NY Times Manga Best Seller List for Jan 10 - 16

One Punch Mans anime really helped out sales

Let me answer your claim with the most well thought reply I could come up with:




Oh, kay den

thank you for the answer :) . You point out some very interesting points .

Non Non Biyori obviously takes the Moe aspect to attract what we highly call the "otaku", this guys are majority Young Adults, so it makes sense it being Seinen. Most(or all) Moe Manga are Seinen, just like most(or all) Moe anime air at night at Otaku hour.

Yotsuba is a Slice of Life about the innocence of a kid girl(And no, it isn't Moe). Is a kind of story that can highly attract both young adults and teenagers. So in the end the audience that the author and publishing company decided to attract is the determining aspect. They decided Shonen, so the author and the publisher are in fact making decisions in order to attract teenagers.

To Love Ru is a simple ecchi. Ecchi most of the time is Shounen. In fact the magazine that To Love Ru ran, Weekly Shonen Jump, is the magazine that created the genre(where the genre first appeared).

Monster Musume is also an ecchi, but about hybrid animal girls(type of Gijinka). These is not only one of the fetishes in the "Otaku" community, but if you think parents and adults already have a problem with ecchi appearing in their kids magazines, what do you think they will think about half human, half animal ecchi series in it?
The author and the publisher would need huge balls, to try to put a Gijinka series directed at Teenagers!

Categorizing series for Magazine is a totally different thing than categorizing series for Demographic.
Demographic categorization is smaller and more general, and it take in consideration the target audience. The people in which the work was made in mind.
While the Magazine has a demographic, that is not the only identifying aspect that the magazine has. So by categorizing by magazine you have to understand for what the magazine stands for. So the categorization is way more specific.
While the Demographic normally used go for about 5 categories(Kodomo, Shounen, Shoujo, Seinen, Josei), the Magazine categorization goes for in the minimum to a dozen, and that grouping isn't even wide enough to include most series. So a person to be able to categorize and discuss about each Magazine a series is in, he has to have a big knowledge of many magazines.
Small example of Magazines:
1- Shonen Jump
2- Jump Square
3- Jump Next
4- Saikyou Jump
5- Young Jump
6- Ultra Jump
7- Shonen Magazine
8- Monthly Shonen Magazine
9- Besatsu(Suplementar) Shonen Magazine
10- Young Magazine
11- Morning
12- Evening
13- Shonen Sunday
14- Monthly Shonen Sunday
15- Big Comic Original
16- Big Comic Spirits
17- Corocoro
...

This is an example with dozens of magazines, still Non Non Biory, Yotsubato nor Monster Musume are in any of the categories. Also in there you have magazines of the same demographic, but they are still highly different magazines. Showing that Magazine categorization is different from Demographic categorization.

Note that the relationship between a magazine and a series, is that if a magazine targets to one specific person, the series inside of that magazine also has to target that person. Is the same for genre specific magazines. If a magazine is a sci-fi magazine, then the series inside that magazine also has to be a sci-fi series.

It might as well, but like the others have said about the actual content in any given demographic, it won't change the factual content within the manga itself. In TG's case, it holds far less tropes action shounen tropes and a lot more mature themes as well as writing that has a much better chance impressing an older aged reader than the average "shounen" would.

I shouldn't have correlated a demographic to be the same thing as a genre, so that was my bad. But I do get your point; people tend to be more harsh judging a manga that's labeled a "shounen" than a "seinen" because of the generalization that it can't be better written than a seinen, which is just false when you consider FMA or Death Note to be shounen yet Himouto Chan is not. Using TG as an example of your point, though, was a horrible idea.

Either way, I feel we're getting off-topic here. I feel people should have said they were happy that there are less ACTION series in this week's list, seeing as there is no dispute that that genre is the most loved one in America.

Non Non Biyori is in seinen mag
Yotsuba&! is in a shounen mag


To Love Ru/Darkness is in a shounen mag
Monster Musume is in a seinen mag


Isn't it better to categorize them in the appearance of the magazines ? To me, it's easier that way and no useless discussions :D . Off topic ~

Good job seeing My Monster Secret up there , it deserves more recognition . Better romcom nowadays.

Oh, yeah, totally! I don't define a series based on their demographic or genre. I'm really open to most things and I know that each tag/demographic has their own unique manga/anime that is very good. I always see that a lot of demographics have similar aspects in their manga, but there will always be a few manga/anime that stand out (hence why I said "most" have the same tropes instead of "all") in their respected genre.



Man, I'd totally make a counter argument for this, but honestly, I'm too tired to argue, and you sort of have a point.

The casuals think seinen is a demographic with no ecchi/moe/harem and well written stories XD
tokyo ghoul might as well be a battle shounen, but because it has the seinen mark, it's elevated into godhood.

You both make good points. But here's how I look at it, basically you will find more mature theme series in the seinen manga than the shounen manga. Why? Because shounen manga caters to kids to late teens, if I'm correct. So you will find more kid friendly theme series in shounen manga.

