Minekura Kazuya - Saiyuki Gaiden, vol. 02
Fri, Feb. 17th, 2006 05:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
oyceterGo me! I read the whole thing in Japanese without the help of my trusty electronic dictionary!
This would probably be more impressive if I chose to do it without my trusty electronic dictionary because my Japanese was so wonderful. Alas, it is actually because I have misplaced my trusty electronic dictionary. I guess that makes it my not-so-trusty occasionally-lost electronic dictionary.
This is a companion piece to Minekura's Saiyuki and Saiyuki Reload. It's not a sequel. Instead, it tells the story of Hakkai, Sanzo and Gojyo's previous incarnations -- Tenpou Gensui, Konzen Douji and Kenren Taisho (respectively). Note that "Gensui" and "Taisho" are actually Tenpou and Kenren's ranks, so I'm assuming "Douji" is a rank as well. Goku is still Goku.
Instead of being in quasi-modern, quasi-historical China replete with youkai, Gaiden is set in Heaven (Tenkai, literally "Sky/heaven world"). Not traditional Heaven, but the sort of dwelling place of the ancient gods of China Heaven. This made me very happy, since this is where the beginning chunks of Journey to the West are set. Tenpou is a marshal of heaven and Kenren is one of the generals reporting to him. Konzen is the nephew or something of Kanzeon Bosatsu. The entire story basically gets started when Kanzeon passes off a strange, golden-eyed animal to Konzen for some reason -- and thus, past-Sanzo and Goku are together!
Herein ends all the rational explanation, because now I'm going into spoiler-land and mostly just squeeing incoherently.
Spoilers ahoy!
I read this in Japanese, which means I probably misunderstood about 50% of the thing, but my reaction is still largely:
SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Just.... eeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!! Poor Goku! And OMG Kenren and Tenpou's first meeting! And Nataku is a robot! Well, technically a mix of god and demon, but he looks like a robot.
Reminds me of X's Nataku as well. I wonder if there is some Japanese tradition about Nataku being a robot. I am quite sure someone out there has got a fat academic tome written on how the ancient Japanese were inexplicably obsessed with robots and the atomic bomb and carefully disguised this in their literature, only to have it come out as a national obsession in manga.
But yes, and oh, I am actually having a hard time deciding if I like Saiyuki better or Gaiden better. I mean... the angst of Saiyuki! The backstory! And yet... there are those one-offs, and the plot isn't quite coherent. Whereas I feel like Gaiden is driving toward something, and ohhhhh, I love undamaged versions of Hakkai, Gojyo and Sanzo as well. I love the easy confidence and power that Tenpou has without Hakkai's guilt; ditto with Kenren and Gojyo. And just watching the two interact makes me so squeeful! Same with watching the quiet, retiring, amazingly not-so-snarky and non-handgun-wielding Konzen try and deal with Goku.
I love the wonderfulness of Kenren and Tenpou's first meeting, coupled with Kenren saving Tenpou from the rampaging dinosaur.
Yes, dinosaur.
I have no idea. None at all. Maybe it should be chalked up as an inexplicable Japanese obsession with robots. I am sure someone could write a huge thesis on the intrinsic Japanese-ness of rampaging dinosaurs and Godzilla-like creatures. Sorry,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
coffeeandink's review of Wrong about Japan is so on target on what I find irritating about a lot of scholarship on Japan. Sadly, this seems to be multiplied tenfold whenever the scholarship is on anime and manga.
Oh right, yes. I was squeeing about the wonderfulness of Kenren and Tenpou and the fact that Tenpou fights in his bathroom slippers because he's just that absent-minded.
However, despite this, my favorite moment is at the very end, when Konzen is protectively holding Goku while Kenren and Tenpou defend him, because it's the Sanzo-ikkou! Or, Konzen-ikkou! Or something! But they're individuals brought together by Goku, and they're all there to help each other out.
But oh, I love the spread with Nataku almost cutting down Goku, the splash of blood, Goku's limiter breaking and everything. And I love that Konzen punches Kanzeon Bosatsu out over Goku. And I hurt so much for Goku, for the moment when Konzen realizes that the emperor of Heaven may want to use Goku as the official court executionist or whatever Nataku's role is called in the translation.
