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THE MANGA FUTURE TRUNKS ARC!!

Were Trunks can't do jackshit but Goku learns God of Destruction exclusive techniques off screen.

Yeah no.

You're acting as if he was completely useless. They give him other abilities in the manga so that he's still able to help out instead of just giving a transformation that puts him on par with Goku.

The Dragonball Super anime is pretty awful at this. You have a character who is as strong as Goku just by fighting poachers. A character who was relegated to a house wife be stronger than Goku. Krillin who quit training and become a cop and got injured pretty easily whole he was doing job strong enough to make Goku go blue. You have Roshi be just as strong because he was secretly training lol. And the other Saiyan from the other universe. It's ok if you like this, I'm not a fan and prefer the manga over the anime. Super as a whole is pretty weak tho, I just can't help watching it because it's DB lol

 

[Ordinaryundone]

HxH is my favorite Shonen in terms of fights for this very reason. With the exception of the Chimera Ant royalty (who are intentionally OP), everyone is susceptible to good planning.

One Piece has power creep, but they establish just about everything early enough that it doesn't feel like an ass-pull. The Straw Hats, including Luffy, start off as really small fish in a really great ocean, and they hit a wall pretty early on when they face the five powers users, Logia-type Devil Fruits, Haki users, and Kuma...and they only get marginally stronger, winning most of those fights by luck. Luffy spends most of the Marineford arc getting knocked unconscious, because even the scrub Navy guys can use Shave, and he still can't touch anyone with a Logia power at that point.

This is something I like about One Piece. It's not that the top tier guys are necessarily super strong (though they almost always are), it's that just having the skills and abilities necessary to even approach them and fight them on even ground is absurdly rare. Of course, it helps that One Piece approaches it in such a silly and charming manner. It could easily be done badly, like Naraku and his never-ending progression of slightly stronger barriers in Inuyasha.

Jojo does a good job of this too. Power levels are all over the place and a Stand that is good in a direct fight might be useless against another Stand if you can't actually find a way to directly fight them. Jotaro being the big example, Star Platinum is easily one of, if not THE most powerful one on one Stand from nearly the very beginning of the story but so few of his opponents actually want to fist fight the guy so he often has to find more creative, and less efficient, answers.

My personal favorite example of power creep are Gundams, they went from being "normal mechs made of a special metal that makes them faster and tougher than average" to space-time bending WMDs piloted by psychics.

 

[LeleSocho]

.

 

[BrutishMrFish]

Did they have anything that was super common besides metal bending in LoK? I did like it a lot less than The Last Airbender so I didn't rewatch as much. I didn't remember rare abilities making a big comeback and were common among people

Lightning bending was common enough that Mako and a bunch of other people were employed to use it to generate power for only a bit of cash in return at the start of season 1. It was supposed to be really difficult to master, and there was no explanation as to how it became so widespread (at least not that I can remember).

Metal bending being so common was at least supported by the story. Toph trained a bunch of people and those people went on to train others.

 

[NastyBook]

What even is this? Don't remember it from the series.

 

[Gamer @ Heart]

Hobbs in Fast and Furious.

He was once just an elite cop man and now he can toss people around like theyre hot potatoes and redirect torpedoes with his bare hands

Hobbs???

Ludacris went from a street racer selling stolen merch to a world class super hacker over the course of 2-6

 

[TheSaddestSort]

Hmm about the only shounen anime/manga I can name off the top of my head where I felt like it didn't have crazy protagonist power creep by the end was Fullmetal Alchemist. Felt like everyone had very specific strengths that were leveraged in understandable ways in that series.

 

[Ordinaryundone]

Hobbs???

Ludacris went from a street racer selling stolen merch to a world class super hacker over the course of 2-6

You might say the premise is....ludicrous.

 

[Trojita]

I'm more interested in seeing when power levels go right in media. Writers especially in manga tend to write themselves into a corner by trying to make their characters more impressive. It reaches a point where it becomes a parody of itself unless the property didn't have a serious tone to begin with

Pretty much just My Hero Academia.

 

[Chococat]

Jojo's does it right. Sure there are characters with insane power sets. But the key to beating bad guys most of the time is outwitting the foe.

Dragonball Z and beyond is terrible cause it is nothing but a powers numbers game. There is no skill, just level, level, level.

