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Paper for “Cultural Flows with(in) a globalising Asia.” November 29th- 1st December 2002.

THE GLOBAL FLOW OF MANGA AND ANIME: THE PAST, PRESENT

AND FUTURE.

Abstract

The history of the development of manga (Japanese comics books) and anime
(Japanese animation) is one of unique difference and ubiquitous sameness.
The ubiquity of manga and anime in Japan and the ease of their global flow
(such as Pokemon, Dragon Ball Z and Astro Boy) suggest a form that is highly
adaptable and modifiable. However, at the same time scholars and critics
consolidate manga and anime as an innovative and unique style, reinscribing
it as an essentially different from western entertainment like Hollywood or
Disney.

In this paper I look at how manga and anime cross boundaries and flow into
many communities and audiences, whilst at the same time being secured to
Japan’s rarified history and culture. I argue that the portrayal of manga
and anime as both nomadic and Japanese, commonplace and different, is a
significant paradox that has resulted in a journey of discovery and
exploration for many scholars, fans and businesses from dubbed global anime
to 'raw' Japanese manga. This is a journey that takes us from the past to
the present and into the future. From the selective framing of a native
tradition of Japanese comic art and visual culture, to its present ubiquity
in Japan and the success of ‘odourless’ (Iwabuchi, 1998) children’s
anime, to its international fan audience pushing and consolidating manga and
anime into a globally-recognised site of imaginary and phantasm. The journey
from raw manga to dubbed anime is one that takes us from the past, haunted,
orientalist vision of a ‘lost Japan’ of doubles, ghosts, death and memory
to an international Otaku (fan) culture extending from Shibuya to Melbourne
that invests in new styles, technologies, and identities, with their gaze
fixed firmly on the future.

Manga and anime, ubiquitous and different

Manga (comic-books) and anime (animation) have become Japan’s domestic and
international success story. They appear to be everywhere and in everything. In Japan
they are available from newsagents to department stores, and are read or watched by
everyone at some point in their life. Manga and anime cover all genres, styles and
themes. They can be anything from fictional romances to documentaries, the
distinctive images can turn up spray-painted onto car-bodies or used in instruction
manuals. From the 1970’s anime increasingly dominated Japan’s film industry to
“emerge as the face of Japanese film positioning Japan as the world’s undisputed
“anime superpower”.” (Kenji, 1997, p. 50). Manga and anime have spread across the
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world to become popular with adults as well as children. Anime such as Astro Boy,
Dragon Ball Z and Pokémon have been translated into many countries to become
commercially lucrative global franchises. The terms ‘manga’ and ‘anime’ have been
integrated into pop culture rhetoric. They are vilified as violent, lewd and vulgar by
critics, while adopted as an innovative new style by Hollywood film directors and fan
artists. Manga and anime’s ubiquity in Japan and the ease of their global flow
suggests products that are highly adaptable and modifiable, at least for those manga
and anime that have become popular.

However, the ubiquity and smooth global flow of popular manga and anime like Astro
Boy, Dragon Ball Z and Pokémon only provide half the story. Manga and anime are
also reinscribed as essentially different from western entertainment like Hollywood or
Disney. Manga and anime’s Japanese origins provide a rich tradition of Japanese
aesthetics. Manga and anime are secured to Japan through an accumulation of images
and styles that refer to Japanese design, food, clothing, buildings, religion, sports,
history, culture, language, and geography. The depiction of these commonplace
Japanese images and attitudes taken from culture and history endow manga and anime
with content, aesthetics and styles that are a part of a rich art heritage from kabuki
theatre to Zen art. Japan’s past and traditions exist within manga and anime’s
references to ukiyo-e woodblock prints and kabuki theatre to Japanese mythology and
festivals. The use of Japanese imagery and style distinguishes manga and anime from
other comic book and animation styles.

Manga and anime: the past, present and future

The depiction of manga and anime as both international and Japanese, free flowing
and fixed, commonplace and unique is a paradox that has prompted a journey that
takes us from the past to the present and into the future. From the selective framing of
a native tradition of Japanese comic art and visual culture, to its present ubiquity in
Japan and the success of heavily domesticated children’s anime, to its emerging
international fan audience pushing and consolidating manga and anime into a
globally-recognised site of imaginary and phantasm.

