Currently Running Manga Discussion

[VLordGTZ]

Weekly Shonen Jump Issue #22/23, 2019
One Piece (Lead CP)
1. The Promised Neverland
2. Dr. Stone
3. We Never Learn
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba (CP)
4. Jujutsu Kaisen
5. Black Clover
6. Yui Kamio Lets Loose
7. Chainsaw Man
To LOVE-ru -Rito to Ayaka no Houkago- (CP/25p)
8. Act-Age
9. My Hero Academia
10. Haikyu!!
Teenage Renaissance! David
11. The Last Saiyuki
12. Yuuna and the Haunted Hotsprings
13. Hinomaru Sumo
Gisou Buden (CP/47p)
14. Ne0;lation (End)
15. Food Wars: Shokeugeki no Soma
16. Hell Warden Higuma
I'm From Japan

Weekly Shonen Jump Issue #24, 2019
New Series, Cover, & LCP: Samurai 8 (72p)
CP: Haikyu!!, Jujutsu Kaisen, Dr. Stone

Weekly Shonen Jump Issue #25, 2019
New Series: Futari no Taisei by Kentaro Fukuda (Devilyman)

Weekly Shonen Jump Issue #26, 2019
New Series: Beast Children by Kento Terasaka

Weekly Shonen Jump Issue #27, 2019
New Series: Tokyo Shinobi Squad by Yuki Tanaka (story) & Kento Matsura (art)

Looks like Yui Kamio is also staying high in the ToC.  Four new series are coming, so we're bound to see some series end in the next few weeks.

EDIT: Looks like Ne0 ends in this issue.

[VLordGTZ]

Weekly Shonen Jump Issue #24, 2019
Samurai 8: The Tale of Hachimaru (Cover & LCP)
1. One Piece
2. The Promised Neverland
3. Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba
Dr. Stone (CP)
4. We Never Learn
5. Black Clover
6. Act-Age
7. Chainsaw Man
Jujutsu Kaisen (CP)
8. Yui Kamio Lets Loose
9. My Hero Academia
10. Hinomaru Sumo
Teenage Renaissance! David
Haikyu!! (CP)
11. Yuuna and the Haunted Hotsprings
12. The Last Saiyuki
13. Gokutei Higuma (END)
14. Food Wars: Shokugeki no Soma
I'm From Japan

Weekly Shonen Jump Issue #25, 2019
Cover & LCP: Futari no Taisei
CP: Samurai 8 The Tale of Hachimaru, Act-Age, We Never Learn
Break: One Piece; The Promised Neverland

Looks like Yui Kamio is staying high in the ToC, while Saiyuki is sinking to the lower end.  It'll be interesting to see how volume sales turn out for both of them.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Shame to see Saiyuki doing so poorly. I've actually really been enjoying it so far. I suppose, though, that it has a lot of stiff competition in the battle shonen genre, which is why it so easily gets overshadowed by Jump's mainstays in that department, whereas Yui Kamio stands out in genre compared to most other Jump series.

That said, if I've learned anything from these rankings when it comes to new series, it's that you can't always go by initial impressions. There have been some series that have started out low and gained more popularity over time, though that doesn't happen too often. I'm hoping that Saiyuki can prove to be one of the exceptions.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

So, take this with a grain of salt because I don't know if it has actually been confirmed yet, but apparently word is going around that Shokugeki no Soma is concluding in just three chapters, which was announced as of the latest WSJ issue. If that's true, then damn did the axe come down hard on this one. I think we were all pretty much expecting it to wrap up within the year, but usually for a 300+ chapter series it tends to at least get a little more advanced notice of when it's ending, so that would really show how bad things are if the series did indeed get that abrupt of an announcement.

That said....I can't really blame Shueisha for making this decision, and if anything it'd be a mercy kill at this point. The series has sharply declined in quality over the past year (and that's after the series had already fallen out of grace with a significant portion of it's fan-base), and it's weekly rankings along with it's volume sales have continued to sink. If anything, it's kind of surprising that it lasted as long as it has up to this point on such weak legs.

