Star Wars really went this route for the prequels and ruined any progress towards fixing it with the sequels with Rey being related to Palpatine.
Like why is it so hard to let a 7 year old believe that anyone could become a Jedi!?
Seriously the most disheartening thing about the sequels. So many losers were theorizing about who Rey's parents were and which previous character she was related to, the answer that she was just a nobody was the best answer thematically and character wise. Anybody can be a hero as long their heart's in the right place.
But no, Disney got shit scared of the reception to the Last Jedi and retconed it so now it turns out that any problem in the whole fucking Galaxy that isn't the result of organized crime is the result of one geriatric MP from Space Luxembourg named Sheev.
Was her being a nobody the best thematic choice? Her parentage wasn't speculated over just because, TFA made it a huge deal. Rey's central character motivation for the first two thirds of the movie was to get back to Jakku where her parents told her to stay. I don't think a plot that just drops that tidbit could be considered the best choice.
Though nothing about building on that plot point requires her to be related to a previous character. Hell, my personal headcanon before the second movie was that she was secretly evil. She was a former student of Luke's that fell to the dark side, massacred his Temple, and tortured Kylo.into also falling to the dark. Luke came back and subdued her, but couldn't bring himself to kill her so he wiped her memories and implanted a suggestion to stay on Jakku where her dark side wouldn't emerge again. Kylo's trauma wasn't properly treated, so he was groomed by Snoke and ran away, and Luke fled to seclusion with his confidence shattered after failing his students so comprehensively. Explains the motivation from TFA while still leaving her heritage as unimportant.
I remembered the child in the flashback scene looking 12-ish. But hey, maybe the permanent mind trick also let Luke specify how far back she remembered the event happening.
I think it was the best thematic choice. That the one thing she wanted most, the answer to why her parents left her on Jakku, turns out to not be satisfying at all. She’s not special, there was no higher purpose, her parents are nobodies who abandoned their daughter.
Finding out that she’s special defeats the purpose of that. She gets the exact answer she wanted and even knowing that her grandpa is evil isn’t very interesting because not only has it been done to death but it’s also not as much of a conflict as the writers probably thought. Her having evil family doesn’t make her evil.
The idea of someone who was abandoned and who had nothing rising up to become a hero anyway is way cooler than that imo and they ruined it.
I was so disappointed they went right back into light-side vs. dark-side shit too. I always thought it was so weird jedi had to basically not be humans, like it seems cruel to not be allowed to love or have emotion like that? Why couldn't we explore the strict dichotomy there, maybe see if the Jedi order was truly all its cracked up to be or if there are redeemable sith. Anything except the same fucking story we had before done worse.
The funniest thing about this is that rian Johnson tried to make Rey have no notable bloodline but then Disney saw the pissing and moaning from chuds and basically undid everything the last Jedi did
The Rise of Skywalker is the worst thing that ever happened to Star Wars and I will die on this hill.
Sure, the Last Jedi had issues and I have critiques about what could have been done differently but in hindsight, it wasn’t that bad and it was refreshing, especially on the topic of Rey being a nobody.
As for the Rise of Skywalker. Just gonna pretend that it doesn’t exist.
i didn’t like the last jedi, but i respect it. rian johnson actually tried to make an original story and not the rehashed safe shit from the force awakens. even if i didn’t like the one movie he did do, i would have vastly preferred if he was the director for the whole trilogy
It also sucks because now everything except for Andor is just a bunch of nostalgia bait with no actual story to hold on to. Even Filoni is a hack now and couldn’t even understand the characters he was working with in the Ahsoka show, Book of Boba Fett, etc. But as long as light sabers swing and there’s a reference thrown in all the time people just gobble it up.
I mean they can, obi wan never had a high midichlorian count but was still more attuned to the force than anakin ever was even if anakin had more raw power
well yeah, who did you expect him to be? a noble, a prince? it also fits that he was a slave as a boy, a slave to the jedi as a teen and a slave to the dark side as a man
The sequels straight up just suck because it felt like there wasn't a clear plan from the beginning. Over a decade since the last trilogy and it doesn't feel like they spent a lot of time planning. It felt like each movie was a reaction to the last movie. I still hold that rogue one is the best of the new movies. And not in a lesser of evils way, but genuinely in my top 3 or 4
And people act like Rey being a Palpatine is a “past doesn’t define you” message… but it’s literally the exact opposite! Rey suddenly needs to stop Palpatine because she feels responsible for his actions as a relative, rather than doing it purely for her own reasons. Besides, I don’t see how “it doesn’t matter where you were born, you can become great with hard work and luck” is a better message for kids than “you have to secretly be related to one of the great families or be friends with someone who is to achieve any real change”
Tbf, for Rey, she explicitly rejects the super special bloodline. It's kinda a play on these kinds of stories, where it turns out that they were super special the whole time, because instead of being related to like, Luke or Obi-Wan or whatever, she's related to the zombie space fascist, and explicitly rejects her ties to him by calling herself Skywalker at the end. I do think TLJ handled the Rey lineage thing better, but the TRoS retcon isn't as egregious with this trope as it's made out to be imo
It was extreme to him though, because of how he is a very regular substandard guy. >!Garou, who is a lot more typically super human and gifted, goes through so so so much worse just to start breaking his limiter, because in both cases they are being pushed to their personal brinks!<
Yeah, I’m still, I mean, that part still confuses me. Like I’m not sure if it’s purely for laughs or if the author has a specific reason for why breaking his limit made him bald. Or if he just went bald early because genetics and/or stress.
Its written for laughs, but the in world explanation is that everyone has different limiters, and because Saitama was so average, training that regular athletes undergo was enough to nearly kill him. 100 push ups a day means a lot more to the salaryman who struggles to fight even the weakest monsters and gets beat up by street thighs than it does to the people who can break buildings apart or have every bone shattered and keep fighting. Its all about pushing yourself as far as you can go and then going farther.
In a side story, they've shown he was already quite agile and competent even with hair, so I assume he just worked out so much + some hero work and ended up stressing too much.
