General

[quote=taotapp]WELL, TS' question has been answered. Can we discuss the merits (if any) of the "shonen" genre? And by "shonen," I'm just referring to those long running shows that tend to take the following formula and run with it:

Ingredient 1. 1 young boy
Ingredient 2. 1 grandiose dream
Ingredient 3. ***THIS STEP IS IMPORTANT: [b]Make the path to achieving the grand dream very abstract[/b]***
Ingredient 4. Season with villains, as needed. They can be completely unrelated to the plot (do this a lot! Some people may call it pointless filler, but you can call it ~original content~), as long as the protagonist says "I CAN'T DIE YET; I HAVE TO ACHIEVE MY DREAM, HNNNG."

~Side Notes~

At this point, you'll have a protagonist driven by a concrete desire, with a vague solution. He wants to be the best chef in the world? How's he gonna do that? WHO KNOWS; the solution is abstract. You'll have a group of antagonists, bent on stopping the protagonist -- they can have motives, but who needs motives when they can just want to kill him for getting in their way? You're so creative! If you're feeling up for it, every once in a while you can define what, exactly, the protagonist must do to reach his goal. If he wants to be the world's greatest thief, have him actually try to steal an unstealable gem this time around. This keeps your audience hooked, tricking them into believe that the series is actually progressing. You don't have to do this often; in fact, half of your series can be unwatchable filler, and most viewers won't complain because viewers will watch anything.

And if you REALLY want to make money doing nothing, you can make your entire series about FIGHTING MONSTERS. That way, instead of coming up with hopes and wants for your characters (something that takes just a smidge of effort), their desires can be "I WANT TO GET OUT OF THIS ALIVE." and you can devote all of your remaining effort to drawing empty backgrounds, and making the characters' jackets look really really cool. It was acceptable in the 90s, so why not now, right? It's not like times have progressed; it's not like you should progress, too.
--

I didn't mean to go quite so far, but I just ... I don't see it. With Naruto, you have ... Naruto. And he wants to be the goddamned Hokage. And that's fine, but it's like ... okay? How? How are you gonna do it? Are you gonna work hard, and one day become the hokage? Are we going to follow this kid around his whole life? When the series starts, the current Hokage is pretty old; is the series going to jump ahead four decades, or is it just going to keep going until Naruto's an old wizard man? Do you see what I mean now, about the path to success being abstract? We see his goals, but we cannot clearly visualize how he will meet those goals.

With Pokemon, you had Ash. He wanted to be a "Pokemon Master". Talk about an abstract goal AND an abstract path to success! We don't even know if he has to catch all of them, or beat the dudes at the Pokemon League, or both. And when he fails at both of those options, he goes to another landmass and TRIES again there, and it's just like ... really? How many leagues are there? Why didn't you stick around Kanto until you mastered Kanto? Do you even want to master ANYTHING anymore?

One Piece is better. Sure, the protagonist has the stereotypical grand dream, but at least his path to success is DEFINED. I ... I honestly can't say anything bad about One Piece. On top of it all, the art is just astounding.

But then we come to Bleach. I don't even know anymore, with Bleach. Sometimes I open up panels of it, and I see just ... white boxes. Empty backgrounds. Cool looking costumes, sure, but that's it. What does Ichigo even want? I mean, long term, what does he want? I must've watched 50 episodes, back when I had time to piss away on trying new things, and I can't even remember. Before his ordinary life gets turned into "AHA, THIS IS MY FINAL FORM," does he even have any dreams? Any desires? This is an honest question here. Outside of the current story arc, is there anything this guy actually wants?

I know how this looks. But I'm not a hater! Really! I swear![/quote]

The damn shame about Naruto is that it was a really good concept. And then it had to be dragged out. However, Kishimoto did gift us with this universe, so there always is fanfiction. Some fanfiction are better than the real version. It was really good in the beginning, and now its being dragged out to monetize.

