Ah, the canceled Shonen Jump manga. If you’re like me who has been reading manga on MANGA Plus, you probably lost count of the number of times the manga you enjoy reading suddenly got canceled.

And if you think that the mangaka who used to have a popular, long-running manga had it easy, sad to say that they don’t.

Even they also can’t escape from the wrath of getting axed.

Take Naruto mangaka, Masashi Kishimoto, for example.

His manga, Samurai 8: The Tale of Hachimaru got canceled after 43 chapters.

The same goes for the Food Wars! Shokugeki no Soma mangaka where his recent manga, Tenmaku Cinema gets canceled after 21 chapters.

It makes sense why Samurai 8 gets the boot considering that the story was rather meh.

But Tenmaku Cinema? The manga isn’t that bad if you ask me.

Sure, it may not have the same oomph as Shokugeki no Soma. But I enjoy reading the manga since it gives me the Bakuman vibe.

When we talk about the canceled Shonen Jump manga, we tend to assume they’re terrible manga.

While I don’t deny that many of them are trash, a handful of them do seem promising.

Aliens Area, The Hunters Guild: Red Wood, Super Smartphone, and Tenmaku Cinema are a few of them.

What got them to land into the canceled Shonen Jump manga territory

Okay, if manga series like Aliens Area, The Hunter Guild: Red Wood, Super Smartphone, and Tenmaku Cinema seem like a promising bunch, then why do they still get canceled?

Isn’t it obvious they get the boot because they’re not even that good to begin with?

Well, if you’re someone who doesn’t like reading those types of stories, then yes, you will say that the manga deserves the boot.

But the manga that I mention here gets the boot certainly not because it has a terrible premise.

Rather it has more to do with the story not appealing to the Shonen Jump manga’s younger audience.

Take a look at the promising manga that got canceled, and you’ll notice they tend to have one or more of these elements baked into the story.

The story requires them to put on their thinking hats

When you think of a story that requires you to think, Super Smartphone seems to fit the mold.

For one, we have a character who receives a pocket-size AI in the form of a smartphone out of nowhere.

While the smartphone helps him in many ways, it also leads him to get involved in something dangerous.

Not going to lie that the manga does have an interesting premise.

But sad to say, this kind of story doesn’t bode well with the younger audience because of its complex story and deep dialogues.

It’s the kind of story that requires you to think, not something that you can speed-read and move on to the next manga in the list.

Don’t get me wrong. It’s not that the younger audience doesn’t enjoy stories that have many layers in it.

A little complexity is fine. But not too much of it, of course.

Lack of interesting action scenes

Take a look at many of the popular manga on MANGA Plus and you’ll notice many of them seem to have many action scenes.

And they’re kind of cool too. It makes you want to imitate them in real life.

But many of the promising manga that got canceled in the end?

They don’t have that many action scenes.

Sure a manga like Aliens Area and The Hunters Guild: Red Wood does have many fight scenes.

But compared to the action scenes in Jujutsu Kaisen, the action scenes you see in those manga can feel a little too minuscule to their liking.

And it doesn’t help when the action scenes aren’t anything mind-blowing and fast-paced like the one in Jujutsu Kaisen.

Just to be clear there’s nothing wrong with having ordinary fight scenes since not all stories need to have mind-blowing, action-packed scenes.

But for the younger audience, it’s the mind-blowing action-packed scenes that draw them to that manga in the first place.

Anything subpar isn’t worth getting the vote no matter how well-written the story is.

It’s too realistic

There’s a reason why the sci-fi and fantasy genre is popular. It’s the kind of genre where the audience gets to explore the world that is inherently different from the current world in live in.

Anything that takes place in a real setting is a tad a little too realistic for them, even if it revolves around something supernatural.

One such manga is Tenmaku Cinema.

Sure, the story may be about a middle school kid who gets possessed by a ghost scriptwriter who wants him to create a movie based on the script that he writes.

But the rest of the story is as realistic as it can be.

Things like how you can make full use of the resources you have and what to do when things don’t go according to your way.

It’s interesting to see how these characters tackle the problem and it makes us wonder what’s next to come.

But for the younger audience? They don’t want a story that is imbued with too much reality in it.

Anything that speaks realism is boring to them.

Yes, some manga such as Haikyuu!! and even Bakuman falls into this category considering how realistic the story is.

But keep in mind that these manga came out a long time ago. The younger audience these days doesn’t seem to enjoy anything that ties back to reality as much as it used to.

There’s no guarantee, after all

Isn’t it strange that the manga that is similar to the ones that got the boot still going strong even to this day?

What does the manga that survived have that the manga that gets the boot doesn’t?

Well, guess what?

It’s luck that differentiates them from the manga that gets the boot.

Sure, you can have the best story that nails down every single trope you can think of.

But the manga isn’t going to see the light for another day if it doesn’t have luck by its side.

Yes, having a sizeable audience is important. But having luck on your side is equally important too.

It doesn’t just apply to manga, of course. You can also apply the same thing in your life too.

The next time you see a promising manga getting axed, you can safely assume that the manga doesn’t possess as much luck as the manga that remains strong to this day.

P.S. If you’re someone who enjoys reading light novels, particularly the ones that are on the serious side, then you may enjoy reading my light novels.

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Books by Sekina Mayu

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