Hunter x Hunter vs. JoJo's Bizarre Adventure

So I've grown tired with fighting shounen. I realized over half of the anime and manga I've seen/read is fighting shounen and so I wnted to diversify my interests.

I still plan on doing that but I hang out with a ton of people who read these sorts of series and when I voiced my dissatisfaction with the genre (I think it does qualify as one since they all seem to share a lot of tropes/cliches/archetypes/whatever), they instantly bombarded me with "but [This Series] is great!"

HXH and JJBA are the two shounen manga I've been hearing the most about though, as in for the past four years nobody I talk to shuts up about how great they are.

Great fights don't matter to me. I care about an interesting world and most of all, a likable main character. You have no idea how much I detest Goku, Ichigo, Naruto, Luffy.... I want heroes like Yusuke or even Kenshin. I guess I don't hate Edward Elric but saying I liked him would be a stretch.

I had a guy who swears by JBBA say that HXH was probably better in characters and plot and all that but JJBA's fights are the most unique and interesting in all of shounen because it isn't just a fight. It's like "a mystery story" according to him.

But yeah, TL'DR, which do you recommend more?

NOTE:

I'monly reading the manga here. Neither series is dubbed and I can't follow subbed anime. I noticed Viz is coming out with JJBA Part 1 and such so now might be a good tme to jump onboard there.

Look, if you're tired of a particular genre, you're just tired of it, and should take a bit of a break. Both Jojo and HXH are plenty good series, but they are still very much shonen fighting series and you are probably going to end up not giving them a fair chance because they are build from the same tropes as the series that you are already bored with.

My recommendation is to check out the Recommendations subforum, and pick something entirely different.

I'd say read enough of them that you can tell your friends that you tried

But, really, if you're not interested in fights you shouldn't be reading fighting series

Well I mean, I don't mind fights. They're whatever. Fighting series don't have to have the fights as their primary selling points - FMA was a fighting manga but it still had interesting characters and concepts and a world I liked to learn more about. I was also told me HXH literally has entire pages of just text with no drawings at all so fighting doesn't even sound like it's the focus there.

It's just that...it's black and white stills. I can't picture it being all that enthralling.

edited 13th Nov '14 4:52:41 AM by Nikkolas

as far as jojo goes i love the series but you have to approach it from kind of a forgiving mindset. there's a lot of deus ex machina and other narrative issues that i would complain about a lot in other series. in jojo i don't mind as much because of how much fun it is to read regardless, but there you go.

also, if you aren't going to watch the jojo anime, the first part of Jojo is not that enthralling. it takes a while to live up to the name of jojo's BIZARRE adventure.

edited 13th Nov '14 5:28:43 AM by wehrmacht

I haven't watched the 2012 anime, but from what I heard of it I think I still prefer the original Hunter Hunter anime, between it and the original manga it is my favorite version.

"Please crush me with your heels Esdeath-sama!

How is the Jojo anime?

edited 13th Nov '14 5:37:42 AM by SaintDeltora

"Please crush me with your heels Esdeath-sama!

it's a great adaptation but upon re-reading the op nikkolas can't watch subbed anime so recommending the anime adaptations is futile.

The thing about Jojo is that it's split into different parts, so it doesn't have a single main character, and kind of switches genres in between parts. It's quite likely that you will like some much better than others.

You have to be wary that Araki has some narrative issues here and there - like wehrmacht says, you have to be forgiving at times. But it's still pretty amazing, and all things considered I would say it's superior to Hunter in most aspects.

I've only watched Jojo's, but from what I've heard, Hunter x Hunter is what you want if we're actually going to take things seriously. Apparently the 2011 adaption is great, as well. Whoops, guess that's not really relevant to the OP.

edited 13th Nov '14 7:11:09 AM by majoraoftime

...What does it mean to take things seriously when it comes to these series? Jojo is the sort of series that, though presented seriously, asks that you have some levity while watching it. The bizarreness of the series stretches its way back and forth between seriousness and humorous. It's both.

Hunter takes itself about as seriously, or maybe a bit less, but because it's a bit less bizarre in context, there's less levity involved. At least, that's how I see things.

The current Jojo anime(stardust crusaders) probably isn't what you want if you want a great MC either.

Yeah, Jotaro can come off as boring if you don't look past the surface. He's got this whole Rated M for Manly Badass '90s Anti-Hero deal going for him, so he can seem pretty bland or one-note without knowing his true character.

Still, I prefer him by far compared to Gon.

edited 13th Nov '14 9:48:04 AM by Crinias

I am the opposite. I prefer Gon's pseudo-innocence and adventuristic spirit over Jotaro's firm warrior spirit.

Then again, Joseph is better than either of them, so...

edited 13th Nov '14 10:09:51 AM by SaintDeltora

"Please crush me with your heels Esdeath-sama!

The full extent of Jotaro's character is only really felt if you read the subsequent parts, especially stone ocean.

taking only SC into account, he's not THAT great.

Discounting the fights (Does the jojo made a poker battle count?) Over All Hunter x Hunter wins on story, themes, cast and setting, though Joseph might be better than Gon. It helps that there are a couple times were something important was resolved by something other than fighting or power of friendship, though those did help.

edited 13th Nov '14 4:41:52 PM by supermerlin100