I always wondered how this route was viable. They route through NRT with a pretty average J class seat. It's not a daily flight and flight times headed west from LAX put you into KUL at an odd hour.
Seemed like a bad idea from the start but will miss the Oneworld redemption option!
Well, you have to understand how the NRT stop over was justified. It was more viable than before when it operated via TPE, where average fare was even lower, in part because MH was under cutting CI, BR, and SQ to maintain load factor between LAX and TPE.
MH used to operate KUL-TPE-LAX with a 744 daily, then dropped down to 6x weekly, then 5x weekly, then 4x weekly, then down gauged to 77E, then switched to KUL-NRT-LAX, and now finally gone. At one point in the mid to late 2000s, there were more seats between LAX and TPE than any other ex-LAX international destinations (!) with 6x daily year-round 744 service and up to 8x daily seasonally. It was a bloodbath of epic proportion.
The idea that MH should fly to all 6 continents and incur pointless losses for political prestige back home has always been absurd. Especially so now that they are in OneWorld. There is no natural traffic between LAX and KUL... it's one of those draw lines on the map fantasy airline route planning decision that lead to its existence in the first place, curtsey of Taiwanese Govt's generous 5th freedom gift.