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EP. REVIEW: Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? II


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Yttrbio
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Joined: 09 Jun 2011
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PostPosted: Sun Sep 01, 2019 6:24 pm Reply with quote
A little bit of the narrative needs being obtrusive in the story was when Aisha was giving Bell a lecture on how he wasn't committed enough, etc. while Mikoto is standing right there, and had a much more compelling and personal need to save Haruhime. At least she got one scream of frustration while running away, but making this Bell's story takes a bit of narrative gymnastics.
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zrnzle500



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PostPosted: Sun Sep 01, 2019 8:53 pm Reply with quote
Tanteikingdomkey wrote:
Ok someone please explain to me how this series went from high fantasy log horizon to freaking goblin slayer all the sudden!!!

Seriously does no one else not find this series sudden shift to it being like it was written by an incel not at all disturbing, is no one even going to address how a series that never before approached rape has had a ton of rape attempts in the past three episodes and some of those were actually successful?!?!

What happened to people demanding and getting an apology from reki kawahara for pulling this same exact type of shit in sword art online? Was is dan machi allowed to pull this shit without a peep?


I find the comparison to Goblin Slayer very overblown, and I don’t really see what in the story could reasonably be construed as being written by an incel. The latter seems to me to be an egregious misreading of the point of the arc as it stands.
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Tanteikingdomkey



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PostPosted: Mon Sep 02, 2019 12:54 am Reply with quote
zrnzle500 wrote:
Tanteikingdomkey wrote:

......What happened to people demanding and getting an apology from reki kawahara for pulling this same exact type of shit in sword art online? Was is dan machi allowed to pull this shit without a peep?

I find the comparison to Goblin Slayer very overblown, ...seems to me to be an egregious misreading of the point of the arc as it stands.


You are right comparing it to Goblin Slayer is overblown, because even if I disagree with its use of rape it is ultimately a show about a guy (and others) overcoming PTSD from rape and other traumatic experiences. and is actively trying to say something about it.

MEANWHILE DANMACHI CAN'T SAY ANYTHING ABOUT IT NOW. It's literally acting like SAO 1&2 where it is by the reviewers own admission it is just using rape as a weapon to throw at the characters and a cheap jump scare basically. How would any of this story so far changed AT ALL if instead of rape they had replaced with torturing bell or fox girl, the answer would be NOT AT ALL.
At least SAO 3 tried to make it about reacting to the atrocity of rape and the lengths that should be taken to stop it. and reki kawahara apologized for that. Everyone who has read the novel being adapted here keeps acting like some powder keg of hatred is going to explode over this book, my theory on that is that they know deep down its the worst writing in the series,

AND LET ME SHOW YOU WHY I SAY THAT.
So the last arc lily had to separate herself from her abusive familia. She was in that situation due to her god (parent 1) writing her off as an addict to his wine and the person running the famila (parent 2) locking her into the famila to abuse her and keep her ability for himself.
She then was given an ultimatum by the god that if she wanted to leave she would have to prove him wrong and overcome the addiction of his wine, and that she had changed due to bell and hestias influence. And she eventually does because she has changed thanks to them, and she has something worth protecting and worth fighting her addiction for.

Meanwhile there is nothing gained by bell or fox girl fighting off rape.
Just in case spoiler[Haruhime not actually being deflied and it being all in her head was the absolute worst twist they could have given this arc. WHY, because now there is no point to haruhime having no self worth instead of it being her overcoming her hang up with being forced into sexual slavery and thinking that now she is "tainted". Instead she just is dealing with having no self worth due to being abused, which doesn't require her to be rapped to have any justification to be a thing. You can remove all references to her and sex with it making ZERO IMPACT to the story, because the author CAN'T or WON'T have the story be affected by rape or sex but still jams it in there because of lazy/hacky writing ]

you could have just as easily gotten bell upset over something else. For example maybe they have some way to break the contract bell has with hestia and force him into their famila, and that terrifies him as he would be losing all his friends and family. and you still have him crying and hugging haruhime and her seeing that she is a human in his eyes.

This makes SAO a far more appropriate compression, but even that kept the rape attempts by the bad group or guy down to 1 per arc (20ish episodes), where as goblin slayer or banana fish make reference to someone being raped or show it around every 3 episodes.

