My admittedly exaggerated response was because TF-Viewer was applauding the ongoing "pervification" of anime, and my point was that it's instead made a growing subset of anime very very awful, and is creeping into mainstream anime as well. I don't think all anime is awful (just a lot), though granted I haven't watched a lot for about a decade.
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And the "tough girls beat you up" trope is just a way to justify having smut without feminists getting pissy about it...because, for some reason, some people are stupid enough to mistake SEXUALITY for SEXISM. Here's a hit: Dead or Alive is NOT sexist, it's sexy, if it were sexist the two most important and able fighters wouldn't both be beautiful women. Metroid Other M is sexist, and if you've ever played it you know why.
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Let me rephrase this for you: the "tough girls beat you up" trope is a flimsy cover-up for sexism that addresses none of the core problems of female representation and enrages feminists because it entirely misses the point. Dead or Alive is sexist because it demands that its leading ladies not only be deadly fighters, but also that they look sexy and flop their breasts around while doing it. Thus, they're actually to do more than the male characters, who may have sex appeal, but generally don't have to worry about flashing/hiding their panties during a fight to attain it.
Sexuality is an interplay between people. It takes two (or more). There is no sexuality on screen in Dead or Alive, just a bunch of voyeurism. Any sexual desire on part of the female characters is totally mutable and controlled by the male desire of the player, as Dead or Alive Beach Volleyball makes painfully clear.
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Now, back to my rant: THAT, all of that, has NOTHING to do with why anime plots are so goddamn glacial. It's partly because of poor production values, partly because of the Japanese simply not understanding what "pacing" and "character arcs" are. Because I have come to believe those concepts simply don't EXIST in Japanese storytelling--and have seen no evidence to the contrary.
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This is called cultural essentialism, where a culture is seen to be so completely different from others that it must function in completely different ways. It's also total bullshit, and Japan is a good case in point. In one generation, Japan went from a militarily controlled Imperial power set on controlling its citizens and totally subverting Asia to a democratic society without a standing army. And while that change was not without difficulty (or old remnants of its past still today), if Japan's culture was truly essentially different, then it would have been impossible.
Similarly, saying that the Japanese don't understand pacing and narrative is pretty damn near racist--and implying, no stating, that the Japanese haven't even developed these things just plain is.
Anime, at least the long running series like Bleach, Naruto, DBZ, are essentially day-time soaps. I'd agree with Krabbi that plot is not the main function of these series (but again disagree strongly and slowly walk away from the notion that it's because the Japanese can't do plot), but rather it's an excuse to get a bunch of archetypes to bounce off each other and create sparks. The appeal is the fun of a character or certain setup, but not because it's anything new. That's why shows keep going on, adding filler upon filler, stretching dialogue scenes out and out, because at some point peoples are just watching for this certain combination of characters, and that's going to be milked as long as it can. People make fun of soaps because characters keep breaking up/getting back together/deciding to kill their children, but as over-the-top as this all seems, they're all established tropes that repeat over and over, but in slightly fun new ways. People get comfort from that. My point is that this is not just in Japan, it exists everywhere, anime just happens to be a medium where its cheap enough to keep going interminably. Similarly Family Guy, and even the Simpsons are kept going now more because of people's affinity for Quahog or Springfield and their residents than because they're consistently breaking new ground in humor.
Godzilla films (certainly not representative of the whole film industry of Japan, despite their popularity) follow a certain pattern, in that their appeal for a lot of people is hitting a series of tropes, including slow pacing. Seriously, there are so many pointless overextended shots in Godzilla films, even going back to the often great original, which spends a lot of time showing off the JSDF before they get destroyed.
Again, not every anime series is like this. I'm totally perplexed by the idea that NGE has no character arc for Shinji. (The whole show is Shinji getting over depression.) Cowboy Bebop as a series, and episodically, is wonderfully paced. Japanese cinema, especially before 1970 when the industry tanked, is far more diverse than people understand, and there are plenty of well-plotted expertly paced films out there.
Oh yeah, and just to be kind of on topic. I remember this show as one of those "Uhh... I think I like weird things" moments as a kid. I think this ep was randomly the first I saw of it, and I kept watching it in hopes of more despite how terrible it was. God, those character designs.