Raw manga and dubbed anime

Dubbed anime and raw manga represent two different ends of the manga/anime visual
spectrum. Dubbed anime have been adapted and changed to suit the culture it is
localised into, most obviously by being dubbed into the language of the country. Raw
manga are comic books from Japan that are written in Japanese and intended for a
domestic Japanese market. The journey from raw manga to dubbed anime is one that
takes us from the past, haunted, orientalist vision of a ‘lost Japan’ of doubles, ghosts,
death and memory to an international Otaku (fan) culture that invests in new styles,
technologies, and identities, with their gaze fixed firmly on the future.

The different global/local flows of manga and anime

Osamu Tezuka1 in his forward to Schodt’s (1983) Manga! Manga! The world of
Japanese comics, defines the spectrum of manga and anime as extending from the

1
Osamu Tezuka (1928-1989) was the creator of Astro Boy and was regarded by many as one of the
most important and influential figures in manga and anime.
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global, ubiquitous dubbed anime watched by overseas viewers, to the resolutely local
and different ‘raw’ manga read by Japanese. Tezuka argues that internationally
dubbed anime provides many people with their first experience of manga and anime.
Tezuka claims that dubbed anime is able to achieve this global influence for two
reasons. Firstly, dubbing into the local language makes it accessible. Secondly, the
dubbed anime is often shown on television that considerably increases its chances of
being seen,

… animation, with its broad appeal, has in fact become Japan’s supreme
goodwill ambassador, not just in the West but in the Middle East and Africa, in
South America, in Southeast Asia, and even in China. The entry port is almost
always TV. In France the children love watching Goldorak. Doraemon is a huge
hit in Southeast Asia and Hong Kong. Chinese youngsters all sing the theme to
Astro Boy. (p. 10)

Tezuka claims that anime has become “Japan’s goodwill ambassador” through its
broad appeal and global flow. At first glance it would seem that dubbed anime is an
ambassador for Japan in spite of its Japaneseness rather than because of its
Japaneseness. Anime once removed of its Japanese language, re-edited, cut, and
dubbed into the local language has few overt traces of being “made in Japan”. At the
time Tezuka wrote this forward in 1983 two of his anime creations were particularly
nomadic and transnational. Astro Boy (Tetsuwan Atom) and Kimba the White Lion
(Jungle Taitei) were both well known around the world, but because they were
dubbed and the setting was located outside of Japan or in the future many people were
unaware they were created in Japan. For many non-Japanese fans of Astro Boy and
Kimba the good will and fond memories fostered by these dubbed anime has more to
do with being swept away by the dynamic story and youthful heroics than anything
assertively Japanese. However, Tezuka offers two ambassadorial roles for dubbed
anime. One, indeed, has nothing to do with Japan whilst the other traces dubbed
anime’s connection to Japan.

Global language of iconography

One ‘diplomatic role’ of manga and anime is to show the potential of the comic
book/animated art form. To reveal the flexibility and creativity of graphic art and
animation through the fantastic and dramatic stories visualised in manga and anime.
The styles of manga and anime extend from highly abstract and fantasy images to
realistic depictions of everyday life and events. This is especially significant in
countries such as the U.S., the U.K., and Australia where comic books and animation
are largely ignored or reduced to nothing more than children’s entertainment. Tezuka
argues that manga and anime’s visual language of iconography can overcome
linguistic and cultural boundaries. So, as long as someone can ‘read’ the sequential
motion of the image, manga and anime can be enjoyed regardless of differences in
language. As the well-known U.S. artist, Frank Miller (in Schodt, 1983 p. 35) said of
his reading of raw Japanese manga in an interview,

I was able to ‘read’ a hundred pages of a Japanese comic the other day without
ever becoming confused. And it was written in Japanese! They rely totally on
the visuals. They approach comics as a pure form more than American comic
artists do.
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Ideally, Tezuka hopes that manga and anime through their visual language will offer a
grander visual experiences that may cross national, cultural and political boundaries to
further “peace and goodwill among nations” (in Schodt, 1983, p.11). A lofty claim,
but one that Tezuka clearly articulates in Astro Boy and Kimba the White Lion. Kimba
depicts the trials and education of the young lion emperor Kimba2 as he learns the
responsibilities of leadership and gains the respect of the animals of the jungle. And
Astro Boy with its retelling of the Pinocchio story as a robot boy strives to help those
around him and understand his own powers and limitations.

