The New New Touhou Character Alternate Interpretation Compendium

She ate Genji.

Okay but seriously, she's under a lot of pressure, yes, but she has a horrible attitude about dealing with it.

Right. Reimu. Being main character. Reimu has a lot of info on her. Oh golly this is going to be tough.

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Lazy Heroine

Reimu Hakurei is always described as being optimistic, lazy but with great natural talent, having no real sense of danger, and treating both youkai and humans with the same general feelings of disinterest. Despite this, she is also always described as rather gung ho about this whole youkai extermination thing, and whenever there is an incident, she sets off to resolve it, shooting everyone who stands in her way in the face.

Reimu strikes me as someone who is less "doesn't judge" and is more "hates everyone equally" and just strikes out against youkai more because it is her job. If humans caused a ruckus, she'd be more than glad to yin-yang them too. They had it coming. Well, I say "hates", but it's more like "looks down on everyone equally". She is perfectly willing to accept visitors from anyone, but I feel the people she actually respects can be counted on one hand (if even that). She can't be bothered to deal with these plebs.

Of course, with that said, she seems really into exterminating youkai. I guess I compare her to Sanae here, whose initial zeal about youkai hunting comes from a misguided notion that youkai are all planning to kill and eat people, but Reimu has no such motive. She doesn't care about humanity, yet hunts youkai with great zeal when called upon. It's probably less about youkai specifically, and more about her wanting to seem needed. It's a shrine maiden's duty to exterminate youkai, so dammit, she is going to show them all who the best youkai exterminator is. Compare how she broke up SoPM, due to the villagers basically asking her to because they were suspicious of all those leader types gathering in one place.

Reimu is also a rather bad shrine maiden. It is stated that she only pretends to keep up with the shrine's upkeep, and instead of properly trying to gather faith through long term services to the people, she either tries to bank on the current incident or resorts to what amounts to get rich quick schemes. She also has no idea who the god of her shrine actually is. Also, she hasn't worn a proper uniform in years.

In other words, she wants to be needed and appreciated, but isn't willing to put in anything but the bare minimum of effort. She only does the fun stuff or acts when directly called on. The rest? Meh, what a waste of time.

Despite all this bad stuff I've said, she has some good points too. She is pretty in tune with nature, animals like her and will help her out without her knowing and so on. Folks tend to like her too, even if they are mostly youkai who she has shot in the face once. I guess her vaguely disinterested yet optimistic persona when "off the clock" and her fearlessness is just intriguing to these people.

Of course, Reimu has powers too! She is apparently the best in dealing with and manipulating borders around aside from Yukari. She also has powers of flight. ...Big deal right? Everyone can fly. Akyuu said so. Well...Reimu can fly away from reality, effectively becoming untouchable, and can float from point to point, effectively teleporting. Despite this, I get the impression that she isn't really aware of her powers, after all she sometimes activates them without even noticing (for example, she doesn't notice when she teleports around and if I recall, she interprets all the homing bullets she shoots as if she was shooting straight and it just happens to always hit its mark.)

So, in conclusion, Reimu is...not exactly the most pleasant person, but she isn't spiteworthy either. She is a lazy opportunist who looks down on everyone else, but at the same time she is bold and headstrong, and has a hidden desire to be needed and relied upon. I do think she is worthy of at least some respect, after all she is among the stronger beings in Gensoukyou and always throws herself into the heat of an incident...even if for mostly selfish reasons.

Also, her hair was purple once.

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EDIT:...This ended up write up length again. Not going to look a gift horse in the mouth, so this is a write up now.

edited 20th Nov '13 8:15:12 AM by Otherarrow

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Please don't say miko when the perfectly legitimate translation of shaman shrine maiden is available. It merely breeds confusion, especially when another character is actually named Miko.

It's worth noting that by Taoist standards Reimu is practically enlightened. She's a master of wu wei, of knowing when the best course of action is inaction ("the supple willow weathers the storm better than the mighty oak", etc.), and this is exactly how some of her strongest spell cards are described. It's not that she doesn't realise she's teleporting because she doesn't care, rather she wouldn't be able to teleport if she was actively thinking about it.

