Chobits #8 - The Story (SPOILERS)

[populuxe]

"A Bookstore with No Boxes"
or
"The Manga Just For Me"

CLAMP's Chobits #8 is finally hitting store shelves. In the mania surrounding the hunt for the Limited Edition box with the Chii figure, the fact that there's a magnificent story drawing to it's conclusion is almost being overlooked.

Zima, the government's national databank persocom, and Dita, the persocom tasked with protecting Zima, are hot on the tail of Chii. She's begun manifesting the mysterious power that Zima, Dita and the Japanese government are so scared of. Surprisingly, Zima keeps finding ways to stop Dita. He seems eager to see how things will play out between Chii and Hideki.

Chii has finally confessed to Hideki how she feels about him. She loves him. He is the "someone just for her". As she confesses to him, all persocoms around them in an ever-widening circle begin to malfunction. The malfunctions even create serious problems when water mains begin erupting. In the midst of this chaos, Hideki must come to terms with how he feels about Chii. There is only one answer. He loves her. Even though she's a persocom. Even though she's not human. It doesn't matter. He loves her. As soon as he confesses how he feels, Chii undergoes a personality change. Freya, whose memories live on inside Chii, wants to have a word with Hideki.

She wants to know just how much he loves her, because his love will come at a cost. He can't make love to her. Because of the location of Chii's reset switch, if he ever makes love to her, she will be reinitialized. She will lose her memories, her experiences, her dreams, her heart, everything that has made Chii Chii since Hideki activated her. Hideki is forced to see that he can never have all of Chii. It is the one wish she can't grant, just like the "City With No People" books said. What's more, we learn that Chobit's don't have emotions. While they are more advanced than other persocoms, they cannot operate outside their programming. The idea that Chobits have emotions really is an urban legend created by humans so they won't feel so guilty about falling in love with persocoms.

Despite this, Hideki can't deny his love for Chii. He accepts that he will never be able to make love to Chii. This satisfies Freya, and she shuts down the program that was threatening all persocoms, everywhere.

After the crisis is averted, we learn more about Chobits, where the name came from, and what that program was. If activated, the program would cause all persocoms to lose the ability to distingues individuals. Humans, persocoms, anyone. Elda and Freya's "father" wanted to create a persocom that could be happy. He wanted all persocoms to be happy. If he was unsuccessful, then he didn't want them to suffer like Freya did. Making them unable to find the "someone just for them" was his way of ending their suffering if Chii couldn't find someone to love, and who would love her back.

Chii's successful search for the "someone just for her" means all the other other persocoms will be able to find the someone just for them, too. The final chapter shows us the various loving couples we've been introduced to over the course of the story: Shimbo and Shimizu; Ueda and Yumi; Minoru and Yuzuki; Chitose holding a photo of her late husband; and even Zima and Dita, who may be the first persocoms to fall in love with each other, thus surpassing the dreams of their creator. We get to read the final volume of "A City with No People", and we're given one final tidbit of information about persocoms.

Hideki asks Chitose why they're called persocoms. Why aren't they called robots? "My husband didn't want them to be bound by the three laws of robotics." While it's not explained in the book, the three laws of robotics refers to Isaac Asimov's famous robot books which he began writing around 1940.

The Three Laws of Robotics are:
1. A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
2. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

Asimov claimed that the Three Laws were originated by John W. Campbell in a conversation they had on December 23, 1940. Campbell in turn maintained that he picked them out of Asimov's stories and discussions, and that his role was merely to state them explicitly. The first story to explicitly state the Three Laws was "Runaround", which appeared in the March 1942 issue of Astounding Science Fiction.

These three laws have become an important part of science fiction, not just in America, but around the world. So well known are they, that CLAMP didn't feel it necessary to explain them. They trusted that their Japanese readers would be understand what they were talking about. So why did Chitose's husband not want persocoms to be bound by these rules? And is the price Hideki must pay for loving Chii too much?

