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It's amazing that this has turned out to be even worse than the LNs, and the LNs were basically terrible dross. (Yes, I read them, but I seem to read a lot of crap, so eh.) The LNs are padded to all hell, but without a lot of the stuff that is in the padding a whole bunch of things they're leaving in the anime make no sense whatsoever. As to whether or not they're villains, well... they pretty much are to an extent? I mean, the author probably doesn't intend for them to be viewed that way but: 1) He's a walking talking nuclear weapon. 2) He happily disintegrates people on a regular basis so long as it's not more troublesome to do so than leaving them alive. 3) He has no emotions except sibling love for his sister. The one time he actually shows significant emotion is cackling like a villain as he basically massacres a bunch of people who tried to harm his sister. 4) The reason he lacks emotions is because his mother and his aunt did illegal experiments on his brain to try and make him a better magician. His mother literally programmed him to love only his sister. 5) His aunt is leader of one of the magic clans. This specific clan is viewed as insane and monstrous by all the other clans. She views Gary Stu as a monster kept under control by a thin leash. 6) He's used his nuke powers at least three times. Once on an invading army. Once of a fleeing army. Once on a naval flotilla and entire port city. God knows how many people he's killed with just this one ability. 7) Related to 4) and how hosed up his mother and aunt are, his sister has a superpower where she freezes people's minds so they're in a permanent state of stasis. So basically his one connection to humanity is a loving horrifying person herself. 8) She literally freezes a whole bunch of people who were mind controlled. Who her brother had just disarmed. Of course she didn't know they'd been mind controlled and she felt really bad about it afterwards blah blah blah and thanks to ~magic~ she didn't kill them but still. Her first choice for people who she hates? Human icicle. Honestly the easiest way to understand the dude is to ask "What does anime Doctor Manhattan look like?" and then subtract all humanity and all hope of a family connection giving him any. The only hope for this show is if the action scenes end up being awesome.
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Apr 27, 2014 08:34
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| # ¿ May 16, 2024 05:04 |
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The anime is pretty much never going to explain it so: The Class 1/Class 2 system exists because of a lack of magical instructors, as already said. Class 2 act as a reserve and are expected to teach themselves everything that Class 1 would get instruction for. Class 1/Class 2 both take exactly the same tests and exactly the same exams and study the exact same material. The reason why the system exists is because in this world, if you're a mage, you have no choice. You do mage stuff. It's the usual Japanese nationalist dystopian bullshit where everyone is out to get Japan, even its ostensible allies in the form of the USA. So basically, since mages are essential for industry (I vaguely remember that mages get used as a source of electrical power through them using magic, since they're a nigh limitless resource except through their fatigue) and military force - if you can do magic to any extent, you get shoved into magic high schools and you study magic and the government basically dictates the rest of your life. You will marry a mage and make mage babies because magic is inherited or some poo poo. The military siphons off the cream of the crop, regardless of where they fall within the Class 1/Class 2 spectrum because they don't give a poo poo what your test scores say if you can do crazy killing bullshit with your powers. Everyone else gets to follow a dumb license system that uses the grading methods of the schools - so if you were Class A you'll become, say, a well paid super specialist magic researcher or something. Class 2 grade and you get to become a magic janitor or some poo poo. But everywhere you work is under the thumb of the military, because the world is out to get Japan. Now according to Mr Japanese Nationalist, the reason why Blanche is objectional is because they want the mages to do magic for free because they're more powerful and they're gifted. So your magic janitor and your magic powerplant worker and your magic researcher are meant to be paid nothing for doing their stuff - even though they pretty much were given literally no choice in life. Of course since this IS a Japanese Nationalist spiel, the real reason why they're a terrible organisation is because (spoiler because I can't remember if it was revealed in episode 4 or not, but you can already guess considering the author) they are, of course, funded by China for the purpose of dicking with Japan and other nations and stealing magical research. Surprise! As for magic engineers, actually, they'd be largely considered a Class 1 style profession. Mr Gary Stu is special because his abilities basically break the grading system over his knee. The reason is that magic works basically like faith in this world - you believe you can do it, the device speeds up the calculation, and then it happens based on your own internal power. Better devices make you better at magic, better internal power makes you better at magic. However if anything shakes your belief that you can do magic, if "magic is impossible after all" becomes a thought in your mind, you're hosed and likely to never do magic ever again. So magic engineers tend to be Class 1 because Class 1 people have more faith that other Class 1 people know what they're doing, so there's less chance of doubt creeping in and no more magic resulting. Writing these sorts of posts makes me sad because there's some interesting world building here, but in the end it's just used for "LOL JAPAN BEST" and creepy incest antics. 
