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

[heavyreader]

and the whole motivation for the arc at least to me wasn't that good given it was about rescuing Ace who for all Luffy knew was already dead after they met in Alabasta.

Luffy had Ace's Vivre Card since Alabasta so he knew he was alive.

 

[TM2]

Longevity works both for and against One Piece. Its huge length provides Oda plenty of room for worldbuilding and long term storytelling giving the series grand scope and scale and the ability to explore different ideas and concepts. However it also can lead to a lack of focus and the sense the series is "spinning its wheels" because it almost feels like that for those who have read the series since chapter 1 we'll never see journeys of the characters we followed for literally decades come to any satisfying end.

 

[G_I_A]

Despite good arguments from all of you guys, there's one that works in favor of One Piece above all others:

For a series to not only survive but thrive on JUMP (with both sales and toc positions) for freaking 20 years is no small feat.

That alone makes it the best manga of the magazine.

 

[Leoat12]

The Greatest of All Time is never something that is unanimous. Take Micheal Jordan, for example, he is the G.O.A.T, but there are still people that disagree with it and brings up the times when he stopped from playing basketball to play baseball and come back after retirement and all. Numbers-wise, though, he is the best, there is no other person that achieved more than him. One Piece is the same, you might disagree, but it is the greatest of all time. There are series that make success without having quality as one of its characteristics, but it is not possible when you the greatest of all time.

 

[Kamen Rider Dragon]

I respect One Piece's and Oda's creativity. I used to be a casual fan for a time, but kind dropped out after the time-skip around the time the Fishman Island arc. While its sales are exceptional, I don't think that equals the best manga so to speak in the magazine. I honestly prefer Togashi as a writer more than Oda, but Oda's success can't be denied.

 

[Tamil]

I don't necessarily think One Piece is the best manga in the magazine. Success/Sales =/= Quality; the best manga in the magazine is HxH.

I still love One Piece and it's one of the best, just not thee best.

 

[G_I_A]

I never understood why people are so into HXH. The story is a mess, the arcs are not even cohese. World development is unexistent. The protagonist goal is already reached.

Overall if we start looking into every single aspect alone it falls apart fastest than the time it's publication resumes chapter-wide.

Even so, Greed Island arc was amazing. To create a whole TDG for a single arc is indeed genius. The relationship between the blind girl and the king is also gold. Fighting scenes are ok (not OP, MHA, Toriko, Naruto or any other famous jump battle shounen level but ok).

But it's pretty much it. I'm sorry I'm not convinced.

 

[Leoat12]

I, on the contrary, think that One Piece is far far far better than Hunter x Hunter.
I did read Hunter x Hunter until Chimera Ants, which is not far from the current chapter, because, you know, hiatus.
It was one of my first mangas, actually, I liked Gon on Jump Ultimate Stars. :P
At that time my favorite manga was Naruto because it was still in the first part of the series, which is unquestionably great, I don't know if I was already reading One Piece at that time, my memory is hazy, but anyway, I was not finding Chimera Ants that great and when I caught up and knew that it was in hiatus, I thought to myself that it was not worth waiting and forgot about it. At that time I was not that biased towards Togashi, I didn't know his hiatus were THAT BIG, so it was just that I forgot about it, it was not that remarkable to make me wait no matter what.
Since then I developed a aversion for mangas in hiatus, mostly because of DGM, I did like the series, but now it is a mess and the hiatus just makes me understand even less, so, complete aversion to hiatus, I dropped Gin no Saji as well.
There is no way to come back to HxH at this circumstances, because we know that there is three certain things in life: death, taxes and HxH hiatus.

 

[G_I_A]

Leo pretty much sums it all when he says that the "best arc" (with HUGE '") are not worth waiting because of (insert your reason here) (mine I already explained).

But yeah, with hiatus the author simply loses that "thing" that makes us wanna keep reading it week after week. That's pretty much why I also hate monthly manga.

 

[Tamil]

I never understood why people are so into HXH. The story is a mess, the arcs are not even cohese. World development is unexistent. The protagonist goal is already reached.

Overall if we start looking into every single aspect alone it falls apart fastest than the time it's publication resumes chapter-wide.

