The Most Controversial Anime Takes (ft. @HasanAbi) | Trash Taste #145
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- Hello, welcome back to another episode of the Trash Taste podcast. I'm Joey and I'm with the boys as per usual. And I have an absolute giga Chad sitting next to me. Introduce yourself. - What's up everybody? I'm a Asant Piker also known as Hasanabi. - Yeah, and you normally talk about politics but we're gonna talk about anime instead. - Yeah. - That's where the real politics are. - Bro, I guess we have found out Hasan is probably a massive win. - He tries to play it down but I think

- Well, I think he's a bigger weed than some people in this room. I'll be honest. - I don't know what these guys are talking about. - Dude, literally, literally, upstairs, Hasan was like, "I've got assets." - So I'm ready to go. - I have a lot of great takes about anime that are spicy, but the only reason why it came on is because they said like, "Oh, trash taste."

they talk about podcasts the first five episodes, they stopped. - Yeah. - So that's why I was like, oh, thank God. Okay, they're like a reformed weeb community. - Reformed weebs. - Showing that weebs can function in society. - Yeah. - It's important to show that.

- Yeah, normally I would go for permanent jail, but it's okay. It's understandable. - We're the only three in all of Japan that are functioning weebs. - Yeah, exactly. So I guess this is gonna be one of the most anime heavy guest episodes we've had on Trash Taste. So there we go. - Most likely. - What a thought. - We have a Vash the Stampede statue and you were like, I should draw him. What?

Oh yeah, I used to draw all the time. When I was younger, like I, my dad basically put an end to it. He was like, you're not going to make money doing this. But I literally, yeah, I literally, that's all I did when I was in high school. I would just sit down, math class. I would just draw on my notebook. Wait, this is before you actually watched Trigon, right? No, no, no. This is, well, I just watched the remake. I just started watching it. Right, yeah. But,

I had seen snippets of Trigon. I never actually watched the anime, but I thought it was so sick. Like I thought the characters look so cool. Yeah. Yeah. That does look cool. Yeah. Vash is like such a sick looking character. Love the gun. And then also the, the cross gun to the rail. Oh yeah. Wolf woods one. Yeah. Yeah. So I would literally draw characters from Trigon all the time without actually ever watching it.

- But recently I watched it and it's so good. - Yeah, it's one of the, especially if you're watching the remake, it's one of the few 3D anime that actually look really fucking good as well. They use the 3D really, really well in that. - And it's like full 3D, which is unique, you know? 'Cause the last time I saw a full 3D anime, I think I swore off anime for good. It was the Berserk remaster. - Oh no! - I'm sorry.

- I'm sorry. - I think I'm good. I'm never gonna wanna watch anything ever again. - You not only watch the 3D anime, you watch probably one of the worst ones. - Oh yeah, yeah. - I know. - Literally starting at the bottom. - Yeah. - Oh my God. - Oh, the fuck? - Yeah, just press it like that. - Oh, I thought there was like a segment on the podcast. - It's now time. - Okay, thanks. - All right. - Yeah, like, I mean, obviously they use assets, like they do 3D.

backgrounds and things like that. And you know, you can tastefully put that in there sometimes, but this is like full blown CGI. Exactly. And I wasn't expecting much from it. And I casually downloaded it right before the flight. And then instead of watching one piece, I literally watched all of the, all of the episodes. Oh, hell yeah. So good. I haven't finished it yet, but yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, try going, I think is, I don't know. I,

I had in my mind that I wasn't sure if it aged well, but watching the remake, I'm like, okay, this is a banger story. A banger setting as well. - It's a remake, not a continuation? - No, it's a remake. - Remake, yeah. - Oh, okay. - So you can watch it as well. - I've already watched the first one. - Oh, okay. - I remember it had a very weird ending though.

- Yeah. - Very 80s ending. - Yeah. - I won't spoil it, obviously. - Yeah, don't, don't, 'cause I legit don't know. Speaking of not aging well, okay, I got some anime takes. - All right, all right. - Let's go, let's go. - Let's go, baby. - I've never seen you so excited. - Okay, first of all, this is gonna be contentious. - Okay. - Yeah. - "Dragon Ball Z" does not age well.

- Oh, the anime? - Yeah. - Yeah, absolutely. - Okay, good. - I thought you guys were gonna fight me on this 'cause like I talk about this stuff in my community all the time and people are like, "Dude, shut the fuck up, stick to politics." Yeah, they're like very mad at me, but like,

- Well, the thing is Dragon Ball fans are some of the most passionate fans you can find in the UZ. So we love clowning on Dragon Ball fans. Maybe a bit too much sometimes actually. - It's so easy. - It was my first like actual anime that I watched that I really got into anime with, Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z. And I rewatched it. I tried rewatching it recently thinking like, oh, this is gonna be sick. And then I realized like, oh, as a kid when I was watching it,

I was basically making up most of the fight sequences in my mind. It was like a puzzle piece that was missing. That was my own imagination. Yeah. Cause like when you're a kid, you're like thinking, Oh, this is so well drawn. And then you watch it and they're reusing assets like crazy, like the punches. Oh yeah. Yeah. And, and in my mind, I'm thinking they're like throwing blows and like dodging, you know what I mean? Turns out like that wasn't the case at all. And then a fight sequence was like,

- 11 episodes? - Yeah, yeah. - You have like five episodes of just them powering up. - Yeah. - And then you're like- - Two episodes of staring down. - Yeah, yeah. And you're like, as a kid, this felt like 20, 30 minutes. - Yeah. - It was like 30 episodes or something. - 'Cause how much skipping is like allowed until you're basically just not watching it at that point?

'Cause I feel like if you wanted to skim through it and just skip through it, it's like, I guess for Dragon Ball, it's very hard to stop at any point and feel like you're getting content. It's just like spread out. - True, true. - Yeah. So yeah, I mean, we've talked about Dragon Ball Z quite a lot on this podcast and it has its lineage. It started a lot of Shonen anime, which is fucking incredible. I would not rewatch Dragon Ball Z. - I mean, it was literally my entry point in anime. The first ever anime I actually watched

was dubbed in Turkey when I was growing up. Oh, shit. It was Subasa. Captain Subasa? Captain Subasa. Holy shit. Hell yeah. And I don't really like soccer like that. I don't really, you know, I don't really fuck with football. And, but because Turkey loves football, they probably thought like, this is a sick shit. This is a sick show to like distribute. Yeah. Yeah. And it was dubbed. It was dubbed in Turkish. Right. Okay. And, and,

I did not like it at all. So I just never really watched any anime 'cause I thought it was all like random soccer stuff. And thank God for Dragon Ball, it brought me back in. - Was the anime scene big in Turkey? Did you get a lot of exposure to anime? - No. - I wouldn't imagine so. - No. - I didn't even understand the distinction between anime and like Western.

- Right. - Western animated shows at all. Like I just thought it was another drawn show with like weird eyes. - Well, because it was probably all on like the same channel as like all the other Western cartoons as well. - Yeah, exactly. - Growing up when I was watching it, I like obviously maybe some Western consuming my own shows targeted towards me. Definitely felt like they were really different and you couldn't really pinpoint why, you're a dumb kid. You don't understand the concept of dubbing. 'Cause dubbing just seems like magic. You mean other languages exist. No, no, no, no.

- Well, there wasn't that much like, I'm thinking about it now. There wasn't exactly like a lot of Turkish cartoons anyway. So like everything is dubbed. - Yeah. - So for me, like I said, I just thought it was like a little bit different. - Yeah. - It was the same thing. And then I realized when I came to America and like saw all this like different branching out between anime and, you know, Western stuff. - Cartoon Network and stuff. - Yeah, Cartoon Network. That's when I realized like, oh, this is totally sick. - Yeah. - What was the anime you watched after Dragon Ball Z then?

It's been so long. I don't know. He's just seen so many. He's just seen so many. Of course. Of course. I mean, I don't know. Ones that are most memorable and are also in my top anime, so probably like Cowboy Bebop and Samurai Champ. Oh, okay. Yeah. A lot of stuff I watched, I watched off of when I came to America in a summer or something because there's no anime when I was growing up in Turkey at all. Yeah. Except for Tsubasa for some reason. Yeah.

So it was all like, what is it called? Toonami? It's like Toonami, I don't swim. Yeah, I don't swim. Yeah, it's all some Toonami stuff. So whatever they had on at night, that's what I kind of got into.

- So when did you actually start getting into anime? And don't say you're not, don't say you're not because- - I don't know what you're talking about. - So I read like, I read the Naruto mangas when they would come out in America, when I was in America in the summer. - Certified weeb right there. - Already, the fact that you went to the

manga? Yeah. Well, because for me, it was like, I love this content. It's so unique. It's so different. And I can't get it in Turkey. So like I would go to, I would park up at like a borders. Yeah. Literally. I would go to like a borders or a Barnes and Noble. And I was like, Oh damn. Like you can just like sit here all day and just read these books. Yeah. Like that's crazy. Cause like I, at the time I'm old, I'm, I'm, you know, I'm 31 years old. So like,

At the time, I didn't even really think about how I could like, like we didn't have access to distribution networks like we do now. You know, you got LimeWire and shit, but like that's half the time you're downloading malware on the family computer. So I didn't know, I didn't know how to like access it. So I would just like consume it as much as I could in a limited time frame. You got what you took. Yeah. Yeah.

And yeah, that was very similar. If you tried downloading anime offline wire, most of the time it was just- - Oh yeah. - Most of the time it was either out of order or hentai. - It was Bill Clinton. - Or Bill Clinton. - A lot of Bill Clinton. - Yeah.

- Yeah, I also never really got into digital. I can't do the digital reading. Like it has to be, I don't know. It has to be physical books. - I'm exactly the same. - Yeah, it's just for some reason it doesn't hit for me in the same way. - I used to be like physical only. And I think reading on a tablet has like offset that a bit. I cannot read on a phone. Phone is like way too small of a screen.

- It's just like a lot of manga don't get adapted nearly quick enough. Like JoJo, for example, in English is like, I think they're just starting part five. - Oh shit, already? - The official English translation. - Jeez. - We had like part five dub of the anime before we had part five English in the manga.

- That's so weird. - 'Cause I don't know why. I don't know why it's taking so long. - Distribution, probably bigger audience. - It's insane that it takes that long. - In the case of JoJo, they're probably reading and they're just like, "What the fuck is this?" - How the hell am I supposed to translate this? Is this allowed?

- It's like, shit, they have board meetings for how to change the band names. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Copyright. - This is copyright infringement the manga. - Well, yeah, how does that work in Japan? They don't care about Western copyright, they just run it? - I think they just kind of turn the blind eye.

maybe in a lot of ways. - I don't think it's more so that the American one would have a problem. I think it's just more of like, it's just a, just do it just in case. Like change it. 'Cause why even risk it? 'Cause there's so many band names where it's like, maybe if it was one, we could maybe let it slide.

but when the whole show has like Pink Floyd, Rolling Stone, it's like, all right guys, think one of them is gonna get pissed off. - Yeah. - I'm honestly surprised there hasn't been a band that has found JoJo on a whim and just been like,

we didn't give them permission to do this. Like what the fuck? - I mean, it'd be super fucking lame if you were like, I don't want it in that. And it's like literally the coolest thing ever. - Or they find it and they start reading, they're like, oh, this is actually kind of sick. - Yeah, you don't want to piss off JoJo fans 'cause holy shit. They will come to your house and burn it down. - Have you seen or read JoJo?

I have, I watched the Jojo ones up to, uh, the last one on Netflix. So I guess part six, like Florida prison. I saw some of the Florida prison one. Um, I haven't finished it yet though. Yeah. Um, but yeah, no, I've, do you fuck with it? Yeah, no, I love Jojo. It's weird as fuck. Uh,

I have a bad take according to Connor. I tell people not to watch part one. - Yeah, that's a bad take. - No, you don't do that. - That's a bad take. - We don't skip parts. - We don't skip parts. - I'm just saying, I'll tell people like it's a little,

- I mean, it's very different. It's like a different show that they made for some reason. Obviously there's backbone there, you know, like the Podonarifu and the Speedwagon or not Podonarifu, but the Speedwagon and you know, everyone else, like the whole family lineage is established there. But like, other than that, it's like a different anime. - Yeah, but it's nice. You get like rewarded for watching.

And I feel like you'd appreciate the show more for wildly changing it up, but then also having little crumbs that kind of like reward you. - Especially when you get to like the later later parts, like seven and eight, where it's where it actually, they start to call back to stuff in part one. It's like, oh, okay. - If I watch part six, you know, and they're doing all this weird fucking shit that makes no sense already. 'Cause they don't explain stands ever. - Yeah. - 'Cause like, why would they? 'Cause you've really watched part three. - Yeah. - And then they're like, oh, and then we're gonna get the stand to the Speedwagon Foundation.

what does any of these words mean? - Yeah, no. - You have to watch. - That's what I mean though. Like you just establish him as a character and like, but then after that, it's like, it just drops you into this world where like, oh, the fighting sequence has changed completely. Like that's cool, I guess. - I mean, I really like it 'cause it's like, even though part one is my least favorite part, it's kind of like a timestamp of the era that it was made in, right? You know, it's very reminiscent of the OG 80s action movies. Everyone's like,

overly buff and everyone's like a giga Chad. - I love that shit. - They slowly get less giga Chad over. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - I mean, I like it though. I like that they're all evolving. - Yeah, for sure. - Which one's your favorite part? - Ooh. - My favorite is Cujo, so I probably like- - Part six?

