Armed Through Dismemberment in Shounen Manga

[parallactic]

When reviewing volumes 9 - 11 of Claymore, oyceter wrote about shounen bodies:

"I also want to formulate some sort of thesis about monstrous bodies and strength in shounen: how strength is directly tied to monstrosity, particularly in the villains, but how even heroic strength is frequently tied in with bodily abuse or breaking down your body to build

Comments

[liviapenn]

See also: Aquaman's harpoon hand-- a little bit trauma/survival, a little bit power-up.

[parallactic]

That's interesting, I wasn't aware that non-shounen also had that trope. Does Aquaman start off with a harpoon hand in the beginning or in his backstory, or does he lose it during the course of fighting in the series? Er, in whichever the dominant origin story is, if the character has more than one.

I see I didn't add that trauma/survival usually happens in the beginning of the series (chapter/volume 1) or in the back story. Power ups usually happen in the course of the series in shounen. (That's one of the differences in my head, although I'm not sure if other examples would reflect the division.) I didn't proof this entry well, because I wanted to get this post up to count as the 13th, since I'm trying to blog daily for November. I'm going to edit the entry to reflect this.

[liviapenn]

Well, superhero comics... are interesting, canon-wise. The thing about Aquaman is that unfortunately he doesn't have a really simple origin story that "everyone knows" like Superman or Batman. He has three or four different ones that come in and out of continuity depending on which writer is writing in his personal favorite bits at what time. I honestly could not recount any one of them. *G

[parallactic]

He has three or four different ones that come in and out of continuity depending on which writer is writing in his personal favorite bits at what time.

I knew about the multiple origin stories and the conflicting canon in DC, but I didn't know it was that bad. I'd assumed they at least tried to keep things consistent until they decided to revamp the character/series, adapt the story for a different medium like movies or cartoons, or reboot the universe. I now feel better about not being able to keep things straight when I read trades. I thought it was because I was reading things out of chronological order.

Aquaman's magical water hand sounds like it's made of cracktastic win. Considering Aquaman's different backstory in the cartoons and the comics, he does seem like he spans two categories.