Twelve Kingdoms, various thoughts

[something]

*****SPOILERS for episodes 1-39*****

Last night (well the night before last, it being 6am as I type this and all), I watched Twelve Kingdoms disc one. It was alright, I guess. Decent setup to the world and I liked the instrumental OP piece, but the character designs were taking some getting used to. I also didn't like Sugimoto or Asano, Youko was pissing me off too, Keiki (Cake!!) talks about protecting Youko and then sort of disappeared, and everything else was a cacophony of names and terms and places so little was sticking. I was tired and it was late, so I went to bed after disc one, waiting for the "hook".

I started watching it again today with disc two around 1pm. 17 hours and 34 episodes later, I've completed the (main) show. I do think that's a record for me - 34 episodes in a single sitting. I was actually about to stop ~12 episodes ago but got something of a second wind.

First Arc, Arrival to Victory

Episode 7 was the turning point, definitely. Youko up until then just waffled between "I don't understand this place, baaaaaaaw" and "I don't understand this place, paranoia paranoia!!" and she was preventing me from getting into the show. But after leaving Rakushu bloody and unconscious and being taunted by the scabbard, she realizes that how she treats people is her decision, and her decision alone, and if they don't want to reciprocate any politeness and respect, she doesn't have to let that control her. She pushes him out of her way, and he gradually fades from the story.

Rakushu was amazing, and stayed as such through the whole show. While episode 7 was the turning point, the initial catalyst was the very end of episode five, when he saves an injured and betrayed Youko. He's absurdly forgiving, but never in a way that makes him look like a pushover devoid of personality. Instead he's just amazingly perceptive. Best giant rat ever.

The King of En and Enki were really fun to watch, especially Enki. There's not a lot else to say about them, but they've been ruling for 500 years and their attitude shows it. Great teachers for Youko, and the ones who lend the physical support she needs to retake Keiki. Enki is probably my favorite Kirin, and I really like the backstory about how he met En.

This leaves Asano and Sugimoto, since Keiki spent almost the whole arc under the Kou kirin's spell. Asano was... well not very important in this arc, other than as one piece of the awkward love triangle that added another layer to the estrangement between Sugimoto and Youko. Kinda glad he fell off a cliff. Sugimoto though, gaaah. I could not muster the slightest degree of sympathy for her at any point. I mean, seriously, what the fuck, Sugimoto? I was supposed to feel sorry for her because she was being so horribly used by the king of Kou, but in reality I just wanted to strangle the life right out of her. Every time I thought she was going to turn around, her DnD geekdom kicked in and she started ranting about being the chosen one again.

It's like her whole role can be summed up as "LARPing GONE HORRIBLY WRONG".

[[And gah, this is where I totally passed out while typing at about 7am, so I'm continuing on now the next afternoon...]]

Some other comments about the first arc:
- I totally didn't see the physical transformation in Youko at first. Sugimoto shows her her reflection in the mirror and they're all like OH WOW SO DIFFERENT, and I'm sitting here having no idea what they're talking about. Only when Fence pointed it out in an IM did I notice it. I would have figured it out eventually, especially seeing Sugimoto and Youko side by side,and after bring told what changed it seemed obvious, but at first it just didn't come across at all.
- I loved the little girl in the traveling performers troupe. I'm pretty sure she's the first of many Gyokuyous we meet. =P Also, Kaneda Tomoko!
- They fleshed the world out very well in this opening arc, even with the whole thing basically occurring in only 3 of the 12 kingdoms. The whole kirin system was especially well explained, even if it seems like they pick some pretty crappy rulers much of the time... And it's definitely the citizens of each kingdom that get the short end of the stick, as usual. So they get relief from terrible rulers who bring calamity, only to face more hardship as they wait for the next ruler to be chosen.
- This arc covered the first phase of Youko's growth, and did it well. From schoolgirl to leader of armies and queen, she changed so much along the way, and definitely for the better. It wasn't an easy change, but she made it very well. I suppose her being from that world in the first place made things a lot easier
- Damn recaps that include just enough new scenes that you can only skip bits and pieces of it...

Second Arc, Kirin of Tai

This arc was all about the Nyosen for me. Loooooooooove the Nyosen, especially Youka (<3 Yukana). Watching them scold all these important people was great, particularly Keiki, who finally got some real development. He was quite fun to watch interacting with Taiki.

I actually have very little to say about this arc. It was good, but I was craving more Youko badly, and wasn't getting it. I found out later she's just a character in 2 or 3 of the ~11 novels, but man, just seeing her become queen wasn't enough. I wanted to see, as Rakushun did, what kind of kingdom she would create. Nonetheless, I liked seeing the Kirin system fleshed out even more (on a more intimate level this time), and Gyousou surprised me - totally did not think he'd turn out to be a good guy, but he was, and the arc was much stronger for it,

This arc also gave Sugimoto something else to do, and she was more interesting in this role than in the first arc. But the way it ended... gah! Didn't end, really. I know there are six episodes left but I have a feeling they don't deal with the conclusion to this story, so it's a bit dissatisfying seeing the characters who just triumphed over adversity go missing after a year. Gyousou to who knows where, and Taiki back to a lonely, sad life in Japan, with Shushi (presumably) killing everyone who gets involved with him - even a friendly teacher who cares about him when nobody else seems to. And I think the last shot we got of Sugimoto was of Shushi making her pants-pissing terrified for getting near Taiki. :sd:

But well... Keiki backstory, Toutetsu becomes a puppy (lol), and NYOOOOOOSENNNNNNN!! Oh, and I cracked up at the method En, Enki and Keiki used to help Taiki realize that a Kirin cannot offer a false vow, and that his choice of Gyousou was entirely legitimate. So it was good but was still a side story to, for the anime anyway, the main Youko story. Though I believe I heard it's finished out in a later novel.

Third Arc, Wa Province

Have to say I was a little worried soon after this arc started too, because it quickly introduced two new girls in different kingdoms and I thought Youko was going to be a mere observer again. She turned out to be anything but, but I was still antsy for awhile.

Part of the problem is that I did not like either girl at all for quite awhile. Shoukei was a horrible, awful, spoiled, hateful, detestable failure of a human being. And Suzu evoked remarkably little sympathy for me, even though I completely loathed the awful Sen-nin who was tormenting her in Sai. Something about her just rubbed me in the wrong way. I shouldn't have begrudged her her fantasies about being saved by Youko, but I *did*, and my irritation with her kept growing. As for Shoukei, I understood there too why she acted like she did, but I still wanted to stab her brains right out of her pretty little head. Meanwhile in Kei, Youko's glorious victory was morphing into a political quagmire of court intrigue and a complicated bureaucracy she did not understand at all, and she was not taking it well. That's not to say I disliked these episodes at all - it was just hard to watch sometimes.

