Shonen Showdown Episode 8: Everything Old is New Again
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Peek outdated keynote overrated Shonen activated. Welcome to Shonen Showdown where we are dedicated to making your Shonen braid rot worse and worse again and again and again because everything goes in a cycle. Isn't that right Lady Emery?

That's right. And hello. Hello, lovely listeners. Thank you for returning, as I said, again and again. And just for maybe rebooting this. No, it's not a reboot. Remixing it. No.

But that is the subject of today, if I'm not mistaken. That's right. Everything that is old is new again, because we are re-re-re-redoing so many things. And we're going to talk about some redos of Shonen, because there are so many of these, especially in recent memory. This has been a much bigger trend in the past few years that I've noticed. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. You listed out a lot of shows and you're right. I feel like, I don't know if it was COVID that really seemed to drive us to want to revisit and dip into that nostalgia pool. I would argue likely has some, you know, some reasoning behind that. But we have gotten so many reboots within the last four years. There are a ton. I'm going to

for a second for all of us going to list out just a few of just the shonen ones that we have because I have a list and the crazy thing about this list is not how long the list is but how long the time span is between the seasons so for the reboots

There's a ton of them. Like I said, there's Yurisei Yatsura, which is a 35-year gap. There's Ranma 1.5, which is an 18-year gap. Shaman King was 20 years. Rurouni Kenshin was 24 years. Trigun Stampede, which I would argue is a sort of soft reboot slash prequel slash whatever you want to call it, but that was 25 years.

I mean, the One Piece is going to be coming out, which even though it is kind of a TBD as far as when it's coming, it's going to be a 20-something year gap from the start. And then even moving beyond that, you have sequels, right? You have Boruto, which just continued when Naruto left off. You have Dragon Ball Daima, which was about seven years after Super. You have even stuff like Yashahime, which is the sequel that nobody watched to Inuyasha, which was like 10 years. And then probably even more confusing...

is the continuations. Oh my gosh. Yeah. We have bleach continuing 10 years later. Didn't think it was going to get a continuation. Uh, you have fairy tale, which I thought that was over. So the fact that I continue just blows my mind. I'm glad you put blue exorcist, especially because we have now touched on that show quite a number of times. And, uh,

Black Butler, what are you doing back here in the mix? And why are you getting a continuation? And we'll go into like what we'd like to see continued. I think what's really funny is the one I, of course, I wanted to see continued. Got a continuation. Bleach, we're finally getting the ending. We're finally going to round this out. And I think that's a great spot to jump into the thing I want to talk about.

Which is with all of these returns, right? All these things coming back and how excited, for example, you are and you were about bleach. Do you think that this is a good thing? It's a big thing that keeps happening. Is it a good thing?

personally believe it is a good thing and I know it's not always a good thing but I really want folks to digest news of a reboot or digest the news of continuations sequels I'm a little bit more iffy on I feel like sequels are harder to really capture a good storyline it does end up feeling like cash grab but going back to reboots continuations I want to explore that idea I um

I'm going to go into it a little bit, but for example, I'm going to just pull from a non-anime, The Wizard of Oz. It is something that was a book, it was a movie, and then it was a movie again. Then there were some quirky TV shows, and now you also have Wicked, which was a musical, and then a movie, and also a book. And you have all of these reiterations and dipping your toe into this, and none of it is bad. It's just different. And...

So I don't think that we should be so harsh on reboots. And when I think of really good reboots, I think of Full Metal Alchemist. I think of Hellsing. It's not Shonen, but Fruits Baskets is another one that had a really great reboot. Just be curious instead of angry about a reboot. I think that in and of itself, it's neutral.

Is where I would take it. It's just a thing, right? There is some good, there's some bad inherently to it. The good is that you have a little bit of an idea going in if it's going to be something that's worthwhile. And that's something from both the creator standpoint and something from the fan standpoint. You kind of have an idea of what to expect from a show that's coming from something else.

Ideally, it's going to be better than what it was before. Otherwise, what was the point of making it then if not becomes the cash grab? But there is something to be said about having a known quantity before you invest your time in and then before studios, actors, writers, directors invest their time and their effort in. So there is something to be said on the inherent positive. The inherent negative is

is that it does eat away resources from newer ideas, fresher ideas. So when you have something that is like, say, a Urosi Yatsura or a Ranma, where you're doing something a little newer with it, a little different with it, or it's such a large gap that

There really is no one kind of still that invested in the original where it's an affront to them. It's a little more worthwhile. And that's sort of the inherent good and bad of the reboot. But do you think that when you lose out on those fans, like some of these, to your point, Ranma, when I think of Ronan Kenshin, I mean, even Trigun,

Do you think that they're losing out on that audience, or is it that enough time has passed that you can get the audience to revisit the work? I think it depends. If you look at Rurouni Kenshin, a pretty much shot-for-shot remake that does not do anything overly different with style, animation, storytelling, pacing...

