Forum - View topicEP. REVIEW: Scum's Wish
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Lifesongsoa
Posts: 34 |
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Okay, I get it. Thanks for explaining without getting frustrated with me. I appreciate it.
I can see where you are coming from. The loved no matter what angle was present in the show, although I feel I could argue pretty strongly Kanai was the only decent match presented for Akane and the "unconditional love" was well nuanced. All men finding her desirable wasn't equal to all men actually loving her for any extended period of time. I think that was an important nuance. I'd also argue that loved no matter what was given a specific nuance that made it important to Akane. It was a specific promise from Kanai that he wouldn't come to hate her for the reasons we'd all expected he might and felt he probably should. I can see the wish fulfillment in that, I guess I'm just okay with it? Now that I understand what you are calling wish fulfillment I can say say a bit more accurately that seeing that specific wish fulfilled didn't bother me. I was happy to see it play out as it did because of other things it accomplished for the story. I've felt like the whole story revolves around Akane since early on so I wouldn't be too surprised if her author does love her character. I wouldn't even be surprised to learn Akane was the first character conceived for the story or that it was written for her sake. I probably wouldn't have a problem with that because I felt like Akane's ending fit in with the theme and narrative in a compelling way. Akane getting punished would have been a lot less interesting I think and left the story with a nasty after taste instead of an optimistic beginning. I felt like Scum's Wish was designed to offer redemption from sexual angst to its cast from a narrative perspective and pulled that off. I think that effect would have been dramatically lessened had Akane been punished.(please note that I'm not saying she hadn't earned or didn't deserve it, the opposite actually, her ending was meaningful because she deserve punishment.) Maybe Akane's author loved Akane to pieces and designed the whole story to redeem her specifically, but I'm okay with that because I felt like it fit in perfectly with the theme of the story and I can only image the opposite as either a disaster or something else entirely. My two cents if I had to guess a character Scum's Wish mangaka relates with the most/is most guilty of self inserting I'd bet on Kanai. I'm not sure what influence she had over the title of episode 11, but "A Kind God" is telling of the overall narrative perspective I think. The god of any story is the author or creators. The thematic god of episode 11 offering relief and redemption for a character who needed it was Kanai. |
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Blood-
 Bargain Hunter Posts: 23742 |
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@ Lifesongsoa - although I think my biases are pretty obvious, I'll lay them on the table just for full transparency and (hopefully) clarity. I have fairly conventional Western narrative tastes. That means when a character does something vile, I like to see some sort of punishment and/or redemption for it. I grant you that satisfying this desire does not necessarily make a work more realistic. Yes, sometimes bad people are undone by their own actions, but sadly, sometimes the wicked really do prosper. Needless to say, the treatment of Akane in Scum's Wish severely violates my Western sensibility for narrative justice. Not only does Akane not pay any price for her horrible actions towards Hanabi, she does not appear - to me, anyway - to feel any contrition about it. Ugh, ugh, ugh. I can't tell you how hateful I find that.
I don't necessarily agree with all of your interpretations (although I do in many cases), but as I've said before, you have never put anything forward that made me think, "wow, where the hell is that coming from?" You've always been pretty articulate about explaining your reasoning. So if you have some insight into how Akane in her own Akane way maybe did feel even a little bit sorry for what's she's done, by all means pass it along, as it might alleviate somewhat the bad taste this show left in my mouth with respect to her. |
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Lifesongsoa
Posts: 34 |
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I think I understand now. I get what you mean. I think I can say more to explain Akane and how she grew in her own way, but I don't know how meaningful it will be for you. Akane's own interest/respect for conventional sensibility is probably most accurately described as oppression. An important nuance to that is no matter how happy or positive she becomes her desire to go outside the box isn't a flexible part of her personality. That doesn't offend my sensibilities, at least not inherently. I actually agree with many of the things Akane thinks, just not with how she acts or how destructive she is toward herself and everyone who gets involved with her.
For Akane her thoughts are far more important to her than her feelings or the feelings of anyone else. Her method for experiencing the world is physical, but her means of processing it is more analytical than emotional. To top it all off she is very reserved about sharing her feelings. You don't find those traits on the same person very often and they lead to an individual who naturally defies expectations and understanding. She is a charming, sensual, analytically minded introvert. It's an unusual combo of personality traits, but not an unrealistic one or inherently evil one. She also happens to be a nymphomaniac with no real respect for traditional morals. Akane hates feeling boxed in. Any sense of justice she has is based off her own internal logic. She understands social conventions, but they don't contain an outlet for her desires. I'd typically expect someone with this type of personality to have their own internal sense of justice that is basically do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Following naturally from that, she has judged herself a failure for her natural tendency to calculate and manipulate and expects to become hated. She has accepted that as a consequence and vanishing is as much a power trip for her as it is a favor to the people she gets involved with. She is skipping the not so fun part for the sake of everyone involved. Akane's entire sense of morality with her relationships involves giving people a thrill and erasing herself from their lives before she transforms from an object of desire into an object of hate. Kanai broke the cycle by presenting a different, but compatible sensibility on emotional matters. At the very least Scum's Wish wants us to believe it's compatible and with what little info we have about Kanai I'm willing to accept it. For Akane prioritizing her own desire over acting as she is expected to act is a simple, practical choice to fulfill her need for excitement. In the past we know she has done that by taking advantage of people who present themselves to her. It's important to note that she didn't protect herself from other people trying to do the same thing to her. That is basically what Mugi attempted and Akane accepted it without prejudice. She didn't want to be emotionally