Japan
The second diplomatic role Tezuka observes of dubbed anime is that it can encourage
an interest in Japan. Tezuka reasons that those fans hungry for more information on
their favourite dubbed anime will be directed to Japan because it provides the largest
amount of manga and anime related product and information. Japan reveals that
manga and anime belong to a rich tapestry of popular culture that includes movies,
magazines, computer games, toys, and other goods. The realisation of manga and
anime’s Japanese origins evokes an awareness of the influence Japan’s culture and
history has on its popular culture. The Frank Miller interview (in Schodt, 1983 p. 35)
later describes how his interest in manga led him to consider the traditional art styles
like 18th century woodblock prints,

Lately, I’ve been immersing myself in Japanese prints. . . . They closely

resemble comic book drawing, which in many ways is emblematic. People have
come to recognize a certain configuration of lines as being a nose, for
example. . . . They deal with a series of images that, like comics, have to convey
information.

Miller describes the fusion of contemporary manga techniques with Japanese aesthetic
traditions such as those used in woodblock prints. Paul Wells (1997) article on
Miyazaki Hayao’s anime and Noel Burch (1970) book on Japanese cinema argue that
the influence of Japanese tradition and western modernity on contemporary Japanese
texts must be understood in terms of the broad influence of “historical change and
differing cultural paradigms within Japanese society.” (p. 22) Contradictions of new
and old in Japan are caused by Japan’s consistent cultural identity, for example it has
never been colonised by western powers or known a ‘true bourgeois revolution,’ yet
during Meiji Japan and especially after WWII Japan has embraced the capitalist
system, the influence of the US and modernity. Wells claims that the process off
historical and cultural change in Japan

… has resulted in a highly contradictory social model. Indigenous cultural

artefacts and systems mix freely with adapted forms that emerged at moments
of social upheaval and transition. (1997, p. 22)

Superposition
Wells explains that the history of adaptation of the foreign and maintenance of
Japanese traditions has resulted in texts that fuse aesthetic and cultural forms from
Japan and the west. Wells is most interested in the maintenance of traditional
Japanese aesthetics with innovative adaptations of the new and modern. Wells and

2
The Japanese title is Jungle Taitei (The Jungle Emperor’).
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Burch refer to Kato Shuichi’s term superposition to explain this Japanese fusion of
old and new. Shuichi argues that traditional Japanese aesthetics exist harmoniously
alongside modern aesthetics.

… Kato Shuichi's view that ‘the history of Japanese art is not one of succession
but one of superposition.’ Both cultural forms and artistic styles do not usurp or
replace that which has gone before, but co-exist simultaneously, redefining
meaning and affect accordingly. This sense of ‘superposition’ is clearly
correspondent to Western conceptions of the post-modern, but unlike the West
where cultural models are increasingly divorced from their historical sources,
many Eastern cultural forms refuse de-historicisation. This is mainly because
cultural forms are fully recognised in the maintenance of artistic models as
systems of spiritual and philosophic memory. (p. 22)

Shuishi’s idea of superposition, that traditional forms exist equally alongside modern
forms and maintain their “spiritual and philosophic memory” for Japanese can be seen
in the anime of Hayao Miyazaki. Wells argues that Miyazaki is an anime auteur who
fuses an accumulation of Japanese and western aesthetics and cultural forms with
their own philosophy and determination to push animation to its expressive limits. In
a similar way Tezuka’s philosophy of manga iconicity and anime’s global goodwill
diplomacy is evidence of an accumulation of aesthetic and cultural forms and an
articulation of authorship and innovation.

All roads lead back to Japan

For Tezuka, dubbed anime is “Japan’s supreme goodwill ambassador”(in Schodt,
1983, p. 10) because it wins goodwill towards Japan and interest in its popular culture.
Dubbed anime’s popularity may inspire some fans on serendipitous research that
leads them to Japan, but there are more solid signposts linking the manga and anime
image to Japan.

Recently Japan’s culture industries used Tezuka’s manga and anime creations as
representative images of a new and appealing Japan for foreigners. The 1999 poster
for the Japanese Government (Monbusho) scholarships for Australian undergraduate
students to study in Japan included Tezuka and his manga icons such as Astro Boy
and Kimba the White Lion (figure 1.1). The photo of Tezuka surrounded by his
manga/anime creations counterbalances the obligatory
photograph of traditional Japan in the form of
Kiyomizudera in Kyōto. While most Australian students
would be unaware who Tezuka was, let alone what he
looked like, the use of his photo is a significant attempt by
the Japanese Government to connect Japan (in the form of
Tezuka as the creator of these well-known manga icons,
and more simply Tezuka as ‘Japanese body’) with
manga/anime.

