skygiants | (no subject)

Sooooo after several months of experiencing Attack on Titan secondhand on Tumblr, I finally decided to read the manga firsthand. I just wanted to get the jokes! I did not expect to get emotionally invested. THE MORE FOOL I.

For anyone who has escaped the phenomenon to date, Attack on Titan is a shonen manga, and, recently, anime series about a world in which humanity lives inside walls and is menaced by cheerful man-eating giants who make no biological sense. (The fact that they make no biological sense is a plot point.)

It is kind of ridiculous, and kind of nihilist (lots of chewed-up death) but I really like it! I have grown really terribly fond of all the asshole and/or idiot teenagers who mostly vibrate between being DEEPLY PERPLEXED and DEEPLY FULL OF RAGE at a universe that is terrible because a.) it makes no sense and they are likely to be eaten at any moment and b.) they are teenagers. Normally I get frustrated by stories full of stupid teenagers, but in this case it charms me, mostly because nobody is trying to pretend they are anything other than terrible. At one point late in the manga, one character attempts to curb her girlfriend's action suicide by shouting at her, "YOU'RE THE PERSON WITH THE WORST PERSONALITY IMAGINABLE! DON'T THROW YOUR LIFE AWAY!" This is completely accurate, except there are SO MANY CONTENDERS for "worst personality imaginable." I am deeply fond of all of them. Even the antagonists. ESPECIALLY the antagonists. ALL THE SAD TITAN CHILDREN ARE MY FAVORITES. ;___; (There are a few nice ones! Mostly they are developing into Machiavellian manipulation machines, though, so "nice" depends on how you look at it.)

The story also has a structure that -- I think is maybe common to shonen? This is the structure where you start out following one SHONEN PROTAGONIST with one fairly simple action goal in a secondary fantasy world of some sort that works by certain rules; then the focus starts pulling back, introducing more characters with more information, and it turns out that a.) there is some VERY LARGE AND SINISTER CONSPIRACY at work that means that the rules of the fantasy world are not what our protagonist or anyone else has hitherto believed and b.) our protagonist's fairly simple goal is not actually all that important at all in the grand scheme of things.

It turns out this is a structure I really like! It tends to feature large casts, puzzle-box worldbuilding, and universes that do not revolve around the protagonist, all of which I appreciate. It also applies to Fullmetal Alchemist and Claymore, which are the other two shonen that I've read all the way through -- but, I mean, I don't know a ton about common shonen structure, and I'm working off a very small sample size here. You guys who have more range, what would you say? Is this actually a common pattern with shonen, or did I just luck out?

(Non-shonen stories I would say follow this structure to a certain extent: the Steerswoman series, Gunnerkrigg Court. Now also taking recommendations for other stuff that fits this model!)

Crossposts: http://bookelfe.livejournal.com/351137.html

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

inkstone

It's a structure of shounen, not necessarily common to shounen, especially when you start taking into account which magazines (and hence, which editorial influences) are at play. I'd say SnK follows the structure of monthly shounen serializations over the weekly ones. FMA and Claymore are also monthly serializations and SnK has more in structural commonalities with them than the weeklies (One Piece, Naruto, Fairy Tail).

From:

gramarye1971

I'm not very far along in SnK, but from what I've seen/read so far I definitely agree that it hits more of the monthly serial structure. Which allows it to buck some of the more standard shounen tropes, or simply have them not work when the protagonists try to follow them. (And I always appreciate that in a series -- there's a part of me that tends to rejoice when protagonists or antagonists aren't rewarded by the narrative for following the tropes.)

From:

skygiants

(ME TOO. Maybe this makes me a little bit of a sadist, but I always enjoy when people try something SUPER SHONEN and it fails horribly. And SnK delivers on that admirably!)

What else would you say falls into that monthly serial structure?

From:

gramarye1971

A fair amount of series that have been adapted from novels/light novels work with the monthly structure (the Index/Railgun series or Seirei no Moribito, for instance). Of those that are manga-original, something like Gunslinger Girl or Pumpkin Scissors definitely have a monthly serial structure.

It's also interesting to look at seinen manga and see some that have the more shounen-typical weekly structure like Naruto or Bleach. For all that Kami no Shizuku (that wine manga I gave up on collecting) is aimed at an older and presumably more sophisticated audience, it's totally a weekly serial with less beating up bad guys and more snarking about ridiculously expensive bottles of wine.

From:

skygiants

Pumpkin Scissors! HOW DID I FORGET PUMPKIN SCISSORS, of which I have read everything available in English, and which follows this structure almost one hundred percent -- though has the unique property that I am more interested in the individual protagonists and their goals than in the wider story.

From:

skygiants

Yeah, I've watched some of the Fairy Tail anime and it does feel very different! But I hadn't quite put my finger on the monthly/weekly distinction before. That makes sense, though; I would imagine that long-range timelines give you more time to work out complex serial plots instead of delivering adventure-of-the-month action hits.

From:

damselfish

I didn't realize we had such similar taste! I am totally digging SNK (thanks, tumblr!) and the only other manga I really read are Claymore and Ao no Exorcist (which is a very different shonen).

And the teenagers aren't all that stupid, given their situations. I mean they make a lot of bad choices but... idk I have lots of forgiveness for them.

I gotta say it's one of the few manga that can actually creep me out. It's mostly the titan designs aaaauuugh some of those designs. Blood and gore whatever--and man some of this gore is unique (tumblr are you really shipping Jean/mangled-corpse-of-friend? My God, you are)--but cartoony long arms NOOOOOO AUGH.

From:

skygiants

For once: THANKS, TUMBLR.

