"Great premise. I think I'll stop reading before they screw it up."

[TMW]

I've been looking at my lists and noticed that I have a few manga that I stopped reading despite enjoying the start of the story. Not a lot, but enough to notice a pattern. I enjoy the premise of the story and even the way it starts to develop, but something makes me think that the rest of the story won't live up to the promise of the start.

Case in point, mangadex.org/title/24316/akuyaku-ouji-wa-koi-ga-dekinai I like the idea, I like the initial chapters, but I don't want to read any further. The way the characters are set up makes me feel like the rest of the story won't live up to the way the main character reacted when he realized he'd played himself.

Obviously not everyone is going to feel the same way about that specific story. I'm wondering if other people have had that reaction to other stories though. "This is a good story, off to a solid start, I like it a lot... but something feels off and I don't want to lose my enjoyment of these first chapters. I'm good with stopping here."

 

[PantsMan]

I get you, since I'm also very picky about series I like having a good ending. People always say it's the journey that counts, but in my opinion a weak ending can spoil considerably even previous chapters I greatly enjoyed.

I don't think I've ever dropped something right at the beginning because of this, but I've often done it with long-running series I like. I promptly dropped Berserk after the Tower of Pain arc, my favorite. I felt the series was going somewhere I wasn't going to enjoy, especially after an arc I enjoyed so much. The extremely slow chapter release also helped. The ending to Tower of Pain made for a good point to stop, so I cashed my chips then and there, and haven't looked back since.

 

[Irian]

I can understand You... But curiosity is my sin.
I should have done it so many times... Vinland Saga anybody?
So now, i must live, with bad continuations and axes...

 

[Bainhardt]

I already know as I'm writing this that I'm not going to have any specific examples for what you brought up, so I guess I'm not really contributing in that regard.
But in my experience, I usually attribute this "bad ending" or "wasted potential" phenomenon to the way stories are planned from the outset nowadays.

A lot of manga, or movie franchises, or TV series, or almost anything you could imagine are pitched with the intention of running "for as long as they can." Almost like newspaper comics, I guess. Is Garfield known for its thrilling narrative? It is not. Obviously that's a pretty dramatic comparison to draw, but the similarities vary by series. Even story-driven manga tend to have to break major plot developments up into "arcs," like the TV equivalent "seasons," just because they're not really allowed or encouraged to end once they get the ball rolling. Especially if they make too much money. Lookin' at you, DBZ.
I guess the word for that is like... periodicals? Something like that? Entertainment that has to update regularly, instead of all at once like a novel.

Stories are usually best planned and known entirely from the beginning, so it's no wonder it's difficult to continuously produce interesting and thematically-consistent stories off of an initial concept. Some manga might manage it (insert your respective opinions about X long-running manga here), but it's not the norm. Just comes with the territory, I guess.

 

[DANDAN_THE_DANDAN]

@PantsMan The ending IS part of the journey. A good buildup doesn't excuse a terrible ending.

 

[TMW]

Yeah, some ideas just can't hold up to prolonged storylines. Or maybe the idea is okay but the team producing it can't figure out how to keep drawing the story out without weakening it. I'm not naming any names here, but when you start drawing things out by having time skips and flashbacks inside of time skips and flashbacks, your story has lost its way.

I don't really need an ending to some series - I read US superhero comics. No endings there. But if the story starts out by promising a begining-middle-ending and then goes off track because the publishers want to keep dragging things out, I feel cheated.

 

[AfterMidnightMoon]

Ingoshima - I was denied the promise of rape. As dark as it might sound, violence is my way of release. Digital violence, at least. I liked the premise, but the author dragged it and kept it tense with every chapter, which made it tiring to read.

Doll-Kara - I wanted to read something with martial arts involving women. Turned out to be walls after walls of text. I'm still "reading" it waiting for fights to happen, but whatever happens in between, I simply ignore it.

Ane Naru Mono - Even for someone who has an older sister fetish, I just couldn't get to read this past the first few chapters. I don't know why.

I Took an Arrow in the Knee and Became a Village Guard - Funny idea turning a meme into a series. Read the first few chapters, but then it felt like he's got no problems moving around with a cursed knee.

Tomie - I find that this series is kind of repetitive. Alive > mutilated, rinse and repeat.

