Japan Hero Era vs. HJU Era - Are Things Better or Worse?

[Keith Justice]

Article's found here at JEFusion:
http://www.jefusion.info/2010/01/tokusatsu-fandom-dont-fail-me-now.html

Ok this is going to be my last blog yelling at the tokusatsu fandom for 2009.

In 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003 and 2004 the fandom mainly had one spot to commute known only as "Japan Hero.com". Owned by a very awesome person by the name of Jeff, Well a lot of time has passed and JapanHero rarely gets any mention in fandom discussions and in stuff in general but back in the "Japan Hero Days" The Tokusatsu fandom was in its complete prime, We had people who had their minds open so much it every snipit of information about any tokusatsu series was like Christmas to them, No series got pushed away for something else, EVERYTHING had a Discussion page about 30 pages or above.

Click the article for the rest.

Are things now better... or worse for the fandom?

 

[Bolt]

I'm trying to generate a positive response for the question at hand, but I can't really find any faults with what the article is saying. The increased popularity of Tokusatsu has become a double-edged sword for the fandom. On one hand, the higher demand has made the amount of readily-available, translated Toku more easily obtainable, and forums like Japan Hero, HJU, and others have made it easier for fans to connect to discuss their favorite shows, which is a great thing, but ever since more and more people started gravitating towards the subgenre, it seems that the amount of snobby behavior towards certain shows, even entire companies and series', has increased exponentially. Obviously personal tastes have always existed, but I definitely remember the Japan Hero days when every stray, low-quality, raw episode of any series that slipped through the cracks and made its way to the internet was greeted with open arms and minds and endless enthusiasm from fans of all colors. It's not the same today. In a way, the genre and the fandom have become more commercial, and even though the art form has remained relatively constant, it seems like there's a lot more complaining going on nowadays that was unheard of in the "fandom's prime." Everybody's an expert and nobody is willing to bend their normal rules of preference in order to accept anything new. In the fandom of yesterday, it was unusual to come across a fan that wasn't die-hard, full-on, 100% in love with all things Tokusatsu; casual fans now overwhelm the really dedicated Toku buffs, and furthermore, most have little or no appreciation of or desire to seek out older shows and simply eat up whatever new product they're given every year, whether it's actually any good or not. I feel like a lot is taken for granted in a fandom where there is actually so little exposure, and honestly, I wouldn't be upset if tomorrow I woke up and the message boards had gone back to being a handful of eager fans with the same interests providing interesting discussion about something they enjoy rather than a bunch of ungrateful, barely-literate middle school students trying to prove how much smarter or cooler they are than everyone else.

 

[Aoiblue]

Lol, I was just reading that XD
Anyway, I wasn't here during the "Japan Hero" era, so I wouldnt know how the fandom felt back then. But, knowing that it's less hectic then it is now, I kinda wish I joined JH a long time ago.
I'm just glad we're not like the anime comminuty though...

 

[Kain]

With me personally I try to watch whatever I can get my hands on and will put more priority on the older stuff, just happens that more often then not the older stuff is harder to find since most sub groups seem to like playing follow the leader and just di whatever new stuff we get during the year.

That said I could never really warm up to Japan Hero but I judge sites by the quality of their rpg sections so who knows

 

[Aoi Kurenai]

I sorta agree with Bolt, but...at the same time, I don't exactly thing it's a bad thing. What I've always wanted was a massive tokusatsu fandom that I could be a part of, I sorta see a lot of people being blinded by "nostalgia goggles" as well when I've seen discussions like this in the past. Back then it seemed like everything had to be a super massive well thought out discussion, one of the reasons I was mostly a lurker on certain boards was because it was hard to have fun. I actually felt really freaking intimidated posting at JapanHero because it felt like I couldn't jump into any discussions, you were a die-hard fan or you weren't part of the conversation is how it seemed. Though it's not as bad now, I remember Rangerboard being a rather hostile environment where you couldn't step on certain people's toes or even even be allowed much room for leniency if you said a rather clueless comment without having people jump all over you.

