives (i.e. no emo High Schoolers either), either in a modern setting, or a parallel universe where magic exists and is intgrated in people’s everyday lives…
Yep, pretty vague, huh!
This post actually validates your observation. I can’t get into the spirit of the hype. Everyone’s almost always wrong anyway.
Yeah you mentioned your tastes, but what would you really want to see next?
Haha, as you might’ve guessed, I’m too lazy to think up entirely original plots; I usually base such thoughts/ projects on real life goings-on or on re-imaginings of existing stories. So, mundane real life goings-on aside, I wouldn’t mind seeing an anime version of Onegin. As well as Pushkin’s poem, I love the Fiennes/ Tyler film ver. and the Cranko ballet. Thus, I think an anime ver. would really deliver the emotions of the doomed love and the costumes and snowy cityscapes would look amazing animated, ahh…
Animate: The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.
Protagonists: A 24-year old, anti-social 4′ 11” female hacker who fights perverts and gangsters with a computer, a golf club, and a taser. And a more down-to-earth journalist who got tricked into a libel conviction.
Plot (some spoilers): Investigating the mysterious disappearance 30 years ago of a girl who was the nephew of a rich tycoon. Finds a connection between her and a serial killer. Drama builds. Excellent anime material there. 13 episodes.
I’d watch it. I just don’t want it to be hypocritical and turn the lead into a fanservice engine.
Well, you know, on the editor’s advice, the author added several unnecessary (but not bad) sex scenes.
With regards to fan service, I mean, tasering a guy, chaining him to a bed, and tattooing “I am a disgusting pervert” on a guy’s belly is not exactly all that attractive in a fan-servicey way.
Also, for GrimDark Crusades story, check out The Prince of Nothing series by Bakker. It has all the elements you want, except the mecha.
Will check out the book. I’m okay with the sex scenes as long as the pedobait isn’t fetishized.
Her motto? Do onto perverts what they do onto others.
Bloody great idea for a series Ghost. Find yourself the next Makoto Shinkai (one man production army) and let’s get it done!
If only things were that easy!
i’ve been saying this for a few years now(when people would listen to me ramble), i want all of Harry Potter to be animated, possibly going 12, 12, 20, 26, 26, 26, 38 in episode counts.
Heck i want JC Staff to do it and have Rei Kugimiya voicing either Hermione or Ginny and for some reason while i’m typing this up, Neville.
but for original ideas? As a comedy i’d like to see dwarfs, elves, humans, cat people getting conned into hunting a white dragon in space.The dwarf would be the captain of the ship, at least a female elf and cat people(i.e. catgirl) and a human who just wants to go home. The end would be giant naked rei.
that and give me more Isekai no Seikishi Monogatari.
I think I’m going to go with your Harry Potter adaptation between the two LOL.
Seriously, an HP adaptation would be great, with the usual and obvious caveats.
i’m just surprised a HP cartoon/animation hasn’t been done in any offical way yet. you’d think that if ‘attack of the killer tomatos’, ‘back to the future’, MIB and various movies got a cartoon Harry Potter would’ve had one about now
I like your re-imagining of the Crusades. There was a three-part BBC documentary on the subject really recently, and I was pleasantly surprised at how little I actually knew about it, and how the latest research has cast the events in a different light. You find plenty of heroism, drama and moral ambiguity in there, which makes for a great story.
After reading the novels of Mardock Scramble, Yukikaze and Loups-Garous then watching the films (Mardock was great, Yukikaze needed a sequel and Loups=Garous was awful) I started thinking about what other Japanese SF and fantasy novels would look good animated. I’d really like to see the Stories of Ibis – possibly OAV or maybe in TV format like Aoi Bungaku was – with different directors working on each story to give its own ‘feel’ and identity. Studio 4 degrees C would make a wonderful job of it I think.
Generally though, I’d love to see more steampunk and alternate-history anime. Futuristic stories are good, but re-envisioning the past or present is even more interesting to me in some ways. Retro-looking mecha would be awesome!
What’s the name of that documentary? I’m a nut for this kind of shit.
The thing about these novels, is how they’d be difficult to translate into the TV format which is what I called for. I mean, unless you have a specific way you imagine them playing out in a weekly 20 minute format. Share anyway.
I’m not really a steampunk fan, but I can dig it. I’d rather have straight up magic than some steam workaround. But yes, robot suits as actual knightly armor would be amazing. By the way, the drawings in this post are from actual manga called The Five Star Stories by Nagano Mamoru (there’s a film too, but he started out making iconic designs for Mobile Suit Z Gundam).
The doc was presented by Dr Thomas Asbridge but was simply called ‘The Crusades’ and an iPlayer link probably isn’t much help where you live either, but here’s the official BBC page: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01b3fpw I’m sure you could find it by some torrent-related means!
Serialising novels is indeed hard. If you’re faithful to the flow of the original story you end up with differing lengths of instalments (Kara no Kyoukai) or you end up with massive cliffhangers (Mardock Scramble). I’d absolutely LOVE to see Nausicaa ‘rebooted’ and following the manga, but I couldn’t even guess at the chances of it happening. 😦
Hehe I found a torrent. Thanks!
A Nausicaa adaptation would never work as TV anime.
Pingback: Nostalgia and a Parlour Game | Animanachronism
What would I like to see? An anime where there isn’t a single panty shot, no beach episode, and not even the remote possibility of a harem. I know I ask a lot.
If wanted something animated, that wasn’t yet, maybe Yakuza Girl (http://www.mangafox.com/manga/yakuza_girl/). Lots of fighting, supernatural powers, an altered timeline. Yes, there are plenty of fan service elements to around, negating my earlier point, but plenty of fighting and blood to cancel it out.
In all of these replies, there are a ton of great ideas for new shows. What’s interesting about some of them is a sense of reality. Death, real relationships, pain, conflict. Too much anime glosses over the reality of day to day life. Keep the fantasy world, but ditch the fantasy people.
While my example seems antagonistic to fanservice, I’m not really. The show I propose is chock-full of scenery, mechanical, and history pr0n. I’m just repressing the sexual aspect of fanservice because the repression is consistent with the hypocritical moralities that form the meat of the show itself.
It’s not like the show I envisioned is for kids LOL.
You talk like other “cool” elements of your show cancel out the “bad” fanservice in it.
Fanservice, I don’t have a big issue with it, but cliche delivery of it is another matter altogether.
As for realism, I don’t make much of it as well. Realistic people in dramatic, contrived plots is another kind of fantasy as well. It’s not the fantasy itself, but the executions of it that give us problems as viewers. So yeah, fantasy people don’t do much for me — unless we can make a distinction for the likes of the unlikeliest characters (e.g. Senjougahara Hitagi) behaving in well-written ways regardless.
Your idea’s GOLD, man. Oh man, all the ideas that could just spin out from that setting. Angelic mechs for the Crusaders. Geometric shaped, abstract gattai-ing mechs for the Muslims. The citizens of Jerusalem are caught in the crossfire, and every last one dies a bloody death. Meanwhile, the Knights Templar are up to shady business, as usual in fiction. Then everything comes to a halt when aliens, who were worshiped in the past as pagan gods, seek bloody retribution in their bio-organic mechs. (Well, probably not the last part, lol)
That said, I’m waiting for the next fantasy epic to be made. The kind of western-like fantasy much like Record of Lodoss War, preferrably with mechs. There hasn’t been anything like that since the 90’s. I really like those settings where you’ve got magic and science at the same time. Steampunk, or alternate history mecha combat like you proposed, would be great too.
Thank you.
I hated Record of Lodoss War. I watched it way back in the 90s. I can’t get past the fact that them HUGE dragons flew like giant blimps. They didn’t fucking flapped their wings. Fuck Lodoss War.
Otherwise, I’d love to see fantasy shit done well, and by that I don’t mean adaptations of JRPGs.
I’ll echo the voice for the next Lodoss War, but I feel the whole aesthetic of Lodoss was really wrapped up in the 80s. Fantasy anime seems to have moved on to a whole new set of JRPG conventions.
I get how a Western, Dungeons & Dragons type of fantasy is desirable, but I just can’t get behind Lodoss War as some kind of banner for this genre. From the same period there’s Heroic Legend of Arslan, I think that was the better show, albeit an OVA.
I have not seen much in the way of decent non-mecha military anime, but I would really like to see one done about Japanese people from both sides of World War II, as unlikely as this would ever happen.
The premise starts of with a Meiji-era samurai family which loses status after the patriarch being too proud to find employment after the Restoration. He has two sons, the younger becoming a martial arts teacher and a disinterested elder son becoming a clerk in a shipping company. These sons, themselves marry and have their own families, with the elder son eventually leaving Japan for Hawaii (big scandal).
The main thrust of the plot occurs in World War II, with the children of these two sons. The children of the martial arts teacher get sucked into the entire militaristic fervor sweeping the country and they volunteer for service in the IJN as pilots, taking part in the invasion of China and SE Asia. The family of the elder son is affected by anti-Japanese hysteria and interned after Pearl Harbor. Their only son, who was previously from ROTC, volunteers to join the 442nd Infantry Regiment and goes off to war in Europe.
