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Sword Art Online (TV).

dragoneyes001, thank you for proving my point. Everything good happens to Kirito. He got to be one of the 10% who were beaters. He got to have the fastest reaction time out of the ten thousand who played the game. He got the only special ability in the entire game (bar Heathcliff's immortality) due to his mental reaction time, even though reaction time should not matter so much due to the pre-programmed attacks.

dragoneyes001 wrote:

by the standards as has been posted every single lead character in every story, anime, movie would be a gary stu/mary sue if you ignore the tribulations and only list the happenstance that every writer allows a lead character to have.

This is an absolute load of bull.

dragoneyes001, I think you're missing the point a bit.

Of course, any character central to a plot is hardly going to be Joe-average. No one here is saying that he should be. What people ARE saying is that it's unrealistic to have a protagonist who's unsurpassed in strength, whom solves every problem flawlessly, is admired greatly by men and desired by apparently ALL women. Go back a bit to my analogy about Bella from Twilight. Bella sees herself as Jane average, but according to everyone she is so Super Mega Sugoi Desu Desu to the extent that she smells divine to every Vampire, is supposedly so incredibly unique and special in every conceivable way, and has practically every guy over the school drooling over her. She doesn't have flaws. When a character (like Kirito) is so one-sidedly fortunate, they become one-dimensional. There's not as much incentive for the viewer/reader to maintain interest, because there's no chance the protagonist will fail (case in point - finale, where Kirito doesn't die for some inexplicable reason). Flawed characters have much more substance to them, because often times it's not just external conflicts that they have to deal with, but an internal battle - either with their conscience, morality, desires etc that results in growth.

There's no room for Kirito to grow in the show because they've established from the get-go that he is overpowered and can easily eliminate an extremely dangerous boss (Gleam-eyes) single-handedly with an obscure skill that only he has.

Generally, in the Fantasy genre, there needs to be a character that the audience member can relate to. They're generally surprised by what's transpiring around them, and they are a conduit for keeping the show grounded because the audience understands what they're going through. That's part of why Luke Skywalker was such an iconic character in Star Wars - he wasn't overpowered. He was a skilled pilot, but that was one of his few notable skills. He was a realistic character with realistic flaws which he worked to overcome in the midst of a huge conflict. [/b]

When a character (like Kirito) is so one-sidedly fortunate, they become one-dimensional. There's not as much incentive for the viewer/reader to maintain interest, because there's no chance the protagonist will fail (case in point - finale, where Kirito doesn't die for some inexplicable reason).

no you thinking what i posted says any of what you posted is Bullshit!

kirito is the main character he will have the lions share of events.
if George nobody was the beater who saved a few people and eventually beat the game we'd be talking about George nobody not kirito.

if you want kirito to be joe average then why are you even watching this anime series its a fantasy anime not a slice of life anime learn the difference then maybe you wouldn't spend 500 posts bashing it.

ZorgonXtreme wrote:

Guys. GUYS ... Is this normal, though?

Probably not normal, but who cares? I approve of this picture.

Christ, you're really not getting it. Not once did I use the term "Gary Stu" in that last post. You seem unable to present a legitimate argument without resorting to hyperbole, sticking your head in the sand and yelling "OMG YOUR WRONG!!11!1!" to anyone who disagrees with you.

I and several others have said before that individual traits like attracting women, having the fastest reaction time etc are legitimate character advantages - but when you stack all of Kirito's advantages together in the form of one character, it ends up a big steaming pile of unreasonable.

And I stand by what I said about him solving problems. After the boss battle in which he defeated Gleam Eyes single handedly, there was absolutely no tension left in the show. There was no incentive to keep watching for me, because in that episode it became glaringly obvious that Kirito will always be the chivalrous white knight who comes out on top regardless of what the laws of the game dictate. I watched the end of the arc for the sake of closure, but I wasn't remotely surprised when they allowed Kirito to keep living. It was a cheap writing trick which they hand-waved away.

I admit, maybe the above suggestion was correct and the real death was lagging slightly behind in-game death. But that is too big a call to make, considering it was never mentioned in the anime. It shouldn't be up to the viewer of a show to jump through hoops to justify crappy writing.

4) if you and the others are so adamant about calling this series a pack of horrible writing why are you not only still watching it. but actually taking the time to debate every single minute detail of the show? I think a number of Series suck eggs have bad writing and simply don't appeal to me besides saying i don't like them or a very particular reason you won't find me wasting dozens if not hundreds of posts in a thread pursuing every possible angle to bash the show.

And why am I still debating? Because it's fun. Plain and simple. In my opinion, talking about the show has given me greater entertainment than watching the show.

edit: 5) to toss the bad writing theory into the trash. bad writing is based on sales. if it sucks people don't buy it or watch it. SAO is anything but not selling and not being watched which pretty much makes the bad writing argument mute.

The two faces of dtm42