Talk:Yoshiyuki Tomino

References

I would ask Ganryuu to attempt to reintroduce the material he cut in a more acceptable manner, rather than just completely eliminating it. Tomino's "kill-em-all" appelation is an important part of any article about him -- not mentioning it would be like not mentioning that Sam Peckinpah is known for violence in his films, or something like that. If you think there shouldn't be as many spoilers, that's fine, but I'm curious what sort of "references" you are wanting for the statement that a number of his anime end with most of the protagonists dying. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.180.44.242 (talk • contribs) 13:16, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree. The original content did have some fancruft, in particular the depression stuff, that said it shouldn't be eliminated entirely. I'll do another write up, but this time am not going to mention the depression stuff at all until someone can provide actual proof. -Quiddity99

See Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons: Negative material that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous. All of the allegations presented previously in this article contained no authentic sources nor references whatsoever and contains unsourced potentially libelous, slanderous and POV material, which as per Wikipedia living person biography guidelines must be removed immediately. Please also follow Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines and address new talk page entries at the end of the page via the + icon, and please remember to sign your talk page entries with four tidles. Ganryuu (talk) 22:49, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Ganryuu, there is no negative material here, what in the world are you talking about? How does describing the theme of many of Tomino's shows equal libel? What is Tomino most well known for? Gundam and being known as 'Kill Em All' Tomino. You claim this is unsourced. Have you even watched these shows? The shows are the source. Numerous articles on the internet call him Kill Em All Tomino, including: http://www.animeacademy.com/profile_tomino_yoshiyuki.php; http://www.animeuknews.net/viewarticle.php?showarticle=35; and http://www.scifi.com/sfw/issue147/anime.html. The magazine Animerica has discussed Tomino's "Kill Em All" origins from Triton and Zambot. I'm fairly certain the book "The Anime Encyclopedia" mentioned it as well. Do a quick Google search and you will see him called Kill Em All Tomino hundreds upon hundreds of times, just in english, let alone japanese. Are you even familiar with Tomino? I'm putting this back. You had a good reason for editing it the last time as the article contained a lot of stuff about Tomino suffering from depression. The revised write up contains no such material. Please don't do this again. Quiddity99 00:01, 21 September 2006 (UTC)Quiddity99

I also do not see any reason why such an important feature of the article is continually being reverted without explanation. None of the statements in the previous version are libelous in any way. I request that Ganryuu explain his edits in a way other than parroting Wiki policy if he wishes to remove content again. Whitesanjuro 03:26, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

Please try to act politely and try to read the policies - these are official policies which have to be mantained. The entire section you are trying to add is extremely biased, POV and completely against Wikipedia:Neutral point of view, not to mention wholly unreferenced and exceedingly negative. The uses of the words "bloodbath" and "kill em all" for example, are more suited for a rant, not an encyclopedic article. As detailed on Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons: Negative material that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous - this is an official policy which has to be mantained. This entire section is poorly sourced and exceedily negative and biased against Mr. Tomino, so therefore must be removed immediately - unless this section is referenced and follows Neutral point of view, this has to be removed immediately. I'm going to take this matter up to the main Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons talk page. Ganryuu (talk) 18:38, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

This article was recently reviewed in the official WP:BLP Noticeboard where an experienced editor agreed that this article reeks of original research. See Wikipedia:No original research. As this section is unsourced, unreferenced and exceedingly negative, and reeks of original research, it should be removed very soon unless authentified references are added (see Wikipedia:Verifiability). As this is original research and is poorly sourced, there are certainly legimate reasons in having it removed immediately. Ganryuu (talk) 06:57, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

I understand that someone with no perspective or background in the world of anime or cinema in general might view the nickname "Kill 'Em All" as a negative designation, but this does not stop it from being Tomino's nickname nor does it make it negative or biased. Calling someone who writes fiction in which they kill all the main characters repeatedly by a nickname which merely reflects this behavior, which is why he was given this nickname in the late 70's (before I was born). Many articles and websites, as well as publications (Newtype, etc.) have historically referred to Tomino this way. Also, other articles within the Wikipedia itself (1, 2, etc.) also refer to this when mentioning Tomino. Here is a brief list of references:

• Anime News Network interviews Tomino and refers to him as Yoshiyuki "Kill 'Em All" Tomino
• the Gundam Encylopedia has an entire article detailing the history of the name ... 'Kill Em All' Tomino, a man who has killed large portions of, if not all of his cast in many of his animes ... this article supports all the assertions of the text in question
• Anime Academy refers to 1977's Zambot 3, Tomino set a rather morbid super-robot story which ended in a bloodbath, something that would be common in a majority of his works. This gave the angry director the now infamous title, Tomino "Kill 'Em All" Yoshiyuki.