This 4-cour show would probably switch viewpoints from one side of the family to the other (privation of the internment camp to privation of war rationing and Allied strategic bombing raids) and also to the sons fighting on both fronts of the war, but on opposite sides of the war. There will be tensions with racist white soldiers, untrusting officers and even fellow Nisei soldiers in between periods of fighting angry Italians and Germans for the Nisei protagonist. For the IJN fighter pilot protagonist, he would initially think of it as a glorious endeavor facing equally matched foes (British and US fighter pilots) but he will start questioning himself as he hears stories of atrocities from the frontlines from grizzled veterans, while fighting an ultimately futile battle against Allied airpower.
Bromances? Yes. Slice of life? Depends. Humor? Surreal in a way people locked in combat would find it. Romance subplot? Nope.
By the way, that giant robot Crusades concept sounds EPIC, while the teenagers are probably younger scions who don’t inherit land, they are old enough to fight and fornicate by that era’s standards. And having a mecha equivalent of Alamut with the Old Man of the Mountains to serve as a potential third force would be the icing on the cake.
Yes, but they don’t reach the holy land as teenagers. The journey from France through Italy, through Constantinople is an adventure in itself. They won’t reach the holy land still wet behind the ears. They’d have seen all kinds of horrors, rivalries, hypocrisies, THE WORKS. It doesn’t make sense that they start out like robot anime leads by the time they’re in Palestine.
Came here to suggest World War II as well. While, arguably, a lot of anime has been “about” World War II to some extent, but I want an explicit story. I want it to be large, with a sprawling cast and an epic story. Give me a Rose of Versailles for World War II, with original and interesting characters who mingle with the titans of their age and wrestle with profound moral questions. Give the common Japanese soldier some heroism, and spare some sympathy for Hirohito and Tojo, since as horrible as their crimes were, they were fascinating people who would easily make for great drama.
I’d watch this shit.
This is amazing. Fucking love this. FUND THE FUCK OUT OF THIS.
Which one? The Nisei soldier and his IJN fighter pilot cousins? Too bad the collective shame of the Japanese plus some of the wacked out politics of some anime directors (I’m looking at you Mamoru Oshiii) will ensure it’ll never see the light of day
All of it. It’s like Flags of Our Fathers and Letters From Iwo Jima. I love this kind of shit.
I’d love to see this but I do agree; it’s not likely to be animated in our lifetime. Will it ever be? Maybe so, but perhaps we might see it animated in a place other than Japan first.
I want an “epic Timeframe” Show, that covers some hundred years (no, not like gundam age, that scope is to narrow)
– “grounded scifi”, so no unrealistic types of battles, machines, Eden-like Planetes for every solar system you set you foot in
– the show would not be about single characters, but about the grand scheme of progression of mankind in space/Colonies (maybe we get to watch some families on the way)
– min 50 Episodes !
– we would follow the path of humankind from the first steps on a new planet to big spacebattles and the main point of view would shift from timeline to timeline
(yeah not going to happen in this age were “moeification -> everything else)
I like this.
In fact I have long dreamed of something similar, an epic timeframe of the history of human civilization. In a different context, though. Story would begin in an ancient civilization not yet really developped, very rural and all about agriculture. One day people would make archaeological discoveries, revealing that this is earth and that there had been human civilization before. A civilization a little bit further progressed (in technology of course) than our own. A civilization which has erased itself in some final world war, probably with giant fighting robots. This was so destructive that some hundred years later mankind is living like it would be 500 B.C., with no knowledge of what happened. Now the discoveries give people the chance to progress in an enormous speed. What happens now is wolrd history repeating itself in time lapse (loosely bonded to real events). Of course this needs a lot more than a hundred episodes with new main characters after every time skip (they should somehow linked to each other, similar to Gundam Age).
Hey, basically this might be a better show than the one i have descriped below.
Well, it’s not going to happen because it’s not that interesting as anime.
Foundation (Asimov) is interesting as print. I think it’ll be terrible as live action. All that talking.
Dune (Herbert) is interesting because Paul Atreides and Leto II are both more interesting and more awesome than the likes of Lelouche Lamperouge. Dune would make for a great show, but what would make it great isn’t the epic timeframe that you want to see.
There’s a manga about space exploration that I remember reading that has this epic span, but for the life of me I can’t remember the title. I’m not convinced it’ll make for that great anime either.
I will respond to more comments when I wake up. It’s half past 2 am already and I can no longer stay awake. Laters.
Man, such great ideas here. FUND ALL OF THEM!
If Band of Zakus (directed by Ryusuke Takahashi) is not allowed, then about this:
I want to see a ‘realistic’ Yakuza story. No scifi, no super powers. The style would be a mixture of Samurai Champloo, Baccano!, Cowboy Bebop, Sopranos, The Godfather and yakuza films. The main character would originally be a highschool boy who becomes involved with a clan and the story would span decades and follow his rise within the organisation while dealing with all the usual conflicts with law, duty, honor, family and rival clans.
I’d watch the shit out of this.
Me too, as long as it has “Battle Without Honor or Humanity” worked in somehow… gotta have that in a “8-9-3” flick…
This isn’t exactly like your example or anything, but can I suggest watching Saraiya Goyou/House of Five Leaves?What you described does sound like it in places.
Ghost, your idea is really great! I would so love to see this! The pictures add a lot to your description, they are from “The Five Star Stories” manga, aren’t they? Guess I should read it someday.
About historical settings, I think G.R.R. Martin’s “A Song of Ice and Fire” has everything I always wanted to read. However, no anime of this please, would not fit. HBO seems to have done a good job, I’ve heard.
But haven’t you done something similar earlier? Taking elements of different anime and combining them newly? I’d have some ideas for that, but something completely new? I’d love to see a space story, though I haven’t seen Banner of Stars, Planets or Macross, yet.
I want to see a contemplation about the human mind, the human psyche and basic human emotions. About relationships and solitude, about euphoria and depression. In space. Something like Kubricks “2001” or Aronofsky’s “The Fountain” or “Love”, the movie by the band Angels&Airwaves (I’ve yet to see) or “Solaris” by Tarkowski (haven’t seen neither yet), not to forget “Moon”. A story about exploration, a space shuttle, or more than one, on a grand discovery in outer space. A cast full of scientists and adventurers, at first euphoric but as time passes full of anxiety, self-doubts and fear. Only adults, no teenage drama. An existantialist intimite play in a space ship sourrounded by endless void. But also in mids of beautiful space phenomena with hope never fully fading. The past of the characters, their relationship among each other, the impact of space on human mind, the emotional bond to earth as the home of mankind. The consciousness of probably never returning, of an uncertain future. The clash of this emotionally extreme sitation and the requirements of complex and difficult work. Hope, dreams, plans and yearnings taking shape and blurring with space to psychedelic hallucinations. This can become surreal. The technical side of the mission, however, will stay completely hard SF, totally realistic.
No aliens. No fighting robots. No war. No fanservice (doesn’t mean sex scenes are forbidden).
The Soundtrack should be post-rock, with some classical pieces from time to time. The designs should be realistic, the visions/dreams of the characters however full of psychedelic special effects. Animation quality of Gundam Unicorn. Though with as few CG as possible (I’m still traumatized from the terrible look of the Berserk movie’s previews). The story should take it’s time, but not been too long. Something in between 25 and 40 episodes should be fine.
I have to disagree that an anime adaptation of GRRM’s A Song of Ice and Fire wouldn’t work. I agree that it isn’t *necessary*, since it would be near-impossible to top how good the HBO adaptation is, but before they came out with that, it was high on my list of things ripe for an anime adaptation that would never get one. It’d work great, it just really doesn’t need to now.
Thank you.
I haven’t read the books, but I thoroughly enjoyed HBO’s “A Game of Thrones.” It’s one of those shows that remind me how far behind anime is in the telling of stories like that.
I don’t imply that I’ve done something truly original. That’s not the point of this exercise. I just know about people really liking “Band of Brothers in Zakus.”
Yes, instead of wishing for space stories, watch those shows you’ve mentioned.
The closest things I can recommend about the kind of show you want are Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, and Planetes. Either way, those shows kick ass (also Paprika).
Since the Nodame Cantabile jdrama already exists, hm.
Ah! What I fantazise about occasionally is E.T.A. Hoffmann’s Der Sandmann adapted into modern Japan, with the main character turned into an otaku who has seen too much Evangelion clones and the mechanical doll into some Vocaloid-like thing. He falls in love with her, buys figures, dakimakura, etc and slowly loses touch with reality, with the plot if possible the same as in the book. The alchemy parts will probably have to be scrapped.
LOL not sure if want, but more power to you.
Wow, when I read the first bit before I read more, I basically drafted up something that is, in certain ways, strikingly similar to what you came up with. I found that pretty amusing.
