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gonzaloohidalgo · 10 months ago

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Since you’re THE biggest IBO understander, I’ve wanted to get your input on something that’s been circulating in my mind for a while.

What do you think was Tekkadan’s biggest flaw that led to their downfall?

Heh, well, first off, I can't claim the definite article. Prolific output does not equal authority. But I can certainly try to give you both my understanding of what the text is aiming for and my opinions about the final result.

I have seen Orga Itsuka's biggest flaw termed a 'lack of conviction', although I would argue it's fairer to call it confusion over how to enact his convictions. Because Orga absolutely believes from the bottom of his heart that the most important thing in the world is to create a future for his friends. He just doesn't know how to do that, long-term. He's a tactical thinker, reacting to what's in front of him rather than taking a bigger-picture view. And he's willing to risk everything, including the lives he's trying to protect, to get immediate results. This works well for short-term victories but tends towards blind recklessness. Moreover, since Orga has not actually established for himself what a good future for everyone should look like, he latches on to other people's versions of it. First the CGS, then Naze, and finally, fatally, McGillis. For all his own intense charisma, he falls hard for that of others, and misjudges badly as a result.

This would be bad enough in isolation, but it's combined with Tekkadan's generalised 'all or nothing' attitude to truly terrible effect. I touched on this in the context of Mika and Orga's relationship in a previous essay: the rest of Tekkadan are behind Orga 110% and that creates its own inexorable momentum. We see multiple characters express dismay at looming problems-- Eugene, Biscuit, Merribit, even Shino -- only to set their doubts aside for what they perceive as the greater good. They believe in Tekkadan, more than anything else, this dream Orga has sold them on, and protecting it and advancing its fortunes becomes an all-encompassing goal for which they will gladly lay down their lives.

[As an aside, Shino's conversation with Eugene right before the 'final battle' is a great example of this problem playing out. As much as I rag on him, Shino isn't stupid. He shows repeatedly that despite his gung-ho attitude, he can recognise a losing fight. But he's quick to mask or go back on his doubts and act like Tekkadan is going to pull through regardless, because Orga has gotten them this far, right? Set alongside Eugene's failure to replace Biscuit as the voice of reason, it serves to underline how deeply enmeshed the boys are by this point. They've bet everything on Orga, and can't bring themselves to break with him. Not unrelatedly, it's Shino himself who talks Orga into the gamble that costs him his life.]

This combination -- the boy who doesn't know where he's going and the people willing to follow him anywhere he leads -- is what the show positions as Tekkadan's key flaw and the results of it steadily ramp up as the story progresses. They scrape through Season 1, making a big name for themselves, and reach their zenith by taking down the Dawn Horizon Corps with minimal losses. But then the 'Silent War' hits, dragging them more directly into political power-plays. It goes appallingly badly: they are betrayed from within, their legitimate connections to the Arbrau bloc are severed, and they lose their presence on Earth.

Next they uncover the mobile armour, and while they mange a victory over it, Mika definitively proves that he won't let Orga stop under any circumstances, McGillis is inspired to throw caution to the wind, and Tekkadan's tenuous position inside Teiwaz implodes. They just about got away with jumping on board with McGillis' coup plans, but once they've taken out the 'armour and embarrassed Iok Kujan into the bargain? A lot of chickens come home to roost.

Naze -- the one person Orga respects, listens to, and who actually has the potential to reign him in -- dies as a result of Tekkadan's display of power. Afterwards, Orga knows killing Jasley in return will mean breaking with Teiwaz. He hesitates, visibly, over going through with it -- only for the pressure of everyone wanting vengeance on behalf of Naze, Amida, Lafter and the rest to tip him over the edge. From there, the only possible route to achieving what he wants is the alliance with McGillis, who turns out not to be able to deliver on his promises. Everything falls apart.

Now. The way this is presented carries judgement. Orga is repeatedly castigated for his decisions, including the loss of one of his closest friends. Likewise, the Arbrau/SAU war arc serves as a microcosm of Tekkadan's failings, with Aston's death stemming from Takaki blindly acting according to their ethos. Crucially, Takaki chooses to change for the better, taking one of the other options available to him (with Kudelia's help) -- notably in the same moment Orga is doubling-down on his existing path.

Tragedies are built from characters making the wrong choices and this juxtaposition serves to underline that they are wrong, and could be approached differently. Takaki is correct to hold on to what he has instead of risking it for the sake of an imagined 'better place'. He recognises something Orga does not until after Shino is killed (and lots of other people, of course, but it's framed around Shino's death).

There follow several scenes of Ogra being directly called out. 'He died for you!' Eugene snarls, taking charge of getting everyone to safety. 'You're whining?' Yamagi demands, when Orga reaches his lowest ebb and comes close to abandoning Tekkadan's cause. 'I was under the impression you had a spine,' sneers Rustal Elion, assuming moral authority and refusing to blunt the consequences of Orga's actions.