Oh, I have tons of forgiveness for them too. I'm thinking mostly of, like, Sasha and Connie goofing off when they're all clearly in quarantine, or Reiner making dumb titan jokes, or Eren and Jean's ETERNAL AND ETERNALLY FUTILE RAGE.

It doesn't actually creep me out as much as, say, Pumpkin Scissors -- body horror doesn't get me as much as psychological -- but it makes me way sadder than I expected! KIIIIIIDS.

From:

kd7sov

I'd nominate the Mistborn trilogy by Brandon Sanderson as another example, and also a thing you should read because everyone should read it.

It's certainly not a perfect fit - the "fairly simple goal" is, in fact, the assassination of an immortal emperor who's ruled the known world with an iron fist for a thousand years (which, now that I think about it, is actually a surprisingly common objective for Sanderson characters - "kill the invincible one!"), and isn't all that unimportant, and also [SPOILER] - but I think it works with what you describe.

Also the main protagonist is a girl who starts out extraordinary, is world-class astounding by the middle of the second book, and goes on from there. So I think you'd enjoy it.

From:

skygiants

I've heard good things about Sanderson -- thanks for the rec!

From:

mneme

Hmm.

One Piece sort of does and sort of doesn't fit this model (the world keeps getting bigger and stranger, but oddly, our hero's goal, which -had- seemed ridiculous and implausible at the beginning, gets -more- relevant over time, rather than less).

Gurren Lagan, what I saw of it [as anime], exactly does follow this model, if in a somewhat simplistic form.

From:

skygiants

Yeah, I mean, I think in weekly-type serials -- a la Fairy Tail, which is my main experience with it -- the world does constantly expand, but the newly-revealed properties of the world don't necessarily shape the overall plot so much as provide excuses for mini-arcs.

From:

cahn

...this is also a structure that I really like! At least, it's one of the things that has made me fall forever in love with Gunnerkrigg Court, now that you mention it :)

So clearly I need to fix the part where I have not read any shonen at all! Where should I begin? Attack on Titan? Fullmetal Alchemist?

(John M. Ford's novels kind of fit this. I can't think of anything else offhand.)

From:

skygiants

oh man FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST. I will always recommend beginning with FMA, although there is the danger that it can ruin people for most other shonen by virtue of really being that good.

From:

shati

I clicked on this work on my phone at work, got impatient when it took a while to load, and put the phone away. As I was leaving I turned my phone on again and there was GIANT NAKED CANNIBAL MANCHILD staring at me.

How long did it take you to catch up on the manga? I ask, having not finished the anime yet. But sad spoiler children!

From:

skygiants

You don't know how long I spent this morning looking for a picture of an appropriately goofy-looking cannibal manchild! I'M GLAD YOU APPRECIATE MY EFFORTS.

Ummm only a few days I think! But I put it on my Kindle and basically zoomed through three or four volumes a day, especially once I got to all the arcs that delved more into the SAD SPOILER CHILDREN.

From:

esmenet

just popping in to say ANNIE IS THE BEST!

also Ymir and Krista because GIRLFRIENDS but Annie does not get enough love.

From:

skygiants

Oh man, I LOVE ANNIE TREMENDOUSLY. My love for Annie is approximately as great as Annie's disinterest in the rest of the world. BABY.

From:

lacewood

I have refused to read/watch Attack of Titans until the series is actually complete because I don't think I can take the nihilism and body count until I know how the endgame will turn out >_> (also the reason I decided not to read Game of Thrones, which in hindsight I feel was a VERY WISE CHOICE)

On the shounen structure, other people have already pointed out the differences in monthly vs weekly structures (I hadn't thought of it that way, but it does make sense) Weekly series don't all follow this structure, but what I think they share is the pulling back and expansion of the world? Especially with long-running series, I guess because it's hard to stretch an action plot past the first 10 volumes if you don't have a fairly large world for it to explore.

Double Arts was a weekly series that I think WAS going to fit this structure but they cancelled it after 24 chapters ahgdhfjfkf. For monthly series, Tegami Bachi/Letter Bee also follows this structure, I think, and Ao no Exorcist with some differences (though in both cases the protags do/will turn out to have fairly central roles in their worlds, I'm pretty sure)

From:

skygiants

PROBABLY WISE INDEED. Now I am one of those people who is dreading the next eight-year wait until resolution. ;___; (On the other hand, I am A-OK with having read Game of Thrones early, because now I get to enjoy the jokes without feeling like I have to read ANY MORE of it.)

What I find super interesting about the monthly shonen structure I've been talking about is the fact that the world doesn't just expand, but in some sense pulls the rug out from under you -- like, in FMA the energy that alchemists use turns out to be DEAD PEOPLE, in Claymore what looks like a whole world turns out to be an island with a bigger world around it that nobody knows about. It's this sense of mystery/conspiracy that shapes the story.

From:

dimestore_romeo

Okay, I've had the anime open in a tab for months and now I am definitely getting around to watching it!

From:

skygiants

I hope you enjoy it! :D

From:

ghost_lingering

Oh my gosh, a friend of mine was just telling me about this. He said: oh hey, I've been watching this anime I think you'd like, it's about giant naked men with no genitals who like to eat people!

And I said: ...are they they antagonists?

And he said: Yes. It made me think of you.

IDEK.

But anyway, thank you for this post as now I know the title! He had told me but I immediately forgot it because I was too busy thinking of it as the giant naked men with no genitals who like to eat people anime.

From:

skygiants

To be fair, if

shati hadn't seen this before I did, I would probably have said almost that same sentence word-for-word to her. Anyway, YOU'RE WELCOME. That description is accurate. Though admittedly very occasionally there are giant naked women with no genitals who also like to eat people.