Watching cartoons for research.
More thoughts on Gunpowder development, in relation to anime. Caution: long blather including costume and race stuff.
Right, so everyone knows Kurosawa did “The Seven Samurai”, and then it was redone with cowboys ala “The Magnificent Seven”. I’m currently watching Samurai 7, an anime remake closely akin to Kurosawa’s version... except that it’s, yes THE FUTURE. This is a prime example of the future is the past thing. There are still peasants growing rice, but now the bandits are giant flying robots (not the air-castle things in that previous picture, though). The visual aesthetic is about 80% feudal Japan, but with a hefty dose of technology that places it some kind of steampunky arena. Thus there are cyborg assassins and mechs and lasers and whatnot, all amid swords and bows and tatami mats.
One of the most interesting aspects of this is costume; or rather, since I’m slightly obsessed with costume, it’s something I latch onto. Anyway, here the fusion of various periods and cultures is more evident. A lot of the people, especially the background extras, tend to wear either very traditional Japanese attire, or generic spaceport gear (Mos Eisley kinda stuff). However, the main cast have a really eclectic mix of styles. (They work well and stand out, even in silhouette.) Perhaps the most noteworthy is Katsushiro. His outfit is a hybrid of Japanese garb and Napoleonic uniform. Interestingly, one of the more “traditional”-looking costume appears on the most “future”-esque character - Kikuchiyo, the mechanical samurai. (And even his look is blended with 18th century touches.)
It’s nice to have a certain part of history to ground the visuals in; knowing where you’re coming from gives you much firmer footing for fancy riffs and mashups. My inclination is to fall back on Victoriana, because a.) I love it so, and b.) I’ve done loads and loads of research on it. But then this will end up turning into steampunk, and as much as I adore that genre, it’s too close to MM and I’m doing Something Different for this project. I’m rather reluctant to draw on the actual historical setting of the Gunpowder Plot (1600s), as it’s not a particular favorite of mine by a long shot. Also, I don’t want this to look merely like Stuart England equipped with rayguns. Still, I should look at it and see what happens. At any rate, I’ve got to work out a modified aesthetic. Of course, this goes back to the necessity of choosing (or inventing) a genre/setting, argh.
On a related note, another visual and - perhaps more importantly - conceptual thing I need to figure out is how to “cast” the characters. I’ve already decided to include females, so there’s nothing to fuss with there. But now comes the ever-so prickly issue of ethnicity. I’ve already rambled a little bit about this whilst discussing the Western Wotsit, but this is a slightly different case. The story deals with polarized sides, oppression, terrorism... and the last thing I want to do is to have it turn into a hamfisted allegorical propagandistic farce. With the original setting, it was at least somewhat simpler, being essentially English against English. (There was, of course, stuff going on with the Spanish and Italians, but that’s besides the point right now, and the people actually involved in the Plot itself - both sides - were all English.)
With my project, I do NOT want this to become some kind of soapboxing, which is difficult given the current state of world affairs. But also, there’s just the fact that race/ethnicity is so dang loaded. I don’t care what people say - it’s the first thing we notice and there’s just so much ingrained, preconceived notions attached to it that we’re likely not even aware of. So it becomes almost impossible to blithely cast anything - but especially a highly visual medium like comics - without any regard to ethnicity. I suppose that’s why people (including me) so often default to “generic Caucasian”... white is the closest to a blank slate. But with a future setting, particularly one wrought of hybridization and cultural mingling, it would be weird (not to mention rather boring) to have a blandly all-white cast.
Samurai 7 does an ok job with this, actually. Given anime’s propensity for either totally European characters or its own trademark bizarre “race” of anime-ness (i.e. giant eyes and spiky hair, both of wholly unnatural colors - that kinda thing), the main characters comprise a respectable mix. The peasants and Katsushiro are anime-y, yet basically Asian. There are three fair-skinned, Caucasian-looking characters (Kyuzo, Hayashida, and Shichiroji). There’s the robot, which, I suppose could count as an ethnicity - mechanical. And there are two darker-skinned characters of indeterminate ethnicity (Kambei and Gorobei). The background characters are also a fairly decent variety, at least as far as I can see from the brief glimpses.
I think mixed-race is the way to go for my comic; with uncertain ethnicity, I can avoid bringing extraneous and inappropriate “messages” to the story and characters. It may sound like I’m being paranoid, but I think it truly is a reality (unfortunate as it may be) that people cannot help applying judgment or presuppositions to ethnic figures. Even if one goes about constructing a painstakingly PC and rainbow-riffic cast, there are going to be questions and assumptions and stereotypes.
Say I make Catesby (the plot ringleader) black - this could bring up issues of civil rights activism and “angry black men” and slavery and etc. If I make Percy (the inside man) Asian, that brings up stuff like questionable loyalty in wartime, or - since he’s a member of the royal bodyguard - it falls back on the mysterious martial artist cliché. And heaven forbid I make anyone Middle Eastern, omg. However, if mixed-race is my avoidance tactic, then a lot depends on my ability to render ambiguous yet convincing ethnicity. That... could be hard.
Eh. Maybe I am being paranoid, and all this is just totally unnecessarily fretting. But I’m hung up on developing my character designs, so my brain is running off on stuff like this. I know these concerns are nothing nobody’s said before, but you know me: dead horse, beating, etc. Or, as with this case, more like tediously poking at said horse with a ten-foot pole. Ok, gonna stop now before the metaphors get even more out of control.
p.s. My sleeping is already screwy enough without it being UK Daylight Savings Time. Or "British Summer Time." Why is it called that? It sure ain't summer, brrrr. Also, universe: why are you stealing an hour of my sleep? It's not like I manage to partake of it much. Gaaaahhhhh.
