Battle Shonen Stuff

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Now, I've already explained countless times in the past as to why I feel that a lot of people mistakenly judge Shonen only among the battle genre, when that is only just a mere branch of Shonen (well, its certainly the biggest branch among them, but it doesn't define shonen series as a whole), and doesn't reflect it as some single genre. Shonen is more of a demographic than it is a genre, specifically one that ranges from kids of 10-14 up to teenagers and even adolescents from ages 18 and older. Shonen isn't just Naruto and Bleach, but its also Death Note, Fullmetal Alchemist, Great Teacher Onizuka, Bakuman, Claymore, and various other series that break through the mold of just featuring generic battles between young angst-driven teens with super powers and abilities.

That said, ironically enough, since I've already touched upon that, I'm not going into that in this thread. Instead, I want a discussion thread based on the more stereotypical type of shonen series that I constantly point out doesn't encompass shonen as a whole. Now, I myself am not a super huge fan of the battle shonen type of series, but I don't hate it either, despite the fact that I find that at least 9 out of every 10 battle series that I try are complete junk. I will say that when a battle series is done right, it truly stands out on its own and can stand up to any top tier series of any other genre, as far as I'm concerned.

The battle shonen genre, to me, is really Japan's equivalent of what the mainstream super hero genre is for us Westerners among comic books. That said, while the super hero genre has been able to successfully evolve in many aspects with brilliant series like Watchmen and the various Batman comics to have come out since the 1980's, among many other things, I feel that the shonen genre has mostly only regressed into formulaic fodder. That said, that doesn't mean that the good series of the bunch shouldn't get the respect and credit that they deserve. As such, I have created this thread for that sort of discussion, and while I don't have time to get into it now, I myself plan to put up some "good series vs. bad series" posts among battle shonen series, and give my personal opinion and judgments as to why I believe what's good in the genre to be good and why it stands out on top of the bad ones.

It'd be interesting to get Foggle in on some of these conversations, as well, though I'm sure he'll steer clear of this thread just from the word shonen being mentioned in it.

In all honesty, though, I can fully understand and even somewhat agree with many people's distaste for the genre, including Foggle's. I just feel that its unfortunate that they were mostly only exposed to the crap on offer in the genre, or at best the plainly mediocre ones.

That said, I'm going to be fair and point out the faults in the genre itself, but also its few strengths that no other genre really has, and how those very strengths should really be exploited more.

That's all I'll say for now, but until then, I'd like to hear other people's thoughts on what they think of battle-based shonen series.

[Foggle]

Well, YYH is awesome, of course, and I'm assuming that would be considered a battle shounen. Do you count Fist of the North Star and JoJo's Bizarre Adventure as battle shounen? Those are great!

Sakigake!! Otokojuku is one of my all-time favorite manga series and that's definitely battle shounen territory (it was even printed in Shounen Jump, I believe). I recommend giving that a read sometime, it's absolutely hilarious.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Well, if you're bringing up Hokuto no Ken/Fist of the North Star, then that practically started the whole entire battle shonen genre (which as you can tell is both a good and bad thing in many ways). But Fist of the North Star is indeed a great series, when we're talking about the manga. As for the anime....its not bad, but Toei really pisses me off with how notorious they are for dragging out their anime adaptations of shonen series. Dragon Ball Z suffered from that same fate to a great extent, and while One Piece initially seemed to be getting away with it, it also succumbed to what I like to call Toei-syndrome.

And yeah, I like YYH primarily because it does way more than just battles, and even when it does battles, they are actually somehow made interesting.

