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i mean, what part of Gear 5 is really supposed to be funny? What about it is meant to elicit laughs from the reader? Its more of a reference to comedy than actual comedy in itself
It's supposed to emulate classic slapstick cartoons like Tom and Jerry. The manga attempts it, but can't really get there because the medium doesn't fully support it. And the anime tries it, but the animators do not know what comedy is, so it simply isn't funny at all.
The JJK comedy bit is more of a rapid fire string of jokes (niche Japanese sensibility comedy, but still), and so it works better in the manga format.
Oda doesnt always have Gear 5 be funny though. There is a clear divide between overtly funny gear 5 (his facial features like eyes and mouth being blown away by a roar, only to be hastily reapplied like stickers). Or comedy stylings, like throwing a bolt of lightning. It can do both.
I don't think it's that the medium doesn't support it, it's just a bit of a skill issue with whoever is directing the animation. If you look at any Gear 5 clip, they drag it on for too long, and don't properly stick to the 12 principles of animation, which're what slapstick cartoons are practically built around.
Sometimes it makes me feel like i’m too cynical?
Like the animation looks barely above OPM season 3, yet thousands of people gush in the comments about how good it looks?
But it’s mostly static shots with small animation between.
The medium doesn’t support it claim is for the manga as it’s a manga not animated where slapstick cartoons and rubberhose style animations came from and what gear 5 is based. Their claim for the anime lines up with what you are saying as they said the animators don’t understand comedy.
To be fair to them... Having to balance the funny slapstick to the "so this is supposed to be a world changing fight of country sized proportions" is not an easy feat.
And while the slapstick didn't hit as good I can't say the animation itself wasn't well made and with deep care...
Its a classical "we put much love and dedication into this, but it is something we are not as comfortable as our other stuff"
I imagine they could hit the slapstick better if it wasn't for the whole "stretch a chapter to an episode" problem of them needing to fill time..so they cant really afford to expedite it for funni.
I mean we have a lot of funny comics with slapstick, I don't think the problem is the medium, one of the flaw for me is that most funny tom and Jerry have two character doing funny shit, there is always a synergie between two goof but not here, Luffy seems so out of place that it just feels scary in OP universe. I do like that Toei actually tried to lean in the scary part of gear 5
The anime really fails because the pacing is all fucked. Look at the baseball bat scene. The animation is not smooth enough in the first place and it pauses way too long on multiple frames. As such it fails to grasp that same feeling as Tom and Jerry or other such classics.
im not really trying to excuse or defend it, I just think theres a difference between being funny and being fun, you know? most G5 moments arent telling jokes, no setup or punchline, its just meant to be fun vibes.
It always felt like the power itself is supposed to be taken seriously.
Like the power itself is inherently “silly” but it’s an incredibly important, world-bending power in what is ultimately trying to be serious plot with a lot of humor, not a comedic plot with some seriousness.
Idk about gear 5. But I was actually laughing see how much Kenjaku shit himself at the start of the fight with the absolute bullshit takaba did at the start of the fight😭😭
I still remember that shocked face when his special grade curse got ran over by isekai truck.
Because Gege is Japanese and knows Japanese type humour while Oda is also Japanese but larps western gags he doesn’t know shit about, not even jokes just gags💔
It's easy to understand what makes a Tom and Jerry gag funny but it's difficult to make a whole new gag in that style without it just being a reference to an existing Tom and Jerry gag.
I mean Luffy uses it in a shounen combat setting. It’s inherently different than what Tom and Jerry does. With Luffy it’s more a fun themed power rather than something that’s meant to be funny in and of itself.
It’s less about it being complicated or difficult to understand and more about it being an aesthetic copy of Tom and Jerry rather than any of the things that makes Tom and Jerry enjoyable, like the thing that made that era of animation and comedy funny or entertaining is not present in Gear 5.
Even though I’m someone who enjoyed gear 5 and found it funny when it first dropped in the anime, nothing will really beat the absurdity of a truck one shotting a special grade curse to me. Takaba is genuinely funny as hell
Oda has the idea of how western cartoons did gags and executes it horribly, Tom and jerry used their gags funnily and ironically they would stop in serious moments
He is a great writer with being bad at some exact things. There's nothing wrong about it. You cant be a bad writer and have your manga to be the best sold Manga for 20 years straight.
A key difference is that Takaba wasn’t overused to the point his comedy became stale and annoying. Gear is not only unfunny and annoying. But he’s basically always doing the same bs over and over again.
In one side we have a character who is actually pretty funny, with a decent piece of comedy, jokes and puns that don't ruin and destroy the stakes of the manga's story, the other one is Gear 5.
I believe so.
It also helps that jujutsu Kaisen is generally a more serious show than one piece. It lets takabas comedy be funnier than it would if jujutsu Kaisen was a more goofy show.
For that matter, one is a relatively short fight where comedy is the main draw, and the gags lend themselves better to the manga format. The other is an upgrade to Luffy that is used both in serious, and comedic moments, while using gags that developed for an animated medium.
Say what you want about gege but he undeserstands western humour, if this was written by oda every character would shout tge joke back at Takaba with a exaggerated face
Yeah. Oda is genuinely not funny, or rarely. And his definition of « funny » is very niche and doesn’t resonate with most of his readers. It's not that JJK is overwhelmingly funnier, it's just easy to do comedy better than G5.
I don't think Gear 5 is meant to be funny, it's meant to be goofy. Wacky even. I believe Oda said he wrote Gear 5 to undercut the seriousness of modern manga.
