AHC: An anime as popular as the Simpsons in the US

RousseauX

Donor
The Simpsons was a cornerstone of American culture for more than a decade before fizzing out in the 2000s. Frankly I don't think something like the Simpsons will ever be achieved again simply because of how diffused our media market has become and it's getting harder and harder getting everyone to watch one thing.

How can we get an anime to have the same level of cultural impact/popularity? What would this hypothetical anime look like?

The closest thing I can think of otl was Pokemon, but Pokemon was also very exclusively watched by kids, whereas the Simpsons reached across generations and age groups.
 
Last edited:

TRH

From what I've seen with Pokemon and other dubs having to deal with a truckload of puns and references that only make sense to a Japanese audience, I think the fundamental problem here is that anime is written for that specific audience. You can't have an anime be as big in the US as the Simpsons because the Simpsons writes its jokes to land for an American audience while an anime won't. And if you did write for a Western audience, then at what point does it stop being an anime and just become a cartoon with anime influences?
 

LeX

Maybe the better question is actually "why is anime as popular as it is?" Logically, rather than Japanese pop culture, it should be something from the UK or continental Europe that gains a following in the US, even as a niche market . But those countries hardly produce anything (okay, there's the Beatles) that becomes popular among Americans, despite being comparable to Japan as large, wealthy US allies.
 

TRH

LeX said:
Maybe the better question is actually "why is anime as popular as it is?" Logically, rather than Japanese pop culture, it should be something from the UK or continental Europe that gains a following in the US, even as a niche market . But those countries hardly produce anything (okay, there's the Beatles) that becomes popular among Americans, despite being comparable to Japan as large, wealthy US allies.
Click to expand...

Not just the Beetles. Popular music in general is something where the US imports a lot from the UK and Sweden and sometimes from elsewhere on the continent as well, while Japanese stuff crosses over very rarely.
 
Math

Math

Otakuninja2006 said:
Maybe an American-Japanese co-produced anime is the way to go?
Click to expand...
Well it wouldn't be out of this world, we had nippo-italian productions in the 80's like topo gigio animation, We also had tms do some episodes of Batman tas, But how would this anime be, it would have to be something innovative or at least break the mainstream of American animation at the time (like dragon ball did with its frenetic fighting action) If it's something more of the same, it Probably end up failing, Maybe a sport anime? It's not that violent, could it be in the 90's, with basketball at its peak, a slam dunk rip off?.
 

LeX

Otakuninja2006 said:
Maybe an American-Japanese co-produced anime is the way to go?
Click to expand...
Maybe in the 1980s or 1990s an animated version of some popular young adult novel is produced as such a binational collaboration, it does really well, and then the industry keeps adapting YA fiction using Japanese illustrators.
 
Aluma

Aluma

Half-jokingly suggestion:

Mook Animation, a japanese studio, animated the Scooby Doo movies for quite a while which would make them Anime in the most literal sense of the word~

The franchise also has been around since 1969 and is as close as you can get to the Simpsons in popularity

Maybe if the original séries had been outsourced to a similar studio from the get go Scooby-Doo as a whole would be an "american anime" :p

And a 53 years old one at that
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top
Top