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since you linked this in the GB thread, I decided to give it a shot and read I Am A Hero. All of it that is available. Thoughts: I enjoyed the plot up to now. I love the characterisation of the main character, although I am far more attached to the second one as she seems to be better characterised. I figured out what it was going to be roughly 2 chapters in, I don't know why or how, but it just seemed obvious that it was going there. Probably something to do with shotguns. To anyone who is reading the first volume and having a hard time making sense of it, stick it out, it is worth it. When I saw it confirmed to be zombies, I groaned, but stuck with it since you seem to believe it is great. Happy I did, as it seems to be very enjoyable despite being based on a very tired and worn out fiction trope. They work it well, and that is probably all due to the characterisation. They make the main protagonists very likeable by giving them very obvious traits, strengths and weaknesses, emphasis on the weakness. Hideo is lucky to be alive. He acknowledges that fact due to him happening to have his gun when it all went down. He is not someone who just adapts to this. He can't kill. He can't break tradition and societal conditioning. He knows he has broken the law times over, even one he seems to hold in utmost, the firearm and sword control one, reciting it on every chance. These little features are ones I feel most other zombie and apocalyptic fictions try to put into their work, however, they cease to be an issue once you get past the opening. That effort goes a long way in investing me into the action of Hideo. I enjoy how it is being more realistic in human reaction towards this sort of scenario. People are holding onto comforts and characteristics, like a trip to the springs, or their discomfort with breaking from their past shut-in lifestyle. They remember their lovers and hold them in some esteem, even if they know they are dead. They realise they are killers and that if things were to resolve they are in a legally grey area. They have real opinions and thoughts, and I appreciate that. It humanises the characters and grounds, a nice break from the typical hero who goes from couch potato to green beret in a day with nothing more than an empty regard for their past lives. It does not take itself too seriously however and that behooves it, as I have seen one too many crappy zombie movies which are too serious in tone. They need to be slightly lighthearted otherwise the ridiculousness of the situation just gets too much and the fiction is broken. The humour breaks the tension, further humanises the characters and also reminds the reader not to take it all to seriously. I say I enjoy the characterisation, however, there elements to it I dislike. It is very misogynistic for what seems like little reason, and while that is usually portrayed in a negative light, our protagonist has yet to truly redeem himself for his actions. He spent most of the first volume openly being a pig, then slowly tapered it off over the next two or three, and while that is a welcome change, I still think he needs a mea culpa to truly be a likeable character, on par with Hiromi. Unless it already happened and missed or forgot it, in which case, disregard my complaint. I seriously dislike the internet and chan aspects of it. Every time the work switches perspectives over to chan posters, I kind of sigh inside. Not only are these characters ones who don't get enough development for me to care about them much, but the development they do get makes them so immensely unlikeable on so many grounds. I know we are not supposed to like them and in the case of the mall they even serve as antagonists, but wow has it been a long time since I was so uninvested in the motives of the antagonist. They are portrayed in such a negative light that not only do I want to see them die, I know they will die. People that lovely just do not get to live, and it is proven true time and again, even in this. As such, the tension of them is kind of destroyed by my meta approach in reading. That fault is entirely my own though, I am just an idiot like that. Also, I refuse to believe that if this were to genuinely happen that any of these idiots would survive. The rants. What is the deal with the rants? They are very weird. It seems like it is just the author taking out frustrations with the industry in the first volume, however, I know nothing of their backstory to really be able to be able to say that. They ultimately end up being entertaining in some fashion or other, but wow are they weird for the first and second volume. The ones after that, like the ghost one, actually proved to be hilarious, so they made their ground up there. All in all, good stuff, one for me to bookmark and check in on every few months.
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Aug 27, 2014 21:09
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| # ¿ Apr 28, 2024 08:08 |
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Oh, I intend to read some more of them. I have the free time necessary to do so since I sleep at the weirdest times. My take on Hideo is not that he is crazy, but rather that he was a severely depressed individual with some very repressed feelings due to his upbringing and lifestyle. As such, I interpreted his rant scenes more as escapism than insanity. He is not hallucinating, but daydreaming and thinking of what he wants to do if he could. The weird people who appear when he is doing this are physical representations of his conscious for editorial reasons. Having a two sided conversation with yourself might not translate well in visual print media, so characterising his conscious physically might make it more clear. That is just my interpretation though, and I just happen to hate 'is crazy' as a plot device. It feels lazy and handwave-y when there are better, noticeable explanations available. My backup for this is because this thing that Hideo does where he is either hallucinating and crazy or just escaping is toned down to almost not being present after a few volumes. It makes far less sense for someone to suddenly not be crazy than it does for someone to become less escapist and depressive when the stress inducing elements of life causing it are removed. Once again though, that is just my take and I usually go down this path when the possibility of insanity is available in media with a depressive character. Escapism just usually makes more sense. It is pretty unreasonable for me to do this, but it almost always feels better, and makes more sense from a character perspective. I was more wondering about the topic of the rants, particularly the manga ones. They feel less about Hideo and more about the author, and they felt angst-y. It was really weird.
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Aug 27, 2014 21:58
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Very true, and I was thinking of that as I was typing. However, his freakouts were very frequent and short spaced at the beginning. It seemed daily. To go from 200mph to 0mph is pretty unlikely, or, it feels to me. Incidentally, aren't times when you are alone the most likely to be having an internal monologue (e; or dialogue, which would make more sense in this case) and considering your chances in life? I find that to be the case with me - alone is the only time I really have to consider my choices in life properly. As such, them only appearing when alone as a manifestation of his concious just makes more sense to me. Again though, this is just me, I can't really speak for the authors intent or the perspective of other readers. And I would not really call them unexpected, we are basically introduced to the character with this hanging over him, and they always appear under the same conditions. That feels fairly well reasoned and explained to me. Basically, I want to say this is depression based escapism, but I will not be too disappointed if it turns out not to be the case. When it comes to sanity, I always want to stick towards the less erratic and fringe states that are so heavily overused in media. Regardless though, crazy or depressed, I will be sticking to this one. Thanks for the introduction Cap!
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Aug 27, 2014 22:29
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I'll make Qualia my next one to read then.
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Aug 27, 2014 22:43
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Figured I would pop back in and say I read all of Boys on the Run that has been translated so far and have really enjoyed it. I really recommend anyone else that is in here gives it a good look. It is a bit misogynistic at times in characterization though, so if you really can't accept that in any of your reading then you might not enjoy it as much. Really becoming a fan of Kengo Hanazawa, I've gone through Hero and Boys, and am about to start reading Ressentiment because I like his work that much. I think I may have actually enjoyed Boys on the Run even more than Hero, honestly. It is even more humanistic than the characterisation given in Hero, the one thing I thought about Hero that put it so much higher than all of the other manga I had looked at before. Gonna say tho, Cap, you might want to change where you link Ressentiment to in the OP. You link it to bato, where every physical page gets its own digital page, which is just bothersome to read through, however, the whole thing seems to be on your usual suggested reading site, Kissmanga here. Scrolling through is just so much easier to read than clicking through when pages are so high resolution that you would probably have to scroll to see them all. e; i also read hinamatsuri which I really enjoyed Another Person fucked around with this message at 22:30 on Oct 18, 2014 |
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Oct 18, 2014 22:26
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Oh, never noticed that. Thanks for the warning tho, I will keep it in mind when reading!
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Oct 18, 2014 23:20
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| # ¿ Apr 28, 2024 08:08 |
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When was the last time Boys on the Run was updated? It has easily been my favourite thing I have read through here, and I really want it to continue. Did it actually receive a conclusion?
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Dec 7, 2014 21:33
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