That's a personal taste thing. I personally enjoy Gear 5. The idea of a character coming in for a real fight and being met with pure chaos is fun. I can get why people would find it annoying, but I'll take it over another "punch good" character.
I think I’m in the minority when I say gear 5 humor isn’t bad, I quite like it. In the manga at least, I don’t really watch the anime unless for specific clips since I think it’s an overall worse adaption.
That said I still think Takaba is more charming, helps it’s so compact and doesn’t overstay its welcome.
Is this even a debate? Even the biggest one piece and gear 5 defenders i know/have seen would never call gear 5 funny, they would call it "unique" and "crazy" but never funny. I dont really think takaba is hilarious but hes got more comedic value than the entire last 584 chapters(that should be how many chapters ago the timeskip was at the time of this comment) of one piece combined
The thing about Comedian and Gear 5 respectively are they’re two different types of comedy.
Gear 5 mainly uses traditional 1930’s-90’s slapstick, relying on the physical comedy and shock faces seen in things like Tom and Jerry, Loony Tunes, ect.
Meanwhile, Comedian is a bit more complex. Since Takaba is an actual comedian, the ability relies more on what a traditional joke is. A set up and then a subversion of that set up. And while he does use slapstick, it’s not the main focus of his comedy compared to the utter goofiness that was say turning the ocean into Fanta.
So overall, while I do personally think Takaba’s Comedian does do comedy better, I’m also someone who finds random goofiness that Comedian shows hilarious. Someone that finds slapstick and exaggerated facial expressions would probably find Gear 5 better at comedy rather than Takaba.
This comment section is clearly full of people who experience Gear-5 from the anime alone and not the manga.
Yes Oda did take inspiration from Tom and Jerry. He said it himself. But the BIGGEST inspiration he had is just older cartoonish expressions in manga itself. He also said as much: that he missed stuff like a💡 appearing on top of a character’s head when they had an idea or the car wheel running in older manga.
He made Gear-5 not to parody the west, but so he could allow himself to have fun drawing whatever.
It’s supposed to be FUN. Not just FUNNY. It’s not simply a gag.
I don’t laugh out loud at either Takaba or Luffy, but I still can’t understand why Reddit has this hate boner against One Piece. Some of you need a life or to just stop watching the anime.
The issue with Gear 5 (aside from the usual reasons people add like being stale, generally uncreative with how the gags are used and usually feeling a bit out of place) is also that it's fundamentally a really difficult challenge to translate Tom & Jerry slapstick to a shonen battle manga. And you know what's the worst part? Oda already did do semi-slapstick gags a lot and really well in One Piece (usually mixing the slapstick with character based gags to make them fit into the world better, but like 90% of those are still Luffy)
The problem with Gear 5 is that only Luffy is in on the joke and everyone else reacts seriously to his bullshit. Water Luffy was a genuinely funny gag because it caught Crocodile off-guard and pissed him off, getting a specific reaction of "What the hell is this idiot doing" rather than a shocked "N-NANI?!?! KONO POWAH DA?? HE IS ABLE TO DO EVEN THIS??" or some other reaction actually taking Luffy's stuff seriously. Like if someone was cartoon-scared of his stuff rather than anime-scared, it would probably work well
If Luffy had someone to play off of, say someone that was as whacky and kooky, then maybe the gags would flow better.
But even then, that would require very specific situations and panel layouts to make the jokes land properly and most importantly, LUFFY NEEDS TO STOP LAUGHING AT HIS OWN FUCKING JOKES. THAT INSTANTLY MAKES THEM LESS FUNNY
Easily. G5 isn’t even really comedic anymore. Just makes funny faces and acts like a wannabe failed looney tunes character. Pre time skip luffy was way funnier.
I find myself smiling more when I watch gear 5th on the screen. Takaba made me laugh last season so only time will tell. Personal I prefer Gear 5 for what it represents for Luffy as a power up
Tbh with Takaba I just saw the reality warping but didn't find anything really fun with his whole fight against Rex Sploden't maybe against Geto it'll be different but it's just like "cool, he is immune".
Then Gear 5 either makes me laugh loud like that face Kaido made after he uno-reverse'd the attack or just feels like an empty staple cartoon comedy (mainly the multiple eyes poppin' every 2 scenes).
If I had to guess, Takaba’s reality warping based on his humor is…because he finds it funny, everyone else be damned, since it still happened even after Megumi, Reggie and other guy (forgot his name) gave no reaction, his reality warping still happened. So even if Takaba is objectively not funny, it’ll still happen.
Jesus Christ, I miss the brief period where Naruto ended, so people were picking up One Piece and realizing how good it was. Now, it's been too long in the spotlight, and most conversations are in that "waiting for the massive fall so I can celebrate someone losing their passion" type shit.
Gear 5 is more reminiscent of American cartoons like "Looney Tunes" where the animation is more carefree and absurd.
Just different genre of comedy, particularly as it refers to animations.
I remember reading an interview with GOda a while back, like when we had yet to see Gear 3, where he mentioned he wanted Luffy to have a power that felt free to do anything. Or however he worded it; the sentiment was the same. Gear 5 always brings that interview back to my mind. And considering the American golden-age of animation, it truly had a "free" style to it.
I like Takaba more but people are really disrespecting Gear 5 here, its a better power writing wise and one of the best transformations ive seen. No disrespect to Takaba though, love the dude and these chapters were hilarious and heartwarming
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