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[sandflow]

For the 1st quote: Hmm yeah I can see that using Ayato or Kazuha might further a negative opinion of Scaramouche compared to an unknowing random npc.

For the 2nd quote: Plausible. The way they keep adding new tidbits of lore yet not enough to be relevant makes sense with the fact that they just...didn't think it through yet, same with the harbinger designs.

For the 3rd quote: Scaramouche was given a focus in an event in 1.1, in AQ 2.1, in an event in 2.6 and then ultimately 3.1-3.3. Kazuha got his own focus in AQ 2.1, his own personal quest, and two events.

But the problem (imo) with Kazuha is that his story was basically repeated 3 separate times aka his story quest, the 2.6 and 2.8 events, that don't make me feel as though he was given any character development.

Kazuha seems like a very complete character to me. As in, he doesn't seem to need any character development. Find out some spooky conspiracy and the culprit behind your family's demise? "It's ok what matters is that we are all safe". Raiden killing off his bestie even though that guy was aware he might be executed by her (even though she didn't kill the guy in her first story quest)? The Inazuma troops went on something like "Raiden is giving you her utmost apology and will help you in case you need to build up your clan again" and he said "I appreciate your efforts". And that's it. He seems to still have a little beef with Raiden since he doesn't want to meet her in the 3.2 ghost event though, but considering his replies and general attitude towards these problems, he seems to be at peace with himself.

For the 4th quote: When I specified Scaramouche out of the 4 harbingers, I was refering up until 3.5. Dottore will definitely get his own share of patches similar to Scara. And probably Childe too. But that's going to happen after 2-3 years probably.

In regards to Raiden, yes, her second quest was way better than the first one. She does seem like she did realise certain things about herself. But this happens very very late story-wise, and it happens in a single quest. Which is not very much.

For the 5th quote: Hmmmm, yeah, I can see why Scaramouche wouldn't want to step in Inazuma from now on since he is now tied to Sumeru. But that didn't stop characters from certain regions to visit other regions. Scaramouche is basically erased from people's minds so he is just like any other wanderer in Inazuma now. If he will visit, people will definitely not be hostile to him. There will be a lot of awkward silence and moments though.

Hi! I just stumbled upon your tumblr!

I have this rather unpopular and controversial opinion about Scaramouche. I feel like 3.3 has pictured him way too dramatic and too much of a victim so that people will feel simpathy for him.

The 3.3 events don't make me feel sympathy for him because Scaramouche joined the fatui willingly based on the Husk of Opulent Dreams set.

The set also states that Scaramouche is not affected by rain, nor does he breathe, which made me think that he doesn't....exactly feel pain? Yet there's a ton of audio lines that hint how he went through a lot of torture back when Dottore experimented on him.

When Scaramouche joined the Fatui, he was seated as a Harbinger, aka a high diplomatic position, had his own subordinates, and probably had access to travelling and many other comodities. It's not like he was a simple labrat similar to Collei.

Collei was kept in a dark cell, treated like a dog, forced through injections to go through the human enhancing experiment, and hunted down like a rabid animal throughout the manga.

Scaramouche was being sent into the abyss constantly, from which he would return and then go directly to Dottore to patch him up. If he felt like he was suffering from those experiments, and disliked the fatui, why not escape or ....end himself through the abyss?

A lot of people kept blaming Dottore for his baggage but it seems to me that there were a lot more factors in play here. Scaramouche was damaged by Ei, then Dottore, then by human nature (with the sick kid dying), then ultimately, himself.

What's your take on how Scaramouche was handled in the 3.3 archon quest? Do you think that there was an obvious writing tactic in making Scaramouche symapthetic so as to influence players into pulling for him? Sorry if you have already talked about this and excuse me if I may rustle some feathers from what I have wrote, in case you're a Scaramouche fan.

Hi anon and welcome! And sorry for the belated response, life is. Yeah. Never fear, Genshin's writing is so Like That that I'm absolutely fine tearing even the characters I DO like to shreds, and Scaramouche is definitely not one of those.

Honestly, yeah? A LOT of weight is put on Dottore pushing Scaramouche down a bad path. Way too much, IMO - it's the realisation that Scaramouche was lied to that makes him decide to undo everything he did to the Raiden Gokaden, which, uh. Look, Dottore wasn't exactly holding a gun to his head forcing him to do any of that. It's not Dottore's fault Scaramouche went Full Revenge Quest 3000 on the ancestors of folks tangentially related to Niwa Hisahide like an insane person. And honestly, Genshin's usual brand of "you only did the wrong thing because you didn't know the truth of the matter!" aesop kinda stings here because, what? Scaramouche just eventually shifted his focus to Dottore, so what's the actual moral here? That if Niwa really had killed a subordinate as Dottore had claimed, Scaramouche would have had nothing to learn or grow from?

Because Scaramouche's drive for revenge isn't actually commented on, you know. Not really. The fact that he was still taking potshots at the - again, tangentially related - Raiden Gokaden centuries on isn't really the focus of any of this in his redemption arc, it's just window dressing for the domino effect of tragedy caused by Dottore tricking him and a convenient setpiece to demonstrate the limits of Irminsul's power. There isn't an aesop of learning to let go and moving on or heal from the past, like one might expect. He is not made to pay for his actions, nor is he ever confronted by anyone affected by what he did, nor is there a lesson to be learnt about the futility of revenge. Once Scaramouche is past his suicidal episode and has been successfully manipulated into working for a different Archon this time, he just redirects his rage and swears vengeance on the Fatui and Dottore instead! So what's the lesson, here? If you're gonna swear bloody vengeance, at least make sure it's on the right people?

