| As Gintama has recently become No.1 on MAL and is pretty much here to stay (until the next season), a lot of people question if Gintama really deserves that spot. Before anything else, Gintama is a comedy series and is pretty damn good at that. But people don't particularly buy that Gintama is No. 1 solely because of good comedy. I wouldn't say it's only because of comedy either. So begs the question, what about the other sides of Gintama? Does it actually have a good story? How does it handle serious arcs? Are the tearjerker Gintama episodes actually sad? Is it too shounen? It needs to handle all it's other aspects very well like characters and story to really be considered the No.1 anime. Discuss! |
| “Humankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost. That is alchemy's first law of Equivalent Exchange. In those days, we really believed that to be the world's one, and only, truth. But the world isn't perfect, and the law is incomplete..." -Alphonse Elric "Then and now, what I protect has never changed!" -Sakata Gintoki I'll take anything like The Pet Girl of Sakurasou. Anything as good as that. |
| I don't think there is anything wrong with something that is only good at one thing being number one in a irrelevant ranking site. A work doesn't need to be all encompassing. Being good at one aspect is more than good enough. It handles everything else other than comedy poorly imo. There is very few instances where I liked the show being serious, but at large is just feels dishonest, cringe worthy and frankly just boring. The problem with the serious arcs even if you ignore the comedic nature of the show is that they are uninspired and badly put together anyway. If Gintama was a straight shounen it would have been cancelled from Shounen Jump long ago, as it feels like it's just mixing up some rejected ideas from one shots manga with every battle manga cliche in the book. Ignoring the story itself it is just not interesting. Aside from Kagura's clan fight scenes everything else is just boring sword swings. I don't feel anything for these characters, the more I watch the show the more I realize I really don't like these people if they are not joking around. It hard to get invested emotionally into them when they are acting like idiots most of the time. So I don't really feel anything for kagura's past, or gintoki's past or the sister of the sadist guy. Or the seemingly larger amount of episodic characters that have a generic tearjerker backstory in their 1-3 episodes of screen time. Which another aspect I don't like, I can't feel anything to characters that are just introduced and the show wanted me to feel sorry for them and be moved of their sad past. The only character that is exempt for this is Madao, that's because I felt sorry for him since his first introduction. There is also the fact that some of his emotional episodes are still grounded in comedy, like that game show episode. So yeah I personally think the show is poor at literally everything except for comedy. 2/5 |
tsudecimoApr 4, 2016 9:43 PM
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| Nah.. kinda mediocre to take too seriously. I mean the fight always epic and it was nicely animated but by its content, it just your run of the mill battle shounen stories. And there's little impact that some of serious arc such as Okita Mitsuba, Prostitution arc, or Kintama contribute to the overall series aside from giving some characters some depth, yet they back to their original self at the next arc . Still.. at the end of the day one should or could tolerate this because Gintama is WSJ series by nature, but for me that still doesn't excuse that some of serious arcs are just plain boring. so yeah It's excellent comedy show with very clever variety of humor and likeable characters, but I'm not enjoy the rest of the content that much. Which is why the 201 episodes is still the best season for me because it much have humor than the rest. 2/5 |
DragonNoleApr 4, 2016 10:07 PM
| I'm too weird to live but much too rare to die. |
| the Kagura vs that one armed(at the time) yato guy when she went crazy was literally the only time anyone else got any serious screen time rest of the time it seriously shoehorns in Gintoki and Hijikata with everyone else on the sidelines after they get their brief time to get injured enough that they cant do anything but watch so yeah not so great |
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| Personally for me it handles everything amazingly. I don't think I'd have liked it as much if it was a comedy only. There's a fair amount of thinking put into anything the story presents. Sorachi planted the seeds long ago and today we are getting so many big reveals. I feel the drama is also one of the parts that Gintama is very good at. It doesn't try to overdo things and keep them to a minimum. I actually got into Gintama after seeing it in an AMV and I though well shit can get pretty serious in this one. And I was not disappointed, especially after watching the last two arcs which were probably one of the highest points in the series. I'm actually looking so much forward to the conclusion and I hope it continues to be just as good till the end. |
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| It handles the serious parts perfectly for a shounen series. Goofy comedy and situations that characters often find themselves in are exactly the reason why serious arcs have more impact than they would in a regular shounen series IMO. Of course, comedy is still the main strong point of Gintama, but there is an overarching serious plot and it's being revealed bits by bits over the course of the series. As for the characters, they develop subtly and slowly. Gintama has a wide array of great characters and incorporates them geniously. It puts them in most ridiculous situations and makes the most out of their personalities and quirks. For me, it deserves the spots it's holding in this list. Again, this is a shounen series. For a shounen series, the serious arcs are done extremelly well and frankly, for a series whose strongest point isn't seriousness, it's more than enough. |
