Archived Discussion Manga / Bokurano

This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.

Tianzi: Well, I feel a little hesitant about removing Downer Ending entry on my own if someone feels it's like that, but that word certainly doesn't fit. The children were going to die and the a circle of fights's not going to stop, that was obvious from a certain point of story, and a result is "we" are not doomed (knowing Kitoh's tastes I consider this a nice surprise). But putting that aspect aside - the ending gives at least accepting view of the situation, as is shown in Kirie's arc, that living thanks to other being's deaths is a perfectly natural state. Being a pilot does have it's heroic and wonderful side, as Dung Beetle at the end. The two Jerkasses of the series come to treasure that and willingly sacrifice themselves to save one of the Earths, and the ending set nearly optimistic mood.

And about Children Are Innocent entry - Bokurano has a novel?

MikoGalatea: Yeah, there's a series of light novels called Bokurano: Alternative, which, as the name might suggest, is an alternate take on the story with a slightly different cast of characters. I heard it's fairly interesting (and tragic, of course) in its own right, but sadly I've never seen any translations.

YT: One translation of the novel is ongoing here

endlessnostalgia Thank you so much!

Peteman: How did the calculations for the number of realities getting pruned in Bokurano come about?

Untuned Strings: Adding to that, I believe it was stated (in either anime or manga, I can't be sure) that the battles weren't actually tournament-style, so they weren't in brackets or anything. Could someone clarify?

Narvi: I believe that even if it wasn't bracketed, each universe still had to fight for the set amount of battles. Fourteen or something. So even if the battles weren't tiered, the number should be pretty close.

Unknown Troper: I'm going to do something about this example:

* The Evil Army (In the anime only; A few military characters are exceptions and try to help the children, but the military establishment as a whole is shown as being more interested in short-term power than anything else. In the manga, the military is shown as being overwhelmed by the sheer scale of what they're facing, but still makes serious efforts to help, and is never shown as simply evil.)

** The United States of America's army, on the other hand.....

I just watched the anime through to the end, and this description doesn't even really fit the events that occur. Also, whoever added that snarky "but the Americans are evil!" sub-example ... I've no idea what you were on. In the anime at least, the American government and military have only a subtle background role in the sequence of events, and they never do anything villainous.

If something does happen in the manga along those lines, it should be specified with a spoiler tag.

Unknown Troper: Okay, I got a chance to read through the manga. I'm definitely calling BS on the guy who snarked about the U.S. being an Evil Empire with The Evil Army. I've added an entry about Eagleland explaining the differences in depiction concerning America in the manga and anime.

Highwind:So why was Dung Beetle translated to Koyemshi across the board? Official English translation, or just sounding more Weaboo?

• People have a difficulty taking a character named Dung Beetle seriously?
  • Well, that and Koyemshi is an acceptable romanization of the character's name, which isn't technically the Japanese word for Dung Beetle (I'm not sure whether it can mean the same thing but isn't the common word or just sounds similar or what, but there's some reason it's like the word for Dung Beetle but isn't literally). But more to the point, Koyemshi is the name of a figure in the same mythology (or from the same region, at least) as Kokopelli, and given the ending of the manga it's pretty clear that Kitoh intended the two names to be connected in such a fashion. Mind, one has very little idea what the role of the man Kokopelli has to do with a fertility God, but Koyemshi was the name given to a type of clown-figure in Pueblo culture/mythology, and their actions were supposedly "obscene" or "sacrilegious" in the midst of important religious ceremonies, which fits Dung Beetle quite well. Though I will grant that it's hard to get used to, and the difficulty in taking the character seriously actually works perfectly well considering he's a demonic cute stuffed animal.

Lynceus: Uh... Anvilicious? Really? I don't see how you can call that on a series that shows just about everything to be subjective. Yeah Kirie goes on about how he feels bad to see innocent bystanders killed in movies etc., and how he feels like nobody else cares as long as the hero survives, but I'm pretty sure Tanaka criticizes his attitude, and I'm almost positive that Jun and Kana never say anything to that effect. The whole thing with Kirie was his dilemma over whether he could choose to save his world over another world, whether that was just being selfish. And in the end he does so anyway. I see nothing anvilicious about it, merely tragic look at an overly-sensitive person forced to make a terrible decision. Unless you're trying to imply that Kitoh thought the significance of wiping out an entire world was somehow lost on his audience. The only thing you can usually expect Kitoh to be anvilicious about is "humans suck," and even that was partly subverted in Bokurano.

Also—any "Take that"s directed at America can be attributed to their speakers—Kitoh does obviously like to play with American-Japanese relations and the history between the two countries, but if the Americans tend to be depicted as antagonistic I think it usually has more to do with the heroes being Japanese than any actual attempt at mocking America. Considering that most overt criticism of America in Kitoh's works come from members of the Japanese military, it's really not that surprising that there might be a certain amount of resentment there, whether in accordance with Kitoh's personal views or not.

• Though this is probably the best translation, a more literal one would put "I am a warrior who knows no fear" before "I have no choice but to pretend". Take a second to think about what that implies.
  • Stupid Troper is Stupid. What does it imply?
  • The best interpretation this troper can work out is that it's saying Humans Are Bastards and anyone who claims to be good is simply pretending they're not evil.
  • How come you get that? The song is clearly overview of Cosmic Horror Story, humans are laughable naive beings in cosmic scale. In front of such discovery, you're either Go Mad from the Revelation or gather you little courage and go with it. YMMV, the song is either a pathetic attempt to stuggle against Cosmic Horror - or Crowning Moment Of Awesome of Doomed Moral Victor.
  • This troper thinks you guys are looking at this from the wrong angle. It seems to me that the original poster was just commenting that the song's word order causes it to read sort of like a confession—that is, rather than introducing a statement that isn't true ("I have to pretend that ... "), it gives us a definite statement and then immediately takes it back ("... that's what I was pretending."). The effect is that the speaker is almost still "pretending," up until the end of the line. The fact that the end of the line syncs up in the opening animation with Anko's completebreakdown also gives that reading, i.e. that the speaker is breaking down over the course of the line. In short, the delayed word order just makes it more sad.