Why are there almost no bad ass women in Shounen?

[Owyn_Merrilin]

While the first two responses certainly covered most of it, they neglected to mention the factor that's best displayed in Sword Art: Online...the good ol' Power Fantasy. Indeed the genre is made mostly for guys and as such male characters are easier for them to plug themselves into and imagine themselves being ultimate badasses who can just stand there getting sliced at from numerous attackers but just be all Cool Sephiroth like "Yeah...I don't even feel that..." before utterly vaporizing their opponents.

That said, I've been binge-watching Naruto from the beginning of the series and I'm now into Shippuuden...and out of what I've seen so far, the best, most "God DAAAAAAAAMN!!!!" kill in the series - at least in my opinion - goes to Sakura during the Sora Semi-Jinchuuriki story arch. It's nothing particularly flashy or over-the-top...still, I found it to be incredibly badass purely because it was Sakura who did it. I remembering thinking "Good god...she just straight up DESTROYED that person!"

Sword Art Online, Soul Eater, Inuyasha, One Piece, Bleach, Ranma 1/2, even Dragonball (You know why everyone is afraid of Chi Chi in early DBZ? It's because she was a strong fighter in Dragonball, even making it to either the semi or quarter finals in the last pre-Z martial arts tournament before losing to Goku, and she's not the only woman to have done well in a tournament arc in that series) to an extent. It's basically Naruto and late Dragonball that OP is complaining about here. And for that matter they brought in Android 18 towards the end of Z and Pan in GT, so I'm really not sure where OP is coming from here.

Now, you can make an argument that you never see a female fighter who can beat the (essentially always male) protagonist in a standup fight, but this is Shonen we're talking about. If the protagonist runs into someone who can beat him, he goes and trains for a while and walks all over this previously terrifyingly strong enemy. Although Soul Eater and Inuyasha are definite exceptions here, due to having more of an ensemble cast than your average shonen. Especially Soul Eater, where Soul (a guy and about as close as that show gets to a single protagonist) is literally a weapon used by Maka (who is female), and neither of them can do much without the other.

That's all well and good...but I fail to see how that has anything to do with my comment about how (in general) shounen main characters are meant to be power fantasies for the (again, generally) male audience.

If you're thinking I was trying to say that it's rare to find a powerful/strong female character, that was not my intent. One of my personal favorites has always been Kaoru from Rurouni Kenshin.

What I believe the OP is trying to get at is "Why not have Goku be a girl?" or "Why not have Naruto be a girl?" or "Why not have Ichigo be a girl?" Yes, there are indeed strong and powerful female characters in the shounen genre, but they're rarely the "Ok, the badass has officially arrived, time to defeat the bad guys" character the way Goku, Naruto, and Ichigo are in their respective series. I suppose there's Kaede from Elfen Lied...but that's a Seinen, not Shounen.

Nah, I was just adding more shows to your mention of SAO. If that's what OP is getting at, then OP is basically asking "why is the main character always the strongest?", which is a question with a pretty obvious answer

 

[kyp275]

What I believe the OP is trying to get at is "Why not have Goku be a girl?" or "Why not have Naruto be a girl?" or "Why not have Ichigo be a girl?"

The same reason why the main character in black comedies tend to be black, the main character in romance novels tends to be woman, CoD main characters tend to be men etc. - they are marketed to the demographics of their audience, because they want to make money, not lose them.

Go ahead, put yourself in the shoes of a manga artist making a shounen story, and see if you still want to make the main character of your manga a girl when your next dinner depends on it.

 

[MerlinCross]

Not one of you mentioned History's Strongest Disciple. I find this disturbing.

There is basically NO female character in that manga that isn't on some level of 'badass'. Yes the series gets waaaay to fanservicey later on but all the girls are pretty interesting.

 

[RandV80]

You know when you start talking about a lack of 'bad ass' women in 'shounen', you're really taking these gender topics a step too far. First, shounen by definition is made for and caters too young males. Second, and this is the key point here, unlike video games which does a poor job representing female interest, anime/manga has a fully supported 'shoujo' category which is the exact opposite of shounen and caters to a young female audience.