- Is that part six? - Well, no, sorry, Kujo. - Kujo. - Jotaro's part three. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. So like Kira and all of that. - That's part four. - That's part four? - Yeah. - Well, Jotaro is in part four as well. - Yeah. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - So Joe's skate ride with the pompadour?

- Yeah, yeah. - Yeah, that's my favorite. - Oh, no, no, no, no, not Josuke. No, no, no, with the hat. - Jotaro. - Yeah, that's part three. - He's in part three, four, and six. - Yeah. - And six. - Yeah. - Yeah. - You just like him as a character? - I just like him, he's my favorite character. - He is the most popular. - Yeah. - Okay, that makes sense. - But I think in Japan, Dio is the most popular character. - Really? - Yeah. - Well, he's probably like the biggest reoccurring character outside of Jotaro. - Yeah, he turns up in everything. - Japan loves the bad boys, man. - Yeah, they do, they do. - That's surprising.

- 'Cause he's like super charismatic and crazy. - He's like psychotic. Japan loves psychotic characters. - Why would you root for the bad guy? That makes no sense. - No, 'cause he's epic. I love him. - What the fuck? - He's great. He's just got a stage presence, you know? And the Japanese voices are so goddamn good as well. It's so fucking good. - Yeah, I think it's just because he is, you know, Japan being like a very, let's say a very quiet society. They love someone who's like more eccentric,

- Show some souls more. - We'd be like this fucking annoying. Like, you know what my first experience with Jojo was? It was the fucking steam sale edits where they would, have you seen these? - Oh yeah, yeah. - They would have these meme edits where it was like a steam, back when steam sale was a big meme. Obviously it's always everything's dirt cheap. And they would do like the final fight in part three with Dio versus Jotaro.

And it would just be like, 'cause he screams mood so many times. It was like throwing more steam sale memes at like another sale, another sale. - That's the first time you ever saw JoJo? - It was the first of my ever interactions. - It was a meme. - It was a meme. And I just didn't understand. - That's how Connor discovers most things. - Yeah, well, 'cause it was like, I was like, what the fuck is this? And then there's this dude screaming and there's, and JoJo's like the wallet and Dio is like the money. Like the guy take the steam, taking the money.

- I have no idea how I got into JoJo. - Yeah, how did you? - I don't know. I literally have no, 'cause it's like one of those things where it's so popular and it has like an annoying fan base. So then like, kind of like One Piece as a matter of fact, I would say. - Is that how you get into anime? You just like, you get annoyed? - I get bullied into it. - You get bullied into watching it? - No, no, no. I don't think JoJo was like, "You have to watch this."

But it just, I don't know. - Well, yeah, 'cause JoJo fans have like the reputation of being the annoying fan base. - Oh yeah. - Never being able to shut up about the show. Which is totally true by the way. - I feel like there's every anime fan base. - One Piece love to pretend they're not like that, but One Piece fans are like the worst. - I promise you, like if someone who watched JoJo and is currently watching One Piece, One Piece was way worse.

with respect to like how much they were like, bro, you have to watch one piece. And it's such a, it's like a biblical text. Like it's too many episodes. So you're like, I don't have that kind of time. We'll talk to you. I'm on the new Testament. Yeah. Yeah. It's like, I don't have that kind of time commitment. Like I can't do this. And then, and then you get into it and you're like, Oh my God, it's so good. Yeah.

- Yes, we did it, One Piece fans. - It's the OG cult in Japan. - Yeah. - Oh yeah. - It's like the most popular cult. - I have people now in my fan base that just like don't know me for politics, but just like listen to me talk about One Piece. 'Cause like there's, I have thousands of fan channels on YouTube, right? Like I don't have any IP or anything. So I'm like, whatever, you know, let it ride. Who cares? - Yeah. - There's this one fan channel that made an edit

about how I like used to talk shit about One Piece and I started watching it. And those videos independently, this channel's got like 10K subs or something, like nothing crazy. That video got like 100,000 views on its own. And now he's just like detailing and documenting every single episode and every single arc that I like summarize basically as I'm watching it. And like, there is a fan base for that. Oh yeah. - You love One Piece. - Yeah. - And you're obsessed with everything. - Which is a very political anime, Connor. - It's okay.

- It is a very political. - What? - He told me One Piece is very political. - Yes. - What aspect? - Oh my God, yes, I love this. This is gonna piss off everybody, but I'm so right about this, even though like, no. - Okay. - Okay, first of all, every single arc, well, other than like the first couple of arcs, every single arc quite literally details like leftist politics, which I think Oda is. Oda is 100%. Oda is 100% a leftist, first of all.

He has a Che Guevara photo in his studio. 100%. Look it up. Established fact. I have assets. I can pull it off. I can pull this off. What else? That's number one. Number two, which arc are you on? I don't want to spoil anything. I just finished. What a seven. Thriller Bart kind of sucks. I'm sorry to hear that. The ending is great, but everything else is kind of mid. Yeah.

It's fine. Because what comes after is...

- Everyone says this. - Okay. - He's right, he's right though. - It's so good. It's so fucking good. - Hold up, let him cook. Let him cook. - That means you watch like, you watch Alabaster, right? Which is definitely political, but like not as aggressively, but it's about like resource deprivation, things like that. But then Skypiea, which again, maybe a little bit too long as an arc, is quite literally about like, you know, indigenous populations being removed from their land

And like violently trying to, to, to, you know, find autonomy and emancipation through, you know, through violent means directly against like an enemy that is much more powerful than them. Right. That is like,

that's like a land back movement, which is inherently very political, very leftist. - I feel like I watched a different, I read a different- - Yeah, I know. I was trying to describe this to him. He's like, "What are you talking about?" - I was like, "Man, I saw funny gum man." - Yeah, yeah. - No, one piece is about having fun with your friends and being free. - Yeah. - Exactly. - I mean, first of all, Luffy is a terrorist. He is, he is. I mean, he literally is.

- I hate that you're kind of right. - Yes. - I fucking hate that you're kind of right. - He is a freedom fighter in the most like honorable sense of the word. He is quite literally fighting against an unjustifiable corrupt military apparatus that is like holding the entire world hostage, the world government and the Navy. He's literally killing cops.

- He's killing sea cops and motherfuckers are like, no, no, no, that's not politics. What do you mean? That's just like gum man having fun. - I mean, the thing is like, I remember you saying this yesterday when we were having dinner and I was just like, I mean, I think when you're

- With "One Piece" just because of the art style and just the way things are, funny rubber man. Of course, you can take it at that level and it's still very, very interesting stories. But if you break down some of the stuff that happens, half of it is Luffy going up against a corrupt government or corrupt- - Yeah. - I mean like- - Bro, you need to start an anime analysis channel. I would legitimately watch like a 15 minute breakdown of this. - Why Luffy is a leftist? - Why Luffy would play Hogwarts Legacy?

Yeah. It's... I'm not even... Well, there's like... There's trans representation in that too, but we're not going to get into that right now. Yeah. But as far as like Oda goes, I mean, here, there is the... I think like...

dragons does i mean i don't want to like spoil anything but um oda oda has talked about how dragons design was inspired in part by revolutionaries like fidel castro yeah he has a che guevara photo in his in his uh office i believe okay i don't know this part yet i'm not at that part yet so i can't speak on this but i think dragon's ship is literally the same name as fidel castro's ship okay but here's the thing here's the thing um

- I think sometimes, especially when you see this a lot in Japanese manga, sometimes authors will put shit in there just because it looks cool. - Oh yeah. - Right? Sometimes it's like the curtain is blue kind of like argument. Sometimes you look at something and it's a reference to some Western media or Western history. And a lot of the times it's just,

Japanese people find Western things cool. - No, no, it's too many coincidences. Listen, listen, listen. The Bolivarian revolution in Cuba was conducted with a yacht that will use to transport 82 fighters of the Cuban revolution from Mexico to Cuba. - Okay. - Okay? The yacht's name is Granma without a D, Granma, which is the exact same name as a dragon's ship.

Like that's, come on. That's not like that. He didn't just see that and was like, cause like you have to be like really invested. You have to be a weeb for like,

to like put that in there. - I think he's just a weeb for history, honestly. Like with the amount of law that One Piece has, like One Piece has some of the most intricate world building in my opinion, any piece of media. - Oh, absolutely. - It's obviously one of the most intricate worlds in anime and manga, but I think it's up there with like some of the best worlds that have been in any like book, movie or TV series, right?

You can't do that without doing a fuck ton of history on just the history of the world. - Yeah. - Yeah. - And being- - For sure. - Being inspired by a lot of events that might've taken place in real world history. - I'm just saying, points too many fingers in one direction. Here's a photo from Oda's office space where he has like his airsoft guns and then like a photo of Che Guevara right in there.

I'm just saying. - Dude, he's come prepared. - I have the receipts. - I mean, Airsoft's pretty popular in Japan. - Yeah. - Yeah. - Oh, he's still giving out of the benefit of the doubt. - He's like, "You just really into Airsoft, that's all." - It's really popular here. - I mean, it's true, it's true. - Yeah. - Well, anyway, so that's definitely a spicy one 'cause like a lot of people watch anime and like- - This episode is sponsored by ExpressVPN.

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don't really think about like who's making it or how they're making it or what they intend to do with their art. So like, I know a lot of people will watch that and still be like, yo, fuck that. That's not the case. - Well, I think a lot of people view anime as being almost non-political. - Yeah, an escape from. - Yeah, yeah. I think people view it that way.

Which brings me to Vinland Saga chapter two, season two. Okay. So you like Vinland Saga? I love Vinland Saga. Vinland Saga is incredible. Amazing. You did an interview with the author of it. Yeah. Is that the right term? Yeah. The author, yeah. The mangaka. The mangaka. And it's really interesting what he told you.

especially 'cause like the first season was sick. - Yeah. - And the second season is just like all about farming for some reason. - I would say it's about farming. It's more. - It's the majority of them. - But it's not about just farming. What's actually really interesting about that is

In the second season, there are very clear class dynamics at play, like class in the Marxian sense, where the indentured servants, the slaves, right?

are undermined by the peasants. Yeah. Even though the owner of the farm is very nice to the slaves in comparison to how mean he could be technically. And this might change, but this is as far as I've seen so far in the second season. I didn't read it, so I don't know. But there's a moment where Thorfinn is talking to the other slave and the other slave is like,

These peasants, they're bullying us, but they don't realize that, like, they're in the same position. They own no land. Yeah. But the reason why they're doing this to us, the reason why they're, like, stealing our food or undermining us or not giving us horses and whatnot is because it makes them feel like they have some kind of lordship over us. Right. Yeah. And that is at the heart of literal, like, that's the...

class position that many people have. It's very important in like the civil rights movement in America is very important in like, you know, the, the reconstruction era politics in America in the aftermath of the abolition of slavery, where like, you know, newly free, newly freed black people started recognizing that they had exactly the same class position as the layman, the people that were Wade slaves. Right. Right. Right.

and, and, um, that, that wage slaves. Yeah. Wage slavery is like what it's considered. I think like originally in the Republican party, uh, in America, which is now a very different Republican party started off with, uh, wanting to abolish slavery, um, you know, chattel slavery in the South and wage slavery in the North. Like that was their credo. Um, so, um,

- I've never heard that term before. - No, I mean. - I've never heard that online, people saying derogatory towards people who just work normal jobs. - No, I mean it's just- - You're not working for John O's, you're a wage slave. - Well, yeah, they use it as a derogatory term, but-

But yeah, that's at the heart of like class politics. So there's no way that dude wrote that on accident. - No, no, for sure. - Into that. - I mean, "Vinland Saga" is very, I mean, it tries to keep very anime, but does- - Go ahead, tell me it's not political. - No, it's extremely political. It's super political.

- I mean, okay, so when you say it's political, do you think there is a, do you think it's just exploring political ideas or do you think there's a, are you saying that there's an agenda that he's trying to like portray in this story? - I don't think it's nefarious. I think that people have worldviews that they inevitably bake into their art. You know what I mean? And I think like his worldview from what you've told me, especially like he's like a pacifist humanitarian kind of guy. - Yeah, yeah, I mean, he, I mean,

- For once I actually have a source because I talked to the fucker. - Yeah, make it the fuck up. - I am not making this the fuck up. He said the reason he wanted to make "Vinland Saga" is that he wanted, one, he thought it was an interesting idea for a story to have a story about violence and promoting how bad war and violence is and setting that in the Viking era. - Why did he make it so cool?

- That's the problem. Season one is so bad ass. And then season two feels like such a departure. In a sense of like, when is that gonna happen? - Every time I see that log throwing guy, what's the big one? - Focal, Focal. - Every time I see him, I'm like, oh, thank God. All right, let's get some violence in here.

- Yeah, and like he told me that he was very, very worried going into like part two, because in order to establish this message, he needed to establish a world where it was violence was glorified. And then what he wanted to do was establish his,

world of glorified violence and kind of break down why that's bad and why we should see another angle to that. And one of his biggest worries is that he did a bit too good of a job with that because everyone really, really loved the first part. - The message definitely went over a lot of people's heads. - Yeah, I thought the message was like, "Violence is sick."

- That's what I thought. - I thought the message was violence is okay if you're Welsh. - Yeah. - Yeah. - As long as you're a Viking, it's okay. - Yeah, you love that. He's like the best Welsh representation ever. - He's the only representation we got in life. - Yeah, exactly. - So sick. - You know what he called Askeladd? - He said cute, right? - He said cute. He said Askeladd was my favorite character, even though it was like very hard for him to pick. And I was like, "Oh, why'd you like Askeladd?" And he was like, "Oh, kawaii."