In this context Tezuka and his manga/anime icons have

become “Japan’s supreme goodwill ambassador,” as a

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Osamu Tezuka and some
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growing interest in them often leads back to manga and anime’s Japanese origins3.

Raw manga
Unlike dubbed anime’s nomadic and transnational depiction, raw manga is portrayed
as resolutely native and Japanese. Japanese critics and artists like Tezuka argue that
raw manga can be indecipherable for a foreigner. Raw Japanese manga is claimed to
present difficulties to the uninitiated foreigner because of the depiction of customs
and attitudes peculiar to Japan, the complexity of Japanese writing with its four
different scripts, and unfamiliar reading protocols4. Therefore, Tezuka declares, “lots
of Japanese comics … simply cannot be understood unless the reader is Japanese.” (p.
10) For Tezuka raw manga shows the insurmountable differences that still restrict the
export of Japan’s visual culture and reinforces its distinction from the west, whilst
dubbed anime is a powerful symbol of the nomadic and transnational potential of
Japan’s narrative art.

Popular anime and ignored manga

Anime, like Astro Boy, has been able to achieve a global status and ubiquity because
it has been dubbed into the local language and broadcast on television during time
slots that have enabled it to garner broad appeal, whilst manga has largely been
ignored. This is particularly the case in English-speaking countries where, while
anime has prospered via the nurturing cathode ray of TV, manga is shackled to a
largely ignored and stigmatised genre of the comic-book, long perceived to be the
domain of young adolescent boys enthralled only by superhero stories.

Popular anime like Astro Boy and Dragon Ball have attained a broad appeal to
become accepted and familiar globally. It is a discourse that strongly affirms manga
and anime as a dynamic part of Japan’s popular culture full of complex Japanese
references. Through this popularity the stigma of comic books and animation is
challenged and the world of Japanese popular culture may be introduced.

Tezuka is a firm believer in the universal qualities of manga and anime. He praises
comics as a genre that can cross boundaries through its universal images, and
acknowledges that many foreigners in Japan enjoy local manga after gaining
sufficient command of the language and appreciation of cultural nuances. However,
Tezuka believes that for most foreigners raw manga presents a distinctly Japanese
experience. Thus, to understand and define manga and anime one must detour into
Japan’s language, culture, history, literature, and mythology. Tezuka (in Schodt, 1983
pp. 10-11) describes Schodt’s Manga, Manga (1983) as research that attempts to
explain the success of manga and “seek out the Japanese character and identify the
wellspring of Japanese vitality.” (p. 11)

Accumulation of aesthetic/cultural forms

The journey from an international ‘dubbed anime’ to Japanese ‘raw manga’ is one
that accumulates references to Japanese aesthetic traditions. Within dubbed anime
there are recombinations and juxtapositions of other recognisable styles from manga

3
However, it is important not to overemphasise the claim Japan holds over manga and anime as their
diplomacy can be in the service of various entities that have nothing to do with fostering a link with
Japan.
4
The pages and panels of a manga are read in the reverse order to western material with panels flowing
from right to left and the back cover becoming the front of the book.
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to Japanese aesthetic tradition. To return to Shuichi’s idea of superposition in

Japanese art, that traditional forms exist equally alongside modern forms and maintain
their “spiritual and philosophic memory” for Japanese, anime can be understood as an
accumulation of other texts and styles fused with the representational potential of
animation. Scholars such as Paul Wells (1997) claim this “anachronistic
juxtaposition” of the native and foreign, traditional and modern in Japanese anime
represents “the instability and multiplicity of contemporary Japan.” (p. 23) Wells
argues that the work of Hayao Miyazaki fuses together Japanese aesthetic traditions,
western forms, and the flexibility of anime to create appealing Japanese fantasies that
also innovative and push the animated forms.

Throughout his work, for example, Miyazaki essentially updates the enduring
tradition of Garden Art, with its infusion of Zen Buddhist principles;
occasionally inflects his designs with the style of Utamaro and Hokusai, two of
the key ‘Floating World’ painters; draws upon the cinematic codes and
conventions within the domestic scenarios of Ozu, the action sequences of
Kurosawa, and the painterly effects of Mizoguchi; and finally, in a significant
act of non-Japanese cultural appropriation, adapts the hyper-realist designs
and narrational strategies of Disney features. (p. 23)

Whilst Wells discusses this fusion in terms of Miyazaki as an anime auteur who
controls this accumulation of styles and images to articulate his particular
philosophical interests and agendas there can be a broader application of this
accumulation and articulation process to the journey from dubbed anime to raw
manga.

