Mag Talk Weekly Shonen Jump [2017] - Discussion and TOC Talk

[Support]

I think it's fine if a character can't be interchangable gender wise. What matters to me is whether they are still appealing and not a token "x" character

I have a simple test for a female character in shonen to see whether they are written simply as the token female character in a group.

Basically...take away the main guys and is the character still appealing? Does she still stand up on her own?

For Emma she definitely still is: her motivation to save her family still exists, she is smart, resourceful and a little naive. Anyone can see her appeal even if they dont like her personally.

For Sakura: I guess she vaguely liked medical ninjutsu? But then she went into it to ultimately help bring sasuke back so that technically doesn't count...

This really annoyed me, because all Kishimoto needed to do here was have her make a statement maybe somewhat like this:

Sakura: i did this medical stuff for sasuke initially, but i grew to like it and enjoy helping people

Boom! A ghost of a motivation not related to sasuke.

However I stopped reading naruto in the war arc, so can't say what happened to her character afterwards.

I did hear that apparently Sasuke was so moved by her devotion to him that he was gonna drop her in a volcano or something. Then she got over that and married him. So...yay?

 

[SkerllyFC]

For those interested, here I have the synopsis for the next Boruto anime episodes, from trustable sources:

- **Episode 7:** Boruto's classmate, Chōchō Akimichi, feels that a stranger is looking for her from hidden places, and that makes her feel uncomfortable. Finally he manages to catch the culprit, who turns out to be Magire Kakuremino. It is revealed that who Magire was watching was the class president / delegate, Sumire Kakei. After learning that Magire feels something for the class president / delegate, Chōchō forces him to admit it.

- **Episode 8:** One night, Boruto dreams of a mysterious person who gives him a strange power. Boruto is very happy because he believes that the Byakugan has awakened, a Kekkei Genkai that is the particular specialty of the clan of his mother, Hinata Hyuga. Therefore Boruto decides to go with his grandfather, Hiashi, and listen to the story of the Byakugan.

- **Episode 9:** Boruto trains with his Aunt, Hanabi Hyuga. While being watched by his father and grandfather, Boruto deliberately fights against Hanabi so that his father could recognize his strength. But no matter how much Boruto tried, he could not activate the Byakugan. Boruto then understands that there is no evidence that he has awakened the Byakugan.

It seems the series is kicking some high gear in the next episodes. Which is your opinion?

 

[jagman1x3]

This is really not the place to discuss the Boruto anime unless it somehow ties in to discussion about the magazine.

 

[Tanzo]

Yuragi's CP and extended 23 pages next week are for the climax of the Kyoto arc.

Also, Tadahiro is judging the May Jump New World Manga Awards.
http://www.shonenjump.com/j/mangasho/shinsekai/

A comment from him on how he draws male main characters (mostly about Kogarashi)

Q.男主人公を描く際に気をつけていることを教えてください！
A.色んなタイプがいるので、あくまでもコガラシ君についてになります。
　　美形にするととっつきづらく、平凡だとモブに埋もれてしまうので、
　　ダサカッコイイを目指したらこうなりました。
　　内面的には可愛い！卑猥！と思ってる時、素直に顔に出ちゃう所が、
　　ヒロインに対して読者にどう思ってもらいたいかを表せていいなと思っています。
　　あと語るより行動の人です。

 

[TyVip]

Yuragi's CP and extended 23 pages next week are for the climax of the Kyoto arc.

Also, Tadahiro is judging the May Jump New World Manga Awards.
http://www.shonenjump.com/j/mangasho/shinsekai/

A comment from him on how he draws male main characters (mostly about Kogarashi)

Da hell, only 5 chapters arc? Is Climax written in katakana? I thought it would be at least 9~10 to fill an entire volume, guess that's not the case.

 

[shoyoboyo]

RoboLaser was great today, Robo's antics are great as always. The straw hat joke made me chuckle too. Looks like we're getting to an actual match finally.

 

[Tanzo]

Da hell, only 5 chapters arc? Is Climax written in katakana? I thought it would be at least 9~10 to fill an entire volume, guess that's not the case.

Yep.

 

[Leoat12]

Tomboys as protagonists are pretty non-cliche. There aren't that many mangas where a Tomboy is the lead character or at least I can't remember too many. Even in most Shoujos you don't have Tomboys as main heroine but either as sidekick, best friend or rival.

