So, what is this thing we call ANIME?

ANIME (ah - nee - mhey) is a shortened form of the word ANIMATION, and is also commonly known as JAPANESE ANIMATION, but more often called simply as animè.

ANIME are animated films often based on manga titles. MANGA (mahn-ga) refers to japanese comics, often black and white, made for japanese magazines or sold separately by volumes. Manga is one of the most popular readable material ever, and in Japan it stands just like a newspaper. It depicts different genres of epic storylines and interesting characters to deal with, which made manga readership reach billions.

On the other hand, ANIME provides the necessary live action and cinematic themes needed for this mangas to come to life. Distinguishing anime from other animated films such as the Disney cartoons are certain aspects unavailable on its counterparts:

• An epic storyline. Soaring mechas, demons on the loose, blooming romance, historical developments, name it.

• The power everywhere. Most animes show characters that possess powers (magical, psychic, mental, spiritual, demonic, and more..) that are impossible for the 'real' human body to have.

• Eye-catching character portrayals. Heroes have unusual hair styles, bright hair colors, magnificent eyes, and one set of attire for the rest of the series. Heroines portray mastery in terms of its artwork, and wears the least clothing possible for the genre. Villians, on the other hand, mostly have horns, demonic bodies, or have unimaginable powers beyond control.

• The display of emotion. Characters laugh, cry, gets irate, gets provoked from losing someone close, gets nosebleeds from sudden excitement (for men only) etc...

• The heart-warming soundtrack. Part of a film's success is its score, and anime does this job better than anything else. Varieties from j-pop to j-rock and instrumental adds the needed spice for viewing.

• The weirdest depictions ever. Deformed characters to signify a funny scene, teary eyes shine as bright as the north star, Transformations using magic rods which are long enough to stun the opponent. Anything that happens in real life happens to anime, but anything that happens in anime does not happen in real life. That's why those trying hard hollywood movies based on anime really suck. `nuff said.

ANIME comes in different varieties, like futuristic (Evangelion), medieval (Rurouni Kenshin), typical romance (Fushigi Yuugi), hyperspeed action (Dragonball Z), sports (Slam Dunk!),  comedy (Lupin), school life (Kimagure Orange Road), adult (La Blue Girl). Not only that, it has different types of viewpoints, from a 100-episode TV series, a 2-hour length movie, or rare to find original animation videos. Overall, anime is considered in a class above the rest of the world's cartoons.

So the next time someone asks you what is anime, tell them to visit this site.. err.. you can tell them this brief background which we hope would be of some help.