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getchman
He started it
Joined: 07 Apr 2012
Posts: 9132
Location: New Hampshire
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Posted: Tue Sep 16, 2014 7:59 am
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that's really good.
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Vaisaga
Joined: 07 Oct 2011
Posts: 13235
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Posted: Tue Sep 16, 2014 6:46 pm
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Wonder how a second season would play out. This season has been a pretty odd duck with how episodes have been distributed. Usually light novel adaptations uniformly spend 4 or 6 episodes on each novel, but Mahouka has been 3/4/5/6/4/4.
I'm still surprised that the Nine Schools Competition took up the bulk of the show. Had it been the standard 8 episodes instead of 11 they probably could have squeezed the Reminiscence chapter at the end (they already showed a clip from it at the start of episode 1), or actually did some stuff from the Summer Holiday Chapter. Both of those are one novel apiece.
I can definitely see the Visitor Chapter taking up almost all of season 2 if they treat it like NSC, since that's three novels long. That finishes off their first year of high school, which would be a good place to end a season.
Switching gears, since we're this far in I think it's safe to talk about Tatsuya. People are quick to dismiss him as a Gary Stu, since throwing that term around is what the cool kids do these days. It's used as shorthand for bad writing, but I think they fail to consider what kind of story this is and what Tatsuya's role is in it.
If Tatsuya was supposed to be your typical everyman type character him having all this power would definitely ruin that. The everyman is supposed to solve problems with hardwork or some previously thought useless talent in order to give the audience the belief that they too can become a hero one day. Tatsuya was never this. His intial dealings with discrimination might have made it seem that way, but his first conversation with Miyuki makes it clear that he's hiding his true abilities.
As the title suggest, the show is about an irregular at a magic high school. It asks "What if someone super powerful tried to live an ordinary life?" If a "Gary Stu" existed in real life, what would it be like? Yes, initially it comes across as a typical male power fantasy with Tatsuya simply being better than everyone, but as it goes on it becomes clear that you do not want to be Tatsuya. His power comes at a price and it's a price not many people are willing to pay.
Because he has to keep his abilities a secret that means he has to constantly lie to his friends and there will always be that distance between them. His family and the military see him as little more than a tool and he is duty bound to be his sister's protector. He has no freedom and despite his efforts to focus on engineering, trouble always finds a way to drag him onto the battlefield. Being able to bisect a guy without batting an eye is not something a healthy 16 year old should be able to do.
He doesn't even have the freedom to get upset about this, because experiments on him as a child left him unable to feel strong emotions. So even though he has the interest of several girls, it's meaningless since he'll never be able to reciprocate. Who'd want to self insert into that?
I think he's too distinct for self insertion anyways. Self insert characters are usually blank to make things easier, but not blank in the sense that they're emotionless. They usually have generic traits any common person would have like "nice" or "a bit perverted," and are typically described in the summary as "an ordinary high schooler." Tatsuya's lack of emotion removes him from this because unless you have a similar affliction it would be hard to see yourself in his position.
True, by the same token it might be harder to identify with him in general, but my interest lies in the trials he faces trying to lead a relatively normal life, and how his immense power is actually the cause of all his problems rather than just the solution.
That he can kick tons of ass certainly doesn't hurt either.
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誤称
Joined: 12 Mar 2012
Posts: 549
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Posted: Tue Sep 16, 2014 9:57 pm
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Cam0 wrote: | So is that good or bad? |
For sales numbers? Pretty good. 3k is pretty good, 12k is likely VERY good.
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Cam0
Joined: 13 Dec 2009
Posts: 4921
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Posted: Tue Sep 16, 2014 11:57 pm
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Well I mostly agree with Vaisaga. However I think they should have told us a lot more about Tatsuya's backround, how he lost his emotions, how was he made into weapon and all that. So far we don't really know much about it. So it's a lot easier for you to sympathize with Tatsuya since you have read the novels. Us who haven't, don't really know much other than some experiments were made and he lost his emotions.
Also I think they should have made it a bit more obvious how much different Tatsuya is from others. There should have been a bit more reaction from everyone when he was dismembering people last episode. I thought that was wasted opportunity.
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Vaisaga
Joined: 07 Oct 2011
Posts: 13235
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Posted: Wed Sep 17, 2014 5:21 am
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Yeah, it should have been revealed in more detail back in episode 9. Instead they opted to be much more subtle about it. The problem with showing rather than telling is that not everyone will catch on. Then again I suppose I just know what to look for considering what I already know.
I think how Tatsuya is different from others has been pretty apparent. Though in this case, him taking out enemies isn't that weird, since Erika has no problem merking some dudes too. Still, they were all pretty shocked when he was revealed to be a special officer.
