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EP. REVIEW: Dororo


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Merida



Joined: 21 Feb 2012
Posts: 1945
PostPosted: Wed May 15, 2019 4:58 pm Reply with quote
MarshalBanana wrote:
Itachis character arc came to a very satanising conclusions...


It was also pretty satisfying. Wink

I kinda liked Itachi and the oddly charming rapport he had with Dororo, but i knew he would eventually be doomed...speaking of which, it was good to see that, even though he's obsessed with killing his brother, Tahomaru still cares about his comrades while it was somewhat worrying (yet understandable) to see Hyakkimaru openly acknowledge humans as enemies for the first time, but he also has Dororo who'll hopefully help him keep his humanity. Parallels all around.
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crazieanimefan1



Joined: 18 Feb 2015
Posts: 409
Location: Auburn, AL
PostPosted: Wed May 15, 2019 6:02 pm Reply with quote
I'm late to the Dororo bandwagon, but I am enjoying it tremendously.

I can understand somewhat Hyakkimaru's situation. No, my dad didn't curse me to lose limbs or anything, but I was abandoned by my mother. And she later had another sibling that she cherished, much like his father did. The emotional impact of this can be hard on a child, that I can understand and I can understand being disabled. This makes me understand his character just a bit. Also, I think Dororo is the human part of him, that while he's been stated to become more demonic, he/she is keeping him from that happening.

Think Tarzan in ways I suppose.

Dororo undenyingly decided to follow him on his adventure, probably more out of curiosity and loneliness I think. Yet he/she is now become more of how the apprentice follows the master. Instead of master (sensei), it's big brother (aniki). He/She has become more the sibling than his younger brother has, but I see redeeming qualities in the boy too. I think there might come a time when Daddy Dearest's influence will wane on Tahomaru and he'll be like, "To hell with this!" and leave to aide his older brother. Or at least I hope that happens, he's smarter than he looks I think as is his brother, even though he's inside a wild child that is struggling for independance and to gain his body back.

lol Although a friend of mine and I said Hyakkimaru reminded us of Sasori from Naruto deciding to find his body parts to stop being a puppet.
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Gina Szanboti



Joined: 03 Aug 2008
Posts: 11306
PostPosted: Wed May 15, 2019 9:38 pm Reply with quote
Merida wrote:
while it was somewhat worrying (yet understandable) to see Hyakkimaru openly acknowledge humans as enemies for the first time

Maybe I'm not understanding the nuance of what you mean here. Didn't he do that when the samurai massacred Mio and the kids?

I actually cheered when Dororo took a few of the coins for the road. They were so setting it up for the cliched stupidity of completely walking away from tainted treasure (or in this case, just not knowing how to use it yet), that I really was startled when they didn't end up doing that. Smile I still worry that some adventurous soul is bound to happen upon it out in the open like that before Dororo can return to claim it again. They could have at least buried it.
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zztop



Joined: 28 Aug 2014
Posts: 642
PostPosted: Wed May 15, 2019 10:18 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
and it's not realistic for a pair that sometimes finds themselves starving to hoard a stash of gold.


At least there was actual treasure in the anime.

In the manga, there was spoiler[no treasure at all. All Itachi and Dororo find is an empty pot with a written message from Hibikuro saying he didn’t trust Itachi, so he’d hidden the treasure in another location to fund a people’s uprising. Tezuka never addressed the treasure or gave more clues after that, since the manga ended shortly after.
Tezuka may have intended an ironic outcome for Itachi’s greed(all his struggle was for nothing), but it does create inconsistency that Hibikuro would’ve risked his beloved child’s life for a risky ruse.]


Also instead of Tahoumaru's army, spoiler[the manga has a random army led by a random magistrate seeking Hibikuro’s treasure. They’d been secretly following Itachi hoping he’d lead them to the treasure.]
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Merida



Joined: 21 Feb 2012
Posts: 1945
PostPosted: Thu May 16, 2019 1:57 am Reply with quote
Gina Szanboti wrote:
Merida wrote:
while it was somewhat worrying (yet understandable) to see Hyakkimaru openly acknowledge humans as enemies for the first time

Maybe I'm not understanding the nuance of what you mean here. Didn't he do that when the samurai massacred Mio and the kids?


