THE HAKKENDEN AND ANIME ENSEMBLES

THE HAKKENDEN AND THE NAKAMA (COMPANION ENSEMBLE) PARTY

Japanese fiction, whether anime or gaming (video, computer, and smartphone gaming), represents a
uniquely Eastern notion of strength through unity – one in which differing and
complimentary skills combine to allow characters to exercise greater strength than
they might without the support of their comrades. The argument, specifically, will
focus on how these games borrow more heavily from tales such as The
Hakkenden than from lonely Western heroes such as, let's say, Hercules or Hamlet.
Moreover, the argument will be made that these fiction tend to
subsume the character who acts as the audience avatar/surrogate, using narrative devices to
constantly draw attention to the other characters in the text.
The Hakkenden, not unlike Beowulf or the Odyssey, is an early epic exploring notions of
heroism, redemption, and paranormal creatures.
However, it is the heroes of The Hakkenden whose origins lie in the supernatural, not the villains
– hakkenden translates roughly to “the legend of the eight sword/hound warriors,” a direct
reference to the origin of these spirits. A Japanese princess, Fuse, is offered as a
prize to the warrior who brings back the head of the Awa clan’s most hated
enemy. And, after some daring attempts, it is a great hound, her watchdog Eightspots, that finally succeeds –
and, thus, must be granted the right to marry her. She becomes supernaturally
pregnant and is killed by a former lover, who had attempted to defeat the
warlord but who had been defeated – and was thought dead. But, at her death,
eight crystal beads from her Buddhist rosary rise up into the air and are scattered
across Japan – each bearing a character signifying one of the virtues of
Confucianism: benevolence, brotherhood, filial piety, wisdom, duty, courtesy,
faith, and loyalty. Each of these crystal beads represents one of the children that
Fuse would have had, and who are later reincarnated as samurai who do not
recognize one another. The majority of the narrative in Hakkenden is concerned
with the meeting and recognition of these brothers and with their various exploits
against the ancient enemies of their clan. Finally, they are awarded Imperial titles
and castles for their service, and settle down to live peacefully in their ancestral
homeland. The symbols on the beads fade away, as do the hakkenden, over
time. Once they have passed away the idyllic period over which they ruled ends
abruptly, and the clans are once again at war in the Awa Province.

(The full title of the epic is Nanso Satomi Hakkenden, which translates as The Legend of the Eight Swords/Hounds of Awa and the Satomi Clan, lords of Awa)

Thinking of the titular warriors, who are supernatural
entities fighting against human corruption, it becomes a clear representation
of fundamental belief systems.
The Hakkenden embraces the Shinto tradition. Along with larger implications, this distinction is highlighted by
the juxtaposition of the Abrahamic belief in the supernatural as inherently evil and
demonic – aside from the LORD and His angels, there should be no
supernatural creatures – and the Shinto belief that there can be powerful spirits in
all things – kami – which are a form of gods.
Shinto embraces a notion of godhood that covers a large spectrum of ethical and moral viewpoints; there are
good kami, evil kami, indifferent kami, and even kami who mean no harm but
cause a great deal of trouble with their practical jokes (just like the gods of ancient Western polytheism or the Fair Folk of traditional Western rural lore). Many of these kami have
children who go on to become heroes and, according to the Japanese myths of
creation, all humans are descended from the same kami that gave birth to the
spirits of the world.
Another point of correlation between Western lore and The Hakkenden is in the
rise to and fall from power – the heroes of these tales eventually come to rule
lands of their own and finally fall from power for some reason. The eight warriors simply fade away – they age, have children, and finally die. As this happens, the symbols on their crystal beads
– which originally signified not only their individual characteristics but also their
duty to their clan – fade as well. Their purpose has been fulfilled, and they have
been granted a respite from strife for the rest of their lives, which extends to those
they rule. Thus, after their death, the natural state of strife between clans arises
again – implying that it was only the presence of the warriors which lead to
that idyllic period of peace. The tale becomes cyclical, as a new group of heroes
will be forced to arise and reclaim that peace for their generation, after which it
will again fade and the duty will fall to the next generation.

However interesting these distinctions are, the one most visibly highlighted
by fictions produced by Japanese studios is that of the group as leading character. Of the ensemble of companions, "nakama-tachi," a diverse ensemble leading cast of equal or nigh-equal weight.
The Hakkenden is the tale of eight brothers of spirit who work together to avenge
their clan. This falls well within the tradition of Japanese epic literature, as tales
such as The Peach Boy (Momotaro), Shui hu Zhuan (Suikoden/The Water Margin), and more contemporary daibóken (epic adventure) anime such as Saiyuki,
Rurouni Kenshin, and Flame of Recca (not to mention all sentai and magical girl warrior fictions) all emphasize the strength of the party over that of the individual. In these and other cases, a singular “hero/ine” is subsumed by the companions with whom s/he travels – all of whom contribute to
the success of the adventure in meaningful ways and all of whom become, at least
temporarily, dominant within the narrative arc.