Narratively, this is all very confusing and unsatisfying to me. You establish a character flaw that is not addressed, and instead set up a misconception mystery where both the misconception AND the truth are explained at roughly the same time so I can't even bathe in the horrific irony of the situation. Perhaps I wasn't meant to look at Scaramouche's insane revenge quest and think it mattered for his character, just like I wasn't supposed to look at Ei allowing Inazuma to get screwed over and think that reflected badly on her, but it was also the most concrete thing we had on him in terms of characterisation (that wasn't an item lore dump) for quite some time so, yeah, after the Iradori Festival I do feel kinda blueballed. I can't feel bad for a character like this. Late Sumeru was the first time he got real focus, and it was already telling me to forgive and feel bad for him.

And, like. Has Scaramouche GROWN as a person? It's not like he's actually been redeemed in any way that matters (to me), and I would hope that Genshin keeps that in mind moving forward (they do seem aware, at least), but it does feel like they couldn't see the forest for the trees when constructing his quest WRT his character. It seemed like the absolute focus was to pull as much attention away from "Scaramouche is a fucked up guy, trauma notwithstanding" and instead hone in on on a) "Irminsul sure is important!" and b) "Scaramouche is a poor little meow meow, he's so sad, please roll for him". Literally, he's depicted as a crying kitten, this quest does NOT want to grapple with the morality of Scaramouche's actions, just the lore surrounding why he did them. Forget anything he did in the Fatui, though. The propagation of Delusions in Watatsumi on behalf of the Vision Hunt Decree, who? What? Eh….

It also strikes me that "Scaramouche is a sad manipulated tortured (off-screen) baby, isn't it so nice he's away from that nasty (off-screen) situation so he can't get manipulated by Dottore (off-screen) anymore, isn't it so good he fixed the problem so that he never did it in the first place (off-screen)" is a HELLUVA lot easier to write than "Scaramouche is a petty, spiteful murderer that can't let go of the past and, as an immortal, that has terrifying repercussions for the descendants of those he despises; is redemption even possible for him what will happen when he meets these characters etcetcetc.", and Genshin always, ALWAYS takes the easy way out, doesn't it? It did with Kaeya and his connection with Khaen'riah. It did with Collei and her backstory with Dottore. Just don't worry about it, keep the actual problem as far away as possible, we'll solve this with the least amount of words and animation possible and preferably with the characters talking to each other for as little time as possible.

I cannot get over the fact that Scaramouche is explicitly a character that will continue taking revenge on Niwa's ancestors and the 5 clans from the Raiden Gokaden - You know, the 5 sword schools, descendants of whom still survive today, some of whom are playable - but instead they had him try to undo everything he did off-screen so he never has to interact with them in any serious capacity. It's so fucking lazy it's unbelievable. What was the Iradori Festival for if not setting up Kazuha and Scaramouche's meeting (it was establishing what happened to the Raiden Gokaden, Kazuha does not matter)? What was Kazuha's quest for if not establishing his moral compass in preparation for a similar situation in the future (it was discussing what happened at Tatarasuna Furnace, Kazuha doesn't matter)? In a real story where the characters matter, these things should have chained into a story and, I'm sorry, I know I'm beating a dead horse with Kazuha FUCKING Kaedehara's ridiculously misdirected character beats but 2022 was a rough year, okay. Genshin set out very explicit building blocks for a story that seemed SO obvious even a child could see what was going to happen and they couldn't even commit to it because, what? It was hard? They didn't realise they'd accidentally set up a character conflict? Were Scaramouche and Kazuha foils on purpose or was that just a cosmic fluke?

Kazuha wanted to understand his friend better - specifically through the lens of how he felt when he fought a god -, he has a shared backstory with a character that is established to still want revenge on his family, and that character becomes a god, but Kazuha is also established as a forgiving character that cares about the present, not the past. I'm not crazy, right? That seems like a pretty open and shut set-up for a future character conflict, right?!

i would like actual validation on this i think because i'm starting to go a little crazier every time i see someone talk about how good and profound scara's writing was, like it wasn't the laziest possible solution for a bunch of shit that happened off-screen where the writers didn't have to, like, actually write any of it

uhhhhh

um, tl;dr, i thought 3.3 and scaramouche's handling pretty much all game was pretty bad. i don't really like the way they resolved his character arc here, it seemed like they kind of missed the bigger picture because they wanted to talk about lore again and couldn't really correctly identify scaramouche's real character flaws. kind of reminds me of xiao's writing in the chasm in that way, actually. like, there's been an attempt, but i'm not sure they really understood the gravity of what they'd written, and it feels like they took the easiest way to resolve the issues they DID focus on, so...

[sandflow]

Thanks for replying! No worries I understand that eveyone has their own life problems.

I understand why you’d feel annoyed with the way people keep talking about Scara’s writing. I was and to some extent still am.

There’s been some negative takes on reddit back when the patch got released. Though other than that, I haven’t seen critisism much. People probably went “eh, typical mihoyo writing” and moved on?

A friend who likes Scara said that the plot made sense as his whole 3.3 quest was a reference to buddhism, and how, through irminsul, he was reborn. Which I can understand, but still, the entire quest felt very rushed and weirdly...boring? compared to how the archon quests 3.0-3.2 were written. It’s like they regressed back to Inazuma-tier writing.

Why didn’t we speak to Ayato or Kazuha when we explored Inazuma and see the consequences of Scara’s Irminsul erasure? Because they didn’t want to pay their more expensive VA’s? So we’re limited to wall-of-text-tell-not-show npc’s? 