I was able to pull this data up with a quick google search from just the first results page. I understand that you may feel this is libelous, but fortunately using a nickname that the rest of the anime/cinema/TV world has given someone and adequately explaining it is not libelous nor is it original research or inappropriate content for an encyclopedia. The whole reason I came to this article and got involved in the first place was that I wanted to explain the origin of this nickname to a friend of mine less experienced and I knew the write-up I had previously read was very thorough and concise. When I found it reverted due to an edit war, I felt it necessary to state my opinion and try to fix things, as a long time fan of Tomino, since his upcoming US appearance at the Chicago International Film Festival for the US premier of the Zeta Gundam movies will most likely draw attention to this article.

I am not a hardcore Wiki markup expert, so I do not want to improperly edit the article to use these citations, but I hope someone else who knows more Wiki than me will add the citations to end this conflict. I appreciate your concern Ganryuu, and hope that this resolves the problems you feel the current text has. Also, please spell check your replies to keep this page more readable (mantained, exceedily, authentified, legimate, etc.) Whitesanjuro 08:47, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Please keep personal comments/opinions to yourself and follow WP:CIVIL (I happen to be interested in anime myself, being a member of the Anime and Manga Wikiproject, and have seen numerous of Mr. Tomino’s works, but as this is not related to the current discussion, if you wish to continue any personal discussions with me, please feel free to do so on my talk page instead).

This section is indeed extremely biased and POV, and as it does not contain any references or sources whatsover, it constitutes original research. There are numerous instances of Mr. Tomino’s works which does not contain any of the allegations present within this section, and Mr. Tomino himself has never referred to himself by this nickname. It is upon the burden of the claimants to back up their claims with verified references from authentified sources (not just fancruft or other non-reliable sources; see Wikipedia:Verifiability) - claiming that they have enough background on a particular field is not enough. You claimed earlier that the "shows are the source" - this alone is not enough and actually constitutes original research if it is used as the primary source for the questionable content being added. As I have said before, it is upon the burden of the claimant to provide references, unless one does so, this section will contain original research and thus has to be removed immediately per the guidelines.

Not a single authentic reference or source has been added to the article since the adding of the original content, its removal and subsequently being added back (which was done without any legimate reason whatsoever - the original research stayed and no references whatsoever were added) — therefore this section does indeed constitute original research - and as thus must be removed immediately. See: Wikipedia:No original research. Ganryuu (talk) 13:33, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Ganryuu, this is not original research. Tomino has the nickname of "Kill Em All Tomino". That is a fact. Whether he calls himself by that name is irrelevent. If you have never heard him referred to as "Kill Em All Tomino" then I seriously doubt you have the knowledge of this subject to contribute to this topic. As I've already stated, Tomino is most well known for two things. The first is his creation of the most famous mecha franchise of all time, Gundam. The second is the fact that he killed off tons of his characters throughout his shows in the late 70's through early 90's. We have already provided you with multiple sources, yet you continously ignore that and keep vandalizing this article. We've posted multiple links for you. You can watch the shows yourself, as much of this article is summarizing material that appeared right in them! If you claim that is original research, then I request you immediately go to every single anime topic on Wikipedia and mark them the same way, particularly the ones you have contributed to for the vast, vast majority of all those articles are based on material from watching the show! And even if thats not good enough, read the Anime Encyclopedia by Jonathan Clements and Helen McCarthy which mention these topics from many of Tomino's shows. Read the December 2002 issue of Animerica, which has an article about the dark nature of Umi no Triton and Zambot 3. Mark Simmon's Gundam Official Guide clearly refers to Tomino's "Kill Em All" heyday in the Zeta Gundam article. There are plenty of sources, the problem is that you completely ignore them and constantly vandalize this article. No matter how many times you delete this article its going to keep coming back until you can prove to us how discussing the nickname that he is well known for throughout the anime community and discussing the contents of his work is libel. Heck, I even went out of my way to explain that not all of his shows end that way, what in the world do you want? An article thats just a list of his shows and nothing else? Sure seems that way. I've added a sources section, hopefully that will satisfy you.Quiddity99 17:33, 24 September 2006 (UTC)Quiddity99