And I was like, what? - I mean, he is cute. He's a cute motherfucker. He is. I see it. - Yeah. But yeah, I mean, like I asked him, where did you get your inspiration for your story? Are you trying to say anything? You know, are you trying to, how did you get the ideas for what you wanted to portray in this story? And he basically just said, I just, I sometimes I just have thoughts and ideas and emotions that I want to convey through the story. And I find the best way

with the characters and with the world to basically convey my thoughts and emotions. And so I don't know how deeply he thinks into the political ideas, but I think at the core, he has these emotions

that he wants to put on the page. And so he finds the best way to get the moving parts to like portray that. - I don't even think he's like ideologically Marxist or anything like that. I just, I think it's like very human to recognize that injustice. - Yeah, yeah. - So it totally still makes sense. But I mean, it's at the heart of that kind of politics. - Right, yeah. I think talking to him, he is a very human like,

- I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good point. - I think that's a good

depending on who you ask, you know, they get the message more than others. Obviously, Hasan is like fucking nailed it. - I love it. - Yeah, but like, I think some of the best authors, especially in the manga world are able to kind of, you know,

try and show both sides of it where it's like, you can think of it as shallowly as possible or as deeply as possible and it's still just as enjoyable. - I want more historical manga and anime. - It's hard though. - I know it's hard, but it's so cool when they do it. - The amount of research that he has to go through just to write like a single chapter is fucking insane. He has to do so much research. How much Viking media did we get here in Japan? - Like nothing.

That's what's fascinating about it because it's like such a unique time period. Like Dane Law and the invasion of like England is so cool. And there's a lot of content in the Western world. Yeah. But it pairs very nicely with like

the last kingdom and, and other kinds of like Western live action, like docu dramas, you know what I mean? Like fictionalized depictions of what happened. So it works really well with that. Yeah. And I think, I think what's most impressive is that he's done his research and he's taken like real historical accounts, like, you know, Thor, Thorkell, um,

Thorfinn, they were all like real, actually I don't know if Thor's was a real character, but Thorfinn was definitely a real person in history. And so he takes these accounts of real things that happened in histories and he's kind of like filled in the blanks with his own imagination. - Well, even Thorfinn's granddad, or I guess technically is that his grandfather? Like the guy who went to the west. - Oh, Leif Erikson? - Yeah. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Real person. - Yeah, real person, yeah. - The first person who like actually found

- Well found America, the continent. - I didn't know that. - Yeah. - Uncredited. - I was just watching the anime and loving every second of it. I was like, damn, it's good. - If you want to get spoilers, just read the Wikipedia page. - I read all the manga, well up to where I was at the time. - Wikipedia is like the extended edition of the manga. - Yeah. - It's like that. - Extra lore. - That's the light novel.

- That's what I love about historical shows is that if you want more, you can just go to Wikipedia. Like you can look in and around of where they tell the story. You can be like, oh, this is fun. - Yeah, like I don't wanna wait for the manga to come out. I'm just gonna read the Wikipedia page. - And then you realize why they stopped at a certain point 'cause it just, the stories often just go downhill 'cause history can't always be interesting or the person's weird. It turns out they become really strange or do weird fucked up stuff.

Well, you know, sometimes they still take weird characters like in JoJo and present them in a shining light. Go on. You can say it. What? The Nazi. Oh, okay. Okay, that was like, I was not expecting that when I was watching. Because I'm like, wow, this new anime I got into is so sick. I'm burning through the episodes and then bam! I'm like, what? Did I just see a swastika? What the fuck?

And then I'm like, okay, this is clearly a villain, right? And then at the end, it's like, oh, no, he's like a good guy. And you think like, oh, he's going to be a Nazi killer, right? And then he's like, no, he died in Germany in World War II fighting...

- Fighting for the Nazis. Like they put that in there. - I think I wiped that from my memory. - I completely forgot about that. - That's like such an insane thing that they put in there that you just don't have to put in, but they did it anyway. And I was like, wow, well, this is untainted by Western liberal hegemonic attitudes. I'll tell you that. - Okay, wait, I gotta ask you, have you finished part six? - No.

- I wanted them to get to it too. - I'm gonna message you when you finish part six because there is a point in part six where they tackle the topic of racism in America. - Oh, I love that. - Oh, that's my favorite. - It comes out of nowhere. - You'll get such a kick out of that part. - I wanna hear your takes on that. - Oh, that's so sick. I love that shit. - It's near the end of part six. So yeah, we'll continue this conversation. - I love when like, you know,

Japanese people are like, yeah, let's cover American racism. Yeah. Like out of nowhere. Like what? No, I'm fascinated by like the perspective of someone that's like super far removed from, you know, like the actual history or the culture. Like there's not, it's not like there's a lot of black people in Japan. You know what I mean? I grew up in Turkey. Not a lot of like Afro Turks in Turkey. That's not like a real thing.

things like very marginal, very small amount. So, you know, I was fascinated by, by black culture in America. So I, I kind of get how that works on this part of the world because it's

like a lot of American culture is black culture for the most part. It's just like, so a lot of the popular depictions of American culture is literally usually black culture. - That's true, yeah. - And so I love seeing other people also go through that. Speaking of black culture in anime, actually, one of the reasons why I love "Samurai Champloo" is because like it kind of merges like rap. - Oh yeah, it's cool. It's so cool. - Hip hop stuff. - It's like, it's so weird that, you know, before "Samurai Champloo," you know,

- The idea of merging samurais with hip hop was just so out of left field. And now it just like, it's like the perfect glove that fits. Like how did no one think of this before? - It's done so well as well. - Yeah, why does it work so well? I still have no idea. - There were some other ones too. Have you guys ever seen Afro Samurai? - Yeah. - Oh hell yeah. - Samuel Jackson baby. - Samuel Jackson. - That's sick. I would even go so far as to say like Boondocks is also like weirdly drawn exactly in the anime style. I don't know why, but like it's one of my favorite

I wouldn't say animes, I guess. I don't know. - It's like anime inspired cartoon. - I think one of the co-creators, LaShawn Thomas is like, he's a huge anime fan to the point where he's made some of his own original anime as well. So it's no surprise that it was probably heavily inspired by anime. - That I love 'cause like when I was in Turkey, I was like watching the shit out of that. I love Aaron Magruder. He's brilliant, really clever.

and you know, so there is this like very cool merger of two cultures, uh, in that respect. Absolutely. I mean, it's kind of like, like, like you said, a lot of, there's a lot of fascination with, you know, the Western world and especially the American culture here in Japan. And you know, Oh, I've seen it. Oh,

Not even in anime, man. In just everyday Japan life. - But I'm like that too. I'm a marabou. So like- - A marabou? - Yeah. So like, that's what I was fascinated with. - I think they're called westaboos. - Westaboos, yeah. - The British one's called tia-boo. - Tia-boo, yeah. - Tia-boo? Who the fuck is booing the British culture? - What the fuck? - There are so many Americans. - I'm sorry, were you not online?

- What the fuck? - Were you not around during like the British vlogger invasion? - The British vlogger invasion? - Yeah. - Wait, like literally just 10 years ago on the internet, being British was like the coolest thing ever. - Okay, let's- - Right before I got on it. - I guess I erased that from my memory 'cause like, thank God. - I'm with you.

- Let's forget about the Tuesday era for a second. There was an era of British culture where every American thought he was cool. Mostly because of like Harry Potter actually. - Yeah.

back when that was like taking over America. - Yeah, no, Americans like, a good chunk of Americans still think like that's England, it's Hogwarts. - Yeah. - Like they think it's real, you know what I mean? Like yeah, it's just an entire country. - It's like don't ruin my fantasy. - I mean, a lot of Japanese people think that way as well. - Oh yeah. - Yeah. - Oh no, I've been to Harajuku. I know what Japanese people think America looks like right now. It's like,

They were trying to sell me like Yankee sweaters and shit. I'm like, no man, I'm good. - How has it been being possibly the biggest person in Japan right now? - Dude, it's so fucking sad, dude. It's so, 'cause like I grew up,

being fascinated by like Japanese fashion thinking like you know Japanese garments like the the history of it you know post-world war ii like raw denim all this stuff right and and I finally come to Japan and I'm I guess weaving out a little bit yeah and I go to like Harajuku and I see everyone is so dripped out there's dressed so well and then I

I'm like, I'm touching the clothes, but I can't wear them. Every store I went to, they made fun of me. They laughed at me. I walk into the store. I walk into the store and I go, what's the largest size you have? Just in general. Yeah. He goes medium. Yeah.

like motherfucker. That means in the middle, like there's gotta be more sizes after medium. And the thing is, that's a Japanese medium as well. It's probably a small American small. Yeah. Yeah. It's like, bro, you guys love American culture, but for some reason you don't have anything fitting American sizes. Yeah.

- Yeah. - Yeah. - I went to Jean Street and I have like a Western sized ass, I guess. - Yeah. - And it was impossible to get anything that fit. So I got one that fit, but the legs were like this long extra 'cause they thought that like to- - Oh yeah, to accommodate. - And then I had to tell them, can you please like cut it please? But it's really nice denim though. - Yeah.

You're just rubbing it into space. Yeah, I know. Well, I had the opposite problem. So I want like you have sick pants. Okay. You guys can't see, but he's wearing like super cool, like kind of parachute pants. Yeah. Right. And they're all the rage. And I want to buy one. I finally, after a long day of getting owned everywhere I went,

I, I'm about to call my Uber taxi. Okay. And then I see, see a beams plus I walk in, there's a fat guy. Okay. Immediately. I rushed to him. He's the first fat retail guy I've seen. Okay. In Japan. I'm like, bro, please help me. I'm like, please. Uh,

And he looked at me and he knew immediately what my problem was. Yeah. I got you. And, you know, he brought out like a bunch of these like pants. I put it on. The first one is like kind of tight, but it's fine. But it's a little bit short. Okay. I'm like, okay, well, this is fitted anyway. Like it's not supposed to be, but it's fitted on me. And then I finally see this parachute pants. I put them on. They're fucking capris on me, dude. They're fucking capris on me.

They're supposed to go down to your foot. They were like above my, they were above my ankles. - I guess I have the opposite problem. My ratio, my ass to leg ratio is like all fucked up and you have the opposite end of it. - Well, yeah, 'cause like he, I mean, he was so happy that he like found some stuff for me and I put it on and I was just like, now it's too short. - I failed you, I'm sorry. - That's what the blessing of both was, you're tall

and you're massive as well. - Yeah. - So it's like, it's either one or the other that you can get here in Japan. - Yeah. - Yeah. - The arm length is like really terrible too. - Yeah. - Everybody wears like oversized stuff now. So that's cool. Like at least I can like find things that fit usually. Right? - Yeah.

I'll put on a, I just want a fucking trench coat. Like everyone in Japan, they love wearing those long trench coats. They kind of look like normal jackets on me, which is fine. Like I'll still wear it. Every time I wear a trench coat, the arm comes to here. I'm like, no shot. Like it's just here. Can't do it. Real life backy character.

- Yeah, you are. - Yeah, it sucks. - You've watched "Baki", right? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Is there any political messages in "Baki" that I didn't realize? - Dude, "Baki" is just insane. - Did I miss anything? - Well, I mean, I told you about, I think like, well, Che Guevara is like literally in the show. And in the manga, I know like Donald Trump is in the manga.

- It's super political. It's like a whole like Muhammad Ali arc. - Yeah. - And there's that too. - Yujiro goes to meet Barack Obama. - Yeah. - Barack Obama. - Yeah. - Yeah. - Yeah. - There's a lot of that, but like, but even then it's like, there's no like consistent political message at all. - There's no consistent anything. - Yeah. - He just put shit in because he thought it was cool. - Yeah. - Yeah. No, that makes sense to me. Cause I love that. Like, it's so sick. Cause,

Every time I rewatch it, like whenever I'm in the gym, when I'm working out, I'm thinking I'm him. I'm literally like, yeah, like parking pusher. This so can I, you know what I mean? Just have to have sex to power up real quick. As my father watches in the shadow. It's like consume her. It's the most psychotic thing I've ever seen. He's just like, yeah.

- Beat it up, son. - I don't know how he did this, but somehow he tries and almost manages to frame it as like something epic. - Yeah. - Which is weird. - It is epic. - It is fucking weird though. - It is so weird. - The speech when the father goes, "You need to fuck."

Fuck every day. And I'm like, damn, I need to get out and fuck, man. - The Ujira spin, dude. - No, he's gonna solve Japan's birth weight problem by himself, man. Holy shit. - Oh my God. - Shinzo Abe could never.

Isn't that a thing? I thought he like didn't like the Hikikomoris and the weebs and shit because like they all they do is like watch hentai instead of fuck. That's what I've heard. So what other anime takes you have? Yeah, I'm invested now. He told me this garbage one. Tell me what you told me. Okay, okay. This one's a spicy one. Okay. So a lot of people have opinions on Attack on Titan on like whether it's fascist or communist. I don't care about that. I like Attack on Titan a lot. I think it's very interesting.

It's the only, I'm not a big fan of this genre, but it's the only mecha anime I watch. Attack on Titan is a mecha anime. Let's discuss. - What is there to discuss? There's nothing to discuss. - You know what? - No. - He's right. - No, don't. - Yes, he's right. - Yes, he is right. - Okay, okay. - Question, question. Is fucking Ratatouille a mecha?

