Sakayume - Gundam Wing

Gundam Wing | Quatre

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Gundam Wing was my first official foray into otakudom. I'd sampled snatches of anime here and there, comprised mostly of badly dubbed ten-year-old series and obscure titles stocked by local video stores. I was instantly captured by Shukou Murase's character designs, which were a major departure from the grossly simplified, grotesquely exaggerated, flat 2-D animation art that is standard in american productions. At the time, in fact, I was attending a private art school and studying animation with an already 12-year-old ambition to enter into the field, inspired by the artistry and surrealism of early Disney films such as "Bambi".

Unfortunately I became disillusioned by the methods and direction of contemporary animation industries, who value output far and away above aesthetic (quantity over quality) and contend that traditional (non computer) animation should become obsolete in the very near future. They instruct artists to construct characters from simple shapes (such as pieces of fruit) requiring minimal lines ("avoid angles and joints") in order to expedite drawing time. They advise that children are not a critical audience, and grade down for unnecessary detail.

Needless to say, writing in american animation is held to the same (anti-)standard. Gundam Wing defied everything that my loathed professors preached daily, and I was inevitably obsessed.