I read the manga when i was little, and then the anime showed up. I was very happy , kind of fan of the manga. But the anime begin well, and get less good than the manga with the time. Then we got Mar OMEGA, wich is the badest, anime got forgot & here we go.
I loved MAR man. Oddly enough MAR didn’t feel a isekai. By time Ginta gets to another world he felt like he was meant to be there and felt like he wasn’t from Earth
I'm aggree with u , that's like Vision of Escaflown , an Isekai before Isekai was a thing, so the plot is interesting & revolve around other things than our recent shitty isekai xD
I like that the "the atmosphere makes humans stronger" system rolls our protagonist back into being inadequate for the task. The previous summoned human was probably extremely OP because unlike our protagonist he didn't start out with bad eyesight and bad physical abilities, so he showed up being much, much stronger. Protag gets a buff, but still needs to work extra hard to be up to the challenge. Sounds obvious for most shonen, but a lot of isekai kinda skip over that.
@@mugenbop I completely forgot about this anime but I remember the few episodes that I got to see were great. I don't remember if I was able to finish the whole series or not but I definitely remember the episodes you talked about at least lol
@@Tea_Dawg Nanashi is literally Joker from Kurei's team lol. Like no joke he's literally Joker from Flame of Recca transported to another universe with amnesia
I was obsessed with this series as a kid. I don't know why, there was just something special about it to me. I'm glad I'm not the only one that remembered it!
I can tell you part of the reason.... The Walt Disney and Grimm's fairy tale crossover elements are very strong and relevant in the story. Jack and the beanstalk, the wizard of oz, Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf, and several other fairy tales like Peter Pan are in there. These guys went out of their way to be different.
My only complaint is I wish the writer had done more with Babbo as a weaponized version of a ball in a cup. That's such a unique and fun weapon and the concept becomes irrelavent the moment he starts transforming into things. In addition to the transformations, Babbo should have had different variants Ginta used. One where his sphere part is covered in spikes, another where it's a molten metal ball etc. Otherwise, yeah this was a fun one that was swept under the rug. Similar to Buso Renkin, Flame of Recca, Tegami Bachi, Prince of Tennis, Law of Ueki and a few others.
This anime lived rent free in my head for so long that I collected all 15 volumes of the manga a couple of years ago. The things they did with the final season leading up to the finale differ quite a bit from the manga, but they were still awesome because they explored the possibilities Anzai didn't get a chance to explore himself. The music by Garnet Crow was also Bomb af. Scoured the internet for those songs. MAR was an underated Gem that deserves to have a comeback. It really was before its time.
I think another reason why MAR was forgotten at least in USA was because Toonami was shutting down in 2008 when MAR was still airing its first 20-30ish episode. After Toonami had their temporarily shut down, there wasn't really way to watch MAR on TV. It was also hard to find subbed episodes for most people because people would type down MAR episode 30 or whatever and it wouldn't pop up. It was years later that if I wanted to find subbed episode, I needed to type down "Marchen awakens romance" not MAR
I swear I watched the subbed in my teen years but just can't remember for certain it was when I went anime watch crazy online to find anything that was good 2007ish to 2014 so many series it just blends together.
i keep talking about this with my friends. how it was odd with its kendama based weapon that can talk, how it has a "chess" themed ranking for the villains, how the princess is the alternate version of his friend from his world... all of these were very unique and still has more to offer than most of the recent isekai.
Saw this video in my recommended and had to watch. I never saw the anime, but I did read the first volume in my middle school library. One of my friends showed me and she basically introduced me to manga. I could never remember the name of the series but when I saw Ginta's weapon in the thumbnail it just came flooding back. I grew up reading and watching a lot of Japanese media and I'm glad you made me remember the other piece that introduced me to it! The first piece being Kingdom Hearts. And now that I think about it, I guess that's why I also love genres where the main character is able to explore other worlds. Thanks a bunch!
2 things: 1. I loved MAR so much, and i actually mentioned it to a friend like three days ago. 2. A macguffin is not just a plot device, it is a plot device that only matters because the desire for it. A macguffin can be replaced with any other. The Maltese Falcon is the most macguffin macguffin to ever macguffin and thats because the damn thing only matters becayse everyone wants it. It could be replaced with a sack full of money, a giant diamond, or a sexy lamp and the fundamental plot wouldn't change.
I LOVE this series. Same story here, I first saw it pop up on Toonami and immediately wanted more. The fairy tale setup is great and there's nods to classics all over the place. Dorothy for example is a walking Wizard of Oz reference - her name, she's a witch, her favorite ARM is a dog she's nicknamed 'Toto', and she uses a version of the Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Cowardly Lion. One part that works out extremely well is how the characters scale up in power. As Ginta and Babbo grow, they unlock new transformations / forms for Babbo to turn into via magical macguffins. When Ginta is given a couple of them and thrown into the first training gate, he has the ability to use them to give Babbo basically whatever power he can imagine. This mechanic has the potential to make him comedically overpowered, but it has limits that are explored naturally. He starts simple and makes both a short-range weapon and a long-range weapon to cover each others' weaknesses. Then he makes a Guardian because he saw Dorothy and Snow use them. Gargoyle is a great example here because it shows that Babbo can't simply turn into an "I Win" button to breeze through everything. An extremely powerful form like that requires a lot of strength from the user as well. Ginta is able to use the Gargoyle transformation better as he gets stronger, but he always tries other tactics first. I think another thing that's handled really well in MAR is that the two worlds are linked together. It's revealed a little ways in that Snow and Koyuki are counterparts in their different worlds. When Koyuki is asleep, she has dreams of what Snow is doing. This is great because she spends her time talking to Ginta's mother about what her son is up to. It's a great way to tie the events of the real world with the events of the fantasy one, and it's a smart way to get around the people in the MC's original world not knowing what happened to the person who randomly vanished.
This was one of my favorite anime growing up. The concept was so creative to me, I still think about it today. Good to see I'm not alone, might be time for a rewatch
I think the most important issue is that "Isekai" is a genre, while the trope is portal fantasy. Most isekai are also portal fantasies, but there's also a ton of "I can't believe it's not isekai", where the protagonist is transported through time or reincarnated, or goes back to an earlier point in their life, or otherwise awakens some magic power that makes the world more game-like. Meanwhile the portal fantasy trope pre-dates the isekai genre by quite a bit, and really isn't anime-exclusive see: Peter Pan, Alice in Wonderland, Inuyasha, Magical Knight Rayearth, and all the others I'm forgetting. These stories don't work as 'isekai', in the way that not every story with a cowboy in it is a western.
I think "isekai" needs the additional differentiation of "having video game like mechanics, magic systems, or social structures with a focus on exploiting or breaking those systems". I don't view escaflowne, twelve kingdoms (this might be if it wasn't so adamant that our world's rules do not give advantage, and basically break many of the rules of the genre before the genre is even established) or even the old hack sign as isekai (log horizon and sword art online are, as well as SAO's Creator's earlier work, Accel world. Hack sign takes place in a video game, but has no emphasis on living there and is about a person trapped there and known players trying to get them out. Most of the anime isn't monster killing but sitting around brooding(product of its time)).
@@SerifSansSerif I don't think you can really draw a clear delineation between Log Horizon and hack//sign. Both have their characters drawn into a video game with seemingly no way back. Also Ascendence of a Bookworm is absolutely isekai, even before the magic reveal, and it has nothing to do with video games. Nor does "in another world with my smartphone", "Master of Ragnarok" or even Re:zero (for all that it does have a checkpoint mechanic). Isekai is a genre, it's an aesthetic and a vibe. Portal fantasy, power fantasy, fish out of water-ness, video game elements, magic (and harems), these are all tropes that it uses often. But not any single one is required for something to feel like an isekai.
