Shaman Warrior, vols. 1-5 (Park Joong-Ki)

[chomiji]

Shaman warriors have the ability to transform their bodies in various ways, making them formidable war machines. As this series opens, a legendary shaman, Yarong, meets his death under circumstances that seem highly suspicious to his servant, the massive fighter Batu. Batu swears to defend his master's child, Yaki, but he soon finds this far more difficult than he expected: shaman warriors are being hunted down and killed, with the circumstances of Yarong's death being twisted to provide an excuse. Batu at last decides he must take desperate measures to ensure that little Yaki survives and becomes able to defend herself.

Thus far, this is playing out like an almost gender-blind shounen/seinen adventure. There are more male characters than female characters (especially in the first volume), but the female characters we've encountered thus far are fighting, doing magic, and adventuring along with the men. These female characters are also generally drawn with reasonable bustlines and amazingly modest clothing. The story includes betrayal, loyalty beyond the grave, a variety of non-romantic attachments (siblings, master-servant, parent-child, team mates, etc.), and complex politics. The artwork is gorgeous, illustration rather than cartoon, along the lines of Inoue's work on Vagabond and Samura's work on Blade of the Immortal (and when we do encounter grotesques, they're all the more unnerving because they're so well-drawn).

Oh, and telophase? Batu the Destroyer traveling with little Yaki is just your kind of thing!

Shaman Warrior, vols. 1-5 (review)

(FYI - that's teenaged Yaki in the icon.)

OK ... wild theories time. The Mr. and I don't think Yarong was Yaki's father. We think Yarong was Yaki's mother.

This may sound like total crack - after all, we have a number of pictures of bare-chested Yarong in vol. 1, and that's a totally masculine-looking torso, very much in the realistic mode: not tapered and bishie-ish, but compactly muscled and slightly stocky. But think about how Yarong has a tiny baby, and Batu keeps urging him to take it easy because "you can't fight anymore. Your body can't take it" and the General who sends Yarong off on his fatal mission apologizes that he had to "inform you of this while your body is still changing," and then later this same General thinks of Yarong with this statement:"I have plucked the most beautiful flower in all Kugai ... ."

I guess only time will tell.

Park gets a little weird with names: there is a character called Genji (female, and supposedly Batu's sister) and another called Aragorn (the tattooed warlord of a clan that's being forced out by the General). Genji is a lot of fun - frankly outspoken, a skilled fighter, and a master of disguise. Aragorn's a pretty good character too, but I keep twitching every time I read that name ... .

Yaki's experiences in the Butcher Camps are all too realistic, except in one area, and I think Park is actually to be commended for not going for the sexual angle in most of what happens to her. I also like how Yatilla gives her a reason to go on and be strong. He's a very promising character, and I hope we'll see more of him.

My only regret thus far is that Yarong was killed off so soon. He was just my sort of character.

Comments

Re: Smut and Sexuality (makes it easier to find ;D)

[chomiji]

Perhaps I wasn't clear - I don't think, myself, that it's a plausible excuse for the hate-filled 353 stuff, but that's what the authors of such pieces are using as the excuse. (And my own dissatisfaction with the idea just came to the forefront with the latest 2 pieces of smut that were posted on the Saiyuki comm ... some parts of them were interesting, but it's not an idea that I like for "punishment" unless one of the particpants is demanding it for that reason, and even that makes me very sad, as it did for emungere's recent thing.)

And I agree with you that they don't hate each other. In an odd way, they feel responsible for each other. One of my favorite bits is the part early in the Kami-sama arc when Sanzo and Gojyo are looking for Kingaku (or is it Gingaku?) and that one youkai knocks Sanzo off the cliff ... what Minekura does with their faces and body language as they're both lying around afterward (and Sanzo lights Gojyo's ciggie) is wonderful.

Re: Smut and Sexuality (makes it easier to find ;D)

[avierra.livejournal.com]

Perhaps I wasn't clear - I don't think, myself, that it's a plausible excuse for the hate-filled 353 stuff, but that's what the authors of such pieces are using as the excuse. (And my own dissatisfaction with the idea just came to the forefront with the latest 2 pieces of smut that were posted on the Saiyuki comm ... some parts of them were interesting, but it's not an idea that I like for "punishment" unless one of the particpants is demanding it for that reason, and even that makes me very sad, as it did for emungere's recent thing.)

Yes, exactly (I got that from what you had said earlier, I was just trying to figure out why I myself found the whole hate-sex stuff so disquieting).

As I said in my comment to emungere's piece, I could see the punishment situation happening *one time*, because if that was what Hakkai needed, Gojyo would do it even against his own inclinations and desires -- and self-interest. And Hakkai is perfectly capable of being a selfish bastard, so I could see him putting Gojyo through it once. But the whole story made me feel very bad for both of them.

