The Official Anime & Manga Thread Vol: 三


I would be hyped if the trailer has:
Inner universe or Rise by Origa
Motoko pulling the helicopter
The sniper scene with colliding bullets

I had high expectations for this because of Rurouni Kenshin. But hollywood gonna hollywood.
 
I think I mentioned this previously, but on reddit, one poster has been doing an in-depth character analysis for ToG characters, starting with Baam. He finally finished Baam, so I figured I'd share for anyone who is interested or wants another perspective on the series. It's long.

Part 1 is good to read if you're wonder why you should pick up the series as it doesn't really have spoilers and discusses what makes the main character unique and the story to an extent. 

Part 1:
Baam

It is without a doubt the case that Baam is the most interesting character in all of ToG, when considering just how well-written and unique he is.

Many could argue Khun and Rachel as another two extremely interesting characters, however, they have fairly “normal” character narratives. The lost man looking to find light again and a girl filled with jealousy. These are good narratives, but they pale in comparison to Baam’s main narrative: the case study of “your environment shapes what you become”.

In a sense, Baam is such an amazing character, because the entire story of Tower of God was clearly created to study his case. A case that is fairly rarely studied in literature and requires EXTREMELY specific parameters to make possible. SIU has already shown in many instances that ToG is essentially a tool for him to tell specific character stories. He has never put much emphasis on the small details(environment wise) and has created a universe where extremely specific cases can be explored while still making sense in said universe. Abstraction is the key word here. Something that light novels tend to lack EXTREMELY. (The absolute must-mention exceptions being Monogatari and HakoMari, which anyone interested in character-driven stories MUST READ). So what exactly is this case?

What happens when you separate a newborn from all of society, all it’s laws, all it’s paradigms and then, once the newborn has developed enough to make his own decisions, release him back into this society. The concept being studied here is that there is no such thing as “natural talent” or "preferences", but everything depends on the environment of the individual while growing up. As an example, a son of a CEO is likely to get the highest quality education possible and as such, develop at a much more rapid and correct way than someone who has not had access to such education. The talent portion of this narrative is explored in ToG extensively. Another, more interesting way to look at it is that if you were to take a person and not expose him to any of the world’s evil, he would inherently never develop evil. This goes very very far back and I don’t have the education to discuss at further length the entire concept of inherent evil so that’s as far as I will go in that.

What makes Baam’s case unique in this study is that he is isolated from ALL paradigms of society. Not just concepts of good or evil, but also base concepts like skills, education and so forth. He is basically not given any “input” and as such, cannot “configure” himself into some sort of state (programming terms, ask in the comments if you want me to clarify on this part).  

And on top of all that, once this “white-canvas” person is brought back into society to watch the interaction, he also is given an ADVANTAGE over all of society. This is possibly the most interesting part, the fact that he, in a sense, is THE natural talent. SIU plays with the concept of “you get shaped by your environment” to create his personality, but at the same time, introduces the concept of talent, which, by the theory, should not be possible.

The key here is that Baam likely doesn’t have any specific talent, but, rather, is simply “given” the advantage by the environment(tower). Here you can branch out into any number of theories as to what the origin of Baam’s power is. Maybe the Tower, as an entity, decided to “give” him access to power or maybe he was created to have it from the start. Or maybe his lack of exposure to the environment simply made him have an “unbroken” bond with Shinsoo and that spiraled into everything else. Which is it, is not the point though. The point is that he starts out with a huge advantage over society, while being fundamentally different from it. What does he do?

So at this point, we would be leaving the “cave” and entering the Tower. Almost every reader should now be screaming – BUT WHAT ABOUT RACHEL? And this is where it gets REALLY interesting.

Essentially, Rachel, as a character, has multiple purposes and one of these, that often gets overlooked, is that she gave Baam some form of teaching into how humans behave. If there was no Rachel and Baam was brought into the tower, he would essentially be a monkey. Zero education. It is just the case that we cannot have an ENTIRELY clean-slate character. It simply wouldn’t be able to interact with society then. We need to give said character a sort of “interface” or “connection” with society. Rachel acts as this interface. If ToG had a different setting, a computer could have done the same, however, here is the key detail : by having another human teach our character, we introduce a SLIGHT bit of corruption in him. We give him a SLIGHT configuration. Make him be a white canvas, but with one small brush of paint on a corner. A sort of “pre-configuration”.

Something to push him in a direction. Those who study artificial intelligence might now start thinking about machine learning. The idea behind machine learning is that you can give it an input, but you also need to give it some sort of “push” in a direction so it would know what exactly to learn. Some sort of “score” or “goal”.

Rachel is exactly that sort of push. She is a slight corruption in Baam that makes him move in a certain direction that those who created him, would want him to move in.

Think back to every single moment when Baam as a character felt negative. Here’s a hint – every single one involved Rachel in some form. That’s the beauty of it. We do not have a perfect case study of the perfect AI, because it would lead to nothing. It is because he has this negative aspect that he is able to move forward. That he moves out of the cave.

In one way, Baam is really the human analogy of artificial intelligence based on machine learning. Grand, is it not?

This concludes Part 1 of my analysis on Baam. This is a great stopping point, since I essentially only spoke about Chapter 0 of the webtoon taken in the context of the entire story so far. If I were to write more, I would need to start rereading every chapter for sources. It would be the start of analyzing his interactions with other characters.
Part 2:
Part 1 was entirely focused on the origins of Baam. Not in the sense of plot, but character. 1F serves to further develop his initial personality and really sets the general tone of his "white canvas", it serves to show in what ways he is not entirely white.

I’ve now realized that even two parts are not going to be enough in the slightest, unless I was to write over 5000 words in one post, which is madness. So I’m limiting part 2 entirely to 1F of the tower.

1F

There are three points about 1F that really stood out to me when it came to Baam’s character.

1.The moment Baam was told of the potential outcomes of his first test, he instantly made the decision to proceed.

There was absolutely no hesitation whatsoever. In a way, Baam was almost like a machine. The moment he knew his options – he made his decision, which was entirely focused on Rachel – do whatever it takes to reach her and protect her from harm. This actually goes well with my analogy of artificial intelligence in part 1. Baam is really, REALLY goal-focused and does not stray. This hasn’t changed thought out the entire story. One could allude this to the idea that being stuck in a cave for the entire first part of your life might make you a bit timid. I tend to agree with that concept and to expand on it more: if a person doesn’t see much color in his life, he never really develops an affinity for one. Rachel was his only color in that cave, so his affinity for her reached MAX levels, but when it comes to personal likes, dislikes and so forth. He just never had the chance to develop these traits. This really brings out the question of how much of our personalities are defined by our surroundings. If there are certain colors in our lives, is it not a very real possibility that we would lean towards those colors? Or even the opposite – completely get sick of them and look for the opposite. Whichever option, the fact stays that the people and the environment by which one is surrounded as he grows up, heavily define what sort of person he becomes. A lot of characters in ToG are used to explore this narrative. It's by no means limited to Baam.