@@Treegona I mean Isekai literally mean "Another World" in Japanese, so the tehnicality of terms is only worls if the world int the stories, have 2 different world. The classic common Isekai Genre usually would always Modern version to fantasy world or vice versa. But it can also have 2 different world where magic is still around for both world, but let's just say they have different kind of magic going on. For example, SAO cannot be considered Isekai cause it just a game world while the reality is still there. Overlord can be considered Isekai cause the MC cannot go back to his original world, also help that while he can use system like the game he played, but the world is actually different world from his own game. Inuyasha tehnically not an Isekai cause the portal is just connecting through the past period, basically they both still in the same world just different timeline, it's not the future place where Kagome live is "normal" but magic and youkai has been weakened at that point, sometimes they even actually fights youkai in Kagome's world.
@@TheMattVis You're missing the forest for the trees. A period piece isn't "a work of fiction set in any time period", because a work set in the modern day or a work where the time period doesn't matter would not count. A slasher doesn't have to involve knives, but does have a lot of other associated tropes that are unrelated to a knife going slash. Plus: You're talking out of your ass if you say SAO isn't isekai. They get transported to another type of existance, where they get stuck for an extended period of time. It's got the gameified magic system that lends itself really well to a power fantasy, and for all that Kirito is monogamous, there's still a whole harem of girls after him. But even if they *could* go back and forth more easily, or if they'd started off in the game world, it still *feels* like an isekai. It's got all the tropes and the conventions of modern isekai. It's got that aesthetic that you don't see outside of isekai. Ask anyone what type of story SAO is, they'll tell you it's isekai.
@@Treegona Bro they literally can go back, if the machine broke off, they would die, and just by that they are back while being dead. They are "stuck" not because they are trapped in another world, they just can't leave the game normally. The fact is their body is all being facilitated in hospital so they still can get nutrients, cause either way, they would die if they don't eat in real world, they tehnically just in comatose. Do you forgot what state when Kirito was waking up? Doesn't really matter what happen in the game, if your real body is dying, this is why the people in the story so shocked, cause what Kayaba does is basically taking hostage of people lives. Also, "if you ask anyone SAO is Isekai everyone would say so" Like ironically, anyone from the non Japanese maybe, but Japanese knows the term "Isekai" cause it's their own languange, nobody would called a series that's not "another world" would called it that, especially on their own languange. Just ask any Japanese, and they wouldn't even know the term Hentai is animated porn just like it known globally, cause it have different meaning in there.
Great video. I really wish more people knew about this series. Also, you mentioned that Flame of Recca and MAR shared a lot of character similarities. Fun little fact, Nanashi, one of the main characters of MAR is actually one of the reoccurring characters in Flame of Recca -- Joker. It's the reason that Babbo keeps saying that Nanashi "smells similar to Ginta". Some Flame of Recca spoilers from this point: Near the end of Flame of Recca, Joker opens a wormhole to save his rival Koganei Kaoru, getting himself sucked into that same wormhole in the process. The end result was him getting transported to the world of MAR with amnesia.
I've not thought about MAR in a while. I read the entire manga since the library near where I lived like 10 years ago had the whole collection. Same with Flame of Recca actually, but that's besides the point. I loved that creativity was one part of Ginta's combat power, with how he could literally redesign Babbo into multiple forms, but with the counterbalance that there were only eight "slots" that he could create a transformation in, and he couldn't edit them after, meaning he had to think through every detail of the transformations he made, and their utility. Also the fact that Jack's weapon, a common shovel ARM, was able to be used to an extent that Jack arguably became one of the strongest characters in the series, and showed that any ARM, no matter how common, could do incredible things when their wielder's know what they're doing. I did totally forget about Edward and Alan though. Also, interesting difference between the Anime and Manga. (SPOILERS FOR THE ENDING): The eigth and final transformation Ginta makes is different. In the Manga, he creates "Reverse Gatekeeper Clown," which literally does the opposite of the Gatekeeper Clown ARM that summoned him, allowing people (namely himself) to go back to his world at the end of the adventure. In the Anime, it becomes instead a Power of Friendship (tm) super powerful summon type ARM.
I’d like to mention flame of recca by the same mangaka real quick, flame of recca is set in the same universe that ginta is originally from, it’s a really good battle shounen that took clear inspiration from yu yu hakusho. By the end, one of its villains gets Isekai’d into a portal and wakes up in the world of mar with no memory of how he got there, in mar, he’s known as nanashi
It's hard to call Joker a villain. He may have started as an antagonist, but so did Kaoru and Tokiya. He clearly had a change of heart towards the end when he saved Kaoru by sacrificing himself.
MAR was such a good work from Nobuyuki Anzai. I watched/read his previous work Flame of Recca, and MAR was so bomb. Sharp AF character designs, great pacing, likable personalities. Also Dorothy was hot af.
Did you ever scrolling through the internet and then you get reminded of something you were barely convinced existed? this video just gave me that experience. Time to go rewatch some childhood memories
Great. I definitely seen MÄR before but never actually fully divulge. Until I recently read the manga last year and really enjoy it for what it was. A very simplistic yet effective series all things consider. I really like its themes of growing up, cruelty of war, hope for the next generation, and humanity being imperfect but redeemable. All the side characters got pretty good payoffs in the end, with Jack and Alviss being the stand outs. What I really like about Ginta overall journey, is this adventure of pure fiction and imagination gave him a wake up call towards his current reality and gaining confidence to be better in the end.
I was racking my brain looking for this anime for weeks and then RUclips just pops this in my recommended. Thank you so much- you’ve helped me unlock a lot of hidden memories lmao
Never heard of this, might check it out! If you ever need another Shonen that people don't really talk about anymore to check out, I'd suggest Psyren! It's one of the few decently popular shonens to come out in the 2000s that didn't receive an anime adaptation of ANY kind, despite being REALLY good, which has sadly caused it to sort of fade out of the public eye from what I've seen and experienced personally.
Im super glad that I'm not the only one who remembers this show! Aslo, DONT THINK I DIDNT NOTICE THAT DARK CLOUD MUSIC IN THE BACKGROUND! You just hit me repeatedly with my childhood man, You've got yourself a subscriber!
Holy crap, you just opened up a refreshing memory that I forgot about! Once I saw the thumbnail, so many memories came back to me. I immediately remembered Ginta, Snow, Koyuki, Jack, Dorothy, Alviss, Phantom, Diana, Alan, Danna, Ian, and so many other characters. This anime was such a joy to watch. RUclips recommended your video and I'm glad it did because I'll subscribe due to you helping me remember this. Honestly thought I was one of the few people that watched this anime. Glad to see so many other people remembering it.
Do you know no the final secret of Bappo? That made the whole series worth it to me. I'll give you a hint: the malicious spirit that phantom had in that weapon was exchanged for another soul in the first war
I remember watching MAR when I was around in between 12 and 13. I watched a lot of episodes right before the series finale. I started reading the manga within a Barnes and Nobles somewhere in New Jersey. This was the first time I actually finished an entire manga series and I was impressed with how MAR’s story ends. Also, there’s another forgotten anime/manga series called Rave Master which was done by the same author who did Fairy Tail.
One slight correction, a Macguffin is a device for catching lions in the Scottish Highlands. Jokes aside, a Macguffin is a very particular kind of plot device, specifically any object that matters more to the characters than the plot. Infinity stones and Ärms aren't, because their nature technically matters and they can do something. The goober, Maltese Falcon, ect are since they could be anything, the only thing that matters is that they move the plot. The death star plans are actually really interesting because in the first draft of the script they were just a magic rock that let the death star fire, I.E. a thing that doesn't matter because if it fired the movie would be over, but and if it doesn't fire it doesn't matter. In later drafts they became the plans, including a weak point which allowed for the third act to begin, taking a Macguffin, and turning it into a full fledged plot element.
Exactly my thoughts when he kept saying that. A Mcguffin is not something that naturally fits into the world in such a way. Like an impossible virus in Mission Impossible 2 is a Mcguffin. Even the writer called it as such.