Why didn’t we get more flashbacks of his life other than his betrayals and Dottore plotting Niwa’s death? Like, scenes from his time with the Fatui. Or some scenes where Dottore experiments on him, or how he interacts with some of the harbingers. 

Anyway, I’ll stop being negative in my post and look on the bright side.

Even though Scaramouche’s writing wasn’t stellar, Mihoyo did evolve when it comes to building up a character and spending time on them. Was there any character in Genshin other than Scaramouche that got 3 patches worth of build-up and character development? Maybe Xiao? But his build-up happened just in 2.7ish, I think. And maybe the Liyue festivals too? Though I didn’t feel as though they were.

Let’s say that the Archons were sort of given some kind of personal quests, but they seem rather filler to me rather than building any relevant character development. Yet Scaramouche wasn’t even archon yet still got a ton of screentime and build-up. He was a harbinger and the first out of known 4 (Childe, Signora, Scara, Dottore) that time on his character was spent on which wasn’t shoehorned into just artifacts.

As for the Kazuha/Scaramouche relationship stuff, when I first played trough the 2.6? event, I felt as though Kazuha should’ve been left with some kind of beef or at least some kind of closure in regards to Scaramouche. But he ends up being so calm and forgiving about it, which is very....*boring*. Scaramouche’s audio about Kazuha feels as though they might meet, as he seems to have a rather good opinion of Kazuha (if laughing uncontrollably can mean a good opinion). But that is definitely going to happen in some Inazuma festival event, and they’ll just exchange a few words after which Scaramouche will snicker silently “Oh so this is the almighty Kazuha, haha”. And that’s that.

Hi! I just stumbled upon your tumblr!

I have this rather unpopular and controversial opinion about Scaramouche. I feel like 3.3 has pictured him way too dramatic and too much of a victim so that people will feel simpathy for him.

The 3.3 events don't make me feel sympathy for him because Scaramouche joined the fatui willingly based on the Husk of Opulent Dreams set.

The set also states that Scaramouche is not affected by rain, nor does he breathe, which made me think that he doesn't....exactly feel pain? Yet there's a ton of audio lines that hint how he went through a lot of torture back when Dottore experimented on him.

When Scaramouche joined the Fatui, he was seated as a Harbinger, aka a high diplomatic position, had his own subordinates, and probably had access to travelling and many other comodities. It's not like he was a simple labrat similar to Collei.

Collei was kept in a dark cell, treated like a dog, forced through injections to go through the human enhancing experiment, and hunted down like a rabid animal throughout the manga.

Scaramouche was being sent into the abyss constantly, from which he would return and then go directly to Dottore to patch him up. If he felt like he was suffering from those experiments, and disliked the fatui, why not escape or ....end himself through the abyss?

A lot of people kept blaming Dottore for his baggage but it seems to me that there were a lot more factors in play here. Scaramouche was damaged by Ei, then Dottore, then by human nature (with the sick kid dying), then ultimately, himself.

What's your take on how Scaramouche was handled in the 3.3 archon quest? Do you think that there was an obvious writing tactic in making Scaramouche symapthetic so as to influence players into pulling for him? Sorry if you have already talked about this and excuse me if I may rustle some feathers from what I have wrote, in case you're a Scaramouche fan.

Hi anon and welcome! And sorry for the belated response, life is. Yeah. Never fear, Genshin's writing is so Like That that I'm absolutely fine tearing even the characters I DO like to shreds, and Scaramouche is definitely not one of those.

Honestly, yeah? A LOT of weight is put on Dottore pushing Scaramouche down a bad path. Way too much, IMO - it's the realisation that Scaramouche was lied to that makes him decide to undo everything he did to the Raiden Gokaden, which, uh. Look, Dottore wasn't exactly holding a gun to his head forcing him to do any of that. It's not Dottore's fault Scaramouche went Full Revenge Quest 3000 on the ancestors of folks tangentially related to Niwa Hisahide like an insane person. And honestly, Genshin's usual brand of "you only did the wrong thing because you didn't know the truth of the matter!" aesop kinda stings here because, what? Scaramouche just eventually shifted his focus to Dottore, so what's the actual moral here? That if Niwa really had killed a subordinate as Dottore had claimed, Scaramouche would have had nothing to learn or grow from?

Because Scaramouche's drive for revenge isn't actually commented on, you know. Not really. The fact that he was still taking potshots at the - again, tangentially related - Raiden Gokaden centuries on isn't really the focus of any of this in his redemption arc, it's just window dressing for the domino effect of tragedy caused by Dottore tricking him and a convenient setpiece to demonstrate the limits of Irminsul's power. There isn't an aesop of learning to let go and moving on or heal from the past, like one might expect. He is not made to pay for his actions, nor is he ever confronted by anyone affected by what he did, nor is there a lesson to be learnt about the futility of revenge. Once Scaramouche is past his suicidal episode and has been successfully manipulated into working for a different Archon this time, he just redirects his rage and swears vengeance on the Fatui and Dottore instead! So what's the lesson, here? If you're gonna swear bloody vengeance, at least make sure it's on the right people?

Narratively, this is all very confusing and unsatisfying to me. You establish a character flaw that is not addressed, and instead set up a misconception mystery where both the misconception AND the truth are explained at roughly the same time so I can't even bathe in the horrific irony of the situation. Perhaps I wasn't meant to look at Scaramouche's insane revenge quest and think it mattered for his character, just like I wasn't supposed to look at Ei allowing Inazuma to get screwed over and think that reflected badly on her, but it was also the most concrete thing we had on him in terms of characterisation (that wasn't an item lore dump) for quite some time so, yeah, after the Iradori Festival I do feel kinda blueballed. I can't feel bad for a character like this. Late Sumeru was the first time he got real focus, and it was already telling me to forgive and feel bad for him.

