Forum - View topicShelf Life - The Ghoul, the Bad, and the Ugly
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maximilianjenus
Posts: 2862 |
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I found onegai twins to be better than teacher, probably because I was nto as burden by the same jokes as I watched twins first.
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bobob101
 Posts: 201 |
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I think the reason why Tokyo Ghoul is such an amazing show/manga is, and I only realized this on a second viewing of the show, is that it takes all the tropes that make a standard Shonen Action show and turns that into a tragedy. Shows like One Piece or Naruto have sad parts sure, but they are triumphant stories of heroes embracing their powers to overcome adversities. Kaneki embraces his Ghoul powers by inflicting the same torture he suffered through, and ultimately eating his opponent. Like an good shonen story the hero will meet new people, and like say Ichigo from Bleach, he will want to protect their friends. No one asked for Kaneki's protection, and his desire to defend his friends isolates him from others (by him in the anime joining Aogiri) and ultimately leaves him broken. Tokyo Ghoul follows all the story beats that a typical shonen story does, but with the right amount of sympathy for both sides (a sadistic murder still has a family and people who cry for him when he is dead) Tokyo Ghoul becomes an amazing experience were triumph is tainted with sadness, and it is the small precious moments between characters that become true happiness for the characters.
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meiam
Posts: 3442 |
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I've read the first two volume of Tokyo ghoul and watched the first episode of it (awesome OP, both the song and the visual) but ultimately dropped it because it felt like nothing more than tragedy porn. Where everything goes terribly for no other reason than it needing to go terribly. Like was said in the review, none of the character are sympathetic, the ghoul are essentially mass murder so you can't really root for them but then the show goes out of its way to make the people hutting them unsympathetic too, needlessly so. There's plenty of good and easy solution (corral the ghoul together in an isolated city, provide them with constant supply of human coming from naturally deceased person and study them to reverse engineer all there super power) but nobody even think about it because it's not tragic.
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Agent355
 Posts: 5113 Location: Crackberry in hand, thumbs at the ready... |
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I think I would have liked Tokyo Ghoul more if it had been about vampires. The rules for ghould (heh) are too extreme--they cannot survive unless they literally eat a whole human body about once a month, not just a part of it (like blood). There is a reason why predators and prey are not of the same species in nature. I also feel that it thematically takes a lot of choice away from the characters. They can't choose to live human body free, even if they want to (for comparison, Parasyte, another gruesome cannibalistic series, gives its much less human parasytes thespoiler[ choice to stay alive by just eating human food]) . That might be the point of the story, but it really disturbs me. There can be no compromise, no happy ending.
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Tenebrae
Posts: 486 |
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Everything said about please twins is pretty much spot on, and I still enjoyed it more than its spiritual precedessor.
Trending: DNA tests. |
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ThatGuyWhoLikesThings
Posts: 1008 |
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Exactly. Turning who is arguably one of the most sympathetic characters in the manga at this point (really, Shuu is having some Kaneki-tier luck right now) into a complete joke is just insulting, especially when the manga has completely avoided this. All of the ghouls (and most of the humans) are victims of loss, abuse, tragedy, etc, and it also shows that redemption is possible for some of the more unruly and twisted characters, like Shuu and some of the members of Anteiku, but it's not guaranteed (as is the case with Mado). The anime willing to do this with some characters, but not one of the most important cases of this is pretty upsetting. But overall, I can still say I really enjoyed the 1st season of the anime, as it was very entertaining. Really, most of the problems I have with the anime, including the above, lie with the 2nd season, and believe me when I say "not following the manga" isn't even among those problems.
Actually, they don't need an entire body. They can just eat a limb to survive for a day or two, but they end up eating the whole body anyway for two reasons. One, if they don't finish off their victims, the CCG will be on their asses almost instantly. And two, the victims will usually die of blood loss anyway no matter how much flesh is consumed. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 11340 |
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Unless you're a ghoul. 
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meiam
Posts: 3442 |
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Not at all, there food would be provided and they could live a normal existence without having to hide that there ghoul. They would be surrounded by other ghoul that could understand them. In exchange for the research being done they could receive a salary and has the research progress they could even be cured or allowed to eat normal food. |
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ThatGuyWhoLikesThings
Posts: 1008 |
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What research? The CCG already know everything there is about ghouls, biologically speaking. What cure? Ghouls aren't a disease, they're a living species. The CCG doesn't give a crap about ghouls. Most of them don't go out of their way to be cruel to ghouls, but ghouls are still viewed as a threat. Thus, they are eliminated. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 11340 |
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What good would a salary do them if they can't leave the city? You're talking like they should be delighted to live in a zoo or a prison. Do you not hear how creepy you sound to be talking about rounding up people (of another species), locking them up in a restricted area and experimenting on them? oO There's tragedy in that both sides' interests are diametrically opposed, as in any sort of war, but concentration/relocation camps are hardly a non-tragic solution for the ghoul side.
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meiam
Posts: 3442 |
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I never said concentration camp or prison, I said city. Like a normal city, just with a ghoul population. The city could still import stuff and the ghoul could buy it, they could just spend there salary on mail/internet order and they could run there own commerce. But any of them could decide not to work and instead let the government or whoever would run the facility to experiment on them (like many people decide to participate in clinical trial and the like). They could even be allowed to leave with some restriction (a simple GPS tag would do).
The research could simply find a way to stop the gag reflex and bad taste that ghoul suffer when eating normal food. From the human side we could learn more, they apparently can live on very small amount of food and have amazing strength. Once more is understood they could find way to disable the ghoul super strength and need for human consumption and they'd be allowed to return to normal city if they wish for it. Nothing tragic about that and both side gains from it, ghoul don't get hunted down and get free food provided and human don't have to live with being that can exclusively eat them. |
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Knoepfchen
 Posts: 698 |
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I was very glad that all that romanticizing vampires have to endure did not find its way into Tokyo Ghoul. I actually though the ghouls and the series benefited greatly from this unapologetic treatment. |
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Ali07
 Posts: 3333 Location: Victoria, Australia |
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 Sorry, I couldn't help but laugh when I read this line in a review.
While the review for Please Twins doesn't seem to do the show any favours, stuff like:
actually have me wanting to check the show out. And, I think I will do so. I do find it kind of disheartening that the reviewer, again, has gone with the "I've seen this kind of thing before" line. Will this become a thing now? As this kind of thought should be coming up frequently. Both reviews have it (though only the positive one mentions a show as an example).
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Redbeard 101
Oscar the Grouch
Forums Superstar  Posts: 16935 |
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Considering I just re-watched all of Black Lagoon, and am going back through the manga, perhaps it is time to upgrade the dvd collection to BR. Might wait and gamble for Right Stuf to put it on holiday sale next month.
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Raikuro
Posts: 347 |
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You have Buddy Complex listed as Hyb when all the places selling it have it listed as sub only. One of Funi's rare sub-only releases.
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