The Necessity

THERE WILL BE SPOILERS FOR THE MANGA SERIES SEIKEN NO KATANAKAJI IN THIS POST. DO NOT READ THIS IF YOU ARE A SPOILER FREAK. Also, this post is rather text-heavy.

So BartreTheBeast and I (ExtraCareful) are currently reading a series called Seiken no Katanakaji (AKA The Sacred Blacksmith or Seiken no Blacksmith. I will refer to it as SnB or SnK from now on.) It's not a masterpiece by any aspect, but 3 of the 4 major characters are pretty appealing on face to the demographics and the drawing style/medieval setting is good enough to keep you going.

A brief introduction: there is a monster that has to be sealed up with a sword because that's how it works for some unknown reason. And swords are good. Whatever. There are political groups trying to take control of everything and the continent, and evil/greedy people inside those groups doing their whole hand-rubbing and putting lasers on sharks business. The political aspect creates (surprise!) restrictions on what our heroes can do.

Our heroes are:

WHAT INGENUITY I COULD NEVER HAVE CREATED A CHARACTER LIKE THIS

Luke Ainsworth: If they made Sasuke Uchiha clones from a "Let's Copy Naruto" factory, this guy would probably be somewhere along the production line. Brusque and curt, as well as violently angry with a sprinkle of vengeance and special eyes on the side to boot. Oh did I mention the sword and the hairstyle? Because I really fuckin' haven't seen this at all. At least he's not too much of an asshole and manages to explain things pretty well. This guy is the destined blacksmith that will make the Holy Sword of Truth (Which is a katana! Yay for subtle cultural bias) and stick it into the monster's belly. His first love was killed by the monster and he is trying to recover and all that psych janx. Guess who heals him?

Miniskirts are all the rage these days in heated combat.

Cecily Campbell: Clearly named after the soup. Uhm...she's red-haired, nicely endowed, plays at being a knight, and does the lovey-dovey + blush thing pretty well (a la Hinagiku Katsura of Hayate no Gotoku, if you get the reference). This means obviously she gets shipped straight to Rule 34-land. Currently, her defining characteristic is the ability to get kicked in the face and into the dirt by pretty much every opponent she sees. Then she gets saved by Luke. How nice. I guess as long as she stays cute and cuddly she'll retain a spot as one of BartreTheBeast's waifus.

I'm not a fashion designer but I think even a Dutch accordion player from the 70s would shudder at this outfit.

Lisa: A loli demon shunned by many. Has affections for Luke but doesn't like to be reminded of her nature and all that crap. She was created from Luke's first love, who was also named Lisa. What a dick move eh. She works as Luke's concubine assistant. Personally I like this girl more than Cecily because she does things other than running around getting the crap kicked out of her.

It's a bird! It's a plane!...No, it's gotta be a freaking demon sword. >___>;; what

Aria: A demon sword that can morph into a human being - walking, talking, and sandwich-making included. Acts as Cecily's sword and can shoot wind while in her sword form. This character right now is about as deep as a puddle on a summer day. All she does is either a) hug Cecily or b) talk about how she is destined to be filled with violentsuperrageevilness because she's a demon sword, despite the fact that she had tea with the elderly just 10 minutes ago. Get over this plotline. Cripes. She's not Anakin Skywalker, and even if she was, she would still be a fucking terrible character. She better improve or drop.

Anyways, this is the issue Bartre and I had. For the most part, SnB is a nice, safe, feel-good medieval romance/action series, reminiscent of Zero no Tsukaima without the extreme characters. However, somewhere in the recent plot timeline, there is an evil blond-haired white main boss dude guy by the name of Dr. Doom Siegfried (wtf...because that's not generic at all). As a proof of how evil he is, he politically forces Cecily to be his escort, then when they are alone he takes and molests her in the manga (apparently in the original - the light novel - Siegfried goes all the way. If you have to ask what that means, I suggest you bash your head against a wall until you find out.) This is not just a strange, or even merely dark, turn. This is akin to a 90 degree sharp bend in the middle of a 70 mph highway. What the hell happened here?

No doubt the act is disgusting, whether it goes all the way or not. Even as an objective reader, I had trouble suddenly being impacted with this scene. BartreTheBeast still cries into his pillow every night due to his waifu's defilement. In no way should we condone any thought of this kind of action happening anywhere except for the sake of plot development.

So was including molestation/rape a wise choice? I would say that as horrific as the idea is, perhaps even more so than gory murder (which is thrown around rather casually these days), the incident in SnB serves a purpose that other plot devices would have been hard-pressed to accomplish. In one chat, I mentioned that the incident serves 4 general purposes:

a) It adds a tint of seriousness. The title of the chapters that encompass the incident (Realism 1-4) should be a dead giveaway. Everything falls apart and then the little pieces jump up and hit you in your face for good measure. Yes, it was half-baked and ridiculously sudden. Yes, Siegfried had no real good reason to carry out the incident other than "I like being evil", which puts him on par with a kid during Sunday school pulling wings off flies. But as clichéd as the whole "let's make things fall apart for reality's sake" plot development is, it's still rather effective. The main divide between reality and the ideal is usually how reality falls short of the ideal, not the other way around. Thus, injecting in that little bit of "Things Fall Apart" mood creates a conscious alert to the reader that not everything can go the heroes' way.

b) It creates/forces hate against the villain. Many fictional villains nowadays - regardless of whether a creator tries to go against the current or not - end up being hated on a more cerebral basis. Why should I hate Aleister Crowley from Toaru Majutsu no Index? Because he's a puppet master hiding in the shadows, apparently. Why do I hate Voldemort? He wrecked half of London and ninja-ed into homes, killing people with laser beams faster than the Green Lantern could. And he's out for power and shiz. And he makes Neville Longbottom piss his pants. A lot of them are rather consequentialist reasons (he kills more than he saves, etc etc.)

