Chibi

[Purple Sage]

My apologies again, Mr. Sage. I realize that you want to talk about the American response to chibi, and I promise to stop digressing from the topic at hand as soon as I am done with this post.
Point taken with regard to manga in America. What I should have said was:

But the type of manga appreciated by these teens (male and female) generally involves teen or young adult characters drawn in a more realistic way.

It may interest you to know, however, that there are explicit and extremely realistic comic books in Japan. I don't know if these have a name that is different than "manga", but they are black & white drawings with cartoon-style text portraying realistic characters engaged in explicit pornographic acts.

These hard-core pornographic comic books are easily accessible to all and read openly by businessmen on Japanese trains.

LOL, nope. She just likes Harry Potter better than the cute and cuddly at the moment.

(And I have never "read" you as an old coot.... so that remark is making me smile at the moment!)

Alice

I guess it depends on how one defines 'manga'. I think of the term as referring to a style, rather than a format, but that may not be precisely correct.

Since everyone keeps focusing on the Japanese, I'm going to throw something a little more distinctly American into the mix- Bratz. The Bratz dolls and cartoons have many anime-like features- large heads and oversized eyes, notably- and are pretty heavily eroticized. They wear outfits Barbie wouldn't be caught dead at a hooker's convention in. But, beyond even this, are Bratz Babies, or some such, which are essentially Chibi Bratz- with the same tacky outfits and depraved-slut facial expressions. Is this some kind of pedophile conspiracy? Or is it a natural aesthetic that just can't be suppressed?

 

[rikaaim]

I don't know what the demographics of manga readership are, but I notice that you're not a girl, younger or not (unless that's a very misleading avatar). I haven't read Chobits, but I believe I've seen some characters from it, which appear to be cutesy/sexual- so what's your take on the appeal there? For you, not some projected 12 year old girl.

No, you're entirely right. My appeal to Chobits is entirely the story line. It's about love and if a human can truly love a robot, if in fact the robot is considered real, and how the main human's human girlfriend reacts to the whole bizare situation. That are there are tons of funny elements to what seems to be a much deeper subject matter.