[Zakkuri! Heisei Anime History] Vol. 4: 1992 -- TV animation was excited by "Sailor Moon! OVAs that made people moe with "Tenchi Muyo! OVAs that were moe with "Tenchi Muyo!"! Anime featuring heroines of the new era appeared one after another!

In this fourth installment of the series, we look back on the turbulent 31-year history of Heisei, a period in which various anime were born and then disappeared, along with the titles of the anime. Here we go again!

Sailor Moon" and "Shin-chan" enjoyed a huge boom

The year 1992 was an important year for two major national anime series, "Sailor Moon" and "Crayon Shin-chan," which began airing on TV.

Sailor Moon" was the first ever "girl-oriented" fighting shape-shifting heroine series, which was developed simultaneously with Naoko Takeuchi's manga series. There had been many anime and manga series featuring transformable heroines who fought, but all of them were basically aimed at male audiences. In addition to the team battle elements of the Sentai heroine series, the stylish setting of Azabu Juban, the reincarnation of the heroine, and the love romance, were all elements that made the series popular among girls.

The director of this film is a director who later worked on "Ojamajo Doremi," "ARIA," and "HUGt! Pretty Cure (co-director). The young staff of the time, including Kunihiko Ikuhara, Yoji Enokido, and Takuya Igarashi, who are still active on the front lines today, also contributed their talents to the series.

This work, with its various hooks, was not only immensely popular among women and men, but also spread overseas. It is said that not a few overseas anime fans have developed a yearning for Japan after watching this work.

Sequels were produced without interruption until 1997, and the series was also adapted into movies, musicals, and other media mixes. The lead voice actors Kotono Mitsuishi, Aya Kugawa, Michie Tomizawa, Emi Shinohara, and Rika Fukami formed the voice actor unit "Peach Hips. In the 2000s, the popularity of the series continued to grow, with live-action dramas and remakes that emphasized the original story, and the popularity of the series has not waned to this day.

This series established the genre of "transformable heroine fighting heroines" for girls. The spirit of this genre is still alive and well in the "Pretty Cure" series.

Another blockbuster hit, "Crayon Shin-chan," is a gag manga for adults, written by Yoshito Usui and serialized in the manga magazine "Weekly Action. The anime version was not expected to be very popular at first, but viewer ratings increased with each episode, and although the ratings for the first broadcast in April were only 4.0%, by January of the following year, the show had grown to become a very popular program with viewer ratings exceeding 20%.

At the same time, criticism erupted over Shin-chan's behavior and vulgar gags that hit a nerve with adults. In a survey of elementary and junior high school students and their parents' attitudes toward TV programs sponsored by the Japan Council of PTAs, Shin-chan ranked high on the list of programs they did not want their children to watch.

However, the popularity of this work, which depicts a "modern family" that is distinctly different from conventional family-oriented animation, has not wavered. Even today, it is one of the few primetime animated programs that still enlivens the viewing room every week.

What both works have in common is that they were completely new works that destroyed old values. It is no exaggeration to say that these two works, which opened a big hole in the TV animation scene, are the greatest inventions of early Heisei anime.

Magical girl anime was in abundance! And "Super Zugan," which foreshadowed the late-night anime era.

Another characteristic of this year's TV anime was the upsurge in magical girl anime.

Other works such as "Yadamon", popular for its stylish character by SUEZEN, "Hime-chan no Ribbon", which depicted the love and friendship of the main character who transforms with a "magic ribbon", and "Flower Wizard Marie Belle", a magical girl anime by Reed Productions (now Production Lead) following "Minky Momo" and "Sweet Mint". and "Mama is a Fourth Grader," Sunrise's first anime for girls, could also be considered a variant of the magical girl anime. These magical girl animations were the talk of the town. This was truly an era of female breakthroughs. What is interesting is that all of them were not only stories of dreams and magic, but also realistic and serious dramas. Because of their gritty dramas, they were popular among anime fans of both genders.

As for anime for boys, let's not forget "YuYu Hakusho. Based on a manga serialized in "Weekly Shonen Jump" at the time, this work started out as a humanistic story about the main character Urameshi Yusuke, who dies in an accident, but quickly turned into a battle-action story. The manga's beautifully shaped characters became popular among girls, and it quickly grew to become a very popular manga. The popularity of the manga led to an anime adaptation, which was also a big hit. Many CDs of character songs sung by the voice actors were also released.

SF animation and robot animation such as "Space Knight Tekkaman Blade," "Super Electric Robot Tetsujin 28-go FX," "Genki Ganbarugar" and "Densetsu no Yusha Da Gaan" also gained a certain level of popularity. Tekkaman Blade" was particularly popular for its serious storyline and appealing characters, although the drawings were a little harsh at times.

