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yunhokick · 7 years

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[GOLDEN KAMUY] Interview with managing editor Ookuma Hakkou, May 2016

Golden Kamuy won the Manga Taisho Award 2016. Noda Satoru was the first male mangaka since 2008 who grabbed the award – 8 years after Ishizuka Shinichi did it with Gaku – Minna no Yama. HONZ had an interview with Golden Kamuy’s managing director, Ookuma Hakkou. The interviewer was Okada Atsunobu from Manga Shinbun.

(pic below: Ookuma Hakkou when receiving the Manga Taisho Award 2016 on behalf of Noda Satoru)

Member of HONZ vary from female university students to men in their late 40s, and their tastes often don’t agree, but Golden Kamuy receives support from all groups. Can you tell us the secret of the strong appeal that captures men and women of all ages?

Thank you. As for the appeal, one of my favourite authors, Fujiko F. Fujio, once said this:

“When it comes to popular manga, what the readers want and what the mangaka try to express, fortunately concur.” (Fujiko F. Fujio in Fujiko F. Fujio no manga gihou, published by Shogakukan. Fujiko F. Fujio is the mangaka who made Doraemon – ty.)

Holding to the quote above, I sought for “materials in Noda-sensei’s drawer that could be accepted by more people”. Those materials were “hunting”, “military”, and Noda-sensei’s place of origin, “Hokkaido”. I think those concur with what readers want to read.

I see. Was such appeal something that you aimed for? Or was it unexpected?

I aimed for it. Editing is the very first tasting of what the chef, the mangaka, prepares. I think an editor must together with the author aims for the taste that can be accepted by many. I’ve been working together with Noda-sensei since the beginning of his debut Supinamarada!, and after the serialization ended, he showed me name (manga scripts) of various themes, but the moment I read the script for Golden Kamuy, I thought “This is it!” Something fundamental was born between me and Noda-sensei.

Then, when the serialization started, did it become popular immediately?

The first responses were truly wonderful. Afterwards, ever since Sugimoto and Shiraishi fell off a snow cornice in chapter 7, poll results too have been stable.

I see.

Although it showed two plain gaffers warming themselves (laughs). After that, we held a discussion to talk about strategy. Actually, without caring about poll results, we’ve made 7 chapters to be compiled in the first volume (180 pages) before the serialization started. We tried putting Hijikata Toshizou in chapter seven at the end of the book… It was such an attention-grabber. It cleverly fit, and the poll results were stellar.

Awesome.

Furthermore, if we included depictions of food, it’d get even better…

I came to realise that pacing was very important. Action creates ‘tension’, so as a reader continues reading a book, they demand more tension. Inserting daily elements such as food prevents tension from soaring too high, creating a synergistic effect like pouring salt on watermelon just heightens its sweetness. However, even though we want to put in everything, putting in different things together takes considerable skill. If we made it clumsily, the elements might cancel each other so that the taste would disappear, but thanks to Noda-sensei’s capabilities, it turned out wonderful.

Because He’s Earnest, He Doesn’t’ Leave Out Scenes of Preparing Game Meat

The culinary aspect of Golden Kamuy has considerable elements of hunting. There are a substantial number of scenes showing the process of cooking, from making trap to capture game to be cooked and preparing the food.

I think that’s the result of Noda-sensei’s earnestness. For instance, when preparing food, the Ainu people will fold the fur of the game they caught. Including on a snow field. There’s a meaning in each of their behaviour, even in their daily routine, somehow. Not only the culinary scenes, the livelihood of the Ainu people is also an important theme in Golden Kamuy, so I think he’s pouring his efforts over that feeling of wanting to tell everything about it without compromise. Because that’s how Noda-sensei works—grounding entertainment on a foundation of reality.

I see. By the way, in addition to that element of “fighting for a purpose” like in shounen magazines, Golden Kamuy also contains depictions that are quite gruesome, seinen magazine style.

We also aim for that. However, er… about gruesome depictions… although he said he’s not good at horrid stuff, I wonder if he’s probably lying… I think he kinda likes it. (laughs)

New Series Is the Transfer Student in a Class

Are there gruesome scenes that are too extreme so that sensei was asked to change them?

There are. For instance, actually the original script for chapter 3 of Golden Kamuy showed the havoc caused by a wandering bear that attacked a village.

(laughs) That makes me want to read it.

In my opinion, a newly serialized manga is like a transfer student in a class. When one transfers school, the first impression given is when one introduces one’s self, showing one’s face. That’s the information for readers—readers are the classmates. Information in manga is something like that. However, as days, that is, pages, go by, as we come to knowing why someone cries, be happy, be angry, what does he eat to stay alive, what kind of girl he likes, then we might think “this person is like me”, or “this person is a friend”, or “this person is someone cool that I want to look up to”, in short, is that person like Hibito from Uchuu Kyoudai (a manga by Koyama Chuuya – ty.) or like Toriko from Toriko (a manga by Shimabukuro Mitsutoshi). Or we can learn that he’s the sympathetic sort of a main character like Komatsu (a supporting character in Toriko).

I see.

How to shorten the sense of distance with readers is tremendously important. So, if you display gruesome scenes in the first impact, it will draw attention because it gives such a huge thrill. It’d start out with a bang.

That’s right.

However, once that point of attention has passed from sight, I think such over-the-top stuff would lose its appeal to the masses.

For sure.

That’s why if at the very first you already put something that attracts attention, to maintain the appeal of the point of attention, we must properly devise it in a calculated way, so as not to overdo it. That’s why I said “If three consecutive chapters are gruesome, people would perceive this as over-the-top, so I don’t think it would be appealing to the masses, and thus can you put more various, balanced interesting elements in?”

Thanks to that trial-and-error, the first chapter turned out to be awesome.

Combination of Reality and Entertainment

Golden Kamuy has a lot of unique characters; I think it’s the appeal of the manga. How were they created? In his blog, Noda-sensei mentioned that the protagonist Sugimoto Saichi was named after his tondenhei great-grandfather, but only the name was borrowed, while the great-grandfather was not really the model.

He was modelled after a historical figure. Both Noda-sensei and I love history, so many of the characters are based on historical figures. The model for Sugimoto, Funasaka Hiroshi, was a person who survived hand grenade blast.

Eeeeh!

In chapter 1, Sugimoto was shot in the neck; the same thing also happened to Funasaka. Funasaka survived nevertheless, and was then called ‘immortal’.

The standard of romance manga is exaggerating the daily moment of meeting the love interest; however, when it comes to thinking of how to draw totally awesome moment in a survival manga, what can show that this guy is cool straight away? How about an immortal guy? Hence, Noda-sensei developed Sugimoto based on Funasaka.

Invincible Ushiyama is modelled after Ushijima Tatsukuma (a judoka) who once fought Rikidouzan (a famous wrestler – ty. ) and taught Kimura Masahiko (another famous judoka – ty.).

The name is so terrific, isn’t it. It’s made up of the kanji characters 牛 (cow), 島 (island) 辰 (dragon) and 熊 (bear). He’s the judoka who’s called ‘Invincible Ushijima’. I heard he’s unbeaten in 100 matches. The murder hotel arc was based on the murders by American murderer H.H. Holmes. A new character that recently appeared in the magazine was modelled after Ed Gein, who made a lampshade from human face skin. Hijikata Toshizou needs no explanation. There are many seemingly unreal people like them, and if we make characters based on them, readers can immediately connect the story with reality. That’s why we want to keep creating characters with such feeling of reality.

How about Asirpa?

Asirpa is slightly different, because she’s not modelled after anyone. But there’s a story about her name. We decided on the name ‘Asirpa’ because our Ainu language supervisor, Professor Nakagawa Hiroshi from Chiba University, when we’re trying to choose a name for her, told us “The name means ‘new year’, but it can also be interpreted as ‘future’.” When we chose the name, it solidified her character as ‘a small girl that opens up a new age after the turbulent Meiji period and opens up a new meaning of life’.

I see.

The Ainu people put great importance in names. For instance, if we use a name that belonged to a person who’s died in unfortunate circumstances, that would be considered a blasphemy, so we cannot use the same name, making it quite difficult for us. A name carries a strong meaning. If you only see the way my name is written (Ookuma Hakkou, 大熊八甲, the kanji for ookuma means big bear), wouldn’t you get an image of a judoka? (laughs) But then I turn out looking more like a bear cub (小熊, literally small bear) instead.

No, it’s not like that. (laughs)

Maybe I look more like a raccoon. (laughs)

No no no! (laughs) Are there any other models for the characters?

Ah, I was told that Sugimoto’s weird faces when eating food are inspired by MAN vs. WILD’s Bear Grylls.

Eeeh!

To stay alive, Grylls ate stuff like worms, snake, and maggots during his survival trips. He’d put up a very disgusted face. But he’d say “They’re good nutrition sources.” He gives the impression “Although I don’t want to eat it, but I have to eat it to stay alive.” I watched it because Noda-sensei told me it’s interesting, and I thought it’s such an interesting entertainment, I want us to make something inspired by this.

You got idea from truly various places.

Abundant reference and running around Hokkaido for field observation

Earlier, you mentioned that Noda-sensei was earnest, but what kind of a person he actually is?

His image is that of the writer, sophisticated and no-nonsense. He’s silent, very earnest about manga, determined, and, in a good meaning, greedy.

Greedy?

Like, “I want to write something interesting”, “Isn’t my manga interesting?”… It’s as if he declares war against all other manga. But he’s actually a very gentle person. (laughs) He’s the professional writer with the strong points that I admire.

Wonderful. I also got the impression that he’s a very studious person, from the very long list of reference at the end of every Golden Kamuy volume… However, I was surprised because I heard the reference only includes books about the Ainu, and he actually reads far more books that he can’t write them all down in the list.

That’s right! Noda-sensei is a guy who doesn’t want to draw lies. His stance is “Always put your effort earnestly, and apologize if you make a mistake”. I think his earnestness can be felt by all the relevant parties, and they can accept his work favourably. Even if there are mistakes now, they will point them out in a positive way, and will help with the correction.

Is research difficult too?

It is. If anyone asks whether it’s difficult, it is, very (laughs).

However, I think probably it’s the nature of an author to do their best when it’s about the things they like, even though they look difficult. For instance, someone who loves soccer would find no problem playing soccer every day, but for someone who hates soccer, it would really be a bother. For Noda-sensei, survival and military stuff are things that he really likes. He also loves Hokkaido. His love seeps into the manga. He reads a lot of books and does field observation himself. I certainly go observing with him, and I do the editing, but at the root, the heart itself, is Noda-sensei’s field observation. It’s truly admirable.

The other day, I was surprised because Noda-sensei wrote in his blog that “Golden Kamuy wouldn’t be published in the next issue because I’m going hunting”. I thought, was the series having a break over hunting Sanzoku Diary or Golden Kamuy…

We’re also going to Abashiri Prison, Oshamambe Airport, Shiretoko. Also to Sankebetsu where the brown bear incident happened. By the way, when we went to Noboribetsu Bear Park, when this bear was fed, our photographer stood by the side and kept taking pictures when the bear took the food. That became the picture at the back cover of volume 1.

Eeeh!

Actually, there’s an apple in front of the bear’s mouth in the photograph. (laughs). That’s just some of the things we do.

So there was such secret.

Since his previous work, Supinamarada!, field observation has been very important. When the ice hockey team of Komadai Tomakamai High, the model for Yuufutsu High, the setting for Supinamarada!, won a match, he went down into the rink (laughs). To draw an interesting manga, he gets involved in many things. Seriously. If he gets angry, he’ll let it out honestly (laughs). He’s got such a great will to fight inside him.

--end of interview—

Note: Again I got help from friends (@yayoimusume and @noirciel on Twitter) in some parts of this translation. Their main language pair is Japanese-Indonesian, so any mistake in translating their suggestion into English is mine! Corrections and suggestions are still, like always, welcome.

Read more of my posts and translations about Golden Kamuy:

About the real Sugimoto Saichi and Funasaka Hiroshi

Interview with Noda Satoru and Ookuma Hakkou (January 2016)

Interview with Noda Satoru (January 2016)

Interview: Noda Satoru x Machiyama Tomohiro

#golden kamuy #interview #translation #ookuma hakkou #noda satoru #ゴールデンカムイ #金カム

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cottonfreakz · 5 years

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Golden Kamuy OAD Trailer

A dramatic new trailer has been published for the upcoming Golden Kamuy OAD, an original animation DVD that will be included as a pack-in bonus with the Japanese special edition release of Volume 19 of Satoru Noda’s raucous adventure manga about groups of rogue soldiers, criminals, and thieves all scrambling to find a stash of stolen golden in earlier 20th century Hokkaido.

he OAD adapts the events of Chapters 63 – 69 of Golden Kamuy (collected in Volume 7), in which Sugimoto and company are tasked with slaying a seemingly immortal red-furred bear that is terrorizing the ranch of an expatriate American horse breeder.

Golden Kamuy Volume 19 hits bookstores in Japan on September 19, 2019, and reservations for the limited edition with the bonus OAD are open until July 16, 2019. The special edition of Volume 19 retails for 3600 yen ($33.24 US) plus tax.

The original Golden Kamuy manga is serialized in Shueisha’s Weekly Young Jump seinen manga magazine, and an English language version is also available from Viz Media. The Golden Kamuy TV anime is directed by Hitoshi Nanba and Takahiro Kawakoshi and features animation production by Geno Studio.

The story takes place in the mighty Northern field of Hokkaido, the time is in the turbulent late Meiji Era. A post war soldier Sugimoto, aka, “Immortal Sugimoto” was in need of large sums of money for a particular purpose…. What awaited Sugimoto, who stepped into Hokkaido’s Gold Rush with dreams of making a fortune, was a tattoo map leading to a hidden treasure based on hints inscribed on the bodies of convicts in Abashiri Prison?! The magnificent nature of Hokkaido vs vicious convicts and the meeting with a pure Ainu girl, Asirpa!! A survival battle for a hidden treasure hunt begins!

