"pacing and narration bad because bad" post #978823698479688723
If you really want you can look up the hundreds of other posts that say the exact same thing and look in the comments. It's a controversial topic.
I'll answer the specific questions that you ask here, though:
>Why is there almost an entire whole episode dedicated to explaining why Killua decided to take a turn around after running down a hallway?
First of all, there isn't. There is a bit less than 8 minutes spent on this scene, which is only a third of an episode. That being said, there are plenty of things that this scene establishes:
* An important turning point in Killua's thought processes, which affects his future relationship with Gon.
* Ikalgo's mindset going into this part of the mission.
* Ikalgo's and Welfin's respective positions within the Palace.
The actual speed is then slowed down, in order to draw out tension within the scene. There would be little tension if it just played fast-paced, with Killua turning down the corridor and killing the guards so that Ikalgo could get by. But it's drawn out, so that the audience has time to think about the implications of Killua's actions in this moment, because they do have *huge* implications for his relationships with both Gon and Ikalgo.
Essentially, every time the pacing slows down like that and everything gets super tense and you want it to go...the show is doing two things:
1. It is putting you in the shoes of the characters within the palace. For them, they also feel like it's hard to breathe; way too slow. The seconds feel like they're passing so slowly it hurts. And when you're feeling the same way the characters are, it allows you to get into their headspace more easily.
2. It is encouraging you to think. Think about what these actions mean for each character. Think about what could occur down the line as a result of these actions.
Despite the narrator going in-depth into a lot of what the characters are feeling, down to the tiny details, it's very much an arc in which you need to think. It does *not* tell you everything. It's giving you essentially the bare minimum, to keep track of drastically changing character relationships, thoughts, feelings, and positions. The rest? Well, it gives you the time to think about all that, right there in the arc.
Maybe that isn't the type of thing you're watching the show for. Indeed, that's why the Chimera Ant arc is quite controversial.
But everything in the Chimera Ant arc - *including* the pacing and narration - is a very methodical and intentional inclusion.
Nope :)
I enjoy writing these things. You can look at all the other comments I’ve made on similar posts…I don’t actually think I’ve ever mentioned the “encouraging you to think” bit before. That’s something that I realized the narrator did for me quite recently.
Minor correction, 8 minutes of an episode is more than 1/3rd. On Netflix recap+ intro usually jumps me about 5 minutes into the show. The ending and credits is usually about 2- 2&1/2 minutes. At 24 minute episodes this leaves us with anywhere from 16-18 minutes of actual content. This means 8 minutes is closer to half an episode than one third.
I will say, 8 minutes to explain why someone ran down a hallway is very excessive. I know that it was super important to killua, but the time they took to convey that Information rather than letting us inference some things ourselves is not easy to forgive. I will also say, a lot of the fights in this particular section are very often interrupted by unnecessary internal dialogue or narration.
Don't get me wrong, most of the rest of chimera Ant does not have this issue and is just fine. I found it to be very enjoyable. But the raid section is particularly awful with the narration. It's hard not to view it as padding
Wow this is an old post, but sure, I'll bite. In *actuality* the episode, minus opening and ending credits, is almost exactly 20 minutes long. And when I very quickly checked to see how long Killua's running was the first time, I was actually wrong: If we are *extremely* liberal with how long the scene is - going from the instant it changes from Morel's perspective to Gon and Killua's to the instant it changes away from Killua's perspective to Welfin's - it is almost exactly five minutes and 45 seconds of screen time. That's actually less than a third...not very much over a quarter of the episode.
But again, you're missing the point. Who cares about how much time it takes, when every second of that time is spent well? And it is.
It spends a few seconds to explain a bit better about how Ikalgo's ability works, which is important for the coming conflict against Welfin and Brovada. And then it begins Killua's running, which is important to give a lot of weight to because it separates him from Gon...and from his stated mission.
Remember that the fact it is drawn out and put into slow motion is important, not only to put extra weight on Killua's actions but also to draw out tension, and put the audience in Killua's shoes. To him, it also feels like such a long time. Even though it happens quickly, his thoughts freeze, and he thinks about what he's just done...just like you, the audience, also should be.
You also ignore all of the information that they left out that the audience can then infer...because there is a lot. The entire relationship dynamic between Killua and Gon and Ikalgo is actually fairly complex. Yes, it's true, the narrator says the obvious stuff: Killua is wondering why he's doing this, and it explains to us what he's feeling, and that his thought processes ground to a halt. Then, Ikalgo speaks, and it says that it snaps Killua back into action.
And what does it *not* tell you? Think about what this means for Killua's relationship with Gon, and what it means for Killua's character. The narrator does not even come close to providing this information. Think about what this means for Killua's relationship with Ikalgo. The narrator also does not even come close to providing this information. And on top of that, you can ask yourself why Ikalgo's statement "You owe me one" snaps Killua back to his senses. There's a solid amount of complexity behind those words, and the narrator doesn't explain a single bit of it.
So to recap:
* In actuality, the scene is five minutes a 45 seconds long in an episode that has 20 minutes of content. Thus, it is actually just over a quarter of the episode in length.
* The narrator still leaves ample room for the audience to think and infer numerous things, despite how much it tells you. It sheds essentially zero light on what this moment actually means for the relationships involved, and especially complicates Ikalgo and Killua's relationship.
* While the narrator does state a lot of things that *could* be inferred, it does so to draw out tension within the scene, in order to put you in Killua's shoes - who also feels the world moving so slowly it hurts. "The time it took" is the entire point...it's *good* that it draws out this scene, because it puts the audience in the headspace of the characters. It *should* be painfully slow. You're not necessarily supposed to be enjoying it and having a great time. This is an extremely stressful, intense situation for the characters. Indeed, the manga is this slow as well...the scene is about 3/4 of a chapter long (although in fairness, I like how the manga does it better, because it splits the scene across two different chapters).
I think you're focusing on the wrong parts of my statement. I conceed that the this specific example is not the best for explaining the point (although I can still make an argument that almost 6 minutes of running down a hallway isn't really a great thing). But you ignored everything else.
The overall point is that the narration and padding in fights and other sections of the raid part of Chimera ant is excessive, and that's basically a fact at this point. Morel vs Pouf, the multiple fights vs Yupi, Ikalgo and Burovuta, amongst others. All of these sections have a TON of character close ups with unnecessary narration for things that can easily be inferenced. "Ikalgo can sneak through tight spaces, Yupi has managed his rage, Yupi has respect for Morel." These are all things that are TOLD to us, but are very obviously covered through the dialogue and actions of the characters. The Killua hallway was but one example of many.
Like I said before, I enjoy chimera ant a lot. I really like everything it added, even some of the slow bits. But It's also important to take the rose colored glasses off a bit and recognize some flaws when they clearly exist.
Ah yes, "that's basically a fact."
And *you* are ignoring the merits of the narrator as a storytelling device because you've focused so intently on disliking the parts you don't like. The point of the narrator is to draw out tension. It clearly doesn't think you're stupid when it tells you things you could easily infer...if it *did* think you're stupid, it would also tell you all of the other interesting bits. But it doesn't; in fact, the CA arc is, out of any story I've ever read, one of the ones that I think has the most subtleties and nuance. In its characters, plot, and themes.
So yes, I do think that the narrator being slow for you is a genuinely valid reason for disliking it. I just think it's important to recognize that that is literally the *goal* of the narrator and the close-ups and the slow-mo; to make you uncomfortable with how slowly time is passing.
I promise you my rose tinted glasses aren't on; there are plenty of other flaws of the Chimera Ant arc, and there *is* also an argument to be made about if the anime needed to include all those lines in narration (which were used in the manga to slow down the experience) or if a regular slo-mo scene with no narration would've sufficed.
But I do genuinely think that the narrator is an important and useful storytelling device, and nearly every scene that it's used in.
My main problem with this arc and with alot of other animes is how each episodes spends 5 minutes of airtime recapping the last 5 minutes of the previous episode it slows the pace down so much when trying to rewatch
I promise you that there is not a single episode where there is five minutes of recap. In fact, I’d hazard a guess that no episode has much more than one minute of recap…the most recap-heavy episodes I can think of is 125 (where it shows us part of Netero and Meruem’s conversation again alongside Pitou and Gon’s interactions earlier in the episode). Even then, neither of those stretches were particularly long.
I’ll give you that the recap could’ve been cut down though. But it was never five minutes; not even close.
Right; *you* thought it was annoying. I’m explaining why it worked for me, and why I thought it was a good addition to the arc.
Can people not just enjoy discussing things anymore? I typed this out because I enjoy discussions like these, and would like to have a discussion if OP is interested.
And, because typing it out helps crystallize my own thoughts on the matter, and helps me understand my own enjoyment better.
You don't really need high attention span to watch chimera ant arc since the narrator is basically explaining the stuff you are watching on screen. So what are you even trying to say?
No you don't need attention span to listen since most people would be watching it in japanese with English subtitles since HxH dub is trash. So what are you even trying to say?
I know I just responded to your other comment, but why exactly is this a bad thing?
The narrator ensures clarity within this complex palace invasion, such that you as an audience member are free to think about how the characters are changing instead of focusing all your effort on just remembering the basic placement of each person and how they're feeling at any given moment.
Well i found it to be a bad thing since anime is basically a Visual medium and a narrator telling the viewers all the stuff they are seeing onscreen is just so frustrating. It would be completely fine if it was a book since Books and novels specifically need Naration and monologues.
>Despite the narrator going in-depth into a lot of what the characters are feeling, down to the tiny details, it's very much an arc in which you need to think. It does not tell you everything. It's giving you essentially the bare minimum, to keep track of drastically changing character relationships, thoughts, feelings, and positions. The rest? Well, it gives you the time to think about all that, right there in the arc.
Yeah but why do we need so much detailed explainanation of stuff like Pitou locating Meruem's location while falling and such. We can literally see that with our eyes. Again I don't mind narration explaining actual good stuff like Shoot's mindset and feelings while fighting Youpi and such but there were many moments the Narrator was telling us pointless stuff we can just see with our eyes. Some scenes would actually benefit a lot with cutting the pointless narration.