 

[StoneFox]

I'm more interested in seeing when power levels go right in media. Writers especially in manga tend to write themselves into a corner by trying to make their characters more impressive. It reaches a point where it becomes a parody of itself unless the property didn't have a serious tone to begin with

You have to do something like Jojo's Bizarre Adventure where characters are direct counters to each other rather than who is physically stronger. Josuke's power of repairing broken objects is a direct counter to Kira's explosive destruction

Spoiler

and to an extent, Bites the Dust

. Kars was the ultimate being but lost to Joseph's unpredictability in a fight.

Hell, Dio and Jotaro was basically a mirror match even though Dio had the advantage and seemingly forgot he had ice powers and eye lasers.

Outside of a few cases, there is a power ceiling with every character which makes the fights interesting and avoids the creep.

 

[Sibersk Esto]

I'm more interested in seeing when power levels go right in media. Writers especially in manga tend to write themselves into a corner by trying to make their characters more impressive. It reaches a point where it becomes a parody of itself unless the property didn't have a serious tone to begin with

Jojo and One Piece do alright.

 

[Ordinaryundone]

Hell, Dio and Jotaro was basically a mirror match even though Dio had the advantage and seemingly forgot he had ice powers and eye lasers.

They weren't really "powers", they were just the result of Vampires having unparalleled control over their own body, to the point that they can lower their own body temperature enough to freeze things or shoot body fluids out with enough pressure to be lasers. Dio's body isn't, well, Dio's actual body in Part 3 and he spent like a hundred years basically dead in the ocean, so he doesn't have the same level of control he had in Part 1.

Besides Stands (especially The World) are so much more effective than anything he could do with Vampire powers. I can see why he wouldn't bother with them once he discovered his Stand.

 

[HStallion]

Jojo and One Piece do alright.

Hunter X Hunter is probably the best of them all. Characters that are really powerful at the start of the series like Hisoka are still really powerful as the series goes on and other characters and such are introduced. When power creep does happen but when it does its pretty much the focus of the story and makes things all the better as our characters can't just overcome it with training or the power of friendship or what not.

 

[BlackJace]

Naruto didn't even feel like Ninja combat by the end. Dudes dropping meteors out of the sky and spontaneously combusting atoms was too much yo.

Planetary Devastation, never forget.

 

[Fj0823]

You're acting as if he was completely useless. They give him other abilities in the manga so that he's still able to help out instead of just giving a transformation that puts him on par with Goku.

The Dragonball Super anime is pretty awful at this. You have a character who is as strong as Goku just by fighting poachers. A character who was relegated to a house wife be stronger than Goku. Krillin who quit training and become a cop and got injured pretty easily whole he was doing job strong enough to make Goku go blue. You have Roshi be just as strong because he was secretly training lol. And the other Saiyan from the other universe. It's ok if you like this, I'm not a fan and prefer the manga over the anime. Super as a whole is pretty weak tho, I just can't help watching it because it's DB lol

Oh yeah, that awesome and memorable ability of subconciously healing the heroes while cheerleading...vs...

Spoiler

Also You really need to pay attention to dialogue in that series...

None of those characters is as strong as Goku, he was just putting them to the test. They all outright say it. 17 just happened to exceed Goku's expectations.

The ONLY character he went full power against was Gohan because he demanded nothing less. And you saw how that ended.

Dragon Ball is full of Power Creep, but those examples are just wrong.

Goten and Trunks or Kale are good examples

 

[Black-Wind]

I'm more interested in seeing when power levels go right in media. Writers especially in manga tend to write themselves into a corner by trying to make their characters more impressive. It reaches a point where it becomes a parody of itself unless the property didn't have a serious tone to begin with

Someone should make that a thread.

Only thing that comes to mind is JoJo. Also HxH.

Anyway, power creep happens as the result of bad or lack of creative writing for making conflicts. Could be due to burn out ... I feel like that's what happened to Naruto. At first we had all kinda fun, interesting skills and in the end that was all tossed aside for giant monsters popping DBZ blast at each other.

As for DBS, I think they're trying to right the ship on this by doing away with power levels and making the current arc more about techniques and pacing than just raw power. They're also allowing characters to get ass pull power ups to match the strongest of the strong for no reason as long as there's a need to (Trunks SSJ Rage) so I wouldn't be shocked if power creep loops back around and ultimately fixes things by making everyone strong enough to have their own personal skills be useful in a big fight.

 

[Sibersk Esto]

I think what I'm noticing is that a story does alright with power creep if it establishes a ceiling early on, sticks to it, and finds a way to work around it.

Hyping up every new thing as the biggest threat ever, then beating them so that a new biggest threat ever emerges is asking for trouble.