The single most visible example of the relationship between JRPGs
and the heroic tradition of The Hakkenden is in Shin Megami Tensei: Digital
Devil Saga, in which each character is marked with a symbol meant to reflect the
powers and nature of the creature into which he or she can transform. These
marks are not deliberate, but appear spontaneously after the characters develop
“Atman”(Sanskrit for "soul!") – a sort of spiritual power which enables them to take on the aspects of
various creatures from world mythological traditions – primarily Hindu,
Buddhism, and Confucianism. In the game’s narrative, this is the releasing of their
primal urges and desires – which are built upon their descent from demons.
Prior to the development of Atman, the Embryon tribe is considered the
weakest of the tribes who subsist within the Junkyard, a bounded space defined
by highly developed bases and strategic gunfights over territorial dominance.
They are ruled over by the Karma Temple, which claims that the first tribe to
successfully dominate all others will be allowed to ascend to Nirvana – as
presented in the text, a sort of wishing world where every inhabitant is blissfully
happy and misfortune is unknown. The beginning of this system’s downfall is the
introduction of Sera, a hacker who had been imprisoned by Angel – the not-soangelic
force behind the Karma Temple – and who had broken free in order to
help the denizens of the Junkyard cope with the changes wrought by Angel’s
virus, which causes the devolution of humans to their demonic origins.
Digital Devil Saga’s party consists of six characters: Serph, the voiceless
leader of the Embryon and the player’s interface with the world of DDS, Heat, the
easily-angered demolitions expert, Gale, the strategist of the tribe, Cielo, the
dreadlock-wearing would-be islander, and Argilla, the sharpshooter and
conservative voice. Sera, who is potentially the most significant character in
relation to the narrative, is not playable – but her interactions with the other
characters, particularly Heat and Serph, are responsible for much of their
development. After they receive their Atman, each of the characters develops a
demonic form representative of one of the Aryan gods: Serph becomes Varna, the
god who created the Three Worlds and master of the seas and seasons, Heat
becomes Agni (Sanskrit for "fire"), god of the sun and the holy fire, Gale is Vayu (Sanskrit for "air"), god of the wind and air, Cielo becomes Dyaus (archaic name of Zeus), god of the heavens and storms, and father of several other gods, and Argilla becomes Prithivi (Sanskrit for "Earth"), goddess of earth and mother of the gods. Their appearances are monstrous, as are their actions in their demonic forms – the first
act of the Embryon after transformation is to slaughter and devour the majority of
the opposing Vanguard tribe.
(This makes also most character names Meaningful Names in the nomen est omen tradition: Heat relates to fire, Gale to strong winds [compare Dorothy Gale and the cyclone in The Wizard of Oz], Cielo is Spanish/Italian for "Sky," and Argilla is Italian for "Clay." Sera can relate to either the evening in Italian or seraphim, the highest-ranking Abrahamic angels, while Serph also relates to seraphim, making theirs the odd names out in an ensemble of Elemental Theme Naming).
In keeping with the tradition of the hero as the central character of a larger
group, Serph’s Varna is both quite powerful and quite vulnerable; despite having
the most latitude in development, Varna is still an ice demon, rendering him
particularly weak to enemies associated with fire and – for at least the first
portions of the game – limiting him to attacks based on water or ice. As there are
several elements in the world of DDS, Varna alone would be unable to defeat all
enemies; it is only by adding Agni’s fire, Prithivi’s earth, and the elements of wind
and thunder/lightning which are associated with Gale and Cielo’s avatars, respectively, that
Serph can hope to defeat the various enemies he faces. Beyond gameplay, it is
generally the other members of the Embryon who develop the plans necessary to
conquer the other tribes and ascend to Nirvana. Gale, particularly, is responsible
for most of the action which takes place proactively while Heat prompts many of
the Embryon’s responses to their enemies’ actions. The narrative, as well,
emphasizes early and heavily the importance of all members of the team, as the
player is confronted with Argilla’s moral dilemma concerning devouring her oncehuman
enemies or going mad and losing what shreds of humanity she has
attained.
DDS is not the journey of Serph or Sera, but the journey of the Embryon as
group as they struggle to overcome the shifting power dynamics of a world
thrown into chaos. Serph takes little part in the dialogue and action of cutscenes, and his passivity serves to
foreground the actions of the other characters. In the earliest action sequences of
the game – a cut scene depicting the moment of transformation – the Embryon
are waging a pitched battle against the Vanguard over a mysterious artifact which
has fallen to earth between their territories. As the scene opens, Argilla is
evaluating the enemy’s presence through her rifle’s scope and describing their
strength to Serph, who sits next to her. Finished, she passes the scope to him and
the player is shown the Vanguard warriors in partial cover across the battlefield.
Argilla informs Serph that the Vanguard leader, Harley, is present, and Serph
focuses the scope’s zoom on him. After some examination of the mysterious
object, Serph signals the other Embryon to move out. Argilla stop Serph as he
begins to move, however, warning him that “We can always find new recruits. A
leader is irreplaceable.” Serph continues, and is attacked by the Vanguard. After a
short action sequence, the mysterious object explodes and the fighters are all
transformed by their Atman.
This short passage is indicative of the way in which most cutscenes in DDS
work: the other Embryon have emotions, goals, and personalities, while Serph is a
solely active character. He never speaks – unless prompted on rare occasions to
do so by the player – and his part in narrative exposition is generally an active,
unemotional one. When the characters’ eyes begin to gain colour to show their
growing emotions, it is difficult to establish whether Serph’s grey-blue eyes have
actually changed from grey at all. He is most clearly set against Heat, who in the
first cutscene after the discovery of Sera explains that he wants to know more
about her and that he’s “sure [Serph does], too.” This creates an interesting
triangulation within the game’s narrative, as other characters tell the player what
Serph, the audience surrogate and avatar, wants and thinks. DDS subsumes that protagonist to near-extinction, reaching a point where the other characters are necessary simply
to establish a connection between the player and her avatar.
The larger implication of this transfer of agency to those who surround Serph is that their stories become more important in the absence of his own. This is intuitively obvious; the game features a strong
narrative element, and it would be incomprehensible without some
characterization and emotional development. Since, then, Serph does not offer
this, the player or spectator finds herself connecting more closely with Serph’s companions,
reinforcing the party as collective hero. DDS
invokes strength through unity of purpose and the combination of various skills –
each of which is attached to certain elements of personality which the individual
characters possess. In many ways, the characters of DDS represent their demonic
avatars far more than those avatars represent them: Heat’s rage and envy ignite
the fires of his spirit, Agni, while Argilla’s hatred of needless killing vocalizes the
will to foster life that her avatar is meant to represent. Gale, who develops the
strongest sense of honor and dignity of the Embryon once his emotions wake,
portrays the majesty of Vayu in his golden chariot. Cielo, who longs for peace
within his family, expresses the fatherly – or, in this case, brotherly – sentiments of
Dyaus. What, then, does Serph’s silence and inaction imply about Varna, creator
of the heavens?