Emotions

The representation of emotions in Japanese narrative art has a number of

distinguishing features. Kenji (1997) claims that the expression of emotions in Japan
is often serious and dramatic whilst in the west there is a strong emotional detachment.
Schodt (1983) also points to a different emotional energy in Japanese texts like manga
compared to Western entertainment,

But surely one of their greatest accomplishments is to render visually

fascinating the most improbable subjects - such as mah jongg, chopping
vegetables, and even school examinations. This is done by exaggerating
actions and emotions to the point of melodrama, and by paying loving attention
to the minute details of everyday life. As the Japanese describe them, their
comics are very "wet," as opposed to "dry": that is, they are unashamedly
human and sentimental. (p. 16)

For an example of emotion used in traditional Japanese aesthetics Kenji uses the
example of Natsume Sōseki, the famed Meiji author, translation of the English phrase
“I love you” into “Tsuki ga tottemo aoi naa.” (The moon is so blue tonight). However,
Kenji’s argues that Japanese today are increasingly capable of appreciating the
subtleness and depth of this difference. He claims that many of today’s Japanese
actors are unable to express ‘true’ Japanese emotions. Kenji contends that actors who
try to perform Japanese emotions are inauthentic because they’ve lost touch with
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traditional Japan. It is only in the ‘fantasy space’ of anime like Miyazaki’s Mononoke
Hime that one can still see traditional Japanese attitudes convincingly expressed.

Loveday and Chiba (1986) also argue that manga and anime convey heartfelt
Japanese emotions unlike the ‘dry’ and emotionally detached western texts. Loveday
and Chiba point to the preferences for more human and believable main characters in
manga and anime rather than the superheroes of the west,

Generally, however, it can be said that Japanese heroes and heroines are never
supermen in the western tradition. Neither are they drawn from the elite. Just as
in the special Japanese art of telling humorous stories, rakugo, the central
figures are usually warm-hearted, sensitive, sometimes gauche and even
unsuccessful but, all in all, extremely likeable for their human weaknesses and
strengths. (p. 167)

One emotion that has been continued throughout Japanese narrative art is a brash,
irreverent humour often expressed towards authority figures and social taboos.

Humour
One of the earliest uses of humour in
traditional Japanese narrative art is the
12th century Chōjūjinbutsugiga (鳥獣人
物戯画), or The Animal Scrolls, drawn
by the artist/priest Bishop Toba Sojo.
The Animal Scrolls used satirical
humour to mock the priesthood. In
Figure Error! No text of specified style in
document..1 Chōjūjinbutsugiga ("The animal figure 2.1 frogs and rabbits engage in
S ll") b Bi h T b S j 12 C t human-like activities as they embrace
and roll around in laughter. Later scenes depict monkeys in Buddhist robes that smoke,
read and perform other human activities5. The humour of these anthropomorphised
animals has a subversive and satirical edge aimed at the clergy and feudal state. The
portrayal of animals dressed as courtiers and priests involved in spurious rituals and
ceremonies suggest a criticism of the haughtiness of the established priesthood and
“mock(s) Toba’s own calling – the Buddhist clergy.” (Schodt, 1983, p. 28) Modern
manga and anime also use this satirical comedy to good effect in their ridicule of
salary men, the military, and other objects of authority or pretension.

The animal scrolls are from the genre of narrative picture scroll (絵巻物 – emaki-
mono) that flourished during and after the Kamakura period (1192-1333). They were
horizontal picture scrolls that illustrated a variety of subjects from myth, history, and
religion told in a chronological narrative order6. However, these narrative picture
scrolls would also be used to tell humorous stories, as Schodt (1983) mentions,

5
The frog, rabbit and monkey are traditionally depicted as magical and comical animals in Japanese
folk stories. As Terence Barrow (1973) points out, “The hare, like the monkey and the toad, is treated
as a comical creature who engages in human acts and frolickings. Hare stories are very old in Japan.”
(p. 23)
6
This chronological succession of images that appear and dissolve into each other as the story
progressed has caused some to notice its similarities with anime. The unrolling of the scroll and the
viewing of anime (L&C quote)
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When not constrained by religious themes, many of the old scrolls ran positively
wild, with a robust, uninhibited sense of humor much like that of today’s comics.
(1983, p. 29)

