Explaining this two-video collection
(officially known as "Grafitti of the Otaku Generation 1982 and 1985")
is difficult if you're a non-anime fan, but if you salivate at the thought of
animation conventions; if your closet has enough anime T-shirts to clothe a third-world
country; if the shelves in your living room are no longer enough to hold your
video collection; if you know every opening theme song from Ranma by heart
-- well, then, you'll have no trouble recognizing the thrust of this OVA. For
Otaku no Video is nothing less than the chronicle of what it means to be
an animation fan -- and all the obsessive, nerdy, anti-social, nutty, and ultimately
liberating behavior which accompanies such a designation.A thinly diguised history of Gainax Studios (The Wings of Honneamise, Neon Genesis Evangelion), the series follows the extraordinary Kubo, who at the beginning is just your average guy -- studying hard for college, wowing the girls, and comfortably set on a path which will lead to a lucrative career and steady life. But Kubo runs into Takashi, an old high school buddy and anime fanatic, and the rest is easy to predict -- a slow decent into television-watching hysteria, costume parties, model building, and social ostracization. But not to worry, because Kubo has one overriding destiny -- to be the "Ota-king" who will lionize anime and preserve it for all future generations to enjoy.
Spliced into Kubo's personal odyssey through Anime Hell and Heaven are a series
of "authentic," live-action interviews in which the subjects' faces
and voices are digitally altered. In each section, we see a portion of the infamous
anime underground "community," whether it be the successful businessman
who grows agitated when confronted with pictures of himself in anime drag, the
wargames-monger with an affinity for painstakingly detailed weapons, a "cel
thief" who sneaks into studios and steals the original drawings for sale
on the black market, or the overweight garage-kit builder who ogles over his cute
girl figurines while his house and life fall into disrepair. It's somewhat difficult
to know how to respond to these vignettes: are they tongue-in-cheek representations?
A sarcastic indictment of the craziness of otakus? A tell-it-like-it-is documentary?
No matter. If you've spent any time at all with or in anime fandom, you'll have
a ball picking out your favorite shows in the animated sections while wincing/laughing
at the live-action bits. The first episode, which is more firmly grounded in "reality," is sharper and funnier, although "Grafitti of the Otaku Generation 1985" also has its moments. The animation, as befitting a project such as this, is colorful, slick, and entertaining, full of passages which defy conventional description and comedy. Perhaps no review can capture the true zaniness of Otaku no Video; watch it and make your lifestyle choice -- crazy, diehard anime rebel or staid and boring normal person?
Note: be prepared to pause the VCR at various points in order to catch the wealth of information and peripheral details that the video presents.