What if everybody was only kung fu fighting?
This episode we and our guest Dylan from Anime out of Context discuss Minya Hiraga’s Shonen Jump manga Neru: Way of the Martial Artist.
Show Notes:
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[Transcript by T-Wolf]
David 0:13
Welcome to this episode of shonen flop where we talk about manga series and Shonen Jump that didn't make it big. I'm David
Jordan 0:17
I'm Jordan.
Dylan 0:18
I'm Dylan. Oh wait, I wasn't supposed to say that.
Jordan 0:21
Oh my god!
David 0:22
We'll fix it in post.
Jordan 0:23
Take it over again! [David and Dylan laugh]
David 0:23
No, he's jumping in. He's doing a karate move a dynamic entry because we are talking about Neru: Way of the Martial Artist, not to be confused with Way of the House Husband or what was the thing you kept calling it? Jordan in the chibi?
Jordan 0:38
Way of the Samurai?
David 0:39
Yes, not Way of the Samurai. And we are joined by a very awesome dude friend of the show, Dylan.
Dylan 0:47
Hello. Hello. Thank you very much for having me on the show. My name is Dylan Crider, and I edit podcasts and make people say terrible things in the process.
David 0:55
Oh, yes. Will we fix this incident? Probably not because it was really funny. [Dylan and Jordan laugh] Shows how much editing work I put in.
Dylan 1:02
Anything for a goof.
David 1:03
Exactly. goofs. gaffes and -
Jordan 1:06
Gags, yeah.
Dylan 1:06
Gags are exactly appropriate.
Jordan 1:09
A gaggle of geese. Yeah.
David 1:10
What would you guys call a group pronoun for podcasters? A subscribe podcasters?
Jordan 1:15
A playlist of podcaster? A basement of podcaster?
David 1:19
Basement? Oh, yeah. Mother's Basement, you can come back anytime.
Jordan 1:23
Oh, yeah.
David 1:24
People were like, oh, but if you don't have guests come back. And like we do when they have a million subscribers on YouTube.
Jordan 1:30
We'll break rules for you if you're big enough.
David 1:32
Yes. It's just like the rest of society if you're rich and famous people break rules.
Jordan 1:36
Exactly.
Dylan 1:37
Big enough, you make the rules. [David laughs]
Jordan 1:39
We don't have principles fuck you.
David 1:41
It's like all those mega by famous artists are famous creators that lasted longer than then they probably should have. But that's not the case with this series.
Jordan 1:49
No, it is not.
David 1:50
As let's get into the manga details. This series was created by Minya Hiraga. He, much like myself has done nothing notable in his life. [Jordan laughs] Um, and this was his first ever series where I feel - actually Jordan, I feel like it's been a little bit since we've read someone that literally this was their first ever publication.
Jordan 2:05
I feel like I could tell that he was young.
David 2:07
Young, you know, with a working wrist.
Dylan 2:09
much working of his wrist was involved.
Jordan 2:12
Feel like there was more working of his ankle.
David 2:14
Uh, yeah, imagine if he just drew it with his feet. [Jordan laughs]
Jordan 2:17
I would respect him so much.
Dylan 2:19
That would be fantastic.
David 2:20
This would be the best series we've ever read if this is 100% done with his feet.
Jordan 2:23
Yeah, like I take back all my criticism if that was the case [Jordan laughs while saying this]
Dylan 2:27
If there's a mangaka that's out there, doing the drawings with their feet, I will find them and I will give them all the money that I can because that is a worthwhile effort just to see how ridiculous it is.
David 2:36
So we talked about this in the warm up audio but improving your SEO by having transcripts. And now the word feet is just going to show up a ton.
Jordan 2:43
Oh, yeah.
Dylan 2:43
Oh, you kidding. It's gonna be in there a lot.
David 2:47
John's just gonna say feet all the time.
Jordan 2:49
Yeah, cuz this series says feet all the time.
David 2:52
Yeah, that's true. Speaking of feet, this series got the boot when it ran from July 5 2021 to November 15 2021. It ran for 18 chapters in three volumes. So this was not long for the world.
Dylan 3:05
Most surprisingly contemporary though.
Jordan 3:07
As we've discussed, this is like if you get canceled these days oh if cancel oh if you get canceled these days. It seems like the exact chapter is 18. Candy Flurry, Hunters Guild and Neru. P retty sure they were all 18 chapters and they've all been pretty recent cancellation.
David 3:23
Yeah, some of those were better than others, though.
Jordan 3:26
I would agree.
David 3:27
We'll go into because why don't we turn it to Jordans not terrible plot summary.
Jordan 3:32
Oh, well thank you.
David 3:33
That was a very passive aggressive sounding legitimate compliment.
Jordan 3:36
I noticed that.
Dylan 3:37
That was a little backhanded.
David 3:39
Every week I always say Jordan wrote a great plot summary.
Jordan 3:42
This is not terrible this time so I'm like oh, well, thanks. It's [grunts] I dunno
David 3:45
Yeah, yeah. All right. Jordan, take us away. It's a good recording
Jordan 3:50
Neruma Isami is a high school kid living in the woods with his grandpa, a great martial artists who just left him one day, like three years ago. All Neru has left of him is a how to book of martial arts. One day he is discovered and fought by Akebi, a strong and pretty girl who invites him to her Dojo. Once there, Neru is elated to find more kids his age who like martial arts. He shows off his skills including his powerful flat feet but is defeated in a duel by Akebi's twin brother Jokuro. Jotaro says that he'll only fight Neru again if he gets the top scores on the entrance exam to their martial arts high school. Neru fails to come in first, but it's cool because it turns out that his grandpa also attended the school and he was like the best student ever. So Jotaro. Oh my god, I did it again. So Jokuro says, hell I didn't like the last time it was on purpose. This is an accident. And Jokuro says he'll fight Neru again if he matches that feet. That feet. Popcorn David.
David 4:51
I was like really excited because when you kept saying Jotaro I was like, oh, did I miss something? Because, you know, we're like, oh, so he doesn't the fucking marine biologist Jotaro Kujo doesn't show up in Cop and Dolphin [Jordan laughs] but he shows up in this random ass fucking fighting manga.
Dylan 5:07
Oh, if only. [Dylan laughs]
David 5:09
This series really could have used Stands.
Jordan 5:11
I have always kind of felt that Jotaro saying he is a marine biologist was a cover story.
David 5:17
No, it's definitely real, uh based on some site material.
Dylan 5:20
Oh no.
Jordan 5:21
You're probably right actually.
David 5:23
So anyway, while at the school Neru meets Kaname. I'm supposed to say ketamine for some reason. It was a great archer -
Jordan 5:30
Konami.
David 5:31
Yeah, but is written very poorly so she immediately gets a crush on him. This is when I started realizing maybe Jordan didn't like it as much as the first chapter
Jordan 5:38
No [Jordan giggles]
David 5:38
After Kaname brother kicks him out of the dorms because she forced him to look at her bra, Neru is sent to live in a shack with a depressed guy who fights with acupuncture named Satomi Ryuzen. Ryuzen did the best ever on the hunter exam, but got really sad when he almost killed someone. The two meet an evil non binary classmate who's scary because they're into gay BDSM. They use correct pronouns for one whole chapter.
Jordan 6:02
Yeah, there's like one chapter where they're referring to this to this character with they pronouns. And they mentioned earlier it's like, oh, is he even a boy. So it was like, is this a non binary character? And then like after that, it's just now they're using he him pronouns. So
Dylan 6:16
I had no idea what they were going for with that.Um. Pronoun wise. That was a little weird.
Jordan 6:20
They were going for gay panic is what they were doing.
Dylan 6:22
Oh [Dylan groans]
David 6:23
Shonen doesn't have a good track record with LGBT representation.
Dylan 6:27
Oh, I mean, it doesn't get much better when it continues on when depression senpai Neru fights transphobia-kun and some random strong guy who has absolutely no plot relevance whatsoever. He's just kind of there.
