What would you change?

[AbbyStabby]

Since we love to discuss all the things wrong with Yoshihiro's work, I decided to make a thread specifically for critiquing anything he's done.

This counts for stories, characters, genders, art, and so on.

I'll write my own shpeals when I have more time to but there are plenty of things I'd be more than willing to change in all the stories/characters/art I'm familiar with.

Though, honestly, I'm more interested in what you guys have to say on the matter!

What do you criticize the most? How would you change it to make it better and why?

(I couldn't find a thread like this anywhere so I hope this isn't a repeated topic.)

[Paragon]

I get rant-y and whiny. So don't read if you don't like that.
Just a warning.

SPOILER: Click to show

Ohhhhh boy. Here we go.

I think thing that I would immediately change is the characters.
Character arcs, character development, character dialogue, EVERYTHING CHARACTERS.

Actually I should change that to: create character arcs, create character development. But it's limited to none. If characters were colours, most of Yoshi's characters would be grey. And not even in the fun grey mortality way. Just grey, and boring. Flat, purposeless. Their own reason for being introduced at all is to be a) killed off for enjoyment or b) to try and bring development to main characters. (Which almost always never works.)

I am all for killing off characters, I truly am. It can be very good for story telling. But it can also be very destructive. Do you want a character to develop from the death of another? Then don't waste the death. Have a good lead-up, have a good death scene, and make sure that you don't do this too often. Killing off characters too much will just stunt things. There is nothing 'emotional' or 'inspiring' from it. It's just beating a dead horse. I get that Ginga is supposed to be bloody and full of battles, but honestly make the sacrifices count. Because this is the canine version of a crap horror film.

Oh, but I shouldn't even started with that. The character arcs- where are they Yoshi?? Because I don't see them. Yoshi admitted to killing both John and Joe off because he was "just done with them". He dropped Chutora and Great off the edge of the earth. And for what? Don't make characters if you're not dedicated to seeing their character arc through, and for giving them a good entry, a rise/fall (or vice versa), and a good exit. And by 'good' I mean yes it can be bloody, yes it can be 'disturbing' but it needs to be done with tact and proper timing.

Yoshi never considers this. He just gets bored. This is very frustrating as a fellow writer.

Don't get me started about the personalities of the characters. Inconsistent, flat, repetitive, dull, and without any substance. You get a few scatter characters where you can see a bit of personality coming lose. (ie. Weed is nice, John is snarky, etc...) But even they are very flat. They don't really change. You can argue that someone like Weed gets less naive over the course of GDW. But for the main character, the guy who has the spotlight on him? That does not cut it. I need to see him evolve into a round and strong character. Not just 'look a tiny change!' That will not work. Most of the minor/secondary characters don't have personalities at all. They serve as mindless drones to the story. That just grinds my gears.

Let's also look at the interpersonal development. Oh wait, where is it? I can't find it.
It's literally nonexistent.

Characters are forced into groups like 'friends' 'rivals' 'neutral' not because they would work into those groups. But because they have no personality, and thus cannot have interpersonal development either. Friends aren't even really friends? You can argue that Weed and Jerome (or GB), and Gin and John, are 'good' examples of friends? But are they really? I mean sure they did things for each other (but I will argue that Gin and John did barely anything for each other. Other than Gin saving John's ass from Madara) but to the extent Yoshi tries to pull off the relationships? No.

The interactions are forced. "But it's used to push the story forward!" No.
They're forced because if they weren't there would be no relationships.
Just spinning fighting dogs.

Most characters lack motivation for anything, besides the ones 'out for revenge!!' Which is just beaten and overused to the point where it's just infuriating. Most of his plot arcs are beaten and overused. It just. Needs. To. Stop.

STOP.

I actually feel better to get all this out.

[M-92 Mantis]

Honestly, I'd like to say everything, give a lawl, and move on, but that's stupid and I really like the idea of this thread without me just falling into a bitchfest. We all know I'm great at those, but I want to make it clear I still do like Ginga, and I'm not ever asking for it to be a deep complex novel or similar to Game of Thrones or Shakespeare or anything like a masterpiece, but there is a reason it is ... well, extremely obscure even in Japan and tons of people grow out of it.