So basically going with some oldies boys have Dragon Ball Z, girls have Sailor Moon. If you want something in between there's Ranma 1/2. If you want to cross the gender boundary there's nothing stopping a boy from watching Sailor Moon or a girl from watching Dragon Ball Z.

For all the flak the Japanese sometimes get on their culture treatment of women, this is one area where they've always done much better than us.

 

[Erttheking]

Snip

I'm not going to defang my criticism just to make it sound nicer. On this website people are regularly called a whole lot worse than lazy and they're called it directly, I don't understand why my comment above all the others you felt needed to be called out.

I would like to point out that that can be applied to the majority of all criticism. Also people do say what they want done, more female characters that actually do important things. Every bit of criticism basically says "I want this to be done better" but al lot those don't get accused of demanding some kind of quota. in fact, you just turned it into Morton's fork. Say you want something specific, you're demanding how the writer should do his job. Don't say something specific, you're pointing to an invisible goal. What kind of criticism is actually allowed in your book?

This is true, but they also have problems women in western media don't have so much. Like the aforementioned sexualization, which frankly half of the time I'm not even annoyed with because of its objectification, I get annoyed because sometimes I want to watch a show without tits getting shoved in my face. A few clips I've seen from Fairy Tail have turned me off wanting to watch the show because so many serious moments happen while main characters are in stupid sexy outfits or making sexualized posses (without enough insanity Kill La Kill style to make it work) and it makes me impossible for me to take it seriously. That doesn't happen so much in western media. Also while I can think of a few sexualized men in eastern media, from my exposure, sexualized men vs sexualized women are still outnumbered at least 5 to 1.

Then I'm not gonna defang my accusation that you judge those who are better than you in doing something that is not required of them and insulting their abilities, and afterwards saying the insult isn't that bad does not make it applicable.

Every criticism that is not defined is worthless, I can shout about taxes being too high, that doesn't help in any way, it's just a worthless opinion by itself, but I can say that taxes should be lowered by reducing govement spending, that's an actual opinion with a way (though it still sucks because it's an obvious solution) but at least it has a goal. That's the big problem with "X genre needs Y" opinions, short of forcing people to do it, there is nothing you can do other than complain, a better goal is just to recommend as much as you can good works that do have Y, at least it comes of innovative rather than 'sit and complain'.

Speaking of sexual poses, watched Jojo lately? There are enough anime to anyone who wants to look if he's turned off by something, don't complain about shows you don't watch despite other people enjoying. And 5 to 1? where did you get this number, is it character wise or the amount of boobs juggling? Maybe write into google NarutoXSasuke and see what a lot of women love in Naruto.

I hope you do realize that that makes you a bit of a hypocrite right? You had no problems criticizing Moviebob and I don't think you've done more than him. And you saying "He won't be missed" in response to him leaving sounded REALLY damn insulting so I find this situation a tad bit ironic. And me saying their writing is lazy is an insult? Really? It's a beyond lukewarm comment, and in that case a good number of reviews I've read were insulting in that case. I think people can handle it.

There's little you can do besides complain? Well call me crazy but I'm pretty sure the exact same thing can be applies to the tax example you gave, because I don't think just because you have a solution that the tax system is going to bend over backwards to accommodate it. In fact most criticism can be, yet my criticism has earned your ire. I've tried recommending good works. I've tried taking the positive route that you and so many other people recommend. You know what happened? No one cared. I tried to recommend positive works, tried to take the positive way out, and half of my threads didn't make it past the first page. And even then people accused me of being annoying Sometimes being critical is the only way to get people to pay attention to you. And if what you do bothers people either way, might as well go for the one that gets more people listening to you.

Haven't seen the last few episodes. Stardust Crusaders doesn't have quite as many sexualized characters as Battle Tendency did, I wish it did, I kind of miss it. Also the existence of one show proves what? It was one of the shows I was thinking off when I said I saw a few sexualized male characters. Uh, question. What shows did I complain about that I didn't watch? Like I said. Personal experience. Character wise, I find for every male character who is based around showing off how sexy he is, there are five women. There's a difference between an character attractive and the character being sexualized. Not too many characters in Naruto are sexualized, with an exception or two (Ino's outfit post time skip showed off a fair but for the audience, but to be fair they toned it down and gave her a standard issue ninja outfit when things were getting serious). From that show, Hinata isn't sexualized, she's just attractive. Sexualized is more along the lines of the cast of Kill la Kill. And while that show handled it well, most shows don't.

