With top seiyuu like Aya Hirano, Ayana Taketatsu and Aki Toyosaki all reduced to pariah status for daring to associate with men in the space of weeks, the divide between fans who treat seiyuu as objects of obsession and those who treat them as voice actors has never been so stark – but as some are keen to point out, it has always been thus. As has been pointed out by sources familiar with the business in some detail, scandals centred on the supposed improprieties of a seiyuu are nothing new:
Tomo Sakurai
Nineties idol/singer seiyuu perhaps best known for voicing Macross 7’s Mylene.
Kept her marriage and child completely secret from fans, only to be exposed by a weekly tabloid. She subsequently apologised to fans at a press conference. She was subsequently shunned by fans and lost most of her work.
Mariko Kouda
Nineties idol seiyuu known for Kanon’s Nayuki, amongst many others.
Announced her marriage to fans on a radio show, upsetting most of her more ardent fans – after which she lost most of her work.
Yuko Miyamura
Asuka Langley, Casca, etc.
Fans managed to identify her (by her teeth and other characteristics) in “SM Erotic Experiences for Two,” an old amateur fetish AV from her student days. Her image amongst these fans was irreparably ruined, although she managed to retain the Asuka role.
Her personal life, resembling that of a normal person and involving the full gamut of marriages, divorces, children, illnesses, etc., also contributed to her losing most of her work.
Kana Hanazawa
Kuroneko, Zange-chan, Suou, Charlotte, etc.
A person claiming “my girlfriend is a seiyuu” appeared on 2ch with photographs of apparently genuine anime scripts and “purikura” shots of her. As she marketed herself on innocent cuteness, the damage would have been considerable had anyone actually heard of her, or had she not found her mini-scandal sandwiched in between several similar revelations.
Aya Hirano
Which is worse, the fans and their unhealthy demands, or the idols who stoop to deceiving them, is a question which is increasingly being debated on 2ch, not coincidentally the place responsible for 90% of the hysterics surrounding these incidents:
“Don’t forget Mizuki.”
“And Taketatsu!”
“The person who wrote all that stuff up knows nothing. Miyamura and company all ended in the late nineties anyway.”
“No – Miyamura was totally ruined by the scandal:
96/06/21 15,400 34,320 *25位 *4回 ケンカ番長 ←1st album
97/09/22 *7,020 31,930 *19位 *4回 不意打ち ←2nd album
98/07/23 **,*** **,*** 圏外 **回 産休～Thank You～ ←Post-scandal [sales figures too low to be published]”“There’s no way the seiyuu caught up in the Sphere fracas will lose all their work though.”
“Mizuki doesn’t even need male fans any more.”
“When I first saw her, I remember thinking Hirano reminded me of Miyamura for some reason. In the end they both fell because of men, it seems.”
“I understand why seiyuu who get married lose all their fans. But why do they have to lose all their roles?”
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Naruto SUN Storm 4 OP Endlessly Energetic
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Top 9 Anime of 2015, According to IGN
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Final Fantasy XV “Might As Well Be An FPS”
Dimension W Spreads It Open
Okasare Hero Strategically Sexy
Studio FOW Alice H-Short “Truly Mad!”
Carnivore Taiga Cosplay Too Cute For Words
Alluring Ahri Cosplay Magically Charming
Tsukihi Araragi BDSM Ero-Cosplay by Komugi Platinum Sexy
Goddess of Twitter “Pink & Perky!”
Serene Horo Cosplay Pure Gold
Iona Ero-Cosplay by Komugi Taking on Water
Cute Kashima Cosplay Full of Elegance
Umaru Ero-Cosplay by Asami Hamsterific
Goddess of 2ch: “Pink & Soft All The Way!”
Kuroneko Cosplay by Mikehouse Full of Life
The Agencys are the worst...
And the damn seiyuus that go along with the scheme to look innocent oure virgin maiden so they can reach new record high levels of popularity. PERIOD.
Agencies are the REAL SCUM bit seiyuus and idols are to blame too, if not equally to agencies.