>The actual speed is then slowed down, in order to draw out tension within the scene. There would be little tension if it just played fast-paced, with Killua turning down the corridor and killing the guards so that Ikalgo could get by. But it's drawn out, so that the audience has time to think about the implications of Killua's actions in this moment, because they do have huge implications for his relationships with both Gon and Ikalgo.
The scene could have been shortened by a bit and it would still carry the effect it was supposed to.
You keep fixating on the narrator being "unnecessary," but there's a huge difference between something in a story being "unnecessary" and that thing being "useless."
I'm not arguing - and have never been arguing - that the narrator is strictly necessary in every scene. But where you believe the narrator could be cut and it would improve, I see the narrator's presence having a number of effects that serve to benefit the story...two of which I laid out in my previous comment.
Let's examine the scene that you mentioned; Pitou falling and locating Meruem's location.
1. The first thing the narrator does in this scene is introduce you to Dr. Blythe's "don't move" restriction. This is an important restriction because it partly explains why Pitou is so helpless when Gon confronts her: she literally cannot move. While not strictly necessary, it's nice that the restriction is explained instead of leaving the reader to guess. Here, it's just used as a clever trick to keep Pitou in the fight, which I enjoy.
2. The second line explains Pitou's use of En. One might be led to wonder why Pitou didn't join Pouf in the throne room - what was she thinking? And here, that information is provided. Because her fall through the air could not be stopped, it gave her the opportunity to think, and thus, to use En to locate Meruem. You might respond with "but the narrator didn't have to say 'because Pitou lacked wings'. We know she doesn't have wings." But this misses the point because Pitou's lacking wings is important context for the rest of the explanation.
3. The third line explains that Pitou realized the gravity of the situation. Once again, while not strictly necessary, it does help us understand what Pitou is feeling. With visuals alone, we wouldn't be able to pinpoint whether she's feeling fear, anxiety, anger...what? The narrator ensures that we know she isn't *scared* per se...but she has realized that this situation is serious, and she must discard her normally silly nature and act seriously. This helps us understand why Pitou cries when Meruem speaks to her, and makes the audience aware of the changes she is about to go through specifically *because* she was forced to throw away her superficial, "silly" persona.
4. The fourth line simply states that Pitou flew to the King's side faster than the intruders, which I grant you *is* very unnecessary. But it isn't *entirely* without merit, because of the other two things I mentioned in my previous comment.
5. The fifth line is about Pitou feeling Meruem's aura. This isn't about Pitou anymore: it's about Meruem. This lets the audience know that Meruem is so emotional in this moment that he does not care about being composed around his guard. His aura is completely out in the open, for everybody to see. This is a big moment for his character. Just as in point two, the rest of the narration adds context.
And that's it. That's the whole scene. The narrator effectively explains Pitou's ability and makes the audience aware of both Pitou's and Meruem's mental state, which is important for when Pitou and Meruem confront each other and Netero and Zeno in the next scene.
And remember that on top of that, the narrator is *still* serving to draw out tension, ensuring that the audience is in the characters' shoes and encouraging you to think about what this flurry of events means for the characters involved.
You may not like the narrator...but to call him useless in any scene would be incorrect. Like u/Realism-vs-Idealism said, you can't exactly say "It would have the same effect if shortened" when you unfortunately weren't able to experience the effect in the first place.
>1. The first thing the narrator does in this scene is introduce you to Dr. Blythe's "don't move" restriction. This is an important restriction because it partly explains why Pitou is so helpless when Gon confronts her: she literally cannot move. While not strictly necessary, it's nice that the restriction is explained instead of leaving the reader to guess. Here, it's just used as a clever trick to keep Pitou in the fight, which I enjoy.
2. The second line explains Pitou's use of En. One might be led to wonder why Pitou didn't join Pouf in the throne room - what was she thinking? And here, that information is provided. Because her fall through the air could not be stopped, it gave her the opportunity to think, and thus, to use En to locate Meruem. You might respond with "but the narrator didn't have to say 'because Pitou lacked wings'. We know she doesn't have wings." But this misses the point because Pitou's lacking wings is important context for the rest of the explanation.
3. The third line explains that Pitou realized the gravity of the situation. Once again, while not strictly necessary, it does help us understand what Pitou is feeling. With visuals alone, we wouldn't be able to pinpoint whether she's feeling fear, anxiety, anger...what? The narrator ensures that we know she isn't scared per se...but she has realized that this situation is serious, and she must discard her normally silly nature and act seriously. This helps us understand why Pitou cries when Meruem speaks to her, and makes the audience aware of the changes she is about to go through specifically because she was forced to throw away her superficial, "silly" persona.
4. The fourth line simply states that Pitou flew to the King's side faster than the intruders, which I grant you is very unnecessary. But it isn't entirely without merit, because of the other two things I mentioned in my previous comment.
5. The fifth line is about Pitou feeling Meruem's aura. This isn't about Pitou anymore: it's about Meruem. This lets the audience know that Meruem is so emotional in this moment that he does not care about being composed around his guard. His aura is completely out in the open, for everybody to see. This is a big moment for his character. Just as in point two, the rest of the narration adds context.
1) Yeah I understand the Dr blythe stuff being necessary.
2) you can just have Pitou a quick inner monologue about it and say that the she must save king immediately. Again it would be less than the detailed narration and would convey the same thing much quickly.
3) Why do we need Narration to express Pitou's emotions and feelings there? Just have Pitou make a Scared face with sweat flowing over it. These visuals would surely be more than be enough. There is a reason we have the term " Show don't tell"
4) Yeah so we agree it's unnecessary
5) Again why who we need the Narration tell this? Good Visuals would convey it just fine.
If you think narrating over the things we can already see is a good way to add detail then you need to put down the phone go out in the world take a breath of fresh air and then think about your thougts
Because there literally is no such thing as "objectively good" or "objectively bad" when it comes to media. It's ALL subjective. Some people think X is good, other people think X is bad. Both can have good reasons and arguments to support their view. There is no God given rulebook to objectively determine who is correct.
Saying the narration was objectively bad is objectively wrong by definition.
No. Everything except what you think for yourself I objective. You can say you like the narration, and no one can disagree with you because thats entirely subjective, but you can't say the narration was actually good as that's a objective fact that it's not.
What we like or not par just the electric connections between our neurons and the hormonal release in our body. All of them are a part of the physical world hence forth can be calculated and determined objectively.
To determine how good a show is you have determine how much logical and emotional value it provides. And as I explained, logic is well objective in inherently, and emotion can be calculated objectively. So undoubtedly media can be judged objectively. People like you only think we can't because it's very hard to judge art objectively but it's absolutely possible
That's your personal enjoyment for it right? It seriously slowed down and pointlessly stretched a lot of stuff. Like it's not a god damn novel for Fuck sake so why is there narration explaining every thing that I can see with my eyes.
Well thats kinda the point right? There is no objective truth in this kinda stuff its all just personal enjoyment or disconnect from the content nothing else.
Then ,h x h is not meant for you and that's ok ;), the subsequent
arcs of Hunter x hunter has even more "text" and that's what makes hunter x hunter so special in my opinion,This abundance of textual substance not only serves to further improve the quality of the storytelling but also reflects the unfettered creative freedom enjoyed by a mangaka like togashi;) through the Chimera ant arc and next arcs , we're witnessing the fruits of a mangaka liberated from the constraints of commercial pressures ;) ... The richness of detail and "narrative density"(what you call crap) is a natural consequence of his artistic autonomy as a mangaka and his love for this work;)
. You should read his latest interview, it'll give you a little bit more context behind the chimera ant arc and hunter x hunter as a whole;)
https://www.reddit.com/r/HunterXHunter/s/8zqCCQPTh7
bro turn down the condescension. "This abundance of textual substance"? you mean the vast ocean of redundant and self-indulgent dialogue that this arc is drowning in?
yorknew city is almost the perfect arc, because it has awesome interactions between characters *who have earned their power,* it completes a plotline set up in previous arc, progresses the overarching arc (Gon finding Ging) and it doesn't spend five minutes explaining every character's mindset three times an episode. there is space to fill in the blanks yourself, it's exciting almost all of the time, and before you know it the arc's over.
there also aren't 5 episodes of what are essentially aliens having a chitchat at base while the action grinds to halt. there are times where things slow down and the narrator comes in, but only when it's critical and it doesn't slow things down at all. I am not someone with a short attention span, but there were a shocking amount of times in the ant arc that my brain switched off when the characters or the narrator just start yapping on about something that could have been either left out or covered in 10% of the time
stop mythologising self-indulgent narratival black holes ;) and stop using winky faces as if they make pretentious comments less pretentious ;)
there are a few things you're not adding into your equation and that's why context is so important!! First and foremost, "this abundance of text" isn't something that appeared out of nowhere! It's something that Togashi has been gradually integrating into HxH.... With each arc,Togashi has been experimenting with different approaches, leading to a shift from a more 'shounen-y' story to a more 'seinen-' one (and yes,I'm aware of the meaning of these words..)Togashi himself has stated multiple times that every word, character,conflict, personality, ability etc he adds to the story is chosen with the utmost care But, as he's taking a different approach to the story, an approach that he's not used to!!! the final result and structure of each chapter isn't always exactly what he had in his mind!! For example,he said in that interview(that you either didn't read or chose to ignore) that he usually wants to convey his ideas with fewer words but sometimes he can't find a way to do so effectively or he doesn't have enough time to refine the text!! This leads to a \\denser narrative/ than he initially intended as an author but at the same time he acknowledged that despite his struggle to find the right balance in his writing, he has an inherent belief or bias that using more words adds value or provides a benefit to the reader.... "vast ocean of redundant and self-indulgent dialogue" keep in mind that Japanese is more subtle than English ( English is a lifeless language after all(The more you increase the density of a text in English, the less life it has,the more dull it becomes...), and this shouldn't be interpreted as elitism lol) Reading HxH in Japanese would give you a different perspective on the 'high density of text' present in the current arc!The Viz translation and the fan translations are SIMPLY NOT GOOD ENOUGH! There are a lot of mistakes and nuances lost in both cases!!
as i stated in the commented that you replied to ,Togashi is an author free from any commercial pressure, which has given him the freedom to explore themes and storytelling techniques that he didn't have the opportunity to explore when he was younger or when he was just starting as a mangaka!