[LumRanmaYasha]

Usually the advance warning for a Jump series conclusion is about 3 to 5 weeks, so this definitely falls on the lower end of that like when Bleach ended. But yeah, it's been clear from sales and the rankings that Soma's been on the chopping block for a while, and I was fully expecting it to end around this time considering a new batch of serializations have started up and Soma's beaten Asahi. This last arc has been pretty superfluous and poorly thought out in the same way the last arc of Hikaru no Go was, in that the series felt directionless after paying off on the character arcs it had been developing since the beginning of the series and beating its central antagonist, and had to invent a new conflict out of nowhere to keep going and kept changing its mind on what to focus on. There've been a few good moments here and there, but the arc has been unsatisfying overall and the series really should've gone out on the high note the conclusion of the Central arc had instead of trying to keep itself going. That said, I'm hoping there's still enough time to do something somewhat satisfying with Soma v. Erina as far as putting a coda on their relationship and rivalry before the series ends, which is the one thing I've always really wanted out of the series' conclusion.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Yeah, but at least with HnG it didn't do anything as dumb as back-pedaling on major character arcs or themes that the series had previously established. It was just another case of a shonen that went on longer than it really needed to.

The thing that feels so insultingly bad about Food Wars is just how damaging the last arc has been to so much of what the series established when it was at it's best. A lot of people really liked Erina's character arc in Central. Even people like me who weren't too keen on that arc and found it to have more flaws than pros would list that as one of the highlights that kept it at least readable. But almost instantly Tsukuda regresses her as a character just to set-up for Soma to "save" her....even though the previous arc subverted that trope by having her be inspired by Soma to save herself. Now she might as well be a typical damsel-in-distress. And I'm not saying that character regression arcs can't be interesting or done well, but it does still have to be the result of reasonable development, however just like Jamie's abysmally disappointing regression in GOT's final season, this all just comes off as really forced and contrived. Likewise, as many people have pointed out, the whole Central series of arcs was heavily focused on Erina as a character and people really wanted a bit of a break from that. However we were immediately thrust into yet another arc about her stupid family drama. There's a reason a bunch of fans have begun jokingly referring to the series as Shokugeki no Erina or Keeping up with the Nakiris.

Likewise, I absolutely detest Asahi as a plot device. I would call him one of the worst villains that I have ever seen in a manga, but I don't want to even give him the credit of acknowledging him as a character. He's nothing more than a plot device with a cheap stock personality that makes you want to punch him in the face rather than an interesting foil for Soma and Erina that Tsukuda probably wanted him to be. Keep in mind that with the exception of Hayama, Soma was never shown to have surpassed any of his other major rivals from the series in one-on-one duels, like Kuga, Shinomiya, Tsukasa, or his dad (who was only built up since the first fucking chapter of the manga). Asahi literally only exists as a way for him to defeat one opponent who is supposedly better than all of those other characters so that Soma can say he has surpassed all of his rivals by proxy. However on top of being a thoroughly unsatisfying resolution to those rivalries, it also rings hollow and feels like complete bull-shit. I had absolutely no emotional reaction to Soma's defeat of Asahi, which is supposed to be the penultimate match of the entire series. That's pretty darn bad for a series that was once a fan-favorite in WSJ.

If Tuskuda plans to keep having a manga career after this whole fiasco, he really needs to learn from all of the mistakes that he started making from Central onward, as it caused a cascading downward spiral that he could eventually never recover from. Once good manga falling apart as the series progresses is nothing new by any means, especially for WSJ, but I don't know that I've seen too many other series (besides the most obvious example) that have fallen quite as hard as this one has.

[LumRanmaYasha]

I definitely agree the execution has been messy, though my problem with it is more that I was never convinced Erina was ever really in need of saving. While I definitely don't like that she's been treated like a prize to be won in the rivalry between Soma and Asahi, there was never any indication that Asahi could've actually beaten Erina, and she still participated in the Blue on her own terms. And even if Asahi beat her, it's not like he can force Erina to marry him, so those stakes have felt completely flat throughout the arc (beyond just being uninteresting in their own right). What's added personal stakes for Erina in all of this is her mother's involvement and her wanting to win the Blue to make her mother eat her cooking, and I feel that situation can only be resolved with her making a dish that her mother accepts, which is how I'm hoping this plays out and think could still be satisfying.

