Male or Female?

[Secret]

I know that profiles are made so that you can show what gender you are...but almost no one fills it in. So, there are at least two people here that I originally (months ago) thought were female but are in fact male...and now I'm wondering how much of the FH Skip Beat fanbase is male.

Polls don't show who says what, so for those who don't fill in their profiles because they want it to be a secret this shouldn't matter...so I'm wondering...what's the ratio?

[scorpio moon]

right now it's 100% girl power! ^^

[Secret]

Lol, sure...it's just you and me. :)

[Mollica]

And me....

[Znail]

I think that there are probobly more guys reading this one then normal for Shojo mangas as even if the setting is pretty girl oriented (showbiz) so is it well written so anyone can read it. Its prety highly rated on manga sites too so is bound to get a look at by anyone searching for something to read.

Anyway, the concept of a forum with mostly females is somewhat alien to general internet rules :) Ah, well, I am sure I have anoyed someone already and didnt realy mean to bring up gender stuff as I am sure its a tired old subject. I was mostly amazed that there was some who liked Sho! :confused:

[Secret]

I didn't detect any annoyance in the other thread about the gender thing. :) Don't worry about it!

[dancu]

everyone love the skip beat
no matter what gender

[Znail]

This is probobly a better thread to talk about gender stuff thou :)

I wonder if I am a bad person? I did some thinking and realised that this is the only shojo manga that I can think of that I am currently reading. I guess its hard to say no to the pretty girls in other mangas :catman:

[Secret]

I like very few shonen mangas, so it seem fair. (I've followed Bleach and Naruto and those are pretty much the only ones. I think.)

Though honestly, I like pretty girls in my manga, too. It's just that the guys are usually prettier in shoujo, and that's more important. :)

But the MOST important thing is the character interaction and development. I think relationships (romantic and otherwise) and character development are much bigger draws for women than all the fight scenes in shonen stuff. (Or sports stuff, etc. Compared to shoujo, shonen manga seems to have very little character development...the characters seem to be in about the same place at the end as at the beginning, internally...at least most of the time.)

Skip Beat is interesting on so many levels, though. But any shoujo manga that has a good portion of male fans has to be great, because usually guys won't follow shoujo manga unless it's too interesting to resist.

[dancu]

nothing wrong with reading shojo
im reading special a as well
and vampire knight(man i need to catch up)
as well as what do they call it over here Shinshi Doumei Cross(need to catch up again)

[Znail]

Bleach and Naruto while entertaining very much exemplifies the problem of little or slow characte growth and alot of fight scenes. There are quite alot of other Shounen mangas around that isnt anyway like that at all. There are quite alot of romance stories even, there is alot more of those then sports or even martial arts mangas around I think. Its a bit diffrent from shojo thou, the main diffrence is that the main character is usualy a guy and there are often more girls then guys (there is an entire class of mangas called harem because there is one guy and several girls) and the look of the art is diffrent.

I could give some suggestions if you want to check some out :)

[deddinty]

Girl power all the way! Really though, I can't say I like shojo over shonen for any reason, as I'm a plot driven reader foremost, followed by art style and quality, then character development. I'm not as picky about characters because I'm actually a one-shot person, I get into very few long series. It's just that there aren't many forums for one-shots, and they are usually in the areas for the mangaka's big famous long series, which I rarely read.

[scorpio moon]

I like both shounen and shoujo manga, for example, my favorite manga is skip beat, my second favorite manga is HSD Kenichi, haha. ^^ I know guys who like shouko simply because the plots are better, so there's nothing too unusual for a shoujo manga to have a male fanbase.

[Znail]

Err, most mangas that turn out a good oneshot turn into series :)
The most common genre with one-shots would be somewhat innapropriate I think...
But I can think of one shounen series that almost fit the description and that is Hatsukoi Limited. That mangaka has written several good romance shounen series. Hatsukoi Limited was actualy someone complained about as it jumps between diffrent people between issues so is almost a collection of separate stories althou some of them connect eventualy. Its not that long either.

[edit]:kukukuh: I was actualy thinking about HSDK when Secret mentioned she liked Bleach and Naruto as its somewhat similar but a bit more comedy, interaction and a slight touch of romance. Its mostly a martial arts comedy thou.

[Secret]

I find it really unusual. I almost never meet guys who are more than passive readers of a shoujo manga. For example, I never never met a single male reader of Fruits Basket. Not one. Now, I KNOW they must exist...they just must. But I've met dozens of female fans and not one guy.

I do know a bunch of girls who prefer Shonen to Shoujo, though. I just can't get myself interested in the majority of Shonen stuff...and I've looked through a fair bit of it. I can't find any interest at all in One Piece, for example, or Eyeshield 21, or Gantz (I really hate that one, it revolts me.) Those are just the ones I thought of first. I like Naruto for the relationships and personal struggles, though the fight scenes do get a bit old.

[Znail]

Gantz is very much Seinen thou and not for the faint of heart. Its rather psycological and alot of people die, including important ones.

One Piece is the other end, I find it too childish, like saturday morning cartoon style.

Havent checked out Eyeshield21.

But there are plenty of interaction based shounen mangas. I would recomend the ones made by the same one who wrote Hatsukoi Limited; Pastell (ongoing), Paralell, Ichigo 100%. Hmm, I's is in the same type of those.

[EhudbenGera]

I find it really unusual. I almost never meet guys who are more than passive readers of a shoujo manga. For example, I never never met a single male reader of Fruits Basket. Not one. Now, I KNOW they must exist...they just must. But I've met dozens of female fans and not one guy.

I do know a bunch of girls who prefer Shonen to Shoujo, though. I just can't get myself interested in the majority of Shonen stuff...and I've looked through a fair bit of it. I can't find any interest at all in One Piece, for example, or Eyeshield 21, or Gantz (I really hate that one, it revolts me.) Those are just the ones I thought of first. I like Naruto for the relationships and personal struggles, though the fight scenes do get a bit old.

I'm a guy. I read Fruits Basket. However, I found that it kept going without answering any of the questions I really wanted to know (like what exactly the relationship of the characters was to the zodiac) and that it tended to hinge on "misunderstanding" plots. And then the ending wasn't entirely satisfactory. So I read it, but I'm not really a fan.

I'm actually not to big on most of the shonen manga myself. I agree with you about Gantz, which I found to be disgusting. Naruto is getting to be kind of tiresome, since it takes sooo loooong for anything to happen (it kind of reminds me of DBZ). I probably wouldn't have got into One Piece if I hadn't started by watching the anime, since the manga's artwork tends to be more confusing than not. However, the anime does a much better job, and once you get into the story, it's a lot easier to stay interested.

On the other hand, Bleach was the first anime/manga that I got into, and I still like it. I particularly find the interactions between characters interesting, though the amount of "misunderstanding plots" is occasionally enough to make me drop it for a while. HDS Kenichi is great, since it blends humor with real martial arts with careful character development (though I find that Kenichi has some serious self-confidence issues).

Lately I've been reading through all the comedy/romance mangas on One Manga. If the artwork is atrocious, I stop reading, but I've probably read more than 75% of them so far, which includes a fair amount of shojo and shonen.

And before anyone thinks it, no I am not gay, and with all due respect to those who are, I cannot even consider myself in such a role without feeling revolted.

[dancu]

I find it really unusual. I almost never meet guys who are more than passive readers of a shoujo manga. For example, I never never met a single male reader of Fruits Basket. Not one. Now, I KNOW they must exist...they just must. But I've met dozens of female fans and not one guy.

