It is so not tennis

[branchandroot]

You know, I'm starting to wonder whether Konomi really doesn't like heros. Or, at least, not shounen sports heros.

I mean, Our Hero started out as a villain, and seems to be going back to his origins, really.

And the Hero School, Seigaku, is getting no development whatsoever. It's like Konomi doesn't really know what to do with them, or how to do it.

Rikkai gets development. Fudoumine gets development. Kirihara and Tachibana have storylines that are far more like proper hero types. Or, more to the point, like proper samurai hero types, since that's the kind of story tenipuri really is. They grow out of their total bastard-ness and insecurities and psychological hangups and gain...

...okay, the only way to put this precisely is to say they gain true swords. I'm sorry, but this just /isn't/ a sports manga.

Tezuka, well, as best we can tell, he's already there. And Ryouma... for a while it looked like he was progressing in that direction, but Konomi seems to have lost track of that thread. Ryouma's struggle is with his pre-existing talent, and that's a totally different shape than /any/ kind of shounen hero.

And this would be so damn much more explicable if Konomi had just given the boys swords! I mean, all the tropes and character types and lines of struggle would match then! As it is the fact that they're in modern schools and fighting with tennis racquets runs severely against the grain of actual character action and development. It's so totally against its own grain that it actually fascinates me for that reason. Tenipuri is one of those brilliantly, utterly flawed stories that makes case studies for future generations to ponder.

And for the life of me I can't tell whether Konomi is at all aware of this. I'm inclined to doubt it, actually.

When you add the anime to the manga, and take into account the way the anime writers have made valiant attempts to turn the story into a shounen sports anime, it gets even more interesting. I do wonder a bit whether to descent into total crack, in the anime, is an expression of the anime team's growing madness and despair at how the story itself is resisting them for reasons which might not be immediately obvious. It would be so much fun to see one of the arcs done over in proper, matching, samurai-story style; that would be an appropriate 'revenge'.

*eyes the AU bunny sneaking around the underbrush with trepidation* Um... that wasn't quite what I had in mind...

Comments

[meitachi.livejournal.com]

This is a really interesting thought...

Ryouma's struggle is with his pre-existing talent, and that's a totally different shape than /any/ kind of shounen hero.

That completely struck me, though, as really, really true. I'm reflecting on Slam Dunk (oh my current love ♥) and Naruto and the like, and Ryoma's the only shounen hero who's not starting from hidden, raw talent and overcoming all sorts of odds to finally display that talent. (I still love him endlessly because I'm biased, but.) Seigaku really doesn't get much in the way of development either--the fact that they win all their matches is proof of that. Losing would help them grow and make their victories hard-earned and much sweeter.

:/ I'm not exactly sure what Konomi-sensei is doing with the boys either.

I mostly stick around to love on Hyoutei now. ♥

[branchandroot]

the fact that they win all their matches is proof of that. Losing would help them grow and make their victories hard-earned and much sweeter.

Exactly! The only shounen heros I can think of who even come close to the shape Ryouma has are Yuusuke and Gon. And Togashi does it completely consciously and deliberately. *thinks* Actually, Ichigo of Bleach, too. but, again, it's clearly on purpose and for the sake of a complex plot development. Konomi... it's like he wants to make Ryouma into that samurai character who's empty of soul and on the edge of crazy because he's so good, and has been consumed by his own talent. It's a classic character shape. For samurai stories.

... actually, Atobe is probably the /most/ classically shounen-hero-shaped character at the moment. He's definitely doing the pride-defeat-growth thing. *dotes on him*

[meitachi.livejournal.com]

I'm not sitting here and encouraging your AU plot bunny, of course not. But I'd love to see samurai!Ryoma. *__*

And Atobe. Atobe in any way is good.

[branchandroot]

*stares at the freaking-epic-bunny staring cheerfully and fluffily back at her* Oh man. This looks like one of the ones that will hang around and ambush me for a month at a time at long intervals.

Kind of like the fma bunnies.

