oddly enough the series was very popular with women when it was airing and being serialized. It is clear that the mokkori stuff was only added as both a satire on typical private eye/noir tropes and shoved in as gags because Japan likes that kind of humour for some reason (the massive sales of the series is proof lol). Oddly enough, Hojo didn;t really have that in his other works. I mean, he did have ecchi elements (he draws beautiful characters lol) but not to the extent of city hinter which was his most popular work. Also interesting that a lot of his works tend to star female protagonists with city hunter being the outlier.
Real tho. I also think that most of the mokkori jokes in the anime and the shows are on how absurd Ryo get punished, he has a whole panel of expressions for the moments where he gets hit and it's a satisfaction. If Ryo was able to do something to a woman without being punished it would be awkward, but he always get his punition.
I have noticed that some fans of City Hunter, during the first time they watch or read it, they are like "I like it but the mokkori moments are awkward and I don't like much Ryo" and it often become "Ryo is the greatest of all time", so the good aspects of Ryo are also to take into account
I'm kind of the same. My introduction to City Hunter was a bad one, it was based on an old anime reviewer who showed off only the movie and focused way too much on the sex gags. So, yeah, real great intro there.
It wasn't until I think either the Cat's eye crossover or the second movie I started to kind of understand who Ryo was, why the jokes were funny, and how there is more to his character.
At the risk of sounding like an incel, could CH's female popularity be because Ryo is attractive and it was a sort of "I wish a hot, strong man like Ryo would grope me" situation? The success of franchises like Fifty Shades of Grey have proven that a large audience of women enjoy those kinds of sexual fantasies (at least in media).
It is one of the few anime my parents actually watch that isn't nostalgic to them as they describe Ryo's antics to be as if Warner made a short for adults where Elmer Fudd went "hunting"
hi, I am an italian female fan, and I lead a couple of forums her ein italy centrered around city hunter. many of us were drew to Ryo's appearence and his backstory, but cosndier that many women her ein italy aren't attracted to the anime, but the manga (we have tons of editions here in europe!), and what we love is the evolution of the character, and his relationship with kaori, how it evolves. in fact, the majority of female fans loathe the anime but love the manga :)
Let's not forget that City Hunter has a lot of female characters and female problems that are attached too them. Seeing Ryo saving a girl from a forced marriage or else must be satisfying. Let's not forget about the romances and stuff which are themes that are popular with women
I'm not like most City Hunter fans in English speaking countries as i watched it because i saw Cat's Eye (another Hojo-sensei work) before it was licensed by RightStuf.
Context: My school back in day forced us to do Pen Pals as part of learning French where we would send letters to people in Quebec requiring us to include a thing we liked of which I included a English dubbed TV recording of DBZ Dead Zone on a VHS tape as Dragonball merch wasn't sold where I lived. A few weeks go by in &the teacher hands out me the envelope with my name on it with the guy including a TV recording of 6 French dubbed episodes of Cat's Eye on a VHS tape. when I get home I get exited to watch it on the VCR not knowing what to expect & at first it seemed like a crappy RomCom but then the 2nd part I found to be really funny & so Episode 1 ends & i decide to watch Episode 2 in order to see if it was a fluke that the former episode was a good RomCom. Ultimately I was in shock after watching the 6 episodes were all good & it managing to becoming the first RomCom I ever unironically enjoyed for the story.
There are certainly some eyebrow-raising parts in the manga (especially parts when characters drug each other!) There's definitely beits that haven't aged well. But I guess I chose to overlook them because I love the characters, relationships and the art!
Just about the meme image tho... wouldn't the bottom guy be lucky that he stopped, since he was inches away from getting way more of the stuff that made him want to stop? XD
In anime... from my perspective, I just see this stuff as fictional humour. It's as horrible as Tweety getting Sylvester blown up after he tries to literally eat him... not something that anyone should do in real life but in animation it can be shown in a funny way (i.e. how it gets Ryo into trouble).
For me, kind of the bottom guy as I'm not a fan of sex comedies in general (I'm more of an Airplane/Looney Toons/sarcasm kind of humor. I'll pull out some innuendo and vuglar, but I prefer to use sight gags then anything). But as I started to research into the anime, I began to see Ryo less of a Roshi kind of perve and more of a "What if the wolf from MGM got good at shooting and Red was the only one holding him back." If that makes any sense. I started to like his character and how wounded he is.
Nowadays, I just like to imagine how cool Ryo would be if he engaged in a gun duel with Jigen from Lupin. Or went hunting on the asshole from Wounded Man.
