Forum - View topicREVIEW: Shaman King Episodes 26-52
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Lord Geo
Posts: 2683 Location: North Brunswick, New Jersey |
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It wasn't so much a "struggle" as it was simply a case of "it never actually got to finish in Shonen Jump". Shaman King originally closed in 2004 with the infamous "Princess Hao ending", right before everyone headed over for the final battle with Hao, as Takei had gotten tired of making the manga, feeling that it had become too "normalized" by running in Jump for so long. The actual ending itself didn't get made until the kanzenban release in 2008/2009, which at that point Shueisha essentially just let Takei do whatever he wanted, a rarity in manga publishing. While I haven't seen this anime reboot, I always did feel that trying to squeeze the entire series, including the new kanzenban content, into just 52 episodes was kind of absurd. While it's nice to hear that the show didn't totally collapse into a mess, it definitely doesn't sound like the best way to experience the story. |
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Shiawase_Rina
Posts: 77 |
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While the anime absolutely should have gotten much more episodes I'm glad it still exists. Thanks to it I could introduce my sister to it which made her binge-read the manga.
And not only does it introduce Shaman King to a possibly new audience, but it also feels like it kickstarted a new spike of popularity in Japan. There is so much going on with the series now! An anime for Flowers (looking forward to seeing my boy Hana animated!), so many spin-offs with the sequels, the successful gacha game and so SO much merch is being released. For so many years we had Flowers at most when it comes to new content. As a Shaman King fan for 14 years, I'm so happy! |
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tintor2
 Posts: 2142 |
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Yoh's pacifism and Amidamaru remind me to another character created by Takei's mentor. What bugs me about the ending is that we never see if some characters stayed dead for real like Faust or Marco. Hao really killed everybody by the climax. One thing that seemed kinda useless was the whole spirits of elements that only make time (or waste budget?)
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Gem-Bug
 Posts: 1325 |
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At the end of the day, this is what matters most. Almost every bit of material the manga has is available easily now, so I hope new people check out the source stuff. Shaman King has been my favorite series for almost 20 years now, and a lot of this adaption was hard to watch. 55-60 episodes might've been able to space things out better, but in the end, we have what we have and I'm glad it was made. |
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egozi14
Posts: 106 |
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Not just that the remake adaption was probably one of the worst and rushed remakes ever,
But I'm also finds the original story that was based on the manga to be extremely bad, Too much spins and stuff that made the whole thing to feel like the creator just run out of ideas and try to test different "scripts" in an attempt to make things more interesting or maybe different as possible from the first adaption (which was really good even with its fillers imo), The moment they also added a way to spoiler[resurrect] people, they've completely lost me as it was one hell of plot-armor that made the entire thing to lose the pressure behind it cause you just know they can spoiler[revive] people. I give the creator some points for his originality and creativity, but overall the story was really bad that even if the anime did things right it still won't have changed the bitter taste I have in my mouth after watching it, And I believe that most people who will be honest with themselves knows that too, stopped being PC with the score and give it a -D |
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Zhou-BR
Posts: 1461 |
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I think an extra 13 episodes would have done wonders for the show's pacing. It was great that it got to spend 4 whole episodes on the 16-chapter Mount Osore arc, but it paid a huge price for that right afterwards, doing a whole slew of extremely rushed episodes that had to cover as many as 7 chapters each, while cutting out important stuff like the spoiler[journey Joco/Chocolove went through in hell].
That just ended up accentuating the final arc's flaws. Even in the manga, the fights against the officiants felt too short, as if Takei just wanted to get to the final confrontation with Hao already. Still, I'm glad Shaman King finally got a faithful, somewhat full adaptation, which will allow Flowers and other sequel projects to be adapted as well. Last edited by Zhou-BR on Fri Jun 10, 2022 4:28 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Break Xerxes
 Posts: 223 |
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I really wish this got more then 52 episodes, but I still love it regardless of how rushed it is. It got me into Shaman King, something I been wanting to check out but never did until the remake. I picked up the manga and plan on watching the 2001 anime (both the original and 4kids dub) once DISCOTEK releases the Japanese version on blu ray.
I love this series and it introduced me to one of my favorite anime characters, Johann Faust VIII. Faust and Eliza are also of my favorite anime couples and I’m so happy that the new anime exists otherwise I might not have checked it out and discovered them. |
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tintor2
Posts: 2142 |
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So yeah, the talk and pacifism is probably the series' best aspect.... Cos the fights are ridiculously bad. In the final battles they try coming up with strategy or rules like elements but they are useless. The pacing of battles was already pretty bad in the manga too. Whenever somebody was about to attack in a battle we got to the aftermath. Faust had probably the worst death scene based on the pacing of his final fight.
