Soul Eater chapter 71, haha.

[snarp]

The plot is still stupid, but it is at least - unlike certain shounen manga I might name - in motion. I still love you for that, infuriating manga.

Also, for this chapter, wherein half the cast switched genders for no good reason. I am easy to please.

And this is not slapdash gender-switch, where people look the same but with slight modifications to the chest area! Oh, no. Ohkubo was so enthusiastic about this idea that everybody got entirely new character designs and outfits for the occasion. Yet they're all fairly recognizable - except for Soul Eater, who, being a fighting manga hero, logically had to turn into a magical girl manga heroine.

I also like how he immediately switches from guy-variant-tsundere behavior to girl-variant-tsundere behavior when he sees Maka getting a nosebleed over another girl. And the conclusions Maka draws from her nosebleed. "Oh, I've gotten a nosebleed! My observations lead me to believe that this is a crucial part of shounen manga male sexuality! What an educational experience!"

Ohkubo clearly gave far too much thought to this development. I can easily imagine him scribbling these ideas out madly and giggling, most likely very late at night. Is it possible to troll your own comic? Because you just know the guy has been checking out forums for reactions every day since the chapter came out. Probably Pixiv for fanart, too. I have just checked Pixiv for fanart, by the way.

I'm just disappointed that Kidd's missing out on the big genderbending party. He could have had asymmetrical boobs and freaked out about it. I think this is a missed opportunity.

Comments

[ross-teneyck.livejournal.com]

Long, looooong ago, I was playing in the kind of AD&D campaign where all the stereotypes about AD&D are born. But in addition to the general munchkinism and railroading and basic insanity, we had a DM who was determined that all PCs would be female. Cursed belts of gender-changing, magical pools of gender-changing... it didn't matter how, it was going to happen, no matter how strenuously the player might try to avoid putting on random belts or drinking from random pools or doing anything with anything.

We chose not to question why our DM was so set on every PC in his game being female. We were of the collective opinion that it was better not to know, since all the other aspects of the campaign had already demonstrated that the inside of our DM's mind was a scary place. We just soldiered on. Or, eventually, quit.

[darkelf105.livejournal.com]

I am going home and reading the first volume of this series RIGHT NOW....okay, at five, but THEN.

[snarp]

Do it!

(...I should mention that there's a lot of fanservice? This is the artist of Get Backers, and while it's maybe not quite as constant as that, there's still a lot of improbable boobs.)