Review of Hunter x Hunter
"When it comes to Chimera Ant I feel it's emblematic of the series as a whole. Togashi has a lot of great concepts but can falter heavily in the execution and can be a bit heavy handed at times in order to get his point across or, worse yet, introduces something interesting only to barely use it or blow it off. Before Chimera Ant arc I thought the series was okay and I didn't find myself questioning too much because they either explained it (at times over explained it) or I figured it'd eventually get fleshed out and, for the most part, that held true. Butthe Chimera Ant arc left me scratching my head so early on that I couldn't enjoy it.
Before I get into all the things I didn't like I'd like to point out the things I did. I really liked that Royals different ideas on what's best for the King. One taking an active role in trying to keep the King as is and one following orders and letting the King dictate what's best for him. I liked the Phantom Troupe getting a chance to showcase their abilities and, for the most part, they all had good fights. I loved Meruem's and Komugi's relationship (despite him stacking the deck sooooo hard to make you like Komugi) and the slow change for the King. Knuckle is AWESOME. Really liked Pitou too.
Wing, a teacher of nen and its techniques, explains that forcibly opening nen can be dangerous and if you have even the slightest bit of ill intent you can kill someone doing it. All the ants have theirs opened up in this fashion and none have any repercussions. This could be explained with their bodies being tougher or acting differently but that's just speculation on something that was defined earlier. They also are able to instantly control their nen which means opening and closing their nodes so they don't harm themselves.
The King is evil for the sake of being evil. It's not like the queen was especially cruel. I'd say this is a nature vs. nurture theme if the ants remained static but some ants are born bad, others are born neutral, some are shaped into being better people (the King himself). If this was a theme he was going for it's muddled by the characters action and growth (or lack thereof) so, I have to ask, why is the King evil to begin with?
It hurts the concept behind the nen system. The system is that there's classes you have an affinity for and you can spec into other classes but it won't be as strong as what you're naturally inclined into. It also says that Class A of equal strength could beat Class B of equal strength (there's a whole thing of attack and defense points) while Class A might lose to Class C under the same conditions. It makes it so that you might not really need to have more nen (in comparison to a Dragonball where your bigger number means victory most times). This makes it seem like the class system will be important but The King simply has more nen, the ants abilities aren't ever really counteracted, and the ants are inherently "stronger". It made me realize how little this actually comes into play.
Dark does not equal quality. I see too many times how much people applaud this arc because of how dark it gets. To me it detracted because it felt very try hard with the kid killing and brain eating. It never really hit that height again but I found myself kind of turned off by it. Not because of it being dark but because how hard it tried to establish itself as dark.
Too many awesome powers are barely showcased or dismissed quickly. Knuckle is the key offender here as he has an amazing and unique ability, he uses it in his fight against Gon, attatches it to Cheeto (who gets it removed by another ant somehow), and against one of the Royals. Kite has a 9 slot weapon, we see 3 slots (2 being bad draws) and never get to see the others. The ant that could borrow abilities for an hour showcases 2 (maybe 3) abilities and then dies in his first fight.
Why did the bird attack Komugi? That was so forced. Komugi is an established klutz, she could've banged into something and go bird seed in her hair, she could've opened the window and the birds nest be outside, something, ANYTHING.
That's the stuff I remember off the top of my head. To me this is when HxH started to become "worse One Piece" to me and from what I hear is going on in the manga that's looking to be the case more and more."
On top of that too often HxH gets praise for its subversive nature but subversion in and of itself is not a positive nor negative. Something that does something unexpected can surprise you and leave you entertained in a way you didn't think but there's just as much chance it disappoints as you don't get what you want. Beyond that, HxH is not subversive nor deconstructionist, so I don't know why it's believed to be such.