Why do you post about yaoi on a Christian blog? We receive this question from time to time across our various platforms when we post, say, fan art from Given on Tumblr or a first impression piece on a yuri series here on the website. And it is a good question, one I want to… Read More Is it Okay for a Christian to Watch Yaoi and Yuri Anime?
When it comes to anime and light novels, you can’t swing a dead cat without hitting an isekai series or six. Countless stories spanning many genres have used the person-travels-to-another-world premise. To borrow language from the infamous TV Tropes, the isekai concept has been played straight, played with, inverted, subverted, parodied, deconstructed, reconstructed, and more.… Read More The World Is Not Enough: Isekai and the Hope for More
As Beneath the Tangles grows, we want to not only be your destination for anime, manga, and light novel analysis, but a platform for all things anime. Toward that end, in 2019 we continued to develop the TangleCast to provide an anime podcast for your listening ears, and also continued to expand our Anime Pop… Read More Introducing Doki Doki News, Your New Anime News Source!
I’ve been slowly working my way through Okami, another one of those older games that I heard a lot about but never got around to playing. Set in a vague, “once upon a time” point in Japan’s past, you play as the wolf goddess Ameratsu, who a century prior had helped defeat the serpent demon… Read More Okami and the Christian Artist
This guest post was submitted by Bob Aarhus. In addition to his short bio at the end of the piece, I’ll add that Bob has been a long supporter of Beneath the Tangles and a model for this particular blogger in how to be a thinking, compassionate Christian. I’m proud to present this excellent article.… Read More Kimi No Na Wa: “Tears…Why?”
When I first saw anime containing Japanese folklore, I passed it off as fantasy content. I didn’t think about the youkai much differently than I would about fairies. I didn’t even notice that the word “youkai” was being used most of the time, as translators muddled along with words like “spirit” and “demon.” But over… Read More Annalyn’s Corner: On Folklore, Natsume, and Nature
Hola mis amigos! To all those who have been looking forward to Something More, I hope I meet your expectations. I am Samuru, one of the staff writers here at Beneath the Tangles who enjoys writing on video games and occasionally anime. I used to write a column on Geeks Under Grace called Treasure Chest… Read More Something More: Ghost Hunting, Spiritual Personas, Suffering from God and Djinns in Final Fantasy
Episode 4 of http://www.Working!! manages to incorporate Shinto, Christianity, and a realistic but humorous discussion of prayer into its comedy. So as soon as I saw it yesterday, I dropped my original blog post plans and switched to this. Shinto, Japan’s oldest and most widespread religion, shows up all over anime. Shinto folklore is key in anime… Read More Annalyn’s Corner: Working!!, Shinto, and Prayer’s Effectiveness
Every-so-often, creators like to throw their fans a juicy bone–putting favorite characters into high-action power fantasies, or allowing an emotional build-up “just for the feels.” Fandom pandering can certainly lead to a watered-down story if creators cater to every imagined whim of their doting followers, but, sometimes, a little sprinkling of fan service can go… Read More Something More: Fan (Dis-)Service, Tsundere for Jesus, and “Playing God” until you Run out of Chimeras
Anime often revels in deviant storytelling. Add that to its cultural roots, and it’s easy for misunderstanding and stereotyping to occur among Western audiences. Christians, especially, seem hesitant to embrace anime due, in part, to its oftentimes default spiritual content. Witches, demons, spirits, and magic frequently flavor Japanese storytelling, which can sound worse in word… Read More Something More: Belonging in Bungou, Berserk “Sunday School,” and Dangerous Flying Witches