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| i don't find it spectacular, but i don't find it particulary bad either. the character carry all of them thou. |
 "If taking responsibility for a mistake that cannot be undone means death, it's not that hard to die. At least, not as hard as to live on." |
| pretty much what tsudecimo and Luxus said. The comedy makes it one of my all time favorites but the serious arcs are pretty weak. The fights are alright but you can only get so far with just sword swinging and blood flying everywhere. The tragic backstories are also alright but it's hard for me to feel anything when it's only relevant once every 50 episodes, if not irrelevant altogether. Still though, I liked Yoshiwara and Shinsengumi Crisis, so 3/5. btw, "It's shonen" isn't an excuse; there are plenty of great serious shonen arcs that are better than Gintama's ones. |
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GaryMuffuginOak said: Does it actually have a good story? Yes. It legitimately has one of the top tier plots in Shonen history. Especially in the modern era. How does it handle serious arcs? There are the odd couple that are average, but the high majority of them are 4-5/5. And then there are a certain two arcs which are two of the greatest completed arcs in Shonen. Are the tearjerker Gintama episodes actually sad? Unquestionably. The deaths can be compared to the saddest ones you've seen in anime (as a whole). Is it too shounen? To the extent that when it executes the Shonen tropes, it becomes a quintessence of that demographic. Therefore, the poll is evidently accurate; besides comedy, it handles every genre & theme it sets out to actualise to superlative standards. |
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| Just like the comments above, the keyword is cringeworthy. sometimes the characters are just too serious, they often forgot that they're just a joke. some dialouges are just too out of character.The comedies are very funny, of course it's one of the best sitcom i've ever seen, on par with friends. Just friends has better serious arcs, they can be serieous without forgetting who they are. |
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F12x8 said: Just like the comments above, the keyword is cringeworthy. sometimes the characters are just too serious, they often forgot that they're just a joke. some dialouges are just too out of character.The comedies are very funny, of course it's one of the best sitcom i've ever seen, on par with friends. Just friends has better serious arcs, they can be serieous without forgetting who they are. Weird comparison to Friends but I agree. It's more like Friends doesn't go from joking around to melodrama in a heartbeat. Which is what Gintama does, from joking around to supposed life and death situations. I agree about the dialogue as well. This is especially true for Gintoki. Sometimes in serious arcs during his speeches and such I keep waiting for the joke because what he says is too cheesy and melodramatic to be taken seriously. Feels like Gintoki is playing a role in a dramatic play or something -shrug- |
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| Judging from the last 2 arcs, pretty fucking well. Better than some of the non-comedy anime for sure. But this opinion might be because I'm a fanboy. |
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| I think Gintama handle everything very well. I think is not right to compare Gintama only about arcs. Everything that happens in these arcs and even in the episode-only will affect what will happen in the future. It shows how strong the characters bonds become with differents situations - since from comedy to drama. It interesting how they try to maintain these bonds with the adversity and the changes that is occuring in their period. And these changes that is happening since the beginning of the series in a subtle way, that will accumulate to create a great change. The characters in Gintama, try to live maintaining their values in a period where everything is changing. The battles in Gintama is very precise and it can be very short and intense, because the characters use their abilities plus their intelligence to try to overcome their enemies. Gintama can in a episode go to a great comedy to a great tragedy and drama. The characters are very well explored (one of the best thing in this anime is the cast of characters, and the seiyuus that are incredibles in their characters). In the comedy, is already known that Gintama is one of the most funny animes. But Gintama can show, in a comedy tone many different ways of social and political problems. I think it's a good anime to watch to have a good laughs, but it have one of the best plots of all, if considering the whole work. |
| The non-comedy elements of Gintama certainly aren't bad but... they're generally very average. Compared to how good the comedy is, it's definitely the series' greatest weakness, and not something you should ever start watching it for The latest season changes this trend a bit however as starting from episode 301 it actually starts having a lot greater consequences to its serious arcs, and with that it suddenly starts feeling a lot more meaningful. I still think the comedy episodes are better but I was totally fine with the last two arcs of this season at least, which is more than I can say for most of them historically speaking To me, Gintama has always been in the 8-10 range as a comedy but more like 5-6 as a serious show (hence why I don't like Enchousen as much as the other entries) |
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| Just like 90% of Gintama's comedy is aimed at 12 year old boys, so's the action. It's so generic shonen tier that you could watch literally any of the shonen arcs in basically any other shonen ever made, which is something you're honestly better off doing in the first place. Gintama just likes to pretend they're deep and extra serious by making them incredibly convoluted. There's also the fact that these arcs try to be "serious" but then still have the same toilet humour the rest of the show thrives on literally a sentence after what was supposed to be a meaningful tearjerker moment, which... isn't how putting serious material into a comedy is meant to work. |
