Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei - generic discussion thread (NO SPOILERS)

[Anh_Minh]

I have no problem with the adaptation. For the most part, whatever flaws there are in the anime take their root in the novel. I never understood the "read the LN" defense.

What we lost is mostly technobabble, which never interested me in the first place. Oh, and Tatsuya's maybe a bit more emotional than he's supposed to be, and Miyuki a bit more childish, but I suppose that's the demands of the medium.

[Verisimilitude]

Originally Posted by karice67

To be honest, I think that a lot of the characterisation and detail that LN readers keep saying is missing has actually been revealed in the show despite the cutting of some key scenes. E.g. Mayumi's first few interactions with Tatsuya - particularly the one where she first started calling Tatsuya by his name instead of "Shiba-kun", and the one where she greeted Tatsuya and Miyuki in completely different ways - told me A LOT about her personality.

So I actually think that the LN readers make this adaptation appear a lot worse than it is by constantly alluding to what has been cut. As I mentioned in the Ep. 9 thread, there are constructive ways to highlight what they like than comparing the anime to the LN.

That's why feel that the discussion threads need to be more constructive in their content. I think many of the LN readers in the threads have adopted a very defensive stance when it comes to people criticising the anime, simply because of various comments from detractors that are repeated over and over again without actually contributing anything meaningful to the discussion. Also, no one likes it when someone else badmouths something they have a passion for.

As for why LN readers use the 'read/compare to the source' card so often, it's probably a combination of it being the easiest method to do, not wanted to get banned for spoilers, and sheer fustration. I know many posters in the LN forum are unhappy about some of the treatment the anime is getting from certain anime-only viewers.However, I think that posts such as yours and thundrakkon's in the Ep 9 thread are indeed very constructive and if people actually start to plunge into the details of each epsiode, it will foster a much more conducive environment in terms of discussion.

[karice67]

But you know, there are some things that the novel readers have also made worse with their defensive reactions.

Mayumi is a very good case - I've never seen her just as a 'reliable slow oneesama', as one criticism of the anime Mayumi goes, because I could see from her flirtatious behaviour (e.g. winking at Tatsuya at the beginning of episode two) or the playful tone that Hanazawa Kana uses in some scenes that she isn't.

I've also skimmed through the LN volumes covering the first arc

Spoiler for comments on scene/dialogue from vol. one that was cut from anime:

and whilst a certain missing scene and some of the dialogue that was cut were fun and would have fleshed Mayumi and Mari's characters out more, I really think the show should get a bit more credit than it does from LN readers.

In sum, whilst I also have a few problems with the anime and the story in general, which I shan't go into here, I really think that a little more observation from almost everyone watching will go a long way. ('Almost' because of thundrakkon and Stilts from RC, who are the two standouts for me.) To me, Madhouse appears to be using 'show, don't tell' as much as it possibly can.

[Mcfart]

So, I was expecting something more actiony/magicy going in, but am surprised that despite how thought-provoking they're trying to be (discrimination with classes, calculated and strategy with each magic spell), how anime cliche it is. From the first 4 minutes of the episode, you see that it's an anime with cliche anime characters (brooding clever protagnist, moe sister that loves her onii-sama, etc) and cliche setting (high school)

[kagato3]

Actually we are missing a lot of characterization from everyone. Tatsuya himself as well I can't feel he would be a lot less referred to as Jesus had they not cut down his first meeting with Mayumi.

Spoiler for what was cut:

It petty much showed Tatsuya has horrible self-esteem issues and will always see the other person in the worst logical possible light until evidence of things being otherwise. First he assumes she is mocking him because he is in the second course while Miyuki is the best in her grade (using the term "a dunce who flat-out couldn't use any magic" to describe himself in his thoughts) and is actually shocked when she started praising him for getting unheard of grades in the written test that she herself doesn't think she could get as a 3rd year student.

Originally Posted by karice67

In sum, whilst I also have a few problems with the anime and the story in general, which I shan't go into here, I really think that a little more observation from almost everyone watching will go a long way. ('Almost' because of thundrakkon and Stilts from RC, who are the two standouts for me.) To me, Madhouse appears to be using 'show, don't tell' as much as it possibly can.

Well some of the more overzealous mods have made that difficult as they seem to have gotten infraction happy when people point out any observation of what the anime shows you but not directly states and I feel some of the posters are trying to egg that behavior on especially when posts show that their point of view is shown to be incorrect by the anime itself.

[Ravagerblade]

Originally Posted by Mcfart

So, I was expecting something more actiony/magicy going in, but am surprised that despite how thought-provoking they're trying to be (discrimination with classes, calculated and strategy with each magic spell), how anime cliche it is. From the first 4 minutes of the episode, you see that it's an anime with cliche anime characters (brooding clever protagnist, moe sister that loves her onii-sama, etc) and cliche setting (high school)

Whether they may be cliché's doesn't mean it can't change up how the result of how it got to be there; maybe something happened to make the moe sister love her onii-sama.

