I read steel ball run twice and quite enjoyed it both times.
Then I looked up the common opinions on it and of course they are mostly positive but the negative opinions are what caught my interest.
The negative opinions seem to just be the positive ones but from another perspective. For example.
A lot of people say Steel ball run is an "Epic" in the sense of scale from the story to characters and themes. The negative opinion I see is that it's "Epic in a forced way". The story is ham-fistedly epic and the characters are grander than they actually are and the themes are too broad and poorly defined.
I for one am sort in the middle. I think this is a classic case of an Anti-climax. An intentional Anti-climax. Somewhere along the way, Araki decided to have the moral of the story be "shit happens". And I think that's fine. For example.
The race stops mattering to any of the contestants. The actual act of winning and the prize and everything stops mattering. And this is consistent to the end that no one particularly cares. So the "Epic" race suddenly feels "forced to be epic" considering the outcome.
Even the characters are like this. Diego is presented with strong motivations informing his cynical view of the world. And before the final show down, his vendetta against his father is even brought back in his deal with Hot Pants. But then at the actual last second we get internal monologue from him showing he doesn't actually care. He's seemingly reduced back to almost Dio part 1 philosophy of superiority over humans or whatever. This seeming "change" happens between just two chapters. Like there's no way Araki did not do this intentionally in my mind. He must have known that he's removing a lot of complexity from Diego and once again we see an "epic" character sort of seem very forced seeing as his complexity vanishes suddenly at the end.
This goes for almost every character and plotline and theme. They all seem way grander than they are culminating in an Anti-climax.
Even the final show down of this "Epic" gets reduced to the main villain begging for his life. And to top it all off, his begging was him saying he's a good guy, yet he's not even that. He was lying. Not only is the main villain begging for his life, he's literally lying while doing it. This has to be intentional. Araki makes sure to give Valentine these great speeches and compelling back story and then show he's lying and opportunistic as any person at the very end. His nobility is a sham and his "Epicness" is anti-climactly forced.
At the end the person who wins is Lucy. A character who only gets things done by being saved by people who end up dying mindlessly for her. And her main advantage over the villains is a completely passive attribute. She's hot. Both Valentine and Diego fall prey to her because she happened to be born hot and they are horny men. Even her back story shows Steel specifically taking interest in her because a Toddler said "hi" to him. When she could barely understand human emotion, her passive child brain said hi to a stranger and that essentially saved her life. How can this not be intentionally anti-climactic. The big villains after meticulous planning and having universe altering powers fall to their libido for a minor.
I don't want to say everyone else who likes or dislikes the story is wrong for doing so. I mean it seems more of a matter of perspective. But this is sort if what I got out if it. The people who say SBR is "epic" seem to be ignoring how it actually ends and the people who say it's forced seem to ignore the possibility that it's intentionally Anti-climactic.
Really though, just the fate of Marco should've driven the point of this story home IMO. Shit happens, sort of like fate I guess.
Then I looked up the common opinions on it and of course they are mostly positive but the negative opinions are what caught my interest.
The negative opinions seem to just be the positive ones but from another perspective. For example.
A lot of people say Steel ball run is an "Epic" in the sense of scale from the story to characters and themes. The negative opinion I see is that it's "Epic in a forced way". The story is ham-fistedly epic and the characters are grander than they actually are and the themes are too broad and poorly defined.
I for one am sort in the middle. I think this is a classic case of an Anti-climax. An intentional Anti-climax. Somewhere along the way, Araki decided to have the moral of the story be "shit happens". And I think that's fine. For example.
The race stops mattering to any of the contestants. The actual act of winning and the prize and everything stops mattering. And this is consistent to the end that no one particularly cares. So the "Epic" race suddenly feels "forced to be epic" considering the outcome.
Even the characters are like this. Diego is presented with strong motivations informing his cynical view of the world. And before the final show down, his vendetta against his father is even brought back in his deal with Hot Pants. But then at the actual last second we get internal monologue from him showing he doesn't actually care. He's seemingly reduced back to almost Dio part 1 philosophy of superiority over humans or whatever. This seeming "change" happens between just two chapters. Like there's no way Araki did not do this intentionally in my mind. He must have known that he's removing a lot of complexity from Diego and once again we see an "epic" character sort of seem very forced seeing as his complexity vanishes suddenly at the end.
This goes for almost every character and plotline and theme. They all seem way grander than they are culminating in an Anti-climax.
Even the final show down of this "Epic" gets reduced to the main villain begging for his life. And to top it all off, his begging was him saying he's a good guy, yet he's not even that. He was lying. Not only is the main villain begging for his life, he's literally lying while doing it. This has to be intentional. Araki makes sure to give Valentine these great speeches and compelling back story and then show he's lying and opportunistic as any person at the very end. His nobility is a sham and his "Epicness" is anti-climactly forced.
At the end the person who wins is Lucy. A character who only gets things done by being saved by people who end up dying mindlessly for her. And her main advantage over the villains is a completely passive attribute. She's hot. Both Valentine and Diego fall prey to her because she happened to be born hot and they are horny men. Even her back story shows Steel specifically taking interest in her because a Toddler said "hi" to him. When she could barely understand human emotion, her passive child brain said hi to a stranger and that essentially saved her life. How can this not be intentionally anti-climactic. The big villains after meticulous planning and having universe altering powers fall to their libido for a minor.
I don't want to say everyone else who likes or dislikes the story is wrong for doing so. I mean it seems more of a matter of perspective. But this is sort if what I got out if it. The people who say SBR is "epic" seem to be ignoring how it actually ends and the people who say it's forced seem to ignore the possibility that it's intentionally Anti-climactic.
Really though, just the fate of Marco should've driven the point of this story home IMO. Shit happens, sort of like fate I guess.
