Why Isekai?

[CharlesEBrown]

Well, yeah. Since those are western things, the term "Isekai" would never be used by them, and it would just be blanketed by the genre called "Fantasy" or whatever equivalent of it like transportation or scifi.

You know the origin of Japanese manga art and animation, right? The artists were trying to capture the look of Walt Disney's cartoons. As Westerners had (to the artists) huge eyes, so did their creations.
Isekai grew out of Portal Fantasy (though there are stories from Japanese lore - like the Kenkou, demon-like bird spirits who live in a world adjacent to ours and who trained an oppressed family to become the first Ninja clan - that are at least concurrent with the European fairy realm tales (not to be confused with their "cleaner" descendants, the Fairy Tale) the same way the art that a lot of isekai stories are told with did; mimicking (and, usually, improving upon, or, if not, adding cultural idiosyncrasies to it, making it feel new and unique) Western entertainment.

 

[Arkus86]

Also Isekai has been popular in japan for so long, it's only now that death becomes popular as a mode of transfer. The isekai of the old days always had the mc wanting to go back.

I think before Truck-kun, the staple isekai method was a hero summoning?

 

[Macha]

The death is the killing of their former self, the one that they dislike.

Why would you kill the part of you that is cringe? Kill the part of you that cringes.

 

[CharlesEBrown]

Most Isekai stories I've read would have been infinitely better if it was not an Isekai at all.

It's a rare gem when I come across one where the Isekai components are actually used or central to the story itself. Those tend to be rather interesting.

Now here I can agree - I've seen several that seem to forget the character had a life before their new one after about ten chapters.

One cool variant thing - so far I've only seen one audionovel that did this, is a character who can sometimes move between the two worlds. It can be kind of extreme, like Thomas Covenant, who only moves back when the story is over (and is a bit of an ass anyway), or like Sliders where the characters just keep on moving from world to world (or Quantum Leap through time instead of universes). There was one series that I'm blanking on the title that I saw the American version and haven't seen the original Japanese one where the MC bounced between the mundane world and the fantasy world at seemingly random intervals, which was kind of cool.
And then there was the short-lived TV series "Awake" in which a character falls asleep in a world where he's a psychiatrist who lost his daughter in a car accident, and wakes up in a nearly identical world where he is a police forensic scientist who lost his wife in that accident but still has an (estranged) daughter - that is kind of borderline Isekai (and I think, if it had been renewed, either they would have had to show a third world, or reveal that HE was the one who really died in the accident)

 

[Terrate]

I think before Truck-kun, the staple isekai method was a hero summoning?

That, and supernatural things happening like opening a book or being "spirited away" in a sense.

 

[ConansWitchBaby]

Personally, I think it's because any other options to force steer into the abnormal, from a modern-day life, might hit a bit too close to home for readers as a viable option to change. A small bit of humiliation saying, "yep. That easy to simply get up and stop being your sad pathetic self."

i.e. Just walk like a migrant toward another location. Literally that easy to start a new life. Ignore the technicalities because in the end it is that easy. Anything else is just an excuse and you want to suffer in your current circumstance.

Another one that might hit closer:
Plop down on the other side of town. Don't even need to do something as drastic as going to bumfuck nowhere. Put a bit of distance and stop interacting with all the bad circumstances permanently. Work on yourself (usually through supernatural means here) without the previous burdens.

You see how death is far more clear-cut without sounding directly demeaning to readers doing it for "the escape"?

 

[PancakesWitch]

This! This is my point. "Is it important? No."

NOT FOR THE STORY!!!! Isekai because it is an Isekai, is Bad. The prologue in-and-of-itself is bad. SKIP it.
No death. no transfer. no mentioning the irl world beforehand. Take the story where the story STARTS in "the new world", and just HAVE it. Have the story. No isekai needed, and it's still a story.

The word Isekai as a Genre is dumb, and pointless.

