Or at least the first half anyway. I can’t speak for the latter, I’m a prude. That innuendo on the way, it’s been rather quiet here on the home front recently.

Perhaps it’s because I’ve been too busy fighting the war over at MAL, being one of the many front- (or second-) line reporters from the character battlefield that is SaiMoe.

Maybe I’ve been busy riding the anime rollercoaster, at times watching things that are horribly dull and not worth writing about, to watching things that are simply so mindblowing I can’t even put words together, and everywhere in between. This will be the 9th draft of a post in the last 3 weeks, and hopefully you’ll be able to read this sentence and shake your head, because that’ll mean I finally managed to get back on the writing track.

Or maybe, it’s that occasional thing called ‘real life’ that snuck up on me with a bat, a bat made of Nerf guns, video games, and sometimes homework, that beaned me over the head, straight in the ‘pretentious writing complex’.

But in any case, an absence, or at least a slowing in posting, can be a good thing. For one, you become much cooler when everyone thinks you’re gone, and then, out of the fire and flames, you carry on you powerwalk towards the camera in slow motion, rock music playing and your hair billowing as your … sorry, got a bit carried away there.

But at least, I know that I smile when I hear from someone that I haven’t seen around in a while, so here’s to hoping you can do the same.

But anyway … It’s that time again, where the democratic process shows its great merit once more as millions of airheads, loudmouths, conspiracy theorists, closed-minded fools, and occasionally an intelligent person go to vote on the one person to rule the world …

… It’s time for SaiMoe 2008.

Although perhaps it’s not quite of the same magnitude as the U.S. Election, there still are a lot of comparisons to be made, little be how fans tend to “change” characters to what “they can believe in”, or how there will be “100 more years” of Zero no Tsukaima (or any J.C. Staff show really), or how there tend to be the strangest running mates chosen (Miku Hatsune with Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei? Really?), or perhaps, more matter-of-factly, the fact that things just tend not to make sense.

And this has been apparent, probably to every fan, at least once, in the seemingly strange upsets that tell you, that perhaps, your moe triggers are a bit off from the norm.

Not that that’s bad or anything, but I’ve found myself becoming continually more decalibrated from my once logical sense of moe, in the early days when I loved the strong, shy, and silent, and ignored the rest.

Now I’ve found myself picking and choosing from a wider range of people, sometimes not from their own merit but sometimes for the lack of merit of everyone else on a show, so that my favorites list represents a relatively large if not scattered population.

But what really struck me was the difficulty that I had when trying to defend that list.

This is something I found while, naturally, searching the SaiMoe ballots, checking out the matchups and making a few tough decisions. Was it worthwhile to throw all my backing behind another KimiKiss character which would undoubtedly fall by the wayside, for example? Or what about later on, when undoubtedly huge clashes will occur, between the big names like Clannad, Hayate, Lucky Star, and many more? How do you decide the true superiority of a heroine?

And to myself, I found the strongest characters in my heart becoming blurred. It’s an interesting effect.

For the second tier, I had no problem. Miyuki’s a fine high-class smart, clumsy beauty. Ayumu’s got Sacchin power behind her back. Chinami’s bright, optomistic and occasionally shy attiude would put a smile on anyone’s face.

But the true legends, have become just that, more legend than truth.

You can start to make a case for Nagato. The glasses, the quiet, terse way of acting, that delight almost similar to prying open a tsundere, except for silent girls. The overwhelming power and the silent sense of duty. Sure, that’s something.

But how can you excuse the ’silent girl’ trap, the feeling that it’s just a bit too much? What about when you’re confronted with Ryoko, or Haruhi, or anyone else from the same show? What is it that puts Nagato above, to the point where she can’t be called the pedestrian ‘Yuki’, a commoners’ name?

I mean, I didn’t even like Shiori that much the first time around, compared to Mai.

Sometimes I wonder if this means that I’ve moved on. That it’s time for a new queen, or maybe time to get a girlfriend. Although I jest - sorry, ladies - I wonder if this failure to have a satisfactory justification for the characters I stand behind, means my failure as a fan of them.

But having watched Akagi a lot recently - as you’ll hear soon enough - I’m reminded that an overreliance on reason is the downfall of many a person in gambling, and what greater gamble than that of the heart?

Indeed, citing this ubiquitous “real life” as evidence, who’s to say that love makes any sense? Sometimes it’s more intangible than that, and that’s all right. You don’t have to know why it’s right - only that it is.

Of course, to say that I love any anime character would be too much of a stretch for me to explain away in any sense, having at least a large enough connection to reality to avoid becoming too much, but it does help me justify having enough of a endearment towards certain characters to dismember anyone (Shiki Tohno style) who tries to demean them with vulgar words or imagery.

I won’t say that it’s a good thing to be so defensive about a character - the big-name Shugo Chara bloggers can attest to why - but I wouldn’t suggest trying to logic yourself into a corner about any particular character.

If you like things, you’ll like them no matter what you try to do otherwise, simple as that; for example, it even applies to shows, like how the no-less-fluffy-than-a-majority-of-anime Haruka’s Secret has endeared itself to the otakusphere, or how I can drop all my bishoujo-fan, harem-loving, white-guy pretenses to enjoy the most over-the-top story of mahjong ever.

It doesn’t matter if you can’t explain or convey it (although if you can’t, I would suggest not trying to, especially if your Shift key is broken). You are who you are, and you like what you like. Don’t try to convince yourself otherwise - although the opposite holds true, to not hold on to antiquated beliefs for the sake of holding the status quo.

And yes, that does contradict what I said, very much in fact, and would imply that maybe I should stop inflating my Nagato imagefolder. But, to end this with the largest cop-out this side of School Rumble, you’ll know when it’s right. You can’t be told for matters of the heart like this.

-CCY

(And that’s why anime is awesome, because it can reach your heart so powerfully.)

This post is tagged Analysis