Do you see the black one...or the white?
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Joined: Tue Feb 27, 2007 12:06 pm
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I've been watching Hunter x Hunter myself, and while mostly a shounen, it does a very good job of deconstructing common tropes usually found in shounen.
One of my favorites, is although the main character gets stronger over time, with the exception of one arc, he either never gets to face or can take down the big bad of the arc. Either the enemy continues to live through the next arcs, or someone that's much more suitable in power goes against the big bad. Heck, up to where it's cut off, the main character is still considered somewhat of an amateur in his world, just has lots of potential. But it's refreshing to see him lose and learn from it. I like that.
Heck, they build up one arc with this whole group that's evil and I think maybe 2 of them are killed while the others get to continue about their business, and not one is killed by the main character.
What I do like though is it has some fantastic character development, to both the heroes and villains alike. The battles, when they do happen, is fun to watch. I think too that it's that way because of the build up. For most battles, it shows them preparing, strategizing, and figuring out how to approach the enemy so when they engage, it's much more involved, and if they win, it doesn't feel cheap.
Funny enough though, what's purposely done is all the characters surrounding the main character tend to get more development than the main character himself. It's still there, but it's much more slowly. Considering his personality is similar to Goku's for quite sometime, it's quite amusing. Especially when happy-go-lucky is thrown into dark storylines and it forces him to grow.
The only downside I really feel this anime suffers from is from a major attack in the biggest arc in the series, much of the battle is narrated at the time with a lot of explanation. Granted, a lot of this is the result of the mangaka constantly having been on hiatus during this part and to get chapters out quick when he could at the time, he narrated a lot. It works in the manga and it's very interesting, but for the anime, while I don't mind it, I wish they could have gone with another approach to make it flow better.
Alright, the other downside is the series is on constant hiatus, but what is out there, I really enjoy. And there's a sadomasochistic pedophiliac clown who is always letting you know when he's turned on and is quite possibly one of the most interesting characters in the show.
I wish I would have known about this series sooner as it's made by the same person who did Yu Yu Hakusho, which I adored and would, at times, also stray from the conventional shounen, though this series completely takes it to a new level.
I am all for anime that neatly can avoid the common shounen stereotypes, but I find it more interesting when it can deconstruct it and totally show how silly those stereotypes can be.
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CatMuto wrote:
Pierre wrote:
Man...that looks dull...this actually makes me worried for KH3 (since that team worked on the battle system)
I feel the same