As i see it, he was in a blind rage back then and probably didn't really register whether or not those samurai were human. He didn't make the conscious decision that they were his enemies and needed to be killed.
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jenthehen



Joined: 23 Dec 2008
Posts: 835
Location: Cincinnati, Ohio
PostPosted: Tue May 21, 2019 8:20 pm Reply with quote
I really enjoyed the Opposite Day episode! My favorite part was after Hyakkimaru was strangling Dororo he immediately was hugging him - that’s such a human reaction to “hug up” a kid or pet after you unintentionally hurt them. I thought it was really cute.
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Gina Szanboti



Joined: 03 Aug 2008
Posts: 11306
PostPosted: Tue May 21, 2019 9:38 pm Reply with quote
I liked it too. It was much less frustrating than when they did it in JoJo's Golden Wind. Speaking of callbacks, this is the second time I've seen Hyottoko referenced in just the last few weeks (in Kimetsu no Yaiba), after years of wondering what that mask represented.

Quote:
Later, his statements about people “looking happy,” including himself, are childlike wordplay. Hyakkimaru has only recently started speaking, but he's no child. In this episode, it feels like his innocence has been exaggerated in order to set the show up for jokes that don't quite hit their marks.

I thought it was sweet. And Hyakkimaru is innocent in many ways, but I don't think you can rightly take his child-level vocabulary to equal childlike thinking or behavior. What should he have said about being happy that would be believable?

What you're able to say in words is very limiting as to what thoughts and feelings you're able to express - something the Opposite Day theme demonstrated very aptly. Like Hyakkimaru was signing as best he could what he meant and that something was wrong, but his words didn't convey his intent.

Lol at the expression on the horse when Hyakki put his sword to its throat while talking about repairs.
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John Thacker



Joined: 28 Oct 2013
Posts: 1006
PostPosted: Tue May 21, 2019 10:30 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
Okowa the swordmaker's daughter, warn Hyakkimaru that if he keeps doing this, his head “will go pear-shaped” which is a bizarre statement (and perhaps the result of another strange translation). We talk about situations going pear-shaped, so maybe that's the joke—Hyakkimaru rubbing his head on people will make situations go sideways. Anyway, I don't know enough Japanese to begin to guess what the original line meant.


The original line was 何故もヘチマもねえの! or "Naze mo hechima mo nee no!" This is a tricky pun.

Literally, a hechima is a loofah gourd / sponge. (Luffa aegyptiaca). Metaphorically, it can be used to mean something that is worthless, boring, insignificant, useless. The pattern "X mo hechima mo nai" (nee in rough speech) means something lie "X isn't even a hechima!" It's an old enough expression that you can find lots of Japanese people wondering "why a loofah?" and asking about it, (saying things like "my grandparents say this all the time, what does it mean exactly?) and then a bunch of possible folk etymologies. (Is it because the loofah gourd is mostly hollow? Is it because the portion you can eat (and the stage in its lifecycle when you can eat it) is very small compared to the overall size?)

So you can translate the basic expression as "doesn't amount to a hill of beans" or "isn't worth a plugged nickel," two somewhat old-fashioned phrases that you might hear someone say (if you're from the US) if their grandparents or parents said it, or people are trying to avoid expletives. (Obviously there's more vulgar expressions as well.)

The problem is the second part of pun, where they're taking the metaphorical phrase literally. He shouldn't rub his forehead on people because his head isn't even a loofah - which is something that people actually do rub themselves with (so it's not useless, like in the normal use of the phrase, thus making it funnier.)

There's possibly a third implied meaning, saying "It's meaningless to rub your forehead if you do it to everybody (it strips the gesture of the significance it's supposed to have, gets a girl's hopes up by giving her the wrong impression, etc)."

See, pun.

