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  • AKIRA: As Jacob Geller notes in this video on the Kill Sat trope, the original manga, first published in 1982 before the announcement of the real-life Strategic Defense Initiative, contains two of the first mainstream depictions of a Kill Sat in the form of the Japanese SOL laser satellite and the similar American Floyd weapon. Like many later Kill Sats in fiction (especially anime and manga, for which this is one of the canonical depictions), both are presented as extremely intimidating Death from Above attacks that represent the last word in advanced military weaponry, the finger of God in the hands of humans... and not only do they both fail to do anything more than make Tetsuo angrier, but Tetsuo is able to hijack Floyd (SOL in the anime adaptation) and turn it against the military. Just like the psychic Super Soldiers at the center of the story, both SOL and Floyd are weapons created with a goal of ensuring "peace through superior firepower" that do nothing of the sort and merely escalate the violence.
  • Astro Boy:
    • Parodies of the manga or works inspired by it often try to make things "darker" by having the Atom character suffer awful childhood from his creator. Many don't realize the original work is already dark, as it deconstructs Replacement Goldfish in the early chapters. Dr. Tenma's failed attempt to replace his deceased son with android led to him abusing Atom and eventually selling him to slavery. Thanks to his sophisticated storytelling, a lot of Osamu Tezuka's work is like this. It's difficult to convince people that Pluto isn't so much a Darker and Edgier version of the tale as it is a mere perspective flip.
    • This seems to be common with remakes of Tezuka's work. Some viewers are surprised to find that the original source material is often just as dark, Art-Style Dissonance aside.
    • As an example, the Astro Boy arc "The World's Strongest Robot" (of which Pluto is an adaptation) unbuilds the concept of Power Levels: when Astro worries his 100,000 horsepower output isn't enough to stand up to Pluto's 1,000,000 horsepower, not only does Dr. Ochanomizu refuse to upgrade Astro's motor, he points out that brute strength isn't everything. Sure enough, Astro's tiny frame and flexibility allow him to destroy a 2,000,000 horsepower robot from the inside — after that robot effortlessly thrashed Pluto.
  • The Boogiepop Series provided the Ur-Example of the Stock Light-Novel Hero with Nagi Kirima, and also deconstructed it. Unlike other examples, her Chronic Hero Syndrome is a deliberate choice because she actually does have a death wish, and even though she has plans within plans, she rarely saves the day on her own, generally requiring the timely intervention of the title character. Unlike other examples who tend to be magnetic, most others, save for the few who know, just find her weird and avoid her. When was the work written? The late 90s/early 2000s, well before the trope was even a thing.
  • Cyborg 009 contains one of the earliest examples of the Nebulous Evil Organisation in Japanese media (which makes given how it was written by Shotaro Ishinomori, who would later go on to create Kamen Rider) in Black Ghost. Unlike later evil organizations though, Black Ghost has clearly defined motives behind their schemes — they're a network of arms manufacturers and war profiteers, with most of their schemes being to instigate or exploit conflicts in order to profit off of them.
  • .hack//SIGN is basically a deconstruction of the Isekai subgenre of fantasy, of stories where the main character, often a social loser, gets trapped in an MMO and gets a very OP skill in the process. Well, except that it came out years before the anime of other Isekai stories like Sword Art Online or Overlord (2012) came out and became popular. Tsukasa starts the show such a miserable jerk that few people actually want to spend time with him, and those that do eventually become his friends are put off by his cold demeanor. His OP power is his guardian, which can one hit kill any enemy or player. But having such a power makes him hated by the playerbase at large for being a cheater, so he sometimes has to deal with people trying to kill him for that. And beyond that power, he isn't a powerful character at all. His class is a support class, so when properly playing the game, he is only good for healing and buffing his allies who do the actual fighting. And his ultimate character arc is finding something that he wants to live for after they find a way to get him out of the game he's stuck in, not finding meaning in the game itself.
  • Dragon Ball, despite making or codifying half of the tropes found in manga today, has so many examples of this that it has its own page.
  • Fist of the North Star was one of the first shonen Fighting Series and played tropes common to later entries realistically. Life would be extremely messed up for an ordinary person in a world where all the real power is wielded by a relatively small number of people, and that power is not financial or political, but militaristic. Democratic government is essentially meaningless since no union of ordinary people can stand against the might of a lone badass. Because everyone knows that violence is the force that drives the wheel of civilization, fights occur constantly, and everyone with a bit of ability wants to claw their way as high up the badass scale as possible, whether for the sake of protecting innocents or enforcing their own will on others. The only genuinely powerful people who have any interest in being in charge are usually megalomaniacs and/or sociopaths. Governments tend to be either tyrannies, or farcical constructs whose laws can only be adequately enforced by sympathetic vigilantes and a few Knight Templar civil servants who butt heads with them at every opportunity. Countries are constantly in flux between the two as evil overlords are dethroned by good guys, replaced with ineffectual governments, and conquered again by new bad guys.
