Anime Sadboys: Not All Shonen Heroes are Jerks | Get In The Robot

heroes like Deku and tundra are ringing in a new era of Shan and protagonists who may have the spiky hair of their shining forebears but they bring something fresh to their stories empathy and vulnerability is it a little different and that's what I'm here to talk about today [Music] simply put Shonen is and always has been for the boys it's what the word means literally I'm not making like a assessment about it on the spot that would be very weird and though Shonen enjoys tons of fans of all genders it's designed to hold a mirror to its particular demographic the boys and young man it's created for so if you notice that the boys of Shonen Jump are acting a little bit differently recently probably has something to do with the shifting social values that they reflect deku and tandro signal a wave of kinder gentler showing protagonists who still manage to kick a whole bunch of ass these characters work because they're familiar while still bringing a fresh take on expressing emotion and vulnerability they share a lot of traits with our favourite shounen heroes of the past like just about every shown in protagonists ever Thunder oh and deku are underdogs deku was born corkulous and tonzura was a humble charcoal salesman before setting out to join the demon slayer core if you line him up they've got a lot in common with shown in giants like Luffy Naruto or Goku all of them are on some sort of faded path they're all outsiders in some way and they all have spiky Shonen hair which is not a prerequisite necessarily but it's the prevailing feature in moe in most cases anyway they are also all destined for greatness so and look I'm not trying to say contemporary shown and protagonists are reinventing the wheel or anything like that Shonen will always be shown in but characters like Deku and Tundra put a finer edge on a shounen protagonist emotional experience as much as I love every single character on my Shonen list here I have to admit that Luffy isn't the most sensitive guy in the world Goku has never kissed his own wife and definitely doesn't know what emotional intelligence is and to be honest our toes just kind of wolves so I guess at least until we get to ship it it but Tundra as I said before went from selling charcoal to gently assassinating demons in a little rainstorm that he created himself so you know this is different vibe and it's not out of vengeance but it's out of love for his sister nesco who I've spoken about very passionately in the past I want to dig more into that relationship in a minute but for now let me shift focus to Deku who is also famous for his very deep feelings now whether he's sobbing his or blushing after an encounter with a choco Deku couldn't hide what he is feeling if his life depended on it and that is a big reason that I like him kind of done with stoic seemingly unfeeling male protagonists there's not really a lot you can do with them especially when a lot of Shonen stories focus on personal growth and I'm not saying I don't love more reserved characters like a razor head or jenos you know you got to have a straight man for comedic effect there's nothing wrong with some texture different types of characters but it is nice that more stoic characters are making room for people who openly express their feelings beyond just being emotionally aware both deku and Tonto and having a rare role for a shounen lead they're both caregivers deku only makes it into you a thanks to his display of true heroism in the face of a failing test score in the entrance exam even before that it's clear that deku is motivated by a selfless desire to help others whether he has a quirk or not season four builds on a trait we first saw on display in season 3 when he rescued Koda during the forest training camp part Deku has a soft spot for anyone who needs protecting but especially kids season 4 draws out this dynamic in Decker's relationship with Airy not only does Deku rescue her from a situation but he also builds a real bond with her it's pretty rare to see ol Shonen boy on the come-up essentially adopted child if you account myrio in Aizawa that's three powerful dads dedicated to caring for arey I can't talk about taking care of little kids without bringing up the whole Todoroki and bakuto baby-sitters club thing which is the thing that happened I'm sure a lot of people hated it but I thought it was pretty cool to watch the fact that both Todoroki and buckle goes arcs focus on them developing the ability to work through their emotions in a healthy way just highlights my hero's focus on its kind of feeling your feelings caregiving is the ultimate tool for building empathy because it requires you to put the needs of others first and at the end of the day that is the lesson that Todoroki and POC ago needed to learn Tanya on the other hand doesn't really need a lesson and how to put others first kind of already does that maybe to an unhealthy degree regardless Tundra took his role as caregiver very seriously long before he and Mitsuko started hunting demons where his family was slaughtered by a demon tonzura was seemingly their sole breadwinner it's obvious that his siblings look to him for love and guidance when tragedy leaves only him and nesco alive he dedicates himself completely to her care no matter the risk to himself mean kind of takes a lot of selflessness to carry a whole person in a little Thundra was also willing to accept and even embrace let's go in her new form yeah his whole quest is to turn her human again but he's never disgusted or repulsed by her demonic transformation he still treats her with the same tenderness he did when she was a human it's one thing to look out for people you care about but it's another to extend that kindness to strangers or even enemies still we see our guys Tonto and deku do both I knew Tundra was above average nice the second he held hands with a disgusting fist faced blob demon from Fuji cos on a mountain even though the demon was responsible for killing so many of LaRocca dakis students Hondros still prayed for it to be spared the same fate in its next life pretty big of them considering how gross and sadistic that dude was later he offers the mother spider demon of the spider family at gentle and peaceful death loving that enemy isn't easy and no one in my hero academia embodies that struggle