Whilst the narrative picture scroll was adopted from China scholars like Schodt (1983,
p. 28-29) and Lent (1989) argue that the Japanese have added their own distinctive
approach such as the use of satirical humour as in The Animal Scrolls. This irreverent
humour distinguishes early Japanese narrative art from the original Chinese template
they were based on, particularly the vulgar and crude subject matter like farting,
excrement and genitalia. For example, Schodt (1983) and Lent (1989) refer to the
genre of “stinking fart pictures” and the Hōhigassen (Farting Contests) scrolls of the
Kamakura period (1185-1333) as excellent examples of the brash and irreverent
humour used in Japanese narrative visual art.

This tradition of satirical and irreverent humour is continued in today’s manga such as
the domestic chaos and misadventure of children in Crayon Shin-can and Dr Slump as
well as the more extreme genres such as unko manga, literally ‘shit manga’7. This
irreverent humour is seen to distinguish the display of emotions in narrative visual art
in Japan from other cultures. Irreverent humour, especially the vulgar and excessive
farting contest scrolls and unko manga are motifs of a ‘manga double’ where
premodern and modern manga share a comical irreverence to social taboos and those
that should be feared or respected.
The Fart Double
The “stinking fart” motif is an important manga-double. It has been used across the
spectrum of Japanese visual mediums being explored here, from premodern narrative
picture scrolls to contemporary manga and anime. The fart has been used in a similar
way, as a motif of humour and subversion against those in positions of authority or
power8. They are all shown to be powerless against an absurdly powerful fart from a
weak and unappealing individual9.

7
As Lent mentions, “Scrolls, when they were not religious in nature, often went to the extreme
of depicting farting and phallic contests. … Japanese television and comic magazines today carry on
that tradition with unko manga (shit comics).” (1989, p. 222)
8
The fart is a popular comic tool in woodblock print and literature of feudal Japan, see Howard
Hibbett’s (2001) The chrysanthemum and the fish: Japanese Humor Since the Age of the Shoguns,
Tokyo/New York: Kodansha International, for the role farts played in Japanese humour particularly
Gennai Hiraga's 18th century treatise "Discourse on Flatulence," which Hibbett describes as "expressing
contempt for modern society and commenting upon the part played by the haphazard and the irrational
in human affairs."
9
In Japan the fart is more known for its futility rather than its power, a common saying in Japan is “as
ineffectual as a fart.” See Hiroaki Sato (1988) January. Gone with the Wind. Mainichi Daily News.
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Figure 0.2 shows two sections from

the narrative picture scroll The
Shinnō Scroll (神農絵巻 -
Shinnōemaki) created during the
Edo period (1603-1867) 10. The
Shinnō scroll is a parody of the
well-known Japanese legend
Momotaro (桃太郎) (Peach Boy).
Momotaro (Peach Boy) tells the
story of Momotaro, a strong boy
Figure Error! No text of specified style in born from a peach who travels to
document..1 Shinnōemaki Edo period (1603-1867) an island of ogres to save his
village from their attack. On his
journey to fight the ogres he befriends three companions, a dog, monkey and pheasant
and offers them millet dumplings as an act of friendship. On arrival at the ogre’s
island they each use their individual strengths and virtues to defeat the ogres and seize
the treasure. Whereas in the original story Momotaro defeats the ogres with his sword,
in this version the ‘hero’, Shinnō, defeats the monsters with his farts. Whilst
Momotaro and his friends draw energy from millet dumplings Shinnō and his three
human friends eat a potent combination of sweet potatoes, persimmon and chestnuts
to create the pungent farts released on the bewildered monsters. In figure 0.2 one can
see the toxic yellow gas being expelled from the crouched over Shinnō. Another
difference between the two is that the Momotaro fable depicts a savage battle between
the four companions and the ogres, but the Shinnō parody resolves the battle with a
fart. The fart emphasises how absurd and unexpected life and struggle can be.

The subversive power of the fart is also used to criticise the every-day pretensions of
the Japanese. In the manga Enomoto (えの素) (1997) the fart is used to debase the
symbol of the Japanese business world, the salary man.