  • Future Diary is credited for popularizing the Yandere trope, but it shows what it takes for someone to become a yandere and the effect they have on others. The yandere in question, Yuno, had Abusive Parents with high standards for their daughter, locking her up in a cage when she didn't do well in school. After killing them in retaliation, Yuno became extremely lonely, which is why she gravitated towards Yukki. This unhealthy obsession for Yukki eventually led to his own Start of Darkness, becoming more unhinged as he started growing closer to her. Unlike most yanderes who came after (and most likely were inspired by her), Yuno was genuinely mentally ill, not just a Clingy Jealous Girl taken to the extreme.
  • Galaxy Express 999 in its various incarnations is a very pessimistic account of prospects for The Singularity, despite coming out in 1978, nearly a decade before Vinge introduced the term.
  • Go Nagai:
  • Gaiking's first two episodes play out in a way that seems very close to what shows like Evangelion would do. The main character, Sanshiro Tsubawaki refuses the call to pilot Gaiking. But what's notable is he does it before even seeing the mech, instead refusing to follow the words of a mysterious caller asking him to come to a lab so he can save the world, something that is a Surprisingly Realistic Outcome that most would do in a similar situation.
    • The antagonists of the series know Tsubawaki is a threat, even before he encounters Gaiking, opting to try and assassinate him during his Baseball game by making it look like his death is a freak accident by warping the balls in different directions across the field, with the hope it injures or kills him.
    • When Tsubawaki does pilot Gaiking to fight the first enemy, it goes poorly, with Gaiking unable to damage the enemy due to not knowing it's defenses or weaknesses. Even moreso, his allies flat out leave him to fight in Sink or Swim Mentor moment.
    • After surviving the battle, Sanshiro opts to leave, feeling he's not cut out for the role. Where as a many series would have the cast encourage the hero in times of doubt, one of the cast straight up agrees that Sanshiro is not competent enough.
    • Lastly, due to the injury Sanshiro sustained from the assassination attempt, his career as baseball player has been ruined, unable to swing a bat with the same strength, meaning he is relegated to piloting Gaiking not because it's his duty to save the world, but because it's all he's got left.
  • Getter Robo Is credited for codifying the Combining Mecha trope. However in contrast to later examples like Combattler, its combining mechanism is more like shapeshifting, liquid metal than the more toyetic, rigid, grounded, jigsaw puzzle-like setup that came after it and even before with Dai-Machine, the first combining mecha manga. A new chapter in the "Getter Saga" manga compilation lampshades this, as it has the Getter able to combining out of the intended order, albeit with hilarious, unstable results.
    • The main characters aren't your stereotypical do-gooders—Ryoma is a violent Blood Knight who is introduced crashing a martial arts tournament and assaulting the participants and judges as revenge over their martial arts committee disowning and shuttering his late father's martial arts school. However, the committee shut down the dojo because Ryoma's father taught a vicious, cruel and often times murderous fighting style. While Ryoma does care about saving humanity, he's appalled to learn that humanity can be just as evil as the monsters he fights when he learns about terrorists willing to use bioweapons on their fellow man for no reason.
    • Hayato Jin begins the series as a psychotic Villain Protagonist, introduced as a student protester turned anti-government terrorist leader who disfigures any subordinates who demonstrate disloyalty or doubt in his campaign of rebellion. He's also shown to be a massive coward when faced with a threat greater than him, as opposed to the bravery of most Lancer-type characters in mecha and shonen he would inspire. While he does quickly become a much more heroic character, he's still willing to sacrifice allies and use underhanded tactics for the sake of protecting humanity and develops a sink-or-swim mentality that magnificent bastards like Gendo Ikari would popularize.
    • Musashi deconstructs The Big Guy comic relief archetype that would become prevalent throughout the mecha genre. Despite his goofy nature, he is disciplined and knows his way around machinery, as evident when he fixes up the Eagle Get-Machine. He's also shown to be just as strong and durable as Ryoma and Hayato, as shown when he was impaled in the stomach yet still managed to not only defeat his assailant, but survive piloting the Getter with an untreated wound as well.
    • The first enemies fought in the series, the Dinosaur Empire aren't alien villains or a terrorist organization, but an ancient race trying to reclaim the Earth after a force beyond their control drove them underground. Their leader Emperor Gore's motivation for exterminating humanity is ultimately to ensure a better life for his people. In the final battle, Gore is left behind as the Empire retreats into the depths of the ocean, deciding to die an honorable death in battle, which even the Getter Team respects. Unfortunately for Gore, the Hyakki Empire kills him before Getter can slay him, an act which infuriates the Getter Team for robbing him of a noble death.
    • A complaint that non-mecha fans have is that the protagonists tend to get the hang of piloting their mechs immediately, with no need for physical strength or quick reflexes. Getter Robo subverts this, as it establishes that controlling machines capable of physics-defying feats requires superb pilots and/or unhinged, fearless fighters with superhuman strength and reflexes, lest the G-forces kill them.
    • Another aspect that is complained about is that mecha pilots seem to only be strong or powerful because of the mechs, rather than possessing their own strength or combat abilities. Getter in contrast shows that not only are the pilots physical strong, but also trained in combat as well as martial arts, and are experienced in firearms and other non-mecha weapons. Not to mention, to varying degrees, all three of the original Getter trio are proficient in machinery and engineering. Musashi is shown capable to repairing Ryoma's Eagle Machine. Hayato is genius, being involved in the development of Getter machines, even inventing his Getter Robos, and Ryoma in Armageddon was shown not only repairing, but also customizing a damaged, discarded Getter 1 on the moon into the Black Getter who is capable of taking on Invaders fused with Earths machinery.