When it gradually became clear that Youko was going to be a huge part of this arc, things got better. She took a number of awkward steps towards asserting her authority as a ruler, though they turned out to be all the wrong steps as she walked right into the trap set for her. Getting her out of the palace really let things pick up again. Shoukei and Suzu started to make major turnarounds as well. For Suzu, it was meeting Shuuhei, and realizing that she was not the most unfortunate person in the world. This was when I disliked her the most - trying to compete with Shuuhei over who was more unfortunate. But it was also the turning point. He didn't want to play that game with her, and you could just see the pity in his eyes for how pathetic she'd become. For Shoukei, it was meeting Rakushun. They really had to bring out the big guns to turn that little bitch around, and absolutely nobody could have done it as well as Rakushun. He handled her bluntly, honestly, and masterfully at every turn, and completely changed her as a person.

When they met each other in Wa province, their transition became complete. Their respective reasons for meeting Youko had completely flipped by that point, and so Shoukei was in a perfect position to calm Suzu down and tame her anger - both as someone who herself had originally hated Youko and as someone who knew well the isolation and ignorance a position of royalty could bring. They're both great candidates for Komachi's 'I was a jerk, now forgive me!" thread, especially Shoukei. I loathed her initially, and by the end I absolutely loved her. She was handled marvelously. Probably my favorite scene involving those two is when they calm down the population of the besieged town by demonstrating their trust in the queen. They were loooovely right there <3

Asano, on the other hand, was a failure from start to finish. But he failed so spectacularly that I don't feel bad for him. It's almost impressive! Even his last ditch heroic ride to alert the rebels ends up being completely unnecessary and results in his needless, pathetic death. Oh, Asano. :sd:

And so the war rages and the rebels get the upper hand, but when the Royal Army approaches it's all over... until Youko rides out on Keiki and gets oh so regal on their asses. She was awesome here, and it's easily one of the highlights of the show. Thousands must have pissed their pants when they saw her, not least of which being that general. From that moment to the end Youko was just utterly divine, and I adored the renewed confidence she expressed when punishing the traitors, reinstating the disgraced officials, and then banning the procedure of kowtowing. A worthy first proclamation, definitely.

It's a great ending, which is why I stopped there last night. I don't know what the next six episodes bring (something of a side story I take it) but I wanted to pause and gather my thoughts before jumping into something else that I know wasn't really "finished". Granted, if this really were a 39 episode show, I'd have been a little miffed (lack of Taiki resolution aside) that we didn't get more epilogue, so if nothing else I hope the ep 40 recap gives us a little about the aftermath.

But even if not, though, the show and Youko both hit their peak with this last arc. Best of all, she's truly severed all ties with the other world, and has dedicated herself to becoming a just and noble queen in Kei. I was worried throughout much of the first arc that she was going to try to go back to Japan, leaving the world of the 12 Kingdoms behind, but that worry definitely disappeared by the end. She found a much greater calling here than she could have in "our" world.

Very, very good show all around, and because I've stopped to assess the whole show at this point, I don't think I'll have any real problems if the final portion of the show is any sort of a letdown. The story of Youko's rise to the throne has been told, and told damn well. Everything else is just omake - if I like it, that's just a nice bonus. If I don't, I won't let it take away from everything that happened thus far.

I no doubt have a lot of other things I noted in the back of my mind as I watched disc upon disc of this show, but this post is long enough. Time for 40-45.

[Fencedude]

Love Shoukei, LOOOOOOOOOOVE

Suzu was meh though, and Yoko was awesome after she got over herself.

BUT SHOUKEI IS LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOVE

[Nemo_N]

Youko, Shoukei and Shushou are pushing me into trying to make an h-doujin about them. *ahem*

The show takes some time to explain itself, but it does so eventually. The whole 12 kingdoms world looks very interesting; that recap where you only see the shadows of the rulers of the other kingdoms just makes my curiosity grow.

Rakushun is one of the best male characters ever. If Youko doesn't end up with him, that'll be her loss.

And Shushou (The Queen of Kyou) is moe.

until Youko rides out on Keiki and gets oh so regal on their asses. She was awesome here, and it's easily one of the highlights of the show. Thousands must have pissed their pants when they saw her, not least of which being that general.

Man, the awesomeness was off the charts; they should sell a poster of that scene where Youko is riding Keiki looking down to the general.

I hated the last arc just because there was no virtually no Youko, Shoukei, etc.; it's good, but after all the hawt awesome girls, watching all those guys is frustrating.

All in all great show that deserves more attention and, of course, more episodes.

[something]

And Shushou (The Queen of Kyou) is moe.
Hahaha, I meant to mention her. Her time was brief, but she was GREAT and needed to do so much more. Definitely the best ruler after Youko and En. Especially since her apparent "cruelty" really isn't - she explains later on that she dislikes Shoukei so much because of the way Shoukei looked down on the work she had to perform. By disparaging the work, she disparaged all the others who did it, so it's no wonder they despised her.

[Andrew Cunningham]

Obligatory the novels are better post:
Asano and Sugimoto are both anime original creations, added...for absolutely no reason that justifies how fucking unlikeable they are.

I absolutely hated the beginning of the story, largely because of them, but Youko as well. I had to be forced to watch more.
When I got around to the novels, I discovered that those useless idiots weren't there, and that being inside Youko's head made her reactions much more sympathetic - the descriptions of the way things she killed smelled was particularly vivid.
I'd very much recommend reading them.

[pianocello]

12 Kingdoms needs a Youko x Suzu x Shoukei hot springs OAV episode.
There. I said it. :sdsmiley:

[something]

I'd very much recommend reading them.
Well, not really an option for me, apparently. At least not in a remotely reasonable timeframe... TP is doing something like one a year, right?

At any rate I really like the anime quite a lot, so I guess I don't feel the level of dissatisfaction I'd consider necessary to go seek out the novels.... especially if they won't be done until 2017, which is so far in the future that it sounds almost like a fairytale :sd:

[HitokiriShadow]

I also didn't like Sugimoto or Asano, Youko was pissing me off too, Keiki (Cake!!) talks about protecting Youko and then sort of disappeared, and everything else was a cacophony of names and terms and places so little was sticking.

Episode 7 was the turning point, definitely. Youko up until then just waffled between "I don't understand this place, baaaaaaaw" and "I don't understand this place, paranoia paranoia!!" and she was preventing me from getting into the show.

This leaves Asano and Sugimoto, since Keiki spent almost the whole arc under the Kou kirin's spell. Asano was... well not very important in this arc, other than as one piece of the awkward love triangle that added another layer to the estrangement between Sugimoto and Youko. Kinda glad he fell off a cliff. Sugimoto though, gaaah. I could not muster the slightest degree of sympathy for her at any point. I mean, seriously, what the fuck, Sugimoto? I was supposed to feel sorry for her because she was being so horribly used by the king of Kou, but in reality I just wanted to strangle the life right out of her. Every time I thought she was going to turn around, her DnD geekdom kicked in and she started ranting about being the chosen one again.

It's like her whole role can be summed up as "LARPing GONE HORRIBLY WRONG".

I came to tolerate Sugimoto near the end of the first arc and actually liked the last two or three episodes, it just took too long to get there and went through too much crap along the way. Sugimoto's character was also, for the most part, just horribly obnoxious. Even for the purpose she was serving, they could have made her, if not more likable, at least less grating.

