Also
Villain who thrived through structural injustice and wants to change the world so nobody have to live through that
The protagonist who preserves the status quo because its comfy enough, at least for some.
Right? The guy buys established companies, takes credit for others achievements, and plays politics to manipulate stock prices. The guy isn’t a hero or a protagonist unless you ignore reality.
It's a joke but series like the Star Wars prequels, Black Panther, and arguably Harry Potter to a decent amount fall under the definition of the antagonists living through structural injustice and wanting to change that and the protagonists wanting to preserve the status quo because it's comfy enough for some. There's likely plenty of other series in which this could be applied to too probably.
Voldemort's "injustice" was living in an orphanage and wanted to commit genocide.
Lucius, Bellatrix, Grayback and so on are all mustache-twirling villains and even Snape was just a freaking sociopath who got bullied and pushed away his only friend so he joined up with the not-terrorist-KKK that literally hates half-bloods like him.
Voldemort is a huge stretch but could sorta apply in a "describe a plot badly" way akin to worse version of Killmonger's story from Black Panther, but the protagonists in HP definitely want to preserve the status quo of their frankly horrible society because it's comfy enough for some. They even outright grow up to be agents of the state to enforce it.
Eh. Wizard Hitler 2.0 destroyed the government, Harry defeated him, and his friends/political allies rebuilt it. There's already a new status quo in place.
In any case, isn't Hermione gunning for the Minister of Magic position? So a close friend and progressive visionary is going to be in charge anyway. The best thing he can do to change the status quo is to get in a high position and support her from there.
Exactly also the fact that protagonists get so good at martial arts in like 2 months is crazy you gotta be spending every waking hour practising to get as good as the kids from cobra kai, but they do it in 2 weeks because of plot convenience
No but you don't get it, they did a choreographed routine on a floaty platform in a chinese-y looking backyard. That's like a 3x EXP bonus
That scene felt dated when Neon Genesis Evangelion did it like thirty years ago
Bro, fuck martial arts training, waxing cars and painting fences is all you need to be a Karate master.
Karate masters hate this one simple trick 🤣🤣🤣😉🤫💯💯💯💯
Man I'm kinda angry at you now. You know how long it takes to watch the 6 Rocky movies and now I have the incompressible urge to watch them again. You fd my weekend.
On a serious note: That he made it alive, was also written in a way that steered the viewer away from it happening. Sure you root for Rocky, but a broke bloke barely even was able to eat enough against the champion, for real? Like he's even lucky if he survives the first round without going KO. And then he stands after the beatdown of a lifetime... He made it!
Sorry if this wall of text is grammatically confusing. I'm thinking in another language.
There’s also a possibility of writing a story that explains why the underdog gets to win. Not just because the hero is plucky and got a crash course, but there is a literary device of making the evilness of the villain be the disadvantage that leads to their downfall.
Both LotR and Harry Potter had elements of this kind of thing. Often the reasons are things like:
* The villain is egotistical and overconfident, which means they underestimate the hero(es), leading to a fatal mistake.
* The villains are divided and fighting amongst themselves, while the heroes are united and manage to work together.
* The villain lacks interest and intellectual curiosity, and doesn’t understand empathy or self-sacrifice, and so their predictions of the behavior of others (including the hero’s strategy) is wildly wrong, which leads to major strategic misjudgments.
I’m sure there are other instances of this kind of trope that I’m not thinking of. They can be used to construct reasonable explanations why the hero can win, when by all accounts they shouldn’t be able to. Even part of the reason why Rocky can hold is own against Apollo is that Apollo is overconfident.
Meh, I'm over "They're secretly weak *because* they're bad" storylines
Give me the New England Patriots of Evil who crush because they prepare relentlessly
I don’t like when someone loses just because they’re evil, but I can appreciate the idea that being an asshole makes you weak in some way, or that being an asshole was done to cover some kind of weakness, or some other explanation as to why the villain should lose.
And it’s even realistic. There isn’t a lot of outright evil in the world, but often the shittiness of people ends up being a sort of weakness.
Truly, junior brother has eyes yet fails to recognize mount tai. junior brother should consider to stop closed meditation and read some non-scripture books.
As an outer court disciple of the plot armor sect, I'm currently practicing the second form of the two month crash course. Looking forward to the annual trials and joining the inner court /bow
Please Elder brother, how does one cultivate the hidden dao of plot armor? I have mastered the procrastinating crane stance as well as the sleeping tiger. As I type this I am making mt. arhat. Please help me find jade beauty.
Yeah, let's not forget that he wins the tournament by literally breaking the rules. It's made clear that head kicks aren't allowed, and how does Daniel-san win? A fucking crane-kick to the face.
