History YMMV / MedakaBox

* CounterpartComparison: Medaka has occasionally drawn comparison to Rias Gremory, the main heroine of ''LightNovel/HighSchoolDXD''. Both have similar figures, including RapunzelHair of an [[YouGottaHaveBlueHair unnatural color]] inherited paternally, capped off with an IdiotHair, as well as impressively large breasts compared to other girls of their age. Both are presidents of a school position, though Rias leads a club while her friend leads the Student Council. Both Are nearly forced into an ArrangedMarriage and avoid it with the help of the main male protagonist. Both girls' paternal lineages are extremely wealthy, owning an absurdly large territory, and known for their extremely loving nature. Lastly, both have an [[BrotherSisterIncest overly affectionate]] older brother voiced by Creator/JunichiSuwabe.

* CounterpartComparison: Medaka has occasionally drawn comparison to Rias Gremory, the main heroine of ''LightNovel/HighSchoolDXD''. Both have similar figures, including RapunzelHair of an [[YouGottaHaveBlueHair unnatural color]] inherited paternally, capped off with an IdiotHair, as well as impressively large breasts compared to other girls of their age. Both are presidents of a school position, though Rias leads a club while her friend leads the Student Council. Both girls' paternal lineages are extremely wealthy, owning an absurdly large territory, and known for their extremely loving nature. Lastly, both have an [[BrotherSisterIncest overly affectionate]] older brother voiced by Creator/JunichiSuwabe.

* AssPull:
** ''Lots''. Especially with combat -- [[TropesAreNotBad not that it was handled badly.]] That is, until [[spoiler: Naze Youka being Medaka's never-mentioned-before older sister Kujira.]] There are hints (her eyes being the same as [[spoiler:Medaka's and Maguro's ]] being the main one) but only subtle ones, and it still feels like a huge stretch.
** The 15 story research lab under the school (re-purposed as a very big gym). Which no one knew about, supposedly. The GenreShift has not been kind to this series, although we may be seeing WriterRevolt.

* CounterpartComparison: Medaka has occasionally drawn comparison to Rias Gremory, the main heroine of ''LightNovel/HighSchoolDXD''. Both have similar figures, including RapunzelHair of an [[YouGottaHaveBlueHair unnatural color]] inherited paternally, capped off with an IdiotHair, as well as impressively large breasts compared to other girls of their age. Both are presidents of a school position, though Rias leads a club while her friend leads the Student Council. Both girls' paternal lineages are extremely wealthy, owning an absurdly large territory, and known for their extremely loving nature. Lastly, both have an [[BrotherSisterInsest overly affectionate]] older brother voiced by Creator/JunichiSuwabe.

* RescuedFromTheScrappyHeap: Akune redeems himself in later chapters as it's revealed it's actually a reformed thug who sees nothing wrong with fighting as dirty as hell (in stark contrast to Zenkichi and Medaka). It doesn't hurt that the romance themes of the series were outright dropped as the series turned into a combat-centric series.

* BaseBreakingCharacter: Medaka is either a deconstruction of TheAce or played overly too straight despite the many attempts to show her faults. She became more controversial when she TookALevelInJerkass toward Zenkicki during the Successor Arc. [[spoiler:Losing her position to Zenkicki and becoming a "regular" student]] brought her down a peg and made her more likable and entertaining.
* {{Squick}}: Taiyaki becomes this when Kumagawa eats it.
* BrokenBase: Regarding the various Genre-Shifts; some people preferred the slice-of-life elements of the first arcs, some preferred the straight up battle manga, and some prefer the Deconstruction manga.

* TheScrappy:
** The majority of the fanbase hates Akune for being a direct rival to Zenkichi for being an all around [[SmugSnake perfect]] Bishounen.

** Medaka became more controversial when she TookALevelInJerkass toward Zenkicki during the Successor Arc. [[spoiler:Losing her position to Zenkicki and becoming a "regular" student]] brought her down a peg and made her more likable and entertaining.
* {{Squick}}: Taiyaki becomes this when Kumagawa eats it.

* MagnificentBastard: Kumagawa

** She decides to stop this attitude in exchange for helping her brother save Koga's life.

* AlternateCharacterInterpretation: Zenkichi. A person only motivated by a SubordinateExcuse and following Medaka's justice, or a truly heroic character who simply gets stressed with the burden of helping people? Or both?
** In canon, he seems to think it's the first. Though he was going through a bout of self-deprecation at the time.
* ArcFatigue: The fighting-manga arc has been going on pretty much nonstop since the series came close to being canceled (see GenreShift below). They stopped for a single chapter, if only for exposition to introduce the new set of villains, then jumped right back in.