I never liked Asano, though his later role was less painful to watch. What I really hated was how their presence affected Youko's character development. In the novels, Youko went there alone. She had no one else to rely on and quickly started thinking and acting for herself. She didn't like her situation, but she was growing and adapting to it. But in the anime, Asano and Sugimoto did and though a lot of the things Youko should have in those first 5 episodes, giving Youko little to do but mope and whine.

In addition, the focus on these new anime original aspects dragged out what they should have been getting through as quickly as possible. I had expected the first arc to end around episode 7-8 at the latest. But no, it went on the episode fucking 13. The arc should have focused on developing the world and Youko, and while the world building was handled decently enough, Youko's development left a lot to be desired in those early episodes and the extra elements (Sugimoto and Asano) were not for the better.


Second Arc, Kirin of Tai

This arc was all about the Nyosen for me. Loooooooooove the Nyosen, especially Youka (<3 Yukana).
I actually have very little to say about this arc. It was good, but I was craving more Youko badly, and wasn't getting it.

That's pretty much how I felt. It was an interesting story, but I wanted Youko, dammit! And it ultimately ends up being so detached from the rest of the anime. I'm sure the events here will come up again in the novels at some point, but the only link in the anime is Yuzu and they didn't need to do this entire arc just for that.

I found out later she's just a character in 2 or 3 of the ~11 novels, but man, just seeing her become queen wasn't enough. I wanted to see, as Rakushun did, what kind of kingdom she would create.

Now that I did not know. That's disappointing.

I know there are six episodes left but I have a feeling they don't deal with the conclusion to this story,

Oh, and I cracked up at the method En, Enki and Keiki used to help Taiki realize that a Kirin cannot offer a false vow, and that his choice of Gyousou was entirely legitimate.

I loved that scene. I could tell what was going on very quickly, but it was hilarious to watch King En act like a humongous dick like that.



Third Arc, Wa Province

Part of the problem is that I did not like either girl at all for quite awhile. Shoukei was a horrible, awful, spoiled, hateful, detestable failure of a human being. And Suzu evoked remarkably little sympathy for me, even though I completely loathed the awful Sen-nin who was tormenting her in Sai. Something about her just rubbed me in the wrong way. I shouldn't have begrudged her her fantasies about being saved by Youko, but I *did*, and my irritation with her kept growing. As for Shoukei, I understood there too why she acted like she did, but I still wanted to stab her brains right out of her pretty little head. Meanwhile in Kei, Youko's glorious victory was morphing into a political quagmire of court intrigue and a complicated bureaucracy she did not understand at all, and she was not taking it well. That's not to say I disliked these episodes at all - it was just hard to watch sometimes.

I actually liked watching Shoukei in this part. Yes, she was exactly what you said she was, but there was something quite compelling about it even though I wasn't sure where they were going with her character. She was just fun to hate because she had such a horrible personality. I didn't care for Suzu much. Like you, I didn't have much sympathy for her though I couldn't put my finger on exactly why. I think subconsciously I saw exactly what her issues where even if I didn't consciously recognize them until she spelled them out herself near the end. I think that's why her view of Youko was even less sympathetic and interesting to me than Shoukei's.

The part I found hard to watch was Youko's handling of some of the issues. Understandable, yes, but hard to watch her muck things up so bad.




They're both great candidates for Komachi's 'I was a jerk, now forgive me!" thread, especially Shoukei.

Exactly what I thought (though mainly Shoukei, I didn't really think about Suzu) when I saw you mention you were starting this in the RightStuf thread.

I loathed her initially, and by the end I absolutely loved her. She was handled marvelously. Probably my favorite scene involving those two is when they calm down the population of the besieged town by demonstrating their trust in the queen. They were loooovely right there <3

And so the war rages and the rebels get the upper hand, but when the Royal Army approaches it's all over... until Youko rides out on Keiki and gets oh so regal on their asses. She was awesome here, and it's easily one of the highlights of the show. Thousands must have pissed their pants when they saw her, not least of which being that general. From that moment to the end Youko was just utterly divine, and I adored the renewed confidence she expressed when punishing the traitors, reinstating the disgraced officials, and then banning the procedure of kowtowing. A worthy first proclamation, definitely.

Yep, those last few episodes were excellent and those scenes in particular. They more than justified the rather poor introductory arc.

It's a great ending, which is why I stopped there last night. I don't know what the next six episodes bring (something of a side story I take it) but I wanted to pause and gather my thoughts before jumping into something else that I know wasn't really "finished". Granted, if this really were a 39 episode show, I'd have been a little miffed (lack of Taiki resolution aside) that we didn't get more epilogue, so if nothing else I hope the ep 40 recap gives us a little about the aftermath.

I haven't watched the last volume myself and I don't plan to; I'll just read the novel version at some point if Tokyopop makes it that far. It appears to focus on King En and someone he knew in the distant past. Its another arc of Youko sitting and listening to a story. But, episode 40 is definitely worth watching as it deals with a few lingering things from the previous arc, particularly in regards to Shoukei.

I was worried throughout much of the first arc that she was going to try to go back to Japan, leaving the world of the 12 Kingdoms behind, but that worry definitely disappeared by the end. She found a much greater calling here than she could have in "our" world.

That's one of my problems with these types of series normally. In these, "whoops, I just traveled to another world" shows, they almost inevitably return home and often spend a lot of time trying to achieve that. It tends to hurt the story potential and my enjoyment because I usually don't want them to go home and I certainly don't care about them trying to get there. If they are visiting another world, I'd like to focus on that world. Fortunately, it was clear very quickly that I probably wouldn't have to worry about that with this series, and for that I am very grateful.

[HitokiriShadow]

Obligatory the novels are better post:
Asano and Sugimoto are both anime original creations, added...for absolutely no reason that justifies how fucking unlikeable they are.

Actually, Sugimoto was in the first novel, she just didn't do much and was there purely to show some of Youko's problems.

I absolutely hated the beginning of the story, largely because of them, but Youko as well. I had to be forced to watch more.
When I got around to the novels, I discovered that those useless idiots weren't there, and that being inside Youko's head made her reactions much more sympathetic - the descriptions of the way things she killed smelled was particularly vivid.
I'd very much recommend reading them.

I actually read the first novel first, which probably made it worse for me, but I pretty much agree. Getting inside of Youko's head helps a lot, but her unlikability in the first batch of episodes wasn't just because of the medium. At first, it seemed like they added Asano and Sugimoto because the director subscribed to the "no internal thoughts" theory of directing since they were basically doing Youko's thinking and actions for her. But then episode six had us listening to Youko going berserk and killed that theory as well as any justifiable reasons for Sugimoto and Asano's roles.

The anime could have shown Youko's thought processes to some degree, they just chose not to and preferred to have her do basically nothing but whine in the first 5 episodes while having horribly unlikable anime-original characters do the things she should have been doing to help develop her character.

