Why Does Criticism Ignore Structure?

When looking at contemporary content criticism, there is a strange trend. When evaluating a work, the focus is almost entirely on themes and ideas—'what is being said'—while there is extremely little discussion about the structure and techniques of 'how it is made.' Whether it is a film being described as 'criticizing modern society,' a novel as 'the author holding this ideology,' a manga as 'depicting gender,' or anime as 'expressing the loneliness of modern people,' works are often treated as material for deciphering the author's ideology or social issues. However, those discussions alone do not constitute an understanding of the work itself. This is because no matter how excellent the ideas may be, a work cannot stand on those alone. A work only becomes a work through structure and technique, not just ideas.

For example, even if you write a story with the same theme, the level of interest varies completely depending on the person. Works depicting 'friendship' exist all over the world, and 'revenge,' 'romance,' and 'family' have been depicted repeatedly for thousands of years. In other words, the theme itself is never new. Yet, the reason people are moved by new works is not the theme, but the difference in the structure used to present that theme. Where to place foreshadowing, where to surprise the reader, where to let emotions explode, in what order to present information, and from whose perspective to view the story. This accumulation of design choices is what makes a work a work. The theme is the ingredient, and the structure is the recipe. Just as the taste of the same ingredients varies depending on the chef, even with the same theme, the value of the work changes significantly if the design is different.

However, in contemporary criticism, there is zero perspective for analyzing this design itself. Most criticism ends with talk of 'what I felt' or 'what the author wanted to say.' But rather than analyzing the work, that is merely talking about one's own impressions and values. Most criticism found today could be called book reports. True criticism is the act of analyzing ' why did I feel that way?' and 'by what kind of technique did the work trigger that emotion?' Anyone can talk about being moved. But to explain why you were moved as a structure, you must view the work from the perspective of design.

Content is Engineering

Content creation can be considered essentially engineering. Engineering here does not mean science versus humanities. It means reproducible design technology. Architecture has blueprints, automobiles have drawings, and software has architecture. Similarly, stories have blueprints. Excellent creators build those blueprints in their minds while creating their work. The scenes that appear natural to the reader are actually built upon precise calculations. The fact that foreshadowing seems to be resolved naturally, that characters feel alive, and that the direction moves the heart, is not a coincidence but the result of design. And there is a technical system to reproduce that. That is what moves people.

Thinking of it this way, the idea that 'geniuses create masterpieces only through inspiration or the unconscious' must also be reconsidered. When talking about creation, people often favor the myth that 'an idea suddenly descended' or 'talent exploded.' However, in actual production, works are completed by repeating planning, composition, revision, and verification many times. The more skilled a creator is, the faster their judgment becomes, so it looks like they are creating only by intuition from the outside, but that is just because design techniques have become embodied. Just as it looks like an athlete is playing unconsciously, but their movements are the result of tens of thousands of hours of practice, creative intuition is also the instantaneous operation of knowledge and experience accumulated over many years. Inspiration and the unconscious are not the opposite of effort, but a state where effort is highly integrated.

The Oversight of Auteurism

A common criticism brought up here is that 'writers of the past read classics, but today's creators only read manga and anime.' There is some truth to this point. If you only keep watching the same genre, expression becomes inward-looking, and it is difficult to generate new ideas. However, this argument also misses the essence. The problem is not whether they read classics. It is how they understood the classics.

The myths, literature, theater, and historical stories that humanity has produced are vast, and it is impossible for one person to read them all. Fortunately, however, they are not infinite. As mythology, narratology, and structuralism have revealed, many works share common structures. The hero's journey, coming-of-age stories, tragedy, comedy, revenge dramas, circular structures, three-act structures, trials and returns, patricide, generational change, expulsion from and return to a community—even if the surface is different, there are recurring patterns in the skeleton. In other words, the meaning of learning classics is not to memorize works one by one, but to understand the universal design principles behind them.