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May 1, 2014 22:42
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Considering all the sneaky bullshit that goes on in their world (and it doesn't really address it because "magic is awesome, who wouldn't want to use their powers for killing?") being skilled at magic but not conforming to the system would probably lead to either: 1) Being kidnapped by a Japanese Government research lab to "make you useful to your nation". 2) Being kidnapped by a foreign Government for research and/or genetic material. Like I said in another post, there's some genetics sperg going on in this series with how magic is inherited. It's kinda like, I guess, ninja stories in that regard? In that certain families of magicians have figured out or have established a hereditry bloodline of being really really good at one type of magic. For example the Ichijou family is really good at killing people because their magic is focused towards making fluids boil. So they explode people. If someone from that family decided they didn't want to do that even though they were really good at it they'd either be kidnapped and imprisoned by their own family, kidnapped and imprisoned by another family/one of the Japanese government labs, or kidnapped by a foreign nation for research into what is effectively Japanese military secrets. It isn't so much that mages lack much choice, it's that you're either a soldier/lab rat for your own nation as a magician or you're a lab rat for another nation. If you go along with the system you're fine, if you oppose it you're hosed. Mages are weapons in this world and a mage that doesn't want to be a weapon for "you" is a liability or a threat. Amazingly for a Japanese Nationalist spiel, this (mages are weapons) is actually considered a bad thing by multiple people, including Gary Stu who wants to break the system (because it would free him and his sister, why else did you think?). Edit: Or rather, the concept of mages being forced to be weapons rather than the concept of mages being capable of doing damage as weapons. Because Gary Stu is a serial offender for the latter. SorcerousHam fucked around with this message at 21:45 on May 2, 2014 |
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May 2, 2014 21:28
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Postal Parcel posted:1)Why was Mibu embarrassed by the suggestion to increase faculty or whatever? Were this Higurashi or some bumfuck town like that, I could understand, but this is the biggest, richest Magic School in Japan. The hell? Depends upon what answer you want for 1). The author clearly doesn't think much of teachers, so that's the real reason. The LN's claim is, well, nobody loving wants to be a teacher. There's a character the author introduces later on who was some brilliant university research scientist that pissed off his bosses, so he got shunted into shitsville of teaching brats how to use magic instead of doing what he wanted to do. Oh and there's nine other schools with the exact same structure. So yeah, but the author having issues with teachers is probably the biggest one. As for 6), did you really think it would be that simple? C'mon, this is a crazy nationalist spiel by someone who clearly hates the establishment he currently lives in. Gary Stu was treated as a literal scientific guinea pig by his rich rear end family because he wasn't good at magic in the way that they think is being good at magic. And also treated as a servant/slave for the same reason. The only reason he has money and the freedom to do whatever the gently caress he wants currently is a) he is Wizard God that nobody in his family can control even though they don't even consider him a mage and b) libertarian spiel remember? He has used his massive brainpowers to ~bootstrap~ a research division of his father's company from being laughable rejects to generating at least a third of their profits. So in other words it's less "gently caress you for not being born into the right family" and more "gently caress you for not being born a god" but then again he literally can't give a gently caress about other people's suffering so it falls flat.
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May 10, 2014 14:06
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There is a Chinese person portrayed relatively positively in the series. So of course they are a) female and b) not actually from China but a Chinese-American along with c) not part of the Chinese government (~kawaii triad leader~).
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May 14, 2014 09:36
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Did watching them freeze/maim helpless and unarmed captives make you laugh in a  manner?Well you're in luck because as soon as they're done with the next arc, we're certain to go back to War Crimes: The Anime!
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May 20, 2014 08:07
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Nah. The superpowers Gary Stu has? They're inbuilt. He was born with them. The problem his family had with him is that the power to blow up the world and/or fix it doesn't fit in with their ~master magician plan~. So his mother hosed with his head and now he can do simple poo poo really really really fast, but nothing above simple poo poo. So he's still viewed as a failure by them even though his Aunt is regarded as quite literally one of, if not the, strongest mages in the setting because her powers focus on loving light of all things so she can kill people before they even realise it - and of course Gary Stu can completely counter her because of the powers he was born with. In short, the Yotsuba are dumb because they are dumb.