No, I mean, it's not important for the genre, every story is different and maybe dying is important to impart some kind of meaning...
Like I told you before, death is not important for the genre, but it can be important in a story where the main character dies bitterly and then is reborn and has a better life... death has a meaning to show how he ruined his first life and reincarnation is what comes right after.
It could also be done to show the fragility of human beings and how we think our life will never end, and when death finally comes, we realize the fragility of our existences and reincarnation becomes this beautiful hope, a dream come true.
To be honest, arguing with you is like talking to a wall, you clearly dont want to listen to people, you just want to rant about it.

 

[Elmir_Arch-Ham_of_Omega]

Isekai fatigue is nothing new. Many turned to anime because everyone got tired of American scientists who gained powers after dramatically holding up a test tube. Many have rolled their eyes at the idea of some village boy picking up a radioactive rock or when a dying elder bequeathes him a magic sword. Many newer magical girl writers are probably writing just to spite the idea of the heroine gaining powers after saving a dying talking cat.

Even edgy deconstructionist stories have ironically fatigued viewers, because you know what? It's existed before.
It was called Noir.

MHA? I say X-Men.
Thrown into an alien world? Wizard of Oz.
Reincarnator bringing modern tech? A Conneticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court.
Guess this puzzle or die? Turandot.
Made a robot and now you want to bang her? Pygmalion.
Pretending to be nice, but is an asshole at the core? Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (no, it was NEVER a split personality story)
Thrown into an unfamiliar future? Rip Van Winkle.

It's just part of the never-ending cycle of novelty-fad-veneration.

 

[DireBadger]

I killed my MC, but that's because I was literally trying to break the trope. He lived a long life, several wives, a lot of kids, grandkids, and great grandkids, and then he was 'reborn' and lived a couple of thousand years as a 'spirit wolf'.

I wasn't exactly mocking the genre, but I was rebuilding it to 'murican' entertainment standards. We don't have a long 'honorable suicide' culture.

Reading any book is escapism, or dissociation, or feeling a sense of freedom. But that's also the story part.
Why is the death necessary?

because when the protagonist is dead, he can be reborn with a giant ****.

it's either that or he get 'captain america' treatment.

 

[AliceMoonvale]

Why would you kill the part of you that is cringe? Kill the part of you that cringes.

Amen.
I embrace the cringe and proceed to write decent cringe.
Keep the cycle going, I say!

 

[CinnaSloth]

Personally, I think it's because any other options to force steer into the abnormal, from a modern-day life, might hit a bit too close to home for readers as a viable option to change. A small bit of humiliation saying, "yep. That easy to simply get up and stop being your sad pathetic self."

i.e. Just walk like a migrant toward another location. Literally that easy to start a new life. Ignore the technicalities because in the end it is that easy. Anything else is just an excuse and you want to suffer in your current circumstance.

Another one that might hit closer:
Plop down on the other side of town. Don't even need to do something as drastic as going to bumfuck nowhere. Put a bit of distance and stop interacting with all the bad circumstances permanently. Work on yourself (usually through supernatural means here) without the previous burdens.

You see how death is far more clear-cut without sounding directly demeaning to readers doing it for "the escape"?

You could.. as the author.. NOT put them in sad, desperate situations to begin with if you didn't want them there.
Unless it's completely, undeniably integral that they learn something that will absolutely be needed in some way, and CAN'T be taught literally in any other way, (which I bet I could find a multitude of other ways.) I don't see the point.

No, I mean, it's not important for the genre, every story is different and maybe dying is important to impart some kind of meaning...
Like I told you before, death is not important for the genre, but it can be important in a story where the main character dies bitterly and then is reborn and has a better life... death has a meaning to show how he ruined his first life and reincarnation is what comes right after.
It could also be done to show the fragility of human beings and how we think our life will never end, and when death finally comes, we realize the fragility of our existences and reincarnation becomes this beautiful hope, a dream come true.
To be honest, arguing with you is like talking to a wall, you clearly dont want to listen to people, you just want to rant about it.

