Forum - View topicBest Supporting Character Tournament: Post-Mortem
|
Goto page Previous Next |
| Author | Message | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Key
Moderator
 Posts: 18584 Location: Indianapolis, IN (formerly Mimiho Valley) |
|
|||||
|
The Best Supporting Character Tournament FINALS are now closed.
Results can be seen here. This is it - the final bout. And we have one helluva match-up, too, with an unprecedented three powerhouses all making it to the Final and the tournament's long-time lead contender not being among them. This could be quite the difficult match-up to choose from, too. Balalaika is one of anime's ultimate bad-asses, with a nearly unmatched screen presence amongst supporter characters and plenty of butt-kicking ruthlessness to back up her cause. In a second corner we have Kisuke Urahara, a man whose depth of involvement in the main plotline of Bleach should not be underestimated and whose contributions to training and enabling main characters are nothing to sneeze at. Finally we have Tanda, one of anime's ultimate supportive characters, whose strengths lie in the consistency of his plot involvement and the depth of his relationship with his series' main cast members. Where Balalaika is a force of nature who dominates the screen and Kisuke a manipulator, Tanda is the buttress which holds other characters up and allows them to complete their purposes. But which aspect makes any of these better than the others? Let the arguments fly, but be sure to keep them civil. Finals Balalaika, Black Lagoon vs. Kisuke Urahara, Bleach vs. Tanda, Moribito – Guardian of the Spirit Last edited by Key on Mon Sep 06, 2010 11:46 pm; edited 1 time in total |
||||||
|
||||||
LydiaDianne
 Posts: 5634 Location: Southern California |
|
|||||
|
Finals
Balalaika, Black Lagoon vs. Kisuke Urahara, Bleach vs. Tanda, Moribito – Guardian of the Spirit All three of these characters are really, really good ones and obviously all deserve to be here, but there can, in the end, be only one. Balalaika is one heck of a woman. Despite of some of the things she does, a bit of an inspiration. Tanda is quiet and greatly underestimated because of that. But, I’m going to have to go with Kisuke because unlike Balalaika, he is more involved with the main characters as well as other secondary characters. While, like Tanda, he supports the main characters, Kisuke does it with style, cunning and butt-kicking when he has to. As well as being a gentle man who dries the tears of little girls, he is perfectly capable of making people scramble for their lives. |
||||||
|
||||||
RHachicho
 Posts: 897 Location: Essex, UK |
|
|||||
|
Finals
Balalaika, Black Lagoon vs. Kisuke Urahara, Bleach vs. Tanda, Moribito – Guardian of the Spirit Wow .. just .. wow. Honestly I do not know how Tanda managed to scrape his way into the finals. If I am right his last three or four rounds where pretty much 1/2 vote splits? I kept telling myself .. no way he's going out this round. It almost makes me want to vote for him by default. However he is against Balalaika. So I am gonna take this through one stage at a time. To clear the air for me Kisuke is not a choice. He is a run of the mill cooky master that has been said purposely witholds information long after the "need to know" point. This does not make him mysterious. It makes him badly written. His design and his funny voice is about the only thing going for him in my opinion. So therefore let us begin my Balalaika vs Tanda analysis. Oh all right I will consider Kisuke as well. Happy now Kisuke fans 
1. Screen Presence. A measure of the characters presence from their voice to the way they move. Balalaika takes this one easily of course however though quiet Tanda does not excactly fade into the background. Personally at this stage I think it is relevent to consider a character's background. Balalaika is a ruthless criminal mastermind. Whearas Tanda is a shaman's apprentice. Sometimes a quiet character can be far more noticable than a barefaced screenhog. Tanda is someone who I pay attention to when he talks. I will therefore at least acknowledge his own quiet style of dominating the screen. Balalaika still wins this round handily in my opinion though which says something as to her sheer presence. That she can play the role of a crime boss, one of the more visual roles a character can play and still have an awe inspiring presence that is uniquely hers. Although grudgingly I must admit that Kisuke has Tanda trumped in this regard. However even his screen presence can not touch Balalaika's. Balalaika 5/5 Tanda 3/5 Kisuke 4/5 2. Degree of support I can not see any way apart from to hand Tanda the crown for this. He basically does nothing but provide support. Both emotional and practical to his fellow cast. Rareley if ever needing the support of others. And while Balalaika's support of the cast is not non existant. It tend's to be highly self motivated and the manner in which it is employed in the show does not make much of her thinking process public. Kisuke is often lauded as a great supporter but honestly he isn't. He trained Ichigo more or less out of self interest (spoiler[He knew about the Hougyoku]). And he witholds information way beyond alowable capriciousness. About the only secret about him that we know (spoiler[That he was chief shinigami scientist and had a hand in the Hougyaku and that he has some kind of relationship, romantic or otherwise with Yoruichi]) Is terribly boring and cliche. And conveniently sets him up as having a powerful mind without him having to actually display such qualities. Which he dousn't. Balalaika 3/5 Tanda 5/5 Kisuke 2/5 3. Involvement in main Story. I think that all three characters are going to score high in this area. Tanda is highly involved with Balsa's history and