*sighs*

[giving-ground.livejournal.com]

*feeds the bunny and tries to look innocent about it*

I'm a little too brain-dead after lab-work to comment very coherently (unfortunately almost always the way when I sit down at my computer, heh) but that was interesting to read at least.

[branchandroot]

*pets* Yeah, I feel that way after a day of coding, too.

*wry* This bunny is growing on me. I fear.

[giving-ground.livejournal.com]

Well. At least it has more of a reasonable basis than my AU bunny, which has been running wild since some time last autumn and resulted purely from the fact that the idea behind it amused me. (That and the trouble I had at the time with making the PoT characters convincingly sound like teenage boys. A problem I still have but am at least working around a bit better now. Possibly.)

[branchandroot]

*laughing* Ah, that's a problem with the canon itself. They /don't/ sound like teenage boys, not even Japanese ones. I was talking with someone a while back, though I forget who it was, and mentioned that, with pot, you can either be canonical or realistic, but you can't be both.

On good days I kind of like that.

[giving-ground.livejournal.com]

Yes... I especially find this with Rikkai, although that's probably only because I've devoted more time to trying to figure them out and concluded that (for example) Sanada is not fifteen, whichever angle you look at it from...

Some days it gives me a headache. On others I can just go along with it.

[prillalar]

Konomi... it's like he wants to make Ryouma into that samurai character who's empty of soul and on the edge of crazy because he's so good, and has been consumed by his own talent.

I don't think I have anything to add, but I wanted to say: yes.

[branchandroot]

And it's really just so beautiful.

But they're using tennis racquets, goddamnit!

[prillalar]

I think PoT appeals so much because is such a glorious mess. All my favourite writing fandoms have been like that. The ones that are tightly plotted and consistant never (or rarely) make me want to add anything.

[chronolith.livejournal.com]

[thwaps AU bunny] No, mine. I have dibs on epic crack-tasticness. You'll have to wait your turn.

Actually, I thought the entire time that Konomi was trying to write a modern samurai story using modern forms of compition and just picked tennis because it wasn't kendo (oh god, so done to death) or baseball (also done to death) and periodically freaks out because tennis and compitions don't really work the way that they need to for the story. So he gets sort of muddled.

At least, I'm going to assume that he was intending this to be a modern samurai story because it makes bits of my cracktastic Revolution Tennis Sanctuary work. Like making Saiyonji and Touga characters that would actually connect to the PoT boys, rather than making the PoT boys run screaming in the other direction. It doesn't fit much with the girls from SKU, but it does make the relationship between Saiyonji and Touga all kinds of fucked up and fascinating.

I keep thinking about heaven and hell and why the demons & angels want particular souls. I keep coming back around to the idea that heaven and hell are created through though, essentially, and thus are highly malleable. So you want strong, creative souls who will shape the realm into interesting things and then have the force of will to keep it that way.

I was thinking about links and bonds and SKU's underlying story about self actualization & self realization. And I think what I want to do, ultimately, is pull Anthy together (because right now she's in at least 3, maybe 4, parts) and when she comes together she's going to be very, very powerful. Given that her psychic pain created Ohtori where she runs over and over the same trauma. Kurai is stuck as a kid, basically, (like Micheal) because her development was arrested. I think between Anthy and Utena she could get a jump start. Utena fits in there as both the catalyst and the stabilizer. And Utena has her own issues with idealism and a tendency to live in a cloud castle.

Where I want to end is with the three of them pulled mostly through their trauma and issues, and strong enough to form a triumvirate. Remember in the manga there is that trio that Kurai consults? The name of which escapes me. the idea is that the three of them become that, but a little more active, more invigorated.

Or something.

[branchandroot]

*nods* The dragons, yeah. Jade and Amber and... I forget the third dragon's name. Sound cool.

And the idea that will is the source of both power and form makes all sorts of sense.

*grins* I now have this image of Sanada looking at Saionji's relationship with Touga with this pitying expression and thinking 'you just don't get it, that's not how it's supposed to be' and then going and cocooning with Yukimura and Yanagi.

[written-in-blue.livejournal.com]

Frigging massive AU bunnies. *grumbles, but only quietly*