Random manga chatter

[Merc]

Hajime no Ippo has been puttering along for like 200+ chapters, but it may finally start picking up again thanks to the awesome Volg.

Spoiler: ShowHide

Not only did he just get a world championship fight, he -won- (and he totally deserves it after his history), and both Ippo and Sendo are fired up as a result of watching that.

Takamura is also clearly insightful and can tell Ippo has been sucking ass, because he calls out to Sendo that Ippo has gotten worse, which will hopefully mean he does actually get better.

On the minus side, Ippo finally relinquishing the japanese title means that Itagaki will get a shot at it. I hope to god he gets creamed by Hoshi or Imai (or whomever he fights for it, but preferably one of those two), but I don't have much hope of that.

[Dracos]

Well, it also means Itagaki won't be whining anymore about beating Ippo?

Hopefully?

Either way, Ippo has an opponent, a pile of issues, and two other badasses in front of him paving the way.  If the series fails to turn around positively on this, I think it could honestly be said it's dead.  There's a clear road to a world championship arc going on, and if it veers off it, then they've lost itself.

I don't think Itakagi is ever going to be allowed to lose again unless he jumps ship and fights Ippo.  If he does, I hope he gets retired.  :P

[Dracos]

Maoyuu Maou Yuusha (The good one) continues to delight.  It's been an excellent run.  The general positive vibe is a joy to read.

Sengoku Youku wraps up the shogun arc.  Like many characters, he came onto the scene as a badass and stayed as one for his whole arc.  The heroes grew and learned and basically the story returns to chasing down the thousand tailed fox.

Anyone else read Sengoku btw?  I miss having folks to yammer with about it.

[Grahf]

I just watched the Tv Tropes Naruto thread implode due to the latest chapter. It was really something. I wish I could tell you what that something was.

[Brian]

A whole new level of stupid, surpassing Kishimoto's previous best since the Izanagi/Izanami thing.

[Dracos]

What is worth not spoiling about Naruto?

[Grahf]

I was more referring to what happened to the thread, rather than the content of the chapter itself.

Basically, among other things

Spoiler: ShowHide

Minato can use the Kyuubi cloak, Sasuke wants to be Hokage, Madara continues to be lovesick for Hashirama, Minato asks Naruto if Sakura was his girlfriend which Naruto answers yes for a comedy moment (this applies more to NaruHina shippers).

[Merc]

I actually enjoyed that chapter. Except for the cloak thing, all the others I thought were amusing.

Spoiler: ShowHide

The cloak thing was just dumb, out of nowhere, unnecessary, and takes away Naruto's one unique move. Considering his reputation, history, and already overpowered skillset, why was one added?

Sasuke being Hokage is hilarious, because -everybody- realizes just how crazy that is, but it's still a valid development of his conversation with the other four hokages. And Kiba's point is pretty important: How would he -ever- become Hokage, after all the crap he's done? Now, if he actually did become Hokage? That -would- be stupid definitely.

I also liked the Team 7 reunion, and Sakura actually standing besides them instead of getting left behind. I'm always a sucker for heroines that manage to get out of the 'I need to be rescued!' state. Wasn't super realistically handled with Sakura and the timeskip, but still, it's the thought that counts.

I do hope that once the battle ends, she sucker punches Sasuke into unconsciousness for trying to kill her before, showing that even if she still has feelings for him, she didn't just forget what he did but was just setting that thought aside for the bigger threat.

[Brian]

Right, but that hilights the worst part of it, Merc.

Spoiler: ShowHide

Sakura standing up is cool.  Team 7 reuniting is a thing.  But Sakura is so far out of her league there it's absurd; she can't compete with a cooperative Kyuubi and an Uchihax.  Plus, Kishimoto doesn't let female characters be capable and competent anyway -- she's Mobile Liability Girl, Sakura-chan, able to henshin from an incompetent (but observant) ninja into a hostage at a moment's notice.

Granted, Kishimoto could be himself and suddenly do something both inconsistent and illogical: make Sakura, a weak-chakra nobody with no boosts like the Kyuubi or the Sharingan just as powerful as the people who do have it....  But what does she have to offer from going toe-to-toe over being intelligent?  It'd be more sensible for her to coordinate and have Hinata watch from a safe distance while Ino relays information (Sakura, of course, could make the all important inferences and solve puzzles) -- and no one who doesn't have hax level powers needs to put themselves at risk.

Or screw common sense and decent planning, must put 'team seven' back together.

Honestly, the way Naruto basically offhandedly rejected Hinata was what really got me, though.  'Cause he's someone who would sure offhandedly reject someone, right?

[Merc]

I don't quite agree.

