Anime/Yu Yu Hakusho [Revived]

Hiei did abruptly change personalities when he became a protagonist. But one could just chalk it up to Hiei being a jerk whenever he thinks he's in control of a situation.

I can't think of "Weird Hiei Behavior" without remembering his giggling fits in his fight with Bui. Apparently the Darkness Flame tickles.

Edited by TobiasDrake on Feb 1st 2021 at 6:48:02 AM

Look, Hiei smoked a lot of weed the day he fought Yusuke. He's not proud of it.

XD

Are there any characters in the anime who get enough screentime to justify a moveset for a fighting game, who I didn't already mention in my previous post about that? I'm thinking about what would be the best way to implement En, Ryo, and Kai, the brainwashed martial artists on Team Ichigaki.

Edited by PushoverMediaCritic on Feb 2nd 2021 at 11:53:56 AM

The main villain from the YYH movie, maybe?

Maybe. I was more asking about the Three Kings arc, though, if there was anyone who stood out in the anime-only segments, such as any of Raizen's friends. Considering how late they arrive to the arc and how little screentime they get, they end up being some of the most important characters in the arc, defeating all of the Dark Tournament returnees and eventually winning the entire thing.

Speaking of the Dark Tournament, it bothers me that the anime cut Yusuke's mom out of the Dark Tournament. In the manga, she's part of the "girl group" alongside Keiko, Botan, Kuwabara's sister, and Yukina, and it's really cool to see her cheering her son on and taking all of this demon nonsense in stride.

Likewise. The original YYH Hakusho manga wasn't like a feminist darling or anything, but one of the big things that struck me after getting into the manga after the anime was how much the anime diminished the female characters in general.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Feb 7th 2021 at 1:33:18 AM

They made Keiko so...meek and way more girly vs the manga. And yeah I noticed the exclusion of Atsuko was a lot more noticeable when you read the manga. Really loved her character since it's so blatant about her being involved with the Yakuza.

They replaced her with Kuwabara's sister. Who had a weird subplot with Sakyo.

Who was probably my favorite character next to Yusuke. Slick, cool, and evil to the core.

Kuwabara's sister was there in the manga, too. They didn't replace Yusuke's mom with anyone, they just straight-up cut her out.

Yeah, if I have one complaint with the Anime adaptation, it was their Chickification of Keiko and Atsuko.

I was surprised that Keiko was actually a lot rougher in the manga, punching Yusuke rather than just slapping him and being less prone to screaming, which makes sense since she's, you know, childhood friends with Yusuke.

And I loved how Atsuko was actually decently aware of her son's Spirit World activities in the manga and actually did things like threaten the school admins to allow Yusuke back to school when he got revived. It's a rare case in media of a parent being an active presence in their child's double life from the start.

It's weird how they excised those parts of their characters in the anime. Did the anime producers assume that having the women closest to Yusuke be as rough as him would turn away their target audience or something?

Edited by Servbot on Feb 7th 2021 at 8:35:29 AM

Huh. I always thought Kuwabara's sister replaced Yusuke's mom for some reason.

I wonder why they cut her out.

Funnily enough, in the first opening of YYH, she's shown watching the Dark Tournament in one shot along with Keiko, Botan, and Shizuru, so it seems like the anime was going to include her in their entourage initially but later decided against it.

Edited by Servbot on Feb 8th 2021 at 7:46:07 AM

I wonder if it's a sort of generational thing since Sailor Moon which was from the same Era had similar issues with a lot of senshi having very different personalities often being more chickified with Rei and Usagi or being much more aloof and anti-social with the Outer-senshi. And yeah, I liked the aspect of the adults being "in" on the double-life stuff and even having an active role at times. If I recall reading, this was a criticism Takeuchi had at the time.

Some of the bits of dialogue and scenes she was supposed to have got folded into Shizuru's character.

Yeah I noticed that too which always struck me as weird.

Edited by doomrider7 on Feb 8th 2021 at 11:34:32 AM

I wonder if this line is in the Japanese version or the manga?

No. That's just them being silly.

Not in the manga, Koto and Juri barely interact at all there.

I have guess they cut yusuke mon largely because how tetrary she was, but maybe because her personality as drinking woman is if the chickfication acusation are true.

My guess is that all the diminishing of the female characters in the anime was done to match industry conventions.

Especially back then, the Neutral Female who supports the male hero but doesn't do much but fret and worry from the sidelines was a standard for shounen works - both battle and otherwise. Only a couple years after Yu Yu Hakusho, we got Kaoru from Rurouni Kenshin - and I don't know how she was in the manga, but in the anime she's another perfect example of this: a character with harmless ability whose job is to conform to the authority of the male characters and worry helplessly on the sidelines.

I can easily imagine that the studio adapting the manga decided "let's make these characters more on brand, and cut out this character we can't really change," thus heavily modifying Keiko and removing Yusuke's mother. Shizuru was kept, but Shizuru is also a side character who doesn't have any sort of relationship with Yusuke himself.

(This happened all the time in the states too. Diverse stories directed at male audiences tended to have their action girls changed into waifs for the boys to save back in the 80's and 90's)

It's only really now that the anime industry is starting to embrace the idea of female characters who are actively as badass (if not moreso) than the hero in a way the audience is meant to take seriously, and whose dignity isn't a joke - and even then mostly in baby steps. For every Tower of God, there's a dozen isekais with those older tropes, and lots of series try to do both at once.

Manga Keiko is almost a tomboy.

Hell, manga Keiko punched a demon larger than her in the face hard enough to knock him down with help from Yusuke's mom and Shizune. Manga Keiko was ahead of her time when it comes to love interests in Shounen, so it's a shame that she was reduced to your stereotypical Neutral Female in the anime.

Edited by Servbot on Feb 10th 2021 at 5:49:30 AM

Oh yeah, there's a segment where Botan is worried about them as humans in an arena full of demons, and then a demon starts harassing them and they beat the shit out of him, and Boton's like "well, I guess I didn't need to be worried."

There's also a segment where they're trying to get into the finals and a demon guard is telling them they can't get in because they're humans, so they beat the shit out of him and pass by anyway.

Didn't something like that happen in the anime? I could swear I remember some gag during the Dark Tournament where Keiko knocks out some random demon.

something like what you described rings a bell and I never read the manga.

Nevermind, shoulda read this post.

Edited by Nikkolas on Feb 10th 2021 at 6:07:14 AM

x5 Manga Kaoru was even worse. You know how that part where the Kenshingumi storm the Kanryuu mansion to rescue Megumi? Kaoru doesn't even accompany them in the manga.

I believe she was told to just stay home and mind the fires (while Yahiko, who was her student mind you) went instead.