Black Cloverhas reached a milestone few shōnen can claim. The series has never gotten a fair rap from the anime community. From its first issue, the deeply underappreciated shonen has been denigrated for being derivative, uninspired, and held up by its heavy use of familiar tropes.
However, ahead of its series finale,Black Cloveris finally getting recognition from anime fans writ large.Themanga has impressively broken intothe top five onShueisha’s MangaPlus platformafterits three-chapter comeback in Jump GIGA’s Autumn 2024 issue.To some extent, this rise in popularity is intuitive—but there’s more to the story than just that.
Black CloverHas Several Explanations Behind Its Success
There Are Many Ways To RationalizeBlack Clover’s Growth
There are two main explanations forBlack Clover’s success at the eleventh hour—or, more precisely, during its yet-unnamed eleventh arc. The first is generally true for any long-running franchise: manga readership tends to grow significantly during a final arc. The second is relevant toBlack Cloverspecifically: after years of a weekly release schedule,Black Cloverhas moved to a quarterly release under GIGA. Intuitively, 4 chapters per year are much easier to follow than 52.
Looking outsideBlack Clover, two motivations could easily drive more traffic toward the manga. On one hand, there’s Netflix’s release ofBlack Clover:Sword of the Wizard King, which presently holds a 100% onRotten Tomatoes. On the other hand, there’s the very simple motivation underlying the film’s success and hype: people are starved for more animatedBlack Clovercontent.Black Clover’s fifth season is taking forever, with no end in sight.
Black Clover is One of the Most Underrated Shonen Ever, & There’s Never Been a Better Time to Start It
Black Clover has never gotten its due, but new developments give anime fans the perfect opportunity to see Asta’s inspiring adventures.
In that situation, it’s only natural to start reading the manga instead, especially if it’s nearing its end. Anime adaptations are generally intended to advertise their source material, after all, especially if the franchise is nearing its end. However, all of these explanations risk undercutting the fact thatBlack Cloveris simply a good series, and only getting better. The last couple of years have seenBlack Clovercoming into its own as a series and obliterating the claims fans would make to argue that it doesn’t deserve special attention. The road to its finale has been wild.
Black Clover’s Success Was Long In The Making, And The Finale Is The Payoff
Black CloverHas Been Misunderstood For So Long, But It’s Getting The Last Laugh
From the very first issue,Black Cloverhas consistently caught comparisons to other series—most notably,Naruto.EvenBlack Cloverfans will grant this comparison. ButBlack Cloveris doing so well because it’s always had bigger ambitions than copying the stories, themes, and ideas of other shōnen. Now that it approaches its finale, those ambitions are starting to fully take shape, and it’s enthralling.
Black Clovernever really copiedNaruto, or any other shōnen for that matter. It was always an open love letter to shōnen as a genre, but it wasalsoalways in the business of building on and subverting ideas from other shōnen. When a character or scenario is compared to a more popular shonen,Black Cloveralways has a plan to do more with it—even if it’s not immediately apparent. Consider how Yami was considered a ripoff of Itachi and Kakashi for years, only for the manga to finally slap it back at those detractors by showingjust how different Yami is.
This isn’t a reach, either.Black Clover’s mangaka is fully aware that many only see it in terms of other “better” series, andhe laughs in the face of that factby writing it into the story itself. This chaotic joy at the heart ofBlack Clover’s storytelling has always been there, but as the story develops, it enables such unexpected twists and turns—which become all the more unexpected, by virtue of the fact they seem so familiar at first.
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NoNarutofan reasonably thought the Wizard King would deviate from the conceptual mold cast by the Hokage; at worst, they would suspect a few bad apples in power, just like there were (supposedly) only a few bad apples among the Hokage and Konoha’s high-ranking shinobi. ButBlack Cloverintentionally uses the Wizard King to undermine the very foundations of its setting,with far-reaching implications for the social fabric so far established.
With every twist, it becomes clear that for hundreds of chapters,Black Cloverhas been a mirage within a smokescreen only just starting to clear. Every page is a premeditated effort to write a story so faithful to its inspirations that it undermines them from within—a clever, but risky, approach. Where many series try (and often fail) to rewrite the book on shōnen storytelling,Black Cloverinstead recites it, mispronouncing and substituting words to make a point. Much of the fanbase is only just now starting to catch on.
The Trick All Along Was That It’s A Good Thing
This revelation of the fact thatBlack Cloverhad always intended to distort the tropes of its inspirations layers the wait for new chapters with suspense, anxiety, and impatience. Broadly speaking, moving to Jump GIGA during its final arc is the best decisionBlack Clovercould have made. With four months between releases, the battle choreography is now tighter, the dialogue is more considered, and the presentation is immaculate.
But then, sitting on top, there’s also the inherent toBlack Clover’s masterful game of subversion.Black Cloverwasamong the first to introduce many traits definitive of modern shonen,likeJujutsu KaisenandDemon Slayer,because ofits ability to regularly execute unexpected, highly creative ideas with total proficiency. The result is the most creative, hype-propelled shōnen to never be called either of those things by most anime lovers—includingBlack Cloverfans themselves.
This raw, chaotic creativity and deft execution permeates throughout the entire series. Not every twist or tweaked trope inBlack Cloveris great, but it’s very hard to think of one that isn’t at least good. This is why it’s important not to deflate the MangaPlus milestone by saying it’s becauseBlack Cloveris ending. It’s becauseBlack Cloverdeserves it.
Top 10 Strongest Magic Types in Black Clover, Ranked
Yami’s Dark Magic and Dante’s Gravity Magic are two of the strongest in all of Black Clover, but who’s magic takes the number one spot in the series?
Firstly,Black Clover’s anime-to-manga pipeline is incredibly good. Viewers were brought on board with the comfort of a battle shōnen that, while fun, seems a tad cliché. Then, with one clever innovation or tweak at a time, the whole feeling of comfort unravels. This thrilling quality is perfectly evident in the anime, and the suspense almost certainly makes for a high conversion rate from anime to manga.
Secondly, the aforementioned quality is what makes it so that, presently, the wait between new chapters is more excruciatingly seductive than ever. It’s no wonder that so many people are keyed into its finale. The present manga release schedule takes advantage of its beautiful deceptions with equally beautiful results.
Black Cloveris finally getting its day in the sun as it builds to its ending because it’s spent a very long time making itself a mystery.
LetYami’s unexpected transformationin Autumn 2024’s Jump GIGA be a final example, and get hyped. There’s a great chanceBlack Clover’s ending will be unexpected. That means there’s an even better chance it will be jaw-dropping.
Black Clover
Cast
Black Clover, released in 2017, follows orphans Asta and Yuno who aspire to become the Wizard King in a world where magic is paramount. Despite Asta’s lack of powers, their journey unfolds as they receive their grimoires and embark on individual paths towards their ultimate goal.
