Which genres suit manga best?

R

Red XIII

Straw Hat Pirate
Manga may present just as varied a selection of genres as anime, but usually with different degrees of success. In your opinion, which genres work best in manga format, and which should perhaps be left well alone?

Personally, I find action-heavy manga can be difficult to follow at times (one example being Naruto)- maybe it's just me, but it can be quite hard to follow the flow of what's going on, or even distinguish between characters in distance shots. The lack of colour also doesn't help, although in general the black-and-white format is fine with me. I've also never felt the inclination to sample 'giant robot' manga to any great degree as I get the feeling it would suffer from the same problems. Other genres, such as slice-of-life, horror, comedy and romance, tend to fare a lot better.
 
Going to have to agree that action heavy manga dosen't really tend to work for me (although their are exceptions). With lots of fighting going on, I find manga tends to feel rather jumbled and unclear at times.

Personally I feel manga suits perhaps genres like drama,romance,slice-of-life etc etc better than anime does. while aniem tends to fare better when it comes to action. As manga dosen't have the episode limitations most anime TV shows have it can tell a more detailed story which I feel is nessecery for dramatic stories for example.
 
An action heavy manga done right is a blessing to witness, but it's very hard to do. Some volumes of Ranma and DN Angel manage to pull it off extremely well, while Escaflowne just tries to pack as many things as possible onto one page making it harder to follow. And maybe it's just the art style but I find the FLCL manga almost impossible!

More slow paced genres are easier, and tend to focus a lot more on the artwork which in essence is what manga is all about. FAKE is an example of how to combine action and drama successfully, but it's the only title I've read to have done so.
 
I pesonaly never found it hard to read the action manga, I just imagine it playing out...Is that just me?
I think Comedys work best as manga I would aggre that romance also works well.
 
Well, I guess most people think that high action stuff should stay with anime rather than manga.
I mean, you could probably show a lots of punches and flurries of attacks in anime, but the manga can 'slow the pace' or miss a few scenes where it might be ok to add a few more moves.
Just dont do what DBZ does, and spend 1/2 the series on 1 fight (Right, Frieza?). You just get sick of the trash talking that's not necessary.

Most successful genres... Hmmm. Well, every time I pick something, everyone likes something else...
Anyways, I think Romance, Comedy and some Fantasy type stories can be good manga Genres (as long as the Fantasy ones dont have super fast samurai action in it :S)

Basically, if the story is good/well written and isn't fast paced, then the mangas should be ok to read.
 
As a general rule I prefer manga that's a bit 'slower' in terms of action and relies more on character interaction rather than physical action. I find really animated scenes a bit confusing and think that they are better portrayed, well, animated.

Manga that works well for me is something like Love Hina or Chobits, which is pretty character driven - the action scenes in the NGE and Nausicaa manga end up looking a bit confused and cluttered, but fortunately the artwork itself is outstanding in both cases. With Nausicaa, the character and story aspects are better explored because of the longer duration which makes it score points oer the anime version. The level of detail that makes the 'faster' moments so hard to follow pays off in that the world that the author has created is richer and more interesting on the page than on screen.

One maga I'd really like to get hold of that of Haibane Renmei - very little happens in an action sense: from what little I've seen (downloaded scanlations) it's all conveyed through conversation and background art. It's a real shame that there's no official English language version.
Melainy said:
And maybe it's just the art style but I find the FLCL manga almost impossible!
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It has a very experimental style that I can only describe as 'sketchy'. Very interesting but I must admit it's put me off buying it so far.
 
Concrete badger said:
It has a very experimental style that I can only describe as 'sketchy'. Very interesting but I must admit it's put me off buying it so far.
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After watching the anime it started to make a lot more sense. At one point they even include a part of the manga as a whole sequence instead of the usual animation! It can probably be understood very well if you have enough focus and patience - that could apply to a lot of action orientated manga too, but personally I read manga to relax so any amount of concentration involved is a bit of a turn-off :?
 
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For me i definitely prefer romance shoujo type manga, most of the manga i have is romance or romance comedy stuff, i've tried a few action type stories, but i just can't seem to get into them so much. For me action is just so much better watched, where it can move and flow in front of your eyes
 
I personally think that Shoujo manga is the best, Its easy to follow and easy to get gripped into, I also love any manga based on magic or fairytales...they so rock. I think that action should be kept to anime, as Charter_Mage said, its better to see it flow in front of your eyes. Comedy/Romance mangas are teh 1337, though I hate having to buy another manga book just to see if two characters have kissed yet or something silly like that ^_^;;;
 
I often find myself enjoying manga that is more character-based, and full of dialogue and monologue, rather than that which relies heavily on action, simply because many such scenes in manga seem to me to be unclear and difficult to connect with due to the very nature of the medium. Then again, when action is done well, as in the oft referenced Berserk, it can make the manga in question infinitly more engaging. Generally, I will choose to read more character and plot-based manga than action based, although I remain a fan of both.

I cannot help but love the FLCL manga's style, although that may be because of my likewise attraction to the anime. It's certainly unlike many series ever drawn.
 
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