Quote:
Originally Posted by Dorsai
Randrak42 but thats how love usually work, doesnt it? Its not ....... contest to pleasure audience or shippers waiting to get sth to troll on forums...
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We're talking about a manga...a story meant to entertain audiences, not a real life person's personal love affair.
I'm all for setting up a couple from the get go, but not how this author has done it. Here we have a harem like scenario with various girls but only one of them is truly being set up to be the end girl and it is practically shoved in our faces. Matching up a couple from the start doesn't work so well in harem series, VNs included. God, I can't tell you how annoying it is in VNs when the makers keep pushing one pairing in your face when you just want to go through a different route.
Setting up a final couple from the start can work well. A good recent example of a couple being set up from the start was Magico, though the manga ended prematurely (IMHO) the whole relationship between Shion and Emma was great and when a love rival for either one appeared the readers did feel the relationship being threatened.
An example of a certain pairing being set up from the beginning but them only getting together later on is Change 123 (I chose this mostly because I re-read the whole series recently) where you knew that Kosukegawa and Motoko set up from the start but for a few chapters you actually feel threatened when Mokoto has a crush on another guy and when another chick shows up later on and hits on the MC you actually feel that it could create good drama (and it did).
Here...there's no feeling of threat in the whole thing because while it is a harem Chitoge gets so much more screen-time and development it's ridiculous, nothing can happen with another girl without Chitoge either being around or her having something happen right after of the same level. Think Rosario+Vampire...TsukuneXMoka is shoved in our faces so much that the rest of the harem is just there for the lols (and fighting later on) there's never any threat to the relationship.
It would have been much, much better IMHO had the author distributed character development and screen-time amongst the girls while dropping only subtle hints that Chitoge was ahead. Weird as it may sound, To-Love-Ru did this rather well. It was a pure comedy harem manga, Lala was believed to be the final girl for a while at the start but as things went on we had other girls get as much screen-time and development as her, if not more at times. Before Darkness, it was still in the back of most people's minds that Lala would be the final girl but the mix of comedy and other girls being in the picture (and by being in the picture I mean getting center stage WITHOUT Lala showing up or getting further ahead right after) kept things fresh...hell plenty of times did I think "He could actually end up with her instead of Lala."...this became even better in Darkness.
So yes, it's not about how love works...it's about how you tell the story.