According to Komachi, Reimu has fewer negative thoughts than most people but she's completely transparent about them, never trying to hide them behind politeness. E.g. If you annoy Marisa she'll pretend nothing's wrong then rob you when you're not looking. If you annoy Reimu then she'll complain loudly but leave you alone.

edited 20th Nov '13 8:48:51 AM by Prime32

Fitting as a foil for Marisa, Reimu's primary characteristic is blunt, thoughtless honesty. Unless she is specifically hiding something, she'll just tell people how she feels. This is completely indistinguishable from rudeness. The irony here is that she's always worrying about her reputation while not realizing how her attitude hurts her.

That's not quite right. Marisa's stealing is also indiscriminate. If she knew you had something valuable, she'll steal from you. I bet she had already made attempts at stealing from Yuugi and Nitori.

For me, one of the most outstanding impressions about the protagonists, is how ZUN is in a sense overprotective of them. Maintaining Gensokyo's status quo means they are always left clueless when something big comes and goes, with no understanding regarding the significance of the event. They are not growing wiser, while Merry and Renko are in an ongoing adventure and keeps growing.

You can say this is either unfair, or makes the protagonists even more unlikeable.

edited 20th Nov '13 7:52:45 PM by atrican

Stop atrican from crawling out of the dumpster! Touhou status updates

Marisa's character might be developing and we never see it, hidden as it is behind her persona as the brazen thief and outrageous magician. Reimu, well, it might not be her nature to grow as a character. She might be needed as a constant, someone to hold Gensokyo together through indiscriminating violence, a balancer against other powers moving into it. If she starts taking her duties more seriously she might alienate the youkai, if she gets too active in youkai affairs she might alienate the humans. The center of a spinning object is the part that moves the least.

Come to think of it, between her intuition and/or luck, she ought to be good at picking a get-rich-quick scheme that would actually get her rich, quickly. Maybe it's another force at work than luck, like she's being guided by something?

What, taking it easy?

I'm not sure about "needed," it really depends on whether Reimu would give a damn about others' opinion of her. She's not happy about her shrine's status as a youkai haven, but I think that's because it keeps visitors (and their donations) away.

It might be more about identity. She was born to be the Hakurei Shrine Maiden, she's got all those powers, the ancestral relics. Take that away and she's what, an open-minded mild misanthrope? An unemployed underachiever?

And when it stopped being purple, she could fly on her own. The connection is obvious, and completely nonsensical.

I think this has come up elsewhere, that Reimu's a muddle of religious influences but closer to being a Taoist than anything else, right down to the rites she uses. I'm sure others could explain it better.

She's Reimu all the way down.

"Shrine maiden of the Hakurei Shrine" doesn't sound as good. Also, four letters compared to twelve, very economical.

Current earworm: "Awe of the Unknown"

Remember what Kasen said in the latest chapter of WAHH. Reimu always fails when she tries to do something. There's no safer bet anywhere. You could probably tie this into the Taoism thing if you like.

I think Hylarn basically nailed it. But being concise is for people who don't like being wordy, and I'm not counted among their number.

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Do or Do not

There is no try. Reimu can either accomplish something as she is, or she cannot. Learning in order to overcome an obstacle is pointless, because its easier to just wait until the obstacle moves out of the way. I see Reimu as a firm believer of following the path of least resistance.

So, it's probably known to most of you that I really don't like Reimu. She is, without comparison, my least favorite character in the series. I see her as a sort of Mary Sue, which basically kinda kills any appeal she might have. I laugh at her pain and mutter whenever she does something praiseworthy... if she ever did... another reason I don't particularly like her: such instances are fleeting and rare.