2.He initially rejected Yuri’s help.

This is very interesting, because it shows that upon entering the tower, Baam already had a sense of selflessness. He knew that this was his problem and did not feel the need to drag anyone with him. It’s clearly a trait that Rachel had already instilled in him. Of course, eventually he does accept the help, but the fact that he hesitated, in my opinion, is very noteworthy. It mostly leads into point 3.

3.Baam did not hesitate to harm the eel in the water tank.

Now this leads into the flashback between 1F and 2F. Basically, in the flashback Baam asks why people fight and Rachel answers : To protect the ones they care for. What’s important here is that upon entering the tower, Baam’s mindset towards fighting is very clear : you fight only to protect the ones you care for, but you fight. Baam had no hesitation in harming the eel. Now I can’t say if it’s simply because it was not a human, given 2F, but there was a clear act of aggression from Baam. Baam’s instant decision was to harm it. Now this is a very big character trait of Baam that is being explored all the way to the current chapters. In the Revolution Road, Baam is questioned upon his ideal to fight the people who oppose him. Before this time, Baam had not been considering the idea that to go up, he had to drag someone down. The idea that him pursuing his goals is still, in a way, selfish. In the name hunt station Baam very clearly expresses that he is fighting solely because his friends were harmed. Fighting to protect the people he cares for. It’s a trait that Rachel developed in Baam from the very, very beginning and one that Baam is now starting to become very self-concious about.

This trait is also why Black March and Yuri instantly went head over heels for him. The guy’s sole purpose in life is to protect the woman he cares for. How do you NOT fall for that? It’s hilarious, since Rachel basically made him into someone like that. Maybe Rachel was making the perfect partner in that cave? Backfired hard. (I’m partially joking, there is further depth to why Yuri follows Baam, but I feel like certain plot developments need to happen in the current story to tell for sure).

Regarding the eel further, many could easily now argue how in 2F Baam did not show any of these aggressive traits and the eel thing is hardly relevant but I feel like these is a very distrinct difference between the eel test and the rest in that Baam was, as Evan put it, fighting on instinct there. He did not see any other options and picked the single one that existed. In the following chapters, for one, Baam was heavily outmatched and secondly – he wasn’t being pressured into a single solution of fighting. The takeaway here is that Baam can really be extremely rutheless when push comes to shove. This is something that gets explored quite heavily in the Hell Train arc and I believe that the "power" has analogical meanings alluding to all this. More on that when we get there.

To conclude, the main point of 1F when we consider the current story is that Baam’s limited idealogies were defined by Rachel. There ideals that many perceive extremely positively that he had from the very, very beginning. Baam has kept a lot of these ideals in him for the entirety of the story and is only now starting to change them. On top of all that, we also saw glimses of these animalistic instincts in him, where he would go full fight or flight. Something really interesting to consider when we watch how he has been changing over the course of the story.

Now some could argue that what I wrote here heavily contradicts what I wrote in Part 1. That I went from analyzing how Baam is a white canvas to someone who actually has a lot of characteristics and is heavily defined. The argument against that is that these traits are really some of the more core human traits. There are extremely idealistic traits that are much closer to philosophical beliefs that society tends to rip out of people. They're primal, in a way. It's a very abstract argument to go over so if someone really wants to go into this discussion, ask in the comments and I'll try to expand my reasoning.

That concludes Part 2. In Part 3 I’ll conclude all of S1, because the first two parts says most of the initial story that needs to be told. All that is left now is to explore how he changes over the course of the seasons. That post will be long as hell, because I want to fit the whole floor into it and that’s over 90 chapters.
Part 3:
Part 3 covers the entirety of S1(~2800 words so you've been warned). Rereading it, I have also noticed quite a few plot details that I hadn’t considered in previous rereads. Especially about FUG’s early plays and Rachel’s POV. However, trying to stay true to the series purpose – to analyze characters, I won’t be going over them. The point of this post is to go over how Baam interacts with 2F and to learn more about his character and how how he changes over the course of S1. I’ll be going along the plot chronologically. Let’s get to it!

2F

First test

2F starts with the flashback of Baam asking why people fight and Rachel answering that it is to protect the ones they care for. We already went over how this relates to the eel test and Baam’s coldblooded approach to the test. The first test of 2F emphasizes this more, but also reveals how this side of Baam only comes up when he is pushed to that single solution.

The test started with Baam running for his life and then facing off against some “poly-eyed” race opponent. What is very important to notice is that Baam figured out that the test requires killing and instantly made a run for it. Yet again, like in the eel test, he only saw the obvious solution that people would need to fight to continue. At the same time, Khun told the reader how the test could be passed by making allies while the others kill each other. Baam hadn’t even considered this. Furthermore, he instantly made the decision to fight the “poly-eyed” race opponent.

Now this time is more interesting than the eel test, since Khun shows up and tells Baam how the poly-guy is pacifist. That lead to Baam putting his weapon away. So from this sequence we learn that when presented with a kill that is OPTIONAL, Baam does not proceed. This shows that his initial cold-bloodedness only shows up when he is acting on instinct or doesn’t know of another option. On a purely rational level, he is completely human and respects human life.

The second important point is Baam’s encounter with Rak. Here, Rak challenges Baam to a fight and Baam, after finding out why Rak wants to fight – to fight a strong opponent, drops his weapon. This is a HUGE detail. Like, astronomically big.

Baam’s decision was based on a single idea – remove the opponent’s purpose to fight. Until now, we only knew that Baam was very instinctual, but this reveals that Baam is actually extremely clever. It also shows that he has a high level of empathy. For someone stuck in a cave for his entire life, to have such strong empathy is pretty insane. Just how did he achieve this? In my eyes, what happened is that Baam, at this point, had Rachel as his main role model of what a person should be like. As such, because he could understand her pretty well after all those years in the cave, he would apply the same principles to everyone around him in the actual tower. This also heavily alludes to the idea that Baam is a genius. Using Rachel as a model, Baam had already developed a skillset of how to analyze and react to another person’s motivations.

The following sequence is of Rak trying to pierce Baam and Khun saving him with the knife. Baam instantly makes a run for Rak right after. Yet again, we are reminded that Baam doesn’t seem to feel regular emotions that a person would feel in a near-death situation. Selflessness is likely to be one part of it, but another is that his mind is simply super focused. He doesn’t get distracted and only focused on what he has to do.