#adventure #Geno Studio #Golden Kamuy #Hitoshi Nanba #Immortal Sugimoto #manga #Shueisha's Weekly Young Jump seinen manga magazine #Sugimoto #Takahiro Kawakoshi #Viz Media #Volume 19 #Anime

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goldenkamuyhunting · 3 years

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Quick outline of the changes in Golden Kamuy Vol 26

Here is a general outline of the more relevant changes that take place in Vol 26 compared to the magazine. Note that as usual I won’t dig into minor changes or redraws unless they seem to be relevant for the plot or characterization (or I really like them).

So now let’s start.

WARNING: I hadn’t had the chance to check dialogues yet. If I’ll find out there are changes in them that are relevant I’ll update this post as soon as I can.

We spend a moment on the cover, which, like the previous, shows us a character who has never appeared on a cover before and that many wanted to see in colour, Vasily.

As expected he’s holding his rifle but what’s in the back is interesting as well.

not Ogata but it seems to be a Lynx, whcih was associated with Ogata... and who’s giving him a hungry look. Vasily, really, if I were in you I would look behind. though I wonder, it’s possible the Lynx is actually associated to Vasily since Ogata is actually a Japanese Wildcat...

Whatever, I’m sure this cover made many happy, though since from Usami all the ones who had appeared on the front of a cover ended up dead, it also feels like a bad omen...

Anyway this is our updated list of covers.

We then move to the colour page.

which was used for chap 254 which is in this volume.

The colour cover of chap 251 was in volume 24 so it doesn’t go lost.

This volume resumes the summary tradition so we’ve a summary!

We also have a new art for the index page.

This volume counts 10 chapters and changes at the plot plus additions of extra pages and panels to expand scenes that already were in the magazine version so we can better understand what’s going on and of scenes that are redrawn, either to improve their quality, correct mistakes or add to the plot.

Note I’m not going to add them all but only those which are plot relevant (or that I particularly like). Also no scanlations this time.

Let’s start with chap 251.

As usual Noda redraw the first page to better explain the situation.

Ha also made more visible how Ogata noticed Usami’s rifle being tossed away.

There are various panels redrawn.

Noda also made Kantarou more active as he doesn’t just grab Ostrog but shoots him.

Vasily is no more a shape but clearly visible.

We continue with chap 252.

Noda corrected the way Nikaidou recharge his rifle, as he now uses the left hand (the right being a prosthesis). The explanation about beer and alcohol is now in a box. Ogata, seeing Asirpa with Kikuta, doesn’t lower his binoculars but keeps on watching.

Kikuta is now well drawn and the panel with Usami seeing Kikuta is redrawn and Ogata comments on how Usami saw them.

Panels are also redrawn to show Kikuta wearing Toni’s scarf and Ogata is redrawn as well.

There’s another redrawn better showing how Vasily hits Ogata’s rifle.

Then there’s chap 253.

Noda cut the bit about Hijikata saying Ostrog is a foreigner to add a panel of Ostrog escaping.

Ogata’s rifle is redrawn to show how Vasily’s bullet remained inside the firing pin.

Kikuta’s words to Asirpa are changed.

Hijikata and Toni are no more shapes but they’re clearly visible, Kantarou is a shape but he has been moved behind them.

We move to chap 254.

Ostrog is depicted as panting a lot which makes sense as now he’s wounded. When he escapes from the fire he says ‘Ainu’ making clear he’s chasing after Asirpa and their meeting later on isn’t casual.

Sadly I don’t seem to notice any change in Ostrog’s dialogue so he’s still saying the same idiocies as in the magazine.

So we are at chap 255.

More firemen now have the appropriate capes.

Asirpa doesn’t try to escape from Ostrog, which is what gives him the chance to grab her.

Sugimoto’s dialogues and fight with Ostrog are expanded. Sugimoto is beyond brutal and when Ostrog was a terrible person Sugimoto’s coldness as he beats him kind of scares me. Ostrog’s position seems to hint at how he perceives himself as some sort of Jesus’ figure.

Ostrog’s face is covered in blood when Sugimoto stabs him.

Ogata’s fight with Usami is also heavily changed. @piduai was so kind to translate most of it. As the changes are really relevant I recommend looking them up.

Then chap 256.

Minor changes in the first page as Ogata picks the rounds Usami tossed on the ground instead than one in his pouch.

Changes also in the scene in which Usami gets killed which make clear how Ogata aimed so as to make the bullet go through two windows to hit Usami.

Tsurumi’s last meeting with Usami is also heavily changed. @piduai was so kind to translate most of it. As the changes are really relevant I recommend looking them up.

And here comes chap 257.

Noda adds Ueji not apprecciating being ignored.

Also he put some info in some boxes.

We have chap 258.

Boutarou’s hair are better drawn as he approaches Shiraishi.

Sugimoto, Asirpa and Kadokura are no more black shapes but fully drawn.

Kikuta has again his scarf when he meest Ogata and, again, Sugimoto Asirpa and Kadokura are no more black shapes but fully drawn.

We’ve reached chap 259.

In this chapter though, I couldn’t find relevant changes.

And we end with chap 260.

Noda only vaguely changed Tsurumi’s expression as he says they secured Asirpa... and shows that Kadokura ends up right in front Hijikata’s group, which is why they could retrieve him so easily.

We finish with a tiny image of Kadokura and Kirawus thanking the editor.

And that’s all for this volume. Considering the relevant changes in the plot and the much better art Noda definitely improved this volume so really, I recommend you to buy this new volume of Golden Kamuy, either in Japanese or as soon as it comes out in your country!

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goldenkamuyhunting · 3 years

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Quick outline of the changes in Golden Kamuy Vol 25

Here is a general outline of the more relevant changes that take place in Vol 25 compared to the magazine. Note that as usual I won’t dig into minor changes or redraws unless they seem to be relevant for the plot or characterization (or I really like them).

So now let’s start.

WARNING: I hadn’t had the chance to check dialogues yet. When I’ll do I might update this post.

We spend a moment on the cover, which, like the previous, shows us a character who has never appeared on a cover before Oosawa Fusatarou, better known as Pirate Boutarou.

Although the image shows him as he looks in present time, the background hints this is his past, when he used to ferry lumbers down the rivers and then began to pull people underwater.

I’m personally glad Golden Kamuy has started dedicating covers to characters who never had one and, as I said in my past quick outline, I wanted a Boutarou cover so I’m rather happy with this cover.

Anyway this is our updated list of covers.

We then move to the colour page.

It’s the image with Sugimoto that was used as a cover for chap 212. Hum... it feels a little weird to have this image as we’ve left Karafuto by a long time but whatever.

A colour cover that was in the chapters included in this volume and that instead isn’t shown is the one of chap 245.

Pity, I loved this one.

No summaries for this volume. Pity.

This volume counts 10 chapters only with some relevant changes, additions of extra pages and panels to expand scenes that already were in the magazine version so we can better understand what’s going on and of scenes that are redrawn, either to improve their quality, correct mistakes or add to the plot.

Note I’m not going to add them all but only those which are plot relevant (or that I particularly like). Also no scanlations this time.

Let’s start with chap 241.

We get an extra page explaining Ainu knowledge and customs.

and then another telling us where the characters are and which convicts they’re searching.

Asirpa’s memories of her father are expanded.

and so are her moments with Sugimoto.

We move to chap 242.

The Sugimoto flashback is changed and expanded.

The bit in which Sugimoto says in order to keep his promise he has to go back home and give the money to Toraji’s wife is moved after Shiraishi searching for them and is no more in the middle of the flashback

The following scenes have the panel expanded and better drawn but I couldn’t notice any relevant change. There are also some scenes redrawn as they discuss about the forest and the coin but the plot seems to remain the same.

Going on with chap 243.

Noda changed this one quite a bit, in terms of redrawing and plot. @piduai was so kind to translate most of it. As the changes are really relevant I recommend looking them up.

The discussion about guilt with Usami remains the same but then scenes are redrawn again.

Dialogues and redrawings also in the following scenes.

The discussion between Ogata and Usami after Hanazawa’s death seems the same... but then there’s a huge change in the following scene.

Usami is redrawn in the final page in which he says he’s sure Ogata will come to cause problems for Tsurumi... though the dialogues seems the same.

Let’s go to chap 244.

We’ve some interesting changes here as well. Noda changed a bit of Ueji’s dialogue with the kid.

Then he showed Tarou, the kid’s dog alive as in the volume version Ueji didn’t kill him, which makes sense since his trauma was tied to his dog’s death.

Boutarou’s past was redrawn and so the aggression to the kid so as to better fit with Ueji’s past.

Ushiyama’s arrival is just the same, though.

We continue with chap 245.

Noda redraw Sugimoto placing his bayonet on his rifle, tossing a table at Hijikata and charging at him.

He also redraw Ushiyama getting up, but the plot seems to remain the same.

So we’ve chap 246.

There’s some minor redrawing but nothing big.

And then chap 247.

Asirpa now calls Ariko just Ipopte and no more Ariko.

Ariko talks with her more than just that she’s strong

We’ve move to chap 248.

The search through the city is expanded.

As Noda has already revealed Jack’s face he’s no more shadowed when he plays with knives and Noda removes his shape from ST Botolph’s church, the dialogues changed a little.

The following pages is better redrawn but the plot seems to remain unchanged till the end.

So we’ve reached chap 249.

There are many panels better drawn and also a small change in Ostrog’s introduction.

The discussion about him is redrawn as well and changed a little.

And we end with chap 250.

They’ve added a panel of Ushiyama looking scary as he grabs Usami. Some panels are also redrawn but overall nothing seems changed in a relevant way.

We finish with a tiny image of Ogata and Usami thanking the editor.

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goldenkamuyhunting · 3 years

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Quick outline of the changes in Golden Kamuy Vol 24

Here is a general outline of the more relevant changes that take place in Vol 24 compared to the magazine. Note that as usual I won’t dig into minor changes or redraws unless they seem to be relevant for the plot or characterization (or I really like them).

So now let’s start.

WARNING: I hadn’t had the chance to check dialogues yet. I’ll probably do it during Christmas holidays. If there are changes in them that are relevant I’ll update this post as soon as I can.

We spend a moment on the cover, which, like the previous, shows us a character who has never appeared on a cover before and who’s also one of my fave, our charming Roger... I mean Kikuta Mokutarou.

It’s an action scene in which he’s making good use of his beloved Nagant while wearing Toni’s scarf... and he’s not alone on this cover.

Ariko is also with him, ready to fire at his opponent. The background is Sapporo as we can recognize the building as appearing in chap 232 when the characters are in Sapporo.

Really, I love this cover and I was hoping so bad to have a Kikuta cover...

Anyway this is our updated list of covers.

Noda please, give us a Boutarou cover as well!

We then move to the colour page.

It’s the image with Tsukishima and Koito that was used as a cover for chap 251. It’s a fitting image considering this volume starts with the chapter in which the cooperation between Tsukishima and Koito began.

A colour cover that was in the chapters included in this volume and that instead isn’t shown is the one of chap 234.

Maybe Noda will use it later.

No summaries for this volume. Pity.

This volume counts 9 chapters only and changes are pretty tame but, as usual there are additions of extra pages and panels to expand scenes that already were in the magazine version so we can better understand what’s going on and of scenes that are redrawn, either to improve their quality, correct mistakes or add to the plot.

Note I’m not going to add them all but only those which are plot relevant (or that I particularly like). Also no scanlations this time as the changes aren’t so characterization or plot relevant you’ll need to read a scanlation to get what’s going on. I’ll add a dialogue explanation though. Keep in mind I might be wrong.

Let’s start with chap 232.

We start with a new opening page for the chapter in which the box says we’re at Asirpa’s grandmother’s house near Otaru and we’re shown that Tanigaki is next to Inkarmat.

As many already know Noda has enlarged Tanigaki’s neck as he watched Osoma and changed a little his expression so, although I know Sensei pays a lot of attention in improving Tanigaki, I won’t show you that.

A line is added to Tsukishima’s dialogue. Now in addition to saying that it might be that Tsurumi doesn’t have a true goal he adds that it might be a lie that Tsurumi is acting for the sake of the dead comrades and for the prosperity of Japan.

Tsukishima’s memory of Tsurumi having finger bones now is enlarged and that shows clearly Tsurumi’s naked feet.

Naked feet had been used to foreshadow the death of a character so is this meant to hint at how Tsurumi too will die?

As everyone knows I’m partial for Ogata I’ll show him adjusting his bandages. I wonder, does he have the glass eye already and he’s trying to get adjusted to it?

Asirpa and Boutarou’ hair had been redrawn, which makes them better but it’s nothing big.

We move to chap 233.

After Ueji manages to disappear noda added more dialogue between Sugimoto, Shiraishi and Asirpa.

Sugimoto asks for confirmation that the boss they met was called Wakayama and Shiraishi asks Asirpa if she’s certain that guy said they would never be able to find the gold. Asirpa says that’s what it sounded like and Shiraishi asks what they will do now, wondering if they should go after the candy seller or continue to pursue the pirate. Sugimoto thinks he should have stripped the candy seller and Asirpa wonders if maybe she heard wrong.

Noda also expanded the scene with Boutarou and the old Ainu. Now Boutarou is no more heavily shaded at the start and his men are more active.

Pirate Boutarou’s main henchman (子分 ‘Kobun’) now has a name, Gontō Kōjirō (權堂公二郎は) and he’s better drawn.

The old Ainu says Boutarou won’t find the gold because his sons also went looking for it but it wasn’t anywhere.

Those are very good improvements, if you ask me.

Chap 234...

...continues the tradition of better drawing Boutarou’s hair (which are also often drawn longer than previously) and also gives him a better pose.

The postman also has a name now he is Nozawa Niheiji (野沢仁平治).

Shiraishi is definitely more worried when he meets Boutarou.

...but Boutarou looks even happier to meet him, while his reaction catches the captain’s attention.

The sailors are better drawn and there’s even a new small panel of a sailor trying to catch Sugimoto’s rifle.

Sugimoto gets an extra page in which he’s shown throwing the sailor off the boat...

...and then some more panels as he fights the other sailor as well.

Really Noda is so good at drawing fighting scenes...