becomes involved with Chagum's. As he supports the cast there is almost nothing that is done in the series without him making some kind of contribution. Balalaika comes a bit further down. She tends to get heavily involved when she does stick her hand in however she often goes for long periods without appearing. And while this does not really count against her as a character per se. It does give Tanda the advantage because he has more involvement and does so naturally. As for Kisuke well I am not so sure he had much after he finished spoiler[Training Ichigo] And I do not consider the scene with Renji to be a seperate event it was a flashback after all. I remember when the Arrancar showed up and Kisuke finally got of his bum I thaught finally! he's going to fight. No such luck he just owned someone. However I do have to acknowledge the little things that Kisuke did along the way. However I really do not think he was much more involved with his show than Balalaika was with hers. And the richness of Balalaika's backstory compared to Kisuke evens things out in my book. Balalaika 3/5 Tanda 4/5 Kisuke 3/5 4. Final Tallies Balalaika 11/15 Tanda 12/15 Kisuke 9/15 Dammit I should really watch myself it's so easy to give yourself a double standard . Vote is now for Tanda as it should be
Last edited by RHachicho on Mon Sep 06, 2010 1:26 pm; edited 2 times in total |
||||||
|
||||||
Ggultra2764
 Subscriber Posts: 3991 Location: New York state. |
|
|||||
|
It's a first for me to see a three-way tie for the Finals.
Final Round Vote: Kisuke Urahara (Bleach) I'm offing Balalaika from this three-way since she lacks the amount of involvement with the lead characters and depth provided with Kisuke and Tanda. As I discussed enough last round, much of what is told with Balalaika's character is mostly implied giving her limited depth and the only prominent arc where she has a major role in influencing the major characters is the Washimine arc while Tanda is around to aid Balsa and other characters at major points in Moribito and Kisuke begins his involvement with Ichigo and others during the Soul Society arc in Bleach. In terms of consistency with character support and versatility for this match however, I give the edge to Kisuke as Tanda's support, while prominent in a few of the show's major moments, is trumped by Kisuke who aids Ichigo and his friends past the Soul Society arc providing meeting places in his shop for discussion on the current situations with an enemy and opening up gateways to wherever anyone needs to go. Beyond being a mentor for Ichigo, Kisuke also helps Ichigo's friends in trying to figure out how to harness their powers and provides comic relief in the show at points. Plus, he is also persuasive in persuading any major character to accomplish any goals that need to be taken care of and when the situation calls for it, he can kick ass when needed. |
||||||
|
||||||
Dorcas_Aurelia
 Posts: 5344 Location: Philly |
|
|||||
Sorry about that, I was a bit burned out last week and ended up forgetting about it. So how about Hughes getting knocked out? He did better than last tournament's favored-to-win, making it to the semifinals. Still, that makes two in a row where the favorite didn't win. As for the mini-game, well, I imagine for Key and Mow this round might be a little tense, as Olliff and dtm (respectively) could overtake them in this final round. |
||||||
|
||||||
|
Redbeard 101
Oscar the Grouch
Forums Superstar  Posts: 16974 |
|
|||||
|
Finals
Balalaika, Black Lagoon Reason: Well just look back at my previous post for more of the same reasons. But to give something new I'll use RHachicho 3 pronged system. I think of the 3 Balalaika easily wins in screen presence. She simply commands the screen every second she's in it and there are no exceptions. She wins that category hands down. In terms of support over all I agree Tanda wins that one. He simply commands that category as well as Balalaika commands the screen presence. Both equally win those categories. Now in terms of degree of support to the characters AND story I have Balalaika and Tanda on equal footing. I think personally Tanda might assist the characters more where as Balalaika supports the story more with her presence and actions. There is not 1 main story but rather arcs in Black Lagoon. However in virtually all of them her presence is paramount to the arcs actual completion and success. But combine they come out equal. I think poor Kisuke just narrowly gets beat in all 3. I'd put him 1 point below the winner in each category. He's Thomas the Tank engine and he main thinks he can...but he runs out of gas 10 feet from the finish line. He deserves every bit of credit but I think he just runs a second too late behind Balalaika and Tanda. Given that though who should I vote for? I mean I see Balalaika and Tanda as equal at this point. So how should win? I'm going to go with Balalaika because of Black Lagoon's episode format. If it was one main central plot drawn out over 24-26 episodes I'd give it to Tanda for the more constant support. However in Black Lagoon as I mentioned it's set in arcs of varying size. In the vast majority of them her actions and role have a more direct and immediate impact then Tanda. Given BL's format her actions and support have more oomph to them and are more critical for the arcs to even be completed. Without her support in them they'd simply not work. Period. I think if you tried you could get through Moribito without Tanda. Might be hard but it can be done. Not so with Black Lagoon. So with 2 equal competitors Balalaika wins for me because her shows format allows her actions to have a more immediate and direct impact. Close call but she gets my vote. |
||||||
|
||||||
Mister V
 Posts: 1000 |
|
|||||
|
Obviously, my vote goes for Balalaika.