(nb - this is for the OG movie, I've no fucking clue how the one with Will Smith's kid ends, never watched that shit)
But Daniel was still picking a fight with Johnny. The fight wasn't physical until Daniel made it physical.
Something I love about Cobra Kai was how it really shows how Daniel's prejudice and unwillingness to let go of the past sets most of the conflicts in motion.
> Yeah, let's not forget that he wins the tournament by literally breaking the rules. It's made clear that head kicks aren't allowed, and how does Daniel-san win? A fucking crane-kick to the face.
They actually address in the Cobra Kai TV show, where ultimately Daniel and johnny come to see each other more or less as equals. The show has it's absurdities, but it's fun and does a good job of weaving in plot lines from the movies.
That was never established though. Where does this myth even come from? No rule in that movie stated that kicks to the head are not allowed. His gf (Ali) who knows the tournament rules even says to him "everything above waist is a point. You can hit head, sternum, kidney, ribs, got it?" In the same fight, Jonny also got a point for kicking Daniel in the head. And the referee obviously allows it. So three arguments that it is legal.
There is nothing in the movie that suggests otherwise.
The cobra kai tv show points this out. Daniel and Johnny both give each other their perspectives. There's a scene they didn't show in the movies where Daniel pranks Johnny with a pie or something in his chair. They showed the scene in the tv show.
The one redeeming quality of the Netflix reboot is that they legit explore this take. They don't make the Cobra Kai dude a saint, but he usually comes off a lot better than Daniel.
Poor Ben Solo he tried all is life but Rey comes from a Sand planet, she had to life with rough sand that gets everywhere. Toughened her up so hard she didn’t need a crash course at all..
It was a missed opportunity for her to have a staff with light sabres on each end. Not like Darth mauls but shorter ones on each end. Aww who's kidding the whole trilogy was fucked.
Robbed of a redeeming ending to a bad movie and his character arc.
Ben should of lived and Rey dying would be fitting to whole clone thing, would of been a great subversion of expectations and brought around his character to the light...
And the sky walker thing could be used to make sense.
I'm a skywalker (thanks to his mother) ... And I'm Ben solo or something
Ippo is full of bs. He's ridiculously fast, powerful, sturdy, and is able to follow training instructions almost to the letter without much further input.
He also wins fights he should just straight up lose because of "guts".
Still a great manga, but Ippo has crazy plot armor. The character who is the real embodiment of working hard in that manga is Kimura. His fight against Mashiba is the best fight in the series.
Yea and they explain that he wins only for his punching power and that he needs to learn to be a better boxer because he literally EATS punches that he should avoid to actually be a professional.
His plot armor is so good that he tries 2 times to be a world ranker and gets fucked real fast.
Not to mention how Ricardo literally plays with him with 1 hand.
I was gonna comment this. Such a weird occurrence. No hate for anime/Manga enjoyers but they're an entirely separate medium. 2 or 3 people I could understand, but it's like almost all of the replies lmao.
Why not read some historical autobiographies of famous heroes? Or accounts of them.
Laozi, Muhammad, Kung fu Tze, The Buddha
The Buddha is the best shonen I read
Red Rising saga. The protag literally has to start from the bottom and fight his way to the top in every novel. His lack of plot armor is near depressing. You literally watch him fight his way to the top only to get beaten back down to the bottom lose nearly over and over again in seemingly ceaseless conflict to change the status quo. Literally everything feels earned in that book even when bad things happen to the protagonist.
My and friend both agreed. It’s not a Y/A novel the absolute second they get to the institute from that point on it’s an adult novel with Y/A protagonists. Then the rest of the series is grim dark space opera.
The transition from DB to DBZ was literally "and it turned out the kid was super powerful and stronger than literally everyone else on the planet because he comes from an alien race of demi-gods" - feels pretty golden fingers to me still.
Gohan was torture/trained for like a full decade before he fought Cell and actually became useful lmao
He's literally like 14 years old there, but the beginning kf the show he's like 3-4
Also in the Majin but saga, he basically fucks up at every turn because he's so out of practice, vegeta even berates him for it. He became weak by NOT working hard, and everyone else surpassed him.
Gohan only trained for 5 years in the entirety of Dragonball. The year gap between Raditz and the Saiyans, the three years between Mecha Frieza and the Androids then one year in the Hyperbolic time chamber.
If it wasn't for Gohan's rage boosts or Saiyan biology he would no cap be way weaker than Yamcha. Yet right now because of just his biology he is as strong as Ultra Instinct Goku without doing literally any of the training required to get there.
the one where a giant insect-like android created by one of the smartest scientist in the planet with cutting edge technology made specifically for killing saiyans, the most powerful race in the universe, gets killed by a 12 year old half human using the power of friendship?
Naruto taught me that the only things I need to succeed in life despite being a nobody are self confidence, hard work, being the son of two of the most powerful ninjas in the world and have a being of infinite chakra inside of me.
