The Age of Discovery for Japanese Anime: Part 1 (The 80s Anime Scene)

I write various articles related to the 80s, but this time I would like to write a "note" about 80s anime.
Please forgive me if this gets a bit geeky!

Recent anime is truly amazing, isn't it?
In the Japanese film industry, it is almost exclusively anime films that are hitting mega-hits one after another, exceeding 10 billion yen in box office revenue.
Also, terrestrial anime has demon-like high quality.
Since works that can be called movie-level are being broadcast, I am truly grateful to the production staff.

Perhaps, even by world standards, I think Japanese anime is of quite high quality, but that means it has diverse entertainment value that can be enjoyed by various generations, while also being established as a business.
There is no doubt that this is what has created the current prosperity.

Speaking of such Japanese anime, in an era when ratings like R15+ were not yet established as they are now...
An era where various "adventures" were carried out, such as "experimental works that put authorship to the fore," "works that tried to expand the scope of restrictions," and "works that pioneered new genres," while repeating various trial and error...
There is an era that should truly be called the Age of Discovery for Japanese anime.

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As a boy, I was practically raised on sci-fi anime set in space, such as "Space Battleship Yamato," "Galaxy Express 999," and "Mobile Suit Gundam."
Fortunately, I feel that as I grew up, the target age range of the anime works being produced also broadened.

Of course, as I moved up in grade, I stopped watching childish works, but because the theatrical versions of "Yamato" and "Gundam" were big hits, many works aimed at junior high and high school students and university students, not just children, began to be produced.

By the way, if you summarize the anime films and OVA works of that time, it becomes a chronology like this.

When you line them up, it looks like a pretty fun era, doesn't it?
The theatrical version of "Mobile Suit Gundam" released in 1981 caused a boom that became a social phenomenon, in 1983 Kadokawa Pictures entered the anime market with "Harmagedon," and in 1984, "Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind" by director Hayao Miyazaki, which would later lead to Ghibli, was released.
The first half of the 80s was when anime films established themselves as a business and the entire anime world became lively.

Furthermore, with the spread of home video, sell-through videos and rental videos were commercialized, and anime works that were neither TV nor movies, but only for video, so-called "Original Video Animation (OVA)" also appeared.
I think the establishment of this "OVA" style is the foundation for the current prosperity of Japanese anime.

Speaking of ratings at the time, the only line drawn was for adults (18+), so unlike TV, OVA with fewer "restrictions" ended up producing a wide variety of works.
While the ambiguity of ratings often caused controversy and the ethics of the creators were often questioned, there were also many works where young creators fully demonstrated their authorship.

In this article, I will introduce the works produced at that time that were impressive to me by dividing them into three lines: the "■ Mamoru Oshii Line," the "■ GAINAX Line," and the "■ 'Neo Tokyo' Line."

■ Mamoru Oshii Line

First, I will introduce the line of director Mamoru Oshii, who is popular for his quirky direction.
He was a director who had already gained a certain reputation with the TV anime "Urusei Yatsura," but it was the theatrical version "Urusei Yatsura 2: Beautiful Dreamer" where he truly showed his worth.

"Urusei Yatsura 2: Beautiful Dreamer" 1984.2

Director: Mamoru Oshii
Production: Studio Deen

It depicted the boundary between dreams and reality, and it was really interesting.
However, it is a famous episode that it was poorly received by the original author, Rumiko Takahashi, because the Mamoru Oshii style was just too strong.

While his reputation grew further with this "Urusei Yatsura 2," the next project Mamoru Oshii took on was a work called "Angel's Egg," which was considered a controversial film when it was released in 1985.

"Angel's Egg" 1985.12

Director: Mamoru Oshii
Production: Studio Deen

As for why it was controversial, this work isn't really much of an entertainment piece. I can understand the avant-garde aspect, but it was just too cryptic... My honest opinion when I first watched it was that I didn't really understand it.
Since the highly popular illustrator Yoshitaka Amano was involved in the original concept, you can enjoy it if you view it as "a mythological world by Yoshitaka Amano directed by Oshii," but it is a work that is surprising just for the fact that it was released as a commercial film.

... After this "Angel's Egg," there is a story that Mamoru Oshii stopped receiving anime offers and disappeared for a while, but in '87, he returned with a low-key (no offense!) OVA.

"Twilight Q: Labyrinth Object FILE538" 1987.8

Director: Mamoru Oshii
Production: Studio Deen

This is the second installment of a self-contained series called "Twilight Q," which depicts a mysterious world similar to "Ultra Q."
The structure, which progresses through the monologue of a dull middle-aged man, is truly a work with the full-blown "Oshii touch," but it's something that is accepted as an OVA rather than a movie.
Well, this series was canceled after this second installment, so I don't think many people remember it, but the connection with the producer of this project would lead to the next work, "Mobile Police Patlabor."

"Mobile Police Patlabor" 1988.4~

Director: Mamoru Oshii
Production: Studio Deen
Original Work: Headgear

It was a series that released one episode at a time for a total of six episodes, and it is one of the masterpieces of "OVA" works.
This work was groundbreaking in that it included commercials separate from the main story, was sold at a low price of 4,800 yen, and was a media mix project where the manga and anime ran in parallel.
As for the anime, rather than being about police robots, it felt more like a slapstick comedy about the people belonging to the same unit.
However, in the 5th and 6th episodes toward the end of the series, it depicted a serious battle of wits against a group trying to stage a coup, which was an unexpected development but very interesting.
Because "Mobile Police Patlabor" was so popular, it went on to become a long-running franchise with movies, TV anime, novels, new OVA series, live-action film adaptations, and more.

The original creator, Headgear, is a planning group for this "Patlabor," and it is a group formed by manga artist Masami Yuki and mecha designer Yutaka Izubuchi joining forces with the "Urusei Yatsura" team, including screenwriter Kazunori Ito, character designer Akemi Takada, and director Mamoru Oshii.
Well, I think it was precisely because it was Headgear that it turned into a work with an exquisite balance between entertainment value and Mamoru Oshii's artistic style.
As an aside, screenwriter Kazunori Ito, who contributed significantly to the story, would later go on to create the "Heisei Gamera Trilogy."

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Now, although it falls outside of this Mamoru Oshii line, there is one more OVA I would like to introduce.

"Black Magic M-66" 1987.6

Director: Masamune Shirow, Hiroyuki Kitakubo
Production: Animate Film, AIC

This work was produced with manga artist Masamune Shirow, who had gained enthusiastic support at the time for "Appleseed," as the original creator, director, and screenwriter, and it was a work that caused quite a stir among my friends.
It was an era before CG, but it was a work made with quite a lot of attention to detail, such as the movements of the runaway android and the camera work.

After this, Masamune Shirow began the serialization of "Ghost in the Shell," and the film adaptation of that original work by Mamoru Oshii, "GHOST IN THE SHELL," would go on to be acclaimed worldwide, but it was in this 80s era that the signs of that were first seen.

<GHOST IN THE SHELL, November 1995>

Director: Mamoru Oshii
Production: Production I.G
Original Work: Masamune Shirow

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I said I would divide the works that left an impression on me into three lines, but since I love Mamoru Oshii so much, I got carried away and wrote too much, and this line alone has become quite long...
Actually, I have been writing this article little by little for quite a long time, so the remaining two lines also have a fair amount of volume.
Therefore, I would like to split it up and move the remaining two lines to the second part.

(Anime-related note)

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