Why are anime boxsets so horrible?

• Posted by jennifer calderon May 16, 2022 Filed in Entertainment #anime  229 views
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  This week's article doesn't have much to do with Canaan in particular, but it is a burning question that has been on my mind for a while now. I am an anime collector. I've been one since my grandparents first gave me the complete Death Note box set when I finished school. I love having a shelf full of boxes representing the shows I've fallen in love with over the years and turning on a Bluray always feels a little more special to me than typing in the URL of a streaming service. Especially when it turns out that streaming service doesn't have anything I'd want to watch anyway. Continue reading here for more information about this article.

   

  I understand that we are no longer in the era of physical stores. People no longer walk up to shelves full of VHS tapes or DVD boxes and choose a show based on how well the box sells. People who buy Blu-ray are likely already fans of a show after streaming it, or at least have done a bit of research on the product beforehand. Especially fans of the show are a guaranteed audience that will buy the stuff anyway. Still, it would be nice if the marketing guys kept up the effort.

   

  I certainly know that as a fan I'd rather have a nice looking bluray box than some generic crap box I just bought to support the chain of companies that keep anime available in my region. I like being able to take a case of a show I'm passionate about and show it to friends and family, maybe show it off and watch a few episodes together. This becomes a problem when the box is just plain ugly, awkward, or completely misrepresents the show.

   

  My most common complaint would be that the images on the back are usually the size of an ant. The catchphrases and description of the show take center stage, and usually about 3 or 4 tiny pictures are added to give an idea of ​​what the animation looks like...if you have a microscope available, that is. I often find these images to be poorly chosen, such as Another having a collection of boring screenshots, followed by an image of Misaki Mei in a swimsuit. It doesn't give a proper idea of ​​what the show is really like.

   

  Those descriptions also tend to be pretty boring. Anime are often eccentric and trying to describe their appeal in a single paragraph is not easy. Comedy anime especially are harsh and tend to end with awkward descriptions that don't come close to capturing the joy and humor of the series they belong to. I can't even blame the publisher for that. How does someone describe Nichijou's story and "feeling" in about 10 sentences?

   

  It's also not in the power of anime publishers to fix the crap quality of the plastic. I have a lot of cases that have little pieces chipped off for no apparent reason and anything with a switch tray inside it is likely to break something important. Even if you try to mitigate this by buying expensive collector's editions, you often end up with flimsy, overstuffed cardboard packaging that breaks easily.

   

  What anime publishers could do is not so blatantly cheap. I've had expensive boxes that are just standard DVD boxes with blank interiors and plain white discs with a title. The now popular collector's editions used for shows like Re:Zero, Erased, and Amanchu have this ugly booklet with the show's descriptions pasted on the back, which is loose enough to be obnoxious and ugly, but pasted down enough good enough that you might damage something if you try to fix or remove it.

   

  I could rant for hours about all the shitty anime DVDs and blurays I've bought over the years, but I think I'm going to save this for a top 10 someday. What do you think about buying physical anime today? Have you ever had a purchase that you regretted or even refunded?