No, actually I do agree with you. I do see the good points in the discussions.
This:
"to show the fragility of human beings and how we think our life will never end, and when death finally comes, we realize the fragility of our existences and reincarnation becomes this beautiful hope, a dream come true."
That's a good reason. If written well. I do listen. It's a beautiful reason to write about death.

My rebuttal to it though, would be:
Having the MC have a friend throughout a few chapters, 10.. 15.. 100 chapters, whatever number. and writing that characters death will still have that same impact of "fragility.", people are "fragile." People CAN die. Same thing.

Just because you have no concrete solution to explain 'why any story would be better WITHOUT an isekai', doesn't mean I'm a brick wall. It just means you have a limited imagination.. Isekai can mean a lot of things when it comes to story, and have a diverse list of characters, and sceneries. The death at the beginning, you so proudly claim to hold dear, can be shown in many other ways WITHOUT being transferred to another world chapter one.

Your turn.

I killed my MC, but that's because I was literally trying to break the trope. He lived a long life, several wives, a lot of kids, grandkids, and great grandkids, and then he was 'reborn' and lived a couple of thousand years as a 'spirit wolf'.

Ayo? That's something new. (Especially to this discussion thread.)
Why didn't you just start off with the story about the wolf spirit?
What was so important to show them as an old person prior? (Not to ask you to spoil the story also which of the four would that title be?)

Isekai fatigue is nothing new. Many turned to anime because everyone got tired of American scientists who gained powers after dramatically holding up a test tube. Many have rolled their eyes at the idea of some village boy picking up a radioactive rock or when a dying elder bequeathes him a magic sword. Many newer magical girl writers are probably writing just to spite the idea of the heroine gaining powers after saving a dying talking cat.

Even edgy deconstructionist stories have ironically fatigued viewers, because you know what? It's existed before.
It was called Noir.

MHA? I say X-Men.
Thrown into an alien world? Wizard of Oz.
Reincarnator bringing modern tech? A Conneticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court.
Guess this puzzle or die? Turandot.
Made a robot and now you want to bang her? Pygmalion.
Pretending to be nice, but is an asshole at the core? Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (no, it was NEVER a split personality story)
Thrown into an unfamiliar future? Rip Van Winkle.

It's just part of the never-ending cycle of novelty-fad-veneration.

but I'm not fatigued.
I want to discuss why have the isekai at all. (The actual PHYSICAL jump from one realm to another, by death, warp, transmutation circle, magical school bus, or whatever reason.) Why isekai?
Isekai is the butt end of literally any other genre. the only thing that makes an isekai an isekai is literally: "i went to another world because (typically) i died." Why the extra steps to write something else?

 

[ConansWitchBaby]

I see now. You don't know how to read. One thing was written down and then you went on a tangent because of the examples instead of the argument.

 

[Cipiteca396]

As much as I like this reply, I do think it's a nonsense answer, no disrespect to you, or the thought process.
Take Mulan for instance, the animation, not the god awful live action, where females are meant to shut up in their era, and simply be the mother figure in the back ground, serving their husband, or taking care of the family. Mulan had a different mindset, and different way of thinking without having to die, and without having to be sent into a new world, (although one could say jumping into the world of man, The Chinese Army, would be similarity of a new world..) Like I said, you can start a character with any mindset, or a different personality than any other character. Dropping that entire reason on, "Because they're from modern era earth" is lazy writing.
Sorry to say, you didn't change my mind.

It's funny that you called it nonsense here when you complemented someone else who gave the exact same answer later. This is definitely the brick wall thing. It's a good thing I'm not actually interested in changing your mind. You should probably just stop obsessing over this.

Why the extra steps to write something else?

But to give the most barebones attempt to answer your actual question (not, "Why Isekai?" but "why start a story with dying?")... People like death-type isekai for the same reason they like religion.