THE POSTHUMAN WORLD
This chapter will return to a discussion of DDS, because while the topic covered
here is clearly present in those games, it is most easily and fruitfully examined in
the larger series from which DDS springs, Shin Megami Tensei (A literal, word-for-world translation of this franchise title is “True Blessing Calamity,” which seems to imply that the
calamities which begin these games are truly blessing – or that, at least, blessings are born from them). Specifically, this chapter will address the postmodern world of simulation within DDS. This title differs
from the Final Fantasy RPGs primarily in its foregrounding of personal and social
ethics over the more common themes of fellowship and the protection of the
world. In DDS, both the characters and the other inhabitants of their world
become infected with a strange virus which causes them to mutate into various
monstrous creatures. This transformation – and the associated transition to a
mindless animal-like beast – is only controllable through the devouring of other humans turned
monsters. Thus, every battle fought becomes an act of cannibalism that is
necessary simply to survive.
To situate this chapter within the larger framework, this
chapter will seek to complicate the notion of “good (us) versus evil (the Others)”
by examining a game context in which the leading characters embody the Others
in the same way that their enemies do, and in which being victorious involves
actions which seriously problematize any notion of “good” which can be
associated with the characters. In a larger context, this chapter will also examine
the fundamentally postmodern nature of a game in which the world is – both
inside and outside the context of the narrative – artificially constructed. It is a
simulation of the fourth order, twice, to use Baudrillard’s methodology; the space
of the game does not exist in our world, and the player comes to learn that it
does not exist within the game’s world, either, but is a digital construction meant
to hold the souls of a group of repressed humans.
One of the primary concerns of DDS as a text is how to differentiate Self
and Other when one can embody both. The character most concerned with this
is Argilla, whose refusal to accept the inescapable fact that, possessing an Atman,
she must consume others in order to live and to maintain her humanity – which
she has only recently discovered – nearly causes her to lose control of herself and
enter – as is shown by many of the other, less focal characters in the game – a
state of subhuman rage in which her need to feed overpowers her self-control and
her moral principles. For the other characters in DDS, this is considered a given;
when the Embryon seek to forge an alliance with a rival tribe, Jinana – that tribe’s
leader – tells them that it will only be done if they can fight their way through her
tribe to her headquarters. Bluntly explaining her actions, she says, “My people are
hungry.” Mick the Slug, another tribe leader, describes how “sweet” his own men
were “on the way down” his throat. Nor are the Embryon exempt from this
callous cannibalism; when Jinana is eventually killed – after going mad – Heat
orders Argilla to devour her, which she refuses to do. Serph, like Heat, has no
difficulty in consuming his slain opponents; directly after his initial transformation,
he is shown in his Varna aspect rending a dead enemy with his teeth.
This, quite frankly, does not seem to be within the context of “good” or
“heroic” behavior; it is, in fact, exactly the crime committed by many dragon and monster slayers across cultures --the enemy has the excuse of having been human, to begin with. The Embryon and other citizens of the Junkyard, however, have no such escape from the ramifications of their actions. However, they do not seem to need one; only Argilla has any particular moral quandary about this development, and even
she overcomes it after Jinana’s death.
Heat, Serph, and the other Embryon have
no such excuse; for them, their enemies are merely food, and they eat a bit too
much to claim it was an accident.
Even before the transformation, the world of DDS is grounded firmly in
lawlessness – rival tribes battle for control of areas at the direction of the Karma
Temple, a central disembodied authority, for the sake of salvation. The group
which dominates all others will be allowed to ascend to “Nirvana,” a world
without war and suffering. Unfortunately, no tribe has succeeded in doing this
when the game begins, and it is during a desperate gunfight between two rival
gangs – one of which is made up of the characters who will become the focus of
the story – that the strange virus sets in. From this point on, it becomes the
player’s duty to guide this group, the Embryon, to dominance over the others and
to finally discover the truth about the authority which has governed the lives of
the characters for so long.
While not quite so obvious in its questions of simulation as games like Star
Ocean III: Till the End of Time and the .hack series, DDS still questions the
fundamental reality of any world in the way that it presents its own. The world
of DDS is an artificially constructed area meant to contain the
memories of the survivors of a terrible accident – who are, simultaneously, kept
from an awareness of this fact. The virus itself is the result of the interference of a
hacker, who seeks to find a way to control the power represented by this world.
Also, the hacker implies that the situation has recurred several times already, with
similar results (Before comparing this unfavorably to the Matrix trilogy, it is important to note that the development of this game began before the release of that film, and that this game exists within a context of similar stories, such as Plato's Parable of the Cave). The end result of this line of narrative is that the Embryon cease fighting for dominance of the Junkyard – the
constructed site within which their digital personas reside, which is also called
Purgatory by Angel, the hacker who releases the virus – and come to fight against
the existence of the Junkyard as a construct. The conflict ceases to be Self vs.
Other – if it ever was – and becomes Self vs. Reality; a postmodern attempt at
redefining existence by reconstructing the technology through which it is initially
produced.
The Junkyard and the Karma Temple both seem to represent a potential
end result of posthumanism – a techno-despotic future in which control of
technology equates to control of society. This is highlighted by Angel’s ability to
overcome and subsume the Karma Temple, and her subsequent ability to control
the discourse of salvation for the Junkyard. It is Angel who, using the Temple as
her mouthpiece, commands the now-demonic humans of the world she calls
Purgatory to consume one another in an effort to establish complete dominance
and thus to earn the right to enter Nirvana. However, lest it seem that Angel
should be seen as overtaking what was originally a valid system, several of the
characters within DDS point out that the new injunction does not vary
significantly from the previous commands of the Karma Temple. The language
has changed, the but the system remains the same: destroy or be destroyed, by the
authority of technology.
Technology is pervasive in DDS; stores, transportation, and even religion
are performed by network-based exchange, and the autocratic ruler of the
Junkyard is a “Dissemination Machine,” a gigantic computer decorated in the style
of ancient Vedic scrolls. To purchase new equipment, Serph needs to
insert his Tag Ring – a digital device containing identification and other data – into
the shopping terminal, at which point the Karma Temple informs the player how
much macca – the currency of the junkyard – she has earned in combat and by
selling bits of aberrant code to the Temple. When the player wishes to save,
another terminal – using the game’s language – is engaged using the same device,
and that option is displayed along with the option to buy new mantras – which
teach the characters skills and powers – and to recover any damage or transport
to other visited areas. The least technologically advanced aspect of the game is
combat, wherein most enemies use magic or physical attacks – sometimes
including ancient weapons – and the Embryon party, in their avatar forms, do the
same. In their human forms, the party is able to access and use firearms, but these
weapons are, compared to the other technology present – decidedly archaic,
being roughly equivalent to modern weapons. They require ammunition, which
must be purchased from the Karma Temple or looted from enemies (who do not
use firearms, which makes this construction a bit illogical), and include sniper rifles,
grenade launchers, handguns, and automatic rifles. This seems to indicate that the
balance of technological power is entirely on the side of the Karma Temple, which
chooses not to disseminate any information that might allow the tribes to
challenge it and its two laws: all must seek Nirvana, and all must pledge allegiance
to a tribe which defeats their own.
In DDS, then, technology is used as means for controlling and oppressing
the populace; it is, in fact, a means of hiding their very identities from them.
When the game begins, the characters are emotionless and interchangeable; their
mute grey eyes and flat patterns of speech along with their lack of concern for
themselves, their fellows, and the other inhabitants of the Junkyard all evoke the
automaton which Adorno feared would be the end result of mass culture. They
have no memories of a time before the Junkyard, and no way of comprehending
emotions or abstract concepts such as honor or mercy; instead, they understand
obedience, logic, and strategy. Like machines, their first response to a given
situation is to evaluate and develop a plan of action, and then to carry it out.
They have no friendships, only a hierarchy, and, as Argilla points out in the
opening sequence, they are essentially interchangeable.
The introduction of Sera marks the beginning of the failure of the
technocratic system. With the advent of emotion and the introduction of motive
and personality, the citizens of the Junkyard begin to question their lives and their
blind obedience to the Karma Temple. Eventually, as their memories return, they
realize the manipulation and coercion that were an essential part of the system
which kept them imprisoned and focused on one another rather than on the
system which governed them. In the end, Sera leads the Embryon to
attack the Karma Temple itself and to force their way into Angel’s presence in
order to demand the truth about Nirvana and about themselves. This is the final
heroism of DDS: to destroy an oppressive system of government which seeks to
turn one against another in order to hide its own manipulative control of
technology, identity, and all other knowledge – and, in many ways, humanity.
To return to Ryan’s formulation, DDS highlights many of the ways in which
Propp’s construction of narratives cannot account for J-RPGs. There is no central
hero, the final battle is not Self vs. Other, and the goal of the party is neither
domination nor, really, liberation – it is the utter destruction of a reality
established within the text. When DDS ends, the player or spectator is unsure what the next
step will be; it is the purpose of the sequel to examine what happens without the
Junkyard, when the Children of Purgatory are no longer caged by the Karma
Temple’s compulsive technologies. Which, of course, points towards the other
explicit critique within the text: that of posthumanism and cyberculture.
When Donna Haraway wrote in her “Cyborg Manifesto” that
"The cyborg does not dream of community on the model of the organic
family, this time without the oedipal project. The cyborg would not
recognize the Garden of Eden; it is not made of mud and cannot dream
of returning to dust. Perhaps that is why I want to see if cyborgs can
subvert the apocalypse of returning to nuclear dust in the manic
compulsion to name the Enemy. Cyborgs are not reverent; they do not
remember a cosmos. They are way of holism, but needy for connection
– they seem to have a natural feel for united front politics, but without
the vanguard party. The main trouble with cyborgs, of course, is that
they are the illegitimate offspring of militarism and patriarchal
capitalism, not to mention state socialism"
she could essentially be writing about the citizens of the Junkyard before their
transformation. At least, they are comparable until she enters the realm of
politics. The Embryon companions, prior to the reintroduction of emotions, do
not dream of families, do not remember any of their history or culture, are not
made of mud but rather of raw data, are not reverent, and represent a united
front. They are also mindless, and their only goal is the one inscribed on them by
the system which has constructed them and which can, in a certain way, be linked
to the “militarism and state capitalism” which Haraway mentions above – but
more closely resembles the way in which those constructs might adapt to the
introduction of Haraway’s cyborg. Most notably, however, they have not
escaped the “manic compulsion to name the Enemy” as Haraway hoped. Indeed,
it is their sole law to conquer their arbitrary enemies, and as cyborgs they pursue
that goal remorselessly – for cyborgs also know no pity and no mercy or
empathy.
DDS, then, can be contextualized as a rebuff of the tradition of utopian,
idyllic visions of cyberculture as the potential liberator of humanity, both from
oppression and from the body. As digital demons, the Embryon have bodies
which are real enough for them – they require food and rest, and the implication
of the initial sequences seems to be that a lack of emotion – of reverence, family,
and other concepts of the sort – points towards a decline of society rather than a
development. Additionally, even when technology liberates us from our bodies
and the oppression they must suffer, it provides a forum for new types and levels
of oppression, as those who control and master a technology are able to
dominate those who do not. And, finally, DDS seems to argue that when
knowledge exists only as data and one entity or group controls that data, that
power is able to designate any enemy it desires and to command and program the
cyborg – whose weakness, in the end, is that her body is made of data, and data
can be manipulate both more easily and more completely than flesh.

