Quote Originally Posted by Toxin View Post
PS: You should absolutely start watching/reading One Piece. Best character development I've seen in a manga. With the exception of maybe Beck. But then Beck is my all time favourite manga....... and it's finished as well.
I would love to ... but time is a huge issue nowadays - and long series can be a real time-sink if you come to them late.

I was put off by the style initially, although I think I've gotten to the point where I can largely ignore it if the story grips me enough. Another barrier I need to overcome now, is my tendency to shy away from longer series because they can swallow up so much time.

Bleach worked up to a point, and so did Naruto, because of the non-stop action element (meaning spreading fights out over multiple episodes a-la Dragonball style, but not as badly), but it doesn't work so well for other genres.

If you look at drama, I think the only series that gripped me from beginning to end for its full run was Full Moon wo Sagashite (52 episodes); NANA was good but it really started dragging at one point (44 episodes); Kaleido Star was great, but there was a bit of a lull in the second half (51 episodes).

It all comes down to presentation and pacing I suppose - I've come across some 26 episode series that are also way too long.