I do know a bunch of girls who prefer Shonen to Shoujo, though. I just can't get myself interested in the majority of Shonen stuff...and I've looked through a fair bit of it. I can't find any interest at all in One Piece, for example, or Eyeshield 21, or Gantz (I really hate that one, it revolts me.) Those are just the ones I thought of first. I like Naruto for the relationships and personal struggles, though the fight scenes do get a bit old.
one piece i dont like
Gantz(seinen actually) is actually good if you get pass teh gore, and the short chapters
Gantz is very much Seinen thou and not for the faint of heart. Its rather psycological and alot of people die, including important ones.

One Piece is the other end, I find it too childish, like saturday morning cartoon style.

Havent checked out Eyeshield21.

But there are plenty of interaction based shounen mangas. I would recomend the ones made by the same one who wrote Hatsukoi Limited; Pastell (ongoing), Paralell, Ichigo 100%. Hmm, I's is in the same type of those.
good choices
Umi no misaki and Ai aori aoshi is good too(if you can get past some brief nudity the story is very cute)

art is a big deal, but im reading Hen the art style is pretty bad yume de aetara's art is that good either and the story isnt that bad

but well not all shonen mangas try to be like one piece or naruto(even though many might try to copy that style) you are really shutting yourself out to potentially great manga that arent shoujo. I mean i could just say bleh shojo they aint for me but kept an open mind and can see great value in shojo mangas

i mean im also ready josei mangas like Usagi drop, and nodame cantabile

so i guess i ask for everyone to keep an open mind and dont just forsake a whole genre by the suckiness of the few

[Znail]

Yeah, there is alot of competition and there is plenty of high quality mangas so even if its ment to apeal to guys so doesnt that mean it will lack content. That said I must admit that I in general not that fond of the general shojo art style, althou Skip Beat is good. My biggest objection is the often exagerated slimness, I guess its aimed at girls who like to keep their weight or something, but it often looks like they squeezed the picture from the side when everyone is tall and ultra slim. I have to admit that shounen does suffer a bit from similar issues, althou them being aimed to please the male eye I guess I fall for it :)

As for the recomendations. Hen is pretty wierd but interesting as it shows some sides not normaly shown in manga (*) I think and got yuri in it, wich I feel the need to warn about as I prefeer to avoid yaoi myself :sorry:
Umi no Misaki is great, not that many chapters yet thou, 23 I think. Ai Yori Aoshi is finnished, but I dont think its being actively translated anymore so you have to look at the pictures for the end.

(*) It shows some parts of japanese night life thats fairly diffrent from atleast what I am used to. But if anyone realy wants to know about that so will The School of Water Buisness answer any and all questions you wanted or didnt want to know about that. Mature content thou, did I have to say that?

[hotandspice]

Hmm i am definitely a girl. My little cousin loves to read shoujo with comedy/slight amount of romance and school life manga coz of story line. He justs dislikes the shoujo manga with too much romance where there is like a love pentagon or the main character falls in love in the first chapter which is also believe is really dumb because it gets to boring. He has only read like 8 shonuen manga 6 which involve at least a little bit of romance/ ecchi.
I really don't mind reading the manga which may be inappropriate for under 13 if its got a nice story line. (I hate physiological and horror manga)

[Jamfl]

I love all types of manga. But most important is plot and character development. I probably read more romance type manga than anything.

Also, I am a guy. I just checked to make sure.

[hotandspice]

Hm i know alot of people in my class who read manga only for the ecchi which is really sad i believe because manga was a way *i believe* oh showing people how japanese people wanted to be as you have seen japanese people have small eyes, chubbier legs and some pimples of their face *PLEASES I AM ON MY KNEES DON NOT TAKE THIS AS AN INSULT TO JAPANESE PEOPLE I AM STEREOTYPING*
Manga have huge eyes, skinny and very fir body and no facial disorders

[Secret]

The Japanese population is among the slimmest in the world. (Not including countries where most of the population is STARVING, of course.)

As for the shoujo/shonen (oh and yeah, I knew Gantz was seinen...never yet met a seinen manga that didn't bother me) issue...I don't write off whole sections, which here implies that I didn't give it a fair shot. I've given shonen a VERY fair shot. However, when I read shonen manga, 90% of the time I just cannot force myself to be interested in it. (That Rosario + Vampire one, for example...I read it because it was so popular, thinking there had to be something to it...and found it very boring.)

It's like pizza versus pasta. If I am totally addicted to pasta and have rarely ever been able to find a pizza I like, when I go to a buffet that is amply stocked with both, I'm going to grab just pasta without even bothering to sample the pizzas...I've already got a big array of what I know I want, without filling myself first with a dozen bites of something I don't (along with maybe one or two surprise 'bites' that I did like after all.)

If I have a reason to suspect that I'll like a shonen manga that I have access to, or even if I'm just curious...I read it. If I like it, I like it. But because I so rarely do, I tend to just stick to looking through shoujo titles to save time.

I'm a person with very well-defined likes and dislikes. I go outside them frequently, due to the fact that my tastes cover less ground and I HAVE to go outside to find something good to drag back to the cave with me. But every time I do, I learn anew that my first judgement was already the right one for me. I'm this way with every form of entertainment. (Tried it, formed an opinion, stuck with it.)

This also happens to me with medical treatments and food, but that's another story. -_-

[EagleVision1999]

Well, in my case I don't prefer anything...Neither shojo or shonen.
It's just that there are very much mainstream series...and that has nothing to do with genders I think.
I'm a girl but I dislike typical romantic shojo, Skip Beat is the only one I'm reading currently but it's my absoltue favourite.
My second favourite manga is Claymore and I think it's shonen...
There are some series from which I don't know wether they're shonen or shojo...
I myself know only a few other forums in which many boys admit that they read shojo...
Maybe many boys just don't admit it? Often the boys there say that it's often seen as embarassing, especially when the covers are designed so that they look girlish ....

[Secret]

Yes, it's possible that there are a bunch of guys who like shoujo and just don't let it be known. Guys are in a more inflexible stereotype; there are a great many things that are 'unmanly' (I'd say not macho is more accurate, though) and NOT a great many things that are unwomanly. We can mostly get away with what we want. If a girl acts like a guy she's just considered 'spunky' or something along those lines. If a guy does anything like a girl, he's not viewed quite so kindly. (Which is frankly an insult to women. What's so terrible about having a feminine aspect?)

I happen to have a brother in law who looks GREAT in pink (it's his complexion, he's very Nordic) but he won't wear it because it's 'gay'.

So yeah. Maybe there are LOTS of guys reading shoujo. But they won't tell me! (And I wanna know! Guys think different stuff about things so it's more interesting if you get opinions from both.)

-_-

[Fluke32]

Yes, it's possible that there are a bunch of guys who like shoujo and just don't let it be known. Guys are in a more inflexible stereotype; there are a great many things that are 'unmanly' (I'd say not macho is more accurate, though) and NOT a great many things that are unwomanly. We can mostly get away with what we want. If a girl acts like a guy she's just considered 'spunky' or something along those lines. If a guy does anything like a girl, he's not viewed quite so kindly. (Which is frankly an insult to women. What's so terrible about having a feminine aspect?)


LOL~ Isn't that an out-dated 80's stereotype to think that guys don't think it's okay to not do macho stuff?