Jordan 6:38
Completely irrelevant
Dylan 6:39
And then depression. senpai he just punches gay panic kun right in the chest and his magical pressure point, which puts him to sleep.
Jordan 6:45
Which is just the solar plexus by the way.
Dylan 6:48
He just he just dropped him with that the entire thing could have been avoided with just a punch.
Jordan 6:52
Yeah.
Dylan 6:53
And then Neru's mom shows up and it turns out she's actually the business version of Grimes and Neru [David and Jordan laugh] is Elon Musk's little Japanese spawn.
Jordan 7:02
More or less. Yes, that is yeah.
Dylan 7:04
Yeah. And he's gonna get the entire company because apparently companies are hereditary. I have no clue what's going on with that but Neru says no, I don't want to be a spoiled rich kid. I want to bite people with my feet.
Jordan 7:20
I don't want your life.
Dylan 7:22
Uh, and then it just jumps to was it five years five years later or so? And then apparently it's turned in Steel Ball Run because Neru is racing horses while barefoot. Apparently there's a final showdown. I think they just imply there's a showdown I don't actually remember seeing it.
Jordan 7:37
They don't, no. It ends with them like starting the showdown. I'm pretty sure. [Dylan groans]
David 7:40
Yeah, and they say oh, to be continued. But not really.
Jordan 7:41
Yeah. [Dylan giggles]
Yeah, this serious was a fucking mess. Also, Dylan that was such a smooth transition, man.
Dylan 7:50
Oh, thank you very much.
Jordan 7:53
Congraduations.
David 7:53
Like a transition of the year. Should have been a category but way too much effort to relisten to every episode
Jordan 7:58
I was gonna give Elliot Page but damn. [Dylan laughs]
David 8:01
Too soon. Alright, so let's get into the character. [Jordan and Dylan laughs] Neruma Isami, I'll start it off, is trying to be good at fight things. High School student, bad at grades, powerful flat feet, heir to a huge company. Okay, Mr. privilege, as Jordan has noted. Uh yeah, he's just kind of the Goku template character where he's not very smart. He wants to fight. Apparently he can be smart. He's like, Oh, I just I can't run around while taking tests because um I'm good when I'm walking and then he still fails the exam, even when he's writing while taking it. So what I don't really understand the point of that section are trying to make it seem like he has some form of intelligence.
Jordan 8:36
This is just reminding me of like all those uh people talking about like kids with ADD. It's like, you just got to let them run around a bit. All right.
Dylan 8:45
Yeah. I think that's kind of what they were going for. They tried to make him like the ADD martial arts Rain Man.
Jordan 8:50
What it seemed like was happening was that like you ever heard one of those memory techniques where like, if you do an action along with remembering something, you'll remember it. So I think the idea was that like he's so in tune with like his body that like if he says a word while he's doing a specific kick. If he does the kick again, he'll remember the word.
Dylan 9:12
Yeah, they did play on that a lot.
David 9:14
That was actually something I learned to improv is when you're doing a herald which is like three scenes and then you reference something where like, if you grab a certain body part during each scene, and you grab it again, it'll help you remember what happened during that part.
Dylan 9:25
Oh, kind of like listening to music when taking a test or something, having it be the same song that you were playing or same type when you were studying that topic?
David 9:33
Yep. Speaking of topic, if we were getting a little off of it, so do you guys have anything else to say about the main character or shall we go to sassy grandpa?
Jordan 9:40
He's apparently like the best like, he's just really fuckin like strong and his strength always seems to come from his powerful feet. Every time he does like something impressive. They're like, wow, that's because his strength comes from the powerful base of his muscular feet.
Dylan 9:58
Urgh, gross, Urgh [Jordan laughs]
Jordan 10:00
It's constant. He goes everywhere without shoes by the way, literally everywhere like it's a point.
David 10:06
Yeah, I forgot to check the first chapter if they drove on without wearing shoes to be honest
Dylan 10:09
They did not draw him wearing shoes at any point I've reread the entire thing today just to make sure cuz nothing stuck. [Jordan laughs]
Jordan 10:18
Really?
David 10:19
That's the attention to detail we know we come to know and love in these series.
Jordan 10:23
Well I'm shocking this wasn't super memorable. [David laughs]
David 10:26
Best case you're not walking around while you're at it.
Jordan 10:28
Fuck that's a good point. [David laughs]
David 10:30
Okay, so anyway, Jordan, do you want to tell us about sassy grandpa?
Jordan 10:34
So basically Neru was raised by this uh old grandpa character who, one of the mysteries of the series that is literally never addressed but that's how the series starts is that Neru is like watching this old man continue to get old and yet continue to get more and more strong and healthier and like more powerful and then he's disappears for three years, but apparently didn't like apparently he was like in contact with Neru's mom. Like I don't fucking know. It was very it was just very poorly fucking laid out. And also out of nowhere, they're just like, oh, yeah, your grandpa went to this school and he was the best student ever. And he won all the awards and I bet you can't do it either. Neru. [David laughs] Oh my God, even though I just talked about him for this much time there's like nothing to say about him because he doesn't really show up. He doesn't show up.
Dylan 11:27
He shows up for a total of what four panels at the very beginning and then that's it.
David 11:31
And then you know, he matters so a little I'm making the argument about if he had eyes or not, we got bigger fish to fry like I Akebi Haiba. So Dylan, would you mind telling us a bit about the first sign that this series maybe doesn't have the best approach towards female representation?
Dylan 11:44
Yeah, Akebi Haiba, who is introduced while being harassed by a bunch of random school boys, and Neru shows up and beats the crap out of all of them. But you know, she's actually secretly a really powerful martial artist, she can track down and watch him and learn everything about him by staring at drawings on the wall and made to be both a damsel in distress, but also incredibly powerful. And she's also the only strong quote unquote, female character in the entire thing. However, they don't really do anything with that. They don't actually give her a strong personality. She's just passive and kind of conniving at points and not very well written.
David 12:22
And it's just like she's too good for everyone.
Jordan 12:25
Also, I do want to say that with regards to her she is like the opposite of Hunter's Guild Red Hood, in that not only are her legs very skinny, they're also poorly drawn.
Dylan 12:35
Oh, yes.
Jordan 12:36
Her upper body well drawn lower body. What the fuck are you doing?
David 12:41
How are you both have a foot fetish and you can't draw a leg?
Jordan 12:44
Right?
Dylan 12:45
I was about to say that. That is impressive dedication to just feet and nothing else.
David 12:50
The inverse Rob Liefeld. [Jordan laughs]
Dylan 12:52
No muscle on those things. Let alone muscle upon muscle upon muscle.
Jordan 12:56
No grimacing ever, no pouches, the opposite of factions. What's the opposite of a pouch?
David 13:02
Women's pocket.
Dylan 13:04
There you go.
Jordan 13:04
Yes. Yes. Yes. I guess a skirt? Yeah.
David 13:07
Can't put anything in them.
Jordan 13:08
Am I right, ladies?
David 13:10
I'll take over the brother.
Jordan 13:11
Jotaro?
David 13:12
Yeah. Jotaro Kujo, who's got the most powerful stand, Star Platinum. Main protagonists a part three of Jojo's Bizarre Adventure, which, you know, really wasn't that great a part. I really do think two, four, seven.
Jordan 13:23
David, David, David, David, David, David.
David 13:25
What?
Jordan 13:26
We'll talk about Jotaro later, we're talking about this character.
Dylan 13:30
I think he got a bit distracted by something better.
David 13:32
I really just wanted to not acknowledge that I was talking about the wrong character and then just be like, alright, Jordan, so let's get on to Koname. [Jordan and David laughs] Sounds like a fun year idea. So now we're just gonna pretend Jordan did her up.
Jordan 13:44
Yeah.
David 13:45
But yeah, so that's really all I can say. Um, it's really weird that he doesn't use timestop at all during the series. But you know, I guess eh you know, probably would have been too overpowered.
