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Oct. 10th, 2013 10:02 amSooooo 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. ( spoiler ) (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!)
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. ( spoiler ) (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!)
