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Seinen
Seinen (Japanese for "young man" or "young men") is a demographic designation of Anime and Manga targeted at the male audiences aged 18 to 40. It is the older counterpart of Shonen and effectively makes for the majority of anime in the older demographic, since major Josei manga titles rarely get adapted on screen. Compared to shonen, seinen caters to a much smaller viewing crowd, since younger audiences have much more time to spare on anime, which makes them a more attractive target, and thus is slightly less known.

Thanks to the older target audience, seinen shows tend to be much more sophisticated and mature than their shonen counterparts. While sharing many of the same sub-genres and themes, they are commonly more psychological, satirical, violent, and sexual. Much more attention is paid to the plot and the interaction between characters than to action and fights, which are the main attraction for the younger viewers, and the characters are well fleshed out. The latter trait often leads to confusion of seinen with Shojo but the key difference is that seinen does not idealize romance, instead opting for more realistic and pragmatic approach to relationships. Realism is indeed the calling card of seinen shows, commonly earning them the acclaim for their depth and maturity and Multiple Demographic Appeal. On the other hand, one shouldn’t forget that all Hentai except Yaoi is aimed at older male viewers as well. This is the other side of the realism coin.

A typical seinen protagonist can be of any gender and age (in stark contrast to shonen, whose protagonists are almost exclusively young and male). Romance-wise, anything goes, naturally, excluding Boys Love but including Romantic Two Girl Friendship. In fact, Schoolgirl Lesbians are a distinctive trait of seinen, rarely if ever present in shonen shows. Relationships are portrayed in a less idealistic light than in shojo, with many grays and uncertainties like in the Real Life, and don’t tend to the shonen over-simplification of "which heroine will be hooked up with the hero". There is a reverse side to this, too: ironically, seinen is most infamous for its sub-category of Pink Bishoujo Ghetto and Unwanted Harem shows that rely heavily on cutesy Moe Fan Service (again, juxtaposed to plain sex appeal of female characters in shonen; see Hot Shounen Mom, for example) to attract viewers.

Recently, there has been a considerable influx of shojo fans into the seinen demographic, thanks to the latter's traditional thoroughness in relationships and, more importantly, general retraction from blatant fanservice. This migration was particularly paved by such Gateway Series as Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, Kanon, The Melancholy Of Haruhi Suzumiya, Clannad, and AIR.

Compare Josei, which is aimed at females of the same age.

Titles:

  • Anything written by Junji Ito: Tomie, Uzumaki, Gyo
    • One can be tempted to lump all horror manga into seinen, but that would be wrong; just for a start, there's the Dark Shojo genre, which can get messed up as hell.

Series sometimes mistaken for seinen

MonAnime GenresSentai
SeekersIndex IndexSelf Demonstrating Article
SarashiTrope Names From The JapaneseSekaikei
ShonenAnime FanspeakShojo
JoseiMangaShoujo
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