The test finishes and at this point in time we can make a conclusion about Baam – he is extremely fit to climb the tower. It’s crazy that this conclusion is now so obvious. When I had first read the webtoon and even the 2nd time, it always looked like Baam was extremely weak and powerless. But now, looking at the story as a whole, it’s clear that upon entering the tower, Baam’s character was PERFECT to go up. People go up this tower to pursue their goals. Baam’s empathic thinking, extremely good instincts, and cleverness all come together to create a well-oiled machine that could pass any test thrown his way. The greatest core idea here is that the people who climb up the tower, all have their specific limitations. They are all “human” in that they can feel fear, be corrupted, tricked, go down a bad path, lack trust. So on and so forth. When we consider a ranker and a regular, we can always see that rankers are extremely open-minded people. They feel oddly pure in a way. Almost as if they spent a thousand years honing themselves under a waterfall. Atleast I get this feeling watching a lot of rankers. It’s not the out-layer (like being eccentric and such), but their inner monologues and decisions being made in situations. Baam, as a character, had no limitations that a non-ranked would often show. He had the brains and he had the instincts and he had THE PERSONALITY, that was so uncorrupt, that people would WANT him as an ally. This is a very big point. Khun CHOSE Bam, because he instantly noticed how truthful he was. He noticed that Baam was oddly pure and unfit for this place. The ally that will NEVER betray you. He even had Black March to be a power-buffer for him. The only two downsides that we were shown by that point were: 1. Lack of knowledge and 2. Naivety.

Now wouldn’t it be super convenient to now have his undergo a one month training arc where he would get all the initial knowledge needed to get started in improving his skillset followed by a series of tests that revolve around betrayal from all directions. Every time I reread 2F I discover a new way in which it was completely rigged.

Crown Game

There is one very noteworthy point in this game.

Anak rushes into Baam’s chamber after sensing Black March and makes a bet over the Black March and Green April. Baam’s initial decision is to refuse her bet, because he doesn’t want to risk the Black March, nor endanger his allies. What is cool here, is that his decision, as might have initially looked logical, was not based on the fact that he might potentially lose his weapon - his only source of any power, but actually harm the people that have helped him. In this situation, he is putting his efficiency of climbing the tower behind others. Of course, the two are not mutually exclusive here, but that wasn’t his mindset and that is what counts. We also get a flashback right after of Rachel teaching Baam to never betray anyone, ever. Yet another trait put in him. This short sequence establishes Baam’s loyalty towards others. A man of his word.

We then get the symbolic image of Baam with the crown looking completely out of place followed by the reunion with Rachel by jumping off the throne to save her from Ryun.

Nothing too noteworthy here, apart from the clear distinction that if the decision involves Rachel directly, Baam picks her over his allies. I’m confident that he would have done the same even if his jump would have ment Khun and Rak getting executed or something.

Rounding up the “initial Baam setting”

Up to this point I have analyzed every single encounter that Baam has had in the webtoon over the first 27 chapters. It might seem excessive and some details were, of course, obvious. However, going forward, when we start to look at his character changes, I feel like it is extremely important to really pin-point what character traits Baam started out with and which of them were developed by Rachel and which Baam developed inherently from living in a cave, disconnected from society. I feel like this difference between the two is where Rachel really gets caught off-guard. The first huge such clash happens in the following monologue that Baam has after waking up from his mini coma.

“A beautiful sky and stars? Freedom? What’s all that? I don’t care about those things.”

“I care about you more than all of those stupid things, Rachel”

It’s without the doubt the case that these two lines of monologue are extremely important. They signal a few things:

Baam does not understand Rachel’s wish to see the stars.

The key here is purely the fact that Baam has a limited outlook. I previously told how Baam was heavily empathic and used that to trick Rak and that remains true, but understanding someone’s motivations is not the same as understanding the reason behind said motivations. In that sense, Baam understood that Rak wanted to fight stronger opponents, but it didn’t need to make sense to Baam. The point that he did was all that mattered.

Similarly, here, Baam understands Rachel’s desire to see the stars, but he doesn’t understand the reason behind it. He can’t really, for he has already achieved happiness by being with Rachel. He does not need anything else and so he assumes that Rachel shouldn’t too.

This leads to point two.

Because Rachel was the person that saved Baam, she had become something of an Angel to him. He, who had absolutely nothing to grab hold of, when presented with a hand, took it as nothing short of god’s help. A divine blessing. A landing of an angel. That initial figure from the very first chapter of Rachel falling from the sky, while looking metaphorical of an angel descending, was exactly that in the eyes of Baam. He truly saw her as an angel.

And many might now think that Baam still sees Rachel as a deity-like figure of worship to this day. The answer to this gets presented in the following arc. It is the start of Baam’s very first big character development.

As Rachel pointed out herself a chapter earlier, Baam was extremely lonely. He did not have Rachel from the start, but began being alone in that cave for god knows how long. This lead to Rachel becoming his saving grace, his angel.

However, there is a big point here in that it’s not entirely just Rachel specifically that Baam values. It’s just as much the human connection. It’s around this time that Baam starts to have his lunch breaks with the teams, to collect the names of friends, to learn about Shinsoo and discuss it with his fellow students. This entire sequence is where Baam starts to change. Rather, he EXPANDS his value system from being just Rachel, to human connection. A value that is ENTIRELY lost within the tower. A value that Rachel herself had lost. All those warm moments, the memories that Baam was making, were of extreme value to him. They were his first steps into a new world, showing that it is not all bloodshed. Atleast that is how Baam sees it.

This leads to the infamous Hide and Seek game. Also known as the Betrayal Games. This arc is where Baam undergoes some incredible character development.

Hide and Seek

Skipping all the irrelevant parts to our narrative, the first big part is when Baam is with Androssi and some other teammates and they all turn on them. This part featured an incredible dialogue sequence that perfectly depicts the tower’s corruption and Baam’s purity.

I HIGHLY recommend rereading chapters 47 and 48. It’s absolutely incredible to read the lines being told by Androssi and Baam so many years ago and to contrast it with how the situation is currently in the Name Hunt Station.

The main dialogue starts with Androssi telling Baam how people only care about their goals and not about each other.

Baam points out how he does not understand why they all fight, if they do not hate each other. This distinction is very important, for Baam’s belief is that you can only fight to protect the people precious to you. At the start of the webtoon, this person was Rachel, but over the time frame of the 30-50 chapters, he had expanded this view to all friendships. He had now shifted his belief from only thinking of Rachel to thinking of all lives close to him as important.

He has diverged away from his initial state that Rachel set. Diverged away from being purely brainwashed to follow her and now sees others as people of importance. People that make up his world.

Contrast this with the two lines of monologue and the difference is clear. This was a clear character development of Baam. I do not want to believe that it was inconsistent writing from SIU, because he has managed to pull off many developments of such level on different characters in similar lengths of time. It’s truly fantastic writing.

We then follow up with Baam catching up to Hon, holding Rachel hostage. Skipping past the actual plot details, right after the entire barnacle, Baam shouts and runs to stop Hon when he tries to commit suicide. Yet again, showing just how much he values other people now, even someone who threatened his most precious person. It wasn’t that Baam didn’t realize that Hon did something horrible, but he wanted to trust that people can’t be all that rotten and there can be hope. He put that much value in a life.

Right after that sequence, Androssi comes up and asks Baam why he follows Rachel and one of his greatest lines comes up:

“When people lose the things they cherish; they lose their reason to live”

I think this line speaks for itself. Baam changed his thinking from wanting to take Rachel back at all costs to actually understanding that she too is a human that has her own ambitions and so he respects them.

