uh Sephiroth is Hebrew...
As for the spiky hair, its about having an easy way of making the characters look different given that other than hair and some times outfit characters tend to look almost identical.
The "be the very best" and "regret/redemption" is over done too, but its an easy angle to write about, ie its lazy...
Though I don't mind Norse mythology stuff as much, but that's probably because I am mostly germanic/Scandinavian. And I can pull off a good Odin when I want to dress up for it. As for its prevalance in anime, lets look at Japans world view on relevant places in the world... Japan... USA... Germany... China (because they have to)... Scandinavia (which one isn't important)... those other places that might exist in the world. Is this fair to the rest of the world, probably not, but it is what it is, and I can understand if you don't care for it.
As for the spiky hair, its about having an easy way of making the characters look different given that other than hair and some times outfit characters tend to look almost identical.
The "be the very best" and "regret/redemption" is over done too, but its an easy angle to write about, ie its lazy...
Though I don't mind Norse mythology stuff as much, but that's probably because I am mostly germanic/Scandinavian. And I can pull off a good Odin when I want to dress up for it. As for its prevalance in anime, lets look at Japans world view on relevant places in the world... Japan... USA... Germany... China (because they have to)... Scandinavia (which one isn't important)... those other places that might exist in the world. Is this fair to the rest of the world, probably not, but it is what it is, and I can understand if you don't care for it.