Or maybe they go along just so they can keep working.
dōmo arigatō gozaimashita, for you demands that seiyuu be holy virgin Marys and innocent that they don't know left to right and what a manhood looks like. And since that is your demands, we do so, so we can get your support.
To simply blame seiyuu idolized and agcenys is just stupid and wrong, they gave the fans what the fans wanted. Didnt they? so now the fans are mad that it turned out to be a lie? I wonder whats worse, the fact that they lied or the fact taht the idiots believed it.
06:13 02/11/2011 # !
You are a retarded sexist. Who cares? Seriously. You are pissed about fan boys getting their feelings hurt? How about being pissed society makes a fetish out of virginity and treats women as objects. Get a life and enjoy your cartoons.
I don't think you know how life in general works, especially in Japan.
Might wanna go read up on that sometime, 6:13.
06:13... relax.
So they work by taking advantage of unhealthy obsession of many of her hardcore fans, awesome work.
They dont give a shit to fans as long as they get more popular to the day getting them more money, more work.
As messed up as this seiyuu business is nowadays if they want to eat from there they should be prepared to what they will expect, but wait, why when they can simply lie to wht they call creepy fans no?
Options:
1)If they want to date, to fuck with any man they come across then they are free to work in something else.
2)They want to be simply seiyuus without becoming an obsession of others then do so and turn down those unscrupulous offers to market your image to something you ARE NOT, an image that you are virgin, innocent and does not have contact woth other men, so be just a huimble seiyuu and do your work and dont make reveal the person behind your characters voice, like this there are MANY examples of seiyuu that are only that.
3) YOu still want to be a seiyuu idolized by fans, you want to become their obsession you are free to do so but then do your work properly and effectively dont date or have sex with any males.
4)You want to be a seiyuu idolized by many, you act the image on an innocent virgin maiden but want to whore yourself to death or ok, simply have a boyfriend, and thus will lie to fans, get prepared for when the consequences or scandals that show your true colors are revealed.
Thank you, I was going to say that, or something similar.
LOL, what's funny is, Kana Hanazawa, Ayana Taketatsu and Aki Toyosaki are my three favorite seiyuu.
I will still support them no matter what, although I understand my fellow fans' concerns if they continue to deceit...
Love them for their voice, talents and roles, not their personal life.
Everything else has my support, for better or worse.
I don't see what's wrong with dating or marrying anyone. It's like their fans don't give them rights to be human.
I guess it's somewhat like how the girls can become all kinds of vicious if their favorite male characters or even their real life actors/voice-actors marry or do anything that 'sullies' a certain image.
Crazy knows no gender apparently.
@Anon 23:54: The problem with that is that marketing on innocence, purity and cuteness works extremely well, since many idol otaku are so embarrassingly gullible that they cannot figure out that it's marketing...
I have a feeling this is just because they've deluded themselves into thinking they have a chance with the girls...
It's super wrong.... I mean come one!
Having a partnet in life, having sex.... having kids..... it's fukin unnatural....
at least in japan that is :P lol
One of these Seiyuus should try saying that she loves going on dates with her fans, and that she promises to go on a date with her biggest fans... That would surely drive up sales
They should just announce that they're seeing someone/married BEFORE they become too famous just to get it out of the way in the beginning >.>
i suppose it is just cultural differences for me. i don't understand. voice actors in america are usually either unknowns or hollywood celebrities. everyone is all up in the business of celebrities, but i suppose they just like the gossip and don't really care that they are fucking each other like wild rabbits. perhaps in japan a "seiyu" having relations or a family is the same as a hollywood actor saying something racist or doing something inhumane (dog fighting).
personally i don't care if they are racist, inhumane, or horny as hell. if they do their job well i think their business is their business and would prefer not to know.
-thebeast
But there's nothing wrong with knowing more about there personal life excluding their sex life, e.g. their hobby, their likes & dislikes, their philosophy of life, their career plans, their friends and family members vice versa.