As far as her character arc regressing, even though Megumi claims in-series that Erina is "worse than she was before," the way in which she regressed in a bit more nuanced. At the start of the series, Erina thought of herself as a perfect cook and looked down on other people and dismissed their skills in cooking. Her character arc in central was letting go of that perception of herself as superior and learning to appreciate other people and their idiosyncrasies and imperfections, and enjoy cooking instead of viewing it as an exercise of perfection. In her match with Takumi, she only chastises him for not teaming up with his brother to take her on, upset that he isn't taking the challenge of facing her seriously by using all the tools at his disposal, because after talking with her mother and realizing the situation winning the Blue has become a personal matter for her. At the end, she doesn't criticize Takumi's dish - it's her dish that she's disgusted by and dumps in the trash. And it's not like we've seen her treat her friends poorly or anything - she's just been cold and kept to herself because understandably she's feeling a lot of negative emotions right now. So it's not like she's become the same arrogant and uptight character she was at the start of the series. The "regression" she experiences is specifically that she's not enjoying the act of cooking like she has been since befriending Soma and co., and I think that's pretty understandable under the circumstances - confronting her absentee mother who treats her like dirt and dismisses her cooking ability and who blames her for not being able to enjoy food anymore, which understandably resurfaced a ton of bitterness and resentment. Having dealt with an abusive parent, I can empathize with the emotions we've seen her dwelling in and think the self-hating way she's been lashing out has been very believable. This kind of emotional relapse makes sense for someone who has suffered trauma and been a victim of abuse like Erina has. Honestly, I think Erina's arc is the one thing that's been consistent throughout the entire series, and her relationship with her mother has been the one idea I've really liked in this arc.

As far as how other fans feel about Erina's prominence in the series, I guess that's just a matter of different interests. I like Soma, I get he's who the series is named after and whatever, but Erina's always been the character whose development I've been most interested and invested in. I wish the series had been Shokugeki no Erina from the start! But that said, it's not like the focus on her is unwarranted either - she's the deuteragonist of the series, and the central relationship/rivalry between her and Soma has been in play since the very beginning. It's not like Soma's been out of the spotlight or anything, the story has still been plenty about him - it's just that he's so frustratingly flippant about everything that's been going on it feels like none of this has mattered to him. Erina's desire to make her mother acknowledge her is really the only thing providing this arc with any sort of emotional stakes that can be satisfyingly resolved, though whether it will be remains to be seen.

I completely agree about Asahi through. Very unsatisfying and lazily developed proxy for Soma to vicariously beat his other rivals. I do think the flashback in the recent chapter provided a nugget of an interesting idea to his character - that he sought to marry Erina in envy of Joichiro's family, feeling emotionally unfulfilled and hoping to achieve the same happiness that Joichiro has by starting a family of his own - focusing on his idea that he'll find the most satisfaction in himself and his cooking if he has someone to cook for. Now if only this had been established beforehand and was actually developed like a proper character arc instead of tacked on at the end to try and make his actions more sensible in retrospect. 

For as much as I haven't enjoyed this arc, I haven't really soured on the series or think Tsukuda's ruined his career as a mangaka or anything. I think he's just made a lot of bad choices, and it's felt like his editors have also been giving him bad ideas and forcing him to keep changing how the story is paced and what the goal and stakes are too. I enjoyed the series a lot at its peak and still do, but I don't really feel "insulted" by this arc. I just think its ideas have been mostly kinda lame, with the conflict between Erina and her mother the one good idea I've been able to be invested in. I haven't really been able to get mad at it the same way I fumed about Naruto and Bleach all those years ago, and that might just be because nowadays I think most long-running shonen series at their worst are only ever just boring. For as many bad ideas as it's had, it's not like the series has been expressing any sort of hateful ideology or toxic messages or anything - it's just a dumb manga about people cooking with chainsaws and stealing knives. So with FW, this arc really has felt like the final arc of HnG to me in being just kinda an unnecessary extension of a series that had a good place to end and didn't really know what to do with itself afterward. I've just never gotten angry at it, only bored or disappointed.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