straggy said: "12 year old boys". Oh boy, you wouldn't believe but majority of the fan-base is not even male. And while not sure, majority of the fandom falls in the 15-25 year old ranges. It's also quite popular among middle-ages Japanese women.Just like 90% of Gintama's comedy is aimed at 12 year old boys, so's the action. It's so generic shonen tier that you could watch literally any of the shonen arcs in basically any other shonen ever made, which is something you're honestly better off doing in the first place. Gintama just likes to pretend they're deep and extra serious by making them incredibly convoluted. There's also the fact that these arcs try to be "serious" but then still have the same toilet humour the rest of the show thrives on literally a sentence after what was supposed to be a meaningful tearjerker moment, which... isn't how putting serious material into a comedy is meant to work. |
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| Comedy is what Gintama excells at, the serious arcs are a hit or miss, but nothing that drags it down alot. There are some great ones like Yoshiwara in Flames, Shinsengumi Crisis, 4 Devas etc. but there are also some pretty bad/average ones like the Spider arc, Benizakura etc. |
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CG-Silver said: straggy said: "12 year old boys". Oh boy, you wouldn't believe but majority of the fan-base is not even male. And while not sure, majority of the fandom falls in the 15-25 year old ranges. It's also quite popular among middle-ages Japanese women.Just like 90% of Gintama's comedy is aimed at 12 year old boys, so's the action. It's so generic shonen tier that you could watch literally any of the shonen arcs in basically any other shonen ever made, which is something you're honestly better off doing in the first place. Gintama just likes to pretend they're deep and extra serious by making them incredibly convoluted. There's also the fact that these arcs try to be "serious" but then still have the same toilet humour the rest of the show thrives on literally a sentence after what was supposed to be a meaningful tearjerker moment, which... isn't how putting serious material into a comedy is meant to work. Oh boy, you wouldn't believe but who a show is aimed at and who actually watches it are capable of being two different things. Shoujo are aimed at teen girls but that doesn't mean only teen girls watch it - the same thing happens for shonen. Nice try at being condescending though. |
straggy said: CG-Silver said: "12 year old boys". Oh boy, you wouldn't believe but majority of the fan-base is not even male. And while not sure, majority of the fandom falls in the 15-25 year old ranges. It's also quite popular among middle-ages Japanese women. Oh boy, you wouldn't believe but who a show is aimed at and who actually watches it are capable of being two different things. Shoujo are aimed at teen girls but that doesn't mean only teen girls watch it - the same thing happens for shonen. Nice try at being condescending though. So you're saying a show aimed at 12 year olds is watched mostly by those who it isn't even targeted at and those 12 year olds don't even make up more than 10-15% of the fan-base? Well by your logic Seinen must be watched by 12 year olds whereas shoujo must be mostly watched by male audience. Comedy isn't aimed at a certain age group, rather certain type of people who find the comedy style funny, age isn't a factor in this one. |
CG-SilverApr 6, 2016 6:10 PM
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CG-Silver said: straggy said: Oh boy, you wouldn't believe but who a show is aimed at and who actually watches it are capable of being two different things. Shoujo are aimed at teen girls but that doesn't mean only teen girls watch it - the same thing happens for shonen. Nice try at being condescending though. So you're saying a show aimed at 12 year olds is watched mostly by those who it isn't even targeted at and those 12 year olds don't even make up more than 10-15% of the fan-base? Well by your logic Seinen must be watched by 12 year olds whereas shoujo must be mostly watched by male audience. Comedy isn't aimed at a certain age group, rather certain type of people who find the comedy style funny, age isn't a factor in this one. You are complicating what she said. Her point was simple, just because something is watched by a certain group doesn't change the fact what the original target audience is. For example Haikyuu has a 65% female fans in Japan, doesn't change the fact that it's target audience are boys. So they are two different things. Her whole point is that Gintama's comedy is immature, whether it's fanbase are 12 year old boys is besides the point. So you citing that there are female and old fans doesn't affect her point since she is talking about what the comedy is aimed at. |
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| I actually like the non-comedy stuff they do better than the comedy stuff they do, which sometimes is too tasteless for me, or just didn't manage to be that funny. |
| Be thankful for the wisdom granted to you. |