This automatically also counters all the theories that suggest that when Baam went ape**** in the first hell train station, he had shown his true colors. It’s now clear that the Thorn had picked up on his PAST selfish and one-sided outlook where he did not consider Rachel’s wishes and used those to take over his mind. In that moment of “let’s go back to the cave, Rachel”, Baam was acting as the Baam pre-tower. As the Baam who was still in the cave and had no met new people and gained a new outlook. I have some pet theories about what the Thorn represents there, but it's still a bit foggy. One idea that I enjoy is that that image of Baam saying "Unnaceptable" was from Rachel's perspective. We'll come back to this later.

Seeing how people showed their dark side for the sake of passing the test, Baam had come to a realization that people really care about their goals more than anything. Baam now understands that Rachel’s wish to see the stars is of great importance to her. That it is her goal and he has now seen where these goals can take people. He still believes that Rachel is the almighty purity, but has now seen her as more human. As a person with ambitions that he has to respect.

This then leads to Baam deciding to be Rachel’s legs and go up the tower with her. Only to be brutally betrayed one arc later. What follows is, in my opinion, the strongest 4 chapters(75-79) of the entire webtoon. These two panels 1  2are where I became a ToG fan for life.

And with that, Character Analysis : Baam (Part 3) is finished.

I believe that this decision to start Baam’s character analysis from the very beginning and analyze all the early encounters of S1 was worthwhile. It has really better framed how Baam’s character was defined by Rachel at the start and how he was affected by being separated from society for all those years. We also get a better grasp of how his character underwent changes in the middle of season 1. We built a sort of framework to better understand how he changes over the course of the webtoon.

One of the main principles that I went by while writing parts 1-3 was to completely ignore the actual plot and focus entirely on Baam’s mind. Writing over 5k words about a character while not talking about the plot of the actual story is pretty crazy and I think it was possibly only because of how complex Baam’s character is. In the following parts, I will now be starting to discuss the plot more, because we’ve dissected the core ideas of the character and S2 is much more plot focused. I am hoping to conclude Baam over the next 1 or 2 parts and then dive into Rachel. Am extremely excited to get to the Hell Train and, more specifically, the Rice Pot.
Part 4:
Part 4 is entirely about the first half of S2 – everything up to the Hell Train Arc. This is the time where Baam goes over a lot of character development and features some of the best chapters of the webtoon. I had a joy rereading the webtoon and writing this.

Resurrection

We closed off with Ryun extending her hand to Baam. The hand that we learn that he initially rejected. To really understand what is going on in Baam’s head at this point in time, we just have to try and imagine ourselves in that situation. Imagine that you are driving on the road with your loved one or family member. The most dear person to you. You’re sitting besides him and suddenly, without any warning, the person opens the car’s doors and pushes you out and drives off. He then proceeds to not reply to any of your calls. How do you think you would feel? Obviously confused. You would not believe that you got betrayed or left. You would think that it was some sort of accident or that the person had an extremely important reason behind it. You spent your entirely life believing in this person. Having spent your entire life believing in this person, you have absolute trust in him. You cannot possibly even THINK about betrayal as an option. If you did – it would mean your belief in the person was not entirely unconditional.

That’s what Baam is going through. To him, Rachel is the closest person to a mother and she is way above even that. Rachel is the person that saved him from the void. From eternal loneliness. It is unthinkable to even consider betrayal for him.

Yet everyone around him is telling him that that is exactly what she did. Confusion. Confusion. Confusion.

EDIT: Another point that I hadn't initially mentioned is that by accepting Rachel's betrayal, Baam would also be rejecting all the ideals that Rachel put in him. Remember that Rachel shaped Baam's initial outlook. If Baam were to accept that she, who preached of kindness and fighting to protect the ones you care for, suddenly betrayed him, his entire belief system would collapse. His inner coping mechanism simply can't accept this fact yet and so he rejects this reality. Atleast at that specific point in time. It's a natural reaction.

FUG, seeing that their initial plan was not going to work, not realizing just how dear Rachel is to Baam, use their trump card – hostages.

They already figured out from the test that Baam had developed an ideal that the human connection is paramount. They use his greatest strength as a person against him. It’s ironic. The thing that makes you shine in the pit of darkness is the thing that predators use to hunt you down. The source of light is light not only to the person creating the light, but also the people looking for him.

Baam finds new determination to climb the tower, but this time, not for Rachel, but to protect his friends. As a side note, Jinsung notices this abuse of Baam’s light and nearly backs off. He realizes that they would be ruining a life by following up on their plan on this boy. The ultimate sacrificial idealism.

5 years later, Baam has changed a quite a lot.

He has become colder, less naïve and is starting to lose his light. Baam has died and Viole has been born.

While he did not reject Wangnan’s proposal to not fight on the first test, at the end of the day, he heartlessly foughtall of them.

We then got the scene with the lobster  and following my belief that everything in TOG has symbolism behind it, so too does the lobster.

The best way I can explain this analogy is by using another analogy. Going back to the idea of Baam’s white canvas, I believe that over the last 5 years, it’s as if FUG took one small and delicate paintbrush and dipped it in some blood colored paint. They then proceeded to leave a dot on one corner of the canvas. One bright red blood dot that feels completely out of place with the rest of the developing painting. A slight corruption. It is a fact that Baam did not want teammates in fear of them going into FUG’s hands to be used as further hostages, but he still acted completely heartlessly towards his opponents and his numbness is a fact. The following is an abstract from one of SIU’s blogs which was released in this arc.
Personally, I don't think Viole is that gentle. He is kind, but umm... Rather than a sense of justice, it's more like he acts according to what he himself thinks and believes. That's one side of him. It was planned to be like that from the beginning.

Now, the goal of finding Rachel has become diluted, so that side of him couldn't be expressed as well,
Click to expand...
SIU himself states that Viole is not the same person as Baam in that his personality has changed. His goals have also lost clarity. He is losing sight of his road. The lobster is a representation of that.

We then get the Trusted Room test which concludes with Wangnan showcasing how you do a weak character with big ambitions RIGHT. At the end of this arc we have a scene where Viole and Wangnan are going to Lurker’s room to finish the test and Wangnan goes all out on Lurker, since he killed Nio. An amazing scene with an extreme amount of raw emotion. In the end Wangnan chooses to not kill Lurker and following that we have a dialogue of Viole and Wangnan in which Viole asks him why he forgave Lurker. This is the key point of the entire arc when it comes to Baam. He actually asks Wangnan WHY he FORGAVE Lurker. Viole is a character that can now understand revenge as a rational trait. This is how far Baam had started to fall. However, Wangnan then saves the day and says some of the best words in the entire webtoon. Followed by this incredible phrase. It is at this point that Baam resurrects. He realizes how far he has been straying from his path and at the same time, begins to understand FUG’s reasoning behind it all. He is starting to understand what people fight for.