The anime does take some liberties but stay's somewhat faithful but not fully.

[zerozeronine]

I don't get the constant comparison with NGNL,even in MAL.It's like comparing Archie (if it had ecchi scenes) with the Dark Knight Returns.

[karice67]

Originally Posted by kagato3

Actually we are missing a lot of characterization from everyone. Tatsuya himself as well I can't feel he would be a lot less referred to as Jesus had they not cut down his first meeting with Mayumi.

Spoiler for what was cut:

It petty much showed Tatsuya has horrible self-esteem issues and will always see the other person in the worst logical possible light until evidence of things being otherwise. First he assumes she is mocking him because he is in the second course while Miyuki is the best in her grade (using the term "a dunce who flat-out couldn't use any magic" to describe himself in his thoughts) and is actually shocked when she started praising him for getting unheard of grades in the written test that she herself doesn't think she could get as a 3rd year student.

Well some of the more overzealous mods have made that difficult as they seem to have gotten infraction happy when people point out any observation of what the anime shows you but not directly states and I feel some of the posters are trying to egg that behavior on especially when posts show that their point of view is shown to be incorrect by the anime itself.

I'm not sure I would call it "horrible self esteem," but the anime does convey that Tatsuya doesn't value his skills and achievements that highly. E.g. His surprise at the start of episode 2 after Erika observes that he is amazing for being able to recognise that her baton was a CAD. And whilst it is clear that wanting to keep under the radar is a big motivation for not wanting to be in the Disciplinary Committee, to me, his voice conveyed that he actually believed some of what he was saying.

And if they actually made it more obvious through his thoughts, I think people would merely switch to criticising him for not recognising how OP he actually is. No way around it from the creator's side, I'm afraid...but I think there are ways to mediate on the viewer's side.

I know you all really want to see all this detail adapted - I think a lot of it is there, but you have to let the show breathe, and you can help by pointing at any "show, not tell" in the anime threads instead if lamenting what isn't there. (Re: over zealous mods - of course, it would help if it was less obvious that you are novel readers....)

[IceHism]

Every time i raise plot points or questions, i feel like i just logically create points / questions that point to what happens later so i'm not sure whether i should even post it. I'll try to notice more of the subtle things that are adapted though.

[Marcus H.]

I don't get the constant comparison with NGNL,even in MAL.It's like comparing Archie (if it had ecchi scenes) with the Dark Knight Returns.

They are both anime adaptations from Madhouse, which has been struggling in anime series adaptations recently. It's inevitable, since more people are calling Madhouse "as dead as Gainax" because of a lack of a decent stream of cash from anime sales.

[Mcfart]

Originally Posted by Ravagerblade

Whether they may be cliché's doesn't mean it can't change up how the result of how it got to be there; maybe something happened to make the moe sister love her onii-sama.

The anime does take some liberties but stay's somewhat faithful but not fully.

Of course there's some dark serious backstory from their early childhood lol. Yet another anime cliche.

Still makes it a mundane cliche. The premise sounded really intersting, so I was expecting someone that wasen't a typical high school anime with typical anime characters and typical anime tropes.

[zerozeronine]

Originally Posted by Mcfart

Of course there's some dark serious backstory from their early childhood lol. Yet another anime cliche.

Still makes it a mundane cliche. The premise sounded really intersting, so I was expecting someone that wasen't a typical high school anime with typical anime characters and typical anime tropes.

You weren't expecting a typical highschool anime with the word highschool in the title?

[guestuser]

Originally Posted by Mcfart

Of course there's some dark serious backstory from their early childhood lol. Yet another anime cliche.

Still makes it a mundane cliche. The premise sounded really intersting, so I was expecting someone that wasen't a typical high school anime with typical anime characters and typical anime tropes.

if we start complaining about cliche we never hear the end of it and it is not the only one this season but you know i never heard of people that dont like the show praise tatsuya for being a god more than his sister ever did or the entire show or even some of the fan to be honest.

[Ultragunner]

Originally Posted by Verisimilitude

That's why feel that the discussion threads need to be more constructive in their content. I think many of the LN readers in the threads have adopted a very defensive stance when it comes to people criticising the anime, simply because of various comments from detractors that are repeated over and over again without actually contributing anything meaningful to the discussion. Also, no one likes it when someone else badmouths something they have a passion for.

As for why LN readers use the 'read/compare to the source' card so often, it's probably a combination of it being the easiest method to do, not wanted to get banned for spoilers, and sheer fustration. I know many posters in the LN forum are unhappy about some of the treatment the anime is getting from certain anime-only viewers.However, I think that posts such as yours and thundrakkon's in the Ep 9 thread are indeed very constructive and if people actually start to plunge into the details of each epsiode, it will foster a much more conducive environment in terms of discussion.