He also expanded the scene of Boutarou talking to Shiraishi about Sugimoto.

...and redrew Gontou with the other henchmen, who’re shown wet because they too had previously ended up in the water.

Really, a lot of additions for this chapter and I love how Noda tried giving the henchmen some characterization now, despite them being merely plot devices.

We continue with chap 235.

I’ll say in the cover Noda better drew the water. It’s not terribly relevant though, so I’m not showing it, i just love the man for the care in this details.

Better image of best boy Shiraishi...

...but there are also a lot of images that are better drawn.

The order of the panels is switched a little as in the magazine the bandits would knock at the door, then we would see Shiraishi praying the boat would hurry then we’ll go back to Asirpa and the postman.

In the volume first we see Shiraishi and Sugimoto praying the boat would hurry then we go to the bandits knocking and then to Asirpa and the postman, with the scene mostly redrawn.

Noda actually put a lot of care in redrawing the postman who now to me look even more like Clint Eastwood.

The shooting fight also gets better drawn and so the boat crashing against it. But my fave redrawn is the one of Boutarou and Shiraishi cheering, which now shows a much more happier Shiraishi and a childishly cheering Boutarou. I love those two!

Noda then proceeds to show how Boutarou is very angry at the idea 3 of his men were shoot... which better explains why he took an anchor and attacked without regard for the people. Similarly to Sugimoto, when he’s furious he’s dangerous... and it’s possible he grew so angry because he was fond of those men.

We then see Boutarou take matters (and an anchor) in his hands...

Another redrawn is in the Boutarou/Sugimoto confrontation.

And with this to chap 236 we go.

Again, some scenes or expressions are drawn better here.

Plus we get some redrawing when Boutarou explains things.

We’ve a new panel of Sugimoto turning down Boutarou’s idea.

Then we get more interaction between Boutarou and Sugimoto as Sugimoto’s reveal of his past now involves more Shiraishi and Asirpa.

And we better dig into Boutarou’s connection with Sugi.

Sugimoto’s expression after he pet the cat is much more dramatic...

...his eyes losing their light.

Chap 237 continues expanding things.

We get a flashback in which Boutarou remembers the cigarette case was Heita’s.

The volume shows us the gold is a lot more than the one we see in the magazine version.

The scene about Botarou trying to kill Sugimoto and Shiraishi is expanded.

Boutarou seems genuinely shocked when Gontou is hit by the spinning wheel, stretching is hand as if he were wishing to bring him aid.

Differently from teh magazine he won’t be smiling when he tries to drwon Sugimoto...

...and the two will fight a lot more. Sugimoto tries to kick Boutarou a lot and Boutarou uses his long hair to tie Sugimoto’s foot and pull him down.

It’s beautiful and definitely worth buying the manga.

We are at Chap 238.

A small panel about Asirpa explaining Sugimoto about Heita.

We’ve then more interaction between Boutarou and Asirpa.

I find interesting how again we’re show Sugimoto saying hinna but not Asirpa.

And so we reach chap 239.

Jack/Ostrog’s face is still kept in the dark at first, but his clothes are much more visible. The battle between him and Usami is expanded and sorry, no, I’m not going to show it. Still Noda is more comfortable showing him, his face partially visible (and Kikuta too as his eyes were back in the magazine).

And it’s when Kikuta see him we’ve the big reveal and it makes A LOT MORE SENSE having it here than as late as it happened in the manga. And honestly that lateness feels it was due to Noda not having chosen yet how to characterize him.

We can also see that on his genitals there’s a birthmark... which explains why Kikuta comments on getting a look on his face and member, because now he can recognize him either by looking at his face or by looking at... something else.

So yeah, Ostrog/Jack stops being a dark silouette.

Noda let us hear his thoughts after he killed those two women.

We’ve a flashback from Kikuta, showing Jack/Ostrog’s face and how he had a birthmark in a... peculiar area, which is why Kikuta remarked it was relevant he saw it.

And now we move to the last chap of the volume chap 240.

Ostrog is now clearly visible where before he was just a dark shadow.

A new panel showing how Kirawus... well, he didn’t quite disguise himself, albeith he did something, he tried to sell fireworks.

Another new panel showing how Kadokura in his disguise, can’t pick up coins.

When Ishikawa explains about Jack the Ripper Noda added people walking in the image of the city he drew and also showed a nespaper talking of Jack. The writing on the newspaper explains how in Japan the case became a hot topic in 1888 and how in 1900 they started to call the killer ‘Kirisaki Jack' (切り裂きジャック “Jack the ripper”).

We’ve another image of Ostrog/Jack when Ishikawa talks about him.

And we finish with the last page which shows the faces of Ostrog and Ueji.

And that’s all.

Well, actually no. The one thanking the editor is... I’ll let you see for yourself.

And that’s all for this volume. While there’s nothing drastic in terms of new content, it better flashed out the relationship between Boutarou and his underlings, giving a name to the main one of them, better showed how Boutarou fought underwater and handled Ostrog/Jack WAAAYYY better than the magazine version where it seems Noda remained undecided on his character design for a much longer time and that’s why he obscured his face, making the reveal pretty anticlimatic as nothing big justifying it happened.

Here instead it’s just perfect so really, I recommend you to buy this new volume of Golden Kamuy, either in Japanese or as soon as it comes out in your country!

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goldenkamuyhunting · 3 years

Note

Hi! I don’t know if you did it already, but are you planning on doing a comparison between the “original” chapters and the vol 25 version? I really love reading the extra pages and your comments on some changes, like the Jack the Ripper face reveal!

Thank you for loking my magazine vs volume comparisons!

I've just made both vol 25 and 26. I hope you will enjoy them!

#Ask #Golden Kamuy Magazine vs Volume

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goldenkamuyhunting · 3 years

Note

Hi! I was wondering if you were planning to do a summary of volume 25 like you did with previous volumes?

Well...

I’d like to do one, but I just hadn’t had the time to really check the volume so I guess it’ll take time but yes, I hope I’ll eventually get the time to make it.

#Ask #Golden Kamuy Magazine vs Volume

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goldenkamuyhunting · 3 years

Note

i don't have all the scans but it seems the changes to vol 25 change usami a lot? what do u make of it?

Well...

I don’t have vol 25 yet (and even if I were to have had it probably I wouldn’t have managed to go through it) so I’m waiting to see it and compare it attentively before giving a definitive judgement. From what was shared in the net though, I can see that, as usual, Noda improved things greatly.

So I think when I’ll see the full volume I’ll probably be satisfied with it as usual... but if the change are really drastic I might make a post discussing them as I did in the past.

So, sorry, but I’ll have to ask you to please, wait a little as currently I can’t really give an accurate judgement. Still, thank you for your ask!

#Golden Kamuy Magazine vs Volume #Ask #Usami Tokishige

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goldenkamuyhunting · 4 years

Text

Quick outline of the changes in Golden Kamuy Vol 21

Here is a general outline of the more relevant changes that take place in Vol 21 compared to the magazine. Note that as usual I won’t dig into minor changes or redraws unless they seem to be relevant for the plot or characterization (or I really like them).

Also, to better let you understand some scenes or from where they come out, in some scenes I replaced the Japanese test with either the scanlation test or an appropriate translation (most of them courtesy of Lusetoj). Remember that this is merely an informative post and you’re actually supposed to support Golden Kamuy and buy the volume, either in Japanese or in your country’s language and that no, I don’t know if I’ll do a similar post for vol 22.

This is just because they changed so many relevant things here I wanted people to be able to follow them as they might affect future chapters and our understanding of them.

So now let’s start.

We spend a moment on the cover, which sees the return of Tanigaki on it.

Tanigaki is kind of a surprise as in the past after a cover with Sugimoto we always had a cover with Asirpa.

Of course the first time we had a group of 8 volumes before we had a cover with Sugi again but the second time we had 9 so it’s possible the cover for Vol 19 with Kiro was a last minute change.

Maybe the Sugimoto cover was meant for vol 19, with Asirpa on 20 and, yes, Tani on 21. We’ll see if Tsurumi will be on 22. Otherwise it’s possible to specualte the cover order is purely coincidental.

It’s also worth to mention that the backcover this time have Cikapasi (in the past it has Nihei).

On a personal note I would have preferred if it was Cikapasi who was on the front cover as in this volume he’s more relevant than Tanigaki but whatever, overall Tanigaki in the whole story has more importance and more fans than Cikapasi so okay, I get why Noda preferred to have him on the back.

We then move to the colour page.

It’s the colour cover of chap 193. In Vol 20 I wondered if Noda would use it later. Well, now it’s later, I guess.

A colour cover that was in the chapters included in this volume and that instead go lost is the one of chap 203.

The one of chap 205 was included in vol 20 so it’s not lost.

It seems in this volume there’s no short summary.

Now something really noteworthy while in the past volumes included 10 chapters, this one includes 11, the last presenting heavvy changes... but we’ll get there later.

Other chapters too saw the addition of extra pages and panels to expand scenes that already were in the magazine version so we can better understand what’s going on and of scenes that are redrawn, either to improve their quality, correct mistakes or add to the plot.

Note I’m not going to add them all but only those which are plot relevant (or that I particularly like).

Let’s start with chap 201.

Chap 201 is one of the most tame in terms of changes.

We can see that in the cover Ogata and Tanigaki now have their rifles and Koito his sword.

I was wondering if, now that vol 20 changed things so that Tsukishima was present when Ogata called Koito ‘barchonok’, hearing Koito asking about the word would ring a warning bell in his head but that’s not the case. The scene is as it was in the magazine.

The image of Vasily gets redraw so that some particulars are improved and his colours now matches with the ones he has in the other chapters.

The one relevant change in this chapter for me is in the final page. In the magazine Sugimoto had light in his eyes, now the light is no more.

Who has heard me or @chibivesicle ramble about the relevance of characters’ having light in their eyes know that we think when they have none is clearly a bad sign. Sugimoto is in full murder mode and Noda wanted us to see it (and he’s also holding the miso better but okay, this is not plot relevant).

The move to chap 202.

Not much is changed in this chap.

They only added some shading to Asirpa’s face in this scene in which Tani told her they couldn’t move because, if the sniper was Ogata, then the target was Asirpa, to imply how this affect her.

Poor Asirpa, a friend of her is under attack and she’s made aware it’s due to her this is happening. Noda did great to underline how this affected her.

We move to chap 203, which, as mentioned before lost its colour cover.

We’ve then a change, instead than a man in the sledge, the ones passing through the street are a man with his whole family all of them on a single horse, a dosanko, a particularly strong Hokkaido horse.

Sugimoto’s sentence as he spoke to Vasily was changed as well.

In the magazine he said something along the line of how ‘when I think to myself that the world Asirpa is seeing has me in it... I feel like I became clean somehow and can be saved.’

Now instead he says this:

The change fits more with what Asirpa will later say in chap 206 which in the magazine originally seemed merely Asirpa’s interpretation of Sugimoto’s words when now is a direct reference to them.

Noda added the Russian version of the sentences Tsukishima said to Vasily and to Sofia and Svetlana’s dialogue. Gansoku though still talk in Japanese and Sofia talk in Japanese to him as well.

Noda also added three small panels of Gansoku, fighting and showing his delight at being hit.

We continue with chap 204.

Chap 204 expands the Tanigaki/Cikapasi scene. Originally, when Cikapasi wondered if Inkarmat was well Tani said only he was sure she was and that they should go visit her when they were to get back. Now he talks about a telegram saying she’s well to which Cikapasi is delighted, with Tani now implying visiting her should be the first thing they’ll do once back.

When Tsukishima talks with Vasily they added the Russian version of his words.

Girel also looks slightly different.

There’s also some minor redrawing but, as you can see though, the changes aren’t really big.

So let’s move on chap 205.

There are some changes in what Sugimoto says to Tsukishima.

In the magazine Tsukishima urged Sugimoto to act because Tsurumi was about to come and Sugimoto replied although he’s sure hadn’t met Tsurumi yet he didn’t believe Asirpa would open up to a man like him. In the volume Tsukishima’s comment is cut and Sugimoto mentions Asirpa’s name when he says he’s sure she hadn’t met Tsurumi yet instead that when he says she wouldn’t open up to him.

Among the minor redrawing I found fun how ‘director Asirpa’ now also has a fitting hat.

Node decided to remove Asirpa calling the guys 3rd rate actors. She’s also not salivating anymore.

He also removed the ‘hey Inaba’ from this scene. I think the idea is to paint Asirpa as less of a rude director.

In place of Asirpa saying ‘We’ll do a story about the Kamuy’, Noda added a minor infobox about the tales of Pananpe and Penanpe.

For some weird reason Noda also redraw the scene in which Tanigaki hit the ground. It’s not relevant, I’m just sharing it because he changed Tani’s pose a lot... not really sure why as it doesn’t seem Tanigaki is making an effort to shield himself, unless it’s some sort of reference to another series.

And so to chap 206 we go.

It’s worth to note in this chap Girel is drawn same as in the magazine, in short he doesn’t wear anymore the glasses Noda geve him for the volume version.

Among the redraws I find worth to mention how not only Noda cut Shiraishi laughing at Tsukishima but changed the bit regarding Tanigaki, Cikapasi and Enonoka. It’s not just that the Tanigaki-bird flies more. In the following panel Tanigaki’s face is now visible but darkened. This remarks how Tanigaki is present in the panel, yet leaves the focus on Cikapasi and Enonoka. Tanigaki’s face is the focus of our attention in the following panel where, like in the magazine, he’s alone but his eyes are shining much more. Likely he too got emotionally involved watching that scene but those three panels are here to anticipate what will happen in chap 209, Cikapasi will choose to stay with Enonoka and leave Tanigaki.

We continue with new changes in the dialogues, specifically in what Sugimoto says to Asirpa.

While in the magazine Sugimoto gave his own interpretation of what Wilk told him ‘he said he raised you so you could fight in a war’, now he correctly reports Wilk’s words about wanting Asirpa to know how to hide and fight and that she would be the leader of the Ainu people.

