Production IG vs Gainax vs Madhouse vs Bones submitted by Syphin

I did want to post this much earlier, as these images came out almost two months ago, but I've been too lazy O.o.

Quote: The artists of top anime studios Production IG, Gainax, Madhouse and Bones each provide an image comparing the most iconic characters of their studios – just which studio is victorious is doubtless in the eye of the beholder.

>> Production IG is the winner in my book, my #1 favourite anime studio, to me they have the most mature and interesting titles coupled with visually stunning animation - Eden of the East recently showed that. I love Ghost in the Shell, I love it immensely, it is my favourite anime. To me this is what makes anime great, mature and creative storylines like this with amazingly kickass characters (the Major is my favourite female character) conveyed through high quality animation and production values. This along with Neon Genesis Evangelion and Akira were the reasons why I got into anime. Back then when I watched GitS, I had no idea what was going on, the one scene I do remember was Motoko jumping off the buidling roof, looking back and cloaking as she falls - that is one of the most iconic scenes in GitS.

There hasn't been a moment while watching GitS (even re-watching), that I have felt disappointed or bored, I always feel entertained and gripped while watching it, it makes my brain and soul happy and high. The Ghost in the Shell movie by Mamoru Oshii is my favourite anime movie and movie in general. It should also be noted that the Wachowski brothers were influenced by GitS when creating The Matrix.

Here's some more food for thought, for those who think English dubs suck, I watched GitS:SAC entirely in English and it is and has been for a long while, my favourite anime series - I know the Japanese dub is better but this English dub is almost as good. I have the watched the movies in Japanese though. Quality anime generally get quality dubs.

Also love Masamune Shirow works - GitS, Appleseed, Dominion, Ghost Hound, Real Drive. His works end up being adapted into anime form by Production IG.

Ghost in the Shell vs Matrix

The artist could have included Kimi ni Todoke, that is extremely popular in Japan (and with me). Haven't watched; Blood+(watched the OVA though), Jin-Roh, The Sky Crawlers, Patlabor - but I do plan to.


>> Well surprising the Gainax artist considered only female characters to be iconic, I would have thought Shinji and "I mustn't run away, I mustn't run away" line would be the face of Evangelion =D, and wow, no Kamina - shocking!!!

Evangelion has to be one of the greatest anime titles in existence, if you haven't watched it along with other specific titles you are blind to the side of anime that makes anime really what it is. It is such a detailed work and the complexity of each character's problems and struggles and watching how they deal with and accept/overcome those problems makes this one hell of a series to watch and re-watch. When I first watched NGE, I didn't understand much about it, and I actually thought Shinji was annoying in a way because he was mentally weak, but there is the saying that you hate in others what you hate in yourself and I can't really deny that. Same thing with Gurren Lagann, I was annoyed by Simon's weakness and hesitation, but in the end, after watching the development of those characters where they end up believing in themselves, I liked them both. Another thing about NGE is that when you re-watch it, you always end up feeling differently about what happened, it's probably because the events that happen largely depend on how you interpret them and since people are continually changing, what you interpret as what is happening at one point, will be different at another point in time (this applies to all anime that ends up making you think a lot about what is actually happening).

Out of those titles in the image, I've only watched, NGE, Gurren Lagann and FLCL. I generally prefer the male characters Gainax creates, even though my favourite character in NGE is Misato, my favourite Evangelion pilots are Toji and Shinji (both male). Could be I like Misato and Shinji because I find the hedgehog's dilemma concept to be very interesting. Female characters I do like a lot in Gainax works are; Misato and Haruko (from FLCL) =/.


>> Surprised Madhouse didn't include characters from some of these titles; Black Lagoon, Aoi Bungaku, Paprika (really really great movie, a fantastic movie, it makes you dream again, also dam Hollywood for wanting to destroy it's image by making a fail live-action movie - you know it will be...ugh...), Dennou Coil, Death Note, Trigun, Kaiba, Monster (one of my favourite anime series - 'what is morally right?'), Summer Wars (indeed best movie of 2009 - glad it won that award and many others). So many [good] titles by Madhouse over their 30+ years existence.

Vampire Hunter D is another movie I will recommend people to watch, you won't regret you did - trailer, same with Perfect Blue and Paprika, these are seriously amazing anime movies. Piano no Mori was also a very good watch.

Paprika trailer:


Paprika opening:


Perfect Blue trailer:


Anyway there's still a lot of titles I want to watch by Madhouse - Millenium Actress and Metropolis are a few (I watched some of Metropolis before, but I don't remember what happened O.o).


>> Bones, everyone should at least recognise one character there =). Moradim's favourite anime - Fullmetal Alchemist, and yes it is indeed a great anime and manga. Studio Bones pretty much for the last few years have accumulated some really amazing titles; in 2007 Bones came out with Eureka Seven, Darker than Black and the movie Sword of the Stranger (shaunz knows how good that movie was), in 2008 Bones produced the Soul Eater anime adaption (one of good shounen anime's you will see) and Xam'd: Lost Memories (it was good, minus me getting confused by the ending =P), last year - Tokyo Magnitude 8.0, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood, Darker than Black 2 - all great series which I loved watching. Looking forward to Heroman this year, will be interesting to see how the Bones/Stan Lee collaboration turns out.

Sword of the Stranger trailer:



The Production IG and Madhouse images do look a bit simple, there isn't a specific direction or scene created in those images, it's just a bunch of characters in one image. The Gainax and Bones images do have direction, they create a pretty cool scene in their respective image.

The blog which I got these pictures from posted this along with the message (found it amusing and hilarious):

Quote: Shaft’s characters weren’t ready in time, and Gonzo ran out of money before starting. Kyoto Animation announced its participation but then delayed before supplying some old pictures of Haruhi.

If you don't know, SHAFT at that time were delaying the Bakemonogatari ONA (ep14) release and kept pushing the release date for the episode back, Gonzo has been struggling financially - they had to sell of sections, make people redundant, and even cancel DVD releases because there was not enough demand (ah poor Shangri-La DVD, I didn't think it was a bad anime) - doesn't help when you make a $30million deficit =(, Kyoto Animation announced a Haruhi S2 but aired the S1, they like to screw with fans, yet fans take it and come back for more...Endless Eight, I can't really comment on that since I didn't watch it but from what I hear it was just an episode repeated many times over (with minor differences).

Wouldn't have minded a Sunrise image - Gundam and Cowboy Bebop would suffice.

[I did make an attempt at trying to name at least the series that is included in the images, but I can't recognise some of them, so if you do, you should help fill in the gaps =)].

--Syphin--

Discuss this article (2 Comments)