I think realizing that you are not the center of the world is a part of growing up, so the mangaka who make the hero the center of the universe are doing their readers a great disservice.
But I think that's part of what I enjoy about shonen-genre over shoujo-genre: that boys do eventually get at some point in the story to, well, 'save the world" or at least to realize that their actions have ramifications beyond just their small circle. Girl-stories start, and pretty much end, with a very limited circle that doesn't expand outwards to encompass much more, let alone the entire world. Yes, the hero (of either) always starts out with a very limited view, focused on just his/her friends and classmates, his/her personal worries, and his/her personal goals... but eventually the boy's story-world expands to include bigger bad guys, many of whom don't even realize the boy exists, and it's up to the boy (and possibly his friends) to stop the bad guy.
What's really going on there isn't just action-adventure, but a kind of large-scale acting-out of the process of growing-up, in terms of recognizing one's place in history. We enter adolescence with a vague sense of history, but by middle adolescence we start to move away from the self-centered (not conceited, just centered-on-self) adolescent view, as we realize on a much more fundamental level that there was history before us, after us, and going on right now without us. That, basically, the world is much much larger than just our sandlot. Boy-stories get that lesson, and although video games are partly to blame for the "each bad is bigger than the last bad", it's also an easy way to scale up the interaction and the 'size' of the ongoing historical world as it comes in contact with the protagonist.
The wish-fulfillment, I think, is not just in the notion of "winning" against the onslaughts of the ongoing historical world, but also in the notion that the larger parts of the rest of the world would even notice the protagonist in the first place.
That is one reason I find shoujo -- even when really well written -- ultimately dissatisfying: because where for the boy, interaction with and victory over the bad is a sign of his interaction with the world-at-large and realizing that despite its vast scope, he belongs within it -- for the girl-stories, the boy is what represents "the world outside" and it's his interaction/notice that works as a stand-in for "the world at-large" in the girl stories. That, frankly, really starts to annoy me after awhile.
Also, I agree with you about Sakura being awfully conventional. I mean, she doesn't even get any past trauma or difficulty to work through, which at least Hinata has.
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Date: 28 Sep 2010 03:53 pm (UTC)But I think that's part of what I enjoy about shonen-genre over shoujo-genre: that boys do eventually get at some point in the story to, well, 'save the world" or at least to realize that their actions have ramifications beyond just their small circle. Girl-stories start, and pretty much end, with a very limited circle that doesn't expand outwards to encompass much more, let alone the entire world. Yes, the hero (of either) always starts out with a very limited view, focused on just his/her friends and classmates, his/her personal worries, and his/her personal goals... but eventually the boy's story-world expands to include bigger bad guys, many of whom don't even realize the boy exists, and it's up to the boy (and possibly his friends) to stop the bad guy.
What's really going on there isn't just action-adventure, but a kind of large-scale acting-out of the process of growing-up, in terms of recognizing one's place in history. We enter adolescence with a vague sense of history, but by middle adolescence we start to move away from the self-centered (not conceited, just centered-on-self) adolescent view, as we realize on a much more fundamental level that there was history before us, after us, and going on right now without us. That, basically, the world is much much larger than just our sandlot. Boy-stories get that lesson, and although video games are partly to blame for the "each bad is bigger than the last bad", it's also an easy way to scale up the interaction and the 'size' of the ongoing historical world as it comes in contact with the protagonist.
The wish-fulfillment, I think, is not just in the notion of "winning" against the onslaughts of the ongoing historical world, but also in the notion that the larger parts of the rest of the world would even notice the protagonist in the first place.
That is one reason I find shoujo -- even when really well written -- ultimately dissatisfying: because where for the boy, interaction with and victory over the bad is a sign of his interaction with the world-at-large and realizing that despite its vast scope, he belongs within it -- for the girl-stories, the boy is what represents "the world outside" and it's his interaction/notice that works as a stand-in for "the world at-large" in the girl stories. That, frankly, really starts to annoy me after awhile.
Also, I agree with you about Sakura being awfully conventional. I mean, she doesn't even get any past trauma or difficulty to work through, which at least Hinata has.