I liked my comment about K-ON! on Kotaku so much I decided to post it here, too.
Pure crap. Even loli artists hate this shit:
The more astute followers of Japanese subcultural trends have long realized that there is an ever-widening schism between old-school "otaku" and new-school "moé" devotees. But what does it mean for modern moé when even a pro degenerate -- and lolicon pioneer -- like manga artist Hideo Azuma has this to say about it? You'd have expected that if anyone could bridge the eras, it would be someone like him, but no dice. (For those not in the know, Azuma is something like Japan's R. Crumb, only without the ability to catch a break and actually get himself laid.)
"I watched [moé staple anime] 'K-On!' It was empty. It was nothing. The jokes made no sense. It didn't even have any eroticism, any grotesquerie. Just the mildest, faintest hint of fetishism. Are the people who made it and the people who watch it that unable to cope with reality? It just feels gross -- kind of like maid cafes, now that I think of it."
-From Matt Alt's AltJapan website.
I couldn't have summed it up better myself. Otaku get all bent over this tripe so that figure companies can make endless variations of these same characters over and over so lonely boys can blow their whole paycheck on them but then bitch about how a real woman would take all of their money, cough. I mean, really, is THIS what society has come to? I approve of hardcore stuff if all you're seeking is a diversion to get off on. Because that's what it is - you're not building a relationship, you want stimuli so you can perform a biological function. On the other hand, how the hell is one able to make a "relationship" with a two-dimensional drawing and "get to know her" or whatever? It's just strange, there's no depth, and anyone who pretends that there is, is just... creepy. It's one thing to appreciate art or a story or any component of the thing, but this has clearly been designed to take advantage of that already-captive male audience for which loneliness is a way of life. But hey, I guess if they make money and otaku doodz can keep deluding themselves into thinking that 2-D drawings - drawn by a man more often than not - then no harm done, right? Well, other than the potential destruction of a once creative medium that has been reduced to panty shot slips, lame jokes and average girls filling the role typically occupied by "interesting characters" because the target audience is too lame to actually go out and talk to one.
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