- Could be. No, good question. - Because if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if it is, if

- They're organic, they're aliens. - First of all, spoilers. Second of all, like, I don't know. Ava for me is really weird because it's like at first glance, it tries to present itself as a mecha. But then the further you go along, you realize it's not a mecha. It's just a fucking sci-fi.

- No Joey, Ava, wait, wait, wait. You're not gonna, we're not going down this road. - Ava is a sci-fi. - Joey. - Ava is a mecca. I don't know how you can. - Ava is a sci-fi. - I'm about to cancel the anime man right now Joey. - I rest my case. I knew this was gonna be spicy. - Get in the mecca. - Get in the Ava. - Sometimes it's not a mecca.

- Why not? - Because they don't get in like a robot. - But they are in the robot. - No, they are literally controlling. It's a flesh Mecha. You are controlling a flesh Mecha in almost an identical way

that you would control in either. - Literally identical, it's like one to one. - What's the definition of a mecha? Is it that you're controlling or piloting something or is it more that it's mechanical? 'Cause I would think mecha comes from- - Mecha originally comes from there is a separate,

mechanical thing that a person goes into that they control to become part of them. But with Attack on Titan, they are the mecha. - Okay, 'cause you're Japanese, what do they call this genre in Japanese? 'Cause mecha is like a mechanical, it's from an English word. What do they call it in Japan? - Mecha?

- Yeah. - This is Mecha as well? - Yeah, Mecha. - Oh, so it's from like a mechanical term. - Yeah. - Yeah. - It literally, it's talking about things like, you know, Gundam and like, you know. - Yeah, right, 'cause it's big, incredible. - Yeah, like Mazinger Z, like, you know, like some human going into a robot that is there before they go into it. - Yeah. - Right? - Yeah. - They're just taking English words. - So fuck, maybe.

- Yes! - Yes! - Yes! - No, no, no, hold on, hold on. - You're making it! - Come to the dark side. - No, hold on. Hold on, I gotta think about this. - This is so sick because- - It's funny because I know a lot of mecha fans get so pissed off at this argument. - Yeah, dude, whenever I talk about this, I'm like, "I'm no fan of mecha anime except for AOT." People go, "What? How dare you say that?" But it makes sense, just think about it. - Mecha fans rejoice, mecha is not dead.

- It's kind of a troll. - If you don't really care for the boundaries of what isn't what genre. - Yeah, 'cause I feel like this is how you're gonna come to terms with the argument by saying it sucks, but like whatever. - If you want to extend the definition of mecca to include that, then that's fine. - It's a flesh mecca. That's why I say flesh mecca. - Flesh mecca.

- Yeah, because like if you don't think Attack on Titan is a mecha then Ava's not a mecha in my opinion because it's all organic material. The mechs that they pilot are real organic beings and they are- - I didn't know this.

- Have you never watched it? - You've watched it. - I've watched it, don't miss that part. - To be fair, it does get very confusing. - It does get confusing. - There was like 19 plot twists back to back. - But they mentioned that during the not confusing part. - Oh really? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - I think I might have just forgotten. - It's kind of like a pre- - I probably just thought there's a robot. - It's kind of like a fundamental part of the whole thing. - Do you not remember where the robot goes berserk and-

- Oh yeah, I remember that now. - And then the armor like falls off a little bit. - And the armor falls off and you see. - Oh yeah, okay, now I do remember this now. - Yeah, yeah. - Sorry, I just thought they were still robots still. - Okay, well then in that convention, right? A mecha could basically be like some person controlling something. - Yeah, kind of, yeah. - So would you say VTube is a mecha then?

- No. - No. - Okay, first of all- - Because in that definition, it would be. - See, here's where I think the difference between like a mech and attack on Titan is, right? Like if you picked up a sword and started using it, right? It's not the same as if you fucking spouted out a sword from your arm. Like your arm just turned it like transformed into a sword. - Right. - Right? It's fundamentally different, right? 'Cause you're having to use the blade and wield it, right?

- I think the fact that you can get out of it, like the fact that you can get out of it afterwards, like I think that like makes it, that solidifies it for me as like a Mecha. - 'Cause I feel like if we're gonna talk about control systems in Mecha, there are so many different control systems in like Mecha when it comes to either just, you know, mechanical controls or, you know, something more akin to Ava. And in the case of Attack on Titan, it's like, we can argue that the control system is just them becoming the body,

- Are we really gonna go down this route of like creating sub genres? - It's a shit argument. - Or like the umbrella term is Mecha, but this is the sub genre of flesh Mecha. - I think that it fits the same like style. Also very political apparently. Just like all the other Mecha animes are from what I understand. - Yeah, it is. - Yeah.

- Has no one ever presented this to the mangaka? - No one wants to hear it. - I just like to hear it. - No one asked. - People get mad, but like- - We're searching for who, Hasan, who asked? - Yeah, well, I don't know. - I'm asking. - I think the mangaka cares. I think he just wanted to make a cool story. But yeah, I'm asking when it's gonna end. That's what I'm asking. - Well, we're on final season part three, part one. - Hopefully next year is, I'm hoping out of hope, I'm hoping.

- There's not even that much material left in the manga. - Dude, they're gonna milk the shit out of it. Like as if they haven't already. - I mean like, yeah, I said it was gonna be this year, but it's gonna be next year. - It's not gonna be next year. - Guys, I'm saying it now, it's gonna be next year. There's only so many chapters left. There's not that many chapters left.

So unless they go an original route and go something completely different from the manga, then it's gonna be, there's not that much material. - Does that happen often? I don't know. - Not so much anymore. It used to be a way more popular thing to kind of take what was in the manga. And a lot of times the manga wasn't finished. So they just make their own original ending. - I mean, Akira did that.

- Yeah, Kira did that, Fullmetal Alchemist did that, even though I haven't actually seen the original Fullmetal Alchemist. - There's two Fullmetal Alchemists. - Yeah. - Yeah. - The original Trigun did that as well, actually. - I think Fullmetal Alchemist, the newer version is better than the older version. - That's the common consensus. - Yeah. - Yeah.

That's the comment. Yeah, I've watched it. Like, I've watched both. Finally, an old tank. Jesus. I don't know, man. You're coming to terms with some of the things I'm saying. I feel like I'm putting it down. I'm putting it down, and you're picking it up. No, no. What other shit takes do you have? What else do I have? I have, like, notes, okay? I have notes.

- Oh my God. - It's the most prepared a guest has ever been on Trash Taste. - Yeah, no, I mean, most of it I used up already. No, I have like, I mean, I have one where it's just like, I call it the Zelda principle. This one's like spicy, where I feel like Zelda, which is not an anime, but it's still like, still, you know, Japanese art video games, where I feel like Zelda doesn't have to be 17, but they say she is.

And it's like, that's one thing where I'm just like, but why did you say she's 17? Like they say it like multiple times throughout the game. They're like, they're like, but know that she's 17. I'm like, well, you didn't draw her like that. Like, why do you have to? Like, you just say she's 18. It's fine. It's the same age range. You know what I mean? Yeah. I mean, I hate this stuff too. Have you ever watched Tokyo Revengers? No.

It's about like biker gangs and they beat and kill each other, but they're 14.

- Well, then you have Jojo, which is hilarious 'cause like no one even thinks that they're 15 and it's almost like a joke. It's like a self-referential joke where it's like, he'll just be like, I'm 15 by the way. And he's like built like a 35 year old man who's like taking steroids in the past 10 years. - Bucky does the same thing, right? - Hanayama Kota is 15, but he's like fucking tatted up like scars everywhere. - So is Jojo Rokujo in part three.

- Yeah, he's 17. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Yeah, and they point to it and you're like, okay, well that's just silly. Like I just, I- - I feel like at that point you almost just disregard the age. 'Cause like the age is obviously just bullshit. - Yeah, of course. - 'Cause the character, like what do you take more? 'Cause online there's always this discussion of, but that character's this age. It's like, well, if you're, are we talking,

personality and lux of the character determine more of the age or is it purely whatever the guy says it is? - Yeah, you got dudes with like full facial hair and they're like, "Yeah, I'm 17 by the way, make sure you understand I'm 17." I'm like, "No, you're not, what the fuck are you talking about?" - I think what's weird- - You would not get carded. - Yeah, I think what's weird is when you have someone that looks like that

You know, you can say they're 50 and it's like a joke or whatever. But when it's like, you have someone like that and then they put them in high school, just like, there is no fucking way this guy is in high school. - That's what I loved about the beginning of part three when Jotaro goes back to school for us. - Yeah, that's what I was thinking about. - I'm like, how are you in high school right now? - He's like six, seven and he's just like, yeah, blending in in the school bro. - It's the same Baki principle too. It's just like, he's just so jacked and so much bigger than everyone else.

It's fucked up. I love it. It's like, oh man, all these assassins are coming and trying to kill him in high school. It's weird. So what would you say your anime tastes are? What kind of anime do you actually like?

- What kind of anime do you gravitate towards? - I think like, I watch a lot of Shonen obviously, like, which is part of the reason why I think the characters are supposed to be teenage. Cause like, for teenagers. - Mainly. - But I mean that, and I guess like,

I know what I don't like and it's just like romance stuff or like cute shit. Like I'm not into any of that at all. - That's fair. - Are you into like heavily political stuff? Not as in like exploring like different political ideas. - No, not even like, I don't, I get excited when I see something that I recognize as like political within the anime. - Yeah. - But it's not something I like seek out at all. - Right. - Like I've never watched a what's it called Code Geass.

Oh, okay. You never said Cogias. No, I've never watched it. And everyone says like, that's...

- Well, it's Mecha, right? - Yeah, it's Mecha. - I don't like Mecha. - In the traditional sense, it's Mecha. - And I don't like Mecha anime, but from what I understand, all the Mecha animes are literally the most- - It's all politics. - Yeah, they are. - It's all politics. - I think the original, I think it's maybe Gundam. That's straight up written by a communist. No, no, no, an actual, I think, Communist Party communist, if I'm not mistaken. - Really? - Yeah, I don't wanna say the wrong thing.

- Maybe let's fact check this before we say that. - No, no, no, it's like, what is it called? - "Legend of the Galactic Heroes" maybe? Is it that one? - No, no, no, it's not that one. - It's like snake something maybe? What is it? - A Gundam? - The original Gundam? - Seed? - Maybe? I don't know. - The original Gundam is just called Gundam. - Yeah, maybe. I don't know. I'll look it up.

- Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like one of the first ever like Gundams ever created was like straight up, I think made by like a communist card carrying, you know, Japanese communist party member. - Oh wow. - Yeah. So like Gundam, Gundams do have a history of like being very political. - I totally understand. - Yeah, I mean, most mechas are, except for like the super robot kind of like genre, most mechas are heavily steeped in, you know, different political ideas. - Most likely inspired from shows like Gundam, right?

- Yeah, yeah, exactly. I mean, Gundam started the real Mecha kind of genre and a lot of them kind of like similar to Attack on Titan, you know, where there's a lot of politics in Attack on Titan. - You should watch Kurt Kios. You'd love Kurt Kios. - Yeah, I mean, we'll see. - We'll see. - The art style is like really important to me too. And when I see like the old school, like very big face art style, like it just,

- I can't get really into it. - Is Koki House old school? - When did it come out? - Please don't call it old school. - No, it's not. - He could have said so many things except for old school and I would have accepted it. - It's not that it's old school, but like it does kind of have that like- - Like unique look, right? - Yeah, yeah. - Yeah. - Yeah, I would say they were, 'cause- - Wait, but hold on, you sat through Baki. You can't get more unique than that. - Baki's like the ugliest anime. - Yeah, but it's still sick. - But it's beautiful.

- I love, I just, I love like, it's the same like JoJo. It's like just muscular behemoths, you know? It's so sick. - There should be more of that in anime. I love it. - No, me too. - If you love that, then you should watch Fist of the North Star. - Oh, I've heard about that one. That is definitely awesome. - That's very awesome. - Yeah. - That is kind of like, I think what, you know,

- Did Fist of North Star come before JoJo? I think it did. - Yeah, it did. - Yeah, it inspired JoJo. - That's where the Omaewa Mou Shinderu meme comes from. - Oh, okay. - It's sick. - Fucking sick. - Explodes.

- "Fist of the North Star." No, that's a really classic anime. Do you watch old anime at all? Because I feel like a lot of people now, if it gets past a certain point where it becomes like hand-drawn anime, a lot of people aren't interested. - I love hand-drawn though. - I do like hand-drawn anime too, but yeah, it depends. It totally depends.

- Sometimes it's harder to get into. I mean, look, I watched all of the old One Piece episodes. You know what I mean? - That's hard to do. - Which hasn't aged very well. - I can't. - Yeah, and it was definitely significantly slower in the beginning too. - Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. - So we're going for more like Saturday morning cartoon as opposed to telling a serious story. - Yeah. - So I think- - Lot of filler as well. Lot of filler.

- Yeah, the website's dedicated to letting you skip. - Oh, I use that. Like I use the- - OnePace? - I have the, I don't use OnePace 'cause like I don't want to download it 'cause like it's too much work. But I use like the filler anime websites. - There's animes that tell you which anime to skip. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - It's so clutch 'cause like, I mean, I can even tell sometimes when it's like very clearly filler. - Oh yeah, you know. - Yeah. - Yeah. Like, especially when they don't feature like any of the main characters.

