The New Touhou Character Alternate Interpretation Compendium!

The way I see it, Satori has a wiretap on your brain's conversations, while Miko has something like an extensive psychological profile on you. She can guess your thoughts based on that and try to predict your behavior, but it won't always work - a man who strongly desires to strangle an obnoxious neighbor but knows that such desires shouldn't be acted on, for example.

Neither ability lends itself to the accumulation of fan art, but that's where I come in. Links are SFW due to ads for... something ripping off the Ninja Turtles. Huh.

• Profile pic
• Colorful, kinda ZUNish
• Magic circles emanate from the bellybutton
• Nothing to do with Germany circa 1939, promise
• An album cover
• That thing wouldn't look out of place in Mesoamerica
• The actual character art is just a silhouette, but damn that's a nice sky
• When we gonna get an updated Bad Apple!! vid?
• Hope she's not channeling Caim... wait a minute, they're both princes who lost their kingdoms and entered dark pacts to extend their lives...
• Onikobe Rin
• (undignified) Persona!
• I count ten, whatever they are
• Almost kinda Vocaloidy
• She in a sailor fuku?
• Judging by her eyes, she's smoking powdered Kogasa
• ...and this is what you look like coming down from a Kogasa high
• Better one, or better two?
• A disconcerting level of spikiness
• Time to duel?
• Powering up with the stiiiiick!
• Sword beaming
• Chunky updrafting
• Delicious woodsy goodness
• She accidentally everything
• Business outfit
• Another character enveloped in petal storms
• It's a gong?
• Very soft
• Her campaign poster
• Don't need to read desires to know what she's thinking
• But she might surprise you anyway
• Not the only one she could run afoul of
• Dangerous synergy
• Is Futo getting friendzoned?
• With colorful Tojiko
• Meanwhile, inside the TAODIS
• That's a subtly different style
• Taoists in black
• They're not up to anything, sure
• They're on a boat
• But there is one they fear: Kulaan Serevakkiir Wuthon, "prince sacred-child of wise hearing"
• I have no idea where she is or what she's interacting with
• Really the only reason to take up necromancy
• Still miss that show
• I look and look, but cannot understand
• Must now expose her to different evolution stones, for science
• Fixed

Ha! While I work, ads for headphones on TV Tropes!

So, anything else to say about Miko?

Her hair is shaped like ears.

I think it's symbolic of something.

Probably goes along with her whole 'listening' motif. Same as her headphones.

ZUN might have had the idea of her getting a serious case of bed hair after sleeping for so long in headphones.

edited 9th Jan '13 5:25:05 AM by Recon5

Yeah, that is what I was thinking. Listening motif. Since that is her power and all.

Here we go. I don't doubt that, as always, there's a lot I didn't cover, but here are my thoughts on Miko.

P.S. I knew her name would cause Shrine Maiden Identity confusion the moment I saw it. Miko vs miko. I rely on caps for the difference.

While everyone has their own interpretation of Miko, there are many, many different points where these interpretations diverge. Most people can agree that Marisa is aggressive and reckless and energetic, and most people can agree that Pathouli is physically weak and magically very skilled...

But Miko Toyosatomimi in particular has nearly as many interpretations as Touhou has fans. Is she good or evil? Repentent or scheming? Upset at her failed revival, or relieved? Thankful for Seiga's help, or hateful of how it killed her? How does her power work? What are her relationships with Futo? With Tojiko? Was Miko ever a man, or did history just forget that? Did miko become female when entering gensokyo, and if so, why? Is she a jerk for having Futo undergo the ritual first, or did Futo volunteer?

There are so many different divergence points for her, and as a rather new character, we simply don't know many of the answers. Perhaps after a while, the fandom will settle on some common attributes of Miko Toyosatomimi... or perhaps she'll keep us guessing for years.

As a quick point of mention, I'm aware Tojiko was merely inspired by Shoutaku's consort, and is not the same person as the historical Tojiko. I assume, however, that she had a similar relationship to Shoutaku as her historical counterpart, in conjunction with the many other parrallels between them.

First, lets start with something very basic: her gender. History remembers Prince Shoutaku as a distinctly masculine fellow... a far cry from Miko herself. Perhaps records of Shoutaku were fuzzy, and most of his image is made up whole-cloth. I doubt it, but an important thing to remember is that the outside world of Touhou isn't quite what we know as the real world (Pretty sure Sanae would have gotten much wider recognition if it were), so slight historical divergences are possible. It's also possible that Miko was born female, and cross-dressed into her position. This is perhaps the simplest resolution to this issue, and it implies a very deep relationship with Tojiko that goes beyond that of a mere consort.