  • Haruhi Suzumiya popularized the idea of overpowered Reality Warpers. The series also spends a lot of time demonstrating how ridiculously dangerous Haruhi's powers would be: she very nearly destroys the universe several times, without even knowing she's capable of doing so. Her self-serving powers have also caused her to become an unbelievably self-centered jerkass, and it takes her a long time to begin growing out of it.
  • Hunter × Hunter seems like a heavy deconstruction of Shōnen series from the 2000s such as Naruto and Fairy Tail, with its profoundly messed up mentor figures, an extremely consequential power system that screws its users over as often as it helps them, insinuation that a setting full of mercenaries with supernatural powers who are the de facto highest authority in said setting might be a bad thing, and its deconstruction of the idea of turning enemies into friends, but it debuted in 1998, before almost all of the series it reads like a response to.
  • JoJo's Bizarre Adventure mostly avoids New Powers as the Plot Demands in favor of enemies being Puzzle Bosses. Each "Part" is essentially a standalone Story Arc with a new main character, but occasionally keeps old characters as the plot skips generations, challenging the Competence Zone. The author even intentionally sought to avoid the Sorting Algorithm of Evil, since it requires you to either infinitely escalate or occasionally reset the status quo in a way that's not satisfying. For example, in Part 3, he chose a location (Egypt) as the protagonists' main goal so that progression could be shown through them getting physically closer after defeating every enemy instead of through every enemy being explicitly stronger than the last. Araki also avoided the stereotypical Tournament Arc for similar reasons. Each of these things might sound like a reaction to a chain of Shōnen Fighting Series about young main characters fighting increasingly more powerful enemies with the stakes growing out of control, but the series was created on the heels of Fist of the North Star, and ended up making and codifying many of the genre tropes itself.
  • Despite the premise of Knight's & Magic seeming like another series made after the Isekai Boom, Knight's and Magic's novel came out in 2010, two years before the boom, and takes a different look at the overpowered main character than most later shows. While Eru is shown to be a skilled at magic and operating mecha due to his memories from his past life, he still needs to study and practice daily in order to reach this point. His innovative ideas in his field of expertise, building mecha, often have set backs, such as extra arms for magic staves needing more mana. This requires extra mana cables which end up making the mechs bulkier and slower - and even with the extra cables, the mana still runs out quickly. Eru's prototype mech, the Toybox, is the first Silhouette Knight to achieve some sort of flight/hovering, but like the sub arms, this also drains the mana quickly. His impact on the world is not entirely good, as while his ideas allow for the mechs to be able to combat larger, more destructive demon beasts, it also causes an arms race which led to equal if not worse mana-powered mecha such as the Wyvern. Eru himself is different also; rather than being the usual bland, well meaning nice guy, his character in the manga and novels is markedly more of a Sociopathic Hero, often caring less about the impact of the above arms race and more that it leads to cooler and more explosive mechs. The manga and novels frequently show his allies being put off by or concerned over his zealousness and Blood Knight tendencies as well as his Skewed Priorities. This is shown when he criticized an assassination attempt on Princess Eleonora, not because he found it cowardly or immoral, but because he wanted to fight them with his his mech. Prince Emrys, a similar blood knight worries about his lack of morality in that moment. Also, while most post-Isekai Boom main characters form a harem of adoring girls, Eru's harem is an odd mix of Cargo Ship and his Childhood Friend Addy who he later marries.
  • While the term Chuunibyou and its examples have existed long before Love, Chunibyo & Other Delusions!, few people had heard about the term before the work debuted, to the point that it's frequently mistaken as being the Trope Namer as it popularized the trope. The series also deconstructed the archetype. Rikka Takanashi became a chuunibyou as a coping mechanism for her father's death, and her chuunibyou behavior became problematic for her and her family. When Rikka renounces her chuunibyou self due to pressure from Yuuta, she is left unable to deal with all the changes happening around her, such as her mother returning to her life and her sister moving to Italy.
  • Love Hina is frequently cited as the codifier of many tropes of the Harem Genre of Eastern animation. Except, from the very beginning, it subverts or deconstructs a lot of tropes that would become commonplace in the genre.
    • Quite early on, hints are already given that the protagonist Keitaro will pair up with a girl in the end. Even before hints are given, half the characters don't develop romantic affection for Keitaro at all, and the few that do are less interested in romancing Keitaro himself and more with shipping him with their chosen love interest for him.
    • Rather than having every girl fall in love with the protagonist as soon as they see him, or being indifferent to him at worst, half the girls in the show hate his guts when they meet him, believing him to be a pervert, including exploiting this for blackmail and trying to get him fired.
    • Keitaro is an adult instead of a teenager, so the plot primarily takes place in an inn instead of a school. And while he is studious, it's at the college level. Half the plot involves Keitaro trying to pass entrance exams to enter Tokyo University, and rather than everything going well, he fails the exams the first time he tries, and has to reapply himself to do better next time.
