Ask John: Why Do Anime Fans Consider Anime Superior to American Animation?

Question:
Why do many fans of anime consider it to somehow be “superior” or “more intelligent” than American animation. I’m a fan of a few anime series but consider myself more of a fan of animation. True, American cartoons tend to be more childish, but there’s still some great animation such as the early Disney movies, Richard Linklater’s “Waking Life” (and “A Scanner Darkly” which has not yet been released, but has animation similar to “Waking Life”) and the Simpsons. (There must be something good about to be on for 16 years).

Answer:
I must state from the outset that although I’m quite interested in international cinema, my interest in animation specifically is primarily limited to Japanese animation. I’ll do my best to provide an objective answer, but when you ask a hardcore anime fan a question, you’re going to get a hardcore anime fan’s answer.

The examples you’ve mentioned, I think, are among the exceptions in American animation. I’m not narrow-minded enough to make the blanket statement that anime is better than American animation, but I do think that on a percentage basis more of Japanese animation is literate, intelligent, and artistic than American animation. The percentage of high quality anime among all Japanese animation is higher than the percentage of excellent American animation within all American animation. The biggest difference between American and Japanese animation is the relative amount that presumes a degree of viewer intelligence. Much of American animation seems to dumb down for children or address the lowest common denominator of the audience while even the most puerile and childish Japanese animation often respects the audience’s rationality and intelligence.

Director Richard Linklater’s “Waking Life” and “A Scanner Darkly” are technically animated films, but I hesitate to compare them to traditional animation because at root they are live action films enhanced by animation. Disney movies, both old and new, typically feature animation quality superior to most anime, but animation quality alone does not make a film outstanding. Disney’s classics do deserve respect, but they represent only a tiny fraction of all American produced animation. American series like The Simpsons and South Park are popular and long running not because of their amazing animation quality, but because they’re witty. These shows, like most anime, presume that viewers are smart enough to follow dialogue and understand irony, personal conflicts, and realistic, nuanced personalities. These technical and literary characteristics are commonplace in anime, but not commonplace in American animation, which is typified by one-dimensional characters that exist to fulfill a narrative purpose instead of exist as part of a believable, fictional world.

Besides differences in the way American and Japanese anime are written, American and Japanese animation frequently have different degrees of visual sophistication. Anime employs the visual techniques of live action film, which are not often used in typical American animation. These cinematic techniques are so familiar to anyone that regularly watches television or movies that we don’t consciously notice them in anime. Anime regularly uses close-ups of faces, establishing shots, background shots, rack focus, over the shoulder shots, low and high angles, long takes. These cinematic techniques make anime feel realistic and believable. These techniques are also rarely used in conventional American animation.

Anime series like DearS and Girls Bravo may not be intellectually stimulating, but they’re still more literate and complex than American cartoons designed to pacify children. I don’t deny the fact that America has produced many exceptional animated works, and as a general rule of thumb, American animation has higher frame counts resulting in smoother animation quality than typical anime. But I firmly believe that a greater percentage of all existing Japanese animation exhibits more literary and narrative sophistication, and greater respect for audience intelligence than the percentage of American animation out of all American animation that does the same. I need to stress that this theory doesn’t mean that all American animation is bad, nor does it mean that all Japanese animation is good. It only means that I think anime fans have some degree of justification for the impression that anime, on average, is “better” than typical American animation.