For example, 'The Odyssey' and modern adventure manga differ in era and medium. However, the structure of the protagonist overcoming trials, gaining companions, growing, and returning home is surprisingly common. 'The Tale of Genji' and modern romance manga can also be compared from the perspective of the arrangement of human relationships and techniques of psychological description. Greek tragedy and modern drama also share the structure where the desires of characters collide and lead to ruin as a result of their choices. If you think by abstracting in this way, classics become not just old masterpieces, but textbooks for learning structure.

Therefore, cultivation is not about competing over the amount of knowledge. It is not about how many books you have read or how many difficult books you know. What is important is whether you can abstract the structure from them. Even if you have read a hundred classics, if you end it with 'it was interesting' or 'it was famous,' it is almost useless as a creative technique. On the other hand, even if you only watch manga and movies, those who can analyze their structure and abstract the design principles can acquire high-level skills. Of course, in reality, having a broad education is advantageous because the number of structures you can abstract increases. But what is important is not the education itself, but the ability to convert education into structure.

This is a minimum ability required not only for creators but also for critics. Criticizing a work is not about saying 'this is how I felt.' It is about breaking down the work and deciphering its design philosophy. What genre conventions are used, where is the reader's psychology being manipulated, what is the information design, why is it described in that order, what kind of market is assumed—it only becomes criticism after analyzing such multiple elements. Discussing only the theme or only the structure is not enough. Only by going back and forth between the two can the entire work be seen.

Misunderstandings about Creator Interviews

Furthermore, one must be careful about the author's own statements. While production secrets and interviews are valuable materials, they should not be considered the absolute truth of the work. Authors may speak while considering commercial circumstances or social evaluation, and sometimes they cannot fully verbalize the creative process themselves. Humans are also beings who give meaning to completed works after the fact. Therefore, critics must analyze the work itself rather than taking the author's words at face value. This is because the design remains within the work, but the author's statements change depending on the situation.

Ultimately, what is most lacking in contemporary content criticism is the perspective of viewing a work as a structure. Discussing ideas, education, and social issues is important. However, they are built upon the design technology that makes the work possible. Just as you cannot discuss a building without looking at the foundation, you cannot understand a work by discussing only the theme without looking at the structure. Education is the same. The value of reading classics is not to act like an intellectual, but to learn the structures that humanity has accumulated over a long time and apply them to one's own creation or criticism. Whether a creator or a critic, one must possess at least the ability to abstract that structure and understand it as a design principle. Without that, criticism will not go beyond the realm of impressions, and creation will continue to depend on the myths of coincidence and talent. What is needed to truly understand contemporary content is not to worship education or to praise only technology. It is to understand the series of processes that convert knowledge into structure, structure into design, and design into a work. When that perspective is regained, criticism will stand on the same horizon as creation for the first time, becoming an intellectual activity that can explain not only 'what is being told' but also 'why it was possible to tell it that way.'

Critics Who Lack the Ability to Talk About Technique and Structure

There is one thing we must consider here. Why has contemporary content criticism stopped talking about structure and technique to such an extent? The reason is not simply a matter of the critics' ability. It is deeply related to the fact that society itself has stopped talking about the 'process' and only talks about the 'result.'

We are accustomed to looking only at finished products. However, there are surprisingly few opportunities to know under what design philosophy that finished product was born and through what trial and error it reached its current form. On social media, only a few seconds of video are clipped, manga are consumed by the episode, and movies are circulated in large quantities with only short impressions like 'it was interesting,' 'it made me cry,' or 'it had a message.' As a result, people have lost the habit of seeing works as 'designed systems,' even if they see them as 'finished products.'

This trend also appears in education. In school education, there are many opportunities to learn about the ideas and historical background of literary works, but structural analysis such as 'why is information arranged in this order,' 'why is this character arrangement,' or 'why is the composition designed to betray the reader's expectations here' is rarely performed. In other words, even if we are trained to read works, we are hardly trained to read works as blueprints or products.

