Chinese Otaku Anime Situation] The Popularity of April's New Anime in China. In some cases, the bad reputation of related works becomes a tailwind for popularity.

My name is Baiyuan Longhoam, and I am here to introduce you to all things related to the otaku situation in China.
This time, I would like to introduce the popularity of the new Japanese anime for April distributed on Chinese video sites and the surrounding circumstances.

The influence of previous reputation and topics from related works on April's new anime was noticeable.

Since China starts a new school year in September, the end of the school year is in the air at Chinese schools around June, and it is also the height of the examination season, so it is a busy time for students, who make up the main segment of otaku in China.
Because of this, the exchange and information gathering activities of Chinese otaku are slowed down, and the new anime titles that succeed in getting off to a good start in April tend to dominate the popularity and popularity of the market.

In the case of this year's new anime in April, it seems that the works that started off well are maintaining their popularity, with "Eromanga sensei" and"Re:CREATORS" being the most popular and talked about.
BORUTO-BORUTO NARUTO NEXT GENERATIONS," which is attracting attention as a sequel to "NARUTO," seems to be gaining high popularity and PV numbers, including among the general public.
Also, "Natsume Yuujinchou Riku," which is a sequel to a standard work and has become a stable and popular work, and "Saenai Kanojo no Nutsukata ♭" and"Zero Kara Hajime no Sho " among anime based on novels that have a relatively stable fan base also seem to be doing well.

How will the bad reputation of related works affect Chinese anime viewers?

The influence of the previous reputation of April's new works was greater than that of other seasons, but the "previous reputation" was not all positive, with "Eromanga sensei" and "Re:CREATORS" receiving very strong negative reviews in the Chinese otaku community. In fact, this is the case with "Eromanga-sensei".

In fact, this was due to the fact that "Eromanga-sensei" shares the same author and creators with "Ore no Imouto ga Konna ni Kawaii Wake ga Nai" and "Re:CREATORS" with"Aldnoah Zero," both of which are well known in Chinese otaku circles for their bad reputation as works that "got it wrong. This was due to the fact that the original author and creators involved share the same creator.

While it is easy to see the reaction to Japanese content in China and the various types of flare-ups due to political and social reasons peculiar to China, the flare-ups among Japanese anime fans in China are more likely to be due to the treatment of the characters, story development, and especially the "lack of conviction for Chinese anime fans" (see Figure 1).
However, most of the flames among Japanese anime fans in China are caused by dissatisfaction with the treatment of characters and story development
However, the flames among Chinese fans of Japanese anime tend to be caused by dissatisfaction with the treatment of characters, storylines, and especially "developments that are not satisfactory to Chinese anime fans".

In addition, when this "development that is not satisfactory to Chinese anime fans" occurs at the end of the work and dissatisfaction explodes, the image of the work and characters is solidified by the negative image based on the dissatisfaction, and the negative image tends to spread for a long period of time. ...... This is one of the reasons for the situation.

Both "Ore no Imouto ga Konna ni Kawaii Wake ga Nai" and "Aldnoah Zero" caused a firestorm in the Chinese otaku community regarding the way in which the works ended.
(*Please note that the following contains spoilers regarding the ending of the works.)

First of all, "Aldnoah Zero" caused a firestorm of dissatisfaction and backlash due to the disappointing and unexpected development of the story.
Among Chinese anime fans, "victory or defeat" is often a topic of conversation, and this applies to such things as "which character gets together with the main character," which is often the main topic of conversation from the middle to the end of a work.

In the case of "Aldnoah Zero," there was a lot of attention on what would happen to the relationship between the two main characters and the heroine, and how it would end, but a new character suddenly appeared at the end of the story and took everything with him, causing a very strong backlash in the Chinese otaku community.

According to a Chinese otaku, "Aldnoah Zero" left those who had been following the work at the time with a deep sense of disappointment and incompleteness, and the firestorm that followed has become synonymous in the Chinese otaku community with developments such as the heroine character being cuckolded by an unexpected character that defies expectations and disappoints the expectations of the audience. The story has become synonymous in the Chinese otaku community with the development of a heroine who is unexpectedly cuckolded by an unexpected character.

As far as I know, " Ore no Imouto ga Konna ni Kawaii Wake ga Nai" is the work that has caused the biggest firestorm in the history of Chinese otaku concerning its content.

Ore no Imouto" became very popular in China and created an era, and in the Chinese otaku community at that time, factions were formed by the fans of each heroine, and heated battles (?) were fought. In the Chinese otaku community at the time, there were heated battles (?) between factions formed by fans of each heroine.

The result was that the most popular character in China was not the heroine, but her sister, and the Chinese otaku community was in flames day and night.
This firestorm was caused not only by the popularity of the heroine, but also by the strong sense of rejection in China of heroines with close relatives, an incident that highlighted the difference in sensibilities between Japan and China.

The impact of this incident was so great that even now in the Chinese otaku community, whenever there is a topic related to "Ore no Imouto" or the "victory or defeat of the heroine," there are comments that seem to dredge up past "Ore no Imouto" related grudges and resentments about the treatment of "Kuroneko," one of the heroines of "Ore no Imouto.

Given the above background, I was also concerned about the impact of the bad reputation of related works on these two works, but judging from the current high popularity and the way the topic is growing, it does not seem to be stalling due to negative influences.

Spread of New Anime Information and Topic

Currently in China, the diffusion of information on Japanese anime, especially new anime, is mainly through the word-of-mouth diffusion on the Internet and summarized information by local anime fans, although there are some publicity activities by licensed video sites and through some Internet news sites. Recently, the number of new releases distributed has been increasing.

In addition to the recent increase in the number of new works being distributed, the presence of Japanese animation is relatively decreasing due to the increased commercial promotion of Chinese domestic animation, and "buzz in the Chinese animation fan community" has become more important than before in terms of the popularity of new Japanese animation. There is no doubt about it.
Therefore, it is said that even if a work has a bad reputation in the current Chinese otaku community, the continued use of it as a topic of conversation draws attention to related works, which in turn leads to a boost in popularity.

However, unlike other works that have become popular in China, the two works mentioned above have always been followed by comments that seem to dredge up past resentments, and even after they gain attention and become popular, they continue to be prone to flames and criticism of the works. One Chinese otaku commented, "The tastes of Chinese anime viewers do not match their own,
"If the development of an anime is not to the liking of Chinese anime viewers, there is a possibility that the fan community will be damaged by the flames.
We also hear stories like this.

In China, the popularity of works changes and the pace of generational change is faster than in Japan, and there is a view that the negative impact of past bad publicity on new anime is not as great as in Japan.

Of course, the circumstances regarding this type of negative publicity vary from work to work, and there is no doubt that it is a difficult element to deal with, but the premise is that without high popularity, there would not be enough bad publicity to spread widely among Chinese anime viewers, so in the current environment of the otaku community in China, it is not possible to create a negative publicity campaign. Therefore, in the current environment of the Chinese otaku community, it seems that the flames of past popular works that are related to the new works can be a positive thing for the new works in terms of buzz.

(Text by Kagoyo Hyakumoto)
(C) 2016 Tsukasa Fushimi/KADOKAWA ASCII MEDIA WORKS/EMP