Ask John: Why Are Americans Ignoring Nijiiro Hotaru?

Question:
Is there any reason why the Niji-iro Hotaru film, the brother of Letters from Momo, hasn’t shown up in the American community yet? The DVD and BD came out several weeks ago.

Answer:
A number of factors contribute to the seeming absence of the recent Nijiiro Hotaru: Eien no Natsuyasumi movie in the English speaking fan community, but the most significant rationale behind the absence is the typical disregard that American otaku express toward children’s and family anime. Toei’s May 2012 film is a family-oriented nostalgic time-travel/fantasy film based on a novel by Masayuki Kawaguchi. The film has a distinct, unconventional visual design more reminiscent of children’s picture books or watercolor paintings than conventional otaku-oriented anime. The film may be getting somewhat overlooked by American otaku because its source material, the original novel, is unknown in America, and because the film got relatively little advance promotion and media coverage in the English speaking fan community. The movie’s visual design may deter some American viewers, and with so much other anime available to Americans, what’s out of sight is out of mind. However, the primary reason that the film hasn’t seen greater circulation among American otaku is exemplary of the American fan community’s typical disinterest in children’s anime.

Although I had no involvement in the unauthorized release or circulation of the Nijiiro Hotaru film, I can confirm from first-hand knowledge that a full 5.56 GB dual-layer DVD copy of the untranslated Japanese film and a 1.97 GB “rip” of the DVD have been available online for at least the past week. Yet with the movie available to online American otaku, it still hasn’t gotten any noticeable circulation within the American otaku community. Such disregard is actually typical for children’s feature anime. Studio Ghibli productions are quite popular among American otaku and get circulated widely quickly, thanks in part to the fact that the commercial Japanese home video releases include official English translations. The Pocket Monster & Pretty Cure franchises are also popular enough among American otaku to get fan-created translations quite quickly. However, most other children’s and family anime take weeks or months to get the attention of the fan community, if they ever do at all.

Madhouse’s 2009 film Maimai Shinko to Sennen no Mahou surfaced in the online American fan community in September 2010. The first native English-speaking fan translation didn’t appear until ten months later, in July 2011. An untranslated “rip” of the 2010 Omae Umasou da na movie hit the American otaku community in March 2011. The film didn’t get a fansubbed release until eleven months later, in February 2012. The 2011 Magic Tree House anime film appeared in the American online fan community in untranslated form in August 2012. A fan-translated copy of the film appeared online three months later. The first 23 Soreike! Anpanman feature films are available untranslated in the online American fan community, yet only one of them (movie 15) has ever been fan translated. All 20 Crayon Shin-chan feature films are accessible within the online American otaku community; however, I think that only four of them have received original dialogue translations by native English-speakers. Even among television anime, the same tendency persists. Although virtually every new TV anime these days gets circulated in the American fan community, practically speaking, the only 2012 anime TV series that haven’t gotten any circulation in the American otaku community at all have all been children’s anime including Haitai Nanafa, Little Charo: Tohoku-hen, Shimajiro no Wow, and Tamagotchi! Yume Kira Dream. One of the only anime TV series of the current season that has been circulated in the American fan community yet hasn’t ever been fan translated is the Pichipichi Shizuku-chan children’s anime series.

The evidence is very clear. If and when the American otaku community turns its attention to typical children’s anime, such anime is the last genre that American otaku regard.