That's just trying to throw out the property to throw it out. You're not going to really keep too many of the old fans because they're just going to watch the original. You're not going to gain too many new people because, well, they didn't watch it the first time around. Maybe you're going to grab a few, but that's one that's not really worthwhile. Even Shaman King was kind of like that. But then you look at something like Trigon, where you've changed the story. You've changed the art style completely. You've changed the animation style. We could argue whether or not it was good,

But it's at least a worthwhile endeavor. Okay. Knowing that we are obviously big fans of One Piece, I'm looking forward to the reboot. I think it has a good studio behind it. I like that it's cutting down on a lot of the episode length because I think that's a big complaint that people have when they see specifically One Piece. And while both you and I recognize that later on,

in the One Piece anime that's currently running, you oftentimes get to revisit old scenes that have gotten the zhuzh, the reanimation. I think this is just a nice starting from scratch, gonna do it all over. Is it a good thing though for you being kind of the One Piece guru, I would say? I've said this before. I will say it again now and I will say it again every time someone asks me this question.

There is no such thing as too much one piece. Give it, give it to me. Give me more. Give me more. I do not care. So they could mess this up and you'll be like, you know what? All right. But thank you. It's right. If it's not as good, I'll admit it, but I will definitely write it down. Cause I like it. Um,

And I know my biases, but as far as a more critically thinking, with the few brain cells I still have left, I do think it's a good thing because there are pacing issues with the original anime that even now they've kind of done a soft reboot of the Fishman Island arc that they're playing during this break from the One Piece era.

current running season. So they've already been doing it to themselves currently before they've even done the full reboot and people are really liking it. So it's, it definitely is going to be something that's worthwhile if it's done with the right intentions with, you know, not just to be a cash grab, but to fix things. I think that's a good way to look at it. But speaking of cash grabs, one that I do want to touch on a little bit is Boruto. I know Boruto

That this one is very, very flawed. And you can correct me on my history, but my understanding was with Boruto, one of the main issues is the author was done and ready to be ready to kind of wrap everything up.

And I thought that Boruto was started by not him, but either a different author or a different mangaka, and then later picked back up by the original mangaka. Yeah. It was originally started by one of his assistants. And then he was still involved, but he wasn't... It's kind of like Toriyama and... I'm blanking on his name, who's doing Super. It was like that kind of situation, except...

came back and is actually now much more involved than Toriyama became with Super. And it does kind of show I'm not super into Bars, so I really didn't get into it, but I do know that the people who did stick with it are enjoying it more in its current run after Kishimoto is even more involved, which makes sense. Again, it's the original creator putting their

you know, spin on things and it's a passion project and it kind of fits with what I'm saying, which is that the more that you are doing it for a good reason, the more likely it's going to be something that's worthwhile. And it kind of goes back to the whole thought of, is it good or is it bad? Well, it really just depends. That's a good point. And I think that's maybe...

It's what I was hitting on before. I've really enjoyed a lot of the reboots we've seen, even Dragon Stampede, which wasn't my favorite, but I'm so dedicated to the original, but at least it tried something new. And I'm looking over these sequels and there's nothing that sparks joy. I've said it on the main podcast, but Dragon Ball Diamond, it just isn't my speed. It feels like it's going...

Back to silliness, which would be fine, except for I already got introduced to serious things during Dragon Ball Z and Dragon Ball Super still had some silliness to it. But there was still some reasoning that, you know, end of the world stuff. We're diving back into the demon world and people are reverse aging. And it's just it's too, too silly for me.

Yeah, and I know you wanted to talk about why this is happening, not just how and what, but why are we going back to all of these things? And I think some of it is, like we've mentioned, it's a little bit of the lazy cash grab. Dragon Ball is always going to make money. A Naruto spinoff is always going to make money. Though surprisingly, you have some stuff here like MF Ghost, right, which...

I know it's more popular in Japan, but I don't think it's been a big moneymaker that recently, especially not out here in the West. You have the sequel to The Seven Deadly Sins, which is not exactly the biggest property. So I get a little head-scratchy sometimes when I see these.

