Results and Discussions

This chapter contains the result and interpretation of all the gathered data from
the interview conducted by the researchers. The targeted respondents for the study
were students who belong to a group culture called Otaku.

Based on the gathered data, it shows that the respondents have their own
reasons to be involved in this group. Anime and manga were created to entertain people
and to show the Japanese culture through these films by redefining animation, making it
different from other countries. The main purpose was achieved because most of the
respondents were entertained and interested on its diverse type of drawings and the
concepts which makes it more appealing to students. The most notable of these
responses, however, was the last respondent who used anime as an escape to reality.
According to a study by Julie Rees, entitled, Desire: The Influence of Japanese Manga,
artists who created manga and anime used this as a reserved world to express their
desire to fantasy. Furthermore, the study posits that anime and manga became an
avenue to relieve built-up pressures from daily life.

There are people who watched anime for leisure, some for following the
trend but some are just obsessed with it and thus becoming hardcore fans. With this
notion, the researchers asked the respondents on the average time they spent
watching anime and reading manga, how many of it, money they invested for it and
conventions they’ve attended. Anime fans are those people who watched anime and
read manga even just for once however, to be an Otaku, a person must watched more
hours than regular fans who watched at an average of 5-6 hours a week or per month
depending on the time they wanted. Otaku are obsessed anime fans who
unconsciously made this a habit and making it a part of their daily life. When asked on
how much time they spent on these Japanese-branded films, all of the respondents, to
the researchers’ knowledge are classified as otaku. All of the respondents watched
anime everyday but this isn’t what makes it more interesting. Four of the respondents
watched anime and read manga at an average of 4-8 hours. The remaining one
respondent has the least number of hours watching and reading which is 2-3 hours a
day but is more than a normal anime fan can do.
Based on the data, the respondents watched anime at an average of more than
20-100 anime and read at most 15-100 manga. This shows that the time they spent
watching anime and reading manga is related to how many of it that they’ve seen,
which served as a proof that they are more than regular anime fans. Moreover, when
asked if they attended otaku conventions, 4 of them attended and were happy to do so.
The researchers observed that these 4 individuals are those otaku who are sociable
and outgoing since otakufest (convention) involves socializing with other people who
shared the same interest as them. On the other hand, one respondent answered that
he don’t attend conventions because even with the same social group as him, he
doesn’t want people to know his weird side, however, he thinks of himself as an anime
character and draw anime characters which is referred to as fanart.
Another question being addressed to these students was the amount of money they
spent on merchandise. All of the respondents invest in products from the anime or
manga that they have seen monthly or yearly with the least of Php600.00 up to
Php3000.00. Moreover, respondents are collectors and sentimental when it comes to
the anime and manga that they like because money was invested to it. A research was
made by Yano Research Institute entitled, Otaku Market in Japan: Key Research
Findings 2016, to study the business side of otaku and it shows that among other otaku
market categories, the highest amount of money spent by acknowledged otaku is the
“Popular Idols” category, which involves photo books, fees for fan clubs and other
related goods.
The respondents were all college students, based on their answers they are good at
balancing their time to attend classes and at the same time doing the thing that they
love which involves being an otaku. It instills creativity to a person as one of the
respondents was implying. Anime inspires children to gain interest in other activities
such as art sports and other languages (Ahsan2014).