And, like. Has Scaramouche GROWN as a person? It's not like he's actually been redeemed in any way that matters (to me), and I would hope that Genshin keeps that in mind moving forward (they do seem aware, at least), but it does feel like they couldn't see the forest for the trees when constructing his quest WRT his character. It seemed like the absolute focus was to pull as much attention away from "Scaramouche is a fucked up guy, trauma notwithstanding" and instead hone in on on a) "Irminsul sure is important!" and b) "Scaramouche is a poor little meow meow, he's so sad, please roll for him". Literally, he's depicted as a crying kitten, this quest does NOT want to grapple with the morality of Scaramouche's actions, just the lore surrounding why he did them. Forget anything he did in the Fatui, though. The propagation of Delusions in Watatsumi on behalf of the Vision Hunt Decree, who? What? Eh….

It also strikes me that "Scaramouche is a sad manipulated tortured (off-screen) baby, isn't it so nice he's away from that nasty (off-screen) situation so he can't get manipulated by Dottore (off-screen) anymore, isn't it so good he fixed the problem so that he never did it in the first place (off-screen)" is a HELLUVA lot easier to write than "Scaramouche is a petty, spiteful murderer that can't let go of the past and, as an immortal, that has terrifying repercussions for the descendants of those he despises; is redemption even possible for him what will happen when he meets these characters etcetcetc.", and Genshin always, ALWAYS takes the easy way out, doesn't it? It did with Kaeya and his connection with Khaen'riah. It did with Collei and her backstory with Dottore. Just don't worry about it, keep the actual problem as far away as possible, we'll solve this with the least amount of words and animation possible and preferably with the characters talking to each other for as little time as possible.

I cannot get over the fact that Scaramouche is explicitly a character that will continue taking revenge on Niwa's ancestors and the 5 clans from the Raiden Gokaden - You know, the 5 sword schools, descendants of whom still survive today, some of whom are playable - but instead they had him try to undo everything he did off-screen so he never has to interact with them in any serious capacity. It's so fucking lazy it's unbelievable. What was the Iradori Festival for if not setting up Kazuha and Scaramouche's meeting (it was establishing what happened to the Raiden Gokaden, Kazuha does not matter)? What was Kazuha's quest for if not establishing his moral compass in preparation for a similar situation in the future (it was discussing what happened at Tatarasuna Furnace, Kazuha doesn't matter)? In a real story where the characters matter, these things should have chained into a story and, I'm sorry, I know I'm beating a dead horse with Kazuha FUCKING Kaedehara's ridiculously misdirected character beats but 2022 was a rough year, okay. Genshin set out very explicit building blocks for a story that seemed SO obvious even a child could see what was going to happen and they couldn't even commit to it because, what? It was hard? They didn't realise they'd accidentally set up a character conflict? Were Scaramouche and Kazuha foils on purpose or was that just a cosmic fluke?

Kazuha wanted to understand his friend better - specifically through the lens of how he felt when he fought a god -, he has a shared backstory with a character that is established to still want revenge on his family, and that character becomes a god, but Kazuha is also established as a forgiving character that cares about the present, not the past. I'm not crazy, right? That seems like a pretty open and shut set-up for a future character conflict, right?!

i would like actual validation on this i think because i'm starting to go a little crazier every time i see someone talk about how good and profound scara's writing was, like it wasn't the laziest possible solution for a bunch of shit that happened off-screen where the writers didn't have to, like, actually write any of it

uhhhhh

um, tl;dr, i thought 3.3 and scaramouche's handling pretty much all game was pretty bad. i don't really like the way they resolved his character arc here, it seemed like they kind of missed the bigger picture because they wanted to talk about lore again and couldn't really correctly identify scaramouche's real character flaws. kind of reminds me of xiao's writing in the chasm in that way, actually. like, there's been an attempt, but i'm not sure they really understood the gravity of what they'd written, and it feels like they took the easiest way to resolve the issues they DID focus on, so...

[sandflow]

Hi don’t judge me bye!

[sandflow]

Hi! I started playing Genshin Impact ever since patch 2.2. The story is fine.

[sandflow]

Actually most people were thinking even Ogata had a really big plot armor too. Until he died of course.

Yeah, I guess Noda just stopped focusing on Sugimoto because he had to work on many other characters he added in the story that didn’t get much spotlight.

So I just finished reading Golden Kamuy

 Oh boy I got lots of things to say about it.

Warning: spoilers from latest and final chapter 314 + rants that might anger people

Keep reading

[sandflow]

I know right?? Kiroranke and Usami’s deaths were so well thought up!

Especially Kiro like that guy was a tank, he had to be taken down by 3 people! It was glorious! He got a great send-off too by Shiraishi. 

I can’t really say Usami was a tank since he was just hit in the stomach and then the heart, but when he died in Tsurumi’s arms it was so great. Usami was happy and Tsurumi got his info. Just overall satisfying.

And honestly after their deaths I was expecting the same for the following character deaths too.

Nope, they keep dying one by one. I liked Heiji’s death though it was nice and poetic. But after that, there were no breaks, they were all dying like flies. Which made me wonder why did Noda even keep them alive in the first place? Only to discard them in the final arcs?

So I just finished reading Golden Kamuy

 Oh boy I got lots of things to say about it.