tsudecimo said: I don't think there is anything wrong with something that is only good at one thing being number one in a irrelevant ranking site. A work doesn't need to be all encompassing. Being good at one aspect is more than good enough. It handles everything else other than comedy poorly imo. There is very few instances where I liked the show being serious, but at large is just feels dishonest, cringe worthy and frankly just boring. The problem with the serious arcs even if you ignore the comedic nature of the show is that they are uninspired and badly put together anyway. If Gintama was a straight shounen it would have been cancelled from Shounen Jump long ago, as it feels like it's just mixing up some rejected ideas from one shots manga with every battle manga cliche in the book. Ignoring the story itself it is just not interesting. Aside from Kagura's clan fight scenes everything else is just boring sword swings. I don't feel anything for these characters, the more I watch the show the more I realize I really don't like these people if they are not joking around. It hard to get invested emotionally into them when they are acting like idiots most of the time. So I don't really feel anything for kagura's past, or gintoki's past or the sister of the sadist guy. Or the seemingly larger amount of episodic characters that have a generic tearjerker backstory in their 1-3 episodes of screen time. Which another aspect I don't like, I can't feel anything to characters that are just introduced and the show wanted me to feel sorry for them and be moved of their sad past. The only character that is exempt for this is Madao, that's because I felt sorry for him since his first introduction. There is also the fact that some of his emotional episodes are still grounded in comedy, like that game show episode. So yeah I personally think the show is poor at literally everything except for comedy. 2/5 Agreed with this. Even in comedy, Gintama often fails. But those are episodes in which Gintama is trying to put some new random character who may or may not appear again in the series such as some random alien, a foreign invader etc, you get the point. Gintama is excellent only, and only, when it tries to do comedy utilizing its main cast. For example the episodes casting Gintoki and Hijikata alone - now that's where Gintama is perfect. Gintama's main cast is strong from a comedic point of view but it's a shame that it seldom utilizes it. |
tsudecimo said: CG-Silver said: So you're saying a show aimed at 12 year olds is watched mostly by those who it isn't even targeted at and those 12 year olds don't even make up more than 10-15% of the fan-base? Well by your logic Seinen must be watched by 12 year olds whereas shoujo must be mostly watched by male audience. Comedy isn't aimed at a certain age group, rather certain type of people who find the comedy style funny, age isn't a factor in this one. You are complicating what she said. Her point was simple, just because something is watched by a certain group doesn't change the fact what the original target audience is. For example Haikyuu has a 65% female fans in Japan, doesn't change the fact that it's target audience are boys. So they are two different things. Her whole point is that Gintama's comedy is immature, whether it's fanbase are 12 year old boys is besides the point. So you citing that there are female and old fans doesn't affect her point since she is talking about what the comedy is aimed at. What would you define as a comedy anime for mature audience? |
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idk, something like Sazae-san? |
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Sazae-san I guess is a family show so it can be for any age group. I believe Gintama also has some adult themes such as Yoshiwara and some basic Japanese history and a bit of politics thrown in. All of the previous bloody fights also aren't directed towards kids. Something more suitable for kids would be Naruto because of the super power themes and Naruto's childish character to relate to and somehow be inspired by it. I can pretty much take an example from myself when 6 years ago I started Gintama and I couldn't even relate to the lazy characters or the boring world setting. I also didn't find the comedy funny at the time. I did ended up dropping it at that time but now I can pretty much relate to the characters lazy nature and their imperfection. |
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CG-Silver said: Sazae-san I guess is a family show so it can be for any age group. I believe Gintama also has some adult themes such as Yoshiwara and some basic Japanese history and a bit of politics thrown in. All of the previous bloody fights also aren't directed towards kids. Something more suitable for kids would be Naruto because of the super power themes and Naruto's childish character to relate to and somehow be inspired by it. I can pretty much take an example from myself when 6 years ago I started Gintama and I couldn't even relate to the lazy characters or the boring world setting. I also didn't find the comedy funny at the time. I did ended up dropping it at that time but now I can pretty much relate to the characters lazy nature and their imperfection. ... I don't think you are getting it. It's target audience is boys (12-18. Aka Shounen). That's it. |
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tsudecimo said: CG-Silver said: Sazae-san I guess is a family show so it can be for any age group. I believe Gintama also has some adult themes such as Yoshiwara and some basic Japanese history and a bit of politics thrown in. All of the previous bloody fights also aren't directed towards kids. Something more suitable for kids would be Naruto because of the super power themes and Naruto's childish character to relate to and somehow be inspired by it. I can pretty much take an example from myself when 6 years ago I started Gintama and I couldn't even relate to the lazy characters or the boring world setting. I also didn't find the comedy funny at the time. I did ended up dropping it at that time but now I can pretty much relate to the characters lazy nature and their imperfection. ... I don't think you are getting it. It's target audience is boys (12-18. Aka Shounen). That's it. Yes, that was my point. That the target range isn't limited to 12, rather 12-18 like you mentioned. |
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| I give it 9.5/10, the thing I like about the fighting scenes in Gintama probably is that they have stories in between, and how it all connect to the fight, the serious scenes are on seinen level, not shounen like people talked about |
“The greatest crimes in the world are not committed by people breaking the rules but by people following the rules. It's people who follow orders that drop bombs and massacre villages.” -Bansky  |
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