As has been mentioned previously, one of the greatest distinctions within
the Japanese tradition in role-playing has been the relative focus
on the party.

Sonobe, Souan. “Hakkenden Hakruyu-Tei.” 6 April 2006.
<http://www.mars.dti.ne.jp/~opaku/shogun/index.html>.
Takashi, Anno, dir. Hakkenden. 1990.

AFTERWORD.
A distinctive mark of the Quest is the extent to which, more than in any other kind of story, the hero/ine is not alone in their adventures. But more consistently than in any other type of story, in the Epic Quest we are also made aware of the presence and importance of the friends who accompany them.
In fact the relationship to the companions assumes one of four general forms, two of which form ensembles (instead of hero/ine and sidekick duos): and since these basic types of relationship are also found, more sporadically, through stories of all kinds, they must be noted.
Firstly, the companions may simply be a large number of undifferentiated appendages, few if any of whom we even know by name. Such are the twelve boatloads of men who set out from Troy with Odysseus, Aeneas's Trojans, Gerda's carriage escort, or the main body of the Jews who accompany Moses. (These are usually expendable "redshirts", dying left and right at the drop of a hat whenever the fellowship confronts monsters, natural traps, booby traps...).
Fourthly, in the most fully-differentiated form of the relationship between the Quest companions, the latter are each given distinct characteristics which complement each other, and add up to a 'whole'. In Watership Down, for instance, the leader of the rabbits is Hazel. But he relies heavily on the physical strength of Bigwig, the rational planning capacities of Blackberry, and the intuitive powers of Fiver; and without all their separate contributions combined, the Quest could not succeed. A strikingly similar balance can be seen in the group who set out on the Quest in King Solomon's Mines. Their leader and the story's is Allan Quatermain: his companions are the 'bull-like' Sir Henry Curtis, representing physical strength; the immaculate Captain Good, who represents rational calculation (it is he who saves them all by predicting a solar eclipse from his nautical almanac); while the intuitive principle is represented by their mysterious, regal Zulu companion, Umbopa, who seems to have more hidden knowledge of the goal they are heading for than he lets on, for reasons which eventually emerge. A third example of such a brains, brawn, heart, and leadership ensemble would be the leading quartet of The Wizard of Oz: Dorothy (leader), the Scarecrow (brains), the Tin Man (heart), and the Cowardly Lion (brawn). (It's this kind of group of companions with distinct characteristics which form nakama ensembles; they don't need to embody brains, brawn, heart, and leadership; in fact there may be fewer [as few as three] or more companions embodying different qualities).

WHAT LITTLE SANDRA MISTOOK

Here are a few slightly foolish mistakes I commonly made as a Baby-Spice-twintailed kid, even as a toddler, and some of them in my nerdy tomboy short-haired adolescence, because of similarities between these concepts' names or shapes! You wouldn't believe it, seriously!

1) Pulp Fiction is Full Monty.
CAUSE: Lexical similarity between "Pulp" and "Full" (four-letter English words with -UL- in the middle), in popular 1990s Anglophone comedies with a full-English title written in condensed bold all caps in the same red-and-yellow colour scheme, and whose highlight was the leading cast performing a catchy signature dance.
DEBUNKED: By reading reviews and watching footage from both films, I came to realise that, in spite of the ostensible similarities between the words Pulp and Full, and between the respective poster titles, both films are essentially as different as chalk is from cheese: the former is a snarky and blood-spluttering Tarantino flick noir; the latter a socially critical British comedy about stripteasing former steelworkers.
2) Black Lagoon is Gurren Lagann.
CAUSE: Lexical similarity between "Lagoon" and "Lagann," and between a few characters' hair colour (especially the respective female leads') across series.
DEBUNKED: By reading anime reviews and watching footage from both anime series, I came to realise that, in spite of the ostensible similarities between the words Lagoon and Lagann, and between the heroines Revy and Yoko, both series are essentially as different as chalk is from cheese: one of them (Gurren Lagann) being a light and soft sci-fi epic, the other (Black Lagoon) a dark and edgy realistic series noir.
3) The left of others equals my left; ditto for the right.
CAUSE: "The left is your writing hand, also the arm with the birthmarks" was how my Spanish- and Swedish-speaking elders helped me clear my left-right confusion, unfortunately and unwittingly creating a further bungle. If I were facing someone else, even my mirror image or a fictional character, I would say that their eye facing my left side is their left eye.
DEBUNKED: The gunshot on Lord Nelson's left shoulder at Trafalgar proved the most influential clue in this aspect: from looking at depictions of the wounded and dying admiral, I realized that my right faced and still faces Horatio's (and everyone else's) left.
4) Woodsorrels are real clovers.
CAUSE: Clovers on screen and in storybooks look exactly like woodsorrels (Oxalis stricta) with heart-shaped (instead of circular) leaves.
DEBUNKED: Elsa Beskow's The Flower Festival (Blomsterfesten) set the record straight in my mind by featuring woodsorrels and clovers personified in the same illustration; the former with heart-shaped leaves and yellow star-shaped flowers, the latter with circular leaves and red or white pompom flowers.
5) Littlefinger is the bald eunuch... another name for Varys/the Spider, right?
CAUSE: I was 15 when I began the first GoT novel, and it turns out that I had a limit back then (add that I was constantly on an uphill struggle with Maths and bullies!) for holding up all the names and relationships! I had already got to make enough of an effort to tell Jaime and Cersei from Visy and Dany, remembering that the Targs were a lighter shade of blond than the Lannisters and (Targs) had violet eyes instead of green! Add the Stark children, the Baratheon brothers, and the other Lannisters, aside from Drogo, Jorah, and the handmaids across the pond, and the ensuing relationship grid was a good-sized mind map the kind I have and then had for a Shakespearean play or mythological pantheon... when we got to court, to the Red Keep, it came as no surprise that I messed up with Varys and Petyr!!
DEBUNKED: Reading the graphic novels and watching the TV series helped me get the characters right in my mind's eye and have a clear, non-confusing picture of who each and one of them was. Again, these two proved as different as chalk is from cheese... or maybe the Spider and the Mockingbird are not that different at heart?

ESOS JINGLES QUE AÚN ME SÉ DE CARRERILLA

ESOS JINGLES QUE AÚN ME SÉ DE CARRERILLA...
Fil per randa, hilo por encaje, se dice en catalán. La expresión inglesa equivalente es by heart, y no puede ser más apropiado para esas canciones cuyas letras y melodías se te clavan en el corazón durante años... al fin y al cabo decimos re-COR-dar, ¿o no?
Postdata. Las partes en prosa de los anuncios van en cursiva para diferenciarlas de la letra.