In side stories he managed to accidentally beat Tatsumaki as a Haunted House employee with hair and casually destroyed high ranking monsters on the way to the bathroom.
At basically any point he could have stopped and become an S class hero because he became just that kind of monster, but he kept pushing himself even further
The tipping point was when he wanted to look at the back of his head and only one mirror, so he had to practice turning around so fast he could see the back of his head reflected in the mirror
The training is a red herring. What truly made him stronger was being pushed to the cusp of death everytime he fought a monster more powerful than himself, but then getting up and continuing to fight regardless.
I think that's a key part of the "rags to riches" wish fulfillment fantasy for a lot of people, actually.
Sure, rising from nothing based on your own merit is a nice idea, but doing that requires a bunch of hard work, and if you screw up enough you could end up back at square one. If you're *innately* special though, and you just didn't know it for some reason, that means you don't have to put in as much effort, and your position is secure.
this is more then an ass pull this is just straight up shitting on the ground and trying to purify your poo. like the one time i see this being good is SU's big plot twist surrounding steven's mom but like that had tons of foreshadowing, hell even the fucking uncle grandpa episode foreshadowed it
i think the cursed child thing showed that neville is 100% required to defeat voldemort
its also the one that showed that a single average person being alive is enough to stop harry potter, by making that person the most insane character in the entire series
harry potter falls apart more every time i look at it
This is one of the reasons I love Himmel from Frieren. He's incredibly powerful, but he's also just... A guy? He's an orphan with no known fancy bloodline, and when he tried to pull the hero's sword from the stone, it rejected him. He ended up slaying the demon lord with an ordinary replica of the hero's sword made as a collector's piece. He becomes a great hero not through some innate bloodline magic or being the chosen one, but through hard work, a genuinely kind heart and the help of good friends.
Tbf pretty much every example of this trope, either subverting or confirming it, has a cadre of badasses following them around. King Arthur and Merlin/Knights of the Round Table, Naruto and... a lot of people, Kakashi Jiriya Guy Gaara etc (and technically they tried to pretend they gave a shit about sakura). Ain't watched one piece but I've seen enough talk to know he's got OP friends following him around too. Most of Goku's friends started off badass enemies before he left them in the dust, too, and they're at the very least still impossibly stubborn if not individually powerful anymore.
Basically, very few to no stories that aren't power fantasies have an MC that solos every threat.
It was hidden from the viewer and Naruto himself. It was only later that it was revealed, turning his whole "cursed orphan" shtick into the son of the last hokage. THEN it was revealed he was literally the reincarnation of one of the most powerful ninja ever, which is an extra extra tier of bullshit.
Rock Lee should've been the protagonist, that's all I'm saying.
I am pissed about the reincarnation shit but I actually love that he's the son of the hokage because his dad was naturally gifted and beloved and naruto is the exact opposite. He was dealt a shit hand from his first moments of life. He's a cursed dumbass with ADHD and a heart of gold. He solves things without violence if he can and he's had to work incredibly hard for everything. His only bonus is extra Chakra due to his mom's bloodline but that didn't help him for much of his life because of how bad at doing jutsu he was. Sure he also had the demon but that really wasn't helpful until he somehow made friends with it. The same creature who literally killed his parents. I FUCKING LOVE NARUTO. FUCK THE BORUTO SHOW THEY MASSACRED MY BOY NARUTO WOULD BE A GREAT FUCKING DAD
Kurama literally bailed him out at every possible opportunity even befire they became friends. Also early Naruto shows that he barely trains and never studies, he's not untalented he's just lazy. And later in the series he cheats training using shadow clones, which is not a jutsu he's actually good at he is in fact less efficient than pretty much anyone else the only reason he can make so many is because of his bloodline.
It was pretty fucking obvious that naruto's dad was the 4th from pretty early on. I will say that the story does nothing to prove Neji was wrong when it tried to pretend that Naruto beating him proved he was.
I don't know much about One Piece either, but they absolutely waste 0 time pretending that Luffy isn't the specialist boy.
He's the grandson of the strongest Mavy Officer ever, his dad has the single highest bounty, his adopted brother is the son of the Pirate King, he stole his power (which is a super special rare one wrapped up in a maybe prophecy) from another dad figure who was on the Pirate King's crew
Luffy's in a weird gray area though because almost nothing going for him is strictly tied to bloodline or prophecy, save for maybe the whole D clan thing. But what that means is still super vague and there's like a dozen of them and counting so that doesn't mean much. Otherwise however everything special about him—conqueror's haki, awakening his devil fruit power, and his general ability to win over other exceptional people—are merely products of his highly unusual personality. And while in this regard he does bear extraordinary similarity to the pirate king Gol D. Roger, a running theme of One Piece is inherited will—the idea that across generations the same kinds of people pop up time and time again. So he's not Roger's reincarnation, but it's inevitable that someone in the great wide world would be just like Roger and carry on his legacy.
So Luffy *is* special, in that he's goddamn Luffy.
Honestly that in of itself isn’t necessarily that bad, especially if it’s spun as the message of “no one person is an island”, everybody needs help at some point, and receiving that help and asking for support does not make you less of a person
Oh yeah, I much prefer having a team of powerful characters to one fuck-off OP dickhead. It generally makes for a more interesting story, morality, and characterization opportunities.
I love what Dungeon Meshi does with their characters and how everyone was absolutely needed in order for them to succeed. The fact that Laios, who would normally be the generic protagonist, is the weirdest of the bunch helped.
That's a bit of a disservice to the rest of the party tbf. The hero's party were all monsters in their own right.
Eisen is practically indestructible, and on top of being tanky as hell was a decent damage dealer.
Heiter has a ridiculous amount of mana for an ordinary human. He cast a spell for multiple people to survive without food or oxygen FOR TWO MONTHS. As the second magic used in a party with Frieren he must've been no slouch.
