| The Team Shoujo Formula- Unoriginal? |
|
By: Draconmouth Everyone’s heard of shoujo teams; Sailor Moon, Tokyo Mew Mew, Winx Club, W.I.T.C.H., etc. They all are different when it comes to plots and magics.But there’s at least one glaring similarity; these shoujo teams consist of five girls who work together to fight evil! W.I.T.C.H. have personalities similar to Sailor Moon! (I’m not kidding- check TVTome) Why why why? Can’t there be a different number for one start? Why five? How about adding and subtracting members during the series so that there is no definite number? (Only do this if you can, however.) The only answer that I can find for this is that because five is a common team number that is neither too little nor too many. Two is not enough for a team, and trios are common enough. Quartets, well, those could work.. If you go beyond ten, then you’re pushing the limit. Besides, hiring over ten voice actors won’t do the budget any good. Not unless you have a person as talented as Tara Strong who can do multiple voices. Even then, it wouldn’t be good for their vocal cords. Second of all, do the girls ALWAYS have to be chosen? What is this, they develop powers because either their ancestors were conveniently magicans or because they are reincarnations of princesses? Please. Not only does this deny girls who don’t believe in reincarnation (I don’t), but this also denies the girls the freedom of choosing whether or not they want to fight this evil.What would make it more feminist is if the girls CHOSE to get powers rather than BE CHOSEN. That’s what I’m doing in one of my novels; the girl can choose whether or not to fight the monsters. She chooses to because she doesn’t want anyone getting hurt, especially her best friend and family. That’s a perfectly good reason- only no one’s doing it. Start thinking, writers and creators! Then the evil thing. Yes, does it always have to be similar and evil? Let’s see, in W.I.T.C.H. the girls have to fight an evil royalty girl who wants power. Sound familiar, anyone? Or let me lay off W.I.T.C.H. for a while. In Tokyo Mew Mew (hereafter known as TMM), there are Chimera monsters, which sound similar to Sailor Moon’s youma when they possess people and are destroyed, and/or the person can be conveniently returned. (Middle of first series, Sailor Stars.) Stop looking back and making things similar. Look back and find out how you can make them different. Make the monsters seriously dangerous if they are monsters. Don’t make them ridiculous. Remember, they’re not just villains; they’re antagonists. They have to stand in the protagonists’ (or heroes’) way. If they are too easy to beat, then you’ve wasted half an hour of your viewer’s time. Personality check. The creators want viewers to identify with the heroes. Umm, what does making them personality duplicates have to do with it? Good question. We’ve had hero groups with a leader, a joker, a goth, a jock, and a ditz. In some Japanese animes, the ditz and the leader are the same person. Sometimes, as in Sailor Moon, 3 of the members are ditzy, including the leader. But when TV personalitities start getting common, they get duller as well. How do you prevent this from happening? Put thought in your characters! Give them good qualities, hobbies, and flaws! Show how they are different and similar to each other! Then think. Suppose you created a few random girls who only have one thing in common- they have powers. Then imagine a scenario in which they’re all trapped in a room. How will they react to each other? If they all argue and refuse to work together PERIOD, either figure out how the heck they’re going to get out or give up on them and work on a different group. Okay, that’s my dollar. I hope that any anime creator who reads this will get the point. Be original, be strong, and be brave! Take risks! |