Cultural Battles: Tiananmen, Helldivers 2, and the Anime Revolution

Speaker 1 There is nothing wrong with your radio. Speaker Do not attempt to adjust the volume. We are controlling the broader questo. For the next hour, we will control all that you hear. Speaker 1 You are about to experience the knowledge and insights of the medium mothership. Craig Alright, welcome here to media mothership on Edge Radio 99.3 FM. The sound effects in the background. That’s absolutely fine. We’re broadcasting. Speaker Ohh. Craig Out of Edge radio. Studios in Nepal, Luna, Hobart TAS and on this show we explore how media shapes our understanding of the world around us. I’m your host, Craig, joined by Taylor. Hello. And Ronan, hi. And we’re streaming on edgeradio.org dot AU as well as on YouTube and Twitch. You can find us just by searching media mothership. Message in on the chat at YouTube. Or twitch or. SMS US on 0488811. 707. Taylor Yeah, 0488811. 707. Craig We’ll do our best. To keep an eye on the monitors around us, hopefully. Taylor Yeah. Craig So today’s topic, we’re going to cover some interesting news around media and popular culture. Cool as well as if we have time on the media mothership website. I’ve been uploading a classic academic work. Created by me, it’s my 1996. It was awarded so this research was done in 1995, so 30. Taylor The year after I. Was born. Wow. Craig 30 years ago. Speaker 4 Yes, so you’re 3231. Taylor That’ll be 30 this year, OK. Craig So yeah, I guess this was Ground Zero for you. This was my honours thesis looking, called manga dreaming. Irresponsible images of cyberpunk anime? Yeah. So you were born into the age of manga dreaming. A lot of irresponsible images, and so we we might dive into that looking at that kind of VHS era of anime in the mid 90s and late 80s and. Great. Yeah. Thank you. The the Audio’s working. We’ve got some chat live. Informing us Hilda is working, so it’s fantastic. Thank you. Twix, Twix, Twix, the dragon. So before we go any further, I’ve got a musical accompaniment guest today. Ronan’s doing music on the kalimba. Yeah, the piano. So we’ll go to news now. So to bring us over to news, we’ll play our theme song. Nice. That’s great. Yeah. We push the the mic towards it as well. That’s great. Yep. Yep. And. Taylor Wow an octave. Craig All right, so news. So, Taylor, you you reminded me of this story. Leaked files reveal how China is using AI to erase the history of the Tenement square massacre. What’s interesting to me about this piece was a article leads. With this image. Which? Pointing out that even a picture of 1 banana and four apples in a line could be flagged because it shares a similar sequence with the Tank Man photo, right? So the tank Man photo is that classic photo of the protester. The Chinese guy with like. Groceries in both hands. Who’s standing in front of a tank during the tenement square kind of protest period and brings to a stop these four huge tax. Of course, as we know in China, there’s been a long history of erasing. Speaker All. Craig Discussion around the 1989 Tenement square massacre from public view and still. 36 years. Since Beijing still censoring that information and has not disclosed the official death toll of this bloody crackdown that occurred. On June 4. Ronan Well. Craig So this image is really interesting though, so how so the arrangement of the one banana and four apples were basically the four green apples represents the tanks, and you’ve got one banana standing on its end at one of the end of the line of apples. So it’s intriguing, isn’t it? How? And in terms of? Meaning making the dominant reading, negotiated, reading and resistant reading that you could have of the the apple banana structures. Ronan According to. Speaker Sure. Taylor You see, I’ve I’ve. I’ve just been trying to do a bit of a a Google at the moment I can’t find it, but it just it just reminded me of like how they’re. Training AI for that. Craig To detect monitor and sensor images. Taylor To to detect sort of like a composition. It’s the training AI to detect a sort of composition, no matter how it is, that sort of thing. And it reminded me of how Renaissance paintings all have that sort of that swirl thing. Do you do you? Do you? Know about that. Ohh like uh. Craig You know davinci’s Adam and God moment of touching. There’s a swell thing. Wasn’t that, Da Vinci Code. You’re the da Vinci. Code I know. Taylor Yeah. Craig The conspiracy theory, or that it’s a brain. Taylor No, I’m talking about like, how. In Renaissance art, you have you have this sort of like spiral, which is like a shell, and then you have like, the focal point in the middle of that shell. And then all of these different things being composed in a different manner. So it’s like a a sort of spiral sort of thing. It just sort of reminded me of that. Because lots of Renaissance paintings also have that similar composition as well. Craig If there’s any Assassin’s Creed players out there. Who? Speaker Oh yeah. Craig Played that level. Let us know. But it is interesting in terms of like you. Know I always like referring back to. Stuart Hall and. The meaning of silent. Taylor I I refer back to Stuart Hall all. Speaker 4 The time. Craig She had one of the great theorists, one of his biggest theories was the kind of dominant reading of an image like how are images given meaning? Often you’ve got a dominant image, a dominant meaning. Sorry. So for instance. The