Of course, my own ideal series differs somewhat. While your ideal series breaks down the mythology of a historical timeframe (with giant robots), I want a series that brings a historian’s eye to epic fantasy (with giant robots). Tolkien a bit perhaps, but more George RR Martin – it should be dark and self-aware, but it should also resonate with mythological themes. I want to see giant robots as ancestral signs of power passed from generation to generation (implicit in your series by your use of 5 Star Stories imagery, but I would push it to a primary theme). Then, for a setting, toss it in a universe like that of Dune – humanity has risen, spread to the stars, and then collapsed back into the inevitable feudal bickering. Relics of a lost age of technology populate countless worlds inhabited by people who have by and large forgotten how to use them, and a single giant robot (and I would scale them as giant – Gundam-sized or larger) is a device of power and fear on a scale most people cannot comprehend. A minor lord might have only a single machine, or a small cadre of them. Scale in general would play a large role in this series; a single, ancient battleship might be the seat of a warlord who rules entire systems, and if it is lost, it is lost forever. Technology should be seen as cultish and arcane – the provenance of sorcerers and priests who squabble over their discoveries and precious knowledge. Sophisticated machines like giant robots might be armed with simple melee weapons purely because even powerful lords lack the capacity to manufacture guns – or even ammunition – in sufficient quantities. Naturally, the series should be full of tragedy – the main character dying about 3/4ths of the way through the series seems appropriate. That said, none of this “kill em all” stuff, since that makes it hard to make badass sequels, in which we see the characters and the universe shape one another over long periods of time.
Several series have actually come fairly close to this ideal, and inform it quite a bit. The Five Star Stories is fairly near what I’m looking for, but a single movie with limited context is not nearly enough, and while I like the mechanical designs and aesthetics, I would like to see both toned down. Scarcity is also not as much of a theme in the film, at least, as I would have liked, and I was kind of thrown off by the weird stuff going on with ubermensche Jedi whatevers. Escaflowne shot, but then swerved off-target as it got lost in philosobabble and crappy love triangles. Gundam AGE hits a few points, but is, overall, far too NOBLEBRIGHT. Technology is the answer to most problems in Gundam AGE, and evolution and progression run counter to the idea of entropy that pervades my ideal anime. Broken Blade got closest of anything I’ve ever seen, but fundamentally, 6 hour-long movies did not provide enough time to tell the sort of epic I’m looking for. Also, the mythological elements of Broken Blade are fascinating but also very oddly twisted, and every time I rewatch it, I flip-flop on whether or not they truly run deep enough to satisfy me. The manga seems to be heading towards the epic scale of the story, albeit VERRRRYYYYYY SLOOOOWWWWWWWLLLLLYYY.
On a slightly related note, a close second for “anime series I want to see” is *anything* in the Warhammer 40,000 universe. I would watch a slice of life moeblob haremtrash otaku-bait series about an everyman Commissar “hilariously” mis-assigned to the replacement instructor for a group of Adeptas Sororitas candidates in the Schola Progenium if it maintained the aesthetics and feel of that IP properly. I would watch the sh*t out of it.
I’m all for your fantasy anime with giant robots with them being relics from the past or perhaps even aliens just like how Ideon started out.
As for your WH40k moeblob haremtrash… I… I’d watch it. Not like I actually like any of that shit or anything!!!
How about… The Horus Heresy instead for Warhammer? Great tragedy, lots of beautiful failure. Adapt the main storyline into a TV anime, and then make a shitton of spinoffs out of the non-mainline books.
Oh, I would be so all the f*ck over a GOOD 40k anime that I can’t even describe it. I was just making a point that I would watch pretty much anything 40k, even in genres I vocally despise. The Horus Heresy would lend itself amazingly well to animation – in fact, I really don’t think it could be done in any other current film medium, since it’s about mythical demigods slapping the everloving sh*t out of each other. Yeah, that’d be great.
A Ciaphas Cain anime would also be pretty fantastic. Plus I feel like Cain would be a great counterpoint to the Teenage Doormat Male Anime Protagonist whose profusion annoys me so much. Mature, with realistic (for 40k) concerns, gets laid semi-frequently, and reacts semi-reasonably to the horrific universe he lives in, unlike everyone else.
My personal pick, though, would be a 12 episode series about the Armageddon War (the one with the Space Wolves and Angron, not the one with Yarrick and Ghazkull). Follow a squad of Space Wolves carrying out a guerrilla war against overwhelming numbers of Cultists and World Eaters, slowly retreating and luring their enemy to the battlefield that the Great Wolf is chosen. The Battle-Brothers slowly get whittled down, their ammunition running low and their weapons breaking. Sacrifices are made, manly tears are cried (by the audience, not the Space Marines themselves, as their tear ducts have likely been replaced by organs that shoot acid or some crap), death-songs are sung in makeshift mead-halls. You could throw in a bit of humanism, too – the Space Wolves pick up some Guardsman hangers-on as they fall back. Finally, at the end of the second-to-last episode, they reach the Space Wolf lines, only to discover their brothers preparing for a final stand. The Daemon Primarch Angron leads hordes of mad berserkers and screaming horrors of the warp into the Space Wolf lines, and just as the two collide, the Great Wolf smiles, ever so slightly.
In a flash of blinding light, a full company of Grey Knights arrive, and this cues a two-episode-long battle with a budget the likes of which has never been seen before as they set upon the daemons and Chaos Space Marines, cleaving their way through many times their number (backed by their allies) to reach Angron and finally banish him back to the warp. As the dust settles, a mere handful of the grim paladins walk out of the inferno around the fallen Daemon Primarch, nod to the Logan Grimnar, and then vanish as they came.
The series ends before the High Lords of Terra get their douchebag on by ordering the deaths of all the Guardsmen exposed to Chaos, Grimnar gets ripsh*t pissed about this crap, and politics ensue.
I wouldn’t mind a Ciaphas Cain anime. It would be like… The Irresponsible Captain Tylor? I haven’t seen that show, but the main character seems to be reluctant at doing his job, yet being absolutely amazing at it, and it’s ambiguous whether he’s a wuss or a magnificent bastard.
Your idea for the Armageddon is very good. I’d watch that!
I like the sordid tale of the Crusades though you probably should add some Knights Templar to the mix even if you don’t delve into secret societies and conspiracies.
My ideal series would be a blend of limited magical girl, mixed with escaflowne mech designs though these would progress as economies change from feudal to industrial age at varying times for different factions. It will all be mixed with a bit of 100 Years War/WWI/WWII/Gulf war I/American Civil War/Six Day War/Yom Kippur War/Yugoslav Wars. It would deal with models of governments, economic progress, treachery, militarism, dynastic struggles, proxy wars. ethnic and religious tension, total war, and post war problems. I have no idea how it will all work yet but it will have at one point knightly nobles scythed down by a peasant army armed with industrial age weapons, Last Samurai only without Tom Cruise. Also mandatory Highway of Death.
Since I don’t have that all worked out yet though I want a series based on the Israeli Wars of Independence. Everything from 1948 to the end of the Second Intifada, Henry Kissinger could be the Narrator. I want all the ugliness to boil forth and for it to be unavoidable. It will never be made though since yeah too recent and too controversial. Could make the cutting point at after Yom Kippur War to keep to the 40 year rule on stuff like this along with the somewhat optimistic end with the Camp David Accords. Nevertheless militarily speaking the IDF were capable of some of the greatest feats in modern warfare and at the out set of the 1973 War the Egyptians and Syrians were perilously close to winning before they fell apart due to Syrian command and control issues as well as Egypt feeling obligated to leave it’s SAM umbrella. Operation Focus was in of it self one of the most devastating surprise attacks in history and Operation Spark was one of the most brilliant deceptions in modern warfare. If nothing else I would love Satelight and Kawamori to use their dog-fighting animation skills to cover Operation Focus.
The Templars will be involved, you should try out Ridley’ Scott’s cut of Kingdom of Heaven.
Lots of good material here. I like how the little strip of dirt south of Asia Minor is the hotbed of so much violence — in a literary sense, of course. The Israeli war you speak of will be a great counterpoint to the Crusades stuff in the show I imagined.
Would you be getting ACTUAL Henry Kissinger as the narrator?
I was planning a scenario that I can work with for YEARS but I never got to writing it because my ambitions for it are too great. Here’s the scenario and what I want to do with it:
There are 4 small countries that are ruled by 2 larger countries in a fantasy setting. The legend of the world states that the countries are created by God and the Devil to maintain harmony in the world they created. The representative kingdom of heaven on earth and hell on earth are the 2 large countries that rule the world by pure power alone. They are composed of the light and dark elemented people that are far more powerful by their military might of it’s citizens, soldier or not and their subsequent versatility of their powers that create technology at a far faster pace than the elemental powers. They are the holy lands, the people are are closer to the 2 worldly gods that rule over all things. The legend states that the Divine entities created the 2 “angel” and “demon” people to maintain harmony with the 4 earthly elemental people – the fire, earth, water, and wind people – that directly rule over the plants and the animals. (Think the creation of man story from Genesis as an inspiration). 1000 years ago, the greats powers had 2 of the elements within their 2 countries, essentially having 2 states in the whole world, while having 6 nations in total (political definition of each). Then a Great revolution split each element into 6 nation-states, supposedly in an effort to end world conflict.