Well, anyway, I'm a guy, and I'm definitely sure I don't have the any qualms about things like wearing pink, purple, or yellow.:p

Anyway, to me, it's not a matter of gender whether or not a person would pick up a shoujo or not, I think it's just based on preferences. Take me for example, I like any manga that has a very good introduction, and main character. Eyeshield 21 and Naruto, Skip Beat! and Kare Kano, and Akumetsu and Liar game are my top faves as of the moment for Shounen, Shoujo, and Seinen respectively since they all met my criteria on what I would read.:groovy:

That said, it doesn't matter to me whether a manga is a shoujo, seinen, josei, shounen, shoujo-ai or shounen-ai. As long as you can give me a definite direction of where the story would go to, and a very well made character with growth potential and character depth, I'm gonna read your manga.

[Secret]

Well, my brother in law is only 25, so I don't think it's outdated, yet...and certainly not an 80s stereotype, as he wasn't even born until 1983 and did most of his forming in the 90s. :) It's what I've seen to be true with my own eyes, of people older than me down to people about 20. (I have no idea what the younger people do, I don't know any young people irl well enough to see what they care about.)

Yellow? Is yellow considered a girl colour? My bro-in-law won't wear pink or purple (which I think is wimpy...to care so much about what others will say about your gender depending on what you wear) but I've never heard him say anything about yellow.

I've read a lot of manga, and I just repeatedly find that all the ones I like are shoujo. I never used to bother checking what was what before, but after I started noticing a pattern, I began to save myself some time and just head straight for the shoujo section.

[Mollica]

I always thought yellow was a neutral colour. But yea guys can look great in pink, tho its certainly a colour my bro won't wear, and he's 25 too. I on the other hand don't like pink cause of the no of pink dresses my mum used to make me wear... too painful...

Certainly in western culture, guys tend and adopt an almost macho outlook, but in arab cultures guys do stuff like link hands whilst walking and hug. Actually because I am among them at times, i didn't notice till there was a program on tv bout an englishman who went to an arab country and learn to b more arab simply so that he could enter Mecca. In our culture guys rarely hug again; thats reserved for like happy occasions like religious celebrations.

Yea I would like to know more of wat guys think bout skip beat and shoujo too, because usually i only see the girls giving their opinions.

[hotandspice]

Wow my cousin always hugs his friends especially the ones that are like the class clowns they do it all the time. I tend to read what ever is in the top 200 on onemanga and yes i have realised how bad rosario plus vampire is, nothing interesting happens its just like those stupid school life ones with a boundless plot. Although i do like that kind of manga if you put supernatural into it its really bad. My manga rating
1.SB
2.hayate no gotoku
3mahou sensei negima
4.ouran high school host club
5. all comedy/school life manga with a plot

[EhudbenGera]

I always thought yellow was a neutral colour. But yea guys can look great in pink, tho its certainly a colour my bro won't wear, and he's 25 too. I on the other hand don't like pink cause of the no of pink dresses my mum used to make me wear... too painful...

I've got a shirt that says "Hard-Core Guys Wear Pink." It makes people shut up about it being a "girly" color (except for my sister, strangely enough. She refuses to associate with me when I wear the color).

Certainly in western culture, guys tend and adopt an almost macho outlook, but in arab cultures guys do stuff like link hands whilst walking and hug. Actually because I am among them at times, i didn't notice till there was a program on tv bout an englishman who went to an arab country and learn to b more arab simply so that he could enter Mecca. In our culture guys rarely hug again; thats reserved for like happy occasions like religious celebrations.

Yeah, it's kind of sad that "skinship" tends to mean "sexual preference" nowdays. Thanks to living as an expatriot for most of my life, I actually don't have that same outlook, which occasionally gets me in trouble. My argument is that I'm so secure in my masculinity that I can do "feminine" things without them being feminine, simply by nature of my being the one to do them. Culture does not define me, I define my culture (muahahaha). I sometimes get some weird looks for that one.

Yea I would like to know more of wat guys think bout skip beat and shoujo too, because usually i only see the girls giving their opinions.

Hey!

[dancu]

*sports his pink tie as he goes to his induction ceremony XD*
gonna be 25 in December 23

skip beat is great
kyoko is a fascinating character
good mixture of drama(but not heavily relying on drama) and comedy
it has some complexity but so much that one would get lost or brainy thingy start hurting

[andreasfr]

im pretty sure im a guy

[dancu]

liar everyone is a kawaii girl

[Znail]

Well, I dont think girls should feel insulted by guys wish to not seem feminine as I think it has only an indirect connection to females. Its not that guys doesnt want to seem girlish its that they dont want to be mistaken for being gay. The indirect connection with girls is obviously that being believed to be gay doesnt exactly improve your odds of catching the interest of a girl. Personaly I think crying or showing feelings in other ways is probobly more acceptable to most guys then hugging other guys due to this. Hugging a girl is perfectly fine afterall :)

As sidenote so have I seen plenty of guys in pink coveralls of the type used in Skip Beat :) The local students at the university uses diffrent colored coveralls as symbols of the diffrent student bodies and one is pink/purple. Good clothes for parties :Hip Hip:

[Zakuhl]

Well I`m usually only reading stuff and not posting but since you people seem interested in guys reading shojo I`ll say something ^^

I have no preference in Manga whatsoever it doesn`t matter what genre it is as long as I like it. That sucks because unlike secret I do have to actually read a mang before i know if i could like it ^^

So normally I start reading a manga and quit if it gets to cheesy/dramatic repetitive or simply anoying. More shoujo manga happen to be quit though.

There are also some manga that make me feel somehow gay .... so i have to listen to some Black/Death Metal to make that feeling disappear ^^

I got a Theorie actually taht preferences in manga deepend alot on how you imagine about it like first person or third person and so on. People thinking in First Person probably won`t like manga with Mainchars of different gender

The Ranking of my manga change alot right now Skip Beat is probably second right after One Piece

Oh Yeah to clarify I`m not Gay and I don`t like shounen ai manga.

And as real man should wear only Black Cloth ^^

my english sucks and my use of points and such sucks even more sorry for that

[Seilin-Seiryuu]

Since I'm a girl I'm more into Shojo then Shonen, but all my real life mangafan friends are guys. I actually used Skip Beat! to introduce them to Shojo and they really liked it! I also used Wallflower.

[pXDRAGONXq]

:spurt:WOW!... I just can't believe the results you know

Thoughts in my head right now

1) the results are flawed... there is no way there are this many girls.

2) wondering if the results are true how come I didn't notice that all these people saying that they are girls are girls. well except for some ^^

3) WOW! things sure have changed from when I was last here a few months ago... and I'm glad they did :p

...and yeah I'm a guy

[hotandspice]

I disagree this poll isn't flawed. I started the manga movement at school when i was in year 8 or 9 with the first episode of bleach. Which was november 2004 or something round there. I used to like the shounen manga but i started getting bored of the repetitiveness in shounen where the storyline is pretty basic and there involves TOOOO much fighting for my likeing and Skip beat was the 4 manga i started to read after bleach/naruto/onepiece and i would say it is better than any shounen or shoujo manga

[Mario]

liar everyone is a kawaii girl

Dancu i don't know you for some reason your like a girl and on the other side your pervert( like a guy). Your making it more complicated just tell your Gender.

[hotandspice]

i don't even know what kawaii means a few pointers???

[hotandspice]

The Japanese population is among the slimmest in the world. (Not including countries where most of the population is STARVING, of course.)



OK i don't wanna be judgmental but this is out of previous experience with seeing Japanese people in AUSTRALIA * i am not shouting, i am just comparing the Japanese people in Australia * Most of them i see (when i go buying manga / anime related items) Are rather larger than i would have expected *once again i am on my knees i am talking about my experiences*

[Znail]

The Japanese population is among the slimmest in the world. (Not including countries where most of the population is STARVING, of course.)