The Japanese language version of this article also refers to his nickname ("minagoroshi no tomino" in Japanese). The article is not asserting that Tomino should be given that nickname or attempting to prove that he deserves it. The only thing the article is saying is that fans often refer to him as "kill 'em all Tomino" and giving reasons why that is done. That is why this is not "original research" any more than stating Sam Peckinpah has a reputation for violent films is "original research". If this article were attempting to create a new nickname for Tomino, then your objection would make sense. You keep asking for "authentified" sources but I'm not sure what you expect beyond the print sources already cited. Anime subjects aren't going to be found in the Encyclopedia Brittanica.

Sources & References, Again

It frustrates me that we have to go through this again after 2 months went by without you complaining once about it after I added those sources to the main page, but oh well, here we go again:

Sources: First off, as has already been said, the shows themselves are the main source. Much of what I wrote there summarizes events from the shows to explain why Tomino earned the nickname of "Kill Em All Tomino" and why he is well known in the anime community for the large amount of death in his shows for the period of roughly 1977 - 1994. Your claim that summarizing events from the shows to explain the nickname is not a source is completely invalid. If as you claim, summarizing events that took place in the show are unrefenced and original research, then you MUST go to every single anime page that does the same and post the same tags (which will be pretty much every single anime page out there!). You then must go to every single page on wikipedia that summarizes the events of television shows, movies and books. Because again, in all those instances where the events of these forms of entertainment are summarized, the entity itself is the main source. As long as you refuse to put up such tags this argument is completely invalid. And you'll find that if you do such post tags that you'll get a huge uproar because you'll essentially end up censoring huge portions of wikipedia. Remember, wikipedia is not censored, even though you appear to want to censor this article.

Second, to appease you I already posted three additional sources that either discuss the nature of Tomino's shows, or refer to him as Kill Em All Tomino. The Animerica article discusses the dark nature of Triton of the Sea and Zambot 3. The Anime Encyclopedia discusses all of these shows, and specifically states (in the main Gundam article) on page 159: "...the franchise returned to the TV series Victory Gundam (1993), though the director (who had gained the nickname Kill Em All Tomino after Zambot 3) soon asserted his trademark angst and tragedy". The book Gundam The Official Guide also states the following in the Zeta Gundam section: "It's also the most unrelievedly grim entry in the Gundam saga, with a none to lovable cast and a bloodbath finale that recalls director Yoshiyuki Tomino's Kill-Em-All heyday".

Speculation: I have placed no speculation in this article. Everything I have posted in this article is a fact. It's a fact that Tomino was given the nickname Kill Em All Tomino after Zambot 3. It's a fact that there is a large amount of death in Zambot 3, Ideon, Dunbine, Zeta Gundam, Char's Counterattack and Victory Gundam. The only speculation in that entire part of the article is the following line, which was not added by me, but someone else: "(It has been speculated that instead of being killed, the entire battle entourage was sent back to Byston Well to prevent further destruction on Earth.)" This line is definately speculation and states that. If you have a problem with this line, please explain, as I would have no problem with removing it (although whoever put it there may want to discuss the matter with you).

