An Anal-ysis of Shounen-ness (see what I did there?)

[Nero D. Ace]

So I wanna start off by saying that if it hadn't been for Dragon Ball Z, I would've 

never gotten into Japanese animation. I'm not just saying it as a "what-if" scenario. I'm serious when I say that DBZ was my entry into everything shounen action, and then shounen drama, and some shoujo drama and currently, seinen.

 

The thing is ... where I live, you usually have the same foreign TV shows/cartoons on continuous re-run alongside the local daily soap operas. Basically, it sucks. You either HAVE TO watch these things or give up TV. And you don't just give up TV in the first 20 years of your life. This shit is vital.

 

So, when I was 13ish ... SOMEHOW, a branch of Toonami found it's way here and they introduced 2 new shows - Cardcaptor Sakura and Dragon Ball Z, one a magical girl anime and the other, classic shounen action.

 

Both shows appealed to me from the beginning itself, as they brought forward a new type of culture and tropes I wasn't used to before. I mean, kids doing shit other than just whining and waiting for parents to solve their shit, flashy beam attacks, new music types ... I was sold for life then and there.

 

So when they both got cancelled about half way through, I got pissed off and started looking for another way to finish the shows - online streaming and eventually, downloading.

 

But then, I started getting into new shows - Bleach, Naruto, One Piece and a separate channel called Animax launched that specialized in Japanese anime, where I watched the first Fullmetal Alchemist and Ghost Hunter (YuYu Hakusho).

 

And a few years ago, I started getting bored as shit from them. Naruto and Bleach had started strong but unlike DBZ and Ghost Hunter, they were refusing to end, which was a good thing at first, but later on, the drop in quality and design decisions made them unbearable to watch.

 

FMA: Brotherhood had been good albeit with a poor start, but I was getting interested in different "types" of shows now, ones that had a fixed 13/26 episode format and were mostly original animations. These shows, like UNGO had a fixed plot line and followed a pace of their own, giving the production company a lot more freedom.

TLDR; I started my anime spree with shounen anime - Dragon Ball Z and moved up to Bleach and Naruto, as well as types of Seinen and Shoujo. A few years ago, I started getting bored of the Shounen mentality.

 

Sure, One Piece had still kept me interested but I'd attributed it to the fact that I had become a fanboy of it's author Eiichiro Oda.

 

And on my 21st birthday, I became highly convinced that I was - 

"growing too old for this shit now."

Blah, maybe I was. Shounen Jump had been making really cliche stuff for a while now and Naruto/Bleach were in an all time slump for me. The only reason I was still reading them (because watching was too painful) was to discuss it's shitty-ness with fellow readers.

 

But then, the day before yesterday, I was tired after finishing a major design document and wanted to watch something to take a break. I was in the mood for anime but had seen all the good shows that came out this year. Also, I'm reaching my bandwidth limit so I needed mini MKV's to download. I went to some mini MKV site and found that the new Hunter X Hunter series was up to 80 episodes. Reasoning that this was as good a time as any to marathon it, considering everyone had been telling me how awesome it is, and given that each episode was 50 MB a pop, I started the torrent.

 

Within 2 hours, I was deep into the show and had just blown my "too old for this" theory to smithereens. 

 

Granted, I'm a god damn fanboy for One Piece. Then why is it that I can enjoy a show that's based on something 13 friggin years old that was made for my older self?

 

Could it be that the shounen action genre itself isn't dead? But it's just the quality that has severely dropped? (Apart from One Piece, of course.)

 

I'm 30 episodes into this show and I gotta say, this show brings back the feeling that I had when I first got into Naruto/DBZ/Bleach/One Piece. That boy-ish charm combined with the moments of human disparity, which is overcome through hard work and willpower!

 

Granted, HXH got generic at times, there's a whole bunch of cliches here that would've flied 13 years ago, but are now a bit hard-pressed against the new Shounen. But ... compared to new Shounen, there haven't been any hair-pulling moments for me yet in HXH.

 

So, here's where the ANAL-ASS-IS happens! 

 

I'm gonna take parts of Hunter X Hunter and compare it with other Shounen stuff, citing the reasons why I think that part is better than it's counterpart in other shows. I'm gonna try and include as many counter-parts as possible based on the shows I've already seen.

I really wanna deconstruct this really carefully, so I'm gonna make one point at a time and only after I've thought over it carefully.