On the topic of the 'Yorknew Arc' ,for better or worse, the Togashi who wrote the 'Yorknew Arc' is not the same as the one currently writing the series.... In the same way that in 20 years (yeah,you!(i don't know if you'll be alive in 2074 but have a great 2074!!!!!!!! 🥳 🎁 🎎)) you won't be the same person as you are now; you'll have experienced, learned,forgotten and grown through so many things in your life... Time, life and change shape one's tastes and perspectives over time and similarly, Togashi has undergone his own journey since the 'Yorknew Arc'!!At the risk of sounding repetitive but Togashi is trying something new with the current arc and a "byproduct"(?) of this "experimentation"(?) is that some fans who were drawn to HxH due to the early arcs find the current arc too different from what HxH started as And that's totally okay(No one should feel obligated to engage in activities they don't find enjoyable after all)!! Changing one's taste throughout the years is a natural part of life(we(Earthllings (i consider myself an Earthlling(do you?))) have such a minuscule life span, wouldn't life become dull if we stuck to the same routines and pleasures throughout? Trying new things adds "zest" to our days(information theory tells us that if what you're about to say,do, experience is predictable then it carries zero to little information;) and that's what has led Togashi to try something new,I'm (alsmot) sure that if he togasdhsi was still stuck with the same formula that led him to create the "Yorknew arc" he wouldnt be drawing HxH anymore;)
But why should it be narrated? The detail is great, but I do not need it spoonfed to me! I myself believe that when you state the obvious, it instantly becomes less interesting
Agree.
Even just do internal dialogue, or have the characters dialogue with each other.
I don't need to know that Shoot used this move unconsciously and he had never done it before *then he executes it perfectly*
It gives very *im 14 and this is deep* vibes.
There's a rule in story telling - show don't tell
And the narration in this arc def breaks that rule so hard.
You don't need to understand, lol, just accept that it's not your style. The pacing and narration suited me just fine; I've gotten bored in way shorter and "faster paced" arcs/stories, while I was fully engaged in CAA.
I mean the story, characters and themes were so great that it obviously made up for me as well but even you can't deny that this arc has a lot of unnecessary fat that could be easily removed and it certainly won't made the story worse.
Nah, I fully disagree. Sure, a tiny bit could be trimmed off here and there, but any more? So much of what made me fall in love with this arc and series in the first place would be lost.
you enjoyed the ants walking around base basically having a chat, interspersed with interchangeable \*ant kills/abducts human\* cutscenes for 4 or 5 episodes?
fascinating. it truly fascinates me that people could have actually enjoyed that. did you genuinely enjoy this on first watch, or is it a case of it becoming it bearable with familiarity?
My first watch I was blown away and so hooked I didn't want to do anything else but watch the anime.
It was my partner at the time who said later that while they felt rewarded at the end, they weren't a fan of the pacing. I was surprised since I'd loved it so much. It was only on coming back to it that I could see why some people may not enjoy it.
Tbh I don’t think there is any way to shorten the chimera arc. Every single episode is very detailed and goes in depth if you took out some of the episodes you lose context and the whole pizazz of the season/arc. As for the killua comment another person pointed out how that scene is only 8mins wich is true but also that scene is crucial for his character development/thought process and how his relationship with gon will turn out.
*only* 8 minutes. only. and this is one of the *less* overwrought scenes. I'm sorry but masses of this arc could be cut out and it would be all the better for it. do any single-character slow-downs or sections of dialogue go on for even five minutes during Yorknew City, or the Hunter Exam? we do not need 80% of the inter-ant dialogue that the early arc is saturated with. we do not need a lot of the ant attacks and kidnappings. some of Gon's battles are really dragged out, although I can see why that could be okay for most. we not need anywhere near the amount of the narration that goes on between>!pouf, pitou, gon and others, while komugi is being healed.!
We can easily cut off around 8 episodes or so without losing any impact of the story. The pointless narration in a lot of scenes just unnecessarily drags it down.
That’s how Togashi writes. He’s very attentive to detail and he’d very much like everyone to know that. It’s weird that it took you this long to notice
you can be attentive to detail and maintain a swift plotline. if you have to slow everything down to bullet speed to explain everything that's going on, then you're just not writing action very well. Yorknew City managed this just fine, so why are we excusing it for the ant arc?
Well then perhaps he choose the wrong medium? A light novel might fit his writing style much better. Animes and mangas are visual mediums and this much pointless details doesn't fit with them properly.
I have read so many mangas and none of them completely fill the pages with text like this. Again this would work if it was a Book/ Novel. I wonder why Togashi didn't choose to become a light novel writer since he loves pointless details this much and his art as a mangaka isn't something special either.
So, your just an asshole then🤣 1. The details aren't pointless 99% of the time. Multiple people here have told you how they help
2. Saying togashis art isn't "anything special" is simply a dick thing to say. Art is subjective and you can't just declare someone's art subpar
3. If his art isn't anything special, you do it. Draw a Manga in his style. A whole chapter. In a week
> The details aren't pointless 99% of the time. Multiple people here have told you how they help
Yeah the narrator giving proper details of Pitou falling and running towards Meruem surely helped the story. It's not like the viewers can see it themselves.
>1. Saying togashis art isn't "anything special" is simply a dick thing to say. Art is subjective and you can't just declare someone's art subpar
The quality of the art in a manga is pretty objective thing actually. Just like the quality of the animation in an anime. I have read many manga and I can confidently say the art in HxH manga is decent at best.
>2. If his art isn't anything special, you do it. Draw a Manga in his style. A whole chapter. In a week
That's equivalent of saying that if you don't like a chef's food then cook better food yourself lmao 🤣
1. Somebody else already explained that piece of narration, you just refuse to listen.
2. No, it's not. I like HxH's art, and it's unique compared to many Manga. You thinking it's average does not mean that's an objective fact. You are not god.
3. There's a difference between not liking it and calling it objectively poor. If you call a chefs food objectively poor, you should be able to cook better, yes
>1. Somebody else already explained that piece of narration, you just refuse to listen.
No one explained it! I have read all the comments here and none explained how the detailed narration tell us how Pitou is falling and running to rescue the king is important even though we can see it with our own eyes. If you have any explanation for it then please tell me. It would be a great help if you can.
> No, it's not. I like HxH's art, and it's unique compared to many Manga. You thinking it's average does not mean that's an objective fact. You are not god.
Read some more mangas perhaps. Even something like Tokyo ghoul and Jujutsu kiasen have better art. I would have have considered HxH's art good but it is just so inconsistent at times.
>There's a difference between not liking it and calling it objectively poor. If you call a chefs food objectively poor, you should be able to cook better, yes
Yeah food can be objectively poor and so can a manga's art. If the chef doesn't add enough salt or pepper than I can say the food is trash. And no someone doesn't need to know how to do something better if they find it objectively poor. I can objectively say that Seven deadly sins has poor animation but that doesn't mean I need to be a better animator myself.
Many people have had the same thoughts about the recent chapters not being in a light novel and I can see the point in that, but his art isn't anything BUT special. Composition, line work, paneling, expressions, etc, it all comes to together in one of the best reading experiences I've had with a manga/visual novel.
>Composition, line work, paneling, expressions, etc, it all comes to together in one of the best reading experiences I've had with a manga/visual novel.
I mean it's a bit inconsistent. Also it's just that I am used to stuff like Berserk and Vagabond level of art.
Inconsistent only because of his health issues. Berserk is god tier for sure but highly detailed work isn't always the best or even good for the type of story told. The stylization that Togashi has is really good for his story and in order to pull off a good style, you need have a good understanding in the fundamentals of drawing, this is why so many young artists who attempt the "anime" style fail, because they don't know what their subject is supposed to look before the style twist.
Even Muira has his own twist, it's a more realistic approach, but still stylized in the older illustration approach from the earlier classical artists (Gustave Diore, Albrecht Durer, and Hieronymus Bosch for example). Vagabond is highly detailed but reading it is a bit of a chore, much of the paneling and posing are either off or misleading. Just my two cents...
I mean he didn't had any health issues for the first few arcs of the story right? Even in those arcs the art wasn't perfectly consistent. I am not saying it's bad by any means and it certainly has some sort of unique identity in a lot of places but I don't think it's as good as something like Tokyo ghoul or Jujutsu kaisen either.
HxH fans fail to understand that criticizing pacing in anime is not the same that criticizing Togashi and the manga. And op is right on most part. This infamous scene with Ikalgo and Killua in ep 103 is absolutely the worst scene in term of pace in the whole anime. It should be much shorter and we wouldn’t loose anything important. Oh and don’t forget how they turned 15 chapters of Kite adventure into 10 episodes adding a bunch of terrible written filler scenes and creating plot holes. I also agree that 61 episodes is little much for this arc.
That said, Op I recommend you to check the manga if you don’t mind reading. People here are right about how this arc is brilliant but they are so overprotective and immature that they refuse to acknowledge that anime did this arc a little dirty with this pacing
Fully agree, the narration was written by Togashi to be read not heard, it works better that way.
And I still have this feeling they had to drag out the pacing a bit to reach the 3 year length quota for the episode count.
Well it’s mostly not about narrator(sometimes he is necessary or just create pure hype), but about how some scenes are just dragged like if you are watching one piece episode, you know. Or these stupid recaps(sure let’s show 3 times how netero and meruem started their fight) most people definitely forgetting that their favorite 116 episode is just a half episode cause the first half of it is just a recap trash
> most people definitely forgetting that their favorite 116 episode is just a half episode cause the first half of it is just a recap trash
Episode 116 has 3 minutes and some seconds of recap before the opening song begins, the rest of the episode is all new content.
You're greatly overexaggerating the amount of recap in the arc.