EL PLÁTANO ES SENSACIONAL:
CUANDO BALOO ANUNCIABA PLÁTANO DE CANARIAS

El plátano es sensacional,
tan sano y fácil de pelar,
y olvídate de la preocupación...

Seamos sinceros, sólo me acuerdo de esos tres versos. NO me sé esta canción de carrerilla, a diferencia de las demás que voy a presentaros. Pero sí se me han quedado grabados estos versos cantados por el oso Baloo. Por alguna razón será...

Aprovechando el éxito y la popularidad de la versión animada original del clásico Libro de la Selva, Plátano de Canarias realizó lo que sería el primer filk con el que me crucé en mi vida (aunque entonces, la pequeña Sandrita de coletas a lo Baby Spice desconocía casi todos los términos del mundillo fandom... pero, ¿ya que fue una campaña publicitaria y se pidieron los correspondientes derechos de autor, se consideraría oficialmente un filk?): reescribir la letra de Lo Más Vital e invitar al actor de doblaje del alegre oso pardo a retomar el rol en una escena del famoso número musical (¡en que Baloo obviamente cosecha bananas tropicales del sudeste asiático, NO plátanos canarios!) redoblada con la nueva letra.
El resultado: que Baloo nos espoleó a los niños de los noventa a llevar siempre a mano un Plátano de Canarias.


NOCHEBUENA DE AMOR, NAVIDAD JUBILOSA...
Las muñecas de Famosa se dirigen al Portal
para hacer llegar al Niño su cariño y su amistad.
Y Jesús en el pesebre sonríe porque es alegre.
Nochebuena de amor, Navidad jubilosa:
¡Es el mensaje feliz
de las muñecas Famosa!

Ah, los anuncios de muñecos, animales de peluche y mascotas virtuales, de juguetes para niñas con A... (los juguetes de varones, con tanto misil y vehículo, nunca han sido santo de mi devoción: de hecho, pienso que ¡si yo hubiera nacido varón, habría sido una fille manquée que, aparte de mi actual pasión por las artes creativas, tendría un guardarropa en colores intensos y el cuarto lleno de peluches y muñecos!). Añade que la marca es del País Valencià y que el anuncio es fijo una tradición navideña: razones de más para que se haya hecho un hueco en mi corazón. Lo mismo que dije a propósito de Plátano de Canarias del término filk puede decirse para crossover --que yo encontraría sin embargo por primera vez en la añorada y apasionante revista ¡Dibus! (2000-2015), siendo una preadolescente (aún conservo como oro en paño carpetas y cartapacios repletos de sus páginas de Zona Pokémon, Digimundo y Cómo dibujar Manga, arrancadas de cada número antes de meterlo en el contenedor azul, por una razón)--, pero añadir tantas líneas diferentes de muñecas y peluches al Portal de Belén para adorar al Niño todos juntos podría considerarse el primer crossover de mi vida, que recuerdo de cada Navidades desde la primera infancia, a mediados de los noventa.


SABORES DEL MAR CONGELADOS

Si quieres buen pescado
con toda calidad,
¡pescado congelado
con más comodidad!
¿Que no has ido al mercado?
¡Pescado congelado!
¿Que llegan invitados?
¡Marisco congelado!
Los niños, encantados:
¡calamares congelados!
Productos que no suben
los tienes todo el año:
¡qué gusto, qué bien saben
del mar los congelados!
Sabores del mar congelados. Saber comer, saber vivir. Es un consejo del FROM y la Unión Europea.

Si es un anuncio de un alimento que te encanta desde que tenías dientes de leche, si la melodía y la letra son alegres y en pantalla hay mucha gente feliz, si encima lo apoya un organismo con el peso y el poder de la Unión Europea (cuyos consejos para ahorrar agua, etc. siempre aceptamos como vox Dei)... el resultado es que hoy en día, como joven adulta, aún te sabes toda la canción e incluso la coletilla en prosa.


MIS MICROBABIES

Mis Microbabies
quieren jugar,
que les cuides y les des de comer...
I... I love you!
Mis Microbabies...

Ah, los anuncios de muñecos, animales de peluche y mascotas virtuales, de juguetes para niñas con A... (los juguetes de varones, con tanto misil y vehículo, nunca han sido santo de mi devoción: de hecho, pienso que ¡si yo hubiera nacido varón, habría sido una fille manquée que, aparte de mi actual pasión por las artes creativas, tendría un guardarropa en colores intensos y el cuarto lleno de peluches y muñecos!). Las Shellies (hoy en día conocidas como Chelseas), los Squinkies, las BuvyMamys que ponen e incuban huevos y cantan duetos con sus crías... todo eso aún me conmueve --¡incluso los anuncios de las Glimmies y de las haditas de Magiki hoy en día a los 25 veranos!-- Estos Microbabies eran a la vez bebés y mascotas virtuales, siendo muñequitos electrónicos de unos tres centímetros a los que dabas de comer con sus biberones. El "I... I love you" del anuncio lo decía, mientras la dulce voz femenina de la cantante se daba una pausa, una Microbaby pelirroja de ojos verdes tras recibir su biberón. Cómo no que eran una creación nipona que encarnaba perfectamente la estética kawaii... y no serían las últimas mascotas electrónicas adorables del Imperio del Sol Naciente: hace unos tres años, me cautivaron los Dream Chicks (o Pollitos de Ensueño): suaves y rubios pollitos a tamaño real que caminan, picotean y pían como si fueran de verdad. Awwwww...


NIEVE, CURVAS IMPOSIBLES...

Nieve,
curvas imposibles y una obra sin razón.
Jabones,
una vaca sorda y carteles sin comprensión.
Un superhéroe herido,
rocas en reproducción,
ciclistas que distraigan
y Richard Clayderman en su piano sin controoool...
oh oh oooh oh oh oooh oh oh oooh...
-¿Algo más?
-Sí, una maratón.
Y una maratóóón...
oh oh oooh oh oh oooh oh oh oooh...
Elige el camino difícil.

(La obra sin razón. Hacen falta elefantes.)

Aunque este jingle sea mucho más reciente, tengo razones de peso para acordarme de toda la letra y para incluirlo en esta lista. No me puedo creer que esta no fuera la Canción del Verano de aquel año. Y eso que el anuncio tenía tela para dar y tomar: entre la melodía de La Historia Interminable de Limahl y la surrealista ilustración de la letra en pantalla, con por ejemplo los adoquines de una calle transformándose en jabones de colores al darse la vuelta, o una vaca medio sorda que oye con una corneta sostenida por un hada, por no hablar de Richard Clayderman en su piano sin controoool...oh oh oooh oh oh oooh oh oh oooh... Todo un viaje por una ensoñación que Michael Ende, en gloria esté, podría haberse fácilmente sacado del sombrero.

Y Richard Clayderman en su piano sin control...

HAKKENDEN NEW WORLD OF DARKNESS AU

A story set in a world very similar yet very different from ours (for instance, with Nazis on the dark side of the Moon and within the hollow Earth, aside from all-steampunk or solarpunk (depending of the nation) transportation and other technologies; it's later revealed to be a Confederate States uchronia in which Europe retained its world supremacy, hence the country-esque, Ruritanian, steampunk and solarpunk aesthetic!) with my OCs, the Chronicles/New World of Darkness, and the inspiration being the EPIC Japanese nineteenth-century fantasy that inspired a four-parter in Season 20 of Detective Conan, the first season of the magical girl warrior anime Corrector Yui (fillers aside: only the episodes in which new correctors are introduced, and the finale), the first Digimon season titled Digimon Adventure, and a boys' love anime sharing the hypotext's title of Hakkenden.

