Archived Discussion Main / Mytharc

This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.

Ununnilium: I dunno - the One Piece isn't so much an Arc as it is a MacGuffin.

BT The P: But the search for the One Piece is. A MacGuffin is a goal, one whose nature is not important to the plot. Story Arc is the plot itself, which can be centered around a goal. The One Piece is assumed to just be a whole load of extremely generic valuable stuff, so everyone looks for it. The story of Luffy and his nakama searching for it, in competition with everyone else, is a Myth Arc. It fits the requirements well enough.

Ununnilium: I don't know, though. That's their goal, but does each episode do something about accomplishing that goal? It seems mostly like they wander around, looking for it and doing good deeds. I'd say that One Piece has a bunch of Arcs - the conflicts against Buggy and Captain Kuro, for instance - but no Myth Arc.

BT The P: The Myth Arc doesn't have to show up in every episode. The definition is descriptive, not proscriptive. The X Files, Babylon Five, Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex, all shows that have a Myth Arc touch on them to variable degrees. The only shows that can be said to have no myth arcs are those for whom every episode is stand-alone. It could be argued that all the arcs of One Piece stand on their own, but that's not the case, characters change and develop, join and leave the cast, etc.

Ununnilium: Well, it still feels wrong to me, but I'll sleep on it. ``v

Devil's Advocate: I've never seen One Piece, but based on the discussion here, I'm not sure it qualifies. It has one long-term goal which the characters are pursuing throughout the series, but I don't think that alone is sufficient to be a Myth Arc—in my mind a Myth Arc has to involve a detailed long-term plot. Star Trek Voyager had a long-term goal which lasted over the course of the series (getting back to the Alpha Quadrant), but I don't think of it as a show with a Myth Arc.

Ununnilium: And I wouldn't say "The only shows that can be said to have no myth arcs are those for whom every episode is stand-alone." A Myth Arc is a lot more structured than that.

Seth "It has one long-term goal which the characters are pursuing throughout the series" I also haven't seen one piece but that line sounds like a textbook definition of this trope. The seems to be the Antithesis of Dis Continuity in some ways, perhaps they need to mention each other in their articles, more links the better for this site anyway.

Edit: Would this include things like ashes quest to become the Pokemaster and other such goals?

Ununnilium: No. That's just... hm. IMHO, we need a trope for the Series Goal. Because it's not the same as a Myth Arc, which is an ongoing story. Even if every episode of your show is standalone, it can still have a Series Goal. It's part of the premise of the series; to watch a Myth Arc episode you have to know the plot of every previous episode in the arc, but to watch a standalone episode you only need to know the premise.

Ununnilium, later: I still say this is a good idea. Gotta Catch Them All would be a subtrope.

Mister Six: Added Series Goal.

Ununnilium: Aaaaaaaand it's a redirect to Failure Is the Only Option. No, no, no; that's not what it is at all.

Tanto: Replaced it with a rudimentary entry of its own; needs expansion.

Fast Eddie: pulled this run-on ...

- particularly in light of the incomprehensibly slow progress of the protagonists towards this goal (the vast majority of One Piece episodes are Monster of the Week which just happen to occur in a location marginally closer to the treasure than the previous one), this is slipping precipitously into [[Failure Is The Only OptionGilligan's Island Syndrome]], and may already be well past that point.

Ununnilium: It was just re-added, exactly the same only the link was fixed.

Fast Eddie: Fixed the language and moved it down as an example.

Deus Ex Biotica: Here's my objection to counting One Piece as a Myth Arc: there's a great deal of Myth (we get told the legend behind One Piece at the beginning of every episode, after all), but not much Arc. The early episodes don't develop the character's knowlege about the One Piece, they just slowly move closer to the Grand Line. Most of the episodes on the Grand Line don't develop the character's knowlege of where One Piece is either, they just involve running through a string of random scenarios with the hope of finding it. When nothing new is being discovered and the approach isn't changing, I don't define something as an arc, myth or otherwise.

Deus Ex Biotica: At the very least, can we assume that the controversy about One Piece implies it shouldn't be the primary example? Babylon Five, Trigun, or something similar would seem like less contested series to put in that slot, with the added advantage that they are over, enabling us to better evaluate their merits in this regard.

Deus Ex Biotica: Okay... not to come off as confrontational, but given that the only thing I seem to be able to get a response from is editing the entry itself, I have removed One Piece from the primary description.

I'm gonna agree that One Piece is a Myth Arc, but the wording for its entry is extremely slanted. I could feel the author's "OMG WHY HAVEN'T THEY FOUND IT YET GEEEEZ drag it out much?" like an aura through the screen. Tone down the bias, please!

Deus Ex Biotica: You mistake me, my anonymous friend. The bias you felt was "I really don't think that this counts, but as a compromise let's leave it on the page along with a description of why I disagree". If anyone would prefer annother entry instead, I am more than willing to discuss that here.

786110: Yeah, the wording regarding One Piece makes it seem as though someone's upset that it's been dragging on a smidge too long. While I'll agree that the there is relatively focus given on One Piece I think it's a case of 'The journey is more important then the destination'. It's not about getting One Piece per se, but the journey to get it and how the crew's zany adventures all relate to reaching that goal.

Capsarc: See, I'd say that One Piece has a Myth Arc, it's just that for the moment, it's not directly related to the actual One Piece. Even before they got into the Grand Line, they learned about the Shichibukai, one of the three great powers that kept the world in check. Then they learned about the fact that Gold Roger had some connection with Luffy (The Will of D), that his brother is working with the Yonkou, another of the three powers, the fact that there were three ancient weapons and an entire century that was erased from history. As they've gone on, they learned that they were more or less following the path of Gold Roger, that the government is willing to commit genocide to cover up the lost century and that Luffy's father and grandfather are a rebel leader and an admiral, respectively. Then there's Blackbeard, who's had an effect on the story since the beginning of Alabasta, and Buggy and Alvida, who presumably still have a part to play. There's a really strong Myth Arc in all that, but it mostly comes up in-between regular arcs, or in the two that directly deal with the Shichibukai.

The Fedora Pirate: I also found the example for One Piece to have an "ugh, we're only halfway?!" slant to it. Also, I agree that the One Piece itself isn't the Mytharc, it's the Series Goal, the Mytharc is what Capsarc wrote out in the spoiler tags. Unfortunately, it's too late and I'm too lazy really change anything; just throwing my opinion out there on the matter.

Austin: I changed it to reflect the myth arc, but I think it could still use additional explanation, and I think others could do it better than I could.

Naruto often has many recaps and episodes that show who all the charaters are, what's been going on, etc. — not only to fill in new viewers, but to help Masashi Kishimoto write more, as well.