As we’ve noted here many times, the anime/manga movement is best seen as having its greatest cultural impact as a fashion/lifestyle trend (a la punk and goth), not as a literary movement, per se. And certainly the fashion gets wilder and wilder all the time. For instance, these over-sized contacts which give your eyes a manga-sized look have been getting a lot of attention.
Disturbing as they are, they aren’t the worst of it, as InventorSpot notes:
The site featuring the lenses sells a few other beauty aids, including a painful-sounding “nose clipper” and a Crystal Colagen Breast Mask which demands a posting of its own – keep a big, watery, shiny eye on this blog!
Must…buy…contact…lenses…
Hmmm… maybe I’ll dress up as a Keane painting for Halloween! Or put them on the family dog!
gah… I can see someone making the wrong turn at Mt. Fuji and ending up in the the Village of the Otaku…
I don’t like wearing contacts. Perhaps they’ve got an eyeglasses version?
Question for those who know Japanese culture and history better than I: is that really fashion inspired by anime/manga or is the fashion, along with anime/manga, inspired by the culture of affectionate indulgence/dependence of the weak and “innocent”? Did the manga/anime style of big, child-like eyes spawn the overall obsession with creepy-cute or was it the other way around?
Really, “anime eyes” is giving those contacts a generous excuse. Those are the eyes of a six-year-old. They are so damned out-and-out freaky “Wish you were here!” postcard from the Valley of the Uncanny.
Reminds me of the song “Japanimation Eyes” by the Fuglees, a band notable to comic geeks everywhere because it features Andy Kuhn (current artist on Firebreather and former Marvel Team-Up penciller) on bass and lead vocals. You can hear a clip of the song here…
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=50:kzfoxm95ldke~T
What makes it the greatest, most bizarrely coincidental thing ever is that on the way into work yesterday morning, I decided to listen to that Fuglees CD for the first time in a year, then saw a link to this the very same day. What are the odds?
Maybe one day Kim Carnes can write another hit record based on this.
~
Coat
coool pics! but are they really real?
From what I understand the “anime eyes” was an influence from Walt Disney Movies that seemed to be popular after WW2. I know that the big innocent bunny eyes were a influence on Osamu Tezuka.
But I could be wrong.
Bit scary but Awesome …