Right, so everyone knows Kurosawa did “The Seven Samurai”, and then it was redone with cowboys ala “The Magnificent Seven”. I’m currently watching Samurai 7, an anime remake closely akin to Kurosawa’s version... except that it’s, yes THE FUTURE. This is a prime example of the future is the past thing. There are still peasants growing rice, but now the bandits are giant flying robots (not the air-castle things in that previous picture, though). The visual aesthetic is about 80% feudal Japan, but with a hefty dose of technology that places it some kind of steampunky arena. Thus there are cyborg assassins and mechs and lasers and whatnot, all amid swords and bows and tatami mats.
One of the most interesting aspects of this is costume; or rather, since I’m slightly obsessed with costume, it’s something I latch onto. Anyway, here the fusion of various periods and cultures is more evident. A lot of the people, especially the background extras, tend to wear either very traditional Japanese attire, or generic spaceport gear (Mos Eisley kinda stuff). However, the main cast have a really eclectic mix of styles. (They work well and stand out, even in silhouette.) Perhaps the most noteworthy is Katsushiro. His outfit is a hybrid of Japanese garb and Napoleonic uniform. Interestingly, one of the more “traditional”-looking costume appears on the most “future”-esque character - Kikuchiyo, the mechanical samurai. (And even his look is blended with 18th century touches.)
It’s nice to have a certain part of history to ground the visuals in; knowing where you’re coming from gives you much firmer footing for fancy riffs and mashups. My inclination is to fall back on Victoriana, because a.) I love it so, and b.) I’ve done loads and loads of research on it. But then this will end up turning into steampunk, and as much as I adore that genre, it’s too close to MM and I’m doing Something Different for this project. I’m rather reluctant to draw on the actual historical setting of the Gunpowder Plot (1600s), as it’s not a particular favorite of mine by a long shot. Also, I don’t want this to look merely like Stuart England equipped with rayguns. Still, I should look at it and see what happens. At any rate, I’ve got to work out a modified aesthetic. Of course, this goes back to the necessity of choosing (or inventing) a genre/setting, argh.
On a related note, another visual and - perhaps more importantly - conceptual thing I need to figure out is how to “cast” the characters. I’ve already decided to include females, so there’s nothing to fuss with there. But now comes the ever-so prickly issue of ethnicity. I’ve already rambled a little bit about this whilst discussing the Western Wotsit, but this is a slightly different case. The story deals with polarized sides, oppression, terrorism... and the last thing I want to do is to have it turn into a hamfisted allegorical propagandistic farce. With the original setting, it was at least somewhat simpler, being essentially English against English. (There was, of course, stuff going on with the Spanish and Italians, but that’s besides the point right now, and the people actually involved in the Plot itself - both sides - were all English.)
With my project, I do NOT want this to become some kind of soapboxing, which is difficult given the current state of world affairs. But also, there’s just the fact that race/ethnicity is so dang loaded. I don’t care what people say - it’s the first thing we notice and there’s just so much ingrained, preconceived notions attached to it that we’re likely not even aware of. So it becomes almost impossible to blithely cast anything - but especially a highly visual medium like comics - without any regard to ethnicity. I suppose that’s why people (including me) so often default to “generic Caucasian”... white is the closest to a blank slate. But with a future setting, particularly one wrought of hybridization and cultural mingling, it would be weird (not to mention rather boring) to have a blandly all-white cast.
Samurai 7 does an ok job with this, actually. Given anime’s propensity for either totally European characters or its own trademark bizarre “race” of anime-ness (i.e. giant eyes and spiky hair, both of wholly unnatural colors - that kinda thing), the main characters comprise a respectable mix. The peasants and Katsushiro are anime-y, yet basically Asian. There are three fair-skinned, Caucasian-looking characters (Kyuzo, Hayashida, and Shichiroji). There’s the robot, which, I suppose could count as an ethnicity - mechanical. And there are two darker-skinned characters of indeterminate ethnicity (Kambei and Gorobei). The background characters are also a fairly decent variety, at least as far as I can see from the brief glimpses.
I think mixed-race is the way to go for my comic; with uncertain ethnicity, I can avoid bringing extraneous and inappropriate “messages” to the story and characters. It may sound like I’m being paranoid, but I think it truly is a reality (unfortunate as it may be) that people cannot help applying judgment or presuppositions to ethnic figures. Even if one goes about constructing a painstakingly PC and rainbow-riffic cast, there are going to be questions and assumptions and stereotypes.
Say I make Catesby (the plot ringleader) black - this could bring up issues of civil rights activism and “angry black men” and slavery and etc. If I make Percy (the inside man) Asian, that brings up stuff like questionable loyalty in wartime, or - since he’s a member of the royal bodyguard - it falls back on the mysterious martial artist cliché. And heaven forbid I make anyone Middle Eastern, omg. However, if mixed-race is my avoidance tactic, then a lot depends on my ability to render ambiguous yet convincing ethnicity. That... could be hard.
Eh. Maybe I am being paranoid, and all this is just totally unnecessarily fretting. But I’m hung up on developing my character designs, so my brain is running off on stuff like this. I know these concerns are nothing nobody’s said before, but you know me: dead horse, beating, etc. Or, as with this case, more like tediously poking at said horse with a ten-foot pole. Ok, gonna stop now before the metaphors get even more out of control.
p.s. My sleeping is already screwy enough without it being UK Daylight Savings Time. Or "British Summer Time." Why is it called that? It sure ain't summer, brrrr. Also, universe: why are you stealing an hour of my sleep? It's not like I manage to partake of it much. Gaaaahhhhh.