Random Saiyuki pondering

[meganbmoore]

*no, I haven't read the new volume yet, don't spoil me*

Are there any female characters in this series who are all of the following:

1)  Alive.

2) Not evil.

3) Not a hermaphrodite.

4) Not fixated on Kougaiji (Lirin: bickeringly adoring younger sister with mutual but understandable complex, Yaone:  devoted apothecary, Pippi: fangirl.)

5)  Around for more than a chapter or two.

Yes, this randomly popped into my head a little while ago and won't go away. 

(And...ahm...kinda spamming, sorry.) 

Comments

[lillypuff.livejournal.com]

*snort*

Nope, don't think so.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Yeah. I have no idea why it popped into my head, but it did.

It does make sense in a way, though. He's the closest thing the series has to a Retard Shounen Hero. Oh forget it, he is one. Probably why I love him.

[droiche.livejournal.com]

Ha ha. That's the best description of Kougaiji ever. :D

[droiche.livejournal.com]

'Fraid not. You pretty well categorized every female character in the entire cast including the animes. Kanzeon, Yaone and Lirin are the only ladies who stay onstage through the whole show.

Unfortunately for you, that statement is a vague spoiler for volume 8. :-/

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Eeh, I pretty much assumed Pippi would die as soon as Goku vaguely noticed she was a girl. It's that type of series.

[droiche.livejournal.com]

*nods* I won't tell you exactly what happens to her in vol 8, but I will tell you that you'll be left wondering what's going to happen in vol 9.

[magicnoire.livejournal.com]

Nope.

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

Don't I wish.

You have no idea how annoyed/disappointed I was about that.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Given the fact that it's shounen and the cast size, it's actually a fairly respectable ratio for the genre. (Which is not to say that a more equal ratio for the genre as a whole isn't desirable.)

Still, Pippi cvould have been a Dokugaku fangirl or something...

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

It's not so much the ratio as the characteristics observable within the ratio that get me.

(Edited for insane typos.)

[lady-ganesh.livejournal.com]

It is the reason I always wished she'd done more with Bus Gamer.

[octopedingenue]

Yaone does get to get her badass on in Reload!

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Oh, believe me, I have nothing whatsoever that resembles a complaint about the 3 ladies, I just suddenly realized that they were all fixated on Kougaiji.

[droiche.livejournal.com]

Doku needs more fangirls. Oh yes he does.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Why is why I'm starting to think Pippi should have been fangirling him. I mean, isn't it typical fangirl behavior to fixate on the secondary guy who's always around the main hero, and build him up to pure and godlike proportions?

(Not that I can claim innocence of that from time to time myself...)

[droiche.livejournal.com]

I dunno. Most fangirls I know fixate on the leader and forget the other team members even exist. Hmmmm. I suppose if I had to choose between Kougaiji and Doku, I would choose Doku.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Maybe it's which series? Saiyuki fandom is fixated on the main 4, but except for extremely massive things like Bleach or Naruto, I've mostly noticed fixating on a main supporting character, and then building up their relationship with the male or female lead to make them more central and crucial in their personal fanon canon.

[droiche.livejournal.com]

With Saiyuki there's such a huge cast of hot guys to choose from that I guess it's easier to spread the love around. Even Chin Yisou has his fair share of fan crushes. I was thinking more along the lines of music groups where it's usually the lead singer who gets the most attention or movies where there's clearly one male romantic lead who's always in the spotlight. You're right that many fans do rewrite the script to make the supporting cast more visible.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Ah. Yeah. I stay completely out of any sort of RP fandom (bandom or otherwise) aside from my opinions on acting/singing/whatever ability and maybe looks.

[lady-ganesh.livejournal.com]

I suspect Kougaiji keeps his assistants in the background. If they started getting 'famous' they might become targets of Stepma or Nii.