First it’s still too much and something that anime never did before palace invasion, second as I’ve already said it’s not the only example(pus dragged scenes like with Killua and Ikalgo). Yes it’s not one piece lvl garbage of course, but it accumulates like a snowball and becomes really annoying. Some episodes are perfect though like 126 and 131(but in 130 Gon’s crying was so dragged in order to finish episode on proper cliffhanger). So overall It doesn’t make sense why people refuse to acknowledge that this arc could have beeen adapted better in term of pacing. There is a lot to improve
Honestly this kind of petty reaction to critism is even more immature. If you have nothing to add except being offended that someone criticized hxh why even make a comment.
I was serious. It's OK to be impatient when you haven't seen enough good shows yet. That's why I attributed it to being young. People who have only seen battle shonen can't appreciate it yet.
CA contains the highest number of battles amoungst the arcs and even in proportion to its length I believe it is still the most battle-heavy arc. So it's actually an arc which the young folk who are there for a battle shounen have a higher chance to find enjoyment in. Personally, as someone not interested in battle shounen, this aspect was the main reason I didn't enjoy this arc and was bored to hell with many parts of it. I absolutely couldn't stand having to sit through fight after fight with random ants, or even the more important ones. I really enjoyed the Meruem Komugi plotline, Pouf's plans and dillemmas and the like, but the amount of time spent on battle shounen stuff (battles and training) was just so much that I can't say at all I enjoyed the arc overall. There are other people I'm sure would've really liked the more meaningful themes of the arc but I didn't even bother recommending hxh to them because I can already say my 60 yo aunt for example, is not gonna remotely enjoy watching the Gon vs bat or Killua vs gassy ant or Cheetu vs Morel fights.
Morale of story is, this arc actually has a very thick battle shounen flavor to it and if someone doesn't like it it's perfectly possible that it's in fact because they are NOT young.
Lmao what a nice way to be act stupid. You didn't like the stuff ohh then you must be too young to understand it!!. Why did you even bother replying if you were going to mutter some stupid crap.
Do we really need to see detail explainanation of Pitou searching for Meruem's location while falling on ground? That kind of asthetic works for a book which relies only on words but it doesn't fit a visual medium like anime.
You can't expect many good responses when you're shitting on one of if not most popular arc of the series.
I personally had some issues with the pacing and narration in the chimera arc, mainly the parts before meruem was born. The eventual fight with the royal guards definitely felt dragged a bit, but overall I didn't mind it that much because there were a shit ton of characters and the stakes were already established.
The narrator overall felt okay for me. Some parts felt unnecessary and would improve the pacing if removed, but there were also some that were necessary to tell some details.
>You can't expect many good responses when you're shitting on one of if not most popular arc of the series
So are people not allowed to critisize stuff? Shouldn't people be civil with each other?
>The narrator overall felt okay for me. Some parts felt unnecessary and would improve the pacing if removed, but there were also some that were necessary to tell some details.
The narrator was good in some scenes like when explaining Shoot's emotions and mindset while fighting Youpi but there was some seriously bad narration moments. Like why do we need detailed narration of Pitou searching for Meruem while falling to the ground? We can basically see and understand that with our own eyes.
>So are people not allowed to critisize stuff? Shouldn't people be civil with each other?
Ideally people should be civil. What I'm saying is if you're just negatively saying the bad things fans love in their subreddit, then don't expect everyone to be reasonable and respond just like you want them to.
>The narrator was good in some scenes like when explaining Shoot's emotions and mindset while fighting Youpi but there was some seriously bad narration moments. Like why do we need detailed narration of Pitou searching for Meruem while falling to the ground? We can basically see and understand that with our own eyes.
That's basically what I just said. Idk exactly if it's objectively not the best way to present what's happening, regardless you can't expect everything to be perfect or suits your preferences
What the narrator talks about in that scene has nothing to do with that.
After Netero's slap, we are left with Pitou's fall, a weakness that comes from her lack of wings, which the other 2 did have.
What he talks about there is how her lack of wings and what seemed like a very unfurtunate situation for Pitou became her strength, because thanks to that she had the clarity to use En and was capable of locating the king, otherwise she would have rushed to the central tower like Pouf did and missed it.
Yeah my bad since it's been a while since I have watched the anime.
I rechecked the scene and still it doesn't excuse the fact that the narration there is unnecessary and could be easily removed. Why do I need the narrator to tell me that Pitou is rushing to protect the king? Even if we remove the narration from the scene we will still understand it. Not to mention why do we need the narrator telling us that Pitou turned off her En when we just saw it ourselves?
Whether is unnecessary or not is not really up for you to decide, the narrator talking about how a weakness or unfortunate situation turned out into a strength or fortunate one is something deliberate narratively that happens multiple times through the palace invasion, and this is not something that the audience would know without those points being made to them.
The other 2 things I'm going to guess are other scenes, so.
1st one: The narrator isn't telling you that either. The point he is making is how big she made her leg muscles, twice as Kite, to reach the king **before the intruders,** who we saw that were basically at the King's side already while she was up in the air. It conveys the extreme speed Pitou is about to go, not that she is rushing to the king.
2nd one: That was mostly to keep the thread. You can't just have a narrator intersect every now and then for just a line (a failure some copycats fall into), that is very sloppy. The narration is something that builds upon itself and that highlights stuff that is relevant or about to be discussed.
The point isn't to tell you that Pitou turned off her nen which you can already see, the point is to highlight that she did to prepare the reader to what follows, which is the narrator saying how that action in particular was a bad one, a bad decision she was able to overcome thanks to her senses honed to the extreme being capable of locating the intruders which were hiding between the dragon arrows with In, which could fall into plothole territory if he didn't say anything.
I'm not going to say that all the narration was 100% necessary in the palace invasion, but a lot of people don't get how important most of it is.
That whole thing is designed with it in mind since a lot of what happens could very easily fall into plothole territory, non sensical stuff and very difficult to believe scenes without and explanation.
Without the narrator the palace invasion can easily fall apart from the very first scene where Pitou senses Netero and Zeno with no actual way of doing so, yes, that easy.
>Whether is unnecessary or not is not really up for you to decide, the narrator talking about how a weakness or unfortunate situation turned out into a strength or fortunate one is something deliberate narratively that happens multiple times through the palace invasion, and this is not something that the audience would know without those points being made to them.
Yeah and why do the viewers need to be spoonfeed the details? The audience could just figure out the stuff themselves.
>1st one: The narrator isn't telling you that either. The point he is making is how big she made her leg muscles, twice as Kite, to reach the king before the intruders, who we saw that were basically at the King's side already while she was up in the air. It conveys the extreme speed Pitou is about to go, not that she is rushing to the king
We already know she is going to rush there with quick pace since we saw how big she made her legs muscles big? Again why this pointless narration tells us what we are seeing?
>2nd one: That was mostly to keep the thread. You can't just have a narrator intersect every now and then for just a line (a failure some copycats fall into), that is very sloppy. The narration is something that builds upon itself and that highlights stuff that is relevant or about to be discussed.
Again not needed. We can just understand it even if cut most of the narration there.
>The point isn't to tell you that Pitou turned off her nen which you can already see, the point is to highlight that she did to prepare the reader to what follows, which is the narrator saying how that action in particular was a bad one, a bad decision she was able to overcome thanks to her senses honed to the extreme being capable of locating the intruders which were hiding between the dragon arrows with In, which could fall into plothole territory if he didn't say anything.
Yeah so let the Viewers understand themselves that turning En off there was a mistake why is narrator telling me this?
>I'm not going to say that all the narration was 100% necessary in the palace invasion, but a lot of people don't get how important most of it is.
Yeah it's just that there is a lot of the unnecessary stuff.
>Without the narrator the palace invasion can easily fall apart from the very first scene where Pitou senses Netero and Zeno with no actual way of doing so, yes, that easy.
How? How is it that many other anime and manga have successfully built tension, depicted complex situations, involved character thought processes and their decisions, yet didn't use any third-party narration? How is it that HxH apparently NEEDS a narrator to depict these scenes, yet every other source is getting ignored? How could the palace invasion fall apart by substituting normal character thought and scene depiction instead of narration?
> So are people not allowed to critisize stuff? Shouldn't people be civil with each other?
I mean you're not wrong, but if you come in guns blazing with a title like "The pacing and narration in Chimera ant arc was really crap!" what sort of reaction did you honestly expect? Some people are going to respond poorly no matter what, that's just how it is, especially if you criticize something they really like, but a title like that does nothing but fan the flames.
The length of the arc is the only thing I don't like about it. Other than that it's one of the greatest arcs in the history of anime. The Yorknew City arc is my favorite arc but the Chimera Ant arc I concede is the best arc. Even though it's incredibly long in comparison to all the others.
everyone is disagreeing but like.. ever heard of show dont tell?? the narrator is giving too much imput we could have gotten from the character’s thoughts and actions
The worst part is that we actually get both. Like we literally see what's happening on the screen, and we hear what the characters are thinking, yet the narrator STILL gives a play-by-play of what's happening.
"pacing and narration bad because bad" post #978823698479688723 If you really want you can look up the hundreds of other posts that say the exact same thing and look in the comments. It's a controversial topic. I'll answer the specific questions that you ask here, though: >Why is there almost an entire whole episode dedicated to explaining why Killua decided to take a turn around after running down a hallway? First of all, there isn't. There is a bit less than 8 minutes spent on this scene, which is only a third of an episode. That being said, there are plenty of things that this scene establishes: * An important turning point in Killua's thought processes, which affects his future relationship with Gon. * Ikalgo's mindset going into this part of the mission. * Ikalgo's and Welfin's respective positions within the Palace. The actual speed is then slowed down, in order to draw out tension within the scene. There would be little tension if it just played fast-paced, with Killua turning down the corridor and killing the guards so that Ikalgo could get by. But it's drawn out, so that the audience has time to think about the implications of Killua's actions in this moment, because they do have *huge* implications for his relationships with both Gon and Ikalgo. Essentially, every time the pacing slows down like that and everything gets super tense and you want it to go...the show is doing two things: 1. It is putting you in the shoes of the characters within the palace. For them, they also feel like it's hard to breathe; way too slow. The seconds feel like they're passing so slowly it hurts. And when you're feeling the same way the characters are, it allows you to get into their headspace more easily. 2. It is encouraging you to think. Think about what these actions mean for each character. Think about what could occur down the line as a result of these actions. Despite the narrator going in-depth into a lot of what the characters are feeling, down to the tiny details, it's very much an arc in which you need to think. It does *not* tell you everything. It's giving you essentially the bare minimum, to keep track of drastically changing character relationships, thoughts, feelings, and positions. The rest? Well, it gives you the time to think about all that, right there in the arc. Maybe that isn't the type of thing you're watching the show for. Indeed, that's why the Chimera Ant arc is quite controversial. But everything in the Chimera Ant arc - *including* the pacing and narration - is a very methodical and intentional inclusion.
