Not sure if it needs a thread but it's not like we're overflowing with discussion here ;), still I recently started watching the original HxH anime from 1999. I have never actually watched/read any of HxH and all I know of it was that it's permanently on h

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HxH 1999 anon Sep 26 2022 (Mon) 12:10:09 No.727

Not sure if it needs a thread but it's not like we're overflowing with discussion here ;), still I recently started watching the original HxH anime from 1999. I have never actually watched/read any of HxH and all I know of it was that it's permanently on hiatus, that cat girl (or boy?) that everyone posts a lot and the designs of the MC's. I decided to give it a shot for no real reason and so far I've been enjoying it.

I've watched YYH last year and enjoyed that as well. I found Season 1 of YYH to be good, 2 to be great the first half of 3 to be fantastic and then it kinda falls off after Sensui is introduced which was a shame, but it's nice to know that Togashi hasn't lost it with HxH.

I will say the first couple of episodes were...fine, I'm still not entirely sure what the plot is. Sure, Gon is trying to find his father and that's the goal but the whole idea of Hunters just seem odd. The fact Gon and that other hunter in the first episode were seen hunting animals and Gon wants to become a hunter kind of makes you think Hunter's are animal hunters, but then they add several characters who don't really fit that niche at all which makes the term "Hunter" kind of confusing. I guess it's more like a catchall term for someone who is exceptional and reliable in everything and thus the guy you go to for troubles, like an official bounty hunter or mercenary.

Character wise, I enjoy them a lot.What surprises me the most about this show was that I expected Gon to be the main part of the whole show and everyone else to sort of be secondary characters who don't really interact with one another since it's about Gon and his story, but it's actually pretty cool to see Leorio and Kurapika be together a lot and see their histories and helping each other out and such. I also like how Gon and Killua have a really normal friendship. They basically act like kids their age would act if they were friends. Which is very surprising since I thought Killua would be very stoic and not want to be friends with Gon but he opened up pretty damn quickly to him. Hell their dynamic feels like the other way around. Killua should be the MC and Gon is the friend who helps him out of his shell, but it's not like that at all.

I'm currently on episode 27 and the final part of the Hunter exam. I found the first section (running) to be a bit lackluster and the second section (cooking) to be worse, but it REALLY picked up by the third section (trick tower) which I wished was longer and had them dealing with more psychological aspects over just fights, plus that 50 hour wait in the room could've been a really fun filler episode. The fourth section (battleship) was also REALLY good, a tough situation and a time limit where everyone had to work together felt really engaging to watch, especially with how it ended. The fifth section (badge hunting) was also quite engaging, giving Gon the task of grabbing Hisoka's badge was great even if we spent around two episodes watching him train and stalk him. A shame Ponzu didn't stick around, I liked her.

I still have no idea what this series is even going to be about, sure Gon finding his dad, Kurapika getting revenge(?), Leorio becoming a doctor and Killua having...fun? I'm sure Hisoka is going to throw multiple wrenches in their plans but otherwise it's quite refreshing to not really know where this is going (although I have been spoiled on how Gon's arc ends).

Anyhow, it probably didn't need a thread but I wanted to throw my thoughts out onto the board. Will probably update it in a few days when I'm nearing the end. Watching 4 episodes a day is fun when the show is actually quite good, as opposed to trudging my way through it like I did for other longer shows.

anon Oct 19 2022 (Wed) 0:21:22 No.728

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>>727
Well, even though no one responded I might as well update this for some discussion, even if the later episodes are post 2000s at this point *shrugs*.

The end of the Hunter exam was a lot of fun and I very much enjoyed seeing everyone pass and Gon getting back together with Killua while Kurpika and Leorio joined him and of course going their own way for their life goals was good too but it's a real shame what we got after that.

Firstly, losing Kurapika and Leorio is a huge minus but I know they'll be back so I'm not too annoyed, but the entire arc afterward has just been kind of boring. I liked the tournament section since that was just fun, but Nen has been a really disappointment and I'm saddened that HxH is going this route.