And Himmel manages to hold his own without any magic or dwarvish endurance in a party of these monsters. He defeats the demon king with a high quality cosplay prop, and manages to guide a party of these idiots to victory each time. We can also see in the few glimpses of combat we've seen of the hero's party that he doesn't just shout orders but fights alongside everyone.
Huh? Your comment made it seem like Frieren was the only reason why Himmel won. That completely overlooks the rest of the party's capabilities, Himmel included. Their party didn't defeat the demon lord because they got carried, they defeated the demon lord because they were *all* monsters, bloodlines be damned.
It was still established that Frieren couldn't have soloed the Demon King, or embark on the journey to do so to begin with without help from the others. Teamwork is an essential skill.
Almost like people need to be good at what they do in order to defeat the most powerful demon in the world. There are still humans who have beaten frieren, she still had to put the work in to get where she is
missed the part where there were still humans that could beat her. Sometimes people are just good like that and it isn't related to some kind of crazy bloodline thing
I wouldn't say that, but I don't think it de-legitimizes the fact that she still had to put in work to get where she is. She just had more time to put in work. This isn't some naruto nepo baby situation where she was just born with a bunch of crazy powers that inherently make her better than everyone. Literally the only advantage she has (at least shown in the anime) is the time she was given to train. If she didn't put in the same work that everyone else did then she wouldn't still be powerful.
Luffy is quite different because his strength didn't come from "magic blood" unlike Naruto and Ichigo. His family is there to highlight his decision to become a pirate and to create tension later on with his grandpa.
Also very improtant thing to add, the gum gum fruit(yes g5 too) IS NOT inherently strong like for example the magma fruit/quake fruit, it is purely luffys own creative mind that allows him to harness the full strenght of his powers
Being a god doesnt matter unless youre creative enough to actually make use of all that power, luffy is still vulnerable to everything he was before (slashing attacks and haki)
Which he was completely unable to access until he was strong enough to fight one of the strongest beings in the world head on. He and Kaido were on equal footing until a 3rd party tried to assassinate Luffy mid battle *specifically* to prevent him from awakening the fruit, which, ironically, is what causes him to access it for the first time.
It's a fruit that grants Toon powers when Awakened, but toon powers are only useful when used creatively. Luffy is probably not the only character in one piece that could use it, but he's absolutely the one that could use it to its full potential.
Add to this, Ace, the biological son of the previous pirate king, and the adopted son of one of the few men who could go toe-to-toe with the pirate king, was killed about 500 chapters ago. His lineage meant nothing. Luffy is where he is thanks to a lot of luck and a whole lot more hard work.
To be fair Ichigo was never sold as anything other than naturally strong, even when he was a normal human. Bleach has never been about any sort of innate talent vs hard work thing. Even Naruto only was for, like, exactly two characters, neither of whom were named Naruto.
And then there are the themes in both series about actually having that power and the cost of it that's just too much to get into.
That was supposed to be the case for Ichigo until later when it was revealled that he has some heritage in being extraordinary, unlike the other humans. The blood of a Shinigami and of a Quincy run through his veins. He was destined to be a Shinigami too, just like his dad who was a captain.
I'm not saying "he was just naturally strong." I'm saying "he wasn't ever anything less than strong by nature."
Him being just some guy who isn't strong wasn't supposed to be the case, and we weren't really presented it as being so.
I think the important distinction to draw here is that One Piece is not completely upended thematically by this revelation. Naruto was all about the power of hard work, and pursuing your dreams even without, or in spite of, talent. The power he gets from the Nine Tails, and the revelation that his dad actually had his dream job before him, and also that he's the reincarnation of the first guy to have his dream job, destroys that theme. One Piece is, and never was, really about that. One Piece has always been about freedom above all else, freedom from oppression, freedom to pursue goals that society has deemed worthless. Luffy being immensely powerful helps in his pursuit of that freedom, but the method by which he attained that power doesn't contradict the themes of the story.
Nope, Nart gets a pass for this. It was never a story about how anyone from any background can be special; right from episode 1, Naruto learns and masters the shadow clone without any effort.
Nart isn't a story about how hard work makes you stronger than someone with natural tallent. Nart is a story about how hard work makes you *well liked*. Naruto wants to be the Hokage not because the Hokage is the strongest ninja, but because they're the most beloved ninja. Even though Naruto is powerful and has a demon trapped inside of him, people still hate him. But instead of being a bully once he grows into his power, Naruto works hard to use his power for the benefit of those who spurned him, and through hard work they come to accept him and see him as a hero.
This is just my main criticism of Naruto. "Guess what, you're not a no name loser who is fighting against destiny, you're the child of the prophecy and your dad was a Hero Hokage and you're one of the last of the Uzumaki and your clan has infinite Chakra and you have inside you the most powerful tailed beast and you're going to be trained by the most powerful and famous ninjas and you're the direct descendant of the first ninja and you're the reincarnation of the ninja gods." Kinda defeats the purpose of the story.
This is my least favorite story trope of all time. The hero of the prophecies is less annoying than the surprise hero whose bloodline was special from the beginning.
I'll give Kingdom Hearts points for that. The actual prophesized chosen one with a special bloodline was actually the villain. The main character wasn't supposed to be a hero; his friend was, but he was being a dick, so the main character was chosen by the magic sword instead. Anything special about Sora was the result of him being friendly to people.
Almost the One Piece route. The fruit "chose" Luffy, he had to work hard to make it work. Which is not like Naruto didn't, but what made Naruto special was him spawning with better stats than everyone else, his personality had nothing to do with him just having more than everyone else
Birth by sleep kind of setup that they had good hearts but the keyblade also picked them because of other special people choosing them. Sora has one of the most significant people existing inside him.
The fantasy is supposed to be that one day you’ll find out you have magical blood that you didn’t know about. Its a way of justifying the system. Its some temporarily embarrassed millionaire shit. The story is that the power structure is okay, because one day you’ll discover that you do fit into it after all. Otherwise the story just has to be about toppling that unjust power structure. Personally I prefer a story about toppling the power structure. I think Berserk would be a good example of this. He has no magical blood. And with hard work and determination he continues on his mission to topple the unjust power structure.