Spiritus Mundi: Of Those Lucky Bastards tells the story of:

1. a perky and wealthy, yet at heart awkward Southern French Troubadour Heiress or Lightbearer who collects funny hats and loves to dress up and draw attention, yet with a dark secret insecurity concerning her loneliness and previous guardians' (Moon Nazis'!) sinister schemes (Two-Leaf Clover on left forearm: the Shino character -- Douceline "Douce" Kaleido),
2. a Byronic high-ranking Staunen officer of the Centre for Circumferential Navigation (and member of the Nine Vertex Devils Club thanks to his pedal-propelled skychaser, which is just like Sportacus's sky chaser!), who happens to be her guardian, the leader of them all, and the team dad/oniisama, aside from a sarcastic lovable eccentric (like his own guardian, a retired French colonel of the same catalyst and foundation); later on, this young man is killed by the Nazis and resurrected/emasculated as an emotionless yet equally snarky Osirian of the Refinement of Cobalt (Six-Leaf Clover on corner of left eye: the Kenpachi character -- Étienne Kaleido [also known by various aliases such as Staffan Storm or Csele István])
3. a Lützen-based Scholastic Wesley --also a Staunen-- studying at Leipzig University, yet commuting home to Lützen, who prefers using his wits to fighting, endowed with an extraordinary skill of probability (One-Leaf Clover on left shoulder: the Shinobu character -- Clément "Clem" Kaleido)
4. a hot-blooded 80s-style rockstar, formerly the keytarist and leader of Prüssiän Blüe with a troubled past -involving massacre of the acting troupe to which Douce and Claudine were also born- and difficulties in relationships (and a keytar that is actually a guntar disguised with the Invoke Conclusion, with the inscription THIS MACHINE KILLS FASCISTS left untouched) who happens to be a Tropicana Siren affiliated to the Current of Dark Passions, with an acquired poison immunity that will soon come in handy (Five-Leaf Clover on nape of neck: the Dousetsu character -- Laurent Pascal "Aliöth" Kaleido)
5. a badass, charming and dashing dark-skinned/freckled blond tennis-playing heiress/ojou who blossoms as a Champion of Swords, and gets involved in an Othello-esque intrigue with her Moon Nazi lieutenant coach/guardian Rainer due to a misplaced wrist sweatband found by Étienne (Three-Leaf Clover on brow: the Daikaku character -- Louise "Wiske"/"Rapière" Kaleido)
6. the scarred and one-eyed owner of a macaron foodtruck --Meowcarons-- that is actually bigger on the inside (mansion-sized, like a TARDIS), a realistic titian blond with a soft spot for stray cats and a friendly demeanour, aside from a missing right eye and a dark secret involving flashbacks about drunkenly falling from heights on shattered glasses, which makes him bleed all over, even from his missing eye --he's a stray Messenger Happenstance wraith or Slip-Up (in his life, he was the beholden, adoptive brother, and muggle best friend of the Navigator leader, and practically began a bromance with Étienne that has officially developed into love)--... (Eight-Leaf Clover on left gluteus; the Kobungo character -- André (mortal name)/Secretkeeper (temporary, former wraith name) Kaleido)
7. a reserved Gothenburg-Valencian amateur otokoyaku/bifauxnen thespian (plays Cassio, Mercutio, Laertes) and type 2 diabetic, with recurrent dreams of drowning in outer space, who appears to be the sole mortal in the group and who serves, along with the Wesley, as a Lemony narrator... (She later becomes a Vaporia Siren with various electric powers, able to fly and change gender at will, a dutyborn of the Current of Conflict -even though, with her condition, her powers are limited)... (Seven-Leaf Clover on right forearm: the Sósuke character -- Arya Aleksandra Kaleido)
8. ... and a graceful and stubborn, gorgeous cajón drummer/backup singer, vying with her partner for the role of lead singer, which she has wrested from him after their breakup, of Prüssiän Blüe and in a presently-broken relationship with said keytarist; an M2F trans person raised by an actor troupe, with a heart of gold but a split personality that will come in handy, who will find their way into their group as well; actually an Oceanid Lahmasu (half human, half Oceanid) in the School of Fog, a bastard rejected/persecuted by her paternal family and coldly, convolutedly seeking revenge on them, aside from on some particular members of the enemy NWoD factions featured in-universe (Four-Leaf Clover on left pectoral: the Keno character -- Claude/Claudine Kaleido)
9. ...as well as a ninth person, not surnamed Kaleido, but still connected to the clan and who has been following their steps all the time; are they good or evil? (the Daisuke character -- ???)

They fight Loyalist of Thule Nazis and Stormbringers, the Cheiron Group, Ahabs, Letheans, and Flensers; in a world where these young people, all of them left-handed orphans and half-siblings with a birthmark of a differently-leaf clover on different parts of their skin, all have to stick together, accept the surname Kaleido --their mother's (Lilia Kaleido --also known as Csele Liliom, Lilianne von Wieduwillst, etc.--, an eccentric heiress without any special powers, but with an affinity to attract and bed supernaturals of both sexes!) surname-- and confront those who would like to cut them up and especially those Stormites --their rightful legacy being wrested from them by a Princess of Storms now resurrected as a half-human Lieutenant leading a sinister group of well-intentioned extremists (may of which, like creepy Shining-esque twins Kanna and Kagura (Credence and Cadence in their past lives), Isuzu, Ayame, Fumi, Ritsu... not to mention the leaders themselves, Yayoi and Uzuki, have names taken from months in archaic Japanese) who do not care about any collateral damage if it means taking down the Darkness --worth citing that some of the Kaleido siblings, due to their circumstances, are considered creatures of the Darkness by the Stormbringers! 

In between Debut Queue, Putting the Band Back Together, Dwindling Party, heist sagas like the Ocean's trilogy, and a first arc finale with Étienne kidnapped by stunning Thulean Baroness Ilse, rescued at the cost of his own life --the puzzle he was made to solve had been made by Ilse as a catch 22 scenario that would bring the solver to die from a volley of laser shots as soon as the puzzle was cracked--, and subsequently resurrected as an Osirian (following the instructions written in his journal as "MANNER TO PROCEED IN CASE OF ÉTIENNE KALEIDO BEING CLINICALLY DEAD;" to announce his status to the CCN as missing in action and take his form to some demiurge acquaintances of his), which can be read as a retelling of The Snow Queen with the team leader in the role of Kai and a team of seven Gerdas (including a brutal subversion of the Women as Reward and Paid Harem tropes in which gay leader Étienne snarkily tells bisexual Vamp Baroness Isolde during their brief stroll through her Den of Iniquity: "I don't want women. Not as reward, not to make love with. I would rather gladly appreciate a brand new pair of ice-skates. Number 40, so they fit.")... with a new twist or left turn at every corner, this saga is sure exciting... and even more when what we took for granted is turned on its head, revealing this to be not a clear-cut conflict of good versus evil!

