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nenya85 I'd do these a while ago - translations of half of Takahashi-sensei's interview in the YGO character guidebook. (The first half, because those are all the Kaiba questions - might do the rest later, but these are the ones I most wanted the answers to!)
Being my own translations, I won't vouch for the accuracy of any of them; I have a long way to go before I can claim fluency in Japanese.gnine helped with some sticky questions but there were still a few phrases that flummoxed me. Hopefully I got the gist. I've footnoted parts that especially confused me; anyone who knows Japanese is welcome to correct me. Please.
[The interview was done right after Battle City ended, at the beginning of the Egyptian arc.]
YGO's greatest enigma, Kaiba Corporation
--Please tell us the secrets of the mysterious Kaiba Corporation.
Kaiba Corporation was originally a company called the "Kaiba Heavy Machine Gun Industries," established by Seto's adopted father Gozaburo's father. He was the so-called "war nouveau riche". Later on, Gozaburo inherited the company, and acquiring the patent for the IC chip and the like, he was going to switch the company over to the high-tech industry. But Seto's adoption gradually started disrupting those plans. [1]
After Gozaburo's death, Seto took the high-tech industry and started pouring those cultivated technologies entirely into games.
To Seto, war and games are the same thing.[2] However, because the important point to him is "fighting and winning by oneself," he happens to have no interest in the business of war.
In the past, Gozaburo held chess tournaments, only to be sponsoring himself by becoming the champion and taking the prizes for himself. As for Seto, he tries such things... Even standing on top of the industry and taking the lead, it's as if he had the thought that it wasn't by his own strength after all. Before long Seto came to seek the reason for existence in battle, that is to say, overpowering an opponent in a game with one's own strength. Battle--for example, war can be called that, a battle between country and country; but as far as Seto is concerned battle is a private/individual conflict to the bitter end. I think that's why the existence of the character of Yugi is so significant. Without Yugi as his rival, Seto, losing the enemy he must defeat, probably wouldn't be able to exist.
Incidentally, the current Kaiba Corporation has 2,000 employees, and the annual turnover is 150 billion yen. Though when Seto lost the duel with Yugi, Kaiba Corporation's stock took a noticeable dive, and also shortly after the company's restructuring began. It seems that Seto is always showing his own duels to the shareholders. For that reason as well, Seto must continue to win games.
[1] "gradually started disrupting those plans" - 徐々に歯車が狂い始めます, lit., "little by little the gears begin to go out of order"
[2] "To Seto, war and games are the same thing" - 瀬人は、戦争とゲームは一緒という考えを持っています lit., "Seto has the thought such that war and games are together." I'm not quite sure how to word this; pretty sure the ultimate meaning is that he puts war and games in the same category.
Gozaburo vs Seto, family strife
--Kaiba Gozaburo and Seto's relationship, could you call it that of a father and son?
To Seto, he might have been a father. However, he was hardly an "ideal" father. When he accomplished the regime change of the company, Seto didn't think about Gozaburo dying.[1]
With Gozaburo's suicide, Seto, losing an enemy, gradually began to go strange.[2] He personally had a sense of condemning himself for "patricide." [3] It could be said that the key word of the whole affair, that would always stay with him, was "patricide". That is to say, Seto was planted with the concept that "games equal death" according to Gozaburo.
In the beginning it was only chess. At the time, defeating Gozaburo, he was adopted. But Seto's chess match didn't end with that. Even the eventual interpersonal conflict in the company, all the schemes of Seto vs Gozaburo, could be considered an extension of their chess game. And Gozaburo lost and chose to die. This, inside Seto, became tied to the idea that "games equal death." Furthermore, he received the penalty game from Yugi, "the experience of death"! Because of all that, he came to believe that the loser of a game must certainly experience death. From that point, Seto's obsession with confronting "games" and "death" seems to have begun.[4]
Seto always fought with his complex with his father. Having him die by his own hand, he could never completely defeat his father. However, upon meeting with Yugi, he seems to have substituted a target.[5] For he is a man who can't live without an enemy he must defeat by himself.
[1] I'm pretty sure Takahashi's saying that Seto wasn't intending to kill Gozaburo: 剛三郎が死ぬとは思っていませんでした - "didn't think Gozaburo would die," but due to the Japanese construction of "to think," it's not that Seto thought Gozaburo wouldn't die, but rather that Seto wasn't thinking about it at all.