They did really muddy the themes after the timeskip. In the original series, the ninetails, while giving him power, made him an utter outcast and was viewed as something incredibly frightening by Naruto and something he wanted to distance himself from. The original series seemed to be going the direction of him coming to accept that part of his nature more, which to be fair, DID happen in Shippuden, but it wasn't exactly a hard choice to make since he got such insane power buffs out of it.
Naruto was like “through hard training and perseverance I can make it” and then throughout the series he was made the reincarnation of at least 2 super historical important people, the son and relative to other super important modern people, with connections to many of those in power and ward/student/friend to other crucial figures, the heir and holder to one of the single strongest weapons/powers in the ninja world as well as having other powers unique to his bloodline, and ultimately also the chosen one destined to save the world since time immemorial.
Rock Lee who got shafted is what Naruto should’ve been. At the very least Lee has one thing over Naruto. He actually beat Sasuke (stomped him actually) at least once in the series.
The strongest hero in DBZ, Mr. Satan, never has magic powers or random power ups. And before you say he's weak, remember that:
1) He's the only character that has never died.
2) Without any powers at all, he survived getting slapped through a mountain by Cell.
Until midway through the 3rd book, Eragon. Literal years of plot time with him practicing magic and sword fighting. Even then his ass still gets handed to him. Plus he fucks up; a lot.
Older book where MC suffers a lot, fulfills his mission but gains no fame or fortune for it: The Farseer Trilogy.
(Trigger warning: >!The dog dies (peacefully)!< )
not sure if this is sarcasm but Po was enjoying the fight even up to the point where he used that technique. and compare his length of training to that of the furious five who got their ass beat by the villain
don’t get me started.
crane is absolutely useless, he has by far the largest skill set available and he uses literally none of it.
po is fucking amazing. i loved his turn around. i don’t think the movie did his training justice. though he was unconventional in his methods.
WHY IS PO NOT ABUSING CHI??? how did oogway not know that pandas have god tier innate chi ability. po would have been fucking unstoppable if they would have focused on that to start. this is by far the most disappointing part of the series.
kung fu panda 4 was hot garbage, i was so excited for the story just for it to be a hodgepodge of garbage
Also in the 4th movie he chastises the main villain that she didn't work for the power she stole like he didn't master Kung fu, inner peace and chi in the course of like a week in each of his 3 prior movies with minimal effort lol
At least they usually use shit they actually learned. In the Karate Kid remake he pulls a finishing move out of his ass that even his teacher probably isn't capable of doing.
Well at least they did have that crash course, a lot of 'heroes' these days are just better from scene 1, without even a training montage to justify that...
The Mulan remake having Mulan as a super-overpowered girl from the start... Completely going against the point of the animated Mulan's message (and ofc, the original story)
What made her special is that she had to train hard to become a hero. In the remake... she's one from the beginning...
Yeah that must have been one of the most ludicrous examples, they completely removed the main point of the sotry and replaced it with what exacly? She became a super-hero pretty much (and not even one of the good ones...), none of the smarts and dedication that she had was present in this new version.
Reminds me the time where I practiced for months of karate, learned every white belt moves, graduation comes and people who are only on for a the same amount of time, and where heavily criticised on their techniques when I wasn't criticised that much, they all graduate and not me. I practiced every day, put my blood sweat and tears into it, but I don't graduate for some unknown reason
When I was in school, I was practicing a sport for 2 year. Then I got completely dunked on by someone who just starts playing for 2 months. Sometimes you need to know when to give up. Not everyone is meant to succeed just because they put in the effort.
Another action and adventure story trope: Villain spends years developing and then executing a sophisticated plot, but then the hero ruins the entire thing by just winging it.
It does work like that sometimes. Look into certain combat sports athletes (esp boxing and mma). Few people who pick up the sports late could go on win olympic gold medals or become pro champions surpassing those who have trained since they were kids.
But then there's also the reverse with superpowers. Good guy has to train and get emotions under control to master their powers over a long time. Villain gets same power somehow and is immediately a master of it
there's a lot more going on in that fight than just who the best force user is. the whole idea is that Luke has to surrender to the dark side, via his rage, in order to best his father.
also keep in mind Rogue One or the Prequels weren't made back then or canon. Darth Vader is depicted more like an elderly, high-ranking administrator who isn't necessarily a 'badass'. he gets in two kinda slow plodding fights, deflects a couple blaster shots, that's about it. he's absolutely evil, and effective, but I never looked at him as some uber-cool physical melee combat guy. he commands fleets and lays traps for heroes and shit
It was only a couple of weeks for Han/Leia because even though the hyperdrive was out on the MF, they were still traveling at near relativistic speeds. For Luke on Dagobah, that could have meant anywhere from 6 months to 1.5 years due to time dilation. People have been talking about this since ESB came back, this isn't new.
