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Over the years I’ve met all kinds of anime fans, both in real life and online, who love anime in different ways. I’ve come to realize that there are perhaps two main relationships to anime that fans could have…

The first main reason for liking anime is for its aesthetically pleasing or analytical elements. These fans love the discussion-inducing aspect of anime, whether it’s exalting a series for how great it is or deriding it for its flaws. They praise things like a creative story, good animation techniques, and faithfulness to the source material while condemning things like cliches, fan pandering, and poor marketing. These fans often become quite knowledgeable about things like anime directors and studios, and they often watch a variety of genres because they like to and/or it allows them to be more active in all fields of anime discussions. Their discussions are mostly comprised of things like “[insert name of anime] could have been better if [list reasons]” “[insert name of character] was flawed because [list reasons], “[insert name of studio] should have done such-and-such with [insert name of anime].” The majority of anime blogs I’ve seen tend to lean toward this way of relating to anime.

I’ve personally encountered many fans who like anime for this reason. But sometimes it seems like they spend more time talking about their criticisms or analysis of anime than simply being pleased with it. I often think “Do they truly love anime or do they just like talking about it and compartmentalizing it?” This doesn’t apply to everyone of course, and there are plenty of fans who can analyze anime but also passionately love it for whatever reason.

Which brings us to our second reason for liking anime, which is almost the opposite of the first – loving anime pretty much unconditionally. These fans have certain aspects of anime that they love, whether its a fan girl who loves bishounen or a fan boy who loves mecha or moe girls. They often don’t care to dwell on anything intellectually stimulating about anime – they just love certain characters, genres, or story elements, whether they’re cliche or not. Often times, they don’t care to watch a variety of anime genres and like to stick to the ones that have what they’re looking for. They rarely engage in any analytical discussions about anime or think about things like the competence of the staff behind the anime. They just love the anime at face-value for what it offers. Their discussions are mostly comprised of things like “[insert name of anime] was so good!,” “[insert name of character] is so cute/cool/hot/funny!” The majority of fangirling/boying/gasms and guilty pleasures come into play with relating to anime this way.

To give a personal example of this, I have a couple of friends who adore action/fantasy anime, and the occasional cool characters. They never dwell on things like narrative quality, plot flow, fan pandering, animation studios, etc,. They never read editorials or anything intellectual about anime. They just love the anime for providing what they want and don’t care about why or how.

I usually feel that I’m somewhere in between these two reasons, though I tend to lean more towards the second. I love to analyze and discuss certain anime titles and anime fandom in general, to a point at least. But on the other hand, I like 90% of the anime I’ve watched simply because of my unconditional love for anime that doesn’t need a reason other than the fact that it’s anime and has some things I like about it.

One recent example of when I was really feeling this division is when the new starter pokemon for Black & White were revealed. Me and a couple of my other friends were like “Whee, new pokemon finally! They’re so cute! I can’t wait for these games!,” while many others were like “Ugh, they’re so ugly! Why can’t Game Freak be more original? The old games were better.” To me it seems like my friends and I were looking at the new pokemon for the second reason – unconditional love – while others were looking at them for the first reason – analyzing/criticizing their creativity. I got a similar feeling during Haruhi’s “Endless Eight” fiasco. I thought that the true fan is the one who can have intellectual discussions about anime, but at the same time can passionately love it and accept it for what it is. But I feel that I’m probably just being biased.

Do you feel that the fandom is divided, more or less, between those who love the intellectually and aesthetically stimulating part of anime, and who like to analyze, criticize, and dissect anime they watch and put the fandom under a microscope, and those who love anime unconditionally and often for trivial reasons, who don’t care to dwell on any deeper aspects of it? Or do you believe that most fans exist somewhere in between these two reasons, so there’s no need to think of it this way?