November 20th, 2020
My personal thoughts on Fire Force fan service (yes it's tamaki)
Anime Relations: Enen no Shouboutai, Enen no Shouboutai: Ni no Shou
So this is the first blog I've written. I wanted to do a more personal one to start but I really wanted to say something about this and I have no one in particular to rant about it to. I'll write a personal blog soon, I want to at least practise getting my thoughts down in writing.
So I've been loving fire force, I watched season one weekly almost religiously and I was super excited for more when I heard about season 2. Overall I love the characters and most of the fire powers, and the story has been decent but nothing stellar. I don't hate the fan service in the slightest, but it's definitely my least favourite part of the whole show. At the most, it gets an eye roll from me and then I move on enjoying the rest of the episode.
I will admit, when I first saw Tamaki and her cat-like fire powers, I was so excited and ready to accept her as my favourite character, cause I can't resist cat stuff. When I realised that she's really only used for the goofy fanservice moments of someone falling on her and having their hand on her boob, or her clothes burning off, I was quite disappointed. I would have still loved her if she still had those scenes but then was actually a competent, possibly bad-ass fighter. But no, it's only ever the fanservice scenes. So I gave up on her being my favourite, but I don't hate her. Maybe there's some bias because I was so invested in her before I started watching.
I told a few of my friends to watch it, and I've gotten the same response multiple times "isn't it very fanservice-y?". And I've always defended it and told them it's not that bad for fanservice and is mostly one character for goofs, it just seems to get a lot of attention from some fans. And I think none of them have watched it yet.
Today's episode, season 2 episode 21. I had seen several people on my twitter feed hyping up Tamaki and saying there's going to be something good because they've read the manga already. I have not, so I was buying into a lot of the excitement. And boy, was I disappointed today. Some spoilers from here on, but I'll try to be vague.
So of course it's sad that a big lovable character died, and I appreciate that Tamaki wants to take him back to the surface so he won't be left underground in the state in died in. So she defends the body from a swarm of infernals.... almost entirely off-screen, while we're watching someone else. (Side note, I loved Iron and really wish he lasted more than the one episode). And when we finally do cut back to Tamaki, she sees more White Clad show up, gets really invigorated and determined to stand her ground, her fire powers flare up and she looks awesome and ready to fight to the death, only to get kneed in the gut pretty immediately, almost killed and saved by people showing up at the perfect time, the perfect SECOND. And that's what I got excited for? And yet I see screen shots and praising comments for her scenes.
It seems quite funny to me how some people can latch onto absolutely any small scene of Tamaki's where she's not being used as pure fanservice. Like part way through season 2 there's that scene with a lot of characters going a bit crazy as they're driving, and Tamaki's miming a phone call with her mom about where she's staying, and yeah ok it's kinda funny cause they're all like that but some claim it's the funniest thing ever?
I really just can't see it myself, I guess. I had personal expectations for a character and I realise I'm complaining because it's not what I want. I'm not dropping the show because of it or loving it any less, these are just things that I personally would change, I suppose. I don't talk to individual people enough to know all their thoughts or maybe why they like Tamaki so much, all I see are comments around different places on the internet. But that's what I'm hoping to change.
Thanks for reading my pessimistic ramblings about me not enjoying something as much as I wanted. Please let me know what you think of Tamaki, if you love her or hate her, or Fire Force as a whole.
Maki is best girl. Latom.
So I've been loving fire force, I watched season one weekly almost religiously and I was super excited for more when I heard about season 2. Overall I love the characters and most of the fire powers, and the story has been decent but nothing stellar. I don't hate the fan service in the slightest, but it's definitely my least favourite part of the whole show. At the most, it gets an eye roll from me and then I move on enjoying the rest of the episode.
I will admit, when I first saw Tamaki and her cat-like fire powers, I was so excited and ready to accept her as my favourite character, cause I can't resist cat stuff. When I realised that she's really only used for the goofy fanservice moments of someone falling on her and having their hand on her boob, or her clothes burning off, I was quite disappointed. I would have still loved her if she still had those scenes but then was actually a competent, possibly bad-ass fighter. But no, it's only ever the fanservice scenes. So I gave up on her being my favourite, but I don't hate her. Maybe there's some bias because I was so invested in her before I started watching.
I told a few of my friends to watch it, and I've gotten the same response multiple times "isn't it very fanservice-y?". And I've always defended it and told them it's not that bad for fanservice and is mostly one character for goofs, it just seems to get a lot of attention from some fans. And I think none of them have watched it yet.
Today's episode, season 2 episode 21. I had seen several people on my twitter feed hyping up Tamaki and saying there's going to be something good because they've read the manga already. I have not, so I was buying into a lot of the excitement. And boy, was I disappointed today. Some spoilers from here on, but I'll try to be vague.
So of course it's sad that a big lovable character died, and I appreciate that Tamaki wants to take him back to the surface so he won't be left underground in the state in died in. So she defends the body from a swarm of infernals.... almost entirely off-screen, while we're watching someone else. (Side note, I loved Iron and really wish he lasted more than the one episode). And when we finally do cut back to Tamaki, she sees more White Clad show up, gets really invigorated and determined to stand her ground, her fire powers flare up and she looks awesome and ready to fight to the death, only to get kneed in the gut pretty immediately, almost killed and saved by people showing up at the perfect time, the perfect SECOND. And that's what I got excited for? And yet I see screen shots and praising comments for her scenes.
It seems quite funny to me how some people can latch onto absolutely any small scene of Tamaki's where she's not being used as pure fanservice. Like part way through season 2 there's that scene with a lot of characters going a bit crazy as they're driving, and Tamaki's miming a phone call with her mom about where she's staying, and yeah ok it's kinda funny cause they're all like that but some claim it's the funniest thing ever?
I really just can't see it myself, I guess. I had personal expectations for a character and I realise I'm complaining because it's not what I want. I'm not dropping the show because of it or loving it any less, these are just things that I personally would change, I suppose. I don't talk to individual people enough to know all their thoughts or maybe why they like Tamaki so much, all I see are comments around different places on the internet. But that's what I'm hoping to change.
Thanks for reading my pessimistic ramblings about me not enjoying something as much as I wanted. Please let me know what you think of Tamaki, if you love her or hate her, or Fire Force as a whole.
Maki is best girl. Latom.
Posted by Xerolta | Nov 20, 2020 3:52 PM | 0 comments