Warning: spoilers from latest and final chapter 314 + rants that might anger people

Continua a leggere

[sandflow]

Yeah exactly. I would have praised the hell out of this series back in 2019-2020. 

I sometimes think that Noda should have put the series on a halt and do whatever else he wanted to work on. 

Recently, Noda started to have this habit of overhyping stuff. Almost every chapter ending with a cliffhanger but with no real payoff the next. He did the same thing with the last volumes too 29-30-31, saying that he will double the enjoyment of the manga. But I really can’t trust him in delivering what he promised. He said the same thing about the ending and that we should trust him on it being delivered smoothly, which it really wasn’t in my opinion lol.

So I just finished reading Golden Kamuy

 Oh boy I got lots of things to say about it.

Warning: spoilers from latest and final chapter 314 + rants that might anger people

Continua a leggere

[sandflow]

Ogata anon here! I don't think it's that strange that he never hallucinated anybody else but Yuusaku, since Yuusaku is different from everybody else in that he was the first (and only) person who openly tried to befriend Ogata. Like, Asirpa, for example, she's friendly, but she's nowhere near as persistent as Yuusaku. After an entire life of being unloved and ostracized, this guy from a good family shows up in ogata's life and tries to befriend him, and he's the very last person Ogata wanted in his life bc he reminds him of everything that he is not... It must have thrown Ogata for a loop, specially when it's Yuusaku, of all people, the one to tell him that it's not right to kill without feeling guilt, which is something though, even obvious, no other character told Ogata. Yuusaku is the only one who challenged Ogata's worldview like this. Like, it's one thing on top of another. So it's not the amount of time they spent together but the impact he had on Ogata. Ogata could've lived 80 years killing ppl left and right and he wouldn't have felt a little bit of remorse. It was since meeting Yuusaku that he began to suspect he was also a "blessed child". But it's not until Asirpa willingly shoots him that this suspicion becomes awareness. The hallucinations weren't just Ogata yearning for love, or him feeling guilt, they were also his subconscious mind telling him his worldview was wrong and Yuusaku was right. So Yuusaku isn't only a person who could've loved Ogata, he's also the mirror in which Ogata sees the worst parts of himself, and a symbol of all the wrong choices he made in his life due to his fucked up worldview, and that's what makes Yuusaku different from all the other potential loving ppl in Ogata's life.

Ooh I see what you mean. Basically Yuusaku was the only guy who truly affected him because he was too much Ogata's opposite.

Hmm yeah it makes sense!

Still, I kind of wanted to see this being triggered by Yuusaku alone and not the use of Asirpa. Cause sure, her role was to kill him. But she doesn't lol because he killed himself. I mean the intetion is there but you can easily imagine anybody telling her that "it's ok Asirpa you didn't ultimately kill him".

[sandflow]

Hi! Was about to reblog again but figured I'd pop in here instead lol

Tbh I feel like Sugimoto's nemesis wasn't even take him serious. I mean if we put him and Usami in front of Ogata, Ogata'll immediately shoot Usami. So cheering for Sugi on his path to get revenge wasn't even that fun. Not to mention Sugi vs Tsuru, Tsurumi's enemy is his past and he saw remnant through Asirpa. So Sugi is just a stand-in, their fight is fun in a sense of seeing some action but on a goosebumps level? "You're responsible for all of this, Wilk." easily take the crown.

It's a shame. He supposed to be a co-protagonist with Asirpa but he just so faded...

Sure! It's a bit tiring to reblog.

Thinking about it, I liked Sugimoto best when the series began. He was grumpy, had post war mental issues, he'd kill anyone on sight, just unfiltered overall. I also liked him throughout the Karafuto arc. He was so fun when he was interacting with different characters other than Asirpa.

But, yeah. Sugimoto truly was used as a bodyguard and his relevance as a main characters started to dwindle.

About the Ogata scene, I'm honestly not sure if Ogata did see him through the window. I think it was just a tease to give readers the sense of how on edge the whole sequence is. Cause after he shoots, we don't even see Sugimoto react to the noise of the shot considering that it was super near him.

If Ogata did see him through the window, I don't think he'd shoot Sugimoto. Not because I'm a filthy Sugio shipper but Ogata didn't give me the impression that he really intended on killing him. They fought on top of a train and he had a 100% chance of killing Sugi in one shot right there when he was pinned by the bear but he didn't do it.

Oh and remember when Kikuta told Tsurumi that "vagrant boy will take you down"? It was Noda's way of giving Tsurumi the motivation in killing off Sugimoto but in the end Tsurumi still felt like he had bigger beef with Asirpa and her dad rather than Sugimoto throwing punches at him as you said lol.

[sandflow]

Yeah. In a way I’m glad that it ended because it was getting more and more obvious that Noda wanted to be done with the series as fast as possible. From what I understood from his 314 end notes, it was hell for him to manage the schedule.

So I just finished reading Golden Kamuy

 Oh boy I got lots of things to say about it.

Warning: spoilers from latest and final chapter 314 + rants that might anger people

Weiterlesen

[sandflow]

Oh man I actually remember back in 2018 when the ice floe chapters were coming out and Sofia brings down a tiger saying the whole curse thing. And some meta posters here were talking about and fully believing it would happen.

Alas is was just one of the things that Noda forgot about. I’m not really surprised by this since it was mentioned only once and never brought up again. So it was most likely not intended on actually happening.

So I just finished reading Golden Kamuy

 Oh boy I got lots of things to say about it.

Warning: spoilers from latest and final chapter 314 + rants that might anger people

Continua a leggere

[sandflow]

Hi! Honestly yeah that was also one of my main gripes with Sugi but I didn’t end up writing about it because I already nitpicked a ton of things in my post.

