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| The Anime/Manga Thread | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: May 8 2010, 06:21 PM (373,621 Views) | |
| Peytral | Apr 26 2015, 09:52 PM Post #9381 |
peytral pls
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Romance is barely even a real genre. I haven't watched many harem shows but if you're an expert on the genre or something then I'm not going to try and argue. And while I'm sure generic archetype characters are a problem, I doubt it's as much of a problem as you claim it is. And if so, it's probably much more easily-attributed to shitty light novels which make up most of the genre nowadays than the genre in general. This is probably moving goalposts, but considering most of those things are likely comedies I'm not sure what huge amounts of depth you'd expect out of them anyways. |
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| Gilgamesh | Apr 26 2015, 09:53 PM Post #9382 |
solbowz Aurarius
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Oh I'm not gonna say they're deep bastions of character, but picking on Asia is picking on a really weak link. It doesn't matter that they're similar, I don't know Hanekawa's position in the plot, but to use a different example, would you compare like the amount of characterization, Arceuid, the main heroine, gets to like, Sakura in Fate/UBW? Of course not, that'd be stupid. At least with like, Akeno, you can use more than one set of adjectives to describe her. |
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| Peakay | Apr 26 2015, 09:56 PM Post #9383 |
me IRL
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Okay, fair point. I like reading romance mangas from time to time, and I drop some of them because of the aforementioned issues. Sure, there are comedies where the depth of characters aren't exactly the focus of the plot or whatever. However, there are a lot of great comedies where they also have insteresting, unique characters. For example, I was reading this comedy romance manga called Yandere Kanojo (or something, I can't remember the exact name since it hasn't updated in a while) where the MC and the love interest are already an item on the first chapter, both of them have interesting takes on their personalities so the comedy seems more fulfilling than, say, MC walks into a naked women because for some reason MCs don't know how to knock doors and then the woman goes kyaaa and then the MC gets punched. Haw Haw Haw Hilarious |
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| Peytral | Apr 26 2015, 09:59 PM Post #9384 |
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peytral pls
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Preaching to the choir in this case since this is one of my least favorite clichés ever. |
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| Peakay | Apr 26 2015, 10:03 PM Post #9385 |
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me IRL
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Seriously though, why do writers think this is a thing that must be done all the time? Is it even funny for the japanese? Is it just fan service? Is this supposed to be some sort of character interaction development? This terrible cliche brings so many questions. |
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| Storm | Apr 26 2015, 10:07 PM Post #9386 |
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Parishioner
  ![]](http://z1.ifrm.com/static/1/pip_r.png)
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Don't ever watch Zero no Tsukaima then. Dear lord Louise must be the biggest bitch in all of anime. |
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| Silvy | Apr 26 2015, 10:07 PM Post #9387 |
idolswag4lyfe
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The thing with Asia is that she does get a decent amount of screentime, but most of it is wasted on silly moe fanservice situations. She's still presented as a love interest to Issei as well, even though as with alot of harem-ish shows, we know who the true love interest pretty much from the start. I can agree with Peekay, a lot of harem stuff just shoehorns characters of each archetype in and it feels very fake to say the least, it isn't to say all harem is like this but it seems like a big chunk. One thing I have noticed in some series is the presence of a couple of interesting female leads that get marginalized by more girls being added for harem shenanigans. The sad thing is it feels like the authors are pressured into making stuff more "harem" because it moves more volumes when they could be writing more interesting stuff and avoiding needless harem archetypes. |
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| Peakay | Apr 26 2015, 10:09 PM Post #9388 |
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me IRL
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Yeah, that was one of the series I was thinking of when I said animes where the heroine is a tsundere girl (She has pink hair but ehhh, close enough). Also I think that we can sum up the last two pages as. Yeah, harem genre generally sucks. And To-Love-Ru is super interesting. |
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| Gilgamesh | Apr 26 2015, 10:10 PM Post #9389 |
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solbowz Aurarius
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Light Novel adaptations seem to be where a good chunk of the recent more generic/cancerous harems are coming from Part of it is probably piggybacking on SAO's success, but I saw one author (who wanted to try writing something different than what he usually does) say that once something works, that's what their editors keep telling them to push out, so yeah. So blame the fat otaku in Japan who keep buying that shit. |
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| Super Slash | Apr 26 2015, 10:24 PM Post #9390 |
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To Love-Ru is weird in that it randomly throws a character arc at you in Darkness and starts getting all serious, when every other part of the series before that was basically random harem stuff. |
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| HyrulianJedi | Apr 26 2015, 10:27 PM Post #9391 |
uguu~
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I mean, it's not like we don't have an extremely similar system pumping out movies in Hollywood. |
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| Peakay | Apr 26 2015, 10:33 PM Post #9392 |
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me IRL
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The point is, a lot of media is trash and follows a set of character archetypes, settings, etc, etc. Because it sells, and not because it gives thought provoking themes or anything and it's worrying because entertainment media is probably already stagnating due to this stuff. At least there are some pretty series here and there so it's not all that bad. Also Slash, To-Love-Ru still relies a lot on fanservice for the sake of it and it even lampshades the main character's ability to crash into women and landing with them in the most fanservice-y positions ever Spoiler: click to toggle . So uh, I dont think you can really defend that.