image of the tenement square protester might be one of the dominant meaning for the West is is resistance. Then you got a negotiated reading where it might be. Well, you know, part of this suggestion, resistance. But also you’ve got to understand, you know, this guy’s not really resisting. He came across it. Why is the tank driver doing it? And then the resistant reading is 1, which opposes that which might flip it on its head and say it’s all the conspiracy. That that never took place, that it was staged and so forth. So it’s interesting when you’re given the symbology of the banana and for apples, how what they’re they’re they’re saying there is that the from the censorship point of view is the dominant reading of that is the tenement square massacre. Yeah. For many people, they might negotiate that and say, well, it’s a beautiful. Taylor OK, I found it. Craig Apple banana arrangement, yes. Taylor That was, it’s not a good image. It’s it’s very poorly done in blender, but the one I was talking about was the golden. Ratio. OK. Speaker Golden. Taylor Used in Renaissance art. This this mathematical ratio, when applied to a square, creates A spiral that guides the viewer’s eye and is therefore considered aesthetically pleasing. Ronan Your reference. Craig Is that the JoJo reference? Ronan JoJo. Craig Isn’t that a meme? Ronan Yeah, the golden. What’s it called? Again. Golden spiral. Yeah. Golden Golden Ratio is is a is a JoJo reference because the main character in. Taylor Oh yeah, price here. Sorry. Ronan Was good again. Part 7 uses the golden ratio to spin his spin. This certain type of bowl that he uses well and if if you spin it correctly. Taylor OK. Speaker 4 Right. Ronan It’s the golden ratio of spinning and it infinitely spins, OK. Taylor Yeah. Craig Beyblade players. Taylor Like all the old Renaissance infinitely spins on the wall. Craig Love that, yes. I thought all the J references were based on music, yes. Ronan The stanza whose stand powers are but only the. Part after part like almost, it’s basically just. For mangakas playlist. Craig Well, we get around to manga after the deep dive into the next China story, which I. Didn’t engage in. It’s a video game. OK, global video game called Helldivers 2, where you play in this fictional far future setting. Taylor Oh, is this where you play the the start of the trailer for it? Craig Yeah, yeah, yeah. I played the trailer for. It a couple episodes ago. It’s. Based on kind of a Starship Troopers vibe where you’re eradicating bugs and various threats to humanity, it’s a third person shooter. You know, it’s really interesting about it is there will be these storytelling moments where it really spills into the real world in a weird way. Trump. Trump’s not involved. China is involved this time, America. Was involved, but in a kind of good way. This was following the recent battle for Super Earth, where Super Earth was under threat from these illuminated. Datas. And anyway, it needed. It gained the attention in China because uh, one of the last cities was modelled after Shanghai, right? So it’s it’s it’s it’s it’s kind of this far future thing and this was the last bastion. Is that right, Ronan, you were playing that. Taylor OK. Craig Days. Ronan Ohh yeah like 1. Craig Day one day and Garrett playing any days anyway, Shanghai was holding out the event, got featured in the chat about hey, we’ve really got to hold off. And the thing that was crazy about it was that it was featured on a real Chinese news show called the Kunka News Morning Shanghai. And they praised how both the Chinese and non Chinese players collaborated together to defend the attack that was. Occurring we’ll play a bit of. The I think you’ll understand it when we hear the the news broadcast. Taylor OK. Speaker What are you? Taylor Just some ASMR. Craig I’ll translate a defence of Shanghai that takes place within the game. It originally happened on May 20th. A version update. Has been released for a shooter called Helldivers 2. In the game setting, Alien invasion of virtual Earth, each of the seven landmarks on Earth corresponding to Shanghai right? Anyway, so basically what happened in the story was. Taylor OK. Craig You know the Chinese players. Delegated some of the time to the American players, the. Chinese players were were were. Defending during the day to help save the earth from this invasion and the American players they organised through chat to make sure the American players would hold off during the. Right, what’s? What’s kind of amusing is with that broadcast. There’s a real news broadcast saying basically how wonderful it was that China and America came together to help defeat this invasion in the game. And the way they put it is fantastic. They say Chinese players were battling the enemies during the daytime. And. Taylor Yeah. Craig Using their excellent shooting skills and strategic plans. And then they talk about how then they say, and then the American players took over the nighttime operations using utilising air drops and firepower to construct the defence line for Shanghai. Taylor So is is it like a a a multiplayer online game? Craig Yeah. Yeah, it’s a Co-op game, so it’s not a PvP game. It’s a close game where you’re. Taylor OK. So yeah, against against the environment, PV E Yeah, yeah. Craig Yeah, yeah. And and it is kind of synchronous. So the Davis too is got into some controversy because it’s considered a game where