Even so, Greed Island arc was amazing. To create a whole TDG for a single arc is indeed genius. The relationship between the blind girl and the king is also gold. Fighting scenes are ok (not OP, MHA, Toriko, Naruto or any other famous jump battle shounen level but ok).

But it's pretty much it. I'm sorry I'm not convinced.

How is it a mess? World development is existent; have you not been reading/watching it? How can you say it's non-existent but then praise Greed Island? Even if it's a game; it still counts and obviously arcs like Yorknew/Heavens arena/Chimera/etc count.

Greed Island was amazing but I enjoyed the ant arc more. I think I may even enjoy the Dark Continent Expedition arc just as much as Chimera Ant or maybe more. The fights are on another league than OP IMO. The battles are mostly tactical and done really well. The prime fight example being Netero vs Meruem; it had more depth than being tactical since Meruem's tactic was really simple but had great characterization for both characters.

One Piece fights can be a mess at times. Oda switches too much and doesn't really let the fights flow that well. I remember most of the fights in Dressrosa weren't that great. MHA/Toriko/Naruto had good fights but OP didn't have that much great fights IMO.

Even with the recent arc; HxH surpassed One Piece for me in terms of art as well. Before that, I never found Togashi's art to be bad, it was actually good if you read it from the volumes

 

[AllEyez]

Lol we should probably change the subject. Cause this gon turn into a huge OP vs HXH discussion

Op my fav all time series so it being as good and top quality at 20 im happy for. As well as it being the most successful series ever

This series replaced DB as my fav series

I Love how Oda has made OP be more than just fighting which is what pushed it over DB for me. It covers so much.

Proud for Oda

 

[jagman1x3]

Lol we should probably change the subject. Cause this gon turn into a huge OP vs HXH discussion

Pun intended?

I honestly don't like either of them anymore but mostly because my memory sucks and I forgot literally everything that happened for the last few hundred chapters in both.

 

[G_I_A]

I see no reason why we should not have a OP vs HxH (healthy) discussion.

One Piece is clearly better overall. There are no story flaws... Everything is deeply connected. Come on...

For the very same reason you guys hate BC you should Love OP. They are perfect opposites.

 

[Kamen Rider Dragon]

I see no reason why we should not have a OP vs HxH (healthy) discussion.

One Piece is clearly better overall. There are no story flaws... Everything is deeply connected. Come on...

For the very same reason you guys hate BC you should Love OP. They are perfect opposites.

Well, you already shut down any discussion when you take a pretentious attitude like that.

Hunter x Hunter excels because it manages to tell a well-told story and build a world that feels connected. Togashi's ability to play around with typical Shonen conventions shows in how he structures his arcs and writes his characters. It's why I think the Chimera Ant is one of my favorite Shonen arcs.

Gon is a protagonist that is allowed to a genuine kid who is pure but, very contradictory. His friendship with Killua is one of the best I've seen in portraying a genuine friendship. The Phantom Troupe are allowed to be an amazingly gray group that have friendships and care about each other. The ants were a fantastic group of diverse characters that made great commentary on humanity. Those are some examples. The battles are fantastic because of the amount of strategy that goes into the systems of Nen. Which is why I consider those fight just as good as those examples you listed.

So that is my opinion. I know you like to talk like that, but I don't have to like One Piece better because of the way you see in comparison to me or because I don't like Black Clover. That makes no sense. Since you seem to think that it's flawless and I don't.

 

[Bigivelfhq]

I see no reason why we should not have a OP vs HxH (healthy) discussion.

One Piece is clearly better overall. There are no story flaws... Everything is deeply connected. Come on...

For the very same reason you guys hate BC you should Love OP. They are perfect opposites.

I don't agree that Greed Island is a masterpiece, in fact I think is one of the weakest arcs in the series to be accurate. Had many problems.