What I was talking about wasnt lack of fat but rather basic proportions of their skeletons. Skip Beat is fine with this and if we look at it so can we see that the shoulder width of Ren and Sho is about the same scale as the shoulder to waist distance, but in many shojo mangas so do they have much thinner shoulders and hips then what a normal human have.

Hm i know alot of people in my class who read manga only for the ecchi which is really sad i believe because manga was a way *i believe* oh showing people how japanese people wanted to be as you have seen japanese people have small eyes, chubbier legs and some pimples of their face *PLEASES I AM ON MY KNEES DON NOT TAKE THIS AS AN INSULT TO JAPANESE PEOPLE I AM STEREOTYPING*
Manga have huge eyes, skinny and very fir body and no facial disorders
Japanese arent that short realy and it doesnt have that much to do with genetics. They used to be alot shorter then nowdays but it was due to them traditionaly eating little meat and having a general food shortage. You dont grow tall and muscular on a bowl of rice and some vedgetables each day.

As a contrast so do northern europeans have a well deserved reputation of being tall and muscular, but it has probobly more to do with fairly robust food traditions and drinking lots of milk (even adults still drink milk).

[Secret]

Kawaii means cute, basically.

Japanese tourists in Australia, or Japanese residents of Australia?

Once you take a person out of their culture, the profile of the people of their home country no longer applies. People conform to their culture. Japanese people living in America, for example, get fat at the same rate as everyone else.

But in Japan...well a good friend has gone to Japan twice in the past few months and mentioned how big an impression she got of health, there. Everyone was so slim and active.

And statistically it is *proven* that the Japanese are a much fitter/slimmer/pick your word country than a place like Canada or America or England.

And...heh! There's no way the poll is flawed. I'm actually stunned by the number of GUYS. Last time I actually spent any time here, EVERY person I talked to in the SB area was female. (Except Dancu and I think one other person.) All the regulars who post the most were girls. Now I see that a few of you have become regulars since then are guys, since I do recognize a few of the names of you (though not most) as posting here in a visible way.

I've been on forums since 1996. Girls are EVERYWHERE. :) Sure, there are still more guys on most of them, at least for topics like manga and anime (I belonged to a forum for RA Salvatore too and that was mostly all guys as well.) but you can always find girls as well.

CURIOUS...

There are more guys here (in the SB section) than I thought. So, somewhere that seems to be almost 100% female...fanfiction. You guys make up the majority of most of the fans on a forum, but do you also read (or write) fanfiction?

In my years on ff.net, I have met ONE guy. One. Are the rest of you just in hiding? Using names that are totally gender neutral? Or are you really not there?

Fanfiction isn't interesting for guys?

EDIT: Sorry, Znail, actually the comment about slimness was directed at hotandspice, not what you said about thin characters. :)

[Znail]

:Hi: Amusing that me and Secret posted about cultures impact on sizes about the same time. Japanese food is traditionaly rather healthy and low fat so its not strange that they arent very fat normaly.

About US, one girl I know went to live there for a while and was rather chubby when she got back...

About fanfiction, I would think there are atleast as many male writers as female so doubt that there are any lack of males writing fanfics. Maybe not the same type thou.

[hotandspice]

Ok i will confirm that these people were residents in Australia because i will ask the book keeper i will be back soon. Ok i must admit that japanese people are rather slim if they have a good diet in japan because most of there food is Raw but i really must admit alot of Asians are rather overweight. (49% australia is over weight) So i am guessing that these people just don't follow the guide lines in australia because alot of food is processed to a degree nothing Raw is left.

I completely take back what i said about japanese people about there weight but i stand strongly about there facial complexity because alot of Asian (including me)people have really tiny eyes. I will stand by this until proven wrong

[Secret]

Hotandspice: oh hey, don't worry, you don't have to 'give in' just because a few people don't agree with you :) Statistically the Japanese in Japan are fairly slender, that's all I'm saying.

You're right that the eyes tend to be smaller. I have a Welsh/German (mostly, along with English and Irish) background and my eyes are considered fairly large...and I have smaller eyes than my mother...so I'm used to really big eyes. Japanese eyes do look small to me, though it's more the almond shape that makes them look so...I'm used to round eyes.

Znail: The only male fic writer I ever spoke to wrote in DBZ. Onnnne lonely little guy. And you can really tell by the way people talk in reviews that they're female, usually. (Though maybe all of the neutral seeming ones are actually guys? Though most of the usernames tend to be feminine as well.)

Well, I've been in Inuyasha, Furuba, Naruto and Skip Beat fandoms, with just a bit of Bleach. Oh wait, and DBZ, of course. I'd like to KNOW which people are guys because it'd be interesting to see what aspects they turn to fanfiction to expand on.

[Znail]

Well, eyesize isnt so much about how large the actual eyeball is but more about how much you are showing of it. If you squint alot then your eye will look small, but if you open up wide then they will look large. I dont know if asian peopel are actualy geneticly more squinty or if its more a matter of habbit as plenty of asian artists have large eyes (probobly by conscious training).

Ofcourse the eye size in mangas are often wildly exagerated, but I dont think that has anything to do with races more with basic instincts. Large eyes look cute on a basic level. Just consider that babes and young animals have larger eyes compared to their head size so its an inherited response to consider large eyes cute.

[Secret]

Agreed. Well I'm very used to large, round eyes...every single girl in my family has them. (Mine aren't the largest of all of ours but mine are the ROUNDEST and my sister has shouted at me before 'Close your eyes a little, would you? Every picture I take has you looking SCARED!' Actually I thought I looked sad. I probably was...I don't like having my picture taken by other people!)

Asian people have different eyelids from Caucasian. They go straight down, often without a crease, and that would make it harder for them to be as 'open' as the average Caucasian eye. Asian eyelids also have thicker skin and a higher fat content. On top of that, Asian eyelashes are often poker straight, and curved lashes make the eye look more open and thus larger.

Look, you can see what I'm saying here...the pale image is my own eye. The other one is an Asian eye...whose I have no idea:

http://www.thefargrove.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/eye.jpeg
THERE WAS A PIC HERE BUT IT DISAPPEARED. :(

Soooo...yeah. Asian eyeballs should be the very same size as everyone else's...it's just that their facial structure doesn't allow for the eye to be as open. Look how much more white shows on my freaky eyeball...I can see where my sis might complain that sometimes I look overly frightened or 'freaky' when she takes pics of me. :P

EDIT: My photo is just a 100 pixel square avvy...you'd have to double its size to better compare it more directly but I don't have a larger one.

EDIT 2: Jeez, just realized how off topic this is for this thread. It's sort of SB related and all so I don't care that much but it certainly has nothing to do with 'male or female'. :)

Oh and here's an interesting 'article' about Asian eyes: http://stuffasians.blogspot.com/2008/03/41-eye-enlargement.html

[Znail]

Hey, its a FEMALE eye, works for me :)

Its still rather strongly connected to the original topic through shojo/shounen art style too.

[infiechan]

interesting...
you guys very seldom post anything here.
I didn't even know that Skip Beat is also liked by guys.
When you like shoujo manga, it doesn't mean bad at all.
Unfortunately in my place, very very few people like manga, so I won't concern gender.

Ahh, I also read any manga no matter the type is. But few are great enough.ck..ck..ck..
So far, I like
1. Fruits Basket (the first manga i read, personal reason)
2. Skip Beat
3. Kyou Kara Maou (it is not yaoi as many have thought, it's neutral)
4. Full Metal Alchemist (great storyline, char dev, etc.)