Following Wangnan’s arc, we get Wool’s Knot – the arc featuring one of Rachel’s most important scenes and a lot of important Ryun & Jinsung moments. Followed by Zigena’s flower. I’m not going into any of that, since they don’t feature character development when it comes to Baam.

The Workshop Battle

Ah yes. The workshop battle. Where everything comes together.

The arc opens with one of Emily’s “followers” getting chased by a bot and Baam running to help him. It’s nice to see how Baam is saving people at this point and not ignoring the guy outright. I’m confident that if there was no Wangnan in the previous arcs, he would not have done anything here.

We follow with the bullet game and there is a single super important point in this mini arc. It’s this panel

The following panel had me in chills

Another very important point is that prior to this panel, Baam was fighting Leesoo’s guys and put himself in danger to protect Yuto. She then proceeded to do the same for him. It is later revealed that that was, in fact, Ryun. Baam didn’t know this at the time so it’s interesting that he risked himself to protect a random FUG member. I’m sure it’s partially because of his ideals and another part because he had developed an understanding with FUG. He can atleast understand their reasoning.

Skipping around, the next important detail is in chapter 72 when Baam has to pass the Plug test and “fake believers” try to clear a path for him.

Wangnan drops a very telling line about Viole. This goes back to how we’ve discussed that when fighting on instinct, Baam can become extremely ruthless.

We follow up with this amazing panel.

This panel was extremely strong in how it shows that Baam is not someone to be used. He has his own reasons and goals and will follow up on them. However, the main point of this panel was to emphasize that Baam does not like being known as Viole – the slayer god. He does not want that title of freeing everyone and working in their steed. This point is interesting in how his opinion on the matter is starting to change as we approach the name hunt station. This is one of the core narrative points and will be discussed in following-final part.

Interestingly enough, SIU’s quote earlier comes from this chapter’s afterword. I feel like it better applied to the 20F arc though.

Next we have Baam’s and Beta’s conversation. Here we are revealed that the ignition weapon inside Baam is a replica of the real thorn for him to get used to. This is where the line between plot and analogies starts to get very messy. I’m not really a fan of the thorn concept, just because I’m actually uncertain about it’s analogical meaning. There is a clear meaning, but there might be no meaning at all. It’s weird. I’ll go over it in the next part.

In the following chapter, this happened. I’ve reread ToG like 4-5 times and every single time this part just gets to me. It’s incredible. This is no battle shonen webtoon. Never ever mistake it for it. We also had this part. Tons of Androssi fans were born here.

We follow up with the actual final game of the arc and chapter 88 where Rak was super cool wrecking FUG people had an interesting line in the afterword:
Looks like Rak was the star of this chapter [sup][sup].[/sup][/sup]  Rak is a character that is very convenient to utilize. He doesn't use his head or hide feelings inside, so I don't need to think too much about his character when I'm planning. Of course, he's difficult to draw when he gets big. Hehe Personally, I enjoy giving life to characters through personalities and auras, so I try to find roles and styles to match the individuals’ personalities.

Of course, this is especially true for our protagonist. Even though he did not make an appearance in this chapter, it’ll be soon. Haha.
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It’s something to keep in mind for people who think that I tend to overthink time to time.

In the following chapter we had an amazing monologue by Baam.

Nothing to really comment here. Just a realization by our protagonist.

Following that, Baam gets thorn and meets with Ryun, which features another great piece of dialogue. Baam chooses his friends. An obvious answer, but it’s interesting how Ryun follows up on him. She knows that he might still develop the reason to fight Zahard himself. She believes in him and his personality. The fact that Baam is the type of person who could not bear to watch injustice and will fight for what is right. Baam’s final lines in the chapter  also heavily express that he has now found his place to belong in. This moment is extremely important, because before it – Baam was content being Viole and felt no reason to live, but to protect his friends from harm. The difference here is that he doesn’t want to be apart from them. He can see they love him and wants to love them back. He wants to be with the people he loves and is ready to put everything on the line to achieve it. It’s not the same as his mentality under the name of Viole. A big development.

Following that, we have the Baam x Beta battle that concludes with yet another powerful line from Baam. Baam now fully comprehends the emotion of revenge. He also comprehends how people need to vent out their frustrations. It’s really amazing how smart he is. It’s this fact that Baam can understand what is going on in people’s heads that really elevate him as an amazing protagonist that is not just muscle and heart, but also brain. The full package. He’s almost too good. Has to have a downside. And he does.

The chapter’s afterword was again, quite telling:
The main character must win, but the antagonist has a point!" is what I hear;;; In truth, Viole is right. There's nothing Beta can get out of hurting Viole, and even though Viole appears soft, he is, unexpectedly, quite the stubborn character, haha so I think his words would have been quite painful to Beta.
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The following chapter is even more important, because it has direct analogical meaning when it comes to Rachel.

Rather than linking a panel, I am just linking the specific chapter on webtoons.

Please go read it all and then come back to this post.

So this is driving into the main narrative of Baam and Rachel. The narrative that Baam had absolutely nothing, but Rachel inside the cave, but when he left into the tower, he had discovered so much more. He had created new bonds to cherish and had seen a world of unimaginable beauty and unimaginable unfairness at the same time. This entire chapter is ment to express how Baam has now found an new meaning in life. He has a meaning to live now and people he has to protect – the people that he cares for that have followed him all the way to this workshop battle. All of Season 1 and the first 100 chapters of S2 come together into this one single chapter of Baam having reached a new point in his life. A point of meaning.

Alright, one last stretch and we’re done with this part!

So following the Beta battle, we had the final boss battle reveal and Baam’s reaction.

Khun says how Baam “never changes”. But I will keep living in my imaginary bubble and believe that it’s because Baam is much more intimate with Ryun. She is the person that had forced so much hardship on him, but also the person that reuinited him with everything that she had taken away. She had become a very special entity to Baam. Right after, we got a panel of Androssi, which I will continue to live in my bubble and believe was done on purpose to emphasize a rivalry. Sue me.

Come on, it’s something.

In the following battle, Baam says the line: “Your goal is an illusion made by your weakness”. In this sense, it’s clear that Baam is referring to the fact that rather than taking up arms themselves, they want someone else to do it for them. Just as Baam did not try everything in his power to reach Rachel, but just kept waiting for her to come to him.

As the battle reaches it’s climax, Reljefo shoots a few strong lines towards Baam. This panel is foreshadowing the start of the Revolution. Foreshadowing one of the things that Baam lacks. It goes well with SIU’s blog post that I quoted earlier. Reljefo really does have a good point here. His means are wrong, but the point is just.. Baam’s reaction is very telling. This is the start of what continues on as we enter the Hell Train arc – him realizing how messed up the world is and how he has the power to make a change.

Conclusion

Over the course of the first half of S2, we see Baam’s incredible array of changes. We see him lose himself due to Rachel’s betrayal and the evil means that FUG use to achieve their goal. We see him resurrect back into Baam due to the acts of his new teammates, especially Wangnan – the person who has an ideal that Baam is starting to see himself. We see him develop new goals and finally lose his selflessness. He finally has a new meaning to live for. He has developed into a person that loves and is loved by someone other than Rachel and is fully aware of the fact. A complete person.