The plot would be an exiled prince of the fire nation gathering the old powers that separated the countries and finally ending the rule over them.
I know this sounds really lame right about now but I want the show to raise as many moral, political, and religious questions as possible by the movement of the plot. I want this show to be an extension and exploration of the dynamics and conflicts that are happening today. I want questions to be raised and reasons for sides to be pitted against each other, but I don’t want them to be answered within the story. I want the characters to question the workings of the legend that socially binds them to the power structure they are in. I want the characters to question their beliefs multiple times when they learn more and more about what is fact and fiction. I want a grand scale that you can see the political decisions of leaders you know can affect the citizens of the countries and themselves. I want to explore the implications of world ending superweapons and the power struggles and moral questions that are raised by having them – kinda like the debate on nuclear weapons. I want to explore the realistic implications of the growth of nationalism and the whiplash it creates. I want to see the identity to the self, the group, the nation, and humanity change or strengthened within the characters as they try to bring their view of world peace in the face of rampant political ideals and obligations. I want the I don’t want one side to be seen as evil but another side to the arguments that are raised through the story. I don’t want the story to be told by narration, or the characters stating what they believe in every 8 minutes but seem obvious through their actions. I want the main character to die once and realistically affect various personal and political aspects of the cast and people. I also want the resurrection of said protagonist with moral consequences. I want the story to end with the plot resolved by virtue of sheer will but with the emphasis on the ever going conflict of belief.
And finally EPIC FIGHTS OF MANRRINESS AND HONOR.
I think all your ambitions regarding politics and philosophy are better served by a science fiction setting than a land-based fantasy one.
Have you seen Legend of the Galactic Heroes? That show accomplishes a lot of what you want.
I heard great things about legend of the galactic heroes and i want to incorporate a lot of its elements into this kind of scenario. I’m thinking something like what Legend of the Legendary Heroes tried to do but on the scale of Legend of the Galactic Heroes and with a late teen-age cast and experienced adult supporting cast.
Given how much Avatar: The Last Airbender is obviously informing this idea, I’m not sure it’s worth recommending it, as you’ve clearly seen it. Keep your eyes on Legend of Korra, I guess?
I want a show about pop idols. No fluff. No happiness. I want a drama. Hardcore. Exposing all the seedy parts about the music business.
I’d like the main heroine to be one of those singers who knows that she’s good. Possibly be a yandere. Her manager would be a bastard, too. Her main competition would be a girl who becomes an idol around the same time she does, but her song is used as an anime intro and her popularity skyrockets, making our heroine very unhappy. As for the length….two-cour perhaps?
I’d also like to see parody on idol shows. A whole bunch of separate singers/groups try to out-do each other in terms of fancy costumes and stuff and try to to see who can get the biggest fanbase.
I’m cool with this.
Right now, we only have two works that take on this kind of thing:
SDF Macross, and subtly too; and of course Perfect Blue.
I had three ideas:
1. A modern fantasy or fantastic realism, if you will, about a guy who is the descendent of a medieval scholar-type guy who uncovered the secret of the Lesser Key of Solomon and all the demons that the King supposedly sealed up in a box prior to the sacking of the Temple in Jerusalem and all that rot. Hidden scrolls and stuff. In the present day, our hero, it turns out, finds a dog wandering around town and, after taking it home realizes that he can hear what the dog is thinking. Things go on as normal until seriously freaky junk starts going down and some kind of hideous monster attacks and kills a whole bunch of people. Well, our hero and his canine buddy get swept up into it and through resourcefulness and some previously unknown unabilities, they manage to defeat the monster, which turns out to be a normal person possessed by one of the demons Solomon sealed away all those years ago. Cue revalations about a shadowy organization trying to speed up the Apocalypse via releasing all the demons previously bound up centuries ago. Hero guy finds out the dog, while a normal dog, is a manifestation of his id and so can do things that he’d never be able to do otherwise, namely take out the nasty monster stuff and reseal them in order to save the world. Basically, this would be a more-frightening but less-grimdark and bleak mashup of Narutaru + Ginga Nageraboshi Gin. So it’s essentially my take on a monster-capturing show. There are many possibilities for tie-in merchandising and video games. I’ve been interested in writing this as a young adults fiction series for a while. This was just the basic premise.
2. This one is much simpler: an anime adaptation of the awesome Holyland manga series. I think the combination of fluid animation and realistic fight scenes would take this one above the standard shounen fighting manga stuff like Dragonball and Naruto while not being “another Hajime no Ippo” like I fear “All-Rounder Meguru” would end up being seen as (that said, I do appreciate your recommendation of that great manga, Ghost. I’m still getting into it but it seems really good so far). I’m a big fan of the Holyland books and even the extremely melodramatic live-action show because, well, the fight choreography was pretty decent, all things considered. Just seeing the matchup of styles on the street would be pretty cool, so I think this one would work.
3. A super-robot show, with what I think is a twist. First, the setup: multinationl mining expedition to Antarctica find the ruins of an ancient city while digging for some kinda yadayada mineral energy source. It’s the future. This kind of thing happens in the future. Well, turns out this is in a H.P. Lovecraft-type world and the previous occupants of the continent were a race of spirit-based beings who inhabited the bodies of pre-cataclysmic humans to form some Atlantean/Mulian-esque civilization when there was only one supercontinent. However, it turns out that the human forms couldn’t live in Antarctica as the climate changed and so some of the Great Race left to found the rest of the world’s civilzations (think R.E. Howard’s stuff) after the passing of many years.
Here’s where it gets crazy: the Great Old Ones (Cthulu-type nasties from beyond the deeps of space) are gonna soon come back to destroy the Earth in revenge against the Great Race, which, since they “became” us, is pretty much incapable of doing anything about it. Looks like we’re screwed. How did our scientist heroes find out about all this. Telepathic penguins. That’s right, some of the Great Race decided to go all hippy and take the forms most adapted to their new, colder climate – Emperor Penguins. And since the spirit beings never die if they remain distinct from their hosts (unlike what happened with humanity), the same ancient race has basically been alive this whole time, just passing between the bodies of new penguins as they’re born and die. Penguin-aliens tell the humans about how to fight back, since they, being penguins, don’t have hands and can’t build anything of their own despite their incredible scientific knowledge – the human heroes will use the collosal robotic object of the Great Race’s worship, which they dub…..title drop in 3. 2. 1…..VALIANT ATTACKER EMPORIZER. It’s a giant robot penguin that combines with other machine to form a huge robot with all the trimmings. It’s called “attacker” because, rather than fighting the Great Old Ones on Earth, the penguin-aliens show the humans how to build stargate-like devices to travel to the deeps of space to beat down Cthulu and Yog Sothoth and the others on THEIR OWN TURF.
This would obviously be just as tounge-in-cheek and over-the-top as an good super robot show, but with lots of good pulp-era conventions thrown in there. I think it’s a winner. Because robots + penguins = the best thing ever.
1. Uh, okay.
2. FUCK YES OMG DO THIS FUUUUCK.
3. …
3. At the Mountains of Madness with Super Robots and comedy penguins? FUCK YES FUCK YES ALL OF MY MONIES, ALL OF MY FUCKS, MY LOVE, MY ANGER AND ALL MY SORROW!!!
har har har so Matt loves Valiant Attacker Emporizer and Ghost is dumbfounded. EXACTLY THE REACTION I WANTED.
Strangely enough, I’m only serious about the first idea. I couldn’t give anything major away, but I’ve gotten good feedback elsewhere, so maybe I should have gone a little bit more into it. I guess I dropped the ball on that one. My apologies.
Ah yes, that reminds me.
A rewrite of Fate/Stay Night that makes Shirou tolerable (perhaps giving him a skill besides “becoming overpowered when the plot demands”?), showcases the awesome mythological characters it takes the time to introduce, gives SEEEIIIIIBAAAAHH the characterization and development that she deserves, and either makes the romance compelling or just excises it. Seriously, Fate/Stay Night has a spectacular concept, but it gets bogged down by a lame main character who take the spotlight from much more interesting characters, various relics of its earlier iterations, a painfully generic romance, and animation of highly variable quality. It is number 1 on my list of series that need a reboot.
So, yeah, I want Fate/Stay Night remade in the style of Fate/Zero. I get that it’s a little stupid to want something so similar to something that exists. It’s just so depressing to think that Fate/Zero, which is utterly awesome, leads to Fate/Stay Night, which is only good despite itself, mostly because of adaptational compromises. And often-times, it’s harder to do a remake justice than an original story. The story needs a fresh eye that does not dwell overmuch on its past and is willing to refocus the story as the ensemble piece it should be; clinging to the VN structure of the story was probably the greatest failing of the anime adaptation.
On the subject of original stories AND epic mythology, I would love to see an Animatrix or Batman: Gotham Knight-style series of shorts by various studios (15-20 minutes) adapting myths in new interesting ways. Though the overall quality of the collections has varied a bit, I really feel like anime studios tend to bring their A-Game to projects like this. The nice thing about mythology is that almost all anecdotes exist within a greater context that people know or can look up, and so the directors could really focus on making a single moment awesome. Also, I want to see a choice scene or two of The Iliad WITH GIANT ROBOTS!