 

[Astral]

Byakuya couldn't even follow Ichigo's movements when he first used his Bankai, and then he got completely destroyed when Ichigo hollowified. He was only winning the fight because Ichigo burned through his power so fast.

Fast forward one arc, Ichigo with mastered Hollow Mask can't even lay a finger on the #4 Espada, but fucking Hitsugaya has no problem going blow for blow with #3 Halibel even after her transformation. Then Byakuya embarrasses the #7 Espada in speed, Kenpachi crushes #5 with brute strength (despite being previously overpowered by pre-Bankai Ichigo), and then Byakuya/Kenpachi combo effortlessly defeat Espada #0. None of this makes sense.

Geez Bleach was so bad after SS. Ichigo 's Bankai nerf was one of the most obnoxious things about it. It goes from granting him tremendous speed to just being a plain old sword because everyone one arc later can catch up to him anyway.

 

[Fulminator]

This is also why the concept of Stands in JoJo are so clever, Araki can get be as creative as he wants and it means beating somebody doesn't always rely on brute strength.

Yeah Stands are also a really good one that don't suffer from too much power creep

Although there some absurdly powerful stands in the final battles of each part lol

Byakuya couldn't even follow Ichigo's movements when he first used his Bankai, and then he got completely destroyed when Ichigo hollowified. He was only winning the fight because Ichigo burned through his power so fast.

Fast forward one arc, Ichigo with mastered Hollow Mask can't even lay a finger on the #4 Espada, but fucking Hitsugaya has no problem going blow for blow with #3 Halibel even after her transformation. Then Byakuya embarrasses the #7 Espada in speed, Kenpachi crushes #5 with brute strength (despite being previously overpowered by pre-Bankai Ichigo), and then Byakuya/Kenpachi combo effortlessly defeat Espada #0. None of this makes sense.

Ok yeah you right, it's incredibly inconsistent

I mean... Blue is described by Goku himself as a Super Saiyan with the power of a Super Saiyan God. Future Trunks arc also makes it clear that Blue is a godly power. It almost seems like the longer the Super series goes on, the weaker Blue is. It feels less like Goku and Vegeta are getting stronger, and more like they are regressing so everyone else can keep up.

Nen is kind of a confusing system though. Again it kind of just boils down to "this character needed to win so he will" like Gon's major fight that ends up with huge consequences. You know the one I'm talking about. In theory what you say about nen allowing a weaker character to beat a stronger one is true, but we don't see it that often. Netero's last major fight is a perfect example of this. It just boiled down to him using as much raw power as he could against an opponent that did the same thing. Even the most dangerous antagonist is dangerous not because he uses one power creatively, but because he can literally have all the powers he wants!

Also I disagree on Goku not being a god. What the fuck HASN'T he beaten at this point? The man has literally beaten death. He's been so strong that the powers that be decided that he gets to live. He's a middle aged man who looks even more jacked than he did in his youth and who is literally out here fighting Gods at this point. Dragon Ball was never that serious to begin with, so at this point it's enjoyable as a tongue in cheek parody of itself and the trends it popularized.

There was one HxH arc where characters intentionally have overwhelming nen, but the rest of the battles in the series are all usually more about planning and strategy than raw power

Nen being complicated is also why it works well, battles have to be more thought out rather than brute Force like Dragon Ball


Also regarding the Goku thing, I was just arguing semantics. There is no doubt he has the power of a god, the series has driven that home multiple times. I was just saying he is not the epitome of a god. There are many godly beings with more power than him, that are also actually Gods and not just a mortal with the power of a god.

 

[ag-my001]

The differences in the power state of Earth in Stargate SG1 in just a few years always bothered me.

The time frame was a bit short, but some of that can be hand waved by it being given by friendly advanced species. They threw in some reasonable points, like the international community being upset and wanting a bigger seat at the table and the Russians having their own side projects.

Draw it out over 15 years instead of 5 and things don't seen that far fetched.

 

[Slayven]

What even is this? Don't remember it from the series.

Zecter mizer, only used for 2 scenes to sell the toy

 

[pbayne]

Guren and Lancelot in an eternal game of one-upmanship every other episode.

Though personally when it comes to R2 nonsense I'm partial to "my geass allows me to SEE THE FUTURE", which still can't trump being commanded to LIVE.

lol that was dumb wasnt it. Spinzaku and red haired girl have one of the worst rivalries in mecha



EDIT; OH another one. Hajime no Ippo gets so ridiculous later on in the manga(its already pretty ludicrous to begin with). Like guys literally doing flash steps and moving so quick they cant be followed by the human eye.