[2] "Began to go strange" 精神がおかしくなっていきます, lit., "his spirit becomes strange," possibly a colloquialism for going crazy?
[3] patricide - 親殺し , lit. "parent murder"
[4] そこから瀬人の異常なまで「ゲーム」と「死」に対する執着が始まったのでしょうね。- There's a bizarre grammatical construction here I can't make heads or tails of - "ijou na made"?
[5] 標的がすりかわってきた - substituted a target? "Surikawatte" (surikawaru?) isn't in my dictionaries...
[This whole section I'm unsure of; the cherished ambiguity of the Japanese language and my own inadequacy as a translator does not make for easy psychological analysis. Still, neat stuff. By the way, Gozaburo's name might imply that he was a third son (三郎 - zaburou, means 'third son'; the "gou" 剛 means strong and is a standard name kanji - on its own it can also be pronounced "Takashi"). I don't know how firmly the Japanese conform to the meaning of kanji when naming children (or mangaka when naming chars), but if he was the third in line, one wonders why his older brothers didn't inherit...]
Yugi and Seto shaking hands!?
--Will Yugi and Seto ever be bound by friendship?
Hmmm, that's difficult to say, isn't it. They're rivals, it can even been said they're old friends [1], but... Their relationship seems to be that, through fighting, they've acquired something mutual. The scene before Yugi fought with Malik, where he handed over the card (Devil's Sanctuary), was hard to come by.[2]
It's a delicate/dicey relationship of opposing one another even as they mutually support one another when needed.[3] Earlier, Yugi duels with a god (Osiris), and even in that pinch, wasn't Kaiba Seto the one who reached out to him? There's really the feeling that being rivals who approve of one another, they don't want to see one another defeated by anyone else.
[1] 親友 - "shinyuu" - Japanese has a lot of different words for friendship; this one is usually translated as best friend or bosom friend, often referring to childhood friends. Could be a reference to their past lives' history together?
[2] シーンは苦労しましたよ - "kurou" is hardships, "kurou shimashita;" I think he's saying that it took a lot of work to reach that scene, that is, that it was difficult for Yami and Kaiba to come to the point that Kaiba loaned him that card.
[3] 互いに足りない部分を補いつつも反発する、微妙な関係なんです - lit., "a difficult relationship where in they are opposing even while mutually supplementing the insufficient portion."
nenya85 I'd do these a while ago - translations of half of Takahashi-sensei's interview in the YGO character guidebook. (The first half, because those are all the Kaiba questions - might do the rest later, but these are the ones I most wanted the answers to!)Being my own translations, I won't vouch for the accuracy of any of them; I have a long way to go before I can claim fluency in Japanese.
gnine helped with some sticky questions but there were still a few phrases that flummoxed me. Hopefully I got the gist. I've footnoted parts that especially confused me; anyone who knows Japanese is welcome to correct me. Please.[The interview was done right after Battle City ended, at the beginning of the Egyptian arc.]
YGO's greatest enigma, Kaiba Corporation
--Please tell us the secrets of the mysterious Kaiba Corporation.
Kaiba Corporation was originally a company called the "Kaiba Heavy Machine Gun Industries," established by Seto's adopted father Gozaburo's father. He was the so-called "war nouveau riche". Later on, Gozaburo inherited the company, and acquiring the patent for the IC chip and the like, he was going to switch the company over to the high-tech industry. But Seto's adoption gradually started disrupting those plans. [1]
After Gozaburo's death, Seto took the high-tech industry and started pouring those cultivated technologies entirely into games.
To Seto, war and games are the same thing.[2] However, because the important point to him is "fighting and winning by oneself," he happens to have no interest in the business of war.
In the past, Gozaburo held chess tournaments, only to be sponsoring himself by becoming the champion and taking the prizes for himself. As for Seto, he tries such things... Even standing on top of the industry and taking the lead, it's as if he had the thought that it wasn't by his own strength after all. Before long Seto came to seek the reason for existence in battle, that is to say, overpowering an opponent in a game with one's own strength. Battle--for example, war can be called that, a battle between country and country; but as far as Seto is concerned battle is a private/individual conflict to the bitter end. I think that's why the existence of the character of Yugi is so significant. Without Yugi as his rival, Seto, losing the enemy he must defeat, probably wouldn't be able to exist.