EXCERPT I:
Wiske reeled backwards as the spherical ray of firelight gradually left her personal space.
The fireball struck Rainer right in the heart, opening a tennis-ball-sized hole in the middle of his chest, then evaporating after it had severed spine, flesh, skin, shirt.
Once he had pinned her to the ground, flushed with brandy and trying to stab her, no matter how much she writhed, while torturing her about giving the wristband to that bloody Frog... and now he lay on his back, pale and cold as ice, with an empty hole where his heart should have been.
She stood back, entranced, looking at the racket in her left hand --now a sword with a racket-sized and racket-shaped blade. Wondering whatever had happened right then and right there.
And if he really deserved it. The one who as a stripling --no longer a boy, not yet a young man-- had fled the Thulean outpost where he was born and raised, weary of his parents' expectations, the terrible physical and emotional pain from his tutors, the lack of friends, and the fate of a lamb led to the slaughter... the fact that the other cadets in his batch of freshly-baked lieutenants, all of them more physically developed, had always called him a "ladybug" in that mocking tone... and his back and limbs were rife with scars from slights that other young officers had committed... It was no wonder that Rainer, after literally fleeing for his life, had clung so strongly to Wiske. Because she had felt sorry, because she had seen the tennis prodigy and the self-made socialite, as well as the runaway outsider, where others saw the Nazi lieutenant; because they were both lonely young people, friendless and surrounded by liars; a stripling and a little girl who might as well have been siblings.
And yet, should her guardian have seriously tortured her, trying to drown his sorrows in brandy, accepting a French liquor in spite of his self-proclaimed hatred for Frogs and Slaves... ironic given the fact that his own society had always rejected his imperfect personality, and even considered discarding him altogether for being faulty?
And now he lay there, shot through the heart.
By the same force that had transformed her.
Just because she had misplaced her wristband for about an hour and another man had found it.
She looked down towards her own chest and saw the breastplate. Her tennis shoes turned to black or dark chocolate-coloured Wellingtons, her ponytail lowered into an eighteenth-century queue... and her usually freckled arms, lilywhite unless the sun made them red as crawfish, having become completely golden-brown, the colour of a perfect latte. Surely her face had changed phototype as well... but that breastplate? That glittering, dazzling breastplate, with those golden and scarlet trimmings?
"This cannot be true, Louise. You look just like your dream self."
Her dream of that battlefield, of looking like that warrior in her dream, the breastplated maiden that shot a Schutzstaffel-uniformed Rainer through the heart with a gun she usually carried flung across her back. She'd had dreams of storming fortresses and defending them from besiegers, of victory revels, and even of being left for dead upon the battlefield at a twilight clouded by carrion crows, or of limbs being severed and eyes gouged out; either at the surgeon's or on the war front.
She swallowed her welling tears, whispering to herself not to cry over and over again.
"Try drying up your tears," Étienne said, reaching out her wristband, his smile sincere and warm, now seeming far closer to her. "It wasn't the Thulean lieutenant, at the end of the day; she was the one..." he then muttered to himself.
Wiske took up the band at first hesitantly. The fireball then suddenly returned and lodged on her third eye, right between her eyebrows. A light shining brightly; she did not feel it sear her skin but rather as a kiss and a caress. The wristband, back where it should be on her right wrist, was now a compact-shaped silvery shield with a golden outline. Yet she took up her racket-sword to see her face reflected on the blade, and was surprised not to behold her transformed self's latte skin, but at the sign between her eyes: a floral pattern with three leaves or petals, instead of the six forming an ice crystal on the corner of Étienne's left eye.
"The three-leaf clover..." said both Étienne and Wiske at unison.

SPOILER ALERT: Rainer, after being laid in state, is also resurrected --endowed with a waterproof clockwork heart-- and returns to life as a supernal Siren Promethean with the Humour of Relationships!

The original Satomi Hakkenden, the Chronicles of the Eight Warriors of House Satomi/the Satomi Clan, an 106-volume epic and its days' counterpart of A Song of Ice and Fire when it comes to length and complexity, begins with the Warring-States-era story of Tamazusa Anzai --the rightful lady of the shire (or is she?)-- and Satomi Fusehime, Lady Fusé Satomi --the usurper's only daughter (or is she?)--. A curse (to only mother bastards) placed by the former on the latter's household after the coup causes Fusehime to take a bullet to the heart from her spurned suitor/intended fiancé Daisuke Kanamari, leading a detachment of her clan's own men; her heroic sacrifice and the purification rituals she had undergone before to free herself from the curse cause eight beads of her rosary to scatter and become eight children, each of them associated with a different virtue of confucianism and with a peony birthmark on a different body part. The bulk of the epic centers on the Debut Queue of these diverse characters meeting one another and learning about their shared destiny, and their subsequent struggle against a resurrected Tamazusa, who has wrested their rightful place --or is it?-- from the Satomis in a bloody counter-coup, since Kanamari abdicated as penance for accidentally shooting his bride down... and the climax is the confrontation of the leading ensemble against the villainess in the fortress tower that is the epicentre of all this legendary Anzai-Satomi war...

The original Hakkenden is a novel expansion of a motif which appears to have developed in parallel in the East and West. While Takizawa's main influence was the Chinese Suikoden, or Outlaws of the Marsh... Occidental versions exist as well, such as Mme. d'Aulnoy's Belle-Belle and the Baron von Münchhausen's adventures (the Baron has a super-strong servant who can uproot and shoulder pines as if they were carrots, a super-fast one who has to wear weights on his ankles to walk, a sniper who never misses the mark, a sharp-eared one who can hear the grass grow, and one with gale-force lungs; Belle-Belle has servants with the same powers, plus an omnivore who requires a cartload of bread washed down with a whole lake... just for breakfast). In the present day, classic heist series like the A-Team and the Ocean's Trilogy, to which this AU is partly a tribute, have drunk at the same source.

OF PTSD, DONUTS, AND THE ZUKA CURES

Review of Kirakira Precure à la Mode ep 7:
or this series's first pet-centric episode on the backstory of the Magical Land... surprise... it's the same world as Earth? And why shroud more the villains' motives in darkness?

Roll call!

AKIRA (to Yukari): Who would have known that you're a Precure as well?
AOI: Now that I mention it... you two go to the same high school (kókó), right?
That means Yukari must have known Akira since first sight... and the fact that Akira is female...

Awwww... don't they look good?
Well, wait until you see them in pâtissière uniform in next episode!

The first batch of donuts have not swollen in the pan, which means...
leave it to Aoi Tategami and let's see if it's worth her approval!

AOI (wincing): KYAAAAH! So hard...

That's because of a mishap involving lack of baking soda... it still stands in a little dish on the table!

ELDER: Hohohohoho, nice to see you're having fun! This reminds me of the sweets workshop back on Mount Strawberry...
A place name that has just piqued the Precures' interest.

While Pekorin hearing about her homeland has her eyes welling with tears of sorrow...
ELDER: With our friends (nakama-tachi), Pekorin and I used to make sweets back on Mount Strawberry.

YUKARI: This is making me curious.
AKIRA: Could you please tell us?
ELDER: Sigh... Perhaps this is a good moment to tell you all, right from the start.

Flashback to the sweets workshop beneath a rock ledge --I assume it's meant as a natural roof to protect the ovens and frying pans from the rain, isn't it?

Everyone's busy making donuts, frying them, kneading dough, cutting biscuits with a heart cutter... decorating treats with berries or whisking up butter cream... in some way or another. Making the treats fills them with kirakiraru, i e positive energy.


PEKORIN (mixing a bit too vigorously): Let's make delicious sweets!