Dylan 13:53
I mean, in his defense, he actually does use this time stop at one point. It's the dual at the very beginning when suddenly [Jordan laughs]
Jordan 13:59
It's true
Dylan 13:59
It's kind of like black and white and you see just a skull and next thing you know, Neru's on the ground and he's all cut up.
Jordan 14:04
He uses Za Worldo Za Worldo throws knives at them. That's what that was. Yeah,
David 14:09
People were throwing knives.
Jordan 14:10
Yeah,
David 14:11
I still stand that the serious the gone longer they were going to introduce some stupid supernatural part.
Jordan 14:15
I hope so.
David 14:16
But anyway, Jordan, do you want to tell us a bit about Kanami, whose last name I'm not going to try and pronounce
Jordan 14:22
Kaname Nozomiya yeah?
David 14:24
That's right.
Jordan 14:22
So she's like, it's pretty implied to be the love interest. Her whole thing is she shows up and the first thing we see is she's like, the crazy girl. And Neru is like, Oh, hey, you're cute. And she's like, don't call me cute. What the fuck? And he's like, I call him like, I see him and you're cute. So I'm just getting keep calling you cute. And she's like, Don't fucking call me cute. What the fuck, and then they physically fight and then Neru accidentally gets a look at her bra. And he's like, I didn't mean to look there. So she's like, Oh my bra. So she like opens her shirt and like forces him to look at it. And like
David 14:22
Yeah
Jordan 14:22
She's a very well written female characters what I'm saying here,
Dylan 15:07
Very strong characterization involved.
Jordan 15:09
What they also do is see this is a little bit of a clever writing thing. They make one of her big conflicts the fact that she is a girl who is trying to show that gender doesn't matter. She can fucking be just as strong as everybody else. So actually, David, we're all wrong. She is a feminist character.
David 15:28
And then later on the series she says, I'm not strong enough to shoot this arrow you do it you're a big strong man.
Jordan 15:34
Yeah, exactly.
Dylan 15:37
Because that's consistency.
David 15:38
Even though he openly said how he was really terrible at archery like oh, man, a terrible man is still better than a highly skilled women clearly by the message of the series.
Jordan 15:46
Like I will say, I did think it was cool when she for a lot for a whole bullshit prop plot reason I don't want to go into right now they have to fire an arrow way further than it theoretically should be able to do. So she uses a lot of actually like pretty interesting archery techniques, like archery, I guess, say, Arrow techniques or something to like, carve it and like take a bamboo shaft and use that to like, add add distance or whatever. I don't know. It's a whole thing. But the point is, that was a really cool moment where you got to see the Kaname was competent in something and I'm pretty sure it was also the last time you saw Kaname, be competent in anything.
David 16:25
Yeah, I just want to highlight the Jordans. Like there's this cool thing but I won't go into detail and then he immediately fully explained it.
Jordan 16:31
No, I did not David, there's more to that, that I'm not even fucking going into.
David 16:35
Uh, you're right. [Jordan laughs]
Dylan 16:37
There's more about you know, the science of what they did with the arrow and why they did all
Jordan 16:41
No, I mean, I'm gonna have to go to the fucking door. The reason why they had to fire the arrow back, which I didn't want to go into. [Dylan groans]
David 16:47
And then he hits the dude and he gains his stand power. And that's this is this is Part Nine of Jojo's Bizarre Adventure. [Everyone laughs]
Dylan 16:56
Oh, no
David 16:57
We do need to do a special where we just say what the stand names for every main character every main protagonist of flop manga would be.
Jordan 17:03
I mean, Neru's can't be uh Little Feet because not only is that already taken, but no that's that's the opposite of what's happening here. Yeah,
Dylan 17:11
I was gonna go with Walk This Way.
Jordan 17:13
Giant Steps.
David 17:14
There we go. [Dylan groans] All right. We're gonna be on this topic forever though. We're still in character section. So we finish. Uh, alright, Dylan, can you tell us about the next character please?
Dylan 17:23
Ah yes, Satomi Ryzuen. He is depression sama
Jordan 17:28
Yes.
Dylan 17:29
He's the saddest like emo flopping living in a shack in the woods person out there.
Jordan 17:36
Oh, I related to him [Jordan laughs]
Dylan 17:39
Upon his introduction, I was like, Hey, I empathize with this guy. You know, he has that burnout feel. They don't really even want him to be there. You can tell he used to be something and he's just sitting there, you know, reading porno mags getting mad at Neru for not bringing porn, the place is just an entire mess. And you know, he reminded me not only of myself, but you know of all of the other Shonen Jump readers out there.
Jordan 18:02
I definitely feel like I had a roommate very much like him before you know, I feel like I was that roommate actually a couple times. Yeah, so you said he likes porno magazines, but does he? Oh man it turns out
Dylan 18:13
I could guarantee he does.
Jordan 18:15
Well, I don't know because apparently all he did was literally take his his former roommates porno mags cut off the covers for it and then insert acupuncture manuals into the porno magazines.
Dylan 18:29
Yet they weren't even his porno mags either. They were his former roommates, which is such a dick move.
Jordan 18:35
So the entire point is that so people would think he was a loser reading porno when actually he was studying martial arts.
David 18:44
So stupid. [Jordan giggles]
Dylan 18:46
Inverse of what I did throughout high school.
Jordan 18:48
I know right? But yeah, his whole thing is that like he got the highest marks ever on the entrance exam. They call them the Fallen Dragon because I guess everyone's like Whoa he did really good on the entrance exam. He's gonna be the best ever and then in the process somebody like cut off part of his ear like somebody Mike Tyson did I guess. And that like pissed him off so much that he wanted to kill them and the fact that he wanted to kill him made it made him be like oh man shit, maybe I should stop this which honestly kind of a healthy reaction.
Dylan 19:20
Yeah, no, I definitely get that and and then he decided he wanted to use his martial arts God powers for good. So he wanted to become you know, more of the human martial arts, which makes absolutely no sense whatsoever.
Jordan 19:31
I mean martial arts is just anime for magic.
Dylan 19:35
Ah yes it's their buzzword MacGuffin.
David 19:37
Oh, that's a that sounds like a JoJo Part Nine character.
Jordan 19:42
Buzz War's MacGuffin.
David 19:45
I remember I had a tweet where I said Turkish Delight is the most JoJo sounding food. [Jordan laughs] Let's go into the last character.
Jordan 19:53
Oh, my favorite character [Dylan groans]
David 19:54
Jordan. Yeah. I was about to say Jordan wants you tell us a bit about what if Hisoka met the bad guy from Double Taisei.
Jordan 20:00
This dude's like way worse than Hisoka. [Jordan laughs] Like their names Yoshiyuki Enkoji and their whole thing is that like they really like pain like they literally just get off on pain. Their a masochist, they say that. They also call all the guys uh honey and darling which is absolutely terrifying if you're homophobic you know?
David 20:16
Yeah. [Dylan grunts in agreement]
Jordan 20:16
What a scary thing to read in a manga you know, And oh he also has got like a split tongue because he's really in the body modding clearly [David grunts in agreement] but like basically when he injure somebody he does the same injury to himself and I guess it gets him off. [David grunts in agreement]
Dylan 20:40
Yeah, he's got some major body dysmorphia going on right there between the injuries, the split tongue and then apparently what happens to him in the five years later, uh little flash forward.
Jordan 20:51
It seems like he just goes to like body mod conventions.
Dylan 20:56
Yeah, he's one of those guys that get his eyeballs tattooed and would get synthol injections for his muscles. [David makes questioning noise] Now question, do you think he has a Prince Albert?
Jordan 21:05
No, I think he has a bisected penis. Let's move on. [Dylan groans in pain]
David 21:08
Alright, speaking of failures, like that [Dylan groans in pain] discussion topic. Let's get into why it failed. Oh, great. reading my notes. We don't have any salvation because Jordans reading this leading this topic. So Jordan, please.
Jordan 21:19
Yeah,
Dylan 21:19
Fuck me I guess
David 21:20
We need to continue on this track of failure.