Wow, ive COMPLETELY forgot about this series, i remember only having read a few chapters in the shonen sunday books i used to have, but completely loving it!
Your videos are honestly so insane. The production quality is so. You can really captivate and suck me into a little void for 20-30 mins while you speak. The background tracks, your tone, and the overall presentation is always outstanding. Keep up the awesome Mugen! Glad i stuck around after the berserk content for an awesome channel! Cant wait for the next one. Be hearing you soon❤
I would like to mention Houshi Engi, which for me is still the Battle Shounen with the best war, the conflict in this story is very good and visually it is MAR and Flame of Recca in its veins.
This was one of those types of shows that I watched as a kid but never remembered the name of. Never forgot, just never knew what it was called. Still, glad to see it be brought up as one of those phantom series that you grew up with.
Mär really seems like it's a series that only could have existed when it did. It has a lot of the standard makings of an issekai, the weak everyman, the fairy tale esq world, the power boost that the main character gets from coming to the new world. But all of it is handled or implemented so differently that it makes for a completely different feeling story. With most issekai today either trying to completely reinvent the genre, or play into the tropes of the genre. Something like mär that rides that line really only could have existed before the boom caused by SAO. Something not mentioned in this video that I really enjoyed about mär is that despite ginta getting the power boost, like in most issekai power fantasy anime. It's handled in a way that doesn't just make him a "cool MC gigachad". the early on encounter with Alvis, mentioning that he was hoping to summon a hero from another world as strong as the one who fought the chess pieces years ago, only to be disappointed they got Ginta, does a lot for the story. It tears him down a bit, acknowledging that even though earthlings are more powerful on mär, Ginta is still that same weak earthling, litterally anyone else would have been stronger, more fitting to BE that hero, he's confronted with his own weakness he had back on earth. And then it gives Ginta a goal to strive towards beyond the adventure and getting home, the previous hero is now an aspirational figure, someone he needs to become like. He can't be the hero right now, but he will become him. That's the part that hooked me when I watched the anime as a kid.
I remember picking this series up when I was in high school, and it's stuck with me enough that I now own the entire manga collection. It's one of those stories that is definitely simplistic, and imo, goes way too fast for a 15 volume story, but it's one I still hold near and dear and would never sell or trade. I'm glad to see someone talk about this series again, and the production was really good! Thanks for taking the time to remind me that it's been long enough to give it another read.
Weirdest thing about Mar is that it was released online for streaming back in 2003. That was one of the marketing gimmicks they used to promote the show, at least in the U.S., that Toonami would put episodes on their janky ass website for free in like 480p.That's how I watched the show at least.
Toonami jetstream was so wild. I remember wondering why everyone didn't do that with movies and other tv shows. 20 some odd years later and now I guess everybody did.
@@InsufferableCrap Jetstream! Also I have no idea why I said 2003, that's obviously too early (I was in kindergarten in 2002 lol), 2006 was a wild time, lots of innovation in the web despite it being firmly 2000s era stuff. Sucks that the site hasn't been archived to well.
Compared to other Shonen @ that time, it actually ended well. "Well" as in didn't drag onwards forever. If anything ot actually felt rushed. It awnsered some of our questions yet for me I was like, "that's it?"
I think the biggest problem with this genre today is that authors want to short hand the lead up and buy in of the character by making them either so disconnected from the real world (either by making them a misanthrope or a sociopath ) or cutting the protagonist off from reality with a threshold they can't recross (death and rebirth) . The idea being that once the main character is on board with their new reality, the audience will be also out of social obligation or empathy (or moe). A lot of authors just want to wrap their flavor of power system and world building on top of the frameworks we all know and treat the protagonist as a vehicle to move the audience thru the tour or ride that is the story. Or they have a series of skits they want to act out with the world or characters, but they need the table to be cleared so they can set them up. Zeroing out the characters past or boiling it down to a bag of skill, memories, and experiences without attachments to bog things down, makes this so much earlier at the cost of long term engagement. They want the character free to work thru the problem at hand or the show piece they set up without having to work thru the mental baggage a real person with context would have to, in the hopes it will pay off for the audience in the short term. The whole industry has constricted the window for a series to take hold. You need to get in and grab the audience quick or you are dropped. Nothing is allowed to simmer anymore and build up the flavor.
The recent generic isekai is "introvert teenager/neet/otaku is transported into another world, a typical JRPG fantasy world with video games attributes and he is OP. After a few episodes, it will become a power fantasy". The most popular ones usualy involve a great World building, including the character (if he needs to), or at least provide something new. Re:Zero's world has a deep lore, Subaru isn't OP and his "return by death" ability helps him (well, help isn't really the best word here XD) row up as a character. Konosuba is a wonderful parodic deconstruction of the genre, and I find it really hilarious. Saga of Tanya the Evil has a really different setup, and the protagonist is an a**hole. Mushoku Tensei has probably the best World building of the whole genre. And this is the grandfather of the isekai genre, creating most of the tropes. Reincarneted as a slime is the closest to the "generics", but it has that little extra in almost aspect. Then you have the ones with a spin: GATE (the army is fighting), No Game No Life (no real battle, just games) or are older and weren't drowned in a lot of clones, like SAO or Overlord. I didn't mention Shield Heo, I couldn't go past the first episode. And the last iteration are isekai with a twist: the hero is a vending machine, a sword, isn't an acxtual fighter, etc; or the vilainess genre. the idea is to grab the attention with a "look look I am different!" just to be forgotten soon enough.
In 7th grade English class we had to do a book project where we had to find a book series and read the whole series within the week then do a project on it, recount the pivotal characters, give a summary, and give a review on it. I was looking through the library and I couldn't decided at first until I saw a book shelf that said "older kids section (grade 7-8)" and whatcha know it had a bunch of Manga. At the time I had never read a single Manga (tbh I never knew it existed. Not a single friend of mine was into this stuff yet either) so I browsed through my options and one series caught my eye. Obviously MÄR I just remember really liking GInta's design. I just remember being so mesmerized by this series and I was constantly reading volume after volume. Watching this video has brought so many memories back from that time. This was a great video man.
Still haven't met anyone who remembers this, but I watched Mär on Toonami Jetstream, one of the earliest anime streaming websites. I never caught Mär on TV, but I have very vivid memories of it being one of the first shows I was ever able to binge (along with Prince of Tennis)
I don't have very explicit memories of this show, but I recognized the characters in the thumbnail, so I clicked it. I'm glad I did. Very heartwarming. Encountered this after watching a video about Yu Yu Hakusho earlier, too. That line you said about revisiting things you used to like as a kid, and discovering exactly why you like them has inspired me, I think. There are a lot of shows I have enjoyed, but I don't understand what I liked about them. In fact, there are very few for which I could put those reasons into words. Thinking about revisiting some things I used to enjoy, and which were major influences on me, to see what I can understand now. Thanks for the video.
Holy crap I thought I was the only one who loved MAR. This is one of my all time favorites that no one talks about! This was a seriously fun, inciteful, and well put together retrospective. The last question about if I want to go on an adventure hit me in emotions I haven't felt in a very long time. I cannot thank you enough for bringing me back to the first time I read MAR. It feels like a lifetime ago.
Something like MÄR is honestly what I want more out of isekai anime these days, just a solid shounen story in another world. I hate how almost all modern isekai are all about the power fantasy. Give me an MC that actually starts weak (relatively at least) and has to slowly work their way up to becoming the strongest/one of the strongest by the end of the series.
Man I remember reading MAR. I would follow it in the once-every-two-week Shounen Star manga collection in Indonesia. I think I remember finishing it, but I don't know if I did it in physical or online form. I think I just don't really remember about it because it isn't flashy enough and no one else talks about it too much. In recent years I only remember it because some artist made porn of it on Pixiv, and man I missed how hot Dorothy was (as my type back then was more towards Koyuki).