Maybe I don't remember Moribito well enough... Actually, I didn't expect him to make it here... not that he doesn't deserve it, no. He is, of course, a more subdued type, and I'm sure that in the (very) long run he would perhaps have more influence on Balsa than Balalaika on the Lagoon's team. However, we are talking about the anime series; and Balalaika was the plot driver (or at least had a major impact) in, I think, about half of its run. I don't see why she should at all be restricted to supporting the main characters - surely we aren't taking the term "supporting" literally? She has her own agenda, and drives it on, even crossing the road of their own - that's the best thing about her. She's not a convenient quest-giver, but a powerful character on her own. Granted, she is less "human" than Tanda, but I would say that is because the character types are too different. I don't think we're supposed to find out about the emotions behind the mask of the mafia boss... and I think she's pretty interesting with her motivations and way of doing things as it is. |
||||||
|
||||||
Spastic Minnow
 Bargain HunterExempt from Grammar Rules  Posts: 4640 Location: Gainesville, FL |
|
|||||
|
I also have to add my vote to Balalaika.
I'll just repeat what I've said before. Aside from her strong presence, level of support and story involvement she has that added aspect that's most important to me and for which she absolutely dominates and that is strong and unique support of the theme of the show. To me, she simply personifies what the show is about. Each character has their hidden dark past that they are dealing with, Balalaika represents one who has apparently made her final choices- she is inextricably connected to the criminal underworld and her presence and influence serve as a guide to ones that could possibly still make a different life. |
||||||
|
||||||
|
RHachicho
Posts: 897 Location: Essex, UK |
|
|||||
Hmm it seems it is easy to forget things sometimes. Bleach is a while back .. still .. It just seems as though his support is too generalised. Too well .. he's just too damn convenient for my taste. I do not like characters that do not display their qualities (Indeed that may have been the deciding point for me between Bally and Tanda). And Kisuke is just as guilty of that if not more so than Balalaika. Many people point out the rare parts of that show where Kisuke gets involved in the fighting or displays some real emotion. But this is really once in a blue moon and is one of the cards played on characters like this to make them seem alot deeper than they are. And while if we consider the sheer amount of support Kisuke gives it would probably come out a bit ahead of Balalaika and Tanda. Even if such a thing could be quantified it has to be taken in perspective of the shows length. I am sure if you picked any 26 consecutive Bleach episodes you could not find a section where you could comfortably say that Kisuke's degree of support is greater than Tanda's. Hell I am not even THAT sure you could do it if you cherry picked them. though you might trump Balalaika in this way. Anyway my point is that though I believe I did uninentionally understate Kisuke's degree of support I do not think I did it by much. Not when taken in context of his native shows length. |
||||||
|
||||||
|
Dorcas_Aurelia
Posts: 5344 Location: Philly |
|
|||||
And that goes a whole lot of nowhere. Tatsuki et al. haven't contributed anything outside of a filler episode since before Hueco Mundo (and before that they'd had no contact with Urahara), while Renji and Chad failed spectacularly against the Espada despite this training, and only end up being useful against generic goons. |
||||||
|
||||||
|
dtm42
Posts: 14084 Location: currently stalking my waifu |
|
|||||
What about Inoue, Chad and Renji before Rukia was rescued? Surely Kisuke gets at least partial credit there for hooking them up with Yoruichi. And in the Hueco Mundo arc, Chad and Renji were at least strong enough to be somewhat useful, even if they did hog way, way too much screentime. Yeah the villains those two fought were basically invented to give them something to do, but that is simply boring writing from Tite Kubo, and nothing that can be held against Kisuke. Don't hold him responsible for a flaw in the show itself that he neither caused nor exacerbated. He trained characters and made them stronger; that's all we should be concerning ourselves with in this particular aspect of Kisuke's performance as a supporting character. |
||||||
|
||||||
|
RHachicho
Posts: 897 Location: Essex, UK |
|
|||||
This almost sounds like you think the character is real. The characters of Bleach are how Tite writes them. I will be blunt and say that I think you are reaching for a reason to assign more depth to Kisuke than he has because you are wowed by his presentation. The very idea that it could be the "writer's fault and not the characters" assumes that the character itself actually has some input into the situation. Which is well ,,, wrong.