In addition, "Battle Fighters: Legend of the Fatal Wolf," a one-off anime based on a popular fighting game, was broadcast at the end of the year. Masami Ohari was in charge of character design and animation direction. Ohbari, who was already popular for his mecha drawings at the time, was in charge of character design for this work. The male characters were stylishly drawn and the female characters were sexy.

It was also during this year that the first late-night anime "Super Zugan" was broadcast in the 30-minute slot. Based on the mahjong manga of the same name, the series averaged a 2.7% viewer rating despite airing past 1:00 am, demonstrating the potential of late-night anime.

OVA Market Matured with the Increase in Video Users

While a new trend was emerging in TV animation, OVAs were also showing a great deal of growth.

While many OVAs had been produced for anime fans for some time, the impact of "Giant Robot the Animation: The Day the Earth Stood Still" on anime fans was immeasurable. Directed by Yasuhiro Imagawa, who at the time was making a name for himself as the director of "Mr. Ajikko," the work is a blockbuster that is fascinating in every way, from the heavy artwork and action to the crisp direction, the full orchestra soundtrack, and the dream collaboration of Mitsuteru Yokoyama's characters. Although it took seven years to complete, this work is still regarded as a milestone in robot animation.

Another must-see is Tenchi Muyo: The Môryôkôki! The Môryôkôki. This work began as the first season of Pioneer LDC's OVA label, the PAC Series. The main character, Tenchi Masaki, is followed by a succession of unique heroines, including the Môryôko, and before he knows it, he is leading a harem-like life. This is a style that is commonplace today, but this work can be said to be a pioneer. In fact, however, it is also a science fiction work with a rather complex backstory, and can be enjoyed from a variety of perspectives. This work became the most successful OVA series since "Mobile Police Patlabor," and was adapted to various media, including TV animation, theater animation, and radio dramas.

Moreover, since it was set in Okayama Prefecture, some of the most ardent fans even made a pilgrimage to the "holy land. In this sense, it was an epoch-making work.

After this work, Pioneer LDC consistently released numerous OVAs and became a leading figure in the OVA scene in the mid-1990s.

And we must not forget "Zetsu Ai -1989-". This work was based on a girls' manga by Ozaki Minami that dealt with so-called "boys' love (BL)," and depicted the forbidden love between a popular male singer and a soccer boy. At a time when BL was only available in specialty magazines, this was the first work to be serialized in Margaret, a girls' manga magazine for the general public, and it sent shockwaves through the industry. Of course, this was also the first BL anime.

The overly sexy performance by Toshi Hayami, who plays the popular singer Koji Nanjo, was thrilling even for male audiences.

In addition, "The Super Dimension Fortress Macross II -LOVERS AGAIN-," a sequel to "The Super Dimension Fortress Macross," was also released. Sales of the sequel OVA, created by a new generation of staff, were strong, and the following year another OVA, "Super Dimension Century OGUS 02," also a sequel to the Super Dimension series, was produced.

Thus, 1992 was a very healthy year for OVA. This can be attributed to the increase in the number of video rental stores. According to a survey by the Japan Video Software Association, the number of video rental stores in Japan reached its peak in December 1990. One theory is that the rapid increase in the number of people who passed the time with video rentals during the mood of self-restraint in TV programming in early 1989 contributed to the generalization of video rental stores. The market had entered a period of maturity.

In the theatrical animation market, family-oriented works such as "Red Pig" directed by Hayao Miyazaki, "Aladdin" by Diz Nie Rnime, and "Chibimaruko-chan: Watashi no Uta (My Favorite Song)" became hits, and Kadokawa animations such as "Silent Mobius 2," "Arslan Senki II," and "Kaze no Tairiku" continued to attract attention as they had the previous year. The odd one out was the year's production of "The Last Airbender".

One oddity produced that year was the anime "Shoujo Tsubaki: Underground Phantom Lights Gekiga Shoujo Tsubaki," based on Suehiro Maruo's manga "Shoujo Tsubaki. Directed by Hisaaki Ezu (Hiroshi Harada), with script and drawings by J.A. Caesar and music by J.A. Caesar, the film was shown guerrilla-style in various locations before being banned in Japan until 2012 at the request of the police, a fate that has made it somewhat of a legendary work.

However, it was not just a cult animation, but also a highly artistic work with special effects using experimental theater, confetti, smoke bombs, smoke, and other gadgets. It is a title that should be kept in one's memory as a reminder that this type of work existed.

(*Honorific titles are omitted in the text. Please note that honorific titles have been omitted.)