Anime vs Manga (rewrites)

S

Sparrowsabre7

Za Warudo
A lot of anime outrun the manga they're based on and take the story in a new direction. I was wondering which anime you guys thought did it better than the manga (direct adaptations, or very close adaptations like Death Note don't count, since very little is changed outright, merely abridged/ a scene or two changed)

For me Trigun the anime was a lot better than the manga. The manga got so convoluted and frankly it lost its heart. I also preferred the GHGs not having backstories. Making them into tragic figures works for some things, but I think sometimes (and in the case of Trigun) villains that are just plain evil work better. Especially with Legato. He was awesome in the anime but he was almost pathetic at points in the manga.

(Also I found the manga a friggin pain to read, in black and white it's so hard to figure out what's going on in the action scenes >.<)

That's my pick. Do you guys have any? (I admit some of this may come down to whichever was seen/read first but I don't think that's entirely it, as I actually do prefer Hellsing Ultimate to the first Hellsing which I saw first, though maybe that's not the best example.
 
I think Haibane Renmei did much better as an anime. In fact I believe they stopped the manga due to the popularity of the anime. It may not be true though, don't remember where I read it.
 
I prefer Fullmetal Alchemist to FMA: Brotherhood, and by extension the manga.

The first series became so much more emotionally powerful and rewarding, and the character journeys far more considered and involving. When you think of the tragic circumstances of the creation of the Homunculi in the original anime, compared to the way they are created in the manga...

Just thinking about Ed and Al having to deal with Sloth sort of breaks my heart a little. I also like the explanation of where the alchemical power in their world eventually comes from.

There's also the way the Nina story develops in the anime, and what eventually happens to the Sewing Life alchemist. It was a storyline that got me crying in the original, but in the manga and Brotherhood, not so much as a sniffle. The first anime series just has so much more depth, such better written, rounded and nuanced characters...

When I saw how Scar developed in Brotherhood, the way that it wasted the Lust character, I can't help but think of it as a poor second best.
 
I was going to type up a similar post, JPT. I occasionally get really into Brotherhood but 90% of the time I find it really really empty in the emotion department. I think FMA struggles sometimes with properly delivering a cohesive story, so the emotion is what it needs. I'd need to rewatch the first to understand properly how Brotherhood fails, but one of the things that sticks in my head is how it rushes through parts where a linger is necessary.

Also, the music is freaking terrible.
 
FMAB is on my watch list so I've yet to compare. It's a shame you all don't like it, because while I liked FMA I didn't LOVE it, so FMAB will probably be even less involving for me =/
 
It seems comedies tend to fair better as anime. I think additional elements, such as audio and movement, in anime add more weight to a joke. Cromartie High School is an example.
 
Durial666 said:
I think Haibane Renmei did much better as an anime. In fact I believe they stopped the manga due to the popularity of the anime. It may not be true though, don't remember where I read it.
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ABe started Haibane as a doujinshi, but it was very promptly picked up for TV so he decided not to continue with it - he did however produce two further doujins with no real story whatsoever - They're more like an insight into the man's very interesting head, doodles, concepts, omelette making and the hardships of buying clothes for those with wings.

I have no idea where the single volume manga fits into any of this, so I just bought it to find out.

It's still pretty rare for me to prefer manga to anime - I think I just prefer animation as an art form. The exceptions being long running manga which have had very limited scope anime adaptions such as YKK, Gunsmith Cats and Appleseed, where the anime versions are really more like a fan-service-y addition to the franchise than a retelling of the story. Not to say they're bad, they just don't compare.
 
Zelgadis said:
It seems comedies tend to fair better as anime. I think additional elements, such as audio and movement, in anime add more weight to a joke. Cromartie High School is an example.
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Totally agree. Ouran was an almost direct adaptation, but the anime was so much better, just because it had tangible delivery

Jayme said:
ayase said:
I have no idea where the single volume manga fits into any of this, so I just bought it to find out.
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I have no real idea but that seems like one of the releases that are literally screenshots of the anime with speechboxes thrown in. VIZ went through a phase of doing them for the Naruto films (and other stuff probably). Amazon has an excerpt posted online, in case you didn't see it.
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You mean 'animangas'?

I don't get the point of those, such a waste of time. If I buy a comic adaptation it's because I like to see the cool 'hand drawn' art, not screenshots.
 
The Welcome to the NHK anime and manga both start the same but finish differently like FMA. It's hard to say which one I prefer as they are both equally good.
 
It's a relief to see I'm not the only one who preferred the original FMA anime over Brotherhood. An awful lot of people seem to go for Brotherhood as it's closer to a straight up 'shonen fighting' series, but I am not one of them.

Other than that, the only anime adaptation that stands out over the manga for me is probably Black Lagoon. I don't think there's much difference in terms of the story, it's more that I think it just works better when its animated. In what I've read of the manga, the art always strikes me as cramped and awkward - the action scenes (on which the series depends so heavily) just don't flow the way they do in the anime.

Saying that, I didn't like the way they animated the omake scenes. The comic timing just wasn't there.
 