He also corrected his words about Kiro. While in the magazine he just mentioned he took her to Karafuto and then died to as to push Asirpa into believing she had to think she had to fight, now he clarifies Kiro brought Asirpa to Karafuto to remind her how to break the code and died as a consequence of this (well, actually he died as a consequence of three men ganging up on him and they would have been four if Sugimoto could have a say in it). However this too, combined with what Wilk did, pushed Asirpa into thinking she had no other way but fight.

Another change is here. While before Sugimoto referred to “Stand at the head of the Ainu and die” and “Fight and kill people” as what they were telling her, now he calls all this as a curse casted upon her.

Next chap 207 & 208.

i couldn’t notice any relevant change in these chapters which is a pity as people might remember I pointed out how the skin count was wrong in them.

The same goes for chap 209.

Things start to change with chap 210.

We start tame with Koito now calling Hanazawa ‘former commander of the 7th division’ when in the magazine he called him just ‘commander of the 7th division’.

I mention this because now I wonder, who’s the commander of the division, the guy above Lieutenant colonel Yodagawa? Has such a commander be appointed? Is he in Tsurumi’s paycheck? Will he be relevant in the future?

Who knows?

Sugimoto and Asirpa’s talk is also different. Not only Shiraishi is present in the beginning and leaves after but Sugimoto replies to Asirpa’s question about what will happen to the Ainu.

Sadly Sugimoto’s idea they’ve an overwhelming advantage is a naive delusion... and maybe he too knows it and that’s why his eyes are completely black, without light. In his wish to save Asirpa he probably knows he’s sacrificing the Ainu.

This bit was also changed as in the original Tsuki didn’t mention Ogata.

This text is changed as well. In the magazine Koito said just ‘was because he wanted me to realize that we were being bade into pawns for first lieutenant Tsurumi, just like he and his father were!’

Now it mentions both Hanazawa and Ogata’s name and the sentence is visually split into two parts.

Then, although dialogues remained the same, Noda changed Tsuki’s expression in this scene. Tsuki now smiles when he says he was tricked too.

Tsuki also gets some new lines here as a flashback also expand the scene.

Noda changed a bit Tsuki here. Actually I wonder if he’s crying considering Noda added whiteness below his eyes.

Noda inverted Tsuki’s lines here as in the magazine he said:

“The first lieutenant is very skilled at saving people with “sweet lies.””

“So I don’t know what his true goal is.”

At the end of the scene Noda added Shiraishi spying them.

And so we reach chap 211... which is like a new chapter.

For start there are changes in the discussion between Sugimoto and Shiraishi here. In the magazine Shiraishi says Asirpa isn’t the Asirpa he knew anymore. In the volume he says she isn’t the Asirpa he first met.

... and here.

Koito’s expression is changed so as to show he’s not happy at all to see Tsurumi.

Now, when Tanigaki comments about how Tsurumi would let Asirpa see Huci she doesn’t say she’ll understand what kind of man Tsurumi is by looking at him. To make up for it Sugimoto says everything will go well and we get an exchange between Usami and Tsurumi showing what Tsurumi planned to do to Asirpa... clearly not even considering to listen to her demands.

As said before, the overwhelming advantage over Tsurumi, existed only in Sugimoto’s dreams.

Again Koito doesn’t look particualrly happy of being praised by Tsurumi contrary to the magazine version.

At this point the plot drastically diverges from the magazine to the point it’s no more an addition or a slight change but a real retcon and I’m not sure how Noda will deal with it in the future.

In the manga Asirpa and Tsurumi exchanged a glance, he was reminded of Wilk’s eyes and commented she had the same eyes as him. This words affect Asirpa (who previously has said she would get which sort of man Tsurumi is by looking at him, a scene removed from the volume) and, as Shiraishi throw up she prepare to toss her arrows.

In the volume instead things will go very differently... but let’s see them first.

All this is an important change as it shows Asirpa didn’t act merely due to her intuition or out of prejudice but because Tsurumi clearly acted in a manner that ended up creeping out even his own men, a manner that clearly implied he planned to part her from Sugi and keep her trapped (as he was doing with Inkarmat only in a much less friendlier environment) and that he had no friendly feelings for the Ainu and wouldn’t keep into consideration their wishes.

There’s actually much more to say about the changes but I’ll let it for a meta, if I’ll manage to write one.

Back to the changes, despite all he has heard from Tsurumi, Sugimoto now looks a lot less assertive and comfortable with Asirpa’s decision.

Tsurumi’s men are now better drawn and characterized, you can see Kikuta and Sugi now also informs them the arrows will kill them with just a scratch.

The last two pages are partially redrawn. but in them Asirpa also gets the chance to better clear up her position. Tsurumi also immeditely sends his men after her.

Anyway the volume ends here.

Enonoka do the thanks but her image is so tiny as Noda has used up all the pages he had hence the poor quality.

Anyway that’s all. As usual I recommend everyone to get the volume as it’s much better than the magazine version.

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goldenkamuyhunting · 4 years

Text

Ramblings about the changes in vol 21

So, as promised, I wanted to ramble a bit about the huge changes in vol 21 and how they impact on the characters.

I’ll divide them according to affected characters.

For the visual I recommend you checking my previous post “Quick outline of the changes in Golden Kamuy Vol 21 ”.

We’ll start first with those who were only vaguely affected to progress with the ones who were HUGELY affected.

TANIGAKI

Ironically Tanigaki, who’s on the cover of the volume is the least one to be affected by changes… but well, they’re an improvement for him.

While in the magazine version Tanigaki only said he was sure Inkarmat was well and they should go visit her once back, which implied a baseless confidence in her recovery without him not even attempting to check on it and a medium wish to see her again, now Tanigaki talks of receiving telegrams confirming she has recovered and her urgency to see her as soon as he’s back is more marked.

It’s overall nothing big but gives the impression he cared more about her than in the magazine and therefore make smoother how he’ll want to go back to her in what will likely be vol 23.

He also seemed more involved in the vision of the movie, as if to imply for him too that scene was a touching moment of bonding with Chikapasi. Nice but it’s still pretty weak and underwhelming.

TSUKISHIMA

Tsukishima also get minor changes. I like to think some of them give his feelings more deep.

However it’s worth to mention something before talking about the changes in Tsukishima and this something is that in vol 20 the scene was changed so that Tsukishima was present when Ogata called Koito ‘Barchonok’ (Барчонок ‘pampered little rich boy’) so I expect this change would affect the plot of vol 21. This wasn’t the case. The scene in which Koito mention such a word in chap 201 is completely unchanged, Tsukishima not recognizing it in the slightest and if he recognized it in chap 210, when Koito contextualized it… well, it’s hard to say as the scene is again unchanged.

So what changed?

Tsukishima was less pushy when, in chap 205, he tried to get Sugimoto to talk with Asirpa, as this time he doesn’t say they’ve no time before Tsurumi will get there. I’m not sure why this was removed as Tsukishima will be pushy as they make the movie but maybe this merely interrupted the flow of Sugimoto’s words.

We see an interesting thing. When Noda redraw chap 103, he removed Ogata’s smiles as he talked to his father. In the volume version Ogata will remain serious through the whole talk and smile only at the end and when he talks to Tsurumi.

Instead here Noda had Tsukishima, who in the magazine was serious, smile as he says he was tricked too. Tsukishima also digs more in Tsurumi’s deception, saying how Tsurumi poured affection into a place in him that was wilted away so as to better describe how meaningful for Tsukishima was what Tsurumi did. That moment in which Tsurumi made him feel he was important enough for Tsurumi to go so far Tsukishima should have felt really impressed… and it’s meaningful how there seems to be tears in his eyes, when he says that it’s fine for him if he was used and that his life didn’t matter much to him.

Tsukishima is saying it’s fine but it actually pains him.

Tsukishima becomes a good example of how men sometimes smile when they’re in pain not because they’re happy but because in that way they seem/feel more in control, their smile being actually a bitter one and of how one might say he’s okay and instead think the opposite.

KOITO

Changes about Koito are also fundamentally minor but they work to flesh out his feelings better in consideration of how Koito’s perception of the world and stance are going to change.

Personally I found interesting how Noda added Koito saying ‘like his Excellency Hanazawa and Ogata Hyakunosuke… like that parent and child’. The sentence remarks their parent/child relation and the parallel with himself and his father. It draws a connection between his situation and Ogata’s, allowing Koito to humanize someone he has always despised but, at the same time, strongly implying Koito’s judgment is strongly tied to his own perception of father/child relations.

It’s hard to judge where this will lead but I think Koito’s view of Ogata, while talking with Tsukishima, has shifted completely from the previous view he had. Probably he felt him closer, both tricked, both, according to Koito, caring about their parents. Koito, who strongly wants his father’s approbation, despised Ogata for betraying Hanazawa’s memory and rebelling but if Ogata was pursuing revenge for his father… well, I think Koito thought this he could approve.

Koito now looks a lot less happy and comfortable to see Tsurumi so, differently from the manga, it’s much more clear he was faking when he pretended to be impressed by how far Tsurumi went to get him. Therefore, even though later he’ll decide to still put faith in Tsurumi, from now on he’s clearly no more a compliant and enthusiastically blind follower.

SHIRAISHI

Minor changes for Shiraishi too but they are relevant enough. Shiraishi qualifies as a smart guy who can watch things objectively and has a better grasp of the situation.

In the volume version in fact, he’s present when Sugimoto and Asirpa discuss, so he heard their little chat but he clearly wasn’t involved. Asirpa asked for Sugimoto’s opinion and Sugimoto first missed the point of her worry (the Ainu, not herself) and then gave a pretty unrealistic reply, at which Shiraishi left, with the result he ends up overhearing half of Koito and Tsukishima’s discussion. Actually, if he got out just after he left Sugi and Asirpa he overheard part of Koito’s accusations and all of Tsukishima’s confession.

In this way the volume tells us that Shiraishi might have heard quite a good part of their chat… and while he was completely sober.

The following changes are in the discussion he has with Sugimoto. In the magazine Shiraishi said Asirpa isn’t the Asirpa he knew anymore. In the volume he says she isn’t the Asirpa he first met. It’s overall similar but I think here Shiraishi remarks more not so much that Asirpa has changed as a person but that what she has learnt had pushed her into different goals. The Asirpa Sugimoto met was unaware of many things and thought since she didn’t need the gold she could happily hand it out to Sugimoto and Shiraishi and lived a life unaware of how Ainu could end up. Present Asirpa wants the gold to be used for the Ainu, she’s more aware of the situation of her people and wants to improve it.

It’s a different type of change in her, one not given by an abrupt shift in her character but by a greater awareness of the world around her.

Character wise Asirpa is still the same. She doesn’t want to kill, she loves her people, she’s a glutton at heart. But now she has knowledge of the world around her, of the dangers for her people. It’s as if she’d sampled the forbidden fruit of knowledge and can’t turn back anymore. This is what Asirpa had been trying to tell Sugimoto, that it’s not that she doesn’t want to go back to say citatap and hinna hinna, it’s not that those things don’t interest her anymore, is that she knows she can’t because her way of living, her people, are in danger.

Always in that same discussion Shiraishi points out something else that’s really relevant and that before he didn’t mention. He basically questions Sugimoto’s ‘naïve belief’ Tsurumi might care about the Ainu. Sugimoto in the volume told Asirpa Ainu would have a use for Tsurumi as a workforce (which, let’s be honest, is not really a great option as this would imply Ainu should leave their own way to live and start to work in Tsurumi’s army factories or in his opium factories so bye-bye Ainu lifestyle). Shiraishi’s question points out not only how this is naïve, but that he doesn’t think Sugimoto himself believes this.

(Note that Tsukishima and Koito didn’t talk about the Ainu so the fact that this is naive is something Shiraishi figured by himself)

Shiraishi in short is showing he understands the Ainu cause is important for Asirpa and, in a way that probably surprises him as well, he has sort of grown to care for it as well and is basically asking Sugimoto if he’s stupid, delusional or a liar when he’s saying Tsurumi would care about the Ainu. I won’t dig into Sugimoto now because I’ll talk about him later but in the volume version Shiraishi comes out as someone who got a more objective look on the situation and a better grasp to what Tsurumi wants as well as even more critical of Sugimoto’s actions than in the magazine.

The last change is very minor. In the magazine Shiraishi throws up, distracting Tsurumi in such a providential way it seemed done on purpose. In the volume version Shiraishi doesn’t throw up, he burps when Tsurumi claims he wants everyone’s happiness and to cooperate with Asirpa which sounds more like a sound of lack of disbelief, even if his face is slightly shadowed. Personally I prefer this change. We already saw Shiraishi getting drunks but in the morning he was always fine. Even though it was clear this time he came back completely wasted (and I wonder if Vol 22 will develop him more) he had also thrown up twice with Sugimoto. He shouldn’t have anything anymore in his stomach.

If anything the only thing I question is that they still have used him as a comic relief not having him escape with Sugimoto and Asirpa but allowing an arrow to hit him. Changing this would have been appreciated.

ASIRPA

Changes about Asirpa are very relevant for how we read Asirpa. Sure, if you want they take from her a ‘first glance’ intuition that however seemed unrealistic but Asirpa becomes more thoughtful and more proactive and determinate. Even more she doesn’t let others order her around but demands for explanations and take her own decisions.

We start really tame, with Noda remarking how Tanigaki’s words about how they can’t try helping Shiraishi because if the sniper is Ogata, the target is Asirpa.

Let’s go back to that scene and look to a bit that remains the same in the volume.

When Vasily started shooting they immediately realized the one shooting them was a ‘sniper’ (狙撃手) and not a random guy. Asirpa sweats slightly hearing the word ‘sniper’, repeating it as Noda shadows her face with an uniform toner. Asirpa knows who the sniper could be and it tosses on her a shadow.

They will however need the sniper to shoot again before Tsukishima (or is he Tanigaki? Hard to say as we don’t see the speaker) will claim the sniper has to be Ogata Hyakunosuke, something Sugimoto also thought, since as he runs toward the sniper he thinks he’s gonna fight Ogata.