Her life is pitiful, and pity is a huge reason that I like some of my favorite characters. Yet, I just can't help but feel that she deserves everything that happens to her. More than blockheaded, cowardly Youmu, more than the naive and foolish Udonge, and more than the detached and distant Ran. Because they may have shortcomings... seeing things through colored lenses or just being too nearsighted to see whats around them... but it's not their fault they're young, or lack exposure, or were taught poorly. Because dammit, they try. Yukari's lessons on independent thought may be lost on Ran, but Ran still follows the orders she's given... she still tries. Youmu Can't hope to compete with the genius of Yuyuko or Yukari, but she tries (She later gives up, but signs show it wasn't for good). Reisen may be a fool and great prank target, but she still tries to understand her masters... tries to learn...

Reimu doesn't. So I hate her. Effort is what makes someone who they are. Reimu doesn't exert effort. She simply does something she can, or gives up because she can't. She might throw out a modicrum of something not entirely unlike effort when he's backed into a corner, but only because it would be less effort than continuing to ignore the problem.

Basically, Reimu when effected by Raijuu's poison is closest to my headcanon of her. "Ugh, breathing is such a bother."

There, that's why i hate her. Now, that said, she's still an interesting character. Why doesn't she try? Why is she (in my headcanon) a physical embodiment of sloth?

One idea that came to me recently is that she's simply 'broken'. Her will worn away through a hellish life, she simply has no cares left to give. She treats everyone equally because she can't muster enough will to think of them as anything other than 'the other' that causes her life to be miserable. Even Marisa, her best and quite possibly only 'friend', gets a huge kick out of playing constant pranks on her. And given what she needs to live with... I can see this.

I need to talk about the Vampire Incident here, because I think it plays a huge part in who Reimu is now (And, indeed, what Gensokyo is). In my last writeup, I bashed on Reimu for not solving the vampire incident... for chilling back and not resolving incidents until they were more akin to games. Perhaps that is how it went down, in which case she deserves every bit of hell she gets, because her failing to act damned thousands upon thousands of people.

But it is possible that she tried and failed, leaving it up to the youkai (probably Yukari) to deal with it. Its also possible That it was the previous Hakurei Shrine Maiden that dealt with the issue and failed (Since given the vampire's rampaging nature, and the fact that they were newcomers and felt no obligation to play by Gensokyo's rules, failing to stop said vampire is probably fatal.) In these instances where Reimu is free of the failure to resolve the Vampire incident, she still must live in its shadow.

Oh, and what a shadow. Human sacrifices she isn't even allowed to try and stop because of an unbreakable contract. Her job being reduced to a glorified playmate for youkai... youkai that can and do still kill and eat people (They're just polite enough to do it out of sight). She can't just kill them, oh no. She has to sit there andjust -know- that they're there, and that she can't save people by killing these monsters. Imagine if Batman defended a Gotham City that offered sanctum to criminals; no one could be persecuted except for crimes committed within its borders. It would be a paradise for crime lords the world over...

That's what Gensokyo may very well be for Reimu. And that's a hefty burden to lay on anyone's shoulders. Throw in the fact that people have begun seeing her as one of those things she's supposed-to-stop-only-not-really, and I can see how she might have just said "Screw it" and mentally checked out, so to speak. She was dealt a shitty hand, and she just doesn't want to play the game through, but she can't actually quit. She can, however, simply not try. Fate or reality or something may have conspired to take control of her life out of her hands, putting it instead in the hands of people like Yukari. I can see that contributing to being bitter.

So the only way I can perhaps not hate Reimu is if her life has literally been so terrible that she's all but dead inside. There is no other excuse profound enough to explain her extreme indifference that I can think of right now, and that state is pitiable enough that it might be enough to overcome the hatred I feel towards her. Maybe.