This arc of dan machi in episode 6 has bell nearly getting passed around between 5 different ladies one of which we are told would seriously injury him and make him unusable by the others, all while set to comedic hijinx music. and then runs into a prostitute room who ignores everything he says and does, starts to undress him and go about her job, but fails because SPOILER and can't stand the sight of exposed male skin and bones. And yes I am counting that, because she was refusing to accept him saying no just like the amazons. Next you have Hermes who we are basically out right told was raped, how he was raped, and even why it happened. And this was YET ANOTHER CASE WHERE IT WASN'T AT ALL NEEDED. She could have easily just slipped some sort of truth serum into hermes drink gotten the information she wanted out of him, and embarrassed him by forcing him to tell her some stories he felt ashamed over, and you still get him crying himself asleep in the end.

There are other far less cheap and hackey ways to show off how horrible Ishtar is. she can piss of the other god some other way in regards to ruining bell in a more permanent manner that actually puts a stop to what ever plans might be in store for him in the future. THIS SERIES HAS PROVEN TO BE BETTER THEN THIS ARC. there is legitimately excellent execution for hestia, lily, the worldbuilding, the level of thought and research put into the various gods and how they all act on this new plane.
HECK IN THIS ARC you have interesting use and discovery of haruhines ability and the idea of passing off that ability to other people and making it independent of her via mythology in our own world.

SO, that is why I am so upset and frustrated with this arc, and think so poorly of it. If you are going to try an deal with such a serious matter like rape then you had better actually treat it correctly, or else just do something else to get the same result.
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aaa1e2r3



Joined: 16 Apr 2017
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 02, 2019 2:03 am Reply with quote
Tanteikingdomkey wrote:

There are other far less cheap and hackey ways to show off how horrible Ishtar is.


I imagine this is in part the problem. They went with Ishtar as the main villain. As they did with Apollo, in taking aspects of Apollo and his mythology, the author would have to have drawn from who Ishtar is in her mythology. Considering she's a goddess of love, sex and fertility, they would have to make that apart of what her familia is and her aims and goals are, in the same way the mythos of other deities has been used to inform their characterizations in the series. The fact that sex is being used as a means by the story's villain, I imagine that's why rape is being used in this way.
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Key
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 02, 2019 3:26 am Reply with quote
Tanteikingdomkey wrote:
MEANWHILE DANMACHI CAN'T SAY ANYTHING ABOUT IT NOW. It's literally acting like SAO 1&2 where it is by the reviewers own admission it is just using rape as a weapon to throw at the characters and a cheap jump scare basically. How would any of this story so far changed AT ALL if instead of rape they had replaced with torturing bell or fox girl, the answer would be NOT AT ALL.

Sorry, no. If you believe that then you are completely missing the point of this part of the story: it's all about sex. This is not a story where rape is just being thrown in to titillate; sex is an integral part of what Ishtar Familia is doing. They use it for moneymaking, breeding, coercion, and discipline. To Ishtar and the Amazons in her Familia, it's at least as much about power as it is about lust. In such a situation any attempt to exclude rape would be disingenuous at best, even if it is distasteful. I, for one, am glad that the adaptation didn't pull its punches much. I'll also wholly disagree that there is any fundamental similarity between how this series is handling the matter and how a Goblin Slayer or SAO did.
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jr240483



Joined: 24 Dec 2005
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 02, 2019 5:22 am Reply with quote
the problem is that in SAO and goblin slayer, it made the thing far worse and i mean in by BAD OL DAYS OF THE 90'S LIKE BAD ALA NINJA SCROLL, BERSERK & MAD BULL 34!!!!

what hapoened in danmachi was extremely tame compared to what happened in SAO & goblin slayer did which is why the outcry is far less for season 2!
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steelmirror



Joined: 22 Oct 2015
Posts: 342
PostPosted: Mon Sep 02, 2019 10:03 am Reply with quote
I might be in a bit of the middle ground for these past few episodes. The sheer amount of sexual violence being portrayed, implied, or threatened has definitely made me uncomfortable, including what I believe was an implied rape scene with Hermes and Ishtar that was played for laughs, which is just...well let's move on.

On the other hand, I do not believe that media should steer clear of handling sex and sexual violence as a topic ever, so I'm willing to see what Danmachi is trying to say with about these themes, and it's got a couple more episodes to make its point.

On the other hand,
Yttrbio wrote:
A little bit of the narrative needs being obtrusive in the story was when Aisha was giving Bell a lecture on how he wasn't committed enough, etc. while Mikoto is standing right there, and had a much more compelling and personal need to save Haruhime. At least she got one scream of frustration while running away, but making this Bell's story takes a bit of narrative gymnastics.
Yeah I completely agree with this. Bell being the center of this arc is expected, given what show we are watching, but a little more respect for the other characters who are theoretically much more deeply involved than he is would be nice. On the other hand, the flashbacks that played while Aisha told her story did more to change her from "absolute monster" to "tragic victim...and also a tragic monster" in my view, which was possibly the best scene yet in this entire arc, to me.