When Tsukishima states so, Asirpa’s face is shown again but, although she’s sweating because she realizes the situation is serious, there is no shadow on her face. I take it’s a hint that Tsukishima’s words merely confirmed what she had thought but didn’t verbalize, that the attacked could be Ogata.

Noda didn’t feel the need to add a shading here.

We go on, Tsukishima points out how Sugimoto is moving to attack Ogata and Koito points out how it’s weird Ogata would forget to check on Sugimoto.

Asirpa worries about saving Shiraishi and Tanigaki tells her they can’t because if it’s Ogata it’s her he wants to kill. And Noda here, in the volume version, added a shading but not an uniform shading like when Asirpa heard the word ‘sniper’ but a swirling shading.

Of course it’s possible it’s just because he wanted to remark which sort of burden Tanigaki pushed on Asirpa. It’s due to her that Shiraishi got shoot, because Ogata wanted to kill HER.

But, I wonder, if Noda didn’t want to hint more here.

Later in fact, Asirpa will question herself and the others about Ogata.

For start she question if he’ll come back at which Sugimoto replies she’s the key to the gold so there’s a chance he’ll do.

Asirpa doesn’t reply at first, then mentions how Ogata ACTED LIKE HE WAS GOING TO KILL HER. If she’s the key to the gold, killing her means giving up on the gold. It’s also interesting she doesn’t say he attempted to kill her, but that he acted as if he was going to do so. Asirpa knows two things Sugimoto doesn’t know.

The first is that Ogata encouraged her to shoot him, deliberately gave her reason to do so and time to do so. The second is that when she hit him, he smiled as if he had got exactly what he wanted.

Honestly I’m not sure she understood most of what Ogata said as she should need previous knowledge about his father and brother.

There’s a third thing Asirpa might have realized but, on this, I’m not sure. She knows first-hand Ogata is very fast but, although both of them were supposedly startled by Sugimoto’s scream, while she let go her arrow in surprise, Ogata didn’t push the trigger. His eyes remained on her but he made no attempt to harm her even though he threatened her about it.

To sum it up when Asirpa basically rejected him Ogata’s first instinct wasn’t to kill her, it was trying to goad her into killing him, although he threatened her to do so he didn’t and, lastly, killing her would lead him nowhere. He still wouldn’t have the gold.

I think that swirling shading might be there to point out how Asirpa had tried to let the whole thing of the drift ice behind her, maybe hoping after Ogata’s escape she wouldn’t see him again, forgetting the whole thing as she had attempted to do with her father’s memories the first time she believed Wilk died but Tanigaki’s words brought it all back and with it, the need to figure the whole thing out.

Not only Ogata’s behavior made no sense from her point of view but also the idea he’d really want to kill her makes no sense either and it’s possible Noda felt a shading was needed to hint how it was Tanigaki’s sentence that triggered Asirpa’s following questioning.

The second change actually refers to what Sugimoto will say to Vasily but, as Asirpa overhears him and that conversation ties with another conversation she will have with Sugimoto, this will become relevant.

In fact originally in the magazine Sugimoto said just because the world Asirpa was looking at had him in it, this cleaned him and he thought he could be saved. There were many reasons due to which Sugimoto could think so, starting with him thinking that if someone as pure as Asirpa were to be friend with him, this somehow made him a better person.

So in the magazine Asirpa saying Sugimoto was doing it merely because he saw himself as a child in her, felt as Asirpa hugely interpreting what she overheard Sugimoto saying. Sure, she was right, but since Sugimoto’s original sentence was so different, it felt like a huge leap.

Now instead not only her words aren’t anymore that distant from Sugimoto’s words but the type of burden pushed on her changes.

In the magazine her existence somehow made Sugimoto feel he could be purified and he saw this as a chance of salvation.

In the volume her existence is just a reminder Sugimoto was like her once, he sees himself in her so he wants to protect her the way he couldn’t protect himself. For Asirpa, who has a crush for Sugimoto, it’s clearly something painful because Sugimoto doesn’t want to protect her for herself, but because he sees himself in her.

Sure, it pushes on her less responsibility than being considered a ‘purifying deity’ or some sort of ‘purifying shaman’ but, at the same time, it denies her as her own person and it makes the matter worse how, when this is discussed, she learns her father too didn’t see her as her own person but as a way to continue his own partisan fight.

Both Wilk and Sugimoto are pushing their own wishes on her (we’ll debate another time on who has the best wish for her) without considering her own.

They don’t ask her which sort of future she wants, they decide for her which future is the best for her, the future THEY WANT.

It clearly pushes Asirpa, who was so proud of choosing for herself her own fate, in an unpleasant place… until, at the end of the volume, she’ll take back the reins of her own life. But we’ll discuss about this in a while.

It’s a tiny change but Asirpa is less of a rabid movie director in the volume. Asirpa is generally not particularly polite but not overly rude so maybe Noda decided to remove it not fitting with her character.

The next change is about the discussion Sugimoto and Asirpa will have as they wait for Tsurumi to come.

In the magazine Asirpa asked Sugimoto what he would do afterward, if he would cooperate with Tsurumi, to which Sugimoto didn’t reply.

The volume removed this scene because it was plainly stupid. Asirpa had already asked Sugimoto what he was going to do in chap 192. The volume even expanded the magazine scene. Having her ask it again with Sugimoto not replying to it didn’t really make much sense.

The other change to the scene has Sugimoto answers to Asirpa’s question about what will happen to the Ainu. In the magazine he said nothing. Here he said that since Asirpa knows the code she has an advantage over Tsurumi and can get him to do what she wants. Although Asirpa is doubtful this actually works much better for Asirpa’s character.

In fact, in the magazine, despite having shown she cared so much about the Ainu and wanted the gold to be used for their benefit, after Sugimoto told her about how terrible it would be if she were to have to kill someone, the fact she doesn’t oppose to being handed to Tsurumi even if Sugimoto doesn’t know what will happen to the Ainu afterward makes her look as if she is considering giving up on protecting the Ainu interests to protect herself from killing.

Sure, later in the magazine she’ll claim she’ll understand which sort of man Tsurumi is just by watching him and, as what she saw didn’t please her, she’ll escape but… we’ll discuss about this later and as if this happened in chap 211 it clearly made her look way too remissive in chap 210.

Here instead, Asirpa’s apparent compliance can be explained with her thinking that agreeing can still work to protect the Ainu, that by giving the gold to Tsurumi the Ainu still have lot to gain.

In short the change it doesn’t make Asirpa consider giving up on the Ainu for her own wish to protect herself. They’re always her first thought and she’s considering going through Sugimoto’s plan because he presents it as one from which the Ainu could still possibly benefit.

And so we reach the hugest change in the story.

As mentioned before, in the magazine Asirpa states she’ll understand which sort of man Tsurumi is just by looking at him. Apparently Tsurumi saying her she has her father’s eyes didn’t impress her positively because she decides to escape a second later.

In the volume Asirpa doesn’t claim she’ll decide which sort of man Tsurumi is just by a glance, she just listen to Sugimoto who, for the second time, tells her everything will go well.

It’s Tsurumi who basically fails to act smoothly, evidently undervaluing her. In fact he begins immediately making clear he plans to part Asirpa from Sugimoto and Shiraishi.

This causes Asirpa to smell disaster and she begins to question Tsurumi asking him why they aren’t going together. Tsurumi, evidently thinking he’s dealing with a child, claims it’s just because there isn’t enough space for them in the ship but Asirpa reminds him he said afterward Sugimoto and Shiraishi would have to remain on stand-by at Wakkanai, meaning she won’t wait for them nor they would reach her.

She asks to know where he’s taking her to which Tsurumi gives a dismissive answer ‘I’ll tell you later’.

As Sugimoto sweats but says nothing Asirpa continues to question Tsurumi, demanding to know if he’s trying to divide her from Sugimoto.

Tsurumi denies this, claiming she will be able to meet Sugimoto wherever she wants, they’re just aiming to bring her to a safe place because everyone is targeting her.

Asirpa isn’t deterred by this.

She remarks that her father only told Hijikata Toshizou about her existence, which might imply she’s starting to wonder how Tsurumi knew about her, and how he did so in order for her to oversee that the gold were to be used for the Ainu’s sake.

So she demands to know if he’s really going to take care of the Ainu in his future plans.

Tsurumi tries to give her one of his propaganda talks, they aim for a future in which everyone is happy and they want her cooperation (which we know is a lie as a previous page made clear they actually plan to keep her trapped in a jail until they got the skin and the Ariko chapters made clear Tsurumi forces people to cooperate with them by blackmailing them).

Asirpa insists she won’t help him if the gold isn’t used for the Ainu. She’s calm yet firm, she’s not sweating, only frowning slightly.

From this exchange Asirpa comes out as someone who’s confident, who doesn’t bow easily and who can read between lines. She doesn’t fall for Tsurumi’s fake reassurances and pretty words, she insists on her line and trying to protect her interests. In a way she is left alone to face Tsurumi as Sugimoto won’t say a word against Tsurumi’s plan and Shiraishi only makes a mocking sound.

It’s worth to mention though that Tsurumi’s emotions play to Asirpa’s advantage. Tsurumi’s brain fluids keeps on dripping always a bit more and he’s clearly reminded of Wilk more than once as he watches her. This is probably why, even though Tsurumi is a consumed liar, he snaps and tosses against her how that gold was a war fund to kill Japanese.

In short he stop trying to smooth Asirpa into doing what he says and tries to scare her into compliance, which surprises his own men.

While I think in a way his answer is what Asirpa wanted, as with such answer he reveals his not benevolent feelings toward the Ainu, Asirpa wasn’t prepared to him attacking her like that.

She sweats as she replies that the few Ainu who had that goal in mind died, that not all the Ainu want to fight and that the usage of the gold should be for the Ainu who are alive in the present to decide.

Tsurumi takes this as Asirpa claiming she’ll inherit and follow Wilk’s wishes and that she has his eyes. Then as he starts laughing hysterically, brain fluids dropping everywhere Asirpa will take her decision to escape which now makes a lot more sense than in the manga as Tsurumi has clearly proved himself as a man with malicious intentions toward her and toward the Ainu, a liar who tried to manipulate her into compliance and someone who’s not all right in the mind.

I won’t stop talking about this much, although the fact Tsurumi tattled out he knew Wilk’s eye colour, combined with how he knew about her existence (something Wilk revealed only to Hijikata), might have helped her to realize he knew her father personally (and might have been what pushed her to escape in the magazine as that her eyes looked like her father’s was the only thing Tsurumi managed to tell her).

I’ll focus more on Asirpa’s last sentence. Skipping for a moment how she continues to affirm she believes the Ainu gold should be used for the Ainu which was something she always claimed wanting, her previous statement regards how she claims that the Ainu who wanted to kill the Japanese were few and had died.

The cynical person that’s in me and who knows how partisans work felt like this is just her assumption. She can’t really know if there are more people like that or not.

Partisans work in secrecy, if there were some they wouldn’t openly discuss this around, especially with someone who is, by their standards, a child.

In short I speculated there should have been partisans in Hokkaido, it was just Asirpa didn’t know about them.

On the other side I assumed Asirpa’s idea that there aren’t Ainu who would want to kill the Japanese, or that those are a negligible minority, is not merely due to her religious belief killing is wrong and all Ainu would abide to this precept, but because she’s not really informed on how partisans work.

In fact not only she didn’t go to school but this wasn’t exactly a common concept among Japanese people at the time.

In fact Ushiyama, an adult man, had never heard the word and Hijikata had to explain it to him (chap 70).

The previous Ainu rebellions were due to Ainu clans deciding to fight against each other or against Japanese. From an Ainu perspective they were wars, battles or occasional uprising. Even the gold, although collected in secrecy, was collected by villages, not by a bunch of men in secrecy.

So Asirpa might be completely ignorant on how partisans would operate, how they would hid among her people, acting one way and thinking another, meeting in secret and keeping their identities secret.

As there’s no such malcontent between Ainu villages that they would revolt, for an Ainu like Asirpa, it would be reasonable to assume they wouldn’t revolt, that the Ainu who died moving the gold supposedly because they wanted to use it to wage war, were ‘oddities’ without real support.

Despite her religious beliefs she knows Ainu can kill, not only they too have murderers, but Ainu went to the Russo-Japanese war, Kiroranke and Ariko being veterans from it and Makanakkuru knowing many other Ainu veterans so it’s hard she could have been unaware of Ainu killing people existing. So I don’t think she ruled the idea out just because Ainu don’t kill but merely because Ainu didn’t act as if they were willing to wage wars. There was no such malcontent (conditions that spurred the rebellions were way more terrible than the ones we see in GK) and there were no councils of war and for her this is probably what’s matter. Even if she were to take into consideration there could be one or two Ainu willing to kill Japanese, in the great scheme of thing ��one or two people couldn’t wage war and therefore wouldn’t matter.

This would cause her to completely miss the existence of partisans because she doesn’t know well how they work (Kiroranke told her something about their partisan life but I think he wasn’t detailed enough and she might have mistaken their secrecy for them having been involved in the emperor’s murder and being fugitive) and therefore she would be unable to spot signs of their existence in Hokkaido, not mentioning she doesn’t know all the Ainu of Hokkaido, although she definitely knows many people in various town and travelled through it (Asirpa knows where they’re going during their travels, she has an idea of where her relatives are and how Ainu of certain regions live so maybe she travelled around with Wilk).

It doesn’t help Wilk completely overlook that part of her training. Although he wanted her to be a guerrilla fighter, he hadn’t taught her secrecy and lack of faith as well as he didn’t toughen her up to ready her to kill people nor, apparently, made her politically aware of Ainu condition, of his past and his belonging to partisans.

Long story short, my feelings were there was a tight network of partisans and Asirpa just didn’t know because she lacked the instrument to spot it. You can’t find something of which you don’t truly know the look. Even if it were placed under your eyes you wouldn’t recognize it, same as she didn’t recognize Kiro was a partisan, nor did Sugimoto, who only though he was a competitor for the possession of the gold.