Yes but HOW did he train characters and make them stronger. We get treated to a few scenes where some character is training in his basement (And often not even with him) And then about 15 episodes later the character nukes a generic goon with their new skill and then get's faceplanted by ichigo's next victim. Indeed most of the time it looked as though most of the people supposedly "trained" by Kisuke made their breakthroughs all on their own. That his basement ended up being their training area does not necessarily give him the right to take credit for all of their training. Some of it perhaps. Not much of it imo. On a more comedic note I actually have to start wondering just how effective Kisuke's training actually is. About the only character not from Soul Society apart from Ichigo that has any real success is Ishida. And he basically refused to be trained by Kisuke. Orihime dousn't really fight per se and the rest apart from Ichigo ended up in the 1 goon, faceplant situation. At best. Hell even ichigo still seems to be the graaaaaar il kill you with mah swod! shounen stereotype I have come to know and hate. |
||||||
|
||||||
|
dtm42
Posts: 14084 Location: currently stalking my waifu |
|
|||||
Let me explain in very simple terms. Kisuke is not a real human being, or even a real Shinigami. He is a fictional character in a fictional show. Not a very good show, based off of the two hundred episodes I've watched. I ended up dropping it and rating it as Weak. Still, good characters can exist in otherwise bad shows; Shikamaru from Naruto is another good example. Now all that said, Dorcas_Aurelia was dismissing Kisuke's mentoring work towards certain characters because said characters only fought relatively weak "bosses" or random mooks. Certainly not anyone who is actually strong and/or who has plot significance. Why should this matter? Hmm? For one thing, it is indisputable that Kisuke took Chad and Renji and made them stronger. Chad even developed a new power as a direct result of the training, and developed another new power shortly after arriving in Hueco Mundo, partly due to being strong enough. If Kisuke hadn't had the bright idea to partner Chad up with Renji, neither of the two would have had the strength to stand up to even the weak Arrancar they did actually fight. Secondly, and a point which is more pertaining to your post, the character of Urahara Kisuke is not responsible for what Tite Kubo writes and draws, nor is the character to blame for any and all changes that Studio Pierrot makes to the animated version that do not directly relate to Urahara Kisuke. It was the story, and not Urahara Kisuke's training and mentoring, that got Chad and Renji involved in some fairly insipid fights (although Chad's fight with #107 was pretty cool). After all, the character - you know what, let's just call him by his actual name. Okay. After all, Kisuke is only fictional and has no control over the meta-story, and so blaming him for the eventual quality of the opponents his students face is just a tad unfair.