 

[Reasonable Atheist]

Getting really really tired of the question "why is x media that is created for y demographic so filled with y characters?"
How popular is the WNBA? that is why.

That doesn't answer why a show aimed at young boys is incapable of having well written female characters. I think if Legend of Korra is anything to go by, boys will like anything so long as its entertaining and well written. Really writers just take the lazy way out if they can't write decent female characters.

That is not even the right question, of course they can have well written female characters, they just do better if they have well written male characters. Also I do not think korra was a well written character, her personality was all over the place and she was constantly snapping at people for no real reason to artificially create drama in the show, most of the characters were like that.

I did not watch the show, therefore I cannot comment on the quality of it. However, I do recall one of the people who worked on the show commenting that he went through a lot of trouble with executives about making a show with a female main character that was intended to be aimed at a male audience, and he found that the boys he showed it to didn't care. That's all I'm trying to say. That boys can't handle/don't want shows with female characters is a load of garbage.

It is not a matter what they can or cannot handle, it is a matter of what they gravitate to on their own. If you sit them down and show them a specific show, you are not really analyzing this, you are only determining if they like it when it is put in front of them.

 

[Erttheking]

Getting really really tired of the question "why is x media that is created for y demographic so filled with y characters?"
How popular is the WNBA? that is why.

That doesn't answer why a show aimed at young boys is incapable of having well written female characters. I think if Legend of Korra is anything to go by, boys will like anything so long as its entertaining and well written. Really writers just take the lazy way out if they can't write decent female characters.

That is not even the right question, of course they can have well written female characters, they just do better if they have well written male characters. Also I do not think korra was a well written character, her personality was all over the place and she was constantly snapping at people for no real reason to artificially create drama in the show, most of the characters were like that.

I did not watch the show, therefore I cannot comment on the quality of it. However, I do recall one of the people who worked on the show commenting that he went through a lot of trouble with executives about making a show with a female main character that was intended to be aimed at a male audience, and he found that the boys he showed it to didn't care. That's all I'm trying to say. That boys can't handle/don't want shows with female characters is a load of garbage.

It is not a matter what they can or cannot handle, it is a matter of what they gravitate to on their own. If you sit them down and show them a specific show, you are not really analyzing this, you are only determining if they like it when it is put in front of them.

Is i really something set in stone like that? I mean, younger boys nowadays don't seem to have that much of a problem going out of their way to watch My Little Pony. Even got a friend whose son likes to watch it. Also, maybe I was different, but when I was a kid, I was more concerned about how many awesome things happened on screen than who the gender of the main character was. I don't even recall registering it.

 

[Reasonable Atheist]

Is i really something set in stone like that? I mean, younger boys nowadays don't seem to have that much of a problem going out of their way to watch My Little Pony. Even got a friend whose son likes to watch it. Also, maybe I was different, but when I was a kid, I was more concerned about how many awesome things happened on screen than who the gender of the main character was. I don't even recall registering it.

Set in stone? Not at all, some boys will like my little pony and some will like sailor moon, but some is not the issue. We are not talking about individuals here, we are talking about a demographic.

 

[Erttheking]

Is i really something set in stone like that? I mean, younger boys nowadays don't seem to have that much of a problem going out of their way to watch My Little Pony. Even got a friend whose son likes to watch it. Also, maybe I was different, but when I was a kid, I was more concerned about how many awesome things happened on screen than who the gender of the main character was. I don't even recall registering it.

Set in stone? Not at all, some boys will like my little pony and some will like sailor moon, but some is not the issue. We are not talking about individuals here, we are talking about a demographic.

I'm just saying that I feel male characters don't really garnet the viewership of this demographic.

 

[Reasonable Atheist]

Is i really something set in stone like that? I mean, younger boys nowadays don't seem to have that much of a problem going out of their way to watch My Little Pony. Even got a friend whose son likes to watch it. Also, maybe I was different, but when I was a kid, I was more concerned about how many awesome things happened on screen than who the gender of the main character was. I don't even recall registering it.

Set in stone? Not at all, some boys will like my little pony and some will like sailor moon, but some is not the issue. We are not talking about individuals here, we are talking about a demographic.

