Hey guys. Specifically looking for people who do not like shoujo manga and if you could let me know what your main complaints are?

I looked and I couldn't find any other topics like this so please pardon me if there is.

I love shoujo manga and it is ALL I read. I don't read shounen for my own reasons. But I've noticed that a lot of women read shoujo AND shounen, then men ONLY read shounen. I know there are exceptions but this is what I've seen for the mass majority. Any comment on this?

I'm doing a panel on Shoujo Manga at a convention next month in an attempt to get more people reading shoujo manga. I'd like to think up great titles for people who typically don't like shoujo manga, but I need to know what they don't like first.

Thanks in advance for your help!


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Good question and a tough one.

First when it comes to the men part of your comment about how boys will only read shounen but their are girls that can read both. This is actually a very broad question, generally you have to look at society and the perception of "girly" things by communities or families themselves. Same thing applies to movies/tv shows. This isn't really an answer but here's an example for you, when I was university I was part of anime/manga club and generally the boys who read shoujo were gay so the straight guys in our club who did maybe on the sly or secretly read shoujo didn't say it because they didn't want people to think they were "gay". It just how society (well north american) has brought up men to be, while the rules are beginning to loosen their are still issues.

Now, why I personally don't read to much shoujo. I'm not a fan of all romance series or all action series, luckily for me the industry does seem to be changing and I'm getting more of a mix of both but I digress.

I guess I just get bored with shoujo sometimes, love is love, romance is romance, no matter what new characters are put into the story its still about the relationship and feelings and that bores sometimes. While more action oriented I can get any different situation, I can get Soul Reapers, Akuma, talking animals, murder, political intrigue, outer space. There are a lot more areas to cover.

Of course their are many shoujo that are not just about the romance, that have a secondary plot that is fabulous! But my preference tends to be non-romantic main plot, romantic secondary plot.

I also personally know people including myself that have felt at times insulted by shoujo as a women. Sometimes I feel like women are treated more as love sick girls, or totally oblivious, there is a lack of realism in the romance/relationship bothers me. Sometimes I just want to yell "Communication people!! It's the key to any relationship!!!!" but that just might be life and experience talking.

My suggestion for your panel, is to bring some titles in that are not just about the romance, but about something more - whether that be action, mystery, adventure, fantasy, sci-fi - just remember to emphasis that its not all about the romance and cute-sy-ness. Also talk about some more mature titles, that the feminists or just proud to be a women (not that I'm saying your not but you know the type i'm referring to?) would enjoy for a strong (not stupid or ignorant) female lead who they can connect to!

Good luck!!

Wow thanks for the in depth input!

It really makes me think of the recent post about not getting "Romance".

I do find longer shoujo series (past 20) usually revolve around something higher then romance, with romance taking a back seat. Romance as a sole conflict does expire it seems. I guess I'll bring that up.

I also like the feminist comment. I am very feminist but I'm a sucker for some less then respectful stories anyways. I could also do a little slide on strong female characters in shoujo.

Thanks so much!

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It really depends on the contents actually. I read both shounen and shoujo manga but now I rarely touch shoujo manga. This doesn't count comedies since I think comedies and gags belong to a whole different set. The primary reason I don't read much shoujo mang is because I don't really like romance. I also stop reading several shounen lately except a few very exceptional ones.

Most shoujo manga can start with an interesting plot but somewhere down the line they all go into a pure romance stage of 'loves me, loves me not'. There are few shoujo manga that has little to no romance and even fewer that are actually good enough to keep reading. Some shoujo manga can get light enough on the romance to actually develop an actual plot. But you are more likely getting into Josei territory when you get light on the romance.

Shounen manga is the same as Shoujo but it's fueled by fighting spirit instead of romance.

Hey I'm glad I could help!

I think someone like you who loves shoujo and is probably well read knows how to find what you want when you want it, but people who are not familiar with the genre may have a really tough time finding what their looking for so just bring a wide range of titles that can accommodation a variety of readers!

Anyway I hope you have a lot of success at your panel because I know everyone has their exception to a genre and hopefully you can give that to someone!

In my directing class my teacher said that story is fueled by Sex or Power.
I never really looked at Shounen as the power and Shoujo as the sex! But I guess that is a main difference. I don't really read shounen so I dunno. Thanks for your input!



Thanks! I really hope I can inspire more people! It's my first time running a panel but I hope my passion will come across to whoever shows up.

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I find that most Shoujo have very weak protagonists. If you allow me to quote myself from a thread that happened quite a while ago:

Hmm I can't disagree. There is a lot of junk out there. Although a lot of people like junk, even me once in a while.

I do agree with Josei being a more "intelligent?" form of shoujo. But then it begs the question whats the difference between Josei and Shoujo? Just the publication? Age demographic? Content? Hmm


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I'm a guy that used to avoid shojo. Stuff like Fruits Basket and other mainstream stuff just bored me with their archetypical cutesy heroines and cool bishounens. The first shojo that I really liked was Adachi Mitsuru's shojo because they were similar to his shounen mangas except with girl as the protagonists. Then I discovered some great works that dealt with more complex themes and ideas and I realized my distaste for shojo was merely distaste for cliched high school romance shojo just like 95+% of manga from any other demographics are cliched crap. Nowaday most of the manga I read are shojo, a lot of it from talented authors like those of the Magnificient 49ers and other influential writers that followed them.

You might find this article (and others on Matt Thorn's site) helpful for your presentation.
http://www.matt-thorn.com/shoujo_manga/japan_quarterly/inde x.php

Last edited by Roughan at 7:34 am, Jun 21 2012

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for me it's the art .....in most shoujo titles the art is so ..how can I put it ...girly that it's just big turn off . Although I've read quite a few shouji and don't dislike the genre all that much the art is realy important

Thank you that article looks PERFECT. Most of what I know is personal expirience not factual history so this is AWESOME.

Wah why is this in the shoujo Forum? You can't ask people who like shoujo why they don't like shoujo. Oh well, the info you guys have given me has been great.

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Main reason: protagonists are female, I'm male, and that doesn't work for me especially if it's romance.

As a result, all the shoujo/josei I've read have male mcs.

Also, the portrayal of some guys in the typical shoujo is obviously aimed to attract a female audience, and as a guy myself it seems either very homo or fake.

As for the art... it can depend, but in general shounen/seinen is better. Especially for any action scenes.


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"I'll shut your mouth~~~~~ with mine~~~"

二息歩行

I'm a guy and I read a few shoujos but I'm quite picky, they have to be very well written. Art is less of a concern though most have the same generic style for some reason. Most of the stuff is boring because the story gets dragged out, only so much can happen in a romance story without it feeling very forced and the characters don't feel like real people at all with the borderline rapist bishounens etc. Indecisive and "weak" girls seem quite common in shoujos and it's very annoying, not to mention all the clichés (like bullying or fan clubs that take it too far).

I mostly stick to seinen and shounen these days and the few actually romantic ones I read are seinen. Shounen is of course also plagued with clichés but the settings can be vastly different and it's less noticeable whilst shoujos usually take place in school.

I just have a big problem with how mangas (well, Japanese series) portray relationships so unless it's a secondary thing I probably won't read it.

Last edited by Jatodude at 2:33 am, Jun 4 2016

That's actually an interesting one. I read an article on women portrayed in comics and often people expect men only to accept male heros while women are expected to accept male heros and female heros.

You should check out Josei. There have been a lot of fantasy josei titles recently with all male casts. Although Josei and Shoujo aren't the same

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