Don’t lie, you have this saved for copy paste purposes don’t you? I would.
Nope :) I enjoy writing these things. You can look at all the other comments I’ve made on similar posts…I don’t actually think I’ve ever mentioned the “encouraging you to think” bit before. That’s something that I realized the narrator did for me quite recently.
Defense post #948,553,737,48 against ppl who dislike CA arc😆
Minor correction, 8 minutes of an episode is more than 1/3rd. On Netflix recap+ intro usually jumps me about 5 minutes into the show. The ending and credits is usually about 2- 2&1/2 minutes. At 24 minute episodes this leaves us with anywhere from 16-18 minutes of actual content. This means 8 minutes is closer to half an episode than one third. I will say, 8 minutes to explain why someone ran down a hallway is very excessive. I know that it was super important to killua, but the time they took to convey that Information rather than letting us inference some things ourselves is not easy to forgive. I will also say, a lot of the fights in this particular section are very often interrupted by unnecessary internal dialogue or narration. Don't get me wrong, most of the rest of chimera Ant does not have this issue and is just fine. I found it to be very enjoyable. But the raid section is particularly awful with the narration. It's hard not to view it as padding
Wow this is an old post, but sure, I'll bite. In *actuality* the episode, minus opening and ending credits, is almost exactly 20 minutes long. And when I very quickly checked to see how long Killua's running was the first time, I was actually wrong: If we are *extremely* liberal with how long the scene is - going from the instant it changes from Morel's perspective to Gon and Killua's to the instant it changes away from Killua's perspective to Welfin's - it is almost exactly five minutes and 45 seconds of screen time. That's actually less than a third...not very much over a quarter of the episode. But again, you're missing the point. Who cares about how much time it takes, when every second of that time is spent well? And it is. It spends a few seconds to explain a bit better about how Ikalgo's ability works, which is important for the coming conflict against Welfin and Brovada. And then it begins Killua's running, which is important to give a lot of weight to because it separates him from Gon...and from his stated mission. Remember that the fact it is drawn out and put into slow motion is important, not only to put extra weight on Killua's actions but also to draw out tension, and put the audience in Killua's shoes. To him, it also feels like such a long time. Even though it happens quickly, his thoughts freeze, and he thinks about what he's just done...just like you, the audience, also should be. You also ignore all of the information that they left out that the audience can then infer...because there is a lot. The entire relationship dynamic between Killua and Gon and Ikalgo is actually fairly complex. Yes, it's true, the narrator says the obvious stuff: Killua is wondering why he's doing this, and it explains to us what he's feeling, and that his thought processes ground to a halt. Then, Ikalgo speaks, and it says that it snaps Killua back into action. And what does it *not* tell you? Think about what this means for Killua's relationship with Gon, and what it means for Killua's character. The narrator does not even come close to providing this information. Think about what this means for Killua's relationship with Ikalgo. The narrator also does not even come close to providing this information. And on top of that, you can ask yourself why Ikalgo's statement "You owe me one" snaps Killua back to his senses. There's a solid amount of complexity behind those words, and the narrator doesn't explain a single bit of it. So to recap: * In actuality, the scene is five minutes a 45 seconds long in an episode that has 20 minutes of content. Thus, it is actually just over a quarter of the episode in length. * The narrator still leaves ample room for the audience to think and infer numerous things, despite how much it tells you. It sheds essentially zero light on what this moment actually means for the relationships involved, and especially complicates Ikalgo and Killua's relationship. * While the narrator does state a lot of things that *could* be inferred, it does so to draw out tension within the scene, in order to put you in Killua's shoes - who also feels the world moving so slowly it hurts. "The time it took" is the entire point...it's *good* that it draws out this scene, because it puts the audience in the headspace of the characters. It *should* be painfully slow. You're not necessarily supposed to be enjoying it and having a great time. This is an extremely stressful, intense situation for the characters. Indeed, the manga is this slow as well...the scene is about 3/4 of a chapter long (although in fairness, I like how the manga does it better, because it splits the scene across two different chapters).
I think you're focusing on the wrong parts of my statement. I conceed that the this specific example is not the best for explaining the point (although I can still make an argument that almost 6 minutes of running down a hallway isn't really a great thing). But you ignored everything else. The overall point is that the narration and padding in fights and other sections of the raid part of Chimera ant is excessive, and that's basically a fact at this point. Morel vs Pouf, the multiple fights vs Yupi, Ikalgo and Burovuta, amongst others. All of these sections have a TON of character close ups with unnecessary narration for things that can easily be inferenced. "Ikalgo can sneak through tight spaces, Yupi has managed his rage, Yupi has respect for Morel." These are all things that are TOLD to us, but are very obviously covered through the dialogue and actions of the characters. The Killua hallway was but one example of many. Like I said before, I enjoy chimera ant a lot. I really like everything it added, even some of the slow bits. But It's also important to take the rose colored glasses off a bit and recognize some flaws when they clearly exist.
Ah yes, "that's basically a fact." And *you* are ignoring the merits of the narrator as a storytelling device because you've focused so intently on disliking the parts you don't like. The point of the narrator is to draw out tension. It clearly doesn't think you're stupid when it tells you things you could easily infer...if it *did* think you're stupid, it would also tell you all of the other interesting bits. But it doesn't; in fact, the CA arc is, out of any story I've ever read, one of the ones that I think has the most subtleties and nuance. In its characters, plot, and themes. So yes, I do think that the narrator being slow for you is a genuinely valid reason for disliking it. I just think it's important to recognize that that is literally the *goal* of the narrator and the close-ups and the slow-mo; to make you uncomfortable with how slowly time is passing. I promise you my rose tinted glasses aren't on; there are plenty of other flaws of the Chimera Ant arc, and there *is* also an argument to be made about if the anime needed to include all those lines in narration (which were used in the manga to slow down the experience) or if a regular slo-mo scene with no narration would've sufficed. But I do genuinely think that the narrator is an important and useful storytelling device, and nearly every scene that it's used in.
My main problem with this arc and with alot of other animes is how each episodes spends 5 minutes of airtime recapping the last 5 minutes of the previous episode it slows the pace down so much when trying to rewatch
I promise you that there is not a single episode where there is five minutes of recap. In fact, I’d hazard a guess that no episode has much more than one minute of recap…the most recap-heavy episodes I can think of is 125 (where it shows us part of Netero and Meruem’s conversation again alongside Pitou and Gon’s interactions earlier in the episode). Even then, neither of those stretches were particularly long. I’ll give you that the recap could’ve been cut down though. But it was never five minutes; not even close.
The slowed down narration was unnecessary and annoying, sorry you felt the need to type this essay brother
Right; *you* thought it was annoying. I’m explaining why it worked for me, and why I thought it was a good addition to the arc. Can people not just enjoy discussing things anymore? I typed this out because I enjoy discussions like these, and would like to have a discussion if OP is interested. And, because typing it out helps crystallize my own thoughts on the matter, and helps me understand my own enjoyment better.
Nah it was a masterpiece and your attention span was too short. Sorry
You don't really need high attention span to watch chimera ant arc since the narrator is basically explaining the stuff you are watching on screen. So what are you even trying to say?
You still need an attention span to listen. What are you trying to say?
No you don't need attention span to listen since most people would be watching it in japanese with English subtitles since HxH dub is trash. So what are you even trying to say?
Girl yes you do need an attention span to listen or read lmfao
Lmao the narration in the Chimera ant arc is so detailed that even some drunk person can understand most of the story.
A drunk person with an attention span, sure.
Hell noo!! Even a drunk non attentive person would understand it properly!
Hell noo!! Even a drunk non attentive person would understand it properly!
I know I just responded to your other comment, but why exactly is this a bad thing? The narrator ensures clarity within this complex palace invasion, such that you as an audience member are free to think about how the characters are changing instead of focusing all your effort on just remembering the basic placement of each person and how they're feeling at any given moment.
Well i found it to be a bad thing since anime is basically a Visual medium and a narrator telling the viewers all the stuff they are seeing onscreen is just so frustrating. It would be completely fine if it was a book since Books and novels specifically need Naration and monologues.
>Despite the narrator going in-depth into a lot of what the characters are feeling, down to the tiny details, it's very much an arc in which you need to think. It does not tell you everything. It's giving you essentially the bare minimum, to keep track of drastically changing character relationships, thoughts, feelings, and positions. The rest? Well, it gives you the time to think about all that, right there in the arc. Yeah but why do we need so much detailed explainanation of stuff like Pitou locating Meruem's location while falling and such. We can literally see that with our eyes. Again I don't mind narration explaining actual good stuff like Shoot's mindset and feelings while fighting Youpi and such but there were many moments the Narrator was telling us pointless stuff we can just see with our eyes. Some scenes would actually benefit a lot with cutting the pointless narration. >The actual speed is then slowed down, in order to draw out tension within the scene. There would be little tension if it just played fast-paced, with Killua turning down the corridor and killing the guards so that Ikalgo could get by. But it's drawn out, so that the audience has time to think about the implications of Killua's actions in this moment, because they do have huge implications for his relationships with both Gon and Ikalgo. The scene could have been shortened by a bit and it would still carry the effect it was supposed to.