better than baklava but since there's been so much coverage of his bromance turned rivalry with Deku I want to focus on someone else gentle criminal and the whole Shia psyche I fight was cool and I can get down with all the plague masks and all that stuff it feels very relevant to right now but at the end of the day I've spent way more time thinking about tech whose fight with gentle criminal Kurt did a whole video about gentle so if you're into him you can check him out gentle is the perfect villain for deco to go up against because frankly he's not really evil he's kind of a nerd with a penchant for petty crime it kind of sounds like me but he has a strong moral code and he sticks to it just like Deku as they fight they begin to understand the values that guide each of them and they begin to develop a mutual respect and while dec who still foils gentles plan to infiltrate the festival and the pro hero's role up he sticks around to make sure they take it easy on him Danko understands that for the most part life isn't black/white and people aren't simply heroes or villains and it's important to be able to empathize with people you love but also in certain cases with people who don't share your priorities or values one of the reasons gentle is so memorable is because he forces Deku to navigate the gray area between hero and villain and if you've seen my video on hero society and vigilantes you'll know that I'm very excited to see the series dig deeper into that in the next season as much as I'm leaning into the whole Deku and tundra or good boys thing I can't argue that they're alone in this there are tons of contemporary Shonen protagonists that embrace the trend and some notable examples from classic shown in properties speaking of someone who spent the last 20 years consuming as much at Dragon Ball as possible I could say that shown in series touch-tones from childhood into adulthood they're designed to help us carry through that journey and have a key role in shaping how we think we should behave so it's pretty cool to see these characters doing simple stuff like being good to a child or showing up for the people who depend on you little things but they really shift the whole mood of a story I got to give props Naruto here because he always traffics in empathy and he probably at least on some level paved the way for the deck oohs and Tonja roads that we're seeing today is evolving a relationship with Gaara is one of my favorite parts of the whole series and it shows how things like empathy and good communication can help people lead healthier lives then there's the original Shonen hero Astro Boy well to think that a genre that at times has been dominated by a hyper masculine story started with a sweet little for some reason half-naked robot boy like I said earlier shown intends to reflect the values of its time and Astro Boy is a perfect example the robot embodies post-world War two Japan grappling with the union of humanity and Technology and it's up to him to make complex moral judgments against both humans and robots he participated in a robot civil rights movement that heavily referenced the fight for civil rights in America so you could say he's the caron of the 60s he went to Vietnam where he protected Vietnamese villagers from American troops at the core of his story as Astro Boy strive to be human and also to be good I say also because being good in the sense of always doing the right thing is often at odds with what it means to be human this is the dissonance that shown in heroes have been exploring ever since I'll take this opportunity to suggest that you check out Pluto by now Kurosawa it's a reimagining of the Astro Boy story that leans into the moral and ethical question around a robot's humanity the manga is incredible and there was some rumbling a while back about an anime adaptation coming out in 2020 but you know stuff happened since then the road between Astro Boy and tundra may seem like it would be a short one but it's actually a twisting road shaped by cultural forces like globalization war and of course 80s action movies if Astro Boy is at one end of the show narrow spectrum Kenshiro from Fist of the North Star is the other most venal Kenshiro from this meme my move-in day but before that he was the unequivocal king of Shonen unlike the family-friendly heroes that came before him Kenshiro was purely designed a machine built for kicking ass violence was at the center of the story with exploding bodies and cool catchphrases dominating the narrative I'm like Astro Boy which took an optimistic view of confusing times control exists in a war-torn post-nuclear wasteland he's stoic he carries a heavy burden and it's his stoicism that allows him to persevere the message of Fist of the North Star is bottle up your feelings use them to fuel you let them develop into a brain tumor in your late 30s while Fist of the North Star is indisputably dope and remains a staple it may not hold up as well for modern viewers much like the unchanging wasteland around him Kenshiro is a static character he never improves he never really grows he's never able to stray away from the path of vengeance he just solemnly pushes forward leaving violence in his wake it's not to say that this kind of story is a bad one it's basically the whole premise of John wick and it's not an anime but it is one of the greatest action movies ever made so I can get down with a classic tale of vengeance but for a series as long-running as fists as the North Star you end up craving some change in evolution from the main character if Kenshiro doesn't grow from his experience what was the point of enduring all the pain I'd argue that that's why Kenshiro type heroes have fallen out of popularity in favor of strong and compassionate protagonists nonetheless Fist of the North Star created a ripple effect in Shonen with titles like super dr. K Kenny c'mon Sakigake otaku jakku and of course JoJo's Bizarre Adventure adopting its hyper-masculine style and as Shonen has evolved and grown in popularity we've seen plenty of characters that combine Kenshiro raw power with astro boys deep moral quandary but few heroes combine these influences as successfully as Goku Dragonball combines a rounded cutesy style of Astro Boy with the kung fu Fist of the North Star and adds a touch of comedy which Toriyama honed in dr. slump Goku represents the middle ground