A Friend Who Became a Mysterious Niche Anime Otaku on YouTube

　A friend of mine from high school — the first time we’d met in a year and a half — has become completely devoted to tracking down every anime art-directed by Shichiro Kobayashi. His love for Revolutionary Girl Utena spiraled so far that he’s now trying to trace the entire creative lineage of everyone involved in making Utena. This is the kind of obsession only infinite free time through welfare support can truly enable.

　The internet is full of people who make you think, “I’m grateful this exists, but… why are they dedicating themselves to this?” Especially on YouTube. For example, there’s an account that illegally uploads only one specific episode of an old bishoujo anime I love called Seraphim Call. Rare episodes that never really make it onto streaming services are suddenly being broadcast to the world. Once you start digging through these strange accounts, you eventually run into people uploading obscure anime in bizarrely high quality — shows that will absolutely never appear on subscription services.

　I’m personally a huge fan of retro commercials, and I love digging through compilation videos of old TV ads. Recently, though, someone started uploading ten-hour-long compilations of commercials. They used to cap out at maybe an hour. Now I can leave one running while I sleep, wake up, and it’s still endlessly playing Showa-era commercials. I like falling asleep to them because it starts making me feel uncertain whether I’m actually awake or not.

　These maniacs devote themselves to collecting videotapes, cutting the commercial sections out of recordings, stitching them together, and uploading them to YouTube. Sometimes you’ll even see them on social media actively searching for recorded VHS tapes from strangers. Like they’re crawling through weeds in search of traces from the past, endlessly harvesting old commercials. Why? And yet, people like this really do exist, and they satisfy the curiosity of weirdos like me. I’m grateful for them.

　So what exactly are these people thinking when they do all this?

　Well, my friend became one of them.

　Somehow, during the year he spent barely seeing anyone, he started ripping footage from rented DVDs and continuously uploading videos focused specifically on background art scenes from anime worked on by Shichiro Kobayashi!

　The colors in THE MELODY OF OBLIVION are incredibly bold. There’s even a faint Utena-like atmosphere to them.

　According to him, he uploads them simply “so I can rewatch them whenever I want.” He’s even compiled directing work by Kunihiko Ikuhara outside of his own original projects, like Sweet Blue Flowers. As a result, the channel has basically become a dream archive for anyone wanting to appreciate background art comparatively, and the playlists he’s assembled also collect videos from even more absurdly niche uploaders.

I see now. One answer to the mystery of these impossibly niche internet people is simply: an unemployed people archiving footage in the most personally convenient way possible. Not really for discussion or sharing — genuinely just for myself.

　And honestly, I’m proud watching my friend turn into this kind of person.

　I hope he never works again, and that every time we meet, he keeps talking about obscure animation direction and background art details that absolutely nobody else on Earth knows about.