There seems to be a recurring theme in Gokushufudou: The Way of the House Husband where Tatsu, deapite terrifying people with how overwhelmingly powerful and dangerous he remains, that he also leaves them nostalgic for their mothers and simpler, more innocent times.
It’s both absolutely hilarious to see a scam artist moved by the simplicity of a simple meal often prepared for children and a defeated, low-rung mobster crying as he remembers being gifted mittens by his mom (all she could afford to keep him warm, being poor).
If I HAD to read anything into this silly manga, the theme seems to be:
Hey, housework is really tough and being a homemaker involves balancing a lot of different, equally important skills, it’s nothing to scoff at.
Hard-hearted men would benefit from remembering the softness with which their mothers/grandmothers, etc. raised them (where applicable).
…….. “have these mittens, so you can stay warm, even when you’re not packing heat” remains the most awesome line to throw at someone you just disarmed and slipped mittens on, before they catch on, because you move just THAT fast.
I think it’s really neat how the original trilogy lawyers and the new trilogy lawyers think about secrets differently.
On one hand, you have Phoenix and Edgeworth. To them, secrets are an item, kept in a box and locked within your heart. In order to figure out what it is, you have to locate the box, find the key, and unlock it. Whether that’s with evidence and bluffing (psyche-locks) or logic and contradictions (logic chess) you use concrete details to unlock the truth.
On the other hand, there’s Apollo and Athena. They view secrets as a feeling, hidden behind a wall. Something that you repress but still seeps through, however small. They use more subjective tactics based on psychology and an understanding of people as emotional beings. They find the cracks in the wall, and they knock the wall down. Perception finds where the nervousness slips through, and the Mood Matrix sees a person’s emotions as they truly are, not as they intend them to be.
I haven’t quite worked out how this relates to their characterization and worldview yet, but I know it makes sense in Edgeworth’s case, having been raised in a household where emotions were a weakness, evidence was everything, and logic and perfection always ruled.
frances has been realistic about the twins’ situation from day one, and maybe that makes her come across as harsh, but it’d be counter-productive to pretend ociel wasn’t the second in line, wasn’t sickly, wasn’t going to struggle to fill his brother’s shoes if he needed to (without the aid of a magical demon butler).
the greatest thing about touken as a ship (my fellow future writers, please take note) is that Ishida took his time to tell their story. That’s why i personally prefer, in fiction, romances that aren’t the actual center of the story, because many other things are happening and it helps to slow down the development of the relationship, making it way more realistic.
touken had so many different stages in their relationship, & they were humanly realistic:
;first meting, mutual disinterest, friendship, romantic feelings, heartbreak, memory loss, bittersweet reunion, final reunion, love confession, & then having intimate relationships.
Ishida took time to explore&develop each one of these stages, he gave us many moments during the mutual disinterest, where they were basically forced by Yoshimura + others to spend time together. We had many moments of friendship, the feelings of some kind of romance lingering in the air but we weren’t sure, then the heartbreak… their time apart was LONG, and Ishida took his time with it. During the memory loss + bittersweet reunion, Touka&Haise had barely seen each other that much, and when the time came for the love confession, it had a huge impact because we had already explored all those different stages in the past, it was like a balloon slowly inflating and inflating and inflating until it couldn’t hold the air any longer and bursted.
that’s why touken feels like something very deep and personal for all of us, because it wasn’t a first-sight love, or something that happened out of the blue, in the midst of only two arcs. It costed Ishida to write the entire first TG AND TG:re to make them officially canon, and during that long process he made sure to give them an actual story of their own, as a couple in fiction they have an identity, a journey. We were there from the first moment to the last, and everything that happened in between.
They had moments together even when they were not actually interacting with each other; but scenes like Banjou asking Shironeki if he was going to see her, standing right in front of her school ((the fact that banjou mentioned that reinforced the idea that Touka wasn’t just a regular friend in Kaneki’s life, but someone special, he always gave her a special treatment and all of the other characters knew that, and they were vocal about it)) + remembering her birthday after a long time not seeing each other;;; or Touka thinking about him while holding her parent’s ring ((the romantic connotation here is huuuuge)) help SO MUCH to build up their relationship, but they weren’t necessarily having a scene together, conversing and clearing things out.
i think the most important thing when it comes to writing a couple in fiction is to give them a story of their own. That even if the main plot of the story doesn’t exist, or something happens and everything goes to hell except for the characters, they will still have a connection with each other, they will still have their own story to tell even if the plot falls apart.
anyway i don’t know where this came from i just watched the first amv i did for touken and there was a lot of shirotouken in there and it reminded me of the years i spent crying for them and it made me realize how perfectly well done their story was
also also also, i feel like touken was unbreakable even if they had many circumstances breaking them apart, drawing them away from each other… their bond and affection for each other was so strong that i knew, deep in my heart, that no matter what could happen, they were unbreakable.
There’s something about Eren that I don’t think I can emphasize enough:
No matter the age.
No matter the time or place or circumstances. Eren is the Attack Titan. I don’t know how the paths between the Children of Ymir are supposed to work, but if we look I think we have to conclude that Eren’s own fate and personhood were deeply tied up in what he would become long before it was ever certain. Maybe it’s so strong in him because he would eventually become the Coordinate, where all the paths converge–I don’t know. But:
No matter the age. Eren could have been born in paradise, in a world of perpetual peace–he practically was–and he would still be angry, and he would still be seeking, because there is no amount of freedom that is sufficient. (Thought: how much of Eren’s reaction to the slavers who took Mikasa was down to the fact that they were slavers?)
He’s doomed to restlessness, in any life. He can’t just stop and be satisfied, any more than he can stop breathing. Even if he settles down, even if he forgets, that’s the truth that’s always going to smolder at the bottom of his heart, and all it will take is a tiny blue-eyed boy telling him about the sea to wake him up to fight once more.
phoenix wright returning to the court of law after 7 years in a hoodie and a beanie and absolutely dunking on kristoph gavin is one of the most iconic things ive seen in my life
I think one of the most interesting parts about RCMT is that this twist isn’t supposed to be likable. It’s a cruel, brutal, and ugly twist that will tear apart whatever you previously thought of Real!Ciel! There’s no better way to culminate the cruelty of truth, one of the biggest themes in the manga! Yana would probably laugh evilly at fandom’s reactions to it. XD
midnight-in-town 