2013-02-09, 01:27 | Link #161 | |
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Join Date: Aug 2012
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I've always enjoyed the ways a protagonist can break that ego and pride. Maybe it interests me more to see someone who hates you; to be on the end of a spectrum; and the protagonist changing them from hate to love. Rather than someone who is neutral about the protagonist and grows to like them. |
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2013-02-09, 01:55 | Link #162 |
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Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: Somewhere, between the sacred silence and sleep
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The problem with Erina has less to do with her stuck up personality, and more to do with her complete failure as a student of culiary arts.
I'm fine with her disrespect of others. I'm not fine with her disrespect for food. Notice both Soma and the senpai, despite being far above others in their skill as chefs, respect the food of others and enjoy dishes made by others in the dorm. Even though the dormmates levels are far below these two. That's becuase they love food. The most basic requirements of being a chef. Erina shows no sign of such, and even go as far to THROW FOOD away at people. You don't have to like people, but you have to love food. Otherwise, you're a fake. It would have been fine if she was supposed to be an Anton Ego. However, she's supposed to be a chef. Therein lies the problem.
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2013-02-09, 01:56 | Link #163 |
Good-Natured Asshole.
Join Date: May 2007
Age: 35
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Erina's not exactly an antagonist, though. The manga seems to frame her more as a rival that Soma has yet to fight because they live in separate and opposite worlds. Erina thinks that only top-class dishes are worthy of her gourmet center of the world, but Soma gives no crap about where a technique is from and will happily cook from the bottom of the pile. The principal let him in so they can teach each other what the other world is like.
Besides, Soma hasn't eaten Erina's cooking yet, so he hasn't learned to respect her either. I'm afraid that he's not going to be a very interesting protagonist in the long run if he keeps on being the cocky kid that steamrolls through everyone just because he has a seemingly infinite bag of tricks. There's no growth potential for him yet. |
2013-02-09, 02:03 | Link #164 | |
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Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: Somewhere, between the sacred silence and sleep
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Her desire to destroy clubs making "those lowly food for commoners" such as donburi, sending assassins to destroy them, is clearly the role of an antagonist in the current run of the manga.
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2013-02-09, 02:12 | Link #165 | |
Good-Natured Asshole.
Join Date: May 2007
Age: 35
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Erina is already in a position to do lots of collateral damage, but Soma almost tried to take out 7th best student head on without much thought. If he had his way, I think he would have done the same to any who challenge him so that he can go match his dad, because that's all he appears to think about. EDIT: On second thought, I'm relatively new to the Jump style of shonen manga, so maybe my idea of an antagonist is different. Jump antagonists don't tend to last nearly as long before they turn friendly, do they? |
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2013-02-09, 02:21 | Link #166 | |
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Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: Somewhere, between the sacred silence and sleep
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Spoiler:
You're clearly not seeing the larger picture here, he's not the same as Erina, and they are clearly not portrayed at equal ground. She's a Vegeta and this is the Saiyans Attack arc. For how long, who knows. Edit: we'll continue the discussion when the scanlation is out.
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Last edited by aohige; 2013-02-09 at 02:43. Reason: spoiler tags added |
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2013-02-09, 03:13 | Link #167 | |
Good-Natured Asshole.
Join Date: May 2007
Age: 35
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It is in that sense that I don't think the dynamic is so cut and dry as good-against-evil. I almost want to guess that Erina's current rampage is a knee-jerk reaction to Soma shocking her the first time. My disappointment is that I think Soma has a looming shadow of inadequacy that the manga is late in touching on. Maybe one could view his willful ignorance of high-class cuisine as a heroic thing to do against the "evil empire" that is the school, but I think of it as more of a yin-and-yang setup. |
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2013-02-09, 03:39 | Link #168 |
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Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: Somewhere, between the sacred silence and sleep
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But he doens't look "down" at it. He's simply ignorant of it. There's a huge difference there.
If he was the same as Erina, he would have told his dad that he's a loser for serving at a high-class restaurant in NY. Did he? No. Becuase he's a friggin chef . The only reason he doesn't really care for the class of food is, becuase he holds the belief his dad does. "FOOD IS FOOD". There's not one case of Soma disrespecting "high class cuisine" or ANY food at all. You can't compare that with Erina's actual hatred of such. In what instance have Soma EVER disrespcted ANY food? When did you see him disregard cuisines as worthless? Where did you see him taking initiative to destroy them? You're only looking at "cocky" and "snotty" aspects of the characters personalities, and disregarding the actual culinary attitudes of both. "Being ignorant" is not the same as "vehement hating and using your position to destoy them". Not even close to it. Yin and yang is a balance of equals, and there's no balance nor equality in this case. If Soma eats a "high-cuisine" that tastes good, he'll say it tastes good. He will complement whatever the food deserves. Erina on the other hand, lies to her own tongue. How is this not obvious?
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Last edited by aohige; 2013-02-09 at 03:57. |
2013-02-09, 09:57 | Link #171 |
ANEGO Worshiper
Join Date: Jun 2011
Location: By the vending machine, drinking tea.
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Erina has tasted Souma's cooking, she knows how good "low-class cuisine" can be. Yet even after tasting how good it can be she denies it, she still views "high-class cuisine" as superior and that the low-class one should disappear from the school.
It's like someone saying a certain race of people is pure evil and should be exterminated from the country, even after meeting people of that race that are saint like. Souma on the other hand is cocky, yes, but he has yet to say anything bad about other people's food. He's the type who, even if he does say something about about a dish prepared by someone else, it would be constructive criticism. Souma is just cocky about his SKILLS in cooking, not about how superior his recipes, he simply says he can cook better than others, not that his recipes are superior to everyone elses. He views food as food like Aohige pointed out, Erina views food as status. She is an antagonist...she's obviously also the female closest to being the lead in this manga. It's damn clear that even if she is the antagonist, she'll eventually fall for Souma and join his side, but for now she's the main one causing problems for Souma to fix. There's a difference between an antagonist and a villain. Villains are usually just evil bastards that cannot be redeemed in any way (following the Dragon Ball comparison Frieza would be a perfect example of a villain) while antagonists are not necessarily evil, they are more like people with their own agenda that doesn't necessarily match the protagonist, but there's still the possibility of them joining the "good" side later on (like Vegeta). |
2013-02-09, 16:32 | Link #172 | |
Good-Natured Asshole.
Join Date: May 2007
Age: 35
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Tags |
cooking, echii, food porn, foodgasm, licensed, school, shounen |
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