Common sense - Although this common sense is not known by most people, the three gods in the Japanese animation industry are "Space Battleship Yamato", "Gundam" (0079), "Evangelion EVA". In the 21st century, probably the only one that can rival the last three works, I think it is "Gintama".
This is by no means a mere spoof animation, and it doesn't even belong to the so-called "tears in laughter" genre. It's a serious historical drama - don't laugh, it's more serious than period drama! !
$1__VE_ITEM__ 1. Historical Background
Shogunate, Heaven and Man, Zhenxuan, and patriotic people. . . Anyone with a little knowledge of Japanese history will know that this is the end of the
curtain. To tell the truth, this history has been written rotten. It seems that Kongzhi's idea is to compare the powers to various monsters, and change the name of the new selection group.
It's not that simple. In Japan, which was forced to open the country at that time, people felt that the foreign powers were just like falling from the sky. For foreigners who are significantly different from their own appearance and living habits, and whose technological strength far exceeds their own, people feel fear and disgust on the one hand; on the other hand, they have great curiosity, want to understand or even integrate and introduce The advanced technology and lifestyle of the great powers. In the animation, the shogunate chose to surrender under the threat of force from the gods. For the samurai of the old era, this is undoubtedly a shame. In fact, the purpose of heaven and man is indeed to force "trade" to plunder resources. But on the other hand, it is undeniable that this decision of the shogunate also promoted the rapid development of Japan's domestic economy and technology. People quickly adapted to various previously unimaginable technologies and integrated them into their lives. As a result, people gradually accepted the culture of heaven and man.
However, since it has a mandatory color, and this change is in such a short period of time, people cannot abandon the old traditions: kimonos are still the main daily attire, scrap knives are basically useless, and a large number of high-tech products are still traditional And the ancient appearance appeared and so on. As a result, the nondescript settings of the police car with night-watching lanterns and the wooden warships flying in the sky showing the "cannon giant ship doctrine" can be found everywhere in the animation.
In fact, what is the difference in real history? Suits and kimonos, gentlemen and sumo, feminism and brothels, democracy and the emperor—the aforementioned nondescript settings are just exaggerations of these things, and there is no difference in essence. These settings may indeed have a funny purpose, but at the same time, they also reflect a point of view of the author - it was a nondescript era.
Our descendants always like to look at history from a false perspective. Even in middle school history class, we can discuss reform and reform in a grand manner, and look at the remarkable "achievements" of the reform period from the seemingly powerful Japan today. But when we really immerse ourselves in the lives of people at that time, we may come to another conclusion: this is just an unreliable decision made hastily by a country under the fascination of fear and inferiority.
Of course, here, there is no substantial difference between spoof and reality. It doesn't matter whether the shogunate was overthrown or not.
$1__VE_ITEM__ Second, the protagonist and the "Soul of the Samurai
" One of the great innovations of "Gintama" is the positioning of the protagonist. Before discussing this, I would like to ask another question:
Is Gintama a Shonen manga? Yeah? ? Maybe in a sense, it's barely considered, after all, it was serialized on JUMP (Khan~). However, the biggest difference between "Gintama" and the previous juvenile comics is that our protagonist Sakata Gintoki is not a hero - absolutely not!
If it is, then from the first episode, there should be monster upgrades, old enemies, big bosses hidden in the dark, and so on, not the "waste wood" companions that appear one after another. If it is, then Yinshi will continue to grow into a great swordsman or even a juggernaut, and Kagura will learn Kaiwangquan and Qigong wave after increasing his strange power. If it is, Yin Hegui will go straight to the theme after turning against Takasugi, go straight to Huanglong, and directly stage a relationship with Takasugi. After that, burn up the small universe for the love and justice of the earth, realize the eighth sense and transform into a Super Saiyan N to collect vitality. The third gear launches the overlord-colored MEGA particle cannon and the swastika spiral shuriken with a synchronizing rate of 400% to break through the wall of sighs and end the Holy Grail War magnificently under the tree of life - I'm sorry, Sister Ono, I smoked.
Of course, the "what ifs" of all this didn't happen. Every day, every day, our main characters live their civilian lives, undisturbed. But what is the theme of this animation? Silver's "Soul of the Samurai" is always mentioned from time to time, but what is the "Soul of the Samurai"? I'm afraid, by the samurai standards of the old days, Gintoki had to cut his abdomen several times a day.
Blood, friendship, love and justice, this is an old and vulgar juvenile comic, so in "Gintama", it is characters like Prince HATA who often talk about love & peace. It's just that One piece is slightly unique because of "dream", and Naruto is slightly noble because of "mutual understanding between people". On the other hand, if "Gintama" is just a simple joke or tears in laughter to teach people a little warmth, then Gintama will just change its name to the keroro team.