Incidentally, the current Kaiba Corporation has 2,000 employees, and the annual turnover is 150 billion yen. Though when Seto lost the duel with Yugi, Kaiba Corporation's stock took a noticeable dive, and also shortly after the company's restructuring began. It seems that Seto is always showing his own duels to the shareholders. For that reason as well, Seto must continue to win games.
[1] "gradually started disrupting those plans" - 徐々に歯車が狂い始めます, lit., "little by little the gears begin to go out of order"
[2] "To Seto, war and games are the same thing" - 瀬人は、戦争とゲームは一緒という考えを持っています lit., "Seto has the thought such that war and games are together." I'm not quite sure how to word this; pretty sure the ultimate meaning is that he puts war and games in the same category.
Gozaburo vs Seto, family strife
--Kaiba Gozaburo and Seto's relationship, could you call it that of a father and son?
To Seto, he might have been a father. However, he was hardly an "ideal" father. When he accomplished the regime change of the company, Seto didn't think about Gozaburo dying.[1]
With Gozaburo's suicide, Seto, losing an enemy, gradually began to go strange.[2] He personally had a sense of condemning himself for "patricide." [3] It could be said that the key word of the whole affair, that would always stay with him, was "patricide". That is to say, Seto was planted with the concept that "games equal death" according to Gozaburo.
In the beginning it was only chess. At the time, defeating Gozaburo, he was adopted. But Seto's chess match didn't end with that. Even the eventual interpersonal conflict in the company, all the schemes of Seto vs Gozaburo, could be considered an extension of their chess game. And Gozaburo lost and chose to die. This, inside Seto, became tied to the idea that "games equal death." Furthermore, he received the penalty game from Yugi, "the experience of death"! Because of all that, he came to believe that the loser of a game must certainly experience death. From that point, Seto's obsession with confronting "games" and "death" seems to have begun.[4]
Seto always fought with his complex with his father. Having him die by his own hand, he could never completely defeat his father. However, upon meeting with Yugi, he seems to have substituted a target.[5] For he is a man who can't live without an enemy he must defeat by himself.
[1] I'm pretty sure Takahashi's saying that Seto wasn't intending to kill Gozaburo: 剛三郎が死ぬとは思っていませんでした - "didn't think Gozaburo would die," but due to the Japanese construction of "to think," it's not that Seto thought Gozaburo wouldn't die, but rather that Seto wasn't thinking about it at all.
[2] "Began to go strange" 精神がおかしくなっていきます, lit., "his spirit becomes strange," possibly a colloquialism for going crazy?
[3] patricide - 親殺し , lit. "parent murder"
[4] そこから瀬人の異常なまで「ゲーム」と「死」に対する執着が始まったのでしょうね。- There's a bizarre grammatical construction here I can't make heads or tails of - "ijou na made"?
[5] 標的がすりかわってきた - substituted a target? "Surikawatte" (surikawaru?) isn't in my dictionaries...
[This whole section I'm unsure of; the cherished ambiguity of the Japanese language and my own inadequacy as a translator does not make for easy psychological analysis. Still, neat stuff. By the way, Gozaburo's name might imply that he was a third son (三郎 - zaburou, means 'third son'; the "gou" 剛 means strong and is a standard name kanji - on its own it can also be pronounced "Takashi"). I don't know how firmly the Japanese conform to the meaning of kanji when naming children (or mangaka when naming chars), but if he was the third in line, one wonders why his older brothers didn't inherit...]
Yugi and Seto shaking hands!?
--Will Yugi and Seto ever be bound by friendship?
Hmmm, that's difficult to say, isn't it. They're rivals, it can even been said they're old friends [1], but... Their relationship seems to be that, through fighting, they've acquired something mutual. The scene before Yugi fought with Malik, where he handed over the card (Devil's Sanctuary), was hard to come by.[2]
It's a delicate/dicey relationship of opposing one another even as they mutually support one another when needed.[3] Earlier, Yugi duels with a god (Osiris), and even in that pinch, wasn't Kaiba Seto the one who reached out to him? There's really the feeling that being rivals who approve of one another, they don't want to see one another defeated by anyone else.
[1] 親友 - "shinyuu" - Japanese has a lot of different words for friendship; this one is usually translated as best friend or bosom friend, often referring to childhood friends. Could be a reference to their past lives' history together?