the players actions will. Change the course of events potentially right? So if the players can. Taylor I need to get this game. It’s a lot of fun. I need to get this game and then the headline will be maniac. Australian destroy the base. Speaker The. Craig Which these graded representation mercenary, right? But there was some controversy. Because days before the Chinese players have become so upset by the fact that they organised this defence of Shanghai, but the percentage of success or stuck at 99.9888%. And there was this big debate saying, oh. This is just. Because it’s fake, they want us to believe that we can make a difference. But even when we come together, we can’t get to 100%. But then other people were saying, well, it’s a defence mission to, you know, unless they stop invading, you’ll never get. Taylor Yeah. Craig To 100%. Taylor Yeah. Craig But yeah, a fascinating moment of politics and video games. Coming to. Either hand in hand to represent that in a really kind of undemocratic fashion. I mean, it’s called managed democracy. You’re pretty much playing in a in a kind of Nazi environments. One of our. Chat messages, nothing happened. Nothing happened in the game. Ronan I think he was talking about. The conversation a few minutes ago about Tillman Square. Craig Yeah, right. Yeah. Of course, something happened at Tenman Square, so this forecast shouldn’t be censored. Hopefully by talking of disasters, the other news story I want to quickly talk about, two stories that are coming out. Around amunga that have caused. People to cancel their tourist plans to Japan. Taylor Wow. Craig Yeah, Mangas July 2025 Japan disaster prediction shakes up fear of the big one, and some are even abandoning their holiday plans. Yes, so a couple of articles talking about how this manga called Mitta. Taylor This earthquake. Craig Mid eye the future I saw, which is a fictional manga. But it’s set of these kind of claims of of disasters that are written in this. Taylor Manga. Yeah, well, so does weathering with you. And that says it never stops raining ever again. Craig Yeah. Yeah. So so it talks about. So the past few weeks, once obscure manga has been making headlines in Japan and overseas, the author claims that. Japan will be hit by a massive natural disaster in July 2025. Speaker Well. Craig Predictions being cited as a reason some holiday makers are abandoning their summer plans to travel to Japan and has exploded across Japanese social media platforms. Why are some people apparently believing this? Mongo’s prediction? So the article talks about how even though this was first published back in 99. And it features, yeah, the author as a character. That’s basically riding his dream Diaries that he’s been keeping since 1985. There’s there’s there’s. Yeah, this idea that these references might he might be onto something. This kind of reference to the 252025 July concern. Yeah, it seems that. Yeah. So it’s it’s, yeah, praying upon people superstitions. I think there was some reference in there that he got one thing correct. In the past there was one thing that was featured in the manga. Then people were sure. Oh, actually that did happen. Anyway. Look into further would. You just not go somewhere. I mean, you’ve got some travel plans. Would you not go somewhere? If a manga depicted the disaster about to befall that. Ronan No, I mean not, yeah. Taylor Media. Ronan That absolutely will be an earthquake in Japan in July. Craig Yeah, that’s true. Well, not all news went, but yeah, it is up for for an earthquake potentially. Ronan In July? Yeah. I mean, it’s reality. Speaker 4 Well, it might not be July. Ronan Geography, it’s just like. Craig Yeah, yeah. I mean, it might be July, it might be next year, it might be 5 years, but yeah, it is one of those things. Ronan It’s it just depends on how. Big it will be. Craig And it is unusual that people are starting to, you know, kind of interpret this as possibly true. But yeah, I mean, Japan is very earthquake prone, and seismologists have been, you know. Warning that there’s possibly a mega quake around the corner. But yeah, there’s obviously a lot of urban legend wrapping to that. You know, media influence and then, you know, going into real concerns as well, which we don’t do on this show. So do always maintain a healthy scepticism. For news next article, I want to talk about is kind of following up the last three weeks of discussion that we’ve done on villains. So last three weeks on the show, we’ve been talking about how. Story writing can create great villains shown and jump in Japan is launching a campaign to find its greatest villains, so this is the Shueisha publishing company. I mean, so if you. Yeah, I mean, I’m not sure. So yeah. Some of the anime that’s in shown and jump includes by X family Kaiju, #8, Hell’s Paradise Dan Dadan, which I do want to watch. And they’re going to, yeah, decide which villain is the biggest villain of this franchise. So do go ahead. Vote now. Really. Yeah. Death note. Taylor I’ve never heard of any of this. Ohh yeah, OK yeah, I know that. Speaker 4 Death notes could be featured there. Dragon Ball. Craig See is. Taylor The only Dragon Ball ZI watched was the live action American one. Craig Well, that is an act of villainy in itself. That vibe, well as last news story in Japan to create digital archive of manga and anime and games. The government is set to launch a new digital archive strategy