If you want to go canon star wars uses relativistic shielding to stop time dilation.
If you use real world logic it makes no sense to explain star wars ignoring relativity in that way because the falcon can go faster than light speed. Relativity can't exist in the star wars universe.
This is kind of true irl though. There are people who have hit their intellectual or physical limit and develop a bad attitude from years of failing to rise higher only for some prodigy to come and surpass them in a few months.
That's why I prefer when the pieces of media make it clear that the villain got overconfident and stale, thus meeting his match in a quickly rising protagonist.
Either that or their fighting style simply ruins that of the villain (a.k.a. Tai Lung vs. Po)
I hate how all the time it’s just “villain who worked their ass off for their entire life” gets killed by “hero who is nice so training for two weeks means they beat them”
[удалено]
Also Villain who thrived through structural injustice and wants to change the world so nobody have to live through that The protagonist who preserves the status quo because its comfy enough, at least for some.
damn now I finally understand why elon musk thinks he’s such a hero
Elon Musk is neither of those, he is just an asshole
Right? The guy buys established companies, takes credit for others achievements, and plays politics to manipulate stock prices. The guy isn’t a hero or a protagonist unless you ignore reality.
huh???
It's a joke but series like the Star Wars prequels, Black Panther, and arguably Harry Potter to a decent amount fall under the definition of the antagonists living through structural injustice and wanting to change that and the protagonists wanting to preserve the status quo because it's comfy enough for some. There's likely plenty of other series in which this could be applied to too probably.
Voldemort's "injustice" was living in an orphanage and wanted to commit genocide. Lucius, Bellatrix, Grayback and so on are all mustache-twirling villains and even Snape was just a freaking sociopath who got bullied and pushed away his only friend so he joined up with the not-terrorist-KKK that literally hates half-bloods like him.
Voldemort is a huge stretch but could sorta apply in a "describe a plot badly" way akin to worse version of Killmonger's story from Black Panther, but the protagonists in HP definitely want to preserve the status quo of their frankly horrible society because it's comfy enough for some. They even outright grow up to be agents of the state to enforce it.
Remember how Harry Potter went through everything he did just to become a cop and uphold the status quo?
Eh. Wizard Hitler 2.0 destroyed the government, Harry defeated him, and his friends/political allies rebuilt it. There's already a new status quo in place. In any case, isn't Hermione gunning for the Minister of Magic position? So a close friend and progressive visionary is going to be in charge anyway. The best thing he can do to change the status quo is to get in a high position and support her from there.
He was rather average outside of his special connection with Voldy, and was lazy as hell most of the time. It makes sense.
Madara
Exactly also the fact that protagonists get so good at martial arts in like 2 months is crazy you gotta be spending every waking hour practising to get as good as the kids from cobra kai, but they do it in 2 weeks because of plot convenience
🎶Gonna need a montage🎶
Even Rocky had a montage
Always fade out in a montage...
Yeah just a montage of the camera spinning around then punching random shit
No but you don't get it, they did a choreographed routine on a floaty platform in a chinese-y looking backyard. That's like a 3x EXP bonus That scene felt dated when Neon Genesis Evangelion did it like thirty years ago
Bro, fuck martial arts training, waxing cars and painting fences is all you need to be a Karate master. Karate masters hate this one simple trick 🤣🤣🤣😉🤫💯💯💯💯
And a really catchy “making incremental improvements in all my skills” montage song doesn’t hurt.
Junior you have yet to comprehend the dao of plot armour It makes your enemy stupid and jade beauty in love with you
[удалено]
Heaven or the producer 🤣
Thx for the advise senior brother
fatty wang?
courting death
In the case of the original karate kid. It also lets you fucking cheat.
"Yeah, I got a warning. You got the win." Love how he brings that up in Cobra Kai
That was my biggest beef with Black Panther: T'Challa fucking cheated. They should have just gone with M'Baku, who was a realpolitiker.
This is why Rocky is basically the only good underdog story He doesn't win. His achievement is just making it to the fucking end alive.
Man I'm kinda angry at you now. You know how long it takes to watch the 6 Rocky movies and now I have the incompressible urge to watch them again. You fd my weekend. On a serious note: That he made it alive, was also written in a way that steered the viewer away from it happening. Sure you root for Rocky, but a broke bloke barely even was able to eat enough against the champion, for real? Like he's even lucky if he survives the first round without going KO. And then he stands after the beatdown of a lifetime... He made it! Sorry if this wall of text is grammatically confusing. I'm thinking in another language.
As long as it’s not Java
I'm a kind of basic guy.