As I said before, I don't necessarily have a problem with character regression in and of itself. You can call it nuanced, but to me the reason it doesn't work is due to the rushed nature of the story-telling. I'm well-aware of how this version of Erina is supposed to be different from her previous pre-central self, but the reason it loses any real impact on me other than pissing me off is because we spent nearly a hundred chapters of Erina essentially moving past her childhood trauma and becoming a better person for it. The hope was that the next arc would further explore Erina as an overall better person and a leader, but instead Tsukuda almost immediately turned her into a depressed husk of her former self to be a trophy to be fought over. It lacks the kind of impact that he probably intended because he didn't first take the time to establish a new status quo where Erina was being light-hearted and friendly with everyone. I mean, yes, we got maybe a few chapters of that, but not nearly enough for it to mean anything when all this shit went down. You can even tell that Tsukuda realized this and had to hastily include a quick flash-back scene to show how happy she was during the months that were time-skipped in the story (personally, I would have rather read about that than all of this nonsense). Also, with the Takumi match, he clearly was taking it seriously. He has a thing called pride and would rather lose with his own strength than use an unfair advantage. You just said that the purpose of Erina's character arc in Central was to shed her superiority complex and accept her friends, and that this arc didn't backpedal on that, yet she openly insults Takumi for not using his brother because of the "level of difference in their skills" and then proceeds to call her own dish trash after utterly destroying Takumi's efforts. How is that not incredibly insulting and condescending to her opponent?

And I understand you're rationale for why Erina's character arc here is supposed to be understandable since deep down she wants to be able to please her mother with her own cooking. I don't have a problem with this in concept, but rather in execution. I find it hard to give a shit about a character's plight that was never previously foreshadowed or alluded to earlier in the series and was clearly pulled out of thin air to try and boost ratings. May I remind you that this whole sub-plot regarding Erina's relationship with her mother was introduced less than 20 chapters ago and now somehow has to be concluded within just three more in addition to the rest of the entire series. It's really hard for me to care about or empathize with her situation as a character when it's so half-assedly rushed through and so poorly thought out. Like, if this was such a big part of her childhood trauma, how the fuck does it not come up during the very arc dealing with her childhood trauma in Central? And I think that we both know that the clear answer is that Tsukuda clearly hadn't come up with this idea until just recently, but it's so poorly woven into the overarching story of the series that it feels on par with one of those very lazy Toriyama retcons that you'd get in the later years of Dragonball.

Also, I should clarify that people jokingly referring to the series as Shokugeki no Erina isn't because they think that she takes the spotlight away from Soma. It's because she also renders almost all other established supporting characters completely useless. Keep in mind that all of Erina's family drama and this Asahi BS has essentially come at the cost of both Megumi and Takumi's character arcs. Takumi's longstanding rivalry with Soma was essentially wrapped up in a half-assed flashback. And all of that talk about Megumi's untapped potential amounted to absolutely nothing. Let's all take a second to realize that she has essentially lost her last two major matches of the entire manga, and the very last one didn't even show her actually cooking! It just skipped straight to the results! The one match that we did see her win was also completely off-screened except for one cheap fan-service panel. And come to think of it, why couldn't we have seen Soma take on Takumi and Tsukasa here in Blue? It's literally set up for it as a tournament arc. Why did one have to get fed to Erina and the other be fodder for Asahi when they were both well-established rivals of Soma? It's not like either Erina or Asahi needed to be hyped up anymore as we had already previously been demonstrated how top-tier their skills were.

Keep in mind, Erina is far from my only problem with the arc and she's not even the biggest one. We are both fans of battle and sports shonen series, and I think we can both agree that one of the most appealing aspects of these kinds of series is seeing the protagonist overcome hurdle after hurdle as well as surpassing strong opponents after past defeats, one at a time, getting stronger by a level of progress with each battle. With Soma, though, he never solo'd ANY of his past defeats before Asahi except for Hayama, and then all of a sudden he's given a single win which is supposed to put him above all of those opponents in one shot. Personally, I would have rather seen the version where he actually rises through the ranks naturally. Which, while I'm at it, yes, I think it was complete BS and totally unearned that he became first seat at the end of Central. I would have complained about the people at Blue not taking the first seat of a highly esteemed and well established and regarded institution seriously enough, but at least on that front I can't really complain given the questionable circumstances of how he even got that position in the first place.