The result of this is an excessive reliance on the question of 'what did the author want to say?' This question itself is not wrong. However, if you place only that at the center of understanding a work, you will end up looking only at the personality of the author rather than the work itself. Therefore, author interviews and social media posts are overly emphasized, leading to short-sighted understandings such as 'it must be correct because the author said so' or 'this work is this way because the author has that ideology.'

However, a work is not a mirror that directly reflects the author's thoughts. A work is a designed artifact. A single scene has multiple purposes, and a single line of dialogue has multiple functions. The placement of characters is not just to convey a theme, but also to maintain the story's tempo, guide the reader's emotions, and satisfy the genre expectations of the market. In other words, a single expression always fulfills multiple design objectives simultaneously. Unless this is understood, a work cannot be analyzed as a technique.

Therefore, I believe that what is needed for content criticism is not literary cultivation itself, but an eye for design. Of course, cultivation is important. However, it is not for the purpose of showing off knowledge. The point of studying mythology, classical literature, art, film history, and manga history is to abstract them into structures and understand them as universal design principles. Cultivation only transforms into a technique when you go beyond ending an analysis with "this work is influenced by X" and instead analyze "why that structure is repeated across eras."

Misunderstandings about Creators

An excellent creator is not someone who possesses a lot of knowledge. Nor is it someone who knows many structures. It is someone who can combine knowledge and structures as needed and transform them into new designs. And an excellent critic is someone who can read the traces of that design within a work and put them into words. Although their positions are different, both are looking at the same thing. It is not the surface of the work, but the structure that lies beneath it.

The content industry will continue to change significantly due to the development of AI and digital technology. However, no matter how much the production environment changes, the importance of understanding structure will not be lost. In fact, precisely because we are in an era where a vast amount of work is automatically generated, the ability to explain "why this work functions" and "why that one does not" as a structure will become more valuable than ever. What is required for future creation and criticism is not new cultivation. It is the intelligence to abstract structures, understand them as designs, and convert them back into works. That ability is the most practical literacy required of both creators and critics.

Misunderstandings about Originality and Uniqueness

Even more important is the fact that we need to rethink our understanding of the word "originality" in the modern age. Many people think that uniqueness in creation means producing something completely new that has never existed before. However, almost all masterpieces in history were not born from a complete void. Rather, they are reconstructions of forms and structures that existed in the past, adapted to new situations and sensibilities.

For example, the form of tragedy has existed since the time of ancient Greece. The structure of a hero heading toward ruin due to their own choices or fate has been used repeatedly for thousands of years. However, that does not mean it is "valueless because it is old." This is because what matters is not the superficial setting, but how that structure is transformed and converted into a form that reaches modern people.

Newness in creation does not come from not knowing existing structures. Rather, it comes from the ability to judge which parts of a structure to change and which to keep, based on a deep understanding of those existing structures. Those who do not know the form cannot break the form. Just as there is the concept of "Shuhari" (protect, break, leave) in traditional performing arts and martial arts, there is a flow of first understanding the form, then changing it, and finally arriving at one's own expression. Innovation in creation is also, in many cases, an extension of this process.

However, in the modern age, "not relying on existing forms" is sometimes misunderstood as creativity. As a result, a trend emerges that disregards the techniques of structure and genre, emphasizing only "one's own sensibility" or "personal experience". However, personal experience does not become a work unless it can be converted into a form that can be communicated to others. Even if you express emotions or experiences that only you can understand exactly as they are, it is closer to a diary or a monologue. By adding structure to it, personal experience transforms into a universal story.

Herein lies the difference between art/creation and mere self-expression. Art is not just venting the author's inner self. It is the technique of converting the author's experiences and emotions into a form that others can understand. That conversion device is structure, form, and the grammar of the genre.

Both Cultivationism and Sensibilityism are Insufficient

This is easy to understand if you compare it to cooking. Using high-quality ingredients and a dish being delicious are two different things. Even if you have rare or expensive ingredients, if you lack cooking skills, it will not be completed as a dish. On the other hand, even inexpensive ingredients can become an excellent dish through cooking techniques. Cultivation and experience in creation are the ingredients, while technique and structure are the cooking methods.

