Recently I got very depressed after watching something I had hopes for turn out to be a massive pile of shit. That thing was Phantom: Requiem for Phantom. I am still toying with the idea of writing something regarding that matter as well, mainly focusing on Urobuchi, rather than just Phantom as a VN/Anime.
In that dark moment, I decided to return to watching something from the animation studio that puts out consistent good anime that I tend to enjoy a lot - Shaft. I watched Soredemo Machi wa Mawatteiru and both seasons of Maria†Holic. I found Soredemo Machi wa Mawatteiru to be hilarious and the last episode also hit me like a truck. I also enjoyed both seasons of Maria†Holic, first season more than the second but I digress. This is not a blog post about either of those shows.
If you've been on the bearable side of the internet for any amount of time and have interest in anime outside of FOTM shlock put out by most studios, watched and either immediately forgotten by the masses or regarded as the 2nd coming of Jesus despite being middling at best (Sousou no Frieren), you may have seen Shaft being regarded as the oddball among animation studios. I believe that's for a good reason. Personally, I'm a big fan of Akiyuki Shinbo's work. I enjoyed Le Portrait de Petit Cossette which I believe is his directorial debut and among the many works he directed, 2 of them made my (current) 3x3. So, going back to my original point, Shaft is just "different". Not in a good or a bad way per say, but you can most likely pick out a Shaft anime from a list if you've seen couple of Shaft anime. And it isn't just about that weird thing characters in Shaft adaptations do either.
I believe there are two types of people that like Shaft anime.
While I agree that Shaft anime is "weird" that's not the full picture. I believe they have something that other studios don't. At `least not to the same degree.
Slight tangent before I continue: I somewhat believe people who like JoJo's Bizarre Adventures also fall in the second type of people who want to be different but that's not the point of this blog post. As a matter of fact, neither is discussing why I or anyone else might like or dislike Shaft. This blog post is about normalcy, the good kind.
If you don't belong in either of the aforementioned types of people, chances are you may like Trigger... and Kyoto Animation. That doesn't mean everything they do is right, just that, everyone else fucks up more frequently or majorly than they do. I can say I like both of them to a certain degree, for different reasons.
Trigger didn't quite save anime as people would like you to believe but they have made a good anime or two. Unfortunately that's it, two good anime. I think Kill la Kill is decent, I am open to anime originals any day of the week, provided they deliver on the concept of the story and don't bastardize its concept or plagiarize any previous anime - looking at you DitF. I really like the Gridman series. I'm glad someone other than Imaishi was in charge of that because Imaishi is a one-trick pony.
On the other hand, unlike Trigger, but like Shaft, Kyoto Animation has also made my 3x3, with Haruhi. This is the part where I explain why I dedicated an entire section to fellating Shaft:
With that being said, I believe Shaft and Kyoto Animation are massively different in both style and substance. Explaining the style portion is easy, Kyoto Animation shows look nice but don't share an inherent style with one another while Shaft shows look nice but also resemble each other in ways that's not easy to explain. Substance is a bit weird. As mentioned previously, I really like Haruhi. I own all the available books, I've read all translated side-stories, official art and guide books etc., but I have reservations about recommending the novels to people. Kyoto Animation did a fantastic job bringing those characters to life and I've been asking for a season 3 for many years. A comparison would be Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei. I also really like SZS. I don't own the manga as not all of the volumes got published in English but I've shilled it like I'm being paid for it to my friends. Unfortunately the anime doesn't end the story and it never will due to the unfortunate loss of Miyu Matsuki. All in all, I can't say which is the definitive way to experience SZS while I can do the same with Haruhi. If I were to simplify what I'm trying to express, it would be KyoAni made Haruhi better, while Shaft made SZS different.
For whatever reason, Kyoto Animation got worse at making anime that Haruhi/Lucky☆Star/KEY crowd enjoyed and eventually stopped making that type of anime altogether. I think last great KyoAni production was The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya while last good KyoAni production was Amagi Brilliant Park. Nowadays, instead of adapting decent but not amazing light novels and manga, KyoAni has an in-house writing team that writes LN for them to adapt. I believe this majorly restricts creativity from both the author's and director's side. Some LNs thought to be impossible to adapt - like Monogatari have only been made possible due to creativity from the anime production side. When you write a story that you know is going to be adapted, you may leave out some of your ideas on the cutting floor on the grounds that, it may not be possible to show on TV. I can probably go on and on about this but my point still stands - KyoAni is at their best when adapting a relatively unknown work by someone else, not their in-house guys. And no, I'm not gonna act like the fire is to be responsible for their recent lack of quality. The second season of Dragon Maid happened after the fire and it was better than some of their pre-fire shows. And if we're talking about pre-fire KyoAni, as much as I didn't care for Hyouka it did something different which is commendable I guess.
Hibike! Euphonium is the worst example of this. I haven't seen a single good thing from that entire franchise and no, Liz and the Blue Bird was NOT good. Maybe I'm just tired of anime that takes place in high school - highly doubtful - but after the commercial success of Violet Evergarden - another anime I disliked, KyoAni's sensibilities have changed too much for me to consider them the same studio as the one that made Haruhi. I am extremely tired of seeing perfectly good studios become middling or straight-up bad because of some asinine reason. There's a reason why Doga Kobo is winning despite doing nothing special. There is a reason why some of their series have animators throwing themselves at it, just for the opportunity to work on it. Passion, the absolute necessity for any creative work is there. That's why even someone like me, who generally dislikes "isekai" went and watched Mushoku Tensei and bought all the books, because there was passion. Passion from the posters on /a/ who made daily threads for entire duration of first season. Passion from the people in the anime's production which I will fail to describe no matter how hard I may try. Passion from the author who listened to the readers who were equally as passionate. Kyoto Animation lacks that passion because they have forgotten to work on something for the very fun it will provide.
All of this may sound like the ramblings of an old man who misses the "good old days", but I'm neither an old man, nor do I have rose-tinted glasses about the good old days. I am simply tired of seeing something that is supposed to come from within - art being degraded to the state it is in now. Unfortunately future looks grim even with all the hope I have. Monogatari: Off & Monster Season will have an opening from an industry plant musician. A lot of the talent from Shaft left quite a while back due to poor working conditions and joined David Production, only to make a shitty Stone Ocean adaptation with heavy CGI use. Fire Force was good I guess, it made me read the manga but season 3 is nowhere in sight despite being revealed quite a long time ago. I just feel like there's an implosion happening in many industries, all at the same time and I'm not too happy about it and as this is my blog, I felt the need to vent out my frustrations that has been building up. I'll talk about something boring like my Master's dissertation next time maybe.