You. Are. Going. To. Die.

That's all there is to it. Only isekai can offer an escape to this inevitable fact. It's not that they want to glory in death, it's that they want an alternative to death.

 

[CharlesEBrown]

Pretending to be nice, but is an asshole at the core? Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (no, it was NEVER a split personality story)

Horror fiction people tend to consider it a "werewolf" (or "beast within") story - fun fact, that story was one of the primary inspirations for The Incredible Hulk in Marvel Comics, allegedly - Stan Lee said "Let's do a monster, like a werewolf but made by science, and he's the good guy but maybe childlike?" and Kirby did it, citing "The Mysterious Case of Dr. Henry Jekyll and Mister Edward Hyde" as his main inspiration.

As much as I like this reply, I do think it's a nonsense answer, no disrespect to you, or the thought process.
Take Mulan for instance, the animation, not the god awful live action, where females are meant to shut up in their era, and simply be the mother figure in the back ground, serving their husband, or taking care of the family. Mulan had a different mindset, and different way of thinking without having to die, and without having to be sent into a new world, (although one could say jumping into the world of man, The Chinese Army, would be similarity of a new world..) Like I said, you can start a character with any mindset, or a different personality than any other character. Dropping that entire reason on, "Because they're from modern era earth" is lazy writing.
Sorry to say, you didn't change my mind.

Mulan was inspired by an allegedly real person. If the story is true (there are some indications it is not), there really was a woman who took her father's place as a recruit in a Chinese army during one of the earlier dynasties. But her commanding officer figured it out pretty quickly, helped her maintain the deception, and possibly even married her after the war ended (like a lot of folklore or legends there are multiple versions - part of why it might NOT have happened but a lot of the details actually fit historical events).

But why have the "Real world to Isekai world" to begin with, why not START in the new fantasy world?

To give the reader a point of reference and give an excuse for exposition in describing the world without having to stop the action for a few paragraphs - the character observes differences between their original world and this new one, and that can take a LOT less time than writing several pages describing the world, yet cover the same ground.

But why not start there, instead of romanticizing suicide? Are they advocating for suicide? Why not dissociate by living through the character beginning with the new fresh area which the entire story settles into after death?


Yes, which is why we pick up a book or read to begin with, for the escape, for the entertainment, to live in a new fantasy for a few minutes whether we hate our live or not. Why do we need the death at the beginning, when you're literally telling a great story immediately after, why not just start with the story? The point that makes an isekai an isekai is THE isekai. The dumb part. You're already telling a story; Skip the prologue of death, and it's still a story. Why not start there?

Why do we need ANY stories? We can just make up anything anyway.
For my story Strange Awakening, the death was an important event because it happened simultaneously on two worlds and a supernatural being was tasked with saving one of them, giving the ultimate decision to the one who would have died last chronologically (by about 19 milliseconds), starting the initial story. Note that I had planned out the death being part of the story - nor even how the rest of the events would pan out; the entire story was written as a challenge, something like: "Have a character wake up to a situation that is not the life they knew."
After I wrote it, I started wondering what caused this change, and the idea of the parallel deaths came into the equation.

 

[Terrate]

I see now. You don't know how to read. One thing was written down and then you went on a tangent because of the examples instead of the argument.

Lmao yeah. At this point, it's just trolling. This thread is close to being a ragebait post since it has been answered already.

 

[Golden_Hyde]

Anyways, if we're here really want to be critical about Isekai, then my proposal to it is to NOT tailor the worldbuilding just for the protagonist. We all have seen how a potentially good world turned into shit just because the protagonist is... "good". And certainly don't overly rely on cheap power fantasy trope where the world allows the protagonist to amass a stupid amount of power... and pussies.