Jordan 21:22
Yeah, so we've kind of touched on it. But basically, it just kind of feels like not much really happens a lot in this series. It turns into Oh, it's high school, but like there's fighting but like, there's not like that much fighting.
David 21:34
The series feels like it would have come in like the mid 2000s When the standards weren't so high.
Jordan 21:40
Yeah.
David 21:41
Like, from art style to writing to plot, this is definitely a time capsule of showing you how much people have improved in the last 15 years and Weekly Shonen Jump,
Dylan 21:50
It felt like a lot of um Greatest Hits ideas from really old, early 2000s, even, manga and such,
Jordan 21:58
I've heard a criticism of Harry Potter that like those kids go to school, and they don't have any math class or English class
David 22:04
Yeah
Jordan 22:04
Or anything. They're never gonna learn how to do like basic shit, like outside of just like some magic and shit. And it seems like that's the exact same thing that's happening at this place.
Dylan 22:13
Yeah, they didn't expand on it at all.
Jordan 22:16
And they kind of bring it up because they mentioned social studies and stuff, but like they show you the curriculum, and it's just different forms of fighting.
David 22:23
I had that same note what the fuck is the point of everything they're doing? They're not learning anything in this high school, you still have to have math and shit and they even set up that idea of oh, I'm really good at studying while fighting so imagine they could have had like a I guess isn't where could have gone but they could have really played that up and then they just completely ignored like that was a major component of their entrance exam.
Jordan 22:43
Dude they have like no classes?
David 22:45
Yeah.
Jordan 22:45
Like on one hand I was kind of glad for that. But on the other hand, that's the whole fucking point. Why would you have them in school if you're not going to show like the classes?
Dylan 22:54
They could have had it just be a fight club type situation if they only wanted to focus on the fighting aspects. But yeah, it's a school give make it a school montage thing?
Jordan 23:01
Yeah, may as well have just been a fucking club.
David 23:04
Which we talked about in the first chapter. He's like, Oh, there's no one where for people like me who want to learn martial art
Jordan 23:10
In Japan.
David 23:11
In Japan, it's not a huge cultural touchstone. You're right.
Jordan 23:14
Also, why is he the heir to a tech company?
David 23:19
That was when he knew the series was getting canceled. Why the fuck was he spending time on that?
Jordan 23:23
Out of fucking nowhere
Dylan 23:23
That feels like a plot point that you would introduce much later down the line where would actually introduce some conflict instead of just being resolved by a simple, Nah, I'm not going to be that.
You have a family member show up they haven't seen a long time when the series is already ending. And you don't bring back fucking grandpa.
Jordan 23:42
Yeah, like there was one moment in the beginning. It was actually a moment that I thought was kind of awesome. We're just they're running out of time to finish the entrance exam and just just Neru shows up with a fucking horse out of nowhere, and they're just that's the only explanation. How do you know how to ride a horse? He's like, Oh, we used to have horses. So I guess maybe that was the foreshadowing that he came from a rich family.
Dylan 24:06
Is it a cultural thing out there were rich families of horses like out here? That felt really weird.
Jordan 24:11
I don't know.
David 24:12
I've never ridden a horse, so.
Jordan 24:14
I've ridden a horse when I was a little kid. It knock me off.
David 24:17
That's cute.
Jordan 24:14
The horse's name was actually Gluey.
Dylan 24:21
Oh [Dylan groans]
David 24:21
That's really morbid. [Jordan and Dylan laugh]
Jordan 24:24
I was too young to get that joke. But then when I was older, I just thought about it. I was like, yo, what the fuck they named that horse? [Jordan laughs]
Dylan 24:32
Isn't there a horse in Animal Crossing named Elmer? That's the same kind of line.
David 24:36
Oh my god. [Jordan laughs]
Jordan 24:38
Well, they also set up this book as being a huge thing. It's really not.
Dylan 24:42
It was introduced as like, yeah, his his sole possession. And then it was introduced at one brief moment again and then never touched upon.
David 24:49
This series, which should just have been mothballed from the first chapter.
Jordan 24:53
Also the writing really, it kind of felt like fanfiction the way that it was set up and written.
David 24:58
Yeah, I can't tell you anything. about any of these characters and they throw a lot of characters at you that are very half develop.
Jordan 25:04
And it's all like oh well he's the heir to x family. He's in the that family, like it's just building all these things up that don't matter. How could you possibly keep track of this shit?
David 25:14
Yeah, that last chapter the offer was like really? Did you really think we fucking remembered any of these characters enough to care?
Jordan 25:21
The last chapter was so hard to follow.
Dylan 25:25
there was nothing going on with that it was in one ear right or the other.
Jordan 25:28
Like they're at a stadium, they're waiting for a fight. There was a moment where Kaname said oh, we broke up implying with Neru but the thing is that the author if its Kaname the author drew her with a different hairstyle which as we all know, if you do in manga, it is impossible to tell who you're talking about. Because the only way to identify manga characters is through their fucking hairstyle.
David 25:50
Yeah.
Jordan 25:51
There's like a horse race and then it says that Neru is the first person they let run in the race using just on his feet.
Dylan 25:59
I think that's their only JoJo reference that they allowed. They just did Steel Ball Run and then that's it.
David 26:03
Besides a character being named Jotaro.
Jordan 26:05
Yeah.
Dylan 26:05
Oh yeah, I forgot about Jotaro actually being in this for a while. Know what you're right. This is actually really just a spin off
Jordan 26:11
One of his better characterisations too I will say.
David 26:14
It's Jotaro [Jordan and David laugh]
Dylan 26:17
they gave him a lot more power will then uh Stone Ocean so yeah.
David 26:20
Also that last battle took forever it was like four chapters for that fucking curtain battle or whatever they were fighting in, like people's laundry.
Jordan 26:28
I fucking hate the thing that happens in manga sometimes where it's like, how does this guy win the battle? Well, he just like powers up and his fuckin essence is just like so intense.
David 26:40
Yeah.
Dylan 26:41
Straight up had a limit break moment right there to pull through and win.
Jordan 26:45
He used Kaio Ken
David 26:47
I really thought that fight was gonna end fast because the guy had that cool idea where you punch the ground and you could see everyone. But no, it kept going for like three more chapters.
Jordan 26:54
Yeah.
Dylan 26:54
They introduced that as if it would be a really interesting idea and it kind of was for the first couple panels and then they it was revealed that Oh, it doesn't matter that it's in laundry would be the exact same if it was taking place just in an open field.
Jordan 27:06
Right like they bring it up like it's going to be a maze so you're thinking oh, they're going to be walking through the maze and trying to find each other no, don't-
David 27:12
Yeah
Jordan 27:12
-fucking worry about they may as well not even be there. Although I will say my favorite part of it is when um the transphobic character throws knives and they block the knives using the cloths. Dude those knives would go through that cloth what what is happening right now like Did they throw it with like such little strength? It just fucking doesn't pierce it. What the fuck is happening?
David 27:33
I really couldn't tell you.
Dylan 27:34
Yeah I've got no idea what was going on with that is maybe like if you want the clothes tight enough and you layer them enough kind of like bulletproof clothing where it's layer upon layer but
Jordan 27:44
Maybe canvas or something but they didn't say that.
David 27:48
Who knows? You know this series sucks.
Dylan 27:50
Hey, hey, it has its good moments. Okay.
David 27:53
All right. Well then Dylan, Mr. Positive. Why don't you lead us off with talking about what the series did well. Man, fucking Dylan. He's like the Tucker of transitions. [Dylan laughs]
Dylan 28:02
The show really is not all or not the show, shit. [Dylan laughs]
David 28:05
No, it's fine. Alex Ptak started calling it a show we've been saying that ever since.
Dylan 28:09
This was not all bad. It wasn't just a straight garbage fire it actually opened up fairly promising especially with the the woodblock style drawings on the color page and just
David 28:19
Yeah
Dylan 28:20
sassy grandpa just having this kind of like drunken fists kind of all around him where they even though he doesn't have eyes, you can tell he's looking and smirking with this kind of like half wink going on the entire time. And when you know as it goes on, the art does actually improve especially like I mentioned earlier when Jotoaro uses his stand and there's the whole skeleton moment [Jordan laughs] and suddenly narrow just gets thrown on the ground. There's some real skill shown off in there, including some of the Buddha statues and everything.