Cleanup: You will have to explain how this needs cleanup. I've kept the article relatively short and to the point. I see nothing there that IMHO needs to be removed with the exception of the above mentioned line on Dunbine. Quiddity99 23:19, 29 November 2006 (UTC)Quiddity99

According to the Wikipedia:Manual of style, this articles requires a huge amount of cleanup to have it conform to encyclopedia standards. Not only that, not a single sentence in the article is referenced per Wikipedia:References and there is still a large amount of speculation and fancruft presented throughout the entire article. Please follow the guidelines linked within the tags in question to understand why these have been added. The tags are to remain due to the section not conforming to the above standards, so unless these concerns are met, these should obviously stay. Unfortunately, the article has not been improved at all, and more, all you are doing is removing the concerned tags from the section in question. Ganryuu (talk) 23:39, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

You continue to completely ignore anything I ask you. Your tags are going to be removed every single time until you prove your opinion. The references have been posted and are described above. You continue to refuse to explain your claims. Instead all you say over and over again is that the article is unreferenced and fancruft when you have yet to state a single reason why. References are there. All from reputable sources (a well known published book about anime, one of the most well known anime magazines that has existed in america, and the 'official' gundam book) There is no opinion in the article. It is all official to the extent that it can be official. Everything I've stated that occured in the show, occured in the show. Its directly from the show, you can't get any more official than that! Quiddity99 22:51, 30 November 2006 (UTC)Quiddity99

I've reformatted the current references to hopefully be more in tune to your standards. If you still are going to complain, please explain yourself in detail, line by line this time. This argument isn't going anywhere until that happens. Thank you. Quiddity99 23:52, 30 November 2006 (UTC)Quiddity99

Please read WP:CIVIL and refrain from personal comments or attacks. See Wikipedia:No personal attacks. The article is still heavily and extremely biased (as if claiming the nature of these works are supposedly downbeat or negative, therefore holding such opinions is still a person's point of view, and as such the neutrality will still continue to be disputed - see Wikipedia:Neutrality)) and giving references from magazines or articles will not still not change the fact that the article has to be cleaned up and contains biased and speculative statements. Unfortunately, if you just insist on removing the tags, the article will still not be improved. One's personal point of view should not be the basis of adding information in articles. Ganryuu (talk) 14:26, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

To further illustrate my point, take these sentences, for example: "the people from Atlantis were so evil", "was given the nickname" (this is not a nickname, but an allegation by certain magazine sources; Tomino himself has never referred to himself by this title, so this therefore cannot be name referred to him in the entry) "next true kill em all show" (the words "kill em all" appears several times during the article without any quotation marks, as if the article claims to supplements the validity of this allegation, again a point of view (POV). Articles should mantain neutrality, instead of supplementing a particular point of view.), "every single character is brutally killed" (the word "brutal" itself is a POV statement), etc. Even the section admittedly refers to speculation, such as : "(It has been speculated that instead of being killed, the entire battle entourage was sent back to Byston Well to prevent further destruction on Earth.)" - this sentence should be therefore removed. If these adjectives and speculative content can be removed from the article and if this section can be rewritten to show a neutral point of view; during the beginning, for example, stating that a large number of his shows contained upbeat content as well, and that "[certain] sources have claimed...", and if the overall manual of the style be improved to featured article status; I think the article could come a long way - wouldn't that be improve and help? I'd happy to be help if I can in order to improve this section myself, but the tags can help other users to venture upon this section in order to improve it as well. Please understand that I have nothing against you, I'd just like to improve the article to featured status like any interested editor would. Ganryuu (talk) 14:43, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

Cleanup

I have attempted trying to cleanup and refurbish this article, in order to have it suit to encyclopedic standards. I decided to create a new section consisting of information about his overall career, including summarizing most of the earlier content in a more neutral point of view, as well as expanding on his most notable works and achievements. I believe this should help mantain Wikipedia:Neutrality and improve the overall quality of the article as well. Ganryuu (talk) 16:32, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

Ganryuu: Thank you for the cleanup. I too have nothing against you personally, but was becoming extremely frustrated with you refusing to even explain yourself until this point in time. Now that you have done that I believe we can move on and work together towards making this a better article. I'll take a look at your revisions later tonight, will make some of my own, and then hopefully that will settle this once and for all. Quiddity99 23:03, 5 December 2006 (UTC)Quiddity99

I've taken a look at the article, have some changes and other comments.

First off, a minor mistake, Gundam came out in 1979, not 1978. Also, I added a reference to the trilogy of Gundam compilation movies which were integral to the popularity that Gundam would eventually attain.