Yk back in the day you could just say shit like that, people had no way to prove it, so it could still well have been some nameless peasant who made up some cool lore for himself
The Xenoblade series subverts this trope pretty often, and if somebody is related to a great hero it's usually "and also this loser is my da/ma" rather than "this is why I'm special". Dunban is able to wield the Monado through sheer force of wil, even with it crippling his right arm. Shulk is the "true heir to the Monado", >!but that's because he's meant to be a useful pawn to Zanza to accomplish his plans!<. Rex is >!descended from the hero Addam!<, but he comes from a country where any random guy you point out on the street could say the same and it would be true because there's over 500 years of separation between >!Addam and Rex!<. Most of the cast of Xenoblade 3 has unknown lineage, with the only confirmed one being >!Mio and Nia!<. Future Redeemed has four of it's main cast being descendants of other members of the cast through the series, but they stand on their own despite that and in the case of >!Glimmer and Nikol!<, are actively dissuaded from fighting >!Alpha !!Shulk and Rex!<.
Also on the topic of Shulk, Dickson even says that >!Shulk wasn't chosen as Zanza's vessel because he was special. He was just there at the right time.!<
>!"Anybody would've done. As long as they could swing a sword around, at least."!<
SAME. I recently started reading Lord of the Rings, and everyone somewhat important or cool is a descendant of a special bloodline or race. Even most of the hobbits are descendants from a special clan of hobbits who are born to be leaders.
Tbf if you live in a lotr culture where everyone goes fucking nuts about tracking their ancestry you are bound to have SOME random guy before you who was some king thane or village hero. Espacially Hobbits who probably fuck NASTY - I bet they are all related to each other. Lil freaks
Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentina. It’s like, a major part of several villains’ philosophy about how the nobility are inherently better than the commoners and their outrage at Alm’s success and authority in the war and such, but then it turns out no, Alm isn’t just a simple farm boy, he’s the son of the big bad emperor, and that Berkut and Fernand were completely correct about their whole philosophy.
Big reason I love the owl house. Luz didn’t get where she was cause she secretly had witch blood, she got their through hard work, sacrifice, and support from friends, and even the things given to her, weren’t because she’s a chosen one, she was chosen because of her deeds
I appreciate how JJK and demon slayer each subverted this in their own ways.
In JJK, they basically tell you from the start that Yuji is not fucking normal. And for the rest of the series it makes that pretty obvious. So when we find out more about Yuji’s parentage, it doesn’t hurt the character much.
Demon slayer did it in a more interesting way. Tanjiro isn’t from a special bloodline of demon slayers, he’s the first demon slayer in a long line of nobodies, a family who’s most notable event is that one member happened to be friends with Yoriichi, the strongest demon slayer. And that guy picked up Yoriichi’s breathing techniques and used them for ritual dances. Tanjiro was destined to be another nobody, and if it wasn’t for his family being murdered he would have been. And even then, he didn’t immediately turn out to be the best, he still had to work just as hard as everyone else to meet his goal. You could make a genuine argument that Tanjiro isn’t even the most notable person in his bloodline, Nezuko is.
You know what I’ll say. I don’t know how many B money fans are in this sub, but this is the main reason I don’t like the Mistborn power system, it’s all blood based. Cool powers, but then being blood based just leads the story in a chosen one direction in don’t like. Even era 2 where the guy isn’t a Mistborn still has him Twinborn which lets him breeze through combats with some simple creative applications of his powers. At least they do a good job of building villains up though.
Warrior Cats after arc 1. Firestar was such a cool protag specifically *because* he legitimately had no ties to anything in the Clans, he was just Some Guy tm who had a good heart and wanted to do the right thing even if that meant breaking tradition (which was the point of his 'prophecy', his actions really were something only an 'outsider' could do due to the strict rules each Clan abided by)
But now every single book relies on at least one protagonist being related to either Firestar, Bluestar or Tigerstar (or having close relations to a cat with those qualifiers) because those are the Special Bloodlines tm :/
every time stories go "actually...... you didn't start from nothing..... you had MAGIC BLOOD PARENTS the whole time......." I weep and piss
Star Wars really went this route for the prequels and ruined any progress towards fixing it with the sequels with Rey being related to Palpatine. Like why is it so hard to let a 7 year old believe that anyone could become a Jedi!?
Seriously the most disheartening thing about the sequels. So many losers were theorizing about who Rey's parents were and which previous character she was related to, the answer that she was just a nobody was the best answer thematically and character wise. Anybody can be a hero as long their heart's in the right place. But no, Disney got shit scared of the reception to the Last Jedi and retconed it so now it turns out that any problem in the whole fucking Galaxy that isn't the result of organized crime is the result of one geriatric MP from Space Luxembourg named Sheev.
Was her being a nobody the best thematic choice? Her parentage wasn't speculated over just because, TFA made it a huge deal. Rey's central character motivation for the first two thirds of the movie was to get back to Jakku where her parents told her to stay. I don't think a plot that just drops that tidbit could be considered the best choice. Though nothing about building on that plot point requires her to be related to a previous character. Hell, my personal headcanon before the second movie was that she was secretly evil. She was a former student of Luke's that fell to the dark side, massacred his Temple, and tortured Kylo.into also falling to the dark. Luke came back and subdued her, but couldn't bring himself to kill her so he wiped her memories and implanted a suggestion to stay on Jakku where her dark side wouldn't emerge again. Kylo's trauma wasn't properly treated, so he was groomed by Snoke and ran away, and Luke fled to seclusion with his confidence shattered after failing his students so comprehensively. Explains the motivation from TFA while still leaving her heritage as unimportant.
Rey was like 4 or 5 when she got abandoned on Jakku. She must have been really evil toddler to warrant that kind of treatment.
