Arise

Yeah, yeah, another Solo Leveling review, I’m sure those of you who are looking for these have seen a million already praising it into the high heavens. And for good reason. Solo Leveling has a lot going for it and the anime adaptation it received is a big step up from other shows based on the webtoon format like Noblesse, Tower of God and God of High School. Still, I wouldn’t write this post if I didn’t have some thoughts I wanted to share with the class. So here goes. Spoilers ahead for the anime, I’ll avoid spoilers for anything that comes after.

Solo Leveling follows E-rank hunter Sung Jinwoo as he goes into a dangerous double dungeon where his entire crew – barring a few – gets brutally murdered. He is the last one to die except he next wakes up in the hospital, unsure why he’s still alive and how his limbs are back to normal. And to make things even weirder, he now has a strange UI floating around that tells him to complete quests or get punished. He obviously ignores it, resulting in a harsh punishment that almost kills him. Once he comes to terms with the reality of his situation he shows extraordinary growth. He continues to grow and becomes strong and oh no, he’s hot.

He finally acquires true power through fighting a warrior in a special dungeon and awakening to his summoning abilities, allowing him to turn slain foes into powerful shadow soldiers. This is where the incredible “arise” panel comes from, where Jinwoo first uses this ability. Now it’s time for me to admit something to all of you. I love Solo Leveling and I think it’s one of the best webtoons out there, second only to Tower of God (although I have to admit I’ve not read that many yet). But I didn’t always think this way.

Before I finished reading the entire webtoon in a couple of days, I actually tried reading it twice. Both times I ended up dropping it early on. Both times before I got to the “arise” moment, the second time being only a few chapters removed from it. I like stories that take their time building up the world, but the worldbuilding in Solo Leveling didn’t really do it for me. It just felt like a very generic power fantasy with no substance. To this day I still think that some of the initial arcs are pretty bland. But I will say the same thing about One Piece and Tower of God, and those are some of my favorite series of all time. So what did this season change? 

Of course I had read the source material, so this season didn’t change much for me, but when I got to this point in the webtoon, it did change everything. From the moment Jinwoo awakened to his shadow powers, the story started going into a higher gear and lore got revealed left and right. The stakes went up tremendously and although Jinwoo didn’t become an edgy loner or a boring good guy, he became a powerful person with his very own goals. He’s a good dude, but he’s not out there playing the hero, which made him interesting. He can be stoic at times, and he really values his family. If he showed up to Jeju island immediately instead of spending time with his mother and sister instead – which he obviously values tremendously – he could have saved a lot of people. Then again, no one could have expected the raid to go that poorly.

I think what I like most about Solo Leveling is the stuff that we haven’t seen yet. It’s one of those stories where I spent a lot of time worrying about how the pay-off to the setup would turn out, and a lot of those worries ended up being for nothing. Jinwoo is a great main character who is complex, kind but can be cruel at times. The worldbuilding gets more and more interesting and the character dynamics are really cool. Without going into spoilers, I feel like Jinwoo is one of those characters that gives the viewer what they want. I’ve watched some shonen shows where I just want the main character to beat the ever living crap out of an enemy, and they instead become more of a pacifist or they show mercy. Cross Jinwoo and you’re done. And of course with this second season we also got a lot more of Cha Hae-In, who is everyone’s favorite character. Maybe not everyone’s, but she’s pretty cool. 

Jeju Island is not my favorite arc in the series, but it’s definitely up there. It’s also the point where the stakes start getting significantly higher, which always makes a story more exciting. I think this season was a great boon for webtoon adaptations as I’m confident it’s blown its competitors out of the water. As much as I love Tower of God, the anime adaptation was pretty underwhelming. I enjoyed seeing my favorite characters in action, but it didn’t get the treatment I would have liked. Not to mention that Tower of God takes some time to get going and only once we got into the workshop arc did things start getting more and more fun. Some fun stuff is coming up in that one too, so I hope it gets a third season. Just like I hope Solo Leveling gets a third season, but with how popular it is I don’t think we need to worry much about it. I did my part by buying the webtoon, which is translated all the way up to volume 11 now, so past what the anime covered. I’m looking forward to reading it again soon.

I wanted to write a quick little anime post since we’re about to dive into April which will be focused on autism and raising awareness for it. Did you know autism kind of sucks? Well, if you didn’t, keep an eye on this blog for the next couple of weeks and we’ll talk about some subjects that might not come up as often when talking about autism. Of course everything will be based on my own experiences, so keep that in mind. Many weebs are autistic, and perhaps I am finally going to write a post with my thoughts on that connection. But until then, thanks for reading!