Japanese culture has supplied a great deal of the entertainment I have consumed in my lifetime. I remember fondly the wild race home from school to catch the animated series “Star Blazers” on TV… it was always a bonus when I managed to reach a TV set in time to hear the opening theme song.Japanese culture has supplied a great deal of the entertainment I have consumed in my lifetime. I remember fondly the wild race home from school to catch the animated series “Star Blazers” on TV… it was always a bonus when I managed to reach a TV set in time to hear the opening theme song. But my love of Japanese animation (or anime) didn’t end with Star Blazers. Showtime used to run a series they called “Force Five” which really was a collection of five different anime shows. One of these shows, called “Starvengers”, was another favorite of mine. Few people will remember the name Starvengers because in America any company that acquires the rights to an anime series will inevitably come up with their own name for the show –- no doubt the Japanese name for this show, “Getta Robo G,” just wouldn’t sell well to an American audience.

You may not remember the name “Starvengers,” but there’s a good chance you’d recognize the star attraction of this show if you saw it : a giant red and blue robot (called “Dragon” in America) with a head that somewhat resembles the Statue of Liberty. The “Dragon” toy was included in a toy line called “Shogun Warriors” that was insanely popular when I was young. Other robots in this toy line included characters from all kinds of anime series, including Gaiking and Great Mazinga, not to mention a giant Godzilla whose fist would shoot across the room at the push of a button.

The popularity of these toys and TV shows in America opened the door for another toy line that originated in Japan, one you’ve no doubt heard of because it’s still alive today… The Transformers. The Transformers took the toy world by force when I was young… an instant hit, complete with a cartoon TV show to bolster sales. In case you haven’t heard of The Transformers, these are toy robots that turn into other things such as vehicles, guns, dinosaurs, bugs, cassette recorders, you name it.

You know where it went from there… The Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers hit the shelves when I was older and uninterested, but American kids devoured them eagerly off the shelves of happy toy stores. The TV show and movies were also successful. More recently, Pokemon toys, movies, TV shows and video games are raking in the American dollars. It’s clear that Japanese entertainment is a hit with the mainstream culture of America.

Yet Japan, unlike America, does not solely direct its animation towards children. Just as America offers live action TV shows aimed at a variety of ages, so too does Japan produce animation for both children and adults. Full-length anime movies like Princess Mononoke (as it was called for its American release) have shattered Japanese box office records and created insanely long Star Wars-like lines in front of Japanese cinemas. For many Americans, animation is intended for children; that’s not to say that adults can’t enjoy it too, but American animation is almost always directed primarily towards the younger members of our society. That’s an American attitude that might be starting to change.

To see how these attitudes slowly start to change, consider video games. When I was young and “Pac-Man” was a national sensation, the older generation just didn’t seem to “get it” where video games were concerned. Every mother I knew would spend a few minutes per week trying (unsuccessfully) to convince her son or daughter that video games were a waste of money. In fact, it was entirely common for mothers to pull the plug on Atari 2600 game consoles just minutes before their child could secure the top score (and thus bragging rights) on Asteroids! Young parents today, however, mostly “get it” because they grew up playing video games themselves. Ten years from now, the percentage of “video game literate” parents will be even higher. The same principle holds true for Japanese animation — that which is geared towards adults in general. Here is where the Adult Industry comes into play.

Japanese animation comes in many flavors, and one of the more popular flavors is that of a graphically sexual nature. This subcategory of animation is most often referred to as “hentai.” Hentai, plainly stated, is animated pornography with a unique Japanese style. Many of the larger Asian themed paysites offer a collection of hentai in their photo galleries… fans of porn featuring Asian women often enjoy hentai as well. It all sounds pretty innocent, but many forms of hentai are amongst the darkest content on the adult Internet.

