Just recently, Key announced that JC Staff would produce the Little Busters anime. Unfortunately, this was not well received by the fans. It stirred a lot of harsh criticism since they expect Kyoto Animation to make it. From what I have seen, this makes me wonder if the rage is justifiable or the fans are too entitled?
In the past two days, I read three opinion pieces regarding the whole matter. Therefore, I felt the need to share my own thoughts on why their decision isn’t as bad or rather, marks a transition to the New Key. (Image Source)
If you know already, I am a big fan of the visual novels Key/VisualArts produced. Although the visual novels take a considerable amount of time to complete, I enjoyed the characters, melodrama and the music. With that, their popularity eventually spawned anime adaptations by Toei Animation for Kanon, Air and Clannad. If you read my review of the Clannad movie, you can tell that Toei did a poor job not because the washed out animation, but it was not faithful to the source material. Kyoto Animation got this right when they made their own adaptation of Air back in 2005 before producing the Kanon remake and Clannad years later. As a result, fans thought that Little Busters should have the same treatment or it’s ruined forever. This eventually contributed to most of the rage shortly after the recent announcement, mostly because many perceive JC Staff as a “hit and miss” studio.
In the recent years, JC Staff earned a bad reputation for producing a lot of mediocre Light Novel adaptations. Although they are not as capable of making shiny looking animation style like PA Works and Production IG, this doesn’t mean they are bad in any way. The studio has produced some great anime like Nodame Cantible, Honey & Clover, Toradora and a few others. This proves that they are capable of doing it when they work hard enough and have the right production staff. It’s just gets overshadowed by everything else that doesn’t receive the same attention. For this reason, people felt concerned because they might not give the same devotion and/or mess up the intended presentation.
Lastly, I think Key wants to make this change to represent the new era. It’s a known fact that we haven’t received the classic melodrama story for years as Jun Maeda transitioned away from same style of story and writing following his work on Tomoyo After: It’s a Wonderful Life, which continues Tomoyo’s arc in Clannad. Not only that, you can notice this change In the recent productions such as Little Busters, Angel Beats and the recently released Rewrite since he has a limited role, especially in the latter where he only works on the music. Having JC Staff animate it instead of Kyoto Animation is probably a sign that they are moving on.
Overall, I think the rage over JC Staff doing the whole thing is unreasonable. I’m very optimistic that it won’t fail as long they have a good production team and have a reasonable amount of control on the project. So yes, I want the anime to succeed to prove the naysayers wrong. If it turns out bad, I may as well eat crow for a whole month. Even so, you shouldn’t judge until they actually air the first few episodes. Otherwise, you will set yourself for disappointment.
I completely agree. JC Staff has given us several faithful adaptations, in addition to those that’re less than, but it’s more consistent than people give it credit for. I’d say that the complaining fans are being entitled twats, but I don’t feel that strongly about it either way. All I think is “Huh, so that’s finally getting adapted. Yay.”
Although I don’t mind whoever produces it, I did enjoy few of JC Staff productions and some of them are really good. The problem is fans prejudge before it actually aired, although it could have been a lot worse if they picked Studio Deen. But yeah, they are just giving Key/Kyoani fans a bad name.
The whole reason I follow most of Key’s work has to do with the melodrama the anime’s provide. It will totally ruin me if they don’t keep that same flow in this anime. But at the same time its good to see another new title from them. I think as long as the anime provides the melodrama tragedy that they have provided in the others then little busters will be another major hit. Most of the people who normally rage about Key making anything are usually the same people who have watched Clannad had didn’t understand the anime because they didn’t follow it from first season to the second or there the person who just doesn’t understand anime’s with deep meaning.
I think people have a hard time accepting change and this is true. Although I haven’t played the game myself, I know it’s different compared to the earlier works since it’s a departure of the classic themes in the four visual novels they made.
Also, I would like to note that the post is about the controversy over JC Staff animating Little Busters between Key/Kyoani fans, not the content in question.
They’re begging PA works to animate Little Busters? Ahahahahahahahahaha, oh wow. After Angel Beats (where it was proven that they could NOT rein in the excesses of Maeda, leading to the rushed ending), I’d be wary of giving them another Key work until they cut their teeth with other adaptations. (Unless it’s planetarian)
The best JC Staff work will forever be Starship Girl Yamamoto Yohko. If Shinbo would return to JC Staff just to direct this, the entire show will be so glorious the entire fanbase will have to shut their gaps.