Well, these are very true.

However, to be fair, even some of the anime watchers claimed to have read the LN and then bash the anime like "the source material is terrible so the anime won't be any good" or as you see quite often "I don't think the author knows anything about social issues"...etc...if they only talk about the anime, I don't have any problem with that (hell, even I, a fan of the LN, agree with many points they raise), but when the they involve the LN or the author, well, you can't blame the readers to react (despite overeacting is still inappropriate )

[Mentar]

Originally Posted by karice67

But you know, there are some things that the novel readers have also made worse with their defensive reactions.

Mayumi is a very good case - I've never seen her just as a 'reliable slow oneesama', as one criticism of the anime Mayumi goes, because I could see from her flirtatious behaviour (e.g. winking at Tatsuya at the beginning of episode two) or the playful tone that Hanazawa Kana uses in some scenes that she isn't.

Well, you've seen the reactions from many anime-only viewers when Mayumi flirted with Tatsuya in ep9: They ranged from "WTF, what is she doing??" to "Now even Mayumi is part of the harem. WTG, TatSTUya." - the reason was that they didn't see it coming, since the Mayumi-Tatsuya scenes were all stripped from the anime. The foundation was missing. (And please don't get me started on Miyuki, whose character was literally butchered by the anime scriptwriter - to a lobotomized puppet).

The main reason why I've become increasingly critical of the anime conversion (and lord knows I wanted to love it!) is that the script is _unskilled_ and crude. It's as if it is a rookie work with no creative touch. There is so much time wasted, that I can't believe it.

Take episode 9, for example. I don't have the episode available atm, but I remember that there were _minutes_ wasted showing pans of the university, then with Mizuki seeing something, Mizuki pondering, taking off her glasses, Mizuki seeing more, Mizuki strolling the university, Mizuki strolling even more... entirely pointless, the relevant information can be summed up with "At the university, Mizuki notices a magical phenomena and decides to investigate". This can be done much more concisely in 20-30 seconds, not several minutes. Time which could be invested in more interpersonal scenes which have been suffering.

Also, Mahouka anime's tendency to show characters full-face for 10 seconds, then either showing next to no reaction at all (Tatsuya, making the scene mostly pointless), or Miyuki beaming in bliss (which good scriptwriters could easily add to the background while concentrating on something else)... I remember that in other shows whose anime conversions I liked a lot, there are scenes where I thought "that was nicely/cleverly done", when they managed to add extra information for the skilled viewer. These scenes are missing almost completely here.

Usually I'm not so critical, but I like the original too much for my own good, I guess *sigh* ... I'll try to get back on a more constructive path, but allow me to vent this once.

[karice67]

Yes, I've seen the comments. All it's done is just reinforce something I've noticed about the ACG community more and more over the last few years: people like stories that make everything obvious to them...so I just ignore it. I personally find that I prefer stuff that makes me observe and think, even if it means I have to watch something again.

But I really don't think harping on and on about what you wish the anime covered helps - it's only made things worse. To be very frank, though it isn't 'in-your-face' obvious, I've noticed Mayumi flirting with Tatsuya since episode one... Ok - I'll admit that it's been quite subtle (all the winking), and perhaps more obvious to people who are very used to the different levels of politeness in Japanese (I was as surprised as Tatsuya was at the way she addressed him in episode 2, especially given how reserved she was or acted with Miyuki), but it is there. It's just that, anime-only viewer or LN-reader alike, those who are only interested in what they're specifically expecting to see probably aren't going to notice the subtleties.

I know it's just about pointless for me to try and change the way that most people view the show: but I really do think that all the critics should try to let the Mahouka anime have a bit more space to show what it wants to show. Honestly, whilst I would never call this show brilliant, or even great - there are a couple of cut scenes I know of that probably would have been better off left in - but it's gotten to the point where I sometimes feel like I'm watching a completely different series from most anime-only AND LN-reader viewers.

------

Anyways, I think I've said more than enough on this point.

[Ultragunner]

^ haha, I know your feeling , hell I am sure glad that FMA B or Clannad: AS do NOT airing now, in such era of "chaos"

BTW, the PV for ep 10 has come out

[The Green One]

Pampz will be happy.

[itisjustme]

Originally Posted by Ultragunner

^ haha, I know your feeling , hell I am sure glad that FMA B or Clannad: AS do NOT airing now, in such era of "chaos"

I remember these forums back when Gundam Seed Destiny was airing, 30-50 pages of arguing every episodes, I think things are pretty good right now. :P

[Kakurin]

Originally Posted by Ultragunner

Uh, Tatsuya finally has that big flower on shoulder and chest. Miyuki will be thrilled.

Good that Erika and co. have made the trip on their own account and are not MIA for the rest of the arc.