- Yeah, and you're just like, why did you make this episode? - Hunter, Hunter? - Yeah. - It's great. - Oh, another, okay. I have another spicy Hunter, Hunter take. Are you ready? - All right, let's go, let's go. - I think the Chimera Aunt Arg is too long. - That's a common take. - Okay. - Okay. - That was like a- - People get so mad at me when I say this. - Well, I mean- - A lot of people like the Chimera Aunt Arg. - No, no, I like it. - It's great, yeah. - But like, if you literally just look at the episodes or chapters comparatively, it is like,

more than everything else combined before it. - Yeah. - Because it's like what 80 episodes in the anime? - Yeah. - It's like half the anime I feel. - And the anime is 144 or something and it's most of it. - Yeah. - And it's long. - It is long and I think the first part of the "Kamehameha" arc was a little bit slow. Just a little bit slow. - Hunter x Hunter greatest pedophile villain of all time. - I mean, I mean,

- I mean, another commentator. - It's just like, it's just so crazy. He's licking his lips thinking about going. - It is wild to see the extent that people will go online to defend a pedophile if he's kind of cool. - Yeah. - Yeah, they shouldn't have made him so cool. - Yeah, that's the problem. - That's what's fucked up. - 'Cause he's like the strongest guy. - Yeah, they should have been like, "That's a bad guy and he's weak."

- He's like literally the most, like the strongest mysterious character in the show. - I feel like they would, they really limit tested that because they're, you know, Hisoka's always been like a creepy character, right? And then there's the scene where he literally says, "I'm getting an erection right now." And it's just like, okay, okay. - I don't know if there's limit testing at that point. They've grown through. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. - They put the gas. - They're like, okay, can you distill your mans after this scene?

- It's insane Shonen Jump looked at that and was like, "Yeah, publish it." - 'Cause one of the most epic fights in the manga is between,

what's his name? Krolo? - Krolo. - Krolo and Hisoka. They fight in the manga and it's like insane. It's like the most insane fight. If you can get through his really bad manga drawings. - Oh yeah. Oh, well they, well he usually repatches it for the actual volumes. - He would, it's been canceled now. - Oh really? - Yeah. So it's not happening anymore, but

- Not because of the pedophile. - No, no, no. - No, no, no. - Like just canceled as in the series or something. - That doesn't get you canceled in Japan. - You gotta finish it, dude. I'm a completionist. - His drawings are like so bad. - It's 'cause he had a serious back problem. - He had a really bad back pain, but it's like at that point you're like, just wait.

- Just hold up. - Why don't they like, you can't have someone else like try to recreate it. Don't mangakas also have like, you know, apprentices and shit? - They do. - Yeah, they do. - But Togashi is like known as like a super perfectionist. Like he, I think during Yu Yu Hakusho, he didn't have a single assistant. Like he drew all that himself.

But like, I mean, Manga is overworked to death. He's been going through some bad health and that's been like pretty well known. So, I mean, it's not surprising. - I'm not trying to be on the guy. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - It's unfortunate. - Yeah, I mean, I think after what happened to Kintaro Miura, like Berserk's author, I think every Manga is like,

"Oh, this is a thing that can happen now? Okay." - Yeah. - I better look after myself. And I think, luckily, I think after that fans are a lot more understanding about- - I finally have an excuse to actually start "Hunter Hunter" now, now that I know it's not coming back. - Finally. - So finally I can start reading it. - I feel like just like some of the most iconic fights in anime are in "Hunter Hunter." There's just so many bang of fights that don't drag on too long. - Also political, you got healthcare.

- Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. - Okay, break that down for me. - The fucking, what's the guy? I, so long since I watched it, but the main guy is not going, the tall one with the glasses. - Fuck, oh God, I'm forgetting his name. Leorio. - Leorio, yeah. - Bro, why is he even involved? Why is he involved? Because he wants to fucking pay for healthcare. It's true.

- It's true. - I think it's an American take where you just see healthcare, you're like, that's about me. - No, I'm just saying, but that's literally why he wants to do it. He needs to pay for healthcare. And then healthcare, another Oda reference back to fucking the Snow Island, whichever, what was the name of that? - Yeah, Chopper. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Drum Island, that's it. - Yeah, Drum Island is literally about paywalling healthcare. - It is.

The guy goes and arrests every doctor and is like, I'm going to control the healthcare now. You may not like it, but this is what the US will be like in two years. Bro, I'm not even kidding. How do you watch that and not realize that?

- I guess, I don't know. - You just thought like, oh, the doctors. - It ain't that deep bro. - I felt like it wasn't that deep. - No. - It 100% is that deep. - No, no, it is not that deep. - I will ride dude. I hope Odo watches your podcast, dude. - He does not watch the podcast. - Okay, the reason I don't think it's that deep is 'cause most of the world don't really think about healthcare because it's not- - This is inherently an America problem. - Yeah, it's not an issue, it's not a topic. We just accept it. - No way, he recognizes it.

he knows he's sticking up for us he sees how bad it is he's like drum island is very similar to america you got the magical witch at the top yeah exactly dude that's another crazy thing for me with one piece is like

I don't know what is going on with like the way women are drawn. And now I'm on Amazon Lily. I'm on the Amazon Lily like arc now. So it's like, this is the first time I've seen versatility because Oda Iter draws women like the most busted you've ever seen or just the same...

hot, like super sexy type. - Yeah, I don't wanna talk about too much, but yeah, one problem I've had is figuring out who is Nami. 'Cause in the manga there's no colors. Some frames it's genuinely like you have to double take. - I think he gets better. I think, well, I can't speak of the manga, but like,

- The anime definitely starts getting a little bit better with like distinguishing the characters. - It's not an anime problem 'cause you can see the colors of the hair. - You can see the color of the, I was gonna say, the manga. - But he had the color of the hair. - Bro, there's some frames you generally have to sit there for like 20 seconds. Oh yeah, okay. - You just gotta, you have to figure out like, he puts different hairstyles. - Yeah. - But like slightly sometimes. - Yeah. - Well, I say after the time skip, right? It gets a little bit better.

- You think? - I have not seen it yet. - I know there's a ton of shit coming, but I wanna hear about it. - I was scared you were about to say something. - No, I wasn't gonna go in just in case. - I won't mention anything. I know it's gonna happen. I thought, wow, I'm 500 chapters in and it still hasn't happened. - How the fuck are you in Japan and don't get it spoiled all the time? - I do, but there's so much shit. There's so much one piece stuff. It is impossible to piece anything together. I go to the gym, motherfuckers watching it all on the treadmills.

I cannot escape One Piece. - It's awesome. - But there's so much One Piece that like you almost, you have no idea when shit is gonna happen. And because like it's weirdish, like the art style is so weird and certain characters happen, have these transformations and it means nothing until I kind of have some context. - That's one thing I love about One Piece is that they change outfits a little bit. - Yeah. - Which I think is so sick. I wish other animes did that. - Not enough anime do that.

- Yes. - And I wish more anime did do that 'cause it makes them feel more like actual real people. - Yes. - Killua has drip in "Hunter Hunter." He's always changing outfits. - Everything, like everything Takashi draws, they have drip. - Except for Gon. - You, Hakusho. - Except Gon. - You, Hakusho. - Oh, you, Hakusho, had drip. - Has so much drip, right? - Drip. - Yeah.

Also bleach. Bleach, bleach. Bleach I would say pioneered the anime. - I think so, I think so as well. - JoJo is literally permanently stuck on like catwalk fashion. - Yeah. - JoJo's beyond drip. - JoJo takes it a different level.

- Yeah, but like, especially like with "One Piece", even when I started it, I got spoiled with some of "One Piece" because of like, you'd like go on like social media and you'd see some fan art or someone had an avatar. You go walking in like Akihabara and there's a figure there. - Yeah, there are figures there. - That's what happened to me. I bought a Zoro figure and he doesn't have an eye. I'm like, oh fuck. Like, I don't even know. I'm like, come on, man. Like I wanted to buy a fucking-

Or like, I mean, I'm sure you've seen like Luffy with the chest thing. Yeah, I've seen so many pictures of Luffy looking like Popeye.

And it means nothing. I'm just gonna have to like, the thing is, it's kind of like JoJo. It's like, if I tell you like part seven, Jesus Christ is in it. It's like, that gives you fucking nothing. It's so stupid and so out there that it doesn't mean much until it's actually in context. If I tell you X character dies, that's a spoiler, right? You'll agree. But if you see a picture of a character looking fucking weird, you pretty much only realize that you were spoiled

the moment it happens in the show. And at that point you've already- - Yeah, you've already got to the point. - So it's like, it really doesn't matter. - You're just waiting for it to come at that point, right? - Yeah, exactly. Like I, for me it was like "Gear Second." I knew that was coming somewhere in like the "One Piece" future. And I was like, I don't know what "Gear Second" is. People online keep saying "Gear Second." Do they get a car or something? I have no fucking clue. - Yeah.

and it just like, it didn't ruin it for me 'cause I'm like, oh, this is it. This is fucking, this is why everyone was talking about it. - I just, I wish Luffy was a little less goofy though.

- I don't know, I guess I'm alone in that take. Everyone always yells at me about that too. I just, I wish it was like, 'cause like Zoro's so fucking cool, dude. I fucking love Zoro. - He's the goat, man. - That's the Samurai Champloo fan in you saying that, right? - Yeah. - But he's so sick. - But he is sick, yeah. - He's so fucking sick. - Zoro's my favorite. - Zoro's the kind of character that only works in anime. In like real life, if someone acted like Zoro, you'd be like, "Bro, what is wrong with you? Just talk."

- Yeah, well also like, even down to the sleeping all the time, like he's just like, that's like- - He's just like me for you. - No, that's like so anime, but he's such a sick character. - Yeah. - Even though apparently, what is the meme? People say he's a racist. - What? - You guys have never heard that? - Oh yes, I've seen this. - Yeah. - What? - He only fights like black and brown people. He literally-

- No, literally. And also Oda said that he would be a cop in the real world, which is kind of sad, but whatever. Like he's still so sick. - I've seen compilations of like, Zoro is racist meme compilation. - Every one of his enemies are black and brown. Every single one. - I gotta go back through it. - Yeah, I gotta go back through it. - Surprisingly also One Piece, like definitely the most diverse anime.

- I will say that- - I think if you've gone that long, it'll just happen. - I think naturally, yeah, Oda's just learned that like, oh, diversity is a thing. And it's just like, okay. - Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, part of the reason that- - I mean, Luffy is like supposed to be Brazilian, right?

- I actually don't know. - I think Luffy's his own enigma. - But Usopp definitely is. Usopp definitely is like, I believe Brazilian. He's half black Brazilian. - I think they did say at one point, I'm sure I've seen this on Twitter. - They have, yeah, they have like nationalities, I think, and Zoro's Japanese and Frankie's American, like that sort of thing. And I don't know if that's like added on as like a style. It does make sense though, especially because

- Well, you've seen, you finished Water 7. - Yes. - Okay, so you've seen Frankie. - Yes. - Yeah, okay, like he's an arms manufacturer. Like he literally is like- - I mean, I didn't know that, you didn't need to tell me that Frankie was American. - Yeah. - The man gets powered by Coke. - Yeah.

- Like what the fuck? - Heel super, like of course. - That's like a deliberate choice, I think. He's like a weapons manufacturer slash drinks cola and is a rockabilly, which is like very Japanese to like hyper focus on rockabilly aesthetic. I love that shit. - Have you ever seen any anime or manga do like diversity or politics terrible that you were like, oh God, no.

- Simon? - There's a black sushi chef. - Oh, I remember. - That's gotta be racist. I saw that, I was like, what the fuck? What are you doing? - Even Japanese people looked at that and was like, yo, that ain't it.

the fuck did you do that? Like, why did you go there? You've never seen a black person? Like...

- He's supposed to be Russian, right? - Yeah, he's Russian. - Yeah, whatever was going on. I remember that. I remember seeing that and I was like, okay, that's a bit much. - Damn, I think that's like, in my head, there's like way worse examples. - Yeah, "I Show 21." - I think Gantz is probably the one. - Oh, Gantz, yeah. - That's only in the manga. - That's only in the manga. - Yeah, they scrubbed that. - Wait, what happens? I wanna know.

- It's so bad. - You wanna explain it? - It's so absurd that if I say it, I feel like I must have misremembered it 'cause there's no way it can be that bad. - Wait, really? What the fuck? - So he wants to get framed for a shooting, right? A public shooting 'cause Gantz is extremely edgy. - It's like extremely edgy. There's a lot of violence and gore. - And it's great at certain points, but this part is definitely fucking awful. - Yeah, it's kind of like a really fucked up death game where they put a bunch of contestants

into a random place in Japan and they have to kill a bunch of aliens. And the aliens are like super OP and everyone dies all the time. So that's kind of like the series we're talking about. - I can't remember why this character does it. - I think he's trying to frame someone. - So he does a public shooting, but so bad.

- To disguise himself so that people don't put him as him, he disguises himself as like a black man and it's so bad. It's so bad. And the way they draw it is just terrible. It's so, so bad. - So they did like minstrel shit. - It's bad, it's so bad. - I don't have my phone with me right now. - It's so bad. - See, I love shit like that.

- Why do you love that? - Because it's fascinating to me. - Oh, because it's like a Japanese dude. - Yeah, it's like insane that this guy thought this is appropriate. - Oh, found it, yep. - Oh, he just does blackface? Oh, that's like tasteful. - Yeah, but that's like a Japanese dude. - Yeah, no, no, no, I understand. I thought it was gonna be worse. - Is it worse or better if it's like- - Oh, what the fuck? That one's funny. What the fuck is that? - That one? Oh yeah, that's Bob from Gantz. - Yeah.

