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Answerman - Do Manga Artists Have Any Control Over "Filler" Episodes?


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Zendervai



Joined: 06 Apr 2012
Posts: 197
PostPosted: Mon Apr 17, 2017 12:06 pm Reply with quote
You do get some really interesting cases sometimes though. Like, Magic Knight Rayearth. The source material for each season is pretty short and there's not a whole lot to make a full series out of. For the first chunk of the first season of the anime, an in house writer wrote most of the new stuff, but for the second half and the entire second season, all the new stuff was written by CLAMP, and not just CLAMP, but the member who wrote the manga of Rayearth in the first place.

I'm aware that really isn't the norm, but it is fascinating when it happens.
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maximilianjenus



Joined: 29 Apr 2013
Posts: 2858
PostPosted: Mon Apr 17, 2017 12:11 pm Reply with quote
but then again, nto all mangaka works for shounen jump, or more broadly, not all of them work in weekly magazines, though, then again anime not based on weekly magazine manga tends not to have fillers.
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0Ninjaz0



Joined: 03 Oct 2014
Posts: 31
PostPosted: Mon Apr 17, 2017 12:16 pm Reply with quote
Makes me think about the 200+ page script and booklet Sui Ishida made for Root A. I do wonder if the reason it ended up such a mess was because of the anime staff having to mix stuff from the manga together with an author's original story for the anime. Since they barely ended up following that script after all. They didn't fully commit to the script, nor the manga.
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Gemnist



Joined: 10 Feb 2016
Posts: 1754
PostPosted: Mon Apr 17, 2017 12:44 pm Reply with quote
Speaking of Naruto, I remember in an interview Kishimoto said that he added a scene between Sakura and a Iwa shinobi in the hopes it would lead to a filler about Sasuke. Ironically, Pierrot didn't get the memo and went with the canon the whole way.
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Aquamine-Amarine



Joined: 13 Jul 2014
Posts: 276
PostPosted: Mon Apr 17, 2017 12:44 pm Reply with quote
"In fact, some artists have tried to influence anime production over the years, and only succeeded in annoying everyone on staff."

Good. Annoy them some more.

I think filler episodes are an insult to the original creator. It's like a big middle finger to them, as though the anime staff is saying "your stuff isn't good enough on it's own, let me fix it by adding my stuff into it". If you want to write original stuff so badly, make your own anime. There's quite a few successful anime original stories out there. Like Shirobako and Yuri!!! on Ice.

On another note, filler episodes might work in a slice of life anime, but manga that rely heavily on plot - shounen and magical girl manga, for example - suffer a lot when fillers are stuffed into their anime adaptions. It completely screws up the pacing, often has contradictory material, the art and animation suffer, the stories are low quality compared to episodes that adapt manga material, and the characters are often out of character. Thankfully Weekly Shounen Jump has learned their lesson, and now they only give their manga a 20-something episode adaption first, then they wait a few months before giving them another season.

If I were a manga artist, I wouldn't tolerate an unfaithful anime adaption. You either guarantee me a faithful anime, or I'm going to tell you to jump off a cliff. I wouldn't let someone destroy my work.
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MarshalBanana



Joined: 31 Aug 2014
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PostPosted: Mon Apr 17, 2017 1:02 pm Reply with quote
I think there was a filler arc in One Piece written by Oda.
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DmonHiro





PostPosted: Mon Apr 17, 2017 1:27 pm Reply with quote
Aquamine-Amarine wrote:
as though the anime staff is saying "your stuff isn't good enough on it's own, let me fix it by adding my stuff into it".


I don't know what the heck you're are talking about, but that's not what filler is. Filler does not modify the story of the manga nor is its point to "fix" anything. It simply exist to fill episodes when there isn't enought manga left to adapt. Example: the second season of D.Gray-man is complete filler. That thing with the future seeing innocence does not happen in the manga. That season was only made to keep the anime on the air while the manga finishes its current arc.

What you are talking about are shows like Rosario+Vampire. Shows that IGNORE the manga and make up their own story. Those are almost always crap and a total insult to the anime. Those are the ones who destory a work, not filler.

Basically, filler is that part of the anime that you can remove and be left with only the manga in anime form.

However, you need to be very careful with filler. If you do a shit enough job you can kill the anime. Ruroni Kenshin has such an abysmal filler season that it killed the anime ratings and it got canceled before resuming the manga storyline.
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zztop



Joined: 28 Aug 2014
Posts: 642
PostPosted: Mon Apr 17, 2017 1:33 pm Reply with quote
This reminds me of the production of the Twin Star Exorcists anime - its creator said his only involvement was overseeing voice acting auditions and designing the anime-original characters.
Quote:

"In fact, some artists have tried to influence anime production over the years, and only succeeded in annoying everyone on staff."


Are there any famous mangakas who were able to successfully influence the anime production of their works?


Last edited by zztop on Mon Apr 17, 2017 1:36 pm; edited 1 time in total
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Lord Geo



Joined: 18 Sep 2005
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Location: North Brunswick, New Jersey
PostPosted: Mon Apr 17, 2017 1:35 pm Reply with quote
Aquamine-Amarine wrote:
If I were a manga artist, I wouldn't tolerate an unfaithful anime adaption. You either guarantee me a faithful anime, or I'm going to tell you to jump off a cliff. I wouldn't let someone destroy my work.