And and and! My jaw fell when Kanzeon named what Goku had become -- Seiten Taisen (Great Sage of Heaven)! Because that was Monkey's title in Journey to the West, the one he took on after defeating Nataku in battle! Except, of course, in Journey to the West it was because Monkey was arrogant and turned immortal by stealing the peaches of heaven. But yay references! I just love what Minekura did to the story with Nataku and Goku, how she turns Monkey's eventual exile into breaking Goku apart and turning him from a child to a killing machine.
Because of the parallels, I'm wondering how much of the story Minekura will tell before it goes on to Saiyuki, and I'm wondering if Kanzeon punching out Goku is like Monkey being brought to heel by Buddha. With more violence and less peeing though. Also, I just love the fact that there are heavenly politics and much mixing between heaven and earth (gekai, literally "below world")
I also love the parallels with Saiyuki, with Goku and Hakkai. Goku's killing spree is from horrible grief and pain, and he ends up tearing out Li Touten's eye. He's youkai now, not a child. And I love that this time it's Goku's massacre that brings together Konzen, Kenren and Tenpou, as opposed to Hakkai bringing together Gojyo, Sanzo and Goku. I really want to see what will happen now when Goku wakes up.
Sorry, this is getting horribly long but I cannot stop from the babbling! It is too good! There is too much squeeing that must be done!
I also must say that Tenpou in the black army uniform with his hair pulled back? GUH. Even more so with a gun. Even more so being saved by Kenren. Even even more so when being chewed out by Kenren for endangering his own life. OMGOTPtheirloveissoreincarnated!
I would be somewhat embarrassed about having Tenpou/Kenren and Hakkai/Gojyo as OTPs, given that I try not to do OTPs, except... I cannot because they incite me to type in capital letters and horrible internet spelling and before you know it, I will be using arcane systems like 585+3-9 to indicate what pairings are my favorite. I am so doomed.
In conclusion, everyone should read this so that I can squee to other people about the wonderfulness of the series and of Minekura in general and how hot and wonderful all the characters are.
This would probably be more impressive if I chose to do it without my trusty electronic dictionary because my Japanese was so wonderful. Alas, it is actually because I have misplaced my trusty electronic dictionary. I guess that makes it my not-so-trusty occasionally-lost electronic dictionary.
This is a companion piece to Minekura's Saiyuki and Saiyuki Reload. It's not a sequel. Instead, it tells the story of Hakkai, Sanzo and Gojyo's previous incarnations -- Tenpou Gensui, Konzen Douji and Kenren Taisho (respectively). Note that "Gensui" and "Taisho" are actually Tenpou and Kenren's ranks, so I'm assuming "Douji" is a rank as well. Goku is still Goku.
Instead of being in quasi-modern, quasi-historical China replete with youkai, Gaiden is set in Heaven (Tenkai, literally "Sky/heaven world"). Not traditional Heaven, but the sort of dwelling place of the ancient gods of China Heaven. This made me very happy, since this is where the beginning chunks of Journey to the West are set. Tenpou is a marshal of heaven and Kenren is one of the generals reporting to him. Konzen is the nephew or something of Kanzeon Bosatsu. The entire story basically gets started when Kanzeon passes off a strange, golden-eyed animal to Konzen for some reason -- and thus, past-Sanzo and Goku are together!
Herein ends all the rational explanation, because now I'm going into spoiler-land and mostly just squeeing incoherently.
Spoilers ahoy!
I read this in Japanese, which means I probably misunderstood about 50% of the thing, but my reaction is still largely:
SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Just.... eeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!! Poor Goku! And OMG Kenren and Tenpou's first meeting! And Nataku is a robot! Well, technically a mix of god and demon, but he looks like a robot.
Reminds me of X's Nataku as well. I wonder if there is some Japanese tradition about Nataku being a robot. I am quite sure someone out there has got a fat academic tome written on how the ancient Japanese were inexplicably obsessed with robots and the atomic bomb and carefully disguised this in their literature, only to have it come out as a national obsession in manga.