 

[Elmir_Arch-Ham_of_Omega]

One should be thankful it's "person from our world into fantasyland" especially if one is complaining about the bad writing. Can you imagine how even more grating it would even be if instead of having a relatable, understandable guy like Ted Jones from Kentucky we need to slog through "Darkness Kiryu Carlton (based on author's real name but let's just ignore that) Xiaxianglion" as the OC and read through character's extreme angsty chuunibyou phonebook of a backstory?

I'll stick with Ted Jones who tripped and hit his head on a quarter that was stuck on the crack of the road, thank you.

 

[CharlesEBrown]

Some of the earliest stories I know of that could be considered Isekai I am kicking myself for not recalling:

The Herald Shea stories (started in 1940 with additional stories added sporadically until 2005 and a complete collection, in two volumes, came out in 2007 - The Mathematics of Magic: The Enchanter Stories of L. Sprague de Camp and Fletcher Pratt) - a group of academics find ways to shuffle off to various fantasy and mythological worlds. A group of authors, led by L. Sprague DeKamp were responsible for these, mostly short stories. Some fun, some tedious, but nobody has to die to travel, they just "find a way."

Silverlock (John Myers Myers, 1949 - with a second book, The Moon's Fire-Eating Daughter, released in 1981, though this is the first time I ever heard of it)- a man is in a shipwreck and awakens to find himself on the Commonwealth (of Fiction) - a massive continent that is home to some myths, some legends, and a lot of fictional worlds (in the Public Domain at the time - many of them no longer familiar to readers, sadly). Whether he died or not is left ambiguous IIRC.

The John Carter stories (1912-1948, Edgar Rice Burroughs and his son) - he has a near-death experience and wakes up on Barsoom (Mars). He keeps getting drawn back to Earth as each adventure resolves, and finds new ways to trigger his transference, but stays there longer and longer, with his body on Earth in a cataleptic state.

 

[Cipiteca396]

Some of the earliest stories I know of that could be considered Isekai I am kicking myself for not recalling:

Dante's Inferno-

 

[PancakesWitch]

You could.. as the author.. NOT put them in sad, desperate situations to begin with if you didn't want them there.
Unless it's completely, undeniably integral that they learn something that will absolutely be needed in some way, and CAN'T be taught literally in any other way, (which I bet I could find a multitude of other ways.) I don't see the point.


No, actually I do agree with you. I do see the good points in the discussions.
This:
"to show the fragility of human beings and how we think our life will never end, and when death finally comes, we realize the fragility of our existences and reincarnation becomes this beautiful hope, a dream come true."
That's a good reason. If written well. I do listen. It's a beautiful reason to write about death.

My rebuttal to it though, would be:
Having the MC have a friend throughout a few chapters, 10.. 15.. 100 chapters, whatever number. and writing that characters death will still have that same impact of "fragility.", people are "fragile." People CAN die. Same thing.

Just because you have no concrete solution to explain 'why any story would be better WITHOUT an isekai', doesn't mean I'm a brick wall. It just means you have a limited imagination.. Isekai can mean a lot of things when it comes to story, and have a diverse list of characters, and sceneries. The death at the beginning, you so proudly claim to hold dear, can be shown in many other ways WITHOUT being transferred to another world chapter one.

Your turn.


Ayo? That's something new. (Especially to this discussion thread.)
Why didn't you just start off with the story about the wolf spirit?
What was so important to show them as an old person prior? (Not to ask you to spoil the story also which of the four would that title be?)


but I'm not fatigued.
I want to discuss why have the isekai at all. (The actual PHYSICAL jump from one realm to another, by death, warp, transmutation circle, magical school bus, or whatever reason.) Why isekai?
Isekai is the butt end of literally any other genre. the only thing that makes an isekai an isekai is literally: "i went to another world because (typically) i died." Why the extra steps to write something else?

Bro really said "your turn" like he thinks he's the Riddler messing with Batman
Nah man, I'm not going to play with you, go do something more productive than rant pointlessly with strangers