As publishers realised that animation magazines were a viable market, more and more standalone magazines appeared, each with its own interesting niche.
Examples not introduced thus far include Animedia (Gakken), which targeted younger readers and was more focused on illustrations and visuals than deep, thought-provoking articles. Gakken is recognised as a provider of educational material for children, largely via the manga format and so parents may have been convinced by the company logo that Animedia would provide the most whole some content, suitable for their children as a reward for their hard work at school (Gakken, 2016). Another example is Animec (Rapport), which started as the eponymous shop’s own publication and ended up with nationwide circulation. The magazine was otaku-centric, catering to hardcore fans, and refrained from explaining basic concepts, preferring to hold discussions with creators and producers. Animec made bold attempts at critique, pondered the viability of a theory of animation as a genre and discussed media influences.
Other public ations, like My Anime and The Anime, appeared soon after these were established.
Combined, these anime magazines painted a fairly accurate cross-section of animation viewership, with most subgroups serviced. Manga magazines still featured anime-related content within their pages, even though Manga Shōnen ended and was replaced by Duo in 1981. The soaring popularity of animators themselves led to the publication of magazines such as Manga Animec, a spin-off
of Animec, featuring comics by Yūki Masami (Mobile Police Patlabor) and others, and The Motion Comic, which serialised manga by animators with celebrity status, such as Mikimoto Haruhiko (Super Dimension Fortress Macross), Itano Ichirō (Mobile Suit Gundam), Hirano Toshihiro (Iczer-1), who is now known as Hirano Toshiki, and Kanada Yoshinori (whose Birth comic series ran in these pages before its release as an OVA/feature film in 1984). The Motion Comic, in particular, due to its roster of artists mostly working for animation studio Artland, often featured columns on what was happening in the studio, with comical anecdotes by the president Ishiguro Noboru and other staff members (The Motion Comic, 1984).
During these boom years, anime magazines played several roles, which may be summarised in three categories: ‘world-building’, ‘critique’ and ‘community’.
World-building refers to the use of magazines to present information that fills in gaps in the anime work, while critique refers to the critical and sometimes controversial content of anime magazines in relation to individual works, or the media itself and its position within society. The category of community, which intimately ties manga and anime fandom, will be discussed below.
Manga, Anime, and ‘Community’
The use of magazines to foster a sense of community refers to a framework of relationships between fans (readers), creators and writers, as illustrated in Figure 3.1.
Figure 3.1. The flow of ‘fans’ in the 1977–1986 period.
One of the aims of magazines such as Out and Animec was to cultivate links between viewers/readers (fans), editors and production staff. Readers of these magazines could appreciate the content because of the synergy between the fans and the writers. That is not to say that all fans made the transition to becoming producers, but their relationship was very much reciprocal. For instance, out of necessity, the editorial departments of early anime magazines were made up of fans. Higher management were of a different generation.
During the 1977–1983 boom, fans worked within the anime industry itself, since they too were from the Terebi-kun generation, having been influenced as children by television and anime, while the producers of the anime shows they grew up with only had manga.
Kawamori Shōji, the creator of Super Dimension Fortress Macross, and Izubuchi Yutaka, the director of Space Cruiser Yamato 2199 (the 2012 remake of the original series), were often seen on the pages of Animec describing what they enjoyed about science fiction or other such topics, before most people even knew who they were (both have become industry icons) (Animec, 1981, pp.
36–37). Kawamori, Izubuchi and others, such as Mikimoto Haruhiko, knew the readership intimately, since they themselves had been part of fan circles and had produced amateur fanzines. There was a reciprocal sense of appreciation: a very ‘inclusive’ environment for all involved (Tsuji, 2012, p. 389).
As well as the aforementioned columns by animators and producers them-selves, the participatory nature of this framework also led to readers having many opportunities to contribute to magazines. Animec, once again, led the field by sometimes publishing entire interviews of staff members conducted by readers, some of them high-school aged.
The ‘lighter’ magazines, such as The Anime, had community pages with sections where readers would post ‘wanted’ and ‘for trade’ messages or invite other readers to their fan clubs. This community concept was further em-phasised in later magazines, such as Animec’s sister magazine, Fanroad, which was predominantly made up of fan-produced artwork, parodying anime and manga works, much like a collection of dōjinshi. In fact, as a testament to the importance of community in the world of anime and manga, this Fanroad formula has survived through the decades and outlived its parent publication.
Break Time was a short-lived, self-styled ‘industry magazine’, which provided insights into the workings of animation studios and acted as an
educational resource for anime fans looking to find their way into the industry.
The second issue published a large feature on employment opportunities within the animation industry. A photograph shows a young visitor to an animation studio, clutching a paper envelope with a semi-comical speech bubble reading
‘ano… sumimasen’ (‘excuse me, may I come in?’ [lit. ‘um… excuse me’]). The caption alongside it reads: ‘Now, the path to the anime industry. Anime industry career information’. The photograph illustrates a common trend of the time – young and inexperienced fans wanted to become professionals and were literally knocking on doors, hoping for their portfolio to get a look (Break Time, 1984, p. 17). The very existence of such a magazine serves to highlight the relationship between fans and producers shown in Figure 3.1.