Finally, our protagonist, while doing so, starts to see the injustice of this tower. He starts to see how wrong it is and that another way is possible. A way that he might just have the means to achieve.

The following Baam analysis post will be the final one. I will be going over the Hell Train Arc. This following part will be by far the hardest one, because I will need to tie it all back together to Rachel and then also go over the Thorn and the Rice Pot. Over the last two weeks, I’ve already changed my mind of what they represent once. It's going to take a lot of thinking and rereading those parts to really get the right idea across.
Final:


This part covers Baam’s narrative progression from The Revolution Road arc all the way to the start of The Name Hunt Station. All his main narratives are explored across this essay.

I will be referencing previous parts of the Character Analysis : Baam series across the essay, but it is not MANDATORY to have read those to understand the point of this one. Still, I highly encourage reading them if you want to get the entire picture, ESPECIALLY considering Rachel.

The essay consists of:

A short arc intro

Rachel

Thorn

Rice Pot

Conclusions

I only slightly touched Hoaqin across the essay and apart from that, it's super focused on analyzing the three plot devices.

-= The Hell Train arc =-

-Revolution Road Intro-

We finished part 4 at Baam’s victory against Reflejo. At that point in time, Baam had been showing clear signs of having found his place in life. Of having finally realized that he had people who love him that he could love back. People that could make up his world. At that exact point in time, Baam had been so emotional about having reunited with his friends that Rachel had completely slipped his mind. For that brief moment Baam had forgotten about her.

As we enter the Hell Train Arc, after the one year time skip it becomes instantly clear that something had gone wrong. Baam has started to get lost in thought. Almost lifeless. Rak being Rak, of course, notices this change. So what happened?

The person that actually triggered all this is no other than Hwa Ryun in this panel

Essentially, the Baam of Part 4 is the Baam that had been healing from the damage that Rachel’s betrayal had caused. Ryun reminded Baam of her existence and how he might meet her very soon. This made Baam start rethinking everything that had happened before. Old wounds started opening up again.

Finally, the absolute single most important panel of the Revolution Road intro is this one. This is where SIU foreshadows the first of three of Baam’s main character narratives entering this arc.

Baam had been working hard over the time skip to become stronger physically. Learning all forms of martial arts, learning new Shinsoo control techniques and so on. However, has Baam been able to become stronger mentally? Has his character improved to the point where he could face his greatest fear?

And so we start the Revolution Road.

-=Rachel – The Chain=-

The Train City tournament battle between Baam and Yura is the first point at which Baam starts to visibly show signs of having not grown stronger mentally. Yura challenges him to a bet for the tickets, saying she would tell Baam about Rachel. This in turn made Baam start making some of the most uncharacteristic moves since the story began. Baam started risking the well-being of his companions over a personal wish. All this shows just how important this meeting is. Just how important it is for Baam to meet Rachel.

So here we go : The first main narrative of Baam

If we were to think back to Part 2, the first things that comes up are the fact that Rachel was Baam’s everything. She was the supreme being, the angel that saved him from a state worse than death. She is also the person to engrave all of Baam’s initial beliefs and ideologies in him.

And so when we consider it all, is it not the case that Baam simply cannot cope with the betrayal?

It is not Rachel herself that Baam is stressed over. It’s the fact that she betrayed him. The fact that he DOESN’T KNOW if she really did it or not. Everyone in the world could tell you that the most precious person to you has betrayed you, but unless you will hear it from the person in question, you will never fully believe it. And until you have this proof, the thought will never, ever leave your mind.

This is the core issue. It’s the fact that Baam is simply unable to move on until he can get the final confirmation of why Rachel did what she did. He is being chained down by this betrayal.

If Baam was to meet Rachel, he would get one of two outcomes:

a.) Rachel tells him that she was FORCED to do it because of an external reason.

Considering how pure Baam is, it is not crazy to imagine that he would be able to justify such an answer. Hostages are his greatest weakness, is it not? It’s easy to imagine that Baam thought that Rachel might be in a similar situation.

b.) Rachel admits to having betrayed him for her selfish gains.

The problem with this answer is that Rachel has tought Baam everything that he knows about being a good person. At the same time, Baam has upmost belief in people and how they can change. And so if Baam was to accept Rachel’s betrayal, he would be rejecting all of the ideals that Rachel had instilled in him. This might sound crazy to the reader, but the reader is NOT pure like Baam. This is the big difference. Baam is pure to the point where he would not be able to comprehend that a person would have tought him everything about life and then not believe any of it. To accept that Rachel had been lieing to him for his entire life is… Unacceptable… He simply wouldn’t be able to cope with this.

So there is this constant clash in Baam’s mind. Being unable to move on as a person until he finds out why exactly did Rachel do it.

The thing with Part 4’s Baam is that at that point Baam didn’t know if he could ever meet her again. However now he has a clear opportunity ahead of him. This encounter is REAL and it is COMING. It’s like when you have to give a public speech in a month and you aren’t worried at all, but when it’s only one day left, you suddenly start to get very nervous. It takes extreme mental capacity to not be. That’s exactly what Ryun had been alluding to in the previous panel. Has Baam developed enough as a person mentally to be able to HANDLE the meeting. To be able to HANDLE the answer. The answer that he himself most definitely knows is likely to be betrayal.

And so the meeting happens and Baam shows us that he has not improved mentally. That he is NOT able to cope with it. He keeps clinging to the false hope that she didn’t do it. That his life is not a lie.

When Baam goes berserk, I believe it is him entering a mental-coping state. By being unable to cope with reality he does what would be analogues to getting drunk in real life. He rejects all of reality. His mind is simply unable to handle it.

The Thorn acts as the Knife that channels his anger and his rejection.

At the end of the encounter, Rachel pushes Baam down yet again. It’s at this exact moment that Baam finally accepts it. He realizes that she really did betray him. And it is this exact moment when his mind just goes blank. It’s at this point that he just wants everything to go away. His mind shuts down and he enters a coma as a coping mechanism.

And so this is the first narrative of Baam – accepting the fact that Rachel betrayed him and that her not following the ideals that she had instilled in Baam does not mean that said beliefs are false. Baam is unable to move on with his life as an individual until he can fully clear it all up. Until he can talk it out and understand why she did it. Rachel is like a chain that hold Baam down.

It’s not the person herself. It’s the betrayal. That’s the core premise.

-=Thorn – the Gun=-

Following the Rachel encounter, Baam goes into a three day coma and in that coma, the Thorn calls for him. It calls for him to draw out more power. To become strong.

The thorn is a test and a tool.

It is the second test that Baam faces on his Road to Revolution.

The following is my INTERPRETATION of the Thorn as a metaphor. I’m not saying it is what the author intended, but just my personal take on it. Everyone is free to have their own idea of what it really represents, but I’m very confident in that the core idea stays across all intepretations.

