On Getting Forty Volumes Into One Manga

"This actually ends" is a comment I remember being made about manga, pointing to thoughts of superhero comics running for decades as their copyright holders hand them from one creative team to another. It may also apply to anime series and the old-fashioned type of unceremoniously cancelled TV shows. Just as there's been a rise in "plot arcs" on this side of the Pacific, though, I've also come to notice criticism about "you'll just have to go to the original source material now" last episodes, undemanding manga series that run on and on so long as they're selling, and dark mutterings about other series that go in creepy, awkward directions to definitely outstay their welcome. In the case of anime I suppose I just shrug that first point off, but when it comes to manga I've called arbitrary halts in some cases and avoided some other lengthy series altogether. On reading my way through the fortieth volume of one particular series, though, I happened to think back to how struck I'd been by the thought of reading through its thirtieth volume, and then back a bit further than that...
( A brief and specific history )