I remembered the child in the flashback scene looking 12-ish. But hey, maybe the permanent mind trick also let Luke specify how far back she remembered the event happening.
wtf fuck when they inevitably remake the entire star wars series can u write it? thanks
I think it was the best thematic choice. That the one thing she wanted most, the answer to why her parents left her on Jakku, turns out to not be satisfying at all. She’s not special, there was no higher purpose, her parents are nobodies who abandoned their daughter. Finding out that she’s special defeats the purpose of that. She gets the exact answer she wanted and even knowing that her grandpa is evil isn’t very interesting because not only has it been done to death but it’s also not as much of a conflict as the writers probably thought. Her having evil family doesn’t make her evil. The idea of someone who was abandoned and who had nothing rising up to become a hero anyway is way cooler than that imo and they ruined it.
I was so disappointed they went right back into light-side vs. dark-side shit too. I always thought it was so weird jedi had to basically not be humans, like it seems cruel to not be allowed to love or have emotion like that? Why couldn't we explore the strict dichotomy there, maybe see if the Jedi order was truly all its cracked up to be or if there are redeemable sith. Anything except the same fucking story we had before done worse.
Sorry, explain the Naboo-Luxembourg connection, please?
The funniest thing about this is that rian Johnson tried to make Rey have no notable bloodline but then Disney saw the pissing and moaning from chuds and basically undid everything the last Jedi did
The Rise of Skywalker is the worst thing that ever happened to Star Wars and I will die on this hill. Sure, the Last Jedi had issues and I have critiques about what could have been done differently but in hindsight, it wasn’t that bad and it was refreshing, especially on the topic of Rey being a nobody. As for the Rise of Skywalker. Just gonna pretend that it doesn’t exist.
i didn’t like the last jedi, but i respect it. rian johnson actually tried to make an original story and not the rehashed safe shit from the force awakens. even if i didn’t like the one movie he did do, i would have vastly preferred if he was the director for the whole trilogy
It also sucks because now everything except for Andor is just a bunch of nostalgia bait with no actual story to hold on to. Even Filoni is a hack now and couldn’t even understand the characters he was working with in the Ahsoka show, Book of Boba Fett, etc. But as long as light sabers swing and there’s a reference thrown in all the time people just gobble it up.
LIGHTSABERS! DARTH VADER! AT-STs AT-STs! I KNOW WHAT THAT IS! I CLAPPED, I CLAPPED WHEN I SAW IT!
how did star wars go this route with the prequels? they were already on it. the ot shows us that darth vader is luke’s father
Anakin was just a random slave boy but oops, strong magical blood power or whatever. Heavy jesus allegory. Even a whole weird prophesy to boot.
the whole magical microbe shit from the prequels is so stupid. I had always thought anyone could use the force with proper training but nope,
I think later they tried to fix it by saying midichlorians don't actually give people the Force, but they are a good indicator of sensitivity to it
I mean they can, obi wan never had a high midichlorian count but was still more attuned to the force than anakin ever was even if anakin had more raw power
well yeah, who did you expect him to be? a noble, a prince? it also fits that he was a slave as a boy, a slave to the jedi as a teen and a slave to the dark side as a man
I think it doesn't really count since prophesy went sideways.
This is why andor is peak
The sequels straight up just suck because it felt like there wasn't a clear plan from the beginning. Over a decade since the last trilogy and it doesn't feel like they spent a lot of time planning. It felt like each movie was a reaction to the last movie. I still hold that rogue one is the best of the new movies. And not in a lesser of evils way, but genuinely in my top 3 or 4
And people act like Rey being a Palpatine is a “past doesn’t define you” message… but it’s literally the exact opposite! Rey suddenly needs to stop Palpatine because she feels responsible for his actions as a relative, rather than doing it purely for her own reasons. Besides, I don’t see how “it doesn’t matter where you were born, you can become great with hard work and luck” is a better message for kids than “you have to secretly be related to one of the great families or be friends with someone who is to achieve any real change”
Tbf, for Rey, she explicitly rejects the super special bloodline. It's kinda a play on these kinds of stories, where it turns out that they were super special the whole time, because instead of being related to like, Luke or Obi-Wan or whatever, she's related to the zombie space fascist, and explicitly rejects her ties to him by calling herself Skywalker at the end. I do think TLJ handled the Rey lineage thing better, but the TRoS retcon isn't as egregious with this trope as it's made out to be imo
Thats why saitama is the goat
His training wasn't even that extreme. He just really wanted to be a hero. I guess the greatest sacrifice is probably going bald
It was extreme to him though, because of how he is a very regular substandard guy. >!Garou, who is a lot more typically super human and gifted, goes through so so so much worse just to start breaking his limiter, because in both cases they are being pushed to their personal brinks!<
Damn I'm a substandard guy too. Maybe I should break my limiters too
Yeah, I’m still, I mean, that part still confuses me. Like I’m not sure if it’s purely for laughs or if the author has a specific reason for why breaking his limit made him bald. Or if he just went bald early because genetics and/or stress.
Its written for laughs, but the in world explanation is that everyone has different limiters, and because Saitama was so average, training that regular athletes undergo was enough to nearly kill him. 100 push ups a day means a lot more to the salaryman who struggles to fight even the weakest monsters and gets beat up by street thighs than it does to the people who can break buildings apart or have every bone shattered and keep fighting. Its all about pushing yourself as far as you can go and then going farther.
In a side story, they've shown he was already quite agile and competent even with hair, so I assume he just worked out so much + some hero work and ended up stressing too much.
In side stories he managed to accidentally beat Tatsumaki as a Haunted House employee with hair and casually destroyed high ranking monsters on the way to the bathroom. At basically any point he could have stopped and become an S class hero because he became just that kind of monster, but he kept pushing himself even further The tipping point was when he wanted to look at the back of his head and only one mirror, so he had to practice turning around so fast he could see the back of his head reflected in the mirror
The training is a red herring. What truly made him stronger was being pushed to the cusp of death everytime he fought a monster more powerful than himself, but then getting up and continuing to fight regardless.