- Yeah, that's the frame though. - It's so bad, dude. - It's pretty bad. - That's not as bad as I thought it was gonna be. - Well, it's just the notion of like, I've gotta disguise myself. - I thought it was gonna be straight up minstrel shit. Like, you know, fucking old depictions, like old timey depictions. Yeah, Americans can get way more racist about black people than Japanese people. - No, I know. There's something about it in anime that feels so...

Weird and out of pocket. Yeah, because it's like, whoa. There's something about it that feels uneducated about it, right? Where it's like, they just maybe see it in media. That's why Baki is the best at black representation. Like, Biscuit Oliva is the goat. Yeah, he is the goat. He runs the prison. Very just...

- Fundamentally weird attitude about how American carceral structure works, but you know. - Is that how it works? - Yeah, yeah. You get the biggest guy eats everyone else and all the wagyu. - Yeah, I mean, but I think a lot of it just comes down to just exposure, you know? They don't have the same exposure, the same conversations, all the same, a lot of the same issues, you know, that America's going through. So it's just- - Which is why, again, Oda is the goat and-

is very clearly anti-racist, literally entire slavery arc. I'm not going to get too deep into it. Every anime has a slavery arc at this point. But this is very specifically getting into the details of how slavery depersonalizes the other person and dehumanizes them in order to self-justify it. You see that and you're like...

I see what you're doing, Oda. - What do you think about people who always try and claim that anime is inherently non-political and doesn't even remotely touch on like, you know, 'cause people are like, it's not like, it's away from the West. - All art is. It is impossible for us to,

it is impossible for us to remove ourselves from politics because like every facet of our existence is inherently political, whether we recognize it or not. Like what you just described about healthcare, for example, like to you, the fact that you have healthcare in Japan versus like Americans not having it, like that is a,

That is a political aspect of our existence, whether we vote or we don't vote. It doesn't matter. It's still happening. So for that reason, like everyone develops their own ideas about the world and how the world should work, or maybe even they have no ideas about how the world should work at all and just kind of let things slide in the way that they currently exist. Even that would be inherently political. Yeah.

So it's just all art is going to have that subtext. It's impossible for it to be completely removed from that, completely devoid of it. And like I said, non-political, like being non-political,

because politics is ever present is still a political act inherently. So even that would be a political statement. - You get a lot of backlash whenever you talk about these kinds of subjects where you were like, I watched this anime and it's about this political idea and exploring this topic. - 'Cause I would imagine anime fans- - Not in my community, not in my community 'cause like obviously this is what I do. But having said that, I'm very,

I'm not in the, in the same team as like a lot of people who go, Oh, that's bad. Like that's bad politics. So you shouldn't watch that. You're a bad guy. If you enjoy that, I don't fuck with that at all. I think that that is completely devoid of like, uh, what, how you are in your real life. And like the call, the things that we consume do not make us who we are. Yeah.

um and i don't think that like cultural things have the capacity to like legitimately shift our added it can shift your attitude about the world it can make you understand certain things but it's not going to like all of a sudden make people extra uh you know evil or extra good or anything like that yeah um so i'm not in the i'm usually not in favor of like you know telling people like you can't watch that that's bad and you're a bad person so

Oftentimes that is usually when people get mad at me more is when I tell them like a piece of content that you shouldn't consume is not really all that, you know, it's not really that game changing. Like you're not making a political statement by telling someone not to watch this thing. Like that's just, that's not politics. It's just, you know, you're just personally stopping someone from enjoying something. What's changed so much recently, by the way?

I only watched the first two episodes, then I stopped immediately because I was like, I need to wait for the whole season to come out, and I haven't had time to watch it now because I'm watching one piece. But it's sick. See you in 10 years, then. No, but it's sick. Like, I'm waiting for... Thriller Bark almost, like, snapped me out of it for a second, and I was going to, like... That's when I watched Vinland Saga. Yeah. But, you know, I...

I can't wait to watch it. It's so, it's really sick. - All right, so like now that we've established that you've actually watched a hell of a lot of anime. Have you already mentioned those that those are your favorites, everything you mentioned or is there anything else that you really, really love? - We talked about this last night, but I love like my top anime, I was thinking about this the other day is like Cowboy Bebop, Samurai Champloo and I said Attack on Titan, but I think Space Dandy too. - Fuck.

- That's how you know he's a real-life choice. - That's how you know, man. - Just like your top three are from the same director, right? Creative team? - Yeah, I don't know. - Yeah, Watanabe Shichiro. - Yeah, right? - I guess. - Yeah, they're actually all from the same director. - All three from the same guy. - You gotta go. You gotta die. - Yeah. I never really like,

I never really thought about that at all. Like who makes the animes at all. - Yeah. - Until like recently when I started getting a little bit, I guess like looking at it from a more adult perspective. - Speaking of, okay. - Well, it's- - I'm gonna derail this, so you should- - Okay, I was just gonna say where it seems like, you know, you're subconsciously gravitated towards someone's style if a lot of your favorite anime are by the same director. But what were you gonna say, Kona? - Do you watch hentai?

- Oh yeah, good question. I have. - That was a real Duma element right there. - No, I have. - Okay. - But I have suggestions. - Okay, okay. - I have suggestions on Jav too, actually. - Okay. - All right, let's go. - Just typical white guy comes to Japan, he's like, "This is how you should do things."

- No, I just like, I don't understand it because like there's so much in hentai that's just like so weird to me. Maybe it's 'cause like I don't watch the good kind of hentai. - Like the concept of weird. - Well, I'm not even talking about like the tentacle porn stuff. Like that stuff is not even- - That's the least weird. - That's not even like, I'm not even interested in that. Like it's whatever. But like normal hentai, which is supposed to like depict normal human interactions for some reason always have like the skinniest smallest dude with like,

a woman that is like eight times the dude's size with like and every time she walks in the room her titties are walking in for like a good two frames before she gets into the room and like that stuff is like kind of weird I'm like make them look like anime characters like why do you have to make them so like bulbous and rotund right

- And then the other thing is like the x-ray vision. I can't stand that shit. - That's a contentious topic. - Yeah, that is, that is. - Some people like it, some people don't. - I'm like, when have you ever, like when you're watching porn, when have you ever been like, I wish I could cut them open and see what they look like? I've never thought that in my life. I see that, I'm like, this is so medical.

- Do you know what I think it is? I just think a lot of consumers of hentai have never felt- - Perverts. - Have never felt what that feels like. So by having the internal shot, it like feeds their imagination of like, I can kind of imagine what it feels like. - It looks like this, it sounds like this, and the character is describing it like this. - It's the immersion, right? - So I can go into that guy's mind and be like, it probably feels like this.

- Yeah, I just, I see that and I'm like gross. It's so, yeah, like I said, it's like medical. It's like an x-ray vision. Like why do I need to see that? - Sometimes it gets too detailed. - Yeah. - Like I didn't need to see the ovaries. - I really didn't. - I didn't need to see the ovaries. - It's like not sexual. Like that's what I mean. It just, yeah. And then like,

she's so large that she could just like suck the entire dude into her pussy. And it's like, what the fuck? Like, what is happening? Why can't they have like normal proportions? Like we just make- - Just fucking attack on Titan all over again. - Yeah, just like, you know, grown up Hinata in the fucking, you know, just do that. I'm fine with that. Like that would be great. - Yeah. - Okay. - I'm just glad you didn't mention the

the types of genres that it is. It's more often than not, "Net-ro-rare" is the most popular one. - Oh, I don't know the genre. Like I'm not that into it. Like I'm not- - Well, just if you watch any, you probably come across it 'cause it's just- - It's unavoidable. - And then normally the ones that look the best. Do you know what this is, "Net-ro-rare"? - No. - Well, go ahead. It's your field of expertise.

- He knows, he knows. - No, because Neterare is basically- - Is that how you pronounce it? Fuck, I don't know how to pronounce it. - I guess, how do I even describe this? It's kind of like,

You basically it's, it depicts like someone who is in love with a girl or, you know, in a relationship with a girl and he watches her, you know, getting fucked. - It's like really popular. - Yeah, and that's like the most popular genre here in Japan. - Yeah, most like any, like any type of like voyeurism is considered like the top dog. - Yeah. - Oh yeah, I saw the binocular section at the fucking,

- At the big, whatever it is. - Big camera. - Big camera, dude, that shit's crazy. They just have an entire like section dedicated to "Barnacus." I was like, what the fuck is that? - I mean, that's mostly for bird watching. - Yeah, bird watching. - Unless you're watching a different type of bird. - There was an old lady who was like, when I was there, she was like testing out the "Barnacus." I was like, okay, I get what's going on. - I don't think she's a pervert. - The birds and the trains, that's what they're here for. - Exactly, exactly. - Have you been to any anime stores?

since you've been there? - Yeah, I went to Akihabara and it was awesome. - Did you go to any store that had like a curtain-off section? - No, I haven't seen like, so people have sent me, what's the, there's like a, it's doujin, right? - Yeah, doujin. - I sent the link to that one. - I sent a ton. - Like the melon books? - I sent melon books. I sent the seven story sex building.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Fuck who in America is like the guy who makes it is a fan of mine.

Oh, Jacob? Yeah, Jacob's chill. Yeah, he like came to me at the anime expo and was like, dude, you take all this. He like snuck out and he gave me a bunch of like fuckoo shit. So I've like, you know, people have sent me like doujins, you know, manga in my PO box before. Like I've looked through it. I just, I can't, like it's too...

that I can't like get into it. You know what I mean? - I don't think it's fascinating. I mean, some people would just can't get into drawn like physical. - No, I want to bro. I watch a lot of drawn shit. Like trust me. - You're like why would it work? - Yeah, literally. I'm over here fucking sweat just dropping down my brow. I'm like, come on man. Fuck. Why do I have to see the x-ray vision? - Holy fuck. - Okay, so what,

What was your contention on J.A.V.? Oh, I mean, I got a lot. So, I mean, I'm very pro sex work. I actually, I used to date a porn star who like actually shot some porn here in Japan too. I'm friends with some Japanese porn stars like, you know, Raylo Black being one of them. Even though she doesn't shoot Jav because she...

has sex with black people and sometimes that's like i guess not allowed okay jav has like a lot of restrictions from what i understand yeah it's all very secretive yeah it's like very very um yeah it's very hardcore um but other than that kind of stuff other than like uh the actual sex workers perspective on it as a consumer like i want to well there's a couple things one

blurred penises and pussies. - Yeah. - Fuck that shit. - Someone needs to be like the brave guy who just fucking fights for that in Japan. Like someone needs to- - That's the head he dies on? - Yeah, like someone needs to be like the guy who's like, oh yeah, let's do an anti-censorship law or something. - It's hard to be that guy who's like, all right, please vote for me by the way. One of my main policies is removing the- - Not the main one. Don't make it the main one.

- I sneak it in. - I think that would either like- - I think it might work. - I think it could work or like it would either backfire or immediately get you elected. There's no in between. - I'm telling you there's no in between. - No, I wanna teach like, I wanna talk to the Japanese people out here. Like I know AOC and a bunch of American politicians like came to Japan recently, like right as I was coming in. - Really? - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I was actually going to originally do a podcast with her here because I was like thinking like, you know, we're both here. We'll link up here. Then I was like, fuck, I could just do it in America. It doesn't matter. But they came and talked to some politicians and I was like, fuck, I want to be one of those envoys who like teaches, you know, sneaky ways of earmarking things into bills. You know what I mean? Go to the, how do you say, is it diet or diet? Diet, I think. Diet? Yeah. Just go to the diet and just fucking...

pass legislation that is completely unrelated, but then hide that shit in there. You know what I mean? - Your honor. - Yeah. - I would like to say something. - Yeah, just like add that in there, sneak it in. Don't even mention it. Everyone will be like wink, wink, nod. Like no one's gonna be- - Yes, your honor, in the not killing orphan bills, I did sneak in a no blurring porn rule. - Yeah. - Sue me.

because this is how it works in America. Because then if people say, oh, wow, there's a dick blurring law in here, you could be like, you want orphans to die? Like nobody wants to be against the don't murder orphans bill. You know what I mean? Wow, you want to talk about unrelated things like dicks and pussies? That's kind of weird, bro. We're talking about not killing orphans here.

So you have to do that. So that's one problem I have with Jav. And then the other one is like, they just look so sad. They look so sad when they're doing it. That is one problem I have as well. It's like they look and sound like they're in pain. Yeah. And it's like, it's not hot. Yeah. I've never been able to fire one off the Jav for that reason. Like I want to, because like the actors are beautiful. They're like three hours long. So it's way harder to like scrub through it. Yeah.

- Yeah. - They've had that shit out like a Dragon Ball. - Some Jabs try to like put a proper storyline in there. - They do, dude. - Dude, there's Jabs that are like full on like episodic series. - Yeah. - And that has like an A plot and a B plot. - Yeah.

- It's insane how much work they put into the story and how much they care about that. But I ain't got three hours of me to jack off now. - They also need a, man, the camera work is so bad. They need to get some like American producers out who are like go to the- - I agree with that too. Like the angles are not doing anybody favors. - The lighting is always terrible. - There's a lot. - Maybe the amateur thing kind of works though. I don't know. Maybe it works in the favor for it.

- Maybe, but yeah. - I mean, clearly, I mean, it must be like very successful and very popular in Japan. - It's very popular, I think in China as well. - Oh really? - Really well in China. - Yeah, I think China has like started doing their own, like they market it as jab, I think, but it's not, but it's not like, and they don't have, they don't censor it. 'Cause I've seen that.