I think this is a very broad strokes view of filler, honestly. Yes, there is plenty of downright terrible filler in anime adaptations, but at the same time there are some really damn good fillers that shouldn't be skipped over. For example, Episode 100 of Naruto was a hilarious bit of poking fun at how Kakashi always covers his mouth with his mask, & the various overly elaborate schemes Naruto, Sasuke, & Sakura would try in order to get a glimpse of their teacher maskless. B't X also had some damn good filler in its first half, especially the two-parter with Chaos & B't Ramuh. Finally, while the second half of Fullmetal Alchemist [2003] has a mixed reaction (though the divergence was approved by Arakawa in advance), there were still some enjoyable bits of filler, especially the ones that expanded on the original manga (like actually seeing Basque Gran's death, whereas the manga simply mentioned it happening). Finally, for short fillers, one can't ignore the beloved filler in Dragon Ball Z where Goku & Piccolo had to get driver's licenses.

There are also some well-regarded filler arcs, like the Asgard Chapter in Saint Seiya, which is so liked that it even received a sequel-of-sorts with 2015's Soul of Gold (At least, I enjoyed SoG). And what about something like the original Eat-Man anime, which is almost nothing like the original manga, outside of some general similarities, but is still an outstanding anime on its own?

Fillers are a necessary evil, yes, but that doesn't mean that nothing good has ever come from them.
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WingKing



Joined: 27 Apr 2015
Posts: 617
PostPosted: Mon Apr 17, 2017 1:50 pm Reply with quote
zendervai wrote:
You do get some really interesting cases sometimes though. Like, Magic Knight Rayearth. The source material for each season is pretty short and there's not a whole lot to make a full series out of. For the first chunk of the first season of the anime, an in house writer wrote most of the new stuff, but for the second half and the entire second season, all the new stuff was written by CLAMP, and not just CLAMP, but the member who wrote the manga of Rayearth in the first place.

I'm aware that really isn't the norm, but it is fascinating when it happens.


CLAMP has a ton of experience also working on the anime side of the business, though - maybe more than any other mangaka since the great Tezuka himself. Nanase Ohkawa's taken lots of jobs as a scriptwriter and/or series composer, and of course they've worked as character designers and artists for quite a few anime too, and even helped to co-produce Blood-C and directed their own short anime video for "CLAMP in Wonderland." So they're really an anomaly.
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falcon.punch



Joined: 07 Jan 2015
Posts: 693
PostPosted: Mon Apr 17, 2017 2:27 pm Reply with quote
The only 'tolerable filler' I liked was Saint Seiya's Asgard.
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SaitoHajime101



Joined: 31 Mar 2013
Posts: 280
PostPosted: Mon Apr 17, 2017 2:45 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
So when a manga artist is old/successful/powerful enough to throw their weight around a little more,


Is it just me or does it feel like there was suppose to be a bit more to this sentence?

Either way thanks for the answer as always. Good read! Very Happy
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rizuchan
Collector Extraordinaire



Joined: 11 Mar 2007
Posts: 974
Location: Kansas
PostPosted: Mon Apr 17, 2017 3:00 pm Reply with quote
Lord Geo wrote:
For example, Episode 100 of Naruto was a hilarious bit of poking fun at how Kakashi always covers his mouth with his mask, & the various overly elaborate schemes Naruto, Sasuke, & Sakura would try in order to get a glimpse of their teacher maskless.


That's because the concept for that storyline was written by Kishimoto. It was a 1 or two page short that the anime expanded on.

Speaking of Naruto, I felt like the original Naruto series mostly did it right. Make story arcs featuring characters that don't get the limelight very often. Or do a funny one-off. Of course they still tended to fall flat since they couldn't have any real character growth, but it worked for mindless action-oriented entertainment.

Shippuuden on the other hand I found unwatchable. I understand that there were some easily skippable filler arcs, but the canon episodes were of full of talking, flashbacks of flashbacks of things that happened 5 minutes ago I was bored out of my skull. I loved The Last and the Boruto movie, so I tried the last handful of Shippuuden eps and... how many damn times are you gonna tell the story about Sakura's headband? It's the end of the show, you could try to make some original back story for her (no, wait, I take that back, Road to Sakura was horrifically bad. Be careful what you wish for I suppose...) and in general, all of the Shippuuden filler I watched had terrible writing. And not just a bad plot, but characters acted out of character, big plot contradictions... like they just didn't even try.

Maybe the problem with filler is cyclical. Nobody watches it, so they don't bother with the writing, which makes it even more unwatchable...


Last edited by rizuchan on Mon Apr 17, 2017 3:02 pm; edited 2 times in total
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xchampion



Joined: 21 Jan 2009
Posts: 370
Location: Idaho Falls, Idaho
PostPosted: Mon Apr 17, 2017 3:00 pm Reply with quote
In some ways I like the approach of anime like Attack On Titan, Yes, we had to wait 4 years in between seasons, but we didn't have to deal with any damn filler. We only have to worry about canon content. I can see why most would want the show to continue to air even with filler. If a show is off the air too long in between season there might not be enough fans left to care about it. It's why shows like Shirobako and Prison School might not get 2nd seasons, not because they weren't popular, but because the demand might not be there anymore. You could say that AoT is the exception to the rule.
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Lord Oink



Joined: 06 Jul 2016
Posts: 876
PostPosted: Mon Apr 17, 2017 3:15 pm Reply with quote
I'm usually a purist, but even I find hate for filler episodes overblown. If you don't like them, they are easy enough to skip. Much more preferable than slow as molasses pacing like One Piece tends to do of 1 chapter = 1 episode As long as its not a replacement for canon, like Soul Eater and FMA's second half, they can be fun to see new adventures with your favorite characters.

Naruto has a lot of gems, like the one about Hinata and Neji as kids where Neji learns to protect her, or Naruto and Sasuke ge handcuffed together and have to fight together The best filler are ones that enhance or expand a canon's story IMO. Like the ones that focused on the kingdom Akatsuki was said to take down prior to the series, giving Torune a backstory and fighting Shino during the war, or following up on Hayate's lover after his death back in part 1. Wink Also that one with china-dress Hinata. Beach/fanservice filler are automatic A+
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