 

[Laiza]

Did they have anything that was super common besides metal bending in LoK? I did like it a lot less than The Last Airbender so I didn't rewatch as much. I didn't remember rare abilities making a big comeback and were common among people

Yeah, none of those abillities were commonplace except for metal bending, and metal bending being more common makes sense as it's just an extension of earth bending with Toph being the origin point for its dissemination.

The blood bender is a freak of nature, a guy with a prodigal level of water bending ability, and the only one who can match him is the Avatar herself.

There are only two lava benders, and one of them is the brother of a fire bender, so it makes sense that he has a foot in both pools, so to speak.

Lightning bending isn't exactly shown to be common - you don't need hundreds of lightning benders to power a generator, and among a population of thousands there are bound to be a decent number who are skilled enough to do it. Oddly enough, outside of the power station Mako is the only one shown on-screen using lightning bending in combat.

I'd say LoK is one of the mildest cases of power creep you'll ever see in that sort of series. It's more a logical extension of everything that came before, rather than something that invalidated everything past.

 

[SigmasonicX]

Lightning bending isn't exactly shown to be common - you don't need hundreds of lightning benders to power a generator, and among a population of thousands there are bound to be a decent number who are skilled enough to do it. Oddly enough, outside of the power station Mako is the only one shown on-screen using lightning bending in combat.

There was also that one Triad guy.

Anyway, the way I understood it is that lightning bending was a secret art taught only to the royal family. Once knowledge of it spread, it was discovered that a fair number of commoners had the potential to learn it too, and once it was discovered they could power generators, there was a stronger incentive to learn it.

An amusing example of power creep actually comes from My Little Pony, which straight up had a DBZ battle in the season 4 finale. They largely got things under control after that point, though.

 

[LiveFromKyoto]

So wait...is this thread trying to suggest that Superman shouldn't have telepathic mind control?

 

[Septimus Prime]

McNulty goes from not being able to finish reports on time to bring able to conjure up a fake serial killer to outwit a press sneak fuck in five seasons.

 

[HStallion]

McNulty goes from not being able to finish reports on time to bring able to conjure up a fake serial killer to outwit a press sneak fuck in five seasons.

McNulty's whole thing is he had to be the smartest man in the room and right about everything no matter how far fetched or hard to prove it would be. He was like that in season 1 and that entire attitude and drive to prove it was often what got him into trouble even if he ended up helping solve a case.

 

[captainpat]

Nothing in manga will ever reach the stupidity Marvel and DC have pumping out.

 

[Subpar Spatula]

In Avatar: The Last Airbender there were a bunch of really rare abilities, like Metalbending, Bloodbending, Lavabending, and Lightning generation. Only a select number of history's best benders of in their field were able to use, let alone master these abilities. Skip ahead to Legend of Korra, where not only every technique is present in the present, but also common enough to have multiple people alive at the same time who have completely mastered them. It immediately made LoK feel cheaper and lazier, but I suppose that was just par for the course.

This is not a power creep. That's just more people training in specialize bending. The mechs power creeped

Yu Yu is a bad example. It intoduces bad guys continuously who are much stronger so the playing field was never even.

Darker Than Black did it well.

 

[Aexact]

In Avatar: The Last Airbender there were a bunch of really rare abilities, like Metalbending, Bloodbending, Lavabending, and Lightning generation. Only a select number of history's best benders of in their field were able to use, let alone master these abilities. Skip ahead to Legend of Korra, where not only every technique is present in the present, but also common enough to have multiple people alive at the same time who have completely mastered them. It immediately made LoK feel cheaper and lazier, but I suppose that was just par for the course.

Eh I think it's reasonable that with the 1000 year advancement of time, tech and communication, skills that were once rare will proliferate in the world. Feels in line with the industrial era vibe of Korra.

 

[acheron_xl]

Power creep is one of the many things that ruined Heroes.

 

[Septimus Prime]

Frank Underwood is a huge creep with lots of power.

McNulty's whole thing is he had to be the smartest man in the room and right about everything no matter how far fetched or hard to prove it would be. He was like that in season 1 and that entire attitude and drive to prove it was often what got him into trouble even if he ended up helping solve a case.

It also had a lot to do with Rawls no longer giving a shit about him, which allowed him to do whatever he wanted.

Eh I think it's reasonable that with the 1000 year advancement of time, tech and communication, skills that were once rare will proliferate in the world. Feels in line with the industrial era vibe of Korra.