I do think her having good intuition is pretty much... not true. it fails in IN (human path is Eirin path; subject to the illusion), it fails in SWR (When Alice's not so subtle hints fly over her head), and it fails on countless get rich quick schemes. Sure, she finds the final boss within 6 stages, and gets on the right track after a few. I mean, Scarlet Devil Mansion: The mist is coming from the mansion. Intuition isn't being called upon here. Spring, she just goes out until running into Alice, who just tells her where to go (And indeed, mentions in some paths "Well, gee, derp, have you tried checking where all the spring you've been collecting are flowing from?"). Also failing to recognize thinly-disguised Mamizou, failing to get a sense Kasen's anything other than a human, failing to notice the 3 fairies despite them being around her all the time... repeatedly falling victim to their tricks If anything, her luck and intuition are rather poor. That she simply wins most conflicts is unrelated to that... she's a sort of idiot savant of spellcards or something.

I do think Reimu particularly resists change. Marisa does grow and change, and her relationships evolve and grow... consider Alice/Marisa in IN vs SA, or Patchy/Marisa in IN vs SA, or Marisa/Cirno in Soku/GFW. But Reimu... just wants none of any of that. She is how she is and darn it that's where she'll stay. She can be momentarily budged from her foundation, but she'll fall back into it quickly. Her comfort zone isn't likely to shift, and youkai aren't a part of it.

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Perhaps, but I think she might be generalizing and thinking that the best course of action is always inaction. Which, when spring is 4 months late, might be not the way to keep carrying on.

Also explains how she walked across a river without realizing it by stepping on a fish she didn't realize was there. She just does things. Sometimes she fails to do things.

But she never truly tries to make something work. It does, or it doesn't, then its on to the next thing.

I assume its because she never puts anything more than a token effort in. She doesn't know how to try (Doesn't realize that it involves effort), so when she... tries... to... try... it fails.

I write some fanfiction. Satori's Tale is done... but I'm not.

You're misunderstanding what that means. It's not promoting inaction at all, but instead "action without action". In Taoism the ideal way to live is completely in tune with nature such that you act completely by instinct. You never need to make decisions or exert effort because what you need to do feels so obvious and natural that you do it without thinking about it. The more you have to force yourself to do something, the further you are from this state, and presumably the less successful your life will be.

Although frankly I don't think Reimu is like this either.

Is that really her fault? You just now excused Youmu and Reisen of all people of being sympathetic for their frankly pathetic efforts, in addition to actively ignoring the advice of their elders, yet Reimu who is equally unaware of how she should behave doesn't get the same slack? and it's not like she's putting in the absolute minimum amount of effort in her get-rich-quick schemes either. I mean like, she builds a little mini-shrine for the (not) dragon egg, she walks around selling refreshments while promoting Kokoro's performances, heck even while dying of energy drain from the fox she insists on continuing to work. She really goes all out on these things, and while I suppose you could come up with more she could have done, she's hardly sitting back and doing nothing.

Reimu Hakurei:

Allow me to post another interpretation of Reimu. Reimu lives her life with the philosophy of Taoism even if she isn't a Taoist. This means she works with what she has and does not want much.

Training:

Her ideas on training are interesting and can be verified for truth depending on the situation. Look at it this way, is it better to have training regiments or is it better to change your life style to have training? This is kind of like dieting or exercising, sure if you go on a diet regiment or an exercise regiment, you will lose weight or you will be more fit. However, both of these are merely temporary solutions as it will end as soon as you stop. All that weight you lost? The fitness you gained, gone if you stop dieting or exercising. Contrast this to Marisa, if her goal for immortality is anything like her training regiments, then she will train hard for 3 months and stop. Reimu differs in that it is her lifestyle that keeps her in shape. Her morning duties include cleaning the shrine and other tasks to upkeep it and depending on the time of the year, she will do some rituals. This is similar to Meiling's Tai Chi Chuan routine in the morning, it isn't really training to Meiling, but it does keep her in top condition.

Reimu's interactions with others:

She is generally neutral to anyone she meets, be it youkai or human. However, it is her duty to exterminate youkai, so she does what her duty says, even if her base opinion of them is neutral. She treats youkai harshly because she is a shrine maiden and not because she hates them. But because of this, youkai like her, as she doesn't judge them before knowing them. She judges them based on her observations of them and not based on what they are thought to be.