I have some thoughts on this arc and how fandom responds to sexual violence inflicted on men, and how toxic masculinity leads to the idea that men who are the victims of sexual violence aren't really victims or are even a punchline, but as I said this arc has a few episodes to go (and I'm not sure whether such a discussion could possibly be productive on these boards). We'll see what happens.
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Tanteikingdomkey



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PostPosted: Mon Sep 02, 2019 10:03 am Reply with quote
I would be a lot more accepting of the fact that rape is in this arc so closely if the series was able to say ANYTHING of note with its inclusion, and if the series didn't have tone issues when it does come up .

I understand bring up the character in mythology require that sex being an important part of her, which makes the Haruhime twist to be really REALLY HORRIBLE! spoiler[Can someone explain to me how making her a virgin does not completely de-fang this whole entire arc from saying anything about rape or sex]

I realize I am hyper sensitive to non com but I am fine with it in beserk because it actually takes the time to go into what happens because of rape. SAO 3 actually had a point to it's rape scene it was super weak but there was one. Goblin slayer ships it's raped characters off to never be seen again but at the very least a lot of the major cast are dealing with some type of PTSD and it shows how they deal with it.
SO what is dan machi 2 doing with it's rape scenes because right now I am agreeing with the episode reviews in that it's just there to scare the audience and characters.
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Key
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 02, 2019 10:24 am Reply with quote
Tanteikingdomkey wrote:
I understand bring up the character in mythology require that sex being an important part of her, which makes the Haruhime twist to be really REALLY HORRIBLE! spoiler[Can someone explain to me how making her a virgin does not completely de-fang this whole entire arc from saying anything about rape or sex]

I don't think anyone familiar with the books has ever said that it isn't a problem point. That being said, this is an issue that hasn't come up yet in the animation, so let's hold off on bringing that up again until we can talk about it without spoiler tags.
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Tanteikingdomkey



Joined: 03 Sep 2008
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 02, 2019 12:46 pm Reply with quote
Key wrote:
Tanteikingdomkey wrote:
I understand bring up the character in mythology require that sex being an important part of her, which makes the Haruhime twist to be really REALLY HORRIBLE! spoiler[Can someone explain to me how making her a virgin does not completely de-fang this whole entire arc from saying anything about rape or sex]

I don't think anyone familiar with the books has ever said that it isn't a problem point. That being said, this is an issue that hasn't come up yet in the animation, so let's hold off on bringing that up again until we can talk about it without spoiler tags.

I understand what you are saying but it's impossible to not talk about that if you are trying to say that this arc ACTUALLY SAYS something about sex and rape other then a puritan view that it is bad. Again I would like to be wrong and have this series go back to being a highly well executed fantasy series if not a bit generic but I can't see way to say that about this arc.
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Princess_Irene
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 02, 2019 2:26 pm Reply with quote
aaa1e2r3 wrote:


I imagine this is in part the problem. They went with Ishtar as the main villain. As they did with Apollo, in taking aspects of Apollo and his mythology, the author would have to have drawn from who Ishtar is in her mythology. Considering she's a goddess of love, sex and fertility, they would have to make that apart of what her familia is and her aims and goals are, in the same way the mythos of other deities has been used to inform their characterizations in the series.


It also depends on which sources Fujino Omori was using, and things can change quickly as scholarship of ancient languages and cultures changes - for example, between when I wrote my review of the novel that corresponds to this anime arc and the arc itself, the theory of sacred prostitution as pertains to Ishtar was debunked/dropped. But the fact remains that she is a very sexual goddess and that it is important to her mythology. One interesting text I read, Inanna, Queen of Heaven and Earth by Diane Wolkstein, had a lot of Sumerian myths that kept making reference to her "beautiful vulva," even when sex or even femininity weren't part of the myth's plotline. (Ishtar is called Inanna in Sumerian mythology.)

How the show is handling things is absolutely up for debate, but it's well within its rights as far as Ishtar and sex goes.
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Key
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 02, 2019 4:35 pm Reply with quote
Tanteikingdomkey wrote:
I understand what you are saying but it's impossible to not talk about that if you are trying to say that this arc ACTUALLY SAYS something about sex and rape other then a puritan view that it is bad. Again I would like to be wrong and have this series go back to being a highly well executed fantasy series if not a bit generic but I can't see way to say that about this arc.