Honestly I felt like Sugi was a total hypocrite in 309 and 310. Like you save your nemesis’s ass on the ice floe + wasted an entire hospital arc just to not make her a murderer and now you get shiny eyes when you see her murder someone with full killing intent right in front of you. And also telling her to shoot him again and confirm the kill. And in 314 we see him being content that he did a good job on getting the gold and making it out alive. 

So I just finished reading Golden Kamuy

 Oh boy I got lots of things to say about it.

Warning: spoilers from latest and final chapter 314 + rants that might anger people

Keep reading

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1/ ogata didnt dislike yuusaku as much as he felt inferior to him and jealous towards him, thats why he's always so uncomfortable in his presence. so it's not like he suddenly changed his mind about him; he merely realized the reasons why he felt inferior were only in his mind. there wasnt much he couldve done about his parents not loving him but there were other people he couldve leaned into (his grandparents, yuusaku, asirpa, sugi etc) but he refused to, he went

Hi!

Yeah I may have exagerated there, he didn’t really hate him.

Hmm well Ogata's main goal or at least that's what I thought until 304, was that he always wanted to take the blessed path (he says so to his dying dad) which in a way meant that he wanted to be given love/validation or something along those lines. And isn't it weird how he never hallucinated his parents or any of the victims he killed along the way? It was just Yuusaku. So 310 confirmed that he knew Yuusaku was a sure source of love and he ruined it fully. He hallucinates him and the ghost even drives him to suicide.

This is why it made me feel like he lost his only opportunity at a blessed life by rejecting Yuusaku. Thus why he killed himself over his guilt.

And about the Sugi group, if I can pinpoint the instances when he really was given opportunities to regress from his original plan, it was either for Asirpa or Yuusaku. Which are kind of the same person in his vision. Sugimoto hated his guts at every step though, I can't say that he had any chance with him, maybe through Asirpa I suppose.

Still I think that naming ONLY Yuusaku as his only source of love is really shallow. I would've bought it more if we were given more scenes with them bonding, like them talking to one another about their families. Or just....anything.

Also I do like how the sequence went. Ogata truly needed a pep talk with himself about everything he’s done. And the suicide was in a way expected since he does have a low opinion of himself. Tbh I had hoped someone stopped him from suiciding but that may be just my bias.

[sandflow]

So I just finished reading Golden Kamuy

 Oh boy I got lots of things to say about it.

Warning: spoilers from latest and final chapter 314 + rants that might anger people

[Edit] -  added new info from vol.30

So I’ll preface by saying that I first started reading Golden Kamuy because of  Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san which sort of advertised the series. And when I checked it out, I liked the combo of a grown ass man teaming up with a kid and hunting stuff. So it got me super hooked. 

I checked out the first season, and then I picked up the manga back when the latest chapter that around that time was 179. It was a super great experience.

Fast foward 5 years and it finally ended. Let’s start:

Pros:

1. The plot is simple and great, it starts off with a simple premise of finding the hidden ainu gold and then it slowly builds up with episodic criminals being killed off and skinned one by one. Sure it does go shonen tropey when it immediately followed with “you need to skin an x number of convicts to get to the gold treasure” but that problem is solved when they find out they didn’t really need all the skins.

2. The humor was mostly great, anime/manga doesn’t normally humor me but GK really delivered something more different than your average "main character gets slapped or yelled at because of a oh so funny misunderstanding har har”.

3. The overall positive and great portrayal of the indigenous group (ainu). The whole ainu theme really contributed to lore for the series. I admit there were times when I didn’t really pay attention to the trivia and cared more about the main conflict and characters but overall, or at least in the first half of the series - learning about the culture of ainu people and seeing the main characters + readers explore it was a nice breath of fresh air.

4. There are a lot of great characters. You just can NOT end up with a favourite by the end of the series. Every main and most secondary characters are likeable. Hell, the main character who is a child isn’t annoying as hell which already is a big + for me. While I did end up disliking some of them by the end of the series, they were still enjoyable at a certain point in the story.

5. Abashiri jail was the best arc in the series. Hands down. It got so well built up, the arc itself had amazing action, the factions blended in so well, and with a great shocking ending too. I may be biased though. Other amazing arcs were : the fake ainu village, Anehata, blind bandit, banya, circus, hospital rescue, and around half of the sapporo arc

6. Tsurumi ended up being a satisfying villain. Best mother hen for a bunch of normal and well adjusted soldiers. My only gripe was that he felt more of a gray to black area character in the first half of the series, while in the second half he fully became black, and that he didn’t get to kill off Sugimoto for good. But he was fine and didn’t drastically change his course.

7. I really liked the aspect of there being different factions having their own goals. It made it seem like there was no true villain. So when they were clashing you’d root for who you like rather than what the plot is trying to show how you should root for.

Cons:

1. The final arc was bad. Characters kept dying one by one and you just stop feeling any sadness or shock for them at some point. You’re just waiting for the next corpse. There’s also a ton of plot conveniences. Sugimoto being so exhausted, shot, stabbed etc etc only to still be able to lift an adult bear and let it hang unto him for at least 20 minutes, or Ogata who didn’t shoot Sugimoto directly in the head when he was pinned by the bear. Or Ushiyama who doesn’t one hit kill Tsukishima. Or Koito who easily killed Hijikata, and so on.

2. Goryokaku was boring. It was mostly filled with Wilk and Hijikata flashbacks. Wilk does have his importance in the plot since he was supposedly the initial “villain” in the series, but Hijikata ended up being a very boring character to me, so him getting around 3 separate flashbacks in the same arc really didn’t do it for me. Other than that, the arc spends a very big amount of time with characters killing off completely irrelevant background soldiers and criminals. 

