Netflix Saint Seiya

Some people don't think that well ahead. The director meant well, but needed to think a tad more about his choices.

I mean, if he wanted a strong female character, Dragon Knight (I'm bad with names) would've been my choice. The character is strong and incredibly selfless. Bleeding out to restore the clothes was a pretty hardcore move, in my opinion.

Yeah. Trying to add more girls can be a bitch in a series like this, especially with it's pre-established rules.

Is this airing in Japan? What do they think of Shun's Gender Flip?

Love the fact that the trailers have so many downvotes.

Also, at least I'm gonna get Sainta Sho, not this Netflix crap.

TBF Saintia Sho doesn’t look very good either.

What with the very...... “distinct” art-style & the knowledge that the Gold Saints are going to completely upstage the titular female protagonists.

But if its bad, then you can chalk it up to being a proper spinoff.

Also, Handsome Rob, Eugene Son mentioned the Toei people were not thrilled about the change — that should tell you everything.

Edited by Klaudandus on Dec 9th 2018 at 11:15:18 AM

I see.

While I don't totally blame them for trying (the lack of female protagonists in some series is an issue), maybe Saint Seiya wasn't the series for it...or at least in the time frame they are in.

How did Omega fair? I know they had more female members in that series, and didn't bind themselves to the must wear a mask rule either.

Jeez that's a depressing thought. Ya rather want the spin-offs to be good.

Its not that flipping one of the Saints into a woman was a bad idea, its just that doing it to the most effeminate one is admitably such an obvious choice that it borders on laziness.

Again the franchise has a very androgynous art-style, you can flip any of the Saints without any major changes to them really.

TBH, I'd rather have Lost Canvas finished, but I know that's never gonna happen. I had some hope for the Netflix show and they're totally trashed.

And slimcoder is right. Making genderswapping Hyoga woulda been a much better option IMO — although that woulda also upset all the Fujos.

But yeah, Shun's very unique among shonen heroes in that he's a pacifist that is not afraid to show his emotion and wear pink.

Edited by Klaudandus on Dec 9th 2018 at 11:26:49 AM

Now that I think about it, if not for the existence of that Sainta Sho series, maybe they would have flipped all of them? You are right that they're a pretty androgynous bunch.

Although I can't say if that would have been a good idea when I think about it.

They will have to explain why this new Shun doesn't wear a mask.

Not just that, it manages to turn adding a girl to the main cast into an act that increases the level of heteronormativity

I've seen a lot of people saying that Ikki would have been the best choice

I imagine the mask thing just isn't canon to this series

Huh now that would have been interesting considering Ikki is the strongest Bronze Saint & an Aloof Ally as well as aloof brother.

If he was made a girl you’d actually be switching the dynamic into the girl being the stronger eldest sibling who is the team lone wolf but who’d also regularly save her more emphahetic, pacifistic younger brother.

....... Damn I would have liked to see that.

Really, bending any of the other four over Shun would've resulted in some kind of subversion of typical female gender roles.

Shun is a example of {{She's a Man in Japan}}.

Just went back and read a bunch of the manga. Yeah, Hyouga is the one where a genderflip would feel the most natural. Shun is actually tied with Ikki for a genderbend feeling really weird and against their archetype... but I'd actually be kinda interested in seeing how Ikki would turn out as a girl

...On a larger scale, the trailer is either very misleading or this is going to be pretty unlike the original. They're making it look like a western adventure series, but it's supposed to be a continuous string of fight scenes? And very shounen fight scenes, with lots of super moves and characters explaining how what just happened should have been impossible

Saint Seiya was one of the earliest shonen animes with a dedicated Fujoshi fanbase. I've seen a decent amount of women upset with this change given Hyouga x Shun was the Fujobait.

While ignoring the shippers seems like a good move, (seriously, they can be completely nuts) they are gonna be given hell for a while.

I think Fujoshis get a lot of flak, some of it quite deserved — but there's no denying that part of it is because Shun broke away from the typical masculine archetype usually present in shonen series.