The beauty of Gintama is that it teaches people how to be a normal person. It is not to be a hero who saves the world, and there is no way to be a hero to save the world. Even with the strongest swordsmanship, it is only a sword used to kill. Keep killing, keep killing, killing people on earth or killing people from heaven, but what's the difference? In the end, it was the relentless betrayal of the politicians and the fallen comrades one by one, and the blood-stained hands and the horrific mountains of corpses behind them. In the end, there is no change in people's hearts. "Shiroyasha", that's not a man, it's a beast, it's a devil - the devil who took his life. I have forgotten, I have forgotten what is the real "soul of a samurai", I have forgotten what the sword in my hand should protect, and I have forgotten that I am a human being.
Dragging her broken body, miraculously, she stole the sacrifice that Grandma Dengshi gave her husband, in the cemetery—in this place where she should rest, I want to live again, once again, want to be a person . "It's easy for a beautiful woman to sell a thousand pieces of gold, but it's hard for a strong man to live in poverty." What Dengshi's mother-in-law gave was not a simple bowl of rice or understanding, but gave Yinshi the courage and dignity to live again. Swords have a new object to protect; people have new reasons to live. And there are more and more things worth cherishing and protecting around Yinshi. When I didn't have any relatives' silver, I felt the meaning of "home" again after the $2 teacher's school in the place called "Wanshiwu" upstairs from Grandma Dengshi.
Has the heart changed? Have the people around you changed? In fact, it has changed. Gradually, I remembered the forgotten "Soul of the Samurai". What exactly is that thing? I am not sure as well. But as I said before, according to the old samurai etiquette, Gintoki would have cut his abdomen countless times. It is by no means a clichéd stereotype, but something that has not changed for thousands of years or tens of thousands of years. Oh, what "soul of a warrior", it's just what a person should have! ! ! It is not the righteousness of saving the people from water and fire, nor is it the ambition to conquer the world. The first thing it has to save and conquer is its own heart. It's just the cockroach-like persistence of an ordinary person.
However, it is such a simple thing that we are most likely to forget. It is what we ordinary people should have and can have, but in fact only a few people have it - this kind, tender and considerate heart. In the trivial life, I try my best to help others bit by bit, and enjoy it and feel the meaning of my own existence. It may be a muddy belief, but it has a light that cannot be taken away.
What can we do in this world? Everyone wants to create an ideal world. But as Katsura Kotaro said, sometimes we can't even change a friend who has gone astray. How can we change others and the world? What "Gintama" advocates is to be an ordinary person's consciousness, to correct himself, and to talk less about the ideal of false Dakong (if everyone can do this kind of consciousness, this will become... forget it here far away). This is the biggest feature of "Gintama" that is different from ordinary anime. Personally, I think its significance in today's society is far more than those over-exaggerated heroism.
$1__VE_ITEM__ 3. Sakata Gintoki, Katsura Kotaro, Sakamoto Tatsuma, Takasugi Shinsuke -
After all, people are diverse in our revolution. It is impossible to ask everyone to be a hero, and it is impossible to ask everyone to be an ordinary person. Putting aside the animation and looking at the history it alludes to, when foreign powers threaten cultural invasion, change is inevitable, but the road to revolution is different. Yinshi, Gui, Chenma, and Jinzhu, the four former barbarians went to different paths.
Yin Shi chooses to be an ordinary person, chooses to stick to his own beliefs in troubled times, and preserves the most genuine kindness of being a human being. This is actually a revolutionary path.
Tatsuma chooses to devote himself to space trade, in an attempt to seek the mutually beneficial coexistence of heaven and the shogunate.
Katsura and Jinsuke chose to stand on the opposite side of the shogunate. The difference is that Gui is taking the conservative and steady road of underground activities, while Jin Zhu is taking the road of militarized armed coup. At the same time, the anti-Yi sect, to give an inappropriate analogy, Gui is like the Ming sect advocates Wuji, and Jinzhu is like Zhu Yuanzhang, the leader of the Ming sect.
The strongest contrast here is Yinshi and Jinzhu. Jinsuke is a fierce heroism, who wants to subvert the shogunate and rebuild the world; Yinshi is like Lao Zhuang Taoist who retreats into the deep forest to be alone. Gintoki was mentioned above, so let's think about the significance of Takasugi Shinsuke's approach?
