Quote:
Originally Posted by Napoleon's Hat
Part of the original charm was that medaka was such a unique, outrageous person. Zen was the normal person that allowed the reader to relate to her and the events around her. Now they're just superpowerd badasses who fight other superpowered people, and Zen isn't even relatable anymore since he got the power-up. Now instead of being fun and quirky they just shout and pose.
|
That schtick got a bit tiresome after a while - having someone so uniquely powerful and out of step of the world's something that has been done before, and somewhat poorly at that (To-Love RU springs to mind, with Lala taking that role), so having her randomly beat on judo clubs, scare dogs, and so forth was getting a bit long in the tooth. There was already one series where there was a main character who was the focus of the whole story, which revolved around her and her invincible nature where she dragged the other people around her into whacky adventures. It's been all the rage lately, and I'm sure you've heard about it. It's called "The Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi".
The swim meet arc is where things started changing, if only to show she wasn't the absolute best at everything; especially given how the judo team won by not forgetting the goal, which is what sunk both the student council and the swim team's chances.
Now we've moved a lot in the other direction, where plot's been somewhat scarce and we've gotten two or three chapters per battle... and while it may have boosted WSJ survivability, is steering back into the 'tiresome' area again.
Beyond that, Zenkichi may have been 'normal' and semi-relatable... except for the fact he was around Medaka, had been around her since childhood, that she had a serious crush on him for the whole time, managed to excel with any club he joined before leaving them, and he managed to win the judo match with a 'Special' all because SHE ASKED HIM TO. Yes, that's
perfectly normal.
Not.