Akame ga Kiru

Um... she likes anarchy. That's her favored state. Chaos provides conflict, which provides fighting and violence. If she favored stability in any sense at all she'd work for the Resistance, because they're the ones who'd stop invading all the neighbors willy-nilly. And maybe even stop butchering their own citizens for no reason, who knows?*

She explicitly rejected this suggestion, because she likes situations where the weak are constantly threatened.

And I think you're missing the point entirely if you're just looking at "what they've done".

edited 5th Nov '12 7:32:44 PM by Clarste

No, she doesn't like anarchy, because anarchy means no military. It means no conquest, it means no worthy opponents, it just means mindless hubbub and pandemonium with no one being organized enough to fight, or even care about fighting. She loses her government sanctioned torture privileges, her undoubtedly ritzy house and luxurious lifestyle, and worst of all, she loses it all permanently, because last I checked, the Empire was the only government around populated by humans that don't want to murder other humans on basic principle, like half of the rest of the world, which has been confirmed to be filled with numerous fantasy races who hate the human's guts. That is why she doesn't prefer anarchy. Order allows her to continue her preferred lifestyle. Even in the rebellion she could still find pleasure as a military leader, but in a state of anarchy, she has nothing.

And personally, I think from a meta perspective that you are the one missing the point here. The only villains beyond redemption are the ones with absolutely no redeeming qualities. Everyone else? Fair game for Defeat Means Friendship. Especially in shonen manga.

edited 5th Nov '12 7:53:02 PM by KSPAM

I've got new mythological machinery, and very handsome supernatural scenery. Goodfae: a mafia web serial

The empire is the aggressor. Everyone else hates them because they keep marching in and killing everyone. Frankly it's absurd to me that you missed this basic point. You seriously believe that it's surrounded by inhuman savages? That's like, standard evil empire propanganda and the series has made no effort whatsoever to confirm it one way or another because the audience clearly has no reason to even suspect it to be true.

All conflict is caused by the empire, except maybe random attacks by danger beasts. The empire does absolutely nothing to protect its people, mobilizing its army only to start new conflicts while letting its citizens die horribly (or killing them horribly itself). As "edgy" as it tries to be, the setting is ultimately very black and white with its morality. The empire is bad, the protagonists are good (the revolutionary army is another question). You may have some good people like Wave on the empire's side, but he's just naive.

Also, based on her own philosophy, assuming that she's not supposed to be hypocrite which I don't think she is because that'd just make her even less redeemable, she doesn't give a fuck about having an army behind her or being given luxuries. If she didn't have power, she'd take it herself, and she looks down on anyone who wouldn't. There is no "privilege" in her worldview, there's only power. The strong and the weak. If she thinks of herself as strong, and she does, she would absolutely never blame her environment for anything that happens to her. She doesn't need protection or support from a government, only the weak would think like that. She has everything she needs within her own grasp.

edited 5th Nov '12 8:07:50 PM by Clarste

Continuing to ignore my main point, eh? And it's been clearly stated since chapter one that have been reports of attacks by other races on the Empire's border. No one has bothered to mention that they doubt this is truthful, or prove it to be propaganda. It's not focused on because no one simply gives a fuck.

And I will concede to you that Esdese certainly does think that way, but as a counterpoint, in a state of total anarchy, where would there even be power or privilege to grab or seize? Esdese knows she's not a leader. Either that or she doesn't give enough of a shit to actually want to lead the country (it would certainly hamper her murder spree). Or perhaps she just hasn't even thought about it because she's too busy having fun with her job. It's not that Esdese prefers anarchy or even that she prefers order, she just doesn't care enough to do anything about it. It's not her problem. She has other priorities.

I've got new mythological machinery, and very handsome supernatural scenery. Goodfae: a mafia web serial

The empire is anarchy. They're not policing anything or regulating themselves. It's basically a guy with a big army taking what he wants. He doesn't "rule" anything, he just sends troops to kill people he doesn't like, and take their stuff. There's no social contract or anything, just one side with lots of weapons and another side without. This is also why it's her favored state.

The question is only why she thinks it's acceptable for the prime minister guy to stay in charge. Honestly I would call this her biggest crime. She endorses him. Not merely by doing nothing, but by not killing him when everything she's ever said has given her every reason to kill him. She doesn't need to rule, but she also doesn't care if anything gets ruled (not that anything is). If she wants something she'll take it. This is not hard to understand. Everything she's ever done has been this.

And it's also been clearly stated that its armies are constantly out conquering things. These facts are not contradictory. In fact, one explains the other. The empire's borders are growing, because they're conquering people. The people who are being conquered are resisting and/or trying to reclaim their land. This is common sense. Although it does please me that the author seems to be very aware of what an empire is. There is constant reinforcement of the fact that this country is composed of a variety of disparate peoples that have been absorbed over a long period of time. Even Esdese herself is a conquered foreigner. Is she too an inhuman savage? ...don't answer that.

