This may be the shortest time ever between me analyzing a character and then coming back to look at them again. I mean, it’s not like I got it wrong the first time. There’s a trope out there called…
Dec 18, 2023 • Subscribe
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Sometimes you go back a look at a character you’ve looked at before because you’ve noticed something new about the character. And sometimes you have to go back…
Character (Re)analysis: Haruhi Suzumiya
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Honda Tohru and the Strength of Nurturing
Female characters who put their energy into caring for others, rather than standing up and fighting, were dismissed as passive doormats who exist only for the male cast’s…
Tohru Honda Shows Us the Savior We All Need
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Character Analysis: Legoshi
Whoever dreamed up Beastars dreamed up something that is like the perfect storytelling cookbook. Stop me if you’ve heard this one: “No conflict, no drama.” (George Bernard Shaw)…
Character Analysis: Edward
Sometimes when you’re just walking around thinking about nothing you think of something. Like, I mean, think about Ed from Cowboy Bebop, right? What a great character! Why…
Character Analysis: Ritsuko
One of the ways you can tell what the target audience for some media message is is to look at the main character. Right? As a rule one…
Character Analysis: Roanapur
It seems a little odd to describe a locale or setting as a character. I mean, in college, it could get your paper marked “-5 Anthropomorphism” or something…
Character Analysis: Kino
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Character Analysis: Lili Hoshikawa
I didn’t have this one ready for Pride Month. Sorry about that. But I wrote it during Pride Month. Does that count? One of the things that routinely…
Character Analysis: Gene Starwind
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Character Analysis: Taiga Aisaka
I think Toradora is a really well-constructed story, and I think I’ll write about why sometime in the not-so-distant future. But here’s part of it: it’s a classic…
Character Analysis: Haruko Haruhara
Warning: This post contains spoilers for FLCL: Grunge and FLCL: Shoegaze. If you haven’t seen them, read on at your own peril. The advent of two more seasons…
Character Analysis: Akira Fudo
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Character Analysis: Yasu Takagi
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Character Analysis: Konata Izumi
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Character Analysis: Asako Yaeshima
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Character Analysis: Momoka Oginome
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Character Analysis: Misaki Nakahara
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Character Analysis: Haruko Haruhara
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Character Analysis: Angela Carpenter
One of the cool things about Carole and Tuesday is that the three major characters are all tropes. So are a whole bunch of the others; it’s almost…
Character Analysis: Zero Two
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Character Analysis: Toshiko Tamura
Okay, yeah, I know you never heard of Toshiko Tamura. Let me lay down some backbeat here. If you ain’t heard of Osamu Tezuka, you’re probably reading the…
Character Analysis: Lisa Mishima
I’ve generally liked the way Shinichiro Watanabe handles female characters. He seems to find a way to avoid simple tropes. Cowboy Bebop: Faye Valentine is seriously hot but…
Character Analysis: Hotori Arashiyama
And Yet the Town Moves is one of those silly little slice of lifers built around a slice of the life of Hotori Arashiyama, and her friends, family,…
Character Analysis: Yoshika Miyafuji
Strike Witches is like a guilty pleasure. It’s a dumb story about characters who are largely one-dimensional by design whose flaws are painted over with constant action and…
Character Analysis: Yui Hirasawa
My writer friend Kate (look, she’s a girl and a friend but she’s not a girlfriend) declared a comic book and comic book movie weekend. The object is…
Character Analysis: Honey Kisaragi
Let’s start with this: Honey Kisaragi, the android star of Cutie Honey, is an artifact of her age. She was born back in ’73. That was a turbulent…
Character Analysis: Takeo Goda
If you look at My Love Story!!, the first temptation is to look at the main characters, Takeo Goda and Rinko Yamato, as a pair. For instance, she…
Character Analysis: Li’l Slugger
Okay, let’s get it out of the way: Satoshi Kon was a dude with a very interesting mind and perspective on the world, and one of the things…
Character Analysis: Ryuji Takusa
It seems bizarre that one of the anime I write about a lot is Toradora. I mean, compared to Neon Genesis Evangelion or Cowboy Bebop or The Melancholy…
Cowboy Bebop, Neon Genesis Evangelion, The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, Toradora!
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Let’s be frank here: Insomniacs After School is so sweet it could be named High-Fructose Corn Syrup. That’s not necessary a bad thing. When you’re making an anime…
Character Analysis: Shinji Ikari
It’s easy to dislike poor Shinji. He’s passive and males are supposed to be aggressive. He’s supposed to love Rei but he’s fascinated with Asuka. He’s supposed to…
Haruhi Suzumiya Character Analysis
A character study for the infamous and eccentric Haruhi Suzumiya.
Character Analysis: Faye Valentine
I have said before and will say again that Shinichiro Watanabe treats his female characters more fairly than just about any director either of us can name. Well,…
Character Analysis: Madoka Kaname
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Character Analysis: Rikka Takanashi
There was something powerfully cute about Love, Chunibyo, and Other Delusions. It’s about kids with delusions of having super powers (yeah, chunibyo), which puts them on the extreme…
Character Analysis: Tsukimi Kurashita
Princess Jellyfish is one of those things that’s just so cleverly constructed that you have to wonder whether it was planned or it just worked out that way,…
Character Analysis: Marin Kitagawa
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Character Analysis: Ringo Oginome
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There’s a meme making the rounds these days that says – and this is an exact quote – “If a show was released today where a disabled girl…
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Happy holidays to everyone who is celebrating a holiday anywhere. May the season be kind to you. Certain storytelling techniques absolutely fascinate me. One is meta, the use…