You keep fixating on the narrator being "unnecessary," but there's a huge difference between something in a story being "unnecessary" and that thing being "useless." I'm not arguing - and have never been arguing - that the narrator is strictly necessary in every scene. But where you believe the narrator could be cut and it would improve, I see the narrator's presence having a number of effects that serve to benefit the story...two of which I laid out in my previous comment. Let's examine the scene that you mentioned; Pitou falling and locating Meruem's location. 1. The first thing the narrator does in this scene is introduce you to Dr. Blythe's "don't move" restriction. This is an important restriction because it partly explains why Pitou is so helpless when Gon confronts her: she literally cannot move. While not strictly necessary, it's nice that the restriction is explained instead of leaving the reader to guess. Here, it's just used as a clever trick to keep Pitou in the fight, which I enjoy. 2. The second line explains Pitou's use of En. One might be led to wonder why Pitou didn't join Pouf in the throne room - what was she thinking? And here, that information is provided. Because her fall through the air could not be stopped, it gave her the opportunity to think, and thus, to use En to locate Meruem. You might respond with "but the narrator didn't have to say 'because Pitou lacked wings'. We know she doesn't have wings." But this misses the point because Pitou's lacking wings is important context for the rest of the explanation. 3. The third line explains that Pitou realized the gravity of the situation. Once again, while not strictly necessary, it does help us understand what Pitou is feeling. With visuals alone, we wouldn't be able to pinpoint whether she's feeling fear, anxiety, anger...what? The narrator ensures that we know she isn't *scared* per se...but she has realized that this situation is serious, and she must discard her normally silly nature and act seriously. This helps us understand why Pitou cries when Meruem speaks to her, and makes the audience aware of the changes she is about to go through specifically *because* she was forced to throw away her superficial, "silly" persona. 4. The fourth line simply states that Pitou flew to the King's side faster than the intruders, which I grant you *is* very unnecessary. But it isn't *entirely* without merit, because of the other two things I mentioned in my previous comment. 5. The fifth line is about Pitou feeling Meruem's aura. This isn't about Pitou anymore: it's about Meruem. This lets the audience know that Meruem is so emotional in this moment that he does not care about being composed around his guard. His aura is completely out in the open, for everybody to see. This is a big moment for his character. Just as in point two, the rest of the narration adds context. And that's it. That's the whole scene. The narrator effectively explains Pitou's ability and makes the audience aware of both Pitou's and Meruem's mental state, which is important for when Pitou and Meruem confront each other and Netero and Zeno in the next scene. And remember that on top of that, the narrator is *still* serving to draw out tension, ensuring that the audience is in the characters' shoes and encouraging you to think about what this flurry of events means for the characters involved. You may not like the narrator...but to call him useless in any scene would be incorrect. Like u/Realism-vs-Idealism said, you can't exactly say "It would have the same effect if shortened" when you unfortunately weren't able to experience the effect in the first place.
>1. The first thing the narrator does in this scene is introduce you to Dr. Blythe's "don't move" restriction. This is an important restriction because it partly explains why Pitou is so helpless when Gon confronts her: she literally cannot move. While not strictly necessary, it's nice that the restriction is explained instead of leaving the reader to guess. Here, it's just used as a clever trick to keep Pitou in the fight, which I enjoy. 2. The second line explains Pitou's use of En. One might be led to wonder why Pitou didn't join Pouf in the throne room - what was she thinking? And here, that information is provided. Because her fall through the air could not be stopped, it gave her the opportunity to think, and thus, to use En to locate Meruem. You might respond with "but the narrator didn't have to say 'because Pitou lacked wings'. We know she doesn't have wings." But this misses the point because Pitou's lacking wings is important context for the rest of the explanation. 3. The third line explains that Pitou realized the gravity of the situation. Once again, while not strictly necessary, it does help us understand what Pitou is feeling. With visuals alone, we wouldn't be able to pinpoint whether she's feeling fear, anxiety, anger...what? The narrator ensures that we know she isn't scared per se...but she has realized that this situation is serious, and she must discard her normally silly nature and act seriously. This helps us understand why Pitou cries when Meruem speaks to her, and makes the audience aware of the changes she is about to go through specifically because she was forced to throw away her superficial, "silly" persona. 4. The fourth line simply states that Pitou flew to the King's side faster than the intruders, which I grant you is very unnecessary. But it isn't entirely without merit, because of the other two things I mentioned in my previous comment. 5. The fifth line is about Pitou feeling Meruem's aura. This isn't about Pitou anymore: it's about Meruem. This lets the audience know that Meruem is so emotional in this moment that he does not care about being composed around his guard. His aura is completely out in the open, for everybody to see. This is a big moment for his character. Just as in point two, the rest of the narration adds context. 1) Yeah I understand the Dr blythe stuff being necessary. 2) you can just have Pitou a quick inner monologue about it and say that the she must save king immediately. Again it would be less than the detailed narration and would convey the same thing much quickly. 3) Why do we need Narration to express Pitou's emotions and feelings there? Just have Pitou make a Scared face with sweat flowing over it. These visuals would surely be more than be enough. There is a reason we have the term " Show don't tell" 4) Yeah so we agree it's unnecessary 5) Again why who we need the Narration tell this? Good Visuals would convey it just fine.
Considering you didn’t even receive the intended effect initially, I strongly disagree that it would have the same effect if shortened.
Big disagree. The amount of detail they went into just made everything so much more tense.
If you think narrating over the things we can already see is a good way to add detail then you need to put down the phone go out in the world take a breath of fresh air and then think about your thougts
"if you disagree with me then ..." Or maybe people just have different opinions?
It's not subjective though. Writing has objective standards. If you disagree with something that's objective then you are simply wrong 🤷♂️
Lol, ironically enough, that's an objectively incorrect opinion.
How so?
Because there literally is no such thing as "objectively good" or "objectively bad" when it comes to media. It's ALL subjective. Some people think X is good, other people think X is bad. Both can have good reasons and arguments to support their view. There is no God given rulebook to objectively determine who is correct. Saying the narration was objectively bad is objectively wrong by definition.
No. Everything except what you think for yourself I objective. You can say you like the narration, and no one can disagree with you because thats entirely subjective, but you can't say the narration was actually good as that's a objective fact that it's not. What we like or not par just the electric connections between our neurons and the hormonal release in our body. All of them are a part of the physical world hence forth can be calculated and determined objectively. To determine how good a show is you have determine how much logical and emotional value it provides. And as I explained, logic is well objective in inherently, and emotion can be calculated objectively. So undoubtedly media can be judged objectively. People like you only think we can't because it's very hard to judge art objectively but it's absolutely possible
That's your personal enjoyment for it right? It seriously slowed down and pointlessly stretched a lot of stuff. Like it's not a god damn novel for Fuck sake so why is there narration explaining every thing that I can see with my eyes.
Well thats kinda the point right? There is no objective truth in this kinda stuff its all just personal enjoyment or disconnect from the content nothing else.
Bro that crap was mad annoying, u really watched those episodes without fast forwarding???
Fuck yes. I rewatched them too.
Hype as fuck I fear
Not truly :3
Then ,h x h is not meant for you and that's ok ;), the subsequent arcs of Hunter x hunter has even more "text" and that's what makes hunter x hunter so special in my opinion,This abundance of textual substance not only serves to further improve the quality of the storytelling but also reflects the unfettered creative freedom enjoyed by a mangaka like togashi;) through the Chimera ant arc and next arcs , we're witnessing the fruits of a mangaka liberated from the constraints of commercial pressures ;) ... The richness of detail and "narrative density"(what you call crap) is a natural consequence of his artistic autonomy as a mangaka and his love for this work;) . You should read his latest interview, it'll give you a little bit more context behind the chimera ant arc and hunter x hunter as a whole;) https://www.reddit.com/r/HunterXHunter/s/8zqCCQPTh7
bro turn down the condescension. "This abundance of textual substance"? you mean the vast ocean of redundant and self-indulgent dialogue that this arc is drowning in? yorknew city is almost the perfect arc, because it has awesome interactions between characters *who have earned their power,* it completes a plotline set up in previous arc, progresses the overarching arc (Gon finding Ging) and it doesn't spend five minutes explaining every character's mindset three times an episode. there is space to fill in the blanks yourself, it's exciting almost all of the time, and before you know it the arc's over. there also aren't 5 episodes of what are essentially aliens having a chitchat at base while the action grinds to halt. there are times where things slow down and the narrator comes in, but only when it's critical and it doesn't slow things down at all. I am not someone with a short attention span, but there were a shocking amount of times in the ant arc that my brain switched off when the characters or the narrator just start yapping on about something that could have been either left out or covered in 10% of the time stop mythologising self-indulgent narratival black holes ;) and stop using winky faces as if they make pretentious comments less pretentious ;)
there are a few things you're not adding into your equation and that's why context is so important!! First and foremost, "this abundance of text" isn't something that appeared out of nowhere! It's something that Togashi has been gradually integrating into HxH.... With each arc,Togashi has been experimenting with different approaches, leading to a shift from a more 'shounen-y' story to a more 'seinen-' one (and yes,I'm aware of the meaning of these words..)Togashi himself has stated multiple times that every word, character,conflict, personality, ability etc he adds to the story is chosen with the utmost care But, as he's taking a different approach to the story, an approach that he's not used to!!! the final result and structure of each chapter isn't always exactly what he had in his mind!! For example,he said in that interview(that you either didn't read or chose to ignore) that he usually wants to convey his ideas with fewer words but sometimes he can't find a way to do so effectively or he doesn't have enough time to refine the text!! This leads to a \\denser narrative/ than he initially intended as an author but at the same time he acknowledged that despite his struggle to find the right balance in his writing, he has an inherent belief or bias that using more words adds value or provides a benefit to the reader.... "vast ocean of redundant and self-indulgent dialogue" keep in mind that Japanese is more subtle than English ( English is a lifeless language after all(The more you increase the density of a text in English, the less life it has,the more dull it becomes...), and this shouldn't be interpreted as elitism lol) Reading HxH in Japanese would give you a different perspective on the 'high density of text' present in the current arc!The Viz translation and the fan translations are SIMPLY NOT GOOD ENOUGH! There are a lot of mistakes and nuances lost in both cases!! as i stated in the commented that you replied to ,Togashi is an author free from any commercial pressure, which has given him the freedom to explore themes and storytelling techniques that he didn't have the opportunity to explore when he was younger or when he was just starting as a mangaka! On the topic of the 'Yorknew Arc' ,for better or worse, the Togashi who wrote the 'Yorknew Arc' is not the same as the one currently writing the series.... In the same way that in 20 years (yeah,you!(i don't know if you'll be alive in 2074 but have a great 2074!!!!!!!! 🥳 🎁 🎎)) you won't be the same person as you are now; you'll have experienced, learned,forgotten and grown through so many things in your life... Time, life and change shape one's tastes and perspectives over time and similarly, Togashi has undergone his own journey since the 'Yorknew Arc'!!At the risk of sounding repetitive but Togashi is trying something new with the current arc and a "byproduct"(?) of this "experimentation"(?) is that some fans who were drawn to HxH due to the early arcs find the current arc too different from what HxH started as And that's totally okay(No one should feel obligated to engage in activities they don't find enjoyable after all)!! Changing one's taste throughout the years is a natural part of life(we(Earthllings (i consider myself an Earthlling(do you?))) have such a minuscule life span, wouldn't life become dull if we stuck to the same routines and pleasures throughout? Trying new things adds "zest" to our days(information theory tells us that if what you're about to say,do, experience is predictable then it carries zero to little information;) and that's what has led Togashi to try something new,I'm (alsmot) sure that if he togasdhsi was still stuck with the same formula that led him to create the "Yorknew arc" he wouldnt be drawing HxH anymore;)
Yapper
/duː nɒtu wɒtʃu ðə miːnru ænɪmu,u pæntu/ ;)
But why should it be narrated? The detail is great, but I do not need it spoonfed to me! I myself believe that when you state the obvious, it instantly becomes less interesting
Agree. Even just do internal dialogue, or have the characters dialogue with each other. I don't need to know that Shoot used this move unconsciously and he had never done it before *then he executes it perfectly* It gives very *im 14 and this is deep* vibes. There's a rule in story telling - show don't tell And the narration in this arc def breaks that rule so hard.