One thing I wanted to bring up is that I only hate the battle aspect of battle shonen series when the battles are dreadfully boring....and unfortunately that applies to 90% of all battle shonen series. For example, I just can't find any interest in any of the fights in Naruto when I can't keep track of what abilities each character has since each character seems to have hundreds of different abilities and it seems that there are, like....at least a few hundred different characters that we've already seen. Its just no fun. It drags on forever, and I see a bunch of random attacks being thrown around. One thing I like about how Togashi constructs fights in both YYH and HXH is that the good guys are usually at a severe disadvantage to the villains and have to rely far more on extremely simple yet igneous methods in order to just stay alive and survive their various encounters and situations. It makes things feel more desperate, and its nice that the battles don't drag out for 10+ episodes/chapters (on the contrary, they are usually finished well within the confines of a single chapter/episode). It also works because its balanced out with a lot of plot going on in the background, good characterization, and great dialogue that helps give flavor the characters and the entire mood of the series in general based on how the various characters interact with one another.

Meanwhile, all I see something like Bleach doing is constantly introducing new characters and new attacks and....that's pretty much it. Its not like most of them even do anything except stand there and try to look cool. It really pisses me off that drek like this is more popular than series with actual effort behind them (especially the great shonen series that have nothing to do with battles and fantasy and such).

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

I've heard of Sakigake before. I'll have to give that a try, sometime. I've also been recommended Toriko by a friend of mine, so I may check that manga out sometime, as well.

[gunswordfist]

I wouldn't say that superhero comics evolved. You got your great comic here and there and then there's the fact that we had to suffer through House Of M and Civil War. Bleck.

[Dr. Insomniac]

I wouldn't say that superhero comics evolved. You got your great comic here and there and then there's the fact that we had to suffer through House Of M and Civil War. Bleck.

Yeah, but crossover events aside, this age of comics generally has a bit more flavour compared to the Dark Age (which itself improved upon the Bronze Age).

[Spark Of Spirit]

Yeah, most battle manga aren't very good because they tend to follow the formula too well that it becomes an absolute bore to read/watch. For every One Piece, you have about ten Beet The Vandel Busters which are as boring and predictable as they come.

Also, since the classics nailed the style so well (FOTNS, DB, YYH) it's really hard for new ones to compete without feeling like total rehashes.

I kind of ran into the same problem with Seinen more recently, the only difference is that the bad Seinen doesn't clog about the genre nearly as much even if it's more prominent than it should be. But that might be because more Shonen is brought over here than Seinen so it's hard to judge.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

And, you see, I don't mind so much that there is a certain formula to the whole battle manga genre. That in and of itself isn't necessarily a bad thing. I mean, having stuff like giving the main character a goal to reach is a good thing if done right and helps make the feeling of progression all the more satisfying if you actually care about the character and enjoy seeing them get closer to reaching their goal. But that's what it really comes down to, the battles, the abilities, the unique aspects of the world if the story is more fantasy-focused are all things that come secondary to characters. Honestly, at its heart, battle shonen series are supposed to be about the characters, and the best of them out there are the ones that really make their cast of characters interesting to follow, and have a good chemistry between many of the characters to the point where you're most interested in seeing how they interact with one another.

You see, series like One Piece and Digimon Adventure are very formulaic for the most part (well, One Piece has evolved so that Oda has given the formula his own distinct twist, but unfortunately too many other long-running shonen series are just content with staying in their comfort zone and not trying anything new), but the reason for why they are so great and so well-loved by fans is really because of their memorable and likable characters, more than anything else. I find both series to be highly enjoyable because I find all of the main characters to be very interesting with extremely well-written back stories and who also play off of each other really well. In One Piece's case the antics of the crew during each arc are nothing short of hilarious and its really nice to see them lighten up the mood with how fun their interactions with each other can be, and its also interesting to see how different characters interact with different villains. In Digimon's case, you get to see stuff like that as well, and as a bonus each character gets a significant amount of development for themselves and really gets to have the more meaningful aspects of their characters explored. By contrast, the battles were the more boring fodder part of the series for me, even when I was a kid. I loved Digimon Adventure purely because of how well-written its characters were, and for the most part I finally got into One Piece because its characters really grew on me.