  • Magic Knight Rayearth came out in 1995, predating the isekai wave by almost twenty years, but its first season finale hinges on the fact if the only people that can save the world are teenage Japanese civilians when it's already populated with powerful warriors, there is probably a very, very unsettling reason why. And even before that, the girls miss their families and modern comforts, and initially attempt to apply JRPG logic to their new surroundings only to nearly die due to their lack of fighting experience and powers.
  • Mobile Suit Gundam codified the Real Robot genre of anime, but also played a lot of its tropes with more depth than even later Gundam shows.
    • Amuro is a fairly realistic depiction of a kid who ends up Falling into the Cockpit. He only pilots the Gundam because there's no one else available who can, and in his first battle he can barely operate it, only winning because the Gundam is so much more advanced than the Zakus attacking it. Being repeatedly abruptly thrust into battle leads to him developing PTSD and spending quite a bit of time refusing to pilot the Gundam. Eventually, as he pilots it more and more, he starts to thirst for combat and for chances to kill Zeon forces, something he also needs to work himself out of.
    • Also, the iconic "Bright Slap" Bright gives Amuro while he's refusing to pilot the Gundam does not work, and only makes his depression worse, to the point he outright deserts. It's only after Frau shows him compassion that he starts piloting it again.
    • The Colony Drop that Zeon is known for making use of is shown to be an incredibly ineffectual tactic. The first colony they drop veers off course and collides into Sidney, Australia instead of their intended target. It wouldn't be until Mobile Suit Gundam: The Origin reconstructs the trope by adding more context to the event to make it even worse— A direct impact would've resulted in extensive-but-localized damage to South America, and at best disrupt the Federation's leadership. Federation fleets intercepted the colony and did their best to divert course, but ended up slowing it down and softened it up enough that it broke into three sections, landing on Sydney, in the Pacific, and in the grain belts of southern Canada. The ensuing coastal disasters, famines, wide-spread disease, and disruption to supply lines resulted in more than half of the entire global population dying instead.
    • At the end of the series, Kycilia Zabi shoots Gihren just as the Final Battle begins. In any other series, this would set her up as the True Final Boss but in practice it looks more like a deconstruction of The Starscream trope. Because she shoots him at such a critical time, it only worsens the chain of command in Zeon, as they now lack Gihren's Cult of Personality to hold them together, resulting in Zeon's collapse as the battle goes on.
    • While Char Aznable spawned an entire character archetype in the Gundam series, his depiction in the original more resembles a deconstruction of that archetype. He's largely an opportunist rather than a long term manipulator, only getting as far as he does because he happens to be in the right places at the right times, and ultimately fails in his revenge quest, the two Zabis he does kill both saw him as an ally and couldn't have at all been involved in his father's death, since they were both children when he passed. The fact that Kycilia's ship gets destroyed by Federation forces right after Char kills her, meaning she wouldn't have survived even if he hadn't turned on her, only further highlights how pointless his revenge ended up being.
    • The Titans in Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam popularized the trope of the brutally oppressive State Sec within the franchise, yet also seem like a subversion of later examples like OZ and the A-Laws, as their flagrant atrocities eventually force the Federation to disassociate with them and mark them as a criminal organization.
  • Monster Musume's first volume was published in 2012, just before the massive explosion of the Cute Monster Girl-centric genre. Many view the series as the Trope Codifier for many of the tropes in said genre. However, the series either Deconstructs or at least Justifies many of the common tropes in the genre.
    • Host families are biased in favor of humanoid or Little Bit Beastly species whilst predator-based species like lamias and arachnes have a much tougher time gaining trust and acceptance in the human population as their predator-based bodies cause fear among general humans.
    • Related to the above, demihumans are treated with much greater scrutiny than humans, with them having to live with a host family and being forced to obey curfews and be accompanied by their host family. Demihumans caught violating the laws can be taken away from their host family and even be deported.
    • Animal-based species are given the strength of their respective animals to match, and examined realistically as well. With the exception of Rachneranote  and Lalanote , Kimihito's monster girls frequently have trouble holding their strength back, which results in him getting injured. Should any of them not hold back any of their strength, such as during a full moon, their strength could literally kill him.
  • Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation. Like Monster Musume, the first volume was published just before the modern Isekai genre exploded in popularity. Many view the series as one of those that served as a Trope Codifier for many of the tropes in said genre. Again, however, the series deconstructs or justifies many of the tropes that became common in the genre.
    • To start with, the main character is, much like many Isekai protagonists, both a Hikikomori and a NEET. However, unlike many other works, the Light Novel actually addresses that this lifestyle is both unhealthy and fairly tragic. The main character (before his reincarnation) is an overweight loser who is considered to be the Black Sheep of his family. He's spent his entire adult life sponging off of his family and when his parents die, his disgusting habits, combined with the fact that he didn't attend their funeral, prompt his remaining family members to kick him out of the house and essentially disown him. On top of that, the Light Novel addresses the fact that many who live this lifestyle have serious underlying psychological issues — he dies shortly after coming to the belief that his life has been entirely meaningless — and those issues carry over with him into the next world, making it difficult for him to socialize with other people his age when they can trigger flashbacks of him being bullied in his previous life just by looking at him. None of this is Played for Laughs, by the way.