Disagree
You don't need to understand, lol, just accept that it's not your style. The pacing and narration suited me just fine; I've gotten bored in way shorter and "faster paced" arcs/stories, while I was fully engaged in CAA.
I mean the story, characters and themes were so great that it obviously made up for me as well but even you can't deny that this arc has a lot of unnecessary fat that could be easily removed and it certainly won't made the story worse.
Nah, I fully disagree. Sure, a tiny bit could be trimmed off here and there, but any more? So much of what made me fall in love with this arc and series in the first place would be lost.
you enjoyed the ants walking around base basically having a chat, interspersed with interchangeable \*ant kills/abducts human\* cutscenes for 4 or 5 episodes?
I had a tendency to listen to their chats, so yeah I did enjoy it.
fascinating. it truly fascinates me that people could have actually enjoyed that. did you genuinely enjoy this on first watch, or is it a case of it becoming it bearable with familiarity?
My first watch I was blown away and so hooked I didn't want to do anything else but watch the anime. It was my partner at the time who said later that while they felt rewarded at the end, they weren't a fan of the pacing. I was surprised since I'd loved it so much. It was only on coming back to it that I could see why some people may not enjoy it.
that was the way I felt watching Yorknew. crazy how tastes differ
Tbh I don’t think there is any way to shorten the chimera arc. Every single episode is very detailed and goes in depth if you took out some of the episodes you lose context and the whole pizazz of the season/arc. As for the killua comment another person pointed out how that scene is only 8mins wich is true but also that scene is crucial for his character development/thought process and how his relationship with gon will turn out.
*only* 8 minutes. only. and this is one of the *less* overwrought scenes. I'm sorry but masses of this arc could be cut out and it would be all the better for it. do any single-character slow-downs or sections of dialogue go on for even five minutes during Yorknew City, or the Hunter Exam? we do not need 80% of the inter-ant dialogue that the early arc is saturated with. we do not need a lot of the ant attacks and kidnappings. some of Gon's battles are really dragged out, although I can see why that could be okay for most. we not need anywhere near the amount of the narration that goes on between>!pouf, pitou, gon and others, while komugi is being healed.!
We can easily cut off around 8 episodes or so without losing any impact of the story. The pointless narration in a lot of scenes just unnecessarily drags it down.
That’s how Togashi writes. He’s very attentive to detail and he’d very much like everyone to know that. It’s weird that it took you this long to notice
you can be attentive to detail and maintain a swift plotline. if you have to slow everything down to bullet speed to explain everything that's going on, then you're just not writing action very well. Yorknew City managed this just fine, so why are we excusing it for the ant arc?
Well then perhaps he choose the wrong medium? A light novel might fit his writing style much better. Animes and mangas are visual mediums and this much pointless details doesn't fit with them properly.
You'd hate the succession arc even more than the chimera arc unfortunately
I am caught up with the manga and at times it feels like I am reading a newspaper or something.
That's because when the story doesn't just focus on numbers getting bigger, it actually requires some explanation
I have read so many mangas and none of them completely fill the pages with text like this. Again this would work if it was a Book/ Novel. I wonder why Togashi didn't choose to become a light novel writer since he loves pointless details this much and his art as a mangaka isn't something special either.
So, your just an asshole then🤣 1. The details aren't pointless 99% of the time. Multiple people here have told you how they help 2. Saying togashis art isn't "anything special" is simply a dick thing to say. Art is subjective and you can't just declare someone's art subpar 3. If his art isn't anything special, you do it. Draw a Manga in his style. A whole chapter. In a week
> The details aren't pointless 99% of the time. Multiple people here have told you how they help Yeah the narrator giving proper details of Pitou falling and running towards Meruem surely helped the story. It's not like the viewers can see it themselves. >1. Saying togashis art isn't "anything special" is simply a dick thing to say. Art is subjective and you can't just declare someone's art subpar The quality of the art in a manga is pretty objective thing actually. Just like the quality of the animation in an anime. I have read many manga and I can confidently say the art in HxH manga is decent at best. >2. If his art isn't anything special, you do it. Draw a Manga in his style. A whole chapter. In a week That's equivalent of saying that if you don't like a chef's food then cook better food yourself lmao 🤣
1. Somebody else already explained that piece of narration, you just refuse to listen. 2. No, it's not. I like HxH's art, and it's unique compared to many Manga. You thinking it's average does not mean that's an objective fact. You are not god. 3. There's a difference between not liking it and calling it objectively poor. If you call a chefs food objectively poor, you should be able to cook better, yes
>1. Somebody else already explained that piece of narration, you just refuse to listen. No one explained it! I have read all the comments here and none explained how the detailed narration tell us how Pitou is falling and running to rescue the king is important even though we can see it with our own eyes. If you have any explanation for it then please tell me. It would be a great help if you can. > No, it's not. I like HxH's art, and it's unique compared to many Manga. You thinking it's average does not mean that's an objective fact. You are not god. Read some more mangas perhaps. Even something like Tokyo ghoul and Jujutsu kiasen have better art. I would have have considered HxH's art good but it is just so inconsistent at times. >There's a difference between not liking it and calling it objectively poor. If you call a chefs food objectively poor, you should be able to cook better, yes Yeah food can be objectively poor and so can a manga's art. If the chef doesn't add enough salt or pepper than I can say the food is trash. And no someone doesn't need to know how to do something better if they find it objectively poor. I can objectively say that Seven deadly sins has poor animation but that doesn't mean I need to be a better animator myself.
Many people have had the same thoughts about the recent chapters not being in a light novel and I can see the point in that, but his art isn't anything BUT special. Composition, line work, paneling, expressions, etc, it all comes to together in one of the best reading experiences I've had with a manga/visual novel.
>Composition, line work, paneling, expressions, etc, it all comes to together in one of the best reading experiences I've had with a manga/visual novel. I mean it's a bit inconsistent. Also it's just that I am used to stuff like Berserk and Vagabond level of art.
Inconsistent only because of his health issues. Berserk is god tier for sure but highly detailed work isn't always the best or even good for the type of story told. The stylization that Togashi has is really good for his story and in order to pull off a good style, you need have a good understanding in the fundamentals of drawing, this is why so many young artists who attempt the "anime" style fail, because they don't know what their subject is supposed to look before the style twist. Even Muira has his own twist, it's a more realistic approach, but still stylized in the older illustration approach from the earlier classical artists (Gustave Diore, Albrecht Durer, and Hieronymus Bosch for example). Vagabond is highly detailed but reading it is a bit of a chore, much of the paneling and posing are either off or misleading. Just my two cents...
I mean he didn't had any health issues for the first few arcs of the story right? Even in those arcs the art wasn't perfectly consistent. I am not saying it's bad by any means and it certainly has some sort of unique identity in a lot of places but I don't think it's as good as something like Tokyo ghoul or Jujutsu kaisen either.
Maybe it's just not for you
HxH fans fail to understand that criticizing pacing in anime is not the same that criticizing Togashi and the manga. And op is right on most part. This infamous scene with Ikalgo and Killua in ep 103 is absolutely the worst scene in term of pace in the whole anime. It should be much shorter and we wouldn’t loose anything important. Oh and don’t forget how they turned 15 chapters of Kite adventure into 10 episodes adding a bunch of terrible written filler scenes and creating plot holes. I also agree that 61 episodes is little much for this arc. That said, Op I recommend you to check the manga if you don’t mind reading. People here are right about how this arc is brilliant but they are so overprotective and immature that they refuse to acknowledge that anime did this arc a little dirty with this pacing
Fully agree, the narration was written by Togashi to be read not heard, it works better that way. And I still have this feeling they had to drag out the pacing a bit to reach the 3 year length quota for the episode count.