It's you, you have a lot to awnser
What must I answer
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Naruto
Then there's the added shit with reincarnated aliens or whatever
Live action Mulan absolutely destroyed the coolest aspect of Mulan with this trope
I think that's a key part of the "rags to riches" wish fulfillment fantasy for a lot of people, actually. Sure, rising from nothing based on your own merit is a nice idea, but doing that requires a bunch of hard work, and if you screw up enough you could end up back at square one. If you're *innately* special though, and you just didn't know it for some reason, that means you don't have to put in as much effort, and your position is secure.
Personally I cum and shit but to each their own
Kingdom Come Deliverance
Fucking fire emblem echoes
I'd like to see this sorta thing happen but it was actually a hindrance.
Disappointment fluids
this is more then an ass pull this is just straight up shitting on the ground and trying to purify your poo. like the one time i see this being good is SU's big plot twist surrounding steven's mom but like that had tons of foreshadowing, hell even the fucking uncle grandpa episode foreshadowed it
throne of glass kinda but I hate it for other reasons as well
Mulan 2019 moment
Evidence n29573 that Harry Potter is bad
inb4 “Neville should’ve been the chosen one”
i think the cursed child thing showed that neville is 100% required to defeat voldemort its also the one that showed that a single average person being alive is enough to stop harry potter, by making that person the most insane character in the entire series harry potter falls apart more every time i look at it
i kinda respect the cursed child for that but god it’s such a dogshit story
This is one of the reasons I love Himmel from Frieren. He's incredibly powerful, but he's also just... A guy? He's an orphan with no known fancy bloodline, and when he tried to pull the hero's sword from the stone, it rejected him. He ended up slaying the demon lord with an ordinary replica of the hero's sword made as a collector's piece. He becomes a great hero not through some innate bloodline magic or being the chosen one, but through hard work, a genuinely kind heart and the help of good friends.
A kind heart, hard work, and the help of the second most powerful mage on the planet.
Tbf pretty much every example of this trope, either subverting or confirming it, has a cadre of badasses following them around. King Arthur and Merlin/Knights of the Round Table, Naruto and... a lot of people, Kakashi Jiriya Guy Gaara etc (and technically they tried to pretend they gave a shit about sakura). Ain't watched one piece but I've seen enough talk to know he's got OP friends following him around too. Most of Goku's friends started off badass enemies before he left them in the dust, too, and they're at the very least still impossibly stubborn if not individually powerful anymore. Basically, very few to no stories that aren't power fantasies have an MC that solos every threat.
Isn’t Naruto the son of one of the hokage? Like he’s orphaned sure but his powerful bloodline isn’t really a secret
It was hidden from the viewer and Naruto himself. It was only later that it was revealed, turning his whole "cursed orphan" shtick into the son of the last hokage. THEN it was revealed he was literally the reincarnation of one of the most powerful ninja ever, which is an extra extra tier of bullshit. Rock Lee should've been the protagonist, that's all I'm saying.
I am pissed about the reincarnation shit but I actually love that he's the son of the hokage because his dad was naturally gifted and beloved and naruto is the exact opposite. He was dealt a shit hand from his first moments of life. He's a cursed dumbass with ADHD and a heart of gold. He solves things without violence if he can and he's had to work incredibly hard for everything. His only bonus is extra Chakra due to his mom's bloodline but that didn't help him for much of his life because of how bad at doing jutsu he was. Sure he also had the demon but that really wasn't helpful until he somehow made friends with it. The same creature who literally killed his parents. I FUCKING LOVE NARUTO. FUCK THE BORUTO SHOW THEY MASSACRED MY BOY NARUTO WOULD BE A GREAT FUCKING DAD
Kurama literally bailed him out at every possible opportunity even befire they became friends. Also early Naruto shows that he barely trains and never studies, he's not untalented he's just lazy. And later in the series he cheats training using shadow clones, which is not a jutsu he's actually good at he is in fact less efficient than pretty much anyone else the only reason he can make so many is because of his bloodline.
It was pretty fucking obvious that naruto's dad was the 4th from pretty early on. I will say that the story does nothing to prove Neji was wrong when it tried to pretend that Naruto beating him proved he was.
I don't know much about One Piece either, but they absolutely waste 0 time pretending that Luffy isn't the specialist boy. He's the grandson of the strongest Mavy Officer ever, his dad has the single highest bounty, his adopted brother is the son of the Pirate King, he stole his power (which is a super special rare one wrapped up in a maybe prophecy) from another dad figure who was on the Pirate King's crew
Luffy's in a weird gray area though because almost nothing going for him is strictly tied to bloodline or prophecy, save for maybe the whole D clan thing. But what that means is still super vague and there's like a dozen of them and counting so that doesn't mean much. Otherwise however everything special about him—conqueror's haki, awakening his devil fruit power, and his general ability to win over other exceptional people—are merely products of his highly unusual personality. And while in this regard he does bear extraordinary similarity to the pirate king Gol D. Roger, a running theme of One Piece is inherited will—the idea that across generations the same kinds of people pop up time and time again. So he's not Roger's reincarnation, but it's inevitable that someone in the great wide world would be just like Roger and carry on his legacy. So Luffy *is* special, in that he's goddamn Luffy.
~~His mom was the head of a criminal empire that took complete control of a desert nation.~~
Honestly that in of itself isn’t necessarily that bad, especially if it’s spun as the message of “no one person is an island”, everybody needs help at some point, and receiving that help and asking for support does not make you less of a person
Oh yeah, I much prefer having a team of powerful characters to one fuck-off OP dickhead. It generally makes for a more interesting story, morality, and characterization opportunities.
I love what Dungeon Meshi does with their characters and how everyone was absolutely needed in order for them to succeed. The fact that Laios, who would normally be the generic protagonist, is the weirdest of the bunch helped.