[2] シーンは苦労しましたよ - "kurou" is hardships, "kurou shimashita;" I think he's saying that it took a lot of work to reach that scene, that is, that it was difficult for Yami and Kaiba to come to the point that Kaiba loaned him that card.
[3] 互いに足りない部分を補いつつも反発する、微妙な関係なんです - lit., "a difficult relationship where in they are opposing even while mutually supplementing the insufficient portion."
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no subject
Date: 2006-05-04 07:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-05 07:02 am (UTC)I think Kaiba doesn't ever compete against Mokuba because he's afraid of just that, of making his brother his opponent, since to him an opponent is always an enemy...it's sad, though, because when they were little they had such fun playing chess together. It might be good for Kaiba if he could get to the point that he could again play against Mokuba...
no subject
Date: 2006-05-06 01:55 am (UTC)That way he doesn't compete with Seto's Duel Monsters championship and -isn't- a rival.
... we never see or hear about Seto playing chess again, do we?
no subject
Date: 2006-05-06 03:47 am (UTC)--and d00d! Now there's a coincidence of timing - I just read all of your "Guard Dog" last night. Quite enjoyed it, which is saying something, because it's only the 2nd KaiJou fic I've liked - it's one of my least favorite pairings, but you've made it oddly convincing. Especially loved Kaiba's reaction to finding out most top duelists are gay. Namely, immediately starting to figure out how to market that fact to his advantage. That's our Kaiba-kun!
no subject
Date: 2006-05-09 09:08 am (UTC)#^^#
Date: 2006-05-09 10:55 am (UTC)Your fics have influanced our version of Mokuba quite a bit as well. It was such a joy to find Kaiba Brothers fics where Mokuba was kicking ass, instead of weeping all over the place.
... which was the first KaiJou you liked? I'm always looking for more, but while there's a fair bit out there, there are damn few that fit our view of the characters IE: Minus the whole Master/Puppy thing.
^^;; We also need to write a porn-ish chapter, Jounouchi 'introducing' Kaiba to the YGO fandom and their version of Real Person Slash... Kaiba reacting to something like... Dungeonshipping or Kamenshipping, or hell, anything with Pegasus! *laughs*
Re: #^^#
Date: 2006-05-10 07:50 am (UTC)The other KaiJou was D.Draggy's 'Being Dead Ain't Easy,' which I enjoyed for much the same reasons as I'm enjoying yours - excellent characterizations of both Kaibas, and more humor and story than romance. Kaiba usually comes across as so asexual that plunging him direct into twoo wuv hurts my brain. But the idea that Mokuba doesn't want his Nii-sama to always be alone is perfectly in character and irresistably sweet besides.
& bwaha! Kaiba & Jou vs the RPS! I can't wait!
no subject
Date: 2006-05-09 06:57 pm (UTC)X-Parrot is a person of many talents, it seems! Writing stories, translating interviews with Takahashi-sama, creating 'to-die-for' icons.....
no subject
Date: 2006-05-04 09:20 pm (UTC)like that surprises you XD. You are awesome for translating this! I can feel the plot-bunnies gathering already. XD.no subject
Date: 2006-05-05 07:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-04 09:50 pm (UTC)Second: I'm apologizing in advance for length ^ __ ^;;;;
Probably the thing I found the most interesting was the implication that at Death-T while Yami might have removed the darkness from Kaiba's heart, he left the craziness intact!
I've always thought the first shadow duel was pivotal (along with Gozaburo's suicide) in pushing Kaiba over the proverbial edge -- but I always attributed that to the shock of being rejected by his dragons. I thought that was really cool -- how his experiences really cemented that losing = death equation in his mind -- something that persists even at Alcatraz, when he tells Yami that if he loses he wants to die.
I was intrigued by the idea that Kaiba feels remorse for Gozaburo's death -- and could definitely see him as so focused on their ongoing game he didn't stop for a second to consider the implications.
I think though, I was somewhat disturbed by the idea that I possibly like Seto Kaiba better and have a higher estimate of his potential to change than his creator -- which seems like the ultimate definition of get a life!
One thing that has always struck me about Kaiba is the way he struggles for a 'true future' as he terms it. That he uses the duels not just to test himself personally against an opponent -- although that's certainly a big part of his make-up -- but also as a way of testing essential beliefs and philosophies. It's striking the way he will frame every duel he either participates in or even watches in terms of philosophical imperatives. I'm possibly over-influenced by the only previous quaote (thank you again for translating this) I had read where Mr. Takahashi said that Kaiba was a warrior, and that meeting Yugi freed him to be one. But it struck me that he took a very 'trial by combat' approach to life, where combat was used to test the validity of beliefs.