Stating that the vast majority of Tomino's shows are upbeat and positive throughout is basically doing the opposite of what you accuse me of doing, taking a POV and inserting too much opinion into the article. Would one call the Gundam franchise 'upbeat and positive'? Outside of ZZ Gundam, you'll find few who would agree with that claim until the series was taken from Tomino's control starting with the alternative universe series in 1994's G Gundam. Yet thats what you claim here, stating that Tomino's most well known and notable shows are his positive ones. Thats incorrect. Again, Tomino is most well known in the anime community for Gundam and the mass murder endings throughout the late 70's to early 90's which caused some to refer to him as 'Kill Em All Tomino'. Infact the Gundam franchise is historic and arguably most notable for turning the traditional 'upbeat, positive and flawless' mecha pilot on its head with Amuro Ray, who revolutionized the genre with a realistic teenage mecha pilot who argued with his commanding officer, featured immaturity, arrogance, and many other negative traits that were rare at the time. It's also extremely notable for showing a much more realistic war based show. Saying Tomino is most well known for being upbeat and positive goes against much of what was so revolutionary from Gundam. Likewise, the next two most well known Gundam entries from Tomino, Zeta Gundam and Char's Counterattack feature much of the cast dead at the end and are certainly are what you can call one of Tomino's darker productions. You later state that the majority of his characters survive in the majority of his shows. Again, this is incorrect. A more appropriate statement, and the one I've revised it with is the majority of his heroes survive. Even the shows that aren't well known for killing off the heroes kill a large percentage of the characters. Mobile Suit Gundam kills off all of the Zabis (except for Mineva, a baby who would eventually reappear in Z and ZZ Gundam) as well as all the main officers and soldiers from Zeon who we come to know across the series. Heavy Metal L-Gaim kills off all the major and supporting characters of the Poseidal military (15+ major or supporting characters) with the exception of one who is taken captive and two whose final fate is unknown.

Umi no Triton is not considered the start of Tomino's "Kill Em All" phase, although it is notable for being more mature and dark than other animes that came out at the time. As my references for that show will not be available to me until the weekend, I'm going to have to hold off on adjusting that statement.

Regarding Ideon, every single character is killed, not the vast majority, so I've corrected that. That paragraph left out Dunbine entirely, implying that L-Gaim followed Xabungle, so I've entered refences to Dunbine as well.

I struggle with the L-Gaim comments. L-Gaim is lighthearted and upbeat in comparison with some of Tomino's darker shows, in particular Ideon, Dunbine and Zeta Gundam. Then again, it isn't anywhere on the level of a Xabungle or ZZ Gundam when it comes to being lighthearted. The ending for example features the main character abandoning all his friends and colleagues to take care of his brain damaged sister. In comparison to the shows that sandwich it, Dunbine and Zeta Gundam, you can certainly say its more upbeat than them, as all of the heroes end up surviving, where very few did in those shows. But to call it a lighthearted show... I just don't know, that's something I'll have to come back to.

Regarding Char's Counterattack, first I've edited the 'OVA' reference to 'motion picture'. Second, the statement that some of the protagonists die and most survive is incorrect. Its the other way around. Amuro, Char, Quess, Gyunei, and Chan all die. Bright and Hathaway make it out alive (Hathaway ends up later getting executed on his father's orders in one of Tomino's Gundam novelizations). I've changed the wording around to reflect this.

Overall I am happy with most of the changes you've made but with the statement that Tomino's most well known and notable shows are his upbeat and positive ones, I must ask, how many and which of Tomino's shows have you actually seen? Quiddity99 01:52, 6 December 2006 (UTC)Quiddity99