I'm gonna want to think of a better way to explain my main gripes, and how I think they could be done better. I don't wanna be pretentious and ever act like I am a better author or critic than a man who makes money off of something I do not, but there are certain things, mostly repetition and the godawful basic, generic writing and casts of surplus cardboard character stands, that can actually really make the typical fan ease away from Ginga. We've seen it drop painfully after GDA and GDWO (mainly GDA, surprisingly), so I'll try to think of how to explain my issues better with some proof of the community's reactions and sales and whatnot.

TL;DR: gimme a sec, my brain is still trying to work in Japanese and I cannot English right now. Paragon's wall of wisdom is extremely helpful, though.

 

[shirazoku]

paragon basically summed it up... but i would also of course, add more female character, female characters that did things and didn't die right away or have puppies and instantly become mother. and probably non-binary characters and the like. and make obvious relationships more obvious... -cough-kenandkage-cough-...

dynamic villains, moral grays... those kinds of things too. i think yoshi toyed with it in GDW:O with Sirius and the Kama bros but could have gone deeper of course.

basically i would like to get away from the stoic samurai origins of ginga.

[The Kirbeard™]

I would have to say that I would like to have seen more of some characters in GNG after they had been recruited. For example, Bill or the Four Heavenly Kings. We spend a lot of time seeing them being recruited, but after that, they kind of turn into background characters.

Another thing that always bugged me is during the fight with Akakabuto, Riki chose dogs like the Kai bros, Akame, and Wilson to be leaders of the entire army over his own original commanders. And they were all from Ben's group. Like, did the other eleven groups not even matter? If I were Riki, I probably would have chosen someone like Great to be a leader in the final battle over Wilson, who Riki probably has never even spoke to.

[M-92 Mantis]

My first rant and explanation about Yoshi's ideas of women and how I think he can just improve it. I'm not gonna complain about what I want since I'm pretty sure this is a thread complaining about what I want and why it would IMPROVE the story, not just cater to my interests.

SPOILER: Click to show

I think the main issue most fans have is with how women are treated, but I also wouldn't want people demanding Yoshi make a bunch of super tough warrior women that are just as generic as the men. When he gives a woman actual moments where she does something influencing the plot, no one cares because she's not fighting something or killing something. I want both genders to be given effort of a personality, I don't care what's between their legs. I also, though, have no problem with the fact that it is based on ancient times, when men fought and the women stayed home to protect the children and house and finances. The problem is Yoshi doesn't ever give that other responsibility to the women or show that they have their own strengths; women had to manage the house, alone, and were in charge of the finances, children's education and training, staff, and connections to other clans or lords to keep up with politics. They even learned a fighting method with a naginata, a pole weapon, so that they could stab and attack from a distance to get an advantage of a man's bigger size or strength. Depending on the era, women slowly became less powerful and were reduced to nothing but livestock who weren't even allowed to leave the house unattended in the Edo period.

Yoshi's women can barely make any sort of decision on their own, or even put up enough of an effort to try to defend their children - they are almost ALWAYS being protected by an infant just because he's a son, so he instantly has more nerve and authority than her. That stuff, not to mention the constant "I'm a woman so I (random bullshit Yoshi pretends to know about)" is insanely funny because it's like he doesn't want the reader to forget that Ohu thinks of women as alien beings who have to explain their totally different mentality and ethics. Just because Yoshi is old-fashioned doesn't mean he also just isn't trying. He is insensitive with everything he does, men included, since with men he demands a man should be willing to die for another man, even if he might not want to die or have no real connection to that other man. He also says men are shameful or weak or 'like a woman' if they feel emotions, show emotions, or cry for anything aside for another man. Suicide was not always the option samurai did, they weren't lemmings that just jumped off a cliff because the leader said so. Basically Yoshi's idealism of the samurai code and mentality is so flawed that he can't hope to save it because he's just made Ohu an asylum of dogs with inconsistent morals who will turn against a law in one page, then jump into it without a care in the next.