WELL, TS' question has been answered. Can we discuss the merits (if any) of the "shonen" genre? And by "shonen," I'm just referring to those long running shows that tend to take the following formula and run with it:

Ingredient 1. 1 young boy
Ingredient 2. 1 grandiose dream
Ingredient 3. ***THIS STEP IS IMPORTANT: [b]Make the path to achieving the grand dream very abstract[/b]***
Ingredient 4. Season with villains, as needed. They can be completely unrelated to the plot (do this a lot! Some people may call it pointless filler, but you can call it ~original content~), as long as the protagonist says "I CAN'T DIE YET; I HAVE TO ACHIEVE MY DREAM, HNNNG."

~Side Notes~

At this point, you'll have a protagonist driven by a concrete desire, with a vague solution. He wants to be the best chef in the world? How's he gonna do that? WHO KNOWS; the solution is abstract. You'll have a group of antagonists, bent on stopping the protagonist -- they can have motives, but who needs motives when they can just want to kill him for getting in their way? You're so creative! If you're feeling up for it, every once in a while you can define what, exactly, the protagonist must do to reach his goal. If he wants to be the world's greatest thief, have him actually try to steal an unstealable gem this time around. This keeps your audience hooked, tricking them into believe that the series is actually progressing. You don't have to do this often; in fact, half of your series can be unwatchable filler, and most viewers won't complain because viewers will watch anything.

And if you REALLY want to make money doing nothing, you can make your entire series about FIGHTING MONSTERS. That way, instead of coming up with hopes and wants for your characters (something that takes just a smidge of effort), their desires can be "I WANT TO GET OUT OF THIS ALIVE." and you can devote all of your remaining effort to drawing empty backgrounds, and making the characters' jackets look really really cool. It was acceptable in the 90s, so why not now, right? It's not like times have progressed; it's not like you should progress, too.
--

I didn't mean to go quite so far, but I just ... I don't see it. With Naruto, you have ... Naruto. And he wants to be the goddamned Hokage. And that's fine, but it's like ... okay? How? How are you gonna do it? Are you gonna work hard, and one day become the hokage? Are we going to follow this kid around his whole life? When the series starts, the current Hokage is pretty old; is the series going to jump ahead four decades, or is it just going to keep going until Naruto's an old wizard man? Do you see what I mean now, about the path to success being abstract? We see his goals, but we cannot clearly visualize how he will meet those goals.

With Pokemon, you had Ash. He wanted to be a "Pokemon Master". Talk about an abstract goal AND an abstract path to success! We don't even know if he has to catch all of them, or beat the dudes at the Pokemon League, or both. And when he fails at both of those options, he goes to another landmass and TRIES again there, and it's just like ... really? How many leagues are there? Why didn't you stick around Kanto until you mastered Kanto? Do you even want to master ANYTHING anymore?

One Piece is better. Sure, the protagonist has the stereotypical grand dream, but at least his path to success is DEFINED. I ... I honestly can't say anything bad about One Piece. On top of it all, the art is just astounding.

But then we come to Bleach. I don't even know anymore, with Bleach. Sometimes I open up panels of it, and I see just ... white boxes. Empty backgrounds. Cool looking costumes, sure, but that's it. What does Ichigo even want? I mean, long term, what does he want? I must've watched 50 episodes, back when I had time to piss away on trying new things, and I can't even remember. Before his ordinary life gets turned into "AHA, THIS IS MY FINAL FORM," does he even have any dreams? Any desires? This is an honest question here. Outside of the current story arc, is there anything this guy actually wants?

I know how this looks. But I'm not a hater! Really! I swear!

Not trying to be rude. but could you not have googled this and found a sufficient answer?

[url=http://www.narutoget.com/]Here you go.[/url]

Kishimoto (guy who made/animated Naruto or whatever) said in an interview that Naruto's gonna go on for two or so more years.
[url=http://www.saiyanisland.com/2012/07/masashi-kishimoto-naruto-still-has-more-surprises-left/]Interview[/url]
[url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DxoZQh9KzA]Some other sniffy thing that I found.[/url]

[quote=Dinossaurr]There are 274 now I think?[/quote]

Will there be more episodes?