It also had this style of advancing really slowly in the plot, but also rushing through it.

3. Sugimoto and Asirpa’s partnership was pretty cool and I liked their bond a lot. But after Asirpa rebounds with Sugimoto after Karafuto, their bond starts to feel very codependent. So codependent that Sugimoto turns from a soldier that had issues with PTSD, to a guy who at any time opens his mouth says “Asirpa”. If he’s not near her we see him monologue about “what’s Asirpa doing?”. That’s his whole character now. 

And Sugimoto kind of stopped having this active role in the story at some point. It’s mostly Asirpa who points the story forward, with Sugimoto burying the bodies left behind. Maybe it was like that even before Asirpa got kidnapped, but it’s a lot more obvious in the later half.

It also didn’t help how after Karafuto the plot kept hinting at Asirpa’s crush on Sugimoto even more. Boutarou full on shipping them like “oooh you care about him” and “take Sugimoto and have a family with him”. 

And in the end, Sugimoto chooses to live with Asirpa for an undetermined time as “partners”. 

I don’t ship Sugiripa and I don’t really care if other people do, but the ending was written intentionally ambiguous with slight shipping tones. I’d definitely think it would have been a purely comradery ending if Noda didn’t add in the numerous hints that Asirpa is crushing on him.

4. Koito was handled pretty badly by the end of the story. I was so invested in his character development. I was waiting in anticipation for his betrayal after he got bitchslapped by Ogata. And it was THIS }{ CLOSE to happen. 

But it didn’t....or....it sort of does? back when they’re in Goryokaku but it went like “Tsurumi you lied to me and dad but let’s say I’m fine with that now, but if nothing good comes out of all this then I gotta protect my men from you-” “oh ok Koito then kill me here and now” And Koito just looks down and leaves. Koito still keeps fighting for Tsurumi.

His character was severely limited to redeeming and saving his subordinate in distress Tsukishima.

[Edit] Since vol. 30 is out, Koito’s confrontation with Tsurumi has been altered slightly. Tsurumi instead of the line “kill me now” he now says “I have no intention of losing” and Koito feels sad that Tsurumi didn’t persuade him to being on his side. “W-why don’t you ask me to be by your s-side? FINE I’m leaving let’s go Tsukishima.” Lol. And Koito still fights for Tsurumi’s goals on the train. A strange and kind of useless addition if you ask me.

5. Tsukishima was frustrating to watch. I truly liked him up until chapter 210. But then he swears total loyalty to Tsurumi and threatens Koito’s life. But then he saves Koito from the Sugi stab. But then he actively hunts down Tanigaki and pregnant Inkarmat just to kill them. But then he’s saved by Koito who reminded him of his ex finacee! But then he gives death glares at Koito when he accidentally speaks normally to Tsurumi. But then joins in the Sofia interviewing thinking he’s finally seeing Tsurumi’s true colours! But then he’s loyal to him again and ends up (almost) killing Ariko (followed by sparkly eyes) and Kikuta.

 It’s like Noda wasn’t sure wether to keep him alive or die with Tsurumi. And Koito kept pushing his ass into redeeming him soooo so much that Tsukishima literally fainted.

Tsukishima got so exhausted of being constantly juggled around between Koito and Tsurumi that he ended up fainting in his moment of choosing any side. And in the end, he isn’t even taken out of his misery. He keeps searching for Tsurumi in the sea, and then Koito appears and asks him to forget Tsurumi and join the him as his right hand man. And Tsukishima is like "sure!”. Welp. That was fast.

6. Tsukishima and Koito end up not confronting Tsurumi at all. Which is honestly dissappointing. I was fully expecting them to have a final battle with him. Nope. Tsurumi fights the main characters. Not that he didn’t have to fight them too, but there was still unresolved tension between him and his subordinates. Tsukishima never finds out that Tsurumi played him again, and Koito still fought for his cause until he had to save Tsukishima from joining Tsurumi. 

7. Vasily was the most underused character in the series. He was put back into the plot just to keep Ogata away from sniping anyone from the Sugi group. He never got a backstory, he never got a proper character ending, he had an annoying language barrier with everyone around him which was lame because I really wanted to see him truly bond with ANYONE. But nope. He’s simply an extension to Ogata’s character. 

And his ending concerning his Ogata lynx painting is just....I mean...if he truly was obsessed with Ogata then why keep a painting of him dead rather than alive? Because it reminds him of how he failed to kill him? Oh wow that’s so romantic Vasilygirls please rejoyce.

I think what Noda truly wanted to do with Vasily is to portray him as the typical Ogata fan insert of the readers (who are also coincidentally creating a ton of Ogata fanart).  

8. Ogata was handled like garbage. He was a pretty complex character plus a total enigma. Lots of people wrote a ton of theories about him. Everyone was talking about him endlessly wether they loved him or hated him. 

But then chapter 304 dropped and it reveals that he just wanted to advance in rank because he wanted to see if a low life like him can reach such a high and esteemed position. Which was...huh? Ogata said he isn’t interested in ranks to Hijikata around the time they were about to attack Abashiri. Now he is. 

In chapter 310 he kills himself because he didn’t want to feel guilt. Because he killed his only chance at true love with Yuusaku. ?! He didn’t want to have anything to do with Yuusaku. He was unifying with the walls when Yuusaku was trying to approach him. But now he was his only chance at love?? What about his grandparents??