But yes, and oh, I am actually having a hard time deciding if I like Saiyuki better or Gaiden better. I mean... the angst of Saiyuki! The backstory! And yet... there are those one-offs, and the plot isn't quite coherent. Whereas I feel like Gaiden is driving toward something, and ohhhhh, I love undamaged versions of Hakkai, Gojyo and Sanzo as well. I love the easy confidence and power that Tenpou has without Hakkai's guilt; ditto with Kenren and Gojyo. And just watching the two interact makes me so squeeful! Same with watching the quiet, retiring, amazingly not-so-snarky and non-handgun-wielding Konzen try and deal with Goku.
I love the wonderfulness of Kenren and Tenpou's first meeting, coupled with Kenren saving Tenpou from the rampaging dinosaur.
Yes, dinosaur.
I have no idea. None at all. Maybe it should be chalked up as an inexplicable Japanese obsession with robots. I am sure someone could write a huge thesis on the intrinsic Japanese-ness of rampaging dinosaurs and Godzilla-like creatures. Sorry,
coffeeandink's review of Wrong about Japan is so on target on what I find irritating about a lot of scholarship on Japan. Sadly, this seems to be multiplied tenfold whenever the scholarship is on anime and manga.Oh right, yes. I was squeeing about the wonderfulness of Kenren and Tenpou and the fact that Tenpou fights in his bathroom slippers because he's just that absent-minded.
However, despite this, my favorite moment is at the very end, when Konzen is protectively holding Goku while Kenren and Tenpou defend him, because it's the Sanzo-ikkou! Or, Konzen-ikkou! Or something! But they're individuals brought together by Goku, and they're all there to help each other out.
But oh, I love the spread with Nataku almost cutting down Goku, the splash of blood, Goku's limiter breaking and everything. And I love that Konzen punches Kanzeon Bosatsu out over Goku. And I hurt so much for Goku, for the moment when Konzen realizes that the emperor of Heaven may want to use Goku as the official court executionist or whatever Nataku's role is called in the translation.
And and and! My jaw fell when Kanzeon named what Goku had become -- Seiten Taisen (Great Sage of Heaven)! Because that was Monkey's title in Journey to the West, the one he took on after defeating Nataku in battle! Except, of course, in Journey to the West it was because Monkey was arrogant and turned immortal by stealing the peaches of heaven. But yay references! I just love what Minekura did to the story with Nataku and Goku, how she turns Monkey's eventual exile into breaking Goku apart and turning him from a child to a killing machine.
Because of the parallels, I'm wondering how much of the story Minekura will tell before it goes on to Saiyuki, and I'm wondering if Kanzeon punching out Goku is like Monkey being brought to heel by Buddha. With more violence and less peeing though. Also, I just love the fact that there are heavenly politics and much mixing between heaven and earth (gekai, literally "below world")
I also love the parallels with Saiyuki, with Goku and Hakkai. Goku's killing spree is from horrible grief and pain, and he ends up tearing out Li Touten's eye. He's youkai now, not a child. And I love that this time it's Goku's massacre that brings together Konzen, Kenren and Tenpou, as opposed to Hakkai bringing together Gojyo, Sanzo and Goku. I really want to see what will happen now when Goku wakes up.
Sorry, this is getting horribly long but I cannot stop from the babbling! It is too good! There is too much squeeing that must be done!
I also must say that Tenpou in the black army uniform with his hair pulled back? GUH. Even more so with a gun. Even more so being saved by Kenren. Even even more so when being chewed out by Kenren for endangering his own life. OMGOTPtheirloveissoreincarnated!
I would be somewhat embarrassed about having Tenpou/Kenren and Hakkai/Gojyo as OTPs, given that I try not to do OTPs, except... I cannot because they incite me to type in capital letters and horrible internet spelling and before you know it, I will be using arcane systems like 585+3-9 to indicate what pairings are my favorite. I am so doomed.
In conclusion, everyone should read this so that I can squee to other people about the wonderfulness of the series and of Minekura in general and how hot and wonderful all the characters are.
(no subject)
Sat, Feb. 18th, 2006 01:36 am (UTC)Yeah, I don't have the right icon for them either. Rachel or Kate should come along to display it.
OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. I have no words for them either.
Um, you pointed out parallels to the original story that I didn't know about! That's neat.
Nataku: I had thought of him less as a robot than as ... a golem? A chimera? A hybrid. But you cast new light on his comparisons of himself to a doll or a machine. I was mostly caught up in his similarities to Goku. And I wonder about Li Toten's experiments and Nii's experiments.