I find Nen as a concept to be very underwhelming because it feels like the ripple from Jojo, in that, it's just made up bullshit that doesn't really have a lot of rules keeping it together even though it tries to. Yes there's Hatsu, Ten, Ren and all that bullshit I'm not going to remember but in the end it just boils down to "he is using Nen, I need to counter with my Nen" and Nen can then be used to do anything it wants with some limits per character, and while I can respect the idea of SHOWING the training for reaching Nen levels I still think it's boring. Watching Gon be in a room for 5-7 minutes going "ORA" or thinking about Nen while nothing else happens just becomes boring.

I'm guessing Nen is more akin to Stands from Jojo and right now it's in a weird phase of not being able to use the powers they'll develop. Killua right now is developing some electricity power so I doubt his Nen will be asspulls and Gon is developing some form of R/P/S I guess. Maybe it's just that Nen right now in both the MC's is very underdeveloped so I'm seeing them train and train to get better.

I enjoyed the arc with the Spiders in Yorkshin and the escalation of that whole situation was great, it was a lot of fun to see their abilities and how they outmatched everyone but Kurapika but Gon and Killua still had to go up against them. Right now, the Greed Island arc has been okay but I'm hoping it gets better since we're stuck in the training part of it all.

I'm also disappointed Leorio has been heavily sidelined, why don't mangaka creators understand that those are the characters we want to see more of, mainly joke character that can AND WILL pull through when needed and you just love seeing them turn shit around when no one expects them to. Seeing everyone who can do shit (Gon/Killua/Kurapika) then succeed in doing shit just gets boring after a while.

As for HxH itself, I'm enjoying it less due to Nen and wished it was more about the natural/learned skills of each of the characters, Gon has his heightened senses, Killua has his assassin techniques, Kurapika has his inherited strength from his people and I'd assume Leorio was going to get some kind of fighting technique from learning to be a doctor but instead everyone just knowing Nen sort of made this all irrelevant.

anon Oct 22 2022 (Sat) 10:22:55 No.729

>>728
Wow that's a fucking shit take on Nen if I ever saw one. I would understand if you were just at heaven's arena but by Yorkshin Nen has already showed why it's great.
Yeah the Hatsu is kinda like stands in that you make whatever bullshit power you want but it's still more interesting by being organised into categories, Kurapika switching between categories to dunk on Uvo was awesome.
Enhancement is clearly different to Emission and Transmusion and I think the inter-play between these categories is pretty neat.

But Nen was/is at its more awesome with the use outside of hatsu. Using Gyo to see what your opponent is doing with his Nen and using En to detect your opponent, Gon using zetsu to silence his presence while hunting Hisoka...ect it all feels very real and tangible. like yeah hiding your presence is literally you supressing your life energy and focusing said life energy on your eyes allows to see life energy clearly.

anon Oct 22 2022 (Sat) 21:46:45 No.730

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>>729
Fair enough, but to me it still comes off as magic powers where anything can happen. At least when it's established for the character I actually don't mind it that much. Currently on the dodgeball part of Greed Island and it's interesting to see Nen be used in the way it has been (even if it starts with "Woah, he made 7 copies of himself using Nen to play dodgeball") since a few of the characters have their Nen abilities already established like Hisoka with his Bungee Gum and using it to grab the ball from afar, and currently Gon with his RPS powers.

I actually don't mind Nen being used as a stand power, it feels fine to give people a unique power they can rely on in times with it's own strengths/weaknesses. I just find the whole "I'll use Nen to turn this pack of cards into a GUN" or whatever to be very odd since it just feels like Nen can be used to do anything by anyone even if there is a set of established rules in there. It just feels like it can be used to explain away everything.

I know I wasn't really paying attention when it was all explained because I just found the whole idea boring and I didn't think it would've become a huge part of the show so I guess I'm suffering for it. I also didn't know HxH was going to establish this at all, since I really enjoyed seeing everyone have natural abilities in the Hunter exam that are now being mostly sidelined for them to develop Nen.

>Gon using zetsu to silence his presence while hunting Hisoka...ect it all feels very real and tangible
In the Hunter exam or was this somewhere else? Gon didn't know of Nen at the time, unless you mean when they tracked the Spiders in Yorkshin?

anon Oct 22 2022 (Sat) 23:11:08 No.731

>>730
>In the Hunter exam or was this somewhere else?
Yeah in the Hunter eaxm. He was suppressing his Nen without knowing what Nen was which got Hisoka very excited.
Killua's assassination technique is also supposed to be Nen but I am not sure how that goes.
That's the whole thing about Nen people sometimes use it without even knowing they are doing so, these are the geniuses and super atheletes in the HunterxHunter world, special people. It's just willpower and dedication/extreme concentration manifesting as an actual physical power and I find that fascinating idea.