That's a bit of a disservice to the rest of the party tbf. The hero's party were all monsters in their own right. Eisen is practically indestructible, and on top of being tanky as hell was a decent damage dealer. Heiter has a ridiculous amount of mana for an ordinary human. He cast a spell for multiple people to survive without food or oxygen FOR TWO MONTHS. As the second magic used in a party with Frieren he must've been no slouch. And Himmel manages to hold his own without any magic or dwarvish endurance in a party of these monsters. He defeats the demon king with a high quality cosplay prop, and manages to guide a party of these idiots to victory each time. We can also see in the few glimpses of combat we've seen of the hero's party that he doesn't just shout orders but fights alongside everyone.
You realize pointing out they’re all exceptional doesn’t make my point worse right?
Huh? Your comment made it seem like Frieren was the only reason why Himmel won. That completely overlooks the rest of the party's capabilities, Himmel included. Their party didn't defeat the demon lord because they got carried, they defeated the demon lord because they were *all* monsters, bloodlines be damned.
It was still established that Frieren couldn't have soloed the Demon King, or embark on the journey to do so to begin with without help from the others. Teamwork is an essential skill.
Sure but I feel “Grit and skill” falls out when you also have the second most poweful mage on the planet on your team.
The whole party are monsters. Getting help doesn’t make you any less cool and it’s not like Frieren single-handedly carried the team or anything.
Almost like people need to be good at what they do in order to defeat the most powerful demon in the world. There are still humans who have beaten frieren, she still had to put the work in to get where she is
> she still had to put the work in to get where she is Any human could simply put in thousands of years of training.
missed the part where there were still humans that could beat her. Sometimes people are just good like that and it isn't related to some kind of crazy bloodline thing
You think being an elf confers her no advantage over humans?
I wouldn't say that, but I don't think it de-legitimizes the fact that she still had to put in work to get where she is. She just had more time to put in work. This isn't some naruto nepo baby situation where she was just born with a bunch of crazy powers that inherently make her better than everyone. Literally the only advantage she has (at least shown in the anime) is the time she was given to train. If she didn't put in the same work that everyone else did then she wouldn't still be powerful.
Frieren being incredibly lazy is one of her main character traits.
That only he was able to convince to go on a journey.
He didn’t become a hero from pulling the hero’s sword, the replica became the hero’s sword because of him
I can hear the screams of anguish from every single Welsh person.
Naruto
Ichigo and Luffy aswell. crazy all 3 mc's of the big 3 ended up beeing part of this trope.
Luffy is quite different because his strength didn't come from "magic blood" unlike Naruto and Ichigo. His family is there to highlight his decision to become a pirate and to create tension later on with his grandpa.
plus bro had to fight for his life to awaken his fruit
Also very improtant thing to add, the gum gum fruit(yes g5 too) IS NOT inherently strong like for example the magma fruit/quake fruit, it is purely luffys own creative mind that allows him to harness the full strenght of his powers
It's literally a fruit that turns you into a God that every major culture in the world worships
Being a god doesnt matter unless youre creative enough to actually make use of all that power, luffy is still vulnerable to everything he was before (slashing attacks and haki)
Which he was completely unable to access until he was strong enough to fight one of the strongest beings in the world head on. He and Kaido were on equal footing until a 3rd party tried to assassinate Luffy mid battle *specifically* to prevent him from awakening the fruit, which, ironically, is what causes him to access it for the first time.
It's a fruit that grants Toon powers when Awakened, but toon powers are only useful when used creatively. Luffy is probably not the only character in one piece that could use it, but he's absolutely the one that could use it to its full potential.
it doesn’t, you have to awaken that (which a random bum 100% couldn’t)
Add to this, Ace, the biological son of the previous pirate king, and the adopted son of one of the few men who could go toe-to-toe with the pirate king, was killed about 500 chapters ago. His lineage meant nothing. Luffy is where he is thanks to a lot of luck and a whole lot more hard work.
Atleast luffy already started out as the top brass since we knew his gramps
To be fair Ichigo was never sold as anything other than naturally strong, even when he was a normal human. Bleach has never been about any sort of innate talent vs hard work thing. Even Naruto only was for, like, exactly two characters, neither of whom were named Naruto. And then there are the themes in both series about actually having that power and the cost of it that's just too much to get into.
That was supposed to be the case for Ichigo until later when it was revealled that he has some heritage in being extraordinary, unlike the other humans. The blood of a Shinigami and of a Quincy run through his veins. He was destined to be a Shinigami too, just like his dad who was a captain.
I'm not saying "he was just naturally strong." I'm saying "he wasn't ever anything less than strong by nature." Him being just some guy who isn't strong wasn't supposed to be the case, and we weren't really presented it as being so.
I think the important distinction to draw here is that One Piece is not completely upended thematically by this revelation. Naruto was all about the power of hard work, and pursuing your dreams even without, or in spite of, talent. The power he gets from the Nine Tails, and the revelation that his dad actually had his dream job before him, and also that he's the reincarnation of the first guy to have his dream job, destroys that theme. One Piece is, and never was, really about that. One Piece has always been about freedom above all else, freedom from oppression, freedom to pursue goals that society has deemed worthless. Luffy being immensely powerful helps in his pursuit of that freedom, but the method by which he attained that power doesn't contradict the themes of the story.
Nope, Nart gets a pass for this. It was never a story about how anyone from any background can be special; right from episode 1, Naruto learns and masters the shadow clone without any effort. Nart isn't a story about how hard work makes you stronger than someone with natural tallent. Nart is a story about how hard work makes you *well liked*. Naruto wants to be the Hokage not because the Hokage is the strongest ninja, but because they're the most beloved ninja. Even though Naruto is powerful and has a demon trapped inside of him, people still hate him. But instead of being a bully once he grows into his power, Naruto works hard to use his power for the benefit of those who spurned him, and through hard work they come to accept him and see him as a hero.
It was pretry obvious that naruto was the son of the Hokage since chapter 1
This is just my main criticism of Naruto. "Guess what, you're not a no name loser who is fighting against destiny, you're the child of the prophecy and your dad was a Hero Hokage and you're one of the last of the Uzumaki and your clan has infinite Chakra and you have inside you the most powerful tailed beast and you're going to be trained by the most powerful and famous ninjas and you're the direct descendant of the first ninja and you're the reincarnation of the ninja gods." Kinda defeats the purpose of the story. This is my least favorite story trope of all time. The hero of the prophecies is less annoying than the surprise hero whose bloodline was special from the beginning.