[Keiti]

heh, well I didn't know the 3 Laws of Robotics, so that clears things up, and gives more meaning to the story.

While I did love the ending, I did find one thing strange. If Chobits, and other Persocoms, don't have emotions, just really good programming, then why did Chi's/Elda's/Freya's "father worry about them being "happy"? I feel as though I am overlooking something here that reconciles these two things. Leaving that aside, however, I did enjoy the story's conclusion. Poor Hideki, he's gonna be a virgin forever [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

[sly]

[ QUOTE ]
martialstax said:
The Three Laws of Robotics are:
1. A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
2. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

[/ QUOTE ]

Thanks for telling me this, I just finished reading this and was about to find out what those three laws were.

[ QUOTE ]
So why did Chitose's husband not want persocoms to be bound by these rules?

[/ QUOTE ]

I guess he really wants to see them as his children and not just things.

[ QUOTE ]
And is the price Hideki must pay for loving Chii too much?

[/ QUOTE ]

All I can say is that there are other ways. [img]/images/graemlins/devil.gif[/img]

[populuxe]

[ QUOTE ]
Keiti said:
heh, well I didn't know the 3 Laws of Robotics, so that clears things up, and gives more meaning to the story.

[/ QUOTE ]

I grew up reading Asimov books, so those laws have been hardwired into my positronic brain. I wasn't sure if I should put all that in, but now I'm glad I did.

[ QUOTE ]
Keiti said:
While I did love the ending, I did find one thing strange. If Chobits, and other Persocoms, don't have emotions, just really good programming, then why did Chi's/Elda's/Freya's "father worry about them being "happy"? I feel as though I am overlooking something here that reconciles these two things.

[/ QUOTE ]

I kinda feel this is a contradiction as well. After all, wasn't it Freya's inability to reconcile her love for her father that caused her to break down in the first place? And wasn't Chii's ability to love Hideki and accept his love what saved all the persocoms in the end. I guess we'll just have to accept that their programming is so sophisticated that they're almost indistinguishable from human emotions.

[ QUOTE ]
Keiti said:
Leaving that aside, however, I did enjoy the story's conclusion. Poor Hideki, he's gonna be a virgin forever [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

[/ QUOTE ]

Like sly pointed out, there are other ways. Just find a Chobits doujinshi on the net, and you'll see all of them.

[Keiti]

[ QUOTE ]
martialstax said:I kinda feel this is a contradiction as well. After all, wasn't it Freya's inability to reconcile her love for her father that caused her to break down in the first place? And wasn't Chii's ability to love Hideki and accept his love what saved all the persocoms in the end. I guess we'll just have to accept that their programming is so sophisticated that they're almost indistinguishable from human emotions.

[/ QUOTE ]

i guess, though, when I think about it, human emotions can be considered as programming too. electrical impulses and chemical interactions are really the meat and bones of our emotions. hmmmmm, ok now my brain hurts [img]/images/graemlins/stunned1.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/stunned1.gif[/img]



[ QUOTE ]
martialstax said:
[ QUOTE ]
Keiti said:
Leaving that aside, however, I did enjoy the story's conclusion. Poor Hideki, he's gonna be a virgin forever [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

[/ QUOTE ]

Like sly pointed out, there are other ways. Just find a Chobits doujinshi on the net, and you'll see all of them.

[/ QUOTE ]

heh, yes, but Hideki's a "nice guy". the farthest he'll get is in his fantasies.

[AmusedObserver]

First off, I have to admit that I'm impressed by the review of this volume. It gave plenty of information, and summarized the volume in an easy to digest manner.

I totally didn't expect the discussion on Assimov's 3 laws of robotics, though. I was a big fan of his foundation series when I was a teenager. And the explanation provided on the 3 laws in this post is exactly on point.