    • The main character's perverted antics are also shown in a much different light. His obsession with sex is shown to be the result of his constant exposure to hentai and other pornographic material warping how he perceives women and sex, and it's also shown to make many of the female characters he interacts with deeply uncomfortable, even afraid to be around him. In fact, growing out of his attitudes and tendencies is a major part of his Character Development.
    • In a similar vein to the above, the series is, like many Isekai works, set in a pseudo-Medieval European setting. A lot of works in such settings either tend to downplay or outright ignore the way that women were treated (or exploit it for fanservice), with even powerful women being little more than political bargaining chips who had very little autonomy in many regards to their own lives. In addition to that, many of the powerful men are very corrupt and often do at-best morally-dubious things. Rudeus's new father is, while not without his redeeming qualities, still a philandering rapist who cheated on his pregnant wife with one of his former victims. His Uncle Phillip is a schemer who offers to allow the 10-year-old main character to have sex with his 12-year-old daughter in exchange for the former's support in a coup he's planning, and his grandfather Sauros (and Phillip as well) both enjoy having at-best extremely-dubiously-consensual sex with their beastgirl servants/slaves. And keep in mind, these are the "good" members of the family. The higher-ranking ones who actually hold power are even worse than they are. And the series does not shy away from showing the psychological impact that living in this sort of society has on women.
    • The Light Novel also justifies the protagonist being a prodigy-level genius with regards to magic: he didn't keep his old body when he started over in the new world, and was reborn into the body of an infant with all his knowledge and memories intact from his previous life. Due to this, he has the intelligence of a fully-grown adult with the learning capacity and neuroplasticity of a child, granting him a massive advantage over other children. And even then, he still has to put in a lot of work in order to excel the way that he does.
  • Neon Genesis Evangelion:
    • Rei Ayanami was the creator of the Rei Ayanami Expy. She also happens to be a deconstruction of the archetype, as she is a Came Back Wrong under-aged clone of the main character's mother and is inhabited by the soul of an Eldritch Abomination that goes on to destroy the world. She's a significant victim of a Misaimed Fandom, as she was intended to fall directly into the Uncanny Valley, only coming this close to climbing out of that valley before plummeting back down into the depths, even creepier than she was before. However, since the initial uncanny valley was fueled primarily by her enigmatic nature, the fans' interest was piqued. Even after The Movie ended the series and made Rei suddenly not so cute anymore, she remained, and to some degree still remains, the queen of waifus — a symbol of the Otaku's lack of interest in real women. Rei is also thought to be a prototype of modern Moe... and she is also a deconstruction of it for much the same reasons. A particularly odd example of the trope being played with is the Rebuild films, where Rei's character was shown in a highly sympathetic light in the first two films, before being replaced by a different Rei in the third film, who also is much more in tune with her portrayal in the original series, and this time most viewers see Rei Q as exactly as creepy and inhuman as the original was meant to be seen the first time around — possibly the result of audiences used to something like a decade and a half of The Theme Park Version of her character.
    • Gendo helped popularize the Manipulative Bastard, but he's also a deconstruction of the archetype, being portrayed as a deeply screwed up man who has only become ruthless because of a Dark and Troubled Past and the loss of his wife. In the end, he gets effortlessly Out-Gambitted by Rei, who steals the role he had planned for himself and gives it to Shinji instead. Most other examples do not ever really get distracted much in their plans and if they are main characters, they get portrayed positively, often absurdly so. The idea that a Manipulative Bastard could actually be taken care of in an unexpected way is usually unheard of.
    • Kaworu is the archetypal White Hair, Black Heart character, but he’s only a villain because he’s SEELE's trump card and the final Angel Shinji has to kill. While he's apparently very nice and selfless (manga version aside) and connects with Shinji easily, even allowing himself to be killed by him, many doubt if he's being manipulative or unaware of the damage he ultimately causes in a series all about very flawed people.
    • Asuka Langley Soryu is widely considered one of the Trope Codifiers of the Tsundere character archetype, also showing a much more realistic portrayal of these sorts of characters than many of her imitators. The show makes it clear that her "harsh" actions towards Shinji do little to help his already low self-esteem, and her inability to portray her feelings for him without it coming across any other way only leads to the two becoming an ineffective Battle Couple. In addition, this front is done to cover up the fact that she is deeply traumatized over her mother's suicide, with said mother having gone insane and treating a doll more lovingly than her actual daughter. Indeed, her character shows just how screwed up someone with a tsundere mentality towards others would be and how damaging it is to both the character herself and her love interest.
    • The series predates Love Hina above, but could easily be read as a deconstruction of the Harem Genre. We have an Unlucky Everydude (who even looks a lot like the generic harem protagonist) who is surrounded by attractive girls and women, in an environment riddled with sexual tension and plenty of tease and raunchy humor. But Shinji's discomfort with the proceedings and hormonal nature are increasingly not Played for Laughs as the series goes on, and pretty much every revelation in their relationships just makes them look weird, creepy, and unhealthy. Rei has unclear interest in Shinji that is also borne out of association with his father and the pairing itself is revealed to be sort-of incestuous, Asuka's tsundere nature is shown to be rooted in deep emotional insecurity and horrifying childhood trauma rather than a misguided crush, and Misato's interest in Shinji is portrayed as somewhere between messed-up maternal instinct and outright pedophilia. And Kaworu is a one-episode character that provides easy, automatic affection to Shinji without requiring any effort from him and then dies soon after these notions turn out to be fantasies, convincing Shinji nobody even cares about him.