[droiche.livejournal.com]

Heh. I suspect they've always been targets of the ever resourceful Dr Nii. Or, more accurately, his playthings. ^_~

[lady-ganesh.livejournal.com]

Have you read the latest? "Experiments" might be the word. :D

[droiche.livejournal.com]

I'm up to volume 8 of Reload. I haven't got around to scanlations of the chapters that will be in vol 9 yet. Experiments is certainly something our beloved mad scientist would use Kou's gang for. =-P

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

Well, I fangirl Doku like crazy because I can't resist those big-hearted adorable Sha boys, and I find his character type more...approachable, I suppose, than Kou? It's not that I dislike Kou, not by a long shot, but he's so wrapped up in the conflicts around his varying responsibilities as a prince, as a son, as a leader of his small group, etc. that it's harder to get a feel for who he is outside of his various roles; whereas Doku is just more of an everyday guy who's sort of inadvertently wound up mixed up in affairs far beyond his original station.

I can sort of see Pippi fixating on Kou in that setting, though, because he seems like he'd be the most famous one. Their podunk little desert village seems like it's a looooong way from Houtou so they'd not likely have very much direct contact with the prince and his crew, and while propaganda and/or gossip might touch on his talented, good-looking sidekicks, it wouldn't surprise me if the prince was the primary focus. He would have been a famous name from birth onwards, after all, while Yaone and Doku would be relative nobodies outside of their recent association with Kou.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

I adore Doku.

Interestingly, though, what you list off is part of why I tend to fixate of Kou a lot of the time. That said, though, the rest...

I'm not sure how to put it, really. It's not a case of my liking characters ok but not understanding why everyone fangirls them(Yukimura is a good example of this...I like him, but I've never understood the mass love. Byakuya in Bleach is another. Then again, both have certain aspects I can easily point to as part of why I'm not crazy about them.) It's more like they're so messed up and have so many issues that I can't really touch it, just kind of admire from afar.

I mean, in complete honesty, if it weren't for the sheer levels of angst and issues, I'd probably be all over 585(the only number pairing I've learned...) but they're both so screwed up that the very idea makes me flee in terror.

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the admire-from-afar is pretty much me with Kou. There's a ton of potential to explore interesting things with all those conflicts of reponsibility tearing him in multiple directions, but I don't feel like we've seen enough of who he is outside of his roles to ever write it myself. (Tho' I'll happily read someone else who feels more comfortable extrapolating from what little we've got.) Zuko would be another character who's hitting a lot of the same notes for me in terms of sort of being forced into a villain role that he doesn't want and being torn by responsibilities, but we get to see enough of his more vulnerable aspects outside of the duty-torn prince thing that I don't get the same sense of distancing that I do currently with Kou. I've written Zuko and would be comfortable doing so again, but I don't feel like I know Kou well enough to write comortably.

And funnily enough, to continue with the reversals, the angst and issues (or to be more precise, some of the specific flavors of angst and issues) are precisely why I am so obsessive about the 585, and less so about other ships -- Sanzo has tons of angst and issues as well, but his particular set don't resonate with me the way Gojyo's or Hakkai's do. If they were relatively issue-free or had a whole different set, I'd probably just sort of give them a virtual pat on the head, awww you boys are cute, and move along to the next subject. But it's the particular ways in which they're each screwed up, and how those issues sort of balance each other out, that really gets my imagination going.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

I think it's just that i worry the angst might be contagious. I mean,there's so much of it that it sssccccaaaarrrreeeeesssss me. Until Tsubasa, I never would have believed anyone could have as much angst as Hakkai. (I have been proved wrong.) Then again, my terror of Fai's angst is the only thing that keeps me from being into Fai and his life partner boyfriend husband companion Kurogane. (Except that, until Clamp kills them both and makes it impossible, I'm assuming they both go back to Kurogane's homeworld and Kurogane turns Fai over to Tomoyo. She managed to rein in Kurogane's overwhelming angst and make him a mostly functional human being, she can do the same for Fai. Granted, it gave Kurogane a massive princess complex, but there's nothing wrong with that...)

I think the main difference between Zuko and Kou (in terms of development) is that Zuko's a central character, while Kou is a supporting character and (to me) has always seemed to be there to show that more conventional ideas of heroism have no place in that world. In many ways, he's a traditional hero who's been trapped in the role of the villain. If he were able to dump the honor constraints and act like Sanzo and Co. most of his problems would go away (he has to know that there's no way she'll ever free his mother, he just can't let go of the hope) but he can't take that step.