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Cam0
Joined: 13 Dec 2009
Posts: 4921
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Posted: Wed Sep 17, 2014 6:00 am
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Vaisaga wrote: | Though in this case, him taking out enemies isn't that weird, since Erika has no problem merking some dudes too. |
I still feel like they should have made a bigger deal out of this. They are all friends with Tatsuya and I feel like they should have been a bit more shocked to see their friend suddenly kill people without hesitation in cold blood. The cool headed Tatsuya who had shown little emotion and incredible fighting prowess before, now showed that he was easily capable of killing people. Shouldn't they start raising questions about his identity, even think twice before trusting him or staying close to him?
Erika had prepared to use lethal force beforehand though I feel like they could have handled her a bit better during that scene.
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Vaisaga
Joined: 07 Oct 2011
Posts: 13235
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Posted: Wed Sep 17, 2014 4:07 pm
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I think magicians in general are prepared for this sort of thing. Most magicians do join the military after all. You do have the softer hearted ones like Mizuki and Honoka who were visably upset by all the blood, and Tatsuya even apologised for that, though in this situation I don't think anyone would hold it against him. He is eliminating enemies who mean them harm, not just random people.
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Spotlesseden
Joined: 09 Sep 2004
Posts: 3514
Location: earth
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Posted: Thu Sep 18, 2014 9:52 pm
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Cam0 wrote: | Well I mostly agree with Vaisaga. However I think they should have told us a lot more about Tatsuya's backround, how he lost his emotions, how was he made into weapon and all that. So far we don't really know much about it. So it's a lot easier for you to sympathize with Tatsuya since you have read the novels. Us who haven't, don't really know much other than some experiments were made and he lost his emotions.
Also I think they should have made it a bit more obvious how much different Tatsuya is from others. There should have been a bit more reaction from everyone when he was dismembering people last episode. I thought that was wasted opportunity. |
background story normally save for later, not at the beginning. Most long running series, almost always have some flashback arc.
But when you see flashback arc, you should expect the series to end in 1 or 2 arc.
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Vaisaga
Joined: 07 Oct 2011
Posts: 13235
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Posted: Thu Sep 18, 2014 10:10 pm
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Well, the flashback arc was in volume 8, and volume 14 just got released, so...
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Spotlesseden
Joined: 09 Sep 2004
Posts: 3514
Location: earth
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Posted: Thu Sep 18, 2014 10:19 pm
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Vaisaga wrote: | Well, the flashback arc was in volume 8, and volume 14 just got released, so... |
so? it means nothing. My statement is still true.
Is the flashback arc about the main character? if not, then it may has another flashback arc. Like kenshin, Kuroko no basket some flashback are meaningless. But once the main flashback arc ended, those series were about to end.
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Vaisaga
Joined: 07 Oct 2011
Posts: 13235
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Posted: Thu Sep 18, 2014 10:33 pm
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Yeah, the arc is about Tatsuya and Miyuki 3 years prior to the start of the series and is quite significant. At that point pretty much everything about Tatsuya and Miyuki is on the table.
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Gina Szanboti
Joined: 03 Aug 2008
Posts: 11543
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Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2014 3:28 pm
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Episode 25
So Tatsuya isn't merely awesome anymore, now he's Ultraman? I think he just redefined the term OP.
I still really enjoyed that episode for the most part. The last couple of episodes have made me feel like that Far Side panel with the cicada graduation speech: "And so, as you enter the adult phase of your life, you will thank God that these past 17 years of being stuck in the ground and unable to move are over."
Last edited by Gina Szanboti on Sat Sep 20, 2014 3:46 pm; edited 1 time in total
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jl07045
Joined: 30 Aug 2011
Posts: 1527
Location: Riga, Latvia
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Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2014 3:36 pm
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Onii-sama vs. Superman. Who wins?
Well, Supes is weak against magic so no contest I guess, unless he gets a jump on Tats or fries his brain before reset kicks in.
Also I can imagine newspaper headlines:
"Breaking news! Chinese invasion defeated by schoolchildren".
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Spotlesseden
Joined: 09 Sep 2004
Posts: 3514
Location: earth
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Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2014 5:03 pm
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Gina Szanboti wrote: |
Episode 25
So Tatsuya isn't merely awesome anymore, now he's Ultraman? I think he just redefined the term OP.
I still really enjoyed that episode for the most part. The last couple of episodes have made me feel like that Far Side panel with the cicada graduation speech: "And so, as you enter the adult phase of your life, you will thank God that these past 17 years of being stuck in the ground and unable to move are over." |
Tatsuya is God. Those level 0 human has no chance. Since he is God killing inferior human is totally fine.
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Cam0
Joined: 13 Dec 2009
Posts: 4921
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Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2014 5:26 pm
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So Tatsuya can use his OP healing ability on others as well....
jl07045 wrote: | Onii-sama vs. Superman. Who wins? |
LOL Supes would just get disintegrated. Even Suzaku look-alike would just turn Superman into a gooey mess
That actually raises up the question. How do other magicians defend against 1 shot kill abilities like Tatsuya's disintegration? It doesn't seem like Tatsuya shoots a projectile, it seems like he just activates the spell at a specific location so how do you avoid that?
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