Post by Rieev on Aug 10, 2013 14:45:26 GMT -8
So Soul Eater has reached its completion after nearly a decade of publication at 113 chapters. How does my favorite anime/manga series hold up?
Art:
5/10 from Chapters 1 to 2X
7/10 around 3X-5x
9/10 around 6X-9X
6/10 10X to Finale.
Art is always an important part of manga because its 90% of the time the art style that attracts an audience. The art for Soul Eater is...Special to say the least, mostly in the beginning. The characters look very awkward at first and proportions and anatomy are really off. But there was a sense of style to it that separated it from other series and it was interesting enough to attract more people.
However, what separates Soul Eater from other mangas with bad art is that it actually shows improvement over the decade its been around. I made a post on tumblr showing the Art Evolution of the Soul Eater characters over the decades, and it really shows how much Ohkubo has improved. In my opinion, Soul Eater looked the best around the Book of Eibon Arc, which is around Chapters 6X-8X and continued to look that way until somewhere around the 90s, when Ohkubo started shifting toward is current style.
I'm going against popular opinion and saying that I absolutely abhor Ohkubo's new style. The distinctive nose shapes of the characters have been replaced by dots 80% of the time, the characters now have more realistic (though really awkward and very skinny) proportions that make them look strange next to the more cartoony characters, and he seems to be making them more moe. Notice that Maka has been now drawn with a lot of highlights in her eyes, a previous design she lacked. I honestly am not fond of it. The characters lack the cartoony feel that the previous arcs had, which one of the reasons that I fell in love with the series.
Beginning
Middle
End
Did he improve? Yes. Do I like his current style? Not really, but I still appreciate the fact he improved since most manga artists have a tendency to stick with one style and do not bother evolving. Overall, the art was best around the middle arcs and slowly got...Strange looking once it hits its final arc.
Story: 6/10
It's pretty much unanimous among the SE fandom- Like most mangakas, Ohkubo is a shitty writer.
Now I love Soul Eater, but even I realize that the overall plot and storylines are pretty jumbled up and lack real closure. The Book of Eibon Arc , Search for the Kishin Arc, and the Battle on the Moon Arc are prime examples of this. And these are the 3 last arcs of the series.
The Book of Eibon Arc started out amazing- the team went inside the Book of Eibon to look for Kid who was kidnapped by a mad collector known as Noah, but they have to make it through quick because Kid has been consumed by insanity and plans to unleash a full world take over. Sounds awesome right? The first couple chapters of the arc were pretty fun because the characters find out that in order to reach Kid they must get through all 7 chapters of the book the correlate with the 7 deadly sins. To add more fun, the character were gender bent in the Lust chapter, the very first one. We also get an interesting insight into Soul and Maka's relationship and how insecure Maka feels now that Soul is a Death Scythe.
However, the Arc proved to be extremely disappointing. One of the many things people were looking forward to in this arc was a further look into Kid's relationship with Liz and Patty, because they're his weapons and are the closest people to him, right? So that should mean they should be able to knock him out of insanity, right? WRONG. Black*Star is the one who snaps Kid back to his senses, by beating him and having a philosophical discussion with a floating blob of madness. Granted we did get to see Liz and Patty's relationship with Kid through Liz's eyes, but we still don't know much about Kid's feelings toward the both of them.
The arc after that was...Boring to say the least. The main highlights was Crona killing Medusa and Tezca, one of the Death Scythes, battling Justin and getting decapitated. Other than that...It's pretty uneventful with most of it being full of exposition and introducing the new Death Scythes. And then finding Asura. On the fucking moon.
The last arc should have been the most eventful but is, unfortunately, a little boring and even annoying. First, it was really irritating to see that Kid is the only main character who doesn't search for Crona. Not because I'm a Kid/Crona shipper, but because Kid hasn't had any proper interaction with the group for so many chapters that it would have been nice to see him, Liz, and Patty have fun with the others again and the search for Crona would have been a good chance to show that. Instead he gets put on the battle on the moon with the adults and fights against what might as well be the most annoying character in the entire Soul Eater universe.
Kaguya.
She appeared in Chapter 91...She died in Chapter 102....She lasted 9 chapters too long.
The ending was also very unsatisfying. While it was nice to see all the characters happy and Marie/Stein actually had some closure, there are still many plotlines that could have been handled better and many questions unanswered. For one thing, Maka and Spirit's relationship has not changed for the better- at all. She still treats him the same despite everything her did. Also, was the part about the boobs really necessary? A more mature way of handling it would be that Crona emits a more loving madness than Asura would have, leading to relationships being more valued.
As the story got closer to its end, it just felt like Ohkubo was getting sick of the series and wanted to end it as quickly as possible. There are so many things that have yet to be explored and so many character interactions that could be seen. But no, we get boobs. And Excalibur being an insensitive asshole.
Fuck you.
Soul Eater was actually pretty good at the beginning, showing that when Soul Eater is good it can be really good. Arguably the Underground Battle Arc and Babba Yagga's Castle Arc were the best since it gave us interesting character interactions, with a good balance of action and emotion. I don't know what happened after that. Did Ohkubo have a plan but he switched Editors half way through and that's when everything turned upside down? Or did he just give up? We'll never know.