I get you. I’m totally for rebuilds, retellings, and the like especially if there is so much lacking in the original anime work, even if only on the production side.
I’m not sure if I can get behind the mythology shorts, as I’m more interested in adapting one of the myths and making a full season of anime from it.
Problem with shifting the focus of Fate/Stay Night away from Shirou is that pretty much destroys the entire point of the story! The original visual novel was an analysis/deconstruction of the nature of heroism, using the Holy Grail War as a backdrop to develop three different Shirous (from the idealism of Fate to the demolishing of Heaven’s Feel.) Shift the focus to an ensemble cast and the story wouldn’t necessarily be any better, just really different–and I’d argue that the source material, despite its flaws, is pretty great to begin with. Don’t think it’s worth losing all that by changing the point/format of the show entirely.
Granted, the animated adaption of Fate/Stay Night is pretty mediocre, and maybe the structure of Fate/Stay Night would be difficult to pull off in anime format. But I do think that if you changed to focus from Shirou to ensemble, the best parts of the VN (the whole conflict with Archer in Unlimited Blade Works, all of Heaven’s Feel) would be rendered pretty weak as a result. Maybe the right thing to do would be to find some kind of balance between the visual novel’s character arc (over three routes, not just Fate obviously) and the ideas of a studio hopefully more competent than Studio Deen? I dunno, I’d think Fate/Stay Night would be a lot easier to adapt then, say, Ever17, but this might be a lot harder than I thought…
I’ll confess that I haven’t played the game. From what I’ve read however, I feel like you’d really have to pick one path and stick with it for any really successful adaptation – the middle ground of fan-pleasing the anime chose was distracting and added little to the series. While the non-linear character development provided by multiple routes is interesting, I feel that it is not conducive to a medium that is viewed instead of played – as you note.
And this is really what I mean by not getting too bogged down in the original. Yes, the VN is beloved, but adaptations have to be pragmatic to succeed. The anime does not have the same resources – massive walls of inner monologue text – and so we must be shown why it is worth having a show about Shirou instead of told. Unfortunately, the anime adaptation that exists never actually shows this. What makes Shirou interesting – the deconstruction of his ideology – only exists because of the context of the other routes, and is necessarily excluded.
That said, there are plenty of ways for the same themes to be played upon in a piece that is not so wrapped up in a single character. Deconstruction of heroism? You have KING F*CKING ARTHUR on set, and yet not once does the anime adaptation of Fate/Stay Night meaningfully explore her background, her ethics, or the codes that guide her. Want to discuss the costs of heroism? The price of holding honor above reason? The weight of being responsible for others? All right there, wrapped centuries of mythology. But no, the anime spends its time on Shirou and his lulzy, lulzy sexism. That’s my complaint, in a nutshell.
I’d love to see an anime take on Dan Simmons’ sci-fi classic The Hyperion Cantos. I just think that the amazing visuals and scenery described in both novels would not be done justice by any live action version. And the main antagonist of Hyperion, the Shrike being close in appearance to an organic mecha deity a la Evangelion, I just think it would look and feel much better as an anime. It’d preferably be a tv series in 2 seasons, (if they just do Hyperion and The Fall of Hyperion) or 4 if they also do include Endymion and the Rise of Endimyon.
I know that some of the team behind the Haruhi Suzumiya are fans of this series. So much so that if you watch carefully in the anime, the book that Yuki Nagato is reading in the library is actually Hyperion. So here’s to hoping that one day they decide to squander all the money they made with the H.S series on Hyperion (since its never gonna happen one can only dream right?).
I’ve known of Nagato reading Hyperion for a long time now though I haven’t come around to reading the books yet. But yeah, I can see Kyoto Animation trying a moe version of the novels somehow.
Making a moe version of Hyperion would be one tall order too pull off!
Another thing I thought I’d really like to see is Jules Verne’s ‘Around the World in 80 Days’ with a steampunk treatment. That’s a lot more likely to happen too.
Two more things:
1. Been reading Mars lately (super-dramatic and disturbing shoujo melodrama about artists and bikers that goes into very strange places) and wondering what would happen if Kunihiko Ikuhara got a hold of the material. I don’t think it’s quite within his range, but both he and the artist of Mars use a similar technique of building up a genre artifice and then pulling the rug out from under you, repeatedly. Doubt it would work, though, because as much as I love Ikuhara, he seems pretty stuck in his own genre of Ikuharaness at the moment. Could he step outside of fate and fairy tales and penguins and work on what is essentially a balls-out uncomfortable soap opera? I have no idea!
2. If somebody decided to adapt Hoshizora Meteor’s insane metafictional masterpiece Forest into anime, I would probably die happy. Unfortunately, such a thing may never happen–but in this circumstance I don’t quite care, that Girls’ Work coming out from ufotable in a few years is apparently written by him, and for all intents and purposes looks like a spiritual sequel! So I wouldn’t mind using up all my credits for imaginary anime to make sure that Girls’ Work gets made, in the eventuality that it is so good that it blows everybody’s minds (because if it’s anywhere near as good as Forest then it WILL. No question.)
Your Crusades with Mecha concept makes my dick hard in ways I thought impossible. I adore the emphasis you’re placing on religion, its always fun to see anime tackle spirituality outside of Buddhism or Shinto. Anime needs more historical epics that aren’t based in the Edo period or that are just Romance of the Three Kingdoms with schoolgirls/demons/pokemon/panty shots/all of the above.
Whole lot of fucking brilliant concepts here. I had a crappy idea for a slice of life comedy where the joke is that Japan is just like it is in countless/tokusatsu shows, done with a touch of pathos here and there. Think Tiger and Bunny meets Dai-Guard. But anime I’d ACTUALLY like to see?
More than anything else in the world (excepting proper sequels to Imagawa shows), I want to see Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure get the full bells and whistles, Hellsing Ultimate style OVA treatment. Jojo is one of the longest ever running comics in Japan, and this year marks its 25th anniversary. While never a flagship title for Shonen Jump like Dragonball or Saint Seiya, Jojo remains perhaps one of the most original, brilliant and unusual examples of the genre. In my own estimation it goes One Piece, Jojo, then Dragonball and the other stalwarts. It’s a really fucking awesome manga is the point I’m trying to convey here.
And in all that time, with all that popularity there has never been a true animated TV series. Just a couple of bitty OVAs and a movie so bad it was never released on DVD. This oversight must be corrected.
I want Jojo to get the kind of treatment such a pillar of Japanese pop culture truly deserves. I want OVAs of the sheer quality and talent that Hellsing Ultimate recieves, but where they adapt a series of 10 volumes, Jojo is currently on volume 105. This show’s production cycle will make Legend of the Galactic Heroes look like a Toei Animation week long hack job.
I want the whole damn saga, start to finish, from Phantom Blood’s cheesy “Fist of the North Star meets Dracula”, right up to Steel Ball Run’s bonkers “Alternate Universe Knights Templar conspiracy concealed by Inter-continental death race.” I want them to find the artists and the budget necessary for Araki’s hyper stylised drawings to be fully realised in their misanthropic, oddly choreographed glory. I’d prefer it if they kept the art appropriate to whenever Araki drew it, slowly morphing into his signature “EVERYBODY IS BISHONEN, EXCEPT THE WOMEN” style around Part 5.
Make the first two story arcs multi-releases, before settling into a steady one fight per episode release around Part 3. Most of the budget wil go on replicating the manga art syle exactly, which is the main visual draw for Jojo. What little movement there is (in brief spurts during the fights) I want to be smooth as butter. Save up the budget for the big set piece fights, usually at the conclusion of every arc (Jotaro vs. Dio had better be Studio Ghibli level quality, but with less enviromentalist messages and more psychic ghosts stopping hearts and freezing time).
Get someone amazing to do the score, see if Masamichi Amano can top his Giant Robo score. Jojo spans nearly 200 years of human history, from Victorian England to 1930’s New York and Venice 2001, so there’s bound to be some variety in the composition. Kohei Tanaka will do in a pinch. In a project of this size the production team is really too huge for me to have any particular demands, but they better know their stuff. Keep the cast members from previous adaptations, Part 3’s actors are mostly perfect but switch Norio Wakamoto’s role from Hol Horse to Part 3 Dio.
Houchu Otsuka, Yazan Gable himself, MUST play Part 2 Joseph Joestar. Ditto for Takehito Koyasu as Yoshikage Kira in Part 4 and Romi Park as Joelyne Joestar in Part 6. No one else will do the roles justice. Best actors for the parts best suited to them. Have Araki’s support and approval the whole damn way.
