I finally understood the 'filler arc' argument after a con panel in Atlanta

I was at Anime Weekend Atlanta last fall, sitting in a packed room for a 'Shonen Jump Deep Dive' talk. The host, a guy named Mark, asked for a show of hands on who skips filler, and almost everyone raised theirs. He then said, 'But what if the filler is the only time the characters just get to be people?' That one line stuck with me. I went home and rewatched the G-8 arc in One Piece, which is filler, and it completely changed how I watch long series now. Do you have a filler arc you actually think adds to the show?

4 comments

4 Comments

davis.noah2mo ago

But isn't it still just extra fluff to pad the runtime?

wesley_jones2mo ago

Oh man, that's a great point. I unironically love the driving school filler in Naruto. It's just them being dumb kids for once.

lilyp372mo ago

Honestly used to skip all filler without a second thought. That whole idea of filler being "character time" really flipped a switch for me. The early Bleach filler with the mod souls, the one with the little guy who lives in Kon? Actually kind of good. You see the whole team just hanging out, dealing with dumb stuff. Makes them feel more real. Changed my whole view on it.

davis.noah1mo ago

@wesley_jones the driving school arc is unironically top tier Naruto content, like actually more memorable than half the war arc. The whole filler argument falls apart when you realize shows like One Piece use that time to let characters breathe, and the G-8 arc proves it. But then you have stuff like those endless flashback filler arcs in Bleach where they just repeat the same scenes over and over, and suddenly skipping makes total sense again. At this point I just look up if the filler is worth watching before starting any new long series.