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Ultimate N
Posts: 148 |
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I have yet to watch the reboot in full but even with what little I've seen this is one of the most difficult anime I've ever tried to defend. It has the ultimate trifecta of dealbreakers for me. It had poor animation, bad pacing, and a lackluster dub. I can forgive 2 of those if 1 is still there but it had all 3 it not only had bad animation but couldn't even pace out its story well enough to potentially justify it, like if the animation wasn't great but had solid pacing it could at least properly tell the story and show new fans why the story is so good but even that had to get messed up, but the thing that truly upsets me personally is that I could maybe still have an easy time enjoying this anime if the dub was genuinely great, but even THAT didn't pan out. I don't have much nostalgia for the 4Kids dub but I do like that they actually tried (and in some surprising parts) actually succeed in bringing so many of the dub cast back like with the sub, tho even then there were things that frustrated me like with Abby Trott just not sounding like a boy at all with Yoh (tho I could potentially see that one getting better) as well as Sean Schemmel ALMOST coming back for Amidamaru and even having an amazing voice for him, Kaiji Tang is great but Sean's was just as good and had the added bonus of fanservice. I don't know why they dropped him but there are very few reasons I can accept and no matter I now can't fully enjoy the reprisal novelty when one of the actors intentionally got dropped. Meanwhile DC Douglas had prolly one of the worst performances as Ryu and I love both him as an actor and Ryu as a character, I didn't need Sean to come back for both or even do the Spanish accent but DC's Elvis impression is just awful for Ryu compared to Sean who better captured Ryu's hilarious energy. Like the fact that the 4kids dub had genuinely better acting even in some cases better portrayal of characters than a more faithful modern day dub pisses me off more than anything else about this remake and this is a dub produced by NETFLIX who I usually have more faith in when it comes to their dubs. Still, I don't want to end this on a bad note because like a lot of other people I am genuinely happy about this remake even existing at all, we got a physical reprint of the manga in the US with the true ending (something US manga readers never got) and hopefully the Flowers manga and other spin-offs will follow, and I'm not even against this same team doing a Flowers anime either, the teaser trailer actually looked good and with there being less content I feel like they could actually adapt that story with at least relatively more ease than what happened here. We even got a Discotek rescue of the original anime which I have and have been watching with my best friend. He and I are massive Jump fans and we prolly never would've gotten into both reading the SK manga and watch the anime together had the remake not happened. So the fact that I'm able to enjoy a classic WSJ manga and anime with my best friend is something I'll always be happy for. Also as much as the phrase "it's better than nothing" can be seen in a negative light I don't wanna use it in that way here. I really do think SK fans are better off having this remake over never having one at all and just constantly spending their days praying and wishing for one that may have never come. Are fans wrong for wishing for something better of course not but you could argue this does give SK fans a level of closure they otherwise never would've gotten. Again, I know most of my defenses are pretty weak but I don't wanna see the SK Remake as nothing but just pure doom. The fact is Shaman King fans got the one thing they've been clamoring for and Shaman King has (even if its small) regained a spotlight. Like I said me and my best friend have become fans and we might never have had this never happened, so when it came to getting new fans, the remake succeeded in that regard, it's a small victory, but a victory nonetheless
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Gem-Bug
Posts: 1325 |
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What...? 
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Zeino
Posts: 1098 |
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Personally, I find the Pacifism at all costs philosophy in Shaman King to be one of the dumbest and most naïvely insulting versions of it ever. Takei basically has no understanding of real world oppression and violence and thinks it noble to just lay down and endure injustice to the point of death.
The ending of the series is a contemptible one and honestly deserves the lackluster adaptation. Last edited by Zeino on Fri Jun 10, 2022 9:19 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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MagicPolly
 Posts: 1626 |
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Well I will say the remake put the manga on my radar since I hadn't heard of the original beforehand, I'll probably end up reading it sometime soon
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gedata
 Posts: 617 |
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The combination of horrible fights and pacing made me drop it despite hoping for an anime like this to come by for at least a decade. 2nd chances like these are very rare, so it guts me to see this one go to waste.
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The Not so Chosen One
Posts: 433 |
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I was beyond excited for this show when news of a Shaman King reboot came out, but when I found out that they were trying to adapt 30-something volumes in 52 episodes and that I had to wait 6 months after its original Japanese release to watch it because Netflix decided to put ir in Jail, I just lost all excitement and hype for it, and I decided not to bother watching it. And unlike most people in this thread, I just can't be glad that a mediocre product like this show "exists", "was made", or whatever other delusion people want to have about this anime being any good.
I'm kinda glad, though, to know that the general consensus about this new anime is that it's pretty mediocre thanks in part due to its pacing, because it proves that not all old manga and 90's anime with their subsequent remakes can work with the Brotherhood treatment. I'm just hoping the new Rurouni Kenshin anime doesn't do the same thing this anime did of rushing stuff only because there was an anime before, or else we're getting a second mediocre adaptation, which would make the need of a remake entirely pointless. |
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Vanadise
 Posts: 532 |
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I don't think that's entirely a fair comparison, since FMA was 27 volumes that got adapted into 64 episodes in Brotherhood, and they definitely rushed through the first few arcs that the previous anime had already covered in order to get to new material. It seems like the general consensus is that if Shaman King had gotten a dozen more episodes and some more careful editing that it could have turned out just fine, which seems like it adds up. |
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