Three final, absolute caveats for my dream adaptation:
1. KEEP THE RIDICULOUS WESTERN MUSIC REFERENCES. Copyright laws be damned! If I can’t watch a Jojo series with Stand names like Red Hot Chilli Pepper, Another One Bites the Dust, Metallica; or characters named Robert Edwards O. Speedwagon, Dire and Straights or (my eternal favourite) VANILLA ICE, then it ISN’T a Jojo series. Pay the musicians off if need be, they can hardly sue for stealing likenesses (Here is the real Vanilla Ice. http://img.karaoke-lyrics.net/img/artists/11043/vanilla-ice-143633.jpg Here is Jojo’s Vanilla Ice. http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ARmtI9dqMHs/Tjn0QfSzDkI/AAAAAAAAPvA/3GSv-X-bXRo/s1600/Jojos%2BBizarre%2BAdventure%2Bpart%2B3%2B-%2BStatue%2BLegend%2BVanilla%2BIce%2BSecond%2BLimited%2BColor%2B-%2BMBT.jpg Twins seperated at birth?)
2. Keep the weirdness, keep the brains. Jojo’s chief strengths are the sheer weirdness Araki injects into the strip, and in the nature of the fight scenes. Jojo is really goddamn weird, the title is accurate in that much. The first story arc starts of as Merchant Ivory adaptation before devolving into Hammer Horror, ending up as Fist of the North Star where the correct breathing method lets you punch sunlight directly into Vampires. Even by Japanese standards Jojo is a bit eccentric, and this version cannot tone that kookiness down to appeal to foreign markets. France and Italy already adore the series, so white people not getting it ain’t a problem.
Ingenuity and intelligence always wins the day in the Jojo universe. My favourite protagonist, Joseph Joestar, is in power level terms the weakest of the entire clan. He takes on the Pillar Men, evolutionary Absolute Beings who are for all intents and purposes perfect, with nothing more than touch of precognition, a wicked sense of humour, and a pair of childrens’ toy crackers! Power is nothing without the mind that weilds it. Fights in Jojo are all about deception and misdirection, more like a mystery novel than a tournament fight ring.
Our heroes often have the strongest abilities, but they can’t just punch their problems to death. They spend the entire fight finding the RIGHT way to punch their opponents, and that is far more tense and suspensful than seeing Goku’s latest transformation or technique. The success of any Jojo adaptation hinges on apturing the cerebral aspect of the fights, resorting to DBZ superpowered blur fests will kill it stone dead. In terms of direction, pacing, animation and editing, the fights must be perfect.
3. Above all else, KEEP IT GAY. REALLY, REALLY FUCKING GAY. Jojo is so flamboyant it makes 70’s glam rockers look masculine. Just check the TV tropes page for innumerable instances of homoeroticism, and bear in mind that Jojo has been that way for decades. Not gay in a yaoi fest or pandering way, but Gee Why Ay Gaaaaaaayyyy!!!! Jojo is simply too FABULOUS to not be rendered in its full Freddy Mercury flamboyancy, its beauty lies in the marring of typical macho man Shonen posturing with the kind of homoerotica that only the 80s would allow. To deny this is to deny the very soul of Jojo, dahling.
And that, in college dissertation form, is my ideal anime. Never going to fucking happen of course, but you did ask. There’s been some small rumours of a new Jojo OVA to celebrate the franchise’s 25 anniversary, so who knows? Sorry for the wall of text, but Jojo deserves more love.
Mmm okay, Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure then! Not quite my thing but if it makes you THAT happy sure make it rain!
Oh my god I forgot about Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure!
Yes yes ONE THOUSAND TIMES YES if somebody was crazy enough to get together and animate the whole thing than the world would be a significantly more awesome place. Also Jason Thompson would probably explode, literally.
(Jason Thompson’s the guy who writes the actually pretty good House of 1000 Manga feature over on ANN, and is such a big fan of the Jojo series that it’s kind of hilarious)
Thompson did a damn fine job on the English edition of the manga. It took him 12 years of pimping it non stop to Viz media before they relented, and when it was finally released he gave it one of the best English translations I’ve ever seen. All the humour and wit of the original perfectly localised to english, a superlative effort. I love how they kept Araki’s original sound effects, how Polnareff swears constantly in French; my only complaint is how they censored Joseph’s signature “HOLY SHIT!!”
HEY!
I fucking love you.
Matt: Astro Fighter Sunred might be up your alley.
Sunred is hillarious, but my crappy first idea played the superhero just a tad straighter. You’d have the mid life crisis Ultraman knock-off dealing with superpower erectile disfunction (hence the “five minute” transformation), the Sentai team suing their replacements for copyright infringement… more delicious failure, less zany comedy.
Your idea for a Discworld anime simultaeneously disgusts and arouses me. It would an absolute goddamn mess, BUT WHAT A GLORIOUS GODDAMN MESS IT WOULD BE!!! Wakamoto is too hammy for Vetinari though, make him the Librarian instead. See how many rrrrr’s he can fit in the word “Ook”.
I want a show made by someone who doesn’t give a shit about what I want. Someone who has more talent than me, is more well read than me, is smarter than me, and has better taste than me. I want something better than anything I could specifically ask for could ever be.
We didn’t get Aim for the Top! or Wings of Honneamise or the original Mobile Suit Gundam because people did a focus group, we got it because those people made whatever the hell they wanted…and the shit was great.
And that sort of thing, honestly, was more common in the old days. There is a reason young fans can’t name directors and key animators or even character designers like they used to…because the stuff isn’t worth remembering.
I guess I want production companies and sponsors to fund new talent (and old, I guess) to make the shows they want to make.
And robots, or course. 🙂
Huh.
This isn’t a focus group.
I don’t buy into this good old days thing at all. There was a fuckton of uninspired crap made back then. It’s too easy to cherry pick the best.
“I want a historical re-imagining of the Crusades at the height of Saladin’s power, with robots.”
I’d watch it, especially if Nagano’s doing the designs. Heck, I’d watch an OVA Viking Age prequel, with the clash of Heathen and Christian values, pagan raider mecha diving down from great floating airship carriers to take slaves and thralls, following alternately the lives of slaves, converts, Christians, and Heathen raiders.
Actually, a Vinland saga anime would be great. There’s kind of a dearth of “medieval” anime in general (I contrast this with “fantasy” anime, which has sort of evolved their own conventions).
Other concepts I’d like to see – a modern or near future take on air combat that doesn’t involve mecha; there’s really a scant handful of those. Another would be a new supernatural horror/investigative sort of show (I suppose the most recent one of this type that I’ve seen might be Darker than Black, but I’d prefer one with a darker undertone like Witch Hunter Robin).
And finally, I was going to say I’d like to see an anime that’s directly about jazz, what with all the shows about bands – I wouldn’t mind if the protagonists were a group of cute high school girls doing cute things if the jazz was good. But it appears that’s already been covered – I just noticed one of the upcoming spring season shows is called ‘Sakamichi no Apollon’, following a pair of young boys coming of age in their school jazz club (directed by Shinichiro Watanabe with music by Yoko Kanno, no less!).
You had me at “vikings with giant robots.”
I’d take away flight in almost any historical/fantasy medieval setting. It’ll be so rare that when something takes to the air people will shit bricks. So, them Viking raiders are going to be like Aquarion’s abductors but totally seaborne with badass dragon long boats.
Sakamichi no Apollon is fucking boner city. Oh my god.
Something I’ve always wanted to see is a show with equal romance and adventure, with the main couple already established. They don’t need to be married or anything, they just need to already know who and what they’re living for. They can have struggles that test their love for one another and yadda yadda but that cannot be in the form of a love rival. That’s one thing I cannot stand in today’s romance series. Both components of the couple should be able to stand by themselves as a person, no dependent princess girl or wimpy male lead. They’ve got to be bad ass but real with their own quirks and failures, something that will both test their relationship and their ability to survive. It would be kind of like it’s them against the world.
For some reason I see the setting as post apocalyptic, but that’s not necessarily set in stone, just some time in the far future would work best I think. The post apocalyptic setting would probably work better than a future utopia setting because not only could the setting then be part of the conflict but it could also be something that could potentially create a contrast between the more lighter moments between the established couple and the state of the world. Now, despite the futuristic setting, I don’t want mechs. I want this to have a very human feeling, despite the time. There can be some robotic stuff, but I don’t want them to over power the humans in the story.
One of my favorite companies is A1 pictures but I feel their art would be too soft, so I’m leaning more towards Production IG, BONES, or Madhouse. I would love to have redjuice as the character designer (mainly because I can’t help but think that his art is completely wasted on Guilty Crown) simply because I don’t feel Lily Hoshino’s (Mawaru Penguindrum, Otome Youkai Zakuro) style would fit the setting, but then again what do I know. As for the director, I think Akane Kazuki (Birdy the Mighty) would do a pretty awesome job, but I am morbidly tempted to hire Shinbo Akiyuki.
And so far that’s all I got.
What you’ve described (the romance dynamic) is pretty rare, I can’t even identify an example. Do you have any?
I mean, I’d totally watch it, so please give examples of anything similar.