It is a beautiful idea to want to create an ideal world, but the practice of promoting this kind of armed revolution is radical, unscrupulous, and even dirty! He was betrayed and failed by the shogunate in the previous struggle against foreigners, and instead believed that the shogunate was the culprit that hindered the establishment of an ideal world, and then unscrupulously launched activities to bring down the curtain, even the former comrades-in-arms and best friends with different ideas had to be obliterated, even at the cost of Collusion with foreign powers to sell their country. Let's assume, assuming the promotion is successful, so what? The country is gone, the people are separated, everything must be rebuilt from the ruins, and the foreign invaders must carve up the interests of this new country. It's easy, what about people's hearts? Has the heart changed? Culture needs to be rebuilt, and how can it be compatible with foreign cultures? None of these problems have been solved! ! ! How can an unscrupulous leader and a leading organization that once betrayed the country make the people of the world happy and peaceful? In the eyes of Yinshi and Katsura, such a "new world" is not as good as the shogunate! ! !
I really don't understand what Jinzhu's "ideal world" is. Maybe it's just like Gui said, he's just a roaring beast with unbridled anger that wants to destroy everything.
In fact, this is not Jinzhu's fault, it is the tragedy of the armed revolution itself. Looking at our history, those radical revolutions are so similar to Jin's approach. How many people have to die before they can give up, how many wives and ions have to be displaced before they can give up, and to what extent does the culture have to be destroyed before they can give up?
From a personal point of view, the tone of "Gintama" is against Jinsuke's approach. You are a hero yourself, but the world has been disturbed by you. The long-term killings have only brought serious disasters and lack of culture to the people, and people's hearts are still getting corrupted day by day. In the end, nothing has changed, but the people of the world have paid for your heroic road. "Gintama" tells us that this kind of heroism should be ashamed of us.
But from a social perspective, this is not the case. From the perspective of "Gintama", Jinzhu is certainly the villain. But if you look at it from another angle, such as from the perspective of the ghost soldiers, then Jinzhu is indeed a hero. Calm and careful thinking, genius charisma and leadership, keen diplomatic vision, outstanding military capability, unscrupulous ruthlessness and decisiveness, and even the courage to bear sins are all worthy of respect. From the perspective of society as a whole, forces like the Ghost Soldiers are even indispensable.
There are positives and negatives, and there is light and darkness. The existence of the ghost soldiers can make the shogunate like a thorn in the back, and dare not further betray the country or act indiscriminately; and the shogunate can also use the ghost soldiers to contrast its orthodox image and divert the attention of the people. Oh, this is dirty politics.
In addition, society also needs people like Chenma to promote economic and technological exchanges with the outside world, and to ease the contradiction between the two in their exchanges with heaven and man.
Of course, as the general public, the most advocated is the practice of silver time. Although it seems to be passive self-indulgence, it is actually sticking to the country's fine cultural traditions and human kindness, and laying the most solid foundation for cultural reconstruction and revival - people's hearts.
$1__VE_ITEM__ 4. Digression:
The proposition of how to deal with foreign culture itself contains the question of how to deal with inherent traditional culture. But the first thing that should be strictly distinguished are the three concepts of foreign invaders, foreign cultures, and foreigners. "Foreign invaders" are "a subset of foreigners." When encountering such people, they should be killed and killed. There is nothing to say. But such feelings cannot be attached to "foreigners" and "foreign cultures".
The problem of foreigners is easy to talk about. We can neither fear nor discriminate, nor blindly flatter and flatter them. Simply put, we can treat them as people just like us. This is the attitude we have towards heaven and man when we are in the animation. (PS: A few years ago, foreigners in undergraduate schools liked to overturn or hang bicycles that were parked indiscriminately on the campus, and the Student Union even issued a notice for this, praising "foreign friends" for being disciplined and having a sense of justice, warning us not to Parking indiscriminately. I heard that I was furious at the time. Parking indiscriminately has its own rules and regulations for management and punishment. Why should you be punished by foreigners by damaging other people's belongings!!! The student union actually flattered this matter, which is extremely stupid.)
The issue of foreign cultures is more complicated. It is absurd for Jinsuke to blame the government for the humiliation of the shogunate in front of the gods, and even to take anger at the inherent traditional culture of the country. Of course, it is unwise to stick to the traditions of the country blindly. What should be done may be a matter of what the benevolent sees, the wise sees wisdom, but it should always be noted that the attitude of the character Gintoki represents the attitude of this comic. Under such a torrent, Gintoki's choice was to retreat and hold on to the last "Soul of the Samurai". In fact, this is not all and not the right choice, and it is questionable whether this choice will eventually solve the problem positively.
However, in terms of returning to the theme of "Gintama", as a way to teach ordinary people how to deal with culture shock, then Gintoki's choice is indeed worth emulating. That is, never forget the warmth and love between people, and try to believe in the things called "love" and "trust" no matter what.
Rarely is an anime work that I can say so much. In fact, there are more topics to dig about "Gintama": such as Xiao Kagura, the members of the Shinsengumi group, Uncle Hasegawa, etc., I am too lazy to talk about it. Above, I just talked about my views on the "mainline" of "Gintama". Because this main line is extremely important but easily forgotten in the splendid laughter.
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