Mar and FfT are two of my favorite series because you have two isekai portages that do what most wouldn’t, they grow up a bit and make it their goal to go home, they realize that left behind people and realize that running away from your problems doesn’t help them or make them go away. I absolutely love series where the main character takes the road less traveled.
remember watching MAR as a kid before findding the manga later as a teen, every now and then i think back to it fondly. i found it so unique and now knowing a lot more about manga and anime, i realised it was my first real expoaure to isekai. loved the vid man, earned yourself a new sub
You know I actually did forget about this show ever Airing on Toonami but what gave me my memory back was that Iconic hammer with the mustache i was like wooooooow chillz ive seen that b4 somewhere "MAR" that the name ty Mugan
Isekai has been around in anime since the early 80s with works like Aura Battler Dunbine and Orguss kinda, but the first one to really kick off a major trend was Spirit Hero Wataru.
I remeber that Toonami showed it and then put it on their website before streaming software and internet speeds caught up. It died so that anime streaming could thrive.
What is mind blowing to me is I was just trying to figure out the name of this like last week.... & never could figure out what it was called and now here I am. Seeing your thumbnail learning what thus piece of my childhood was
Man what a nostalgic gem of an anime. I’ve never forgotten about this one. I’ve always wanted to find it and watch it all over again. Thanks for the video! Put a smile on my face haha.
This video showing up in my recommended made me SO happy,, I love mär, it’s the first manga I ever read and it means so so much to me, I keep rereading it over and over and it always makes me a little sad that basically no one seems to know about it, so whenever something like this pops up, I get super happy!!
Didn't forget! I think about it a few times a year anyway, it was one of my favorite manga as a kid. Thanks for covering this and hopefully putting a new wave of people on!
I LOVED Mar. Never watched the anime, but I read the hell out of the Manga. By the time I discovered it, Mar had already finished, so I binged read it in high school. I agree it is rather simplistic, but the fact that it stuck out to me after all these years shows how meaningful it actually was. I'm new to the channel, so I'm not sure if you've covered Zatch Bell before, but the way you analyze Mar makes me think that Zatch Bell is the reverse of the Isekai trope. The magical aspects come to the real world instead. Anyways, great video!
i love this series, it was litteraly my first manga alongside soul eater. i think the best part of it is the villains, i struggle to find an villain we can empathize with as much as Kimera, or one as interesting and with amazing motives as ash. thanks for the video, i needed it.
This is amazing. My mum used to buy me random books as a kid, and the only manga I had were YuGiOh (the all time greatest) and this weird one called MAR. I only got volume 2 of MAR too, but I read it a hundred times. It seemed so cool, even if I never got to know anything that happened after Ginta fights Ian, or any of the backstory. Your opening statement is so true; I saw this thumbnail and thought “holy fuck this is the first person I’ve ever seen mention this!” I thought the concept of chess ranks and pieces were so, so cool. I never even knew it had an anime! Great video bro.
I never forgot MAR. I had a solid crush on that one chick. Also just realized I've been saying the name wrong. I've been calling it Mar, like in Mars. And did not know this was the same creator as Flame of Recca.
"This sounds so familiar, but I can't say why. I must have seen it just in passing or-" *sees the hammer* "I DID WATCH THIS ONE!" Not a huge amount of it, but I definitely saw at least a few episodes. I remember that damn hammer.
Man, MAR was the first manga I ever collected the full set of volumes for, thank you for this video ❤ I seriously wish i could add the anime to my collection but the Dub never completed the show and finding it now is impossible T_T but I'll always look back on this one fondly
I’m definitely one of the people that is relieved to see anyone talking about MÄR! Since this video also discussed Isekai so much as a genre, I’m curious if you’ve seen any of Amphibia or The Owl House which are two Disney shows from the past few years that are just Isekais into frog worlds and demon/witch worlds respectively.
Then there’s Ghost Ärm- which mutate your body into weapons- usually the eldritch sort. Darkness Ärm that curse their targets. Holy Ärm that cures wounds and remove curses. And lastly, Nature Ärm that have elemental powers such as ice, wind, fire, earth, etc.
I just want to say that i've been trying to find this anime for over two years because i first watched it on animonday on syfy and was hooked ever since but i couldn't remember the name of it. i thank you so much for triggering this memory and giving me a chance to revisit this work of art.
I Loved MAR as a kid and for several years was convinced i was the only person who did. This video makes me unreasonably happy
I read the manga when i was little, and then the anime showed up. I was very happy , kind of fan of the manga. But the anime begin well, and get less good than the manga with the time. Then we got Mar OMEGA, wich is the badest, anime got forgot & here we go.
same, had a hell of a time trying to convince my friends that it was worth reading
Same thing here. I loved Mar and rewatched it multiple times. I wish they continued it in a modern twist with better writing
Literally how I feel right now finding this video
Facts😂
I loved MAR man. Oddly enough MAR didn’t feel a isekai. By time Ginta gets to another world he felt like he was meant to be there and felt like he wasn’t from Earth
I'm aggree with u , that's like Vision of Escaflown , an Isekai before Isekai was a thing, so the plot is interesting & revolve around other things than our recent shitty isekai xD
@@Ryxem34 There's also Magic Knight Rayearth
Most good isekai don’t feel like Isekai.
I think Dragon Drive was also somewhat like that
Cuz it felt like a battle manga more than anything
I like that the "the atmosphere makes humans stronger" system rolls our protagonist back into being inadequate for the task.
The previous summoned human was probably extremely OP because unlike our protagonist he didn't start out with bad eyesight and bad physical abilities, so he showed up being much, much stronger.
Protag gets a buff, but still needs to work extra hard to be up to the challenge.
Sounds obvious for most shonen, but a lot of isekai kinda skip over that.
You can't forget what it was like being a kid, if you never stopped being one. As Disney said "Growing old is mandatory, but growing up is optional".
Facts 🫡
y'know, despite the fact that disney is kinda shit rn, it used to have true artistic talent in there.
@@cyrusmann5443 The artist Disney is there, sadly it is fighting a losing fight against the corporate.
Yeah but unfortunately now Disney just says buy our shit
@@IBoofRanchDressing And it's working, so they don't really have any need to change that.
This anime actually lives rent free in my mind. I just remembered having a massive crush on Dorothy, thank you for this nostalgia trip haha
anytime, long live Dorothy
@@mugenbop I completely forgot about this anime but I remember the few episodes that I got to see were great. I don't remember if I was able to finish the whole series or not but I definitely remember the episodes you talked about at least lol
Anzai's work in general is very underrated and overlooked. His series before this, Flame of Recca, is also great
Keen to read it :)
@@mugenbop one of the characters from MAR is actually a character from Flame Of Recca who has lost his memory too!
I watched both growing up and didn’t know they were from the same creator
Just finished MAR a few weeks back. The only thing it did wrong was come out in the same period as Naruto and Bleach
@@Tea_Dawg Nanashi is literally Joker from Kurei's team lol. Like no joke he's literally Joker from Flame of Recca transported to another universe with amnesia
I was obsessed with this series as a kid. I don't know why, there was just something special about it to me. I'm glad I'm not the only one that remembered it!
I was obsessed with Dorothy
I watched the whole series it was great 😊
same but I lost sight of it when it went off air.
I can tell you part of the reason.... The Walt Disney and Grimm's fairy tale crossover elements are very strong and relevant in the story.
Jack and the beanstalk, the wizard of oz, Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf, and several other fairy tales like Peter Pan are in there.
These guys went out of their way to be different.
I remember the jumping scene when he first arrives to the world to this day. So much fun!
My only complaint is I wish the writer had done more with Babbo as a weaponized version of a ball in a cup. That's such a unique and fun weapon and the concept becomes irrelavent the moment he starts transforming into things. In addition to the transformations, Babbo should have had different variants Ginta used. One where his sphere part is covered in spikes, another where it's a molten metal ball etc.