My personal thought on Miko's gender is simply that she was male, and when performing the Shikaisen ritual, Shoutaku/Miko chose a female body (even if it is a bit of a boyish one, in my mind). Going with this, the question becomes why (The how is part of the shikaisen ritual; the person undergoing the ritual can change their appearance trivially, as they're effectively making a new body for themselves). She expected to return from the dead in short order, so why would she want a new identity? Perhaps being undeniably Shoutaku in mind and capability while also being anyone but Shoutaku in appearance would give Miko a social edge. She could claim to be her own reincarnation, or claim to have ascended to godhood, or whatever. If she'd claimed it and successfully proved she was Shoutaku (A trivial enough act when she is Shoutaku), people would have been willing to believe just about whatever else she wished to claim, as well; her rule would be absolute.

Miko spread Buddhism through a bloody, violent war to pacify the masses. After all, if you're going to have absolute rule, having those peasants get all uppity would cause no end of difficulties. As we all know, this backfired spectacularly for her. So what went wrong? Why was her mausoleum so well sealed? My guess is that it was an innocent act; They respected Shoutaku a great deal, and having him come back as some sort of zombie would be completely unacceptable, so sealed. It is possible, however, that some buddhists found out about Miko's two-faced nature, and made it a point to keep her sealed. Byakuren, at the very least, seems to have wanted to keep Miko sealed, though Byakuren's exact motivations for doing so are difficult to pin down.

Jumping back a bit, let's talk about Miko's transformation. 'Thanks' to Seiga's advice, Prince Shoutaku was suddenly faced with a crisis of life ("What do you mean mercury is poisonous?"). Thanks again to Seiga, however, she was given a way out. I do think Miko intended to use Futo as a test subject. Whether Futo was willing or not was irrelevant to Miko. Miko wasn't about to take the chance with her own life... especially considering Seiga's previous instruction is what backed Miko into that corner to begin with. Personally, I suspect that Futo was willing, but I don't think this lessens the paranoia/selfishness of what Miko did.

Miko chose her now-legendary seven-star sword as her new body for Shikaisen-dom. I suspect choosing such an ostentatious piece reflects her personality. No lame pot for her, no siree. A sword is a symbol of a ruler, and a ruler she is.

Futo and Tojiko had their little spat, and Miko's consort is now a ghost. Which might be awkward, except for the far more awkward point that Miko was now not even a male. So perhaps things worked out for the best, or perhaps there's a bit of animosity between them centered around this drama. Personal headcanon has Miko changing her gender without consulting anyone, and Tojiko being very upset that her man is now... not. vengeful, even. Kind of a tsundere interpretation, I suppose.

Now, Miko and Seiga have a history. Their relationship is very complicated. Miko both owes Seiga her life, and also owes Seiga for the loss of Miko's kingdom. To me, it seems Miko isn't very fon of Seiga at all. Once bitten, twice shy, after all. My headcanon, at least (I think it's actualy canon, but I don't know where it was, so I'm likely wrong), has Seiga being the one to suggest the idea of the Buddhist pacifying war. Whether Miko still loves this or has become more repentent about starting a war, or was reluctant, but figured it to be a necessity is quite unclear.

Speaking now of Miko's 'alignment'. I place her firmly in Lawful Neutral, with slightly evil leanings. My view of her is selfish, scheming, paranoid, with little respect towards 'lesser' beings (aka everyone ever). She hides all this behind a terrific, impressive mask, and lies with the ease of... well, a politician. If she is seeking hermit status, it's only because of the potential power such a position commands. She will hesistate at nothing to get what she wants, but neither will she recklessly jump into something without testing the waters, especially after being humbled from doing exactly that.

Of course that isn't the only interpretation of Miko. I can also see her as repentant of the death she's caused, ready to embrace her new position as 'just another important person'... pursuing hermitage and enlightenment for its own sake, struggling against her nature as a ruler that drives her to meddle. I currently remain of the opinion that this part is a mask she wears, but she may be genuinely interested in enlightenment for its own sake.

