[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by Vena

I'd be able to agree with you more if Kagura and, by extension, Mykage were genuinely presented as threats. Mykage is threatening but without knowing what he's actually planning (for all we know he may want to save both worlds and that Fudo's been lying) he's a sort opaque fluid that just sloshes around and move the plot when necessary and hasn't shown himself to actually be against Mikono/Amata, and we know he's pulling Kagura's chain. Kagura, on the other hand, is currently in the MoTW non-threat zone as every time he appears, he losses. I'm not sure how the audience is supposed to perceive him as a threat to Mikono/Amata when Kagura cannot win and, in the only moment he's ever had his hands on Mikono, the writers invert everything we actually know about his character and, to a degree, make him somewhat sympathetic a character. Fudo is a larger threat to Amata/Mikono right now than Kagura is.

Kagura can't work as a serious antagonist threat (at a physical level, anyway) any more, imo. Not unless he actually wins in his next fight, whatever the context of that fight is. If he loses his next physical fight, I will be extremely "ho hum" about that, if not downright "meh". This is an area where you and I both agree.

However, I think that Kagura still works a little bit as a romantic threat because Mikono feels some sort of weird connection with him, and she definitely feels pity for the poor guy.

But note I call him "poor guy", and not with an ounce of irony. And that's because he's become really hard to hate or root against. He's actually pitiable at this point, in spite of all the death and destruction he's caused, imo.

You're right - He's handled more like a classic underdog protagonist (downright Popeye-esque, even ) than as a major villain. If this is all due to some grand bait-and-switch planned by Okada (we actually get Kagura/Mikono at the end) then I tip my hat to her for beautifully subverting several anime romance cliches/tropes.

But without such a bait-and-switch, this is a puzzling handling of Kagura's character at best.

You could, honestly, just as easily flip the entire *fight for the girl* theme and aim it at Kagura. Why? Because he has never won, ever. He's this loser, chasing the girl, through torture, defeat, and pain... and he's your damn villain? That's not usually how a villain is supposed to be framed. He's supposed to regularly win and beat the hero, eventually steal the girl, laugh menacingly, and, after a long rescue arc, get beaten and the hero and girl reunited!

In my experience, underdog villains only work as filler villains designed to provide action scenes until the main villains make their move (classic example: the core Team Rocket trio, but not the full organization).

And maybe that's all Kagura is... although the new OP seems to suggest otherwise.

And what about Zessica? Your cockblock on the other side is built a sympathetic girl in love who can empathize with our hero and worry about his problems... what? No one else in this show even seems to give a damn about Amata's problems aside from Fudo.

Originally Posted by Vena

If you ask me, they've put the secondaries (Zessica and Kagura) through more shit to prove their love for their respective target than the main leads because neither of them (the secondaries) has had their romantic interest handed to them on a silver platter since the first episode.

If you're going to start out as a blazing race horse then you need to introduce some genuine obstacles (Okada's Hanasaku had distance as a genuine obstruction, priorities and family, and later library-glasses girl, True Tears had a hateful mother spreading lies and a brother out to make his sister win at all costs and by any means possible. What does Aquarion have? Kagura who was removed for seven episodes? Zessica who removed herself for six episodes? There's just no believable obstacle for such a drawn out romance, unless, again, its not meant to be the believable romance.)

I strongly agree with this too.

There's nothing wrong with the main pairing here - with Amata/Mikono. In fact, I find them cute together, and they've had a lot of nice scenes together.

But the problem is that the challengers on both sides of it (Kagura on one, Zessica on the other) are coming across as working harder for it/wanting it more than the core pairing themselves do.

In other words, I get a sense that Kagura wants to be with Mikono more than Amata does, and I also get a sense that Zessica wants to be with Amata more than Mikono does. That obviously doesn't reflect well on the presumptive main pairing.

I mean, actions speak louder than words, and the actions are that Kagura is doing everything in his power to get his 'wench', and now Zessica has loudly confessed her feelings to Amata while also showing more consistent concern for Amata than Mikono has, imo.


Again, if this is all setup for a trope subverting bait-and-switch, then it might work out beautifully. But if (as is likely the case) the anime goes through with Amata/Mikono, then it's a strange way to go about it. At the very least, they're going to need to start making a more compelling case for Amata/Mikono by having one or both of them really strive harder to make it happen.