I used to be into some way back in the day. I’m talking like tower of god and noblesse. Back in the day, these two felt like the bleach and Naruto of the webtoon world so pretty much like two of the biggest titles, both action based and a bit shoneny, but way more leaning into that Korean pretty boy stuff which makes them feel like they would cater more to fujoshis (female weebs with a kink for homoerotic anime boys basically).

I’m not trying to shame the way they presented this stuff simply because it came off as homoerotic (low key I can be a little into that myself), it’s just that… it was so corny and forced. The main characters were treated as basically borderline infallible gods by both the author and the audience. In one of the stories (Noblesse), this was more or less the case. The MC if you could call him that because he barely had a speaking role felt like he was designed to be so “perfect” that he basically never had one moment where we could see him as anything other than some wish fulfillment fantasy archetype that caters to the possible whims and desires of both the fans and the author themselves. I used to stan the guy (ofc) but over time, the predictable and formulaic nature of the story became apparent to me and I had to drop it because I realized it was like brain rot for my mind - I get to have constant dopamine hits from the characters I like doing cool things without ever being forced to examine any deeper motivations or conflicts within the story. It feels like it perfectly encapsulates what’s wrong with a lot of popular media, especially in the world of literature that mostly caters to young audiences which is that it leans heavily towards wish fulfillment scenarios with barely any deep examination of the characters as flawed and complex individuals. It’s not necessarily that much better than your typical isekai anime in that way.

I’ll admit tower of god wasn’t as bad as Noblesse in this respect so I stuck with it for longer. It’s positives are that it did go for a more complex storyline that feels like it was premeditated on some sort of actual plot development that followed some sort of structure that made the unravelling of events in the story sometimes feel unpredictable and subversive - basically it had more of a knack for sincere storytelling over merely beating the audience over the head with omg these characters are so cool and sexy. Tbh it’s not even that it didn’t do that either - that’s one of my major problems with it and most other webtoons, this tendency to over idealize characters rather than make them more flawed and worthy of examination.

So yeah… but tbh I haven’t seriously tried to peep a webtoon in a while. I tried to casually peep the one about the ugly kid that becomes attractive but it was also very s***e and felt like it leaned heavily into not just stereotypes of attractiveness but milked them in a very basic and predictable way. It once again suffered from basically being another boring wish fulfillment type of thing where the appeal was zomg cool attractive person does something cool and attractive not oh like… I actually have to think about this and reflect on what this scene or part might mean. I get some media is just like that but for me, it borders on nonsense. I think reading it is basically brain rot equivalent to watching tik tok videos for hours that give dopamine hits but don’t force you to think or use your brain at all. Therefore predictably, the audience for these types of things are gonna be probably younger people who have no desire for deeper storytelling possibly because their life experiences haven’t led them to the point where they crave deeper meaning out of their media but still prefer to just get quick dopamine hits.

F*** okay this was a rant but it felt good to get it all out. Inb4 I didn’t read any of that s***. Hol on lemee do one of those tl;dr things.

Tldr: webtoons are basic af and have more to do with wish fulfillment that anything related to mature sophisticated storytelling. I used to like them (when I was 17) but now I hate them.

Idk about all that but Circles is romcom HoF

just started reading tower of god

Sorry, ain't reading all that
But Hellper i a goated webtoon, highly recommend

Tower of god is a rough read but Noblesse is decent. Who remembers that one jumpscare webtoon?

I just read the gay ones

I really liked Windbreaker back in the day. The artist started with a dope streetwear style for all the characters. Like the style was so front and center it felt like it was a part of the story. Maybe it's still like that idk but I stopped following it.

It's still ongoing though which is pretty cool to see.

lmao

Tower of God

Caught up to Lookism, which I found solid. The manhwa increasingly focuses on delinquency and martial arts and sheds many of its early interests. The tone in the Jiho arcs for example remind me of Shamo or Holyland - furyo works where violence destroys and reshapes a man from the inside out. Manga that explore this reality well are rare.

I'd push back against your criticism on this point: the biggest problem with webtoons like Lookism or Tower of God is their surfeit of ideas - too much lands on the surface and never penetrates - but Lookism has benefited from its author deciding to concentrate on gang warfare.