| It was tempting to simply post in the chapter 75 discussion thread, but this thread is for discussion of the series as a whole, rather than just chatter about the finale. I'm not sure how well I'll be able to express myself, considering I'm tired after going on a seven volume marathon in order to finish SAO before I added it to my 'on-hold, and will probably never finish' list, but I'm going to give it a go. Just know that I have this nasty habit of showing love by focusing on the negative, and that that 'quality' will probably shine through in this post; making you question why I rated it 8/10. First of all, since everything that came before built up to it and it was BY FAR the most involving (as well as lengthy!) section of the story, I'm going to ramble about Munsu's past, and his doomed romance with his childhood friend, Kye Wol Hyang. If there's one character I was left feeling truly sorry after finishing a series where the lead was hypocritical and needlessly dickish on a frequent basis, and his sidekick remained a blank, easily changeable young woman in S&M gear, it's Kye. Even though she only ever loved Munsu, and even though he only ever loved her, for reasons unknown - maybe purely because of broship - Munsu refused to confess to his love and take their relationship to the next level. Instead, he decided to run away, abandoning her... and even when she managed to go with him, after their mutual friend/the third wheel lent a helping hand, he refused to answer her honestly when she put him on the spot; instead lying to her and causing her to collapse because of her illness. And when he FINALLY did what he should've done many years before, in order to 'save' her, he then, once again, abandoned her--unwittingly leaving her to be raped by Aji Tae, and causing her great sadness in general. Of course, it goes without saying that the two were deeply in love, and that Munsu expressed the depth of his feelings clearly by first taking on Kye's illness and later leaving her in order to prevent her from killing herself because of him, but that doesn't change the fact that Kye suffered for most of her life because of Munsu being a coward. Not only did she have to deal with having an incurable disease that caused her to writhe in agony on a daily basis, she had to put up with her love not wanted to commit himself to her because of his best friend... despite Kye not even loving his best friend. What would've made the love triangle far better is a full-on, from start to finish flashback arc--detailing the trio's friendship starting with how they become friends in the first place. I'm something of a romantic at heart, and it's surprising how hard it is to find a love story involving three childhood friends being torn apart by the transformation children undergo as they edge towards becoming adults. If not for the EXTREMELY CUTE bits showing Kye and the other two as brats, I wouldn't have minded so much, but seeing those brief glimpses made me certain it would've improved the drama by a significant amount if the king had been developed properly, and his relationship with the others that resulted in the dilemma of friendship vs. love had been delved into. Annoyingly, I think it would've made the actual flashback arc flow better, too, what with Aji Tae's (re?)birth having occurred when the trio went to a cave as brats and all. Her last few lines were pretty powerful. When she said, "Have you forgotten? I can have only one husband" and then proceeded to *somehow* kill herself (again), it hurt; even more so after reading about the real person her character was based on and how the real Kye had refused to go back to her love after being defiled by another man. ...What else did I want to say about Kye... Oh, yes: it made no sense whatsoever for her to have shot herself in the head and lived and then manage to kill herself by stabbing herself with a sword. Logic where, exactly? And why, oh why, would Kye agree to marry the king when A) she didn't love him and B) she had no intention of sleeping with him. WHY!? He'd already started acting like an evil rapist guy by then, him having been devoured by Aji Tae long before, so it made even less sense when you take that into consideration. I've never felt much love for Munsu, truth be told. To start with, he treated Chun like a piece of shit on his shoe; even blaming her when he fell in on her naked, whilst she was bathing. Even when she saved him from certain death, he'd insult her for doing so, and that made him impossible to respect. Then there was the bit where he slaughtered the 'undead' people mercilessly early on in the story... even though he only had what Jun told him to go on. (Following that, a twisted side of me thought about what his expression would've been if he had been wrong and the people he killed had been alive!) And I suppose I don't even need to mention that, even though he'd expressed how avoiding death using mandrakes went against the laws of nature and was inherently wrong, he