One thing that bugs me in review discussions is when people call any show with a slower pace 'anime Malick'

I see this in almost every thread about a slower anime like Mushishi or even certain Ghibli films. Not every quiet moment is a deep artistic choice, sometimes it's just bad pacing or budget cuts. Has anyone else noticed this getting way more common in the last year?

3 comments

3 Comments

gavin_hill271mo ago

Yeah it bugs me too. Like slow doesn't always mean deep or artsy, sometimes a show just has weird pacing because they ran out of money for that episode. Mushishi gets a pass since the whole point is atmosphere, but I've seen people throw that comparison around for shows that are just boring.

hollyc921mo ago

The quiet moments in a show only work if the loud ones actually meant something first, otherwise it's just dead air. It's like when a horror movie tries to be "atmospheric" but you're just watching a character walk down a hallway for five minutes because the director forgot tension needs a payoff. Mushishi earns it because every silence is carrying emotional weight from earlier episodes, not just filling time until the credits roll.

fiona_young26d ago

Has anyone actually tried calling out the comparison in the moment? Like next time someone says "this is so anime Malick," just ask them what specific scenes made them think that. Usually they can't give you a straight answer if they're just throwing the label around. I started doing this in my groups and it cut down on the lazy comparisons by a lot. The other thing that helps is pointing them to specific shows that actually earn the label, like Kino's Journey or Haibane Renmei, so they can see the difference between intentional pacing and just slow editing. It's a lot harder to spam a comparison when you have to defend it.