aimed at preserving and promoting Japanese trove of such cultural assets as manga, anime, and video games, which are mentioned popular among people young people. Taylor Well, haha, Nintendo says good luck with that. Craig Would be interesting video games. Yeah. I mean, there is this problem of of particularly online games. Basically, having a shelf life, which means that in 10 years time they could be unplayable because they require online engagement or online playing. Yeah. So there is, I think there is a threat that people don’t realise that a lot of this stuff could disappear. Hmm. You know, mobile games disappear, right? Trying to archive mobile games from the early 2000s. Speaker Hmm. Taylor Ohh absolutely there was heaps of my favourite games from Adult Swim. Can’t get anymore. Craig Or is it just? Just, yeah. Right. Yeah. That they would release for a short time linked to. An Adult Swim series. Yeah, this initiative is expected to have a spillover effect on charging domestic and international enthusiasts too. After seeing the digitised version. Of it to pay a visit to wherever the asset is located so you know the Ross Bakery and kick his delivery service. Michael Guernsey with this. Yeah. So the strategy emphasises that local communities should lead the decision making process for preserving local cultural and artistic work. With municipalities paying a central role in expanding and utilising digital archives. So yeah, let’s see if we can get the Ross Bakery in the middle of Tasmania. To feature as part of the digital archiving of. Kiki’s delivery service. Taylor I’ve tried to go to the Ross Bakery every time I’ve. Gone to Ross Ohh tried. To tried to every single time it’s been shut. Craig You never made it. Taylor And then I went there. The most recent time I went there, they said sorry, we’re shut for the next seven months. Craig Wow. Wow. Wow. OK, well, hopefully this digital archiving event in Japan will help. Yeah. All right, let’s get a musical interlude going. With our musician. That’s really good. Speaker 4 That is really good. Craig Certainly better than so anyway. So welcome back here. To. Media mothership. Yeah, as I mentioned. I want to dip into briefly the impact of manga and anime. OK, good, right? Because I found this thesis that I’d written back in 95, available now on the media mothership website. If you head over there, yeah. Yeah. Or at least the first chapters up. That’s how you do it. First Chapters 3, and it was all about. Taylor For free well. Ohh come on. Craig My experiences in 95 as an honest student diving into this new thing at that stage called manga and anime. Taylor Whoa. Craig I know which was blowing my mind. With some of the stuff that was there, what I was thinking might be interesting is one of the big debates that was certainly part of the manga anime scene then. And it’s still an issue. Today is the dub verse sub sub debates. So I want to get around to that. But first what I want to do is you know when I was getting into anime in the in 1995 the big. Series or big movies that were kind of getting a lot of high profile media attention was. Course. Katsuhito automobiles. Akira. Right. It was the. Taylor Cool, cool. Craig Movie, of course. Right. And then a little later, the ghost in the shell. Movie alright, yeah. I was going to the local anime club at Adelaide University and catching Rama half and then Mad Men ended. Sorry, not now. This was before Mama and entertainment. You had manga and attainment and Kiseki Entertainment who were releasing a DP. Piece bubble gum crisis, Cyber City, Oedo and of course Urotsukidoji legend of the Overfiend which got banned in many countries to to set the mood. I found a couple of quick YouTube shorts that talk about. This kind of nostalgic period of mid 90s. Ronan I don’t think you meant to. I don’t think you’re allowed to play a clip, a single clip from the last one. Craig You mentioned not yet. Ronan It’s classified as ******. Craig We need a later time slot. Taylor We’ve got a we’ve got a. A message, yeah. Craig N&S. Do you want to read? Taylor It out OK, yes. So it says hello. Tay, Tay, Taylor Lidstone and Doctor Craig Norris. So we know who you are. I’m one of Taylor’s students and I have a question related to Star Wars. I was wondering what both your opinions are on the new Star Wars shows, specifically the poorly written pieces of Star Wars. Media with poor storylines, but also on Andor, which is known for being dead infantilized with implications to human mating and brutal on screen deaths, with examples like people being hung. And K2, so using an Imperial soldier as a human shield, he’s clearly dead in the scene too. And then they also go on to say also Taylor, I would like to apologise for being so creepy lately with digging up your entire digital footprint and the way we talk about it might come off as bullying on me, but I genuinely find the work you do outside of the education. Speaker Yeah. Taylor An interesting and well done and it’s given me personal courage to start writing my own music and potentially get into a podcast myself, so that’s brilliant. Craig Get referenced this on the CV. Taylor Yeah, all the best. Nathan Wright also apologises and is sending this message for me also love. Craig Your music. Wonderful. Shout out to our fans, fans of the show. Yeah, yeah. I think we can see now. Yeah, well, let’s hope that this enlightens them somewhat. I think