I also don't mind though that Ginga is supposed to be a Shonen/Shounen. Meaning it's meant for boys... but is now being published between hentai stories. I really don't wanna get into that. Yoshi has never once catered or pandered to his fanbase, neither in Japan nor overseas. He insulted the play that was done for him in GDW, and he was not entirely happy that the Finnish play was run by and had so many females. However, Yoshi set out to make a Shonen about samurai dogs. No one is egging on Fist of the North Star to randomly add a bunch of fighting women to a show that is nothing but a huge manly man doing manly punches and things. No one ever tells Sailor Moon or bishounen stories that they have too much women and not enough men. Yoshihiro himself is extremely old-fashioned, and obviously likes to completely ignore entire ARCS he's made before because he doesn't like them, not bothering to tell his fans about the changes or apologize for constantly rewriting and removing things fans may have liked. Not giving him sales because of his lazy way of not writing anything interesting anymore is a good reason to not want to waste your money - being sad because your viking warrior princess OC isn't going to show up in his story that consists of 90% men is ridiculous.

I think, then, to actually improve the story, not make me happy, he should honestly add as many females as he wants, but without the warped mentality that females have literally nothing better to do than wait for a man or a male child to save them, or commit suicide at an instant because they give up on doing anything else that may cause conflict. I don't want an army of warrior women, I want more scenes of Reika giving Weed good advice that changes the tide of his strategies (the anime took OUT her lines and gave them to the Ohu characters) and I want more of Koyuki charging forward to attack a bear with the sole purpose of wanting to save others and her little brother, not because she's got a vagina and wants to prove something. I want his women, just like his men, to have character development and personality, SOMETHING to make them interesting, not how amazing they are despite what genitals they have.

That's basically my rant on his notable lack of finesse with the scary creature known as the 'woman.'

Basically I couldn't care how many women are in it as long as they had the same effort of personality as the men should have, as ALL characters should have, regardless of if they fight or not.

[Paragon]

Y'know Rascal, I would never ask a writer to change their style, but honestly after reading that, Yoshi just seems incredibly rude. I mean yes, it's his story and he has the right to do whatever he wants with it. But it just sounds like he's horrible with fans.

[M-92 Mantis]

Jun 6, 2015 14:07:23 GMT -7 Paragon said:

Y'know Rascal, I would never ask a writer to change their style, but honestly after reading that, Yoshi just seems incredibly rude. I mean yes, it's his story and he has the right to do whatever he wants with it. But it just sounds like he's horrible with fans.

SPOILER: Click to show

That's why I really honestly don't support Yoshi himself, and why I'm not keen on making a Ginga collection. You could argue that Yoshi is very shy or reclusive with his fans, since he gets very uncomfortable with interviews (or at least acts like it, because for some reason no one ever asks him about his stories, just his personal life), but either way, his marketing also has never been good. It's why it's so hard for even people in Japan to find out when he's released something, it's why he relies heavily on Goraku Weekly or (in the past, I think they cut him out) Shonen Jump. Lots of people say the budget is too low to make merchandise; that is entirely false, at least in the early GDW times. Sandals, hats, mugs, coasters, towels, postcards, notecards, buttons, pins, posters, shirts, phone cards, plushies, figurines... these are all official merchandise that didn't do well because almost all of it is in very minimal quality. The towels are said to be rough and fall apart, even without use. The plushies are of decent quality but there is nothing special about them. We've all seen the horrible derp faces and creepy paintjobs of the GDW figurines. Back then when this stuff first came out, no one wanted much of it, because the marketing never thought "hey let's make things that are in demand, like different plushie styles, more clothing, more posters that aren't generic stock pictures used on every volume cover, ever." There is no merchandise for GDWO besides the volumes themselves; GDA was supposed to be a milestone for Yoshi's progress and almost no one is saying anything about it other than it's a huge load of "meh." There's never attempts of improving or changing merchandise up because there's no effort already, almost all other anime/manga series have all those things as the default starters to their merchandising. Yoshi used to feature fan letters at the end of every Yamato volume (I think I'm gonna get around to translating those) and even featured Ginga fanart in the GDW omnibuses for Weed's World. The lack of response to fans is a huge issue with any author or manga author. Can you imagine the creator of Dragon Ball not ever saying or gesturing a single reaction to his fanbase? You almost always see an interview or "author's note" of thanks for support, or replying to feedback on something to explain a character's reasons or origin, something about the plot, or even inane trivia like "here's some concept sketches of when I first wanted Son Goku to be an actual monkey." People appreciate being heard, even when all they want to tell an author is "hey, I like your work! Thanks for everything you do!" That's never shown anymore, so ever expecting to see his reply to the support, even in Japan, is not even considered anymore.