As for her relationship with Byakuren... well, There's that 'hint' of resentment at being sealed away, likely deliberately, by the youkai magician. I think I've mentioned this before, but Miko and Byakuren are clearly foils of eachother. Both feared death. Byakuren was focused internally (fearing for herself, using self-buff magic), and now focuses outwardly (spreading Buddhism/youkai rights), while Miko was outwardly focused (spreading her influence... and spreading Buddhism, humorously enough.), and is now inwardly focused (Reaching for enlightenment.) Miko trusted her life to a hermit, and is on the side of humans, while Byakuren turned to youkai to avoid death, and now favors them, instead. Byakuren was rather guarded and restrained at the Symposium, while Miko was anything but.

On to Miko's power. Long story short, She's a genius of contextual clues, like Sherlock holmes. Long story long...

I think the best analogy I've come up with for how Miko's power works in contrast to Satori's is the idea of masks. Imagine, if you will, a masquerade, with people wearing masks and costumes and disguises. Miko has the sort of hyperanalytical skills necessary to Holmes her way to correctly guessing who everyone is. Satori, in contrast, shows up with no mask, and simply cannot see masks or disguises. So it's easy enough for her to just see who's who. In fact, she doesn't even realize its a masquerade, except through deduction as people call her out for ruining their disguise.

Satori is extrasensory, while Miko is hypersensitive. Satori determines who you are from your mind/heart/core, while Miko simply knows what sorts of cores lead to what sort of actions.

Miko has developed complex algorithms to reliably rebuild a 3D image from it's 2D 'shadow'/projection. Obviously, this requires some assumptions to be made, which is how and when we see her power fail (Guessing completely wrong about Youmu, for instance). In contrast, Satori can simply see the 3D image... but can't see shadows/projections.

Now, think of the 3D image as the person's true self/thoughts, while the 2D image is their actions (including speech and words). Everyone else sees the 2D images, so Miko is far more capable of interacting with people. She can guess their 3D forms much more easily than most people, because she can see all the light sources that cast the shadows, and has intense familiarity with shadows. Satori, however, can't understand this... she sees the third dimension, but not the shadows it casts. She doesn't understand the importance of actions in determining someone's image... to her, only the person itself is visible.

Extending the metaphor further: Say the 3D person is grabbing a bird's nest from an apple tree. A normal person sees one shadow reaching for another that's kinda round-ish, and blurring together with a bunch of other shadows from a nearby fence and other trees, and says "You're doing something... to... probably a tree of some sort." Miko sees the shadows, but she has keen senses needed to seperate the overlapping shadows, and see which tree the person is reaching for, and that the person is reaching for it. So Miko says "Ah, you're trying to get something up in that tree, and it appears to be an apple tree, so you're probably trying to pick an apple." Satori sees her reaching for the nest and says "Ah, you're grabbing the nest from the apple tree.."

And in response to Satori, the typical person says... "What nest? You're weird...", while Miko says "Oh, the nest... they could be reaching for that, yeah." Indeed, SOPM seems to indicate that Miko can kind of begin to sympathize with Satori, which seems to be something no one else can do. This is why I kind of pair Satori x Miko... OTP? Maybe for Satori, but Miko's got her choice of the ladies, and most of them don't live in a hell.

Touching just a bit on Miko's design, I find her appearance rather boyish for some reason. As for that Zun-Art with the two right hands, if I feel like justifying it, I like to think that Miko either consciously made the decision to have two right hands, in hopes it would make her ambidextrous, or she messed up the Shikaisen ritual in another way. I legitimately mistook her hair for ears when i first saw her, and I was like "What sort of beast youkai is she I wonder. Herp a derp. Also, those earmuffs... Miko is a DJ, now and forever.

Who knows what Miko will do to Gensokyo? Her plans are hers and hers alone, as is her mysterious history, made somehow more mysterious by the fact that it's rather well documented. Whatever happens, I suspect Miko's going to have some serious trouble keeping her hands out of pies...

So she oughta fit right in.

edited 9th Jan '13 4:08:36 PM by Antimatter625

I think that Seiga is solely responsible for the entire 'mess' (including the events of 13.5) and it was all part of her quest to become the most famous Taoist in history. Unfortunately she's now unable to get beyond 'top Taoist in Gensokyo' even if she somehow manages to upstage the Prince so she must content herself with being a boogeywoman of sorts.

That's for her own discussion, though.

I don't see Miko (or Tojiko or Futo for that matter) being particularly malevolent. They're just having to roll with what the hermit's shenanigans have given them. They'll probably end up settling for parity with the Temple and the two Shrines.