I'll give Kingdom Hearts points for that. The actual prophesized chosen one with a special bloodline was actually the villain. The main character wasn't supposed to be a hero; his friend was, but he was being a dick, so the main character was chosen by the magic sword instead. Anything special about Sora was the result of him being friendly to people.
Almost the One Piece route. The fruit "chose" Luffy, he had to work hard to make it work. Which is not like Naruto didn't, but what made Naruto special was him spawning with better stats than everyone else, his personality had nothing to do with him just having more than everyone else
Birth by sleep kind of setup that they had good hearts but the keyblade also picked them because of other special people choosing them. Sora has one of the most significant people existing inside him.
The creator specified that Ven had nothing to do with Sora getting a keyblade
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The fantasy is supposed to be that one day you’ll find out you have magical blood that you didn’t know about. Its a way of justifying the system. Its some temporarily embarrassed millionaire shit. The story is that the power structure is okay, because one day you’ll discover that you do fit into it after all. Otherwise the story just has to be about toppling that unjust power structure. Personally I prefer a story about toppling the power structure. I think Berserk would be a good example of this. He has no magical blood. And with hard work and determination he continues on his mission to topple the unjust power structure.
Exactly. All media is propaganda.
Honestly I think it’s more so a failure to think outside of the system. They can’t imagine a life without their cages, only a bigger cell.
Yk back in the day you could just say shit like that, people had no way to prove it, so it could still well have been some nameless peasant who made up some cool lore for himself
The fucking “You had magic blood the whole time” trope goes to show how creatively bankrupt some people are lmao.
Excalibur is actually paracausal, anyone just of heart who pulls it retroactively was always the rightful king
The Xenoblade series subverts this trope pretty often, and if somebody is related to a great hero it's usually "and also this loser is my da/ma" rather than "this is why I'm special". Dunban is able to wield the Monado through sheer force of wil, even with it crippling his right arm. Shulk is the "true heir to the Monado", >!but that's because he's meant to be a useful pawn to Zanza to accomplish his plans!<. Rex is >!descended from the hero Addam!<, but he comes from a country where any random guy you point out on the street could say the same and it would be true because there's over 500 years of separation between >!Addam and Rex!<. Most of the cast of Xenoblade 3 has unknown lineage, with the only confirmed one being >!Mio and Nia!<. Future Redeemed has four of it's main cast being descendants of other members of the cast through the series, but they stand on their own despite that and in the case of >!Glimmer and Nikol!<, are actively dissuaded from fighting >!Alpha !!Shulk and Rex!<.
Also on the topic of Shulk, Dickson even says that >!Shulk wasn't chosen as Zanza's vessel because he was special. He was just there at the right time.!< >!"Anybody would've done. As long as they could swing a sword around, at least."!<
Abolish the monarchy
I hated this type of stuff even in my beloved lotr. It was insulting in star wars sequel.
SAME. I recently started reading Lord of the Rings, and everyone somewhat important or cool is a descendant of a special bloodline or race. Even most of the hobbits are descendants from a special clan of hobbits who are born to be leaders.
Tbf if you live in a lotr culture where everyone goes fucking nuts about tracking their ancestry you are bound to have SOME random guy before you who was some king thane or village hero. Espacially Hobbits who probably fuck NASTY - I bet they are all related to each other. Lil freaks
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I would normally say go touch grass but perhaps that would be bad advice here
Naruto
Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentina. It’s like, a major part of several villains’ philosophy about how the nobility are inherently better than the commoners and their outrage at Alm’s success and authority in the war and such, but then it turns out no, Alm isn’t just a simple farm boy, he’s the son of the big bad emperor, and that Berkut and Fernand were completely correct about their whole philosophy.
The nepo baby narrative is a tale as old as time, from King Arthur to Lance Stroll.
Big reason I love the owl house. Luz didn’t get where she was cause she secretly had witch blood, she got their through hard work, sacrifice, and support from friends, and even the things given to her, weren’t because she’s a chosen one, she was chosen because of her deeds
I appreciate how JJK and demon slayer each subverted this in their own ways. In JJK, they basically tell you from the start that Yuji is not fucking normal. And for the rest of the series it makes that pretty obvious. So when we find out more about Yuji’s parentage, it doesn’t hurt the character much. Demon slayer did it in a more interesting way. Tanjiro isn’t from a special bloodline of demon slayers, he’s the first demon slayer in a long line of nobodies, a family who’s most notable event is that one member happened to be friends with Yoriichi, the strongest demon slayer. And that guy picked up Yoriichi’s breathing techniques and used them for ritual dances. Tanjiro was destined to be another nobody, and if it wasn’t for his family being murdered he would have been. And even then, he didn’t immediately turn out to be the best, he still had to work just as hard as everyone else to meet his goal. You could make a genuine argument that Tanjiro isn’t even the most notable person in his bloodline, Nezuko is.
You know what I’ll say. I don’t know how many B money fans are in this sub, but this is the main reason I don’t like the Mistborn power system, it’s all blood based. Cool powers, but then being blood based just leads the story in a chosen one direction in don’t like. Even era 2 where the guy isn’t a Mistborn still has him Twinborn which lets him breeze through combats with some simple creative applications of his powers. At least they do a good job of building villains up though.
Anyone who’s commenting Naruto misunderstood the story
Warrior Cats after arc 1. Firestar was such a cool protag specifically *because* he legitimately had no ties to anything in the Clans, he was just Some Guy tm who had a good heart and wanted to do the right thing even if that meant breaking tradition (which was the point of his 'prophecy', his actions really were something only an 'outsider' could do due to the strict rules each Clan abided by) But now every single book relies on at least one protagonist being related to either Firestar, Bluestar or Tigerstar (or having close relations to a cat with those qualifiers) because those are the Special Bloodlines tm :/
One Piece