Happy Moe Day! Due to the way the kanji for moe looks like the characters for “10-month 10-day” or October 10, today has been designated as the unofficial “Moe Day” by fans. Moe — pronounced mo-EH, and no relation to a certain bartender on The Simpsons — is a collection of archetypical character traits of extremely cute female anime characters that have come to define many anime shows over the past decade or so. One element of a good moe chara is a single major defect, from the ditziness of characters like Yui Hirasawa or Tsukasa Hiiragi to the extreme shyness of Mio Akiyama (this “cuteness through imperfection” is probably why we like meganekko, it seems to me). While we’ve had characters that could affect fans emotionally for decades — I fondly remember buying Macross models I didn’t intend to put together mainly for the Minmei art on the box — the term moe came about in the early 90s, probably as a result of the popularity of Hotaru Tomoe (Sailor Saturn) in Japan at the time. Moe is supposed to bring out the “protective oniisan” instinct in males, but a lot of female fans report they’re also drawn to the extreme cuteness of these characters. So what do you think about moe?
Oct. 10 is a day to celebrate moe characters.