It will be Inkarmat who’ll inform the group about how Wilk was a partisan but from the way she describes the partisan movement to Asirpa, she doesn’t seem aware of how it works because from the way she describes how Wilk was hurt, it’s clear she seems to think of him having been involved in a real battle, which not only is false but also unlikely as the partisans’ modus operandi isn’t actually to give battle to the enemy.

From the way Inkarmat put it she also doesn’t consider a possible involvement of partisans from Hokkaido, who might have joined forces with the ones in Russia and no one corrects her belief.

No one expects partisans to exist in Hokkaido, even Sugimoto who at first was afraid of Ainu assumed there would be rebellious villages, not men plotting in secrecy.

After all it’s meaningful in Japanese the word “partisan” is “パルチザン”, which is merely the katakana version of the French word “partisan” and the same goes for the word “guerrilla”, “ゲリラ”, the Katakana version of the Spanish word “guerrilla”. Japanese people didn’t have such word, they adopted it from other cultures so it’s possible to assume back then they didn’t know well how such things worked.

However, as I was discussing in Discord about it, two things dawned on me.

The first is that actually so far Golden Kamuy had given us no single proof such partisans exist.

Hijikata do not search their alliance, nor, apparently, did Kiro or Wilk. In fact Wilk was supposed to contact the partisans and revolutionaries in Russia, not to rally the help of the partisans in Hokkaido, and Kiro too wants the help of the revolutionaries in Russia, and doesn’t search the one of the partisans in Hokkaido.

Also Wilk, who tried to get Hijikata to find his daughter, didn’t give him names of Ainu partisans who would join him. Even with all his faith in Asirpa, leaving his daughter, a young girl, alone into an allegiance with Japanese men is risky, it would be much better if Asirpa were to have Ainu allies to support her.

The Ainu who join Hijikata are Kirawus, who apparently did it because he searched for money and who met Hijikata coincidentally and Ariko who was yes, the son of one of the Ainu moving the gold, but he’s clearly not a partisan.

As for the Ainu who helped Wilk to move the gold, they didn’t necessarily have to be partisans. As Boutarou figured out, before it was moved, there were too many people already who knew where it was. Wilk could have managed to persuade the Ainu the Japanese government had found out where it was as well and planned to steal it, so that the Ainu would have to relocate it in a more secret place.

Long story short yes, it can be it just wasn’t in the Hokkaido Ainu culture to be ‘partisans’, that they simply didn’t conceive such a way of fighting, so there weren’t partisans, just some unhappy people who wouldn’t really manage to do much harm.

The other important thing is that… well, even if Asirpa had been aware of Hokkaido pullulating of partisans she couldn’t really tell Tsurumi this in such a situation. She was testing ground to see if an allegiance was possible, giving him a speech about how Hokkaido had plenty of Ainu who wanted to kill him would have only sparked animosity toward the Ainu in a moment in which Japanese had a army to fight them while Ainu had not.

So it’s hard to judge Asirpa’s reply since it’s actually the only reply she could give regardless of her knowing/believing partisan existed or not.

The last change is rather small but Noda added a sentence in which he made clear Asirpa’s position.

She says that between going back to her village and WAGE WAR to protect the Ainu there’s only an option she can take. This paints her intentions as much more belligerent than they were in the volume and makes clear that, if Sugimoto is her partner, she wants his support in THIS.

In short she comes out as a much more determinate Asirpa. I think there might be changes in vol 22 as well, so it’s possible that it’s by this point Asirpa starts to consider she could murder people to protect the Ainu and not some chapter later, just to protect Sugimoto.

However we’ll need to wait and see.

SUGIMOTO

Sugimoto… well, he goes though a lot of changes but, in a way, except for a couple, most of them don’t play in his favor in the sense they mostly don’t show him acting better than in the magazine (except in one instance) but digs more and more into how terrible and self serving Sugimoto’s plan was, even if his intentions were good, so that the volume is ultimately a VERY HARSH critic to Sugimoto’s idea it would be better for Asirpa to be handed to Tsurumi.

The first change is minor but, as I’ve already commented, it’s probably also relevant. Noda removed the light in Sugimoto’s eyes when he runs toward where Vasily is, persuaded the attacked is Ogata.

I take this is Noda’s attempt to hint that what Sugimoto wants to do is no good for him on a psychological level, as the lack of light in people’s eyes often hints ‘inner dead’ (see for example Sekiya’s eyes prior to his daughter’s death and after he realized she died). I like to think this hints at how Sugimoto’s wish to kill Ogata is actually psychologically harming Sugimoto who was a man who started this adventure saying he wasn’t a murderer and that he would only kill if someone were to try to kill him back… but now he’s running to kill Ogata not so much because he thinks Ogata is holding his friends at gunpoint but because Sugimoto wants to kill him, because when Ogata escaped he remarked his wish Ogata would come back so he could ‘fucking kill him’. This is no more self defense, ‘oh, I didn’t want to kill him but he attacked me so I had to’, this is more ‘I want to kill you so, please, please, please, give me a reason to fulfill my wish’.

And of course since Sugimoto doesn’t want to be a murderer, longing to murder someone clashes directly with this.

The second change refers to what Sugimoto will say to Vasily.

In fact originally in the magazine Sugimoto said just because the world Asirpa was looking at had him in it, this cleaned him and he thought he could be saved. This caused Asirpa to look like she was an entity who, just by turning her gaze on him, would wash away his sins, sort of like a goddess giving him her blessing.

And just to be clear, this is not romantic, this is delusional. Even though ‘Golden Kamuy’ has joked Asirpa was Jesus not even Jesus would clean people of sins at random, just by happening to look at them when they weren’t even planning to stop sinning. Pushing on Asirpa the role of his magical sin-washing-machine was pretty terrible.

Noda then decided to change this for the volume version, a change that was probably already planned not much later that chapter was printed as Asirpa’s words in chap 206 matches with what she overheard in the volume version, not in the magazine version.

So in the volume version Sugimoto says when he watches Asirpa he thinks he can be saved merely because he retained part of his purity which he had when he was a child.

Long story short in Asirpa Sugimoto sees the ‘little Saichi’. As he thinks ‘little Saichi’ was pure and deserved to be saved and ‘little Saichi’ is a part of him, he thinks he as a whole can be saved.

It’s still bad, even if in a way that’s different from before.

We don’t exactly know what Sugimoto means by ‘salvation’ but it’s clear a part of him loathes himself, thinks he deserves a special place in hell, but now he finds a renewed appreciation in himself because as a child he wasn’t a murderer. Which would be good only if he were to act over it.

Just because he was pure as a child, it’s not like this will make all his wrongdoing magically disappear. Everyone started as a pure child.

And it’s interesting compare his words with Ogata’s.

Now take this with a grain of salt as I’m going by the definitions as they were explained to me as I’m not a Japanese expert.

Anywa…

Ogata talked about ‘Kiyoi’ (清い) “Pure/innocent” with Yuusaku and Asirpa (yeah scanlations translated the word in two different manner, ‘innocent’ with Yuusaku, ‘pure’ with Asirpa but Ogata is actually using the same words). Interesting enough ‘kiyoi’ is the word used in this sentence, ‘Kokoro no kiyoi hito-tachi wa saiwaidearu’ (心の清い人たちは幸いである) or, if you prefer “Blessed are the pure in heart” from Matthew 5: 8 (full sentence being “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.”)

Sugimoto used ‘Kirei’ (きれい) “Pure/Beautiful”.

Apparently ‘Kiyoi’ isn’t commonly used, except in literature but it has a strong meaning of ‘nobility’ as it implies not just ‘cleanliness’ but also ‘honesty/inner nobility’. What Ogata complains is that no one is inherently ‘kiyoi’, pure, noble, innocent. We’re all imperfect beings after all, we all not only have the power to hurt/kill others but we’re also responsible of what we let/encourage/empower the others do. Yuusaku lead the men to murder other men, even if he didn’t kill anyone he was still involved in the massacre, motivating men to do it. Even though he didn’t personally stain his hands in blood, he was no better than the others because he actively encouraged others to commit murder.

Ogata, who probably was also used as hit-man, denounces the hypocrisy of who believed that, as long as he weren’t to commit the deed personally but had another do it for him, he remained pure.

Sugimoto’s ‘kirei’ instead is a much more commonly used words and implies a general ‘beauty of clean/pure things’. I think his idea is that having something that’s ‘kirei’, beautiful, pure, gives him a sense of worth. He can be saved just because a part of him is worth being saved.

So, even if, in the English version, they seem to talk about the same thing, ‘purity’, their speech is actually referring to something different.

Something that was believed to be pure but actually it felt so merely because it let other do the dirty work versus something that was pure because it was never tarnished and therefore remained beautiful.

Probably Sugimoto would see Yuusaku as ‘kirei’ as he never personally killed, never tainted his own hands with it, while Ogata feels he’s not ‘kiyoi’ because guilty of murder by association.

Anyway, since Sugimoto sees his child self in Asirpa, he wants to keep her ‘pure’ as in ‘untarnished’, he wants her to be saved the way he couldn’t.

He doesn’t want Asirpa tainted by Ogata’s death, he doesn’t want her to become a killer. It’s not a matter of her remaining noble, of her keeping on believing killing is bad, but of her remaining untainted, unsullied by the action of killing.

Sugimoto won’t tell her ending a life is bad, just that the guilt that will come with doing it will make you feel bad, as if that guilt wasn’t tied to the wrongness of killing.

There’s a bizarre dichotomy in Sugimoto. He agonizes over his kills, over how he couldn’t go back to his own old self but, at the same time, he thinks killing is the best choice when something threatens him and tries to overcome his sense of guilt by telling himself those he kills are soulless creatures. Sugimoto can never go back to his own old self as long as he doesn’t accept killing is the wrong choice and that he had made a mistake, that he had been forced during war to make it, but that killing wasn’t right.

Of course since all this is hellish hard and people normally would need to go into therapy before realizing it, I get it’s not so easy for him but anyway, his belief that Asirpa doesn’t have to be tainted, explains his view.

The next changes are in the words Sugimoto says to Asirpa after they watched the movie.

In the volume Sugimoto reports Wilk’s words correctly instead of just his own interpretation. Now… this is better on a storytelling level. In media there’s the recurring trope that, if a character has to report the words of another, he’ll quote him word by word and if he doesn’t he’s trying to hide something. In the real world of course it doesn’t work like that, more often than not we don’t remember words that exactly however, as this is a media, Sugimoto not quoting Wilk in the magazine, gave me a bad impression, as if he were trying to push on Asirpa a falsehood or, at least, a biased information so the change is definitely an improvement in Sugimoto’s favor.

Sugimoto in the volume also better explained how things went with Kiro.

In the magazine it sounded as if Kiro died to push Asirpa to fight… when Kiro actually had no intention to die in the first place as he very clearly was murdered against his will.

In the volume version Sugimoto gives a better account of how things went but the implication is that, along with Wilk who forcibly pulled Asirpa in the gold fight, Kiro also took Asirpa to Karafuto to have her remember the code and paid this act with his life but, doing so, pushed her to think Asirpa has to fight for what she wants to protect.

This is more what had happened although the implication is that Kiro’s actions were forceful and moved by the will to drag Asirpa into that battle... when Asirpa actually wanted to remember the code and willingly followed Kiro because THAT WAS THE PLAN, should things go bad. Actually, hadn’t he been shoot, Sugimoto would have gone to Karafuto with her as well.

Ultimately is clear that Sugimoto is telling the fact through his visions as his summary ‘stand at the head of the Ainu and die’ and ‘fight and kill people’ aren’t exactly what Wilk and Kiro told her to do.

Wilk in particular never said she had to die… and Kiro didn’t tell her to kill people.

Sugimoto interprets their words and actions as such and, while in the magazine he said just this was what they were telling her, now he says with those words they’re casting a curse on her.

This new choice of words implies even more than the previous how negatively Sugimoto sees their actions but also kind of undervalues Asirpa’s ability to decide for herself and, more importantly, doesn’t offer any other way to protect what Asirpa wants to protect, nor admits his own role into dragging her in that gold battle as HE is the one who started Asirpa’s involvement.

In light of the changes of Sugimoto’s sentence in chap 203, it’s clear that although Sugimoto in the past commented Wilk’s cause was just, he prioritizes preserving Asirpa’s purity. Someone has to fight but it doesn’t have to be Asirpa who’ll fight to protect what she’ll care about and it’s clear Sugimoto isn’t saying this just because Asirpa is young or female. He doesn’t want her involved but he doesn’t offer any other solution from saying ‘I’ll do it’ to ‘you can protect the Ainu in another way’.

It’s more a ‘give up on protecting the Ainu and protect your purity instead or you’ll regret it’, that fails to see the problem that Asirpa is an Ainu and by protecting Ainu she’s also protecting herself.

So overall the changes made Sugimoto more sincere but didn’t really change him much even if now it’s more clear he was trying to preserve Asirpa’s purity not because her existence washed away his sins but because he saw himself in her.

Although he would chose something different for Asirpa, overall his way to go at it is the same as Wilk.

Both he and Wilk saw Asirpa as a version of themselves and both tried to force her on the path they preferred without asking about Asirpa’s opinion.

To Sugimoto’s defense it can be said his own seems safe, but only in a superficial way, as he actually plans to hand her to Tsurumi, which would be very unsafe for Asirpa, although in a way that’s different from taking part to a war.

Another important change in the volume is that while in the magazine, when Asirpa claimed she worried for the Ainu Sugimoto didn’t reply, now he does. However it’s clearly something he’s not really believing. His eyes are completely black, and at first he hesitated and turned his gaze away from her when replying Tsurumi doesn’t want the Ainu as enemies but as a workforce, continuing they’ve overwhelming advantage over Tsurumi so he’ll do as Asirpa demands.

Now… while it’s good he answered his answer is… well, pretty farfetched and misleading.

Although Ainu in Hokkaido back then were 15,000 this count included old men, women and children.

The only things Tsurumi might need the Ainu for are as extra troops for his army or as workers in his weapon and opium factories. This would mean the Ainu would have to drop their lifestyle, which Asirpa wanted to preserve, to become soldiers or factory workers (never mentioning factories would pollute nature damaging Ainu environment fundamental to hunt or fish) or, in case of the females, wives of Japanese, otherwise they’ve no use for him, it’s not like Ainu are producing something fundamental for Tsurumi he can’t get rid of them.

