Solo Leveling is a story that excels at delivering a protagonist that is “larger than life”. Sung Jinwoo is an absolute menace on the battlefield and the manhwa has given him several aura-farming moments to cement his place as the strongest and coldest hunter.
I wish I could say the same about the anime. I’ve always felt like the anime has been making Jinwoo weaker than the manhwa and the most recent episode has confirmed my doubts. Thought we wouldn’t notice, A-1? Well, I did.
How does Jinwoo stack up against his manhwa counterpart?
Sung Jinwoo is one of the strongest beings in the Solo Leveling universe. He is the GOAT and no one comes close to him in terms of aura. Whenever Jinwoo enters a battle, it ends up becoming a massacre.
I am, of course, referring to the manhwa. Manhwa Jinwoo seems like a presence that no one can overcome even if they train for centuries.
Jinwoo from the manhwa is an unstoppable force of nature that crushes his enemies brutally. He is confident in his abilities and doesn’t miss an opportunity to instill fear in his enemies.
The anime, however, seems to be undermining Jinwoo’s strength by making him weaker.
This can be seen in several instances, but the first time I noticed it was during Jinwoo’s battle with Cerberus, the guardian of the Demon Castle. Now before all the people start attacking me, yes, I know that in both the Solo Leveling manhwa and anime, Jinwoo is shown struggling.
But while in the manhwa he quickly gains the upper hand, the anime takes his struggle to extreme levels.
Also, in the anime, the Cerberus has something called a rage status. Its effects of skills are doubled in this state.
But Jinwoo attacks him and wins after the rage status finishes and its effects of skills has worn off. Even then he struggled. Goes to show how weak he is. https://t.co/Bd5YVKFP6L pic.twitter.com/0dwjzceWZ3
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In the anime, Sung Jinwoo loses his HP twice and has to rely on his healing to gain the upper hand. And even after he uses Kasaka’s venom, he is thrown around by Cerberus.
The monster tears into his body and nearly kills him, with Jinwoo surviving only due to his tenacity.
In the Solo Leveling manhwa, Jinwoo is so strong that he can lift the beast with his bare hands and toss it away. This beast-like strength isn’t shown in the anime, and this is where I started to notice the power gap.
My hunch was confirmed in Solo Leveling’s Season 2 Episode 12 titled “Are You the King of Humans?” where Jinwoo faces off against the Ant King.
While the animation was excellent, Jinwoo wasn’t. In the manhwa, Jinwoo is seen mutilating several ants before the Ant King arrives but in the anime, he does nothing as such. Even when it’s time to face the monster, he fails to match the manhwa Jinwoo’s power.
Jinwoo’s expressions in the anime seem to suggest that he is struggling against the ant, and at one time, he is about to be killed by the Ant King, only surviving because of pure luck.
I’m sorry but I wasn’t pleased with that move. Jinwoo doesn’t need luck. He is a force of nature that crushes his enemies. He doesn’t luck to intervene and grant him a new upgrade to gain the upper hand.
In the Solo Leveling manhwa, the upgrade is granted to him because of his dagger mastery, not because the system needed to save him from death.
Is the anime prioritizing the story over feats?
All this has made me wonder if the makers of Solo Leveling are doing this in an attempt to prioritize the story over raw power. Perhaps they are trying to portray Sung Jinwoo as an individual who grows by struggling.
This, no doubt, would add more character to Jinwoo, since in the manga, he is just too strong for a challenge.
But are the makers damaging Jinwoo’s image in an attempt to build a better character? Will this not make Jinwoo struggle even more in the future? As someone who has read the manhwa, I am no stranger to the power of the monarchs.
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They are dangerous individuals with power we can’t even comprehend. Will the Jinwoo from the anime be able to go against them with his strength? I do not think so.
At its heart, I feel like Solo Leveling is an action-oriented manhwa with an overpowered protagonist who seldom struggles, and that is the most exciting part about it. While wanting to build a good character is applaudable, perhaps all this anime needs is an MC who can take on any threat with ease.
Solo Leveling is available to stream on Crunchyroll.
This post belongs to FandomWire and first appeared on FandomWire