Jordan 28:50
It was kind of bullshitty he didn't use Star Finger though. I mean, it was an obvious like out
David 28:54
Araki forgot
Jordan 28:55
Araki forgot
Dylan 28:56
Star Finger hasn't been a thing for far too long. That would have made it so much better.
Jordan 28:59
Yeah. [Jordan laughs]
David 29:01
Star Finger you. Uh
Dylan 29:02
Woo-hoo-ooh.
Jordan 29:02
Uh.
David 29:03
Oh my.
Jordan 29:04
Oh shit.
David 29:05
I legitimately don't have a single positive to say that we haven't discussed because literally pretty much Dylan just said word for word what was my list of positives.
Jordan 29:13
I do I got I got some positive
Dylan 29:15
Oh. Oh, let's go
Jordan 29:15
I got some positives. Yeah, I actually like the art. I think the art was pretty good. In a lot of places. I thought that the backgrounds were actually very detailed, very nice looking and a lot of shots. The action was also very cool. The art was not an issue for me, except for Akebi's legs which look like shit. He draws all these girls in long flowing pants and they look good. That's usually the hard thing to draw. Usually it's tough to draw like the folds and fabric but no, he pulls that off so much better than like legs.
Dylan 29:45
Legs are like hands. They're incredibly complex and very difficult to do. They're not you know, [Jordan laughs] one of the most basic parts of human anatomy that everyone learns how to draw from a young age.
David 29:55
Yeah.
Jordan 29:55
Her legs were legit like Beast Children legs.
David 29:59
Oh God
Jordan 30:00
I mean it. But like generally I thought the art was pretty distinctive. I liked how he drew the eyes of the characters. I think there was a lot of movement. And yeah, I mean, I will say the guy really knows how to draw muscular feet. [ Dylan groans] Those were some Baki ass feet.
David 30:19
Yeah. [Jordan laughs]
Dylan 30:21
I don't know if I ever want to hear that sentence again. [Dylan groans] [Jordan laughs]
David 30:25
God, we'll make it as a soundbite for this episode just for you.
Dylan 30:27
Oh no.
David 30:28
All right, so do you guys have any other positives for this series?
Jordan 30:31
Some of the archery stuff was pretty cool. I feel like this guy should have just made an archery comic.
Dylan 30:36
Yeah.
David 30:37
That was the only time where you really felt like you put effort into a scene.
Jordan 30:39
Yeah.
Dylan 30:40
I think it's the part that the author really knew the best and I mean, the archery himbo older brother was actually one of the better characters.
David 30:47
And it's funny because there was no feet involved in that entire scene.
Jordan 30:50
Yeah, how about that? How strange,
Dylan 30:53
hmm. [Dylan laughs]
David 30:54
It would it be cool, though, if he had shot the arrow his feet.
Jordan 30:56
I thought he was gonna do that.
Dylan 30:58
That would have been interesting.
David 31:01
Yeah I find it like my arms aren't strong enough. And then you know,
Jordan 31:03
Yeah.
David 31:03
shot with his leg. He uses fucking quads. But no. [David laughs] But though that does make me think about why don't we talk about where their series could have gone?
Jordan 31:10
Cool. Yeah.
David 31:11
Beyond the idea of him shooting archery with his feet, which is a real thing. Dylan, where do you think this series could have gone?
Dylan 31:17
I really actually would have appreciated if the series actually because it opened it was the they, when he entered the school, they were given a list of like it was 12 different types of techniques or martial arts or whatever, I don't know the exact amount. I'm just spitballing 12, because I like the number 12. [Jordan giggles] But if they actually gave it more depth, because they were supposed to give each of them based on how it was planned out. I'm assuming they're gonna do a chapter or two based on each of the martial arts techniques, and then it was going to evolve into more of Neru's journey with whatever when he decided to continue studying. However,
Jordan 31:48
Sorry, hold on, I have to stop you right there because you said the way this series was planned?
David 31:53
Yeah, the series was not planned.
Dylan 31:55
Really did, it felt like there was an overall plan that was in the air, but they didn't have the skill or opportunity to follow through on it, which is why they rushed everything so much, like throwing the entrance exam into chapter four.
Jordan 32:10
Yeah.
Dylan 32:10
Oh, everything felt super rushed, but also hold out way too long. If the plot itself had actually moved at a faster pace. But still, the characters weren't suddenly evolving, developing and throwing more and more in all at once, where if you just focused on the characters already introduced and you had the plot expand and move faster, I thought that would have been a really cool improvement and probably given the series a little bit more staying power.
David 32:34
Yeah, but then we wouldn't have had so much fun talking about it.
Jordan 32:36
No.
David 32:36
They have done good ideas like that.
Dylan 32:38
Yeah, dunking on it is really fun.
Jordan 32:39
I know right?
David 32:40
And it's not even basketball. [Dylan groans] Bazinga
Jordan 32:44
We'll have to read Kuroko's Basketball for that.
David 32:47
Oh no, no, no. They were reviewing it constantly Yeah, this is pretty racist now as like yeah, that sounds about right for the author.
Jordan 32:53
Yeah. What Rem should read is RobotxLaserbeam? [Jordan laughs]
David 32:55
No, just no.
Jordan 32:57
That's the series by Kuroko's Basketball guy. [Jordan laughs]
Dylan 33:01
Oh no.
David 33:02
It's even more racist.
Jordan 33:04
So racist that fucking nowhere [Jordan laughs]
Dylan 33:07
Oh, no that that will be terrible
David 33:10
Jordan just loves talking about you're like here's a fun fact the RobotxLaserbeam manga was super racist.
Jordan 33:15
Yeah, it's just out of fucking nowhere. Like it wasn't racist for like half over half the fucking run. Just out of nowhere.
David 33:23
Yeah, God. [Dylan graons] I'm just thinking what else? Oh, yeah. So I think that he really could have just took in the mirror thing and been like he can mirror any technique but instead of arms he has use feet and literally everything he does has to be foot based.
Jordan 33:35
If I've read enough manga and watched enough anime, I know that one of the ways that they could have done this was um you know, you introduce the book, alright. And every time he pulls up a mirroring technique, they do this a little bit but not enough they could have been like ah, Chapter Three page like 92 or whatever this move, like you set it up that he learned from this book, you could just lean into that more you know, make it more about the book because the book is also his relationship with his grandfather like that's
David 34:04
Yeah.
Jordan 34:04
That's his connection. Like I really thought it was cool how like all those little markings were actually just drawings of forms, but like I want to know more about his connection to the book and his emotions around it.
Dylan 34:17
Ah, but that would require being able to write character depth.
Jordan 34:20
This author is clearly somebody who learned how to write for fanfiction dotnet so you wouldn't have done that? But you know, I'm just saying.
David 34:28
Writing his foot fanfiction. [Dylan groans]
Jordan 34:31
Yeah, actually.
David 34:32
This is reminding me how Dungeons and Daddy's had like a sock ad so the Dungeon Daddies is four dudes and one woman and they had the woman reading the ad and she's like when I'm cold and you know, I just want to warm up my feet and I just put the in there like we're tracking on she's like, Oh, I know. [Jordan giggles] [Dylan graons] Bethany is a fucking national treasure
Jordan 34:46
Bethany's great. Yeah.
David 34:49
Dylan, if you haven't listened to Dungeons and Daddies, I think you'll enjoy it quite immensely.
Dylan 34:53
I will need to sit down or have it running in the background while I'm doing some office work.
Jordan 34:57
That's a good thing to do. It's a DND podcasts that's what they're for.
David 35:01
They have 16,000 patrons. [Dylan makes mind blown noises] Right?
Jordan 35:08
I'm pretty sure they were like already kind of famous. Yeah.
Dylan 35:11
Oh.