[When @prezaki asked me to explain my stance on Rustal Elion's intentions, I talked about his gestured-to positive traits. That's not what I mean here: Rustal takes control over the setting and imposes his morals upon it. The tenor of his exchange with Orga is of someone in the right looking down on someone pleading for unearned leniency. Whatever you think about that -- and I view it as a great demonstration of Rustal's inherent contempt for 'little people' who don't meet his standards -- this is functionally what's happening, and Orga is powerless against it.]

In light of this, the manner of Orga's death -- finally taking up a gun and sacrificing his life for his comrades after two seasons of doing the opposite -- is both fitting and a form of redemption. Given the director's original conception of the show being one that ended with every named protagonist dead, a thread of 'just desserts' is undeniably present. Tekkadan are not placed in a positive light for their determination, which comes with a bloody cost, both on their side and on their enemies'. They are fools and upstarts in a world that violently rejects change.

However, like many of the show's components, its authorship is a two-part affair. Mari Okada and other writers argued against the kill 'em all direction, and the end result is far more ambiguous than clean-cut condemnation. To be clear, it is absolutely still saying that Orga and Tekkadan as a whole make terrible decisions. But the more-hopeful-than-it-might-have-been ending allows space for greater nuance. (Which is good - I doubt I would be as enamoured with IBO if it had concluded by thoroughly punishing a group of child-soldiers for being what they are and committed to their never being anything else.)

In light of the actual ending, we can look seriously at the ways the show demonstrates why its characters behave as they do. Mika and Orga's ingrained behaviour is responsible for a lot of what goes wrong, but we are shown quite blatantly that they would not have survived into adolescence if they hadn't developed it. The ever-present threat of what would happen if Tekkadan *didn't* strive to grow stronger and resist the harmful forces surrounding them frames every decision. Even the individuals who mean them ill are the products of the systems that created this whole miserable situation. Nobliss, Ein, Gaelio, Carta, Iok, Jasley, Galan, Rustal -- they each have major personal failings but are equally shaped by their positions in society, just as the boys are shaped by theirs. By being so thorough in constructing an exploitative world, the writers and director hew against reducing the characters down to simply being flawed people.

They are instead flawed people doing their best with limited resources in oft-times impossible circumstances. The story at once highlights the brutality of its protagonists and that they are children, abused by those who see them only as tools, within systems that encourage that perspective. Tekkadan is itself a microcosm of larger patterns, of might making right and human life being exchanged for money. Throughout, lines are blurred between 'proper' soldiers and teenage mercenaries, between businesses and the mafia, between pirates and police. The whole is rotten and while struggling may not be a path to survival, it is at least clearly a path, if you can stick to it.

Thus, any discussion of Tekkadan's flaws must account for the show's refusal to place them in a vacuum. I don't know to what extent Iron-Blooded Orphans is the result of a push and pull between competing ideas about how the tale should go. Yet what was put on screen frequently refuses easy categorisation into straightforward condemnation or sympathy. It's just not the kind of story that allows us to neatly assign blame to zealousness, recklessness or a murderous attitude. All these have too demonstrable a cause and within that context, it's hard to argue they are incorrect as responses. They are, at the very least, eminently understandable.

Errors of judgement on Orga's part and the failure of those around him to moderate his haste play a role in what happens, without question. But to a large degree, no one involved is allowed to be otherwise. Takaki's path is contingent on too many factors to be a widely-viable alternative. Likewise, for all that the eventual escape of the survivors is facilitated by wiser and cooler heads prevailing, it is nonetheless paid for in blood, past as well as present. Heck, Kudelia's character development is about learning the cost of improvement and accepting that cost as necessary -- the same calculation performed by every boy who steps on to the series' battlefields.

In the end, perhaps the most honest answer to 'what caused Tekkadan's downfall' is simply that they existed as part and parcel of the world they were born into. Their 'mistake' was responding to it on its own terms, meeting violence with violence and oppressive hopelessness with desperate hope. They tried to win a rigged game, not because it was the only one in town, but because it looked better than the alternatives and once committed, there was no easy way to turn back.

I think that's a startlingly mature approach to a subject too often reduced to power-fantasies or personal horror. The existence of child-soldiers is a flaw in the real world. Through the way it fleshes out its tragic structure, Iron-Blooded Orphans manages to capture some of what that entails.

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Thank you for the ask! I don't know to what extent this is the answer you were after. I tend to view Tekkadan's naiveté as a significant single contributing factor, but it's really only a facet of their being stuck where they are, socially speaking. And I wanted to discuss the narrative treatment of Orga's flaws because it's something that could be a lot more clear-cut than it actually is.

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