Otherwise, yeah this was a fun one that was swept under the rug. Similar to Buso Renkin, Flame of Recca, Tegami Bachi, Prince of Tennis, Law of Ueki and a few others.
Mark My WORDS! If you continue with this production value, just give it time, you’re going to blow up more than you already are bro!
Thanks that’s very kind :)
@@mugenbop He's not lying. I just stumbled across this vid and am impressed by the production.
i too am a new product of the algorithm. Great job!
i usually dont sub to these kinds of channels but your videos are too good SUBBED
very quick sub for that very reason
This anime lived rent free in my head for so long that I collected all 15 volumes of the manga a couple of years ago. The things they did with the final season leading up to the finale differ quite a bit from the manga, but they were still awesome because they explored the possibilities Anzai didn't get a chance to explore himself. The music by Garnet Crow was also Bomb af. Scoured the internet for those songs. MAR was an underated Gem that deserves to have a comeback. It really was before its time.
I think another reason why MAR was forgotten at least in USA was because Toonami was shutting down in 2008 when MAR was still airing its first 20-30ish episode. After Toonami had their temporarily shut down, there wasn't really way to watch MAR on TV. It was also hard to find subbed episodes for most people because people would type down MAR episode 30 or whatever and it wouldn't pop up. It was years later that if I wanted to find subbed episode, I needed to type down "Marchen awakens romance" not MAR
Remember when Tom's last day actually meant something?
I swear I watched the subbed in my teen years but just can't remember for certain it was when I went anime watch crazy online to find anything that was good 2007ish to 2014 so many series it just blends together.
i keep talking about this with my friends. how it was odd with its kendama based weapon that can talk, how it has a "chess" themed ranking for the villains, how the princess is the alternate version of his friend from his world... all of these were very unique and still has more to offer than most of the recent isekai.
Man, I could never forget this series lol. Part of my childhood and one of my favs, also go a fig and volume from back as a kid
Saw this video in my recommended and had to watch. I never saw the anime, but I did read the first volume in my middle school library. One of my friends showed me and she basically introduced me to manga. I could never remember the name of the series but when I saw Ginta's weapon in the thumbnail it just came flooding back. I grew up reading and watching a lot of Japanese media and I'm glad you made me remember the other piece that introduced me to it! The first piece being Kingdom Hearts. And now that I think about it, I guess that's why I also love genres where the main character is able to explore other worlds. Thanks a bunch!
2 things:
1. I loved MAR so much, and i actually mentioned it to a friend like three days ago.
2. A macguffin is not just a plot device, it is a plot device that only matters because the desire for it. A macguffin can be replaced with any other. The Maltese Falcon is the most macguffin macguffin to ever macguffin and thats because the damn thing only matters becayse everyone wants it. It could be replaced with a sack full of money, a giant diamond, or a sexy lamp and the fundamental plot wouldn't change.
I LOVE this series. Same story here, I first saw it pop up on Toonami and immediately wanted more. The fairy tale setup is great and there's nods to classics all over the place. Dorothy for example is a walking Wizard of Oz reference - her name, she's a witch, her favorite ARM is a dog she's nicknamed 'Toto', and she uses a version of the Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Cowardly Lion.
One part that works out extremely well is how the characters scale up in power. As Ginta and Babbo grow, they unlock new transformations / forms for Babbo to turn into via magical macguffins. When Ginta is given a couple of them and thrown into the first training gate, he has the ability to use them to give Babbo basically whatever power he can imagine. This mechanic has the potential to make him comedically overpowered, but it has limits that are explored naturally. He starts simple and makes both a short-range weapon and a long-range weapon to cover each others' weaknesses. Then he makes a Guardian because he saw Dorothy and Snow use them. Gargoyle is a great example here because it shows that Babbo can't simply turn into an "I Win" button to breeze through everything. An extremely powerful form like that requires a lot of strength from the user as well. Ginta is able to use the Gargoyle transformation better as he gets stronger, but he always tries other tactics first.
I think another thing that's handled really well in MAR is that the two worlds are linked together. It's revealed a little ways in that Snow and Koyuki are counterparts in their different worlds. When Koyuki is asleep, she has dreams of what Snow is doing. This is great because she spends her time talking to Ginta's mother about what her son is up to. It's a great way to tie the events of the real world with the events of the fantasy one, and it's a smart way to get around the people in the MC's original world not knowing what happened to the person who randomly vanished.
This was one of my favorite anime growing up. The concept was so creative to me, I still think about it today. Good to see I'm not alone, might be time for a rewatch
I used to think Mar was the name of The Prince of Tennis. The toonami ads would exclaim that coming up next was Mar! The Prince of Tennis!
I think the most important issue is that "Isekai" is a genre, while the trope is portal fantasy. Most isekai are also portal fantasies, but there's also a ton of "I can't believe it's not isekai", where the protagonist is transported through time or reincarnated, or goes back to an earlier point in their life, or otherwise awakens some magic power that makes the world more game-like. Meanwhile the portal fantasy trope pre-dates the isekai genre by quite a bit, and really isn't anime-exclusive see: Peter Pan, Alice in Wonderland, Inuyasha, Magical Knight Rayearth, and all the others I'm forgetting. These stories don't work as 'isekai', in the way that not every story with a cowboy in it is a western.
I think "isekai" needs the additional differentiation of "having video game like mechanics, magic systems, or social structures with a focus on exploiting or breaking those systems".
I don't view escaflowne, twelve kingdoms (this might be if it wasn't so adamant that our world's rules do not give advantage, and basically break many of the rules of the genre before the genre is even established) or even the old hack sign as isekai (log horizon and sword art online are, as well as SAO's Creator's earlier work, Accel world. Hack sign takes place in a video game, but has no emphasis on living there and is about a person trapped there and known players trying to get them out. Most of the anime isn't monster killing but sitting around brooding(product of its time)).
@@SerifSansSerif I don't think you can really draw a clear delineation between Log Horizon and hack//sign. Both have their characters drawn into a video game with seemingly no way back.
Also Ascendence of a Bookworm is absolutely isekai, even before the magic reveal, and it has nothing to do with video games. Nor does "in another world with my smartphone", "Master of Ragnarok" or even Re:zero (for all that it does have a checkpoint mechanic).
Isekai is a genre, it's an aesthetic and a vibe. Portal fantasy, power fantasy, fish out of water-ness, video game elements, magic (and harems), these are all tropes that it uses often. But not any single one is required for something to feel like an isekai.
@@Treegona I mean Isekai literally mean "Another World" in Japanese, so the tehnicality of terms is only worls if the world int the stories, have 2 different world.
The classic common Isekai Genre usually would always Modern version to fantasy world or vice versa.
But it can also have 2 different world where magic is still around for both world, but let's just say they have different kind of magic going on.
For example, SAO cannot be considered Isekai cause it just a game world while the reality is still there.
Overlord can be considered Isekai cause the MC cannot go back to his original world, also help that while he can use system like the game he played, but the world is actually different world from his own game.
Inuyasha tehnically not an Isekai cause the portal is just connecting through the past period, basically they both still in the same world just different timeline, it's not the future place where Kagome live is "normal" but magic and youkai has been weakened at that point, sometimes they even actually fights youkai in Kagome's world.
@@TheMattVis You're missing the forest for the trees. A period piece isn't "a work of fiction set in any time period", because a work set in the modern day or a work where the time period doesn't matter would not count. A slasher doesn't have to involve knives, but does have a lot of other associated tropes that are unrelated to a knife going slash.
Plus: You're talking out of your ass if you say SAO isn't isekai. They get transported to another type of existance, where they get stuck for an extended period of time. It's got the gameified magic system that lends itself really well to a power fantasy, and for all that Kirito is monogamous, there's still a whole harem of girls after him.