Does it make any difference? Female protagonists are rare in Jump, the series that have one are automatically masterpieces just because of that? Of course not. The whole cliche/non-cliche is irrelevant in Jump, the most cliche magazine ever, we already know that cliche is not equal to bad quality and vice-versa. Therefore, Emma being tomboy or not, or tomboy protagonist or not is irrelevant when it comes to quality. TPN is a good manga because of multitude of factors, but Emma being tomboy is not one of them, or at least it shouldn't be, it would be a shallow analysis. Please, say to me that you guys don't like TPN just because Emma is a tomboy protagonist.

Could you guys, PLEASE stop saying that!
I know what you mean by this, and we really dont have the need to debate if "girly-girl" maincharacters are OK. They totally are. The goddamn reason, why she is such a bad character, and why so many people complain about her, is the fact, that her whole character was just being about boys, and that she loved a bad guy for years, even married that same guy, because he was the "cool guy" in their youths. And dont give me any examples in real life, because this is a really bad thing in fiction and in reality.

I didn't say that it was okay neither in a fiction nor in reality, I just said that Sakura is a good mirror of reality, girls act like that. Notice that a character you don't like doesn't mean a bad character. You may not like Sakura, but she was a good character in a sense that she was faithful to a girl her age.

 

[shoyoboyo]

I was with you until you said Sakura is a good character. Maybe in the beginning when her obsession with Sasuke was more believable because of her age, but she never developed past it.

 

[Leoat12]

I was with you until you said Sakura is a good character. Maybe in the beginning when her obsession with Sasuke was more believable because of her age, but she never developed past it.

Then you probably didn't read the "in a sense that she was faithful to a girl her age". Would you like my opinion in the sum of factors? XD

 

[WyldViolet]

ITT: people who have never talked to a girl outside of a classroom setting arguing about what girls are like

 

[Leoat12]

We were utterly defeated by this ad hominem. I will take my leave in shame. XD
5 minutes in a only-girls circle will make my point, it is not necessary a lot of experience. I saw and heard it with my two eyes and ears.

--- Double Post Merged, May 11, 2017, Original Post Date: May 11, 2017 ---

You talk like neither us nor the authors had any experience with girls, but most people here has a life outside here. I don't even have to talk about mangakas, the majority is married with children and all that, they had normal lives and experienced everything we experienced. xD

 

[iceemperor]

You talk like neither us nor the authors had any experience with girls, but most people here has a life outside here. I don't even have to talk about mangakas, the majority is married with children and all that, they had normal lives and experienced everything we experienced. xD

Regardless of whether they are married and have kids, writing female characters is still challenging for many mangaka, especially shonen mangaka. Kishimoto married and had kids during serialization and still wrote Sakura's entire development around Sasuke and later added a brief inferior complex to Naruto and Sasuke which was briefly touched in the war with the Three-way Deadlock but again takes a backseat. Her biggest achievement was keeping Naruto alive, which is incredible but is only one of a handful of moments over 15 years where she shows initiative and development. Besides that she's either comedy relief or crying over her inability to do anything. While we can make the argument Kishimoto probably meant for her to be that kind of character and have weakness, his execution of her character was sub-par.

The biggest problem I see in shonen manga with female characters is tying their development entirely to either the MC in the case of the heroine, or some other male rather then having them focused on their own dream. Heroaca is also slowly doing this with Ochako and Deku but I'd like to be optimistic that she will again develop further without Deku being a catalyst or factor. Oda has done a decent job of writing female characters chasing their dreams but then barely gives them screen time and usually has them as support characters. Nami will point out all the possible dangers and need for worry and then be immediately rebuked by Luffy's go-with-the-flow attitude and then yields. Rebecca showed nice potential but eventually became completely dependant on Kyros, granted she was completely out-classed in fighting power.

 

[Leoat12]

Regardless of whether they are married and have kids, writing female characters is still challenging for many mangaka, especially shonen mangaka. Kishimoto married and had kids during serialization and still wrote Sakura's entire development around Sasuke and later added a brief inferior complex to Naruto and Sasuke which was briefly touched in the war with the Three-way Deadlock but again takes a backseat. Her biggest achievement was keeping Naruto alive, which is incredible but is only one of a handful of moments over 15 years where she shows initiative and development. Besides that she's either comedy relief or crying over her inability to do anything. While we can make the argument Kishimoto probably meant for her to be that kind of character and have weakness, his execution of her character was sub-par.