Similar to her interactions with the Kitsune during the full moon. She has no obligation to feed them, but did so anyway. She understands that they are said to be dangerous and tricky, but observation and evaluation is needed before judgement.

Lifestyle:

She generally lives a carefree life working with what she has. She has no real ambitions for being greater. She does her duties like every other shrine maiden and it only really shows in Hopeless Masquerade when people lose hope. As seen in Wild and Horned Hermit, chapter 18, she isn't doing anything different, but her shrine became popular because of the lost of hope.

In normal days, no one cares, because life is relatively peaceful in Gensokyo and the Hakurei shrine is too far to visit. Doing her normal routine will simply not get customers to the Hakurei shrine because of the distance. Unfortunately, only special events can get people to come to the Hakuren shrine. This is also mainly because of the shrine's blessing, which is youkai extermination and people have no need for that. All of this just makes Reimu poor.

@Reimu's powers of flight: Reimu's power of flight may or may not have anything to do with her ability to use Musou Tensei. It is more likely that she is about to use Fantasy Heaven, because she can go into a nothingness sort of zone.

That is not true. She upkeeps her shrine and yet no one visits. She doesn't pretend to do anything, pretending is not what Reimu can easily do. As seen in Silent Sinner in Blue, when she came back after a month, the shrine was in bad condition, because no one was there to upkeep it.

She solves incidents, because that is what she does, not because it makes her look good, since no one really knows that she is the one to solve most of these incidents.

That is a terrible example, since Marisa is also affected and does the exact same thing.

That argument can be said for all of the protagonist. Do you assume Marisa to be lazy since she also waited 4 months before heading out?

@Wuwei:

I am not quite sure if she has reached that state. Action with inaction. She sometimes seems to do it.

Everything is relative.

No, her profiles explicitly state that she doesn't upkeep the shrine and is barely acting as a shrine maiden. She pretends to clean it and take care of it, but is really just loafing around and drinking tea.

She probably does the bare minimum in making it look presentable, and even that is for her own convenience, since she has to live there and all.

edited 21st Nov '13 4:34:59 AM by Otherarrow

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She fixed the roof at one point in an FS chapter (the one with the snake). As in, she got a ladder, climbed up to the roof, and used a hammer and nails and all that. Arguably this was for her own convenience since a leaky roof is just unpleasant all around, but she's not adverse to physical labor if the shrine needs it.

Also, it's worth noting that Reimu wants folks to know she solved the incidents, but they don't believe her because they see her as mostly incompetent. She isn't a unsung hero by choice.

Also, her involvement in several of the more recent incidents is mainly because she sees some way it can benefit her. Off the top of my head, she gets involved in UFO because of her greed and gets involved in Hopeless Masquerade because she wants to boost her own popularity (OK, everyone else is also doing that, but still).

Ah, I see. Yeah, that does seem like something she would do for her own benefit, but at the same time, yeah, she was willing to exert actual effort on fixing something at the shrine. Huh.

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Living away from other people doesn't help.

Ah... not unlike that enlightenment-sorta-thing Koishi was suggested as an example of, then? kinda like... Acting without intent, but not without meaning?

First, I realize I'm irrationally biased against Reimu. Unfortunately, that doesn't stop me from being irrationally biased against Reimu.

Pathetic effort is still effort. They fail through their own myriad other shortcomings than through a mere lack of drive (which I consider to be a more substantial and fundamental shortcoming than mere foolishness(. As for their mentors, I mentioned I feel Yuyuko is 'teaching' more for her own enjoyment than for Youmu's benefit, so its a tossup whether her advice is even helpful. Eirin's a more complicated subject RE: her mentoring, but suffice it to say Udonge has been given some reasons to maybe not have complete, unwavering trust in Eirin.