But even if they *could* go back and forth more easily, or if they'd started off in the game world, it still *feels* like an isekai. It's got all the tropes and the conventions of modern isekai. It's got that aesthetic that you don't see outside of isekai.
Ask anyone what type of story SAO is, they'll tell you it's isekai.
@@Treegona Bro they literally can go back, if the machine broke off, they would die, and just by that they are back while being dead.
They are "stuck" not because they are trapped in another world, they just can't leave the game normally.
The fact is their body is all being facilitated in hospital so they still can get nutrients, cause either way, they would die if they don't eat in real world, they tehnically just in comatose.
Do you forgot what state when Kirito was waking up?
Doesn't really matter what happen in the game, if your real body is dying, this is why the people in the story so shocked, cause what Kayaba does is basically taking hostage of people lives.
Also, "if you ask anyone SAO is Isekai everyone would say so"
Like ironically, anyone from the non Japanese maybe, but Japanese knows the term "Isekai" cause it's their own languange, nobody would called a series that's not "another world" would called it that, especially on their own languange.
Just ask any Japanese, and they wouldn't even know the term Hentai is animated porn just like it known globally, cause it have different meaning in there.
Great video. I really wish more people knew about this series. Also, you mentioned that Flame of Recca and MAR shared a lot of character similarities. Fun little fact, Nanashi, one of the main characters of MAR is actually one of the reoccurring characters in Flame of Recca -- Joker. It's the reason that Babbo keeps saying that Nanashi "smells similar to Ginta". Some Flame of Recca spoilers from this point: Near the end of Flame of Recca, Joker opens a wormhole to save his rival Koganei Kaoru, getting himself sucked into that same wormhole in the process. The end result was him getting transported to the world of MAR with amnesia.
I've not thought about MAR in a while. I read the entire manga since the library near where I lived like 10 years ago had the whole collection. Same with Flame of Recca actually, but that's besides the point. I loved that creativity was one part of Ginta's combat power, with how he could literally redesign Babbo into multiple forms, but with the counterbalance that there were only eight "slots" that he could create a transformation in, and he couldn't edit them after, meaning he had to think through every detail of the transformations he made, and their utility. Also the fact that Jack's weapon, a common shovel ARM, was able to be used to an extent that Jack arguably became one of the strongest characters in the series, and showed that any ARM, no matter how common, could do incredible things when their wielder's know what they're doing. I did totally forget about Edward and Alan though.
Also, interesting difference between the Anime and Manga. (SPOILERS FOR THE ENDING): The eigth and final transformation Ginta makes is different. In the Manga, he creates "Reverse Gatekeeper Clown," which literally does the opposite of the Gatekeeper Clown ARM that summoned him, allowing people (namely himself) to go back to his world at the end of the adventure. In the Anime, it becomes instead a Power of Friendship (tm) super powerful summon type ARM.
I’d like to mention flame of recca by the same mangaka real quick, flame of recca is set in the same universe that ginta is originally from, it’s a really good battle shounen that took clear inspiration from yu yu hakusho. By the end, one of its villains gets Isekai’d into a portal and wakes up in the world of mar with no memory of how he got there, in mar, he’s known as nanashi
It's hard to call Joker a villain. He may have started as an antagonist, but so did Kaoru and Tokiya. He clearly had a change of heart towards the end when he saved Kaoru by sacrificing himself.
MAR was such a good work from Nobuyuki Anzai. I watched/read his previous work Flame of Recca, and MAR was so bomb. Sharp AF character designs, great pacing, likable personalities. Also Dorothy was hot af.
yes Dorothy, I love her too!
wait, this and FoR have the same writer? i loved both and never knew that.
Don't sleep on dorothy's sister 😂😂 much bigger personality iykwim
@@vijaz5559 yes personality and "personality"
@@vijaz5559 Big toxic personality. Great bobs, bad for the soul hahaha just ask Phantom
Did you ever scrolling through the internet and then you get reminded of something you were barely convinced existed? this video just gave me that experience.
Time to go rewatch some childhood memories
Dude I thought this show was a dream, the memories man
2:11 I'm actually in the secret third category who only got to read the first few Manga volumes and didn't know that was how you pronounced it.
Great. I definitely seen MÄR before but never actually fully divulge. Until I recently read the manga last year and really enjoy it for what it was. A very simplistic yet effective series all things consider. I really like its themes of growing up, cruelty of war, hope for the next generation, and humanity being imperfect but redeemable. All the side characters got pretty good payoffs in the end, with Jack and Alviss being the stand outs. What I really like about Ginta overall journey, is this adventure of pure fiction and imagination gave him a wake up call towards his current reality and gaining confidence to be better in the end.
OMG, I remember this. Back when isekai was halfway decent, main characters actually lost, and didn't purchase slave harems!
This was an absolute joy to sit through. I appreciate you shedding light on this show and creating this video !
I was racking my brain looking for this anime for weeks and then RUclips just pops this in my recommended. Thank you so much- you’ve helped me unlock a lot of hidden memories lmao
Never heard of this, might check it out! If you ever need another Shonen that people don't really talk about anymore to check out, I'd suggest Psyren! It's one of the few decently popular shonens to come out in the 2000s that didn't receive an anime adaptation of ANY kind, despite being REALLY good, which has sadly caused it to sort of fade out of the public eye from what I've seen and experienced personally.
Im super glad that I'm not the only one who remembers this show! Aslo, DONT THINK I DIDNT NOTICE THAT DARK CLOUD MUSIC IN THE BACKGROUND! You just hit me repeatedly with my childhood man, You've got yourself a subscriber!
Holy crap, you just opened up a refreshing memory that I forgot about! Once I saw the thumbnail, so many memories came back to me. I immediately remembered Ginta, Snow, Koyuki, Jack, Dorothy, Alviss, Phantom, Diana, Alan, Danna, Ian, and so many other characters. This anime was such a joy to watch. RUclips recommended your video and I'm glad it did because I'll subscribe due to you helping me remember this. Honestly thought I was one of the few people that watched this anime. Glad to see so many other people remembering it.
For a good while I genuinely couldn't find this anime anywhere. Im glad recommended showed me this; it makes me happy
extremely happy that someone is going to talk about MÄR
I had extremely vague memories of this anime, and seeing Babbo made a fair few childhood memories come back. Couldn't forget him that easily
Do you know no the final secret of Bappo?
That made the whole series worth it to me. I'll give you a hint: the malicious spirit that phantom had in that weapon was exchanged for another soul in the first war
I can't believe someone is finally talking about this. I love the show and recently I started buying the manga and most of it surprisingly holds up.
I remember watching MAR when I was around in between 12 and 13. I watched a lot of episodes right before the series finale. I started reading the manga within a Barnes and Nobles somewhere in New Jersey. This was the first time I actually finished an entire manga series and I was impressed with how MAR’s story ends.
Also, there’s another forgotten anime/manga series called Rave Master which was done by the same author who did Fairy Tail.
That Dark Cloud OST in the background just grabs my attention instantly. Fits quite nicely with Mär!
I'm saying. Always love to see Dark Cloud appreciation. 👌😌
One slight correction, a Macguffin is a device for catching lions in the Scottish Highlands.
Jokes aside, a Macguffin is a very particular kind of plot device, specifically any object that matters more to the characters than the plot. Infinity stones and Ärms aren't, because their nature technically matters and they can do something. The goober, Maltese Falcon, ect are since they could be anything, the only thing that matters is that they move the plot.
The death star plans are actually really interesting because in the first draft of the script they were just a magic rock that let the death star fire, I.E. a thing that doesn't matter because if it fired the movie would be over, but and if it doesn't fire it doesn't matter. In later drafts they became the plans, including a weak point which allowed for the third act to begin, taking a Macguffin, and turning it into a full fledged plot element.