But basically, what I meant was that because of his lack of attention to any sort of fanbase, he doesn't do it to spite women, he really just doesn't acknowledge anyone, even in his own country. At least I've certainly never seen him take the time to say it aside from HANAKO, when he goes "I seem fated to draw animal manga, and thanks to that, I have been able to receive a lot of fan support from all over the country." That's kinda the only time I've seen him mention his fans with appreciation. I honestly don't even think he's sexist in the sense of hating women, he's just incredibly ignorant and insensitive to how he writes, and since he sees women as an enigma, he wouldn't want to take the time writing a female character just as much as he wouldn't want to write a male character that has total loyalty to his wife, children, and peace without having another man influence and govern his life.

[Ace]

Jun 6, 2015 13:39:00 GMT -7 M-92 Mantis said:

SPOILER: Click to show

I also don't mind though that Ginga is supposed to be a Shonen/Shounen. Meaning it's meant for boys... but is now being published between hentai stories. I really don't wanna get into that. Yoshi has never once catered or pandered to his fanbase, neither in Japan nor overseas. He insulted the play that was done for him in GDW, and he was not entirely happy that the Finnish play was run by and had so many females. However, Yoshi set out to make a Shonen about samurai dogs. No one is egging on Fist of the North Star to randomly add a bunch of fighting women to a show that is nothing but a huge manly man doing manly punches and things. No one ever tells Sailor Moon or bishounen stories that they have too much women and not enough men. Yoshihiro himself is extremely old-fashioned, and obviously likes to completely ignore entire ARCS he's made before because he doesn't like them, not bothering to tell his fans about the changes or apologize for constantly rewriting and removing things fans may have liked. Not giving him sales because of his lazy way of not writing anything interesting anymore is a good reason to not want to waste your money - being sad because your viking warrior princess OC isn't going to show up in his story that consists of 90% men is ridiculous.

Wait, what? Yoshi complained about the Finnish GNG musical? I couldn't understand a word of it, but they put some effort into it. From what I've heard, Yoshi was treated like a king at the conventions. I've had the impression he was shy and reclusive, but now he just seems downright rude. Well, it explains the lazy Finnish character as a small kudos to his Finnish fanbase :S 

[M-92 Mantis]

Jun 6, 2015 15:05:07 GMT -7 Ace said:

Jun 6, 2015 13:39:00 GMT -7 M-92 Mantis said:

SPOILER: Click to show

I also don't mind though that Ginga is supposed to be a Shonen/Shounen. Meaning it's meant for boys... but is now being published between hentai stories. I really don't wanna get into that. Yoshi has never once catered or pandered to his fanbase, neither in Japan nor overseas. He insulted the play that was done for him in GDW, and he was not entirely happy that the Finnish play was run by and had so many females. However, Yoshi set out to make a Shonen about samurai dogs. No one is egging on Fist of the North Star to randomly add a bunch of fighting women to a show that is nothing but a huge manly man doing manly punches and things. No one ever tells Sailor Moon or bishounen stories that they have too much women and not enough men. Yoshihiro himself is extremely old-fashioned, and obviously likes to completely ignore entire ARCS he's made before because he doesn't like them, not bothering to tell his fans about the changes or apologize for constantly rewriting and removing things fans may have liked. Not giving him sales because of his lazy way of not writing anything interesting anymore is a good reason to not want to waste your money - being sad because your viking warrior princess OC isn't going to show up in his story that consists of 90% men is ridiculous.