On the other hand, I would never support seiyuus who resort to hard drugs or any other illegal activities.
"I don't see what's wrong with hard drugs.. "
Err, dude. You really need to take a peek on what drugs have done to celebrities like Amy Winehouse, Lindsay Lohan and Charlie Sheen.
I don't see what's wrong with hard drugs or any other illegal activities. If it makes them the great seiyuu they are, then they should go for it! As long as it doesn't kill them.
Everythings wrong with hard drugs and illegal activities. What gives them the OK to use them? Now if there never caught, who cares- but if exposed, they should suffer like everyone else.
Agreed. It's their talent at acting I'm interested in. If I ever met one I really liked, any potential questions would be about her actual work. For example: "What's the most difficult voice you've done?" or: "What's the funniest thing you can remember happening in the recording booth?"
I don't care who they're dating. I don't care who they're having sex with. I don't care what their fetishes are. Why? Because it has nothing to do with their work, and certainly has absolutely nothing to do with me.
That is how it should be in the first place.
Fuck the pop culture and their practice of invasion of privacy among their celebrities only to gain fame and criteria.
unfortunately, our support means nothing if we only watch pirated anime...
oh, i watch fansubbed anime, sure, but i do much more than that. just take a look at my room, for example.
I doubt you'll see a seasoned anime fan with pirated figures; at least I can't stand having low quality figures, I need the real deal
Well, I try to only take real figurines but since I live in Brazil the price of bootlegs are more expensive than what you guys pay in japan or the states for the real deal and lets not even talk about how much I payy for the real deal, so the temptation is always there...
not full of pirated figurines i hope...
Speak for yourself I've spent thousands on purchasing actual anime alone...and i'm not including gundam models, figures, artbooks, manga etc.
Lets be real everyone leeches through torrents, but it doesn't mean people don't buy things.
They still get paid highly despite piracy. The only one that piracy will cover are the DVD/BD distributors. Their salaries are measured not thru sales but by their fame and talent.
I know, coz I am a copywriter. Bastards can pirate my the works of me and my peers, but we still get paid. The only ones who will go bankrupt are our commercial distributors.
As for that "support" part...no really, do you still support celebrities through capitalism? Real support is respect, not money.
time to get the blu-rays or DVD of the anime you've watched..
Ordering the Haruhi BD-box would cost me around 500€, aka two months of rent or a top-level piece of computer hardware.
A bit too steep, that.
@03:12
Not even a price could stop me from getting what I want..
@shippoyasha
Perhaps it's those who support freeloading and piracy.
@20:30
LoL'ed at your comment. Google Translator bug, haha.
Maybe because it's not anonymous. Or perhaps Google Translate somehow makes it offensive.
Why is this being downvoted?.. It's good to support the hobby.
That's Right.
The Industry needs it's True Fans.
Well, I used to watch DVDs that I bought to support the industry. I really liked AnimEigo, ADV, and Geneon and wanted them to keep going. Then the Funimation monster showed up and ate all the other companies. I never liked them as much so I stopped buying anime at that time. Not only that, but I don't have the storage space to keep adding stuff and I also shouldn't spend the money.
You can watch anime legally at Crunchyroll, yes for free too, although you need to wait for a week for the newest series in SD resolution (reasonable youtube quality), otherwise take a subscription for watching the newest series in HD without waiting.
And it's heavily region-restricted, packed with obscure advertising, intrusive advertising, bad encodes, a bad file player that gives tons of people a headache all around the world, it's basically USA-centric, the mods do a sub-par job at addressing many problems and so on and on.
It is an interesting test-bed for would-be professional legal anime-streaming but on a "world-level" it is far from good.
sighs,...
looks around @ peers,...
sighs moar
"Normal" people in everyday life scares me to wit's end anyway.
I wish some day, hardcore fans would actually BECOME actual fans and support the talent through thick and thin. At least as long as it's nothing to the point of criminality
Compare that to how some people religiously worship Hollywood and American actors and actresses and sports stars even after they did something as heinous as engaging in dog fighting, elicited child prostitution/rape or even complicit in murder and brutal assaults.