I've always though of the ending of Alcatraz as hopeful, though. At the beginning Yami tells him that after a loss, one should feel sad, but then the road to the future continues. At the end when he talks about letting his bitterness sink into the sea, and finding his heart under the rubble of Alcatraz, and then saying as he flew off that the future road of battle was open, I always took that to mean that for the first time in a long time, he was questioning the whole losing = dying thing, and was ready to try and find a better way.
I guess I always saw Kaiba a bit like Aoshi in that way -- where first he needs Kenshin as an opponent, but then weans himself from this to find other goals. I guess I had thought that in the Alcatraz arc, he was finally starting to get a handle on doing that, so I thought it was interesting, if a bit disturbing that Mr. Takahashi did not seem to see that kind of growth or development in his character... which makes me wonder how much I've been seeing things that aren't there.
Anyway, thank you for translating and posting this!
Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-05 07:13 am (UTC)Yes, I really liked the emphasis that Takahashi puts on games = death and how that screwed Kaiba up. (the phrase mentioned in footnote [4] in the second question, "ijou na", means "disorder" or something of the sort; as I said I wasn't sure how to translate it so just went with "obsession", but Takahashi does seem to be saying he considers Kaiba at least a little clinically nuts-o...)
Not exactly sure if he was saying Kaiba feels remorse for Gozaburo's death - 自責 means "self-condemnation" according to my dictionary but I'm not sure on the nuances, how much it's remorseful vs how much it's more just acknowledging that one is guilty for a crime? But I'm pretty certain at least that killing Gozaburo was not Seto's goal...
Hmm, which lines gave you the impression that Takahashi thinks Kaiba can't/doesn't change? Because I too find the end of Battle City to be very much a new chance for Kaiba. Mokuba asks him to let his hatred be buried with the tower, and I think he is going to make the attempt. I don't think that's reading too much into it; reformation and redemption is a tried-and-true theme in most shounen, and Kaiba is on that path from his second appearance in the manga, going from villain to rival, and perhaps eventually friend...(yes, very like Aoshi. I always thought Kaiba was a fusion of Aoshi and Saitoh - he got Aoshi's sense of honor and taste in trenchcoats; and Saitoh's fascinating ability to see in absolutes, black/white good/evil, (aku soku zan!) while simultaneously living his life on decidedly gray terms...)
(Some of the confusion of interpretation here might be my fault, there may have been some parts I translated in present tense, implying it's Kaiba's present state, when really it was referring to the past...Japanese is confusing tense-wise, it only has two verb tenses (past and present/future) and one can often switch to present tense when describing past events, as long as it's understood it's actually taking place in the past. I can easily miss such nuance, so for the most part I just translated it all in the tense actually written... ^^;)
Anyway - I don't know if Takahashi was being critical when he says that Kaiba can't live without an opponent. It's a trait of many shounen heroes to define themselves by who they oppose (you mentioned he thinks of Kaiba as a warrior, and while I'm not that familiar with Japanese samurai tradition, at least in shounen 'warrior' figures are immensely competitive souls...) The difference is the manner of that opposition. Yami is the one who questions during their final BC duel whether there's any real line between rivals and friends (and Takahashi does say they might as well be "shinyuu"...really want to know if that's a reference to Egypt - but Ishizu doesn't use the word when talking about the pharaoh and his priest, I checked. So it might just be acknowledging Yami & Kaiba's present bond...) One can be friends and rivals both (Jounouchi and Yami's friendly determination to duel, for instance) - having a rival can be a positive force, if there's someone you're always striving to be better than, someone who can drive you to improve yourself beyond your limits.
So I don't think Takahashi was criticizing that trait of Kaiba, so much as acknowledging a basic part of his personality. The major problem Takahashi seems to find in Kaiba was the "games = death" philosophy (which turns all "rivals" into "enemies", if they're not just trying to defeat you in a game but actually kill you, if you play every game as if it's a mortal battle) and that I think is altered by the end of BC - after all, Kaiba does lose there, and doesn't die - doesn't let himself die, even when there's the opportunity, and that's significant (and now I wanna go translate the rest of the end of BC, I did those few pages before but there's more...!)