Wait, what? Yoshi complained about the Finnish GNG musical? I couldn't understand a word of it, but they put some effort into it. From what I've heard, Yoshi was treated like a king at the conventions. I've had the impression he was shy and reclusive, but now he just seems downright rude. Well, it explains the lazy Finnish character as a small kudos to his Finnish fanbase :S 

With the Finnish musical, when he was asked what he thought about it, all he said was, "It was better than the one in Japan." There should be sources but that's the one consistent part everyone remembers him saying.

I think, since Paragon's post was so good, the first thing I'd have to say about wanting to change for the better is Yoshi's choice of making cast and handling characters. I think the fact that he doesn't bother with anything remotely different for each personality is what makes it so hard to really choose a character as a favorite other than "I like his design/name/that one fight he had." I don't expect a story about dogs and bears to be complex, but I need a reason to care for these characters. Some groups of a cast I can't even tell the differences about them. Remembering minor characters like all of Izou's brothers is incredibly hard. And THEN, once you've grown to maybe like a character or two, Yoshi does a complete overhaul like with GDWO and adds in 30 more characters no one knows anyting about... and then those characters don't even do much so you don't know what the point of them was. I remember when GDWO first came out and people were struggling to count them all, trying to figure out who they were and what the fuck they were even doing there, especially when in GDW it made it clear that no one in the country didn't know about Ohu and Hougen, and suddenly all these new characters come up with no reason as to why they never bothered doing anything earlier.

The Kirbeard™ actually that's a really good point. What was even the purpose of the other units if Yoshi didn't want to bother showing any of them? I guess it'd be difficult since his several POVs might've been more confusing with unit commanders without any of the main cast with them? It would be weird to suddenly see someone like Luke and his team doing everything when that team doesn't have the Kai or Smith or those guys. Then AGAIN, just don't make up the feudal system of Ohu when people will literally commit mutiny and get away with it (Gin to Ben), the GENERAL goes missing and no one bothers to care or ask (Riki never gave a shit about Sniper leaving, being a dick, anything like that), and like you said, commanders get pushed out of place for another commander's followers just because ... I dunno, the unit commander and the main character vouch for them.

[AbbyStabby]

All of these points so far have been pretty spot on, I gotta say. I agree 110% with most of everything that's been said so far!

On the topic of female characters...

While I'm figuring out that I like Reika (from the Manga) more and more, I don't think there are any female characters that I particularly like in any of Yoshihiro's work. Though, as we all know, that's not necessarily the fault of the characters themselves, it's how the author writes/portrays women.

And due to the facts that have already been stated about them, I often find myself wishing certain characters were female instead of male... Mainly my favorites (partially because we don't need more characters).

Often times I get flash backs of when I was a kid that played a lot of video games and they didn't have female protags/characters to play as. I had to pretend some were female just so I could relate to them easier and feel included/represented. I don't know how many people here did that but it certainly resurfaces for me when reading these stories. I almost have to pretend some characters are "women" to get passed the fact that these books are so sexist due to Yoshihiro's ignorance and stupidity on how to handle us.

I just want a female character that isn't treated differently because of her sex. Is that really so much to ask?

It's hard to explain... I hope that doesn't sound stupid.

Anyway, the character that is actually female that I really wish would be given this shot is Bella. She's highly under developed and could have serious potential in growing as a good character. I would love to see her go from being a whiny pushover to a strong and potentially being Leader material in The Last Wars... But we all know that's not going to happen...

I'm also going to stand by how I think The Last Wars should go, which I talked about here. At least until I know exactly what direction Yoshihiro's going to take this finale(?). 

On to another topic, I think I'm going to make an artist point.

I absolutely cannot stand how Yoshihiro flip-flops between how he draws paws. Let me show you what I mean... 