Now that doesn't mean all shounen series are all the same in terms of troupes, themes and quality, it just means that's the norm you will expect in most shounen manga. And that's where the grey area comes in for both magazine.

Basically you should not look at it in a black and white view. Watch/read the series then decide for yourself if the series meets your standard, whether its by maturity or whatever. Don't just judge a book by its cover just because the series is tag as shounen [oh this series is for kids and teens, not interested.] or seinen [this series is mature and deep, for young adults like me. Definitely going to check it out] that's just ignorant.

The problem is that Kodomo, Seinen, Shoujo and Josei also have those tropes. And a lot(majority even) of Shonen series also don't have them. So you really can't point out those tropes.
Not to talk that these so called "Troupes" change with generations, because the target audience tastes change.

Look at Weekly Shounen Jump right now and see how this so called "troupes" mean little:

Comedy
. Kochikame
. Gintama
. Saiki Kusuo no Sainan
. Assassination Classroom
. Isobe Isobe Monogatari
. Samon-kun wa Summoner

Battle
. One Piece
. Bleach
. Toriko
. World Trigger
. Boku no Hero Academia
. Black Clover

Sport
. Haikyuu!!
. Hinomaru Zumou
. Sesuji wo Pin! to
. Mononofu
. Buddy Strike

Cooking
. Shokugeki no Souma

Romantic Comedy
. Nisekoi


Talk to me about these so common troupes all these series have and that make you immediately realize it's a Shounen(Just take a look at Kochikame or at Isobe Isobe Monogatari). Hardly you can point me one, just go look at those series and you will see that these so called troupes don't count for much.
And we are talking of series of 1 magazine. Magazine that has pretty strong identity.

Majority of these so called "troupes" is because people is just looking at series of 1 genre, Battle, and from this Magazine, Jump, that is a magazine with a strong identity. Looking outside of the magazine and this so called troupes become even more useless. Not to even talk about Seinen and other demographics also having a significant amount of works with those same "Troupes", because you know? they aren't Shounen exclusive patents! That is why we get a ton of discussions, useless discussions, about something just being in reality from A demographic instead of the B demographic that it says to be.

yes, they share common tropes, but it's not that strict. it not really can make them identified as stand alone. the limit on them is really blurry. it's make people generalize things.

people calling tokyo ghoul shounen is laughable when in reality it is seinen. it also source of hxh is seinen jokes. seriously, people need to stop strict shounen as "this" and seinen as "that". shoujo and josei border even more blurry. it make you look like ignorance people who not even know what you are talking about.

You're not wrong. It's a demographic. But let's be real here, most shounen/shoujos/josei/seienen (shounen and shoujos ESPECIALLY) have those tropes that you can point out and immediately realize it's a shounen, like much genres.

Shounen isn't a genre!

It's so sad TG has a false reputation of being something akin to, say, Akame ga Kill or something. If you really did read it in detail you'd know the action is hardly it's main ingredient; or selling point, even.

I don't fully blame you, though. It's the trash anime (that deliberately turned it into a shounen-esque series) and a small (but noticeable and more vocal) cancerous part of their fandom who love Ghoul for the wrong reasons.

Edit: As for OPM, it's really difficult to prove that it's either genre, really. Like you said, it's a parody of typical shounen, because it has shounen elements, but it's a parody of it, but it's a parody of shounen action, but etcetc...

A man can dream though

Holy shit I was able to predict that the list would basically look the same as last week

I must be an esperYou are 100 % correct

That's not going to happen, some of the earlier volumes are going to drop off the list eventually. Take a look at Tokyo ghoul for eg.
The only way that's possible is if they release all the volumes at the same time.

It seems MAL call those series ecchi because they focus in a way or another in sex. If you go to Baka-Updates for example they aren't categorized as ecchi.
To note that Sexaroid came at the same year than Harenchi Gakuen, and it seems like a manga that tackles the concept of androids being used as sex toys. I don't think it really tackles pervertness like ecchi.
The Osamu manga seems like is a sexual dirty comedy. Instead of poop jokes, that the Japanese like, it had sex jokes. I didn't read the book, so I don't know if is in fact that, but if it is, isn't ecchi.

What I know is that at the time the Harenchi Gakuen was mega polemic because of being the first type of manga with this type of content, and so is considered the parent of modern Ecchi/Hentai.
The manga was so polemic to the point where the magazine was forbidden to include its chapters in certain parts of Japan. There was even a Protest against it where a ton of people took the volumes of this series and burn it in the Street. The author supposedly made a horrible ending to this manga, with every character dying in a horrible way(a protests I think) or something like that as a message for those protests.

Most Westerns don't know, but Weekly Shounen Jump is also known by its ecchi titles, and for defusing the genre. The genre in the magazine isn't as predominant as Battle Manga, and the magazine never went as crazy about the genre as other magazines do right now, but WSJ is known to have at least 1 really popular ecchi series at a given time. Shokugeki no Soma, To-Love Ru, I''S, Ichigo 100% and others.

jitsu managed to sneak in? that's surprising

Oh yeah, by the great Go Nagai!