later used the mandrake method to put his own death on hold just so he could get his revenge. ...I swear, near enough everything the guy did rubbed me up the wrong way. He was cool at times, and even funny on a good number of occasions, but his actions were borderline infuriating. It was nice seeing a hero who didn't simply save others because of being the lead character - that being the biggest selling point of the series, early on - but a dick is still a dick; cool and funny or not cool and funny. And, as for his S&M gear wearing fangirl, who refused to string more than a few words together at once over the course of the 17 volume story, I can only say that her character was wasted by the author. She had all the makings of a fantastic character, and she looked truly beautiful at times because of the often jaw-dropping artwork, but, really, she remained as a plot device with some cute moments (lol @ the "KYYYYYYYYA~!" over crossing the bridge)... and fan service to pull in the fans. It was blatantly obvious she'd join the 'dark side' after meeting up with Aji Tae early on and seeing Mong Ryong (so wrong...) in him. Not that her switching sides is my problem: it was how easily she jumped ship; ignoring the fact Aji Tae had the panther girl as an ally, commanded an undead army, and somehow knew her master had been killed. Rather than asking how he knew Munsu had died, and why Aji Tae had so many skilled servants, she did the logical thing and joined the side of evil--dressing in black and having no issue slicing up midgets on top of mountains. Honestly, as much as I enjoyed seeing her extremely flexible (DO WANT!) body and found her innocence to be endearing, the 'character development' was shockingly bad in her case and left me feeling very disappointed. Women... Before stopping moaning about the characters, I do have one more character to have a good old fashioned whinge about: Aji Tae. At first I was intrigued by his character. As soon as he was introduced I got 'manipulative final boss' vibes, but it wasn't made clear whether he was good, evil or somewhere in-between. Like I said somewhere far, FAR above, what first interested me about the series was the examination of what true justice is and the fact there wasn't a clear line drawn between good and evil. Seeing him act nice one second and less nice with a plain expression later made me hopeful he wouldn't be just another typical 'I SAVE WORLD NOW, BY DESTROYING MANKIND AND LEAVING ONLY MAH ANIMALS'... but all his character ended up doing is replacing the animals bit with demons. I'm not saying he wasn't a good villain. It's just that the author used misdirection early on to suggest he wasn't going to be a darker than black, 'I RAPED YOUR WOMAN, AND IT FELT GOOD... HAHAHAHA!!!!' kind of guy... and then had him turn out to be that kind of guy. Evil grins, lots of needless slaughter for amusement purposes, and all the rest--in the end, there wasn't anything special about him. I was (and still am!) interested about what, exactly, he's supposed to be, and why he was able to devour people, but that was left vague/unexplained--presumably because it was impossible to explain without making the readers facepalm as much as Bleach and Naruto fans do nowadays, every week. ...AND HE EVEN DID WHAT A NUMBER OF OTHER VILLAINS HAVE DONE, IN ORDER FOR GOOD TO PREVAIL OVER EVIL: HE ALLOWED THE HERO TO LIVE, WITHOUT HAVING ANYONE ATTEMPT TO KILL HIM, SO THAT GOOD COULD PREVAIL OVER EVIL. GRRRRRRRRRRRR. Here are there other issues I NEED to get off my chest, before passing out: 1: The fairly lengthy Gil Hildong (w/e!) arc wasn't needed, and it reminded me of Black Cat. It wasn't needed because Kye's sister wasn't even mentioned during the 20 chapter flashback arc. It reminded me of Black Cat because of how so many shounen-esque villains came out of the woodwork all at once. I mean, c'mon: a clown, a black guy with an afro, and some fella with an eye-path and a top hat? There was me thinking I was reading a MOSTLY deadly serious, adult story... and then then came out the Black Cat team of failure. 2: When the clown-person entered the picture, complete with power-level based energy blast, Chun's sword skills became worthless. From that moment onwards, skill with a sword came a distant second to being able to destroy mountains with fighting spirit. It made me remember that I need to finish Dragon Ball... 3: The run up to the ending, and the ending itself, kind of sucked. Following the end to the (mostly epic) flashback saga, non-stop action followed. Now, I don't have anything against action, but when SAO had previously been deeper and more meaningful (/Korean history) than most other stories put together, I expected more than messy fighting between characters who I still don't even know the name or motivations of. Thinking about it, it was pretty bad--a great example of the badness in question being when the revived, 500-year-old Jushin legend said something along the lines of, 'Pssh, I don't give a