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From sushi and karaoke to martial arts and technoware, the currency of
made-in-Japan cultural goods has skyrocketed in the global marketplace
during the past decade. The globalization of Japanese "cool" is led by youth
products: video games, manga (comic books), anime (animation), and cute
characters that have fostered kid crazes from Hong Kong to Canada.
Examining the crossover traffic between Japan and the United States,

Millennial Monsters explores the global popularity of Japanese youth
goods today while it questions the make-up of the fantasies and the
capitalistic conditions of the play involved. Arguing that part of the
appeal of such dream worlds is the polymorphous perversity with
which they scramble identity and character, the author traces the
postindustrial milieux from which such fantasies have arisen in postwar
Japan and been popularly received in the United States.

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