But I'm getting off topic. Reimu doesn't get slack in large part thanks to Kasen and her failed efforts to make Reimu improve herself. And I think we might seeing slightly different implications in the word 'effort'. Building the Mini-shrine for the egg, I'd say is the minimum consdiering what she was trying to do with it. She puts the (can't remember what it's called with all the paper streamers or whatever) around the tree the 3 fairies live in, then calls it a day. She walks around selling refreshments is hardly any effort at all: she's already there (it being her house), and she probably wants to watch the play anyway... so she grabs some refreshments, paces around, and if anyone buys, good for them. Continuing to work while the fox drains her to death I see more as either a sign of greed or even just more laziness... just like its too much work to chase youkai away, its too much work to chase away people... and heck, they at least bring money...

For some reason, I parsed this as people thinking "Whelp, nothing for it now. Guess the only shrine around's the Hakurei shrine, for now and ever. Woe is we."

I know. It wasn't an example, it was a description of how I see her. I'm aware that's not her normal operating state, yet when I read that bit, my mind goes "That's the Reimu I know."

Reimu's entire job is dealing with these events. It's more of a hobby for Marisa. So my assumption is Marisa was just waiting being like "Geez, When is Reimu going to do her job and fix this? Ah, screw it, I'll go do it myself."

I think Marisa sees her projects through to the end, actually. She's so edgy about immortality because she's really picky about it. Magiciandom, hourai elixir, and Shikaisen all have various baggage associated with them... baggage she simply might not want.

The key word there being needs. She does what she thinks is needed (for her own comfort), and hardly a whit more. ^note Kinda odd that she got a ladder since you know the flight thing, but w/e, characters don't generally fly in the manga, so its excusable as adaptation weirdness. While one might point towards this indicating enlightenment and a lack of desire for things she doesn't need... it seems to me she still has those desires... as a lot of those 'needs' aren't exactly such.

The Moriya shrine is located in a far worse position, yet Akyuu doesn't question Sanae's worth as a shrine maiden (As a human being, maybe, but not as a shrine maiden).

I might argue her involvement in every incident is because it would benefit her. EOSD and PCB are obvious (death/starvation ain't cool), in IN it gets Yukari off her back, SA she wants to keep the hot springs/make them more awesomer. UFO is treasure ship=money, TD I honestly don't remember, and DDC has her stick getting to be a problem. SWR has her trying to get her shrine fixed (something she is... surprisingly passive about. I mean, how many people give her obvious and explicit directions to find the culprit and she just stays at the shrine and moans.) SOPM she breaks up to save her reputation...

Obviously, those are just one set of motivations, but they're the ones that my headcanon of Reimu most align with.

I'd be very interested in knowing just what Reimu was doing while Tenshi was rebuilding the Hakurei shrine. Its clear Reimu wasn't supervising or watching Tenshi work, so... what, was she just chillaxin' at Marisa's or something?

Oh, also for those who didn't catch my earlier writeup or anything, I also hold the creation and immediate abandoment of the 3-fairies' tree as a deity rather harshly against her.

I write some fanfiction. Satori's Tale is done... but I'm not.

Reimu has plenty of drive. Drive to make the shrine popular, drive to improve her reputation with the village, drive to advertise her "heroic deeds" by hosting parties, etc. She knows exactly what she wants and does what she thinks she needs to do to get it. Even if unsuccessfully.

By contrast, Youmu*

has no idea what she wants and no plan to go about finding out. Not that she'd know how anyway. She's content to wander about randomly doing random things like killing ghosts (which is just as bad as killing gods, of course) until she receives a direct order from Yuyuko. In which case it's 50-50 whether she'll disobey or not. She's never once thought about her life or why she does what she does.

edited 21st Nov '13 7:43:33 AM by Clarste

Oh no, main character alert!

Reimu Hakurei:

A shrine maiden whose job is to exterminate youkai. Very aloof.

Hakurei Reimu. Ha, just realized it's repetitive when putting the family name first.

The Balance Maiden:

Reimu Hakurei has been in the youkai exterminating business for a long time now. However, despite the job description, she hasn't really exterminated any youkai of note. She's the type of person who likes to enjoy living a life free of problematic things.

