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There seems to be an impression, both among fans and authors, that the main problem with isekai right now is that the main characters don't "earn" their powers or something 🧵On twitter.com
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Shield Hero, Re:Zero, Konosuba, and Mushoku Tensei were all actually written around the same time. Weird huh? Yeah apparently they're all the same "generation" that were developed immediately in the shadow of SAO's popularity on TVPermalink On twitter.com
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These stories aren't all equally bad or bad for the same reasons or super comparable. But they all, in their own way, highlight how much their protagonists have to STRUGGLE to achieve, unlike those other silly bad isekai of yore. Actually a little obnoxious once you see itPermalink On twitter.com
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But that's such a weird framing. The problem with isekai was never that Kirito or whatever got super powers and pretty girls without trying.Permalink On twitter.com
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The actual power fantasy itself was the problem. Like, the fact that isekai only ever tells the one story about the virgin otaku who's surrounded by cute girls and has really awesome powers actually was the issue.Permalink On twitter.com
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I almost wish I knew Japanese and could time travel, so I could actually see the discussion on naro-kei forums and figure out how exactly the dividing line between good and bad isekai became "if the hero struggles enough to earn everything or not".Permalink On twitter.com
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But it feels like people's backlash to SAO both in the States and in Japan was like "I hate how Kirito doesn't work for anything" which is, like, such a shallow reading of why SAO doesn't work. The kind of shallow reading that would go viral on the internet oh I get it nowPermalink On twitter.com