Occasional Readers Wiewpoint

I just wished to put a comment, since I came to this page as an occasional visitor looking for a biography of Tomino. I happened to access the discussion page, precisely because, while I was reading the article (I did not notice the tags) I read so many times about this issue of "killing" or "survival" of the characters that I had the impression it was the only issue that it was wished to underline in Yoshiyuki Tomino's work. Now, I'm not questioning whether this is important or not, to say, but the article stresses so much this aspect, which seems to me even misleading when evaluating the quality of a story as a whole, that I felt I was not getting information, but that I was witnessing a sort of impartial "trial" of the artist. I apologize if my English is not so good (I am Italian), but I hope this "outsider" impression could be of some value to improve the article's quality, giving maybe more information on the setting of the different series instead of this repetitious talk. In Italy we have had just Gundam, and I wished to know more in general. Piccic 20:23, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree with you completely, and I too feel that these issues brought up against Tomino, which you mentioned, are completely overblown, overly-stressed, biased, and most certainly breaks Wikipedia's policy of neutrality. I also completely agree with your analogy that it sounds like an impartial trial. Previously, the content was even more overly biased and inflammatory, so I attempted to remove it completely, as it was unreferenced, non-notable, unfounded and biased, but my cleanup was opposed by one or two users, as you can see above. As detailed on Wikipedia:Neutral point of view (WP:NPOV): "All Wikipedia articles and other encyclopedic content must be written from a neutral point of view (NPOV), representing fairly and without bias all significant views that have been published by a reliable source." and "NPOV requires views to be represented without bias. " - this must be implemented in the article. ···巌流^{? · Talk to Ganryuu} 09:05, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

I know Ganryuu will be surprised by this statement, but I would agree with the notion that too much of the article deals with his 'Kill Em All' notoriety. But the problem relating to that is not that there's too much discussion of his 'Kill Em All' shows, but that there's not enough discussion of his other work and the other things he's so well known for. I don't think a single thing from the current article should be removed. But certainly a lot more information can be added to this article. In particular a detailed discussion of Gundam, which he is the most well known for (even more than the fact that so many die in his shows). What I'd prefer to see is to remove the 'Kill Em All' discussion out of the Career area entirely and put it off into its own subsection. The same with Gundam's impact. So perhaps instead of the current format, which is mostly the 'Kill Em All' argument, we could have three main sections, one dedicated to discussing his entire career in detail, one section dedicated to Gundam and its impact, and one section dedicated to the 'Kill Em All' discussion. So if someone wants to help with an expansion of this article, I certainly would welcome it! I continue to disagree considerably with Ganryuu's opinion (and would say that even he has put his own point of view in this article with comments like "The vast majority of Tomino's shows are upbeat and positive", which shows a lack of knowledge with respect to Tomino's work), but if he or anyone else wants to work on an expansion of this article without removing or vandalizing the current material, I would certainly welcome it! Busy this week, so I don't know whether I'll have a chance myself to expand on things til the weekend. Quiddity99 23:49, 12 February 2007 (UTC)Quiddity99

I agree with Quiddity. Searching for the Japanese nickname (皆殺しの富野) brings up many references in regular online columns (reliable sources) as well as a plethora of discussions on the topic in blogs, forums, and other community noticeboards. Discussing this in in the article does not in the least violate WP:BL as this nickname is not a statement about Tomino, but rather an observation of his body of work. I've added two Japanese references about this. I think the best course would be to expand the discussion of his other works (perhaps separate sections with summaries of the work articles and links to the main article on each series). ···日本穣^{? · Talk to Nihonjoe} 03:36, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

I've revamped some of the article to expand on some of his works, in particular the original Gundam series in 1979. I've added subcategories in the career section as well. I've also restored most of the edits Ganryuu has made, which had included deleting large portions of the article. I understand your stance of trying to make this a 'non-biased' article Ganryuu, but the fact is many of your edits have resulted in inaccurate statements and the deletion of entire series like Dunbine and L-Gaim. Rather than delete large portions of this article, why not assist in expanding the discussion of the content and impact of these shows? That will do a much better job at making this article seem less biased than the current statements, which sound quite akward (although I still don't think its biased at all, Tomino is very well known for the large amount of death in his series, thats a fact and is not opinion at all). Quiddity99 04:19, 24 February 2007 (UTC)Quiddity99

Ganryuu's "viewpoint" deserves neither respect nor consideration; continue to revert any edits he makes until he gives up. It's obvious that he is clueless about Tomino and his reputation, and refuses to accept any sources provided.

Spoiler Alerts

There needs to be spoiler alerts in this webpage. Major plot points being spoken about without warning is exceedingly rude, especially since it is not expected that such should be revealed in a discussion about the man himself and his works briefly.24.239.162.211 06:12, 17 August 2007 (UTC)Anonymous