Quote:
Originally Posted by Arabesque
The bold pretty much says why cliche was what springs to mind at first when it comes to the story here. You said it yourself, this is a pretty common story that had been told countless times across different mediums, all the way from the East to the West of the world.
Now that's not to say that any of that is bad. Just because the story lacks originality or doesn't appear to be that ambitious in it's aims doesn't mean it's going to be any lesser than other shows IMO. Treading over already explored and known territory without offering anything new is cliche since these are tropes and stories we had seen before, but in ToK case, I think that helped it.
|
Well, that's where I disagree about the use of the word cliche. Lacking ambition does not make something cliche. I feel it's a misrepresentation of the word. The term cliche in the normal use of the language is very much a bad thing. It refers to specific elements which have been so overused that they are no longer interesting or appealing. I feel that a base idea cannot be cliche, only the execution of it.
If you look at the distribution trends themes in anime and popular media today, I think you'll find that the story elements and characters found in Towa no Quon are actually by no means overused or even common. That's one thing which I found very refreshing about the show. In most other works, even in BONES' recent releases, the trend seems to favor making everything more complex and having too many layers in the narrative with plot twists being used for the sake of confusing or surprising the viewer instead of having actual depth or story purpose. Xam'd and Darker than BLACK both suffer from the feeling of copying more popular works at the expense of originality or quality. That would definitely be more suitable for the use of the term cliche.
A work can be unambitious but not feel cliched, but a work can also be over-ambitious and yet feel absolutely cliched. Just my two cents.
Quote:
|
Well yeah, it's CLAMP story. WHat did you think the C stood for? I'm not sure why you'd bring up Blood-C here, when no one really mentioned it (or even said that it was original lol) but for the record, being a fan of Blood-C, I admit it's not the most original show and does contain several CLAMP cliches. However, the problem with the show right now rests more with it spending half of it's time trying to overbuild intrigue and the mystery, when it should've spent less time on that and tried to make better use of it's time getting to the point.
|
I only bring it up because it's the most recent show I have been following regularly that strikes me as absolutely and utterly cliched. I like it a lot, because I'm a pretty huge CLAMP fan, but I'm giving an example of a current show which I feel actually falls under this umbrella of a show that is constructed of nothing but bullet points of "what a CLAMP fan expects", and it literally feels like they're dishing out the specific overused elements week after week in a specific order. It's hilarious, and yet so entertaining.