I think the easiest way to guess wether a girl or guy is by their avatar, username, signature, and post. In glance, I can get the feeling, although it's only 45% accurate

Anyway, I read Naruto too. So I can tease my friends and siblings cause they don't know online manga.:)

i'm a girl

[DanteFan15]

(hi, im this tread now)


i know alot of people that read and watch anime, at my school they have a huge club of like 60+ people, and iv noticed gender dosent matter so much, the guys there enjoy sailor moon just as much as the girls, actually more guys were singing the theme song when it came on. in the club i think theres a pretty good ratio of boys and girls.



now i love manga, i think everyone should read a manga at least once.

between shojo and skip, i cant say i like one more, out of all the manga i have its a pretty equal mix of them, but im like non-MAIN stream stuff, manga almost no ones heard about, that to me is cool, same for anime, although i dont like main stream stuff too much, im still a huge naruto fan, and vampire knight is amazing, the anime for it is realy cool.

[Znail]

I just had a rather big insigt, even if its pretty obvious when you think about it. I now think I know why alot of you girls may dislike some shounen manga and the other way around. And why Skip Beat is pretty popular among guys too.

Shounen mangas usualy have a guy as main character and shojo a girl. But here is the main thing, the main character often just go along with the flow and may have a rather bland character (this is often intentional so that anyone can see themselves as that person). Its often the other people of the opposit sex that drive the story forward and have often wierd and interesting personalities. So when a girl picks up a shounen manga and sees this rather bland guy that doesnt have much personality then they wont like it as they want to like the guy in the story.

Skip Beat is rather diffrent in that Kyoko probobly has the most interesting personality so guys have no problem liking her and the manga :)

There is ofcourse other series that are also good in this way and I think the ones I mentioned fit in, but its not something I would usualy consider that much as I dont see the guys in the story from that perspective normaly.

This might keep the thread on track I think :)

[Mollica]

Hey I'm just wonderin, isn't "asian" a bit of a misnomer wen ur like describing the eyes. Cause u no a 1/6th of the world's population is from the indian subcontinent, and they sorta like have larger eyes than like the people from the orient?

[infiechan]

aa, I forgot to mention Kunimitsu. A shonen manga that's good enough to read.
No promotion, it's just I find more shonen is interesting than shojo so far

[EhudbenGera]

Hey I'm just wonderin, isn't "asian" a bit of a misnomer wen ur like describing the eyes. Cause u no a 1/6th of the world's population is from the indian subcontinent, and they sorta like have larger eyes than like the people from the orient?
This is what is known as semantics. It really doesn't matter, since almost everybody understands what you mean if you say "asian" when referring to facial/body structure. However, if you really want to be anthropologically correct, then the term would be "mongoloid."

[Znail]

:whistle: To be perfectly honest I think you risk insulting more people by using the proper term in this case :)

[dancu]

im late to this
but the large eyes are just used to make children and women look innocent

but they are influenced by western art old school cartoons with huge eyes and Osamu Tezuka drew the large eyes cause it was easier to show emotions, but not all characters have huge eyes

[Fluke32]

Well, my brother in law is only 25, so I don't think it's outdated, yet...and certainly not an 80s stereotype, as he wasn't even born until 1983 and did most of his forming in the 90s. :) It's what I've seen to be true with my own eyes, of people older than me down to people about 20. (I have no idea what the younger people do, I don't know any young people irl well enough to see what they care about.)

Yellow? Is yellow considered a girl colour? My bro-in-law won't wear pink or purple (which I think is wimpy...to care so much about what others will say about your gender depending on what you wear) but I've never heard him say anything about yellow.

I've read a lot of manga, and I just repeatedly find that all the ones I like are shoujo. I never used to bother checking what was what before, but after I started noticing a pattern, I began to save myself some time and just head straight for the shoujo section.
You do realize that Stereotype encompasses a decade or two right?:megane: It's definitely an 80's thing and the stereotype of 'guys don't think it's okay to not do macho stuff' was basically from the early 70's.

As far as I can tell it was ever since the Marlon Brando era started when people started to associate guys who are 'macho' are 'cool', and if you don't even start to look the part, you're practically 'not worth the bother'.:megane:

Also, in comedic movies here in the Philippines, to project the image of not being macho in the silver screen, the non-macho characters wore yellow, purple or pink. That's basically a fixture during the 70's to 80's when the whole 'Third Sex' thing started to explode out of proportions here in the Philippines.

If you ask me how I know this stuff, it's from the pop culture studies seminar that I had to go to during college for credits.:Geez:

PS
Well, I pretty much associated Yellow as being a girly color since when I was young, all the Sentai series I've noticed that the ones in yellow has mostly been girls.

About the Eye sizes, I too think that I've read it somewhere before that the reason behind the large eyed style in Anime was because it helps in showing the emotions much better. It was an Osamu Tezuka origins in Japan, but was actually an influence from Walt Disney's character designs.

Anyway, I think the idea behind characters that don't have large eyes was to show that the character is a little dim, shady, shy, or secretive. Well, that's just the way I see it I suppose.

[hotandspice]

Ok ima get it now... i think i just naturally assumed by my eye size and every other Asian around that the big eyes in manga was to show how japanese people want to feel *once again i am begging you don't kill me for stereotyping my beliefs*

EhudbenGera: i really know what you are talking about but i really think people can't remeber the use of our technical terms but when i get my medical degree i am just going to say to my patients small eyes rather than mongoloid it really is easier to remeber.

About the manga i usually judge it by the first chapter and the Art. I don't really mind if the character development is bad because if it is i just skip stuff because i assume it isn't interesting. What drives me to read manga is just the amount of creativity the artist put in about the story/character and drawing style. I really don't think people stereotype when they say girls are smarter than boys. GIRL POWER

[EhudbenGera]

EhudbenGera: i really know what you are talking about but i really think people can't remeber the use of our technical terms but when i get my medical degree i am just going to say to my patients small eyes rather than mongoloid it really is easier to remeber.


I completely agree. That is essentially what my post said. And I also agree with Znail, who said that the anthropological terms for races would probably offend more people than the "stereotypical" terms. As another example, I doubt Arabic peoples would appreciate being called "Semitic," since many of them are "anti-Semitic." That distinction always made me laugh.

And I know that the anthropological term for "black" races would be highly offensive out of context.

[Mollica]

This is what is known as semantics. It really doesn't matter, since almost everybody understands what you mean if you say "asian" when referring to facial/body structure. However, if you really want to be anthropologically correct, then the term would be "mongoloid."

Well actually in Britain, "asian" usually refers to people from the indian subcontinent u no from pakistan india bangladesh etc... Maybe the language usage is a little different in n.america. But thats probably because of the immigration of south asians from the colonies etc.

[EhudbenGera]

Well actually in Britain, "asian" usually refers to people from the indian subcontinent u no from pakistan india bangladesh etc... Maybe the language usage is a little different in n.america.

Really? Fascinating. I wonder if the difference is because of which direction people from each area would travel.

Or is it because of the areas of influence during the imperialist era?

Hmm. What sort of ratio of "Far East" Asians to "Near East" Asians are in the British population? I live in California, and I'd say that there are far more "Far East" Asians living here than "Near East" Asians. Is it reversed in Britain?

[Mollica]

I think it is reversed. never really thought about it... Well there is a large chinese community, but they speak mainly cantonese since most of them r from hong kong, thats in liverpool. But according to wiki (though i question the reliability) there are more indians, bangladeshis and pakistanis than east asians.

[Znail]

Its not strange that there are a fair number of Indians (:) that could be easily confused) as an effect of the old empire. And as there will be more from that area already so will it attract more new from the same area too. Its pretty noticeable that people tend to move in groups as they want to move where relatives or friends did. Even knowing that there are some countrymen already there is probobly preferable over some random country.