I know the new Pre Cure show got praise for having a male precure recently — Shun is basically a step removed from that... and was done nearly 30 years ago.

Shun was already a progressive kind of character. He shows that one can be manly and kind. He's the heart between all those macho men. There was a message with Shun. Shun could do what other makes could do, he would risk his life, die for his beliefs like any other of the group. Hell, he arguably has the strongest potential out of the main chars, but doesn't tap into it because he loves everyone, even his enemies.

He was the anti Shonen hero cliché.

Now he's a chick, and none of his traits are special anymore. Unless they change the character into a "strong independent woman" type of character. Which kills the link Shun used to have with Ikki.

And none of those decisions were for the sake of telling a better story. A decision of cowards who were afraid of being branded a "non progressive" story. This stupid and blind progressive thinking is stupid.

I read that Toei was against turning Shun into a girl, cause he has a LOT of fangirls in japan.

They didn't want kids buying a feminine guy toy so they turned him into a chick for marketing reasons.

Disgusting.

There's already strong women in Saint Seiya FFS. Seiya spent several years as Marine's punchbag and they all listen to Athena's orders. What more do you need ?

Edited by Yagami1211 on Dec 10th 2018 at 7:41:25 PM

To extend the analogy to other areas, it's like having a character who is well-known for being on the brutish side and giving them a Race Lift from white/Japanese/Mukokuseki to explicitly black and patting yourself on the back for promoting racial diversity when you've just created a stereotypical Scary Black Man, unless you remove those traits and make them In Name Only. Which can be done well as we saw from Isaac in the Castlevania Netflix series, but it sounds like Son is keeping Sh(a)un's personality intact.

'cept he's not. Shun is rather shy — And right from the tone of voice, Shaun sounds brash.

Yeah, I have to agree that doing a gender bend of any of the other four would have been much better than this.

Would totally have digged a genderswapped Ikki — Evil Big Sis that becomes Cool Big Sis and one of the strongest saints that just won't stay down. Also... since Ikki is Phoenix, would totally be comparable to another famous female phoenix: Jean Grey

Also, kinda funny but one of Ikki's attacks is written with the female version of Phoenix. (Hōō Genmaken) so that woulda fit even more.

from the beginning,I knew handing creative direction to an American staff would be a bad idea,but even worse if said staff is of people whose experience is handling crap like Ben 10,Ultimate Spider-Man and Avengers Assemble(I NEVER liked Man-of-Action's style).I don't want Seiya to talk and act like he came out of a Man-Of-Action show.

Eugene Son,like many americans,probably never heard or cared about Saint Seiya before and ignored the huge cultural impact the series has in Latin America and Europe(he deleted his twitter account probably after hearing many expletives in Spanish,Portuguese and French towards him...) by turning this into generic american saturday morning Man Of Action show,of course you're going to alienate the huge fanbase of those regions...

By the way,despite the issues with the Mexican dub(Seiya's new VA is apparently a youtuber and this is his first role.Not exactly an ideal choice to replace an iconic voice there...)the Brazillian dub has confirmed that most of the original voices are returning once again(except Shun,obviously...now voiced by the original VA's sister!). In fact,the franchise's dub there is actually pretty consistent,with most of the original cast being kept for about 25 years now,and replacements usually happening only when the actor dies or retires.(it's actually more respectful of its cast than Japan itself,who is casting a fifth different voice for Saori in Saintia Shou while the other classic characters are having their Hades OV As voices kept...)

I was really hoping for a Truer to the Text adaptation. Now it seems they have taken many liberties with the story line. I get the reasoning to do a genderflip, but they definitely chose the wrong character to do it. I would have chosen Hyouga instead, as his character arc is the least reliant on his gender than the rest of the main five. His standard personality would better fit an Action Girl -as Yuzuriha pretty much demonstrates- and would mean the least Ripples through the story. Since all of his love interests belong in non-cannon stories -and a Gaiden tale completely irrelevant to the main plot- they can be removed safely.

Instead Shun's arc is integral to the plot.