So Kenren without Gojyo's damage is so confident and sexy, and Tenpou without Hakkai's, yes, but with some weird damage I can't quite make out, or is it supposed to be just boredom that makes him risk his life? Because Tenpou and Konzen both seem constrained--trapped--by Heaven. You can see how their deaths are a kind of happy ending, because they hate Heaven, they hate the lack of connection, in some way they are less alive (if less damaged) than they will be on Earth. It's part of what makes it hard for me to tell what Minekura's take on Buddhism is--or maybe it's a native Buddhist paradox?--because Tenkai's "non-attachment" is clearly a trap, the way Sanzo's pretense of not caring for anyone is, and so it's better for Konzen to care fiercely for Goku than to care for nothing.
I love how Konzen is prissy and restrained and bad-tempered, all old-mannish, and then by the end of it he's the same violent Sanzo we know and love.
Also, I love Kanzeon Bosatsu SO MUCH.
(no subject)
Sat, Feb. 18th, 2006 01:39 am (UTC)Them on the couch! Sitting! And smoking! And they are so totally flirting in this very guy friends way even if they're not quite conscious of it yet! And Kenren chewing out Tenpou for getting himself hurt, the way Tenpou will chew Kenren out later with Li Touten! (And Tenpou's murderous glare up at Li Touten, just like Hakkai looking up at Chin Yisou!)
(no subject)
Sat, Feb. 18th, 2006 03:04 am (UTC)(no subject)
Sat, Feb. 18th, 2006 01:54 am (UTC)I might have something coherent to say later, but my reaction just to leafing through 2 (without being able to understand anything except stuff I knew already, like people's names and dialogue like "What are you doing?" or "Oh my God!") was basically SQUEEEEEEEEEEE! Tenpou + Kenren 4EVAR! Tenpou in bathtub!!!!! Oh no, poor Goku! OMGWTF Dinosaur?! They're all together again, SQUEEEEEEEE!
(no subject)
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Sat, Feb. 18th, 2006 02:50 am (UTC)Ooo, I'm glad there is something useful in this post besides: Kenren+Tenpou=OMG TEH SEX
That's so interesting, re: Nataku! I have no idea why I just leapt to "robot." I think it may have to do with Nataku from X and Nataku from Gundam Wing (that's what one of the Gundam pilots nicknamed his giant mecha because his wife used to aspire to be like Nataku). Also, the room with the blood and the wires remind me of the human-robot hybrids so often seen in anime (Nataku from X pops up again), particularly wrt to Ghost in the Shell and that image of the protagonist rising naked out of a tank filled with fluid with wires attached everywhere. But I like the image of Li Touten as some arcane sorcerer or alchemist.
I totally didn't catch Tenpou's constant risking of his life until I scanned the translations! Ditto with Konzen and Tenpou disliking Heaven. Tenpou's still got Hakkai's killing streak, just closer to the surface and more reckless, maybe because he hasn't loved and lost like Hakkai has.
I wish I knew more about Buddhism! It does map closely to the social activism branch of Buddhism, in which people claim that even though suffering is part of life and attachment is bad, that there should still be steps taken to relieve suffering, ergo Buddhist monks protesting the Vietnam War. I also tend to think of Saiyuki and Journey to the West not so much as Buddhist stories, which is sort of odd, now that I remember. I think it was just the combination of the Jade Emperor and Buddha and demons and sutras and obviously Chinese mythologies all together. Ergo Kanzeon Bosatsu and the Jade Emperor can exist in one heaven and one story.
So mostly I was thinking of Goku/Monkey as a force of chaos that can only be restrained/constrained by Buddha (or a Buddhist priest), but not before wreaking havoc in Heaven and upsetting the careful hierarchy of things -- Monkey by eating the fruit of immortality and Goku by being sunny and loving and hungry for affection.
Must think more about the Buddhism thing!
Also also... Eeeeeee to the Kenren always finding Tenpou lying prostrate thing! EEEEEEE!! And I'm so taken by the new dynamic between them, with Tenpou being the superior officer but still more restrained, personality-wise, and the whole way the protection of his general makes sense from a beauracracy point of view but is also just... guh. Yes, no more words.