That is why both cultivationism, which competes only on "what one knows," and sensibilityism, which considers "only one's own sensibility to be important," are insufficient. What is needed is a comprehensive ability to acquire materials, understand them as structures, and convert them into works through technique.

The Game of Constraints

Also, from the perspective of the content industry, this problem becomes even clearer. Commercial works are not established by the complete freedom of a single artist. They are created within relationships with publishers, production companies, editors, producers, sponsors, marketing staff, and consumers. There are many constraints there, such as budget, deadlines, target demographics, and media characteristics.

However, having constraints is not a denial of creativity. Rather, it is because there are constraints that technique becomes necessary. A manga artist who makes a story work within a limited number of pages, a film director who depicts emotions within a limited runtime, and a creator who completes a game within a limited development period are all performing optimal design within constraints.

Just looking at a work from the outside makes it difficult to see these production-related judgments. Therefore, it is easy to fall into criticism that only talks about "the author's thoughts" or "what they wanted to express" by looking only at the finished product. However, in actual production sites, realistic judgments are constantly being made, not just ideals. Which scenes to cut, where to spend the budget, which expressions to prioritize. Each of these determines the shape of the work.

Practical criticism is to understand this reality. It is to see a work not as a product of pure mental activity, but as an artifact born at the intersection of society, industry, technology, psychology, and culture.

Having this perspective also changes how you read author interviews. There is no need to deny the author's words. However, there is no need to treat them as absolute, either. This is because the author themselves is also just one designer making judgments within a massive production system. Works also contain structures and influences that the author themselves was not conscious of. That is precisely why work analysis does not end with just exploring the author's intentions. It is necessary to read the structures present in the work.

The Rampant Proliferation of Those Who Insist Their Impressions Are Criticism

There is another issue that cannot be ignored when considering the contemporary content environment. That is the fact that the boundary between "impressions" and "criticism" has become blurred due to social media. Of course, the fact that many people can now freely talk about works has great value in itself. In the past, a few critics and specialized magazines monopolized the space for evaluating works, but now everyone can broadcast their own opinions. However, that free environment for expression does not directly lead to an improvement in the quality of criticism. Rather, with the circulation of massive amounts of impressions, there is an aspect where the value of criticism that analyzes structure is becoming harder to see.

Impressions are the individual reactions of someone who has received a work. Words like "it was interesting," "I cried," "I hated it," or "I empathized with it" are valid as the receiver's experience. However, they do not explain the structure of the work itself. For example, even if you feel "moved" after watching a movie, if you cannot explain where that emotion came from, it does not become criticism. Is it due to the script structure, the musical direction, the camerawork, the character placement, or is it the result of utilizing the audience's psychological expectations? What kind of technique brings about what kind of psychological effect?Only by analyzing to that extent can one explain how a work functions.

However, in the modern age, there is a tendency to place excessive importance on "how I felt". Individual impressions should be respected, but problems arise when they are equated with work analysis. This is because, even if emotions are important, they are separate from understanding the mechanism that created those emotions.

This is similar to music. Being moved by listening to a song is different from analyzing why that song moves one's emotions. Only by understanding the structure of the melody, harmony, rhythm, lyric placement, and choice of tone can one approach the technique that creates that emotion. Stories are the same. Emotion is the result, and what criticism should look at is the cause that produced that result.

Without understanding this difference, if you process work evaluation only by "likes and dislikes," the essential value of the work becomes invisible. This is because an excellent work is not necessarily a work that everyone will like. There are works that cause discomfort, works that are difficult to understand, and works that are hard to grasp at first glance. However, if they possess a sophisticated structure and achieve their own unique purpose, criticism must analyze them beyond simple likes and dislikes.