About HxH and OP, I think OP is way, but way better than HxH, in practically any aspect.
Though I will say that recently(3 years ago) my love for HxH has been disappearing mainly due to blind sheeps of the series. One person can take so much of hearing and reading about people delusions of parts of the series until it starts to affect your love for the series.
And there is also the hack of Togashi that decided to overflow the series with text, the series from very soon had that problem of info dump, but I would never believe that it would reach the level it reached now. And to make things worse Mangastream that are the only people I know that translate the series other than Viz, think they are so elite and increase the amount of text even more and make things even more info dumpy and confusing.
And then there is the Hiatus, that basically takes me to the level of Bleach during the middle of the Arrancar Saga: "Who cares what is happening".

The series was a Great+, maybe even Very Great, but now I'm really confused between "good", "who cares" and "dislike".

One of the things I hate the lovers of the series talk is the deconstruction of shonen or "play around" with the concepts. Or the fact that it isn't conventional. For some reason with Togashi series fans always say that, Yu Yu Hakusho is the same thing. Still for some reason I take his series and is obvious to me that he is an old time author and takes even older authors influence.
Example, the structure of having a "training sub-arc" in the middle of an arc to increase super fast the power of the characters. Is something that is easily seen in his stories. In Hunter x Hunter you have that in Chimera Ant arc, Greed Island, heaveans Arena, and even a little in the Hunter Exam.
Another Example, the super fast evolution of power(that is many times connected with the training arc) we have Gon in Rescue Killua arc with the gates, Gon and Killua in the Heavens Arena arc with Nen(because they are genius, the genius thing is also another), Kurapika in the Yorknew Arc; from weaker than the Ninja to defeating the Spiders with ease. Gon in the Greed Island Volleyball game. The famous Adult Gon in the Chimera Ant arc.

 

[Nakura]

I vastly prefer HxH to One Piece, but my interest in HxH dwindles with each hiatus. I find what's going on in the current arc interesting(setting aside the walls of text), but knowing that it's going to take years to get anywhere in this series at this point takes me away from getting more invested.

I also have a problem with a lot of the fan base. Just looking at the MS comments section, for example, frustrates me. If you say anything bad about what's happening, you're accused of not understanding, or that you don't appreciate how 'deep' the series is.

 

[Kamen Rider Dragon]

One of the things I hate the lovers of the series talk is the deconstruction of shonen or "play around" with the concepts. Or the fact that it isn't conventional. For some reason with Togashi series fans always say that, Yu Yu Hakusho is the same thing. Still for some reason I take his series and is obvious to me that he is an old time author and takes even older authors influence.
Example, the structure of having a "training sub-arc" in the middle of an arc to increase super fast the power of the characters. Is something that is easily seen in his stories. In Hunter x Hunter you have that in Chimera Ant arc, Greed Island, heavens Arena, and even a little in the Hunter Exam.
Another Example, the super fast evolution of power(that is many times connected with the training arc) we have Gon in Rescue Killua arc with the gates, Gon and Killua in the Heavens Arena arc with Nen(because they are genius, the genius thing is also another), Kurapika in the Yorknew Arc; from weaker than the Ninja to defeating the Spiders with ease. Gon in the Greed Island Volleyball game. The famous Adult Gon in the Chimera Ant arc.

To clarify my perspective, I don't think of HxH as a deconstruction at all. I do think Togashi does take conventions and plays with them. Arcs don't typically end with a fight with a big bad, for example, the YorkNew city arc, which ends not by beating the Troupe but a standstill because players in both groups of characters are protecting people they care about, or how the Ant arc ends and progress, or Gon's character. Even in the examples that you pointed that follow conventions, I think are done well. Gon and Killua never really become much stronger than every around them. In the Chimera Ant arc, they were still outclassed tremendously, Gon has to commit a taboo just to survive at the end and pays for it after, Kurapika screws himself over to just defeat one group etc. There are consequences to huge increases in power, it never reaches Naruto levels, where he suddenly becomes as strong as all these other Ninja.

 

[G_I_A]

I see only pointless deepness and dialogues over dialogues over dialogues over dialogues...

 

[Tamil]

Yep, MS translations are awful. That's why it's a must to purchase the volumes. MS makes it more lengthy than it should be, not sure why. That's why I picked up volume 33 when it came out in spring. It was a much better experience than reading it from MS. This video shows a good comparison and why MS isnt good.