In a past AVN Online article titled “Hentai 101- A Primer on Japan’s Amazing Cartoon Porn,” author Mark Logan had this to say about hentai: “If all this sounds silly, understand that much hentai isn’t light in tone. Incest, rape scenarios, extremely hard bondage, fisting, pissing, scat, bestiality, and even storylines with early-teen girls and boys are common.” Through hentai, fans often fantasize about forbidden sexuality… fantasies that would often involve criminal charges if they included actual models. Merely every topic mentioned by Logan’s quote has been the source of an American obscenity conviction in the past.

First, and most obvious, is that sexual depictions of minors are a big no-no in America. When hentai is sold in America, publishers will often change words used in the descriptions of scenes to comply with American law. For example, high schools are changed to colleges, and “19 year old” is often placed before the names of primary characters. Yet all this is really a smoke screen… Japanese laws regarding sex and minors are different than those in America. Those sailor outfits we commonly see Japanese girls wearing in hentai titles are really school uniforms worn mainly by underage Japanese girls. The manner in which the characters are drawn also indicates that they are early teenagers. Storylines further betray the true intentions of many hentai films… storylines such as “the teacher’s pet has sex after school,” or “the inexperienced young boy lives his sexual fantasies.” Sure, these storylines COULD be about legal teens or young adults… but often they are not. A simple check of the original Japanese version of the work will verify this truth, but of course you’d have to speak Japanese to be sure. Subtitles can lose something in the translation.

Rape and incest are two more subjects that are a no-no in America. Any explicit hardcore photo set depicting a staged rape scene – even though done with consenting models – is likely to attract the attention of obscenity prosecutors, and you can be almost sure that a jury will side against any producer of simulated rape erotica. In fact, even “hard bondage” can land you in hot water – hard bondage being any bondage scene that depicts hardcore sex acts. Prosecutors have argued successfully in the past that hard bondage too closely resembles rape.

Whether of not hentai could result in an obscenity conviction is something that anyone offering hentai should really discuss with his or her lawyer, but during a legal seminar at a past conference in Miami it was stated that Americans have been arrested over “obscene” drawings in the past. To make matters more urgent, the Supreme Court is currently considering the constitutionality of a “virtual child porn” ban that would outlaw all images that “appear” to be of minors. Should that law stand, it would no doubt affect anyone who currently offers hentai from within America.

Hentai in America is certainly a market worth watching, and for the adventurous Webmaster is might even be a market worth entering. If you do plan to offer hentai on your site, make sure that you spend some time analyzing your risks. Only pick that content which you are comfortable offering… don’t just blindly throw up a random collection of hentai without combing it for problem content first. Hentai content is expensive, so if you can afford the pictures then you can probably afford the counsel of an Industry lawyer. There’s a lot of money to be made in offering hentai to the right crowd, but stay safe and take the time to do it right and you’ll sleep easier at night.

Connor Young is the editor of theAdultWebmaster.com.

Japanese culture has supplied a great deal of the entertainment I have consumed in my lifetime. I remember fondly the wild race home from school to catch the animated series “Star Blazers” on TV… it was always a bonus when I managed to reach a TV set in time to hear the opening theme song.Japanese culture has supplied a great deal of the entertainment I have consumed in my lifetime. I remember fondly the wild race home from school to catch the animated series “Star Blazers” on TV… it was always a bonus when I managed to reach a TV set in time to hear the opening theme song. But my love of Japanese animation (or anime) didn’t end with Star Blazers. Showtime used to run a series they called “Force Five” which really was a collection of five different anime shows. One of these shows, called “Starvengers”, was another favorite of mine. Few people will remember the name Starvengers because in America any company that acquires the rights to an anime series will inevitably come up with their own name for the show –- no doubt the Japanese name for this show, “Getta Robo G,” just wouldn’t sell well to an American audience.

You may not remember the name “Starvengers,” but there’s a good chance you’d recognize the star attraction of this show if you saw it : a giant red and blue robot (called “Dragon” in America) with a head that somewhat resembles the Statue of Liberty. The “Dragon” toy was included in a toy line called “Shogun Warriors” that was insanely popular when I was young. Other robots in this toy line included characters from all kinds of anime series, including Gaiking and Great Mazinga, not to mention a giant Godzilla whose fist would shoot across the room at the push of a button.

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