As the question already stated... How important is the choreography of Action scenes in Action Anime ( especially Fighting and Martial Arts-based ) How significant is that aspect in famous Action Anime and future Action Anime?

What does it mean to you when an Anime's Action scenes are choreographed well? And what experience did you have with previous Anime that you saw? Which Anime had good Action scenes, and which one disappointed you?

Let the discussion begin...

Well, the action in anime has to have good quality...in a way that the characters are designed well even though they are moving fast or something.

I cant quite explain it but take for example: Naruto. In the filler episodes, each time there is a fight its like the movements are stiff and the drawing looks f***ing s**t if you get my drift...

Some anime with really good fight scene would be Karas. Even if the characters are moving, the drawing is still well proportioned (uhhh...i remember some anime...some episodes have drawing that look crap. YES...CRAP) and the way they make the movements of it is well good.

Ah yes...some perfect example: Bleach. The whole seretei arch had quite good choreaography as well as animation but in the Bounto arch...its just looked plain stupid (the drawing just sort of got ugly).

Good fight scenes but bad choreography: Gundam Seed. Overusing too many scenes kinda disappointed me. At the beginning, it was getting kinda cool the way the gundams moved so freely being robots. But then as you progress...the scenes are just being repeated over and over again while adding new ones. It kinda gets boring when it comes to that.

Either way...i just cant explain my point XD and you guys probably didnt get my anyway.

Overall, all anime have their good points and bad points...its just appreciating and ignoring the stuff in it.

For me, the choreography doesn't have to be factually realistic in either firearms or martial arts (I'm well aware of the differences having been trained in both). What I look for is execution of movements and fluidity. The action and reaction of the movements should not be "jumpy" but flow in such a manner that it becomes plausible in the anime fantasy world.

Two excellent examples of radical gunplay are Gunslinger Girl and Black Lagoon. The first episodes of both set a standard.

Two series with martial arts action that I really enjoyed are Tenjou Tenge and Ikki Tousen. Sure, no one can do what they can do, but both take ass-kicking to new levels. While the movements are fantasy, the execution of the movements are consistently precise.

Still, my ALL TIME favorite martial arts scene is Chun Li vs. Vega in Street Fighter II with KMFDM playing in the background. I still get a rush watching that fight. I went out and bought KMFDM's "Nihl" after watching it for the first time years ago.

Bad: any time mechas are doing martial arts. O, man, does that suck and look supremely stupid. A big mecha should show that, to quote the Thing from Fantastic Four, "It's clobbering time!"

Well, even if Choreography is a very difficult issue to create in Animation, I really have high expectations on certain Anime. Good drawn Action scenes usually take a lot of time and the creators need a lot of Cels and other material to make them look good, I guess.

Anime that fulfilled my expectations are Street Fighter 2-the animated movie, Rurouni Kenshin, One Piece, Naruto and Ghost in the Shell, Cowboy Bebop, the movie.

As I said in some threads before. Some Anime that have decent Artwork disappoint me in their Action choreography.

Anime that disappointed me in choreography aspects were Samurai deeper Kyo, Weiss Kreuz, Tenjou Tenge...

Max, I can neither confirm or deny that my opinion on Tenjou Tenge was biased because of boobs ;) I boobs.

Just thought of a choreographed scene with fantastic camera work: Lucy vs. Nana (main fight) in Elfen Lied. The straight on shot of Nana's fingers is righteous.

What do you think of some of the fight scenes in Fighting Beauty Wulong and Tokko?

I think itss is very important such as the fight between naruto and sasuke that fight implemented rag doll physics and over exagerated the hits but it was well done so was black lagoon as it feels lik a movie but as stated gundam has good scenes but is repeated i think personally the best fight scenes are done in 26 or shorter series as it becomes expensive for a long running show

Without doubt my vote would be for Karas: The Prophecy. I could watch that movie a million times over simply because the action choreography is so amazing. The cinemaatogrophy is prefect and the way the action flows is so fluid it's unlike anything else.