Exactly my thoughts when he kept saying that. A Mcguffin is not something that naturally fits into the world in such a way. Like an impossible virus in Mission Impossible 2 is a Mcguffin. Even the writer called it as such.
Wow, ive COMPLETELY forgot about this series, i remember only having read a few chapters in the shonen sunday books i used to have, but completely loving it!
Your videos are honestly so insane. The production quality is so. You can really captivate and suck me into a little void for 20-30 mins while you speak. The background tracks, your tone, and the overall presentation is always outstanding. Keep up the awesome Mugen! Glad i stuck around after the berserk content for an awesome channel! Cant wait for the next one. Be hearing you soon❤
I would like to mention Houshi Engi, which for me is still the Battle Shounen with the best war, the conflict in this story is very good and visually it is MAR and Flame of Recca in its veins.
I’ll add it to the list :)
omg Houshi Engi is a name I haven't heard in a long time.
I stumbled upon the MAR manga in the Rochester MN library this year. What a fascinating and inspiring piece.
This was one of those types of shows that I watched as a kid but never remembered the name of. Never forgot, just never knew what it was called. Still, glad to see it be brought up as one of those phantom series that you grew up with.
Remember watching MAR, Hikaru no Go, and Prince of Tennis on toonami's jetstream. Was that really 17 years ago? Wow, fond memories
Mär really seems like it's a series that only could have existed when it did. It has a lot of the standard makings of an issekai, the weak everyman, the fairy tale esq world, the power boost that the main character gets from coming to the new world. But all of it is handled or implemented so differently that it makes for a completely different feeling story. With most issekai today either trying to completely reinvent the genre, or play into the tropes of the genre. Something like mär that rides that line really only could have existed before the boom caused by SAO.
Something not mentioned in this video that I really enjoyed about mär is that despite ginta getting the power boost, like in most issekai power fantasy anime. It's handled in a way that doesn't just make him a "cool MC gigachad". the early on encounter with Alvis, mentioning that he was hoping to summon a hero from another world as strong as the one who fought the chess pieces years ago, only to be disappointed they got Ginta, does a lot for the story. It tears him down a bit, acknowledging that even though earthlings are more powerful on mär, Ginta is still that same weak earthling, litterally anyone else would have been stronger, more fitting to BE that hero, he's confronted with his own weakness he had back on earth. And then it gives Ginta a goal to strive towards beyond the adventure and getting home, the previous hero is now an aspirational figure, someone he needs to become like. He can't be the hero right now, but he will become him. That's the part that hooked me when I watched the anime as a kid.
I remember picking this series up when I was in high school, and it's stuck with me enough that I now own the entire manga collection. It's one of those stories that is definitely simplistic, and imo, goes way too fast for a 15 volume story, but it's one I still hold near and dear and would never sell or trade. I'm glad to see someone talk about this series again, and the production was really good! Thanks for taking the time to remind me that it's been long enough to give it another read.
Weirdest thing about Mar is that it was released online for streaming back in 2003. That was one of the marketing gimmicks they used to promote the show, at least in the U.S., that Toonami would put episodes on their janky ass website for free in like 480p.That's how I watched the show at least.
Toonami jetstream was so wild. I remember wondering why everyone didn't do that with movies and other tv shows. 20 some odd years later and now I guess everybody did.
@@InsufferableCrap Jetstream! Also I have no idea why I said 2003, that's obviously too early (I was in kindergarten in 2002 lol), 2006 was a wild time, lots of innovation in the web despite it being firmly 2000s era stuff. Sucks that the site hasn't been archived to well.
Man... this surely bring back good ol childhood memories when watching this on tv .. yes this series even got Malaysia dub . i really enjoy this
And i still want that Griffith Arm !
Man!!! Out of all the old animes getting remade, MAR definitely deserves a second chance!!! Such an underrated series! Its brilliant!!!
Compared to other Shonen @ that time, it actually ended well. "Well" as in didn't drag onwards forever. If anything ot actually felt rushed. It awnsered some of our questions yet for me I was like, "that's it?"
I think the biggest problem with this genre today is that authors want to short hand the lead up and buy in of the character by making them either so disconnected from the real world (either by making them a misanthrope or a sociopath ) or cutting the protagonist off from reality with a threshold they can't recross (death and rebirth) . The idea being that once the main character is on board with their new reality, the audience will be also out of social obligation or empathy (or moe). A lot of authors just want to wrap their flavor of power system and world building on top of the frameworks we all know and treat the protagonist as a vehicle to move the audience thru the tour or ride that is the story. Or they have a series of skits they want to act out with the world or characters, but they need the table to be cleared so they can set them up. Zeroing out the characters past or boiling it down to a bag of skill, memories, and experiences without attachments to bog things down, makes this so much earlier at the cost of long term engagement. They want the character free to work thru the problem at hand or the show piece they set up without having to work thru the mental baggage a real person with context would have to, in the hopes it will pay off for the audience in the short term. The whole industry has constricted the window for a series to take hold. You need to get in and grab the audience quick or you are dropped. Nothing is allowed to simmer anymore and build up the flavor.
The recent generic isekai is "introvert teenager/neet/otaku is transported into another world, a typical JRPG fantasy world with video games attributes and he is OP. After a few episodes, it will become a power fantasy". The most popular ones usualy involve a great World building, including the character (if he needs to), or at least provide something new.
Re:Zero's world has a deep lore, Subaru isn't OP and his "return by death" ability helps him (well, help isn't really the best word here XD) row up as a character.
Konosuba is a wonderful parodic deconstruction of the genre, and I find it really hilarious.
Saga of Tanya the Evil has a really different setup, and the protagonist is an a**hole.
Mushoku Tensei has probably the best World building of the whole genre. And this is the grandfather of the isekai genre, creating most of the tropes.
Reincarneted as a slime is the closest to the "generics", but it has that little extra in almost aspect.
Then you have the ones with a spin: GATE (the army is fighting), No Game No Life (no real battle, just games) or are older and weren't drowned in a lot of clones, like SAO or Overlord. I didn't mention Shield Heo, I couldn't go past the first episode.
And the last iteration are isekai with a twist: the hero is a vending machine, a sword, isn't an acxtual fighter, etc; or the vilainess genre. the idea is to grab the attention with a "look look I am different!" just to be forgotten soon enough.
In 7th grade English class we had to do a book project where we had to find a book series and read the whole series within the week then do a project on it, recount the pivotal characters, give a summary, and give a review on it. I was looking through the library and I couldn't decided at first until I saw a book shelf that said "older kids section (grade 7-8)" and whatcha know it had a bunch of Manga. At the time I had never read a single Manga (tbh I never knew it existed. Not a single friend of mine was into this stuff yet either) so I browsed through my options and one series caught my eye. Obviously MÄR I just remember really liking GInta's design. I just remember being so mesmerized by this series and I was constantly reading volume after volume. Watching this video has brought so many memories back from that time. This was a great video man.
Still haven't met anyone who remembers this, but I watched Mär on Toonami Jetstream, one of the earliest anime streaming websites. I never caught Mär on TV, but I have very vivid memories of it being one of the first shows I was ever able to binge (along with Prince of Tennis)
YES! Oh my gosh! I was OBSESSED with Toonami Jetstream. It is how I found MAR, Prince of Tennis and Hikaru no Go.
@@Ambertrine Literally, same! Those were the big ones for me, on top of getting the chance to watch Dragonball in chronological order.
@@Ambertrine Love Hikaru no Go. Real gem of an anime.
I don't have very explicit memories of this show, but I recognized the characters in the thumbnail, so I clicked it. I'm glad I did. Very heartwarming. Encountered this after watching a video about Yu Yu Hakusho earlier, too. That line you said about revisiting things you used to like as a kid, and discovering exactly why you like them has inspired me, I think. There are a lot of shows I have enjoyed, but I don't understand what I liked about them. In fact, there are very few for which I could put those reasons into words. Thinking about revisiting some things I used to enjoy, and which were major influences on me, to see what I can understand now.