To answer the questions thrown out, I think loving someone means being able to hurt him/her, and being hurt in return. If you don't give a hoot of how a special someone feels about you, then you don't love this person. So inherently, love and the 3 laws are in conflict. And that's why the creator chose not to have persocoms bound by these rules, b/c he wanted them to have the capacity to love.

As for Hideaki, it means a platonic relationship. While Hideaki enjoys looking at porn mags, he doesn't strike me as the kind of person who can have a successful "physical" relationship that includes ordinary intercourse. So I think this guy could accept a platonic relationship w/ no problem. Someone else, like Shimbo for example, wouldn't be able to pull it off.

While platonic relationships are rare in this day and age, I'm sure they still exist and people still consciously choose to enter into them. There is still a sort of societal standing that is derived from being a married person, compared to a single person. And to some extent, there are less pressures on a married person (to engage in social gatherings like weekend dance parties, for example) b/c of the implicit understanding that a married person has certain obligations to the spouse/family, compared to a less restricted schedule (that's the stereotype, anyway) of a single person.

[AmusedObserver]

[ QUOTE ]
sly said:

[ QUOTE ]
And is the price Hideki must pay for loving Chii too much?

[/ QUOTE ]

All I can say is that there are other ways. [img]/images/graemlins/devil.gif[/img]

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm sure Hideaki can get pointers from the porn mags under his bed. [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

[MadL]

[ QUOTE ]
martialstax said:
She wants to know just how much he loves her, because his love will come at a cost. He can't make love to her. Because of the location of Chii's reset switch, if he ever makes love to her, she will be reinitialized.

[/ QUOTE ]

I have to give CLAMP credit for this. Even in the home stretch, they manage to throw the readers another curve ball, but it was still something that had been set up from the very beginning. I also like how they took what could have been just a throwaway gag and made it a plot point of great consequence. I also enjoyed how they fleshed out Zima and Dita's relationship in the last volume.

[ QUOTE ]

Hideki asks Chitose why they're called persocoms. Why aren't they called robots? "My husband didn't want them to be bound by the three laws of robotics." (. . .) [W]hy did Chitose's husband not want persocoms to be bound by these rules? And is the price Hideki must pay for loving Chii too much?

[/ QUOTE ]

BTW, thanks for repeating the Three Laws of Robotics. I've seen them in plenty of stories over the years, but I'd forgotten what the actual laws were. My personal thoughts -- one of the most important things Chi's Dad wanted for his daughters was for them to be able to truly love a human being, and he must have thought that wouldn't be possible so long as they were compelled to help humans by an immutable law. Implicit (IMO, anyway) in the Three Laws of Robotics is that robots are always subservient to humans (since there's no exception to the "harm no human" rule, even if the robot's life is at stake). Coerced affection can't be true affection.

Is the price too high? Hard to say; that's the sort of thing that's up to each couple (I know, I'm dodging the question). It looks as if what Hideki and Chi have is true love, and if anyone can overcome this obstacle, they can. Nevertheless, it is a rare couple that would be able to make that sacrifice. Looking back, even though their father's intentions were good, that's quite a burden he placed on the Chobits -- responsibility for the fates of all their descendants, and being deprived of a very important thing those descendants presumably will be able to enjoy (since the standard reset button's in the ear -- right? Correct me if I'm wrong on that).

All in all, a touching ending to a great CLAMP series (albeit a depressing one at times for Angelic Layer fans).

[AmusedObserver]

CLAMP seems to ENJOY throwing in a curveball right at the end of the story. They've done it w/ Rayearth I and some other titles (that I can't remember offhand right now [img]/images/graemlins/sad.gif[/img] ). Probably the most annoying aspect of Clamp's work, imo.

*waits for CLAMP fans to flame AO for his complaint* [img]/images/graemlins/sweat200.gif[/img]

I absolutely loved the ending! I liked the curveball a lot more than the endings that I saw coming (Cardcaptor Sakura) Now to collect the rest of the anime.