That's very true. And yeah, we can dive into the why is this happening? I obviously I touched on is it what, you know, was part of it due to COVID because we are all in our houses. It's a good time to reintroduce. People were not happy with where the world was at. Maybe just hitting them that dopamine nostalgia push. And yeah,

I think that's part of it. I think that the key thing when it comes to remakes and reboots is these are stories that we as fans are very familiar with. And I think that's one of the biggest reasons that you don't have to go around introducing people to the world, the characters. You already have a fan base there and then you're ramping them up and you might be able to grab new people along the way while you're going.

I would agree, though that does make the continuations even more of a head-scratcher because there is no picking up along the way. You're hoping to try to grab enough people that didn't drop it and trying to capture in on this excitement from God knows how long ago. And it is funny, though, that they still do well. Yeah.

Bleach, very popular, even despite being in Hulu, Disney Jail, Fairytale, still popular, even though while I'm enjoying it, arguably not a great show. It's fun. It's a lot of fun, but it's not the same caliber as Bleach or Ranma. Even something like Blue Exorcist has terrible reviews on like AnyList and MyAnimeList, but a ton of people are still watching it. Yeah, it's just, that's a very good point.

because we both raggedy and I have actually gotten multiple people going back to bleach who have said, do I have to watch the whole thing? Do I really want to get into bleach to get into thousand year blood war? And we'll say, yeah, it's, it's probably worth it. But you know, maybe go watch a compilation on YouTube, like look for somebody to, to break it down. But the,

creators aren't looking for that. They want you to go back and revisit everything and get on the train, basically. So very good point that people are returning to these. And it's bizarre because I don't know how many... It would be fascinating to see the statistics of how many new people are coming in and now watching the continuation. Yeah, which is just data you're never going to have. I think that...

It shows how ingrained these franchises are. Because if I had to guess, most of this is people who just grew up watching these shows, knew about them, loved them a lot when they were in middle school or high school or college even. And then they see it appear on their streaming service one day and they go, oh, I remember this show. I remember really liking this show. And it's almost a way to pull people because...

Mitsuki has talked about this before, his theory that the average lifespan of an anime fan is five years. This pulls those people back into being anime fans a lot of the time. Someone who hasn't watched something in five, ten years suddenly sees Bleach and goes, oh man, I really remember loving Bleach.

anime, and it can pull them back in, which I think is the biggest strength of a continuation more so than the sequel or the reboot, because there is more of an investment.

Talking about Mitski, we all know if you are a, you know, well-known listener of the pod, he is not the biggest fan of CGI. And I feel that a lot of these reboots are like to explore CGI a lot more than hand drying, working with cells, anything like that. Do we think, and I'm looking at you, Tragen Stampede, do we think that is good, bad, hard to tell?

It's kind of the same thing with the intent, right? If you're doing a Trigun Stampede where you're doing...

CG to tell a story in a almost different, like a, it's not a fully different medium, obviously it's still anime, but like a pseudo different medium and do something different with it. That's a good thing. If you're doing it to cut corners and you're like, Hey, I'm going to make this on the cheap. And I know I have a dedicated fan base who's already here. That's a terrible thing. And some of these are more guilty of that than others. I think that's a very, very good point. Yeah.

So I would say going into any of these shows, you know, I think the right mentality to have with any of these is a healthy skepticism, right? So go in with having your, be optimistic, you know, enjoy that nostalgia hit, but also be wary for the shortcuts. Of the ones we have here, which ones do you think, besides the two we spoke the most about, you know, Bleach and The One Piece are the ones?

I'm pre-recommending the One Piece. Yeah. And obviously Bleach. Are there any others on this list that you say are definitely worth checking out? I'm going to tell, and this feeds perfectly into what I was going to comment. I think Rumiko Takahashi is having herself a renaissance right now. She is in reboot heaven. And so with that said,

Ranma. It's so enjoyable. It's cute. It's fun. There are some little...

Okay, they could be considered bigger nits, for example. The names, you pointed that out because you actually went back and watched the entirety of the old show in time for the new season. Well, it's not new season, in time for the reboot. So I'm very well aware that they aren't pronouncing names correctly. But that aside, the voice acting is great. The dub and sub are both enjoyable. I've been watching it personally in the dub.

