Mag Talk Weekly Shonen Jump [2019] - Discussion and TOC Talk

[supercow297]

Well, MHA has never really tried to go out of its way to be grand and epic(which admittedly is kinda weird for the genre). Even All Might vs AfO was more about what it personally meant for them than the actual stakes of the conflict. Same for Endeavor in Pro Hero and now with the LoV. Almost every single arc is more an excuse to develop some character or another. It's always been a very character-driven story. The plot barely exists. It's never really gone beyond ''there are some bad guys plotting nefarious stuff''. There's also no serial escalation. There's no clear power level system to tell us whether any given situation is more dangerous than the last. Instead, every arc gives us its own stakes and explains why they're important and we should be invested(save Bakugo, get a license, save Eri, Eri's smile), even if they aren't so big in the grand scheme of things. An unique structure for sure.

So I think Horikoshi knows very well what he's doing (It's not hard to see what A vs B was trying to accomplish: Fully introduce Class-B and show what their deal is, set up Shinsho to join the hero course, give some focus to many 1-A characters after a very long time of staying in the background and of course the whole deal with OfA, which, like it or not, is one of the most important things to ever happen in the manga. Whether the execution was good is a separate discussion, but there was a point to the arc). It's just that what he's doing is not some quest to save the world from evil, it's the story of a kid learning to be a superhero.

The problem isn't that it's a character-centric story. The problem is that the plot, which enables characters to shine, is contrived to the point that it's hard to care or empathize at all. And having a bad plot is not excused by "muh character development". And in either case the characters are not a strong point in BnHA anyway, otherwise just seeing the characters hang out would be nice... but the school free-time arcs certainly weren't.

Gonna do a few replies in bold.

Well, MHA has never really tried to go out of its way to be grand and epic(which admittedly is kinda weird for the genre).
AFO vs OFA. Smashing up an entire city. Helicopters flying around and report. "YOU'RE NEXTTT!!!!" Really, not trying to be grand and epic?

The plot barely exists. It's never really gone beyond ''there are some bad guys plotting nefarious stuff''.
This is a fault of the series.

There's also no serial escalation.
There was supposed to be escalation via Deku's percentage, until MUH MILLION PERCENT, MUH ERI PERCENT, and MUH SEVEN QUIRKS.

There's no clear power level system to tell us whether any given situation is more dangerous than the last.
This is a fault of the series.

Instead, every arc gives us its own stakes and explains why they're important and we should be invested(save Bakugo, get a license, save Eri, Eri's smile), even if they aren't so big in the grand scheme of things. An unique structure for sure.
Not unique at all. Literally in every manga if not every piece of fiction. Just one example, saving Rukia in Soul Society Arc, had way more compelling plot AND characters, without the crutch of "b-but we're a character drama".

So I think Horikoshi knows very well what he's doing (It's not hard to see what A vs B was trying to accomplish: Fully introduce Class-B[...]).
Whatever Horikoshi is doing, it's with extremely poor execution. Of course A vs B was to introduce characters. But you can give characters focus in far better ways than a contrived fight with no stakes. Off the top of my head World Trigger's rank wars are a plot-linked, high-stakes, extended tournament arc and a great way to introduce characters.


The following is all mine, even non-bolded.

Overall, Horikoshi sucks ass at writing characters. Todoroki and Deku(&All Might's relationship) are exceptions because I'm pretty sure the emotion from there was mostly personally inspired, which is how he got the raw emotion on the page. (If you disagree with that, it's fine, doesn't affect my point much.)

No one acts human in his series. Even in their downtime, people only say filler phrases that somewhat fit their character archetype. It's Horikoshi's "oh this must be how the teens talk nowadays."

I'm sure Horikoshi is a hard worker. And that many people love his series for what it is. But from a more objective analysis it is going off the rails and has been for years. And despite being primarily a character drama as you said, the characters are soulless.

Miyazaki once said (or some other, old-age Japanese animator) that the original generation of anime creators all studied real life and real people as a base for their shows. And that new generations only "studied"... past anime. This dilutes the human element out of the stories, reduce them to the most "anime" type of stories. I'm thinking "rule of cool", fluff, isekai, etc.

Horikoshi is one of those authors. Writing manga inspired only manga (whoops, American Comics) and not reality. And while that certainly has a market (anime examples: gurren lagann, kill la kill etc.), and have their own appeal, I think it is sad that the human touch is missing from many modern works.

TL;DR: Horikoshi is missing the human element that makes manga magical. And he has no f*cking clue what he's doing.

---

Thinking about it now, Black Clover is also missing the human element, but then again makes up for it with plot, comedy, battles, teamwork etc.