manipulated, but she'd already torn down her own boundaries about sex. Anyone who approached her could have it, they weren't going to find Akane the individual and like what they saw so it wasn't even worth thinking about past that. I don't think Akane really did feel bad about how she acted, or at least she didn't feel any more bad about it after episode 11 than she did before episode 11. Akane managed to reject her own feelings and keep on keeping on. She didn't feel bad about how she treated herself either. Her game, as terrible as it was, had fair rules(at defined by her) and she stuck to them. She analyzed her situation and created her rule set based off what she wanted, what other people wanted and what was practically available. Akane offered excitement for anyone interested in her before she broke things off with them and disappeared. She would have needed to break those rules to feel bad about it, or really to feel anything different from her usual excitement. She did break those rules with Kanai which is part of why she ends up bonding with Kanai instead of breaking things off with him. We saw what happened when she tempted her friend's crush and how dramatically such a simple thing changed Akane's view. I don't think it's much of a stretch to say Kanai managed the same thing. Perhaps the hardest thing to accept about all this is that Akane is a reasonable person and no one ever understood her well enough to reason with her on her own terms before Kanai came along. I can accept it because her bond with Kanai was more about identity than it was an emotionally driven romance. We'd probably need to skip forward 10 to 15 years to see if Akane recovers dramatically in an emotionally believable way or not because of Kanai's support. Akane did grow and we got the see the beginning of her new rule set when she poked that flower at Hanabi. She didn't repent, but she did expose herself honestly. She didn't try to run away and hide from Hanabi or Kanai. She didn't pretend she hadn't hurt Hanabi. Maybe not what you want, but for Akane exposing her thoughts is a more meaningful expression than an apology. That is true precisely because she would have been taking on a role to give that apology. Wishing Hanabi happiness in the future as a teasing gesture was genuine. It was probably the most meaningful and genuine gesture she had to give. |
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Blood-
Bargain Hunter Posts: 23742 |
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Interesting perspective, as always, Lifesongsoa.
On the previous page, zensunni noted the difference between what Akane says to Hanabi when giving her the flower in the manga versus what she says in the anime (or to be more precise the difference in the translation of what Akane says to Hanabi in the mange versus the translation of what she says in the anime). At first blush, her statement in the manga doesn't seem to make much sense, but I advanced a theory as to what the statement in the manga may have been driving at - assuming the translation was accurate. I'll link to zensunni's post and if you are interested in supplying your own thoughts on what may account for the difference between the manga and the anime, I'd be interested in hearing them. zensunni's post is here: animenewsnetwork.com/bbs/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=4901475#4901475 |
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#Verso.Sciolto
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Excerpt from the dialogue, in Japanese, taken from the end of the scene in which Minagawa pokes a thorny pink rose in Hanabi's face, and labels her act a bouquet toss. After Hanabi accepts the single flower and as Minagawa turns away, still holding the remainder of the bouquet:
Minagawa: 次は 盗られちゃ駄目よ Hanabi: よ・・・っ よけーなお世話ですっ Kanai’s "茜さん?" reaction to Minagawa's behaviour just moments earlier was very nicely voiced and animated too. As is the framing with other flowers surrounding the characters from different angles in those scenes. Spoiler for comparison with Manga Chapter 47: spoiler[Also titled 2人のストーリー That part of the dialogue between Minagawa and Hanabi is verbatim. The exact same words are used in the anime as in the corresponding manga panels. Minagawa: 次は盗られちゃ駄目よ Hanabi: よ・・・っ よけーなお世話ですっ Kanai is entirely absent from that portion of the scene and is not shown or heard reacting to the exchanges between Minagawa and Hanabi. There are also differences in the depicted and -compared to the anime adaptation- absent flowers in the manga panels. The nuance differences are significant. Perhaps the respective translators were guided by those to come to different interpretations of the identical words spoken by Minagawa in both these versions of Kuzu no Honkai ... Something else about which we'll likely never get confirmation.] |
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Blood-
Bargain Hunter Posts: 23742 |
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That's very interesting, #Verso.Sciotto. So in other words, with respect to the original Japanese text, the dialogue that Akane speaks when giving a flower t Hanabi is identical in both the manga and anime, but they were translated differently. If it is not too much trouble, how would you have personally translated the text? I'm curious.
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Lifesongsoa
Posts: 34 |
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I like the Google translate version. Google is so tone deaf... lol
Minagawa: Next time you can not steal it. Hanabi: Okay ... okay, thanks for your help I didn't mention the translation shared before because I suspected it was an odd translation, but I had no way to be sure. Thanks #Verso.Sciolto for clearing that up. It seems to me the Amazon Strike translation is the more accurate one. What little I know of how Google translate deals with Japanese to English adds to that suspicion and I think it fits the story better. I wonder how the YenPress release will translate it. I am buying physical copies of the manga, but I'm sure this thread will be long dead by the time the last volume is released. If you are wondering if Akane and Hanabi might strike up some kind of odd friendship in the future because of Hanabi's relationship with Kanai then maybe. I don't think anyone in Scum's Wish walked away hating anyone else. I did feel like Akane was and always will be someone Hanabi has a hard time dealing with. Akane would probably have some positive feelings for Hanabi though. It was Hanabi's taste in men that ultimately led to Akane's bond with Kanai after all... lol I will admit as easily as I feel I can fit into Akane's mentality I do occasionally have moments where I find myself laughing at how ridiculously focused she is on the blow by blow in the moment practicality of events around her and the experience she gets out of it. She is extremely manipulative, but it's missing the point entirely if you think she sees the big picture. She relies almost entirely on her experience for her perspective on the world. If she had a healthy imagination she wouldn't make sense anymore. |
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Mr. sickVisionz
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I'm just glad they saved that for penultimate rather than final episode. |
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