It was only about 70 years, but I agree.

 

[kunonabi]

I'm not sure if it fits the standard definition of power creep but Lana Lang on Smallville was ridiculous by the time they finally got rid of her.

Martial Arts skills on par or greater than Green Arrow
As devious, clever, and ruthless as the Luthors
Computer genius on par or greater than Chloe, the resident tech wiz.
Super strength and speed on par with Clark prior to his finale power-up with no Kryptonite weakness
Apparently the most beautiful woman on the planet

She makes almost everyone obsolete by her very presence. Rey from the TFA has the same problem which is one of the main things that turned me off the movie.

MJ in Renew Your Vows is getting ridiculous too. She beat Magneto by herself, has the will to control the Symbiote like no else has, and is showing feats of strength Spider-Man never has despite operating on borrowed power from him. It's unfortunate because its taking a lot away from both Peter and Annie right now as much of the writing is already focused on how amazing MJ is.

 

[TetraGenesis]

John Wick 3 is about to enter this realm and I can't wait.

This is so true, hahahaha. Chapter 2 already had a ton of power creep (and was in general a lot less grounded than its predecessor) but managed to still be exceptional in every way. It wouldn't last 5 or 6 movies, but I could definitely stand another John Wick film where he basically becomes a superhero.

 

[Dr.Hadji]

Togashi solves this really well with his Nen system. There's not really power creep because a much weaker person can still take out a really strong guy if his Nen ability is really useful, or hes strategic or whatever. Of course there are a couple exceptions.

Nen is easily the bbest power system in anime though

Also Goku is not the epitome of a god, but I get what you mean

This is true to a point. There is always a point however, no matter how clever you are, you still need some strength to back it up. Having tactics and strategy to have the underdog overcome impossible odds is a fairly common dynamic in shounen. What makes HxH particular, is its style of introducing a completely new power on the spot. Explaining all the bells and whistles and then proceeding to use this foreknowledge as the basis to form a strategy. The particular way they conjure their powers doesn't really make much of a distinction from Chakra or Hamon or whatever.

Anyway, power creep happens as the result of bad or lack of creative writing for making conflicts. Could be due to burn out ... I feel like that's what happened to Naruto. At first we had all kinda fun, interesting skills and in the end that was all tossed aside for giant monsters popping DBZ blast at each other.

But they weren't though. Most all the basic abiliies are carried throughout the entire series and are still used in meaningful ways all the way to the end. The series has always had many different battle types. The show featured DBZ fights all the way back to Lee vs Garra. But yah, at the end tho..........power creep.

 

[Ray Down]

Byakuya couldn't even follow Ichigo's movements when he first used his Bankai, and then he got completely destroyed when Ichigo hollowified. He was only winning the fight because Ichigo burned through his power so fast.

Fast forward one arc, Ichigo with mastered Hollow Mask can't even lay a finger on the #4 Espada, but fucking Hitsugaya has no problem going blow for blow with #3 Halibel even after her transformation. Then Byakuya embarrasses the #7 Espada in speed, Kenpachi crushes #5 with brute strength (despite being previously overpowered by pre-Bankai Ichigo), and then Byakuya/Kenpachi combo effortlessly defeat Espada #0. None of this makes sense.

Yeah Kubo was just making shit up.

 

[Otakumegane]

Nen and Stands are really the only 2 I can think of that hasn't shown the degree of power creep that makes old powers useless.

 

[LotusHD]

I'd argue that a lot of the powers are made up on the spot in order for a character to win. The best/worst example is in Zoro's fight against the giraffe man. No hinting that he has this power, no explanation, no flash back. At least when he fought Daz bones in the Alabasta arc, we got a flashback where he remembers a lesson his teacher was trying to give him and it finally clicks. One piece is way ahead of other Shonen with this though because the author already wrote the ending and planned much of the arcs and characters years in advance. Other writers just seem so obviously to be making things up as they go along. And the haki thing still pisses me off just because of how incredibly corny it is. It literally is just a plot device to allow a character to win because they really really really want to you guys.

What? No... It's not like it magically appears someone's in a big fight or something.

Haki, hardening specifically, is basically like the equivalent of Ki Blasts for the upper-tier One Piece characters. You're just expected to have it at that point, and it helps Logia users in check. (Though they're still crazy powerful regardless.)

---

Anyways, I agree that One Piece and HxH do it pretty well for the most part. Early on, they tell you who the strongest characters are, so you know where the protagonists stand, which really helps. Although on that note, it's been more consistent on One Piece's behalf, because we don't know of anyone stronger than the Admirals or Yonkou

Spoiler

and Mihawk

, while HxH is introducing new people all the time.