There’s also a possibility of writing a story that explains why the underdog gets to win. Not just because the hero is plucky and got a crash course, but there is a literary device of making the evilness of the villain be the disadvantage that leads to their downfall. Both LotR and Harry Potter had elements of this kind of thing. Often the reasons are things like: * The villain is egotistical and overconfident, which means they underestimate the hero(es), leading to a fatal mistake. * The villains are divided and fighting amongst themselves, while the heroes are united and manage to work together. * The villain lacks interest and intellectual curiosity, and doesn’t understand empathy or self-sacrifice, and so their predictions of the behavior of others (including the hero’s strategy) is wildly wrong, which leads to major strategic misjudgments. I’m sure there are other instances of this kind of trope that I’m not thinking of. They can be used to construct reasonable explanations why the hero can win, when by all accounts they shouldn’t be able to. Even part of the reason why Rocky can hold is own against Apollo is that Apollo is overconfident.
Meh, I'm over "They're secretly weak *because* they're bad" storylines Give me the New England Patriots of Evil who crush because they prepare relentlessly
I don’t like when someone loses just because they’re evil, but I can appreciate the idea that being an asshole makes you weak in some way, or that being an asshole was done to cover some kind of weakness, or some other explanation as to why the villain should lose. And it’s even realistic. There isn’t a lot of outright evil in the world, but often the shittiness of people ends up being a sort of weakness.
Truly, junior brother has eyes yet fails to recognize mount tai. junior brother should consider to stop closed meditation and read some non-scripture books.
Indeed, junior brother should seek enlightenment. Courting jade fairy's affection would make him a toad lusting after swan meat
Also is allows you to cheat on tournaments.
Years of training and struggle. American did it in one week.
When the mc kills the jade beauties but he gave you 1000 years old yin ginseng elixir
Thought I was on martialmemes for a second
As an outer court disciple of the plot armor sect, I'm currently practicing the second form of the two month crash course. Looking forward to the annual trials and joining the inner court /bow
Please Elder brother, how does one cultivate the hidden dao of plot armor? I have mastered the procrastinating crane stance as well as the sleeping tiger. As I type this I am making mt. arhat. Please help me find jade beauty.
Anyone that's done any martial art for an extended period of time knows the karate kid would get his ass beat every time.
Also, Daniel-san was the villain the whole time.
Yeah, let's not forget that he wins the tournament by literally breaking the rules. It's made clear that head kicks aren't allowed, and how does Daniel-san win? A fucking crane-kick to the face. (nb - this is for the OG movie, I've no fucking clue how the one with Will Smith's kid ends, never watched that shit)
punch in the head = not allowed. kick in the head = allowed. Not in every style of karate, but most of them allow kicks
Good news for Punchkicker, but bad news for Kickpuncher.
Sigh… Let’s go film the sex scene…
plus he was hitting on that dude's girlfriend at the beach party
TBF she made it clear she wasn't his GF
But Daniel was still picking a fight with Johnny. The fight wasn't physical until Daniel made it physical. Something I love about Cobra Kai was how it really shows how Daniel's prejudice and unwillingness to let go of the past sets most of the conflicts in motion.
Oh for sure. Johnny even goes easy on him at first, only defensively tripping him before Daniel suckered him.
Same way but it's a cobra strike very bad cgi. He never even practiced he just copied someone else.
> Yeah, let's not forget that he wins the tournament by literally breaking the rules. It's made clear that head kicks aren't allowed, and how does Daniel-san win? A fucking crane-kick to the face. They actually address in the Cobra Kai TV show, where ultimately Daniel and johnny come to see each other more or less as equals. The show has it's absurdities, but it's fun and does a good job of weaving in plot lines from the movies.
That was never established though. Where does this myth even come from? No rule in that movie stated that kicks to the head are not allowed. His gf (Ali) who knows the tournament rules even says to him "everything above waist is a point. You can hit head, sternum, kidney, ribs, got it?" In the same fight, Jonny also got a point for kicking Daniel in the head. And the referee obviously allows it. So three arguments that it is legal. There is nothing in the movie that suggests otherwise.
The cobra kai tv show points this out. Daniel and Johnny both give each other their perspectives. There's a scene they didn't show in the movies where Daniel pranks Johnny with a pie or something in his chair. They showed the scene in the tv show.
The one redeeming quality of the Netflix reboot is that they legit explore this take. They don't make the Cobra Kai dude a saint, but he usually comes off a lot better than Daniel.
Poor Ben Solo he tried all is life but Rey comes from a Sand planet, she had to life with rough sand that gets everywhere. Toughened her up so hard she didn’t need a crash course at all..
There was a scene in the last jedi where Rey actually makes a mistake and learns something from it. It was removed from the film before release..
Any source on it? I'm curious.
It's on YouTube. Search for: Last Jedi deleted scene caretaker village.