I'm just saying that I feel male characters don't really garnet the viewership of this demographic.

I am pretty sure shounen even means "boy" in Japanese

 

[NeutralDrow]

Shonen literally means "boy" in Japanese. That's why their are so few girls in them. Its mostly stories about boys for boys.

Because 'Shounen' literally means 'boy', typically around highschool age. So it's going to focus on boys. Surprise.

I am pretty sure shounen even means "boy" in Japanese

Fun thing: it actually doesn't. Its means "youth," as in a young person (its two kanji, 少年, translate literally to "small years" or "few years"). "Shoujo," on the other hand, is more specific, it literally means "young girl" (少女, "small woman").

Shounen only means "boy" because male is the default assumption in the language. It's the same principle as behind French third-person pronouns. Or, for a non-linguistic analogy, the same principle that everything aimed at girls must be specified with pink.

 

[Asita]

What I believe the OP is trying to get at is "Why not have Goku be a girl?" or "Why not have Naruto be a girl?" or "Why not have Ichigo be a girl?" Yes, there are indeed strong and powerful female characters in the shounen genre, but they're rarely the "Ok, the badass has officially arrived, time to defeat the bad guys" character the way Goku, Naruto, and Ichigo are in their respective series. I suppose there's Kaede from Elfen Lied...but that's a Seinen, not Shounen.

Considering that the OP listed Olivia Armstrong, Sui-Feng and Tsunade as examples of what he's looking for, I don't think that's an accurate characterization. His stated premise is that he found it hard to think of 'tough female fighters' in shonen. Not the lack of female protagonists, not the trump card of the protagonists, just 'badass women'.

 

[Bat Vader]

I would have to say Konan from Naruto is pretty powerful because of whom she fights at one point.

Massive Naruto spoilers.

Spoiler

She pretty much basically beats Tobi(Obito) at one point by having the prep time to lure him into a trap. The only reason she gets beat is because of an Uchiha Deus Ex Machina.

 

[CpT_x_Killsteal]

Shonen literally means "boy" in Japanese. That's why their are so few girls in them. Its mostly stories about boys for boys.

Because 'Shounen' literally means 'boy', typically around highschool age. So it's going to focus on boys. Surprise.

I am pretty sure shounen even means "boy" in Japanese

Fun thing: it actually doesn't. Its means "youth," as in a young person (its two kanji, 少年, translate literally to "small years" or "few years"). "Shoujo," on the other hand, is more specific, it literally means "young girl" (少女, "small woman").

Shounen only means "boy" because male is the default assumption in the language. It's the same principle as behind French third-person pronouns. Or, for a non-linguistic analogy, the same principle that everything aimed at girls must be specified with pink.

Just did some more research into and you're right. It's kind of like how saying "let's go guys" can be used to refer to both sexes, but only males 'I'm a guy'.
Not exactly the same, but a similar idea.

 

[Reasonable Atheist]

Shonen literally means "boy" in Japanese. That's why their are so few girls in them. Its mostly stories about boys for boys.

Because 'Shounen' literally means 'boy', typically around highschool age. So it's going to focus on boys. Surprise.

I am pretty sure shounen even means "boy" in Japanese

Fun thing: it actually doesn't. Its means "youth," as in a young person (its two kanji, 少年, translate literally to "small years" or "few years"). "Shoujo," on the other hand, is more specific, it literally means "young girl" (少女, "small woman").

Shounen only means "boy" because male is the default assumption in the language. It's the same principle as behind French third-person pronouns. Or, for a non-linguistic analogy, the same principle that everything aimed at girls must be specified with pink.

So what is the specific for young boy then?

 

[RJ 17]

What I believe the OP is trying to get at is "Why not have Goku be a girl?" or "Why not have Naruto be a girl?" or "Why not have Ichigo be a girl?"

The same reason why the main character in black comedies tend to be black, the main character in romance novels tends to be woman, CoD main characters tend to be men etc. - they are marketed to the demographics of their audience, because they want to make money, not lose them.

Go ahead, put yourself in the shoes of a manga artist making a shounen story, and see if you still want to make the main character of your manga a girl when your next dinner depends on it.