And yes I suck this series' dick way too much but in the characters' downtime in Chainsawman, and just from the cinematographic panelling and direction, I feel a human element from the series, a movie-like gritty, real-person type of thing, as if the characters are physically there and vulnerable. And I like that a lot. That's just my subjective take as a reader.


---------------------------------

Yeah, both kimetsu and MHA are like that, their arcs is more about the character.
But in MHA pre-AfOvsAllMight and Kimetsu reader think is more "Hype" because they have a big bad(Muzan and AfO).

Don't get what you're trying to say, would you mind restating that last sentence?

He got banned for misconstruing something I said and going off the deep end.

What's the rundown on this?

 

[Rain Spectre]

...I'm honestly scratching my head as to that entire wall of text to be honest.

I'm going to say that I'm baffled as to why Miyazaki is being cited when he most definitely wasn't even considering Jump in his words. Indeed, by the time of YuYu Hakusho, the industry was probably long gone as far as Miyazaki was concerned.

 

[supercow297]

...I'm honestly scratching my head as to that entire wall of text to be honest.

I'm going to say that I'm baffled as to why Miyazaki is being cited when he most definitely wasn't even considering Jump in his words.

I hope you actually read it because I'm really looking forward to a proper response.

He is cited because he is referring to otaku in general. The new generations of anime/manga creators are all otaku that grew up on anime/manga. They lack human experiences to create works with relatable themes and morals. Their stories lose more and more of the human element, that was present in older generations (which is ironic, that in a more limited age, we would have better stories, since we had more time to involve ourselves in real life and real problems.). I pose the point that this is evident in Horikoshi's writing.

Instead of thinking about what makes a story good he is trapped in the genre/demographic.

 

[WyldViolet]

Miyazaki is talking about the general state of the modern industry. Jump is a part of that industry. Totally relevant quote.
Sometimes I think you're being intentionally difficult. You definitely have a tendency to grasp at straws.

--- Double Post Merged, May 25, 2019, Original Post Date: May 25, 2019 ---

Anyways, I find the issue exists not just within manga, yet in other mediums as well.
I find Miyazaki's quote describes the auteur side of the film industry all too well.
People like PTA or Inarritu who are just soulessly lifting from things they've seen before without anything cerebral or intinate from their own psyche to actually contribute to the artform. Just surface level navel gazing at filmmakers who cared about more than their legacy.
That's not nesasarily an issue when filmmakers are deliberately creating homages, but when the filmmaker deludes themselves into thinking they're saying something when they've made nothing but a pretty empty homage it becomes pretentious and creates an emperors new clothes esque situation where people who don't know any better think these fraudulent filmmakers are genuine because they're told they are by tbtb and confused by the confidence emitted from the counterfeit artists.

 

[Rain Spectre]

I hope you actually read it because I'm really looking forward to a proper response.

He is cited because he is referring to otaku in general. The new generations of anime/manga creators are all otaku that grew up on anime/manga. They lack human experiences to create works with relatable themes and morals. Their stories lose more and more of the human element, that was present in older generations (which is ironic, that in a more limited age, we would have better stories, since we had more time to involve ourselves in real life and real problems.). I pose the point that this is evident in Horikoshi's writing.

Instead of thinking about what makes a story good he is trapped in the genre/demographic.

Well, for starters, I actually did read it. I simply don't respond because someone with your level of bias is clearly going to impossible to change the mind of, hence I won't bother there.

That said, I am headtilting at that, because I see really no issue in being influenced by prior works. All this "human element" talk is is the sort of pretentious stuff people use to sound superior, because they ultimately think the truth is is that the world is wrong.

Miyazaki is talking about the general state of the modern industry. Jump is a part of that industry. Totally relevant quote.
Sometimes I think you're being intentionally difficult. You definitely have a tendency to grasp at straws.

And I think you're overly antagonistic and have a tendency of sniping at me because you think I'm wrong.

 

[WyldViolet]

because someone with your level of bias is clearly going to impossible to change the mind of,

Oh my.

--- Double Post Merged, May 25, 2019, Original Post Date: May 25, 2019 ---

Also there's nothing at all wrong with being inspired by other works. It's impossible to avoid.
However as an artist you should have something unique to say or add as well. If not you're just recycling and being a lazy inauthentic conman. The problem is I don't think many frauds even realize they're frauds.
Some people are so convinced in their own self importance that they are simply blind to their blatant character flaws or intellectual dishonesty.

 

[Bomber D Rufi]

I realize this is mostly personal and stuff but as much as Chainsawman and BC are hyped here, I just totally can't get into them because I don't like their main characters like at all. What's weird about it is it's not as if I dislike them because I don't understand them --I do, and I get how they fit in their respective worlds I just totally do not like them on a personal level which keeps me from enjoying the rest of the series. It is really a shame since it sounds like BC is a fun time and I like Chainsawman's artwork but as long as I have a strong dislike of the leads I can't really get into them, unfortunately.