of the Shonan spectrum we had to see him grow from a child into an adult and we get to see his whole training process unlike Kenshiro whose training is complete when we meet him in short we get to see Goku be vulnerable both physically in battle and emotionally like when he watches his best friend die before turning into Super Saiyan for the first time because that this is kind of a prerequisite unfortunately honestly if I had to name someone who walks line as well if not better than Goku I would say it's Vegeta who's motivated entirely by his constant competition with Goku and who we've now seen involved from a genocide all maniac to a loving father who sacrifices himself for the greater good in the majin buu arc if you remember that that's a character arc that we wouldn't even tolerate in the real world unless you live in Argentina I guess in any case both characters in their own ways embody the balance of unnecessarily Jack fighting machines and secretly emotional good dads and I love them for it as we see contemporaries shown in skew more toward the astroboy side of things we're meeting tons of new heroes who aren't afraid to share their emotions but that doesn't mean they're all crying tears of joy of course one punch man explores another part of the emotional range malaise sytem eyes basically a contemporary answer to Kenshiro he's becoming super strong look up and find happiness so he does that but then he becomes so strong that fighting villains is almost too easy still he has no choice but to continue on and while it's becoming more common to see Shaun and protagonists expressed fear sadness and doubt there are fewer examples of shown in Heroes dealing with more complicated emotional experiences like depression it's gonna be hard to even talk about hunter hunter without spoiling things so for the fans out there let me just say net arrows fight against marijuana's to be one of the most powerful in all of anime not because these characters are so strong but because their fight is really about a complex ethical choice and there's no right answer oh we're all shown in heroes having a lot harder nowadays most villains have some redeemable qualities rather than just being pure evil so heroes are forced to make moral and ethical decisions whether or not they're really equipped for it Eren from attack on Titan has all the power of a Kenshiro but has to wrestle with making decisions that affect the entire population he may not always deal with the resulting emotions in the healthiest way but he definitely works through them sometimes Mike accidentally transforming into a Titan but still at least he's not always bottling things up she gave up for mob Psycho on the other hand sort of has to bottle up his emotions at least in the beginning his powers are directly tied to his emotional state so he worries that if he really gets in touch he'll lose control leading him to actively suppress his feelings but as the series goes on he develops new ways of using his powers that are completely centered on what he wants and as a result he's able to channel his emotions in a powerful and positive way he's also down to spare his enemies or at least forgive them like when one of his first real foes dimple is defeated and mob takes him in allowing the two to become really good friends of course befriending your enemy is a classic shown in trope but it's especially powerful in the context of a show that's so focused on emotional intelligence and of course there's one of the greatest shown in duo's of all time the Elric brothers from Full Metal Alchemist although FMA is a little bit older than the other properties I've listed I think it's worth mentioning alongside these other kind and gentle Shonen guys I mean the whole show focuses on healing emotional wounds from the past not to mention the fact that Ed and Al are kind of precursors for tandra ionesco it's kind of a similar sibling dynamic except instead of turning into a cute demon girl al turns into a somehow even cuter sentient suit of armor I would like to respectfully abstain from arguing about which of these two is cuter so maybe that age-appropriate people in the comments can argue there al is also a really interesting spin on shown and masculinity because of his form everyone the brothers encounter assume that al is the powerful full metal alchemist they've been hearing so much about because of course he is fully made of metal and he's terrifying but then of course he opens his mouth and reveals he has the voice of a fourth grader of course people are always shocked to learn that it's the actually the skinny tiny blond guy who is the real Full Metal Alchemist Elric's aside we're also finally seeing more shown in titles with non male leads the promise Neverland star is Emma a bright and incredibly competent orphan who's all about looking out for her friends at age gave us KO Nagi a young actress as preternaturally talented as any shown in protagonist who finds herself taking care of her younger siblings there are more female manga kata than ever and the pages of shounen jump so here's hoping that we see an even wider range of heroes and shaman to come in fact that seems like something we could do a whole video about nude maybe you would want to see that huh let us know nowadays a lot of Shonen is focused on the internal journey as much as the external will always have muscle-bound overpowered Jesus figures and lead roles but it's nice to see how creators are playing with the dynamic between power and empathy the creators of my hero academia and Demon Slayer aren't the first to explore this dynamic but they're certainly leading a wave of news stories that acknowledge that emotional growth is as important as growing stronger I'm Udo a you've been watching getting the robot made in NYC because we can't move to Japan if you like this video subscribe and you know follow us on social media in snow [Music]

Channel: Get In The Robot

Views: 189,592

Keywords: my hero academia, demon slayer, deku, shounen, shonen protagonist, naruto, goku, luffy, one piece, one punch man, fist of the north star, vegeta, Kenshiro, my hero academia season 4, hunter x hunter, evolution of shonen anime, dragon ball z, dragon ball, mob psycho 100, dragon ball super, fullmetal alchemist brotherhood, anime, get in the robot

Id: zTbXdDB6T40

Length: 15min 22sec (922 seconds)

Published: Fri May 08 2020