pomiiidoriii

[pomiiidoriii]

the bffs forever 🥺💕

Lil wip of the lil guys

[pomiiidoriii]

Personally I think most studios have a problem with depicting baldness in general animated or not. Also it doesn't help that a lot people first introduction to JTTW is Dragonball or Saiyuki, none of the pilgrims are even dressed or behave like monks.

Honestly yeah, a lot of character designs are dependent on hair too. So, I can see why giving Monkey something other than his iconic wild hairstyle would take away from it.

It would definitely be interesting and unique to see a JTTW adaptation with accurate book descriptions though!

[pomiiidoriii]

Sun Wukong's Baldness

There have been countless depictions of Monkey King throughout the years. My personal favourite ones include the Lego Monkie Kid, The Monkey King Conquers the Demon, and Journey To The West (1986).

While these depictions are AMAZING, when they show the Monkey King on his pilgrimage journey, they miss this one small detail; Sun Wukong’s baldness.

That last sentence mostly likely made you pause and go–”Hold on…since when was he bald?!”

Well, let’s dive into the source material ‘Journey To The West’.

Screen shot of Monkey King and Nezha fighting from Havoc in Heaven (1961)

There are many times that Sun Wukong’s baldness is mentioned in the novel. The first is in Volume 1, chapter 20 when Monkey has already joined the pilgrimage with Tripitaka and an old man asks;

"... and why did you shave your hair to become a monk?"

(Wu and Yu, 2012, Vol. 1, p. 395)

Seven chapters later, his bald head is mentioned once again:

"But ever since Nirvana delivered me from my sins, when with my hair shorn I took the vow of complete poverty and followed you as your disciple, I had this gold fillet clamped on my head."

(Wu and Yu, 2012, Vol. 2, p. 24)

And then twice more in chapters 34 and chapter 75

The fiend then gave the rope a tug and pulled Pilgrim down before he gave that bald head seven or eight blows with the sword. The skin on Pilgrim's head did not even redden at all. "This monkey;' said the demon, "has quite a hard head! I won't hack at you anymore. Let me take you back to the cave first before I hit you again. But you'd better return my other two treasures right now:'

(Wu and Yu, 2012, Vol. 2, p. 24)

"You come over here," said the old demon, "and act as my chopping block first. If your bald head can withstand three blows of my scimitar, I'll let you and your Tang Monk go past. But if you can't, you'd better tum him over quickly to me as a meal.... ...He lifted up his scimitar with both hands and brought it down hard on the head of the Great Sage. Our Great Sage, however, jerked his head upward to meet the blow. All they heard was a loud crack, but the skin on the head did not even redden. Greatly astonished, the old demon said, "What a hard head this monkey has!"

(Wu and Yu, 2012, Vol. 3, p. 373)

Monkey King from Journey to the West (1986)

But even with all these excerpts from the book, it's interesting to me how Wukong is never depicted with shaven or bald head in media. At least not to my knowledge.

Sun Wukong has been adapted over and over again. He's been everything from Peking Opera, to an anime, a video game, and then a literal Lego character!

Monkey King from Lego Monkie Kid (2020)

But not one shows him bald even though it is wide knowledge he became a disciple of a monk.

I just wanted to show this silly little thing I noticed. If anyone knows any kind of media that has him as a shaven or bald head, I would be very interested in seeing it!

[pomiiidoriii]

[pomiiidoriii]

A page from the Yellow Submarine 1968 Comic Book