Is it just me...

[Dr. Casey]

... or is Inuyasha nicer now than he was during the first volume of the series? Who knows, maybe I'm just misinterpreting his character.

[Brill]

Inuyasha has mellowed a lot since he was freed from the tree. The group however reuses to acknowledge it. Even in the latest chapter they have expect a "sit" command from a rather bland comment.

[Dr. Casey]

Yeah, he has mellowed a lot. Hell, his demeanor changed significantly between the second and third episodes.

[melda]

i think that was pertty well established because you barely seem to even notice the diffrence until you reach season 3 then your like wait a minute Inu. wouldn't react like that or well he didn't use to

LOL i love how the manga and anime alike both potray this picture.

[Mikadzuki Tatsu]

IMO, Inuyasha has matured a great deal since Kagome freed him from the tree so many chapters ago. He's become a gentler, more compassionate person. (Think about it. At the beginning of the series, would he have ever offered to let Kagura join the group? Never!)

I think it's nice that he matured gradually over the course of the series, so that it's not blatantly obvious (which is more realistic), rather than within a handful of episodes. It's just a shame that his comrades (with the possible exception of Kagome) haven't seemed to have noticed it yet.

[Ketaru]

I remember this distinct time he was up in the air with Kagome on his back, and had every intention of letting her plummet to the earth after getting her help to get the jewel back. Yeah, I'd say he's matured. I say they all kick Shippo off the team. All he constructively (or destructively?) does these days is put InuYasha in a negative light time and time again.

[Dr. Casey]

You know, Inuyasha really is a manly guy. The main male protagonist for each consecutive major series just gets more and more masculine (Ataru, Godai, Ranma, Inuyasha).

[Mikadzuki Tatsu]

I say they all kick Shippo off the team. All he constructively (or destructively?) does these days is put InuYasha in a negative light time and time again.
Back in September, I might have disagreed with you, but now I'm starting to agree. I think it's safe to say that Shippou is the only main character who has not developed at all; 456 chapters after his introduction, he is still the same useless kitsune kis who starts trembling every time he faces a formidable foe. I believe he was the comic relief in the beginning, but insulting Inuyasha gets old after awhile.

Despite that, I would miss him if Takahashi got rid of him. His fear of tough opponents is understandable; he is young, probably hasn't "awakened" to his full potential yet, and he is not exactly the strongest youkai out there. But there has been plenty of room for him to develop, and I wonder why Takahashi hasn't developed his character the way she has developed her other characters.

You know, Inuyasha really is a manly guy. The main male protagonist for each consecutive major series just gets more and more masculine (Ataru, Godai, Ranma, Inuyasha).
I would say that Inuyasha is very manly, and the only reason he seems immature is because of his age. Keep in mind that this boy's physical age is equivalent to that of a 15-year-old human (we know nothing about his mental age, although we can assume it's about the same). When you put it that way, he is actually mature for a 15-year-old boy.

[Yume Sakka]

As far as Inuyasha's maturity goes, he might even be more mature for his age than you'd think. He's half youkai, and youkai are supposed to live for centuries, right? If we discount the time he was in a sort of suspended animation pinned to that tree, we've got three possibilities:

1) He is physically about 15 years old (or a bit more than half-grown, in human terms) and his maturity is about average with a human male

2) He is physically 15 but mentally far ahead of his long-lived youkai counterparts, since at 15 most of them would probably look and act younger than Inuyasha, right? Unless they all age at different rates...

3) He is physically older than 15 but has the maturity level of a half-grown human boy because he really IS only half-grown, no matter what his physical age is. They have never given an actual age in terms of how many years he has been alive, have they? I know Rumiko Takahashi once was quoted as saying Inuyasha was 'like a human boy of 15 or 16' but that doesn't tell you his real age, does it?

And being half-youkai, you'd expect him to have a longer lifespan than a human, and --here's what gets me--a longer childhood. They show a few pictures of him as a small child with his mother, but none when he looked, say, 10. Is that because his mother was only his companion in his earliest childhood because she grew old and died before he reached older childhood? They have NEVER said how she died, have they?

So if Inu Yasha has a lifespan of, say, 200 years (about half of Old Myoga's age) and he looks only a bit more than halfway to adulthood, he may even be about 40 years old, physically. But since Rumiko Takahashi implied that he was only 15 or so, then with a lifespan of 200 years he's actually VERY mature for his age.

[Yume Sakka]

As far as Inuyasha's maturity goes, he might even be more mature for his age than you'd think. He's half youkai, and youkai are supposed to live for centuries, right? And being half-youkai, you'd expect him to have a longer lifespan than a human, and --here's what gets me--a longer childhood. They show a few pictures of him as a small child with his mother, but none when he looked, say, 10. Is that because his mother was only his companion in his earliest childhood because she grew old and died before he reached older childhood? They have NEVER said how she died, have they?

If we discount the time he was in a sort of suspended animation pinned to that tree, we've got three possibilities:

1) He is physically about 15 years old (or a bit more than half-grown, in human terms) and his maturity is about average with a human male

2) He is physically older than 15 but has the maturity level of a half-grown human boy because he really IS only half-grown, no matter what his physical age is. They have never given an actual age in terms of how many years he has been alive, have they? I know Rumiko Takahashi once was quoted as saying Inuyasha was 'like a human boy of 15 or 16' but that doesn't tell you his real age, does it?

3) He is physically 15 but mentally far ahead of his long-lived youkai counterparts, since at 15 most of them would probably look and act younger than Inuyasha, right? Unless they all age at different rates...

So if Inu Yasha has a lifespan of, say, 200 years (about half of Old Myoga's age) and he looks only a bit more than halfway to adulthood, he may even be about 40 years old, physically. But since Rumiko Takahashi implied that he was only 15 or so, then with a lifespan of 200 years he's actually VERY mature for his age.