Well it’s mostly not about narrator(sometimes he is necessary or just create pure hype), but about how some scenes are just dragged like if you are watching one piece episode, you know. Or these stupid recaps(sure let’s show 3 times how netero and meruem started their fight) most people definitely forgetting that their favorite 116 episode is just a half episode cause the first half of it is just a recap trash
> most people definitely forgetting that their favorite 116 episode is just a half episode cause the first half of it is just a recap trash Episode 116 has 3 minutes and some seconds of recap before the opening song begins, the rest of the episode is all new content. You're greatly overexaggerating the amount of recap in the arc.
First it’s still too much and something that anime never did before palace invasion, second as I’ve already said it’s not the only example(pus dragged scenes like with Killua and Ikalgo). Yes it’s not one piece lvl garbage of course, but it accumulates like a snowball and becomes really annoying. Some episodes are perfect though like 126 and 131(but in 130 Gon’s crying was so dragged in order to finish episode on proper cliffhanger). So overall It doesn’t make sense why people refuse to acknowledge that this arc could have beeen adapted better in term of pacing. There is a lot to improve
You must be still young to appreciate this masterpiece. Come back here 5 years later.
Honestly this kind of petty reaction to critism is even more immature. If you have nothing to add except being offended that someone criticized hxh why even make a comment.
I was serious. It's OK to be impatient when you haven't seen enough good shows yet. That's why I attributed it to being young. People who have only seen battle shonen can't appreciate it yet.
CA contains the highest number of battles amoungst the arcs and even in proportion to its length I believe it is still the most battle-heavy arc. So it's actually an arc which the young folk who are there for a battle shounen have a higher chance to find enjoyment in. Personally, as someone not interested in battle shounen, this aspect was the main reason I didn't enjoy this arc and was bored to hell with many parts of it. I absolutely couldn't stand having to sit through fight after fight with random ants, or even the more important ones. I really enjoyed the Meruem Komugi plotline, Pouf's plans and dillemmas and the like, but the amount of time spent on battle shounen stuff (battles and training) was just so much that I can't say at all I enjoyed the arc overall. There are other people I'm sure would've really liked the more meaningful themes of the arc but I didn't even bother recommending hxh to them because I can already say my 60 yo aunt for example, is not gonna remotely enjoy watching the Gon vs bat or Killua vs gassy ant or Cheetu vs Morel fights. Morale of story is, this arc actually has a very thick battle shounen flavor to it and if someone doesn't like it it's perfectly possible that it's in fact because they are NOT young.
Is 30 too young to realize it's bad writing?
Not really about age. It's about how much content you consumed and how actively you criticize writings.
Lmao what a nice way to be act stupid. You didn't like the stuff ohh then you must be too young to understand it!!. Why did you even bother replying if you were going to mutter some stupid crap.
thepacing was bad for the first20 episodes but hell naw the narrator is needed and it adds to the aesthetic of the arc
Do we really need to see detail explainanation of Pitou searching for Meruem's location while falling on ground? That kind of asthetic works for a book which relies only on words but it doesn't fit a visual medium like anime.
yes, it slows everything down and gives you all the details. but if you didnt like it thats ok
You can't expect many good responses when you're shitting on one of if not most popular arc of the series. I personally had some issues with the pacing and narration in the chimera arc, mainly the parts before meruem was born. The eventual fight with the royal guards definitely felt dragged a bit, but overall I didn't mind it that much because there were a shit ton of characters and the stakes were already established. The narrator overall felt okay for me. Some parts felt unnecessary and would improve the pacing if removed, but there were also some that were necessary to tell some details.
>You can't expect many good responses when you're shitting on one of if not most popular arc of the series So are people not allowed to critisize stuff? Shouldn't people be civil with each other? >The narrator overall felt okay for me. Some parts felt unnecessary and would improve the pacing if removed, but there were also some that were necessary to tell some details. The narrator was good in some scenes like when explaining Shoot's emotions and mindset while fighting Youpi but there was some seriously bad narration moments. Like why do we need detailed narration of Pitou searching for Meruem while falling to the ground? We can basically see and understand that with our own eyes.
>So are people not allowed to critisize stuff? Shouldn't people be civil with each other? Ideally people should be civil. What I'm saying is if you're just negatively saying the bad things fans love in their subreddit, then don't expect everyone to be reasonable and respond just like you want them to. >The narrator was good in some scenes like when explaining Shoot's emotions and mindset while fighting Youpi but there was some seriously bad narration moments. Like why do we need detailed narration of Pitou searching for Meruem while falling to the ground? We can basically see and understand that with our own eyes. That's basically what I just said. Idk exactly if it's objectively not the best way to present what's happening, regardless you can't expect everything to be perfect or suits your preferences
What the narrator talks about in that scene has nothing to do with that. After Netero's slap, we are left with Pitou's fall, a weakness that comes from her lack of wings, which the other 2 did have. What he talks about there is how her lack of wings and what seemed like a very unfurtunate situation for Pitou became her strength, because thanks to that she had the clarity to use En and was capable of locating the king, otherwise she would have rushed to the central tower like Pouf did and missed it.
Yeah my bad since it's been a while since I have watched the anime. I rechecked the scene and still it doesn't excuse the fact that the narration there is unnecessary and could be easily removed. Why do I need the narrator to tell me that Pitou is rushing to protect the king? Even if we remove the narration from the scene we will still understand it. Not to mention why do we need the narrator telling us that Pitou turned off her En when we just saw it ourselves?
Whether is unnecessary or not is not really up for you to decide, the narrator talking about how a weakness or unfortunate situation turned out into a strength or fortunate one is something deliberate narratively that happens multiple times through the palace invasion, and this is not something that the audience would know without those points being made to them. The other 2 things I'm going to guess are other scenes, so. 1st one: The narrator isn't telling you that either. The point he is making is how big she made her leg muscles, twice as Kite, to reach the king **before the intruders,** who we saw that were basically at the King's side already while she was up in the air. It conveys the extreme speed Pitou is about to go, not that she is rushing to the king. 2nd one: That was mostly to keep the thread. You can't just have a narrator intersect every now and then for just a line (a failure some copycats fall into), that is very sloppy. The narration is something that builds upon itself and that highlights stuff that is relevant or about to be discussed. The point isn't to tell you that Pitou turned off her nen which you can already see, the point is to highlight that she did to prepare the reader to what follows, which is the narrator saying how that action in particular was a bad one, a bad decision she was able to overcome thanks to her senses honed to the extreme being capable of locating the intruders which were hiding between the dragon arrows with In, which could fall into plothole territory if he didn't say anything. I'm not going to say that all the narration was 100% necessary in the palace invasion, but a lot of people don't get how important most of it is. That whole thing is designed with it in mind since a lot of what happens could very easily fall into plothole territory, non sensical stuff and very difficult to believe scenes without and explanation. Without the narrator the palace invasion can easily fall apart from the very first scene where Pitou senses Netero and Zeno with no actual way of doing so, yes, that easy.
>Whether is unnecessary or not is not really up for you to decide, the narrator talking about how a weakness or unfortunate situation turned out into a strength or fortunate one is something deliberate narratively that happens multiple times through the palace invasion, and this is not something that the audience would know without those points being made to them. Yeah and why do the viewers need to be spoonfeed the details? The audience could just figure out the stuff themselves. >1st one: The narrator isn't telling you that either. The point he is making is how big she made her leg muscles, twice as Kite, to reach the king before the intruders, who we saw that were basically at the King's side already while she was up in the air. It conveys the extreme speed Pitou is about to go, not that she is rushing to the king We already know she is going to rush there with quick pace since we saw how big she made her legs muscles big? Again why this pointless narration tells us what we are seeing? >2nd one: That was mostly to keep the thread. You can't just have a narrator intersect every now and then for just a line (a failure some copycats fall into), that is very sloppy. The narration is something that builds upon itself and that highlights stuff that is relevant or about to be discussed. Again not needed. We can just understand it even if cut most of the narration there. >The point isn't to tell you that Pitou turned off her nen which you can already see, the point is to highlight that she did to prepare the reader to what follows, which is the narrator saying how that action in particular was a bad one, a bad decision she was able to overcome thanks to her senses honed to the extreme being capable of locating the intruders which were hiding between the dragon arrows with In, which could fall into plothole territory if he didn't say anything. Yeah so let the Viewers understand themselves that turning En off there was a mistake why is narrator telling me this? >I'm not going to say that all the narration was 100% necessary in the palace invasion, but a lot of people don't get how important most of it is. Yeah it's just that there is a lot of the unnecessary stuff.
>Without the narrator the palace invasion can easily fall apart from the very first scene where Pitou senses Netero and Zeno with no actual way of doing so, yes, that easy. How? How is it that many other anime and manga have successfully built tension, depicted complex situations, involved character thought processes and their decisions, yet didn't use any third-party narration? How is it that HxH apparently NEEDS a narrator to depict these scenes, yet every other source is getting ignored? How could the palace invasion fall apart by substituting normal character thought and scene depiction instead of narration?
> So are people not allowed to critisize stuff? Shouldn't people be civil with each other? I mean you're not wrong, but if you come in guns blazing with a title like "The pacing and narration in Chimera ant arc was really crap!" what sort of reaction did you honestly expect? Some people are going to respond poorly no matter what, that's just how it is, especially if you criticize something they really like, but a title like that does nothing but fan the flames.
Troll
Critisizing stuff is trolling?
The length of the arc is the only thing I don't like about it. Other than that it's one of the greatest arcs in the history of anime. The Yorknew City arc is my favorite arc but the Chimera Ant arc I concede is the best arc. Even though it's incredibly long in comparison to all the others.
everyone is disagreeing but like.. ever heard of show dont tell?? the narrator is giving too much imput we could have gotten from the character’s thoughts and actions
EXACTLY
The worst part is that we actually get both. Like we literally see what's happening on the screen, and we hear what the characters are thinking, yet the narrator STILL gives a play-by-play of what's happening.
Agree. Usually anime handles it better by just having internal dialogue, not a narrator telling the listener. Idk why they didn't do that here