that you got powers for the sake of powers without any boundaries, so anything goes. Meaning when you have a Guardian who uses the Iron magic of his Witch to use "JUDGEMENT LANCE" and then the MC still stands after taking it to the face with hardly any damage to his body and weapons then the question a reader ask himself is "How did he do that?".
We got to see Fafner survive such an attack without an explanation why and how. We see a wall of Iron spears in the ground and some hole in it in which Fafner was probably standing but there are like no broken spears around or no showcase of how he dodged the attack, so we just got to believe that he somehow survived that due his sword technique of which we also saw nothing and that's it. That is pretty unsatisfying.
Or the whole "I ask you a question so that I can lay down my own beliefs without giving you a chance to answer said question because I don't care". Like it was a good question! Let Fafner answer that and then have the other guy belittle it!
Or Mana asking the other Witch why she allows herself to be used as a weapon when she herself was ready to die just till yesterday. Like come on, that Witches are used till they are ditched is their entire culture and established in ch.1. Why even bother asking when you have lived under the same rule and thought for yourself for years. Even if you didn't liked it you could still see reason and common sense in that practice else Mana would have planned to run off way earlier and we would have far more Witches deserting their jobs.
Like the whole Steel Maiden thing is okay because it explains that the more pain this Witch feels the more potent her magic becomes. But then to have just a bigger sword for the rule of "big = cool" then it is just a let-down especially when said giant sword is just used to do a straight chop down, meaning as long as you step one two steps aside you are fine. Like did they all visit the Prometheus School of Running away? You don't stand or run away in the same direction as a falling object, you run to the sides. Like this was such a simple attack even Mana could have dodged it without need of a battle training.
Same with how only Nahta the maid got hit while Fafner blocked it somehow again without showing us how he would block such a giant and heavy attack with his thin sword and scabbard. It's a sword not a pickaxe. Either all 3 got hit and thus hurt or Fafner was able to block it and then the ones behind him couldn't possible be hurt because of this:
If Fafner stopped it then the sword would have stopped at Faf's point unable to get past him, if he failed to stop it then both he and Nahta should look hurt because Nahta chose to protect Mana which given the size and material of the sword attack would have been a useless but noble attempt. Since neither situations happened you got the situation where Faf was somehow able to block the sword to keep himself safe to not get hurt while unable to stop the same sword from hurting Nahta and Mana of which only the maid got hurt due her sacrifice. Also the way damage is shown is really weird, like with such a massive attack you'd expect blood and cuts and torn clothes everywhere and all you get are some "smudges" on the face and back. That again lowers the intense of the "Super attack" from the cocky Guardian and his willing Weapon Witch.
Same with the ending of Mana being able to "overload" her collar and breaking it and there somehow a "Backlash" being involved and yet all of that was never mentioned before as option. Like Mana could have freed herself the entire time and get rid of the "pet collar" she hated so much. Sure she needs it because somehow it suppresses her Evil seed inside her but she could have rebelled all on her own and go gung-ho and full magicks on everybody and the town. Like at least mention it before for example having Nahta ask Mana why she won't break her collar herself and run away, just the two of them, that could have been a possible situation where that could come up.
I know a lot are mentioning that it is "stiff" which is mostly the art and characters, but for me the battle and build-up choreography is a mess, things are happening for the sake of happening and not because they have to happen that way and no other way. Like in UxU the build-up makes sense as in we had Andy use an entire chapter of finding out what Gina's Negation power is while also showcasing us why Gina is so obsessed with Andy due her obsession with staying unchanged herself and Andy being an Immortal never-changing human being perfect for her obsession. So we got her motive as well as her power explained. In this chapter we have the whole internal and external negation power, Andy being internal meaning he himself is Undead but can never make somebody else undead whereas Gina can unchange the form like making air solid but cannot stop her own body from changing no matter how much she insists on being eternal 16. She's 66 and her ass is sacking as Andy points out so tactfully. And the readers can also see her heavy make-up cracking and breaking as a visual cue which was already shown in chapter 5, same with her using her own to repair her make-up to appear young again after losing her mind for a little her and there when it gets too much for her to handle the whole "You are not 16 anymore, Gina...".
This way we also got a case of difference between Andy and Gina with the tiny flashback of Gina to what were her happiest time, the years Andy spend as a prisoner of the Union. For Andy it is just one epsiode of his past, for Gina it is her whole life. As Gina said, unlike Lil'Lucky she hates change, she wants to stay young and cute and be with her loved one always. Which gets us to the difference between Andy and Gina: Opinion about Death. For Gina Death is the ultimate change, after that it's over. Your dreams, your hopes, your fears, nothing matters once Death happened to you. For Andy Death is "so sick", to experience what everyone else in his 200+ year long life experienced and to finally escape his immortal body with all the pain the many times he got hurt or hurt himself seems like a blessing.
Gina lives in the past, afraid of Change = Death vs Andy lives in the present, yearning for Change = Death. All of that took 3 chapters, first being Izumo (change is good) and Gina (change is bad), 2nd being Andy and Gina (talk about their past and power) and 3rd being about Gina and Andy with their motives and issue with death. Next chapter will conclude their battle, most likely with Gina being unable to "unchange" her own death, meaning a 2nd seat will get free. Maybe we even get to see her face without all the make-up on when her time has come.
So yeah, compared to GotW UxU is more dynamic and grounded in its build-ups and battle choreography with its rules for Negation powers and usage of it as well as finding out weaknesses/avoiding of others using your weakness against yourself whereas in GotW things are happening and witch powers are doing whatever witch power want to do. In a way it feels pretty immature, like it hasn't thought out yet why and how things are happening and as long as it looks cool it's good to go. After this 5th chapter I don't have much big hopes for GotW to be a hit. Then again I thought the same about Yozakura and that one was able to sell like what 20k+ or so in two weeks? So who knows, maybe the Japanese audience of Jump likes it because big swords are cool. But if so Faf gonna need a big sword himself pretty soon enough to stay relevant.^^