shit, bitch--I'm just here to fight the strong and test my capacity. FIGHT ME!!!!!' And I SO knew Munsu was going to go to some kind of grassy heaven. The fact that his lover, best friend, country, and everything else he liked were gone from the world kind of suggested he wouldn't survive beyond the final chapter. Maybe I'm getting too smart for my own good (if that's possible?) but I was able to see the three main twists (Chun's betrayal, Aji's intentions, Munsu's fate) in advance. The only thing I wasn't able to predict was whether Aji Tae really was the king or not--that part totally threw me, and it pleased me so much that I read through the pages at a furious pace in order to uncover the truth. Now, I know I've moaned a bit/in every paragraph, but that's out of love for SAO, rather than hate. I'm the sort of guy who likes to focus on why I didn't give 10/10, instead of focusing on why I did give 8/10, and the numerous issues outlined above are what prevented SAO from becoming a favourite of mine. Let me make this clear: I DO like SAO. A lot. The author reworking either Korean history or famous fiction made a lot of the content fascinating, and I was always eager to read the end of volume notes. The artwork is up there with the best I've ever seen; me having mentioned a few times that Chun, and a number of the other female characters, looked truly beautiful throughout. The thin line between right and wrong made a number of the stories totally absorbing, the early mandrake story in particular, where as a reader I was forced to question whether it was right to kill individuals who were revived, being very shocking. And the 20 chapter flashback arc was worth the wait; Kye's story being heart-wrenching. My problem is, I can't help but focus on the flaws when I can see how close SAO was to being a 10/10, top tier series. SAO had some 10/10 content - I'm in no doubt about that after blazing through seven volumes and typing so much - but it also had a fair bit of poor stuff that ended up weighing it down. Imperfect brilliance--that's the best way I can think of describing it. ...I'm done, I think. Thanks go to Ai-something for making my type so much when I'm not even messaging him/her. I hate my life, etc etc. Goodbye. |
| I agree with most of the things you said. Chun flipping to the dark side so easily just left me confused, Aji Tae leaving Munsu alive when he knew he was a problem was a stupid cliche villain move, and towards the end it seemed to break down. I'm actually to seriously dislike this cliche of having one of the protagonists meet the villain who appears charming and helps them but never reveals who he is, and that particular protagonist later on joins the bad guys and there's a major struggle in getting them back to the good side replete with tears and reconciliation. |
| It did kind of go to hell towards the end, didn't it? Ironically enough, I once avoided Korean titles because of my first tastes of manhwa suggesting they only offer mindless, messy violence. Before the ending craziness, SAO had convinced me that I was wrong... and then it ended in a manner that was very similar to how I predicted the series would be before I knew anything concrete about it. When I was clicking through the non-stop battles fought between characters I cared not for, I couldn't help but think that the team behind SAO were pulling whatever they could think of out of their arses by that stage. The alliances between the opposing armies were horribly rushed, Won Sul getting turned into an ugly monster was pointless, and I know not why the two lead characters from two of the earlier Korean history arcs got shown bonding; later getting married after the slaughtering had ended. Thinking about, even the actual end of the ending made no sense, and added insult to injury. Why was a Munsu lookalike shown to be alive, holding Munsu's old medal? He'd just been shown to be happy with his beloved in some form of grassy heaven, so what was the point of suggesting he'd somehow returned from the dead, or had been reborn in order to continue to punish the corrupt? It stank of desperation; the writer seemingly having no idea how to end the story neatly. The fact that Chun got only one, rather pointless page, showing that she'd killed bandits after the end, also irked me since, as the second most important 'good guy', I expected her to get most of the time in the epilogue. Instead, Bang Ja got time, simply because Chun wasn't able to string a few sentences together. ...Actually, while on the subject of Munsu's medal, here's another issue I neglected to mention in my short 'n sweet opening post: Why on earth did Aji Tae give Munsu the medal that allowed him to summon 100 undead warriors? At that stage he'd already devoured the king, and all he did was give his ultimate enemy the power to fight. It's confused me ever since Aji Tae revealed the truth, and the incredibly vague 'I used you and your woman to devour one of my own kin; somehow sending him crazy by having