First off, I'm not saying that the arc is saying anything about sex beyond "rape is bad regardless of whether the victim is male or female." And second, yes, it absolutely is possible not to talk about that scene even when talking about what this arc does or doesn't say about sex. This is a response thread to Rebecca's episode reviews, and she has been scrupulously writing them as if watching for the first time, so discussions should be about what the anime is or isn't saying so far.

Besides, keep in mind that this adaptation has already shown a propensity to skip significant details, and I can point to other cases this season of significant changes being made in adaptations. Hence there's not a 100% guarantee that the scene in question will even be in the anime. (That being said, Haruhime's behavior in her initial encounter with Bell makes it seem likely to be there.)
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kotomikun



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PostPosted: Wed Sep 04, 2019 5:23 pm Reply with quote
steelmirror wrote:
On the other hand, I do not believe that media should steer clear of handling sex and sexual violence as a topic ever, so I'm willing to see what Danmachi is trying to say with about these themes, and it's got a couple more episodes to make its point.


While I agree with that in general, my faith in harem-adjacent fantasy anime (especially one with, uh, that title) to cover this topic gracefully is not very high. Maybe the fact that I haven't quite reached the point of dropping it yet counts for something, but...

Phryne the unattractive-predatory-woman stereotype is probably the biggest sticking point. Also the way everyone in Ishtar Familia wears an average of one square foot of fabric per person, except for Haruhime, because she's the good one. And the offscreen rape gag you mentioned. And the whole thing with Aisha demoralizing Bell for not being a Real Man who saves the good girl from all the bad ones... okay so it's a lot of things.

Not everything it has to say is uncomfortable--the first encounter with Haruhime made a good point about sex workers being unfairly treated as worthless and impure, and Aisha's backstory gets into (in sort of a fantastical way) how people can be forced into that lifestyle. (In addition to Haruhime's situation being essentially trafficking. Though whether we're supposed to question the morality of this in general, or only for her specifically, isn't clear; the heroes want to buy her from her captors instead of breaking the rules.) But all that other stuff makes this a mixed message. It's not Goblin Slayer levels of schlock, but also not really the level of subversiveness I've come to expect from this show.
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Key
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 04, 2019 7:07 pm Reply with quote
kotomikun wrote:
Also the way everyone in Ishtar Familia wears an average of one square foot of fabric per person, except for Haruhime, because she's the good one.

Except for Haruhime, all of the prominent members of Ishtar Familia are Amazons, and Amazons have been well-established since the inception of the series as being minimalists when it comes to clothing. None of them are wearing anything that much different from what Tiona and Tione wear, and the same has been consistently true of other Amazon characters who have appeared in crowd scenes. Contrarily, non-Amazon female characters mostly dress much more conservatively. Hence I'd be cautious about trying to read any additional meaning into the comparative ways that the characters are dressed.

(Now, if you want to complain about Amazons' skimpy clothing being a cheesy cultural trait, I won't dispute that point.)
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Tanteikingdomkey



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PostPosted: Thu Sep 05, 2019 3:54 pm Reply with quote
Key wrote:
kotomikun wrote:
Also the way everyone in Ishtar Familia wears an average of one square foot of fabric per person, except for Haruhime, because she's the good one.

Except for Haruhime, all of the prominent members of Ishtar Familia are Amazons, and Amazons have been well-established since the inception of the series as being minimalists when it comes to clothing. None of them are wearing anything that much different from what Tiona and Tione wear, and the same has been consistently true of other Amazon characters who have appeared in crowd scenes. Contrarily, non-Amazon female characters mostly dress much more conservatively. Hence I'd be cautious about trying to read any additional meaning into the comparative ways that the characters are dressed.

(Now, if you want to complain about Amazons' skimpy clothing being a cheesy cultural trait, I won't dispute that point.)

I think it is more just the author (once again) going down the rabbit hole of this is how we think things were about this and shoving it in his story without thinking through the consequences to his story or thinking about saying anything this arc that a five year old wouldn't be able to say or agree with.

I am not saying that it's NORMALLY a bad thing even. Dan machi has always been DND greek mythological fantasy edition with some decent stuff set around it to give the material some mater of taste and substance. But you really can't bring up certain topics and just go "You shouldn't do that you meanie"

I am sorry but Steven Universe with a rating of Y-7 is able to have a far more nuanced discussion about rape and consent issues then this show does. I am not saying that this show needs to have that level of discussion, in fact I would argue it breaks the tone of the show, but it could have tried to do something and make moments like and bel and haruhime crying much more important and actually related to sex and rape.
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