#umezu kazuo

[strangemonochromes]

Cat-Eyed Boy (猫目小僧) // Kazuo Umezu

[asnowperson]

Present (Umezu Kazuo)

We have a present for you, and the present is a one shot from Umezz!

Merry Christmas, y'all!

[flowerymoments]

Baptism by Kazuo Umezu

[weirdominate]

Always a barrel of laughs on the Orochi show. (Orochi, by Kazuo Umezz; 1969.)

[lasaraconor]

Umezu Kazuo

[fortressofserenity]

Moe style

Pretty much the anime style in question, but if it's the case in Japanese then other anime and manga don't look like this. Especially with older stories like Jojo's Bizarre Adventures and Berserk where it wasn't so widespread in anime and manga, go further back in time and the moe style disappears. In fact a lot of anime and manga in the 1950s and 1960s looked rather cartoony, others like any one of Umezu Kazuo's works have a more naturalistic look and style.

Even today, some anime don't adhere to the moe look. But as to why the moe look became popular in anime, it's mainly got to do with the rise of otaku as viable and profitable consumers. Sometime in the early to mid-20th century, not a lot of anime and manga pandered hard to otaku. They might as well be nonexistent in the early days, which explains why they weren't that considered much before. In fact, they were rather shocking.

The moe style wouldn't become the dominant school of anime until sometime between the 1970s and the 2000s, which neatly coincides with the rise of otaku as a viable demographic. Anime wasn't like that before, in fact a good number of early anime had rather cartoony styles. Moe wouldn't become dominant until otaku became anime's biggest patrons, which happened rather recently.

That's why older mangaka like Hirohiko Araki know the differences between nonotaku manga and otaku manga, especially if somebody like him is usually outside of otaku culture. They know what's otaku-pandering right away, something that was mostly absent in many manga from the early to mid-20th century. Otaku wouldn't become a big part of anime's consumer base until sometime in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.

This means it took time for moe to become the dominant school in anime, back then anime and manga didn't pander hard to otaku. This meant the moe look, the things otaku like had yet to emerge in anime, let alone in the form we recognise it as. Otaku pandering would've been an afterthought had it existed in the 1950s up to the 1970s, so it wouldn't emerge until later on when it came from fanzine-making otaku.

Eventually more of them got to professionally publish anime and manga in the late 20th century, which affected subsequent anime and manga for the better or worse.

[ghostnight]

[shihlun]

Kiyoshi Kurosawa

- Kazuo Umezu’s Horror Theater: House of Bugs

2005

[classic-shoujo]

Doll Girl (1960) by Kazuo Umezo

[alienorchids]

DIR EN GREY - DOZING GREEN

SFCD-0051

2007

[arcadebroke]

[strangemonochromes]

The Wish (ねがい) // Kazuo Umezu

[xenosagaepisodeone]

[flowerymoments]

Baptism by Kazuo Umezu

[weirdominate]

One of those mornings. (Orochi, by Kazuo Umezz; 1969.)

[lasaraconor]