Those were what I had presumed were the OP's questions, not my own. If you look at my original post in this topic (found on the first page) you'll see that my thoughts on the matter are pretty much the same as yours.

However...

What I believe the OP is trying to get at is "Why not have Goku be a girl?" or "Why not have Naruto be a girl?" or "Why not have Ichigo be a girl?" Yes, there are indeed strong and powerful female characters in the shounen genre, but they're rarely the "Ok, the badass has officially arrived, time to defeat the bad guys" character the way Goku, Naruto, and Ichigo are in their respective series. I suppose there's Kaede from Elfen Lied...but that's a Seinen, not Shounen.

Considering that the OP listed Olivia Armstrong, Sui-Feng and Tsunade as examples of what he's looking for, I don't think that's an accurate characterization. His stated premise is that he found it hard to think of 'tough female fighters' in shonen. Not the lack of female protagonists, not the trump card of the protagonists, just 'badass women'.

In re-reading the OP, it seems I did misunderstand what the OP was asking for. In that case I really don't see the need for the question, as there are indeed countless powerful females to be found throughout the shounen genre. Naruto alone has a pretty decent number of very powerful fighting female characters. As does Bleach.

I thought the OP was pointing out how, while all those characters listed were powerful, they're still only side characters. Again, after re-reading the OP, I realize I was mistaken about that.

 

[NeutralDrow]

Shonen literally means "boy" in Japanese. That's why their are so few girls in them. Its mostly stories about boys for boys.

Because 'Shounen' literally means 'boy', typically around highschool age. So it's going to focus on boys. Surprise.

I am pretty sure shounen even means "boy" in Japanese

Fun thing: it actually doesn't. Its means "youth," as in a young person (its two kanji, 少年, translate literally to "small years" or "few years"). "Shoujo," on the other hand, is more specific, it literally means "young girl" (少女, "small woman").

Shounen only means "boy" because male is the default assumption in the language. It's the same principle as behind French third-person pronouns. Or, for a non-linguistic analogy, the same principle that everything aimed at girls must be specified with pink.

So what is the specific for young boy then?

The word literally meaning "boy?" Otoko no ko (literally "male child").

 

[Timeless Lavender]

Yes they do For example Bleach- Yoruichi, Blue exorcist- Shura, Gurren Lagann-Yoko. But all of them are just archetypes just like about every characters in Shounen and Shojo. Since it is aim for children, the writers to not bother trying to flesh them out making them cookie cutters.

 

[spartan231490]

Recently I was challenged to think of how many tough female fighters I could think of in shounen. Not women who hold power in other forms, Im talking about fighters. The results were dismal:

Hawkeye(FMA), Olivier Armstrong(FMA), Pitou(HxH), Sui-Feng(Bleach), Morgiana(Magi) and maybe Tsunade(Naruto)

Is it really only because the genre is meant to appeal to boys, and boys cant handle seeing a strong woman? I refuse to believe that. Perhaps their is sexism in the industry, which you can pick up on from some undertones in anime. Or is it just easier to follow the status quo? It just seems like most female characters are relegated to the side so that they can cheer on the male protagonist. If they have any sort of abilities they typically are of a supporting nature, most often represented as being a healer. It gets old. Let them do something cool.

Im not saying that every series needs to fill out a female quota or anything, it would just be nice to break up some of the formulaic stuff once in a while. What are your thoughts on this and what other badass women would you add to the list.

It's not that boys can't handle strong women, but that they identify more with strong men, which is why you don't see many strong female characters in shounen specifically. That said, some if it is also due to the fact that japan is still much more sexist than the rest of the western world, which is why all of anime is fairly anemic for strong female characters. They exist, and there are more of them once you get away from shounen, but there is certainly a shortage.

As for others I would add to the list, you find a lot of strong female fighters in the harem genre. Xenovia, koneko, numerous knights and rooks from DXD, inner moka, all the non-magical sekerei, and so on.

From other shounen you've got sherri from zatch bell is pretty badass for a book holder, Kallen from code geass, Yoroichi, Matsumodo, Nanao, I mean there are a lot of female lieutenants and captains in bleach, not to mention a few vizards and espada, the girl from Magi, the girl from blue dragon, Asuna and Yuuki from SAO, Akatsuki from Log Horizon, just off the top of my head so they're out there.