@Irian I've seen reviews, recommendations on Vinland Saga, read a few chapters then forgot about it. Heck, I've watched Vikings and loved it. But Vinland Saga? I just couldn't get to like it. It's less serious than how I wanted it to be.

 

[TMW]

I dropped Doll-Kara as well. It started off really well, but at some point I realized that business and marketing were going to be one of the major sources of drama. If I wanted that, I'd go back and reread my old class notes.

 

[Teddy]

1 piece, detergent, ramen topping, genie dragon, dragon tails basically any that are so popular that are padded out to over 300 plus chapters atleast

 

[Bainhardt]

Wait, I did think of an example, Saike Mata Shite mo. It's on this site. I technically still have it set to "Reading" but I might drop it soon for this very reason.

The premise and first volume are really cool. In fact, it arguably feels like it should have ended there, lol. But It's now stretched into just another endless "arc" series, to pretty variable degrees of success. I've kept reading because I like the main character's power and some of the situations he's ended up using it in. There have been arcs after volume 1 I thought were neat, and ones I don't really care about (like the current one).

But I definitely don't see it remaining interesting forever. And it's only on chapter 89, way fewer than many other series that probably come to mind.

 

[Sem]

@Bainhardt

If you liked Saike but didn't like the drag, trying reading Law of Ueki. The author's writing style has changed shockingly little and you can binge Ueki fairly fast. I don't think it dragged on for overly long, and the sequel was only like 3 volumes or something.

Other than that, adding the conversation, I don't really have any manga I personally found this problem with outside of the shonen action genre. I remember Psyren being a pretty early example of this for me because the beginning had a lot of mystery and then once the big bads were revealed it just became a straight forward battle manga. I stopped giving a shit immediately. Toriko ran into the same issue. I really enjoyed the earlier chapters that were actually about food and exploration. If it turns into a constant powering up battle manga I'm instantly out.

 

[FireFish5000]

I am sort of the same. Though, I keep reading until it reaches the point of no return (too hopeful). By the time I drop it, it is already ruined, but usually setup to last another 20 chapters or so.
From my perspective, a lot of authors are great at coming up with plots, unique/interesting settings, great characters, etc. But.... they completely fail to plan out the story, or grossly underestimate how hard it is to maintain the quality level they started out with.

It often feels like, past ch 5-12, they have no clue what to do. They suddenly realize their story is about to end and they have no plans on what to do afterwards. The normal response seems to be to kick it down 20 notches and drag things out. Making the story last much longer, but at the cost of everything that makes it better than average.
Perhaps this is actually the plan to begin with, gain readers by overwhelming them with greatness, and then stab them in the back and make them trudge on since they have already committed to the series. But I for one cannot keep reading a mediocre manga when the author has already proven to me that they can do better.
^{_{The next most common response is to invoke the JUMP protocol. At which point I grab a knife and hunt them down}}

In general, I now expect this out of every manga that is starts off genuinely great. Every now and then though, I get an author with a game-plan. These few keep a rating of 10. Most of them though drop to a 7 by ch 16 though. It hurts every time.
Of the ongoing series I am reading, One of the few that I fully expected to fall, but, surprisingly, maintained its quality level throughout the series (40+ chapters now), Miss Not-So-Sidekick (sadly not on MD). The first 1-2 chapters were a bit tough (mostly bc I hate that art style), but after that its great. Part of my villainess list.

Also, I am currently betting my pride on:
The Monster Duchess and Contract Princess

This story is only 10 chapters in. Its still fair game. In fact, the main story hasn't even started yet. May seem crude to bet on it before the main story starts, but, I believe the fact the author made it 10 chapters in without starting the story is a good sign that they planned this out.

I also am betting
Lady Baby

Will fail misrably. It already has a big problems in my opinion, but I believe the author noticed it and attempted to fix it by the next chapter. Its just... the damage done is unreparable, so we have to wait it out. A time leap will help.
But, thats where the real problem lies. Look at the title. Look at the genre (which is filled with time leaps), and then look at the cover art. From this, I believe the author had very little written before publishing, and no plans for the future. Otherwise, I am positive he would NOT have put 'Baby' in the title. It probably wont be long before the title is unrelated to the plot. Honestly, we have already entered toddler stage, and I have a hard time believing that he doesn't plan to timeleap past the age of 5 with that cover image.
Aparently has 40 chapters. But I am betting the rating will drop to around 7.6-8.2 as they get translated just bc I do not trust an author with so little foresight when naming the work.