Yeah Hatsu will be used in a stand-esque way where you come up with whatever power and call it a nen ability and it gets worse with that aspect as the series progress but there's still enough of the rules being applied that it don't feel like total bullshit. The categories especially are very important.

Like you say the Dodgeball starts with bullshit "let me just copy" myself but then you have to respect the rules, emission is not efficient, enhancement makes you more powerful, In can hide nen....ect

You balance the bullshit with the logic to create fun and I think Togashi did it well, and there are many interesting uses of nen later on.

anon Oct 22 2022 (Sat) 23:18:40 No.732

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>>731
>>730
I am not a super HxH fan but I like it enough and thought Nen is great and more interesting and developped than most typical battle-shounen powers.
I was refreshing up on Nen after reading this thread and it's interesting to even look at something as basic as the category hexagon.

At top you have Enahnacers most basic use of Nen basically just outputting Aura, you go right you have transmutation, giving the aura different properties, next to it is conjuring, manifesting the aura into physical objects they are similar to each other but conjuring is further away from enhancement and feels like a logical progression to Tranmutation.

On the left of enhancement you have a different application of Aura, Emission, sending the Aura away from your body, further on is Manipulation using the aura that's seperated from your body to manipulate objects or people, again logical progression and it's feels natural that the further you go the harder it is to master the other category.

anon Nov 5 2022 (Sat) 23:12:41 No.733

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Sorry for the late reply, some stuff got in the way but I did finish HxH. I found the ending of HxH to be quite good, when I figured out why they brought the Accompany card I was actually pleasantly surprised and enjoyed how the 1999 version had a pretty decent ending when HxH still goes on until today. It's a shame they could only bring three cards and used them up at the end, I would've loved if they kept a certain, literal ace up their sleeve of an Angel's Breath or something for when a fight was wayyyyy too difficult for them.

I enjoyed the final fight with Bomber but I do think it was a bit lackluster to have a random bad guy introduced at the end of the series to be the final bad guy defeated by Gon, still a great fight though.

>>731
>Yeah in the Hunter eaxm. He was suppressing his Nen without knowing what Nen was which got Hisoka very excited.
Alright, that's pretty cool I like that.

>Like you say the Dodgeball starts with bullshit "let me just copy" myself but then you have to respect the rules, emission is not efficient, enhancement makes you more powerful, In can hide nen....ect
Honestly, after you explained Nen and I actually started to pay attention to what was happening in the show I started to enjoy it more. I originally thought it was bullshit powers that were limited by whatever Togashi wanted to limit them by, but after finishing the dodgeball fight and the fight with The Bomber I finally saw that it was a lot more deeper than it seemed.

When he split into 7 copies he didn't really have any other ability beyond that, he was just powerful himself and once I noticed that I enjoyed the fight a bit more because he was VERY powerful but that was the limit of his power which Gon, Killua and Hisoka were able to bypass. Also, Hisoka being on their side for a bunch of episodes was great.

>>732
>I was refreshing up on Nen after reading this thread and it's interesting to even look at something as basic as the category hexagon.
In a way, I wish Nen was explained either during fights or in a way that wasn't so God damn boring. When they were explaining this hexagon I really thought it wouldn't be that important but I guess I was wrong. Reading the explanation in this thread was honestly much better than how it was done in the anime imo, but that could've just been me.

>again logical progression and it's feels natural that the further you go the harder it is to master the other category.
That explains a lot actually, I did wonder why they just made it so there are 0% chances to master a certain Nen ability but it does make sense if it follows logic.

Anyhow, I don't think I'll jump on the manga yet or the 2011 anime anytime soon, but if Togashi actually gets around to finishing HxH sometime I may read through it and see how I feel about it as it goes on.

anon Nov 7 2022 (Mon) 14:19:15 No.734

>>733
Well there's always the Chimera Ant arc which many consider to be the peak of the series. But I would say there's no rush if you enjoyed the experience. take a year or so off from the series dwell on it allow yourself to forget it and then maybe watch HxH 2011 from the beginning to the end, it does end on a much better note than Greed Island.