  • Watching Now and Then, Here and There today, you’d be forgiven for thinking it was intended to invert or subvert various aspects of the Isekai genre that have become so popular since the early 2010s. The Mysterious Waif is explicitly not interested in a romance with the protagonist, said protagonist is not only not The Chosen One but ultimately accomplishes little in the end, the other world is a hellish dictatorship instead of a magical RPG Mechanics 'Verse, and the villain is a disturbingly realistic sociopath instead of a demon lord. But it came out in 1999, long before the the “RPG-inspired Isekai” trend started.
  • Perfect Blue heavily emphasizes the dangers of the Japanese idol industry: A former Idol Singer who decides to graduate to pursuit her career as an actress, Mima ends up landing the role of a rape victim in a murder-mystery show, only to struggle with the increasingly-intense demands of her part. Along the way, Mima finds an internet blog seemingly written by her former Idol Singer persona, only to find out that it's written by a creepy stalker from her days as an Idol Singer. Sounds like a harsh deconstruction of the Idol Singer. It came out in 1997, well before franchises like The Idolmaster and Love Live! popularized the Idol Singer to the mainstream audiences (outside of Magic Idol Singer series like Creamy Mami, the Magic Angel), and well before issues plaguing the idol industry such as sexual abuse from the executives of groups such as AKB48 became publicized.
  • Pokémon: The Series is one of the most famous examples of the mons genre, popularizing it even more than the games. But earlier seasons, especially the first episode, deconstruct the whole Pokémon experience:
    • Ash Ketchum in the early seasons is an example of what happens when you let an inexperienced and ignorant child into such a world. In the first episode, his incompetence gets him laughed at, and at worst, nearly gets him and Pikachu killed. Criminal organizations, like Team Rocket, weren't bumbling nuisances but were very real threats to him. Two of his most powerful Pokémon (Pikachu and Charizard) were very disobedient because they didn't respect such a hapless kid. He didn't earn half of his badges in the intended manner of defeating a Gym Leader in battle, instead usually getting them by doing favors for the leader or stopping Team Rocket. He doesn't end up actually facing his rival in their first tournament because he lost before Ash and he doesn't actually win said tournament either, due to laziness and bad luck. Sure, Ash eventually became a good trainer (and the Champion of Alola- and even later the World Coronation Series Monarch i.e. the strongest trainer in the world to boot) through his loyalty, tenacity, courage, and love, but it took a while to get there.
    • Other early episodes deal with other problems with a Pokémon world, like abandonment (Charmander's first appearance), disobedience (Pikachu in early episodes, the aforementioned Charmander shortly after it evolved), crime (not only the omnipresence of Team Rocket's Pokémon-stealing operations, but even groups of Pokémon themselves committing crimes like the Squirtle Squad, as well as the episodes in and around the Safari Zone implying serious problems with poaching), and the origins of Mewtwo, which are a tragic and frightening example of the experimentation that can exist in a world with the same kind of technological advances as this series.
    • Mewtwo's portrayal in the first movie, in particular, can come across as a pretty sharp indictment of many aspects of Mons series. The treatment of a highly intelligent and powerful creature as a primarily subservient entity and a means to an end (like in the games, where Mewtwo is a Superboss and a Purposely Overpowered fighter) by humans is precisely what turns Mewtwo into a villain, more than a decade before the source material would question if the concept of Pokémon training was ethically right in Pokémon Black and White. And while Ash's sacrifice destroyed his vendetta, he still felt lost and alone in the world.
    • Pokémon 2000 introduced Lawrence III, the first villain who went after Legendaries, predating Team Magma and Aqua by a couple of years. His goal was much different than other examples; while they wanted to use them as part of some plan, he was merely looking to collect Zapdos, Moltres, Articuno, and Lugia for himself. Plus, merely capturing one of them was enough to throw the weather completely out of balance.
  • Ranma ½:
    • The series was one of the earliest examples of the Harem Genre, but whereas most stories in that genre have the girls fall for the male lead on the vaguest of reasons, Ranma 1/2 gives each girl a unique reason to be in Ranma's romantic circle. Akane Tendo was engaged to Ranma by a pact between their fathers. Ukyo Kuonji is a childhood friend who had a crush on Ranma and who also had her marriage arranged by their fathers... except in her case, Genma stole the dowry and abandoned her rather than honor the promise. Shampoo was engaged to Ranma by her tribal customs when he defeated her in a fight, and doesn't accept his ignorance of the custom as an excuse. Lastly, Kodachi Kuno fell in love with Ranma after he saved her from a fall — but she's portrayed as an overly melodramatic and unstable individual, whose affections are given little real consideration by Ranma.
    • The series also deconstructed the Harem Genre by codifying the Unwanted Harem subgenre. Whilst Ranma does think that Shampoo and Ukyo are physically attractive and even have their character upsides, he's ultimately in love with Akane and has no interest in leaving her, while most shows with even a Supporting Harem have the hero develop romantic tension with every member. Not to mention the series focuses far more on wacky martial arts hijinks than on the typical romantic interactions with any of the girls.