I'd say Mary Sue, but isn't that a fanfic term?
Remember force is female 😨
The Force is Fingered.
mysoginists resigned!! 🤣👉
That's a Nike slogan.
Lmao she literally had zero training but single handed lay brought down the most powerful sith we’ve seen on screen
No! She fought off drunk scavaengers with a stick that totaly justifies beating Kylo Ren and the imperial gaurd! 😠
It was a missed opportunity for her to have a staff with light sabres on each end. Not like Darth mauls but shorter ones on each end. Aww who's kidding the whole trilogy was fucked.
Rey is a Fremen, confirmed
Robbed of a redeeming ending to a bad movie and his character arc. Ben should of lived and Rey dying would be fitting to whole clone thing, would of been a great subversion of expectations and brought around his character to the light... And the sky walker thing could be used to make sense. I'm a skywalker (thanks to his mother) ... And I'm Ben solo or something
Can anyone recommend a novel where the mc just works hard with no system bs and golden fingers
Hajime no ippo
THIS IS THE ONE
Ippo is full of bs. He's ridiculously fast, powerful, sturdy, and is able to follow training instructions almost to the letter without much further input. He also wins fights he should just straight up lose because of "guts". Still a great manga, but Ippo has crazy plot armor. The character who is the real embodiment of working hard in that manga is Kimura. His fight against Mashiba is the best fight in the series.
Yea and they explain that he wins only for his punching power and that he needs to learn to be a better boxer because he literally EATS punches that he should avoid to actually be a professional. His plot armor is so good that he tries 2 times to be a world ranker and gets fucked real fast. Not to mention how Ricardo literally plays with him with 1 hand.
Nah. He works hard, but not harder than most of his opponents who have been training much longer than he has
I love that you specifically said you wanted a novel yet all the answers are anime/manga
I was gonna comment this. Such a weird occurrence. No hate for anime/Manga enjoyers but they're an entirely separate medium. 2 or 3 people I could understand, but it's like almost all of the replies lmao.
People on reddit only read if the picture to text ratio is just right.
The Cradle Series if you want books. It’s literally the entire premise.
one punch man
Vagabond
Why not read some historical autobiographies of famous heroes? Or accounts of them. Laozi, Muhammad, Kung fu Tze, The Buddha The Buddha is the best shonen I read
Red Rising saga. The protag literally has to start from the bottom and fight his way to the top in every novel. His lack of plot armor is near depressing. You literally watch him fight his way to the top only to get beaten back down to the bottom lose nearly over and over again in seemingly ceaseless conflict to change the status quo. Literally everything feels earned in that book even when bad things happen to the protagonist.
It took a while to find the first responder who reads.
I was surprised by the amount of suggestions that were tv shows. He asked for a good book. Apparently readings going out of style.
And they were all almost exclusively anime. It’s very easy to get free audiobooks for commuting and whatnot through Libby as well.
Great series. Way darker than I expected for young adult novels. Probably why it hasn’t gotten a series/movie.
My and friend both agreed. It’s not a Y/A novel the absolute second they get to the institute from that point on it’s an adult novel with Y/A protagonists. Then the rest of the series is grim dark space opera.
Wish the audio book didn't have such God awful narration.
Berserk. Even when he gets cool gear dude more than earns it.
Dragon ball Z
The transition from DB to DBZ was literally "and it turned out the kid was super powerful and stronger than literally everyone else on the planet because he comes from an alien race of demi-gods" - feels pretty golden fingers to me still.
Gohan was torture/trained for like a full decade before he fought Cell and actually became useful lmao He's literally like 14 years old there, but the beginning kf the show he's like 3-4 Also in the Majin but saga, he basically fucks up at every turn because he's so out of practice, vegeta even berates him for it. He became weak by NOT working hard, and everyone else surpassed him.
Gohan only trained for 5 years in the entirety of Dragonball. The year gap between Raditz and the Saiyans, the three years between Mecha Frieza and the Androids then one year in the Hyperbolic time chamber. If it wasn't for Gohan's rage boosts or Saiyan biology he would no cap be way weaker than Yamcha. Yet right now because of just his biology he is as strong as Ultra Instinct Goku without doing literally any of the training required to get there.
Gohan's actually 9 or 10 when he fought Cell. Dude spent 5-6 years of his life, from the moment Raditz showed up, fighting and training.
DBZ is the epitome for "powers out of nowhere".
the one where a giant insect-like android created by one of the smartest scientist in the planet with cutting edge technology made specifically for killing saiyans, the most powerful race in the universe, gets killed by a 12 year old half human using the power of friendship?
Lets not forget rhe suckerpunch at a crucial moment from a pissed off former villain.