It's kind of like having a joke where you're telling someone not to use something as fertilizer because it "isn't worth sh*t" (which ironically makes a good fertilizer) or so on.
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crazieanimefan1



Joined: 18 Feb 2015
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Location: Auburn, AL
PostPosted: Wed May 22, 2019 3:05 am Reply with quote
I thought the pear shaped statement was if he did it to the wrong person, they'd knock him upside the head and he'd get a knot on it after a few whacks aka what happens if Miroku from Inuyasha becomes Hyakkimaru. lol

That being said, I liked the statement he said at the end. "We are happy." Sure, slaying demons and such may make him happy, but I think he is beginning to find happiness just having Dororo around. Hyakkimaru is starting to become a parental figure in ways to the girl, even if he's still a man-child himself. And her showing some jealousy makes me wonder if once she gets old enough, we might be looking at a future couple in the mists.

Eh, that's wishful thinking...but I can still dream. lol

Edit: I forgot the horse! That poor thing! He wanted them to ride him and was like shocked when they didn't! That horse needs some love!
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jdnation



Joined: 15 May 2007
Posts: 1994
PostPosted: Wed May 22, 2019 4:44 pm Reply with quote
I think John Thacker has it correct when he said "Literally, a hechima is a loofah gourd / sponge. (Luffa aegyptiaca). Metaphorically, it can be used to mean something that is worthless, boring, insignificant, useless."

Basically, the intimacy of the action will lose its meaning, which is precisely what the reviewer of this episode complained about, that his repeated actions to a horse and others undo the significance of him doing it to Dororo.

A gourd is kind of like a common item, an empty vessel, as common as a drinking cup or a bottle.

So basically by overusing something that is supposed to be meaningful and special, you risk reducing it to irrelevance. Like a common household item.

As an analogy, when you propose marriage to someone, you traditionally give them a ring and put it on their finger.

But if you went around putting rings on everyone's fingers, or toes or dog, for the heck of it, it reduces the significance of the item and the action.

So Hyakkimaru needs to stop using such things as he would a common object, in this case, a gourd.

A more appropriate non-literal translation could've been to just say "it will become meaningless" or "it won't be special." Or they could've just yelled "Save that only for special people" or "those close to you." Or more succinctly, "Save it for those you care for!" or "It's only for those you care for!"


crazieanimefan1 wrote:
Edit: I forgot the horse! That poor thing! He wanted them to ride him and was like shocked when they didn't! That horse needs some love!


I like how the horse gave a smug grin afterwards. Smile
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supercalafragilisticjoy



Joined: 17 Aug 2015
Posts: 95
Location: Chiba, Japan
PostPosted: Thu May 23, 2019 5:51 am Reply with quote
John Thacker wrote:

There's possibly a third implied meaning, saying "It's meaningless to rub your forehead if you do it to everybody (it strips the gesture of the significance it's supposed to have, gets a girl's hopes up by giving her the wrong impression, etc)."

See, pun.

It's kind of like having a joke where you're telling someone not to use something as fertilizer because it "isn't worth sh*t" (which ironically makes a good fertilizer) or so on.


I didn't want to copy and paste the whole explanation, but it was super helpful, thank you!
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Nordhmmer



Joined: 11 Feb 2017
Posts: 1028
PostPosted: Thu May 23, 2019 7:23 am Reply with quote
......

"going pear shaped" = "going South" -The're telling him something will go wrong if he keeps rubbing peoples foreheads,that's all.
--------

This episode was a remake of episode 14 of the '69 anime and is the first of many anime original episodes that the original series created to fill in the story,as the manga was cut so short.
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MarshalBanana



Joined: 31 Aug 2014
Posts: 5294
PostPosted: Sun May 26, 2019 3:15 am Reply with quote
Episodes like this I believe are important, they give such much needed down time after the end of a story arc.I mean they could have just got the swords mended off screen, or had this be a quick visit and then gone straight into the next part of the story, but that would have made the story feel rather rushed.
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John Thacker



Joined: 28 Oct 2013
Posts: 1006
PostPosted: Tue May 28, 2019 9:40 pm Reply with quote
Wish they had translated the name of the antagonist in the last episode to Pip instead of just Dice-spot. I suppose not everyone would know that is what pip means though
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Gina Szanboti



Joined: 03 Aug 2008
Posts: 11306
PostPosted: Sun Jun 02, 2019 1:01 pm Reply with quote
Something I've been meaning to ask from early on and kept forgetting, but does anyone know what's the significance of the herd of white Dullahan horses in the sky over Dororo in the first OP? They're really beautiful, but I don't recall seeing them in any episodes and now they're gone.
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