Miko strikes me as potentially dangerous, but ultimately either well-meaning or at least the inoffensive kind of selfish at the worst. While she seems to mostly keep to her pocket dimension, I'd imagine she drops in on Futo fairly frequently, and either does the same for Tojiko or lets her bunk with her- Depending on how one chooses to interpret certain facts of their history and relationship.

I don't think that anyone in Gensokyo can be seen as 'dangerous' in the sense that they'll irreparably disrupt the order of things as long as there's a Hakurei shrine maiden around. There might be some unrest and quite a few humans might die at worst but I don't think that ZUN will give us any major tragedies. Not outside of someone's backstory.

Seriously? She taught Miko Taoism and suggested a few things, but that's saying that Miko is as much her puppet as Yoshika is

Now that's just silly. From what we know, 13.5 is either the result of all the various incidents over the last decade, or someone new. There's nothing implicating Seiga

So, yeah. It was Seigaaaaaaaaaaaaa's idea initially.

Am I the only one that's reading it like Seiga's seducing Miko with power? Seriously, she comes across as a huge snake, here. Miko couldn't resist the temptation, and so started the war and learning Taoism... which ultimately led to her being 'just another player in Gensokyo'... a far cry from her goal of immortal absolute dominion over a nation. No wonder Miko's wary of Seiga.

I believe Miko used that plan because it was the best one she had at that time, and it partially worked. Buddhism did pacify the country, on the other hand her resurrection ritual was ironically interrupted by them.

I think like old japan rulers, Miko does cares for her servants, but she acted superior because in that time rulers were supposed to be related to the gods, and were teached to act like that.

An alterna-cynical explanation is that pretty much nobody would want to be associated with Seiga. If her aura of ebul isn't enough, she probably hasn't endeared herself to the populace by stealing Christmas.

If Miko wants the village to call on her to be leader, she needs to disassociate herself from people like that.

So, she distances from Seiga and even from Futo and Tojiko. They were useful to her once but now they're a liability in her goals. Whichever goals even. If she plans to rule everything or if she plans to become enlightened.

I think Miko's objective now it to simply gain entry to heaven than to rule Gensokyo as Sop M showed.

And to do that the basic thing to do is to separate herself from everything.

edited 9th Jan '13 8:54:38 PM by asellus111

She only stops with this after Kanako contradicts her. The first goal on her mind seems to be rule but only for 'their own good' sort of thing. When Kanako tells her that it would be bad for a strong ruler to emerge among the humans, then she stops talking about it and then this starts.

If one were cynical and predisposed to calling her eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeevil, then one might see it as Miko trying to avoid rocking the boat after she saw that two out of three of the symposites would oppose her bid for power. So when asked what she wants to do, she goes 'oh, I just want a carefree life. No boat rocking here.'

Other people would see this as Miko trying to avoid more unnecessary trouble, after all at that point she listened and learned more about Gensokyo and her "rivals".

On the other hand Miko clearly sides with humanity and will stand firmly with them.

She'll stand firmly above them.

And apart from them. In her little fractal dimension ivory tower house.

Her ideal situation was one where the masses were pacified and knew their place and she was an immortal god emperor over all of Japan.

But, yeah she's with humans.

edited 9th Jan '13 9:43:49 PM by Bocaj

And knowing your enemy is the first step to victory.

Hm. Interesting that the Buddhists are the largest cast herd, while the Taoists are much smaller to begin with, and seem to keep getting in each other's way. Kind of mirrors Miko's whole life, doesn't it? "Power for me, Buddhism for the people."

Of course, that's just on the surface, anyway, since the Buddhists are pretty much just Buddhists in name only, and more functionally a Youkai rehabilitation group.

Old habits die hard, and Miko's got that habit of thinking herself as being better than everyone... perhaps, like Sanae, she'll catch on and settle in.

,Like queens or kings in the past, but don't forget that people actually followed her because Miko is a great leader. In universe she is still remembered and considered a god because of her actions and wisdom she had even before the whole Buddhist stuff.

edited 9th Jan '13 9:53:33 PM by asellus111

And she managed to poison herself. So, yeah. And?

Trying to master Taoism is not as easy as you think, luckily Her master Seiga was around to save her.

The same master that didn't stop her from poisoning herself.

No wonder Miko decided to test the process on a guinea pig first.

Miko biggest fear was to die, she wasn't perfect, that's why she asked Futo to try the ritual first. And this same fear was the one that made her use dangerous stuff in her experiments IIRC.

"I'm afraid to die. You, test this to see if it'll kill me. You're expendable."

edited 9th Jan '13 10:18:34 PM by Bocaj