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

*nods* It's kind of telling that Kou is literally a character out of his own time in some ways, isn't he? I need to go poke through the earlier volumes again, but my memory (blurred by time and lots of cold medication at the moment) wants to say that the rest of the Houtou-jo royals were sealed away somehow at the same time Gyuma-oh was defeated 500 years ago, and have only fairly recently been unsealed/revived/etc. themselves?

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

IIRC, Stepmama From Heck woke Kou up to be her flunky, but she and Lirin hadn't been imprisoned. (I remember this because of an author's note saying not to take Lirin lightly because even though she's little and cute and spunky and hyper and childlike, she was awake those 500 years, and Kou wasn't. Which has always made me wonder if the Lirin we see is Lirin trying to be the sister he remembers, or if she's trying to be someone she used to be because she was happier then.)

[lady-ganesh.livejournal.com]

But Lirin doesn't remember Kou's mom-- I always assumed she and Kou were sealed at the same time.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Hmm...I always took that as the wife and mistress kept apart. I should try to remember what manga that was, and exactly what she said. Maybe Lirin just woke up earlier? In all honesty, I mostly remember it because it made me wonder if she had plans for a Big Reveal about Lirin.

Course, the only authors notes things I remember is that, and a comment in I think the first volume where she said Gojyo was looking for the right person, but it might not be a girl.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

And completely unrelated (because I don't want to hunt down the post in the community) the box of manga came today. The poor widdle box had been abused, but the manga itself was all safe and secure.

[octopedingenue]

Yay! Thank you for letting me know.

[lastseptember.livejournal.com]

It would detract from the fact that Minekura's series are all boy's love series undercover. When couples are not ambiguous leaning on gay (Goyjo and Hakkai) than they're cute and mentor/student with a shady definition of who is the mentor and who is the student (Sanzo and Goku). lol If you think Saiyuki is bad with the lack of females sans the pretty disposable one, you should read Wild Adapter, it's less "ambiguous" too.

I don't mind though. I think for a woman Minekura writes some fairly believable--and of course likable--male characters. There are some strong women characters in other series, even surprisingly enough series aimed more towards guys. I seriously knew a guy like Goku, and have met a couple Gojyo's, and have known a couple Sanzo-like guys. Never yet met a Hakkai, he's really distinct. I'd probably be in trouble if I did. I kind of go for guys who drop their moral standards out of loyalty. =___=;

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Heh, it was an observation, really, not a complaint. I think all 3 are pretty cool.

In complete honesty, the only male characters here I could even comprehend in a romantic relationship, regardless of gender, are Goku and Kougaiji. Most of the rest creep me out and I'd be happier with less of (Hazel, Ni) or have so much angst that the very idea makes me want to flee in terror.

[chomiji]

No, I don't think you're spamming ... I just haven't felt able to discuss most of these topics.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

I was mostly thinking about the fact that I started the post about 10 minutes after posting, and started writing up a book to post on before bed in between.

[chomiji]

Eh, I think we all get moments when we're primed to post on a bunch of different subjects, and it all just comes pouring out.

[lady-ganesh.livejournal.com]

To be fair, a good number of the male characters are also obsessed with Kougaiji.

I would actually not consider Hwan an evil character-- like the Kou-tachi, she's working for the wrong side, but unless more is revealed, she seems to just be a pawn in the game.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

It's what Kougaiji gets for being a fairly typical shounen hero. Everyone obsessing over you.

Hmm...remind me who Hwan is?

[lady-ganesh.livejournal.com]

Exactly!

She's the scientist at Hotou Castle.

EDIT: I'm not sure 'fixated on Kougaiji' is entirely fair to Lirin. She loves her brother and she does go the extra mile to protect him, but he does the same for her. And there's also food. Lirin/food OTP.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Like a lot of manga siblings, Kougaiji and Lirin both seem more than normally fixated on each other (and I think him even more than her) but for pretty understandable reasons.

[lady-ganesh.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the rest of the family's not winning any prizes.