Sadly I don’t know of any, which is why it’s something I’d be so totally stoked to watch. It seems like all the romance shows are all about the same thing, and in all the action shows that have romance, it always seems like the romance was thrown in to placate those looking for it but then it’s never enough to be truly satisfying. After all, doesn’t the term romance imply that the two people in question are finding love and have not already obtained it? I think that’s what makes today’s good romance stories so limited. Because the main couple isn’t established (even though it’s painfully obvious to the viewer) we can’t move past the first awkward steps of romance. I’m not saying that those shows aren’t good (Ano Nastu de Matteru is actually the show I look forward to most every week this season) , I just want to move past that stage already, so those stories can finally achieve something more than obtaining love but actually living it while kicking but at the same time.
You could try Kare Kano, though the manga does more with the couple past getting together. There’s also BECK: Mongolian Chop Squad (same case of the manga going further after the couple gets together). Then there’s NANA, again the manga. Itazura na Kiss somewhat has a similar scenario, but there’s a lot of stupid in its stupid charm.
I’ve seen Itazura na Kiss and I certainly have to agree about it’s charm, it does have quite a bit of stupid in it. As for the others, I have always been kind of hesitant to watch NANA and Kare Kono. They just seem to be overloaded with drama, more so than usual romances and since there’s no other outlet – ie action, humor, etc. – I feel like it may be a bit overwhelming.
Kare Kano is brilliant until the second half when the anime really went all crazy and production values went to shit. The manga is where it’s at. I haven’t watched the Nana anime yet, but I’ve read all of the manga. It’s one of my favorites.
Romance and adventure in a post apocalyptic setting? The closest I can think of is Miyazaki’s old TV series “Future Boy Conan”, but it isn’t much of a romance story and I don’t think its been subbed either.
It has been, actually. There’re new good quality rips with subs out nowadays even
if you guysh aven’t seen Future Boy Conan yet you’re missing something superb, by the way
Pingback: Anime I’d Really Like to See « Kritik der Animationskraft
Pingback: The Anime You’d Really Like To See | We Remember Love | Japan Wham
Your anime sounds far more interesting than all the moeblobs shits that are being served lately. For us who knows the value of anime, it matters not, but for some tight ass people, I figured they will be extremely offended. It would be pretty fun to see people of different religions’ point of view on such anime.
Hell, even the feminist would have a fit! TROLOLOL
No, not trolling in any way. There will be those who are so addicted to butthurt that they’ll look for things to jam up their ass, yes. But the show I want, has nothing to do with them.
Pingback: Spirituality in the Anime Blogosphere: Pokemon and Priests, Dreams of Crusading Anime, and Superflat Artist Tackles Buddha in Qatar «
Pingback: Colloquium: Anime We Would Really Like to See | The Untold Story of Altair & Vega
Pingback: The Anime I Would Really Like to See « Moe Fundamentalism
Pingback: The anime that Kuro wants to see | Kansatsu~観察~
How about one of these two::
1) A story set behind the scenes on a space warship about an untested middle ranking officer on her first voyage – two or more years away from home, almost no chance of action, just a day job watching monitors. The drama comes in the focus on how cliques form among the upper class officers, their interaction with the ratings etc. 12-26 episodes of almost entirely straight character stuff about a young woman trying to get by in the navy and off duty life on a warship.
2) An expansion of a short story I recently wrote about the crew of a 5 part combining robot after the battles are over. A focus on how being the saviours of Earth had wrecked their lives as they ended up with no prospects and shell shock. 12 episodes mixing modern realistic animation with 70’s style flashbacks.
FUND THEM BOTH!
Love both of them, very bitter.
As I said, I’ve actually written something for idea 2 so that must count for something!
As a matter of fact I’ve done some more thinking on this topic:
1) A short OVA a little like the typical extreme super robot stuff with one massive twist. At the start there’s the usual human fleet getting wrecked stuff and then the super robot being built. Then in the final battle the robot is trashed almost instantly and it falls to the new fleet (which has been upgraded with super technology). The perspective character is a badass old ship captain who survived the first encounter and gets his revenge.
2) A deliciously nasty and dry shoujo series about the relationship between a spoiled princess (with high hairline and mocking laugh) and her tutor, a much put upon disgraced sorceress.
I love the non-super robot show super robot show.
You’ll have to say more about your shoujo series, though you pretty much got me with the high hairline…
Sorry for not providing more detail, but my phone ate the original post!
Essentially it’s a very limited in scope, period-drama like affair with a roughly early 19th century setting, possibly generic Eastern European (the original idea I had when I was going to write something on it was Tsarist St. Petersburg, set in the Pushkin palace village in an alt-history world where magic was real).
The main character is an older woman with a chequered past; from high birth and the best schooling in magic and the arts possible for a child of her breeding to all of a sudden total reversal of fortune for some reason not immediately made clear, but assumed to be that her family fell out of favour with the monarch. She’s reduced to being a travelling governess and tutor figure in elocution, etiquette, magic and general education for the children of nobles.
Desperately looking for work, she ends up at the house of a family who were once good friends of her own family, but who now are cold and distant; she is given the task of making something of their spoiled, indolent and cruel eldest daughter in order that she may be married off. The task is presumed to be impossible, but seen as a delicious way of further twisting the knife in someone who’s fallen on hard times (the family, in case you haven’t guessed, are actually pretty awful people – sycophants to the monarch et al).
Much of the series is based around the icy relationship between tutor and pupil; setting itself up perhaps as a generic “warming the heart of the ice maiden” type of thing but somewhat more hostile. It’s more of a sort of triumph against adversity thing, as it’s revealed that the family employing the protagonist were in some way responsible for her ruin. In essence it starts bleak and ends little better (the ending featuring the protagonist seeing her name cleared and being assigned back to a minor role at court with the implication of a brighter future, but nothing done about her employers’ own failings); almost a black comic spin on the old “teacher with a difficult class” trope, with an added helping of courtly intrigue, 19th century veiled insults and over the top Russian palaces.
Probably best done as something short in scope; I almost think an OVA of 2 or 3 parts, or a feature film, would be best. The idea being it’s subverting in some way the traditional “the good eggs win out in the end” trope with a slightly more accurate “the rich obnoxious folk get away with it” historical plotline; a kind of more depressing take on the masters-servants period dramas TV likes nowadays which shows the contempt with which some servants may have been treated.
Indeed, a two-strand narrative of the bitchy princess and her suitors compared with her tutor’s struggles just to get by would be the ideal. Intersperse scenes of the decent character’s hard work and effort with the decadence the nobles in favour enjoy.
But yes, the image I had of the student was essentially Nanami from Utena in visual terms, but with an, if possible, even more vindictive personality.
Is one kidney enough? Or do you need both?
1. This is great. It would be awesome if they showed the ship doing stuff in fetishistic glory (like Mouretsu Pirates), but it’s just character drama.
2. Hahahahahahaha… *sniff*
Basically I just want series that combine my love of mecha and sf with my love of horribly bitchy shoujo like Glass Mask.
In short a massive tl’dr there for what can basically be summed up as “young travelling tutor given almost impossible task of making irredeemably awful person slightly less awful in order to stand a chance of clearing their family’s name, achieves minor success after much hardship.”
–
And on the subject of awful people, another concept I’ve begun writing as a novella but which is really a straight love letter of sorts to a very specific genre of anime, I propose one more idea; Coral Bodies, it’s called.
At its heart, Coral Bodies is pretty much a homage to the “mystical mechs fighting inconceivable invaders” genre ala Eva, Rahxephon, Fafner. The difference being it’s played a lot straighter, if you will.
The basic premise is at an indeterminate point in the future, alien monoliths rise up from the Sea of Japan, and a scientific group called NERA (National Extranatural Research Agency) is set up to monitor them. There’s no actual apparent threat, they’re just there. Sure there’s slightly more thunderstorms, and weird aurorae in the sky, but they’re rocks.
What NERA is keeping secret from everyone is it also found three giant robot like entities at the site of the monoliths. They’ve done tests, and the things seem to respond to people getting in them by showing them visions of what they secretly desire.
The three protagonists are a workaholic student who applies to work at NERA to escape the distractions of a social life, on the condition they’ll fund his further education, a boy who runs away from home to avoid having to help his father work providing aid for the families split up by NERA’s long working hours, and an otaku girl kicked out of her home by her family signing her up to NERA in the hope she’ll develop a life outside of watching 70s giant robot anime and playing video games.
When an oil tanker running aground causes the monoliths to awaken and reveal themselves as living coral-like creatures, the Bodies awaken. The initial test pilots don’t fare too well; one is horribly killed by the corals, and the others point-blank refuse to pilot the things after that. So by a strange run of events, the three protagonists end up piloting the robots. The “visions” turn out to be manifestations of the machines’ own sentience forming an interface with the pilot; workaholic, awkward-around-girls guy gets the woman of his dreams, otaku girl gets a Kamina-style “aniki” figure, and the runaway gets someone to protect; the robot realising he’s actually in denial of his desire to help others.
The plot is as much about fighting the extradimensional corals as the relationships between pilot and mech; the mechs’ strength and weapons are based on how attuned to their pilots’ needs they are, and so they help the pilots overcome their failings and “fix” their lives.
DAMN. Fund it, publish it, send it out to Gainax, but get it out there! This is incredible stuff.
I will watch the shit out of this.
I’d wanna see a K-ON show/spinoff/doujin with the seriousness of the Beck manga, but the main focus is the perils of female musicians in a male-dominated rock scene.