[HitokiriShadow]

I'd very much recommend reading them.
Well, not really an option for me, apparently. At least not in a remotely reasonable timeframe... TP is doing something like one a year, right?

So far, yes. And Tokyopop doesnt' exactly have a good track record with theire novel. Not a single novel series of their's has made it past volume 3 before being canceled. I'm particularly bitter about Scrapped Princess because of the circumstances of its cancellation, but the fact that I'll probably never finish FMP is even more frustrating since the anime lacked a real conclusion. Missing and Gosick worked better as stand alone stories so those aren't as big of a deal.

[something]

I probably could have watched 40 with 39, though it's no big deal either way. I rather like the Gekkei guy - good man, even if he was being virtuous to something of a fault. I looove how Shoukei comes to appreciate what he did in saving her, and returns the favor as best as she possibly can. It gives a much better sense of closure to her and her story. And we get to see Queen Kyou again, if only for a minute or so =P

As for the last disc:
They... ...they spent the last episode of a pretty epic 45 episode fantasy story recapping a 4 episode arc.

Whyyyyyyyyy?

That said, it was actually a pretty good arc for me, because I really liked the En gang from the beginning. Enki is still my favorite Kirin, and Shouryuu/King En is just the kind of adult male character I tend to like. I especially liked the way King En interacted with his closest ministers. Ditto on seeing him only 20 years into his reign, when before we'd only seen him after he'd been in control 500 years.

Yes, it's another "Youko listens to a story" arc, but given the structure of the novels, I suppose I can't complain too much about that. The majority of the series was still Youko-centric, even if I'd be willing to watch about 100 episodes of her and her reign, not just the ~30 we got that focused on her in an active role... she's immortal after all, so why not?

I guess this is a case of "good story, inappropriate ending" (recap for the last episode is a truly grave sin), and it's a damn shame we won't get any more of the world of the Twelve Kingdoms animated.

I come away highly, highly satisfied with the 45 episodes I've watched, in the end.

[Orihara_Kaoru]

I just re-watched the Youko-Suzu-Shoukei arc last weekend. Yay!

I just love the perfect storytelling in this arc. Everything comes together in a perfect crescendo of awesomeness. It was actually better the second time through, because I knew where Suzu and Shoukei would end up, so that made them much more tolerable in the first few episodes. When I first watched them, I was like, "WTF are these whiny girls doing taking away screen time from Youko??" But now I realise that they were necessary in making Youko become even more awesome. And their journeys of character development made them awesome themselves.

I have to agree about Rakushun. He is such a likable character. He also adds a dimension to the show that is hardly ever seen in other fantasy anime. Namely, he talks about social justice and creating a more tolerant society. It's fascinating how Ono (the author of the original novels) created a world whose kingdoms shared much religiously, culturally, and linguistically, but varied widely in wealth, prosperity, and social structures depending on how they were governed. I always wondered what would happen if a ruler (especially a Kaikyaku/Taika like Youko) tried to introduce democracy, at least for the positions under ruler.

The one thing that bugs me about the meticulously created world of the Twelve Kingdoms is that progress just doesn't seem to happen. Arcitecture, medicine, culture, agriculture (srsly!), etc should all be progressing forward, like they do in our world. It's just a natural part of society. I guess maybe the gods/heaven are somehow stopping it, but it just seems incongruous to me.

As for love interests for Youko, I will accept three possibilities. I ship Youko/Shoukei because a) it's yuri (wee!) and b) Shoukei is awesome and would be perfect for Youko. But I also wouldn't mind Rakushun or Bear-hanjuu-guy-that-became-General-of-the-Royal-Army.

I love the books, too, and can't wait for the one that covers the Youko-Suzu-Shoukei arc. That is guaranteed to be amazing. Unfortunately, the next book is based on the last arc of the anime (eps 41-45), which wasn't bad, especially if you assume there's a deeper relationship between Enki and King En (waves hand), but it wasn't nearly as good as the above arc.

Oh, and you should totally watch episode 40 soon. It's not a recap at all. It's an epilogue of the aftermath of the previous events mostly dealing with Shoukei and a little bit of Suzu. It also sets up events for the last anime arc.

Finally, I just have to add that this series is what being an anime fan is all about, at least for me. Sometimes I wonder if I'm falling out of touch with anime (because a lot of it doesn't appeal to me), but then I watch something like this or MariMite and I think, "Oh yeah. This is the whole reason why I'm an anime fan."

:)

[BonnKansan]

I'd very much recommend reading them.
Well, not really an option for me, apparently. At least not in a remotely reasonable timeframe... TP is doing something like one a year, right?

At any rate I really like the anime quite a lot, so I guess I don't feel the level of dissatisfaction I'd consider necessary to go seek out the novels.... especially if they won't be done until 2017, which is so far in the future that it sounds almost like a fairytale :sd:

Oh, it won't take quite that long. The material that was already published in Japan only comprised 6 novels and 1 story collection, it's just that most of the novels were split into two parts. The first 2 novels, which cover the first two anime arcs, have already been released by Tokyopop. Novel 3 has been listed to come out next March, and will cover that final anime arc which you're avoiding ;). Book 4 will be about Youko and Shoukei and Suzu. Book 5 is the start of the material that wasn't animated, and is about how little Kyou-Ou made the journey to become queen - totally awesome book! Book 6 comes back to both of the ongoing stories, with a desperate Risai arriving at Kei to beseech Youko for help in finding Taiki. Book 7 is a collection of shorter stories, some of which were covered in intermission episodes in the anime (like the letters between Youko and Rakushun).

We're still waiting on Fuyumi Ono to return to the 12 Kingdoms world and finish the Tai story, since it doesn't get completely resolved in Book 6 even though there is progress. Another novel would (hopefully!) provide enough material to make it worth continuing the animation too. But meanwhile, at least the novels are coming out at a steady pace, and Tokyopop seems to be more committed to these than the light novel line, so the current material should finish coming out in 2013 (ouch, I guess that is still a while to wait). The writing is very good and really gets into the characters' thoughts well, and the translation is excellent, so I think they're definitely worth reading even if you've seen the material animated. I'll admit I'm biased though ;).

[Andrew Cunningham]

Book 5 is the start of the material that wasn't animated, and is about how little Kyou-Ou made the journey to become queen - totally awesome book!

Yeah, it was really amazing. By far my favorite. I've been reluctant to read anything after that, though, since she's already taken something like seven years away from the series.
Good thing the Moribito series is scratching that itch - I'm halfway through the fourth one now, and it is amazing.

[something]

The arc should have focused on developing the world and Youko, and while the world building was handled decently enough, Youko's development left a lot to be desired in those early episodes and the extra elements (Sugimoto and Asano) were not for the better.
I probably came at it rather differently. I never read the novels and likely never will, and knew from the start I had 45 episodes ahead of me. I also didn't know at the time that a sizable chunk of those wouldn't be about Youko. So while 5 to 7 episodes is a long time to be ambivalent towards the main character, I did at least recognize that there were major changes going on within her, and when she finally snapped out of it, it was fairly glorious to see.