 

So, here's point number ONE -

 

 

PACIFISM

-I'm a lover, not a fighter

 

I like my main characters to be pacifists sometimes. And this matters a lot in Shounen anime. Most of these characters are in their teens and mighty inexperienced, as well as prone to violent acts of anger at times. Learning when to not be angry is a critical part of their character development and an important phase in their journey.

 

However, sometimes pacifism is exaggerated to the point of "hair-pulling", a term which I will use to illustrate the point at which the viewer will start insulting the character for being a Gandhi prick. This point is usually reached when the character is -

A) Really really adamant about not fighting.

The character is unbelievably dumb.

 

In most cases, B is the result of "hair-pulling". Take the following cases, for example -

 

(Warning- I'm not gonna put spoiler tags around every event. For your safety, if you haven't reached the following episodes for the following shows, leave or risk being spoiled -

DBZ - Ain't nothing I can spoil that the internet hasn't already

Naruto Shippuden - 220

Bleach - 316

One PIece - 408

Hunter X Hunter (2011) - 23)

 

Let's start off with the first one I remember -

 

1. GOHAN - DRAGON BALL Z

 

 

This kid ... This f*@!ing kid! Son Gohan, child of Son Goku, main protagonist of Dragon Ball Z holds distinction for having simultaneously - the most bad-ass moment of the show as well as the most "hair-pulling" moment.

 

After being beaten all around by Perfect Cell, an android whose sole purpose is to become the strongest and eliminate those who aren't, Gohan finally becomes the most powerful character in the show at the time after Android # 16 is mercilessly destroyed by Cell.

 

After gaining that immense strength, Gohan proceeds to return the favor 10 times over and beats the ever loving shit outta Cell. Seriously, look at the guy's face after being punched in the guy -

 

 

So the heroes are cheering now that they're finally winning. Gohan's ready to chalk up a win for the Z fighters and what does he do ... he let's the bug-man live, refusing to kill him.

 

That's right, Gohan went Gandhi. At the worst possible time. He didn't have to kill him, but god dammit kid! Put him in some kind of phantom zone! At the very least, take out the obligatory bomb he has inside him!

 

And sure enough, that last part comes back to bite him in the ass. Cell starts a self destruct sequence, Goku pulls an obligatory savior trope, Cell resurrects stronger than before and now they are right back where they started.

 

I'm not particularly mad about this one partly because it leads into one of my favorite anime moments in history - 

 

 

and partly because, hey, THIS is what Gohan is and always has been - the Pacifist. While his dad has always been eager to fight and become the best, Gohan has always, from DAY ONE shown that he will fight only and only to protect his loved ones, and never for glory or self-worth.

 

As a result, the hair-pulling-ness fades away after a while and the score for this comes down to ...

 

^5/10

 

 

2. NARUTO - NARUTO

 

... I'm not gonna include an image of the guy. If you know him good. If not, I'll describe him - ORANGE clothes, BLONDE hair, WHISKERS, simpleton.

 

Now, in the early stages, Naruto would solve problems in one simple way - standing up to the guy who's causing problems. Didn't matter how strong he was. Just stand up to him and hit as hard as possible. It was standard, it was classic and it was fun to watch at times when the little tyke would start improvising mid-fight.

 

He was basically a god damn fighter.

 

Then some shit happened, his sensei died and he ended up training to face the guy who killed him not just for revenge/justice but for protecting the village. He goes through some deep meditation shit and emerges as something of a Buddha -

 

 

So this results in a major fight between that guy, called Pain and Naruto, which ends in a rather unique way - they both accept each other.

 

Naruto can never forgive Pain for killing his sensei but he knows that killing Pain will just cause an endless cycle of death all over again, just as had happened so many times. It's a rather interesting moment. For a change, a fight ends so anti-climatically. Not with the hero standing victorious over the villain, but with the hero and villain reminiscing about all that they've lost.

 

This moment wasn't hair-pulling to me at all although other's reactions were different. No, the hair-pull for me came at this moment -

 

 

For me, this ... THIS ... is the lowest point in Naruto history. After an intense fight with Pain and achieving a sense of enlightenment, Naruto decides that the best way to make peace in the world is by letting anyone with pent-up-anger beat the ever loving shit out of him.