Imagine a swordsman living in the swordsman era that is suddenly given a gun. He can see that the gun is extremely powerful and that by using this gun, he could do anything. He could win every battle and become king.

How does the swordsman use the gun?

He could use it to beat everyone and become the king, sure. But would he really become the king? He would have gotten there walking the path of blood. Not for being more qualified than the current king, but by using an external force.

Such a path would be selfish and would not lead to a good king. A good king would get there with his own strength.

On the other hand, he could use the gun to make good. To bring piece to the land.

This is better, but still cheating. The concepts of good and evil are highly abstract. What seems evil to one, might be good from the perspective of another.

In this analogy, the swordsman should give up the gun. That would be the absolute most moral act.

The gun is like playing god. Only a god should have access to such a superior power.

And so following this analogy, Baam is our swordsman.

The Thorn is a tool that he could use to achieve anything, but it wouldn’t be by his own strength. The Thorn is tempting him. It is a test for Baam to not fall into it’s trap and stay true to his ideal.

It is also in line with the previous words of Ryun. The Thorn would boost Baam’s physical abilities, but it wouldn’t make him a stronger person. On the contrary, to give in to it’s power would be to give up one’s humanity.

And so over the course of the following chapters, Baam is fighting the Thorn. He is fighting the temptation to not become mad with power and to actually move forward with his own strength.

Now the final bit is where it gets most interesting.

The only person who should use such a power is God.

This directly correlates with the idea that Baam has a choice between persuing kingship and godhood. This is explored in much more depth in the name hunt station so I won’t dig deeper, but just keep the idea in mind.

As Baam nears the Horse Station to finally enter the train, we see him struggle to control the Thorn. Battling his inner demons.

It is also the case that this battle is also Baam trying to cope with the fact that Rachel betrayed him. He is trying to not lose his beliefs and stay true to his ideals as a human. To have faith in those ideals even if Rachel had betrayed them.

As Baam enters the Train, he seems to have taken control of the Thorn. He is no longer passing out and no longer spacing out. His increased combat abilities are a reflection of his increasing willpower.

This also goes back to one of the core principles of this type of story – one where the character is trying to find himself. It’s in these stories that as the character becomes increasingly more aware of himself and gets closer to his inner origin, he becomes stronger in the relative skill of that story. In TOG’s case that would be power-level. Baam gets stronger physically as he gets stronger mentally. The Thorn is used to explain it for plot’s sake.

After facing Hoaqin for the first time at the Horse Station, Baam enters the train and meets the God of Guardians and starts his journey into the Rice Pot.

-=Rice Pot – The Mirror=-

The Rice Pot training arc starts with this panel.

SIU decides that unlike with the Thorn, he’ll keep it very open here – the Rice Pot serves as a test to find one’s true individual self.

I will go over practically all of the panels of the Rice Pot and try and give my interpretation. Just like with The Gun, it’s just my interpretation and anyone else could have their own completely different one and it would most likely still be valid.

The first notable panel is this.

This chain of thought is what lead to Baam meeting the demon within him. It can be considered as progress so we can make a safe assumption that Baam train of thought is correct to approach one’s self.

In these panels, Baam is reflecting on the fact that he entered the tower. It’s almost like reflecting on being born. The topic is selflessness. If Baam had never been born, would anything have been different? What if none of that was actually real? Baam is reflecting on the idea that he as a person MATTERS. That he is not like a ghost, but a full person. That he has the right to happiness and has meaning to others. This train of thought is entirely outside the Baam of the earlier floors, where he was still living a dream. Selfless, not valuing his life.

The power then tempts Baam is very similar to the Thorn. Just here, the power would define him, not question his morals.

If Baam gives in to the demon, he would be giving himself up to this power. This power would then be what paints him as a person. It would not be the pure Baam of himself. He would not be true to himself.

The demon keeps tempting Baam to give in

Baam then gives his answer.

It’s easy to see how this goes directly with what I said in the Gun part. It’s also where it’s very difficult to draw the actual distinction between the two, for with just those panels, it could be easy to make the case that the Rice Pot is just a manifestation of what Baam went trough while trying to take hold of the Thorn, however, the following part  does counter this quite heavily.

The case that could be made here is much more that Baam needs to reach the person of himself. The person fighting for the sake of his own people. To protect, rather than to control.

So one analogy that we could make is that in the previous test, Baam chose to take hold of the Gun and is now being tested on how he would use it. Along those lines atleast.

The bottom line is that Baam is being tested upon whom he is. Is he a person that would values himself and the people around him and does he fight to protect himself and others or to control.

After Baam gives his answer, he exits the Rice Pot and the fight with Hoaqin begins. In this fight, the Rice Pot’s revelation is clearly portrayed, with Hoaqin thirsting for the power of the souls of the people that he had slain, while Baam stays true to himself and says how this power is neither his, nor Hoaqins. That Baam only acted a vessel there to let them enact their revenge. The huge difference of using that power for personal gains and for allowing the souls to do what they wanted to.

This leads us to the 2nd Rice Pot encounter

The second encounters starts with GoG saying these words. Now, this is said in the context of Baam having absorbed the souls so there is only ONE way I can interpret it – Baam acting upon the wishes of others. Channeling the labour of other people to make their dreams become reality. Acting as a vessel.

This is followed with the beautiful image  of Baam devouring all these souls.

Now there is a very beautiful way to put all these pieces together.

Essentially, we have to look at it from both perspectives.

Baam channels the wishes of the people and works in their bidding, however, at that point, he is not longer acting as himself. He is acting upon what others want.

At the same time, the souls themselves are GIVING UP their own wills to let Baam do it all for them.

This goes directly with the point that right after exiting the Rice Pot, Baam allows Wangnan to stay on the train and pursue Huaqin. The entire point is how the roles can be reversed. Baam is the Gun and his comrades are the swordsmen. Beautiful, is it not?

People have to be able to fight for themselves, not only others. The core difference is that Baam needs to understand how he fights to protect HIS HOME, not EVERYONE’S home. Altruism is, by itself, quite selfish. By doing everyting for everyone’s sake, Baam would be giving up his own identity and at the same time doing a DISSERVICE to others, for they have to find their own way to achieve their goals with their own strength.

This is then directly followed by the Name Hunt Station that explores THAT EXACT PREMISE.

Just beautiful. What’s even more beautiful is that Baam isin’t finished yet. There is ment to be a round 3 of Baam’s Rice Pot Training, since he hasn’t fully found HIS OWN GOAL yet.

Part 5 conclusion

Over the course of The Revolution Road we explore three different narratives of Baam.

The narrative of letting go of your past and moving on.

The narrative of going forward with your own strength and not accepting a disservice.

The narrative of finding your own goal in life.

All these narratives are beautifully explored using Rachel and the Revolution Road.

However, it is clear that we are not yet at the finish line. For Baam has still not finished his Revolution. It is clear that the Rice Pot and the Thorn are two plot devices yet to be fully explored. Only after having really passed the trials will Baam find his inner self and be able to face Rachel – his final test.

