What Do You Do When An Anime Doesn’t Fully Satisfy You?

After I watched the first series of ‘Castlevania’ I was hesitant in carrying on as I wasn’t sure what to think of it after only four episodes. Then I just shrugged and thought “If I get part way through the second series and I don’t like it I can just stop watching it”. Turned out that I really liked it and fully enjoyed the animation style (holy SHIT but the animation on the battle on the fourth series with Death was amazing😲😲😲😲😲😲😲😲😲😲😲!). Yes the scenes with Camila felt a bit woke with her raving on about “smelly old men” but they were a minor inconvenience.

@TowLiquor

I hated the remake movies of Code Geass. CG is my all time favorite anime and then I heard they’re gonn make a movie 10 years later I got excited (even thi CG had a perfect ending). Then I heard they’re gonna remake CG into movies before making the sequel movie, and I was like okay well maybe add some new scenes and compress them to movies for those who wanna refresh their memories.

But after hearing that they changed the plot and a certain character actually doesn’t die in the remake (whose death changed the main character and made the death of another character even more conflicted and dramatic), and that this character would exist in the sequel movie, I decided to ignore it and go back to believing Code Geass ended at season 2.

@DigiCat Asuka isn’t a narcissist, though. She’s the tsundere archetype; she may act mean and aggressive sometimes, but that’s her idea of appearing “strong” because deep down she’s insecure and is afraid of showing vulnerability. Narcissists tend to be psychopaths without regard for feelings of others. Tsundere characters like Asuka aren’t in love with themselves: They act the way they do because they don’t want anyone to suspect how they really feel, because often they’re not certain of their own feelings themselves. They’re basically the “hard to get” love interest in many stories in anime, and often end up becoming the main heroine and primary LI in the end.

Granted, it’s bit different in reality. While men tend to have a weakness for this type of character, IRL it would just drive them nuts because they can’t stand women who play mind games (the duality of man, lol). I guess it’s the equivalent of women who like bad boys; it’s a fantasy which rarely turns out well in the real world.

Anyway, onto the topic title if there was one anime which failed to satisfy it was definitely Naruto. Kishimoto ran on many strong themes and ideals throughout the series run, but it when came to the conclusion he didn’t just fail to stick the landing, he just… straight-up abandoned these concepts all-together. By far the most egregious example was how Naruto’s main goal, to become Hokage, which should have been the series biggest achievement, ends up becoming a mere afterthought (to make matters worse, we never actually see it happen in the main series: It was relegated to a single bonus chapter, where, on his inauguration day, he is knocked unconscious by his own child, and thus misses out on the most important day of his life).

That was definitely the final nail in the coffin for me, seeing the main goal and dream of the protagonist being reduced to a “cute joke.” I was kind of amazed at myself for tolerating the general decline of the series as long as I did, but I had invested myself quite a bit into the franchise and wanted to see it through to the end. Almost wished I hadn’t, as those who decided to jump ship midway through made the right decision.

It’s been roughly seven years since the series ended, and time heals all wounds, as the saying goes. I find myself still enjoying what I used to like about this series (even played a bit of the CyberConnect 2 video games). But it’s hard to fully enjoy on the same level knowing how it all plays out now, and I find myself pining for how much potential this series had and how it went largely untapped. In the end, I came to accept that Kishimoto wasn’t as good a writer as I thought; that he didn’t have much clue as to what kind of story he wanted to tell and relied far too much on the input of his editors. I’ve since tried to move on by watching infinitely better anime, and can only hope day I might find a series similar to Naruto but learns from Kishimoto’s mistakes.

Well, Evangelion was never about romance, thats not the point of movies, tv shows or manga (the main ones that is). In the Rebuilds they never really developed Shinji and Asukas relationship, it consistent tru all movies. So no wonder they didnt end up together. From all the girls Mari was the only one who flirted with Shinji and didnt insult him. The worst was maybe she called him a puppy, but I didnt see it as condescending. So it does makes sense Shinji would pick her. I dont really get why they would make them a couple at the end in the first place, because the ending is similar to the manga, its just Shinji didnt end up with anyone there, they could have just use that, it doesnt change anything. They could have used more time to develop it in that case, yes, but saying “it doesnt make sense” is not really a legit argument.

I dont really get this obsession with romances and shipping in not shoujo or similar animes. If relationships are badly developed in those then yes, thats a big problem, cuz thats kinda the point lol If you are watching something like Evangelion for romance then yes, you are gonna be disappointed, haha.

Yea, I get that sometimes it can be frustrating when authors dont develop enough relationship and then two characters just end up together like in Naruto manga when Naruto and Hinata ended up together without much build up, but it doesnt make the anime or manga bad exactly. You just need to set your expectations right.

Yea, its all about how you write relationships, you dont need some sort of arcs dedicated specifically to romance in shounen, but if you want to pair characters up in the end, you need some good subtle groundwork. I think in Dragon Ball Toriyama paired up Chi Chi and Goku very well given the circumstances. At the end you dont go “Wait, what?”. Vegeta and Bulma seemed kinda random yes, but, actually, in anime they had a filler episode they put that groundwork so when I read manga after I was kinda disappointed that Toriyama didnt include that, haha. My Hero Academia right now Deku and Uraraka seems to be going fine if Horikoshi decides to pair his characters in the end (unless he screws that up too and pairs everyone randomly lol). But the point is I dont really waiting for them to be paired up or anything of the sort, it would be nice, but not necessary.

Sakura and Naruto would made more sense yes I think so too. Naruto couldnt stop talking about how he likes her lol and Sakura started to like him too eventually. That was the biggest issue from the beginning. If Kishimoto didnt plan to pair them, then he should have at least wrote Naruto in a way that he likes other girls too then there could have been some arc where he and Hinata went to a mission together and develop them there. Although, they kinda did that in some filler episodes in the anime and managed to screw that up. So, maybe not. So many pointless fillers and nobody figured out they should put more work into Naruto and Hinata relationship.

I was a bit disappointed how Naruto manga ended, but I didnt hate it. Then they started making dlc to the manga like novels and anime to explain some stuff. I was like “Oh, no.” Then they announced Boruto and I was done, haha. It felt like yea, Kishimoto just burned out and didnt know what to do.

@Mustangride1 😂😂i love you. No homo.