* AssPull: ''Lots''. Especially with combat -- [[TropesAreNotBad not that it was handled badly.]] That is, until [[spoiler: Naze Youka being Medaka's never-mentioned-before older sister Kujira.]] There are hints (her eyes being the same as [[spoiler:Medaka's and Maguro's ]] being the main one) but only subtle ones, and it still feels like a huge stretch.

* EnsembleDarkhorse: Aka Aoki. She's been in three chapters, has barely moved from one spot, and didn't even fight. There is already a whole bunch of fanart of her on pixiv. Probably because she's a [[HelloNurse nurse]] though...
** Kumagawa himself. He starts out as the third BigBad, and pretty much Medaka's Arch Enemy and complete opposite. His dissonant serenity and overall humor arguably make his character more interesting than Medaka's. And having a [[spoiler: [[HeelFaceTurn status change]]]] doesn't deter his status in the slightest.
*** In the second ''Magazine/ShonenJump'' popularity poll contest, Kumagawa won with almost four thousand votes. The second place holder (Medaka) did not even reach one thousand votes. And for a while he was either played as TheDreaded or the BigBad.
*** His popularity became much higher than even the ''main character'', he's got his own one shot story, and became somewhat of a flagship character for the series. Just compare the amount of fanarts he gets to the rest of the crew on pixiv! Maybe even some people who aren't into ''Medaka Box'' know him by now. Much of his success must be related to his CoolLoser and LovableSexManiac traits, also.
*** Gets a [[LampshadeHanging lampshade hung on it]] in chapter 128.

** Nekomi is also popular for her CombatPragmatist ideology while being perky at the same time.
*** Nekomi is this in-universe as well. As a Special she ranks relatively low on the power scale but is very popular with the student body for her David versus Goliath victories using CombatPragmatism.

* GrowingTheBeard: The Unzen fight, where it dropped the SliceOfLife element completely for {{Shonen}} style storytelling packed with CrazyAwesome powers and many SerialEscalation upon Escalation that build up on each other.

* LauncherOfAThousandShips: Hitoyoshi, arguably. He has Medaka, Shiranui, Kikaijima, Mukae, Ajimu, Naze, Akune, Kumagawa, Maguro, Munakata, and now Tsugiha.

* {{Moe}}: Several female characters fit, but with different archetypes.

* NightmareFuel: Kumagawa, in-universe and out. In chapter 64 he manages to make the act of eating taiyaki creepy. That's how scary he is.

** Medaka can be quite... [[LossOfIdentity enthusiastic]] when improving people.
** Especially after the Successor arc, she shows no hesitation in wanting to fight Zenkichi without any remorse beforehand. It clearly shows just how [[DissonantSerenity unnerving her behavior is]].

* TheScrappy: The majority of the fanbase hates Akune for being a direct rival to Zenkichi for being an all around [[SmugSnake perfect]] Bishounen.
** RescuedFromTheScrappyHeap: However, he redeems himself in later chapters as it's revealed it's actually a reformed thug who sees nothing wrong with fighting as dirty as hell (in stark contrast to Zenkichi and Medaka). It doesn't hurt that the romance themes of the series were outright dropped as the series turned into a combat-centric series.
*** Medaka became more controversial when she TookALevelInJerkass toward Zenkicki during the Successor Arc. [[spoiler:Losing her position to Zenkicki and becoming a "regular" student]] brought her down a peg and made her more likable and entertaining.

* TrueArtIsAngsty: Naze Youka, who [[spoiler: gave up a life of luxury as one of the Kurokami children]] due to the theory that true genius can only come from living through hell.

** [[FridgeBrilliance So she actually *didn't* like reading disturbing manga about murderous bunnies?]]

* UncannyValley: Misogi crawled straight out of the valley the moment he was first mentioned.

* AffectionateParody: Of the shounen genre, to the point of being generally dividing in the world of manga as either very good (those who see it as a parody), or very bad (those who take it seriously).
** This extends to Medaka herself, who is referred to as MarySue Ultimus on /a/. She's either a Mary Sue parody, or just a Mary Sue, depending on who you talk to.

* AntiSue: Class -13 and the rest of the -Abnormals; Combining BlessedWithSuck with WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity.

* BlackHoleSue: Medaka literally contains [[spoiler:a wad of blackness]] so deep it melts Oudo's arm when he tries to take some of her abnormality and so dangerous that he immediately apologizes to her.
** Medaka seems to be a deliberate example due to her status as the main character; nearly all plots and characters draw at least some of their motivation from her, whether it be defeating her, admiring her, fearing her, hating her, etc.