you take a feather' explanation didn't help. The objective part of me feels that I should give SAO 7/10. But the artwork being up there with the best, the flashback arc living up to the build-up, and me knowing not of Korean history/fiction make it impossible for me to go lower than 8/10, in spite of the numerous complaints I have. After reading The Breaker, and seeing that enter into the mindless violence zone following lots of wonderful drama that got stolen from GTO, I can't help but wonder if most great Korean works still their ideas from others, cover it up with some added details and stunning artwork, and then fall apart once the theft stops, but I need to read more before being quite so critical. And, in the case of SAO, I can't say I mind a great deal when the stories covered, and the characters based on famous figures, moved me so much. |
Aironic said: When I was clicking through the non-stop battles fought between characters I cared not for, I couldn't help but think that the team behind SAO were pulling whatever they could think of out of their arses by that stage. The alliances between the opposing armies were horribly rushed, Won Sul getting turned into an ugly monster was pointless, and I know not why the two lead characters from two of the earlier Korean history arcs got shown bonding; later getting married after the slaughtering had ended. c/s all of this. Aironic said: Thinking about, even the actual end of the ending made no sense, and added insult to injury. Why was a Munsu lookalike shown to be alive, holding Munsu's old medal? He'd just been shown to be happy with his beloved in some form of grassy heaven, so what was the point of suggesting he'd somehow returned from the dead, or had been reborn in order to continue to punish the corrupt? It stank of desperation; the writer seemingly having no idea how to end the story neatly. The fact that Chun got only one, rather pointless page, showing that she'd killed bandits after the end, also irked me since, as the second most important 'good guy', I expected her to get most of the time in the epilogue. Instead, Bang Ja got time, simply because Chun wasn't able to string a few sentences together. Chun's end didn't bother me much since any hope she had of development as a character disappeared when Aji Tae got a hold of her, so seeing her going about defending people seemed like all she could do at that point Aironic said: ...Actually, while on the subject of Munsu's medal, here's another issue I neglected to mention in my short 'n sweet opening post: Why on earth did Aji Tae give Munsu the medal that allowed him to summon 100 undead warriors? At that stage he'd already devoured the king, and all he did was give his ultimate enemy the power to fight. It's confused me ever since Aji Tae revealed the truth, and the incredibly vague 'I used you and your woman to devour one of my own kin; somehow sending him crazy by having you take a feather' explanation didn't help. I hadn't even thought of that. What was the point of giving him the medal? I'm upset that Aji Tae went from the guy who "was the villain because he opposes the protagonist and ruined his life but in reality he's just pursuing a goal he finds noble through not-so-noble means" to "villain who set up his own ruin because instead of killing the biggest threat, he killed a buttload of people who had nothing to do with anything" Aironic said: The objective part of me feels that I should give SAO 7/10. But the artwork being up there with the best, the flashback arc living up to the build-up, and me knowing not of Korean history/fiction make it impossible for me to go lower than 8/10, in spite of the numerous complaints I have. I feel the exact same way. Although if half-points were allowed, I'd give it a 7.5/10. Aironic said: After reading The Breaker, and seeing that enter into the mindless violence zone following lots of wonderful drama that got stolen from GTO, I can't help but wonder if most great Korean works still their ideas from others, cover it up with some added details and stunning artwork, and then fall apart once the theft stops, but I need to read more before being quite so critical. And, in the case of SAO, I can't say I mind a great deal when the stories covered, and the characters based on famous figures, moved me so much. Yeah. This is my first experience with manhwa, so I definitely can't say all of them are like that either. I'm upset for that fact too, because it started off so well but then wtf bombs started falling from the sky and the plot was critically injured. It wouldn't hurt so bad if the art and history weren't so good. |
BlackPanelsJun 16, 2010 2:17 PM
| everything in the last Classic (Classic 21) disappointed me.. if they could have made 5 volumes to wrap up a good backstory of flashbacks (Classic 20, which is one of the things in the series i really loved), they shouldn't have wrapped up and end the main story in two volumes.. |
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