Anyone can pretend to be a critic

What becomes important here is the issue of expertise. In the modern age, the value that "anyone can become a critic" is spreading. However, the fact that anyone can state an opinion is different from anyone being able to analyze at the same level. Just as everyone who eats food can say it is "delicious" or "bad," it is different from a chef being able to analyze cooking techniques, handling of ingredients, heat control, and flavor design. There is a difference in roles between impressions as a viewer and professional analysis.

Of course, this is not to say that a qualification system is necessary for criticism. However, at least to structurally analyze a work, appropriate training is necessary. One must combine multiple types of knowledge, such as narratology, film grammar, historical background, genre studies, and an understanding of the production process. Simply having the experience of consuming many works does not necessarily lead to structural understanding.

The background where creator ability connects with criticism

This is the same for creators. While it is important to watch many works, the quantity watched alone does not become a skill. A person who has watched a thousand movies cannot necessarily shoot an excellent movie. A person who has read tens of thousands of manga cannot necessarily become an excellent manga artist. What is necessary is what you extract from the works you have watched.

Instead of ending with "this work was interesting," think about "why it was interesting". Instead of ending with "I liked this character," think about "why this character was designed to be felt as attractive." Instead of ending with "this development was unexpected," think about "what information manipulation created that unexpectedness." The accumulation of this analysis becomes a skill.

In other words, what is necessary for a creator is not just experience as a consumer, but a perspective as an analyst. And what is necessary for a critic is not just viewing experience, but the ability to imagine the designer's perspective.

In this respect, creators and critics are not actually opposing entities. Excellent critics try to understand the logic and structure on the side of making the work. On the other hand, excellent creators have a perspective to objectively analyze their own work. What both have in common is the ability to see the structure behind the surface rather than superficial impressions. Therefore, it is difficult to be a critic without having experience in making things as a matter of course.

The reason why just being an AI user does not make you a creator

And this ability to see structure becomes even more important in the AI era. Currently, due to the development of technology, the production of many types of content, such as text, images, video, and music, is becoming automated. However, precisely because we are in an era where AI can generate massive amounts of expression, the ability required of humans is not "to make in large quantities," but "to judge what should be made."

What is an excellent structure? Why do some works attract people while others are buried? Which format is suitable for which purpose? For such judgments, the ability to abstract is required, not just information volume.

What is required of future creators and critics is not the possession of knowledge, but the understanding of structure. It is not about memorizing a massive number of works, but the ability to see through the principles behind them and apply them to new situations.

Ultimately, creation is not something born from complete freedom. Rather, it is the act of recombining into new forms after understanding the countless patterns accumulated from the past, social constraints, technical conditions, and the psychology of the receiver. Freedom is not a state of knowing nothing, but a state of being able to choose within constraints and structures after understanding them.

That is precisely why what is needed for contemporary content criticism is not mere showing off of one's education, nor emotional defense or criticism.It is to decipher the invisible design that makes a work possible..Understanding structure, evaluating technique, treating education as material, and keeping the process of how a work is born in view.Only by having that perspective can criticism stand on the same horizon as creation.

Conclusion—Criticism as Practical Realism

To summarize what has been discussed so far, what is needed for contemporary content criticism is not to judge a work solely by its superficial meaning or the author's statements, but to have a perspective that looks at the structure and production process that exist behind it. A work is not merely a container for ideas. It is an artifact established by the complex intertwining of the author's sensibility, the historical background, the history of the genre, technical constraints, market conditions, and the psychology of the audience.

That is why multiple perspectives are needed to understand a work. It is necessary to look at the theme. It is also meaningful to consider the author's philosophy. However, that alone is insufficient. This is becauseideas and themes will never reach others without a structure that converts them into a communicable form.

No matter how wonderful an idea one may have, it will not become a work without the technique to express it. Conversely, no matter how advanced the technique, it will end up as a mere display of skill if there is no meaning or purpose behind it.An excellent work is the result of combining ideas or experiences as material with the technique to process them.