Sugimoto either knows his own is a lie (or, if you prefer, a very misleading answer) or he’s seriously deluding himself.

He then goes on claiming since Asirpa is the only one who can solve the code, they’ve overwhelming advantage so Tsurumi should just obey her.

This also is completely wrong.

First of all it he can’t be sure the tattooed code couldn’t be solved without Asirpa as he has not the slightest idea how the code works. Tsurumi could get code breakers to solve it or maybe figure it out on his own for all Sugimoto knows. Other codes were cracked after all, and we’ve no idea how versed Wilk is in making codes. Just because Sugimoto doesn’t know how to crack it, it doesn’t mean no one can.

But the real problem here is once Tsurumi has Asirpa he can very well torture her to force her to tell him the code, or just threaten her by telling her he’ll kill one Ainu after the other until she doesn’t talk.

And if Asirpa gives him a wrong key to the code he can just resume torturing.

After all we were shown in this exact volume how Tsurumi coerced Ariko into cooperating.

Sugimoto can’t be unaware of this as Tsurumi imprisoned and tortured him too and Tsurumi has, differently from him, the means to carry it on.

So while Sugimoto would never torture Asirpa and might not manage to force Boutarou to talk, Tsurumi has plenty of means to torture Asirpa and plenty of time and if she gives him a wrong answer it’ll only slow him down a little.

The changes in the volume, which show how Tsurumi in truth never planned to get her cooperation but just to imprison her and postpone worrying about the code after he got the tattoo add to this.

Noda wanted us to be extremely sure Sugimoto’s choice to entrust Asirpa to Tsurumi was wrong, wasn’t moved by great ideals or sense of responsibility but merely by personal feelings.

We’ve another moment that’s changed and that’s when Shiraishi questions Sugimoto, asking him if he really thinks Tsurumi will care about the Ainu. Sugimoto is surprised by being questioned but also nervous (he’s sweating), yet his reply is ‘Dōiu imida?’ (どういう意味だ？) “What do you mean?” however this isn’t only used in the sense of ‘I hadn’t understood you’ but in the sense of ‘What are you implying?’ and in the sense of ‘what in the world are you saying?’

Shiraishi was accusing Sugimoto with his question, basically asking him if he’s stupid, delusional or a liar when he’s saying Tsurumi would care about the Ainu. Honestly I hope this will be developed further in the next volume but, for now I think Sugimoto is probably being neither of the three. He’s actually being dismissive about the Ainu.

When Asirpa questioned him it’s clear his first worry is Asirpa, in fact in his reasoning he didn’t consider the Ainu at all.

“Nobody will come after you.” Which match with his previous “It doesn’t have to be you (who’ll fight).”

When he’s pressured by Asirpa ABOUT THE AINU, he likely replied the first thing that came to his mind that would reassure her and make her play along. There’s not Sugimoto’s heart in that answer, it’s just a way to reassure Asirpa (hence the ‘dead eyes’ and him avoiding her gaze).

Sugimoto claimed he didn’t care about what Tsurumi plans to do with Hokkaido, implying also he didn’t know what this thing is.

However if he were to care about the Ainu he should care about what Tsurumi wants to do because it would affect the Ainu and this something Tsurumi plans to do, as far as he knows, could be everything, from world peace to Ainu extermination. This is relevant.

His words are basically words said to push Asirpa to accept but they’re based over nothing. Sugimoto hasn’t asked himself what Tsurumi would do with the Ainu and doesn’t care, he cares about protecting Asirpa but Asirpa is an Ainu so he’s hugely missing the point.

Another minor change.

After Tanigaki suggests Asirpa to ask Tsurumi to go visit her grandmother, Sugimoto tells her it’ll go well. This is a call back to the talk they had in chap 192, when Asirpa pointed out how she didn’t believe Tsurumi would allow her to see her grandmother and Sugimoto (in the volume version, in the magazine version he agreed with her) insisted that Tsurumi would let her do it.

Basically Sugimoto’s words are again aimed at reassuring Asirpa so she’ll play along with the plan… with Noda immediately informing us that no, Tsurumi won’t let her see her grandmother, Tsurumi tells Usami he’ll plan to hide her in a basement with no windows or furniture for all the time it’ll need him to crack the code, even several years if that will be the case.

The following change isn’t a change to be honest but an addition and sadly it’s not about something Sugimoto does or say, but about the chat Tsurumi has with Asirpa, during which Sugimoto will look at first a bit surprised and then sweat but won’t comment not even once. And this is really terrible because although it became clear Tsurumi wanted to rip Asirpa from him and Shiraishi and hid her and, since he didn’t even bother to lie about where he was taking her, it probably was nowhere good and, if she couldn’t be with her friends it’s even more clear she couldn’t be with her grandmother, Sugimoto says nothing.

It’s Asirpa who questions Tsurumi, if she hadn’t, Sugimoto would have let him just take her away.

There’s an expression we use in my country to imply that a person in order to keep another safe, doesn’t want to allow that person to get in contact with anything and is ‘to put someone under a glass bell’.

Basically this is what Sugimoto wishes for Asirpa. As long as Tsurumi doesn’t ask her to murder, even if he keeps her jailed, he’s fine with it.

It gets worse.

Tsurumi, instead than trying to manipulate Asirpa into being obedient with lies, ends up on arguing with her, clearly showing he has not benevolent feelings and creeping out even his own men. Sugimoto still does nothing, he doesn’t try to defend Asirpa saying ‘no, she’s not going to wage war like Wilk, she’s a peaceful person’ nor, apparently consider walking back from that deal.

But sadly this is still not the end of it.

When Asirpa tells him she’ll chose her own destiny, in the magazine Sugimoto was first surprised then smiled.

Here instead he’s visibly more anxious, sweating, his eyes thinning slightly (in the magazine they widens) as he chews his lips for ultimately agreeing with her with a nod… that’s clearly without the smile he had in the magazine.

Sugimoto is not happy with Asirpa’s decision. He bows to it to remain her partner but he would have let her in Tsurumi’s care.

There’s another change, even if it’s hard to spot. At the very end in the volume Asirpa says that between going back to her Kotan and waging war to protect the Ainu there’s only a choice she can take, implying she’ll wage war to protect the Ainu. Therefore her words about wanting Sugimoto to say something optimistic like ‘let’s do this together’ tie to ‘wage war to protect the Ainu’.

Sugimoto’s reply though is unchanged. He says ‘let’s find the gold by themselves’ but this doesn’t imply his future involvement in the Ainu protection.

It can be something that will be developed further in the volume version but, for now, this volume set up firmly several points about Sugimoto.

His plan to protect Asirpa from killing by entrusting her to Tsurumi was the WORST POSSIBLE IDEA he could have. I’m aware many thought that since it would be terrible for a child like Asirpa to murder people, this seemed a good plan but, actually, it’s just another type of horror.

Sugimoto, differently from Asirpa, is not interested in the future of the Ainu at all. He acknowledges their cause might not be wrong but overall, as he said to Wilk, they should just keep quiet and do what they’re told to do so as not to cause a civil war. Or maybe change lifestyle and serve in Tsurumi’s army and factory.

Sugimoto’s interests as stated in this volume are therefore: find the gold, protect Asirpa from murdering and murder Ogata.

There’s also something I should have noticed earlier when watching chap 211 but that I missed and that was actually noticeable also when the chapter was released on the magazine.

The argument between Sugimoto and Shiraishi parallels another argument they had, in chap 62.

Back then Shiraishi suggested they would just take advantage of Inkarmat’s magic ability of predicting the winner of a race to get the money they both needed without running around risking their lives.

Sugimoto claimed he couldn’t do so because it would mean to tell Asirpa to fend for herself… in short to go to Abashiri on her own to discover the truth about her father (on a completely unrelated note can you see Wakayama and Nakazawa behind him?).

While Sugimoto’s words are painted as noble it’s worth to note that, as Shiraishi pointed out, going there meant to risk their lives and it’s Sugimoto who involved Asirpa in the gold hunt and is not even considering telling her ‘Asirpa, is dangerous, you should go back home’ in an attempt to persuade her to give up. In short he’s not prioritizing her safety but HER WISH, or so he says.

In chap 211 Shiraishi turns the argument against Sugimoto.

He points out he keeps on saying he is doing it for Asirpa but it turns out he hasn’t given up on the money, in fact he had made an agreement to get the money. Asirpa has made clear she wants, same as when she wanted to go to Abashiri, know the truth about her father but handing the code to Tsurumi doesn’t insure she’ll get what she wants.

In short this time Sugimoto is prioritizing his own wishes, getting the money and keeping Asirpa pure (which isn’t even ensuring her safety) while Shiraishi points out how Asirpa has grown for that time and, instead than deciding for her he should support her, and how Sugimoto’s decision might not even protect her.

Now… just to clear things up.

I don’t think Sugimoto is doing what he’s doing because he’s evil or something like that. But he’s taking wrong choices under the guise of doing something good for Asirpa.

By doing him do this and remaking he’s doing this, Noda is telling us that Sugimoto isn’t the classic Shonen hero whose decisions, even the most controversial ones, either ultimately work out greatly (think to how Goku spared Piccolo and Vegeta and they turned out to be allies) or are immediately set right (when Goku spares Freezer and Freezer betrays him Goku immediately kills him… well, tries to as Freezer will survive) or, at least, immediately pointed as wrong (Goku��s plan to have Gohan fight Cell without warning him is quickly denounced as dumb by Piccolo).

Sugimoto’s decision was bad, very much so, but he took it in vol 14 and we had to wait till vol 21 to see how bad it was and it’s not even Sugimoto who acknowledges ‘ops, I made a mistake’ when Shiraishi warns him and fixes things or tries to but it’s Tsurumi who screws up while it’s Asirpa who fixes things.

Long story short, just because Sugimoto has the ‘main character’s status’, it doesn’t mean he’s always right or that he’s always doing good. He screws up like any of us.

Noda didn’t want us to despise Sugimoto, just remind us that the road to hell is paved with good intentions and if you aren’t careful you might screw up beyond belief.

TSURUMI

Actually there are no changes regarding Tsurumi, there are additions.

1 & 2)

We learn contrary to what Sugimoto and Tanigaki thought Tsurumi had no intention to let Asirpa some measure of freedom, he just wanted to keep her trapped until he were to solve the code. We also learn he planned to part her from Sugimoto and Shiraishi as soon as possible.

Honestly I’m not particularly surprised by this and I don’t think Noda made us aware of this to point out that Tsurumi is a jerk. The chapters with Ariko but also the one in which he cut Nikaido’s ear or murdered Wada or have Ogata kill Hanazawa or kidnapped Koito, should have told us Tsurumi would do everything to get what he wants. He wants the code and he doesn’t want others to get it. Of course the safest way it to keep Asirpa trapped in a place where nobody can find her and get that info from her.

Also, as long as he hadn’t checked the info, even if she were to tell him the code, he could never be sure she had been sincere, hence the jailing.

The changes in the volume version though, only remarks what was already pointed out. Tsurumi doesn’t come out worse or better, he just confirms his modus operandi.

Tsurumi has a giant size grudge toward Wilk, seeing Asirpa immediately causes him a beyond strong emotion that causes him to leak brain fluid like crazy and the fact she reminds him of her father only causes him to lose his cool, stop attempting to manipulate her and attack her verbally, claiming Ainu wanted to kill Japanese and she’s going to follow her father’s footsteps, a flashback implying Tsurumi believes Wilk might be responsible for Funa and Olga’s death.

This is all new material for Tsurumi. We knew Tsurumi knew Wilk but in the magazine it wasn’t shown Wilk shoot, it was something that was added in the volume, and anyway, as Sofia blamed herself, it was assumed it could be her who murdered Sofia and Olga.

Instead he suspects Wilk and he seems very hung up on his loss, to the point he loses it in front of Wilk’s completely innocent daughter who, however, got to grow up differently from his own.

This definitely adds quite a big load of new meaning to Tsurumi’s actions.

On another side I’ve always wondered if the loss of Tsurumi’s brain fluid is mean to imply an orgasm or him crying. I think Tsurumi is so messed up in him pain and pleasure conflated and, in a way, it’s both. But it might be just me.

Well, this is all for the comments to the volume version. Sorry if it was a bit late.

#Golden Kamuy #Sugimoto Saichi #Asirpa #Shiraishi Yoshitake #Tsurumi Tokushirou #Tsukishima Hajime #Koito Otonoshin #Tanigaki Genjirou #Golden Kamuy Magazine vs Volume

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goldenkamuyhunting · 4 years

Note

How drastic are the plot changes in the collected editions?

Well...

...it really depends.

I’ve a tag in which I usually ramble a bit about changes in the volume version if you’re curious for a detailed explanation.

The volume version changes and improve a lot of things so I always recommend buying the volumes.

Anyway for a quick summary of the most basic changes that were however either relevant to the plot or to the character interpretation...

I’ll start with Vol 11 as I’ll take people are curious about what they didn’t see.

Vol 11 basically redrawed most of chap 103 to the point it’s almost a new chapter even if the general idea of the plot stays the same. To give you an idea of what this includes, Ogata’s expression is different for most of the chapter, part of the dialogues are changed, panels are added, entire scenes are added and overall all the changes are pretty meaningful.

Vol 12 changes Sugimoto’s expression at the end of chap 113 and, in chap 116 expands Inkarmat and Wilk’s past. While this doesn’t really change the plot as the dialogue is more or less the same, the visual implies more Inkarmat’s romantic feelings for Wilk and showed more moments of them together. In chap 116 Kiroranke gets between Ogata and Inkarmat, moving away Ogata’s gun and looking much more confident as he says his fingerprints can’t be on those objects.