To me, choreography is not really the most important part of the action/shounen anime. To me the best examples would be Rozen maiden and Gunslinger Girl action scenes Were just great and enhanced the anime verymuch.
Bleach and naruto go for the big power moves and dont involve very much choreography (although Rock-Lee druken style was pretty cool to watch) BUT they're both really really great animes. I hope my explanation makes sense.

theironwarrior

Max, I can neither confirm or deny that my opinion on Tenjou Tenge was biased because of boobs ;) I boobs.

Just thought of a choreographed scene with fantastic camera work: Lucy vs. Nana (main fight) in Elfen Lied. The straight on shot of Nana's fingers is righteous.

What do you think of some of the fight scenes in Fighting Beauty Wulong and Tokko?

Well,... in Tenjou Tenge only the first fight between Sojiro Nagi and that bob-eaired handsome guy was good. The other fighting scenes disappointed me. There were way too many jumpcuts or cuts before the moves had any execution, and then right before the character is doing any move,... in the next cut you only see a thrusting arm or leg... instead of the whole movement,... there are many fighting based Animes that were shot like that.
I rather see the whole movement instead of such jump cuts in that the arm or leg are shown right after the pre-execution of the move is done and then cut...

What I hate as well is to use freeze frame animation,... I mean scenes in which the Character's hit moment is shown in a freeze frame for a few seconds...

Well... action choreography in anime... ummm...
Well... action animes always have fight scenes in them hence ACTION anime. For each character's fight scene someone has to illustrate it so that when the drawing is finnished and it has gone into the animation process... the fight scenes will be smooth and really fun to watch. For example, in the anime Samurai X or Virtua Fither. They were illustarted so that the drawings will have a slick movement while fighting, in a closer to real life manner. Unlike animes like, Dragon Ball, etc. I mean they draw lines to portray fast movement. What's up with that? That means action choreography in anime is really important for the audience to feel the action that any action anime wants their audience to feel. =)

Long term series like One Piece, Rurouni Kenshin and Naruto display good choreography considering the fact that Animators have to put a lot of effort and CELS to make the fights look spectacular...

... and that leads to my next point. If a series becomes popular the Animation companies can earn a lot of money and thus can afford to make up the costs for Cels and Animation material which are necessary to make the Choregraphy in Action and Hand to hand combats very fluently.

if an Anime fails... then there cannot be any profit which results in using cels sparingly...

I guess that Series like Naruto and One Piece were high risk high reward... but also the Manga versions were already so popular that Anime companies had no problem making the fights spectacular even with the filler arcs.

Anyone who has seen Spike bust out his Jeet Kune Do in Cowboy Bebop can understand just how important it is to have that direction.

I mean, if you're watching an action anime, isn't the most important part how that action is done?

Haha, but it doesn't have to be realistic. Goodness no. Anyone who has watched Karas understands how unrealistic action should be done. Ridiculously stylish; that's how.

Well too me. the action just has to be right like for example they have to do the kicks right and or the shooting right if they don't choreograph the action the way it is supposed to be like an uppercut doesn't look like an uppercut i really won't be happy. I think that the animators have to first view an actual scene of that nature then animate it so yes choreography to me is really important.

If they can make the fighting look good without it, it's alright...but stuff such as in Avatar the last airbender makes it pretty darn awesome and realistic looking, unlike dragonball z which simply has a bunch of lines...naruto fighting looks pretty darn awesome as well, i'm not sure if he does that though...Choreography definitely makes stuff look alot better in fighting...(Rock Lee drunken Fist!)

I'm just gonna say that I think choreagraphy is the most important part of an action/fighting anime. Look at the last fight in bebop, there were no really flashy bits, just them going at it stylishly and its one of the best fights that don't involve some sort of spiritual power anywhere.

I mean, yes, when I watch Naruto I want to see the cool moves, the neat strategies, and chakra expenditure up the a$$. But you've gotta have pacing and good movement down, otherwise you end up with DBZ and two episodes of AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH while powering up for a move that will be another episode or two of AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH, so yeah, choreographing those scenes really well is important.