Okay, what was the main point again? That villains can always be redeemed because writers are terrible and just don't care? I think that misses an awful lot of subtleties. You keep mentioning Accelerator so I'll address that specifically. He initially had no real character development. He was just a generic monster type villain. When the author decided to bring him back, he retroactively gave him character development that made him more sympathetic. He hates himself, he seeks strength to stop being a target, he's aware of his tendency to dehumanize his enemies and specifically fights it, etc.

By contrast, Esdese has been given plenty of development and none of it makes her more sympathetic. Every time we see a brief potential "pet the dog" moment, the story interrupts it to remind us that she's a sadistic psychopath. This is apparent through the lens of Tatsuki's reactions to her, since he experiences that exact feeling of "maybe she's not so bad, oh wait yes she is" over and over and over again. That's like, all of her character development. The only even mildly noble trait she has is respect for her comrades, but that ends the instant they become "weak" ie: lose.

You seem to be directly ignoring both authorial intent and, you know, the text we've been presented.

edited 5th Nov '12 8:38:30 PM by Clarste

If the authorial intent was to paint her as an irredeeemable psychopath, then we wouldn't even be having this argument. We wouldn't need reminders that she is, in fact, beyond help. It would just be obvious. Yet we are consistently shown she can act like a good person, is loyal to and cares about her subordinates, and has some kind of honor. In other words, she's not being portrayed as a bad guy. She's being set up as an eventual ally. If he wanted us to believe she was a villain through and through, there are a lot of easier ways to do it.

Now, if the author wanted us to think she was an irredeemable villain, this is probably what we'd see. A lack of humanizing scenes, her crush on Tatsumi being a lot more psychopathic and obsessive ala Yuno, and her crimes against humanity being onscreen and a lot more graphic. As it stands, she hasn't even killed one of the heroes on screen or otherwise and in general has acted much more like your typical heroic sociopath like Claire Stanfield and Zaraki Kenpachi rather than a straight up villain or irredeemable animal.

I've got new mythological machinery, and very handsome supernatural scenery. Goodfae: a mafia web serial

My two cents: It doesn't matter whether Esdese can be redeemed or not, my guts say she's gonna die. Tatsumi has already seen her good side, and still resolves to kill her. That's it.

NEW CHAPTER! *reads* *cries a bit*

what a stupid, but plausible, way for her to survive...

Yu hav nat sein bod speeling unntil know. (cacke four undersandig tis)the cake is a lie!

Poor Borse...

So true.

That too. Kurome should get killed too to balance things out.

... Why. Why did you kill Bors. WHY?!

I've got new mythological machinery, and very handsome supernatural scenery. Goodfae: a mafia web serial

Because he's an enemy, silly!

But he was nice guy! (aside of burning few vilages of course)

edited 4th Dec '12 12:59:30 PM by Tenzen12

The fact that he's a nice guy who's only doing what he's ordered to do, and knowing how horrible it was, was EXACTLY why he had to go.

Here's my take on things: This is a story devoid of both heroes and villains, though a few monsters run around in human guise. The whole point is the dichotomy of people and situations. The loving family man is a butcher that slaughters villagers without blinking. The sweet gentle ditz instinctively responds to threats with killing. The open-hearted and loyal lover is a sadistic social darwinist who believes committing atrocities is the best way to motivate people to grow stronger and defend themselves. The bottle fairy cool big sis rips off bumpkins for fun and tears drug dealers apart with her bare hands.

Night Raid isn't helping the people for great justice(except for Tatsumi, who gets told off for his naivete), rather, they're garnering popular support while undermining the ruling class. Black and Grey morality rules this setting and the 'bad guys' aren't all bad, and the 'good guys' aren't that good. Trying to find the black and white to events just won't work in the long term.

Creed of the Happy Pessimist:Always expect the worst. Then, when it happens, it was only what you expected. All else is a happy surprise.

So it's like real life then?

I've got new mythological machinery, and very handsome supernatural scenery. Goodfae: a mafia web serial

Honestly, at this point, I feel like the author is killing off characters too fast. They've already given Chelsea a huge death flag.

Tropers watching movies

In other hand there is Leone who eating death flags for breakfeast, we can't belive every single one that appear.

edited 10th Dec '12 1:59:33 AM by Tenzen12

Raws are up, but it might be a while before translations appear, being the holidays and all.

Someone just lost her head (literally!) in stupidest way possible. I won't even give you a hint, as it's pretty obvious who by this point.

edited 24th Dec '12 4:22:09 PM by MyssaRei

NOOOOOO

Knew it.

It's a shame, she was introduced so recently, too.

Tropers watching movies

Translation's up.

RIP Chelsea.

That was expected, but it's still suck big time.

Hmm. Is Kurome dead too? She did say, "This might be it for me." If Chelsea succeeded, well, at least it wasn't in vain. If only she'd brought back-up...

Nope there is only one person that is alowed do that.