golden kamuy: character arcs

[sword_logic]

well, i've reached the point where tungle no longer feels like the right platform to Post™ on, but rather just to Shitte Poast™ on. in any case: thoughts on GK i've been mulling over the past week, mostly for posterity's sake so i can see how right/wrong i will turn out to be.

first off, heads up for discussion of (gross) canon injuries, namely sugimoto's.

to start: it is so thoroughly fascinating to see sugimoto finally getting a character arc - and a negative one, at that. i wouldn't count his head injury as part of it, per se; that feels kind of. weird. his head injury and the associated frontal lobe trauma sure enhance his negative traits (namely aggression and violence) but those have been, well, character traits since day 1. his willingness to do anything/everything for asirpa was also established pretty early on and i wouldn't count that as a character arc, either; nor would i count his acceptance of help/teamwork with former enemies.

sugimoto's been a pretty steady-on character for the bulk of the series so far - which is totally fine, his relative narrative steadiness was a great backdrop to characters who do go through changes, like tanigaki and inkarmat - but the moment he took a sharp turn into "negative development" was, to me, making the decision for asirpa to get her out of the fight. up till this point, he's been following her lead on everything, even big, life-threatening decisions like going back to see noppera-bou, and this marked the first time he'd decided something for her. which, functionally, puts him in the same spot as wilk (and even gen. hanazawa and adm. koito): making decisions for the younger generation, which has been repeatedly framed as one of the primary "evils" in the series (mostly vis a vis ogata's childhood, but adm. koito's speech rang true too, before he... misinterpreted everything at the end, lol).

another - maybe bigger? - show of sugimoto making a decision for asirpa was when he saved ogata's life. yes, don't point a weapon at someone unless you intend to hurt them - asirpa knows this and has scolded sugimoto himself for it - but when she released the arrow, she did not release it with the intent to kill ogata. she fired by accident. she was startled. the blood would have been on her hands, but intent to kill has also been a running theme in this series, and i think the lack of intent to kill on her part (shown clearly through her horrified reaction) was/would have been significant. but regardless, sugimoto made a choice for her here, rather than allowing her the (horrifying) experience of killing someone, and i'm fairly certain this is going to snowball itself till everything comes to a head. because, frankly, ogata was right in a very backwards way: as of what we know, could we assume that wilk truly expected his daughter to lead the ainu in a (supposed) war for reclamation and independence, and not either take lives, or, as a leader, be directly responsible for them being taken?

in any case, i think the broad strokes of what happens next will be fairly predictable: sugimoto lies to asirpa about what noppera-bou said before ogata killed him, and asirpa will have a negative reaction to it when she finds out, and sugimoto will Learn A Lesson. of course, everything is delicate as fuck currently and the wrench has already been thrown with ogata waking up, but i'm really curious to see sugimoto's reverse/negative development arc move forward.

and by contrast: ogata is uniquely positioned to (finally) get a positive character arc, and he was so close to just smoothly sliding into it before the drift ice encounter happened. but, that being said, turning on asirpa (and kiroranke; i don't think shiraishi even shows up on his mental radar, lmao) was 100% necessary for him, and i'd say maybe even for asirpa, too. to repeat what i said above, ogata's got a unique (and incredibly valid!) perspective on leadership, responsibility for death, and parenthood, and he was seeking validation in asirpa when he goaded her. he was looking for proof that people are just as shitty and twisted and broken as he is; looking for that same aspect of "raising you to be perfect and protected" vis a vis both wilk and sugimoto.

what he'll get (or not) out of that encounter obviously still remains to be seen, but i feel like this will lead to two things: first, the reveal of his true loyalties and intentions, as per tanigaki's comment that ogata is unlikely to have worked with kiroranke in support of eastern russian partisans. second, the drift ice encounter will be/will have been a pivot for his character, and my feeling is that as sugimoto continues to spiral down, ogata will... move sideways a bit, probably, and then start back on his slow climb up. (jazz hands) foils!

i don't think ogata will end up as the main villain in the series, because this is a series where having a main villain flat-out doesn't make sense. the whole point of both tsurumi and hijikata is that they're both right, both wrong, and both horrible in each of their ways. there aren't any set antagonists or clear lines drawn anywhere, and that's the point. secondly, i don't think ogata would end up as a third counterpoint to tsurumi and hijikata because he simply does not have the people skills to do so. tsurumi, hijikata, and ogata are all absolutely fantastic manipulators; the former two are fantastic at it on a grand scale, whereas ogata is really only capable of it on a very small (but very effective) scale.

ogata is a really difficult character to get a read on because he's a liar and a manipulator, but i believe (or... i want to believe) that some of his small moments with asirpa were actually genuine, and not just "gotta save the key to the map." asirpa has that effect on people, and especially if ogata was constantly comparing her to yuusaku and finding her Better and Gooder and Realer, there's a chance she grew on him - saying citatap and hinna, the reindeer hunt, protecting her from the russian sniper, etc. how likely is a heel-face turn for the better? no idea! probably not very! but i want a character like ogata to get a chance to be better, and i hope/think that this will be the start of it. ideally, i'd love for ogata to be the better brother/parent/mentor figure alongside sugimoto & co., to choose to not make the mistakes that hanazawa and adm. koito made, and reset the cycle for himself.

unless, of course, his true loyalties lie somewhere completely off the map, in which case we'll see. it's definitely possible that ogata is a spy working either for the russians, or for japanese high command, with the latter being more likely, imo. i wouldn't be too surprised if that were the case, and it'd throw some interesting light on the fact that he tried to rebel against tsurumi at the start of the series.

but at the end of the day, maybe i'm just biased.

maybe.