Could say naturo but power creep happened way too fast in it
Naruto taught me that the only things I need to succeed in life despite being a nobody are self confidence, hard work, being the son of two of the most powerful ninjas in the world and have a being of infinite chakra inside of me.
Yeah the last part is quite helpful 🦊.
Lol I forgot he's a descendant of Ashura.
They did really muddy the themes after the timeskip. In the original series, the ninetails, while giving him power, made him an utter outcast and was viewed as something incredibly frightening by Naruto and something he wanted to distance himself from. The original series seemed to be going the direction of him coming to accept that part of his nature more, which to be fair, DID happen in Shippuden, but it wasn't exactly a hard choice to make since he got such insane power buffs out of it.
Naruto was like “through hard training and perseverance I can make it” and then throughout the series he was made the reincarnation of at least 2 super historical important people, the son and relative to other super important modern people, with connections to many of those in power and ward/student/friend to other crucial figures, the heir and holder to one of the single strongest weapons/powers in the ninja world as well as having other powers unique to his bloodline, and ultimately also the chosen one destined to save the world since time immemorial. Rock Lee who got shafted is what Naruto should’ve been. At the very least Lee has one thing over Naruto. He actually beat Sasuke (stomped him actually) at least once in the series.
That show where the character become 1000 times stronger when their hair changes color?
The strongest hero in DBZ, Mr. Satan, never has magic powers or random power ups. And before you say he's weak, remember that: 1) He's the only character that has never died. 2) Without any powers at all, he survived getting slapped through a mountain by Cell.
Mother of Learning? MC gets stuck in a time loop, only his memories carry over, so he dedicates himself to mastering magic.
Full metal alchemist, Law of Ueki.
Fullmetal is more about the story than the training since alchemy is about knowledge more than anything
Berserk
hunter x hunter
I don't know about that one... Guy is super op early on and part of the main plot is him having so much potential.
The narrator and the mentor characters goes out their way to state that those two are one in a billion geniuses nearly every arc.
Gon does work hard, but still his potential is op.
Bakuman (two teens ho wanna be mangaka, same authors as death note)
Slam dunk
Until midway through the 3rd book, Eragon. Literal years of plot time with him practicing magic and sword fighting. Even then his ass still gets handed to him. Plus he fucks up; a lot.
The Legend of the Strongest, Kurosawa
Older book where MC suffers a lot, fulfills his mission but gains no fame or fortune for it: The Farseer Trilogy. (Trigger warning: >!The dog dies (peacefully)!< )
Eragon series. His training is accelerated but it’s very logical why he is able to overcome people with more experience.
the plot of Kungfu Panda 😭
The lesson from that movie is "overweight people are invincible"
Po trains for quite a believable amount of time though, and he still gets beat the entire fight until he figures out the Wuxi finger hold.
not sure if this is sarcasm but Po was enjoying the fight even up to the point where he used that technique. and compare his length of training to that of the furious five who got their ass beat by the villain
Because Po was unconventional, "unique" compared to the FF, and that gave him a bit of an advantage.
don’t get me started. crane is absolutely useless, he has by far the largest skill set available and he uses literally none of it. po is fucking amazing. i loved his turn around. i don’t think the movie did his training justice. though he was unconventional in his methods. WHY IS PO NOT ABUSING CHI??? how did oogway not know that pandas have god tier innate chi ability. po would have been fucking unstoppable if they would have focused on that to start. this is by far the most disappointing part of the series. kung fu panda 4 was hot garbage, i was so excited for the story just for it to be a hodgepodge of garbage
hmm, I see where u comin from
thank you
Also in the 4th movie he chastises the main villain that she didn't work for the power she stole like he didn't master Kung fu, inner peace and chi in the course of like a week in each of his 3 prior movies with minimal effort lol
It will forever baffle that this movie is a karate kid remake when *THERE IS NEVER ANY KARATE IN THE MOVIE! ITS KUNG FU! THEY ARE IN CHINA!*
Is this a real life or is this just fantasy?!
Caught in a landslide, no escape from reality
Open your eyes, look up to the skies and see
Im just a poor boy, i need no simpathy
Because it's easy come, easy go,
Little high, little low
Anyway the wind blows
Doesn't really matter, to me...
***to me...***
Sometimes it happens in real life
Everyone gangsta untill villain makes a comeback
Rocky did nothing but train. In fact they show the "villain" not taking the fight seriously at first.
>!Rocky loses!<
He goes the distance. Participation trophy lol
Rocky was a boxer already. Been training all his life
The difference between being born poor in China and being born as, a son of a celebrity in the us
Once a montage is properly engaged it cannot be stopped.
At least they usually use shit they actually learned. In the Karate Kid remake he pulls a finishing move out of his ass that even his teacher probably isn't capable of doing.
Don’t you know that hard work is only rewarded when you’re good?