The one downside that I do see to the growth of the fandom is the influx of members who just...well as bolt said it, are barely literate middle schoolers. But for every few members like that, there are more that I think contribute to the fandom. I do get annoyed that there are certain people who won't seek out certain shows because of their age or because they aren't Rider or Sentai, but...well is that really different from a lot of the members in the older days? I can recall tons of members who wanted nothing to do with Heisei Kamen Rider shows (y'know, back when there was all this old gen, new gen stuff). The only thing that has changed for me is the fact that it doesn't feel as "fresh" anymore, but that's just how it felt when I first got into the fandom and was so incredibly new to me. I remember hunting down and insanely small encode of the first Kamen Rider episode and freaking loved it because finding anything older than Kuuga was hard at the time (but hey! We have the entire series uploaded now!). This feeling used to pop back to me every winter when shows were coming to an end for the year and the new ones were about to start up, so that was good enough to make me look forward to new stuff, though it wasn't a feeling I've gotten this year at all actually.

...and yeah, I do think a lot of the fandom growth is because of HJU. It was really one of the first boards that wasn't JapanHero or Rangerboard that grew large and felt more like a community to me than others. More members gravitated towards the forums and found different things to enjoy, it's not the perfect forum, but it's definitely the best forum I've ever had a long term stay at. As much as I hate to say it, a lot of members are JapanHero are pretty much jaded and seem to think themselves to be superior to other boards because of certain members here and at other places that stifle discussion at times. Rangerboard is just...still a pretty antagonistic place as well, I feel like HJU is the one and only place in the fandom I can feel at home and have all sorts of tokusatsu related discussions with, from serious, in-depth ones to people just goofing off and enjoying the company of other members. That's a plethora of discussion types I've never seen too often at other boards.

Though if I had to put out one nitpick, it's that there aren't as many good fanfics in the fandom anymore. Yeah, that's my little nitpick, otherwise I think this is really the golden age of the fandom for English speakers.

 

[Black Ranger RX]

While I agree that there are other cool shows from Japan to discover, say.. Winspector, Gridman, Cybercops, Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon, Kikaida, the list goes on.. I guess the popularity come from Power Rangers. Most people seem to like to talk about Sentai because it's the original Japanese version of Power Rangers, and Kamen Rider, well "WHAT? Masked Rider was also a Japanese show?!!".

 

[Bolt]

I agree with most of that Ryou, but I think the reason has more to do with the HJU forum itself and the temperaments of the people running it than with the era of the fandom. This is still the only Toku board on the internet that is this relaxed about most of its rules and requirements; in fact, as fans have "wisened" and become more numerable, I've found that treatment on other forums becomes more tense, not the other way around. There was some superiority floating around Japan Hero, but there's double that much here and mostly from people who don't have anything to boast about. Everybody's so busy trying to be ironic and play favorites that it gets to the point where there's a lot of great shows, and fun, being missed out on.

 

[Kenori]

Why should I be forced to slog through something I just generally do not enjoy, just because its considered "tokusatsu". Its one of the other reasons I stopped watching anime before it became all mainstream and cool. If I don't like something, I'm not going to watch or support that thing, regardless of what it is. I don't really like giant men fighting each other. Kamen Rider RARELY has this, and I usually just zone out during Super Sentai's giant zord fights. I know this is a thinly veiled bitch about Ultraman, and thats all Ultraman is: Giant men beating the **** out of each other. Thats not to say that the story is inferior or anything like that, from what I've seen the story isn't that bad, but the action has never held my attention, and thats something that will make me drop a series quick fast and in a hurry (Just ask Kiva's jazz hands). Maybe that makes me shallow, maybe not, but I honestly don't give a ****. If you're going to cram this "BRANCH THE **** OUT!" message down my throat, you need to give me something quality that's WORTH watching to branch me out, and Ultraman; though it is quality; is just not my flavor of awesome. I'm quite frankly sick and tired of some of you people who akin us to just these most horrible of snobs because we dont like Ultraman.

Also, another reason its hard to branch out is that these shows are Japanese subbed and run for an entire year. Its SO much easier for subtitlers to commit to a series that they KNOW will get viewership than to try to branch out and do one that might not get any viewers. Its also easier for viewers to spend their precious time watching something they know they're probably gonna get a kick out of, with state of the art SFX and generally well written story (Yeah I'm gonna get flak for that, but I dont care, I love Toei's storytelling for the most part). I'm not saying non-Toei stuff is always inferior, but Toei's been in the game of mainstream toku a LOOOONG time, they're pros at this ****...