Hardcore fandom for real life celebrities are on a whole other scale of scary. Because anime characters are NOT REAL.
HAHAHA!!! idols and seiyuus gonna crash land if they have a life... those people seriously needs to get laid.
Thanks Sankaku Guy - I juat saw Asuka Langleys BOOBS!! (cross her off the list) SOOO Cool!! I really want to see the "K-On!" seiyuus naked but Asuka is a bigger thrill cause I've jerked off to her.
Tried once to Tiffany Grant's Asuka and my dick crawled back inside. I saw Rangiku "Bleach Musical" naked that was sweet! (Harumi Inoue). I would tattoo Ayana Taketatsu naked on my arm if I only saw her naked once. Fuck You I'm strange.
I've heard much worse. Be proud of who you are.
=_= what. the. fuck.
"Kana Hanazawa
A person claiming “my girlfriend is a seiyuu” appeared on 2ch with photographs of apparently genuine anime scripts and “purikura” shots of her."
Huh. I never knew Hanazawa was involved in a scandal. Seeing as how she's still landing one big voice role after another, her fans must have forgiven her. A lesson to be learned there for Hirano, Toyosaki, Taketatsu...
A few Haruhi movies and TV shows later, fans will be groveling at Aya's feet anyway. Too much ridiculous drama. All for nothing. Animation fans shouldn't worry too much. Worry for TRUE backstage drama like the turmoil behind Persona 4 anime.
which is stupid if it actually happens,they just like Aya because of Haruhi,both of them are overrated.
Care to elaborate on the Persona 4 backstage drama?
Also, which scandal of mizuki (nana?) are they talking about?
Don't touch Hanazawa! She's my favorite VA.
Considering what makes a scandal for seiyuus... I guess it's reasonable to not know.
I for one don't really remember what aya did.. wasn't it something about dating a guy? (and then she totally flipped out, but she already was a scandal by then)
the job of a seiyuu seems to be pretty unforgiving... but the customer is always right! so the seiyuus should know what they're getting into!
Though, I still think the seiyuu otakus should try to calm down a little bit.
What about normal sane people that just want talented voice acting? Just seems like bs double standards to me.
you'd probably never hear about the anime because the otakus down voting due of some scandal seiyuu doing the voice acting.
it's not bs double standards... guess why there are "hidden gems" -.-
Same with modeling... how many people would actually watch healthy models (maybe some guys, but they aren't the aimed audiance)?
Overall, theses fans have severe issues...
Really, OMG - someone with a SEX / Love / family life. None of these seiyuus have done anything illegal. What, they are saving their virginity for a fan?
Looking at some of the photos, with fans cutting out the faces of Anime characters shows severe mental instability, a possible murderer.
Some of these women do sexy photo shoots or their characters anyway - so what is it, sex or no sex?
These problems may cost them otherwise good voice talent.
"the damage would have been considerable had anyone actually heard of her"
You are either kidding or a Hanazawa-Anti...
I doubt seiyuu fans could ever forget something, no matter how unpopular she was when it happened.
And I'm super pro-Hanazawa. I'm even getting Type-0 just because Hanazawa is voicing Deuce.
Not to mention Toyosaki is Cinque. Yandere Toyosaki, HELL YES.
Maybe he meant "at the time"??
"Kana Hanazawa"
is still getting lots of work, though, so the scandal doesn't seem to have affected her much.
I place my bet that she's trolling with her stalkers on 2ch when she posted those purikura pics and claimed that she's Hanakana's boy, which is a really heroic thing to do in my book :)
Then again, what can you expect from the Queen of The Denizens of Darkness...
Why did this comment get voted down?
[Beckett voice]
This city's not *that* dull...
[/Beckett voice]
I think people think 2ch runs the anime world or something.
Who cares about a few fans pissed off on the internet.
Enough,already too much trouble in seiyuu circle now,let this kind of pink news calm down.
Who's that man who's betraying her at 2ch?