It's just so delightful. What are your thoughts on that? And do you also have any other suggestions? Yeah, Rama is the easiest to recommend just from a sheer quality standpoint. I'm also, of course, watching the dub because I just be that way. And yeah, there's some nitpicks, the little tiny things, a few small, small things that I do miss, two of which I'm going to complain about. One is,

In the original Ranma, and not the nipples. The two things I'm complaining about are not the lack of nipples. I'll complain about the nipples, man. That's fine. One of the complaints is that Ranma always would call Akane uncute, and he never says it in the reboot. And I don't know why, but it bugs the crap out of me. He calls her unsexy, and it just doesn't

I don't know. It lacks that like... It doesn't have the same flavor. It lacks that like young adolescent charm of trying to be like a mean bully, but also still being too immature to come up with like a good insult. Yes. And I miss that. And the other thing is my wife's favorite joke from the original Rama completely written out and gone. It's...

If you've seen the show, when we're first introduced to Kodachi, the Black Rose, and she tries to attack Akane in her bedroom at night, she's overly dramatic. She throws her rose, like the rose petals are everywhere around like the back screen for like the effects or whatever she appears. And it's like this thing that in the show is an effect in the show. And you don't think about it because it's like, oh, it's an anime. It's just the background they're using. But

It cuts to after she leaves and Akane has to vacuum up all the rose petals because it wasn't an effect. It was just a thing she does. And it's just so fucking funny. Completely written out of the show. Those are my two minor gripes. You actually sent me that scene to show how funny it was. And it is. It's really, really funny. And very sad that that didn't make it in. I know that you've also mentioned that...

It is an older show, just for everyone's reference. And I think we have a second core coming up for it. 12 episodes are currently out. But there are some problematic things that might happen later on. Oh, yes. I am. You've already flagged because, you know, I kind of like to get that warning of just FYI, FYI, Emery, there's...

something that you might not love coming up and we'll see if they cut it, but likely it's going to stay in. It's which I am so curious. And again, this is a chance for a reboot to improve on an original. I'm very curious what they're going to do with the little, we'll go with wrinkle. I'm going to use that word to leave out any, any spoilers, but you know, if you know, you know, but yeah,

Beyond the ones that we like and the ones we don't like, but moving in a more positive direction with the ones we like, what if we had the choice? If you and me could sit down and make these studios do whatever we wanted between a remake, a sequel, and a continuation, which ones would you like and which ones...

Which, now looking at your list, I feel like one of these is cheating. So we'll get to it when we get to it. We will. But yeah, so for each of those, we'll give our own thoughts. I'll let you go first for the remake. Yes.

remake hands down easy I want you Hakusho I want it to be redrawn I just want that zhuzh up I don't know if I need anything different other than maybe make the female characters do something interesting maybe we age them up so I'm not sitting there being like oh my gosh they're like 14 a botan's like a mortal right it's true I do love me some botan

But for those who don't know, I'm a big Dragon Ball Z abridged fan. And there's a running gag at one point for the cell games where he encounters these characters as like a side joke. And they have to take the bus because they're kids. And that's all I think of when I see them. So maybe that would be something new and different to do is maybe give them, age them up a little bit so they're not children fighting in the demon and Rhea. But yeah.

I didn't even think about that. That's amazing. I didn't even think about that. The only thing I would want them to change, because obviously updating a lot of stuff would be nice, but the other thing I would like to see them change is the ending. The last arc gets a little weird. Yep. The two before it, the Dark Tournament and the, actually the Chapter Black arcs are excellent.

The one after, not the greatest. The way we end it? Yeah. I wouldn't end it with, I'm gonna just, you know, we don't know what people have seen. We're trying to be good about spoilers. I'll just call it the tunnel. Just, I could just end at the dark tournament. I'd be so happy. Just let, let me end there. I don't need the tunnel.

I like that arc in and of itself. It's the arc that follows that I read. Really? Yeah, which we can get into at some point, but I do enjoy that arc. Yeah, one day we can get into it. But what is yours? What do you want remade? I mean, we've kind of said it already. Rumiko Takahashi, this is her renaissance, and you can't complete the renaissance without Inuyasha.

That's such a good pick. I was so jealous when you picked that. Yes, let me see Shishomaru all over again, please and thank you. With updated animation and better pacing. Without the sequel that I don't want to think about. That's why we're remaking it and ignoring the sequel. Perfect, perfect. For those who know, you know why I'm saying this.

So for speaking of sequels, my sequel of choice is going to be Soul Eater. And you might think, well, Raggedy, don't you want a remake of Soul Eater? And I say no, because the first 90, like 9% of this show is flawless. How dare you? The last five minutes, it's okay. It's okay.

