That’s a nice question…

Do you feel that you will ever abandon anime?

Personally, that’s an easy thing for me to answer. No.

Why? I guess it’s all thanks to the perpetual kid in me. The multi-faceted world of anime never fails to amaze me. Japanese animators have this really good knack of bringing all our fantasies to life. Something western cartoons have started to fail in miserably after He-Man and She-Ra. I mean, c’mon. Even the popular “US Cartoons” are actually American dubs of the actual Japanese works: Voltron (Go Lion), Voltron: Vehicle Team (some other mecha anime but not at all related to Go Lion), Transformers and a whole lot more.

But I digress. Would I really ever abandon anime? Again, nope.

I’ve always enjoyed cartoons ever since I was small and I still wake up extra early during Saturday mornings for my weekend dose of kiddie eye-candy. Also, thanks to my irregular working hours (I do Europe support so I work from 1-10PM, RP time), I’m at home in the morning on weekdays, early enough to watch all the morning cartoons that I used to miss out on when I was still studying.

Anime has a way of making even the most normal, everyday things so surreal and so amazing that you’d end up getting hooked on something you never thought you’d get hooked on before. For example, I never really appreciated the technical aspects of boxing until I got to watch Hajime No Ippo in our local channel. The anime itself presents a very unique perspective in a usually brutal and fast-paced sport as well as nice look into the personal lives of boxers even though the lifestyle is based in Japan. I’ve always liked cars but I never really got into understanding the racing lifestyle as well as the technical stuff put into street racing until I watched Initial D. And that’s just the reality-to-anime adaptations. There are a multitude of other anime that show worlds that are beyond our imagination and shown in such action that they’re already being mimicked by modern movies like The Matrix Trilogy. You think the brothers merely thought all those action sequences up? I doubt there wasn’t even the slightest inspiration from awesome fighting animes like Dragonball Z among many others.

Anime is a window into the seemingly-impossible and it makes the seemingly-impossible look so real. And even if the features, physical dimensions, emotions, and the technology are all exaggerated, it brings to life something we’ve always fantasized about deep inside ourselves. We’ve always wanted, as kids, to be able to save the world and use really awesome weapons to do so and be and look cool doing it. Thus the Gundams which are normally piloted by kids who learn who drive mobile suits into war sooner than they learn how to make children. There’s also Mamoru from King of Braves GaoGaiGar. These anime shows are kids fantasies come true! And you can’t tell me you don’t nurture an inner child in you. I mean, the coolest stuff really come from adults who nurture their inner children!

So yeah, I don’t think I’ll ever abandon anime. When I end up having kids, I’ll be showing them my toys and develop in them a deep appreciation of anime. Not the hentai, doujin and fanservicey stuff that you see all over the place but the quality shows like Fullmetal Alchemist, Ghost in the Shell, and the Universal Century series of Gundam.

Huwaito sooru Gundamu, ikimasu! (White Soul Gundam – my personal Gundam, hehehe)