"In today's pop cultural landscape there seems to be this sort of obsession with the ideas of "subversion" and "deconstruction." When a show comes along that does something a little bit different from the Lowest Common Denominator idea of what would be considered normal for its genre, people are quick to praise the innovation that they feel is on display and to herald the crushing of the old tropes. While I can appreciate this excitement over the idea of innovation and challenging storytelling norms, I think that a lot of this overzealous celebration is misguided. And to me it reeks too much of coming from the position of wanting to think that the things you like are somehow smarter, more mature, and more interesting than the stuff that came before, or that is propped up by the mainstream.'"
Of course, a lot of the people who wrote those fics figured "Deconstruct" meant "have your Marty Stu come in and shoot everybody while insulting them."
— Binaroid, from Revenge Fic Discussion
"[N]ow I really understand why calling Madoka [M]agica a deconstruction really is a disservice to and infantilizes the mahou shoujo genre. [I]ts visual expression might be different, but themes of death and dread are common all through the genre."
— iamalittleboat, Crunchyroll, commenting on episode 25 of Cardcaptor Sakura
"K-On!, but un-unironically. The anti-K-On, if you will. I won't, though, I think that's kind of reductive as to what both series accomplish. Kind of like calling Madoka Magica a subversion of the Magical Girl genre as opposed to a darker interpretation of the same core concepts and themes as most of the classics. Bocchi's simply telling a very different story with a much darker sense of humor using most of the same storytelling tools and core themes as K-On''.
— Mother's Basement, reviewing Bocchi the Rock!