However, when villains pass a deontological line that we often ignore as arbitrary (do not kill messily, do not rape, do not kick dogs, so on), it sparks something in us that causes us to (at least on a subconscious level) hate the character for taking the action. Call it defending our personal, initial values. Whatever floats your boat. One prime example is the Joker from The Dark Knight. The Joker hasn't subjugated a universe OR killed off what must be three-halves of London with his whatever-inch stick. How come he's such a memorable villain? Because he does bad, bad things in front of our faces. The Joker isn't afraid to put a bomb in a lackey's body, or blow half a guy's face off, or kill someone in an empty hospital for the lulz. It's the same concept. By making Siegfried carry out this incident the author can be SURE that every time we see Siegfried in all his black-armored glory, there will be hisses and boos in the audience.

c) It creates an additional depth via flaw-making in Cecily, as well as sympathy from the reader. So far, other than the fact that the girl with a Costco-approved family name fucking fails miserably at fighting anything more aggressive than a wasted gerbil in a cage, we've never really had much to say about Cecily. Oh she likes Luke? How cute. That brings the romance factor up, but it doesn't make her a 'better' character in any sense. Any girl on the street could have fallen for the main hero, not just her. However, after undergoing this incident, SEVERAL things have changed for her. She has heavy psychological, as well as some societal, repercussions (as shown in the aftermath of the incident) due to this happening. Obviously this is going to be a recurring problem, especially if Siegfried shows up again to remind her. By creating this uncertainty in societal status (as well as how she should show herself to Luke from now on) and this mental damage that cannot be overcome too easily (even though she grits her teeth and does stuff in the end), Cecily has the potential to become a very complex character as she mulls over this incident over and over again in her head.

The sympathy part should be obvious. Before, it was all fun and laughter while being thrown to the side by ugly demons. Now, however, a very visible someone has come and - with a human face - ripped Cecily's innocence to shreds. You thought it couldn't happen - and it did. Again, as can be attested by BartreTheBeast's focused rage over 3 days straight, Cecily post-incident creates sympathy for her situation.

d) It tightens the bond between Luke and Cecily - namely, the dependence on Luke by Cecily. Although this sounds bad, Cecily should have been made more clingy. Part of the problem in SnB with getting the heroes together + upping the romance factor was that due to the independent natures of both Cecily and Luke, the author ends up with the characters going off on their merry way in different directions. Bad idea. Power Rangers never split up if they want to succeed. And since Luke, as the classic cold jackass, wasn't going to say anything until the last moment, Cecily needed a reason to have Luke's support constantly. And, well, this incident gave her the chance. In the words of Keima in The World God Only Knows, "I can see the ending!"

...................

C and D are the most important, as it makes for better individual and interpersonal character developments. However, remember the main question: could there have been any other type of incident that would accomplish the same things to nearly the same extent? Unfortunately, my answer is no. By including this extreme action in the story, the author of SnB has clearly taken a step towards 'realism' and character complexity - just as he intended. Again, as inexcusable and rude as the incident may seem, even in a manga series, I think adding it in was beneficial to the story and - dare I say it? It also increased my interest in this series further. So when you come across bad incidents like this in a series, think about what purpose it serves. It may not be as bad as it seems.

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Small comment from BartreTheBeast:

First things first:

F*** YOU SIEGFRIED. AND F*** YOU ISAO MIURA FOR COMING UP WITH THIS.

I admire how friggin' monsters people like ExtraCareful can think about how the rape has been beneficial to the plot/character development. Because I just think that the author was a dick for pulling this crap. Yes, it forces you to sympathize with Cecily, it deepens her character, and it ensures that everyone reading will want to go Accelerator on Siegfried. But quite honestly, I would much much rather have done without it. The series could have gone on perfectly well with a less severe incident, but no, we have to see another example of the Japanese's fixation on rape (for more comical examples of this fixation, read Boku wa Tomodachi ga Sukunai [ExtraCareful: There's a reason that that part of Boku wa Tomodachi wasn't published...ugh]).

They don't have shotguns in SnK, so we'd like you to introduce it to them. Kill with violence.

While I'm pondering inter-series crossovers, I'd like Keine Kamishirasawa to change history and do away with the rape. I only wish more of you people played Touhou, so you'd get the reference.

* End of blurb from BtB *

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As a parting shot, read Fujimura-kun Mates. Probably the funniest series I have read so far - think of it as D-Frag! with the number of gags multiplied by a thousand. I highly recommend this series (and no, it is not completed). Gogogo read it!

Oh God what's wrong with their eyes