I should try to catch up on Jujutsu Kaisen, though.

(I wonder how long it'll take for me to regret posting in this thread.)

 

[Rain Spectre]

Also there's nothing at all wrong with being inspired by other works. It's impossible to avoid.
However as an artist you should have something unique to say or add as well. If not you're just recycling and being a lazy inauthentic conman. The problem is I don't think many frauds even realize they're frauds.
Some people are so convinced in their own self importance that they are simply blind to their blatant character flaws or intellectual dishonesty.

This is rapidly devolving into pesudo-intellectualism.

 

[WyldViolet]

I realize this is mostly personal and stuff but as much as Chainsawman and BC are hyped here, I just totally can't get into them because I don't like their main characters like at all. What's weird about it is it's not as if I dislike them because I don't understand them --I do, and I get how they fit in their respective worlds I just totally do not like them on a personal level which keeps me from enjoying the rest of the series. It is really a shame since it sounds like BC is a fun time and I like Chainsawman's artwork but as long as I have a strong dislike of the leads I can't really get into them, unfortunately.

I should try to catch up on Jujutsu Kaisen, though.

Which is fine.
Personally I like art with more degenerate characters because I can connect with it.
At least you're giving a personal reason for not connecting rather than falling into the "ITS NOT FOR ME=OBJECTIVELY BAD" trap.

--- Double Post Merged, May 25, 2019, Original Post Date: May 25, 2019 ---

This is rapidly devolving into pesudo-intellectualism.

Or maybe passionate people discussing the meaning of passion?
It's far too easy for people to call things that make them uncomfortable "pretentious". Misuse of the word petentious has turned into such a pretentious meme.

 

[zygmunt95]

Why are you reading stuff that you think are bad ?
It's a waste of time isn't it ?

 

[WyldViolet]

Why are you reading stuff that you think are bad ?
It's a waste of time isn't it ?

Better question.
why have I been here for 7 years?

 

[Bomber D Rufi]

Which is fine.
Personally I like art with more degenerate characters because I can connect with it.
At least you're giving a personal reason for not connecting rather than falling into the "ITS NOT FOR ME=OBJECTIVELY BAD" trap.

Yeah see, that's exactly why I don't like Denji. I don't connect to him in the least. Like at least in the first chapter when he was presented as a really sympathetic character I found him interesting, but since after that he's basically just a walking wall of libido I pretty much lost all interest in him and the series outside of the really inventive use of paneling and expressive artwork. Like I can understand why he's the way he is, and appreciate it but it really doesn't work for me, and I'm much more a person who reads for an interesting story than for "whoa that looks cool/gory/sexy" every page or whatever.

Asta's just a case where If I knew someone like him I'd constantly want to punch them in the face even if I understand why he's the way it is and how it fits in the story. I mean straight up, if the series were to be redone without him I'd probably pick it up.

Though in fairness I don't connect to characters in series overall --I'm more a spectator who wants to be entertained than someone who deeply connects to them on a level and thus can see past some flaws the series might have. It's probably why I'm so cold on Gintama nowadays despite enjoying the series enough to translate it for ten years. I'm more into plot/ world building than character based stories.

 

[WyldViolet]

I don't nesasarily like how Denji acts, but he's shaped by trauma and series or movies with well portrayed traumatized characters, especially youth is something I find therepeutic and cathartic to consume.

Asta however is just a poorly written character and seems like a challenge to make the worst Jump Mc imaginable.

 

[Bomber D Rufi]

I guess I can get that on a level --Denji being shaped by his tragedy, but I don't really care for how he's basically become a gag character. Also really Chainsaw doesn't do anything differently that other better exorcist series haven't done so that's another mark against it (for me.)

I wouldn't call Asta the worst but yeah he's definitely one of the most divisive.

 

[supercow297]

Well, for starters, I actually did read it. I simply don't respond because someone with your level of bias is clearly going to impossible to change the mind of, hence I won't bother there.

That said, I am headtilting at that, because I see really no issue in being influenced by prior works. All this "human element" talk is is the sort of pretentious stuff people use to sound superior, because they ultimately think the truth is is that the world is wrong.



And I think you're overly antagonistic and have a tendency of sniping at me because you think I'm wrong.

I'll try one more time.

Being influenced by other works is not bad. But only being influenced by the surface level of past works IS bad.

For example. Evangelion isn't one of my favorite shows, but even so I know that the characters are great because they come from Anno's personal struggles. They exhibit true human emotions. In BnHA, only Todoroki (tournament arc) and Deku (AFO vs OFA arc)'s emotions really feel real. But in general it's just rehashes of characters from hundreds of other series, copied because they seem like "proper characters".