- That's how you tell the difference. - Yeah. No, literally like they, I think they do that. And then another thing I know, like they shoot it in the Philippines sometimes. Like they'll get like Japanese actresses to shoot in the Philippines so they can like override the JAV rules. - Oh shit. - I know a lot about the mechanics of porn and because of like my- - This is why you like Jack off tricks. You're like, God, the fucking supply chain.

No, no, no. It's just, I know about it because like my advocacy for sex work. So like it's, it's very, it's very detailed and very interesting when you think about it. But as a consumer, when I look at it, I'm just like, bro, you are so sad. Yeah. Like I can't, I don't want to jerk off. I want to help you. Like what's going on?

I can fix her. I can fix her. Like, what's happening? Like, I'm expecting, like, a Taken-style situation where, like, Liam Neeson bursts through the door. Doesn't have to be a white guy. But, like, you know, bursts through the door and, like, saves her. And then they fuck.

in a loving way, you know what I mean? - Yeah, I never understood Japanese censorship laws when it comes to like pornography. 'Cause you look at some stuff that in hentai and some of like the most fucked up decrepit shit you can think of. - Yeah. - But don't show the penis. - Wasn't it originated from something to do with America or something?

being involved, I can't remember if it was. - See, I'm trying to remember because I remember they covered this in "Naked Director." - Yeah, I feel like they changed it preemptively, I think. - I thought it predates even post-World War II Japan. I thought it was like- - Yeah, 'cause all the traditional paintings, dude. - No, 'cause the Ukiyo-e, which is the kind of the pornographic paintings from the Edo period, were all, everything was out.

- Too much, too much. - Dude, America instilled puritanical values in Japan too? That's so fucked up. - Yeah, well, the reason tentacle hentai exists was because that was their way to get around censorship because- - Which is why I thought it predates it because I thought hentai existed before, like tentacle porn existed, right?

- Well, the tentacle concept was from this Ukiyo-e from I think it was like the 1700s. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Yeah, but like, I think- - Modern. - Yeah, when the modern stuff came out. - Yeah, because like back in that painting, the tentacles didn't look like penises, but they figured out that they could make something look- - They figured it out. - Yeah, if something looks like a penis, but technically isn't a penis, we don't need to blur that out. - Exactly. - And so that was the way they got around that. - Yeah, that's fucked up.

- That's just like, that sucks. They should just show the penises. - Also just like some of the hentai and like JV I've seen, the sensory is just so lazy to the point where it's like, it's no secret what's behind the sensor. Like I know what's happening. - I feel so bad for the Judas to sensor three hours.

- 'Cause you look at the sunship and you realize that's someone's job to sit there and frame by frame, blow out all of the penises. - You know what the thing is? It's not like, you said this and I get lazy, but the actual blurring, 'cause if you've ever had to blur a video, you know it's not easy to get the shapes. And they are doing it as little as possible. Don't let your customers get angry if they blur too much.

just the right amount of pixels and they're moving it all the time. Like this is psychotic. - Millions of frames. - I'm surprised the editors haven't had an uprising and lobbied them to get rid of this. - You can tell, sometimes you see a JV and you can tell that the censorship guy definitely loved their jobs because you can always tell there's always the surface area of the censorship. Some are just like cutting it close. Some are just like, we're just gonna cover half the fucking body. Whatever man, I don't get paid enough for this shit. - That's a master in his craft. - Yeah, right?

What was your... Said it was America. Well, they did it, like, preemptively. Censor America? No, they, like, self-censored around the same... America's done a lot of fucked up shit to Japan. I'll say it. Not a controversial take. One of the censoring that was, like, so the Meiji period, the Pacific War, did have, like,

apart during the censor, like a lot of like- - Yeah, so it was the major restoration, right? - Yeah. - Which is basically where Japan started incorporating Western political values and stuff like that. - That is the most common, that is literally the entire planet. Like even, I mean, I've talked about this before, not to get too political, but like I talk about this on my stream all the time,

homosexuality for example in like the ottoman era in turkey or even in like the mena region was not even considered like it was just like normal mode of existence you know people are gay who gives a fuck whatever and it's like western attitudes that that against homosexuality uh that that stem back to like i guess the the dark ages and you know wanting to make sure that like you know a

and a wife, like a father and a mother stayed together instead of like going out and fucking dudes so that they could have as many children as possible so they could repopulate.

at a time when like children were just like dying nonstop and you needed more farm hands, that culture and that attitude absolutely was the reason why so many cultures, even all the way out here in the Far East are homophobic. Yeah. I'm not educated enough on this. No. It's interesting to think about that like it's so, it's such a powerful, it's such a powerful thing that, you know, you just...

slowly but surely change the way people view their daily existence. And then they take it on themselves. And that's how you get blurred dicks and penises in Japanese adult video. God damn it. It's fucked up.

- It's all those farmers in the dark ages, man. If it wasn't for them, we would have been able to see everything. - It's like the domino meme. It's like farmers in the dark ages. - It's the church, man. They fucking ruined everything. - Yeah, because censorship had a, well,

back in the Tokugawa period as well. It was like, Christianity is like, so they have to censor and ban all those books away from people. - Oh yeah. - Damn Christianity. - Yeah, it's fucked up. - So we've been here for like over an hour and a half now. We haven't asked you how your time in Japan has been yet. - Yeah. - You've been living your best weeb life. - Yeah. - Dude, it's so, I love it, dude. It just, it seems insane that like,

People just live here and like go to work. No, I'm not even kidding. What do you mean by that? It's wild, dude. Like people just fucking straight up go to work and like,

and live here when you think about it, I'm like, everything is awesome. - That is the most weeb thing you've said all along. - You are the biggest weeb I've met. - You are the biggest fucking weeb ever. - No. - You are literally the biggest which is like thing, thing in Japan. - It's like, oh! - No, but like, it is like that.

People don't understand it. No, literally it is like that. - Oh my God. - I don't know what it is. Like, I mean, it's just- - There's a magic to it, I think. There definitely is. - It's not supposed to work. Like Japan is not supposed to work, but it works somehow. I don't know how. - What do you mean? - Just everything is, everything that I would normally look to with like my political understandings and like everything I know about the world, like,

Japan basically took on and was like, no, no, no, we'll make it work. And it does somehow. Like you have 3,800 homeless people on the entire fucking island. But like at the same time, it's not like the country's doing really well economically. You know what I mean? Younger generations are very frustrated with the lack of opportunity. People are just not dying so much so that you got fucking Japanese Yale economists talking about how like, oh, I have a solution. Kill yourself to the older people. You know what I mean? You have all this shit that's like so...

you have what I would consider to be like, oops. - Oh my goodness. - No, it's just my phone. It's just my phone. You have what I would consider to be like a ticking time bomb. You know what I mean? Like capitalism is like hyper-capitalist, but it's held together by like thousands of years of like rigid structure and tradition and like unflinching in the face of like, you know, a world that

is constantly being like, no, no, no, things should be very different. Like things should be more free. So in some ways it's shitty, like with the, you know, the hentai stuff. That's at the top of the list. The blurring of Japan's social issues since the hentai. Yeah, like blurring of the penises and vaginas, like that's weird. But also at the same time, I think like that is still the reason why, you know, you have such an emphasis on like,

cleaning your own space, making sure that you have, uh, making sure that you leave the place better than you, you, uh, uh, than you first. Yeah. It's, it's a very like, uh, I would say like a collectivist, but like that collectivist society creates like very, uh, uh, like, uh, selfless people. Oh yeah. You know where it's like,

it's I'm at the bottom of the priority and everybody else is above me kind of thing, right? So it's like that. And when everybody is like that, then everyone's looking out for each other. - Yeah. - Yeah. - Which is crazy because at the same time, it's like insanely capitalist. So you're like, how the fuck does this work? Because in America, we're insanely capitalist. It's a hyper capitalist dystopia, but then also people are hyper individualist.

So when you have that, that's when you get to like no healthcare, everybody has a gun, you know, full freedom. You have the freedom to like die from, you know, not getting your, your diseases treated. Right. Right. But, but you don't have that in Japan. You have the economic structure, which I think is like wild, right?

and inherently incredibly exploitative, but then it still somehow works. And I still haven't figured out exactly what the fuck's going on. Like, I don't know how it works. - I don't even think Japan's figured that shit out. - It doesn't make any sense. - I mean, I guess that's why they called it a post-war economic miracle. - Yeah. - I think a lot of people just take a lot of,

a lot of pride and a lot of care in what they do in a way that is kind of hard to expect of people in Western countries. 'Cause we'd be like, fuck that, I'm not working. I'm not doing a job at McDonald's for five fucking dollars an hour. Whereas I think in Japan, there's not really that concept of, you know, fuck your employer for not paying you enough. There's like no such- - You take what you're given, right?

- Yeah, but also like how do they survive? You know what I mean? Like that's the other, that's what I don't understand. You guys have talked about, you know, like anime, not voice actors obviously, but like the people that draw. Yeah, the animators, like how the fuck do they survive? - By doing multiple jobs. - By doing multiple jobs or, you know, as you might've noticed, stuff in Japan is overworking or stuff is really cheap in Japan as well. - That's true. - It is very cheap. - If you wanna live off literally the bare,

you can kind of do it pretty cheap in Japan. - Yeah, you want to live well, but you can survive. - You could do it. - That does blow my mind though. Like, 'cause housing, you know what I mean? Like that's a huge problem. - Housing is crazy. - Yeah, that is a big problem in Tokyo. - Yeah. And not even just in Tokyo, but like, I just, I don't understand how they spend so much less money overall and yet like this is an issue that they've been able to,

- Not fully eradicate obviously. - No, I mean the economy is not great. - But certainly still do a lot better than America. - In some aspects, yeah, I think so. - Yeah, the best example is like, is the railway system, right? It's a marvel. Obviously it's like originally it's government funded. 'Cause you have to do it like that. That's a massive infrastructure project. You have to get the government and the tax dollars to pay for it, right?

but also now it's like fully privatized. Yeah. So that's the reason why you see like, uh, so many railway, uh, switches in between and like all this, like frustrating, uh, all these like frustrating things that you experienced without even realizing why it's happening. Well, that's because it's owned by like multiple different, uh, multiple different companies. Right. Um,

but it still fucking works. It still works. It's not supposed to. In America, those trains will be fucking eating each other every day. They would literally be like hitting each other nonstop. - The most inconvenience you get in Japan in terms of it being different companies competing is that I guess you have to change gates sometimes. So you wanna go on the Metro, you have to clock, you have to go out. - Yeah, that's what I mean. - That's literally the like bare minimum. - And that's crazy when you have like such a intricate system

and yet the trains fucking run on time. Yeah. That's what I mean. It's not supposed to be that way. Like, it doesn't make sense. You go to the UK, a lot of places where railway is nationalized have privatized, shouts out to Margaret Thatcher, that fucking bitch. But,

- I was gonna say it was good. - No, no, no, no, no, no, of course not. - She ruined it. - No, exactly. So like that privatization has genuinely destroyed like what is otherwise something that people hold onto as a lifeline. 'Cause like if you're poor, that's the one thing you have, you know what I mean? Like that's how you travel. We don't even have that in America. So like that's a foreign concept. Public transit is like not even a thing. And you see that like privatization is supposed to destroy

the things that otherwise government should be able to handle. But in Japan, it just fucking works and it works really well. And it like blows my mind when I watch it, when I see it. - Well, I think there's just a general kind of like culture in Japan where no matter what your job is, you should take

pride in your work to make it the best it can possibly be. And that translates to every single aspect of Japanese culture, whether you be fucking buying fruits from the supermarket or going to a restaurant or getting any kind of craftsmanship. - Yeah, it doesn't always work. There are a lot of things that Japan has definitely not caught onto.

Just like adopting to the online world is tough. - Or the receipt system. - Yeah. - What the fuck? Why? Like, you're using paper? - Yeah. - Yeah. - What the fuck? - So when I did my taxes, I have to scan every receipt and upload them.

- That is insane, dog. That makes no sense. - It makes no sense, right? - They're just playing on hard mode. Like what the fuck? - And like, you know, even though you mentioned the trains, like there are certain trains, if you want to book them, where it becomes like a, you know, a doom, like a Dark Souls one hit level of difficulty. It's like, it's for no reason, like just some things that just didn't quite adapt the way they should have. And it ends up making this kind of really fucked up amalgamated system of like booking and things

stuff that doesn't quite work right, but it works if you know how to do it. Because people are pretty persistent here if they want something. - I mean, even just doing like general paperwork in this country is the most like asinine thing ever. Everything is layered behind 10 layers of paperwork. - You could- - Oh, I know. I had to fucking write like all the forms to like get into the country. - Yeah. - I got to have the opposite of thing and he was super easy.

- Wait, really? - No, that shit was not easy at all. Also, they're like- - You could go to a government building, you could just walk in, you can just see where all the workers are, the stacks and stacks of papers. - Yeah. - 'Cause they're all working analog. - This can't be efficient. - No, it's not. - And it's not. - It's so hard for bookkeeping.

You can't search. Like you could just search on if you modernize it. It makes no sense. That sort of stuff also is like very strange to me that they're like, nope, we're going to keep using paper. Well, again, it's that whole idea of like holding on to tradition. Yeah. Elderly people. Elderly people. People just like don't want to buy the systems. There is a positive to that because like it probably, and I don't even know this is the case or not, but I suspect that,

that it probably keeps certain economies alive. Oh, for sure. The more you like stick to paper, for example, the more you like literally have the... Have you guys ever seen The Office? Yeah. The American version? Like Dunder Mifflin going out of business because no one uses paper anymore. But you have like... What is it? Is it Muji? Like there's like companies that just like make paper products. Yeah. But then they also like become conglomerates and also sell like vibrators and shit too on the side, which is wild. That's like a very...