Thanks for the video.
I'll never forgot MÄR it's one of my favorites tbh
Holy crap I thought I was the only one who loved MAR. This is one of my all time favorites that no one talks about!
This was a seriously fun, inciteful, and well put together retrospective. The last question about if I want to go on an adventure hit me in emotions I haven't felt in a very long time. I cannot thank you enough for bringing me back to the first time I read MAR. It feels like a lifetime ago.
Something like MÄR is honestly what I want more out of isekai anime these days, just a solid shounen story in another world. I hate how almost all modern isekai are all about the power fantasy. Give me an MC that actually starts weak (relatively at least) and has to slowly work their way up to becoming the strongest/one of the strongest by the end of the series.
Man I remember reading MAR. I would follow it in the once-every-two-week Shounen Star manga collection in Indonesia. I think I remember finishing it, but I don't know if I did it in physical or online form. I think I just don't really remember about it because it isn't flashy enough and no one else talks about it too much. In recent years I only remember it because some artist made porn of it on Pixiv, and man I missed how hot Dorothy was (as my type back then was more towards Koyuki).
It's gotta be pixiv
Don’t forget that one of MÄR’s characters is secretly a Recca character that got isekaied there and lost his memory
Mar and FfT are two of my favorite series because you have two isekai portages that do what most wouldn’t, they grow up a bit and make it their goal to go home, they realize that left behind people and realize that running away from your problems doesn’t help them or make them go away.
I absolutely love series where the main character takes the road less traveled.
FfT?
i think homie meant Final Fantasy Tactics Advance.
I REMEMBER MAR
OMG I THOUGHT NO ONE ELSE KNEW
I still have my old fan arts
I honestly wonder how many people read it in recent years....because theres a reason why it was forgotten.
👀👀👀 what’s the reason
Fr cus i still love it
remember watching MAR as a kid before findding the manga later as a teen, every now and then i think back to it fondly. i found it so unique and now knowing a lot more about manga and anime, i realised it was my first real expoaure to isekai. loved the vid man, earned yourself a new sub
I still can't believe people accept a "Better Help" sponsorship when it has been proven time and time again it is a SCAM!
Unfortunately they’re making a crazy comeback
You know I actually did forget about this show ever Airing on Toonami but what gave me my memory back was that Iconic hammer with the mustache i was like wooooooow chillz ive seen that b4 somewhere "MAR" that the name ty Mugan
Isekai has been around in anime since the early 80s with works like Aura Battler Dunbine and Orguss kinda, but the first one to really kick off a major trend was Spirit Hero Wataru.
I read the Mar manga back in high school and I love it, I actually re-read the series earlier this year and it still holds up
Holy shit... with this production quality, I'd listen to you talk about anything. Earned a sub!
Thanks Grandma!!
I remeber that Toonami showed it and then put it on their website before streaming software and internet speeds caught up. It died so that anime streaming could thrive.
What is mind blowing to me is I was just trying to figure out the name of this like last week.... & never could figure out what it was called and now here I am. Seeing your thumbnail learning what thus piece of my childhood was
Man what a nostalgic gem of an anime. I’ve never forgotten about this one. I’ve always wanted to find it and watch it all over again. Thanks for the video! Put a smile on my face haha.
Thank you bro! I’ve been looking for a someone talking about this anime/manga for THE LONGEST
This video showing up in my recommended made me SO happy,, I love mär, it’s the first manga I ever read and it means so so much to me, I keep rereading it over and over and it always makes me a little sad that basically no one seems to know about it, so whenever something like this pops up, I get super happy!!
Didn't forget! I think about it a few times a year anyway, it was one of my favorite manga as a kid. Thanks for covering this and hopefully putting a new wave of people on!
I LOVED Mar. Never watched the anime, but I read the hell out of the Manga. By the time I discovered it, Mar had already finished, so I binged read it in high school. I agree it is rather simplistic, but the fact that it stuck out to me after all these years shows how meaningful it actually was.
I'm new to the channel, so I'm not sure if you've covered Zatch Bell before, but the way you analyze Mar makes me think that Zatch Bell is the reverse of the Isekai trope. The magical aspects come to the real world instead. Anyways, great video!
This was the first manga I ever read! Made me fall in love with the stuff, so cool to see someone finally cover it!
i love this series, it was litteraly my first manga alongside soul eater.
i think the best part of it is the villains, i struggle to find an villain we can empathize with as much as Kimera, or one as interesting and with amazing motives as ash.
thanks for the video, i needed it.
MAR and Xiolin Showdown are thr reason im still obsessed with magic items/weapons to this day.
Shit I remember Xiolin!!
This is amazing. My mum used to buy me random books as a kid, and the only manga I had were YuGiOh (the all time greatest) and this weird one called MAR. I only got volume 2 of MAR too, but I read it a hundred times. It seemed so cool, even if I never got to know anything that happened after Ginta fights Ian, or any of the backstory. Your opening statement is so true; I saw this thumbnail and thought “holy fuck this is the first person I’ve ever seen mention this!” I thought the concept of chess ranks and pieces were so, so cool. I never even knew it had an anime! Great video bro.
I never forgot this anime, but they should have made more episodes!!!!
We got another banger of a channel to watch out for! I haven't even heard of this series, but I love anime from that time.
THANK YOU! Such an amazing series, I've still got all of the manga on my bookshelf. (I think it may be the only one I still have all the volumes for)
I never forgot MAR. I had a solid crush on that one chick. Also just realized I've been saying the name wrong. I've been calling it Mar, like in Mars. And did not know this was the same creator as Flame of Recca.
"This sounds so familiar, but I can't say why. I must have seen it just in passing or-" *sees the hammer* "I DID WATCH THIS ONE!" Not a huge amount of it, but I definitely saw at least a few episodes. I remember that damn hammer.
I remember MAR existing but never actually watched it. My friend however used to go on about it back in highschool
I never saw the anime, but MAR was the first manga series I've ever read that got me into the medium as a whole. Absolutely loved it
Man, MAR was the first manga I ever collected the full set of volumes for, thank you for this video ❤ I seriously wish i could add the anime to my collection but the Dub never completed the show and finding it now is impossible T_T but I'll always look back on this one fondly
Ahhhhh this brings me back! This was such a blast from the past. And love the dark cloud music right there!🤙
I’m definitely one of the people that is relieved to see anyone talking about MÄR!
Since this video also discussed Isekai so much as a genre, I’m curious if you’ve seen any of Amphibia or The Owl House which are two Disney shows from the past few years that are just Isekais into frog worlds and demon/witch worlds respectively.
oh my god dude you just unlocked a memory for me with this, holy crap i loved this show as a kid!
Then there’s Ghost Ärm- which mutate your body into weapons- usually the eldritch sort.
Darkness Ärm that curse their targets.
Holy Ärm that cures wounds and remove curses.
And lastly, Nature Ärm that have elemental powers such as ice, wind, fire, earth, etc.
I just want to say that i've been trying to find this anime for over two years because i first watched it on animonday on syfy and was hooked ever since but i couldn't remember the name of it. i thank you so much for triggering this memory and giving me a chance to revisit this work of art.
This video was amazing I was so excited to see it pop up. I'm subbing IMMEDIATELY! Also the soundtrack for the video *chef's Kiss*
MÄR is my favorite nostalgic manga series and I'm glad this video was made and I stumbled across it!!!
There is a Peter Pan anime. It aired 41 episodes in 1989.
thanks for making this. MAR is very good. Its tonal shift from light hearted shonen to serious battle tournament was amazing.
AYYYY!! MAR was something I enjoyed so much as a kid and this video has made me EXTREMELY happy!
So glad I stumbled on this video! I loved this series as a kid!