    • It even deconstructs the Unwanted Harem; the major reason that Ukyo and Shampoo pursue Ranma, after their personal attraction to him, is that each feels she has a legal obligation if not right to Ranma's hand in marriage. And both they and Kodachi feel encouraged that they have a chance to win Ranma's heart because Ranma and Akane's incessant quarrels make them feel the two don't love each other.
    • Furthermore, Ranma occasionally has to deal with an Unwanted Harem of men who are attracted to his female form and don't make the connection between the two. And in an action that is often very different from other harems, both his primary love interest Akane and other pursuers have people who are interested in them. These occasionally bear fruit.
    • Akane is usually cited as one of the Trope Codifiers of the Tsundere. Critics and deconstructions of the archetype usually cite how unjustified such behavior is (namely that such a person would have to be somewhat imbalanced and could easily cross the line into Domestic Abuse), but in the manga, Ranma is portrayed as a bit of a jerk, with Akane's actions coming across as justified (or at least understandable) in most cases. It also examines why she's a tsundere: she suffers from deep insecurities and had to deal with a lot of frustrations (such as Kuno) even before Ranma and his father came to the Tendo Dojo.
    • The series simultaneously embraces the "Takahashi Couple" trope but also deconstructs it, in that Ranma and Akane's mutual tsundere antics only leave each of them doubting whether their attraction is reciprocated and inspires their various romantic rivals by giving them hope that they have a chance to break up what appears to be a very rocky and unstable couple.
    • The series is commonly considered to be the main Trope Codifier for the Gender Bender in modern fiction, yet it almost completely averts or subverts many important conventions associated with the trope, such as Man, I Feel Like a Woman or Gender-Bender Friendship. The first main plot point that is presented in the story is an Arranged Marriage, and Ranma's relationship with Akane gets as much focus, if not more so, than the gender-bending related gags. Also, it's pretty clear from the start that the series is set in a semi-fantastic universe and is not meant to be a realistic exploration of gender-bending in any way (Ranma never has to worry about becoming an experiment subject, for instance). Furthermore, whilst Ranma does exploit his female form for his advantage, he never loses sight of his goal to return to being 100% man, and the only people encouraging him to give up on a cure or fully become a girl are the local perverts. It's worth to note that, unlike most later examples which were written by straight men, the series was made by a woman, so the use of this trope probably meant something entirely different for her.
  • The Rising of the Shield Hero started a couple trends in isekai stories that it does much differently from later imitators:
    • The series is often credited as the source of the isekai subgenre of the revenge-seeking hero who is betrayed by the people who summoned him, typically including a Villainous Princess, and must work his way back from nothing to become the greatest threat the kingdom has seen. In such stories, the character is a Villain Protagonist who may have certain standards, but is otherwise willing to engage in things like Cold-Blooded Torture. Naofumi starts out as a dark Anti-Hero with severe character flaws and a distrust of everyone, but never quite goes to those depths and gradually improves himself.
    • The series is responsible for creating and popularizing the Hero's Slave Harem, typically portrayed as the haremettes having no problem with it. Naofumi's reason for buying a slave in the first place is desperation to have an ally as he cannot fight for himself and no one trusts him after a False Rape Accusation. Further additions to the group are slaves due to Naofumi's trauma, meaning he cannot trust someone who is not bound to listen to him.
    • The series is also credited for popularizing (and not just in Isekai, but in non-Isekai fantasy as well) the hero getting a power that looks lame at first (and it may play a role in the aforementioned betrayal), but upon closer inspection turns out to have the potential to be devastating. Except Naofumi's Cardinal Shield never fit such a mold. Sure, it makes Naofumi into an excellent tank, healer and buffer from the very beginning despite a nonexistent potential for defense (bar a couple corrupting Dangerous Forbidden Techniques), however, such power is useless on its own and makes him extremely dependent on others to defeat his enemies. Even if Naofumi does get increasingly more powerful as the series progressed, this never extends to his offensive ability; he never outgrows the roles of Stone Wall and White Mage, instead relying on Raphtalia and other companions to deal some actual damage.
  • Comparing Sailor Moon and the Magical Girl Warrior genre it inspired:
  • Saint Seiya:
    • It popularized the Rescue Arc as well as the convention of having a sequence of enemies impeding the heroes, but it also deviates heavily from later versions of it. The Gold Saints were above the level of strength Seiya and company could bring to the table and the battles were often determined by outside forces intervening.
    • It also established early on that Made of Iron was not the default state. The whole point of the Cloths wasn't just for a Transformation Sequence or to give the wearer superpowers; the Saints need them because for all their flashy and powerful attacks, their bodies are still that of a human's. Not to mention that from all those fights, they need to be repaired very often.
  • Skull Man has all the trappings of a '90s Anti-Hero, complete with killing numerous people just for the hell of it. And yet it also does a good job of pointing out the protagonist is murdering relatively innocent people and by his own standards, he'd have to kill every person in Japan to accomplish his goals. It also originated in 1970.
