I hope that I can reach the word count on this, as I have
not had a very otaku-filled life. It all started a long time ago when I was
eight years old. I was very interested in video games, and for Christmas my parents
got me a Gameboy and a copy of Pokemon FireRed. This started my interest and
appreciation of Pokemon as a franchise. I watched a lot of the anime on
Saturdays, as well as played the games and bought all kinds of toys related to
the series. This interest in Pokemon was really the only otaku aspect of my
life for a long time, and it wasn’t even that otaku.
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| Sadly, all pictures of the actual cosplay were lost to the annals of Facebook servers so this is the best I can do. Imagine a yellow tshirt, and a white tshirt cut to look like the spikes around it's neck. Then imagine a hat that one of my very talented friends made that even had ears! I looked amazing. |
This changed a lot late in middle school. At the time I had
made friends with other people who liked Pokemon at my school, and while they were
much more otaku than I was, I still only really talked to them about Pokemon,
and wasn’t interested in any of the other anime they would talk about. Then one
day, they told me about a nearby convention they were going to, and how they
were doing a Pokemon-themed group cosplay. They told me that one of their group
members had quit on them, and they asked if I wanted to fill the space. It was
a fairly simple cosplay as you can see by the provided picture, and I really
enjoyed the convention (It was the first one I ever went to). After that, I
continued to go to the convention with the group, but I never cosplayed again.
I had fun, and met a lot more friends and even found new anime and other franchises
that I was interested in. I was mostly interested in series that were tied to
video games, but there were a few others that I found and enjoyed. Around the
end of high school, I was hanging out with the group less, and due to the
timing of the convention, I haven’t been able to go since I started college, so
I haven’t done anything otaku since I arrived in Collegeville, that is, until
this class.
I do not consider myself a weeaboo, as I really don’t get
too involved in anime, I simply watch it, play games related to it if they
interest me, and have gone to conventions (mostly for the social aspect) I wouldn’t
even really consider myself an otaku, as I am only interested in a few series,
and don’t tend to own anime or manga, but rather have rented manga from
libraries, and streamed what anime I can over the internet. I don’t ever
involve myself on discussion boards or chat rooms. I think the only reason I
got involved with otaku culture is because of my love for Pokemon as a child, which
was much more based on the games than the anime. While I did watch the anime
for a time, I got bored with it quickly and soon moved on and didn’t watch it
much, starting right around the time I got to middle school. I don’t have any
stories about my family judging me, especially because it didn’t really take
over my life, my parents were encouraging when I first tried it, but didn’t need
to worry that it would ever get out of hand.
Another embarrassing anecdote I can share is that the group
at the time was doing a lot of cosplay music videos, and I was slightly
interested in film-making and photography, so they asked if I could help them
film a video. I’ll let everyone make fun of me for something
that I was really only camera-man for. It was quite fun walking around the town
I grew up in with my friends who were all in quite elaborate costumes, and
filming all of these scenes, though the production value of the thing is quite
low seeing how we were all in early high school at the time.
I do like anime, and I appreciate it in much the same way as
other forms of film and TV. I’m usually less interested in the story and plot
and more interested in how the filmmaker of director uses different kinds of technology
to intrigue the viewer and enhance the story. I like to look at how things
transition or the pacing of the story and why the director chooses to do those
things. I really enjoy how this class requires analytical thought as opposed to
pejorative comment because I often don’t get very pejorative about the story
anyway. I try to let the visuals lead me along, and sometimes like to see what
themes get emphasized to tell the story.
