Bounty Dog © Manga Entertainment

When looking for a common thread to link this article, I was struck by how often anime had ran foul of censorship in Europe, a problem that is certainly something of a sore point with fans here in Britain due to the many cuts imposed on videos by the British Board Of Film Classification (BBFC). To briefly explain the role of the BBFC, its examiners view and then assign certificates to all the films and videos shown in Britain. These certificates place legal age limits on who can watch a film, and range from a "U" for Universal to an "18" for anything of a strictly adult nature. I should point out that an "18" does not equate to the American "X" rating, which is often synonymous with pornography. The BBFC is also able to demand cuts and modifications to bring a film into the realms of public decency and can refuse a certificate completely if deemed necessary.

Naturally the board has long been at the center of controversy regarding issues of personal freedom, and in recent years anime has come very much to the forefront of that debate; but before we delve deeper into the situation in Britain, let us begin with a brief overview of anime in mainland Europe, from where it began, to where it stands at present.

Spain & France
There are a number of European countries where anime enjoys a much broader exposure than in Britain; however, things got off to a difficult start when early imports of television shows came up against local opposition to their content, which, even if made for children, often took a far more relaxed attitude to mature themes than broadcasters and parents were used to. A case in point was the giant robot show Mazinger Z (TranZor Z in America), which in 1980 was picked up for broadcast in Spain by Television Española (TVE), but was discontinued after only 26 episodes because the broadcasters judged it was too violent. The problem is a familiar dichotomy to anime fans wishing to see the genre expand it's appeal. Broadcasters are thrust into a state of confusion, equating cartoons with children, but unable to place anime comfortably in this niche. A similar fate befell Saint Seiya, a series based on the manga of Masami Kurumada, and which took inspiration from both Greek and Norse mythology. However, Saint Seiya got a second chance when the entire series was broadcast by another Spanish channel, Tele-S, and this time the flame caught and started a fire. Now it is possible to see an incredibly broad range of anime on Spanish television, including shows that have almost legendary status with Western fans, such as Lupin III, Kimagure Orange Road, Touch, City Hunter, Ranma 1/2 and Maison Ikkoku. As an interesting aside, the degree of tampering appears to vary with regions in Spain, hence in the Catalan region you can see the Dragonball series with it's original titles intact, while in the rest of the country the show goes out in an edited format.

UFO Robot Grandizer

In France, anime has had a particularly rough ride. The first anime to reach the country was Ribbon No Kishi (Princess Knight), translated as Le Prince Saphir, and Jungle Taitei (Jungle Emperor) as Le Roi Leo, both from the fertile imagination of manga and anime genius Osamu Tezuka. These appeared in 1974 and I can't imagine caused any great stir; but things really heated up in more ways than one in the late 70s. First of all, the series UFO Robot Grandizer was broadcast in 1978 as Goldorak and, like Saint Seiya in Spain, was the catalyst for a boom in anime imports, as it apparently was the most watched program on television at the time. However, during this period a French psychologist also wrote an article which warned of the danger to young children of watching "violent" Japanese cartoons. This event has real parallels with the work of Dr. Frederick Wertham, the psychologist who created a considerable panic in the early 1950s amongst American parents when he proposed a link between delinquency and the horror comic books popularized by publisher EC. A similar hysteria was to be whipped up in France, and in much the same way as America came up with the Comics Code Authority (CCA) to regulate comics, so France was to have it's CSA, or Comité de Surveillance Audiovisuel. The CSA set to work cutting the violence from shows such as Hokuto No Ken (Fist Of The Northstar). Although you can reasonably argue the merits of such a move, worse was to come when the government enacted a law banning advertisements during cartoons.