As for all this talk of Sugimoto and Asano externalizing her thoughts, again I have nothing to "compare" it too, but I'm surprised they're mentioned in that role rather than the 'monkey' in the scabbard, which I thought was far more significant a plot device for that.

That's pretty much how I felt. It was an interesting story, but I wanted Youko, dammit! And it ultimately ends up being so detached from the rest of the anime. I'm sure the events here will come up again in the novels at some point, but the only link in the anime is Yuzu and they didn't need to do this entire arc just for that.
Do you mean Suzu or are you talking about someone else? I do think the arc was useful for the larger show because of the development for Keiki, but yeah it didn't have to be that long. But again, I didn't dislike it. It does seem to be pretty detached, because it's sandwiched between two very Youko-centric arcs, and because the conclusion to the story isn't animated... I wonder if they intended to do it, but just couldn't? Youko going off and helping Tai find Gyousou and Taiki would be great, but obviously we're never going to get it animated.

I hate to make a Lord of the Rings comparison since people can be so love/hate about it, but I've been exposed to very few fantasy stories generally, so bear with me. If you hate LotR, swap in some other large fantasy story, it's not the specifics that matter... When I read LotR, I was interested in the events going on in the "present". The Fellowship, the quest to take the ring to Mount Doom, yadda yadda. I was also quite fascinated with the larger world of Middle Earth Tolkien created, and all the other stories it no doubt contained. But, even though I also enjoyed my reading of The Hobbit, I wouldn't want, say, the entirety of The Hobbit plunked down in the middle of LotR as a 500 (or whatever) page "flashback" or "side story" one had to get through before getting back to the main quest. Therefore, while suddenly spending ~7 episodes on the story of the Tai Taihou is relevant to the larger world of the Twelve Kingdoms and I actually rather enjoyed the story, that doesn't necessarily mean I wanted it right then, right there, when I was already so invested in Youko's story - which was far from over, in my mind (and as was proven in arc 3).

I found out later she's just a character in 2 or 3 of the ~11 novelsNow that I did not know. That's disappointing.
I don't remember where I read it, but yeah, I think a lot of the later novels are kingdom by kingdom deals, which don't necessarily focus much on Youko, or something like that. Either way, she's the "main" character of the anime but it seems like the novels don't quite have a "main" character. At least not to the same extent?

I actually liked watching Shoukei in this part. Yes, she was exactly what you said she was, but there was something quite compelling about it even though I wasn't sure where they were going with her character. She was just fun to hate because she had such a horrible personality.
I think I was able to get through it because she was so relentlessly despicable that there was no way she wouldn't eventually display an equal but opposite degree of strength and humility and compassion later. You know, Newtown's Third Law of Character Development. And display it she did. God, I would killllll to see an arc where she blasts apart some nasty court intrigue against Youko. I can just see her looking gorgeous in some official robes, tearing the conspirators up with her words, making them feel like the most pathetic beings in the world... Muahahah, it'd be great.

I didn't care for Suzu much. Like you, I didn't have much sympathy for her though I couldn't put my finger on exactly why. I think subconsciously I saw exactly what her issues where even if I didn't consciously recognize them until she spelled them out herself near the end. I think that's why her view of Youko was even less sympathetic and interesting to me than Shoukei's.
I came to love her in the end, but yeah... it's just hard to put it into words. I understand why she became so pathetic, and I hardly imagine I'd fare much better in her situation, but goddamn, I did not pity her at all. And really, I don't know if I was supposed to. Shuuhei is much easier to sympathize with than she was, and I think it's when she came to realize that that she finally burst forth as a real, sympathetic, likable character.

The part I found hard to watch was Youko's handling of some of the issues. Understandable, yes, but hard to watch her muck things up so bad.
Same thing here - I was silently screaming for her to figure out she was being used and get things right... and thankfully she did. It took awhile, but that's pretty typical in this series - nothing comes quick or easy, but when it does, it's really worth it.

They're both great candidates for Komachi's 'I was a jerk, now forgive me!" thread, especially Shoukei.Exactly what I thought (though mainly Shoukei, I didn't really think about Suzu) when I saw you mention you were starting this in the RightStuf thread.
Oh definitely Shoukei more, I just sort of took Suzu along for the ride when mentioning it. Suzu was never really a "jerk", she was just hard to sympathize with initially.

That's one of my problems with these types of series normally. In these, "whoops, I just traveled to another world" shows, they almost inevitably return home and often spend a lot of time trying to achieve that. It tends to hurt the story potential and my enjoyment because I usually don't want them to go home and I certainly don't care about them trying to get there.
Yep! If they're obsessed with going home, they're not thinking about what they're doing in the place they've come to. The place where the damn show takes place! :sd: I can't really bring up other examples without spoiling anything, but I'm glad Twelve Kingdoms didn't go that way. It was so much stronger for it, and so was Youko.

Oh Youko <3

[something]

Oh, it won't take quite that long. The material that was already published in Japan only comprised 6 novels and 1 story collection, it's just that most of the novels were split into two parts. The first 2 novels, which cover the first two anime arcs, have already been released by Tokyopop.
Ah, so not actually 11 separate releases. Well, I still doubt I'll read them of course, as it'll be at least a few years which is too long for me... and it's quite distressing to hear she hasn't even written the conclusion to the Tai story yet. Sheesh, I was under the impression the whole Twelve Kingdoms universe ended years and years ago. This is why I cannot follow novels (errr, aside from the fact that almost none are translated and even fewer actually get finished) and have long since given up manga. :sd:

Novel 3 has been listed to come out next March, and will cover that final anime arc which you're avoiding ;).
Heh, not avoiding, just hadn't watched yet.

[something]

When I first watched them, I was like, "WTF are these whiny girls doing taking away screen time from Youko??" But now I realise that they were necessary in making Youko become even more awesome. And their journeys of character development made them awesome themselves.
Hah, exactly how I felt. When it became clear that their story would intersect with Youko's rather than take the place of it (like Taiki's did), I breathed a massive sigh of relief. I really didn't want the first arc to be Youko's last!

The one thing that bugs me about the meticulously created world of the Twelve Kingdoms is that progress just doesn't seem to happen. Arcitecture, medicine, culture, agriculture (srsly!), etc should all be progressing forward, like they do in our world. It's just a natural part of society. I guess maybe the gods/heaven are somehow stopping it, but it just seems incongruous to me.
Good observation. I guess when I'm watching a fantasy series (or thinking about Gensoukyou from the Touhou universe), I assume a degree of eternal technological stagnation. If they have cars and electricity, it just doesn't feel right, you know? Maybe the societies just never developed an intellectual curiosity about such things. Maybe vital natural resources don't exist in their world. Maybe it is, as you said, regulated by the gods, who have altered the fundamental laws of physics. Maybe the upheaval created when a kingdom falls wipes out the gains made during the period of peace...

