I think it clear that the writer didn't know what to do once they introduced Azami and it never recovered. The thing is before that the school was the primary antagonist with Erina being its main..."avatar." As such she should have been defeat first before going on to the next villain. But instead to increase the stakes, and so they don't have Erina be defeat by Souma so early they moved onto the next villain before the first one was defeated. Also since they couldn't fight Azami directly he needed minions for them to defeat (which I suspect is a major reason for his early intro) the Elite Ten. The greatest cooks in the school, and half of them will be graduating at the end of the year -so to not get everyone blue balls about them not fighting Souma they were made the minions-. The problem with this is that the year was more then half done by the time Azami appeared which gave him very little time to actually be the villain before he had to be defeat by the end of the first year. also in order to defeat the Elite Ten they had to become better cooks then them...meaning they are now at the end of the first year better cooks then people that are about to graduate. Which means one Azami and the Elite Ten were defeated the school in either its challenges or its students could no longer be a threat to the main cast as far as cooking went. Which means they had to go international to find foes. Which led the current arc. Also they have become increasingly reliant on food fight over other tests of the characters' abilities.
Ideally the arcs should have been this:
First year: Souma Vs. Erian and the Elite/Capitalistic School System
Second year Souma Vs. Azami and his Socialist School System.
Third Year: Souma Vs. the international community and the Blue.
The rush removed the second year.
Also another problem is Souma first fight with Eishi. Souma lost the fight and as a requirement of their fight should have became Eishi's assistant and join Central. Eishi dropped it, and it led to problem for the manga; Souma can never truly lose now. Before anytime Souma wagers "dropping out of the school" we know he is going to win, because it would end the story otherwise. But he could still lose other competition where he doesn't make that wager. Now even if he does lose; he never has to suffer negative consequences for any lost. Which means any food fight Souma get into is no long interesting because he will always win regardless, or the fight didn't matter anyway. Look at his lost against Asahi all the happen was: lost a knife with no magic power init (yes that was also a problem but it was only introduce in the blue and I suspect to try to make Asahi a threat,) get thrown in a garbage bin, and Erina gets carried away bridal style (which doesn't woo her and she quickly get annoyed by Asahi's antic making even less of a threat to any bond between Erina and Souma.)
Yeah, agreed entirely. although the MC never losing if there was never any real stakes to begin is typical "shonen writing". You've come to expect it, truly. they only one that truly subverted that was Naruto who never won Against Sasuke, although that is not a real stake so much as it is losing his best friend and the fact that Sasuke is Kishi's "favourite pet". That does not negate anything criticism towards the whole thing, I'm just saying.
First year: Souma Vs. Erian and the Elite/Capitalistic School System
Second year Souma Vs. Azami and his Socialist School System.
Third Year: Souma Vs. the international community and the Blue.
This is similar to how I expected the manga to go, before Azami was introduced, though more, first year they got a taste of the elite 10 and it was the second year that they really battled with them, and last year focusing on a International competition, then final battle against his old man and Erina.
After Azami was introduced, I was partially hoping that Souma would actually get expelled, and we'd see a time skip, where Souma returned and was equipped with the skills needed to take on the new regime, with the way the manga felt it never really felt like we saw a convincing growth period that put Souma at the same level as someone like Eishi, and even despite being the number one seat in the last arc, he never felt like he really should be there.
The only problem with that is, WHY WOULD Azami accept a challenge from Soma after Soma had already been expelled from the school, and Azami completed his "true gourmet" plan as intended? You saw his ego. there was nothing Soma had that intrigued him even whne Soma hadn't been expelled yet, and Joichiro offering himself was only because Azami did not assimilate his final piece yet which is Erina. Once Erina is his again I don't imagine Azami would bother with havin his ideals challenged because in his head he is proven right and would have everything he ever wanted so even if Soma got stronger the point wouldn't really matter anymore.
I feel that Azami should have come at a later story arc if at all. but again he only appeared when he did to DEVELOP Erina. My biggest complaint is what happened AFTER, the whole Asahi and B.L.U.E debacle which threw everything out the window even worse than Azami ever did
Edited by Phantom_999, 14 June 2019 - 08:56 PM.