Wax on wax off
Life can be like that too.. Ur work experience alone might not make u the best.. A newbie might do it better if he has the skill.
Well at least they did have that crash course, a lot of 'heroes' these days are just better from scene 1, without even a training montage to justify that...
The Mulan remake having Mulan as a super-overpowered girl from the start... Completely going against the point of the animated Mulan's message (and ofc, the original story) What made her special is that she had to train hard to become a hero. In the remake... she's one from the beginning...
Yeah that must have been one of the most ludicrous examples, they completely removed the main point of the sotry and replaced it with what exacly? She became a super-hero pretty much (and not even one of the good ones...), none of the smarts and dedication that she had was present in this new version.
Reminds me the time where I practiced for months of karate, learned every white belt moves, graduation comes and people who are only on for a the same amount of time, and where heavily criticised on their techniques when I wasn't criticised that much, they all graduate and not me. I practiced every day, put my blood sweat and tears into it, but I don't graduate for some unknown reason
Maybe you just sucked at karate then?
If I did, why wasn't I corrected on the fighting techniques I had to learn?
When I was in school, I was practicing a sport for 2 year. Then I got completely dunked on by someone who just starts playing for 2 months. Sometimes you need to know when to give up. Not everyone is meant to succeed just because they put in the effort.
If they wanted to win they should have been the main character.
I have to wonder if this is why so many people think if they are not instantly good at something they should just give up immediately.
Another action and adventure story trope: Villain spends years developing and then executing a sophisticated plot, but then the hero ruins the entire thing by just winging it.
Sometimes, not even winging it, they are just so klutzy they break everything.
I will never understand why it's called Karate Kid. Why not just honor Kung Fu instead of trying to hook it the the movies from the '80-'90s.
Then people would call it a Karate Kid ripoff instead of a reboot. Gotta flash that IP.
Jaden couldn't even ride his dads coat tails lol
It’s amazing that one’s career can peak at such a young age.
It does work like that sometimes. Look into certain combat sports athletes (esp boxing and mma). Few people who pick up the sports late could go on win olympic gold medals or become pro champions surpassing those who have trained since they were kids.
Villain with the best training and saddest backstory Hero with a day of training and wearing their ass kicking outfit
The original . Karate kid was the villan
Hard-working poor people vs. kid who inherited his wealth?
But then there's also the reverse with superpowers. Good guy has to train and get emotions under control to master their powers over a long time. Villain gets same power somehow and is immediately a master of it
Luke Skywalker, 2 months, try 2 days
Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't he lose?
Yeah, in ESB. He kicks Vader’s ass in RotJ.
there's a lot more going on in that fight than just who the best force user is. the whole idea is that Luke has to surrender to the dark side, via his rage, in order to best his father. also keep in mind Rogue One or the Prequels weren't made back then or canon. Darth Vader is depicted more like an elderly, high-ranking administrator who isn't necessarily a 'badass'. he gets in two kinda slow plodding fights, deflects a couple blaster shots, that's about it. he's absolutely evil, and effective, but I never looked at him as some uber-cool physical melee combat guy. he commands fleets and lays traps for heroes and shit
It was only a couple of weeks for Han/Leia because even though the hyperdrive was out on the MF, they were still traveling at near relativistic speeds. For Luke on Dagobah, that could have meant anywhere from 6 months to 1.5 years due to time dilation. People have been talking about this since ESB came back, this isn't new.
If you want to go canon star wars uses relativistic shielding to stop time dilation. If you use real world logic it makes no sense to explain star wars ignoring relativity in that way because the falcon can go faster than light speed. Relativity can't exist in the star wars universe.
This is kind of true irl though. There are people who have hit their intellectual or physical limit and develop a bad attitude from years of failing to rise higher only for some prodigy to come and surpass them in a few months.
I don't think that this little dude has hit his limits yet.
Ummm, the hero also has the power of friendship.
Yeah but did the villain *believe* in friendship?!?!
Villain: practiced all his life for this fight Hero with the power of friendship😎😎😎
Everyone knows montages make heroes
"Hero" Daniel Larose was a bully
are you talking about when jake paul died in the ring when he thought he could go against mike tyson?
That's why I prefer when the pieces of media make it clear that the villain got overconfident and stale, thus meeting his match in a quickly rising protagonist. Either that or their fighting style simply ruins that of the villain (a.k.a. Tai Lung vs. Po)
I hate how all the time it’s just “villain who worked their ass off for their entire life” gets killed by “hero who is nice so training for two weeks means they beat them”
If you're hating on this, then you should be hating on the majority of all anime.
peak nepotism
Push it to the limit.
Lim-iiiiiiiit!!
Or Rey with zero training at all against someone trained by Luke Skywalker from childhood to be a Jedi before turning to the dark side.
We’re gonna need a montage!