Sparrowsabre7 said:
A lot of anime outrun the manga they're based on and take the story in a new direction. I was wondering which anime you guys thought did it better than the manga (direct adaptations, or very close adaptations like Death Note don't count, since very little is changed outright, merely abridged/ a scene or two changed)

For me Trigun the anime was a lot better than the manga. The manga got so convoluted and frankly it lost its heart. I also preferred the GHGs not having backstories. Making them into tragic figures works for some things, but I think sometimes (and in the case of Trigun) villains that are just plain evil work better. Especially with Legato. He was awesome in the anime but he was almost pathetic at points in the manga.

(Also I found the manga a friggin pain to read, in black and white it's so hard to figure out what's going on in the action scenes >.<)

That's my pick. Do you guys have any? (I admit some of this may come down to whichever was seen/read first but I don't think that's entirely it, as I actually do prefer Hellsing Ultimate to the first Hellsing which I saw first, though maybe that's not the best example.
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Not sure which of two version of Trigun I prefer. I would considered the Anime to be the more rounded off version of the two but it did lack some of the better characters and moments from the Manga. Both the Anime and Manga did in quite few case took the same moment improved upon it compared to one and other. I would consider the ending to the Manga a more conclusive ending as everything is nicely tied up compared to anime. Not just because it lack the material to fill in the story gaps but the anime end was a quite open fair.

Quite like the new direction the first OVA hellsing series took as Alucard actual had the chance to fight a real vampire which I never recall happening in the Manga
 
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@Dave: Alucard does, throughout the entirety of the manga. Sure we have the battles with Anderson as we all expect, but the rest is against vampires, in the way Kohta Hirano pictures them, of course. Keep in mind, the OVAs follow the manga to the T, a volume per more or less as the idea was to have ultimate tell the story of the manga instead of go for some filler style series like what was done originally.

In relation to FMA, i do prefer Brotherhood/manga to the "original" series. In many ways though, this could be because i was fully up to date with the manga before i touched on the series, but i just couldn't find myself getting into it. The manga comes to an end this month anyways, so seeing what people say about comparing the endings will be interesting, even though i'd technically call both series alt universes, but there we go.
 
Arbalest said:
@Dave: Alucard does, throughout the entirety of the manga. Sure we have the battles with Anderson as we all expect, but the rest is against vampires, in the way Kohta Hirano pictures them, of course. Keep in mind, the OVAs follow the manga to the T, a volume per more or less as the idea was to have ultimate tell the story of the manga instead of go for some filler style series like what was done originally.
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They aren't real vampires but manufactured ones, the one at the end of OVA was ancient vampire that Alucard desired fighting
 
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I can think of a few shows where the anime adaption is better then the manga, but this is mainly because it was a reverse adaption (e.g. the show came out first with the manga following). However there's also quite a few manga that just blow the anime adpation(s) out of the water.

First and foremost example would be Shaman King, to clear things up I saw the series first, like most people I would assume. It was a while after that I picked up the manga for the first time and instantly fell in love with it. I much preferred the route they took in the manga, the characters felt more defined, and there wasn't much the anime could offer in its place.

The other would be Guyver, none of its animated adaptions have matched it as its best. Its second OVA adaption did great job though, and not only because that was my first exposure to the series (as i'm sure it was for many others). The 26 ep adaption tried its best but fell down in several areas (mainly character re-designs, and its choice of ending point, although that wouldn't be an issue if there was a second season made to carry the story onward).

In the corner of adpations not as good as the source material, my first shot would be against the Tsukihime anime. I confess the first time i watched it i fell in love with it. However since then I've been reading through the manga and I've looked at the game and its storylines. The anime doesn't do it justice enough. You have half-developed characters and half-developed storylines abound (I'm thinking Shiki and the Nero fight).

In a sense they had a hard task given that the source game had different storylines to go through. Still it would of been better if they had just stuck to one and went all the way with it. Musics great on the series though.
 
Dave said:
Arbalest said:
@Dave: Alucard does, throughout the entirety of the manga. Sure we have the battles with Anderson as we all expect, but the rest is against vampires, in the way Kohta Hirano pictures them, of course. Keep in mind, the OVAs follow the manga to the T, a volume per more or less as the idea was to have ultimate tell the story of the manga instead of go for some filler style series like what was done originally.
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They aren't real vampires but manufactured ones, the one at the end of OVA was ancient vampire that Alucard desired fighting
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Just took a glance over a couple of bits in the manga and i'm gonna change what i said, it was pretty much bollocks, hah. Basically i was under the impression they where all vamps that he fought, but i was mistaken. In ultimate and the manga, He fights some vampires, but there is more than that in Millennium, since there is a Werewolf section as well. Not having vol 10, i can't say anything about the good old major though So yeah, there we go. Of course, don't read unless you are well up to date with Ultimate or the manga.
 
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Lupus said:
I don't understand how BONES could **** FMA up so bad.
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It's intentional, there'll be another reboot in five years.

EDIT: So, erm, last night I was thinking about this and I've come to the conclusion that five properly adapted two-hour films would be awesome. I don't want them to follow the manga to the tee, just get the essence and basic story right. Don't make the films jump around, fitting in loads of arcs in one story, make it a real film that has a natural structure to it. Yeah.
 
I can't remember where I read it, but I seem to recall an interview with Ken Akamatsu where he said he preferred the Love Hina anime to the manga as it rejigged the order events happened and the story made more sense because of it.
 
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