[Mollica]

Lol, they also reckon we bathe in riches, maybe because "England" has a grand feel to it to the people there, and also obviously there are greater numbers of south asians who have migrated to the uk. Its so funny wenever we go to the village, they always ask us wat words mean in english. Lol i found it funny one time they were asking me wat a "table" meant in English (i guess they didn't realise the word adopted from english...) I could almost feel the disappointment wen I said it was a "table"...

[hotandspice]

Wow in my part of Australia Asian means any person who comes from china/Vietnam/japan/Korea and so forth. Mainly the middle east call us this but i really don't know why middle east people have anything against us

[Znail]

Wow in my part of Australia Asian means any person who comes from china/Vietnam/japan/Korea and so forth. Mainly the middle east call us this but i really don't know why middle east people have anything against us

I think this is the common useage althou I dont know why it would be considered an insult. I guess its a matter of intent thou.

[Mollica]

Well watever the intent, I'm asian and proud, with a scouse heart! Wow, i did't expect ther to b a high percentage of guys... I would have thought it would be up to 10%.

[hotandspice]

Yes i guess your right alot of guys think it is queer to read shoujo i really don't understand them

[scorpio moon]

they probably think it's queer because if you look at the definition of shoujo, it's manga who's main target audience are young girls, which would be a turnoff to most guys who've never accidentally read a shoujo manga.

[andreasfr]

i thought you were only supposed to say your gender and leave... guess i was wrong...

[scorpio moon]

no, this topic is more kind of debate and conversation. ^^

[andreasfr]

what are we debating right now then, if theres a fight ill have to know what to say to protect you

[scorpio moon]

haha, thank you adde, but it's not a fight, there's a very big difference between a fight and a debate, so don't worry about it, as I said it's debate and discussion, so we're just having fun expressing opinions about this subject and debating over them from time to time. ^^ You'll know what I mean by a fight if swords ever start flying. ^^

[andreasfr]

i said if, IF there id a figth... so whats the subject? :)

[scorpio moon]

check the backpages, but basically we're talking about how a lot of guys don't read shoujo cause of the stereotypes, and how girls shouldn't drop shounen if they've only tried a few bad ones, stuff lik that. ^^

[andreasfr]

im gonna pas on that if thats ok... :S

[Secret]

However, if you've read about a HUNDRED shonen you don't like...hey, go ahead and pass on it. That's the way *I* operate. I gave the genre more than a fair shot. I still read a few that I managed to like, and if I see one I think might be more geared to my tastes I check it out...but otherwise unless I have specific reason to believe I'll like a shonen manga, I now skip over it summarily and go straight to the shoujo section to look for something new to read.

There's only so many times you have to taste liver before you know you're just never gonna like it.

[hex]

liver... oh, this brings back a history... history told to me, by my mother, of my younger days...
we ate liver one day, when i was really small, max 4 year old... and 2 days later, i told my mother... "i will not eat (bad tasting/disgusting) food", she replied "huh?", and i explained, "i will not eat liver", its more than 10 years ago... and i dont think i have eated that sort of liver since....

oh well, now is not the time for me to remember.... its discussion about shounen&shoujo
i focus on shounen... since i prefer the art, and plot most of the time...
i dont really like the art in shoujo, and most of the time shoujo is too much romance for me.
nothing wrong with shoujo... i've read some, that i enjoy... but i prefer shounen...
oh, and now i have to vote...

[hotandspice]

Basically speaking i like manga that fall into 3 major genre and 1 sub genre romance,comedy and drama Sub is School life. I just believe shounen manga plot line is pretty much the same it always involves something out of this world which i really dislike.(No offense to all the final fantasy lovers)

[Znail]

I can with confidence say that not all shounen mangas have stuff out of this world in them as the ones I suggested earlier does not. They incidentaly falls into your prefeered categories too :)

Now many of the most popular ones do have some sci-fi or fantasy element, but thats another matter.

[hotandspice]

Hm its not that i don;t mind the fantasy i mean i love making the hands signs and incantations like in bleach where i just shout bankai or getsuga tenshou or in naruto where i do kage no bage jutsu (can;t remeber spelling) Its jsut that some of them get repetitive and the next one i read must be better than the first.

[Znail]

This thread is somewhat amusing as they now have sorted up this board in the diffrent categories (shounen, shoujo etc) but they made some mistakes and some shounen ended up in the shoujo section. It seems that some considers Romance = Shoujo :)

[EhudbenGera]

Looks like that got fixed. We're all alone now.

[Znail]

Nah, Skip Beat is the only subforum but there are alot of independent threads under the Josei&Shoujo and some dont belong. The most amusing one would be Fate/Stay Night wich doesnt fit in at all. Some others I can understand as they are romance stories, but thats not the same as Shoujo after all.

[Alvina]

wow. there ar mor females in FH... i never knew that...

[scorpio moon]

not necessarily, just more females reading skip beat.

[Alvina]

true... but i don't think it that good really, um... 7.6/10

[scorpio moon]

it's not nice to say that in the skip beat forum ivy >.< haha, but everyone has their own opinion. ^^ How far did you read up to?

[Alvina]

im waiting for new updates

[Secret]

Why come to the SB forum, obviously intended for fans, and say 'this manga isn't very good'?

[scorpio moon]

exactly my point. ^^ well, she didn't give it a necessarily bad rating at least...

[pXDRAGONXq]

...Well where should I start

Yes i guess your right alot of guys think it is queer to read shoujo i really don't understand them

Well... i don't even know what shoujo is, and probably a lot of guys don't I read manga and watch anime for entertainment that is it. I think I have only read like 3 or 4 manga and I have watch a few more anime but thats it

its the same with all o my friends that read manga and watch anime, the number is low like mine

they probably think it's queer because if you look at the definition of shoujo, it's manga who's main target audience are young girls, which would be a turnoff to most guys who've never accidentally read a shoujo manga.

If Shoujo has stuff that is like R+V then I don't think is queer, because honestly I really like R+V

Basically speaking i like manga that fall into 3 major genre and 1 sub genre romance,comedy and drama Sub is School life. I just believe shounen manga plot line is pretty much the same it always involves something out of this world which i really dislike.(No offense to all the final fantasy lovers)

I agree that the plot is a little repetitive in shounen like in bleach naruto, but its still entertaining to me at least, and It would be the same with all my friends that read and watch anime unless they are girls, then it changes.

[Znail]

If Shoujo has stuff that is like R+V then I don't think is queer, because honestly I really like R+V
They do, but the obvious diffrence is instead of one guy with multiple girls so is it one girl with multiple guys :) I dont think either of those types are that suited for both genders realy as alot of the draw of a series like R+V are the art and antics of the girls, wich obviously doesnt apeal as much to other girls. The same with the shoujo mangas with simmilar concepts. I guess Vampire Knight is a shoujo variant of R+V if you want to give it a try.

[EhudbenGera]

Bwa haha! Comparing R+V to Vampire Knight is like comparing the Count from Sesame Street with Bram Stoker's original!

Ok, maybe exaggerated, but my point remains the same. R+V is a comedic harem manga with some drama thrown in, or at least it started that way. Vampire Knight is thriller/drama with romantic elements. Two very different balls of wax.

[Znail]

Bwa haha! Comparing R+V to Vampire Knight is like comparing the Count from Sesame Street with Bram Stoker's original!

Ok, maybe exaggerated, but my point remains the same. R+V is a comedic harem manga with some drama thrown in, or at least it started that way. Vampire Knight is thriller/drama with romantic elements. Two very different balls of wax.