I suppose none of these are adequate or reasonable explanations, of course. What makes it stranger is that at least certain segments of society are intimately familiar with life in modern day Japan. And at some point, you have to imagine an electrical or sanitation engineer is going to plop down out of a Shoku and get in good with a local ruler. Look at En, they actually have a whole section of the bureaucracy keeping tabs on changes to Japanese postal regulations! They know what a phone number is!

But this is where I fall back on the old "'Caus the story said so." :sd:

As for love interests for Youko, I will accept three possibilities. I ship Youko/Shoukei because a) it's yuri (wee!) and b) Shoukei is awesome and would be perfect for Youko. But I also wouldn't mind Rakushun or Bear-hanjuu-guy-that-became-General-of-the-Royal-Army.
Love interests for Youko... it is strange that I didn't talk much about that, huh? I'm not one to overlook a yuri pairing, but somehow romance was on the bottom of the agenda for me while watching 12K. Odd... That said, I totally agree that Youko x Shoukei would be amazing, though initially I would have considered Shoukei x Suzu, before they met Youko. But all the more reason why I'd love to see Shoukei live out her once again immortal life in the royal court, as a fierce and brilliant defender of Her Majesty, Youko of Kei. <3

Oh, and you should totally watch episode 40 soon. It's not a recap at all. It's an epilogue of the aftermath of the previous events mostly dealing with Shoukei and a little bit of Suzu. It also sets up events for the last anime arc.
Heh, everyone seemed to think I wasn't going to watch the last eps immediately. :sd: I just wanted to stop and collect my thoughts at the "real" end before moving on, just in case it wasn't all that great. In sitting down and spending a few hours typing up these ridiculously long posts, I'm able to relive a lot of the moments of a show and think about them a but more deeply than if I'd simply thought to myself "hey that was neat" and moved on to the next show. I figured after 39 was the best place to do that, just like I decided to make my final post on Kaleido Star. I definitely do these threads as much for me as for any broader discussion it brings, heh. My favorite way to watch a show is still week by week with lots of other watching and posting week by week when the show is first airing in Japan... So while I can't possibly recreate that sort of feeling for a show that ended years ago and that nobody else would be watching the same time I am except by sheer coincidence, I nonetheless like making these posts. It's especially satisfying to see others use the thread as partial motivation to go rewatch the show, or to buy the show in the first place. The more the merrier, and all that. Anyway, I just went off on a completely irrelevant tangent, but, what else is new? =P

[HitokiriShadow]

The arc should have focused on developing the world and Youko, and while the world building was handled decently enough, Youko's development left a lot to be desired in those early episodes and the extra elements (Sugimoto and Asano) were not for the better.
I probably came at it rather differently. I never read the novels and likely never will, and knew from the start I had 45 episodes ahead of me. I also didn't know at the time that a sizable chunk of those wouldn't be about Youko. So while 5 to 7 episodes is a long time to be ambivalent towards the main character, I did at least recognize that there were major changes going on within her, and when she finally snapped out of it, it was fairly glorious to see.

I was coming from the same angle in regards to the bolded, but I only saw it as 39 since I had heard that 39 was the best place to stop, though I was mistakenly under the impression that the subsequent arc was an incomplete story arc.

As for all this talk of Sugimoto and Asano externalizing her thoughts, again I have nothing to "compare" it too, but I'm surprised they're mentioned in that role rather than the 'monkey' in the scabbard, which I thought was far more significant a plot device for that.You're right. If they just wanted to externalize her thoughts, they had a perfectly good way of doing it with that. Instead, they actually had Sugimoto say some of the things he said as well, mainly in regards to trusting that first woman they came across. Speaking of her, what was with her suddenly throwing herself in front of that monster? That was completely random and made no sense given what we had seen of her.

Do you mean Suzu or are you talking about someone else?Yeah, I meant Suzu. Today's been a bad day for me with that kind of thing. I've discovered that I've been reading, thinking, and typing Rie Kugimiya's name wrong for the past two years. Fencedude finally caught it and corrected me. I feel incredibly stupid but I felt a bit better when I discovered that this thread (http://www.mania.com/aodvb/showthread.php?t=83832) used "Kugiyama" too and no one caught it there, or any of the other times I've typed it for that matter. I still feel pretty stupid though.

I do think the arc was useful for the larger show because of the development for Keiki, but yeah it didn't have to be that long. But again, I didn't dislike it. It does seem to be pretty detached, because it's sandwiched between two very Youko-centric arcs, and because the conclusion to the story isn't animated... I wonder if they intended to do it, but just couldn't? Youko going off and helping Tai find Gyousou and Taiki would be great, but obviously we're never going to get it animated.Oh, I agree that it was interesting and I certainly didn't dislike it. I think we pretty much agree entirely about this arc. It was nice in its own right, but the context was poor.

Either way, she's the "main" character of the anime but it seems like the novels don't quite have a "main" character. At least not to the same extent?I've only read the first novel and she was definitely the main character there as pretty much everything was told through her point of view. I simply assumed the rest would focus on her while dealing with other kingdoms as well, but it seems I was wrong. While the relatively small role Youko plays is disappointing, I don't necessarily have a problem with that as I am interested in the other kingdoms and characters (I'm pleased to see that Kyou-Oh gets a book, as she was great in the bit of screentime she got). Likewise, I wouldn't have much of a problem with the second story arc had the series been significantly longer.

I think I was able to get through it because she was so relentlessly despicable that there was no way she wouldn't eventually display an equal but opposite degree of strength and humility and compassion later. You know, Newtown's Third Law of Character Development. And display it she did. God, I would killllll to see an arc where she blasts apart some nasty court intrigue against Youko. I can just see her looking gorgeous in some official robes, tearing the conspirators up with her words, making them feel like the most pathetic beings in the world... Muahahah, it'd be great.I was hoping for something similar and that's precisely why the content of that last story arc (or all indications of what it would be as I didn't watch it) is so depressing.

I came to love her in the end, but yeah... it's just hard to put it into words. I understand why she became so pathetic, and I hardly imagine I'd fare much better in her situation, but goddamn, I did not pity her at all. And really, I don't know if I was supposed to. Shuuhei is much easier to sympathize with than she was, and I think it's when she came to realize that that she finally burst forth as a real, sympathetic, likable character.During the early episodes, I wasn't quite sure how I was supposed to feel about her. In hindsight, I don't think the viewer was supposed to like or sympathize with her anymore than they were supposed to for Shoukei. I pitied Suzu slightly, but only just barely and only because Sennin-nen or whoever was being such a nasty bitch to her. And even that pity was worn thin. It's actually pretty impressive how they made someone who was getting abused like that so unsympathetic.

On a related note, I just love how Twelve Kindgoms took two characters that were, if not outright nasty people, where highly unsympathetic and then made them such great characters in the end. Plenty of anime do the Jerk>Like Me! conversion, but I'm not sure any have done it so wonderfully as Twelve Kingdoms did with those two.