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| Super Slash | Apr 26 2015, 10:38 PM Post #9393 |
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I wasn't really defending anything lol, I was just pointing it out. Regardless of how it was solved though, I wish the series would continue in that direction (whether or not it does I'm not sure, as I haven't read the Darkness manga yet). |
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| Peakay | Apr 26 2015, 10:38 PM Post #9394 |
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me IRL
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I just wish the the author made something like Black Cat again, that was an interesting series. |
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| Silvy | Apr 26 2015, 10:44 PM Post #9395 |
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idolswag4lyfe
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oh god, I usually have a high tolerance for tsunderes but she is the worst. Characters of noble upbringing are usually assholes in that kinda setting but the way you're supposed to "like" that she's an ass is beyond me. All I remember from my brief reading of To Love Ru was boobs, the MC doing some crazy backflip and having his mouth catch some girl's panties and some tentacle-plants of some sorts. I definitely see some writers going for harem, most likely because it sells. Not to knock Nihei or Knights of Sidonia, but it definitely seems like he's going for a more accessible style with it compared to stuff like Blame! and Abara. |
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| Saturos | Apr 26 2015, 11:45 PM Post #9396 |
heart-under-blade
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The role of tropes/archetypes as being opposed to making people think is an interesting one, PK, kind of a sales/art continuum. I don't necessarily think it holds up, because stuff that uses archetypes can also build off them in a way that's really productive. In fact, I can't really think of something that's totally free of archetypes. I think if something like that could exist, it would just be wholly alien or strange to the audience. Like listening to super achromatic music for the first time. And even then, once you get a sense of the tropes and archetypes, you can begin to make sense of and appreciate the logic to it. Theoretically. 8D But like, taking Madoka Magica because ofc, it's one of the highest-selling anime, but I definitely think it's something that rises beyond its archetypes to make some really interesting insights about them. |
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| Peakay | Apr 26 2015, 11:57 PM Post #9397 |
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me IRL
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Okay maybe the thing I'm looking is character archetypes that don't seem to be flat as a board or character archetypes with a twist. |
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| Saturos | Apr 27 2015, 12:06 AM Post #9398 |
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heart-under-blade
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I agree, but I think that could also be called "bad writing." But at the same time, does that account for popularity? I think an easily way of putting it might be "simplicity" tends to be popular: things that a great many people can easily understand that don't have a lot of substance to it. And by simple I mean simple in execution and in ideas, so not like, stylistically simple but complex in ideas. And frequently, those simple ideas are expressed through baseform archetypes or tropes without any depth added into them. Of course, I think some things are able to be both simply understood, but also have a lot of potential depth to them (ie. Madoka Magica, Game of Thrones, Sopranos, Harry Potter, etc). So it's not really a distinction you can easily make. |
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| Admiral Miral | Apr 27 2015, 12:58 AM Post #9399 |
The Light of Hope
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Do you even Rie Kugimiya. |
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| Peytral | Apr 27 2015, 06:03 AM Post #9400 |
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peytral pls
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I'd rather not. Don't give me Dokidoki flashbacks. |
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