Karachi:
In the Hucon of Students of Habib University, Fahad Ali Shah reminds fans for the first time in Pakistan gathered for anime. “They could never imagine a convention of this level,” he said. “I used to be on a very small scale. Now, you find people with similar interests everywhere. If a person likes a character, you will talk to them. There are references that only anime fans understand.”
It is this sense of recognition that has drawn the anime from the niche social networks that was restricted to the social calendar of the young Pakistani. Once confined to groups of online fans, culture now fills university auditoriums, exhibition rooms and social feeds. Student clubs in IBA and Lums organize events such as Ibacon and Comic Day, while sellers establish positions to sell items such as Naruto pillows and A piece Cups In Lahore, the comedian with Pakistan of Geek Haven established for the first time the reference point, and his spin-offs continue to shape how these meetings look and feel.
Photographic credits: Fahad Ali Shah, Hucon Organizer
The most anticipated is Popclash, scheduled for the end of November. Organized by Hox Studios, the Convention offers free positions to artists, publishes the original work and builds spaces for cosplayers, illustrators and writers to convert hobbies into professions. Similar efforts have multiplied throughout the country. Geek with, organized by Geek Haven, took place in Lahore last month and previously in Karachi, with performances by young stunners along with the art inspired by anime. Each event maintains active microcomunity but, more importantly, visible.
For the organizers, the impulse is personal and practical. “The reason why they are too hyperactive to grow and invest is because young people can write their stories and work in some situations instead of wasting their time,” said Mohammad Umair, a popclash presenter. Yasir Obaid, co -founder of Geek Haven, described his first convention as a passion project that later revealed a broader market. “The few events that were happening before were made by older people and we really didn’t get their mentality,” he said. “We wanted to close that gap and do it in a way more driven by the community.”
Transmission platforms have accelerated change. Netflix offered programs such as The last Airbender, Howl’s Moving Castle and The boy and the choza brought the anime to new homes, while global successes such as Attack against Titan and Demons Slayer He gave him the main state. “The stigma that saw it has decreased,” said Yasir. “Now it has become great to see anime.” Others track the Boom back to COVID-19 blocks, when people turned to accessible content as Dragon Ball Z and Pokémon Available online.
For fans, attractiveness goes beyond novelty. “Unlike children’s cartoons, the Japanese anime is made for all ages,” said Arsalan Hussain, who has followed the genre from the Dragon ball Z was. This wide demographic group makes the anime easier to maintain, he explained. For Umair, the Fandom also reflects a particular profile: educated, English speaking and, often, working in professions such as law, coding or independent work. Even the Cosplayers, he said, save and invest carefully to finance their trade.
The reasons, argue, are partly linguistic. “Anime fans are seeing the anime in Japanese, which has subtitles. For that, they need a specific reading rate to consume it in Japanese and also instantly understand the context. Therefore, it needs some intelligence to do it.”
But most of the crowd is younger. “It has OG fans in their veins or thirty years, but most are sixteen to twenty years,” said Umair. “It is more a youth movement at this time.”
As November approaches, calendars are filling quickly. Popclash in Lahore, Geek with in Karachi and the comic days of the students on the campus will keep the anime at the center of youth culture. What began as a niche hobby is now an industry of meetings, merchandise and shared language, proof that Pakistan anime geeks are not only alive, but they thrive.