I also was never a fan of Erina as headmaster, or how OP she was written to be in general. I could completely buy her as by far the best student in Tootsuki's entire history, but to put her above the level of far more seasoned and experienced chefs just feels wrong to me, God-Tongue or not. How much more interesting would it have been if she was made first seat instead, but still had to work on equal footing with her newfound friends through various challenges that even put her advanced abilities to the test, and she further bonded with her classmates that way?

I can respect your opinion on the matter at hand, but I personally just can't get behind any of the writing or decisions made for this arc. I personally can't put HnG's final arc on the same level as this one because to me it's only real crime was being ultimately kind of meaningless, but the same is true for a lot of shonen that go on a bit too long. Nothing stood out to me as outright atrocious about it. I've given my reasons here, but I do personally think that the Blue arc really damages a lot of what was good about the series to the point where I don't even feel like going back to the earlier stuff knowing that certain things that I was looking forward to will never pan out in a satisfying way.

[LumRanmaYasha]

I agree with you that the pacing has been rushed, which hasn't allowed the storytelling to progress naturally and come at the expense of good ideas and characters falling to the wayside. We really didn't need to have Takumi job to Erina or Tsukasa and Megumi job to Asahi, since we already knew they were skilled. Megumi getting the shaft, in particular, bummed me out, since she's she's second only to Erina in being my favorite character and having the best character development in the series, and it's a shame we'll never get to see her reach her full potential now.

To me the story choices made in the series these past few months have been a clear sign that Tsukuda was given the heads up to wrap the series up a few months back, and has been scrambling to get rid of the characters he didn't know what to do with to focus on the central conflict between Soma and Asahi and Erina and her mother as quickly as possible, and he made the worst decisions on what to do with those characters with the time he had left. In general, I think it's pretty unfortunate that so much of FW's cast has gotten the shaft because of lack of time, planning, and probable editorial interference. Though, I can't blame him for wanting to prioritize Erina as a character over the rest of the supporting cast knowing the series was heading towards the end, considering she is the deuteragonist and the relationship between her and Soma has been at the series' core since it's beginning, so the pieces needed to fall into place to get to a conclusion where that gets resolved. It's not surprising to me that he would also decide to introduce characters like Erina's mother and Soma's mother to just execute those long-standing story ideas and try his best to integrate them meaningfully into the story, even though the way it's been done leaves a lot to be desired. I don't agree with most of the story decisions in this arc, but I can sorta understand the thought process behind them, as flawed as that thought process has been.

I'll also clarify that I think Erina's relationship with her mother and that development in her arc is a good idea, which isn't to say I think it's one that's been developed that well. I agree the execution has been too rushed to really let it develop, and I would've preferred if we'd have had more arcs depicting Erina's growth as a leader and if more direct foreshadowing of the emotional scars her mother's absence inflicted upon her had been established. I also wish there wasn't a time skip and we could've had an arc directly after the fall of central to see Erina adjust into her new administrative role while the other characters fought over seats on the Council and we saw them really earn those spots, which could've been a lot of fun and a satisfying a way to have matches that won't get payed off on at this point like Soma v. Takumi or even a 1v1 Soma v. Tsukasa before the latter graduated. But I actually really liked Erina becoming the Dean and I think they could've done plenty of interesting things with her in that kind of administrative role, taking the charge on dealing with other threats both internal to Totsuki and from other culinary institutions in the world, coming up with strategies to deal with Totsuki's foes from behind the scenes while Soma and co. fought shokugekis on the front lines. It seemed like that was the direction it was supposed to go at the start of this arc and it's a shame that Tsukuda didn't follow through with that.


