Ever since HXH went into a hiatus and Twin Heroes 2 ended I ran out of the best and the worst manga I was reading, so now I'm in some kind of manga purgatory where nothing is ever good but nothing is spectucularly bad like Twin Heroes 2 or even a Prince of Tennis level where each week you've to look forward to how much lower the bar can be set. It's an indication of sad times when the manga I'm most looking forward to is Naruto. Here's what I'm currently reading, which you may or may not care...
Naruto - This gets the nod for the best manga (that I read) right now simply because it is making an effort to make something happen. Sure everything still revolves around fancy eye power or having even more clones, but at least every week it looks like something is actually happening. Presumably at the end of the Pain arc something is irrecovably changed one way or another. The fighting stuff actually looks decent too.
One Piece - How can OP loses to Naruto? Because nothing is happening in OP right now. I'm pretty convinced the whole Amazon Lily arc is just going to be unmitiigated disaster but the damage has somehow spread beyond just the arc itself. You have more pointless fighting with people who totally ignore any previously established power levels. Right now I think Luffy should have died about 100 times since the Amazon Lily arc but his death defying thing is so common now it's like it's not even worth being mentioned.
Bleach - Nothing ever happens here. At the start someone joked that their plan to hold Aizen for 'a short while' will probably last 1 real life year. Well it seems like that's wrong since 'a short while' obviously means more than 1 real life year. Bleach has mastered the art of consuming space without actually saying anything. The whole thing is just pure emptiness. It's not even good or bad. You read next week's manga and it'd be same as the one before: nothing actually happened.
Eyeshield 21 - The biggest highlight of ES21 was that there was a guy named Mr. Don with the title 'The man who controls everything'. But I can't find his picture and caption in a way small enough to put in the avatar screen. I'm pretty sure the president of the USA depicted in ES21 was supposed to be Obama, and he's a white guy in ES21. I think that also sums up how much the author knows about US and American Football in general.
I watched the Superbowl and realized like what's depicted in ES21 doesn't even make sense even if you had those super powers. If you had people who are as powerful as guys in Prince of Tennis or Captain Tsubasa the way they play tennis/soccer might actually make sense. But you'd never play American Football like the way they do in ES21 even if you got people who can go light speed (and actually beyond light speed now). The whole notion that you always got to run through this mythical defender, standing still, with some kind of super duper running technique is totally dumb. There's no way one defender staying still can stop a running back going at light speed. You'll simply just veer off another direction to start with. It's almost like guys in ES21 exert a zone of control that you cannot run around no matter.
Silent Sinners in Blue - This is a perfect example of start out with some kind of IP with a decent following and then completely ruining it in every way possible. I think the writer of this must have some kind of moon rabbit fetish because the whole story right now is about how moon rabbits totally own the #1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7th most powerful/popular character in the Touhou universe. Maybe the moon rabbit cult is bigger than I thought.
Fate Stay Night - On the opposite spectrum we have a good example of taking some kind of IP and making it better. It's not even clear to me why Typemoon would allow someone to change their story like the way the manga did, but it's way better than the original ever presented since the parallel universe approach in dating sims just doesn't even work in dating sims let alone something that's supposed to be coherent. The change to the story is needed to give characters like Archer and Ilya meaning since even in the original version their appearance are totally Deus Ex Machina.
The removal of Saber and Shirou from the spotlight now turns the story in the hands of Rin and Archer, the realist of the Fate universe as opposed to Shirou 'justice conquers all' Emiya. I always liked the Fate universe when Rin and Archer are in charge. They are fairly powerful character who gets no miracles to bail them out of a sticky situation, and both are prepared to resort to drastic measures to protect the world's peace instead of just yelling "Justice will prevail!" and get a 100X powerup like Shirou Emiya.
Naruto - This gets the nod for the best manga (that I read) right now simply because it is making an effort to make something happen. Sure everything still revolves around fancy eye power or having even more clones, but at least every week it looks like something is actually happening. Presumably at the end of the Pain arc something is irrecovably changed one way or another. The fighting stuff actually looks decent too.
One Piece - How can OP loses to Naruto? Because nothing is happening in OP right now. I'm pretty convinced the whole Amazon Lily arc is just going to be unmitiigated disaster but the damage has somehow spread beyond just the arc itself. You have more pointless fighting with people who totally ignore any previously established power levels. Right now I think Luffy should have died about 100 times since the Amazon Lily arc but his death defying thing is so common now it's like it's not even worth being mentioned.
Bleach - Nothing ever happens here. At the start someone joked that their plan to hold Aizen for 'a short while' will probably last 1 real life year. Well it seems like that's wrong since 'a short while' obviously means more than 1 real life year. Bleach has mastered the art of consuming space without actually saying anything. The whole thing is just pure emptiness. It's not even good or bad. You read next week's manga and it'd be same as the one before: nothing actually happened.
Eyeshield 21 - The biggest highlight of ES21 was that there was a guy named Mr. Don with the title 'The man who controls everything'. But I can't find his picture and caption in a way small enough to put in the avatar screen. I'm pretty sure the president of the USA depicted in ES21 was supposed to be Obama, and he's a white guy in ES21. I think that also sums up how much the author knows about US and American Football in general.
I watched the Superbowl and realized like what's depicted in ES21 doesn't even make sense even if you had those super powers. If you had people who are as powerful as guys in Prince of Tennis or Captain Tsubasa the way they play tennis/soccer might actually make sense. But you'd never play American Football like the way they do in ES21 even if you got people who can go light speed (and actually beyond light speed now). The whole notion that you always got to run through this mythical defender, standing still, with some kind of super duper running technique is totally dumb. There's no way one defender staying still can stop a running back going at light speed. You'll simply just veer off another direction to start with. It's almost like guys in ES21 exert a zone of control that you cannot run around no matter.
Silent Sinners in Blue - This is a perfect example of start out with some kind of IP with a decent following and then completely ruining it in every way possible. I think the writer of this must have some kind of moon rabbit fetish because the whole story right now is about how moon rabbits totally own the #1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7th most powerful/popular character in the Touhou universe. Maybe the moon rabbit cult is bigger than I thought.
Fate Stay Night - On the opposite spectrum we have a good example of taking some kind of IP and making it better. It's not even clear to me why Typemoon would allow someone to change their story like the way the manga did, but it's way better than the original ever presented since the parallel universe approach in dating sims just doesn't even work in dating sims let alone something that's supposed to be coherent. The change to the story is needed to give characters like Archer and Ilya meaning since even in the original version their appearance are totally Deus Ex Machina.
The removal of Saber and Shirou from the spotlight now turns the story in the hands of Rin and Archer, the realist of the Fate universe as opposed to Shirou 'justice conquers all' Emiya. I always liked the Fate universe when Rin and Archer are in charge. They are fairly powerful character who gets no miracles to bail them out of a sticky situation, and both are prepared to resort to drastic measures to protect the world's peace instead of just yelling "Justice will prevail!" and get a 100X powerup like Shirou Emiya.