Its a bit a matter of perspective. I agree that there are more commedy in R+V but atleast the first chapters are pretty similar else. In Vampire Knight the girls go 'ooh' over the 'cool' guys and in R+V its the guys that oogle the girls. Both develop a more serious plot later on. I think it would be a bit narrowminded to consider one side of the same coin clearly superior apart from aimed at diffrent genders.

[pXDRAGONXq]

^ I totaly agree with the last part

[EhudbenGera]

Its a bit a matter of perspective. I agree that there are more commedy in R+V but atleast the first chapters are pretty similar else. In Vampire Knight the girls go 'ooh' over the 'cool' guys and in R+V its the guys that oogle the girls. Both develop a more serious plot later on. I think it would be a bit narrowminded to consider one side of the same coin clearly superior apart from aimed at diffrent genders.

Eh? You think that comedy is inferior to drama?

Must... restrain... desire... to... brainwash!

Personally, I prefer R+V to Vampire Knight. Perhaps my comparison to Sesame Street's Count was ill-founded, but I was trying to think of a comedic vampire representation, and that was the first that came to mind. I don't think I was trying to say that one side of the coin was superior to the other, so much as I was trying to say that there are two distinct sides to the coin.

Anyhow, I prefer comedy to drama. It's sometimes a disappointment to me when a manga that started as a comedic manga erodes into a time-worn dramatic plot, and almost always a pleasure when comedic elements reveal themselves in a dramatic work.

Shakespeare got it right. His tragedies always have comedy, while only a few of his comedies have tragedy.

[Znail]

:whistle: Ok, ok I thought you was talking more about quality or such. I admit that I didnt like Vampire Knight that much either, but it may be the animes fault as I didnt like that one at all (*). But I thought Vampire Knight might be popular among girls atleast as its a semi popular manga. It felt like an obvious suggestion for someone looking for a shoujo version of R+V anyway. Hmm, I wonder if Drama is more popular then Comedy amoung girls? I havent read that many shoujo to realy know, but maybe someone else can answer that? From the little I know so would it seem so atleast.

(*) Somewhat amusingly so is the guy watching scenes and slow pace that turned me off the anime, that was easier to ignore in the manga as you can just flip another page so I deffinitly understand if a girl gets turned off by the R+V anime as its to put it mildly, not quite as good as the manga.

[scorpio moon]

Actually, I prefer comedy to drama as well and I'm a girl, I mean, yeah, drama is good, but if there isn't any humor to lighten the mood, then it gets to be too serious and heavy, and it gets kind of boring.

[Znail]

Oh, I actualy watched a shoujo anime I liked, Itazura no Kiss. I think it was pretty funny and somewhat similar in style to Skip Beat in that there was alot of focus on the main heroine and what she is thinking. I havent read the manga but I guess its pretty good too and probobly something a guy could read.

[hotandspice]

Ok i don't want to break it to you but R+V is a ecchi SHOUNEN manga with one guy in like a love 1000000 sided polygon

Edit: Comedy to me is only good with a touch of romance. I like drama manga over comedy because i can get emotionally attached which i am on the verge of crying. I really like drama touch my feelings even if its NOT a sad ending.

[scorpio moon]

well of course comedy just for comedy's sake is kind of bland, but so is just all drama with no humor whatsoever, those are really hard to get through, and I've read R+V, it's not bad.

[hotandspice]

I like that kinda genre in R+V where there is something new everyday. Its like all the schoollife i read but if it can't come up with enough comedy i just drop it. Thats really close to happening to R+V.

[EhudbenGera]

Ok i don't want to break it to you but R+V is a ecchi SHOUNEN manga with one guy in like a love 1000000 sided polygon

I don't think anyone's arguing with you. In fact, that is precisely what we were saying: that it was amusing that R+V was in the "shojo" section of this site. Someone also recommended Vampire Knight as a shojo alternative, and we were discussing whether it was an appropriate alternative or not.

[hotandspice]

I am saying that i really do believe R+V is for guys my little cousins always says i can see this girls "boobs" which i believe is something that wouldn't be shown in a proper shoujo manga that follow the traits.

[Secret]

Yeah, hotandspice...that's actually what EhudbenGera has said twice now. It IS a Shonen manga. Very, very clearly. Any manga where the girls constantly hang out of their underwear (or forget to wear any underwear at all) and where the main male character has every hot girl in sight (and they will ALL be hot) in love with him...unquestionably shonen.

I don't care for R + V at all, I was bored while reading it...but on the other hand, I don't care for Vampire Knight, either. Too darn moody. (Plus I dislike vampires in general. I find them gross, not sexy.) Skip Beat is the perfect balance, for me. Strong plot...lots of drama, lots of comedy, very interesting characters who do evolve as the chapters progress.

[EhudbenGera]

Any manga where the girls constantly hang out of their underwear (or forget to wear any underwear at all) and where the main male character has every hot girl in sight (and they will ALL be hot) in love with him...unquestionably shonen.

Also unquestionably Gary Stu characterization. :p

[Secret]

Oh, absolutely. And I hate Stus and Sues equally so I don't enjoy that type of story much. Too hard to sympathize with!

[hotandspice]

No someone back then said it was listed under shoujo...

[Secret]

Yes, R + V was listed under shoujo in Frankyhouses forums...by accident. It was corrected soon afterward. That's all they were talking about. No one meant that R + V was a shoujo manga.

[Znail]

Ah, that was just on this forum when they changed it recently and people pointed out that it was in the wrong section. There is still threads that doesnt fit (R+V has its own forum, like Skip Beat). Everyone have been agreeing with that its a shounen manga all along :) Even if I like it so dont I recomend it for girls realy as its so clearly aimed at guys. Harem series often has very weak male leads too so that makes them extra uninteresting. The guy in R+V have improved over time in some areas, but he is still working on the first baby steps when it comes to girls.

[EhudbenGera]

Hmmm, I wonder what Kyoko's Sue number is. Here's the litmus test (http://www.springhole.net/quizzes/marysue.htm). Going to check it out.

Update: I got a 47.
36+
Fanfiction authors, you might just want to start over. Role-players and original fiction authors, at this point your characters are likely to provoke eye-rolling and exclaimations of "yeah, right!" from your readers. (Well, at least from me.) Immediate workover is probably in order.

Of course, there is a disclaimer at the top of the page that warns against taking the test too literally, since some authors are able to pull it off.

Here's my breakdown and explanations of how I scored the test:
5. Is your character described, illustrated, and/or shown as exceptionally beautiful, cute, or handsome?
d. Do any characters see his/her attractiveness as a threat? while Kyoko is not described as exceptionally beautiful most of the time, there are characters who see her attractiveness as a threat - such as Ruriko and Chiori.

22. Does your character become a genetically, scientifically, cybernetically, or magically altered/enhanced being, possibly with new powers? I'd say that this is what happens when her "box" is opened.

29. Does your character have a spitfire personality, sharp wit, attitude, and/or strong temper? I'm not sure about this one, actually.

31. Does your character have any of the following psychological disorders?
c. Inability to form a solid intimate relationship? If you don't know why I said yes for this one, you probably haven't actually read the manga

32. Is revenge one of your character's main motivations? Umm, YES.

40. Is your character unusually accomplished for his/her age, time period, place, occupation, and/or social status? Yes.
a. In something that is extremely desirable and/or useful in the story's universe? acting
c. Is your character unusally accomplished in more than one area? we've got a whole thread for this!

