Ymartes, agosto 15, 2006
Encontrado
aquíTop 10 Manga Clichés
By: Kara Stambach, Features Writer
Date: Wed, July 19, 2006
Boobs ©Fawn Lau for TOKYOPOP
Cliché #1: Boobs.
They’re not merely a time-honored tradition, but an integral ingredient for success: boobs. Barbie and Dolly be damned, manga chicks have the ultimate racks. I firmly believe that without large, rotund mammary units, the manga industry itself would implode, leaving a vast vortex of nothingness—a black hole of cleavage, if you will—in the lives of many rabid otaku with nothing better to do on a Saturday night than watch a completely two-dimensional babe get jiggy with it.
Subsets of this cliché include schoolgirl uniforms (while ridiculously short skirts are included, batteries are not) or harems of scantily-clad pretty girls all fighting over one boy.
Cliché #2: Mechs, Techs, and Specs.
GUNDAMs.
EVAs.
Mechas.
Starships.
Warcrafts.
Giant… robot… pandas…
If your manga doesn’t have dozens of pages full of pointless height, weight, speed, armament, weapons grade, time-traveling capability, and water-to-surface-to-air transformation ratio schematics of a giant mechanical suit of some kind, you lose. Minmei says you should go home and cry like a little girl. Your manga is totally original, and we don’t take kindly to that ’round here.
Cliché #3: Anime-mals.
Cute, fuzzy sidekicks—they aren’t quite animals, but they pass for animals in manga and anime. You know what I’m talking about. Evangelion’s beer-guzzling Pen-pen; Love Hina’s Tamago, the flying turtle; Gravitation’s pink fluffy bunny, Kumaguro; Tsubasa Chronicles’ spinning Mokoto—and the entire cast of pocket monsters. (Catch them all… or they will eat your family.)
I also want to mention Furries. Here’s a shout-out to all my ear-and-tail wearing, reincarnated fox-spirit cosplayers. You fluffy freaks, you. Where would manga be without animorphism? Bring on the cat-bois!
Cliché #4: That old “wipe out the world” ploy.
A manga collection is little more than a set of worst-case scenarios for the impending apocalypse. Maybe you heard about a prophesy where a princess/philosopher’s stone/dragon god/computer virus is going to wipe out the world? Perhaps an evil queen wants to take over the universe? Demonic devils are overrunning your city? Genetically-altered alien races seem hell-bent on subjugating your species? Industrial revolutions keep antagonizing the forest spirits? Nefarious shinigami plots to bridge the gap between this world and the next are wreaking havoc in the city’s streets?
You name it, manga has it covered. These aren’t just comics anymore—they’re how-to manuals. Remember: don’t give up! Unless your destiny is inexplicably linked to the fate of Tokyo Tower. Then, you’re pretty much toast, sorry.
Cliché #5: Tongue-twisting torture.
Some manga have made-up alien languages. (I’m looking at you, Seikai.
I’d like to take the Barohn of the Kasarl Gereulak and shove it into Fal Feia Kufena’s Frokaj! But I’m just an Onyu.) Why are made-up manga languages always slightly less desperately dorky than, say, Klingon?*
A subset of this cliché is Engrish, which is an entirely made-up language of its own. So drink your cohii in peasu and sankyuu!
* No disrespect to Mister Wharf.
Cliché #6: Petals, and feathers, and tentacles, oh my!
Ever notice how shojo manga has all those different petals and feathers and starbursts floating around, making the manga all deep and symbolic and infused with a somber, nostalgic tone? Yeah. I like the ones with the tentacles better, too.
Cliché #7: Pretty hyper soldier sailor super ninja priestess princesses will never forgive you!
She’s going to power-up and use her special star-seeded tiara/card/scroll/staff/sword of justice to blast the Monster of the Week into outer space… or she’ll simply keep believing in humanity… (perhaps both, if it’s sweeps week) but rest assured, that old “wipe out the world” ploy won’t work with Usagi-Miaka-Sakura-Tohru-Kiki-Utena-Belldandy on the job!
Cliché #8: Destiny’s Child (the bishonen, not the band)
If you’ve ever taken a film class, you’ve probably read up on the Male Gaze. The great thing about manga is that along with big-breasted, pretty-pretty princesses, there are characters for the Female Gaze, too. See, we girls get bishonen. Those big-eyed, long-haired, oh-so-noble, delicious-when-wet, knight-in-shining armor, “I will protect you with my life” type of guys. You know the ones. They may not always have rippling pecs (heck, sometimes they get mistaken for girls) but they got it where it counts.
Plot analysts will tell you these bishonen are destined to be the heroes of the story, but we girls know better, don’t we? They’re eye candy, and their fates are sealed.
Cliché #9: Chibi Wobbly Eyes of Doom ™
It’s enough to make you sweatdrop while your nose bleeds and your hands clench and that tiny vein in your forehead bulges… but let’s just acknowledge something right now: Nothing. Withstands. Wobbly. Chibi. Eyes.
Maybe if you’re a soulless blood-sucking Nazi that likes to drop-kick little puppies, steal candy from orphans, and yank Christmas outta Whoville, you could resist the Chibi Wobbly Eyes of Doom ™, but some of the universe’s better-known villains have succumbed to the misty, sorrowful expressions of an innocent protagonist coming to grips with the fact that life isn’t fair.
Except in manga, when it is… so long as you just believe that in your heart.
And finally:
Cliché #10: Phallic symbols spell success!
Every boy must have his magic sword/customized gun/specialized attack that only he can use. No, listen to me. This is very, very important. Blood can’t spray, bullets can’t fly, and plasma can’t hurtle toward the enemies of the free peoples of Earth unless the hero has his security blanket in the form of a personalized weapon. Expect nothing less, accept no substitutes.
And that, ladies and gentlemen (and Furries), are some of the most oft-used clichés in manga. Now, if you’ll excuse me, my huge boobs and I have to climb into my giant mechanical aardvark (a sneernernozzle in my native tongue) and shoot laser-feathers out of my magical cigar-shaped angst-cannon, in order to save the princess, win the heart of the pretty boy, and wipe out the world.
With special thanks to artists Fawn Lau (Clichés 1,3 & 8) Joe Macasocol (Cliché 2) Sophia Hong (Cliché 9)
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