FUND THIS FUCKING THING
I’ve been playing a lot of Super Robot Taisen lately, and the first game gave me a solid concept. Some of the game’s greatest pilots (Sanger, Elzam, Gilliam, Kai) are revealed to be former members of an elite proto-Personal Trooper squadron called the Aggressors. The actual details of their early days have never been elaborated on by Banpresto, outside of minor backstory. This is where my idea comes in.
Super Robot Taisen: Original Generations: Chapter of the Aggressors.
Before our favourite badass aces were badasses, they were green pioneers in the latest field of warfare: mecha combat. This is their story. What prevents this from being just another Band of Brothers with Robots concept? Firstly, Banpresto’s Original Generations universe is a schizoid collision of Super and Real Robot tropes. This will be a nominally real robot anime which wears its influences on its sleeves, not to mention with a healthy dose of lampshading and tongue in cheek humour.
Secondly, the depiction of combat is paramount. This is a universe where mecha combat is in its infancy; there’s no Zakus instantly dominating the battlefield. Our heroes field in extremely tempremental prototypes which are prone to breaking down or getting slaughtered by cutting edge fighters and tanks. The first prolonged battle our characters take part in is a resounding curb stomp, they get their asses kicked! They’re partaking in a form of warfare where the rules have yet to be written, its up to them to make these unweildy things actually work, never mind work EFFICIENTLY.
Its similar to the prototype Valkyrie engagements in Macross Zero. Our main characters are writing the book on mecha warfare as they go along, and a lot of the action revolves around really examining how mecha would operate on a modern battlefield context, pushing the envelope in tactics and operational limits. The mechs all sustain heavy damage in every battle, and they are supported every step of the way by an entertaining and intriguing supporting cast of tank operators, anti-tank personel and air force pilots. Then its chucks this realism out the window in the final episodes with the introduction of Super Robots and Gundam-esque super prototypes.
A lot of focus would be placed on the interaction between our youthful heroes, their growing friendships, friendly rivalries and bonds forged in war. Sanger is a wet behind the ears Samurai-wannabee German weeaboo with a flair for hacking things up, Elzam is a hotshot UCC colonies test pilot who forms a chalk and cheese dynamic with the hot blooded CHESTOOH king. Major Wong Kar-Wai is the Max Jenius style ace drafted into making this new theater of war a success, Kai Kitamura is the reluctant red shirt Sergeant who wants to live long enough to retire on an army pension. Tempest is a kindly family man with a hidden dark streak, and Gilliam is the mysterious G-Man who provides intell and reconnisance.
(Gilliam starts off in a powered armor Gepsenst derivative, similar to his first appearance in Hero Senki as a Henshin watch Hero. He carries out behind enemy lines espionage and sabotage missions before upgrading to a proper mecha.)
Hardened veteran Kar-Wai slowly opens up to his newfound nakama, Kai matures into a true badass normal survivor and consumate soldier. Elzam struggles with living up to the legacy of his family name and the shadow cast by his father, Tempest balances his life as a family man with his violent career. The enigmatic, dimension hopping time cop Gilliam learns to be at ease and depend on other people, after too long alone or mired in the shadows. And as for Sanger? He Aims for the Top!, single handedly writing the book on melee mech combat and growing in leaps and bounds into the future Blade that Smites Evil we all know and love.
Sanger’s growth as a pilot and his rivalry turned Bromance with Elzam forms the core of the show’s dynamic. At least thirteen episodes in an OVA format, though the budget doens’t have to be too high. Just enough to make the action sequences look good and for the mechs to be hand drawn, not CG models like the Divine Crusaders TV series. The central conflict is similar to the Macross Unification Wars; an emerging world government consolidating its control over the Earth Sphere and the Space Colonies. Unlike Macross however there’s lot more moral ambiguity; our heroes are forced into some rather unsavory actions, calling their loyalties into question. Because they’re professional soldiers and this isn’t Gundam, they go through wtih their orders anyway and get PTSD as a consequence.
After 8 episodes of strictly real combat with clunky Gespenst Mark I’s, things go all Gundam on us. Kar-Wai switches to the Super Robot Gespenst-S, and Gilliam gets the Super Prototype Gespenst-R. Things go grimdark rather quickly; escalating conflict slowly morphs Tempest into a bloodknight until the Federation blows up the colony his wife and baby daughter are in to avoid negotiating with terrorists. The event breaks him and he retires from the unit. Elzam faces conflicting loyalties as a Spacenoid with the “Freedom Fighters” opposing the oppressive Federation, at least until they take his wife Cattleya hostage.
Threatening the use of nerve gas on an entire colony he makes a Sophie’s Choice that sets him onto a bloodstained destiny as a worthy Char clone. Kai struggles with seeing every subordinate under him die, finding solace in an awkward romance with his wife-to-be (also he grows out his mustache). Kar-Wai goes Missing in Action fighting the shadowy Alien Aereogators, undergoing cyborg conversion into an atagonist for OG 1. Sanger gains a sensei in Master Rishu and his inhuman reflexes and stength begins the drive towards custom tailored Super Robots like the Grungust unit line. In between this we get an in depth look at the practical workings of the OG universe, along with cameos and backstory for supporting cast members like Daitetsu Minase and Brian Micrid.
So thirteen episodes of Banpresto fanboy catnip, along with some half hearted attempts at interesting depictions of semi-realistic mecha combat. It’s not exactly an original idea or a particularly good one, but I’m proud of it none the less. If nothing else it would help popularise Gespies as the de-facto cannon fodder real robot, along with expanding the underdeveloped Original Generations universe. Sorry for the mountain of text but I had a lot of ideas for this.
This is an excellent idea and something that will make a solid and welcome contribution to robot anime as a whole.
It’ll be interesting how the robot concept in warfare will get over the proverbial hump, since in theory it must be overwhelmingly dominant otherwise the expense would be too prohibitive to even try.
This ties into my own big problem with real robots: humanoid design. Building a human shaped weapon the size of a two story house offers no discernable tactical advantage. Real world physics make it impossible, repairs and manfacture must be exorbitive, and the sheer mass involved makes it a giant plodding target.
But drop the humanoid design in favour of something more practical and the action suffers for it… nobody wants to see walking tanks take potshots at each other when you can watch a Gundam zoom about. Scopedogs come the closest to overcoming the cost vs size x efficiency problem, but the action in VOTOMS leaves something to be desired.
Yes, it’s variable scale (big, Bigger, GODDAMN BIGASS ROBOTS) action that makes robot anime compelling.
Man, its posts like this that remind me I should keep up with your blog more…
Pingback: Spring 2012 Anime First Impressions – Part 2 « The null set
Just a quick idea that came to me, little more than a basic outline. I want to see a Super Robot show that takes a similar narrative approach to that of Gundam AGE, remembering love for distinct eras of the genre in much the same way AGE remembers love for different eras of Gundam. The structure of AGE mixed with the the themes of Gurren Lagann and the tongue in cheek approach of Gekiganger III.
The show starts off with a Tetsuijn 28/Giant Robo style boy hero and his robot buddy, before moving on thematicly with each successive generation. His hot blooded teenage son drives a Mazinger Z style descendant of his father’s mech, followed by a five man combining team manned by the cast’s children. Each successive generation escalates the central conflict whilst aping the features and storytelling conventions of each continuing generation of Super Robots.
Each central mech will mimic a certain era’s design conventions, with Dynamic Pro style super robots followed by clunky 80’s combiners and spiky 90’s Masami Obari style “reimaginings”. I want you to be able to see the evolution of the original concept mecha in response to the demands of each era it seeks to emulate. Even the animation style will parody the styles of the time, with Tezuka style cuteness followed by Go Nagai sideburns, and noticeably recycled stock footage and corners cutting animation succesively getting better with each generation.
A lot of this idea was heavily influenced by the 90’s Tetsujin 28 remake, which had a Grandpa Shotaro and his now antique Gigantor fight directly alongside his grandson’s Transformers-esque Tetsujin 28 FX. I’d get the creative staff of GaoGaiGar involved; their track record with GGG, Brigadoon and Godannar shows they could handle that fine line between pastiche and tribute that this project would require. 52 TV episodes to begin with, or alternatively 26 episodes in OVA format. Anymore after that depends on how much more mileage the concept allows for.
I’d also REALLY love to see another transforming super hero show with body armour, similar to Bio-Boosted Armour Guyver or Tekkaman Blade. Sacred Seven and Zetman might fill the hole somewhat, but neither of these series quite deals with the theme of metamorphosis and transformation like the former examples I mentioned. And neither of the latter do so in the dark and depressing way of their predecessors. In lieu of this idea, an adaptation of the Kamen Rider SPIRITS manga would be highly welcomed.
It’s good, but TTGL did a lot of that already… but who cares, it’s fanservice that I can get behind.
Pingback: The Anime I’d Really Like To See: HIGH SCHOOL GIRLS PLAYING CHESS | Continuing World
Pingback: Altair & Vega » Colloquium: Anime We Would Really Like to See