What Bakuman Teaches About Manga

Manga readers tend to have strong opinions about the works they consume, especially when they don't think the works' creators are doing a good enough job. They're entitled to those opinions, but they may not always understand the colossal amount of effort that goes into making a manga. Bakuman effectively helps shed light on the lives of manga artists, and shares some important lessons about how manga is made, lessons that also apply to many other types of professionally made works of fiction.

Making Manga is Hard Work

You might have seen the pie charts for how many hours manga artists work, and how desperately they struggle to complete their weekly chapters on deadline.

This is best shown when Mashiro's attempts to draw Detective Trap while still attending high school catch up to him, and he ends up being hospitalized. The editor in chief puts him on hiatus, and while the main characters and their friends aren't happy about this, it's preferable to being canceled. Mashiro eventually recovered, and was able to resume work on Detective Trap, but what happened after that will be covered in another section.

Compare this to amateur fanfic writers, who aren't bound by set schedules. Depending on their mood and their real life schedules, they may end up taking weeks or months to release their next chapters, if they don't end up giving up. Doing so is perfectly fair, since they can't make a living writing their fanfics, but the freedom they enjoy may make it difficult for them to appreciate how hard work it can be to draw manga for a living.

You Have To Write What People Want To Read

While many people cynically note that editors zero in on the lowest common denominator, follow current trends and pander to people's tastes, the reality is that making manga people want to read is a win-win situation. The manga artist gets their work published, the magazine sells more copies and more people get to read something they enjoy.

This is seen in the debate between the main characters' assistants, Moriya and Shiratori, about whether manga artists should aim for artistic quality or popularity. Moriya believes the former, Shiratori believes the latter and Mashiro resolves the dispute by saying that manga artists should strive to make great art, but should focus on popularity until they focus their skills enough to do so. Both Moriya and Shiratori have valid points in their argument, but in the end, Shiratori's first effort is deemed promising enough to get serialized with some revisions, while Moriya's gets rejected from two different magazines, taking the haughty assistant down a peg.

That said, you also need to avoid pandering to what your readers (or at least the vocal minority you hear from) want. Mashiro and Takagi end up making that mistake near the end of Detective Trap's serialization, and their pandering is obvious enough that even Miura notices. Miura then calls them out on it, saying that the fan mail writers only represent a small portion of the fanbase, and most people are there to read the story they had originally pitched to Jump.

The need to be popular may result in less creative ideas, and writers shying away from potentially controversial subject matter(unless by writing about controversial things, they end up drawing attention to themselves), but there's a question of practicality involved. Publishers are in a business to make a profit, and if they can't make money off of your work, there's no reason for them to invest in you.

You Have To Listen To Your Editor

I discussed this before in my post about Miura, but this bears repeating.

The main characters start out with Hattori, a fairly experienced editor, who sees their potential and helps make them into promising manga artists. After they get serialized, however, they end up with Miura, a less experienced colleague of Hattori's who is desperate to prove himself. Their relationship is workable at first, but they run into problems when he suggests that they make a gag manga, even when Takagi's skills aren't suited to it. They end up clashing with Miura, but realize that they'll have to be able to work with him if they want to succeed.

Going back to amateurs, some writers may employ beta readers to provide feedback on their work. The relationship between writer and beta reader varies from case to case, but most beta readers provide suggestions that the writer can ignore. At times, the writers are right to ignore those suggestions, but it's important to remember that the manga artist isn't the sole creative authority.

If You Aren't Popular, You'll Be Cancelled

Have you ever read a manga that suddenly shifted to a perfunctory and rushed conclusion just when it was getting good? Odds are it got cancelled.

Mashiro and Takagi end up suffering this fate after Mashiro is released from the hospital, largely because two competing manga with similar premises got serialized while Detective Trap was on hiatus. They're then left with three different routes for their four remaining chapters- write an ending that fits the story, experiment or use four of the chapters Mashiro made when he was in the hospital- but while they go with the the second choice, none of them are exactly the way they hoped to end the series.

Amateur writers generally only enjoy a fraction of the pros' popularity, and generally won't make any money, but that isn't a problem for them. The freedom they enjoy can often make for better stories, but at the same time, they don't always understand the pressure that pros who write for a living feel, knowing that their success or failure influences their livelihood.

You Can't Quit When You Want

As expressed above, manga is a highly competitive enterprise. You'll have to outdo many rivals in order to get your manga published, and consistently achieve high rankings to avoid being replaced by another up-and-comer. So with lots of people vying for their chance to get started, one would think you could easily step aside and quit, right?

Wrong. Popular manga are assets to the editors, and readers wouldn't like it if their favorite artists suddenly quit. Even worse, manga artists might be pressured to continue to milk a popular series for all it's worth, even if it would be better for the pacing and story to bring it to a swift end.

Mashiro and Takagi run afoul of this when they want to quit Tanto. When they approach the editor in chief, they're warned that if they do end up quitting, they will be unable to work for Jump ever again. It ultimately takes betting their right to work for Jump in order to get the editor in chief to let them quit Tanto, and the next six months are an especially hair-raising time for Mashiro and Takagi. In the end, it's worth it, since they're able to make Perfect Crime Party, their finest work yet, but it goes to show that it's not easy to just quit.

This rule ends up being a main motivation behind Eiji Nizuma's actions. At the start of the series, he asks for the right to cancel one manga of his choice if he gets to be the top manga artist in Jump, and at the time, most assumed that he would pick a series he didn't like. Surprisingly, the editor in chief agrees to honor this promise once Eiji reaches that level of popularity and realizes what it means to be a manga artist. Eiji succeeds... then announces that he wants to cancel his own series and go out on top. This is a rather exceptional case, one that could only be achieved by someone as talented and audacious as Eiji, and most professionals aren't nearly as fortunate.

Many amateur writers can quit whenever they want, and without any contract or expectation of profit, they have no obligation to continue. As a result, they're free to end their works whenever they want, whether bringing them to a natural conclusion, or walking away and never writing for them again, but once again, they should recognize and appreciate that freedom.

Conclusion

While many manga readers have legitimate criticisms of content producers, they can fail to appreciate the sheer amount of effort that goes into making a good manga, as well as how manga artists aren't always free to do what they want with their stories. Bakuman is an effective story of what is required to be a professional manga artist- skill, hard work, the willingness to make compromises and a certain amount of luck- so it's required reading for those who have an interest in learning more about manga.