David 35:11
It's Jimmy Wong's gang and Anthony Burch is the DM. The best recent moment is there is I didn't know there was a meme called at least I'm not Anthony Burch because people just dunk on Anthony Burch being like a cuck and like his wife treating him like shit and stuff like that.
Dylan 35:23
Oh, wait? [Jordan giggles]
David 35:25
And literally people on 4chan would be like, no matter how bad your life is, just remember, you're not Anthony Burch. [Jordan giggles] And they played a session where they did like a Bonus Session and one of the villains was Anthony Burch and they killed Anthony Burch. And like he wasn't supposed to die, but they just rolled really well in the DM was like really mad. And Anthony Burch goes well at least I'm not Anthony Burch. [Jordan laughs] There you go. That meme's dead.
Dylan 35:47
Yeah.
David 35:47
They fucking killed it. That's it.
Jordan 35:49
It's like when uh Rick Astley saying saying Never Gonna Give You Up at the Macy's Day Parade like we're done. We're done. Now. It's a good cap for it.
David 35:57
Or when Obama did Thanks Obama meme in that subreddit shut down. [Jordan laughs]
Dylan 36:00
Exactly. You know what, when you have a crowning moment on a meme like that it that's the best way to kill it.
David 36:06
And then [David thinks and makes noise] uh fuck fuck this where it could have gone shit. This series really just didn't need to exist. Really, this should have been like a 25% of a different series that had something much more interesting because this is sorry, that's more Final Verdict. Uh um but
Jordan 36:19
Yeah
David 36:19
Speaking. You guys cool if we just keep rambling about miscellaneous thoughts.
Jordan 36:22
Yeah.
Dylan 36:23
Oh, absolutely.
David 36:24
The main thing I want to talk about as a fellow flat footed person-
Jordan 36:27
Me to David, yeah!
David 36:28
This series really spoke to me. [Jordan laughs] You know you're welcome to excuse yourself with your inferior feet.
Jordan 36:34
With your inferior feet.
David 36:34
That don't get cramps all the time. [Jordan laughs]
Jordan 36:36
Yeah, without foot pain.
Dylan 36:39
I just the thought of, I'm sorry, I'm very anti foot as a human being if I had the option, I would replace my entire lower legs with just springs like the good runners. Because feet are to me are just the most vile thing.
David 36:54
So I know someone who's not got an account on wiki feet.
Jordan 36:58
Man, so we really picked a great series for you, huh?
Dylan 37:01
Oh, yeah. No. Um. [Jordan laughs] Shawn Rollins, my roommate
Jordan 37:06
Name drop.
Dylan 37:06
when I brought up that this was the manga you were having me read he'd laughed and he looked at me said Oh, Dylan. Oh, you're in for a rough time, bud.
David 37:14
It's like by chance. When Shawn was on we happen to do the one series it has like an incest subplot. Which we didn't know ahead of time [Everyone laughs]
Jordan 37:22
It rule, Shawn was great.
David 37:26
Man, Teenage Renaissance! David was such a fucking strange manga to read.
Jordan 37:29
Oh piss and incest.
David 37:31
Yeah,
Jordan 37:32
That's that's what I remember about Teen Renaissance! David.
David 37:34
And that actually had Jotoro's hat in it [David laughs]
Jordan 37:38
It did. Oh, that was that was good though. I was I was actually good joke Manneken Pis was great.
David 37:43
We're really getting miscellaneous in this section. Also, did you guys see like frogs just kind of showed up? There's like a frog at the entrance exam and it's just like not explaining why there was just like a frog hanging out.
Dylan 37:53
Oh, I'm assuming that's just the grandpa. He turned himself into a frog. He's that good at martial arts. He can transform it animals.
David 37:58
Turned himself into a frog. It was the funniest shit I've ever seen.
Jordan 38:01
As a prank. Yeah.
Dylan 38:02
it was the most martial art shit he's ever seen.
David 38:05
Yeah, Jordan just doesn't get it. It's okay.
Jordan 38:07
I kind of felt while reading this like maybe this is this maybe this is the school that Mash should have gone to for Mashle but it's not as interesting if you go see your [Jordan laughs]
David 38:15
Mash's overqualified to attend the school.
Jordan 38:18
That's how you make Mashle into a boring series.
Dylan 38:21
I mean, so boring that nothing from this will stick in my head. Except for the gross obsession with feet in like a couple days. I'm not gonna remember a single thing.
Jordan 38:30
The foot manga there's only one.
David 38:32
Yes, Big Foot.
Dylan 38:34
I hope this is the only one.
Jordan 38:35
Oh, don't worry.
David 38:37
No.
Jordan 38:37
It's not
Dylan 38:37
Oh, no. Oh, no.
Jordan 38:38
I can't think of any more. I just know there are more.
David 38:41
I wanted to point out the really blatantly lazy copy paste job with the flashback.
Jordan 38:46
Yeah.
Dylan 38:47
Oh.
David 38:48
Like they didn't do anything. They just copy and paste it into Photoshop, which really makes me appreciate that in One Piece. Oda doesn't recycle panels. He will redraw the panel when there's a flashback.
Jordan 38:58
Well, Oda's a machine.
David 38:59
Yeah, I remember when Queen shot himself twice in the manga. And there was an explosion twice and he actually drew the explosion twice. Despite it being identical explosions. [Dylan laughs]
Jordan 39:10
Hell yeah.
Dylan 39:11
That's some dedication.
Jordan 39:13
I did want to point out like, so his mom just shows up at the end and his mom walks out to see him and he's just like, I'm hungry. Make me food. So she's made some fucking rice balls.
David 39:24
Yeah.
Jordan 39:25
Like I don't know. Just say I'm like, I'm hungry woman. Make me fucking food is just like,
Dylan 39:30
Dammit, woman make me rice ball.
David 39:33
And he talked about bland it is. [David giggles]
Jordan 39:34
Yeah, it's just rice with salt. Oh my god.
David 39:39
Yeah, it's like it reminds me that I really live that stereotype about white people don't use seasoning When my aunt brought mashed potatoes and all she put on them with salt.
Jordan 39:48
Oh God.
Dylan 39:48
Oh no, if you haven't had good Funeral Potatoes though that's that's a shame.
Jordan 39:52
Gotta kill somebody first for that.
David 39:55
Tough. Okay, Jordan, like we've murdered this series.
Jordan 39:59
Yeah, it's dead.
Dylan 40:00
It's dead it's in the ground.
David 40:03
I feel like people are not going to be shocked about our opinions on the series as we turn it to the final verdict. So why don't we kick things off with some six word summaries. Naturally we did not quite as many as Cop and Dolphin because Cop and Dolphin was actually really worth reading and you know didn't make you wonder about the foot fetish the author had but we still got some good ones. So first from T Wolfwood who is listening to us right now I forgot to read this manga so I guess he didn't.
Jordan 40:26
Well no, he said I forgot I read this manga. Huge difference. [Jordan laughs]
David 40:30
Sorry, let me restart okay. T Wolfwood said I forgot I read this manga. I'm sure I will do this will be a strong contender series we forgot existed.
Jordan 40:37
Yeah.
David 40:37
Kirbymon said everything is flatter than Neru's feet.[Jordan laughs]
Jordan 40:40
True
David 40:41
Generic Man said wrong generation for martial arts degree.
Jordan 40:44
Generic Man, oh, he is my favorite character from uh Neru. [Dylan laughs]
David 40:48
Big shout out to Generic Man who made that super awesome Shonen Jump uh List where he literally wrote down every series by run length author and chapter
Jordan 40:56
Yeah dude, that shit rules and is going to be very helpful. Thank you so much.
Dylan 41:01
Hell yeah.
David 41:01
And then Tucker said, recording tomorrow. Uh, it's probably bad
Jordan 41:06
again, once again! Without even reading it! Oh my god!
Dylan 41:11
Way to go, Tucker.
David 41:13
Dammit Tucker, you got to save some for the rest of this, fuck [Dylan laughs]. And then Jordan, what was your six summary?
