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krpalmerAfter nine volumes of manga about an eccentric university club of manga, video game, and anime fans, two anime series adapting a fair part of the story and including some OVAs of its "story within the story," a disreputable spinoff anime making changes to the show-within-the-show that did include some OVAs adapting a bit more of the main manga, and a short manga version of the disreputable spinoff, Genshiken came to a close. With picky manga-buying habits when that happened (mostly because of the constant scandals ginned up over various companies retouching the art to water it down for North American sensibilities, something Del Rey Manga, the company releasing Genshiken, had made a point of saying it wouldn't do), I did wonder about how to fill the space taken up by a standout title. Then, though, to what seemed the surprise of others too, Kio Shimoku started the Genshiken manga again, with new characters added to continue the story.
I adapted when "scanlations" that actually didn't read in stilted fashion were replaced by an official English version from Kodansha Comics, which had taken over Del Rey's titles but annoyed a lot of people in the process, and when the continued story got another anime adaptation I wound up thinking I'd liked it the best of any of the Genshiken anime series. It had had to close with an invented quasi-resolution, though, and I kept waiting for each new volume of manga. At least some people were either able to take in the "raw" Japanese chapters being serialised or finding new scanlations, though, and I did become aware of a certain discontent growing.
Where the continued story had shifted to having more female members of the club, all of them fujoshi (approximately "slash fangirls") to some extent or another (although Hato, counted to some extent among them, had started out a guy interested in "boys' love" who'd gone on to dress and sound like a girl for the sake of plumbing that interest in congenial company), by around where the anime adaptation had wrapped up the focus was shifting back to a character from the original series, the gaunt and pathetic-enough-to-provoke-sympathy Madarame, who'd wound up in the original stuck with an unfulfilled crush. Now, though, enough girls were taking odd interests in him for everyone to start talking about a "harem situation," which seemed to get people annoyed that things were shifting from comedy to soap opera. Aware that the story did seem to be coming towards a close, though, even as it ran to more volumes than the original manga had, I did get to wondering what would happen, or what had happened, and just how it might have kept irking the rest of the audience.
When challenged to make a choice at last at the beginning of the final volume, Madarame had found an excuse to keep from hooking up with every option. I could suppose this would be annoying, but for some strange reason I could reflect on my personal peculiarity in not demanding that every fictional character in a story I'm taking in be granted a romantic partner. Just when I'd supposed things would trail off, though, the joke might have wound up pretty much on me. Some more of the old characters made some of their occasional appearances in the new story, and now the one weak excuse among several more reasonable ones Madarame had made was being pointed out, so that he did find a different resolution after all. I could still wonder if this final wrinkle would keep annoying people, but I suppose I was able to take in what had happened with the rest of the new characters and not feel discontented myself. I suppose my manga-reading habits have picked up to where I no longer feel as if I'm reading standout series among substitutes for other titles not being bought, anyway.
I adapted when "scanlations" that actually didn't read in stilted fashion were replaced by an official English version from Kodansha Comics, which had taken over Del Rey's titles but annoyed a lot of people in the process, and when the continued story got another anime adaptation I wound up thinking I'd liked it the best of any of the Genshiken anime series. It had had to close with an invented quasi-resolution, though, and I kept waiting for each new volume of manga. At least some people were either able to take in the "raw" Japanese chapters being serialised or finding new scanlations, though, and I did become aware of a certain discontent growing.
Where the continued story had shifted to having more female members of the club, all of them fujoshi (approximately "slash fangirls") to some extent or another (although Hato, counted to some extent among them, had started out a guy interested in "boys' love" who'd gone on to dress and sound like a girl for the sake of plumbing that interest in congenial company), by around where the anime adaptation had wrapped up the focus was shifting back to a character from the original series, the gaunt and pathetic-enough-to-provoke-sympathy Madarame, who'd wound up in the original stuck with an unfulfilled crush. Now, though, enough girls were taking odd interests in him for everyone to start talking about a "harem situation," which seemed to get people annoyed that things were shifting from comedy to soap opera. Aware that the story did seem to be coming towards a close, though, even as it ran to more volumes than the original manga had, I did get to wondering what would happen, or what had happened, and just how it might have kept irking the rest of the audience.
When challenged to make a choice at last at the beginning of the final volume, Madarame had found an excuse to keep from hooking up with every option. I could suppose this would be annoying, but for some strange reason I could reflect on my personal peculiarity in not demanding that every fictional character in a story I'm taking in be granted a romantic partner. Just when I'd supposed things would trail off, though, the joke might have wound up pretty much on me. Some more of the old characters made some of their occasional appearances in the new story, and now the one weak excuse among several more reasonable ones Madarame had made was being pointed out, so that he did find a different resolution after all. I could still wonder if this final wrinkle would keep annoying people, but I suppose I was able to take in what had happened with the rest of the new characters and not feel discontented myself. I suppose my manga-reading habits have picked up to where I no longer feel as if I'm reading standout series among substitutes for other titles not being bought, anyway.