it’s a great question they’re asking. Speaker Yes. Craig About the current status of Star Wars and the direction of Andor, we can touch on that briefly. I I’ve seen the Andor series both for seasons now. If you haven’t either. Taylor Star Wars. Craig Well, I mean, what’s really fascinating to me about the and or season or the Andor approach is it’s set in this obviously in terms of the storytelling, we’re looking at a series that sets just before the Star Wars Empire strike spec return of the Jedi World, right. So this is the. Taylor OK. Right. Craig Lead up to how the Empire consolidated its power after the prequels, and then how they established the Empire and their brutal reign of power over it over the Galaxy. UMI think it’s, you know, in terms of some of I mean the the the the the question that Nathan is quite right in terms of the you know it’s Dean Tantalised in terms of it’s made for an adult audience. Taylor Hmm. Craig It’s certainly really political if you look on YouTube, there’s a number of really fascinating political scientist reacts to, and Oregon clips which are out there talking about how clearly the showrunners of and Oregon read up on their history, that there are a number of real world. Analogies that are going so the current season of Andor has this fascinating kind of there’s the Gorman. I think it’s called the German planet, which is going to be mined for this substance. Well, it’s fantastic, is that it’s it’s France based. The planets France and we’re looking at an analogy of the. Taylor OK, you’re right, yeah. Craig Brutal Nazi dictatorship and control over France during World War 2, and the emergent rebellion. The French resistance which? So there’s this really powerful play between real history and resistance culture that’s playing out in Andor. They don’t pull their punches as well. There’s some wonderful ideas of the kind of banality of terror and evil which we see with the. Kind of enforcer. Imperials that like there’s this character, Deidra, who is the kind of imperial police. OK, yeah. Thought police anti espionage anti terrorism kind of think tank group and spoilers. It’s suggested that her actions lead to the rebellion being able to get the Death Star plans, but the way she does it, it’s this kind of banality of middle management bureaucrats. Taylor Oh wow. Craig Career escalator promotion in a climate of suspicion and competitiveness, I mean, we’ve talked about this before in terms of accents that middle management references because Ben Mendelson plays the Chief Imperial officer and in the interview she’s described it as kind of well. Is a middle manager. Basically, it’s that banality of working in in a work environment where you’re you’re dealing with people that you hate. It’s in an environment that’s kind of stifling, but you just got to get through it. And sometimes you manage is. And sometimes it’s not. And in this case, yeah. Ben Mendelson delivering this, this perfectly calibrated middle management terror. Taylor British accents? Yeah, of course. Craig In British accent. Taylor Because British accents are evil. Evil. Craig Yeah, yeah, full of of of kind of colonial terrorism. Taylor All I can say to do with Star Wars is the worst thing they’ve ever done was the movie. Craig Joe Joe thinks. Taylor That’s not moving. Speaker 4 Well, you know, he walks. Caravan of Courage was pretty horrible. The Star Wars holiday special after the first style was pretty horrible. Taylor I mean like actual feature length movie. Craig You know, I I struggle with all the prequels. Certainly fancy manners. Taylor So I mean, for me, it’s solo. That is one of the worst pieces of media I’ve ever watched. Craig OK. Yeah, the thing I found interesting about the solo film is that it showed kind of non storm trooper Imperial soldiers. You had this idea that. You know you’ve got this kind of? You know, you know, barely trained soldier force. You know, there aren’t the Stormtrooper space. So it was it was. Building but yeah, look, I think the thing about the solar film that’s so dire was that the initial production of it that I was keeping an eye on had a tone and temperament that was much more comedy based. Yeah. And then they fired that team. The show. Taylor A little bows, yeah. Ohh, that’s right. Yeah we went. Craig With the director and they brought Ron Howard on to take over. And yeah, I think that, yeah, you can see that there was a lot of tampering that the tone changes that. Yeah. Yeah. So I think it was a victim. Taylor Through development, yeah, yeah. Speaker Hmm. Craig Of its circumstances. Yeah. I mean, Rogue One was which, which is linked to Andor. I mean. Taylor I liked Rogue one. Craig Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think Star Wars very much has been saved. I mean, you’ve got the baby Yoda. Taylor Mandalorian. Craig Mandalorians I mean that yeah, I’ve forgotten now, but it was a great series that really rejuvenated Star Wars. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, I think it’s it’s it’s. It’s a fascinating. Franchise. Really. You know, interesting. Well building I think the Andors series has been fantastic. I’ve really enjoyed it. I think the politics of it have really held up the first season’s really strong. The second season I think equally strong, they’ve avoided I think. A lot of the pitfalls. If you think about, there’s a there’s a female love interest character they owned or has, and the way they they, the way they use that character I think is really clever. Speaker Hmm. Craig So they they don’t just. Oh, yeah, they were talking. Some people were really worried that this love interest that Endo has will be fringed. Do you know this reference? The trope of when the hero’s love interest gets fridged fridged it’s based on comic books, this Green Lantern comic book had his girlfriend is killed by the villain. And then cut up and put into a. Fridge. Brilliant. And of course, you know, the troop here is that, you know the point at which the villains at ohh. Sorry the the hero. Taken to the edge right, something disastrous happens to our hero and you know all the chips are down and he has to draw upon his inner strength. And also they wanted to get rid of his girlfriend to give him. Yeah. Taylor Yes, free. And gets free. Speaker 4 Gets fridge gets fridged. Craig Yep. Yep. So that’s Andor, that is Andor. Taylor There, there’s another. There’s another one there. Speaker Yes. Craig OK. Wow. We’re in conversation. Taylor It’s it’s to you first, actually. Craig Alright. Taylor Hello doctor. Craig Norris. Craig Hey, Gary, can you read it? I can’t really wrap my head. Taylor This is. Around. Hello, Doctor, Craig Norris and Taytay. This is right at this time. Craig Why are you tasing that Taylor Swift? Taylor Yeah, that’s people call me that all the time. Please don’t start. Craig Do they know that you’re an ordained minister? Taylor No, they don’t know. OK. And then they say, I was wondering if there’s a chance you could maybe have a discussion on like ongoing conflict and like how you feel about them that doesn’t make any English sense. So I can’t, I can’t respond to that. Speaker Listening. Craig Well, you know the and or discussion of of. Alien and resisted. Once speaks into. That I mean. Taylor How much suggestion on like ongoing conflict? Craig Well, I mean, what I find really interesting is obviously the endless series went into production a long time before the moment in history we’re in. At. The moment? Yeah. But you think about how well it’s lined up with some of the? Conflicts that are. Today facing the world. Particularly the Israel Palestine conflict. Ohh yeah, yeah. And they feel that you can’t. You can’t not watch and or and think of the news you’re seeing. Speaker Oh. Craig And the Israel Palestine conflict and the the tensions around how to resist that space, how to to protest in that environment, it’s. Yeah, it’s quite powerful. Also the fact that Trump got into power, this would have been in production before that election occurred. But now Trump said. Now again this idea. Of how do you resist and protest in an environment like this? It’s yeah, look. And I think that’s where Andor is so successful as a series that it seems to be in conversation with today’s moment of history around this issue of conflict and providing storytelling to cope in that. Right. It’s it’s a. Taylor Funny story actually, I found out that my. Girlfriend’s cousin? Yes, it’s called Trump. Wow. Awkward. And his brother is called Putin. Craig Wow, did they cosplay? That would be wonderful. Wow, Trump, Putin, because those are not usual names. Taylor But, but Putin’s now called Ben. Speaker Ohh yeah. Craig Putin changed his mind. Taylor Yeah, like Ben Kenobi. Craig Wow. Oh wow, it’s I guess, I mean, Putin came to power. What, like, 20 years ago? How old is Putin? Do you think? I mean, was he born pre or after Putin’s rise to power? Right. If he was named after races really cause that’s more troubling, right? If if you name your child after an established problematic figure like Putin. Taylor I don’t know idea. Speaker I think. Craig And after you know they’re problematic, then that’s a problem, right? If you name them before that, they’re problematic. It’s just bad luck. Taylor And Trump, come on. And Trump. Speaker 4 Well. Craig Yeah, I mean, Trump’s been going for a long time, but you wouldn’t really. I mean, Trump is an unusual name. Yeah. Trump and Putin are both unusual names. So yeah. Yeah, maybe. Speaker 4 It was just. Craig Yes. Taylor Anyway, back on to manga. Anime please. Craig So I want to play this first clip. Remember these nostalgic anime from the 90s and early 2000s so you would have. Been what 5? Taylor OK, so it’s boring ones, OK? Yeah. Craig At that age, and you weren’t even born. So let’s see if these if. This clip speaks to your experience. I mean, what? Where did you get into anime? What was your big anime that you kind of got? That you like. Taylor What gave you the bug? Ronan Ohh what like I mean I watched Dragon Ball Z but like no, I think what really got me into anime series is probably JoJo. Craig Jojo’s bizarre adventure. Yeah, yeah, which is enormously popular series. It’s really aesthetically distinctive style. It’s not your kind of mungus style that many people would associate with Astro Boy, Big Eyes, cute face. Taylor I’ve never actually seen it. Craig It’s it’s. Ronan Yeah, the JoJo style is very artistic. Craig Yeah. Yeah, it has. You were saying it has a huge fan base in design and yeah, and and kind of high fashion, yeah. UM. Ronan Yeah, very, very big fandom and high fashion. Craig What’s 1 of the attacks that are based on? Songs. Ronan Ohh my gosh, there’s so many. I don’t know so many. Craig There’s like dirty deeds done dirt cheap. The great thing about it is so the original Japanese version of the manga and anime got to