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Jun 1, 2014 13:31
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The Yotsuba are pretty much presented as evil. They're not really morally grey. I mean Gary Stu's dad got forced by them to marry his hosed up mother and have babies because ~mage genetics sperg~. They have cloned child soldiers/assassins. When Aunty got kidnapped and raped by the Chinese they proceeded to get revenge by murdering almost anyone in a lab coat in China. Them treating Gary Stu like poo poo for ~mage genetics sperg~ reasons is pretty much just the poo poo topping on top of a pile of poo poo. Also he blew up a few thousand people and/or disintegrated them because some (mixed race) Japanese soldiers betrayed Japan for China and killed his mother and almost his sister so it was time to murder all the Chinese invaders. Edit: He gets around to murdering non-soldiers later. Such as: Chinese Triads and human victims of the Chinese Triads who have been turned into humanoid weapons. They too were probably Chinese at some point. SorcerousHam fucked around with this message at 11:13 on Jun 2, 2014 |
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Jun 2, 2014 11:05
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The most amusing aspect about this trainwreck is that even if the original writings are useless schlock, at least the internal monologues of Gary Stu help explain his actions. The fact that the anime doesn't have basically any of them means he's just a giant walking rear end in a top hat with no motivations, whereas the novels at least have him as a giant walking rear end in a top hat with explained motivations. For example, a viewer of the anime can only see a creepy brother/sister incest story. At least the novels have Gary Stu acknowledging in his own head that his sister is loving weird and hoping that if he ignores it she'll eventually stop. (I mean, he's loving weird, but he's at least got magically induced Autism as an excuse. She's just following a long and distinguished bloodline of psychopaths.) There really is nothing redeemable about the anime adaptation except that it's occassionally pretty to look at. There's very little redeemable about the novels either, but at least they attempt to give people motivations and reasons for their actions, even if they're stupid or stereotypical Japanese nationalist cliches.
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Jun 3, 2014 09:46
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Erika belongs to pretty much the second richest clan of magicians in Japan. Or they might be the absolute richest. Why? Because they literally provide basic and advanced combat training to all police and military forces in Japan and it is implied they also do a lot of it for allies/friends/clients of Japan. They're actually comparatively weak magician wise, but when you have some loyalty from just about every cop and soldier in Japan, well, you're going to have clout. Especially in glorious re-militarised Nippon.
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Jun 4, 2014 09:37
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The Shiba name comes from their dad iirc because he was a branch family member before he got forced to have mage babies with a main family member. Tatsuya will never be called Yotsuba because he doesn't match up with their ~mage genetics sperg~ but Miyuki eventually will be. Upon which she will have the power to name him Yotsuba because ~family head~ so the Clan being dicks to Tatsuya makes no loving sense what so ever, but that's par for the course now. Also apparently the (dumb) reason why they can even hide in plain sight like that is that Japanese people and companies like naming themselves along the lines of "four-something" because it means they might be connected to the Yotsuba and therefore be someone not to be hosed with because they might murder you for looking at them the wrong way.
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Jun 7, 2014 12:17
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Because the current head is also worthless for running a family of magical illuminati? She's the head because she's the strongest under their ~mage genetics sperg~ system. Miyuki will be the next head because she is considered even stronger under their ~mage genetics sperg~ system. It seems like the butlers do most of the grunt work/heavy lifting of leadership in all the Clans at any rate, the inbred leadership just make the final calls on everything.
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Jun 8, 2014 23:12
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Nah, that "number 4" dude is just the fourth butler. Meaning he has some leadership responsibilities but most of them involve babysitting important clan members. No, the reality is that it's worse than that. The current head's right hand man is a butler and he literally gives out orders to anyone and everyone in the Clan. In a very polite manner, but the hint is "the Head wants this to happen" is behind everything he says, even if it's not a specific order.
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Jun 8, 2014 23:25
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Actually while she does join the harem to an extent, she almost does us all a favour and nearly kills him. Of course, because the USA followed the same stupid tactics/training/enlistment rulebook as all anime nations do, because she's a naive teenager she gets somewhat shocked when she finds out that even though she used a loving magic laser cannon/railgun to blow off one of his arms he could regrow it so she got distracted and failed to disintegrate him when he refused to surrender. Alas. Also because it is mandatory she is like, a quarter Japanese and related to Mr No-Eyes-Elder from the latest episode. Because how else could she get superior magic skills and a superpowered illusion spell without being related to Japan?