Art:
5/10 from Chapters 1 to 2X
7/10 around 3X-5x
9/10 around 6X-9X
6/10 10X to Finale.
Art is always an important part of manga because its 90% of the time the art style that attracts an audience. The art for Soul Eater is...Special to say the least, mostly in the beginning. The characters look very awkward at first and proportions and anatomy are really off. But there was a sense of style to it that separated it from other series and it was interesting enough to attract more people.
However, what separates Soul Eater from other mangas with bad art is that it actually shows improvement over the decade its been around. I made a post on tumblr showing the Art Evolution of the Soul Eater characters over the decades, and it really shows how much Ohkubo has improved. In my opinion, Soul Eater looked the best around the Book of Eibon Arc, which is around Chapters 6X-8X and continued to look that way until somewhere around the 90s, when Ohkubo started shifting toward is current style.
I'm going against popular opinion and saying that I absolutely abhor Ohkubo's new style. The distinctive nose shapes of the characters have been replaced by dots 80% of the time, the characters now have more realistic (though really awkward and very skinny) proportions that make them look strange next to the more cartoony characters, and he seems to be making them more moe. Notice that Maka has been now drawn with a lot of highlights in her eyes, a previous design she lacked. I honestly am not fond of it. The characters lack the cartoony feel that the previous arcs had, which one of the reasons that I fell in love with the series.
Beginning
Middle
End
Did he improve? Yes. Do I like his current style? Not really, but I still appreciate the fact he improved since most manga artists have a tendency to stick with one style and do not bother evolving. Overall, the art was best around the middle arcs and slowly got...Strange looking once it hits its final arc.
Story: 6/10
It's pretty much unanimous among the SE fandom- Like most mangakas, Ohkubo is a shitty writer.
Now I love Soul Eater, but even I realize that the overall plot and storylines are pretty jumbled up and lack real closure. The Book of Eibon Arc , Search for the Kishin Arc, and the Battle on the Moon Arc are prime examples of this. And these are the 3 last arcs of the series.
The Book of Eibon Arc started out amazing- the team went inside the Book of Eibon to look for Kid who was kidnapped by a mad collector known as Noah, but they have to make it through quick because Kid has been consumed by insanity and plans to unleash a full world take over. Sounds awesome right? The first couple chapters of the arc were pretty fun because the characters find out that in order to reach Kid they must get through all 7 chapters of the book the correlate with the 7 deadly sins. To add more fun, the character were gender bent in the Lust chapter, the very first one. We also get an interesting insight into Soul and Maka's relationship and how insecure Maka feels now that Soul is a Death Scythe.
However, the Arc proved to be extremely disappointing. One of the many things people were looking forward to in this arc was a further look into Kid's relationship with Liz and Patty, because they're his weapons and are the closest people to him, right? So that should mean they should be able to knock him out of insanity, right? WRONG. Black*Star is the one who snaps Kid back to his senses, by beating him and having a philosophical discussion with a floating blob of madness. Granted we did get to see Liz and Patty's relationship with Kid through Liz's eyes, but we still don't know much about Kid's feelings toward the both of them.
The arc after that was...Boring to say the least. The main highlights was Crona killing Medusa and Tezca, one of the Death Scythes, battling Justin and getting decapitated. Other than that...It's pretty uneventful with most of it being full of exposition and introducing the new Death Scythes. And then finding Asura. On the fucking moon.
The last arc should have been the most eventful but is, unfortunately, a little boring and even annoying. First, it was really irritating to see that Kid is the only main character who doesn't search for Crona. Not because I'm a Kid/Crona shipper, but because Kid hasn't had any proper interaction with the group for so many chapters that it would have been nice to see him, Liz, and Patty have fun with the others again and the search for Crona would have been a good chance to show that. Instead he gets put on the battle on the moon with the adults and fights against what might as well be the most annoying character in the entire Soul Eater universe.
Kaguya.
She appeared in Chapter 91...She died in Chapter 102....She lasted 9 chapters too long.
The ending was also very unsatisfying. While it was nice to see all the characters happy and Marie/Stein actually had some closure, there are still many plotlines that could have been handled better and many questions unanswered. For one thing, Maka and Spirit's relationship has not changed for the better- at all. She still treats him the same despite everything her did. Also, was the part about the boobs really necessary? A more mature way of handling it would be that Crona emits a more loving madness than Asura would have, leading to relationships being more valued.
As the story got closer to its end, it just felt like Ohkubo was getting sick of the series and wanted to end it as quickly as possible. There are so many things that have yet to be explored and so many character interactions that could be seen. But no, we get boobs. And Excalibur being an insensitive asshole.
Fuck you.
Soul Eater was actually pretty good at the beginning, showing that when Soul Eater is good it can be really good. Arguably the Underground Battle Arc and Babba Yagga's Castle Arc were the best since it gave us interesting character interactions, with a good balance of action and emotion. I don't know what happened after that. Did Ohkubo have a plan but he switched Editors half way through and that's when everything turned upside down? Or did he just give up? We'll never know.