You can very easily retcon that out in the beginning of a sequel. And even in and of itself, it's not terrible. It's just that's a terrible way to end the story. So you could do a sequel series spinning off of that. There's so much more you could get into. They did some weird prequel-y, sequel-y stuff that didn't really work because it was a weird...

timeline like soul eater nod and they completely changed the the feel of the story so i want like a true sequel like give me a soul eater ship would end three years later see where they're at kind of kind of thing

I love it, but I love the Soul Eater universe too. It's such a fun and unique universe. You could have just a lot of fun diving into that. Oh, there's so much fun. In fact, there's other shounen anime out there that are in that universe.

Which if you know, you know. And if you don't, which it looks like Lady Emery doesn't, makes me real happy. I don't. We need to have an Easter egg episode, I think, where we go over all of the little Easter eggs that Shonen sprinkled in there. Oh, it's not an Easter egg. It's not? No, it's just... Fascinating. There's a few of them. So it's in the same vein as Bleach and Burn the Witch, but even more so.

Okay. Okay. Yeah. We're going to need to dive into that at some point. But what is your sequel? My sequel is, let's get a season two of The Promised Neverland because we never had it. How could you not have a sequel to The Promised Neverland? It's crazy. Yeah. I mean, it ended at season one and I think we need a season two. And anyone who says differently must be in a fever dream of whatever season.

you know, thought process that, yeah. So for those who don't know,

Is there technically already a sequel to The Promised Neverland? Yes, but I want to say, scratch that. Jacob's Ladder it. It was all a dream. Do it over. Just do the actual sequel over. Give me a season two that is not horrendous. Give me? Just... Just give me Goldie Pond, please. If there is a god up above, I will get...

A Goldie Bond animated in my lifetime. Oh, I love it. Yeah. So that was my sequel. And I don't know if that's what you were referencing or if it was my continuation that you were not pleased about. Oh, no, no. Your continuation is full on cheating because that's not a shonen. But I'm going to let you talk about it anyway. It's not like it just finished airing.

That's because all of my continuation, my continuation was Bleach. And if it's not Bleach, I feel like we listed out some remakes. Like, I don't need a continuation of these. Take your cheat pick. My cheat pick is a cheap shot. I just want more Yakuza of the Ansei, which is not a shounen. If it is, it's like...

And 5% of the show involves punching, and the rest is just a delicious trash heap that I just want to get my grubby ragtime fingers on. Like, I love it so much. Season two has not been announced yet, but I'm hoping I can get more. Yeah, because of Fiance. But yeah, no, it was...

It was the only one I could come up with at the time. I think yours is a much, much better pick. And so I'll just say if I had to go with another show, I'm going with your show as well. So my show, which is an actual show. A real shonen. Is Black Clover. I feel like that's like the easiest choice for a shonen continuation. They just stopped making episodes. Yeah.

And I don't know why. It was so successful. You had a movie. Why did you stop? I think, I know that there was some breaks with the manga, which definitely put

you know a little bit of a break on things and i don't know if it's just because it's been so long that they just decided not to continue it i but it still doesn't make any sense to me because you have these shows that have like bleach and black butler that 10 years later we're like yeah we're just gonna pick up where we left off

I mean, it's what we talk about. Muppet, you're doing Ranma. That was 18 years ago. And you picked that up and you're like, yeah, I'll just keep doing this. You're picking up a different show entirely. Just, yeah, no. It frustrates me that that one hasn't been continued. It's easily the winner, like the crowning jewel of please continue this. Seriously. And with no news, no information, like there is –

It just, we're waiting. We're absolutely waiting. And I do feel like oftentimes rumors for other shonen do turn into something. We've gotten more continuation for Haikyuu or hopefully inching closer to the end of that series. But for some reason, I just feel like it's clocking right now for Black Clover and we are just, nothing is moving forward for some reason. It's got, I have to imagine it has to be. They're waiting for the manga to just finish.

or at least enough of it to finish where they feel that they can do a full season's worth of content because black clover similar to much more of the modern shonen similar to what bleach has done even similar to what fairy tale has done blue exorcist any of these shows that have come back they skip the filler or they keep it to maybe an episode or two so yeah that's the hope that's the dream

Yeah, but also more Yakuza Fiance. I mean, it's totally a shounen show. You know, I recommend Yakuza Fiance to all of you shounen heads out there. You cannot see me, viewers, but I have taken in the essence of the gum gum fruit just so I could put my hand so far into my face that it is coming out the back of my head.

It's great because I understand this reference now because I finally got there, people. I'm finally nearing the end of the Wano arc. Which means that we have some exciting stuff for next time. Isn't that right?

That is. So remember, everyone, the glory of Shonen can be yours for the taking if you just believe it. So set sail and join us next episode where we are going to finally rank the One Piece arcs. It's here. It's happening. Find out more next time on Shonen Showdown. ♪