Pekorin, just like Aoi, mixes too vigorously... leading the Elder to give her some constructive criticism.
ELDER: Pekorin, you're overmixing.
PEKORIN'S BLOND FRIEND: But you're still the most eager one around these parts, as always!
PEKORIN'S AUBURN FRIEND: That's right!
ELDER: Hohohohoho!

PEKORIN (in high spirits): Someday, Pekorin will make scrumptious sweets, just like the Legendary Pâtissières, the Pretty Cures!

So the Queen of the Magical Land was a Precure who is considered at least a demigoddess within her realm...

ELDER: You can do it (Ganbaru ja na). Bring liveliness into people's hearts with your treats. Then someday the time will come when we'll have to use this... (pointing at the Pâtisserie)


ITADAKIMASU!!

Pekorin and friends are nomming on donuts they have just made.
PEKORIN: Oishii (delicious)!
PEKORIN'S AUBURN FRIEND: Hey, haven't you heard? Some villains have tried lately to steal the kirakiraru from our sweets...
PEKORIN: Really?
PEKORIN'S BLOND FRIEND: There are really awful people out there...
PEKORIN'S AUBURN FRIEND: I'm worried for my friends (nakama) who are studying abroad...

THEN EVERYTHING CHANGED WHEN THE FIRE NATION... I MEAN, THE EVIL EMPIRE OF THIS CONTINUITY, ATTACKED.

The MotWs from previous episodes appear to claim the kira-kiraru; to be stopped by the Elder armed with an umbrella. Priori Incantatem ensues.


Pekorin and friends just stand back in awe.
ELDER: NOT IF I CAN HELP IT!!!

As a result, Pekorin's friends were scattered abroad all over the face of the Earth.

ELDER: In that explosion, I lost my physical body as well. And all our friends (nakama-tachi) were scattered and separated.
(So that's why he is presently a legless ghost!)

Remembering her home and the diaspora, Pekorin begins to sob as her ears glow blue and she flies away on her own...

So the Pâtisserie is more or less of a TARDIS... the size of Versailles on the inside!
AOI: Guess she wanted to be on her own, especially after losing all her friends (nakama) like that.


She only stands there musing and looking at Mt. Strawberry, which happens to be the hill behind the Cures' hometown. So the Magical Land in this series may not be another dimension, but rather a wainscot society located on Earth... that's an interesting premise, isn't it?

While Pekorin ponders, all alone, the Cures decide to try Usami's latest inspiration flash as a positive surprise for their pet...

...while they watch in the sidelines themselves, sure that their cunning plan is not allowed to fail.

#AoiApproved


The donuts have wound up golden brown and scrumptious.
AOI: Hihi... (chortles)

A smile returns to Pekorin's face as she decorates the donuts with her friends' faces.
So she leaves to put the donuts on the ruins of the workshop on Mt. Strawberry as an offering, to try to call her nakama back to her side... but in vain.

These ruins confirm as canon my hypothesis that this continuity's Magical Land is a wainscot society on Earth.

What the donuts do, however, is trigger an immersive pensieve flashback of the happy days before the invasion.


However, no filler episode is complete without the standard MotW attack and the ordinary call into action, right?


Definitely... seeing Akira take the leadership in battle is impressive.
AKIRA: Now it's our turn to help! (Watashi-tachi mo ikuyo!)
YUKARI+AOI+HIMARI: Right! (Hai!)

CURE À LA MODE! DECORATION!



An impressive choco-shield from Cure Chocolat! Now it's time for Macaron to use her yoyo!


CURE MACARON: Hey! Over here!

CURE GELATO: My turn!! Here I GOOO!!! (She sends out a right straight that has the multiple MotWs of this episode --a temporarily quadruple battle; this MotW could use Double Team or a similar technique-- exclaim: HOW DARE YOU, PRECURES!?)

Now: We know, from seeing Aoi play the guitar and write lyrics, that she is a rightie.

We also know that her magical self Cure Gelato is a boxing battler.

The right-handed boxing stance, the orthodox stance... is exactly this one: left fist forwards for defence and the right one backwards for more offensive purposes.

Which means... that maybe if a sinistral antagonist appears, they will exploit the gap in Aoi's/Gelato's stance. **shudders**

Once more, the Precures claim victory...

Returning to the Pâtisserie, they decide to open it to the general public.


Then, maybe Pekorin's friends (nakama) will come!

AKIRA: Pretty good, eh?
YUKARI: I suppose so.

And thus, everyone gets ready for the grand opening of the Kirakira Pâtisserie. But it will be no bed of roses... that's for certain...

CANNIBALISM!?



If Pekorin eats a Pekorin donut (or one of those patterned after her friends) is it cannibalism (no matter how scrumptious the treat is)!?

THE MISSING QUEEN

Is this legendary Precure from the past some kind of queen of Pekorin's species? If so, why is she rather more humanoid than her subjects? Did the evil empire take her away... Little by little, the plot thickens...

MY OWN HUMBLE OPINION:

Akira Kenjo/Cure Chocolat takes the de facto leadership of the group from on right now.
Historically, and seeing how the shadow of Sailor Uranus was cast over the whole character archetype for these two decades, otokoyaku had always been Aloof Allies... that is, unlike the first Western example of one,  the impressively deconstructive Brienne of Tarth, deviated significantly from what we expected. (Though the first otokoyaku, those long-haired princely girls in uniform like Oscar de Jarjayes --colonel of the French Royal Guard at 18--, were quite badass leaders, and Oscar's rose-haired reincarnation of the 1990s, Utena, followed very closely in her predecessor's footsteps! Still, Uranus was far more popular than Utena; and the Sailor Soldier of the skies and elegance was the first short-haired otokoyaku ever, while neither Utena nor Oscar had Boyish Short Hair... a feature that has become a FIXTURE of the otokoyaku aesthetic and that the first Western otokoyaku, the Maid of Tarth, has got as well as many other modern examples!)

The Magical Land being located on Earth... and some of its denizens are studying pastry techniques abroad, in foreign countries... gods, how do you, if you're basically a sentient stuffed animal, get to learn pastry skills while still blending in and finding a niche, a life, on the Left Bank, for instance, without making anyone wonder? My own theory --later to be confirmed-- states that there are various mascot communities/polders spread across the Earth as wainscot societies.

As for Pekorin's PTSD; Kuroro in Go!Princess was the first thing I was reminded of. Only that Pekorin did not have a temporary coat turn to the dark side. Still, that depression and guilt remain the same. As well as the way these brooding characters' new human friends help them cope with the trauma...

Now, there's something I forgot to explain for you about why I always explain why I put the original word used for friend/s in parentheses after it. And the answer is that there are two different concepts signified by these two different words in Japanese:

Nakama means more like comrade or companion, and refers to those who share battles/adventures, and/or pursue a goal, together. Tomodachi refers more to the concept of friends as people who are close to each other without sharing blood ties.

NEXT EPISODE -8-:

It's messy, isn't it... the pâtisserie upstairs garret has not been cleaned for ages.
Akira gladly takes up the cleaning chore, while Aoi just standing there as if she thought: what if I make a bigger mess, given my own impulsive nature? (Spoiler alert: She will make a bigger mess indeed!)
I clearly understand Aoi's predicament...

The Headman/Elder becomes a human... who looks like a classier Count of Tilly, right?

PS. Any slender old (like, senior) gentleman with a curly moustache looks like Jan 't Serclaës to me...

Also, the Cures get to debut in their pâtissière uniforms,
Akira being the only one donning trousers instead of a skirt.

Don't the Zuka Cures look good in uniform? PS. Akira wears trousers as part of hers...