Though I will say that I interpreted Erina and Takumi's exchange before their match much differently, and actually liked it a lot as a character moment for her. When she asks Takumi why he isn't cooking with his brother, it's in the context of what she knows her mother is interested in  "The Book Master is, I'm sure...quite enamored with your freakish talent for cooperative cooking. Why not put it on display for her?" While she's giving Takumi a backhanded compliment here, the way she frames her question makes it clear that what she's really upset and thinking about is that her mother is interested in everyone else's skills but dismisses her own. She doesn't say Takumi needs his brother to beat her because he's not skilled enough, she just asks why he's not using the advantage that she knows her mother permitted. If Takumi had responded he thought he could beat Erina without his brother, maybe her response would be different, but he doesn't say that. He admits Erina is "more skilled than [he] is right now" and that he wants to "give this [his] all, challenging [himself] against [his] betters." The way Takumi states his case here makes it seem like he isn't going into this match with the intention of beating Erina, just to "challenge" her. Of course, that isn't wrong of him to want to do - like you said, he has his own pride and thinks teaming up with his brother would be unfair against one opponent. But for Takumi, he's only going into this match for the challenge, while Erina is bringing much more baggage into it. Winning the Blue has become a personal matter for her - she wants to win to prove to her mother her cooking prowess, so understandably she's become competitive. Erina responds to Takumi by saying "If you truly mean to beat me, you wouldn't spout drivel at me like that!" - and she's not wrong, because from Takumi's words it seems like winning was not his priority, when it is for Erina and under these circumstances it makes sense why she would be upset that he isn't being more competitive, at least from her perspective, which is I think the key thing to keep in mind. From our perspective as the reader we know that Takumi doesn't take Erina lightly, but her headspace is in the wrong place because she has tunnel vision stewing over her interaction with her mother just minutes before. Never once does she directly criticize Takumi's cooking ability, and she doesn't even imply that they are on different skill levels. Really, what she's mad about is that he says his skills are lesser than hers and isn't going into the match with the intention of beating her, which I think makes sense for her to feel upset by considering the circumstances. Sure, calling her own dish trash after beating Takumi is bad sportsmanship, but she clearly has other things on her mind right now, and I think the way that's been expressed through her interactions with other characters and her actions have been believable. We might just have to disagree on this, but this is how I interpreted the scene personally. One thing I will say is that even though I haven't liked how the characters have been used in this arc, I also haven't felt they've done anything out of character or made a bad decision that I wouldn't expect them to make (not that they haven't made any bad decisions at all, just ones that I can buy that they would), so I'll give Tsukuda credit for that at least.

I dunno, while I agree the arc has been a mess, it hasn't soured me on the series as a whole. I haven't felt anything in it has really hurt my appreciation for the earlier stuff that would discourage me from rereading it. Maybe a few years ago that would've been the case - I remember we argued about this once with the final arc of Kuroko's Basketball before, where I claimed that I wouldn't be able to recommend the series because of how much I hated that final match. But I don't really stand by that stance anymore, and my perspective on long-running series have changed since then, where I'm more willing to separate a series highs from its lows, especially if there is a clear stopping point between arcs where I feel I've gotten everything I've wanted out of the story and the stuff beyond is just a bonus I can take or leave. For me, Food Wars! reached its emotional climax when they beat Central and Erina victoriously said "Happy to serve!" standing center in that big two-page spread of all the protagonists, and since then the only thing I've really wanted to see happen since has been Megumi getting a win to show off her skills and Soma v. Erina as the final match of the series, and at this point I'm just hoping I'll at least like the latter well enough.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

I was also looking forward to Soma vs. Erina, but I'm not quite sure how it's possible for Tsukuda to make anything satisfying come out of it when he only has three chapters left. While we as readers have been informed of the series ending just now, Tsukuda would have been notified of it months ago, as you proposed. I would imagine it was during the beach exams arc which would explain why he abruptly cut that short and rushed straight into Blue out of seemingly nowhere.

That said, if he knew about this then it begs the question of why he saw fit to give Soma vs. Asahi so many chapters as opposed to a match that was significantly more foreshadowed and hyped since early on in the series.

