Forum - View topicREVIEW: UQ Holder! GN 1
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ThatGuyWhoLikesThings
Posts: 1037 |
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I've been reading this series on Crunchyroll, and while it starts strong, the first arc (the one with the orphans; you'll know it when you get there, which will probably be around volume 3) is sadly mediocre. Thankfully, it gets better from there (or at least it seems to be so far).
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Thatguy3331
 Posts: 1799 |
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What I find kind of interesting about this series is that my friend and a few others who were big fans of Negima found it really difficult to get into this series for some reason. I read that entire series and while I liked it (not enough to call it a favorite) I didn't have that much of a hard time getting into this series. For me right now it's more of a popcorn action type of manga that I read weekly since my manga reading schedule on a weekly basis really lacks in that genre (only One Piece and Magi atm but they don't always shove fights down your throat each week.) As a battle manga I like it a lot since the art makes the action clear and the fact that Akumatsu actually has fight choreography in the fights makes them more fun to see.
As far as everything else though while I find Touta likable enough he isn't really that interesting to read about, he doesn't annoy me in the same way Natsu does from fairy tail but he can get close at times. Other people also complain that his goals aren't really clear enough but I don't particularly take that as much of an issue at the momment since not everybody on the planet has a 100% view on what they want to do in life, but he does need something to define him more specifically. There's also the fact that I'm not remotely engaged in the story or where the characters are heading and am just treating this more like a fun roller coaster ride. I did the same with Negima but I would like to see this series gain some actual narrative legs. |
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ZeetherKID77
 Posts: 982 |
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I'm holding off on this series until something decent comes up regarding characters from Negima. I know a bunch of other people are that way and I hate to be one of them but I can't get used to a new cast even with Evangeline present.
spoiler[Also, Negi is not dead. I'm calling it.] |
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meiam
Posts: 3450 |
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What's the proportion of fight/not fight in this? Akamatsu is one of the few mangaka (the only one really) who I wish would spend less time on world/character building and more time on the action.
The more he would define the world in Negima, the less interesting I'd find it, and the harder it would be for me to take the fight seriously, at first because spoiler["why are they trying to fight the enemy themselves when they could call any of the OP wizard there's around" and then it was the opposite "bullshit that a 13 year old is the strongest wizard in the world".]. On the other end the fight looked amazing. |
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CrownKlown
 Posts: 1762 |
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I thought Negima took a nose dive half way through and this series continues that trend. Akamatsu is best at romantic/comedy and harem, and is not as good at writing generic battle shonen. I think he still writes good characters, I like grown up Eva, and a few other characters are okay, but the story just feels like a shell of the first half of negima, love hina, and even AI Love You.
I do appreciate he went out of his comfort zone, but it just something hard to do, even Takahashi, while Inuyasha is massively popular I doubt the majority of her fans that have seen all her works would put it above UY, Ranma, or even Masion Ikkoku. Last edited by CrownKlown on Sun Apr 27, 2014 10:29 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Thatguy3331
Posts: 1799 |
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From what I've read they're mostly fighting, getting limbs severed/decapitated and anything else you can think of. Like I said a popcorn action manga. |
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ShatteredWorld
 Posts: 265 Location: ATL |
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While I wouldn't agree that Negima really took a nosedive half-way through (It's more of a rollercoaster ride in terms of quality...and those last few chapters were just awful), I agree that this series, so far, has been very lacking. |
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CrownKlown
Posts: 1762 |
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Maybe nose dive was a bit much, but it was very good through maybe the Academy Festival, but thought from Mars and on it was not very good. Negima was best when it was Negi interacting with his students with occasional magic hijinks thrown in, but not full blown action. |
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HeeroTX
Posts: 2046 Location: Austin, TX |
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If the "gender gag" refers to spoiler[Kuroumaru], then there's good news and bad news. The good news is that there's actually a story explanation for it. The bad news is it does NOT in fact go away.
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Thatguy3331
Posts: 1799 |
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I...somewhat have to disagree... I'll admit this mostly has to do with my tastes rather than any factual information, but honestly I thought a good chunk of the early chapters were pretty boring. I did like the student characters (surprisingly I should add) but I was still waiting for something of real consequence to happen and for me, that's what made the magic world arc more entertaining for me and may be why I'm honestly not having that much of a problem with UQ holder. I'm not really saying I thought it was a masterpiece, by the time they were explaining the history of everything my brain kind of just tuned out and and the end of the series really made me thankful I did just that (though that ending did stink) but I think seeing the students grow and change from that sudden shift was a bit more interesting to me than anything that happened beforehand, to a point where I honestly didn't care how long that arc lasted, I almost didn't want them to go home! 
But hey that's just me, I'm not knowledgeable if this fan base has too many hang ups about that shift and I'm not interested into getting to a two page argument about it. |
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Animegomaniac
Posts: 4161 |
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I've always read Negima! as a parody of shonen manga, from its earliest bit where it was a not quite harem series {"why doesn't he choose a girl already?" " He's about 10!"} to its action adventure phase where, I can't stress this enough, nothing had consequences, because you know, magic. Best fight: Jack Raken versus Negi. Point of said fight: In hindsight, it was a stupid idea for everyone involved, which came straight from Evangeline.
I loved all the chapters, except the one that was an obvious Yue spin-off which, bringing me to a point, I still would rather read than UQ Holder. UQ Holder! Same exclamation point, only not as serious in the comedy department so its serious side is a serious detriment. Seriously! Saying from the start that its the same world {universe, wait, one of them was fictional, "idea"?} as Negima! so it becomes a case of trolling creator. "Oh, missing Negima bits will come into play. Trust me!" What is UQ Holder! about, is it worth reading?
Short answer: it's not a sequel but still can't exist on its own so no? |
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Princess_Irene
ANN Associate Editor
 Posts: 2657 Location: The castle beyond the Goblin City |
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It can exist on its own, at least so far - the Negi references are small and don't really make a difference to the main story.
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Chagen46
 Posts: 4377 |
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You be crazy, Negima's best parts are after it stops pretending to be a harem comedy and goes battle shounen. You do realize that Akamatsu wrote Negima because he was sick of making harem and only made it look like one at first to fool his publishing company, right? The amount of detail and world-building was incredible for a battle shounen, and it's one of the few I actually liked. Negima is what battle shounens shoud be like. The ecchi comedy was just icing on the cake. The fights were the main draw, especially as they weren't "let's take turns throwing attacks at each other until the author decides to have one of us win" like other shounen stuff. |
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kgw
 Posts: 1197 Location: Spain, EU |
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Love Hina is 14 volumes long -and the last volumes were quite overstretching the story- Negima is 38, so I fail to understand how you can "have a nose dive" when you triple your previous work.
I agree with the idea the Negima started to work when it stopped being "Love Hina 2. When Harry (Potter) meets Naru". |
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jr240483
 Posts: 4470 Location: New York City,New York,USA |
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OF course not. He's also immortal just like evangeline due to mastering magica ereba. Unless this is the future that Asuna was on during the final vol However none of this make sense. for one thing from Vol 37 & 38 it stated that due to this he couldnt have any children of his own. So how is it possible he could even have a grandson? have a feeling that will be answered in later volumes. and speaking of which they never explained who he was involved with in the first place. I believe its definitely will be him and asuna & I'm definitely calling that one for the future volumes. that or his sister complex went into overdrive and he end up choosing Nekane which will seriously piss off a lot of fans. Also i have a feeling that the series ending he will be in a relationship with someone from the linshen family which will of course result in Chao being born. and that is another one i am calling for. |
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