But like you, I had serious reservations about the other piece. I dunno, that didn't seem like the Hakkai who said he'd bite his tongue out and die before betraying Sanzo.

what Minekura does with their faces and body language as they're both lying around afterward (and Sanzo lights Gojyo's ciggie) is wonderful.

Yes! That's how they are with each other when all the guy testosterone-laden BS is stripped off (notice it didn't take long for it to come back though :D )

Re: Smut and Sexuality (makes it easier to find ;D)

[chomiji]

Was "Easy" hers? I'm not finding it ... I've sort of come to terms with "Proof," by fanficing the fanfic with a couple of "what happened later" scenes in my head: nothing very solid, but one riffs off Gojyo's reflection at the end of "Proof" that some of the cuts might scar. (Hakkai sounding like he might be working himself up to ask for another such session, Gojyo fingering the scars and reminding him that Gojyo's already proved himself ... .)

Re: Smut and Sexuality (makes it easier to find ;D)

[chomiji]

Oh! She has a huge mass of "unclassified" fic on that site (including wads and wads of Weiss Krusz stuff, and look! Samurai Champloo smut!), and it's in with that! No wonder I wasn't finding it ... I wonder what else is buried in there? Unfortunately, it's a really slow site.

Re: Smut and Sexuality (makes it easier to find ;D)

[chomiji]

Well, I tried to find "Easy" on her LJ, but then, I was using her tags. She may have missed tagging it. At least she tries to tag hers - I love Zilch's stuff, but she doesn't tag it. I just pawed around in hers for 20 minutes or so, adding things to memories so I could find it again.

Re: Smut and Sexuality (makes it easier to find ;D)

[chomiji]

Sorry was off this for so long ... these are such wonderful discussions, but I get days when I can't get online at all, or aonly long enough to download new e-mail. And I always want to make such long, complete answers here, too.

I sometimes think that Sanzo is afraid that if he lets himself go for an instant, he'll lose all his hard-won toughness and never get it back. (I went into it a little in my angsty Hakkai/Sanzo fic for the kink meme, Down Came the Rain.) Hakkai is easier for him because his own natural reserve doesn't impinge on Sanzo's boundaries as much. Goku and Gojyo are much tougher for him to withstand.

I guess I could deal with it in 585 if I were certain Hakkai wouldn't try it again. And I just went back and re-read it and wasn't qite as flipped out by it this time - it was probably my own mood as much as anything.

I still can't see Hakkai punishing Sanzo with anything but iciness and silence - you're right about that. He's very conscious of both Sanzo and Gojy as his saviors, but the relationship with Gojyo is intimate enough that I can almost see some of the Hakkai/Gojyo sex-as-punishment scenarios, even though I don't like them - Hakkai does get angry, and Gojyo will take abuse he shouldn't.

Re: Smut and Sexuality (makes it easier to find ;D)

[chomiji]

I definitely think that Gojyo would rather take almost any amount of physical abuse than have Hakkai shun him. Yes, Mommy Dearest has convinced the red-headed stepchild that punishments prove that the one you love knows you're still there ... that was actually explored, gently, in one of the Addiction stories on saiyuki_time - yes, here it is ... cicer's "Entrapment."

Stories like that are somewhat of a guilty pleasure - I respond to them and hate myself for doing it. It helps if Hakkai realizes he's lost it and gone too far. (The after-the-rescue-from-the-goons one almost doesn't count ... that one's partially just Hakkai's letting go after keeping himself so tightly wound for so long, and Gojyo, although he's scared, more or less welcomes it. So that's where my line is drawn ... that's my story and I'm sticking to it!)

Re: Smut and Sexuality (makes it easier to find ;D)

[chomiji]

Yes, I see what you mean about its being potentially disastrous ... cicer is surprisingly mature in her view of what goes on between them - she's only an undergrad, from what I can figure out.

Heh, I do the same things with stories that bother me ... work out an "afterward" where it comes out all right, or as close as it's going to get, anyway.

Re: Story dynamics

[chomiji]

I think you're right.

David Gerrold is a very lame writer - his one claim to fame, really, is having penned the classic comic Star Trek episode "The Trouble with Tribbles" - but he once made a very good point: the best episodes of that show are those in which the POV character (usually Kirk) has to make a choice: save his friend or save his ship, save his career or save an innocent life, carry out his mission or set straight an issue from his past, and so on.

Similarly, I think the best Saiyuki fics - especially the sex/romance ones - are those in which at least one character resolves an issue (or at least takes a step in that direction) or discovers something about himself. (Sometimes what's discovered can be very painful: in "Tomorrow and Tomorrow," Hakkai discovers that he really has no intention of surviving Gojyo's eventual death.