Oh definitely Shoukei more, I just sort of took Suzu along for the ride when mentioning it. Suzu was never really a "jerk", she was just hard to sympathize with initially.She wasn't a "jerk" (that term seems far to kind for what we are talking about; "self-absorbed asshole" seems more appropriate) initially, but there was a period where she was high on the Self Pity Express and definitely qualified. At her worst, she was just as bad as Shoukei, possibly worse. Her conversations with the boy about how much luckier he was were at least as bad as Shoukei's proclamations of innocence and disdain for the commoner's life. Both Suzu and Shoukei planned to kill Youko, but Suzu came a lot closer to pulling it off as she actually obtained the weapon and reached the palace with the intent to kill.

[jojo_home]

Shoukei's such a fascinating character. It's easy to like her later in the arc--it's pretty much a given ANYONE would. But I always felt attached to her from the beginning. Perhaps because I saw bits of myself, and other people in her. One could say, in a larger sense, she kind of symbolized who most people REALLY are--ignorant, self absorbed, spoiled, emotionally knee jerk...but ultimately capable of growing. It's easy to condemn her early behaviour when you watch her from an objective narrative such as this, but I bet you most people here are more like her pre-mature version than you'd think.

And who wouldn't be biased towards their own family? Sure, they may have been tyrants but they treated HER well, and I'd be pissed if someone just came and hacked the heads off my family as well, whether they were "bad" or not. So, she may not have been LIKEABLE at first, but I actually sympathized with her point of view, whether she was actually "right" or "not". And I dare anyone not to laugh a little when she started using her stolen jewels to pay for the best travelling accomodations. Cuz that's what I would have done. :)

I agree with people around here that Suzu ended up the weakest character of the trio, but she's a very passive person so she's actually mentally and emotionally more immature than the rest of the cast. She relied mainly on pity gifts and nice people to get her from place to place, while Shoukei generally went out and did things on her own free will. Yes, Rakushun was the one who "converted" Shoukei, but she created her own destiny by stealing, conniving and spending her way to meeting Rakushun (albeit inadvertently). You always get the feeling that Suzu is being pulled around by outside forces, which isn't the case with Shoukei.

Twelve Kingdoms is such a big, ambitious, messy beast. In some ways, a lot of the smaller, non-Youko centred story arcs are abrupt and superfluous. Yet, it says something about this show when despite all of these flaws, I still consider Twelve Kingdoms my favourite fantasy anime of all time.

I always wished we could have gotten around to the Queen Kyou arc. She must have one helluva story behind her ascension. It's interesting how someone who is so outwardly bratty can still be a wise enough ruler to last as long as she has.

Oh, and check out some episodes when Shoukei, Suzu and Youko are standing together. Shoukei's the tallest girl of the bunch, which surprised me!! A nice little bit of visual there symbolizing their levels of development (and an implication that Shoukei may have grown even more even-keeled than Youko by the end of that arc)

[zrdb]

Junni Kokki might be a "big messy beast"-but it's still one of the best fantasy historical series out there-bar none.

[jojo_home]

Junni Kokki might be a "big messy beast"-but it's still one of the best fantasy historical series out there-bar none.

Agreed. I wish more anime would try to be this ambitious. I'd rather watch an imperfect ambitious show over a perfectly executed, but totally by-the-numbers anime.

[joelgundam01]

And so the war rages and the rebels get the upper hand, but when the Royal Army approaches it's all over... until Youko rides out on Keiki and gets oh so regal on their asses. She was awesome here, and it's easily one of the highlights of the show. Thousands must have pissed their pants when they saw her, not least of which being that general.

Episode 39 is my favorite episode and I just finished rewatching this series yesterday. I just like the pose Youko has, when she was riding Keiki. Her arms are thrown back and her glare shows the look of death. Wow!

[mighty_vespa]

Reading all this exuberant praise for 12K brings a dopey smile to my face. I love it. :sdsmiley:

Of course, no 12K thread should be complete without lofting some huge dap in the direction of Kunihiko Ryo (the series' music composer). I've been saving up little-by-little to buy every one of the 12K CDs; there are so damn many! I loved the series' theme; especially, it's piano/acoustic versions. Plus, the "poundy-drum" battle themes are epic. The one's where Youko is about to completely own someone or several someones (i.e. army).

What gets me is that number of anime series' scores Ryo has produced can be counted on one-hand. And not even the whole hand. Man, maybe he's an expensive hire, considering his live-action body of work. Perhaps he's very choosey in what projects he'll take on. All I know is that I pay extra-special attention to whatever new show he's working on.

[zrdb]

I have 4 cds of music from Junni Kokki-I especially love the opening theme!!

[Andrew Cunningham]

I have 4 cds of music from Junni Kokki-I especially love the opening theme!!

Juuni Kokuki, actually. Kokki is a misreading that got spread for a while before anyone noticed what the furigana actually said.

[zrdb]

I guess I only know what I first saw it spelled as-oh well.....?

[Zalis]

Keiki (Cake!!)Heh, I figured I wasn't the only one to make this association, which quickly branched into "Delicious Keiki..." and "The Keiki is a lie."

Anyway, I just watched this series for the first time over the course of July and August. I was aware of all the warnings about it, like how it was based on novels that were on hiatus and how the last arc was a let-down. But I plunged ahead anyway, and wasn't disappointed with the overall product.

What impressed me most was that of all the anime that have a teenaged character being swept away to a fantasy world, 12K succeeded best at presenting a different world that's actually different. Most of the time with series like Fushigi Yuugi or Escaflowne or Magic Knight Rayearth, the other world feels like "Real World minus Technology plus Magic" -- there's no barriers like language or custom to impede the hapless Japanese teen from achieving their destiny. But with 12K, Youko and others experienced being unable to speak the language and being treated like unwanted outsiders. They had to work at blending in and understanding the world (right down to the radically different childbirth system) before they could find acceptance and happiness. The deluge of series-specific terms was quite confusing at first (especially since I watched the first 5 discs on vacation and didn't have the liner notes with me), but I realized that by not having those terms fully translated, we as viewers get to experience what Youko experienced in being thrust into a strange new world.

As for story specifics, I'd been forewarned that the beginning was slowgoing, so I prepared myself accordingly. As has been mentioned in the thread, the anime-original characters dragged things down, and I wasn't sad to see them phased out of the story. While Youko's character development was always center stage or in my thoughts ("Is this ever getting back to Youko?" was a common question), I was still fascinated by the world itself, its setup, and the various other kingdoms that sadly received only passing mention. I did have some issues with the Taiki arc (despite Rie Kugimiya proving that she could be adorably moe even in male roles) -- I didn't see it as irrelevant, but I really thought it could've been told in only 2-3 episodes. Then again, if that's the material they had to work with, that's the way the cookie crumbles.

While the "Distance in the Wind / Sea at Dawn" arc took awhile to warm up, it and its episode 39 conclusion did live up to all the hype I'd heard over the past few years. I'd almost rather they just ended the series there instead of doing another arc a few months later and leaving us hanging. After all, ep39 even had a "series finale credit roll."