The Hakurei Shrine is mostly visited by youkai. Due to this, it has been labelled the youkai shrine. She doesn't like that. But she doesn't really put much effort into making them leave when they come knocking. It would be bad manners either way. Or maybe deep down, she actually enjoys their company? She's 'cold' and a 'jerk', but she's not one to fervently despise others.

If an incident gets serious enough, she'll take action. But she's usually aimless in getting to the heart of the matter. Good thing she capped the Luck stat. And when it's over, she usually invites the perpetrators to tea and snacks. Whether intentional or not. Maybe she does this to better understand them and warn them not to cause trouble for her... Other times, the things they say might catch her interest.

Animals are drawn to Reimu. She probably has a naturally calming aura to them. So much that they would do anything for Reimu out of their own will^note Well, that only happened with the fish, so maybe I'm blowing things out of proportion. I had even mused at one point over whether all the animal-based youkai secretly admire her.^note Like a fan club or something.

She's one to perform rituals or throw parties if it means getting some money in that donation box. However, her plans will always fail. Even if it's going so well at first. She just hates the word 'effort'. But that won't stop her from doing what she can.

She's an incident resolver, yet most humans know not of her feats. The youkai, however, do. They respect Reimu. Maybe it's the way she conducts herself. Maybe it's because she can kick their butts and can keep up with them. Or maybe it's because she at least gives them a chance when most humans would be outright hostile or feigning kindness just to survive.

So yes, Reimu has her dark, horrible side, but her good qualities shine just as bright. She's just like the very weapons she uses in battle.

Also, she suddenly gained the ability of flight during her deadly bout against Shinki, during the world-destroying chaos that was Shinki's final attack. She got knocked off of Genji, so what else could she have done? Fall to her death? No way we can have that.

edited 21st Nov '13 6:33:17 PM by Diamite

I don't really think much of Reimu's intuition when every other playable character manages to follow the exact same path that she does and end up at the exact same end point. At least in the main shmup games.

Forever liveblogging the Avengers

Perhaps I'm more lenient towards Youmu because I see her as a kid (Who is a terrible victim of awful parenting), while I see Reimu as an adult. (Again, this probably isn't fair, especially for early-games Reimu, who... is still a kid.)

Reimu maybe has drive enough to give everything a shot. And if it doesn't pan out immediately, she abandons it. But she's not willing to stick with anything that doesn't have immediate payout. I guess maybe the training in SSIB, but I continue to believe she was heavily coerced into that. In a sort of 'or else' kinda way, in which case the immediate payout is not being subjected to 'or else'.

I guess that'd be why she doesn't train on her own. Training takes time to see improvement, especially when you're near the top already to begin with. And I don't think Reimu's the sort to keep training if she's not feeling like its helping... whether or not it actually is.

When they don't simply invite themselves over (which is often), she might be going by the whole 'keep your friends close and your enemies closer' idea. They can't cause trouble while they're drinking tea in her presence, after all.

I think the Youkai admiration for Reimu comes from her power, mostly.

Easily corrupted and usually immobile? ^note *slap* Ow! Hey!

I also don't think she has particular affinity for animals. I think the whole fish jumping out think is a complete fluke, basically. Although the idea of a fan club (Amongst Youkai/animals) for her amuses me.

And she arrives there substantially later in SWR. Also, her intuition kinda fails her in SOPM, else she'd have, I dunno, maybe have suspected that the articles she threw down to prove her point kinda... did the opposite. Or maybe she just didn't care and it was all for show and she knew her mere presence would suffice to break it up.

I write some fanfiction. Satori's Tale is done... but I'm not.

Shots fired.

So she's fully on autopilot when she's resolving incidents, a la Taoist thought? Or just half-assing things but somehow winning in the end, a la Hakurei cheatery?

Ouch! Well, the theory about the Vampire Incident could work, but there might be a simpler explanation for Reimu's Reimu-ness - look at her childhood. We know Marisa has at least one living parent (and a dubiously-canon former mentor figure) but just look how she turned out.

Reimu had a turtle.

We may have to differentiate "intuition" from things like reasoning or pattern recognition. And this may be related to that wu wei stuff, where Reimu's ability to go where she needs to be isn't connected to any mental process.

