Folks are accusing this of being the studio’s fault for de-cuntifying the mangaka’s artwork but that’s not entirely the full story
Ohkubo is one of my fave mangakas style-wise (unfortunately his writing suffers from terminal misogyny brainrot), and he has a lot of range and evolution since his first work in the early 00s. These are all Makas drawn by Ohkubo himself over the years
I think Ohkubo's at his strongest when he completely leans into the gothic hiphop aesthetic, unfortunately it feels like over the past decade he's sidelined that swag to his monster designs while the human cast became homogenized anime girls. It can be fun when juxtaposed, especially when a human character is progressively drawn more fucked up the more they've been corrupted
But then you get to soul eater NOT and it's gone full moe, even the new gorgon sister looks fucking lame compared to Medusa and Arachne. It was only further compounded by the anime's art directors, the source material already looked much different than what the 08 directors had to work with in the original series.
There's still some stylized art in fire force, but it still seems not as common
Anyway Ohkubo is incredibly frustrating to me as a creator. He makes very compelling characters and premises only to be squandered on fanservice. It kind of sucks seeing a very visually distinct artist neuter themselves into the status quo, even if their art skills have improved in other ways. I'm sure it's more financially rewarding to lean fully into the moe demographic, and he has a compulsion to draw teen girls in revealing miniskirts. I'm so tired.
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