41. Does your character pick up new skills unusually fast during the course of the story? acting, catwalk
a. Like, insanely fast? She picked up the catwalk overnight, though it usually takes years to master.

42. Is your character the best or among the best at anything he/she does? One box for each: five boxes checked.
1. acting - she gets so into her character that she forgets herself, which it is said only happens to the best and most experienced actors.
2. cooking - she is capable of a peeling technique that only the best cooks are supposed to be capable of.
3. doll making - her dolls are so realistic that anyone who sees them is shocked by their realism
4. crafting - she creates a high-quality necklace for Princess Rosa
5. tea ceremony - she wows everyone at the shoot with her mad skillz

43. Are other characters extremely impressed or astonished at your character's skills and/or virtues? (Does not count if they are easily impressed due to their own inexperience.) most people who realize her skills are extremely impressed
a. Do they impress even the most cynical, jaded, exacting, and/or experienced? Ren Tsuraga, Kuu Hizuri
b. Does your character modestly dismiss or deflect well-earned compliments? "You must have received training!" "Er, well, just a little bit!"

47. Does your character have telepathic and/or telekinetic (Force-like) abilities in a world where this is unusual? Grudges smash windows, walls, hold people in place, etc.

54. Not counting his or her first language, how many languages does your character fluently speak? Click one box for every language: 1. English. She speaks it well enough to make Kuu think it was his son - a native English speaker.

55. Does your character succeed at virtually everything he/she tries? I haven't seen Kyoko really fail at anything, yet

59. Is anyone envious of your character's talents and/or abilities? Ruriko, "Pochi," Chiori, the LME girls who didn't want her in the acting class

70. Does your character manage to become friends with a villain, and through this friendship cause the villain to become reformed? This seems to happen a lot, really.

71. a. Was your character orphaned, abandoned, kicked out, or at least raised by a family/person that was not his/her own family? abandoned by mother, raised by the Fuwa family

72. g. Abused? emotionally, by her mother

75. If your character has a torment-ridden, pain-filled past, do you believe it excuses his/her actions? It seems to be the source of a lot of her actions

80. Does a major villain have a personal fixation/obsession with your character? Sho Fuwa, currently

82. Would you like to be friends with your character? Wouldn't you?

3. Is your character well-liked by virtually much everyone he/she meets? Eventually, even if not at first
c. Even characters that are not known for their friendly, outgoing attitudes? Moko, Maria

4. Do characters who criticize or don't like your character from the start like him/her by the end, or at least have a grudging respect? Again, major trend.

1. Do you ever poke fun at your character's faults/weaknesses and/or use them as plot devices? Her naivete is a major comedic element, as is her anger and her hyperactive imagination.

12. Has your character ever been in a situation that he/she had no way of overcoming on his/her own? Stalker

13. Does your character ever admit to being wrong, even if he/she doesn't really mean it? Constantly apologizing to Ren for real or imagined faults

14. Has your character ever ignored wrong-doings against him/herself and/or others because he/she simply didn't want to get into trouble? the Ribbon incident

[hotandspice]

Soz about that i jsut skimmed through the last pages

[infiechan]

umm, maybe the poll is right. Sometime Skip Beat has common problem like other shoujo manga, BUT the way it's represented and other great work make it still a GREAT manga

well, thank you for sparing your time filling the questions, they are just too much for me.
hehe

oh, number '55' she did fail but not long and not really important, e.g. overdid cleaning the corridor, fainted in the middle of the tea ceremony shot, almost ruined the Bridge Rock show (but it was covered by staff), act out of place as Natsu etc. but for the big part, yes she never fail, wonder why or how. Anyway, when there's will, there's a way, and she always has will. lol

[EhudbenGera]

umm, maybe the poll is right. Sometime Skip Beat has common problem like other shoujo manga, BUT the way it's represented and other great work make it still a GREAT manga

well, thank you for sparing your time filling the questions, they are just too much for me.
hehe

oh, number '55' she did fail but not long and not really important, e.g. overdid cleaning the corridor, fainted in the middle of the tea ceremony shot, almost ruined the Bridge Rock show (but it was covered by staff), act out of place as Natsu etc. but for the big part, yes she never fail, wonder why or how. Anyway, when there's will, there's a way, and she always has will. lol

Actually, that's the funny thing about Mary Sues. Most good stories have them, to some degree - Luke Skywalker, Aragorn, Simon (from Memory, Sorrow and Thorn), Kurasaki Ichigo (from Bleach), Galadriel, Dorothy (from Wizard of Oz), and many others rate pretty high on the list. In fact, if you were to rate yourself on those charts, you might find yourself to be a Mary Sue! The trick is to not overdo it, or to do it in such a way that no one can tell you're doing it (which Nakamura-sensei excels at).

And you're right, she did fail several times at something she tried. However, none of her failures had terribly bad results - at the most, Kyoko recieved a slap on the wrist for them. At any rate, I imagine that the score will end up being above 36 in any case.

[hotandspice]

Yes thats right you never make the Main character look really good by doing something that makes them go to the top that just ruins that plot

[EhudbenGera]

*coughEragoncough*

[hotandspice]

Yes but eragon is like a 3 book squeal its just like rangers apprentice, keys to the kingdom and artimis foul they all are gifted or have special powers but its like really short so they have no choice. Unlike in manga where its uber long but the main character has like more power than anyone else

[EhudbenGera]

That statement is a massive misunderstanding of books, manga, length, and depth. I find that books quite often are worse about creating Sues because of how much time they do or don't invest in character development. With manga, certain aspects of character can be brushed over that in books is inexcusable. Most manga don't delve as deeply into the thoughts and motivations of the characters as books do. In Skip Beat, for example, we simply see when Kyoko is enraged (her demons come out). In a book, however, this would require that the author describe exactly how Kyoko was feeling, at least in order to convey that same sort of feeling to the reader. Books require more character development, not less.

Incidentally, Keys to the Kingdom was no where near as good as Garth Nix's other series, the Abhorsen trilogy. Mostly because of the lack of character development in KttK, and the amazing development in Liriel and Abhorsen.

[hotandspice]

Thats true but i have one word to say that proves character development in manga like SB is deeper than books because there is a saying everyone knows. Here is the word.

PICTURES

[EhudbenGera]

Perhaps, but that just means that each chapter of Skip Beat would make a 30,000 word novel (which is a fairly short book). Additionally, the phrase is metaphorical in nature, which is why it's a cliché. And it doesn't work all the time. In manga, I'd say that the thousand words would mostly be tied up in descriptive prose, with only as much dialogue and introspection as is already in the manga as words.

Basically, the pictures do a good job of letting us understand the scenery, costumes, and what the people look like, but they don't do as good a job of letting us know why they feel what they feel. THAT is the heart of character development.

At any rate, I have to firmly disagree with your statement that manga does a better job of developing characters than books. Though I'm not entirely sure how we got on this subject.

[hotandspice]

Me neither but when i read books that i am not interested in usually those that you get from school i tend to skip paragraphs that are tooo long or have a large description of someone

[Secret]

As noted above...

You guys, we keep taking our threads off topic. This thread is called "Male or Female". Discussing whether books are better than manga for whatever, while interesting, just isn't on topic, which makes it spam. It wouldn't be a big deal if this was only one or two threads that went this way but it seems to be happening with a lot.

If the original topic has died out and you have nothing more to say on it, don't try to keep the thread alive, if that's what happened, here...let it sink to the bottom and start a new one to compare books and manga, if you can tie it to Skip Beat. Something like this might be best in a more general forum, though.

[hotandspice]

OK i could you tell the admins to close this thread

[yami_no_tenshi1563]

Closed because of spam