- That is a very like, you know, East Asian country thing to have like- - I think at least for the government as well, I think a lot of the priority is just keeping jobs. - Yeah. - And fortunately, if you want to modernize things, it only means you either gotta move people around or figure out something new. - Yeah. - And that's tough. - Also Japan is just like in general, really bad at adopting new things. - Oh yeah, terrible. - Yeah. - Occasionally they'll take something like a toilet and they'll be like, "We're up in the game." And other stuff they'll be like,

They're like, but we're keeping the fax machine just in case, you know, people may be using it. - Yeah, I mean, we've just started, I've just started seeing contactless like payment machines

- Just starting to- - Wait, that's new? - That is new. - Well, for credit cards, right? - For credit cards, yeah. - They had it for a while for Suica, like the transport cards, but for debit cards and all that kind of stuff, that's just a little more new. - For me, I took that for granted. I'm like, "Oh yeah, it's great." - Yeah, in the UK, you've been to the UK, right? No one uses cash at all. It's all dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe, dupe

- That's the, oh my God, I have to fucking have like a coin wallet. - I have a coin wallet too. - That's insane. Like there's this, oh no, I don't want any of that, man. - And keep it. - And it makes keeping bookkeeping, like you mentioned, hot, 'cause I have to then keep all the receipts. And I have no trail of it existing if I lose that. - Exactly. - That kind of stuff is crazy. Like that definitely blows my mind.

But overall it's there not to weeb out too much, but it is very, it is beautiful. - There's problems and as every country does, but there's so much good here. So much amazing stuff. - It's so beautiful. Like that's what I mean when I say like, motherfuckers are just going to work and I'm just sitting there like looking around like.

- It's crazy. You just don't like, you don't want to take it in. Like you're just running to work. Like, look at that. That's so sick. You know what I mean? - Yeah. - Which probably is like a by-product of me being here for the first time and like anime definitely breaking my brain. - I mean, it definitely like for, I think the big one that we've always mentioned about bunch of the podcasts is like vending machines wear off. They wear off real quick. - Yeah. - I saw you coming with a boss coffee. - Yeah, like the coffee machine, the vending machine coffee. I remember moving to,

After moving to Japan, I thought I would get those kinds of coffees every day. When I was a tourist, I would like go to the vending machine in the morning, get a coffee and I'd be like, this is it. This is the life. Moved here, didn't drink it at all. - No, no, no, I understand that. I'm not that fascinated with the vending machines. - But it's like a very easy example.

- Yeah, yeah. But oh my God, the fucking, the 7-Elevens dude, holy shit. - I will say, I will say, that is one thing that never seems to like, I never seem to, I always appreciate it. - The egg salad, dude, it's like, it's just so good. - And you'll appreciate it more if you ever leave Tokyo, 'cause you'll be in the middle of nowhere, middle of nowhere in Japan. You're like an hour away from any restaurant, but there'll be a 7-Eleven fully stocked with every food you buy. - 24/7 as well. - And it's like, this is just the best.

Like if you go to rural Wales, it's like good luck. - Yeah. - You die. - Eat some grass. - There's no food. Maybe there's a Gregg's three hours from you, but there's no food. - Yeah. - And then the shops shut at four. So if you don't have food by four, you know, you're fucked. - You're just fucked. - By four on certain days, it depends on the store. But the point is, yeah, you don't get food like that in the UK.

- It's just convenient, isn't it? It's something that we've definitely taken for granted. - UK still kind of looks like Vinland Saga, honestly. - I mean, yeah. - The Danes did a number on them.

But other than that, you know, I feel like I'm experiencing Japan right now at like 10%. Because I can't speak. Because one, I'm in Tokyo. So like that's, you know, there's so much more. But also because I can't speak Japanese. So in many respects, I feel like I'm literally for the first time in my life, because I've been in Western Europe a lot. Like I grew up in Turkey. You know, I live in America now, all around America. I visited...

I feel like a fucking alien. Like, I feel like I'm an alien that just landed on a, on, you know, another planet that just kind of really looks like my planet with people that kind of look a lot like me as well, but I can't understand anything. Right. And it's so shocking because like,

with the Latin alphabet, you really take it for granted. You go anywhere, you go anywhere else. Like you can still kind of make sense of like what you go to Germany. I don't, I don't speak German, but like I can make sense of like what I'm looking at. Yeah. But with like kanji, I'm like, what the fuck? What? There's so much.

It's like blocks of text. I'm like, what am I looking at? It's like, it like hurts my brain. And yet it's still so much fun at the same time. So I'm like, I'm thinking like, you know, if I learned even a little bit of Japanese, which I feel like is how it starts. Oh yeah.

- It's like when you were being like, "Whoa, white boy swag." I'm like, this is just the script. I have gone to Starbucks and had so much coffee. I know every single dialogue option they have. - Dude, you should make a YouTube compilation. - What? - White boy swag. - I was like, "What is white boy swag?" And he was talking about, you know the guy who goes- - Is it Lao Wai or something? - Yeah, the guy who speaks Chinese. And then they go, all the Chinese people go like,

- Oh yeah. - When you try that in Japan, it just doesn't work. - No. - They're like, "Oh, you speak Japanese? Good as you fucking should." - You get an Ihongo Jozo ad first. - Yeah, yeah. - But like, you know, they don't freak out 'cause they're not like, I don't know, they're not like characters.

- Well, I don't think that the Chinese people are like that either. I think he's just like faking it for the most part. - Yeah. - Oh, he orders in perfect fluent Mandarin below shopkeeper's mind. It's like, okay, dude. - You might have just said coffee hitotsu on a guy's shoe. - 'Cause for some reason, I was on that stream with you and someone uploaded the clip and then the comments were roasting me. They were like, he's literally just saying Japanese English words.

- What? - So I'm like, caramel macchiato, hitotsu. - Okay. - You're only saying like one word. - But it's so sick because like when you speak Japanese, one, your voice drops, okay? And two, you have a lisp. - He said I had a lisp. - Yeah, when you speak Japanese. - No, I do not. - Yes, you do. - That's slander. - No, 'cause now everyone's waiting for you to speak, I don't know how to speak in Japanese. - You don't have a lisp normally when you're speaking English, but when you speak Japanese, you're like, "Wana go to the moon."

- I don't know. - Sylvester Stallone Japanese. - Side effects from being fluent in Welsh and SH is pronounced like shh. - Yeah, it could be. - My Japanese is more closer to, I think, like my Thai accent than my Japanese accent because when I speak Thai, my voice goes up like two octaves. I don't know why. I think it might just be easier for a tonal language that goes up two octaves.

- Well, I've heard my Japanese, like my voice gets a lot higher when I speak Japanese. But like when you say it, you don't notice it. - Yeah. - But what about with you? Like does it change with Turkish? - With Turkish? - Yeah.

Definitely, yeah. People say I sound like way more aggressive. That's just Turkish culture, right? Yeah, I guess. I mean, that's just the language, yeah. Like, I'll say like, you know, I love you to my mom or something in Turkish. People are like, what the fuck? Like, why are you yelling? Like, it doesn't sound like that. It's like, okay, I'll kiss you, mom. You know what I mean? Yeah. It's like you say, like, I see you. But it,

- Japan is the opposite. - Japan is literally the opposite. - Japan is like, "Korosuyo" it's like, "I'll kill you." - Yeah, it's like, "Oh my God." - People say things very polite, but they'll literally be saying it, but they won't even be saying bad things, but they'll be, the context of what they're saying is like, "I will fucking murder you."

- For me, I feel like because of watching so much anime and also because I speak Turkish, when I say things in Japanese, I feel like I'm saying it wrong. Like I was like, "Mata ne." And it's like, that's not how you're supposed to say bye, I don't think. - It sounds like Yakuza, right? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - "Mata ne." - Your size can't be speaking like that.

- You could probably have a slightly easier time picking Japanese out 'cause you're bilingual. - Yeah, maybe. - It helps a little bit. - I feel like it does. - You'll be surprised. There's a lot of similarities because I mean- - I want white voice swag like you. - You can get it, man, honestly. - I can get it. - Yes, you do.

- Do you think Turkey would be better if it focused a little bit more on making it like more foreigner friendly or do you think it's like, this is it? - No, I don't think, I mean, I think like ease of access is good. Like at least use like Latin alphabet in places, but I don't think they should do that. I don't think they should like- - 'Cause I've always had this,

like really interesting thought because you know i come from thailand and we've made our uh we've made our you know cities very very easy to like visit and very foreign and friendly and i'm like we try to keep as much of the culture as we can but there are some things like you know bangkok isn't even like the thai name of like thailand um sorry bangkok isn't the thai name of the city um it's actually which

which is harder to say for Westerners. - Which is actually not the full name. - Oh yeah, isn't the name of Thailand like super fucking long? - I think it's actually like the longest city name in the world. - He knows all about that shit, bro. - Yeah. - Well, that's not the longest city, but it's just a long name city. - Dude, come on, that fucking, that sounds insane. - Do the thing, come on. - Do the thing, come on. -

- Oh, God damn. - So, okay. So I think I can remember the Thai full name for Bangkok as well. - Okay, let's go. - So it is . - I'm serious. - No way. - I am serious. - What could you be saying?

- In that length. - It's basically describing the city, right? - So you know how like in, you know, Game of Thrones where they, you know, introduce like the Khaleesi, mother of dragons, all this stuff. So it's kind of like that. - Oh, that's sick. - Yeah, so. - Just nailed that.

- I think, I don't know. - Yeah, you could have fooled me. - I feel like that gets real tough if you're just trying to be like, where are you staying? And then you just like, how much time do you have? - It's just like, you're on the 911 call and you're just like, oh, so where are you staying? - Could you imagine like going through immigration and being like, where are you embarking from? It's like, uh. - I'm glad they changed it.

- That makes sense. - But like, I believe like we had to change the name. I don't know if I'm making this up, but like we obviously shortened it, but no Thai person calls like the capital city Bangkok. - No shot. Even that one, they just call it most of the time. - Yeah. - That's pretty long. - Yeah. - It's hard though. Cause it's just like an unnatural way to talk I think for.

- Yes bro, Welsh is like, why the fuck do you have so many throat sounds? Like what's happening? - Welsh is the most like, can I buy a vowel please? - Similar like throttles. - I mean we have but that's like it. We have like which is like a soft G. So it's like a G with like a thing on it. But like those are some of the sounds, but we don't have like anything like that. - Well it's just like double L is .

- It's like the kind of the side, like tongue. - That's a crazy thing. - Yeah. - That's cool though. - Because you're like right there next to England. - Yeah. - That's what makes it crazy. - We were around before English. - No, I know. - Crushing it. - I, yeah. - And then we didn't do it, then we didn't crush it. - I know, but it's still like crazy that, you know, it's the common language and you're like so close and you have like these insane sounds that just sound so different. - They really fought to keep it around.

- I'm kind of glad they do. 'Cause compared to, it's a lot more prevalent in Wales than it is in say like how Gaelic is in Ireland or in same in Scotland. There's a lot more Welsh speakers and it's taken a lot more seriously. - I think it's really cool. I mean, keeping traditions, I think is like the more grow older and especially being in Japan, the more I think there are some traditions that if you try to like go with, you know,

if you try to like lose some tradition to be more accommodating sometimes you can lose a lot of good culture. - You can lose the charm, yeah. - You can lose the charm of it. - That name got to change though. That name, yeah. - That needed a change. - I like Japan the way it is. Why am I gatekeeping Japan?

- I've only been in for like- - All I get to decide is good and bad. - You've reached the final stage of like weeabooism now. You're like, no, no, no. - I'm basically Japanese at this point. - They should definitely like, you know, the ease of access. If you want to like, you know, fix the aging population problem, like you have to have immigration. - Of course, yeah. - Well, that's going to be hard to get votes. - Yeah. - Which is crazy when you think about it. Like, but you know, they,

like integration is definitely a component in a multicultural world. And I feel like Japanese people do not give a fuck about that. They're just like, Oh, you're not going to integrate. I don't give a fuck. Fuck you. I don't even want you here. So is there anything you want to shout out?

- I stream on Twitch every day, even in Japan. - I know, I've been too much. - Yeah, it's insane. - Yeah, even in Japan, I've been waking up at six, you know, streaming for eight hours every day. - I'm just on my grind. Yeah, but obviously go check out Hasan's stuff, link in the description. And look at all these patrons though. Oh my God, you see all of them? - Look at those. - They're all over. - Wow. - Who's your favorite?

- Point which one's your favorite? - Yeah, that one right there. - Lucky you if you got pointed out. But hey, if you'd like to support us, then go to our Patreon, patreon.com/trashtaste. Also follow us on Twitter, send us some memes on the subreddit. And if I had a face, listen to us on Spotify. And thanks for coming, son. - Thanks for having me. - This was awesome. - Great talk about anime. - Yeah, hell yeah. - Thank you for forcing these boys to talk about anime for once because...

- It's impossible. - I thought, yeah, I heard this is the number one anime podcast that never talks about anime. - Hell yeah. - And that's what I was excited for. - That's how sketch the market is. - Yeah. - All right, see you guys next week. - See you guys next week. - Bye.