A fair question. With Renji, Chad and Inoue, he passed them off to Yoruichi. I mentioned before that he doesn't deserve full credit, but I do believe he earns at least some credit for being wise enough not just to help Ichigo. As for Chad and Renji alone, a full hundred episodes later, he cunningly got them to train against one another. They learnt one another's fighting techniques and disposition, which helped them out big time against spoiler[the second sand giant] if I remember correctly. As proof, it was explicitly mentioned in the show that this knowledge was directly derived from their sparring. Kisuke could have trained Chad by himself, but chose not to. I have been somewhat eager to impress upon my arguments that Kisuke does more than training; he mentors (and enables too, of course). Sometimes mentoring takes a hands-on approach to work, and sometimes it requires just putting the characters in the right situation soe they can find the strength/answer/power themselves. Kisuke told Renji to train Chad (and at the same time unknowingly train himself) and gave them a battle room to do it in. In this respect, he enables them, as well as providing a small but important nudge in getting the characters to improve their capabilities and work as a team. It's not flashy, it's not obvious until one hundred and twenty-odd episodes later (I wish I was joking), but it does have an indisputable effect. As for Ichigo, that's very clear-cut. He enables Ichigo several times just in training alone, and mentors him to boot. He is the one who put Ichigo into a situation where he could activate his endemic Shinigami powers, as seen in the clip. He outright trains the guy by battling him in Training From Hell, and in a mentoring role, he gives Ichigo advice that helps him get his new sword and spoiler[defeat Renji.] He even indirectly enables Ichigo later on in the Soul Society arc when Ichigo spoiler[uses his machine to learn Bankai. Or perhaps he outright told Yoruichi to use it on Ichigo; it is impossible to tell.] And don't forget, Kisuke does more than training and mentoring. He makes the spirit gates to get characters places. He made the item that Aizen wanted to badly and which I cannot spell properly. Hougyoku? Anyway, he turned Rukia into a walking safe, and made the very plot-important spoiler[Pillars] in an attempt to trick Aizen. He sold Kon to Rukia as well as various useful items. He does entertaining comic relief and also gives off a mysterious aura that makes the viewer want to know more about what he's saying/planning. That's a pretty good list to me. |
||||||
|
||||||
|
RHachicho
Posts: 897 Location: Essex, UK |
|
|||||
Sorry I understand you're argument but it's hogwash I am afraid. Blaming the writer for not making effective use of the character implies the character had some merit beyond what was written by Tite. I am not trying to be thickheaded I see what you are trying to say. And I am saying that it just isn't true. A character is not like a human being you don't judge it based on it's own merits for indeed it has none by default being a fictional character. You judge it based on how it fits into the narrative, how it complements the strory. What a character does and achieves and the consequences of it's actions are part of the character. It is of course relevant and desirable to give credit for well potrayed feelings and emotions. However youre argument would only be relevant if there where something real that Kisuke was based on. And that Tite had somehow failed to translate it properly. Even then it would not be that relevant as we are talking about Anime not any kind of "real life" that said Anime may or may not be based on. If we where to take youre argument as given we could feasably apply it to any character in this tournament. No matter what flaw a character has it could be dismissed as "The Author's fault" Unless you wan't to re start this tournament and instead judge the authors of these shows? I mean yeah of course the character is not to blame for their flaws. That would imply there is something there to blame. Of course Tite Kubo is responsible for the flaws in Kisuke's character. He wrote it! Kisuke Urahara is his character. Just as someone wrote Tanda and Balalaika. By the same logic we can also strip Kisuke (and every other fictional character in this tournament) of each and every single one of his/her achievements on the grounds that it was the author's skill that made them possible. The character did not have anything to do with it! The only possible way I could see something even close to this argument having relevance is if the show regularly breaks the fourth wall.
By spoiler[sitting on his bum and having them fight each other in his basement. Saying you two! fight each other until you improve! isn't rocket science to me I am afraid]. And that is basically what he did. You also basically give Kisuke all the credit for their growth as characters. Don't they get any credit? spoiler[As far as Chad goes it sounds as though he managed to aquire his power purely through his own reasoning and determination.] At least that's how it seemed to me. About all the rest of the stuff you apply to Kisuke is also to be honest weak plotting in my opinion. He often shows up for no other reason than to feasibly provide something that wouldn't be believable from any other source. It sometimes feels to me that without the Kisuke character Tite could never have made his plot make sense. And indeed his more recent works have made even dedicated fans question wether he ever really had what it takes or if he just struck on a really cool concept. I don't really see how I could make this point any clearer so this will be my last word on this particular matter though 
|
||||||
|
||||||
|
Dorcas_Aurelia
Posts: 5344 Location: Philly |
|
|||||
Insignificant, he didn't train them himself, and introducing them to someone else is a very limited interaction. Wait, when did Kisuke even see Renji before the end of Soul Society? You're counting the fact that Renji used his old training spot? No, not going to do it for me.
I fundamentally disagree with this. His contributions in training them - something which occurs almost entirely off screen - lead to absolutely nothing productive in terms of advancing the plot or their character development. It may not be an outright flaw, but I'm certainly not going to give Urahara any points for it.
What good exactly does making them stronger do if they don't become enough stronger to change anything? We only even know they're stronger because they say they're stronger; they didn't develop new abilities or techniques because of his training. Yes Chad gained a new power, but Chad explains that this is a result of his power responding to the nature of Hueco Mundo, not because of his increased skill. |
||||||
|
||||||
 |
All times are GMT - 5 Hours |
|
|
|
Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group