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Jun 9, 2014 13:33
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Technically the Americans come close. They have a pseudo alliance but, well, just look at how the Japanese's powerbase works - the ten master clans do whatever the gently caress they want and the military is largely under its own control. So basically they, quite rightly, view them as unreliable allies who are constantly getting into wars and skirmishes with the Chinese/Koreans. Then the Japanese reveal that in addition to having a bunch of other "strategic" class magicians (aka, people with stupidly powerful skills that can affect huge areas) they have one that can create an impact like a nuke on command and that the occurance a few years ago was not simply a fluke or an accident. Needless to say this upsets the world, but also the Americans to an extent - for similar reasons that North Korea having nukes is annoying for China in the real world, it escalates the possibility of its ally making GBS threads all over itself. Therefore, while performing a manhunt within Japan for rogue agents (that Japan somehow managed to let slip through their borders even though almost any mage can detect these traitors for ~reasons~), they decide that if they can find this nuke-wizard at the same time they are either going to capture or kill him. Because gently caress having an unstable ally with such a dangerous toy. So of course, these actions increase Gary Stu's harem because this is a LN.
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Jun 11, 2014 22:24
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The military isn't worried about Gary Stu because he is loyal to them. Gary Stu is loyal to the military because the military, the military, were literally the first people in his entire goddamn lifespan to say that his skills and abilities were interesting and that he wasn't a scrub failure that should be treated like dirt. Of course, that's the story reason. It's a Japanese nationalist spiel, of course the military isn't going to be worried because the hero will never betray glorious Japan.
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Jun 11, 2014 22:56
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Rangpur posted:...so when his family got done tinkering with him on the operating table, and found out he could now disintegrate/heal/nuke at will, their reaction was, "eh, that's alright I guess." It's worse than that. He had those powers to begin with. Super spider sense, disintegration, nukes, auto-regen, etc. That's all innate. The operating table stuff was so he could fit in with their ~mage genetics sperg~. But it failed, so all they got out of that was a liability that could potentially see their entire clan destroyed by all the others (because it is illegal and other clans have been ruined for smaller offences) and it only made him able to instantly cast minor poo poo without a device. Even though he could literally destroy the entire planet with his abilities, they still treat him like poo poo. Yotsuba be dumb yo.
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Jun 12, 2014 09:33
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The saddest thing about this series is that they made magic olypics look boring and meaningless. Magic olympics! It should be amazing and cool to look at and yet it's just tedious nonsense with half the animation time spent focusing on female characters' crotches and legs.
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Jun 17, 2014 10:07
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Weaboostomper58 posted:So my understanding of this thing is that the sister wants to gently caress the brother and they're still in school and likely underage and it made 27 pages without a gas? Because there is never any chance whatsoever that there will be sex or anything even approaching it because the author is some sort of weird Japanese nationalist prude who is also probably a misogynist and has a female character spout such weird phrases like: "I believe in a patriarchal ideology, so I believe that men are supposed to work harder than women. Thus, men must learn to discipline themselves and take responsibility for their own actions."
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Jun 18, 2014 13:08
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I don't think the author believes in the "samurai spirit" stuff. I guess he's some sort of new age Japanese nationalist or something? There's some chapter where an American agent gets surprised that a Japanese person is shooting at them because there's a ton of them still obsessed with swords and then there's this gem:quote:However, Tatsuya did not know the reason why Naotsugu was lending Tatsuya his assistance in this fight. Our "hero" ladies and gentlemen.
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Jun 22, 2014 04:28
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| # ¿ May 16, 2024 05:04 |
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SSNeoman posted:Considering the origin story, just saving his mother from the evil Chinese would be enough to prevent Tatsuya's existence. Miyuki would probably be dead, but that's not a bad thing. Miyuki got shot by a bunch of half-japanese JSDF soldiers who turned traitor because they were treated like poo poo because of their race. I don't think his mother actually died in that incident? Their babysitter/mother's bodyguard who was a clone of their mother died protecting Tatsuya while he nuked the Chinese during that time period.
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Aug 9, 2014 23:15
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