  • Tenchi Muyo! has the definitive example of an Unwanted Harem, and arguably the first. But to many modern viewers, it can seem like a deconstruction. Tenchi Masaki is literally an Unlucky Everydude — he is both a Butt-Monkey and a Nice Guy. Being a Nice Guy means he's too ethical to abuse the girls' affections, let alone Marry Them All with any kind of speed. Also, every one of the girls is both jaw-droppingly gorgeous and a prime example of a certain fetish... but they're also actual people with all the complications thereof. As he's a Butt Monkey, those complications threaten his life — along with the entire planet and occasionally universe — on a regular basis. Manic Pixie Dream Girl Ryoko? A space pirate with a price on her head several dozen orders of magnitude greater than Earth's combined GNP. The princesses? Elegant and refined Aeka is a bossy, prudishly-repressed proto-dominatrix, while adorable homemaker Sasami is a little girl who happens to be one of the three goddesses who created the universe, in "human" form. and they're both half-sisters of his grandfather. The cute lil' Mad Scientist? She's really 20,000 years old, is the mother of the Space Pirate, she wants him anyway, and she's another of the three goddesses who created the universe. Oh, and according to Word of God, the third goddess wants in as well. There's also two Galaxy Police Detectives; both are interested, but the sensible one is Married to the Job and the other is an absolute ditz who clears cases mostly through blind luck. The ditz is also the grandchild of the Mad Scientist's disastrous first marriage.
  • Tomorrow's Joe heavily emphasizes the dangers of the boxing world: Joe is forced to undergo Training from Hell to have any chance of qualifying for even the lowest-ranked matches, a regimen that is only harsher for Rikishi, who forces anorexia upon himself in order to lose enough weight to fight Joe in the bantamweight ranks. This measure ends up disastrous for Rikishi, as it ultimately ends up killing him after his long-awaited match with Joe, combined with an unlucky blow to the temple and him hitting his head on the ropes during a fall. Rikishi's death traumatizes Joe, inducing a phobia of delivering blows to the face, and it takes him a considerable amount of time and three straight losses to get over it. During the chapters leading up to Joe's championship match with José Mendoza, it becomes increasingly clear that Joe is suffering from punch-drunk syndrome, which is severely impairing his ability to fight; in the end, Joe not only loses the championship bout, but also passes away from his injuries immediately after. Sounds like a harsh deconstruction of the Determinator trope and sports manga, doesn't it? Well it couldn't be, because the manga ran from 1968 to 1973, making it one of the earliest contributors to the genre. Another thing to note is that the manga started and ended long before the issues it touched on were common knowledge; most people wouldn't even become aware of the health effects of boxing until Muhammad Ali's appearance at the 1996 Olympics.
  • Urusei Yatsura predates both the Magical Girlfriend genre and the Harem Genre as we know them, but looks like a Deconstructive Parody of both genres now that they're established. Ataru is a Harem Seeker and unabashed pervert who wants every girl except the one girl who can actually stand him, and the number two girl actually does the smart thing and books out of their relationship fairly early rather than putting up with Ataru's games. On Lum's part, she likes him being lecherous but wants a bit of that lechery for herself, and is a hot-tempered woman who's not above using Shock and Awe to punish him when his gaze strays too far. Furthermore, Ataru actively wants nothing to do with her, at least at first, and thinks of her as more of a pain in the ass rather than a Love Interest. This is because Lum's alien nature makes her very clueless about human society, which means that when she's not causing Ataru problems deliberately, she often causes problems accidentally.
  • The Yu-Gi-Oh! manga actually deconstructed the franchise idea of card games being Serious Business very early on. In the Death-T arc, which was almost completely removed from the anime, Kaiba goes nuts after losing a single Duel to Yugi, developing a single-minded obsession with revenge (not just humiliation, but murder with death traps straight out of Saw) and explicitly not caring about the lives of anyone who gets in his way, be they Yugi’s friends or even his little brother Mokuba. The ultimate reason for this madness? His adoptive father abused him as a child and convinced him that losing even once makes you a worthless being who deserves to die. This arc makes it very clear that only a total psychopath would treat a card game with such seriousness, and there is a reason why later manga arcs and all spin-off anime series make Duel Monsters the key to ancient magic and not just a game.
    • It must also noted that part of the reason Kaiba organized the Death-T was due to going through the "experience of death" after his loss to Yugi, which again emphasizes that Kaiba is not in his right mind to organize something like it. Atem's own way of using games to torture and punish people was supposed to be jarring and paint him as a kind of anti-hero, and just like the card games in the anime's later seasons it was enforced by Atem's own magical powers. And a number of opponents weren't above trying to cheat their victory.
    • Also, despite the magical elements, up to Battle City the game was still somewhat more grounded and with more personal stakes: in the japanese dub getting the three God cards will put you at the top of the dueling world, not give you actual world-domination powers, and the conflict between Marik and Atem was very personal instead of Marik trying to take over the world. It's only with Dartz that the cards get actual world-altering abilities.
    • While in most cardgame anime characters just don't think of cheating, or when it happens is a one-off side character who is despised by heroes and villains alike, it was much more common in the first seasons (think Mai, Arcana, Roba, Keith, Weevil, or the Rare Hunters using counterfeit cards). And if today you heard about a Yu-Gi-Oh villain using supernatural powers to win you might think it a deconstruction or a perspective flip on how often main characters are accused of cheating for doing just that... except it's the anime's very first Big Bad, Maximilion Pegasus, and back then it was treated as an unfair and underhanded tactic.

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