Samurai Deeper Kyo, vol. 22 (Akamine Kamijyo)

[chomiji]

Happiness! This one was well worth the wait. Vol. 21 was a little slim for me - mostly just a lot of fighting as Shinrei squared off first against Kyo and then against Hotaru. This time, there was a lot of emotional payoff of all kinds: angst, reconciliation, and several different flavors of humor. We also find out some more about what's happening with Oda Nobunaga's severed head and Kyo's missing body. And last but not least we meet two important new characters: the last of Kyo's old allies, the Shiseiten (usually translated as the "Four Emperors" - although for some reason they became the "Four Kings" last volume) and, in a nifty bit of parallelism, the last of the Mibu high officials, the Taishirou (the "Four Elders").

Samurai Deeper Kyo, vol. 22 (review)

Akari!    > squeeee! <

Ok, now that I've got that out of my system ... .

For guys who claim that all they want to do is become the strongest - even if it means killing each other - Kyo, Akira, and Bontenmaru are looking pretty horrified at the idea of seeing their old comrade Hotaru killed in front of them (even though he was doing his best to kill Kyo a couple of volumes ago ...). Shinrei swings - there's an explosion - and all we can see left is a crumpled body and one of Hotaru's preposterous one-tooth geta (clogs), tossed off to the side. > waaahhh! <

I really liked Akira's outraged "Shinrei! How dare you!" as he attempts to charge Shinrei - only to be caught once more in one of Shinrei's devastating water attacks. And then when Bon shouts that Yuya is dying, Kyo is overwhelmed by his memories of times with her - his pawing her, her yelling at him, but also the many times she's declared that she believes in him - and he staggers to his feet, growling "Shinrei! You're dead!" and as Shinrei attacks him again, he's thinking "stupid girl!"

It's impressive that Kyoushirou cares enough about Yuya to come through again from wherever Kyo has him bottled up in their shared body and tell Kyo to protect her. Kyo suddenly says that he feels "light" - I think Kyoushirou stopped fighting him for control of the body - and so he can beat Shinrei. Shinrei's childhood memories of what happened when Kyo saved his life all those years ago - basically, his father smacked the crap out of him for saying that the "demon child" wasn't evil - were just so sad. (Of course it helps that Shinrei was so damn cute as a kid.)

And then Hotaru - not dead yet! - steps in to keep his half-brother from being killed. And Kyo is furious - "I defeated you already - you have no right to say anything." And Hotaru saying "please," which he never says. And then he asks Shinrei why Shinrei didn't really kill him - and lectures him about using his brains about whether the Mibu are worth defending: "You've been tricked and used and manipulated ... see what's true ... ." And when Shinrei asks why Hotaru is telling him this, he says "'Cause we're brothers. 'Cause you couldn't kill me before." And Shinrei's symbolic "chains" shatter ... and he takes the waterwyrms out of Yuya ... and Hotaru collapses ... and before Kyo can get the words out, Shinrei says he accepts defeat.

Aaauuughhhh ... wonderful angst catharsis!

So Yuya's all better and back feeling Yuya-ish (she starts calculating how much the Mibu owe her for pain and suffering ... ), but everyone else - except for Bontenmaru - is a total mess. The half-brothers have a very good brotherly conversation as they bandage their wounds: they're sitting with their backs toward each other, just far enough away so that there's no question - they're not being cuddly - no, absolutely not, he's an idiot and I'm just sick about being related to him - really delicious, especially when they start arguing over whether they made each other smile or not. But then Hotaru starts reminiscing about the 4th Emperor, because that one had the ability to heal. Bon and Akira start freaking out: "No! Don't! Don't say anything! She'll hear you!" (Actually, it's a pretty funny echo of the very beginning of the series, when Kyoushirou would try to warn everyone to avoid violence so that Kyo wouldn't show up!)

And .... ta-da! There's the jingling of a shaman's staff ... and Akari shows up. A gorgeous woman! Um, yeah. Benitora has issues with this, doesn't he? First he was crushing on Yukimura in his drag disguise for the tournament, then he got all hot 'n' bothered over Muramasa when he first met him ("Tora-san, I'm not a girl ..."), and now Akari ... .

I think my favorite bits of the whole sequence were Akari's fantasy description of Kyo as Prince Charming riding up on a white horse to rescue her - and Hotaru can see her fantasy and starts complaining about the role he's playing in it! And then, when she and Yuya both go off behind some boulders to take a leak where the guys won't see them ... and Yuya is politely looking the other direction ... and it's obvious that Akari has forgotten a key detail about female behavior in such situations ... and Yuya's WTF???: "What the heck just happened???" after Akari leaves ... .

But what the hell happened with Benitora's secret (that he has to hand over before Akari will heal him)? In Sanada's translation, it was this wonderful, horrible howler of a come-on ... "I'm always serious about trying to get laid!" Now it's a lame thing about his eyes being squinty even when he sleeps. And Akari's hilarity at this stupid little confession is really a mismatch, whereas before it was understandable. C'mon, Tokyopop!!! We've been watching Kyo grabbing Yuya's boobs for 21 volumes now ... not to mention various crotch shots (including the spectacular view Bon had when they nearly fell into the chasm in Chinmei's realm ... he almost lost his remaining eye ... ). (This really makes me shudder at what they might do with some of the racy lines in the future .... are they going to let Kyo's famous "I'll show you what a real man is like!" near the end of the series stand? I guess that one doesn't actually mention s-e-x ... .)

So ... Hishigi, and the four "real" god-shoguns, and Yuan, the last of the Taishirou. I was a little surprised at how blasé Hishigi was over the priest-minions being attacked, given how he was preventing Tokito from having "his" fun with those guys in vol. 21. And it's a good thing that I knew about the true Kubira's illusion power already, because I don't know how clear that scene is to everyone - "what's Fubuki doing there?" is likely going to be the first thing a lot of people think ... although I guess it becomes more or less clear when Kubira complains that his illusions don't work on the blindfolded Yuan. Yuan's ambiguous attitude toward Hishigi is interesting ... he's pretty clearly picked up on Hishigi's self-loathing, and even though Yuan doesn't seem to like him very much, to me there seems to be a little bit of rough sympathy there. That's going to make some of the later scenes a lot more powerful.

Oh, and Tokito is a total little creep. uuughhhhh!

Aside from the stupid business about Benitora's secret, Tokyopop's other changes are, I guess, OK. There are a couple of references to surgery (presumably sex-change) with regard to Akari that presumably weren't in the original, and some of the other details in the not-quite-joking around between her and the other Shiseiten have changed. Actually I liked having her call Kyo "pumpkin" at one point - in English it sort of fits with how she's fussing over him. The one real idiocy - completely no excuse - is when Shinrei is thinking about the reasons why he has to win, and refers to his "dear Hito." Tokyopop, can't you keep a notebook or something on the characters? That's Saisei - I presume the characters of her name can be transliterated as more than one set of sounds. But given how significant Akira's fight versus Saisei was, and how poignant were both the flashback of Shinrei talking to her (when she asks "Shinrei, why do you speak with the dead?") and the moment when he realized she was really gone ... that's pretty awful!

All in all, though, I'm very very very happy!!! Now I need vol. 23 .... (it's out in July, I hear).

Comments

[chomiji]

I think the name Shiseiten is meant to be a litle sarcastic. A good example of something similar would be the name of the U.S. motorcycle gang, the Hell's Angels.

Also remember that the name of the World War II Japanese suicide attack planes/pilots was "kamikaze" - which means "divine wind."

I think you may be thinking that what Heaven wants is peace, but throughout history, people have often thought that Heaven wanted some butt to be kicked!