The biggest problem I see in shonen manga with female characters is tying their development entirely to either the MC in the case of the heroine, or some other male rather then having them focused on their own dream. Heroaca is also slowly doing this with Ochako and Deku but I'd like to be optimistic that she will again develop further without Deku being a catalyst or factor. Oda has done a decent job of writing female characters chasing their dreams but then barely gives them screen time and usually has them as support characters. Nami will point out all the possible dangers and need for worry and then be immediately rebuked by Luffy's go-with-the-flow attitude and then yields. Rebecca showed nice potential but eventually became completely dependant on Kyros, granted she was completely out-classed in fighting power.

It is not only female characters that are challenging, any character is challenging to perfect, if it would be easy to write something, a manga, a book and stuff, we would have masterpieces everywhere. People are complex things, it would be necessary books and books to develop a character enough to be remotely as faithful as an actual human being. I don't see why female characters would be harder than any other kind of character, all of them are complex in their own right, I generally have complaints for both genres, Naruto, for example, doesn't need any comments, 90% of the characters are like you described Sakura, the majority were shallow. This is a problem of big casts, there is simply no time to develop everybody, even when a character is so close to the protagonist, like Sakura were. In any case, female characters being harder to write just because author supposedly have no experience is not a strong enough argument. Authors deal with inexperience in a subject all the time, even more with characters. Authors that write about a depressed character without even being depressed, authors writing about characters with an incurable disease without even experiencing such thing and so on, they don't know how those people felt when they experienced that, in the story they just suppose it. Anything that is not an exact mirror of the author and his/her experiences is a unknown ground for an author.

The protagonists are the center of the story and there is no way to solve such thing. Bakugou also has Deku as a catalyst most of the time and nobody complains about that, just because Ochako is a girl, it is a problem? The story revolved around Deku, many characters are influenced by him. It is true with One Piece and any other manga.

Anyway, wall-text. XD

 

[iceemperor]

It is not only female characters that are challenging, any character is challenging to perfect, if it would be easy to write something, a manga, a book and stuff, we would have masterpieces everywhere. People are complex things, it would be necessary books and books to develop a character enough to be remotely as faithful as an actual human being. I don't see why female characters would be harder than any other kind of character, all of them are complex in their own right, I generally have complaints for both genres, Naruto, for example, doesn't need any comments, 90% of the characters are like you described Sakura, the majority were shallow. This is a problem of big casts, there is simply no time to develop everybody, even when a character is so close to the protagonist, like Sakura were. In any case, female characters being harder to write just because author supposedly have no experience is not a strong enough argument. Authors deal with inexperience in a subject all the time, even more with characters. Authors that write about a depressed character without even being depressed, authors writing about characters with an incurable disease without even experiencing such thing and so on, they don't know how those people felt when they experienced that, in the story they just suppose it. Anything that is not an exact mirror of the author and his/her experiences is a unknown ground for an author.

The protagonists are the center of the story and there is no way to solve such thing. Bakugou also has Deku as a catalyst most of the time and nobody complains about that, just because Ochako is a girl, it is a problem? The story revolved around Deku, many characters are influenced by him. It is true with One Piece and any other manga.

Anyway, wall-text. XD

You're point about inexperience stands without a doubt. Its true that mangaka have to deal with it and its for this reason why you'll see lots of shonen manga, especially Shonen Jump Battle manga, specifically the "王道" (Oudou) or "Royal Road" manga like One Piece, Naruto, etc, have very similar structures. Mangaka are writing to cater to an audience instead of trying to write a piece of literature (if you can even consider manga literature). Writing about topics and in settings they're familiar with like schools is easier for them and also appeals to most of the readers as recent mangaka have grown up reading those series. Its also why when One piece completely does away with the school setting or any realistic setting in general, we find it so exciting or when HxH does arcs like Chimera Ant arc, we find it to be so good. But inexperience is definitely a factor that affects mangaka in the execution of characterization. If you're not aware of how depression works or how it feels to be an orphan, then the depiction becomes that much more difficult after the initial chapter. Mangaka will then try to bring it towards something they're familiar with and the whole thing falls flat.