And yes, HxH fanbase can be pretty cancerous. Overpraising and putting down others for not understanding/seeing their viewpoint; or more annoying is making assumptions Togashi's work ethic. To be also fair, other big fanbases can be just as cancerous too. i.e OP/MHA/Naruto/JJBA/Toriko/etc

 

[Bigivelfhq]

To clarify my perspective, I don't think of HxH is a deconstruction at all. I do think Togashi does take conventions and plays with them. Arcs don't typically end with a fight with a big bad, for example, the YorkNew city arc, which ends not by beating the Troupe but a standstill because players in both groups of characters are protecting people they care about, or how the Ant arc ends and progress, or Gon's character. Even in the examples that you pointed that follow conventions, I think are done well. Gon and Killua never really become much stronger than every around them. In the Chimera Ant arc, they were still outclassed tremendously, Gon has to commit a taboo just to survive at the end and pays for it after, Kurapika screws himself over to just defeat one group etc. There are consequences to huge increases in power, it never reaches Naruto levels, where he suddenly becomes as strong as all these other Ninja.

For me just adding a consequence doesn't change anything. Just like is mega simple to do a huge power up is also easy to create a consequence for it. The consequences started with Kurapika because it is totally unthinkable that a person of his caliber could suddenly jump dozens if not hundreds of levels(I'm using level as a really loosely word here).

The out of the norm, just really seems a desire, it also doesn't adds nothing to the story in fact sometimes even does quite the opposite, it damages it. And this desire his one that comes from Togashi since Yu Yu Hakusho and some of it comes from not knowing what to do anymore. Like he change the character of Urameshi because he didn't had anything more to write about the characters, though his story was really short and he spent half or more than half in a repetitive tournament. He wanted to change Urameshi 180º, fortunately was stopped, but he still changed him. For me to worse, that was one of the reasons that Chapter Black arc wasn't my favorite arc of the series.
In HunterxHunter is the same thing, this desire of going out of the norm just for the lols and when he goes into a corner. It makes many of the arcs loose their power. Strangely enough though Greed Island is one of the arcs with the weakest endings and ended quite regularly.

I don't think he takes conventions and plays with them. At least not in grand part. So I don't really see what people see so exotic of HxH, people also think YYH is exotic and I also don't see what.
I think that for majority of the story it follows conventions and is not that I think that they are badly made, but they are quite obvious to me. If it wasn't for all the different and deep and deconstruction or things like that I wouldn't even bother with saying or even thinking much about how much it follows old conventions and is really based on them, but the yelling really brings that always to the memory when thinking about HxH and hearing people saying something in those terms. Is like a curse :P.


Gon and Killua had no business in getting the level of Nen they are in. Though after just two arcs it seems is easy for anybody to get Nen and to the levels they got(And Kurapika, is even worse than them. If they are genius of one in a Million, than Kurapika is 1 in a world life). The Chimera easily got it, with the excuse of Instincts, than it was invented the fast way of beating someone and if he survives he gets it too, to make the old without Nen chimeras to also get it. Then that was also true for humans, and now the princes are also going to learn Nen in a usable level super fast, and it seems by regular learning, at least the serial killer one.

I would call the Spiders just one group. The way they appeared they were stronger than mega strong Nen users, I don't remember what was the title given to the guys from the Mafia, but they were supposedly mega strong, and just one guy from the Spider kicks their asses like it is nothing. And then Kurapika comes and shits on him, like he is nothing.

In fact I would say Naruto is better in increasing the levels of power, not to say Naruto is good, but there was never a boost like Kurapika, nor one like Adult Gon and not one like Gon and Kurapika learning Nen. The explanation of Naruto fast increase in power though somewhat stupid wasn't has bad as HxH. HxH doesn't have good increases of power, what it has is an addition of a consequence. That is also as ridiculous as the increase in power. In fact I would like to know who is the person that teached Kurapika about the consequence game, his Nen master? It was never shown, and if it was him why does he know that and why does he told him? And how did Gon became aware of the consequence game? Did it really happened by "instinct" without him noticing. Why are them the only ones doing it, why only the main characters? Netero had such a restriction didn't he? Or does it work in a specific way that not included him placing a bom in his heart where he would explode it if he failed his mission? Why didn't he gained such a huge increase of power?