A bluffer's guide to anime and manga

On the streets of Japan, it is not uncommon to see a salt-and-pepper-haired businessman, perched alongside a young cherub-faced girl, both with their heads buried in a manga book. In the United States, passes to this year's San Diego pop culture convention Comic-Con – which includes a large range of anime and manga alongside more traditional comic content – sold out in one day, while the anime- specific expo sold upwards of 40,000 tickets.

Back on home soil, the product manager at Australia's leading distributor of anime and manga films and books, Madman Entertainment’s Dean Prenc, says the 'graphic content genre' of which anime and manga are a part, is growing, but still has a way to go. “It has changed dramatically in the ten years that I have been at Madman, the perception of your average fan used to be an older heavy-breathing, trench coat-wearing bloke,” he says. “Now you can go to a convention and it can be anyone. The gender split is about 50/50, the youngest fans are on average 12 or 13 and the bulk of fans are 25 and under.”

The upcoming Sydney Manga and Anime Show (SMASH) is a highly creative and interactive experience, and a good place to get a start in Japanese pop culture. The volunteer-run event features art, 'cosplay', anime, music video competitions, karaoke, trivia, and voice acting workshops. And you don’t have to be a hardcore fan to appreciate this year's guest list. Voice actor Shin-ichiro Miki has worked on mainstream projects such as Disney’s Aladdin, sci-fi thriller Inception and Len Wiseman’s vampire/werewolf series Underworld. “It is very hard to describe in print, or over the phone the energy that is at these events,” says Prenc. “What is unique about anime conventions is you get a lot of cultural panels, and workshops as well. You might find something on traditional ikebana scrolls, or bonsai, or traditional sword play workshops.” 

An active member of sydney’s pop culture community, and regular attendee of nationwide conventions, Prenc’s advice for anyone with even a mild curiosity for the art form is to take a leap of faith and get involved. “The anime community in Australia is tight, vibrant, and robust."

Keen to get involved, Time Out asked Prenc for some Cliff's Notes on the scene so that we don't come off as total n00bs when SMASH rolls around. “To start: anime, manga and cosplay are three entirely separate things that are all interlinked,” he explains. “Anime refers to Japanese animated cartoons, and manga are Japanese comic books. They differ to the Western versions of comics and cartoons as they are made for any and all audiences – not just kids – and cover any subject imaginable.” Both are broken down into different styles that indicate their appropriate audience. Kodomo is targeted at children, shonen for young boys, shojo young girls, josei adult women, seinen adult men. And, perhaps the most important tip of all, manga comics are read from right to left.

The scene also includes hentai, a much smaller and consideraly darker sub-set of adults-only pornographic texts. The misconception that hentai makes up a much larger percentage of Japanese pop culture is, in Prenc’s opinion, the result of early marketing targeted at young males aged 16 to 25.  “It started with Akira which has some dark scenes and a little bit of nudity. Now it makes me happy to go to an event and see a dad with his daughters, who are clearly at their first convention, and their minds are just being blown by the size of the world they have just stepped into.” 

One of the first things that might blow your mind as you set foot inside SMASH is costume play, or 'cosplay', but soon enough a decapitated Elmo head on a stick or a bearded man bulging out of his Sailor Moon suit will barely cause you to bat an eyelid. The practice involves participants donning costumes and accessories to represent a character or idea from anime, manga, comic books or video games, and cosplayers often role-play scenes involving their characters too. “It can be as simple as throwing on a costume from your favourite show,” says Prenc. “Or, for the more extreme cosplay, it can mean embodying the attributes of the character they are portraying. In our national cosplay contest, our winner built a suit of armour that cost more than the grand prize, two return tickets to Tokyo. There is absolutely no shame in getting online to get an outfit to wear along to your first gig, but remember the ultimate cosplayer makes their own costumes. That is like a badge of honour.”

Prenc has one last piece of advice to avoid a lynch mob of angry cosplay characters’. “Nothing is going to single you out more than if you confuse manga and anime, so if you remember anime are cartoons, manga are comics, then you are taking a solid step in the right direction to becoming an Otaku – a proper fan boy.”

Get started

If you’re looking for a taste of Japanese pop culture on the printed page or silver screen, Prenc offers this list of primary texts:

Vampire Night
	Madman's most popular series is soon to air on the ABC. Think beautiful vampires and angsty teens, like Twilight for anime.
Neon Genesis Evangelion
	Released in 1995, this TV series has won major animation awards, and follows a paramilitary group that battles monstrous angels with humanoid beings.
Naruto
	Manga action comedy Naruto, is a must-see, but is a huge commitment of hundreds of episodes.
Bleach
	This manga series follows the adventures of Ichigo Kurosaki, who uses his powers as a death god to defend the human race
Death Note
	This supernatural thriller is also a manga must.
Astro Boy
	For Prenc, this manga series first published in 1952 and adapted to an animated television series a decade on, is canon.