Now contrast that with stuff like Naruto, Bleach, D. Gray-Man, and **Insert any other popular generic shonen title here**, and all it seems that they are doing is just trying too hard to make their characters come off as cool. They feel that just introducing a lot of new powerful characters makes things interesting, but it just makes it more boring and even harder to connect with any of the main characters. In Naruto's case, it got the point where I couldn't even keep track of all of its characters and whenever another one came back after a gap of several chapters I would have almost completely forgotten who he or she was. Its a good thing to not have your main character be the entire focus of the story in every single chapter, but its just going plain overboard when the main character appears for a handful of chapters at a time and is then overshadowed by a dozen new characters who are introduced at a time and get very little to no development for them (and even if they do, you'll more often than not find yourself not caring one bit about them, anyways). Bleach is even worse in this regard. While Naruto at least has some level of characterization, I really feel that after the Soul Society arc, Bleach's characters literally had no personality whatsoever, and the new characters just came off as dull, lifeless dolls.

That's basically the reason for why Yu Yu Hakusho is still the best battle shonen out there, to me, personally. Its very much a character-driven series, beyond even the fights and action. As for people who prefer Hunter X Hunter, I do enjoy the series and admit that its better in certain aspects, but one reason I give for why I don't feel that Togashi managed to surpass YYH's quality with it is because its characters aren't really as interesting. Well, to be more clear, I think it has a few really well-done characters (the main character, Gon, isn't really one of them, though). But for a character as interesting and well-developed as Killua, you'll get a fair number of extremely plain characters, who aren't necessarily bad but do nothing to leave a lasting impression on you and really only serve more as plot devices to move the story along. In YYH's case, whether it was luck or pure talent, I feel that Togashi really managed to make each and every one of the characters he introduced since the Dark Tournament arc (especially the villains) completely memorable.

[Angus]

I don't mind the battle rehashes, just like with pro wrestling - it's all about the hypes and the buildup, and then the come from behind or overcoming adversity win.

Although some matchups seem mandatory:
Battle royales and draw numbers to decide the bracket spots.
The pervy guy losing to the hot femme fatale.
The mysterious participant.
The kid genius or some brainy dude.
The strong girl/boy that's usually related to someone famous.
The bots.
The cheaters.
The Bruce Lee lookalikes.
The buddy that you promise to meet in the semis, or cheer for until they lose to a tough participant.
The Karate Kid strategy of sabotaging your opponent for the next round. (well not too often but I like it)
And of course the super boss S-class like rival that you won't get to meet until the finals but is the reason you entered the tournament in the first place.

Titles that I liked outside the obvious DB / YYH / OP ones:
Angelic Layer - There are a lot of battles that employ the typical matchups but also the optimistic, resourceful protagonist.
Negima's Mahora Tournament - A lot of battles among friends, and some decent magical strategies. The rest of the manga suffers a bit from new character saturation.
Initial D - most Battles are close wins, but still fun to listen to their on-board strategies.
Bamboo Blade - at least in the anime series they didn't make it to the finals, but nice to cheer for the girls.
Rurouni Kenshin - Kyoto arc had some great buildups and decent boss fights. Not too many new moves either, but gotta play with what you have.

Ones that could have used more help:
Air Gear - well it had potential but having each battle be a do-or-die situation gets tedious
MAR - ok fine, have chess ranks, but why put rook below a knight? just seems like it's One Piece without as strong an interaction, and without a decent buildup of the enemies/rivals.
Ikki Tousen - ugh, you already overloaded the show with shredded clothes and panty-service, who really gives a crap about a tournament?
Sekirei - same reasoning as Ikki Tousen, except with large breasts, oh and it doesn't start until the second season

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Ones that could have used more help:
Ikki Tousen - ugh, you already overloaded the show with shredded clothes and panty-service, who really gives a crap about a tournament?
Sekirei - same reasoning as Ikki Tousen, except with large breasts, oh and it doesn't start until the second season

Both of those shows are already beyond the point of having any amount of help do them any good, lol.