Spoiler: ShowHide

Sakura probably -will- be a liability during the fight, but I wouldn't call her incompetent either. Inconsistent, yes, but incompetent, no. She hasn't been that since before the timeskip, or at least that's what we're supposed to believe.

The timeskip unfortunately, while it did power her up, did not do so very realistically, but that factor aside, she's definitely capable and has taken out one S-class criminal before. Even if it was with assistance and someone she matched up with well because of her profession, it was still someone who had taken out a kage before. And we -know- what kind of monsters kages are (Konoha's just tend to be more monstrous).

There's also the fact that the chapter outright stated that she's been storing energy for something big. I'd suspect that yes, it can give her a brief burst to compete with Naruto and Sasuke, but unlike their overpowered stuff, hers probably won't last, and it'll probably crash at a crappy moment, triggering the liability effect. She'll still kick butt for a while and probably save Sasuke or Naruto once. Probably. Hard to tell with Kishimoto, he's terrible with women and as mentioned he has done a lot of inconsistencies with her character.

As for Hinata...well, given that her face doesn't show any heartbreak or anything? I suspect she didn't take it seriously, probably thinking Naruto was just being Naruto.

Anyway, even if it wasn't a joke? She's known for ages that he likes Sakura. She -still- likes him. Just like Naruto still likes Sakura even though Hinata has confessed to him and he knows Sakura still has stupid feelings for Sasuke. Because that's how love works sometimes.

Or what, just because Hinata loves him, he has to love her back? That's stupid. It's one of the reasons I tend to dislike the pairing usually, since that's what it boils down to in the majority of fanfics with that matchup. "SHE LOVES HIM SO HE SHOULD LOVE HER BACK!" Blargh...

So all honesty, if he was offhandedly rejecting her, big whoop, he clearly wasn't thinking about her, he was thinking about his dad and Sakura. He's stupid like that.

[Brian]

Spoiler: ShowHide

That aside:

Spoiler: ShowHide

However you want to spin it, Kishimoto was either trolling, or just doing his regular BS of not being capable of maintaining consistent characterization or plot with the, "Is this your girlfriend?" line.  Seriously, even if you remove Hinata from the equation, how was Naruto's response (and Sakura's, in turn), better than the much more sensible, "This is my teammate," or the (hard-earned, but uncontestable), "This is my friend!"?

The line does grate on me because I'm a Hinata fan, but more than that, it irritates me because it's [spoiler]stupid

.  Granted, Sasuke saying, "I'ma be Hokage now!" is also monumentally stupid -- but at least the characters on screen can recognize it.[/spoiler]

[Merc]

Spoiler: ShowHide

Hah. =)

[Dracos]

Don't worry.  She's learned from Tsunade.

She'll use Premature Aging and keep up!

~~~

Anyhow, separately, there's a whole mixed messages thing.  Naruto does come off as a jerk there.  Not because he has to love Hinata, but because all the manga has shown him doing recently was giving positive messages on that front and it dodged having him react and at least say 'sorry, I don't feel that way' at some point.  The whole point of manga is it communicates a lot visually that doesn't have to come in text.  Kishimoto spent a lot of the last few chapters showing Hinata and Naruto constantly standing together holding hands.  Not Naruto and alternating Rookie nine, or collective group stuff, but those two.

It's poor messaging that basically has the art say one thing and the characters say a different thing.  As it's not real life, it doesn't have the excuse of people give mixed messages because the author in theory knows his plan and is intentionally choosing what scenes to show to deliver his idea.

Kishimoto remains superhack.  Just as Kubo remains supertroll.

Sadly, Oda is super sick.  Why do the good ones catch the plague?

At least Sengoku Youkai and Maou are continuing to be both consistently released and awesome.

[Kt3]

Tried reading a bit of Sengoku Youko (or is it Youkai?), but I'm not particularly drawn into it.  I got through most of Volume 2 I think.  I think I just don't particularly care about most of the characters - they're not bad characters, don't get me wrong, but I don't particularly empathize with them.

However, after reading a bit of that, I decided it was that time of the year to start catching up on The World God Only Knows.  And I did not regret it at all.  Especially as a lot of my questions about the latest arc have been answered, and now I'm just waiting to see how the arc gets tied up.

[Brian]

I guess we discuss webcomics here too from time to time?  I can't remember?

Dominic Deegan finished last week:

http://www.dominic-deegan.com/

A comic that was not without its moments.  On the other hand, I can't recall it ever becoming supremely awesome, but it did have some fun or otherwise good bits.  Ending wasn't handled so great; a lot of buildup for a rather anticlimactic ending.  Felt a bit rushed.  But not terrible.