use and reference all these as their attack names, which of course is a song title by ACDC. But when it got localised into the West, they didn’t have the copyright ownership of those titles. Ronan People say yeah. Yeah, and anime, yeah. Craig So they had to change them to adjacent terms. So dirty deeds done dirt cheap is something like. Ronan Yeah, but that’s one of a joke. Yeah. Craig Filthy inconveniences. Yeah, they call it, like, filthy inconveniences that. Are very affordable. Speaker Ohh. Speaker 4 OK, right. Ronan Uh, yeah, this I think you know, Sex Pistols. Craig Yes. And in the UK. Ronan It what we named you 6. Speaker 6. Craig Pistols. That’s kind of clever. Alright, so and your series, what was your series that, that, that you enjoyed? What’s the series? You. You. Loved and they make that you were young, yeah. Taylor When I when I was younger, when I was younger, I didn’t particularly love it, but I watched Astro Boy. Speaker 6 Alright, you did watch. Craig Astro boy, yeah. Taylor And I what? Yeah, the classic. One that’s one thing and Pokémon. And then my actual one, which is like OK, I know this is Japanese animation and I like Japanese animation now spirited. Craig Away. Ohh, right. OK, Miyazaki. Well, I’m glad that got guns. I mean, certainly Miyazaki was considered this moment where what anime meant changed dramatically up until muzaka’s popularity. Or from like. Pro spirit away, norca. Ponyo. All those movies started to come out before then. Up until that point, anime manga was really seen as adult violence. Taylor Hmm. Craig Highly sexualized, right? So full of a cure and cyborgs. And it was very much tailored towards a a very niche demographic, but then it became much more family viewing. Astro was a really interesting reference because I know when I was doing my reference in the mid 90s. Speaker Hmm. Craig It was this emblematic moment of no one knew this was Japanese right when you watched Astro Boy dumped and you know there was no context around it. Being from Japan, there’d be no tells in it. The faces were not stereotypically Asian. The setting was the future, so didn’t have. Taylor Yeah. Speaker 4 Hmm. Craig Like shrines and a ramen shop and. It probably was rhyming in there. Yeah, Pokémon as well, right, you know, I mean, for a while, you you didn’t need to get into Japan to understand. Speaker Hmm. Craig That. But when yeah in the mid 90s when this. Came out there was this idea. Of that, you needed to tap into Japan that you needed to watch it subbed, that it was all about this different non Western, non Disney animation style. Taylor But now, of course, Studio Ghibli has just gone really terrible now, and they can’t make anything good, can they? Craig Yeah. Well, I mean, I think I think the the. Taylor The have have you seen earwig and the? Craig Witch. No, I haven’t. I haven’t. Taylor It is some of the worst writing voice acting visuals I’ve ever seen. It is worse than 30 years ago. Speaker 4 Well, you know. Ronan 4.7 out of 10 IV. Craig Really. That bombed? Well, OK. Message in now or for what your favourite enemy was. What got you into enemy. Taylor So, so, so, but at at the moment, I think the the new company that’s sort of like overtaking them now I can’t remember who it is or what the company’s name is, something comix studio, but it’s the one that did your name and weathering with you and. Craig OK. Yeah, yeah. And they’ve got a lot of success. There’s a there’s a. Yeah. Taylor Susan May, which is really good too. Craig Me. So it was me is actually retired, right? So Studio Jubilee went through a moment of its its main artistic centre left with Miyazaki hail. I think he’s been brought back or. Taylor Yeah. Craig There’s little projects. He’s working on, but the thing I love. About me these days is. Now he’s the meme of him saying, you know, enemies ruined. Yeah, you know, what did he say? Like, like he hates AI. There was a documentary that was done with him on AI and how he just. Taylor Yeah, yeah. Craig Is the most depressing person to speak to about how he sees the current and future of anime. He just says it’s it’s all pretty horrible. Ronan Oh my gosh. Speaker 4 OK, we’re going to reply. That’s great. Taylor So someone’s texting you and said my fave is avatar. Craig Avatar The Last airbender? Yeah. Speaker 4 And. Ronan That’s a big controversial with that. Craig What’s the controversy? Your own avatar? Because we’re not talking about the James Cameron. No avatar. We’re talking about the classic anime animation, I mean. Speaker 4 No, right? Craig It’s western produced. Ronan It’s not. Yeah, it’s not people. If you call people, some people get really offended if you call animal. Craig And that’s right. Yeah, yeah. Cause you got this. Purest vibe. And then you’ve got this globalised vibe, right? You got these very at moments. There are these very different 2 communities, but Avatar, hugely popular series based on modelled on, styled after the Japanese manga anime style. But. I guess it didn’t. It wasn’t produced in Japan. It didn’t have an animation. I mean, a lot of Japanese animation is produced in Korea, but the main thing, and I mean there’s still anime. Taylor And and and. US animation is based in Korea as well, SpongeBob. Speaker Hmm. Speaker 4 All right, right. Right. Speaker Ah. Taylor So is uhm, you know The Simpsons Family Guy, American dad, all Korean? Craig The hill. Taylor I don’t know. Craig OK. All