![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elsaneNew Saiyuki! translated by the wonderful, wonderful people over at saiyuki_manga.
There are two chapters, the last chapter of the sky burial arc, and the first chapter of a new arc that is bringing ALL OF THE AWESOME.
So you remember how I was lamenting that Minekura didn't seem to have a lot of space for living women in her story?
And you remember how so far in Reload Blast we've gotten a fantastic teaser bit of a young youkai girl who seems to be some kind of seer? And now we get Sharak: A FEMALE SANZO (!) who is scarred (!!) and no-nonsense and utterly awesome (!!!). And both the priest and the prophet are fully clothed! I love Sharak madly already. I know the structure of the story dictates that she won't be able to be as awesome as our Sanzo, but still. Minekura, finally creating new awesome female characters, plural, FTW!
Also, wait, Kanzeon is the Buddha? She created the heaven and the earth? How does this interplay with her subservient position to the Jade Emperor, and is this a question that would be resolved if I knew more about how Chinese mythology dealt with the Buddhist pantheon? (undoubtedly.)
All the Gaiden wheels are still turning, eee be still my heart.
Finally: altitude sickness , hahaha. ILU Minekura.
In the long wait between chapters, I reread what we've got so far of Ibun, and was struck by the huge gap between the world were seeing in Ibun, and the world we see now. So Ibun is really setting up the question: what on earth happened? Once upon a time, all of the sanzos knew each other. Once upon a time, all sanzo candidates were trained in a group. Once upon a time, all of these candidates were men.
Now, Sanzo has never met any of the other sanzos, except for when Ukoku came to visit Koumyou. Now, we have a woman as sanzo. Now, no youkai are ordained. And it's not Nii, or at least not Nii alone -- already by the time we see Goudai's temple in Burial, we're in a different place, and there is no central training of candidates.
What happened to make the Sanzos abandon their traditions and avoid each other?
I am all of a sudden much more interested in Ibun.
Somehow I hadn't quite processed before what it meant that Sanzo is carrying the Maten Sutra, the one that should be held by a youkai. In a very real way, this makes him more one of the ikkou: not quite human, not quite youkai, somewhere in between. And, moreover, as it is with Gojyo and Hakkai, Sanzo's halfway status is a reflection of pain, and of things not going right, or at least, not according to plan. Which adds more dimensions to the way he resists thinking of himself as part of the ikkou for so long, or the way he keeps grumbling that he's completely human, stop lumping him in with his youkai servants -- of course, the fact that he's carrying a youkai scripture, that he is in some weird metaphysical way a halfbreed priest, is deeply reflective of what he sees as his failure, and Koumyou's.
saiyuki_manga.There are two chapters, the last chapter of the sky burial arc, and the first chapter of a new arc that is bringing ALL OF THE AWESOME.
So you remember how I was lamenting that Minekura didn't seem to have a lot of space for living women in her story?
And you remember how so far in Reload Blast we've gotten a fantastic teaser bit of a young youkai girl who seems to be some kind of seer? And now we get Sharak: A FEMALE SANZO (!) who is scarred (!!) and no-nonsense and utterly awesome (!!!). And both the priest and the prophet are fully clothed! I love Sharak madly already. I know the structure of the story dictates that she won't be able to be as awesome as our Sanzo, but still. Minekura, finally creating new awesome female characters, plural, FTW!
Also, wait, Kanzeon is the Buddha? She created the heaven and the earth? How does this interplay with her subservient position to the Jade Emperor, and is this a question that would be resolved if I knew more about how Chinese mythology dealt with the Buddhist pantheon? (undoubtedly.)
All the Gaiden wheels are still turning, eee be still my heart.
Finally: altitude sickness , hahaha. ILU Minekura.
In the long wait between chapters, I reread what we've got so far of Ibun, and was struck by the huge gap between the world were seeing in Ibun, and the world we see now. So Ibun is really setting up the question: what on earth happened? Once upon a time, all of the sanzos knew each other. Once upon a time, all sanzo candidates were trained in a group. Once upon a time, all of these candidates were men.
Now, Sanzo has never met any of the other sanzos, except for when Ukoku came to visit Koumyou. Now, we have a woman as sanzo. Now, no youkai are ordained. And it's not Nii, or at least not Nii alone -- already by the time we see Goudai's temple in Burial, we're in a different place, and there is no central training of candidates.
What happened to make the Sanzos abandon their traditions and avoid each other?
I am all of a sudden much more interested in Ibun.
Somehow I hadn't quite processed before what it meant that Sanzo is carrying the Maten Sutra, the one that should be held by a youkai. In a very real way, this makes him more one of the ikkou: not quite human, not quite youkai, somewhere in between. And, moreover, as it is with Gojyo and Hakkai, Sanzo's halfway status is a reflection of pain, and of things not going right, or at least, not according to plan. Which adds more dimensions to the way he resists thinking of himself as part of the ikkou for so long, or the way he keeps grumbling that he's completely human, stop lumping him in with his youkai servants -- of course, the fact that he's carrying a youkai scripture, that he is in some weird metaphysical way a halfbreed priest, is deeply reflective of what he sees as his failure, and Koumyou's.