Jordan 41:18
Uh, my six word summary was Quentin Tarantino presents ninja art school. [David and Dylan laugh]
David 41:26
That's really good. How about you Dylan?
Dylan 41:28
Oh, that's fantastic. Mine was martial arts with a foot fetish. [Jordan laughs]
David 41:34
So apparently I'm the only one who didn't talk about the foot fetish, so I piece of shit I always am I wrote two. One of them I thought was really good. And one of them I just wanted to make fun of the series. So the first one I said I didn't think was quite as good was like rice balls with only salt.
Jordan 41:47
Yeah.
Dylan 41:47
Fairly apt.
David 41:49
And then the second one was everyone was only kung fu fighting.
Jordan 41:52
That's a good one. That's the banger. Yeah,
David 41:54
Yeah. That was my real six word summary. [Jordan and Dylan giggle] Thank you. Thank you. I was proud of that one, but I think nothing will ever beat My Hero Zootopia.
Jordan 42:01
Yeah, it was for... [Dylan grunts]
David 42:03
O-Zoo but that one's not six words, so I feel like it's disqualified.
Jordan 42:05
Yeah.
David 42:06
All right. So speaking of flops Jordan is this a flop or not?
Jordan 42:09
Yeah.
David 42:09
Well certified flop?
Jordan 42:10
I don't know if I'd say it was certified flop just because the way like the biggest issue with this is that it's just very mediocre.
David 42:16
Yeah.
Jordan 42:16
Enough good stuff with like the art and stuff like that where I think it just barely barely isn't a certified flop, but it's on the fucking cusp, it's not a good series.
David 42:26
I agree with that. Dylan, how about you?
Dylan 42:28
Oh, yeah, absolutely a flop not good by any measure. It's all right in some regards, but I wouldn't say it's the worst. It's it's it's a flop. You just drop it on the ground and it goes plop. [David laughs]
David 42:40
It's a plot flop. [Jordan giggles]
Jordan 42:42
It's a plop, Shonen Plop.
David 42:44
Dan Harrison with the belly flop.
Jordan 42:46
Yeah, yeah, I like that was a good one. [David laughs]
David 42:49
That's another good mod modifier. Uh, but yeah, I agree. This is a flop so Jordan though, was this the worst thing we've ever read?
Jordan 42:56
Uh, no, that's the thing we've read far worse like far worse like this. This sucks. No God fuckin fucking Bone Collection is way worse than this, way worse.
David 43:08
Or Build King.
Jordan 43:09
No, there are many series that we've read that are far worse than this. Yes.
David 43:13
So I'll take it that this is not better than Chainsawman.
Jordan 43:15
No.
David 43:15
Though Dylan I know you've been reading Chainsawman in preparation of being on the show. So just just because you read Chainsawman lately, how would you compare this to Chainsawman?
Dylan 43:24
Well, I mean, considering both of these uh characters feature socially and somewhat academically inept main characters who admit very early on that their downfall will be the women in their lives, I will say this compares very poorly compared to Chainsawman.
Jordan 43:39
I just remembered there was a moment where fucking Akebi says, Oh be careful, the women here the women are all crazy, and then he's just like, that knowledge would turn out to be very true. [David laughs] Something I do think I I would really like to bring up is the fact that so long time ago and we covered Time Paradox Ghost Writer, we found this discord and I've mentioned this before on the podcast, we found this discord that was all obsessed with Time Paradox Ghost Writer and then when that got cancelled, they shifted to be about Our Blood Oath and when that got cancelled, they shifted to Neru Way of the Martial Artist.
David 44:15
So what you're saying is we're gonna have to pop back into the discard and say guys, we're back?
Jordan 44:18
Yeah, pretty much. Now what they've moved to instead is Ayashimon which is at least far better than Neru. The fact that it was appreciated by this group makes me really worried about Ayashimon.
David 44:19
That's actually my argumentation. [David laughs]
Jordan 44:34
Yeah, I saw that. [Jordan laughs] It's good. [David laughs]
David 44:35
I wonder if this is gonna be like uh Red Sprite. Who was our guest on Red Sprite? Mitch! When Mitch recommended Candy Flurry two weeks before it got cancelled. [Jordan laughs] Ayashimon though is pretty great. It's by the dude who made Hell's Paradise who was an assistant on Chainsawman.
Which is great. Hell's Paradise fucking rules. By the way.
How did we not mentioned in the Dandan Dan bonus content that he also worked on Chainsawman.
Jordan 45:01
You think we'd be on that. Damn, we dropped the fucking ball.
David 45:04
Chadjimoto, man so based.
Jordan 45:06
Chadjimoto show. [David laughs]
David 45:09
So Dylan though, um, as our guest, I'd really love to ask you next, what would you recommend?
Dylan 45:14
Instead of reading Neru Way of the Martial Artist, I would say you can read absolutely anything else. But first of all, I'm gonna recommend Chainsawman because
David 45:23
I fucking was like, is he gonna reconmend Chainsawman?
Dylan 45:26
Forgive me for the cop out.
Jordan 45:28
You're just pandering to the people that you're with at this point
David 45:31
In his defense, he did just read it.
Dylan 45:33
Yeah, it is the most fresh thing in my mind, have been reading it for just the past few days. So that that is why I'm recommending it highly. First of all above this.
Jordan 45:41
I will agree read chainsaw man over Neru. I think that everybody here will agree with that.
David 45:47
You don't worm your way out of that. Jordan, you need a real recommendation. [David and Dylan laugh]
Jordan 45:50
Oh, no, I have, no no, that wasn't my placement for recommendation.
David 45:53
Oh, just making sure.
Jordan 45:54
I use a recommendation, and this is also something that we've, we've recommended before, obviously, but um if you had like a series about a strong kid who got trained by his older caretaker in the forest, and then winds up in a really interesting, uh special high school, you should read Mashle.
David 46:13
Yeah, Mash was great. We had an episode rec episode on it.
Jordan 46:16
That's why I'm saying we had a recommendation episode. So everybody listening you should already fucking know you should read Mashle. [David laughs]
David 46:22
You know, that's completely fair. By the way. So Dylan, how far are you in Chainsawman?
Dylan 46:25
Uh, let me let me pull it up real quick. I believe I hmm Jiminy Cricket.
Jordan 46:30
Jiminy Cricket.
Dylan 46:31
That's what I say to avoid saying Jesus fucking Christ. [David laughs] I acknowledge that I swear far too much. I just finished reading uh chapter 36, which is in the middle of Gun Arc when everyone's been shot, and now they're zombies.
Jordan 46:45
Oh, fuck yeah.
David 46:46
By the way, one of the best things about Chainsawman is you should go read Fujimoto's author comments
Jordan 46:52
Yeah
David 46:52
With each chapter because he just kind of says whatever the fuck he wants to say.
Dylan 46:56
I can imagine his back on a man based on Chainsawman. That is written by a man who gives no fuck.
David 47:02
yeah, there's at least a YouTube video or someone compiled them all. And like there's some highlights. Like he just talks about how much he loves like a specific dessert. Like he mentioned it maybe 10 plus times, [Jordan giggles] or how he says what his top three favorite numbers are. [Dylan and Jordan laugh]
Jordan 47:19
The best one was a Shonen Jump anthology, right when COVID started.
David 47:24
The fucking best thing ever.
Jordan 47:26
Like Oda was like, Oh, we're going through some tough times now. But we can all stand strong and everyone else was just like, Oh, we're gonna get through this then Fujimoto was just like, Yo, guys, did you know that you could get two for one pizzas at Domino's right now? [David, Dylan and Jordan laugh]
David 47:43
Best part is he was explicitly asked about COVID and he ignored it. [Jordan laughs]
Dylan 47:48
Oh man after my own heart.
David 47:50
Also, his Twitter account says he is a girl in the third grade. [Dylan and Jordan laugh]
Jordan 47:56
Fucking love Fujimoto.
David 47:58
We could talk about why you love Chainsawman, but we've only got a few but also in your own free time as a piece of homework, look up the results of the first ever Chainsawman-
Jordan 48:06
So good.