In this sense,what contemporary criticism must overcome is the simple binary opposition of 'ideas versus technique' or 'education versus entertainment'. In reality, they are not in opposition. Education is the material that supports technique, and technique is the method of converting education into a work. The two do not exist separately; they are linked within the single process of creation.

However, the current problem is that this relationship is not understood. On one hand,there is a tendency to evaluate works solely as expressions of social messages or ideas. On the other hand,there is also a tendency to neglect the cultural and ideological background of a work by overemphasizing technique and structure. Both areone-sided.

What is truly needed isthe ability to view a work from multiple layers.

Look at the story on the surface. Look at the structure beneath it. Furthermore, look at the author and production environment that chose that structure. And look at how that work was received within society.

Suchmulti-layered analysisis what constitutes mature criticism.

Also, the same is required of creators themselves. Creation is not merely an act of expressing one's inner self.It is the act of converting the vague emotions and thoughts within oneself into a format that others can understand. To do that, one needs not only one's own sensibility but alsothe need to understand the structures and techniques that past works have accumulated.

An excellent creator is not necessarily someone with vast knowledge. However,an excellent creator has the ability to extract something from what they have encountered. If watching a movie, look at the visual structure. If reading a novel, look at the sentence composition. If looking at manga, look at the panel layout and eye guidance. If playing a game, look at the system design and player psychology. And observe in detail what techniques make these possible, sublimating them into one's own skills and mastering them.

In other words, whether one can convert every experience intodesign knowledge and techniqueis what is important.

In this regard,the debate over 'whether one should read classics or watch contemporary works' is also not the essence. It is not that one should only read classics, nor that one should only follow the latest works. What is important is being able to extract structure and absorb it as technique from either.

Classics have structures that have survived for a long time. Contemporary works have new structures adapted to the current market and technical environment. By looking at both, creators and critics can gain a broader perspective.

Conversely, if one treats a work as a mere consumable, what can be gained from it is limited. Watching it because it is popular without thinking about why it became a trend. Saying one was moved without thinking about why one was moved. One cannot learn technique from a work that way.

To watch a work is, fundamentally, to engage in a dialogue with the work. To do that,one must have the question, 'Why is it like this?'.

Why is this character attractive? Why does this scene leave an impression? Why does this development feel unexpected? Why was this work supported by so many people?

By accumulating such questions, only then does theinternal structureof the work become visible.

And having this perspective is not just for the sake of creation or criticism. It is also important for understanding contemporary society itself.

We currently live surrounded by countless pieces of 'designed information', including advertisements, social media, news, video works, games, and entertainment. These are not naturally occurring phenomena, but rather things intentionally constructed by someone. Which information to highlight, which emotions to stimulate, in what order to present them—there is always a structure present.

Therefore, the ability to see structure is not merely a creative technique. It is also a fundamental literacy for deciphering modern society.

Do not believe only the superficial words; look at the mechanisms behind them. Look not just at the results, but at the process that leads to them. Look not just at individual cases, but at the patterns common to them.

This ability is precisely practical education for the modern age.

Education is not the amount of knowledge one possesses. It is the ability to discern common structures from the countless phenomena that exist in the world and apply them to different situations. And technique is the power to translate that understanding of structure into actual results.

What modern content criticism truly needs is a perspective that connects these two.

Do not discuss works solely through ideology. Do not evaluate them solely through technique. Do not consume education as a mere title. Do not confuse personal impressions with criticism.

What is necessary is to understand how a work is made, why it functions, and through what structure it moves people.

Creation is the work of combining countless forms inherited from the past, current technology, and individual experience to transform them into a new shape. And criticism is the work of deciphering and verbalizing the mechanisms of that transformation.

These two are inherently pointed in the same direction.

Do not look only at the surface of a work, but at the design beneath it. Do not look only at the author's words, but at the structure of the work itself. Do not look at the quantity of knowledge, but at the power to transform knowledge into structure.

When that perspective is regained, content criticism will move beyond the mere exchange of impressions and become a more practical and precise intellectual activity connected to the front lines of creation.