[something]

Keiki (Cake!!)Heh, I figured I wasn't the only one to make this association, which quickly branched into "Delicious Keiki..." and "The Keiki is a lie."
I kept thinking of Azumanga OP parodies... Keiki, Youko and Rakushun doing the wiggly dance! So-ra-mimi-KEIKI!

The deluge of series-specific terms was quite confusing at first (especially since I watched the first 5 discs on vacation and didn't have the liner notes with me), but I realized that by not having those terms fully translated, we as viewers get to experience what Youko experienced in being thrust into a strange new world.
And sometimes I swore they were being intentionally confusing. Did the guy from Hou who killed Shoukei's parents have to be the lord of Kei province? Because then in the last arc we got Queen Kei delivering a letter to Lord Kei. =P Then there was the running gag with everyone being named Gyoukuyou. :sd: And of course multiple names/titles for many characters too.

I'd almost rather they just ended the series there instead of doing another arc a few months later and leaving us hanging. After all, ep39 even had a "series finale credit roll."
I'm still guessing they planned to continue onwards and do the Tai arc (which supposedly involves Youko) but couldn't for some reason. Such a shame.

[Kirarakim]

All the characters are very unlikable at first but I think that is the point. They have major flaws that they have to overcome and that is what I love about the characters. I don't think I can think of series where there are so many complex and interesting female characters.

And don't get me wrong I love romance as much as the next person but I am really glad there was literally no romantic focus in this series.

The 12 Kingdom world is also one of the most unique and interesting fantasy worlds I've come across. Not just in anime but in general. :)


Although I think some people are being unfair to Suzu. While Youko and Shoukei are my favorites of the 3 girls. I still find Suzu to be an interesting character. She was the character who thought she had the worst fate always waiting to be saved. Her eye opener was when she realized other people were suffering too and it wasn't just about herself. Finally Suzu was always waiting for someone to save her instead of realizing she needed to save herself.

On a side note I love Shoukei's little song about the doll how it ends up becoming symbolically really about her. :)

[Thomas Alan]

and everything else was a cacophony of names and terms and places so little was sticking.

That's easily the most difficult aspect of the anime/novel to deal with at first. All these new words come pouring out in the first few episodes and I'm just as confused as Yoko. It says something when, a third the way through a series, an entire episode is dedicated to teaching the viewers the vocabulary they've been barely getting for the past dozen episodes.

Really, I think it would have been better for them to concentrate fully on Yoko's reign and dumped the other side stories. If they wanted to develop the world fully, they could have made a second series for that. The story flows so beautifully (minus the two silly mostly made-for-tv creations) that it would have been an even better show if they'd trimmed it down a bit.

[Sicondera]

The one thing that bugs me about the meticulously created world of the Twelve Kingdoms is that progress just doesn't seem to happen. Arcitecture, medicine, culture, agriculture (srsly!), etc should all be progressing forward, like they do in our world. It's just a natural part of society. I guess maybe the gods/heaven are somehow stopping it, but it just seems incongruous to me.
Good observation. I guess when I'm watching a fantasy series (or thinking about Gensoukyou from the Touhou universe), I assume a degree of eternal technological stagnation. If they have cars and electricity, it just doesn't feel right, you know? Maybe the societies just never developed an intellectual curiosity about such things. Maybe vital natural resources don't exist in their world. Maybe it is, as you said, regulated by the gods, who have altered the fundamental laws of physics. Maybe the upheaval created when a kingdom falls wipes out the gains made during the period of peace...

I suppose none of these are adequate or reasonable explanations, of course. What makes it stranger is that at least certain segments of society are intimately familiar with life in modern day Japan. And at some point, you have to imagine an electrical or sanitation engineer is going to plop down out of a Shoku and get in good with a local ruler. Look at En, they actually have a whole section of the bureaucracy keeping tabs on changes to Japanese postal regulations! They know what a phone number is!

But this is where I fall back on the old "'Caus the story said so." :sd:


Actually, it does make a little bit of sense if you consider how technology progressed in the Orient in our own world. China may have leapt out to an early lead 2,000-some-odd years ago, but then they hit a plateau. It was missionaries and traders from Europe with all their Renaissance and Industrial Age goodies that really shocked Asia into some major technological growth.

Since the Twelve Kingdoms don't really have any place equivalent to Europe, it makes some sense that their technological progress would be glacial. Until, of course, something like what something said happens and a skilled technician of some kind gets dropped into the world and finds a way in to the good graces of a King. :bigsmile:

[Zalis]

And sometimes I swore they were being intentionally confusing. Did the guy from Hou who killed Shoukei's parents have to be the lord of Kei province? Because then in the last arc we got Queen Kei delivering a letter to Lord Kei.I forgot to mention that, but yeah, that annoyed me too. Seriously, they could've used any other random syllable combination like Ru or Gan for that Hou province name with zero difference to the plot. Then there's Wa Province (of Kei) vs. Wa (Japan). And it actually made sense within the Japanese language to call Japan by that name, though why the 12K-ers also called it Hourai was beyond me.

[jojo_home]

The one thing that bugs me about the meticulously created world of the Twelve Kingdoms is that progress just doesn't seem to happen. Arcitecture, medicine, culture, agriculture (srsly!), etc should all be progressing forward, like they do in our world. It's just a natural part of society. I guess maybe the gods/heaven are somehow stopping it, but it just seems incongruous to me.
Good observation. I guess when I'm watching a fantasy series (or thinking about Gensoukyou from the Touhou universe), I assume a degree of eternal technological stagnation. If they have cars and electricity, it just doesn't feel right, you know? Maybe the societies just never developed an intellectual curiosity about such things. Maybe vital natural resources don't exist in their world. Maybe it is, as you said, regulated by the gods, who have altered the fundamental laws of physics. Maybe the upheaval created when a kingdom falls wipes out the gains made during the period of peace...

I suppose none of these are adequate or reasonable explanations, of course. What makes it stranger is that at least certain segments of society are intimately familiar with life in modern day Japan. And at some point, you have to imagine an electrical or sanitation engineer is going to plop down out of a Shoku and get in good with a local ruler. Look at En, they actually have a whole section of the bureaucracy keeping tabs on changes to Japanese postal regulations! They know what a phone number is!

But this is where I fall back on the old "'Caus the story said so." :sd:


Actually, it does make a little bit of sense if you consider how technology progressed in the Orient in our own world. China may have leapt out to an early lead 2,000-some-odd years ago, but then they hit a plateau. It was missionaries and traders from Europe with all their Renaissance and Industrial Age goodies that really shocked Asia into some major technological growth.

:


And even then, it still took hundreds of years for what we call the "Industrial Revolution" to happen. People don't realize how quickly technology has been advancing over only the last 100 or so years. On the other hand, we don't have talking, flying animals to help us travel from country to country within hours, so you can forgive them for being a bit satisfied with what they have, while we're forced to MAKE our talking, flying animals. ;)

[HitokiriShadow]

As they say, necessity is the mother of invention. On top of that, we don't know what their mineral and other resources are like, so its possible they lack copper, petrol or other materials necessary for certain technologies.