Definitive Anime Review Issue #3 – Can animators cook?

Hello everyone, and welcome to a brand new issue of Definitive Anime Review, the best way we can get journalism in the anime industry in a time when journalism is being destroyed by Tesco Value Bond villains living in San Francisco.

Today’s issue is tackles a very important topic, you see I have recently learned that anime should be quantified using political potential, something that seems extremely frightening and horrifying to virtually 0% of my audience. One of the most hotly contested political axis that people argue about is the ability to cook good food. My ancestral home of Sicily is home to a wide variety of excellent food, whether it be Pane Panelle from the street markets of Palermo to the Pignolati that I look forward to munching every Easter and Christmas.

Anyway, we must answer the question. Can animators cook? I will look at some examples that I know about very well and will let you, the reader decide whether animators truly can cook. So join me, on a trip to Italy, Japan and wherever Bahi JD lives right now (he deleted his last address about one minute after he moved in) to find out if animators really can cook.

Dish #1 – Cooking at Studio Ghibli

Studio Ghibli, one of the most well known and respected anime studios on the planet and the planet’s planet. Is well known for their good animation. They once made Ponyo, a film that is not bad and Howl’s Moving Castle a film that is not Ponyo. At Studio Ghibli, the various staff on their films need to eat food and various staff take turns making dishes that the others won’t disapprove of. Jamie Oliver infamously was declined a job at the studio because he made everyone upset, hence why he ended up getting a job making dodgy cooking shows for the BBC.

First up, I must show you the spaghetti dish that director and character designer Kitarou Kousaka made for the others at the studio. Kousaka is known for being the character designer for Master Keaton and directed the very good Okko’s Inn. Unfortunately in my humble opinion, the spaghetti I saw Kousaka cook looked bland as could be.

Just look at it! It’s so plain that it could feature in Ace Combat. Utterly disgraceful. The even more crazy thing is that the other staff at Ghibli liked it!

We then get to the final dish shown off at Studio Ghibli, cooked by none other than Hayao Miyazaki himself. He’s the leader of the bunch, so you know him well enough. He’s cooking Poor Man’s Salt Flavoured Ramen a simple and hearty dish that is designed to turn even his good friends into bitter chain smokers who make auteur works that families can go watch in the cinema.

The way Miyazaki cooks is as awe inspiring as his film making. He stands commandingly and auteur like over a large boiling pot as ten blocks of noodles and beaten egg are carefully placed into the mixture by a lackey of his. The dish also has mushrooms and green onions and has some unknown seasoning packets to give additional flavour.

I am very pleased with the dish that Miyazaki created for his staff. As someone who occasionally has a Buldak ramen at work when I don’t have time to make sandwiches, I can appreciate the love and care taken to make a large noodle dish that everyone can enjoy. Also the noodles actually have some sort of flavour, which is more than can be said against that sad excuse of a spaghetti dish from earlier.

However, I feel that Miyazaki’s ramen has less of a political potential compared to Kousaka’s spaghetti because unlike the spaghetti, I don’t think the ramen would cause a diplomatic incident between the Japanese and Italian govenments.

Dish #2 – Bahi JD’s Potato Sausage Mix Animation Power

Yes, you read that correctly. That’s the name of the dish. Bahi JD, one of the anime industry’s greatest foreign animators, is also an aspiring chef. You of course did not know that because he deleted this information about 17 seconds after he told everyone.

Bahi’s dish is very simple. Sausages and Potatoes are chopped and pan fried under a gentle heat with a dash of olive oil. He also uses what appears to be some paprika and some chopped green onions to provide additional flavour. It’s kinda unclear from the image if Bahi ate the food straight from the pan or not. Between the large workload he has and hanging out with Hideo Kojima, I imagine he probably still at least had time to plate it up and make it look nice.

This is actually the best looking food I’ve seen so far from any of our animators, and I actually would probably make this dish myself! The political ramifications of the dish could be massive however, as it’s unclear exactly what sasuages Bahi used in the dish. We don’t know if he used German sauages, British sausages or even if he decided to use Vegan sausages because I don’t know if Bahi is a vegetarian or not. The man is an enigma after all.

Dish #3 – Roccia’s Pizza

My good friend Roccia is up next. Now in case you’re not aware of who they are, Roccia has done work for Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure and even 100 Meters. They’re from Italy, the country where pizza is from.

Just look at this:

Now I’m not going to debate whether Roccia can cook. I’m not going to debate whether the pizza is edible. I’m not even going to debate how it’s even possible to burn the tray in which the pizza stood. I’m just going to debate the political potential of this dish.

Now firstly, can this pizza be used as a weapon? I would argue yes. Judging from the structural integrity of the pizza, it looks like it is roughly 6 to 7 on the Mohs Scale of hardness. Some manufacturers claim that their products are engineered using military grade precision and by that, I could say that some army could theoretically cook pizza to Roccia’s specification and use it in combat. Probably as some death frisbee or something.

Secondly, the pizza has large amounts of carbon from the burnt pepperoni, cheese, tomato and the pizza base. High amounts of carbon could potentially poison someone and therefore there is a high likelyhood that the pizza could be banned from being served in some political gathering of some sort. I know politicans like meeting each other sometimes. They’ve got to do something when they’re not making the lives of their citizens a bit more miserable right?

I am going to say that Roccia’s pizza is the most political of all the dishes in this article. I can see no other option here.

Is that it?

Yes. Animators can cook (animation) but we have learnt that they might not be able to cook food. If you have any examples of animators cooking good food or cooking food with high amounts of political potential please let me know in the comments!