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A Certain Magical Index 22: Well, It's Over (perhaps)
It wasn’t the first series of translated light novels I started buying to see just how their story continued after their anime adaptation gave out, but I did post here about the opening volume of “A Certain Magical Index.” I followed that up with another post when, after some early difficulties on finding the series’ translated prose not as engaging as first-written-in-English fiction and coming close to just letting the volumes build up on bookstore shelves (without having got past where the anime had left off), I managed to rally. Now, after managing to get (and get through) a copy of the twenty-second volume of the series, which I’d come to understand was a sort of “cliffhanger conclusion” before the books restarted with a new subtitle, the thought of wrapping up with one more post did come to me. However, I am conscious of the persistent feeling keeping up with the books had pretty much been due to some elaborate form of inertia.
The translated prose stayed just about as drab as ever, events often fading from my memory as soon as I’d finished reading about them for all that they might have become a bit more interesting while reading, and I do wonder about losing track of the secondary characters without the prop of “constant visual representations.” Beyond that, I did consider the brief description I’d noticed early enough I can no longer remember just how it got into my head, of the series amounting to “almost a superhero universe,” and suspicions those sprawling intellectual properties are built to never end so long as they’re still making money. I could suppose “one major antagonist has been defeated, but the built-in problems of the protagonists still haven’t been resolved,” and even ponder the “cinematic superhero universes” I’ve managed to stay clear of, with impressions of “ultimate villains” that might help wrap up the stories of heroes played by actors retiring from their roles but remain “one villain among many” in the original comics.
In an odd, unfortunate way there being no clear current intimation of the series continuing in translation lifts a weight off me. I do wonder even so about this affecting what I’ll make of the “A Certain Scientific Railgun” spinoff from now on. Having seen criticism of a recent anime adaptation of later volumes, I am wondering just a little about their manga adaptation; however, I’m also conscious of how often “manga adaptations” get dismissed straight off.
The translated prose stayed just about as drab as ever, events often fading from my memory as soon as I’d finished reading about them for all that they might have become a bit more interesting while reading, and I do wonder about losing track of the secondary characters without the prop of “constant visual representations.” Beyond that, I did consider the brief description I’d noticed early enough I can no longer remember just how it got into my head, of the series amounting to “almost a superhero universe,” and suspicions those sprawling intellectual properties are built to never end so long as they’re still making money. I could suppose “one major antagonist has been defeated, but the built-in problems of the protagonists still haven’t been resolved,” and even ponder the “cinematic superhero universes” I’ve managed to stay clear of, with impressions of “ultimate villains” that might help wrap up the stories of heroes played by actors retiring from their roles but remain “one villain among many” in the original comics.
In an odd, unfortunate way there being no clear current intimation of the series continuing in translation lifts a weight off me. I do wonder even so about this affecting what I’ll make of the “A Certain Scientific Railgun” spinoff from now on. Having seen criticism of a recent anime adaptation of later volumes, I am wondering just a little about their manga adaptation; however, I’m also conscious of how often “manga adaptations” get dismissed straight off.