As for predictions, I personally like the prediction that some fans have brought up that this match won't end with a real winner, but instead Soma will try and make a dish to compliment Erina's and through their combined efforts will create a synergy that impresses Erina's mother with a flavor that's completely new to her, or at least that snaps her out of her condition. It would call back to the RdC finals, but instead of making two dishes that clash in an interesting way, Soma will show some of his own character growth and forgoe simply winning the match in order to help Erina. He stated that his inheritance of Yukihira (the restaurant) would be on the line with him having to win the whole competition, but prioritizing cooking for someone important to him over his own personal goals will both fulfill his father's advice from the beginning of the series and at least make it feel like his character finally learned something about life from his time in Tootsuki. In doing so, this may snap Erina out of her depression and she would essentially return the favor by fulfilling one of his other major goals to have her admit that he is a good chef.

That is, of course, wishful thinking on my part. I honestly have no clue how Tsukuda will really end all of this given how little time is left.

[Painted Outlaw]

So, according to this, Boruto is filling the hole Shougeki is going to leave open. Looks like it's seeming more likely now that SnS having only 3 more chapters is true.

[LumRanmaYasha]

I was also looking forward to Soma vs. Erina, but I'm not quite sure how it's possible for Tsukuda to make anything satisfying come out of it when he only has three chapters left. While we as readers have been informed of the series ending just now, Tsukuda would have been notified of it months ago, as you proposed. I would imagine it was during the beach exams arc which would explain why he abruptly cut that short and rushed straight into Blue out of seemingly nowhere.

That said, if he knew about this then it begs the question of why he saw fit to give Soma vs. Asahi so many chapters as opposed to a match that was significantly more foreshadowed and hyped since early on in the series.

As for predictions, I personally like the prediction that some fans have brought up that this match won't end with a real winner, but instead Soma will try and make a dish to compliment Erina's and through their combined efforts will create a synergy that impresses Erina's mother with a flavor that's completely new to her, or at least that snaps her out of her condition. It would call back to the RdC finals, but instead of making two dishes that clash in an interesting way, Soma will show some of his own character growth and forgoe simply winning the match in order to help Erina. He stated that his inheritance of Yukihira (the restaurant) would be on the line with him having to win the whole competition, but prioritizing cooking for someone important to him over his own personal goals will both fulfill his father's advice from the beginning of the series and at least make it feel like his character finally learned something about life from his time in Tootsuki. In doing so, this may snap Erina out of her depression and she would essentially return the favor by fulfilling one of his other major goals to have her admit that he is a good chef.

That is, of course, wishful thinking on my part. I honestly have no clue how Tsukuda will really end all of this given how little time is left.

I really love that theory! I think that would be the most satisfying resolution to the lingering threads that need to be resolved between Soma and Erina and showcase how they've grown since the beginning of the series. Crossing my fingers that they go in a direction like that.

I think the series really started to feel like it was entering "final arc" territory when Erina's mother was introduced a few months back. Before that, the focus had kept shifting early on in the arc, but to me that read as editorial interference - ill-thought-out attempts to spice things up to attract more reader interest. The way in which the series sped to get to Asahi vs Soma very shortly after Erina's mom came into the picture after having spent a lot more time on the matches early in the Blue signaled to me something was up and that Tsukuda was trying to get to the climax of the arc - and the end of the series - as fast as possible.

So, according to this, Boruto is filling the hole Shougeki is going to leave open. Looks like it's seeming more likely now that SnS having only 3 more chapters is true.

Viz's schedule confirms it, though their chapter count is off by two for some reason. I think it's a good move to make Boruto bi-weekly so they can tell more of the story in less time, though I suppose that depends on whether or not the chapters will now be half the length they were before.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

So SnS/Food Wars just got an announcement with the release of it's final scheduled chapter in Jump that it will be getting a fourth season to finish up the RdC arc and will be running three epilogue chapters in Jump Giga, in case anyone was wondering what the special announcement would be.

[VLordGTZ]

The news has been out for a few days, but Hinomaru Sumo will most likely end in the next issue.

Kawada should be able to wrap everything up with the next chapter, so it will hopefully be a satisfying ending.  Overall, I've loved Professional Sumo arc, and if all goes well, Hinomaru will probably end up being a new favorite of mine.

[Spark Of Spirit]

A lot of series have been ending recently in Jump, but not much has been sticking.

Hope they get a hit soon!