 

[itwasTuesday]

It creeps pretty quickly, but in the film de force that is "The Big Hit", Lou Diamond Phillips sets up to trace a hostage call with a trace buster and second trace buster. But Jiro Nishi also has a trace buster, and then a trace buster buster to counteract his trace, and a third trace buster buster to bust his ass. Panic ensues.

edit: oh wait, goes Wrong. Well, it went bad for Lou.

Also, Puzzle & Dragons, a mobile freemium game that I can't quit. Every month there is a new king of the hill.

 

[Principate]

I'd argue that a lot of the powers are made up on the spot in order for a character to win. The best/worst example is in Zoro's fight against the giraffe man. No hinting that he has this power, no explanation, no flash back. At least when he fought Daz bones in the Alabasta arc, we got a flashback where he remembers a lesson his teacher was trying to give him and it finally clicks. One piece is way ahead of other Shonen with this though because the author already wrote the ending and planned much of the arcs and characters years in advance. Other writers just seem so obviously to be making things up as they go along. And the haki thing still pisses me off just because of how incredibly corny it is. It literally is just a plot device to allow a character to win because they really really really want to you guys.



Men is kind of a confusing system though. Again it kind of just boils down to "this character needed to win so he will" like Gon's major fight that ends up with huge consequences. You know the one I'm talking about. In theory what you say about nen allowing a weaker character to beat a stronger one is true, but we don't see it that often. Netero's last major fight is a perfect example of this. It just boiled down to him using as much raw power as he could against an opponent that did the same thing. Even the most dangerous antagonist is dangerous not because he uses one power creatively, but because he can literally have all the powers he wants!

Also I disagree on Goku not being a god. What the fuck HASN'T he beaten at this point? The man has literally beaten death. He's been so strong that the powers that be decided that he gets to live. He's a middle aged man who looks even more jacked than he did in his youth and who is literally out here fighting Gods at this point. Dragon Ball was never that serious to begin with, so at this point it's enjoyable as a tongue in cheek parody of itself and the trends it popularized.

Haki has nothing to do with that. Like seriously are we even reading the same manga?

Not once has what your describing ever happened in the story with regards to haki.

 

[Lord Azrael]

The obvious shonen examples have already been pointed out do I'll just throw in one that hasn't been mentioned yet: Toriko went from characters being able to destroy large boulders to the final boss being able to eat supernovae and leave continent-sized imprints on a planet with a mere slap. It was pretty grounded for quite a while and then just suddenly went off the rails and never stopped.

 

[Heroman]

DragonBall Super would be a really boring show if they didn't stealth buff the supporting cast

But it already a boring show

 

[Imperial Bishop]

One of the reasons why I can't get too excited about Dragon Ball Super.
It doesn't do anything new or creative power-wise, and just keeps escalating the stakes to keep people watching.

 

[LotusHD]

One of the things that bugged me about Naruto aside from the crazy escalation, one of the themes of Naruto is that hard work prevails and what not. Then it just turns out that nah, he's the chosen one or whatever, so it just puts a sour note on the whole thing when you see him grow up to be basically Ninja Jesus.

 

[smurfx]

air gear is pretty ridiculous. starts off pretty normal and ends with people with insane power.

One of the things that bugged me about Naruto aside from the crazy escalation, one of the themes of Naruto is that hard work prevails and what not. Then it just turns out that nah, he's the chosen one or whatever, so it just puts a sour note on the whole thing when you see him grow up to be basically Ninja Jesus.

lee is the one that really shows this and he is crippled for his problems. he returns but is never really important again.

 

[BladeoftheImmortal]

What the fuck is this?

 

[RiderKairuu]

I recognize the Kamen Rider Kabuto beetle but not the thing behind it. Anyways, that dude started off OP and got even more ridiculous as the show went on lol.

 

[Imperial Bishop]

This reminds me that Gigguk made a video about this problem, particularly in shonen action manga.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lyR-Gk0RAiQ

 

[Linkstrikesback]

Pretty much just My Hero Academia.

So far. It's only like, 150 chapters in, isn't it? Naruto had barely met Jiriya yet at that point in Naruto, Ichigo hadn't yet shown his bankai, Dragonball still had kid goku at that point, so on, so forth.

If the manga goes on anywhere near as long as any of those series, I do doubt they won't be able to avoid slipping up eventually.