Currently, recent series like Amalgam and Demon's Plan had good premises but in Amalgam's case, it became too edgy (for me anyway) and the mangaka seemed unable to balance out the edgy bits and properly develop his characters. Demon's Plan had an interesting premise in the curses but the mangaka decided to make it as "王道" as possible and the whole thing fell flat because he was unable to execute the balance between light and dark that made series with relatively dark elements like Naruto a mega-hit.

 

[Tamil]

I do.

Good female casts in a magazine written for young boys makes things more enjoyable.

And how's that working out for you?

I don't think anyone denies that statement but how often does that happen? Not so often.

 

[G_I_A]

Guess who's back? Yeah, you can be horrified already.

For christ sake I stay some weeks away and all hell breaks loose... Norman only

Spoiler

killed

himself because he loved Emma... Without this nobody could ever be able to do you know what...

Emma is not a great character because she is a girl. But because she kicks ass. Differently than pretty much all girls in all jump manga with rare exceptions.

Emma > Sakura, Medaka, wtv.

Off topic 1:Hope you guys enjoyed BC OVA. I did my best there. Whenever I have a better raw we'll release a better version
Off topic 2: LIKE I SAID the VETERANS (except maybe Marie because it sucked) dominated the new batch. I'm not sorry for that xD

I don't quite remember who said it but... YEAH I had an OMINOUS grin with those comments =)

 

[Leoat12]

You're point about inexperience stands without a doubt. Its true that mangaka have to deal with it and its for this reason why you'll see lots of shonen manga, especially Shonen Jump Battle manga, specifically the "王道" (Oudou) or "Royal Road" manga like One Piece, Naruto, etc, have very similar structures. Mangaka are writing to cater to an audience instead of trying to write a piece of literature (if you can even consider manga literature). Writing about topics and in settings they're familiar with like schools is easier for them and also appeals to most of the readers as recent mangaka have grown up reading those series. Its also why when One piece completely does away with the school setting or any realistic setting in general, we find it so exciting or when HxH does arcs like Chimera Ant arc, we find it to be so good. But inexperience is definitely a factor that affects mangaka in the execution of characterization. If you're not aware of how depression works or how it feels to be an orphan, then the depiction becomes that much more difficult after the initial chapter. Mangaka will then try to bring it towards something they're familiar with and the whole thing falls flat.

Currently, recent series like Amalgam and Demon's Plan had good premises but in Amalgam's case, it became too edgy (for me anyway) and the mangaka seemed unable to balance out the edgy bits and properly develop his characters. Demon's Plan had an interesting premise in the curses but the mangaka decided to make it as "王道" as possible and the whole thing fell flat because he was unable to execute the balance between light and dark that made series with relatively dark elements like Naruto a mega-hit.

I agree with most of what you said, I think, but you don't consider manga literature? It is as hard or even harder to write manga sometimes. Every author writes to cater to an audience, not only mangakas, at least when they write books for a living. Manga is an art that shouldn't be underestimated.

 

[G_I_A]

Wait what... Manga, comics in general are not literature? Give me a break... Your argument were going so well until everything fell apart because of this statement.

Literature, in its broadest sense, is any single body of written works.

 

[randimari]

Have to admit, I usually lurk on this thread but the topic of the lack of good female characters is interesting. First it's silly to say "who reads jump for girls" Erina? Yuuna? Chitoge? Sakura seems to have set the standard of what not to make your mc if she's a girl. We all can agree Kishi sucks at women, even Tsunade, who was propped up as so strong and admirable, was supported by Dan so again iceempeeor's point is valid and I loved his answer to this condundrum.

On neverland, I ageee with chocobar. I'm a girl but I can admit nothing would be too different if Emma was a boy. Norman would be a girl and so the crush would still exist. Neverland's story does not matter who's the main lead, it's simply inspiring enough to have anyone be the lead, as most of the children get their screentime as the lead. I don't read neverland for Emma being a girl but it's nice to see a female lead even if she's a tomboy. We can't tell others what to read this or that for but we also shouldn't discriminate things due to this having no girls or this having no boys. A good story is a good story.