Ah and I don't know how I forgot, but a clear example of stealing the setting/style of the past generation (that actually had humanism in their works) but not the substance is Darling in the Franxx. Compared to EVA.

Another example. I don't think Berserk is as good as everyone says, but Gut's large sword, even to me, conveys more meaning than Asta's. Guts's is a large cross he bears, a weight on his back, something that represents his conviction. In every battle its swings feel powerful. Meanwhile Asta just has a large black sword because it looks cool and "oh it's black and rusted since it represents my misfortune!" But otherwise has no narrative weight and tends not to factor in fights beyond its actual anti-magic abilities. It seems like it was influenced by the facade and not the underlying connections.

It's taking what SEEMS to make other series compelling, but really only taking the SURFACE LEVEL.

It's also why Game of Thrones this season is so trash. It's still got emotions, big wars etc. But it's got no impact. Because the writer who understood his characters and made them "human", is gone.

Miyazaki ain't a god but this one quote of his at least is nice.

And finally let me demystify what I mean by "human element". All I mean is this: People should talk and act like reasonable people would. Anime/manga has devolved into caricatures because many creators are otakus who don't have time/effort or even just social skills capable enough of reaching out, and hearing others' stories to create more grounded stories. Hence they draw on what they know. Which is manga/anime.

One person's life is not enough to experience all facets of human nature. That's why stories are based originally on the oral tradition, and why it's still so important. So we can hear others' stories and feel connected to them. I think that for writers, social skills are a tool just as important as any other in their craft. Or besides social skills, at least other clever ways to glean meaningful insights from stories, instead of simply copying the surface.

That's why I think 3-Gatsu no Lion is so good, because Chica Umino clearly has a host of real-life experiences to draw on. She's close friends with the famous band Bump of Chicken and the famous singer YUKI, and has many mangaka friends with whom to share life experiences. (She's close friends with Berserk's Kentaro Miura!!) Meanwhile Horikoshi seems very shy, and stuck in his own world. Which is a bit sad.

 

[Rain Spectre]

I shall say this, then.

I believe in all fiction.

I believe in the crushing waves on the beachside. The epic crusades towards the truth. The beating of the ball across a long sports match. The human drama of discovery the infinite. I believe in it all.

Is it not in human nature to reach beyond the pinnicle? To find that beyond limit which reaches all? I think it does, and until the point is reached, I keep moving.

Till memento mori, fiction shall rise.

 

[Nakura]

In BnHA, only Todoroki (tournament arc) and Deku (AFO vs OFA arc)'s emotions really feel real. But in general it's just rehashes of characters from hundreds of other series, copied because they seem like "proper characters".

What is it about every character in MHA other than these two that makes them not feel 'real' enough?

 

[supercow297]

I shall say this, then.

I believe in all fiction.

I believe in the crushing waves on the beachside. The epic crusades towards the truth. The beating of the ball across a long sports match. The human drama of discovery the infinite. I believe in it all.

Is it not in human nature to reach beyond the pinnicle? To find that beyond limit which reaches all? I think it does, and until the point is reached, I keep moving.

Till memento mori, fiction shall rise.

What does this have to do with anything?

Oh wait is this you trying to tell me how pretentious I sound rn? I really meant everything I said and don't think it's too far-stretched as long as not all the media you consume is Hollywood, shonen, and isekai.

 

[WyldViolet]

I guess I can get that on a level --Denji being shaped by his tragedy, but I don't really care for how he's basically become a gag character. Also really Chainsaw doesn't do anything differently that other better exorcist series haven't done so that's another mark against it (for me.)

I wouldn't call Asta the worst but yeah he's definitely one of the most divisive.

Personally, another thing I love about the series is that I find it does do things differently than other exorcist series but in the characterization.
It reminds me of a more extreme HxH in how the characters act in contrast to its genre. There's a lot of pitch black comedy and playing with expectations as well which gives it a unique flavor.


I absolutely see how it's not for everyone though.

 

[Bomber D Rufi]

Personally, another thing I love about the series is that I find it does do things differently than other exorcist series but in the characterization.
It reminds me of a more extreme HxH in how the characters act in contrast to its genre. There's a lot of pitch black comedy and playing with expectations as well which gives it a unique flavor.


I absolutely see how it's not for everyone though.

I might just be kind of bored of that kind of writing, I guess. Nowadays I'm more interested in seeing the upbeat side of things than how "everything sucks including me". Or, something more laid back where the characters are all kind of chill like in Jujutsu. I can see how Chainsaw would be appealing to those who like that sorta writing though, and unlike say Naruto which I despise, while I'm not all that interested in Chainsaw I don't hate it by any means. I'd probably check out a panel or two for the artwork, but it isn't something I'm excited for.