Caucasoid Nippon

I remember the first time I first sat down to watch anime. The show was called Saint Seiya, and it was an odd combination of pretty boys clad in gold and silver, and much, much action. That day’s particular episode was about the protagonist’s showdown with his nemesis. I recall said protagonist looking true to his heritage given his rich chocolate hair. This was not the case with his opponent, a tall, blonde, charmingly effeminate gent sporting pink armor. Truly, for all it’s worth, I should have wondered more about this guy’s sexuality than his racial ancestry, judging from the nuances in his voice alone. Yet, his paleness was something I simply could not ignore, for everyone around me, as well seasoned watchers of the show and of anime in general, persisted that the characters, all of them, were Japanese. At the age of 9, I didn’t know whether or not the Japanese population possessed blonde or red hair. What I did know was that they did not have colorful eyes, and they certainly weren’t as large either.

Fast forward a few years, and Nima Fiend is still, as the name implies, an anime fanatic (not to be a confused with a Japanophile, by the way.) And, while the question of why there are blondes and redheads in the Japan of so many mangakas’ minds still lingers I have stumbled upon a plausible reason which would be, a lack of creative talent, or your standard run of the mill laziness. Now onwards to the proof:

This here is exhibit A:

The first girl is Aino Minako. The second is Tsukino Usagi. Both are from Naoko Takeuchi’s well known Sailor Moon. I like to notice the little technicalities like the girls’ design in traditional girl’s comics or shoujo style; tall, shimmering eyes with smaller noses and mouths. You however, should note the shared blonde hair and blue eyes on both women. For anyone who is even vaguely familiar with Sailor Moon, these faces are at least slightly recognizable, quite possibly because they are both major protagonists in the story. Everybody else will most likely spot the similarities between them save for their differing hairstyles. Just so you know, apparently both of these girls were born in Japan.

Sit around and observe more of Takeuchi’s work and chances are you’re going to see a lot of slender, cute Caucasoid girls. Unless of course, the character in question is playing the part of villain, in which instance you’ll likely spot a slight change in eye shape as well as wardrobe and cosmetic use. Beyond that, you’ll have a standard archetype; slender, tall eyed, cute; a helluva lot of times more often than not, they’ll be blue, green, violet or hazel eyed and, if they’re really supposed to be special, eye color will be heterochromatic (Negima’s Asuna anyone?) but that’s it. Take away funny pigmentation for “Japanese” people and you are effectively left with a bunch of clones. Drawing two different characters in anime and trying to adhere to a realistic Japanese rendition without diverging even slightly from anime aesthetic is, well, kind of difficult. Take it from an avid watcher of Takahashi’s Inuyasha, who has spent countless hours watching this production, observing characters like this..

..standing side by side and actually not confusing one with the other.

But wait… Perhaps some of you out there think I’m being more than a little [obnoxiously] technical. “You’re comparing two characters designed by the same artist,” you might add. “Just how do you expect for there not to be at least some resemblance between them? It’s art signature!”

Art signature indeed, for no two artists have or will ever draw in exactly the same style. Well, for the sake of that potential argument, consider the fact that art signature and anime aesthetic are two different things; while art signature is what makes Goku look like Akira Toriyama’s original creation anime aesthetic is what explains the size of his, and indeed, all anime characters’ eyes. With that in mind, let’s look at this other exhibit:

Image A is just a random girl; one of hundreds that a random Google search for anime will get you. Image B is a picture of Daidouji Tomoyo, supporting cast of CLAMP’s Card Captor Sakura. Two different artists, two different girls, ja? Not like you’d really be able to tell with an untrained eye. Both are blue eyed, both are fair skinned, both have tall eyes, and seem rather cute. Again, we see the shoujo classic style; again we see an eerie resemblance and European features. ‘Cept, these are two completely different buckets of oat. The rest explains itself.

These days, I admit I am quite obnoxious when it comes to defining what makes good anime. Storytelling, character development, plot, are all givens. However, this being anime, a venue unapologetically visual, the extra mile an artist needs to go is character design and there is simply no way around it. To have a cast of individuals in your work who all vaguely resemble each other save for hair and eye pigmentation isn’t any kind of positivity in your favor, especially when there are artists out there standing behind works like Death Note, Cowboy Bebop, Ghost in the Shell, Bleach, etc. (seriously this list goes on, way on) taking the time to develop, stylize and differentiate each character from the next from the largest to the smallest detail. They’re doing that, and doing quite the job at it.

So , if you’re not lazy, or lack creativity, why aren’t you?