This is interesting, that Reimu doesn't train so much as meet the requirements of her vocation, which just so happens to allow her to excel at it. It's almost getting suspicious, isn't it? Like she's merely the pawn of some higher power, who built a whole setting for her to inhabit and dominate?

It's not just a matter of location; Sanae has roommates, Reimu occasionally has visitors.

I guess this could be like that moment where the superhero realizes he has more in common with his similarly-costumed enemies than the ingrates he keeps rescuing, but I don't think Reimu's that introspective. She'd probably get along just as well with humans if more of them visited, but they're too lazy and frightful.

I'd say it's that lack of malice, or maybe it could be a shrine maiden thing. Or they recognize her as the most important person in Gensokyo.

Certainly one of those "she'll put forth an effort when it's absolutely necessary" situations. Or, she's been flying ever since PoDD but Genji kept the truth from her as his revenge.

Those losers had to try and think and stuff.

edited 21st Nov '13 10:14:39 PM by Tacitus

Current earworm: "Awe of the Unknown"

Which profile explicitly states she doesn't upkeep her shrine? I know her profile mentions she doesn't do shrine maiden stuff. The latter makes sense as she tends to follow Taoistic beliefs over Shinto beliefs.

More than what can be said about most people. Most people will call a repairman for things like this.

There are also mundane examples of this. Going on strike and boycotting is action with inaction.

Not at all. The minimum is just putting an egg up and asserting there is a shrine housing it. Most people will not even exert the minimum required effort.

Really? so restaurant-like jobs require no effort at all? Have you worked in a restaurant before? I mean all you do there is walk around taking orders and giving it to the customer.

Or do you do house cleaning? It isn't as easy as it looks. Yet, these are things that Reimu does.

That is also Marisa's job. Marisa has taken it upon herself to do that as a job. Did you notice that the reason why they did not set out because they don't know the cause? They needed something to hint that it is not just a natural occurrence, like that special cherry blossom.

Akyuu questions Reimu's worth as a shrine maiden? Could you post the link to this article? Perfect Momento in Strict Sense seems to put Reimu in good regard when it comes to youkai extermination and incident resolution. Akyuu even calls the others hacks/fakes when it comes to this stuff.

You can do this argument for anyone. You can always find a benefit from resolving an incident. Reimu did not resolve UFO, it would be Marisa. That event is a non-incident. Reimu does not try to resolve SWR, as it is an act of god, she does nothing about it. She never does anything about natural events. You see this several times in the 3 fairies' manga.

Not quite sure where you got this idea. Double Dealing Character pretty tells you that isn't so. Unlike the other 2 characters, Reimu's personality does not change much when using her weapon.

@Reimu training:

She does her routine daily and consistently. We know nothing about how the others train. Whether it is in bursts or not. As you know in real life, altering your lifestyle is necessary for dieting or keeping yourself fit. Just going on dieting binges do not help.

@Vampire Incident and Spell Card rules:

I would like to go on this topic, but maybe tomorrow or the day after.

Everything is relative.

Being a Taoist in all but name doesn't excuse Reimu for being a poor shrine maiden. She isn't consciously a Taoist, it just so happens that the Shinto arts that the Hakurei shrine maidens practice picked up a awful lot of Taoist trappings.

Akyuu mocks Reimu every time she comes up except in Reimu's article. Whenever Reimu is mentioned as having done something in someone else's article, Akyuu adds a footnote expressing her disbelief.

Also, Reimu's personally not changing with the corrupted weapon reflects pretty badly on her. It implies that she was already corrupted and violent.

(I couldn't refind where it says she doesn't take care of the shrine, but her profiles state multiple times that she basically sits on her ass and does nothing all day. So it's implied)

edited 22nd Nov '13 6:08:07 AM by Otherarrow

Don't PM me. We don't like being PMed.

Wait, so changing personality more means she's worse than the other Player Characters... and changing personality less also means she's worse than the other Player Characters?