[Angus]

Oh, I forgot about My-Hime. Now there's an entertaining battle royale: Unwilling participants, temporary alliances, betrayals, mysterious late entrants, and that the stakes were that if you lose, you didn't lose your life since that's cliche but you lose the person you loved the most.

There's also the Run the Gauntlet battle style where the players go through several rounds of adversaries before reaching the boss fight; worked great with YYH and DB.  And the dreaded open-ended Collection Quest where you never know how many pieces you need to win, but usually those focus more on adventures than battles. Fortunately shows like Soul Eater don't wear you down with that tedium and jump straight to the more interesting conflicts.

[Angus]

I'd like to hear some recommendations for battle themed shows that are good with animating realistic physical fighting techniques. I remember seeing some wrestling in an episode of Magical Witch Punie-Chan that was fairly decent, but then I had to go watch Master of Martial Hearts (which makes Ikki Tousen look good) where they focused on clothes shredding to boobs for pointless reasons.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

While far from realistic, Hunter X Hunter has very fluidly animated physical fight scenes, which have some element of martial arts to them (at least it seems that way).

In terms of other shows, I've seen some pretty fluid fights in Hajime no Ippo, though sometimes that anime itself can stretch reality, but its probably the most realistic that I've seen from a shonen series.

Other than that, I'm not too sure to be honest. I have seen some shonen series that do have more realistic marital arts or fighting in them, but those ones usually end up having pretty weak animation just like most other shonen series, so it doesn't make much of a difference.

I'm sure that Desensitized could probably recommend something better, though.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Another discussion question....errrr, more like a series of discussion questions, I guess:

What is it about this genre that might usually turn you away from shounen shows? Basically, it could be anything, from the abundance of bad battle shonen manga/shows out there to the plethora or agonizingly bad cliches that plague most shonen series. And a little sub-question I would like to add is: What are some things that you think kill a series that has some potential to be good and would otherwise be entertaining? By that question I basically mean, what is it that some mangaka could do that could take a series that starts out OK enough and then ends up making it completely unreadable or unwatchable?

Also, what are the few exceptions to you (if any exist) among battle shonen series, and why exactly do you find them to be good, or at least entertaining and bearable to watch as opposed to most other battle shonen series out there?

Oh, and we all know that Fist of the North Star and Dragon Ball, for better or worse, are basically the main 2 titles that have influenced most modern shonen up until today. However, if any of you could pick another shonen series that most modern mangaka should take influence from in terms of its stronger aspects, which series would it be? And as far as that question goes, it could be more than one series.

And one final question that I have is which currently running battle manga do any of you guys find to be good? That is, of course, assuming there are any that you guys are currently following that you enjoy enough to recommend.

In this case, I have quite a few things to say myself, so I'll give my own personal answers to my own discussion questions in this thread a little bit later on.

[Avaitor]

I like a good fight scene as much as the next guy. If it takes a couple of episodes to get an epic one across and add some development in there, so be it, but when you end up padding them just to reach a specific episode order, that's when it gets a little annoying to watch. I don't think I have the patience in me to watch whole episodes of powering up like I did when I watched DBZ as a kid, even if the pay off is totally worth it.

I can't really think of any specific cliches that annoy me besides padding. Humor I'm hit or miss on, I guess. I can laugh at some shounen if the series is honestly funny, like Dragon Ball, but constant pervert jokes and nagging like in Inuyasha gets on my nerves. I'm a little forgiving when it comes to fillers since the way the Japanese television market runs is a little different than over here, but unless the filler is worth watching, I'll tend to skip over it, at least during rewatching. And I guess that mostly relies on the staff and how they interpret the characters and story they're adapting.

As for the last two questions, I don't really follow manga and I'd say YYH is my favorite battle manga. I do read Claymore, but I haven't been catching up with it lately, so I don't really know what to say about it right now, and I'll get to why Yu Yu is my personal choice later.