She is beauty, she is grace, she is the handsome Prince Charming! Yuu openly flirts with her female fans and plays the princely roles in the Drama Club's shows because no guy in the school is better at making everyone swoon than her! 7. He's happy and he looks great in whatever he wears! 6.
Crossdressing is more than just a hobby for Kuranosuke it helps him connect with his estranged mother in a way. Kuranosuke Koibuchi - "Princess Jellyfish"Īnother cisgender male makes it onto the list for being secure and confident in his love for pretty, beautiful clothing. What's that? We need more trans girls in anime and manga? I agree, and Seiko delivers! She's not a major character, but she does get her own arc revolving around her struggles with her gender identity. What's this? A confident canonically agender queer POC? In my anime? With a relatable backstory? Who is capable of exercising greater control over his flame powers than most of the rest of the cast with their own powers? Who is a successful owner of their own company? Incredible. This article will examine how 20 popular anime approach their queer characters.Though technically not human (Inugami is the vengeful spirit of a dog), Inugami is portrayed as able to present themselves as male or female without any particular preference for one or the other. As the LGBT rights movement picks up steam in Japan, there's thankfully been an increase in more respectful and believable portrayals. There's also the yaoi (boys love) and yuri (girls love) genres which focus on same-sex relationships, but often in a very unrealistic and fetishized manner. Sometimes these stereotypical characters are written well enough to transcend their problematic origins, other times they can be incredibly offensive (let's never speak of "Puri Puri Prisoner" from One Punch Man). Because of this, while including queer characters is less taboo, they're often portrayed as jokey stereotypes. While there isn't the same "think of the children!" panicking as in America, Japan still has a fair deal of cultural stigma around the queer community. There's been anime for adults almost as long as there's been anime, and kids anime have long featured openly queer characters.Īs for the quality of queer representation in anime, it's a mixed bag. In Japan, however, neither of obstacles exist. Thankfully that first obstacle started being challenged in the '90s with shows like The Simpsons and South Park, and the second obstacle's being challenged now thanks to shows like Steven Universe and The Loud House.
Until recently, queer representation in American animation has faced two ridiculous obstacles: the idea that cartoons are just for kids, and the idea that it's inappropriate to expose kids to the existence of queer people. In terms of sheer quantity, there are a lot more queer characters in anime than there are in American cartoons.