right. Well, look, setting us up. For next week’s show, then. I’ll play this clip and this will set up our discussion for next week show, potentially on service stub and yeah maybe some VHS and. Speaker Hear it? Ronan My favourite is avatar. Speaker 6 Complementary vision of the future was unfolding. Anime was no stranger to weaving tales that combined technology, identity, and society in intricate ways. These works weren’t just visually stunning, they introduced to the West the multifaceted approach to futurism, from the philosophical quandaries of AI and serial experiments lane to the dark, gritty. Teams of technologies Japanese pop culture was bursting with fresh takes on the digital age. Taylor Right, that’s that’s great. Craig Yeah, that’s exciting. So we’ll, yeah, we’ll look into some anime I might pull out my old VHS copy of it or the dodgy legend of the Overfiend, which is banned. Yeah. I mean, it’s just absolutely filthy enemy. Wow. Taylor Wow. Craig It’s one of those state. Taylor These. Legal goods that you have imported into Australia. Craig No legal, I mean it was released by Kiseki Entertainment at that time or Manga Entertainment actually released it as well. It was on the Film Festival circuit, right? The only way you’d watch a lot of anime in 95 between 90 and 95 was either what was on TV. So Astro boy, pedal for planets, star blazes or. Taylor Thank you. Speaker OK. Right. Craig It would be on a in a Film Festival like Akira, Ghost in the Shell or Fist of the. North Star wow. So yeah, yeah. I have to do a cheat GPT search to see if it’s. OK, to show my 15 year old. Speaker You know. Taylor Oh, my God. Well, well, the thing to do with what’s his name as well with to do with anime and manga sort of thing is to look at how that has shaped gaming as well. Because if you think about it, visual novels, very popular as well. So things like Doki literature, Literature club. Have you played that ever? Speaker 4 Yes, yes. Craig No. No, no, no. Dokie, dokie. Ah, doggy, doggy. That’s the onomatopoeia for heartbeats. Yeah. Doggy, doggy. Taylor Wow. Literature club. Literature club. And it starts off as this sort of like dating SIM, which soon turns into a horror game. Yeah. Yeah. Well. Craig We’ll get a reading list together for the next show. Speaker 4 Of course. What? Craig What’s interesting about exploring this is how completely misrepresentative. Of this is for. The lift reality in Japan that most of the titles certainly Akira have been. I like niche titles in Japan, right? They’re not at all part of the mainstream enemy consumption experience. Taylor Yeah. Craig I mean Akira. Lesso because it got so big in the West in the early to mid 90s that it became popular. In fact, when I was in Japan leading up to the Olympics before COVID. A lot of the building sites in Tokyo had erected the scaffolds and and printed on all the scaffolds were frames from the Akira Manga Wow and Cause in Akira. They referenced the the Olympics that’s running in that fictional future Japan. Yeah. Anyway, so reading list. Speaker 4 Olympics. Taylor Another thing for the reading list as well, have you ever heard of Ghost stories? Craig OK. Speaker 4 No, no, I’ve. I’ve, I’ve. Taylor This will be. This will be great for the sub versus dub that we’ll have next week. It’s a dubbed version. Of of a of an anime, but it it is. Done as a. Joke by the people who. Were doing. It ghost stories, ghost stories. So it was it was an anime that came out that was so boring that they just said we’re not gonna translate this. It goes through all of the different sort of cliches that go with any sort of ghost story. So we’re just gonna have some fun with it. Speaker Yeah. Craig And is there any reference to the 1980s? West Hobart Deterrent plant. Good story. OK. Well, we’re gonna watch it and I’m going to try and do my own fan fiction in the style of that. All right, well, that’s been media mothership for another week. Taylor No, no. Craig Nick, thank you very much for. Commenters throughout this show. Taylor Yes, thanks commenters who would be Nathan and Ryder. Craig Right. I think the main points and takeaways from today’s. Show you know. Include you. You’re doing some good teaching, yeah. Show notes will be available on the episode description via YouTube or your podcast supplier of choice. Next week, we’ll see if we can get some time to do some self versus dub debate and watch some anime. You can list the previous episodes on YouTube, Twitch, or at edgeradio.org Dot AU or your podcast provider. Choice. You can find Taylor. On something. Are you going to do a? Speaker 4 Show at some point some, OK. Taylor I will at some point, but it will be when I’m. Craig Back. Back. Alright. Yeah. In the future, if you enjoyed the show, please subscribe and leave a review. If you’re listening via. Taylor Leave a review. Really. Speaker 4 No, do you? Craig Can do that. Heart me if you have questions or topic suggestions right in and contact us on Facebook and I’m going to try and get the discord working again. Taylor The Discord’s already working? Yeah, so. Craig That it’s unmoderated. OK, that’s true. And anyone posting my show things up in. Speaker Well. Craig There. But yeah, we have a discord or we have an Instagram. Well, TikTok, maybe I’ll dust that. Taylor Off OK. Speaker 4 Yeah, yeah. Craig All right, coming up now we’ve got some really cool. Music on Edge radio. To to chill to. Taylor Chill to it.