Enomoto Shunji’s manga Enomoto concerns

the misadventures of a crude and lazy father,
Gōsuke (郷介), and his son, Michirō (みちろ
う). It was first serialised in the manga-
magazine Weekly Morning (週刊モーニン
グ) from 1997. In one particular episode
(figure 0.3) Ōmajime (大真面目), a work
colleague of Gōsuke’s, arrives at Gōsuke’s
house to inform him that the boss has
reconsidered his decision to fire him.
However, before Ōmajime can tell Gōsuke
the good news, Gōsuke has felt the urge to
fart and rushed into his son’s room, farted
10
I came across
Figure the text
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Shinnō in Tsunehiko
style in Segawa & Keita Fujimoto (eds.) (2000) Daiyoukaiten
(Grand Exhibition of ghosts, ghouls,
document..1 Enomoto p. 22 (1997) monsters catalogue). The Shinnōemaki is held at the Hyougo
History Museum in Japan.
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and then breathed in his son’s own fart, gone back to Ōmajime, farted on him, causing
him to fart and kill a mouse (all this is depicted in “the current of a fart” diagram
within fig. 0.3). The dead mouse’s wife and child then take vengeance on Ōmajime by
biting his feet. Ōmajime, whose name literally translates as “Super-serious”, is the
epiphany of the work-acholic Japanese salary-man that should be aspired to rather
than derided. In this example we can see the systematic humiliation and derision of
Ōmajime as Gōsuke and his son fart on him and later proceed to ‘make him a man’
(男になるんだ大真面目!!) by getting him drunk, stripping him semi-naked, and
tying him to a pole to impress a fellow female employee he likes.

The image of noxious green and yellow fumes wafting from the body is repeated in
the Tensai Okamoto’s anime Stink Bomb (1995). Stink Bomb is Okamoto’s
contribution to Katsuhiro Otomo’s anime anthology movie Memories (1995). The
Japanese title for Stink Bomb, Saishū Heiki (最臭兵器), involves a revealing word
play. Saishū is usually written as 最終 and translated as “the ultimate”, however in
this case the kanji 最臭 is used and can be translated as “the stinkiest,” suggesting that
the title could be both the ultimate/stinkiest weapon. This title indicates the crude
black humour of the story and the unexpected combination of foul body odour and
weapons of mass destruction.

Stink Bomb is about Nobuo; an employee at a chemical factory, who suffers from a
bad cold and accidentally takes an experimental pill thinking it’s an anti-flu tablet.
The pill produces a chemical reaction with his body causing him to unwittingly
become a walking bacterial weapon as his own body begins to emit a deadly
green/yellow fog of poisonous odours. As Nobuo’s wanders around Tokyo looking
for help his “stink bomb” quickly spreads to threaten all human and animal life in
Japan. Unable to smell the stench
himself, he is baffled as to why
humans and animals alike are dying
around him. He escalates the national
catastrophe when he hops on his
scooter determined to meet a deadline
to deliver documents to a government
agency. The ‘gallows-humour’ of
Stink Bomb centres on Nobuo, the
bumbling but well-meaning ‘victim’
and the ludicrous over-kill strategy of
the US and Japanese military as they
Figure Error! No text of specified style in use the latest “smart weapons” in a
document..1 'Stink Bomb' by Tensai Okamoto futile attempt to kill him at any cost.
The Japanese and US military and
government hopelessly squabble between each other as they attempt to prevent the
mounting crisis.

In Stink Bomb the motif of the subversive stinking fart and noxious body odour is
aimed at humanities own propensity for self-destruction. Nobuo inadvertently spreads
the disaster by simply trying to do his job under the most trying of conditions using
true Japanese gaman grit and determination. Whilst the government and military are
shown as inept and gung-ho in their tenacity to ‘de-oderise’ Nobuo. The story’s
doomsday theme is made even more powerful when one considers the similar
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destructive power and death unleashed on Japan when the atomic bomb dropped on
Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War II and the 1995 nerve gas attack in
Tokyo subways that caused several deaths and the hospitalisation of hundreds. These
ghosts haunt the gallows humour of Stink Bomb as animals and humans die yet plants
and flowers bloom and prosper as a result of Nobuo’s odour, all set to an upbeat jazz
score.