I do love how Kaiba does make every game he plays a test of a philosophical debate...(still wonder if he'd be quite so protective of Mokuba if his duel with Yuugi in Duelist Kingdom hadn't 'proved' that protecting someone is a good strategy to be strong! ^^;)
Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-06 01:00 pm (UTC)That's interesting --yeah I can see acknowledgement that he had committed this 'crime' as distinct from actual remorse.
I didn't mean to imply that I thought Takahashi was critical of Kaiba for needing an opponent. Like you I think that's a facet of his character. The idea of a 'worthy opponent' is also an established martial arts thing -- where the idea that an opponent is also your partner (this is particularly strong in Judo where you literally can't practice a single move -- except falling -- without a partner) and also someone who pushes you to your best is precious.
I think it was more the tense thing -- that I thought it was a wonderful description of Kaiba at the end of Duelist Kingdom or the start of Battle City, but it didn't seem to acknowledge any of the changes he goes through, so I guess combined with the use of the present tense, I thought the implication was that Kaiba hadn't changed. That was probably me reading too much into it.
What has always struck me about the duels is as we've both said, the way they are used to test philosophies. I know aboslutely nothing about samurai philosophies except that Judo was created as a modern alternative to them. Judo was created in 1886 -- Jigoro Kano would have been a contemporary in age of Sanosuke or Yahiko -- and he thought of himself as an educator not a martial artist -- his writings are eerily like the philophy of Kaoru's kamiya kasshin-ryu (or perhaps not eerily so - lol) The name, btw reflects the change in philosophy -- most of the moves are based on ju-jitsu, but this is a 'do' not a 'jutsu' -- it was always explained to me that this reflected the change from a means of combat to a peaceful undertaking (an odd way to describe judo to anyone who's played it -- but I guess everything's relative!)
Anyway -- there is a point here -- the pivotal event in Judo'shistory was that Jigoro Kano's fledgling dojo, the Kodokan, entered and won a challenge against the Tokyo Police. What's interesting is that the importance of this victory was not that the individual opponents were stronger -- or even that it showed that Judo had effective fighting techniques -- but that the competition was considered to have proved that Kano's philophy that strength was acquired through cooperation and peaceful means was 'stronger' than the opposing more martial philosophies. (I'm not sure a jujitsu person would have heard the same story, but I'm not about to argue with a sensei or a room full of black belts.)
Anyway that mindset -- that personal competition is a way to test beliefs (besides being a pretty old one) seems to really fit Kaiba -- and it is inherent in martial arts -- that these make you stronger because of their values, not because you have memorized some nifty moves.
This sort of seems to be part of the opponent thing with Kaiba -- that he is not only looking to test and measure himself -- which he certainly is -- but that he is also looking to test his beliefs -- so that it almost has become the way he learns. I suppose it is this quality more than any other that makes me think he could make a transition to needing a mission as much as an opponent -- as at the end of Alcatraz. This is also similar to Aoshi. I don't think Kaiba is the kind of person who could live without a mission or an opponent -- I think he must always have an external goal and an external measure, if that makes sense.
Anyway I grovel at your feet for translating this and posting it! It's certainly given me a lot to think about! In a shameless bit of self promotion, coincidentally a lot of The Newly Revised Book of the Dead is about the whole losing = death equation (lol)so the timing was excellent!
Talk to you later...
Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-10 08:19 am (UTC)I have to say, I'm always fascinated by your knowledge of martial arts history/philosophy - your primary familiarity with Japanese culture comes from a completely different perspective than mine, and the contrast (and similarities!) intrigue me. I have a few friends who have done various styles (no judo, though) but no personal experience, just what I glean from things like Kenshin... ^^;;
The idea of duels/battles being used to test philosophies is primary to most fight shounen I've seen/read (and that's quite a bit, it's one of my favorite genres of manga!) so I'm not surprised that it comes from cultural tradition. It's one of the things that makes fights in animanga more interesting than a lot of action movies or Western comic books, because there's more at stake than sinmply who wins and saves the girl/planet/whatever - fights become a matter of *what* wins, what the victory says about the people and situation involved. (And it definitely helps in YGO specifically...card games aren't my thing; I wouldn't have any patience at all for the duels if it weren't for their significance to the story ^^;;;)
As far as Kaiba goes - I really like the idea that his problem is that Gozaburo infected Seto's honorable, positively competitive nature with the viral 'games = death', so that he lost the ability to view an opponent as a partner instead of just an enemy. And if he can bury that negative equation with Gozaburo, then he can finally recover, maybe learn to enjoy games again (isn't Yami saying something of the sort at the end of their duel in BC? Maybe I should translate some of that, too. Darn it, I need to get better at Japanese!) I suspect, though, even if Kaiba does start focusing more attention on his mission, the road to his goal - he's still going to be seeing it in terms of a battle. God help anyone who tries to get in the way of Kaiba Land construction... ^^;
And ee, the new fic's started! Looking forward to it ^__^
Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-13 03:35 pm (UTC)is a total compliment whoreI thought it was a great point that Kaiba and Saitou are alike in terms of seeing things in black and white while living their lives in shades of gray (did you say that or AmunRa -- wqho btw should have the nexy chapter of Intruders out soon...) Anyway, and I agree in terms of snarky attitude they are such a match especially as it relates to how they act around Jounouchi/Sanosuke (and those two really are identical!)