The entitlement issue appears to be a much bigger malaise that is affecting the anime community. It is a shame that people would rather have THEIR needs gratified than trying to enjoy the show on it’s merits.
There will never be a planetarian anime T_T
1. Angel Beats did pretty meh because they stuffed too much into 12 episodes, which is probably a bad idea. 24 episodes would have been better, but…
3. This is a problem not only in the Anisphere (and not limited to complaining about lack of fansubs, although you shouldn’t anyway.) but elsewhere… Just look what happened to the flak Bioware received for the Mass Effect 3 ending. It’s a big disaster.
4. I would like to see that someday… and also a Tomoyo after anime as well while you at it.
AB could have easily fit in 12-13 episodes had they focused on what they really wanted. The meandering wasn’t too bad, but with such a small episode count, they really let Maeda do his thing.
On the flipside, Bioware did screw up horribly with Mass Effect 3. Some of that flak is warranted.
Little busters and J.C. Staff? I facepalmed when I first heard the news…>_<
The reason? J.C. Staff is a company who proved unreliable in terms of animation quality during the many series they produced. Do you remember the painful animation in Toradora?! 🙁
Yeah, they are a hit and miss and I have watch some of their earlier works. Just look at the animation of Hayate no Gotoku and it looks kind of, well you know… but they eventually improve.
Also, you have to realize that JC Staff is a huge studio and not all their works necessarily represent what we will see in the adaptation. Who knows… they might surprise us. Either way, I don’t think the choice is bad considering that they could pick a worst studio than them, like Studio DEEN? Even so, some of the concerns are legit, but raging about it isn’t the right way to deal with it.
I think so many people wanted it to be Kyoto Animation that there was bound to be disappointment. I think KyoAni probably wanted to move on from making Key adaptations, which was made easier by Angel Beats being all over the place. I think what happened here is that it was the classic combination of finding the studio that would make the best adaptation at the cheapest cost (both creatively and financially). So it will probably end up looking not as great as other adaptations, but with Maeda firmly in creative control.
I agree considering that they are focusing more on slice of life shows since Clannad After Story. The popularity of K-On has contributed to it, but I suspect Kadokawa being the main influencer since Nichjiou, their last spring anime is published by them. Also, it seems that they have better things to do as animating an award winning mystery light novel rather than more visual novel adaptations.
I do wonder how JC Staff will handle it considering that many people including Jun Maeda have contributed to the overall story of Little Busters. Hopefully, the awesomeness doesn’t overwhelm them like it did with PA Works and Angel Beats (although it could have been better if it was a bit longer, but whatever).
I find this whole drama silly, Sure im pissed off about it not being Kyoto Animations, actually im more pissed towards them then Key, I dont understand why they wouldnt want to do it, Do they think doing 3 adaptations is enough? they dont need to work with key anymore with the success of K-ON!? if so then that is plain sad, because together with key they create memorable series and it pains me to see that the partnership is gone.
Im still not sure because me being a big loyal to Kyoani/Key I just cant see another main series being adapted by another company. We will see how it goes but for sure to say, It wont be the same feeling like Kyoani gave us, and yes they did a brilliant job!
Like I have said earlier, Kyoto Animation seems to have better things to animate at the moment. So essentially, Key felt that other studios have made great advancements in the past few years for visual novel adaptations that they could use a different studio.
I think the problem reacting to this news is that it’s not easy to accept change. Although some legitimate complaints still exist, we shouldn’t judge before it actually airs.
But yeah, definitely read this post which breaks down everything about the announcement… It might give you an idea why they decided on this.
That’s NOT THE POINT.
I don’t think anyone really cares that the studio carries the name J.C. Staff, it’s the director.
Who on earth would look forward to Little Busters! if they hear it has the same director as Kill me baby.
I haven’t watched “Klll Me Baby,” so I don’t know exactly how bad the show is. However, I’m not too familiar with the director, but if he is incompetent or lack experience from the work done in the past, I think the complaint is legitimate. Still, I think he can prove himself wrong considering that “Kill Me Baby” source material is conceived mediocre to begin with, but it does leave some worry to begin with.