Oh and he also felt guilt because he was always born a blessed child just like Yuusaku. ???? Yuu was rich and had loving parents. Ogata was raised in poverty, with shitty parents and was being constantly ostrasized for his bloodline. By this logic, if your parents had sex once, had the child and then broke up, even if they did feel a little bit of true love in that moment, it fully justifies their child in being blessed from the very beginning and growing up just as blessed even if they’re raised in a shitty environment with a dysfunctional family. 

9. Sugimoto should have died. There were so many hints that he’d die in the last chapter. His name, his “going to hell” catchphrase, his numerous wounds in the final arc, the SWORD STABBED IN HIS HEART, his final line to Asirpa after he throws her off the train “I’m immortal you know?”, seeing him with closed eyes and being sunk deeper into the ocean.

Next chapter he’s okay and already found Umeko. He doesn’t even confront her directly, and he doesn’t even get emotional when he eats the persimmon. OK. So much for the pay off of that amazing emotional scene when he started crying inside the deer.

[Edit] 10. Sofia’s character was treated poorly. You start off with a really strong woman who can wrestle and ride a tiger with ease. But then she fights Tsukishima and overpowers him and she conveniently- I MEAN accidentally hits a pole thus now is Tsurumi’s hostage in the church. 

And afterwards, She kills a ton of 7th soldiers with utmost ease only to be killed by Tsurumi because she froze (initially) though in the volume version she tries to shoot him (even though she wasn’t able to even scratch him which makes me think she deviated her shot because of guilt).

Conclusions:

- don’t ever read an ongoing manga especially when you have no other series that you’re following. Noda was sometimes taking breaks in moments where he’d drop a chapter with a cliffhanger ending.  It’s paintful. Plus more and more expectations get built up the more you wait. So yeah, don’t touch anything that isn’t finished.

- the series was super great but then the quality dropped at around 65% progression of the story (around the beginning of the Sapporo arc). Maybe it was becoming a lot more serious and had less comical scenes. Or maybe I’m just hung up on Pre-Abashiri times lol.

[sandflow]

I’m not on board with how the plot has been handled ever since Goryokaku. But this arc has been really unexpectedly underwhelming for me. 

I think that the only deaths I thought were great were Koito’s father since that made sense for Koito’s development, Toni Anji’s, and Nikaidou. Other than that, Sofia, Ushiyama, Hijikata and [redacted] have been oof.

But my negativity is also stemming from the numerous brakes Noda went through too. 

Spoiler for 310 leaks

I’ll talk about Ogata’s [redacted] more in depth after the series will end since my head will be cooled off by then. Right now I feel emotional about it. 

I’m so glad I’m not alone in this feeling towards GK, and how it’s dropped in quality. It makes me terribly sad because this was my all time favorite manga series. It’s just distracting to read this downfall of quality in characters, story lines, and what everything was leading up to. I’ll keep reading because it’s my favorite series, and I hope it improves, but I’m not liking much of the story so far. Everything feels dragged on and rushed at the same time:( Sorry for the rant but I had to get it off my chest lol

I understand your feelings.

Keep reading

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when you pass by your co-worker in the hallway

a comic from a while back of that scene in chapter 258 where kikuta and ogata do that “i’ll mind my business and you mind yours” smooth walk past each other while the building is on fire and falling apart but i made it totally awkward because anyone who’s ever run into their coworker on the way to or back from the bathroom knows firsthand the grimace-inducing pain of that split second eye contact and smile-nod which feels like one thousand agonizing years haha

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So I just finished reading Chainsaw Man part 1

I have much to say but I’ll try to limit the walls of text.

Warning: spoilers

Pros:

- the girls in this series are actually bearable and seem cool. Some have simple yet neat designs.

- the slice of life moments with the trio are cute. Even the dates were cute and I usually hate romance. Even though they were highly sexual every time, they did try to give some sort of character building to Makima and Reze.

- most of the demon deisgns are badass

- I initially disliked the main character because of his need to flaunt his horny needs everywhere, but I grew up to somewhat like him because of his whacky scenes with Power and Aki

- Power is a cutie pie because she likes cats and has an ego bigger than the moon. And she also hits the MC with a car. 

- for a shonen there weren’t that many walls of text in speechbubbles which I appreciate.

Cons:

- the plot is generally really laughibly bad. It’s fine and bearable in 2/3 of the series because of the mix of gore with SoL and not taking itself too seriously made me want to read further. Then it tries to be serious with the whole political subplot about killing Makima or the Gun Devil or etc etc I was just wha? why? was this necessary? give me my 2 men babysitting Power back.

- Makima telling Denji that he killed his dad which wasn’t overshadowed in the whole series. At all. The story was expecting me to buy his whole mental breakdown after this reveal and I was like lol what a crybaby.

- Power wasn’t given any chance to shine either in the battlefield or in general. She just jumps from a building with a hammer in the beginning and that was pretty much her only fight scene. She got pushed back to comic relief and that’s where she stood her ground until the very end of the series where she helps Chainsaw boi fight Makima.

- Makima was extremely underwhelming in the end. I liked her 2/3rds of the manga and she was sort of the only character that motivated me into finishing this series. Her date was so cool it made me hope for some more character buildup but it just never happened. All of it was thrown in the mud when she was like “ok so I wanted you to become my slave because I actually want the chainsaw sausage dog to end world hunger and cure cancer“. ...ok? And then she got an asspull death because she “can’t smell or see someone she never aknoledged”. LMAO ok. And then she reincarnates into a child with a Reze haircut. Big boo.

Conclusion: the author needs to stick to slice of life and ditch shonen all together.