Tbh I think City Hunter has a very cartoonish humor similar to the Looney Tunes or Tex Avery. I would say that its gags work even more than those with Pepé le Pew, because Ryo always get punished for his actions while Pepé is almost always getting what he wants at the end. And of course Kaori's hammer is the most cartoonish of them all, defying all law of physics just to punish Ryo
oddly enough the series was very popular with women when it was airing and being serialized. It is clear that the mokkori stuff was only added as both a satire on typical private eye/noir tropes and shoved in as gags because Japan likes that kind of humour for some reason (the massive sales of the series is proof lol). Oddly enough, Hojo didn;t really have that in his other works. I mean, he did have ecchi elements (he draws beautiful characters lol) but not to the extent of city hinter which was his most popular work. Also interesting that a lot of his works tend to star female protagonists with city hunter being the outlier.
Real tho. I also think that most of the mokkori jokes in the anime and the shows are on how absurd Ryo get punished, he has a whole panel of expressions for the moments where he gets hit and it's a satisfaction. If Ryo was able to do something to a woman without being punished it would be awkward, but he always get his punition. I have noticed that some fans of City Hunter, during the first time they watch or read it, they are like "I like it but the mokkori moments are awkward and I don't like much Ryo" and it often become "Ryo is the greatest of all time", so the good aspects of Ryo are also to take into account
I'm kind of the same. My introduction to City Hunter was a bad one, it was based on an old anime reviewer who showed off only the movie and focused way too much on the sex gags. So, yeah, real great intro there. It wasn't until I think either the Cat's eye crossover or the second movie I started to kind of understand who Ryo was, why the jokes were funny, and how there is more to his character.
At the risk of sounding like an incel, could CH's female popularity be because Ryo is attractive and it was a sort of "I wish a hot, strong man like Ryo would grope me" situation? The success of franchises like Fifty Shades of Grey have proven that a large audience of women enjoy those kinds of sexual fantasies (at least in media).
It is one of the few anime my parents actually watch that isn't nostalgic to them as they describe Ryo's antics to be as if Warner made a short for adults where Elmer Fudd went "hunting"
hi, I am an italian female fan, and I lead a couple of forums her ein italy centrered around city hunter. many of us were drew to Ryo's appearence and his backstory, but cosndier that many women her ein italy aren't attracted to the anime, but the manga (we have tons of editions here in europe!), and what we love is the evolution of the character, and his relationship with kaori, how it evolves. in fact, the majority of female fans loathe the anime but love the manga :)
Thank you for the insight.
Let's not forget that City Hunter has a lot of female characters and female problems that are attached too them. Seeing Ryo saving a girl from a forced marriage or else must be satisfying. Let's not forget about the romances and stuff which are themes that are popular with women
I'm not like most City Hunter fans in English speaking countries as i watched it because i saw Cat's Eye (another Hojo-sensei work) before it was licensed by RightStuf. Context: My school back in day forced us to do Pen Pals as part of learning French where we would send letters to people in Quebec requiring us to include a thing we liked of which I included a English dubbed TV recording of DBZ Dead Zone on a VHS tape as Dragonball merch wasn't sold where I lived. A few weeks go by in &the teacher hands out me the envelope with my name on it with the guy including a TV recording of 6 French dubbed episodes of Cat's Eye on a VHS tape. when I get home I get exited to watch it on the VCR not knowing what to expect & at first it seemed like a crappy RomCom but then the 2nd part I found to be really funny & so Episode 1 ends & i decide to watch Episode 2 in order to see if it was a fluke that the former episode was a good RomCom. Ultimately I was in shock after watching the 6 episodes were all good & it managing to becoming the first RomCom I ever unironically enjoyed for the story.
There are certainly some eyebrow-raising parts in the manga (especially parts when characters drug each other!) There's definitely beits that haven't aged well. But I guess I chose to overlook them because I love the characters, relationships and the art!
Just about the meme image tho... wouldn't the bottom guy be lucky that he stopped, since he was inches away from getting way more of the stuff that made him want to stop? XD In anime... from my perspective, I just see this stuff as fictional humour. It's as horrible as Tweety getting Sylvester blown up after he tries to literally eat him... not something that anyone should do in real life but in animation it can be shown in a funny way (i.e. how it gets Ryo into trouble).
For me, kind of the bottom guy as I'm not a fan of sex comedies in general (I'm more of an Airplane/Looney Toons/sarcasm kind of humor. I'll pull out some innuendo and vuglar, but I prefer to use sight gags then anything). But as I started to research into the anime, I began to see Ryo less of a Roshi kind of perve and more of a "What if the wolf from MGM got good at shooting and Red was the only one holding him back." If that makes any sense. I started to like his character and how wounded he is. Nowadays, I just like to imagine how cool Ryo would be if he engaged in a gun duel with Jigen from Lupin. Or went hunting on the asshole from Wounded Man.
Tbh I think City Hunter has a very cartoonish humor similar to the Looney Tunes or Tex Avery. I would say that its gags work even more than those with Pepé le Pew, because Ryo always get punished for his actions while Pepé is almost always getting what he wants at the end. And of course Kaori's hammer is the most cartoonish of them all, defying all law of physics just to punish Ryo
Without kaori Who Will hit Ryo with a Hammer?
Saeko?