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Link #8361 | |||
阿賀野型3番艦、矢矧 Lv165
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Location: Belgium, Brussels
Age: 31
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I don't imply that he has made no mistakes so far, however, the brutal shift by the end of MM arc is, to me, a glaring proof that Akamatsu could not continue what he had planned, despite the biggets chunk of MM arc had a similar pacing than the other major arcs, albeit longer due to obvious reasons. To me, bad writing would be an -extended- period of time where you have contradicting or nosense elements being thrown in the main plot, spiraling into the main story being hardly making sense by its own standards. You may think the sport festival is within such criteria, but I don't think so: surely, it sidetracked the main plot, however it didn't affect the main story, past shortening the amount of available chapters. I really dislike the off screen stuff as much as anyone do, but frankly, suddenly bashing the author and the series -as a whole- is a bit too much, but that's just an opinion among many. Quote:
I don't think the off screen was a solution, yet I don't believe the situation could be solved "with few chapters" only, considering how Akamatsu was crafting the issue surrounding Nagi for a huge number of chapters, prior and during MM arc. Frankly, I really believe that Kodansha was pressuring him to shorten MM arc, considering the pretty variable amount of fanservice in MM arc, which is quite weird if you consider how Akamatsu wrote the previous major arcs. Simply speaking (and call it naive or whatever), Akamatsu wanted to wrap things by the end of his contrast with Kodansha, but even while the contract is about to end, Kodansha made sure Akamatsu doesn't go against the said criteria they have apposed for Negima. Quote:
There were various onimous stuff regarding Nagi the very few chapters after Rakan has explained Ala Rubra saga, and suddenly shifting Nagi's whereabouts wouldn't be any better.
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Link #8362 | |
Senior Member
Join Date: Mar 2010
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When a work is partially influenced by the editor and publisher, the liberty to continue or end the work does not fall on the writer alone. The writer has to keep both options open: keep the world expansive enough to write more on it later, but also limit the story into separate arcs so that it can end if the time comes. Again, it's not new. Wakaki did it early on in The World God Only Knows: the early story arcs were short and episodic, in case he had to end it soon, but there were several points that he could pick up later if he needed to, like the nature of Old and New Hell, the Weiss, Majima High's founding, etc. |
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Link #8363 |
Maniacal laughter ensues.
Join Date: Apr 2008
Location: My own delusions of grandeur.
Age: 29
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My questions that will never be answered are now "How did Nagi show up to save Negi's ass six years ago" and "WHAT THE HELL ARIKA". I also could have handled not knowing who Negi ends up with if it wasn't for the brutal tease that he does in fact have someone in mind.
Arika, though, isn't something I can just shrug off. Is she dead? There must be some reason she didn't stick around to help her quietly desperate and lonely son save her world. Or try to free the love of her life from his imprisonment. Or anything. The fact that Negi has absolutely zero interest in her whereabouts is frankly infuriating. Also, our finale was Yue getting raped. I'm not sure how to handle that.
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Link #8367 |
Senior Member
Join Date: Mar 2008
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And there we have it. 355 Chapters of awesomeness.
After taking a breather from knowing a big favorite of mine is finished, had some time to put some thoughts together. This ending would have been the perfect ending (ok maybe not perfect, but REALLY good) IF we were shown "One more story arc", which could have been the "Save Nagi Arc" to make this ending more meaningful. I really liked the Fire Emblem like epilogue to each of the characters, to show how far they've come, though there's gonna be audience interpretation here and there. An example is: Spoiler for 355:
I'd like to believe there's more to her ending, especially since she's always still maintained the 'working in the shadows' aspect. But that's what Akamatsu has left us, which I still find very strange. It's not like that "Oh this ending frigging sucked, Negima ruined" moment for me, its more as I said, would been great if it had one more arc before it closed the book. Even if in the future Negima material gets made, whether as a new manga, OAD (yes I'm aware anime final is meant to be the last but hey, time changes) or even drama cd, it will unfortunately never be seen as a "Sequel" to continue the story, and rather only ever be seen as 'side-material' or at most a 'prequel'. A prequel would be nice to detail Spoiler for 355:
However knowing the conclusion wont be as exciting compared to the event happening in real time. It'd be a feeling like the Ala Rubra stories, which while they were definately exciting, awesome, fun as hell (gosh see this is why you'd love this manga, lots of emotional mix, then again thats me) - it was already established that these events have happened, with foreshadowing/story hints here and there. Whereas with the final chapter, its just "This is what happened" blurb/summary. The real feeling in the end is that of sadness + greatfullness to Akamatsu-sensei for writing one of my most favourite manga's for over the course of 9 years, despite the ending. At least this ending wasn't as weird as the anime final....which the only reason you'd accept that ending is the chance for a sequel. |
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Link #8368 | |
Zok, Biff, Pow, Wham.
Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: Valencia, Venezuela
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And it's shocking to see the lenghts some people will try to go to justify the unjustifiable. |
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Link #8370 |
阿賀野型3番艦、矢矧 Lv165
![]() ![]() Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Belgium, Brussels
Age: 31
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Many mangas were canned in a worse way (Mz0 anyone?), and still were "justifiable". To consider Negima's situation as unjustifiable is quite an overstatement, but that's just me I guess.
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Link #8372 |
Honya-kun
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: Clinton, Maryland
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I think the best way to describe the problem with Negima's ending is this: instead of deciding on one or the other (i.e provide proper closure for either the "romance" section or the "Lifemaker possessing Nagi" situation), Ken Akamatsu ended up deciding to focus on both, resulting in the "romance" aspect being nothing more than Ken "teasing" the audience, while the "Nagi" situation was badly in need of real closure (rather than just "hey, Nagi's been saved, with some of 3-A meeting him in the final chapter").
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Link #8373 |
Banned
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Dai Korai Teikoku
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I'm just going to say that such a statement seems to have come from someone who had been pampered too much by the overall high quality of the series. I don't blame people if they feel as such, but still, Ken-san did magnificently considering the length constraint he was under, especially when compared to almost any other series.
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Link #8374 | |
Senior Member
Join Date: Dec 2011
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Link #8375 | |
Not Enough Sleep
Join Date: Nov 2003
Location: R'lyeh
Age: 42
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What is so hard to understand that Akamatsu is leaving his publisher which is why all the important stuff got skip?
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Link #8376 | |
Labda Prakarsa Nirwikara
Join Date: May 2010
Location: Pekanbaru (UTC+07:00)
Age: 31
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Let's say that he's obliged to keep drawing Negima 'till chapter 355. Thing is, there are several useless chapters that could have been allocated to resolving the story: - Chapter 341-343: They wasted three chapters talking and fighting about how great Negi and Asuna's sacrifice and yada yada and for what? Asuna got a Deus ex Machina that practically made all the surrounding drama meaningless and Negi wasn't shown with any side-effect in the ending. - Chapter 344-349: Six chapters of teenage girls trying to pry on the private life of a freakin' ten-year old, with character derailment on several people just for good measure. What did we get out of that? Only Akira's pactio, which never got used in a serious story. What's the point of giving new powers when he's already planning on abandoning this story? - Chapter 350-353: Oh noes, Asuna's going to stasis for more than a century and now she's alone. My gawd, that's so sad....wait, here's Chao to the rescue with a time travel machine to give her a super happy ending! Never mind that there's two Asuna now, and the other one still won't get lucky when it's her time to wake up in the future. Thirteen chapters. Shoehorn those to the Mundus Magicus Arc to resolve the question of Nagi and Arika and there wouldn't have been a major loose end (it's inevitable that the minor things would be abandoned). Or make it thirteen chapters of people finding hints beneath the Gravekeepers Palace resulting in them finding Nagi, whatever. The resolution may end up rushed compared to the rest of the arcs, but that would still be much better than having it resolved off-screen Instead, he made... the above. ![]() You know what's even more sad? Anya didn't even got mentioned and Chisame became a hikkikomori. They got luckier on the supposedly Bad End ![]()
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Link #8377 | |
Senior Member
Join Date: Jun 2008
Location: Brazil
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Quote:
If he is leaving the publisher, this means a sequel would be released somewhere else, so not necessary all who read Negima would be able to follow it. So that would be a reason to give Negima and end, even if he is going to continue, instead of leaving it at a point like ch 355. Of course this is assuming, like you did when you wrote your post, that is the reason the manga ended at that point and that he will indeed continue it. Which are things we don't know.
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Link #8378 | |
Honya-kun
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: Clinton, Maryland
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Link #8379 |
HI, BILLY MAYS HERE
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Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu~.....
I was a little disappointed with the ending since it still left a lot of goatse-gaping holes throughout the plot for most of the characters, and I hope it's not too late to blame the publisher for their hand in this...But I can't be arsed to complain; It was a good 9 years, and at least it actually came to an end instead of dragging on forever lost... If I can salvage anything out of the final chapter, it would be my interest in the changes to character design to reflect respective aging/maturity (Though dammit if as a Shinobu fan from Love Hina, I can't help but find it extremely coincidental that Nodoka pretty much evolved into a near-copy of Shinobu, lastly in the looks department by the end; Reduce, reuse, recycle)...A concrete time frame wasn't given for the skip, was it? Oh well; Fanart material begins again
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Link #8380 |
Junior Member
Join Date: Mar 2012
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I have to agree with all of Tiresias's points.
IMO, it would have been better if the manga had a "Negima: Anime Final movie"-like ending right after the MW arc instead of this pseudo-arc that didn't solve anything and didn't make any point. In other words, the movie had actually a better ending than the manga. I found the last chapter pretty enjoyable to read though, and kinda liked the idea of a "open to speculation" ending to troll fans, regarding who is the person who Negi likes. Also, I wasn't really sure of where should I post this, but this is a negima/megaman crossover game I've been working on, and tried to release the trailer before the end of the manga: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDhjf4hFZPk ![]() |
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action, fantasy |
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