This particular image shows exactly what I hate. With Thunder, each of his toes pretty much line up with one another, including his pads. However, with Weed's paws/pads, they more realistic in proportion, with the two outer toes being shorter while the two in the middle are longer. The inconsistency has always bugged me.
How he draws male dog parts has always bugged me too. Not just because I really don't want to see them and are unnesecary in (almost?) all cases, but because they aren't accurate either. I understand stylistic choices but something tells me he actually has no idea how to draw them and bases them off male HUMAN parts. Just... Why. Whyyyy. Whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy.
And, of course, more recently, a lot of his dogs/animals have been looking the same... I gotta say. Yoshihiro is the perfect example of an artist who gets too comfortable with their style and no longer looks at references or practices drawing real animals because they don't feel like they need to. Your art absolutely suffers from that mentality and if you're going to continue to improve and be an accurate artist, you always have to be willing to practice things you may already know. All the time.

Sorry for the short-ish  rambles. Perhaps I'll come up with something a little more wordy and meaningful later.

Though I have made some rants here and here that go more in depth with other things.

EDIT: ... In the drawing above I just noticed that not only is Weed's neck huge and his torso is very small, his shoulders are up on his neck. Why'd he draw it like that?!

[Kit]

I have yet to post here because I'm still thinking of something that other people haven't said better. But AbbyStabby, if I remember correctly, in an interview, Yoshi admitted he uses no references. Or at least very few. If memory serves, he drew at least SSY without a single reference, and his style with dogs evolved from that story, so...

Also I'm weirdly glad you brought up how he draws the male... part. Because I was never ballzy enough (HAH!) to actually bring up how that always bugged the hell out of me from an anatomical standpoint, too. He never even needs to draw it, but then when he does, anyway, he just ignores all basic anatomy, AGAIN. It probably shouldn't bug me so much, but it really does.

His paws drive me insane, too. Even when he sometimes gets them right, the pads are flat and it just all generally weirds me out trying to think that it's supposed to be a dog paw.

[The Kirbeard™]

I don't have so much an issue that Yoshi never really went to another unit's POV. What I had a problem with is that in the final battle, Riki chose random dogs from Ben's unit that he probably never even spoke to over his original commanders that he's known since day one. It's one thing for the Kais, Akame or Wilson to have positions of power while they were with Ben's group. Ben recruited them and gave them positions of power among his particular unit because they earned his respect as he got to know them. While scouting for soldiers, the ranks were like this:

Ben, Great, Smith, Gin (unit commanders that everyone has to listen to) > Akame, Moss, Heavenly Kings (leaders of packs that were recruited) > John, Wilson, Jaguar, Kais (Individuals who proved to have valuable assets, but aren't pack leaders) > Everyone else (followers of recruited leaders and random individuals who aren't as well respected)

However, once all the units regrouped in Ohu, Riki favored everyone in Ben's platoon over his original commanders, and the ranks went something like this:

Riki (supreme commander) > Ben (took Sniper's place) > Gin (took Ben's place), Smith, Akame, Kais, Benizakura, Wilson, John, Heavenly Kings (IDEK) > Everyone else (Yoshi logic)

How it SHOULD have been once they all regrouped in Ohu:

Riki (supreme commander) > Ben (took Sniper's place) > Gin (took Ben's place), Smith, Great, Luke, Callas, etc. (the rest of the original unit commanders that Riki actually knows) > Everyone else (actual logic)

WTF Yoshi?

[Paragon]

Jun 7, 2015 13:44:21 GMT -7 The Kirbeard™ said:

I don't have so much an issue that Yoshi never really went to another unit's POV. What I had a problem with is that in the final battle, Riki chose random dogs from Ben's unit that he probably never even spoke to over his original commanders that he's known since day one. It's one thing for the Kais, Akame or Wilson to have positions of power while they were with Ben's group. Ben recruited them and gave them positions of power among his particular unit because they earned his respect as he got to know them. While scouting for soldiers, the ranks were like this:

Ben, Great, Smith, Gin (unit commanders that everyone has to listen to) > Akame, Moss, Heavenly Kings (leaders of packs that were recruited) > John, Wilson, Jaguar, Kais (Individuals who proved to have valuable assets, but aren't pack leaders) > Everyone else (followers of recruited leaders and random individuals who aren't as well respected)

However, once all the units regrouped in Ohu, Riki favored everyone in Ben's platoon over his original commanders, and the ranks went something like this:

Riki > Ben > Gin, Smith, Akame, Kais, Benizakura, Wilson, John, Heavenly Kings > Everyone else

How it SHOULD have been once they all regrouped in Ohu:

Riki > Ben > Gin, Smith, Great, Luke, Callas, and the rest of the original unit commanders > Everyone else

WTF Yoshi?

I don't agree with what he did. It wasn't realistic.
But I can see why he did it. Those "unit commanders" were characters people knew, and it would make the battle easier to follow for the readers.
Plus he probably forgot about his original platoon leaders.

Then again we've clearly seen Yoshi doesn't mind confusing us with new characters.
So I dunno.

[The Kirbeard™]

Jun 7, 2015 10:42:19 GMT -7 AbbyStabby said:

All of these points so far have been pretty spot on, I gotta say. I agree 110% with most of everything that's been said so far!

On the topic of female characters...

While I'm figuring out that I like Reika (from the Manga) more and more, I don't think there are any female characters that I particularly like in any of Yoshihiro's work. Though, as we all know, that's not necessarily the fault of the characters themselves, it's how the author writes/portrays women.

And due to the facts that have already been stated about them, I often find myself wishing certain characters were female instead of male... Mainly my favorites (partially because we don't need more characters).

Often times I get flash backs of when I was a kid that played a lot of video games and they didn't have female protags/characters to play as. I had to pretend some were female just so I could relate to them easier and feel included/represented. I don't know how many people here did that but it certainly resurfaces for me when reading these stories. I almost have to pretend some characters are "women" to get passed the fact that these books are so sexist due to Yoshihiro's ignorance and stupidity on how to handle us.

I just want a female character that isn't treated differently because of her sex. Is that really so much to ask?

It's hard to explain... I hope that doesn't sound stupid.

Anyway, the character that is actually female that I really wish would be given this shot is Bella. She's highly under developed and could have serious potential in growing as a good character. I would love to see her go from being a whiny pushover to a strong and potentially being Leader material in The Last Wars... But we all know that's not going to happen...

I'm also going to stand by how I think The Last Wars should go, which I talked about here. At least until I know exactly what direction Yoshihiro's going to take this finale(?). 

On to another topic, I think I'm going to make an artist point.

I absolutely cannot stand how Yoshihiro flip-flops between how he draws paws. Let me show you what I mean... 



This particular image shows exactly what I hate. With Thunder, each of his toes pretty much line up with one another, including his pads. However, with Weed's paws/pads, they more realistic in proportion, with the two outer toes being shorter while the two in the middle are longer. The inconsistency has always bugged me.
How he draws male dog parts has always bugged me too. Not just because I really don't want to see them and are unnesecary in (almost?) all cases, but because they aren't accurate either. I understand stylistic choices but something tells me he actually has no idea how to draw them and bases them off male HUMAN parts. Just... Why. Whyyyy. Whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy.
And, of course, more recently, a lot of his dogs/animals have been looking the same... I gotta say. Yoshihiro is the perfect example of an artist who gets too comfortable with their style and no longer looks at references or practices drawing real animals because they don't feel like they need to. Your art absolutely suffers from that mentality and if you're going to continue to improve and be an accurate artist, you always have to be willing to practice things you may already know. All the time.

Sorry for the short-ish  rambles. Perhaps I'll come up with something a little more wordy and meaningful later.

Though I have made some rants here and here that go more in depth with other things.

EDIT: ... In the drawing above I just noticed that not only is Weed's neck huge and his torso is very small, his shoulders are up on his neck. Why'd he draw it like that?!

Well obviously it's because Weed is a perfect little butterfly with a pure soul and no flaws