Forum - View topicEP. REVIEW: Mashle: Magic and Muscles
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MFrontier
Posts: 13918 |
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Mash muscleing his way through Harry Potter has been pretty fun so far.
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Traptrix Lover
Posts: 108 |
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I've been a fan of the manga for a few years now and am enjoying finally seeing it animated, producion issues aside. I never got the feeling Komoto hated Harry Potter though, that's probably just confirmation bias on the reviewer's part. Given the meticulous details and knowledge they have of the series and how it ties into the overall plot, that kind of genuineness can't come from someone with hatred in their heart, let alone dedicating so much of your life to it.
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 11602 |
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This has been pretty creative so far. I like that Mash isn't always the Goodest Boy (threatening to bury the moustache guy was unexpectedly sinister), and can realize there are people even denser than he is, which requires some self-awareness from him I hadn't realized he possessed.
I also get a kick out of how all the lackeys turn into Tiny Face Charlie Kirk whenever they're shocked by something. That hasn't gotten old yet. |
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everydaygamer
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Personally I'm not a fan of how it repeatedly hammers its one Joke into the ground as it gets old pretty fast. Yeah One Punch Man did that too, especially early on, but it was supported by amazing animation and a fun supporting cast which Mashle currently has neither.
That said I'm enjoying it enough to keep watching. Surely it must get better if the manga has lasted as long as it has. |
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Beatdigga
 Posts: 4609 Location: New York |
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With the Hogwarts resurgence, this show picked the perfect time to debut. I don’t know if the author hates Potter, or just gleefully enjoy mocking the rules of a Hogwarts style setting. I’m going to have to watch more to see.
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theotheranimeman
Posts: 74 |
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Wow, this reviewer is hardcore projecting on this Harry Potter-inspired manga. He's borderline delusional.
There's no signs that the author hates Harry Potter. If anything, I believe he loves it because of how much (maybe even too much) it inspired Mashle. |
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spacedin
Posts: 44 |
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1. The magic school concept long predated Harry Potter, and is what Harry Potter itself drew from. 2. Mashle deconstructs way more than just Harry Potter (one of its best jokes sends up Full Metal Alchemist) 3. Yes, the author is projecting. Going as far as to mock the name of the author of Harry Potter, and retread the whole "Harry Potter is fascist because it never advocated for a Lenin, Mao or Khmer Rouge style revolution to replace the hierarchical structures with egalitarian ones" - never mind that this means slaughtering millions of people - reinterpretation (that and what the goblins allegedly represent) upon Rowling making her views on gender known. 4. Anime/manga applying the "outsider filter" to western works and tropes isn't new. Both My Hero Academia and One Punch Man do this with the superhero genre by pointing out that in the real world entities like the Justice League, X-Men, the Avengers etc. would attract government regulation, need significant financial support, be held accountable for property and collateral damage and that solo/unregulated superheroes - which Spider-Man is generally depicted as - would be viewed as dangerous vigilantes instead of heroes ("J. Jonah Jameson wuz right") because of the emphasis on maintaining order over rugged individualism (Tony Stark's refusing to allow the government to regulate his technology and proclaiming "I have privatized world peace" in Iron Man 2 would have been a villain monologue in Japan). You've also had the likes of Gundam, Legend of Galactic Heroes, Crest of the Stars, Kiddy Grade, Gunbuster etc. put darker and more cynical spins on far more optimistic and idealistic western space operas (Flash Gordon, Star Trek, Star Wars) because, well, things like "exploring new worlds" and "galactic military alliances" are interpreted far differently by people whose nations aren't NATO members and was occupied by a foreign power that changed its culture, wrote its constitution and still maintains a huge military presence in to this day. It is true that a lot of these works have a great deal of overlap with progressive politics as a result, especially when they are written by Yoshiyuki Tomino, Hayao Miyazaki and others with socialist, environmentalist, antiwar etc. views. But it is quite distinct from western style progressivism, especially in its motivations and the conclusions that they draw, and particularly modern American progressivism where now identity politics particularism is the tail wagging the entire dog. |
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Avec ou Nous
Posts: 150 |
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Oh God, I never thought about this until now. With certain people's obsession with hating Harry Potter these days, Mashle is going to get caught up in the crossfire and dragged into the stupid argument. It doesn't deserve that but I guess it makes sense people have to pretend a show or creator they like agrees with them. This is going to be another "Anno hates otaku' misinformation that gets spread around, isn't it. Nothing in Mashle indicates Komoto hates Harry Potter or Rowling any more than Spaceballs was proof Mel Brooks hated Star Wars and George Lucas. |
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meiam
Posts: 3450 |
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I'm more or less there, I think it could work if they tighten the pace and it would go faster, but its just a bit too slow and it really has only one joke, so you end up figuring out the punchline long before it happens which really limit how funny it is. My guess is like a lot of comedy, it'll slowly veer into shonen territory to sustain itself and get away from its one joke man problem. |
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moozooh
Posts: 151 |
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MFrontier
Posts: 13918 |
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Lance seems like a fun rival-type character, and Anna is super cute!
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Minos_Kurumada
Posts: 1186 |
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Yeah... the series would be 100% better without those overextended explanations.
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MFrontier
Posts: 13918 |
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I'm starting to think Lemon is the perfect fit for Mash...can use his love of cream puffs to her advantage, can land a punch on him, and is surprisingly effective at getting him focused on the plot even when he has no interest.
I'm glad Dot finally got a win. And Finn might finally fight now too? I was expecting Love would fight Lemon. Nothing more classic Shonen than splitting the protagonists up so they can get their fights in. |
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Nagatoka_Morito
Posts: 50 |
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No spoilers, but waiting for Lemon to be useful is a fool's errand. But the reason for it is slightly more interesting than the text:
Simply put, the author wanted to have an all-boys team, but his editor strongly suggested adding in a girl for broader audience appeal and thus was Lemon born. ...but because this is Mashle, she ended up being written as an example of the clingy love interest of most adolescent power fantasy fiction: seemingly no life outside of her attraction to the hero and her involvement in most scenarios being either a cheerleader or somebody to be rescued. |
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MFrontier
Posts: 13918 |
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These are some solid and engaging fight sequences, which I wasn't expecting. Even adds into the series lore of how messed up magic society is to the point where the antagonists are just as much victims of it as the protagonists.
I'm finding her a cute presence nevertheless! |
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