David 48:06
Popularity poll.
Jordan 48:07
So good.
David 48:08
We will leave that to you Dylan as an exercise in an exercise to the readers. And we've told this story before, but it may be the greatest thing to have ever happened in Chainsawman. fandom. Actually, it is literally impossible to have had a better result for the popularity poll [Jordan laughs] than what occurred.
Jordan 48:24
You know, a series is bad when we just start talking about Chainsawman.
David 48:28
Also fuck Makima. I don't even if she has a dump truck.
Jordan 48:31
I showed you this there's a Twitter account just called At Shonen Flop. It's a Makima simp account. [Jordan laughs]
David 48:36
Yeah, that's why we didn't sue him. [David breathes in] I love that meme, Fujimoto's avatar, which is like what it's like a heart or something that has like a smiley face.
Jordan 48:45
Yeah.
David 48:45
And it has sunglasses and he's like I implore you Shonen Flop editors Makima having a dump truck ass is very important to the plot of Chainsawman [Jordan laughs]. But here's the thing, it is 100% true.
Jordan 48:58
It is. [Dylan and Jordan laugh]
David 49:00
Why don't we go to shout outs and really talk about some other awesome things that we could talk about forever. Props to Jordan for making the opening and ending theme, [Jordan laughs] being a great co host and helping with the editing and also knowing who the best girl on Chainsawman is. Props to Mer Liel for the awesome cover. You can find her online at liel_mer and Nigel for being our generous art benefactor. Thanks to Tucker for assistance with pronunciation, translation other miscellaneous research even if he actually didn't have really a chance to read this series because we had an off scheduling time and he just kind of got caught off guard. Thank you for Nicole for helping with social media. Thanks to Luke for being our community producer. And thank you to Generic Man for providing us with a really awesome Shonen Jump sheet with all series ever featured in the magazine with chapters, authors, run dates, etc.
Jordan 49:41
Seriously, it's nuts. Amazing. Thank you.
David 49:43
How about you Jordan? Is there anyone?
Jordan 49:44
Yeah I would like to thank you, David, for all of your hard work editing this very episode. So if you hear me start talk talking like this, then it means David is editing some stuff together anyway, let's Yeah. All right. Thank you, David.
David 49:59
You tried. You know who else I really want to thank are all of our awesome patreons. I want to give a shout out to Pterodactyl Ghost for actually speaking of being a Chainsawman level patreon and then I also want to give a shout out to Albie, Gabe Lando, Majin Nights, Mark, Matt, Marty, Meghan who just joined today actually so they just got-
Jordan 50:00
Yeah.
David 50:13
in the wire to be given a shout out. So welcome back Megan. OverratedApples, T Wolfwood for being our awesome King of the Forest patreons as well.
Jordan 50:23
Yes, thank you so much.
David 50:24
And if you're thinking about joining our Patreon we really appreciate it. We have a ton of awesome perks ranging from exclusive mini episodes, deleted scenes and you can even help us pick we're going to cover next. You can find us at patreon.com/shonenflop and if you're not ready for a regular commitment, consider buying some merch. We have a ton of awesome designs including the much requested Gomez moon and Mashel punching Harry Potter shirts along with the cover art from this episode and a portion of the proceeds go back to the original artists to boot. And no worries if you can't help the show out financially, if you could like rate review or share our show. It really helps us build an audience. Even telling one friend to check us out means a lot. You can find us on Twitter @shonenflopcast and our website shonenflop.com. We're on Spotify, iTunes, YouTube or wherever else you get your podcasts. But enough about us I really want to give a sincere thank you, Dylan, thank you so much for being on the show and you know just being a really awesome friend in general. It's definitely one of my favorite things of being on Anime Out of Context that we really got to connect like this.
Jordan 51:14
Yeah, thank you so much, Dylan for showing up. It's great.
Dylan 51:17
Oh absolutely. Thank you guys so much again for having me on. I always am down to talk to you in regards to rediculous uh shonen manga or anything like that. But yes, as you guys mentioned, um I am the editor for Anime Out of Context. That's how we actually got all together and I just make Shawn Rollins and Remington Chase say some absolutely horrible things[Jordan laughs] as well as make sure that uh they don't say incredibly horrible things on purpose. But yeah, that's all that I really do. I just handle audio and I make great art out of it.
Awe.
Jordan 51:49
Hell yeah. Just like the orc.
David 51:50
Shut up, Jordan. You know, I just realized actually, who, what's the reference to the Boy Wizard tier in your patreon?
Dylan 51:56
So starting around episode I think one even-
Jordan 51:59
Woah.
Dylan 52:00
of our very first episode or even our non first episode like the one that we reserved like our demo episode.
Yeah.
They started making an in joke where they said Harry Potter is my favorite anime. They have not made that joke in a while because of a particular individual. And um how problematic that could be saying that. However, we are still leaving the boy wizard tier because of course the image is Elijah Wood.
Jordan 52:20
Hmm.
Dylan 52:21
We also had the Cory in the House bit that I have finally said, All right, no, and put an axe to and I've changed it to inappropriate Joey Wheeler.
Jordan 52:29
Hey, you-g.
David 52:29
I was just thinking that because [David laughs] so the main series, we want to do a mini series on for Shonen Flop, which is probably my favorite canceled is called MO and it's literally about a wizard school.
Dylan 52:40
Ooh. I can see that
David 52:41
So that's why I was wondering, [David and Dylan laugh] I feel like oh, maybe you guys should be guests on it where we literally cover a wizard school manga. But then I was like, Yeah, I was like, why do they reference boy wizards in their Patreon?
Dylan 52:51
It's a lot better than just the Harry Potter tier, because that would be a little bit too much.
Jordan 52:56
Yeah, a little tone deaf right now. Yeah.
David 52:58
Uh, yeah that'd be some difficult turf. If you know what I mean.
Jordan 53:03
Ahh.
Dylan 53:03
Aye.
Jordan 53:03
Hey.
David 53:04
Also trans rights are human rights.
Jordan 53:07
Trans rights and so everybody just say trans rights all the time.
Dylan 53:10
Damn skippy, trans rights!
Jordan 53:13
Everybody in the chat you know, just say it right now even if we can't hear you we'll know
David 53:17
Yep.
Dylan 53:17
And we're watching or listening.
Jordan 53:19
Yep
Dylan 53:19
T Wolfwood is written trans rights so we know they're with it.
Jordan 53:22
Hell yeah, T Wolfwood, yes. [David laughs]
David 53:26
So is Albie. Both listeners wrote trans rights there you go.
Jordan 53:28
Yes, Albie, yes.
Dylan 53:30
Damn skippy Albie.
David 53:32
I love how there's a discord gang weeb where they just post like pretty much like ironic memes, but [David laughs] I don't know how to explain it, but they just talk about smoking weed and trans rights in all their memes. [Jordan laughs] There's like a picture of like Heath Ledger's Joker or no, not Heath Ledger. The fucking Suicide Squad Joker. Some people say we live in a society. I say trans rights, and shit like that. [Dylan and Jordan laugh] It's just just the dumbest fucking subreddit and I love it. Uh [David laughs] Like this was a great episode. Dylan, thank you so much for being on you guys ready to go to sign up?
Jordan 54:01
Yeah. [Jordan laughs]
David 54:03
Thank you so much for joining us. [David and Jordan laugh] My que. [David and Jordan laugh]
Jordan 54:06
Yeah, that's what we've been waiting for.
Dylan 54:07
Wait, did I miss my moment? Was I supposed to talk?
David 54:09
Yeah, sorry, sorry. This has been David,
Jordan 54:11
This has been Jordan.
Dylan 54:12
This has been Dylan.
David 54:14
And you've been listening to Shonen Flop.
Jordan 54:16
Keep on flopping floppers.
David 54:18
Yeah,
Jordan 54:18
Yeah. Floppity floppity, floppity. Bye. [Transcribed by TrafalgarWolfwood]
Transcribed by https://otter.ai