** The unveiling of the Flask Plan to artificially create {{Mary Sue}}s, the discovery of a ''15-story government weapons research lab under their school'' and the start of essentially [[SortingAlgorithmOfEvil a year long fight scene against progressively more eccentric and over the top characters.]]
** The arrival of the "-Abnormals" and "Class -13" -- Abnormals that aren't MarySue parodies - but rather, ''AntiSue'' parodies. At this point, all attempts at a realistic tone were completely dropped, in lieu of people who can instantly heal any wound, disintegrate entire buildings, are so awesome the brain literally [[{{Invisibility}} cannot]] [[UnPerson bear]] [[RetGone to remember them]].
* GodModeSue: Medaka. Interestingly enough, the story starts deconstructing the concept of a MarySue as it goes on. It turns out she's very good at mimicking other people's abnormalities, minus the downsides. The series was largely using the entire concept for laughs even before the shift, as Medaka was often shown to be utterly clueless and ridiculously naive for all her intelligence and physical prowess, with her boundless sincerity actually more effective than her other abilities.
** Sort of inverted in that the entirety of the -13 class has similar, extremely bad "-Abnormalities", such as the ability to rot anything and everything they touch -- including buildings. A character even specifically states [[ContrivedCoincidence the -13 class is basically Medaka's perfect enemy]], since she can't even approach some of them without absorbing mental illness or BlessedWithSuck, which she would then take UpToEleven.
** Taken UpToEleven with Ajimu Najimi, who has several quadrillion superpowers. It's as absurd as it sounds, intentionally so.
** Then there's Iihiko, who is so powerful he can curbstomp any and all of the above.

* TrueArtIsIncomprehensible: Becomes a plot point with Yabaru in episode 7, who wants to capture the beauty of a goddess, but turns down various girls, and even the guys, until Shiranui shows up. The fact that he chose her to represent what he wanted doesn't sit well with the girls.

* IKnewIt: That Misogi would [[spoiler:join the student council as Vice-President.]]

* MemeticSexGoddess: It's not far off to say that Medaka would dom ''everyone''.

*** In the second ShounenJump popularity poll contest, Kumagawa won with almost four thousand votes. The second place holder (Medaka) did not even reach one thousand votes. And for a while he was either played as TheDreaded or the BigBad.

* GodModeSue: Medaka. Interestingly enough, the story starts deconstructing the concept of a MarySue as it goes on. It turns out she's very good at mimicking other people's abnormalities, minus the downsides.
** The series was largely using the entire concept for laughs even before the shift, as Medaka was often shown to be utterly clueless and ridiculously naive for all her intelligence and physical prowess, with her boundless sincerity actually more effective than her other abilities. [[HateDumb Some readers just didn't get the memo that it was meant to be a comedy]].

* JumpingTheShark[=/=]GrowingTheBeard: An amazing example due to GenreShift. Pick one of any of these major arc-ending {{Shocking Swerve}}s / arc-climaxes:
** The unveiling of a DBZ style SuperpoweredEvilSide for Medaka -- War God Mode, which happened when the manga first started dipping into fighting manga, and the semi-realistic tone was dropped.
** The unveiling of the Flask Plan to artificially create {{Mary Sue}}s, the discovery of a ''15-story government weapons research lab under their school'' and the start of essentially [[SortingAlgorithmOfEvil a year long fight scene against progressively more eccentric and over the top characters.]]
** The arrival of the "-Abnormals" and "Class -13" -- Abnormals that aren't MarySue parodies - but rather, ''AntiSue'' parodies. At this point, all attempts at a realistic tone were completely dropped, in lieu of people who can instantly heal any wound, disintegrate entire buildings, are so awesome the brain literally [[{{Invisibility}} cannot]] [[UnPerson bear]] [[RetGone to remember them]].

* DesignatedProtagonistSyndrome: Medaka is arguably a {{Deconstruction}} of this trope and how those lack of personality traits that make her ostracized from others that find her unrelatable to others.

* DesignatedProtagonistSyndrome: Both Medaka and Zenkichi suffer from this, fairly or unfairly. The former for her GodModeSue qualities, the latter for being something of an everyman.
** In fact, Medaka is arguably a {{Deconstruction}} of this trope and how those lack of personality traits that make her ostracized from others that find her unrelatable to others.

* BaseBreaker: Regarding the various Genre-Shifts; some people preferred the slice-of-life elements of the first arcs, some preferred the straight up battle manga, and some prefer the Deconstruction manga.

* IdiotPlot: You would think that in episode eight, where it demonstrates Onigase's strength, the handcuffs wouldn't be too hard for her to brake. At least Medaka had the excuse of 'she didn't think Onigase would want the handcuffs broken.'

* IdiotPlot: You would think that in episode eight, where it demonstrates Onigase's strength, the handcuffs wouldn't be to hard for her to brake. At least Medaka had the excuse of 'she didn't think Onigase would want the handcuffs broken.'