Vol 13 shows more in details Shiraishi’s plan to get into Abashiri and has an extra scene in which, for once, Shiraishi gets praised by Sugimoto and Asirpa due to how good his plan is (Abashiri was a prison in which it was impossible to get in or out). Hijikata says he also got info about Ogata not just from Tanigaki but also from Kiroranke (who was in the 7th as well, although under a different Lieutenant). Wilk is shown having, instead than an Ainu bow and want a rifle. There’s a spread page that put focus on fake Nopperabou and Asirpa’s eyes and how they’re different. When Toni Anji pulls Asirpa up in the volume she tries to grab Sugimoto’s hand but Sugimoto hesitated to grab hers to then tell her to get away.

Vol 14 has a panel showing Koito fighting well in Abashiri. As that’s is probably his first battle since he didn’t take part to the war he’s doing fine and without hesitations. He’s using his sword though, idfferently from others who use the rifle. It also show Ogata was on one of the prison watchtowers when he shot. As he said to Kiro he had bad visual of the scene and, when Tanigaki came to save Sugimoto it got worse as the smoke covered the scene, forcing him to leave. Sugimoto drinks the hurep juice before throwing the glass at Koito’s head. Not really relevant but part of chap 141 is actually moved in chap 140 so that the volume ends with the wolverine attacking Koito.

VOL 15 shows that Sugimoto takes a lot of punches to his head before losing control. Cikapasi and Ryu try to fight the wolverine after Cikapasi fell and before Sugimoto came to fight the wolverine. Gansoku, before leaving the group, exchanged words with Tsukishima who told him that if he’ll come back to Japan he would shoot him and that he should study Russian like his life depended on it. I think Gansoku was positively impressed by him. When the 7th division is back to Otaru Tsukishima tosses in the sea Egogusa’s hair and then joins Tsurumi who wears his enamel head protector.

VOL 16 shows how Youichirou tried to drown himself because he didn’t want to die without even realizing it, and was rescued by one of the guy at the herring. When Hijikata arrives after Youichirou said to the deer he didn’t want to die, Youichirou tried to run for it for one panel before stopping to listen him. We see more of Koito chasing the boy. The chase is hard but when Koito grabs against a branch and the branch breaks, although he will expertly manage to fall on his feet, the branch will fall on his head and there are never hints Koito lost Choukichi (in the magazine he looked around and seemed not to see him anymore). Kiro talks a bit about how the minorities have been forced to switch their customs. We gets a flashback in which a young Asirpa is explained the orocikk ulaa. There’s a panel showing Ogata checking the Berdan as Kiro explains they’ll sneak into Russia. The Russian guards are shown earlier and we see the group passing the border marker before the Orok is shoot and at the end of the volume we’re shown Vasily.

I wrote in details about the changes done in vol 17 to 21 but for an extremely short summary...

Vol 17 is tamer. Sure, it confirms Vasily survived but it’s something we knew by the time the volume was out, showed Ogata starting to feel sick and Tsukishima being more affected by Svetlana’s story however the overall plot remains unchanged.

Vol 18 expanded Sekiya’s past, which is relevant to the character and added scenes to the Wilk/Tsurumi flashback which are relevant. Like showing already how much Wilk was into wolves, or that he too shoot at people when Tsurumi’s home was attacked.

Vol 19 added a dialogue between Sugimoto and Asirpa and Sofia’s actions as Kiro was fighting. Having that dialogue there instead than later as it happened in the magazine was a good choice plot wise but it’s overall not a dramatic change. Learning about Sofia’s actions can change your opinion on her so this is more relevant.

Vol 20 made relevant changes to Sugimoto and Asirpa’s dialogue and Koito’s flashback. In short Koito can be read differently from the changes in his past.

Vol 21 was... well dramatic in terms of changes, a lot was changed with many scenes added and it was all relevant. I’ve even made an extra rambling on the changes because really, they changed things A LOT in terms of how we perceive the characters. I’m not even going to try to summarize them all because it’s simply too much. Sorry about it.

And here we are. I definitely recommend buying the volumes as they’re really awesome.

I hope this helps and thank you for your ask!

#Golden Kamuy #Golden Kamuy Magazine vs Volume #Ask

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goldenkamuyhunting · 4 years

Text

Quick outline of the changes in Golden Kamuy Vol 20

Here is a general outline of the more relevant changes that take place in Vol 20 compared to the magazine. Note that as usual I won’t dig into minor changes unless they seem to be relevant for the plot or characterization (or I really like them).

We spend a moment on the cover, which sees the return of Sugimoto on it.

Sugimoto has appeared already on two covers in the past. I tend to think the next one will be Asirpa, Tsurumi will appear on the one of Vol 23 and Ogata on the one of Vol 27 as in the past they rotated in a regular manner.

Said this I also expect Golden Kamuy to end with Vol 28, in short to have as many volumes as the chapter of Matthew’s gospel... though this might be just me. Honestly, if this were to be wrong, I don’t expect it to go past 29/30 volumes. Considering the magazine version is already at vol 23 we’re getting close to the end... ;_;

It’s also worth to mention that the backcover this time doesn’t have JUST Asirpa like the previous Sugimoto cover but Asirpa AND Ogata, Ogata taking Asirpa away from Sugimoto, in a clear reference to what happened in Vol 19... although during it Ogata was a lot less calm and confident than he looks in this cover, as if this scenewas seen in Sugimoto’s vision... and it’s worth to mention in the cover Sugimoto is trying to pull out his bayonet to likely kill Ogata with it, as he had attempted to do in their first meeting and as he likely considered to do in the hospital when he learnt Ogata would die.

We then move to the colour page.

It’s no new illustration, it was the cover for chap 205, ‘Cinematograph’ which will be in the next volume. Not one of my fave covers but it can be fitting considering the plot of the last chapters of this volume.

The downside of it is that we lose the colour cover of chap 193. I wonder if Noda will use it later.

It’s worth to note though how Noda drew for chap 193 a new black and white cover.

Always in regard to covers, the cover of chap 191 now is used as background for the summary.

As usual the volume presents a cute summary.

And now let’s talk of extra pages and panels which are added to the story.

Same as in past volumes the new pages seems to have the purpose to expand scenes that already were in the magazine version so we can better understand what’s going on.

Note I’m not going to add them all but only those which are plot relevant (or that I particularly like).

Let’s start with chap 191.

Maybe nobody noticed it but volume pages are longer. This allows us to better see Shiraishi’s expression as he buries Kiro.

Asirpa’s expression as Shiraishi says Kiro was too serious for his own good is also redrawn (and they added some background behind Tanigaki, Koito and Tsukishima).

Tanigaki’s dialogue line about Inkarmat reporting how Kiro told her Wilk had changed is cut as Noda had added some panels in the past volume with Sugimoto telling this to Asirpa.

This allows Noda to expand the scene in which Sugimoto tells Asirpa Nopperabou told him he didn’t kill the Ainu, to which she replies ‘really?’ when in the magazine version she just looked down sadly.

Noda shortened the scene in which Sofia unbury Kiro to say her goodbye to him to add one in which she joins her men, even though it was too late to save Kiro.

It should hurt her horribly.

We go on. At Noboribetsu Noda added a Kikuta panel with the man saying something. No idea what but I love Kikuta so enjoy him.

We go to Chap 192.

The inside of the ryv is now more detailed and Ogata looks a little better... as in his bandages seem cleaner than in the volume version. Also Noda gave him a fur cover which matches with the one has in the othe scenes.

Sure the cloth placed against his eye is still not perfectly clean but the one in the magazine seemed much dirtier.

On the opposite side Tsukishima looks worse, his lips chapped now.

Noda expanded Sugimoto’s reply to Asirpa’s question ‘what are you going to do, Sugimoto? Will you cooperate with Tsurumi?’

We jump to chap 193.

As said before the color cover is removed and Noda drew a black and white new cover for the chapter.

When Kikuta notices the man with the eyepatch, the guy looks much worse than in the magazine and Ariko doesn’t turn toward him as well but looks at Kikuta. Noda also changed a little Kikuta’s expression in the following panel.

Ah, it’s not really relevant but Noda changed a little how one of Toni Anji’s men look so as to help differentiate him from Toni Anji’s other man. I’m not going to post all the scenes in which he looks different but here you can get a glimpse of him and compare him with how he previously looked in the magazine.

Noda took better care of Ariko’s mother, drawing her in action instead than still as a statue.

(and yeah you also get a glimpse of Kikuta as he says ‘the sound of geta’ as Noda redraw him)

Noda also made more clear how Kikuta removed the eyepatch (you can now see him moving something above his left eye and said eye widening and also being visible although Kikuta’s face is darkened when Toni shoots him) and Noda also drew better Toni shooting at Kikuta.

Let’s go to chap 194.

A lot more fog is added in almost all the scenes better showing how it was hard to see something in it for Kikuta and Co. No idea why but the Nikaido panels have now him looking in the opposite direction and there are minor redrawing here and there.

Overall though there is no terribly relevant change.

Chap 195 presents only one small yet relevant change.

In it it’s Ariko who volunteers to go after Toni while Kikuta remains with Usami, when in the magazine version it was Kikuta who told Ariko to go after him.

To chap 196 we go.

Ogata is confirmed to look as bad as in the magazine version in this chapter, as to imply his conditions has worsened quite a bit.

There are some minor redrawings here and there but nothing terribly relevant (still enjoy Kikuta looking more awesome... yes, if you hadn’t figured it out yet I’m partial to him).

And now we reach Chap 197 and things turn interesting.

While Asirpa remains very distressed at the idea Ogata might die...

... and we have no explanation whatsoever regarding to the Russian doctor’s odd behaviour, we get a lot of changes in regard to how Koito and Tsurumi’s first meeting went because the volume version changed it A LOT. Not only Tsurumi’s face isn’t kept in the dark for as long as it was in the magazine but Koito definitely isn’t the well mannered kid we met in the volume version but a real bonbon, spoiled, bossy and angry, much more fitting of the personality he’ll have as an adult. Tsurumi also will show here he’s not going to let a young boy bully him.

Again Noda have someone slap some sense into someone else.

While the scene can look violent it’s clearly for Koito it was catartic. He knew he was acting like an asshole and he likely did so because he wanted to draw attention on himself but, as he says also in the magazine version, his father won’t scold him. So fundamentally Tsurumi hitting him for his bad behaviour gave him the attention he wanted and makes tematically sense with how he pointed out his father didn’t scold him.

After that fight Tsurumi’s kindness also likely made more of an impression on Koito.

It’s also worth to mention Tsurumi is freakingly strong. Remember how Ogata warned Sugimoto he shouldn’t try to block Koito’s first strike, the info box informing us it should be dodged at any cost? Well, Tsurumi blocks it with his arm and breaks Koito’s ‘sword’ (actually the cane of a poor man Koito took using his status).

So we move to chap 198.

The panels post Koito’s kidnapping are expanded. Now it’s more obvious Koito’s tricycle is in front of the consulate. Many panels are also expanded but, overall, I couldn’t detect relevant changes.

So we reach Chap 199.

The whole run in the tricycle is expanded, the chase between the Kidnapper (Kikuta) and the duo Tsurumi/Koito senior is now longer and Tsurumi gets to show off more and even express his Tsurumisexuality on two women passing by.

The destruction of the tricycle is now in a spread page, Koito senior calling for his son in another, below him the background of the Goryokaku.

And so we reach the last chapter of the volume, chap 200.

Interesting enough Noda removed Tsukishima leaving the room when they hear Koito senior calling for Koito making the scene entirely a Koito-Ogata one.

Tsukishima will remain present, we can see his hat when Ogata ties Koito, meaning he heard Ogata saying Барчонок ‘Barchonok’ (ボンボンが ‘Bonbon ga’ "pampered little rich boy’“).

This means it was clearly Tsurumi the one who knocked out Koito senior, showing us again how Tsurumi is actually quite strong but this also tells us that when Koito will mention the word Барчонок ‘Barchonok’ Tsukishima probably felt very, very uncomfortable about it as he might have understood from whom Koito might have heard it... while in the magazine version Tsukishima knew nothing about it and Koito could hope Tsukishima was actually the kidnapped who used it (unlikely, not only it’s Ogata the one with a bruised nose but ‘black hat’ was shorter than ‘white fedora’ and a much better fighter, all things that match with Tsukishima).

By the way, not only Ogata’s nose is confirmed to remain bruised (so yes, it was him the one who rubbed Koito’s back) but now we can see the number on their shoulders, which in the volume version wasn’t clearly visible although the bands showing their ranks still aren’t present.

It’s also worth to mention Noda expanded the meeting between Tsurumi, Koito and Koito senior when Koito has enrolled in the army.

No idea why they say but they discuss again how Koito was saved. I’ll say Tsurumi succesfully has managed to make Koito senior feel in debt.

Ogata’s escape is also expanded, with Sugimoto trying to shoot at him more than once. None of the shoots is remotely close to the horse as Sugimoto was clearly aiming above it, to Ogata. Not that he gets him.

Koito is shown coming out of the hospital on unsteady legs as Sugimoto wishes for Ogata to come back so he can fucking kill him though his gaze here is a little more normal.

In short Ogata didn’t put Koito completely out of service but, between the blow at his head and Ogata’s kick Koito was definitely not in his best shape.

As far as I’m involved the worst part is that nothing is explained about the Russian doctor who first didn’t want to have anything to do with them as his hospital was full, then realized they were Japanese and was threatened by Sugimoto into going with them EVEN THOUGH HIS HOSPITAL WAS FULL AND HE CLEARLY WAS BUSY, and once he sees the poor shape Ogata is in, decides to bring him to his hospital going so far as arguing with them, even though before being threatened he didn’t want to help them.

Then he perfectly smoothly acts as if Ogata is about to die, not even a drop of sweat on his face, before we discover that it’s highly possible he was being threatened by Ogata? That or there’s more and we hadn’t been told yet?

Hard to say, it’s possible Noda just wants to handwave this but really, it’s weird and it’s not addressed at all.

Anyway the volume ends here.

Ariko and Kikuta do the thanks.

...and the spoiler for the next volume is the cover of chap 210. I’ll be evil and let you check which one it is if you don’t remember it. :P

Anyway that’s all. I recommend everyone to get the volume as, as usual, it’s much better than the magazine version.

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