I agree on seeing Kaiba as a fusion of Aoshi and Saito. It's striking that Kaiba and Aoshi are both loners who's stongest character trait is their dsevotion to others, but it's mainly their journeys that strike me as similar. Aoshi needs time in the temple to piece his life back together, which strikes me as similar to Kaiba having his heart shattered. They both (hopefully) transfer from needing an opponent to measure their life against to needing a mission to fulfill, bioth find themselves through reaffirming their connection (without ever mentioning anything like an emotion) to the person most in their lives.
Then I had a totally eccentric random thought (surprise, surprise) -- they are also similar in how they use their soul card/weapon of choice. The weaposn the characters choose in RK is very revealing, especially in the case of Aoshi and Kenshin (which I suppose is appropriate given the whole 'the sword of the samurai is the soul of the samurai mystique), the same way each character in YGO's soul card is equally revealling (I would argue it is the entire deck that's revealing, but that's another rant.)
Anyway, (yes there IS a point!) Kaiba's card is the BEWD. Aoshi's original weapon of choice is a kodachi -- which is a single weapon. When both lose their intial fights using their signature card/weapon and then they both choose to augment that weapon, to sort of intensify it's effect in a way that no one had considered or thought possible -- Kaiba by creating the Ultimate BEWD and Aoshi by adoptina a dual kodachi.
Talk to you later...
Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-20 10:00 pm (UTC)Um, HI! Sorry to disturb you but I came to this page from a link on
Anyway, nice to meet you!
Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-22 03:13 am (UTC)Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-22 04:55 am (UTC)Heh, don't mean to be a habit-former, but . . . yeah. LOL *goes off to find*
Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-23 03:13 pm (UTC)Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-20 10:10 pm (UTC)Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-20 10:11 pm (UTC)Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-09 04:35 pm (UTC)*peace signage* You 'wow' me. :D Would it be alright if you translate the rest of it? It's really food for thought.
And since you're one of the people that have really impressed me in the first place... would you like a fanart request? :) It would be an honour to draw something for you. -Inami
Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-10 08:00 am (UTC)I'm going to try to translate the rest of the Q&A sometime soon. There's not much more on Kaiba but I'm curious what else Takahashi has to say...
...and eee!! I would never turn down an offer of fanart! Anything with Kaiba would thrill me - most especially Kaiba & Mokuba being cute and brotherly, but really, if it's got Kaiba, it's all good. ^^
(Obsessed? Who, me?)Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-11 01:08 am (UTC)Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-20 10:08 pm (UTC)Hi! Came here following the link from
Anyway, guess I just wanted to say hi. HI!! If you'd ever like someone else to chat with also, let me know. *sheepish*
Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-21 09:39 am (UTC)You asked about fic - Nenya's fic is on ff.net here. She writes epic, extremely character-intensive Kaiba/Yami yaoi, which I recommend if you like either char, even if you don't generally go for that pairing. Her stories are as much about Kaiba coming to terms with himself as they are about romance (and she writes an awesome Mokuba, too!)
(I also - because I'm shameless - must mention I write fic myself, found here. My stories are gen, mostly focused on the Kaiba brothers.)
Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-21 04:14 pm (UTC)like you couldn't tell LOL.I've actually come to a much greater appreciation for Kaiba than I had in the beginning. For a long time, all I had to go on was the early anime, and dub at that, and he's an almost irredeemable ASS the way 4Kids primarily seems to portray him. It wasn't until I started reading the manga and found sources for the original Japanese content of the anime that I started to give Kaiba another look, and I've been really impressed by who I personally refer to sometimes as "the real Kaiba" as opposed to dub-Kaiba. Original-Kaiba shows a lot more growth and movement in his character throughout the series that dub-Kaiba seems to. So, yeah, while he's not my favorite, per se, I've certainly grown to love him! Just that I identify with Yugi and Yami both more, and feel I share character traits with each of them more than anyone else in the series. But then, everyone's different. "To each, his own." I LOVE reading in-depth discussions on any character because it helps me to understand and appreciate that character all the more myself.And it helps in my own portrayals of the characters in the stories that /I/ write while we're on the subject of shameless plugs - LOL! I don't know how to do a hyperlink in a reply like this, but I'm also on FF.net. "DragonDancer1014" For some reason, searching that name will not bring back a match, but if you search "DragonDancer" it will come back with something like five or six pennames, mine being one of them. Just in case you're interested. *sheepish grin*
*scampers off to save Nenya's and Xparrot's bio pages for later looksy*
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Date: 2006-05-09 07:08 pm (UTC)*Grin* Thank you, I reaally like this particular thought, although I'm not so certain about Saito. I am now almost 99% certain that Seto and Mokuba's original family name was Shinomori.
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Date: 2006-05-10 08:26 am (UTC)(The other problem is, if Seto = Aoshi, then Mokuba = Misao, and the poor boy's tired of being cast as a chick...)
I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-05 04:18 am (UTC)親友 [しんゆう]
n. close friend; bosom (old, intimate) friend; buddy; crony; chum; (P)
...the image/idea/concept of the two as close friends is interesting.
Re: I also got a name!
Date: 2006-05-05 07:06 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-09 07:13 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-10 08:37 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-09 09:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-10 08:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-09 03:48 pm (UTC)pr0npaid accountsgraphics. ^_^;;;no subject
Date: 2006-05-09 07:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-09 07:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-10 08:53 am (UTC)shamelesslyopen to bribery - at least the Q&A interview doesn't seem to have anything about Bakura, that I could see. The character guide in the first half of the book does have a couple pages on them, but I'm not sure if what's there is anything more than what's already in the manga...could give 'em a look after I finish the Q&A, though ^^no subject
Date: 2006-05-09 10:29 pm (UTC)^^
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Date: 2006-05-10 08:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-10 03:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 06:25 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-10 10:43 pm (UTC)Thank you so much for composing and posting this. I always love to hear the opinions of others, and being on my favourite character from a comic series that I've spent a lot of time and money on...well, that just makes my day, doesn't it?
Now, I generally like shounen series in spite of the themes and tropes; this notion of the "fighting spirit" and it is a means of philosophy and communication still seems, after a few years of enjoying characters from various series...a little corny.
But there's fodder here for a more conventional psychological reading of Kaiba, helped by the "conditioning" via Gozaburo's suicide, and the mention of "going strange". That's just how I prefer to see Kaiba, really. In terms of mental instability instead of just being that way because he has to fit the character type of The Rival, considered as an individual apart from all the characters like him that have come before.
Somehow Kaiba has become a very complex character in my mind, which I feel a bit insecure about, given all the flaws that I can see in the source material, but something like this helps set me at ease a bit. I might even start work again on that large character analysis piece that I started last year.
Thank you again. Much love. :)
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Date: 2006-05-11 06:32 am (UTC)Would love to see that char analysis when you do it! I've been working on one for Kaiba myself for the past year; he's become one of my all-time fave chars, so... ^^
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Date: 2006-05-11 09:41 pm (UTC)I'm glad you seem so confident; and I guess if, from the many, many characters I love, I chose Kaiba to be one of the big guns, there's got to be something coming from the source material. I like to think I'm a canon stickler at heart, or at least I've grown into one through years of fandom.
Heh. I feel that I've written enough about Kaiba (two or three essays, each on a certain topic) that I should work on something else, plus being interested in the series for four years when my friends have all left it makes me feel a little lonely and decrepit. But we'll see...
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Date: 2006-05-23 05:11 am (UTC)-dragonwrangler
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Date: 2006-12-02 02:18 am (UTC)(Also, your fic simply rocks. But you should know that from the reviews I left on FFN.)
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Date: 2006-12-13 05:33 am (UTC)