The depiction of a landscape in full bloom with the Sakura (Cherry blossom) in full
bloom with its petals cascading downwards in the breeze evokes a distinctly Japanese
aesthetics reminiscent of Japanese springtime landscapes depicted in woodblock
prints. Donald Richie (1990) explains that Japanese artists can articulate meaning to
their Japanese audience through the use of commonly understood and deeply
empathised with Japanese icons and concepts. Richie calls these scenes transitional
moments and they are a key technique of Japanese cinema. A transitional moment is
where,

… separate scenes can be devoted to separate events: the flight of lovers, the
soliloquy, the recognition scene, and so on. These might halt the narrative, but
they also contain, for the Japanese audience, moments of beauty, contemplation,
familiarity, which it finds appropriate and satisfying. (1990, p.8)

Wells (1997) argues that Richie’s transitional moments are an important part of many
anime however animators use the representational flexibility of anime to transcends
these iconic images into a more imaginary and fantastic space11. Wells describes these
transcendental scenes as those that “speak to Japanese aesthetic traditions yet at the
same time become benchmarks for distinctive authorial operation within the animated
form.” (pp. 23-24). In Stink Bomb the horror and death of a gas attack is reinterpreted
as a process that creates a rich abundance of flora and the beauty of nature. Our
destructive civilization is replaced by the image of a wholly organic world of ‘nature’
that endures beyond humanity.

In these three examples the fart symbolises an absurdly comic irreverence towards
those who would normally be feared or respected. In Shinnōemaki a hoard of
fearsome monsters are repelled not by the sword but by the fart, in Stink Bomb
Nobuo’s toxic body odour proves too much for the combined might of the Japanese
and U.S. military forces, whilst in Enomoto Ōmajime, the model salary man, is
stripped of his seriousness after being ‘baptised’ by Gōsuke’s fart.

Dynamic flow of sequential art

Of course there are some important differences between the mediums of scroll12,
manga, and animation but they all share a dynamics of sequential motion. Loveday &

11
The recent anime Sennen Joyu (Millenium Actress) uses transitional moments to evoke nostalgic
memories of the past as an aging superstar recounts her memories of the past. Sennen Joyu transcends
these transitional moments of Japan’s cinematic and historical past as the actress’ memories merge
fiction and reality to create a grand adventure of romance and idealism.
12
As Schodt (1983) points out, scrolls have no sperate pages, no division of frames, no speech-bubbles
or onomatopoeia as modern manga have. Instead scrolls rely on scenery and buildings dissolving into
one another or the use of symbols such as cherry blossoms to show the passage of time and space.
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Chiba link the dynamic movement of anime/manga and scrolls as evidence of a

shared tradition of sequential art. As they argue,

It is very important to realize that the Japanese comic is not a mere

Western importation but belongs to a century-old tradition of pictorial narration
that can be traced back to the picture scrolls of the 9th century. These scrolls
(emaki-mono) depicted epics, novels, folk tales and religious themes, employing
techniques ranging from line compositions to colourful scenes inlaid with gold
flakes. These were drawn on one continuous piece of paper that was rolled on
one side and so, when rolled along, had a dynamic effect not so different from
an animated cartoon. (p. 162)

Motion, real or imagined, provides energy to narrative pictures like anime and manga.
The images in a scroll flow into each other and the physical unrolling of it provides a
direction to the motion. Animation by the very nature of the medium literally
“animates” an object by camera movement or sequential cells. The reader of manga
perceives a similar motion occurring between each of the frames that depict key steps
in movements, organising them together to create a sense of dynamic sequential
motion. As Robin Pen (1996) argues of the comic’s dynamics,

The action (in the popular action comic) is not created within the frames but
between the frames. The immediate experience of the comic is the moving
image the reader creates between one frame and the next; from the arm raised in
a tight fist, about to strike, to the victim of the blow flying backwards through
the window. The images within the panels are just storyboards. (p. 34)

The unrolling picture-scroll and the dynamics of manga and anime become doubles in
a visual experience developed and perfected in Japan.

Manga and anime’s accumulates aesthetics, styles, and imaginings from Japan and
overseas and then stirs them into life through the representation flexibility of
sequential narrative art. The source of manga and anime’s appeal is their fusion of
accumulated references, stories that entertain and provoke, and the medium of
sequential narrative art of anime and manga that gives them motion. The popularity
and endurance of manga and anime is due to the accumulation of aesthetic/cultural
forms from Japan and the west and the articulation of innovation and distinction. To
paraphrase Paul Wells (1997) article on Hayao Miyazaki, anime and manga’s appeal
is in its “floating signifiers” of accumulated aesthetics and “floating worlds” of the
past, present, and future.

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