Why doesn’t manga ever make any sense?

[Bargain Bin Laden]

Every time I read a manga I can never understand the plot. The dialogue makes no sense and I can’t tell what the characters are doing. Why is this?

 

[ToroidalBoat]

I often find action scenes in manga hard to follow.

 

[DankSmoker]

There’s no such thing as a troll on Kiwi Farms, we’re literally cool with everything.

If no one responded to Bargain Bin Laden, I would feel like we were trolling him, and I could never live with that.

 

[Cougar Pump]

Bruh I tried reading Chobits left to right, right to left, top to bottom and bottom to top and in no universe does that dude ever get his dick wet.

 

[Pierre D'Olnique]

Iunno, I read One Punch Man and it was about a One Man who Punches. Made perfect sense.

 

[DankSmoker]

Iunno, I read One Punch Man and it was about a One Man who Punches. Made perfect sense.

I don't know, there were also other men who punched, which muddied the water and makes it hard to keep track.

 

[The Evil Midnight Bomber]

I don't know, there were also other men who punched, which muddied the water and makes it hard to keep track.

Yeah but those men had to punch more than once

 

[Pierre D'Olnique]

I don't know, there were also other men who punched, which muddied the water and makes it hard to keep track.

No no, you see, the others do different stuff. Punches, tackles, kicks, slams, headbutts, whatever WWE bullshit you can think of. The MC just punches. Sometimes once, sometimes multiple times.
Now compare this to, say, Dragon Ball. There's multiple. Disingenuous and confusing from the word go.

 

[dick brain]

Iunno, I read One Punch Man and it was about a One Man who Punches. Made perfect sense.

What the fuck man spoilers

 

[Feefee81093]

It's a nice companion piece to the respective anime. They're usually more linear. If I didn't finish reading Naruto I would have been stuck watching every filler episode. I liked being able to see the scenes in action because they can be difficult to interpret.

 

[Bargain Bin Laden]

Unless mirrored, most manga is read right-to-left. This throws off a lot of first-time readers. The panels are read right-to-left. Even the individual word bubbles in each panel should be read right-to-left. If you're actually holding a physical book, the cover will be on the right side of the book and you'll actually flip the pages right-to-left.

For example, here's a page from some fantasy manga where I've marked the reading order of the panels and word bubbles:

View attachment 5547428

I don’t understand why would they do this? Are they retarded?

 

[dick brain]

I don’t understand why would they do this? Are they retarded?

Yes but that's not the reason, they're on the other side of the world so everything is flipped, just like how everything in Australia is upside down.

 

[Drain Todger]

I don’t understand why would they do this? Are they retarded?

Short answer, yes, they are.

Long answer, it's because Japanese text was traditionally read vertically from top to bottom, right to left, in tategaki (vertical writing), although horizontally-written Japanese text nowadays tends to read left to right due to the influence of English. Even then, the page order is still right to left. A lot of East Asian languages are like this.

Hebrew is read right to left, too, come to think of it.

 

[Poppavalyim Andropoff]

same reason you never make any sense
anime is gay so is OP

 

[KingCoelacanth]

You're a retard that can't understand shounen manga made for 12 year olds

 

[SSj_Ness (Yiffed)]

It's in Japanese, duh.

 

[DankSmoker]

You're a retard that can't understand shounen manga made for 12 year olds

I really doubt that's the kind of manga he's trying to read.