Ultimately though, whats the point? Its not like we have any kind of sayso in the material, we're not going to be influencing any decisions. So I say watch what you like and what you have time to watch, and don't listen to anyone who whines, moans, and bitches about why their favorite little niche series discussion threads dont have 100+ posts.

PS. Let me say this about the board: I wasn't here for the old days, but what I can see here is less of a Forum and more of a family. These people are like my brothers and sisters, this place is like no other forum I've ever been on before. I love you guys. So yeah, I dunno how it used to be, but I can't imagine it being better than this.

 

[Aoi Kurenai]

I agree with most of that Ryou, but I think the reason has more to do with the HJU forum itself and the temperaments of the people running it than with the era of the fandom. This is still the only Toku board on the internet that is this relaxed about most of its rules and requirements; in fact, as fans have "wisened" and become more numerable, I've found that treatment on other forums becomes more tense, not the other way around. There was some superiority floating around Japan Hero, but there's double that much here and mostly from people who don't have anything to boast about. Everybody's so busy trying to be ironic and play favorites that it gets to the point where there's a lot of great shows, and fun, being missed out on.

I suppose that attitude doesn't bother me too much here because I think a lot of people like that will eventually change because they're still rather new to the fandom. The reason it bothers me a lot at JapanHero is because I see a lot of older members just jaded with the fact that since the fandom has grown, different types of people have made their way in. I certainly see a lot of members here that irk me at times because of that attitude you mentioned, but I tend to think it's not as prevalent as the members who don't know a lot and are willing to discuss and learn, the members who know more than average, and the members I'd really consider "gurus" of the fandom...though I only consider two members at HJU to fall into that zone.

And speaking of people who boast when they're undeserving of it, I...really see that attitude a lot in the person who wrote that article, maybe not in the article itself, but he's the self-freaking-proclaimed king of the fandom and something about that just strikes me as arrogant.

Also, another reasons its hard to branch out is that these shows are Japanese subbed and run for an entire year. Its SO much easier for subtitlers to commit to a series that they KNOW will get viewership than to try to branch out and do one that might not get any viewers. Its also easier for viewers to spend their precious time watching something they know they're probably gonna get a kick out of, with state of the art SFX and generally well written story (Yeah I'm gonna get flak for that, but I dont care, I love Toei's storytelling for the most part). I'm not saying non-Toei stuff is always inferior, but Toei's been in the game of mainstream toku a LOOOONG time, they're pros at this ****...

Personally, I liked it when CGI was practical and didn't overtake the show to the point where a lot of stunts were poorly done CGI models of the characters. As for Toei being in the game for such a long time...so what? Tsuburaya has been in it for much longer, so why don't people love Ultraman? I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that 90% of this fandom probably comes from Power Rangers and find it hard to step out of Sentai, and if they do, they tend to only be able to do it with Kamen Rider because it's seen as a sister show. Toei shows are good, but when placed against other tokusatsu, I think non-Toei shows tend to be better, heck, K-Tai Sousakan 7 was probably one of my favorite tokusatsu in the last ten years and that's insanely far from Toei.

Though, that's just my opinion, I'll gladly state it, but I don't want to become like those people who talk about "poor ol' Ultraman" not getting enough lovin' from this part of the fandom and try to place themselves on a pedestal.

 

[Undrave]

Boohoohoo.

I don't know the JapanHero era, I wasn't there. I might have liked it, I might not. One thing for sure, ten pages essays on the symbolism in a kid show got tiring three Evangelion remakes ago.

I have other things to do in life than hunt and watch every Toku show around, I got a horrible machine that can't handle most toku that's up on Youtube to begin with... I'm gonna prioritize what I like and just dump what I don't. Sure I could go look for Winspector, that looks cool, I could go give some other Ultra show a spin or maybe some Showa era series.

Sure I could, its not that I don't want to or discriminate. It just a pain in the backside, for me, to find them and sometimes you can't find the whole show in subs.

Yes because I LIKE to understand what I'm watching. Sure I'd LOVE to take classes and learn Japanese but I don't have the ressources right now and I can't find a decent place to learn in this town so lay off.

This place is FUN! Its a community, we can goof off, we can relax, we can make jokes, we can be ourselves.

I don't care what stuffy, snobby old timey fans have to say about it! I ive in the now, not in some idyllic past that probably wasn't that cool.