Were most con goers in the early 2000s casuals who'd watched like 10 anime in general? What was that experience like
>>287957050God, no. It still hadn't hit the mainstream so everyone there was an awkward, unwashed weeaboo. Back then you still had to look for anime if you wanted to find it. It did a good job of gatekeeping.
>>287957838so what was up with all the cosplayers of mainstream shows? Inuyasha and dbz lol and sailor moon?
>>287957050The overwhelming majority of millennial anime fans are basically just toonami fans and never explored the medium beyond that even today.
>>287958150Well I started with anime in the 96-2000 on VHS. Non toonami shows. But I didn't find internet anime until 2006. I do recall buying a volume of manga in 2003 or so. Blade of the immortal lol
>>287958123Popular things are popular? Groundbreaking observation.
>>287958260Yeah but if they were hardcore weeaboos, wouldn't the cosplays have more variety?
>>287957050I miss SRW, bros...
>>287957050none of your business
>>287958777is it?
Yo
>>287958273There were far fewer options; you couldn't just pirate everything in a season and had to rely on physical media. The lack of wikis and easily accessible information also meant you showed how hardcore you were with how much trivia you know within a larger fandom.Aiming for hipster clout by watching obscure things was much harder to do unless you were an /m/fag, regularly went to Japan, or had a hook-up with access to Japanese TV.
>>287961802well im just wondering, because i started with anime in the 90s, with obscure mecha shows, but it wasn't all that much. I just didn't find fansubs until 2006 and I just wondered if the fandom was super hardcore by that point and watched dozens of shows or if they were still mostly casuals
>>287961932and it was dubbed too.
>>287961932>>287961973If it was dubbed, it wasn't obscure.
>>287962549It wasn't dubbed in English. It was obscure to western fans. I know. Because it only got subbed in the 2010s.
>>287961932You didn't "start with anime", you just watched whatever shit was shown on your TV or what parents bought you on VHS, idiot. You didn't even know it was called anime.
>>287962733And the tape traders back then called it Japanimation. Heck, most of the world started with anime far before the USA and didn't know it was called anime. The French for example watched way more anime than the tape traders did in the 90s, and didn't know it was called anime lol. That isn't really all that much of a requirement. And by the time DBZ aired on toonami , which was probably just a year or two after I watched some of those, it was obvious it was Japanese to me. Fuck I finished DBZ and GT in 2000, before those were dubbed in English via non-english dub. It was pretty clearly not an american cartoon lol
>>287962783same with Gundam, I asked for that shit on VHS in non english but they didn't have it. That was in 2000. But I didn't know what anime was. I just thought it was another american cartoon right?
>>287962783>That isn't really all that much of a requirement.That's a requirement because were just watching cartoons. American cartoons, Japanese cartoons, Finnish cartoons, French cartoons.
>>287962850No you're coping. Italians and French people. Latams have been watching anime a decade or two before the tape traders of the 90s. They didn't know it was called anime. And the cultural effect is noticeable. The french spend more per capita on anime products than the US does despite lower incomes. You can cope all you want. Just liking an anime even if you don't know its anime is good enough. Especially if it influences your taste later on.
>>287962878Coping with what? I'm simply telling you that kids watch a lot of cartoons and don't really care about where it comes from. Until you consciously start looking for specifically anime, you're just watching whichever cartoons you are shown.
>>287962906But still, an anime fan. Even if you don't know where it's from. An Italian might not now Gundam was from Japan, but he still knew about Gundam in the 1980s. Before almost any american. And he built merchandise back then. And for Mazinger. And Grendizer. etc. But he's not a fan because?
>>287962924>But he's not a fan because?Because he just liked those specific cartoons that he saw on TV. Along with Winnie the Pooh, The Moomins, The Smurfs and so on.
>>287962972Ok sounds to me you're just angry because anime was largely not niche even in the 80s. Fine. I started with anime in 2000.>>287962802I was explicitly aware Dragonball and Gundam were not US cartoons. I also watched a show called Might Gaine and was aware that wasn't American either. Pretty sure I knew they were all Japanese. Happy now?
>>287958150Nah they watched AoT and Demon Slayer
>>287957050>casuals who'd watched like 10 anime in generallol casuals back then were the guys who watched stuff like Dragon Ball and Digimon on the weekendsWatching like 10 anime was enough to be considered obsessed back in the day
>>287965062in like 2002-2004?