 

The whole section was a giant hair-pull for me, enhanced by the fact that the girl beating him up wasn't that endearing of a character at the moment she's introduced. There's no particular reason for her to beat him up. She's beating him up because he's asking her to beat him up. All the while that she should be doing what she came to do. 

 

...

 

The initial pacifism was handled well, but this moment was probably THE point where I started thinking -

"Well, Naruto's shit now. What else can I read?"

 

8/10

 

TO BE CONTINUED ...

 

What do you think about this analysis? What moments/points do you agree/disagree on?

 

Lemme know! I really wanna gauge the shounen meter from different sources.

[lemmingllama]

Shounen can easily stand up to other anime, the genre is amazing based on what shows you have watched. You have only really been talking about the big ones, which are only good if you skip the filler and enjoy crying scenes (other than One Piece). However, any genre is good if you watch the right series. (ex. D Grey Man, Death Note, and Soul Eater are shounen and awesome)

 

Either way, that isn't the point you are trying to make. I do agree that "hair pulling" is a bloody annoying thing unless done properly. Sadly it just isn't done properly very often. Just like the comedy cliche of "making it so awkward that it is funny" isn't actually funny unless done in a very specific way, screwing with the fan's minds for a plot point isn't worth it. Of course, if shounen characters didn't have their high moral standards then they couldn't be shounen characters, they would fall into seinin at that point.

[LTJG RIO]

I actually do like shounen anime's for there child like simplicity and endearing character's. They are in essences timeless. However, I have also never finished one all the way through. The only character to this day who I still follow from beginning to (there will never be an end) is Superman. He was my first and favorite superhero and Gundam was my first anime. So regardless of whether those two series have a bad story arc or not I will continue to watch them because, they, for all intents and purposes, brought me to my version of a galaxy far far away.

 

What I'm getting at though is the reason I never finished any shounen style anime's like DBZ or Naruto is because the series eventually just lost it's luster. It wasn't because it was bad or to childish I just kind of stopped caring about the plight of these band of character's. At a point the series hit's it's absolute climax for Naruto it was the invasion of Konoha during the chunin exams for Dragonball Z it was Goku and Frieza fighting on a crumbling planet out in the middle of space. After these particular parts in the story it just didn't have the same life to it as the story built up to the next story arc climax. To me it felt like the day had been won and I just really didn't care about Bibidi, Babbidi, Buu or any other bad guy or good guy for that matter. The story had appeased me for a while and now it was time to move on to something else.

 

On the flip side I also feel a big empty swell when show's like Cowboy Bebop or Needless finally do end because I had grown attatched to said character's and I feel like there story ended to soon but, at least when it ended good or bad the story ended while I still loved the show and not like it was a chore to see the whole series.

 

In summary I enjoy shounen anime's and manga's as much as the next guy but, I am not gonna be able to hold interest 200 episodes later. And it's not because there childish it's just the length that the creator goes to, to fill in another 50 or 60 episodes to create yet another bad guy who has yet another grand scheme to conquer or kill all these (insert helpless character's here.)

[lemmingllama]

 

In summary I enjoy shounen anime's and manga's as much as the next guy but, I am not gonna be able to hold interest 200 episodes later. And it's not because there childish it's just the length that the creator goes to, to fill in another 50 or 60 episodes to create yet another bad guy who has yet another grand scheme to conquer or kill all these (insert helpless character's here.)

 

You feel this way because you haven't experienced One Piece yet. It is so good that the filler is barely noticeable as filler and it still gets in the top 10 for sales for every DVD and manga chapter that comes out. I watched 500 episodes of it in a month due to my love of the series.

[LTJG RIO]

 

 

In summary I enjoy shounen anime's and manga's as much as the next guy but, I am not gonna be able to hold interest 200 episodes later. And it's not because there childish it's just the length that the creator goes to, to fill in another 50 or 60 episodes to create yet another bad guy who has yet another grand scheme to conquer or kill all these (insert helpless character's here.)

 

You feel this way because you haven't experienced One Piece yet. It is so good that the filler is barely noticeable as filler and it still gets in the top 10 for sales for every DVD and manga chapter that comes out. I watched 500 episodes of it in a month due to my love of the series.

 

I have not watched One Piece yet but, it is on my plan to watch list on myanimelist.net. I really do look forward to watching it. Everyone keeps telling me how awesome it is. Thank you so much I really can't wait to marathon it.