Manga Kaiwa Podcast

Welcome back. Manga Kaiwa is kicking off it's return with our top 10 favorite Anime Soundtracks. As much art and animation define anime as what it is, OSTs bring an entirety different level of intensity to the experience, so there was no way we weren't going to have a discussion about which one's did so the best in our view!

Firstly, R.I.P. Toriyama Akira, creator of Dragon Ball, Dr. Slump, and other treasured works…

When a storyteller entrusts their work to another author, it can get messy, but it can also create some of the most interesting developments in the story and fandom. Series like Dragon Ball, Naruto and Berserk have changed hands in one form or another, and the discussions around the topic tend to be highly controversial. 

Do continuations like Dragon Ball Super and Boruto only distort the legacy of their parent series, or do they perhaps have something truly interesting to offer? Maybe both? When it comes to media, discussions around stories transcending their creators are certainly some of the most valuable to be had, and, today, we join in on the conversation!

Are Musashi and Thorfinn really that similar? Are tragic manga endings the ones that get received most poorly? How much does canonicity actually matter? Oh, and we’ve got some opinions on a few Dragon Ball Z films as well (*cough* Gogeta vs. Vegeto). This time we do a bit of experimenting with an unstructured episode touching on a plethora of topics!

Time to talk about the GOAT! This time we (over)analyze one of the newest Berserk chapters which follows Casca’s unnerving, psychedelic confinement in Falconia. Man it’s awesome to have new content to rant about for this beautiful series! Regardless of what it is (it’ll probably be peak anyway) :)

Anime, manga, and sword wielders are inseparable, and, as two guys who can’t get enough of animanga badassery, it would be unthinkable for us not to make a top ten celebrating this holy trinity!

This has got to change. We’ve been at this for over a year and STILL haven’t done a Top 10 Most Badass Characters list? Badass characters emitting outrageous cool factor performing ridiculous feats of power is the only reason many people need to get into Animanga, and, honestly, that’s fair. That’s why, today, we’re doing what we should have done a long time ago…

You can really tell just how old storytelling is when you watch five different shows and feel like you’re seeing the same characters with a different appearance. What you’re experiencing there is one of the foundational pillars of fiction! You could sort Natuto, Luffy, and Asta into one or Guts, Thorfinn and Eren into another; this time we’re discussing what we consider the most important character archetypes in animanga. From the mentor figures to the hot-headed upstarts, look forward to us ranting about them all.

Settings are quite literally “the background”, but who ever said “the background” is unimportant? Particularly in the bombastic stories of animanga, the world the events of the series take place in can shape its identity, keeping readers engaged with unique ways of life, civilizations, and natural phenomena that push the plot forward. Today, we celebrate the often overlooked awesomeness of setting with our 10 favorites!

Here’s a bold statement: another name for “catharsis,” or the emotional “payoff” in a story, is “minor villains”. See what I did there? Especially in animanga, Mini-bosses are the most popular way writers build up the tension and anticipation around a main villain’s defeat, and in this episode of Manga Kaiwa, we count down our top ten minor antagonists!

What's the first thing you think of when you think of fighting anime? Is it perhaps... a hero screaming out the name of his ultimate technique!? Of course it is, which is why we're returning with an episode dedicated to listing off our top 10 attacks in animanga!