Grand Conclusion

I think it is without a doubt the case that Baam is really one of the most complex and organic realizations of the “finding yourself” narrative in all of fantasy literature. This narrative gets explored in practically every light novel and yet never taken to a really high quality level. Always half-assed, always just taken as a device to move the plot. In TOG’s case, the story is what drives the narrative.

Baam’s story is one of a chick.

A chick that that lives his childhood in a nest with no one but a single mother.

A chick that then slowly leaves the nest and starts to explore the world.

Only to then be thrown out of the nest entirely.

A chick that then has to learn to adapt to this new environment.

A chick that has to learn to let go of his mother and nest and find his own home.

A chick that has to find himself, for that is the only way that he can survive, but still remain true to his nature as a bird.

A beautiful tale of growth.

Going from a white canvas to a full painting.

Afterwords

Well this has been a journey.

I had an incredible amount of fun writing this series. It has been a great excuse to reread the entire series and to really pick my brain at all the small details presented by SIU across the entire webtoon. It’s incredible how well different stories and narratives come together to create a single coherent character. Before writing all this, I had my ideas of what the Thorn and Rice Pot ment, but never gave it too much thought, this helped me really buckle down a single interpretation and it seems to fit very well.

So what now?

I said at the start of this series that I would do Rachel next, but at this point, I’m uncertain if it’s really the right time for it. From the Baam analysis, I’ve now gotten a fairly clear picture of her character and how she can EASILY branch into either direction. Going back to the chick analogy. Her being the mother, the question becomes whether she threw the chick off to let it become independent or to let it die. I feel like BOTH cases ARE possible to make and it’s up to SIU to make a grand reveal as to which is true in the end, when they have their final confrontation.

Still, comment on what you think I should do next. Thought I won’t get around to it very soon ,because uni is getting crazy intense this time of the year. Once the Name Hunt Station finishes, I will do an “Arc Analysis” post on it.

Thanks to everyone who expressed their enjoyment of the series, it made me want to keep going at it even more!
 
tiger energy said:
I would be hyped if the trailer has:
Inner universe or Rise by Origa
Motoko pulling the helicopter
The sniper scene with colliding bullets

I had high expectations for this because of Rurouni Kenshin. But hollywood gonna hollywood.
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Funny you mention the ost. inner universe was on of the related videos, which led me to Steve Conte, who did Living in the shell.



One of the many great tracks on the GITS OST.

He also did stray from Wolf's Rain.

Dude's killing it.
smokin.gif
 
 
FMA live action would be great. Vid looks cool to an extent.

If made a franchise and remade for the West there's a chance they could do stories from both the manga and anime :smokin
 
I'm too much of an FMA fan & would be too critical to ever enjoy that FMA film. I hope they do it justice tho.
 
2sappy said:
So, Ghost in the Shell live action or FMA live action? :lol
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How bout neither. I love Japanese liveaction drama, but they cannot due action anime or anything not grounded in realism any justice. They don't have the budget not the skill to properly adapt something like Full metal alchemist.
 
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World trigger is on hiatus for anybody that reads it

A hiatus might actually be a good time for me to pick it up though[emoji]129300[/emoji]
 
Looking to get into a manga but can't figure out what to read. Nothing crazy like naruto or dbz, more like death note.
 
What genre do you like.. you want something short to get your feet wet.

Action. Adventure. Story?
 
You guys seen this? Ghost in the Shell trailer but edited with one of the original music.

A different music made the trailer better.
 
Tdogg2k said:
What genre do you like.. you want something short to get your feet wet.

Action. Adventure. Story?
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Yeah something short, nothing too lengthy. I'm open to like the genre that death note is related to. A story would be cool. Nothing that's like out of this world. I liked death note because of the realism with a slight twist to it (death gods obviously aren't real)
 
Rare said:
Yeah something short, nothing too lengthy. I'm open to like the genre that death note is related to. A story would be cool. Nothing that's like out of this world. I liked death note because of the realism with a slight twist to it (death gods obviously aren't real)
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Monster

Vagabond if you like historical fiction. Only problem with Vagabond is it stopped right as the last arc started. 

Pluto is good, but it takes place in like a more mature Astro boy universe, so the main characters are very humanistic robots. 

Bakuman, if you want to know more about how the manga industry works. Same author as death note. 

Bastard if you want to try Korean Manwha. It's still an ongoing series, but I think only like 60 something chapters are out. It's about a kid who's father is a serial killer and forces him to be an accomplice.

Liar Game kinda tedious due to the main character being so naive and the games are complex. Idk how the last arc ends been meaning to finish it for a while
 
Tower of God:
So let's start with Ewha and Rak. So SIU in his blog post stated they're not dead. Don't know if I like that or not. I guess we'll see how he handles it going forward. I guess it will depend on the impact it has on Baam and the story. I think they survived due to Guardian/Administrator intervention. It's been mentioned a few times that it's weird that the Guardian hasn't intervened, so he probably did at that time. Other alternatives, Ewha's flames offered some protection, but that seems like a reach. However, we don't know when that will be revealed and the implications of that. If people think 3 regulars were just killed by Yuri's attack there will probably be severe ramifications for her. I guess we'll see how things play out.
That rose attack was amazing though.
The panel of Elaine and Ha Jinsung is kinda funny, with Elaine appearing like a little kid and Ha Jinsung like a disinterested old man.

Hwa Ryun's words are interesting. She knew Baam wouldn't die, but at the same time, she's stated she can't really see Baam's path anymore. Maybe she meant his far reaching end goal path, but can still see paths for him related to short term actions. I hope we learn more about guides soon. I saw someone compare guides to Chess Masters, who can see 10-20 moves ahead once an action has been made.

Karaka and Wangnan are brothers. I saw a theory that this is based on Man in the Iron Mask, where Wangnan is the brother destined to become princess and Karaka becomes the brother who has to wear a mask and becomes an assassin. Anyway does him knowing Wangnan is alive change his character? Lots to be explored there.

Karaka has some nice powers, I don't think he used teleportation to avoid that attack, but rather body cloning, but it'll be nice to get some explanations of his powers. I still want to see Baam start developing his own fighting style, especially as we see all these different styles. 
 
Nako XL said:
Damn this thread slowed down ever since Bleach died. I don't even see my whoadie Gordonson Gordonson anymore.
Click to expand...

Super late pass, but I'm still here dawggg.

The thread slowing down a little after two of the last decade's big Shounen 3 ended/died is to be expected though.

Hasn't affected my manga/anime habits at all since I had realized that I was more into seinen for a while at that point. You watching/reading anything now?

Finally just ran through Durarara X2 Ketsu

As for this current season, I'm messing with 3-Gatsu no Lion, Drifters, Occultic;Nine, The Great Passage, Shuumatsu no Izetta, and Udon Somethinganother.

None of the above are blowing me away, but they're good enough in my opinion to keep the season from being complete ****.

Anyone else finding any gems in this season?
 
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