Seimaden Vol 3

[meganbmoore]

I must confess, I don't know that I like Laures that much.  The incredibly popular "manslut because of angst" trope has absolutely zero mileage with me (I think the only character ever where it didn't cause my opinion of them to drop is Gojyo) and it loses even more ground when it's because of romantic angst.  Still, he seems to be laying off that.  My main use for him, though, is saving Hilda and angsting over her and doing dramatic things there.  He does those in ways my inner 13-year-old likes.

This is Higuri You manga.  Like Kaori Yuki manga I have nothing but spoilery exclamations:

LAURES BECOMING THE COUNT'S SLAVE TO SAVE HILDA!  
LAURES IN A CAGE!  
ZADEI BRINGING HILDA TO LAURES IN HIS CAGE!  
HUGGING THROUGH CAGE!  
KISSING THROUGH CAGE!  
LAURES ENTERING INTO DEMON GLADIATOR FIGHTS FOR HILDA!
DRAMATIC CONFESSIONS OF LOVE!

There's also Roddrick and Hilda's whole "I am the hero and you are the heroine and we were meant to be from birth and destroy the demon lord except you are the reincarnation of the demon lord's True Love and so you love him and I must accept it and I will always protect you even though I'm off to kill your True Love now!"  aaaaaaaannnnnggggggsssssttttt.  It kinda makes me feel guilty that I'm not a fan of Roddrick, what with his being the good guy and all, but he's just kinda...dull, next to everyone else.

Tetius and Zadei are like an extreme "nice girl/violent bad boy and the nice girl is hung up on the other bad boy" shoujo cliche only as slash.  Which, as the main thing, would alienate me like nobodies business for my usual reasons, but as a side pairing in a gothic shoujo crack manga I read primarily to satisfy the dark urges of my inner 13-year-old who likes gothic shoujo cheese in spite of the adult's opinions.

Cheryl and Tetius are a mass collision of cute.  I'm sure any fandom this has hates her for distracting Tetius from the angsty evil demon lords.  (I don't get the impression they like each other that way anyway, though Tetius would probably be much better off redirecting his attentions to a nice girl like her.  Or boy.  Whatever.)

And Hilda goes around bashing windows in the duke's castle, looking for a way to escape  I love you Hilda.

And finally:  ROOM OF STUFFED CORPSES!  HILDA BEING TOLD HOW SHE'LL BE POSED WHEN SHE'S ONE!  lAURES!  RODDRICK!  THAT WAS YOUR CUE!

Comments

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

I like Yukimura just fine from what I've seen so far, too. Basically, I have no problem with characters, male or female, who are cheerfully open about liking casual sex and don't seem to mistreat or look down on their partners; it's the ones who are deceptive and/or manipulative to prospective partners, or who treat them like things to be used for their convenience rather than fellow humans who are also out for a mutual good time, that really set my teeth on edge.

He also doesn't seem to have the "I have sex with a string of people to distract myself from my angst, but I discard and forget them right after. With Gojyo, it seems to be actively looking for a connection in the wrong way, instead of using it to avoid deeper connections.

Hmm, interesting -- see, I would have said that to my eyes, there is definitely an element of "sleep around as short-term distraction from pain" to the kappa, but he doesn't angst about it constantly and openly. That's a big plus for all the Saiyuki characters to me, honestly -- pretty much every last one of them has massive reasons for angst, but except when it's necessary to plot they mostly just do their sometimes dysfunctional best to just get on with their lives, instead of sitting around whingeing endlessly about how much their lives suck.

I would agree that he's longing for a deeper connection while going about it all wrong, but at the same time I also tend to think there's a (possibly quite unconscious) level of self-sabotaging avoidance of deeper connections going on at the same time; those same bargirls he focuses on seem like they're a lot more interested in finding Mr. Right NOW rather than Mr. Right. The "nice girls" like Shunrei, he seems wistfully interested in but always seems to have some excuse not to do more than his baseline casual flirting: the boy's got enough self-esteem Issues that I really tend to see him not feeling like he's got anything to offer a nice girl who's looking for a nice long-term prospect she can take home to meet her family, and sticking to girls who are only interested in one-night stands neatly lets him sidestep that whole issue.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

My problem with Yukimura isn't so much Yukimura himself, but with the idea of pairing him off with anyone. Kamijyo and Yukimura both draw a pretty broad line between people he sleeps with, and people he works with or is friends with. He very strictly limits himself sexually to people he doesn't actually have a relationship with, and people who are "in on the game." Look at how embarassed he was when Yuya walked into the wrong room and he grabbed without looking. I'm sure a bit of it was the "I'm trying to establish a working relationship with this guy and anyone with a brain can figure out in two seconds that it isn't safe to mess with this girl," but there was also sheer embarassment for doing that to the wrong kind of girl, and he limits his flirting to people who won't take it seriously, or to throw them off, either from the scent or from demanding answers/accounts, or for a fight, but with the regular cast members, there's clearly no intention (or really desire to) of ever going beyond that level. (If it makes sense, he's always struck me as incredibly interested in not being interested in anyone.)

Gojyo, I think, is just messed up. There's the "looking for a good relationship" (romantic or otherwise) thing, but it mixes with the fact that he only really has examples of bad relationships to go by, as far as we know. I think he does the "Short term distraction" thing, but unlike most of the type, I don't think he does it deliberately.

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

I don't think I've made it up to the inadvertent-grab bit, tho' that does sound amusing.

There's the "looking for a good relationship" (romantic or otherwise) thing, but it mixes with the fact that he only really has examples of bad relationships to go by, as far as we know.

*nods* His childhood models are obviously deeply messed up, and as Cho pointed out in one of our endless metas, pretty much all of his teen and early-adult exposure seems to be drunks and barflies and petty toughs like Banri, which also doesn't exactly seem like the best place to go looking for models of healthy behavior, romantic or otherwise! And heck, you know I love Hakkai to bits too, and love the idea of Hakkai and Gojyo together, be it platonically or romantically -- but at the same time, even I have to admit that when the most positive relationship in your life is with an incestuous mass-murderer of extremely dubious sanity...yeah, you're officially a total mess.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Hmm...it was pretty early on, but fairly small. Basically, Yukimura is staying at the same brothel they were, and she accidentally went into the same room and Yukimura just kinda pounced. We cut from her getting pounced on (but not seeing who) to their both being sheepish in front of Kyo right after. I really only remember it because it came up that he never hit on Yuya(though he does use her to try to get Kyo mad/motivated later, and decides to do "how do people react to mentioning her sex life?" to parse what's been going on lately) and I distinctly remember him doing something to her at one point, and looked it up.

Gojyo's past is the the biggest mess of screwed up signals ever. As far as Issues go, his probably interest me the most, I just like maintaining a safe little distance. I also figure that any ideas he has of a healthier relationship are whatever he managed to gather of Hakkai and Kanan's relationship. Which, you know, may not help matters much...

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

D'oh, and forgot to add, I do totally agree that the short-term distraction element of the womanizing (and the drinking, and the chain-smoking) is there, but not entirely deliberate. He definitely seems to me be the sort who tries not to think about things too much. I can see there being some occasions where he might be a little more deliberate about getting smashed and picking up chicks to avoid dwelling on things, but most of the time it seems more like it's force of habit, it's easy and it feels good, living in the moment is more fun that sitting at home alone, and that's plenty enough conscious motivation for the average day.