The Touhou Character Alternate Interpretation Compendium

It's not Shinki's name that's the problem. It's what she is associated with that's the problem.

In other news, this is a vunderbar page-topper.

edited 16th Nov '10 7:36:57 PM by XionGaTaosenai

I make video games! Or plan to, anyway.

RE Hisoutensoku as a Kappa Giant Robot: Alice could also take the opportunity to make a proper Goliath doll.

EDIT: And this one would have been even better.

edited 16th Nov '10 7:38:41 PM by Durazno

She made a proper Goliath Doll. She just needs to fix that "exploding after a minute or so of use" problem.

It would be the ultimate showdown, of ultimate destiny.

Forever liveblogging the Avengers

...The Hisotensoku wasn't a Humongous Mecha?

I thought that was the entire point of the game.

edited 16th Nov '10 8:42:02 PM by Chagen46

"Who wants to hear about good stuff when the bottom of the abyss of human failure that you know doesn't exist is so much greater?"-Wraith

Since this is gonna have a big ol' picdump, I'll limit it to one character.

Shinki's one of those non-villains - she isn't directly responsible for the demonic incursion into Gensokyo, she offers the heroine a chance to turn back, tries to talk her maid out of attacking them, and only fights after the protagonist lays a beatdown on her favorite servant. She's cool, refined, charismatic, and utterly the master of her domain. I guess she's a lot like Kanako was at the height of her power, and what Remilia wishes she could be.

But then there's that whole "side ahoge" thing. Now I haven't played the old Touhou games (or any of them for that matter), but I hear the fight with Shinki is notable because at one point the background pans down to reveal that the attacks the creator of Pandaemonium has unleashed on you have absolutely demolished her domain. So while it's unfair to earn a reputation for stupidity with one bad decision, accidentallying your home... I mean, Cirno only made a spellcard with a blind spot WAIT A MINUTE. Six wings, baka tendencies, and the heart of Makai is a frozen abyss, but a side-ponytail... Shinki is Cirno and Daiyousei's lesbian progeny sent back in time.

I like the mama-Shinki idea for the same reasons I like Mima-mama. I reconcile the fluctuating canon by imagining Shinki adopting and raising a young Alice into the magician-turned-youkai she is today, thereby "creating" her. Similarly, Byakuren learning an attack from Shinki is quite appealing, and would be a perfect prelude to the Lady of Makai's reappearance. Imagine her pique after learning the same bunch of heroines have invaded her realm again.

Shinki has a good deal of good fanart, and I'm struck by how many artists portray her as a gentle, smiling goddess, or with a quiet melancholy.

• serene
• gentle smile
• sparkly
• those eyes
• I bet her wings come out of nowhere like a tear in the sky
• blush
• in her hands
• soft
• monochrome
• the boots are kind of jarring, though
• costume change
• hey again, Mima
• is that what the sky is like in Makai?
• dark is not evil
• is this how Koakuma was recruited?
• seen this one all over YouTube
• nice wings
• Mazeran is awesome
• actually looking threatening
• this is how you accidentally all of Makai
• the claw
• circles
• Devil's Recitation
• look behind
• those two again
• she's in the background and still manages to steal the scene
• a lesson in magic
• I like this style
• probably an early attempt at dollmaking, given the angry face
• flower
• d'awwwww...
• the cuddles continue
• family outing
• I like the idea of her covertly popping in to check on Alice
• reunion

Current earworm: "Mother - Outro"

And I think that's the first time I've seen you posting around here. Welcome! And since you're pretty much the only female Touhou fan I'm aware of, double welcome!

Wait, I suck. You've posted plenty of times before! ... Well, you're still welcome either way.

Hmm, I guess in the game it was supposed to show another one of those "morality beyond our understanding" type things where a character seems nice, but then turns out not to have a particular regard for human/non-human life.

Alternately (and perhaps more interestingly or just more comfortably), here's two possibilities. It could be that she doesn't think much of destroying parts of her realm because she created all of it – and it's entirely within the realm of her abilities to undo any damage it might have taken. An extension of this idea is that not only did Shinki create, and can rebuild all of its contents, including living beings, but all of Makai is her. Those buildings that caught on fire? Nothing more dramatic than a risky bodycheck that harmed herself a bit in the process. Simple scrapes on her body that will recover easily, all organisms that might have been undone in the process brought back to what they were before.

By the way, that picture that shows her destroying stuff, I think it has her apologizing for it.

This is, of course, awesome.

I was going to point out that "quiet melancholy" is a staple of mysterious pretty ladies in anime art, but then I realized that this is Touhou, where you're just as likely to find people who like portraying the characters as ruthless forces of nature for the lulz. And those pictures did indicate a higher level of serene melancholy than the standard.

As for her being Alice's mother, I'm always happy to see more families in Touhou, but this particular mother-daughter pairing seems a little too complex to integrate into my understanding of the setting. Then again, I've never really thought much about who or what Alice used to be (and for that matter, I don't really think too much about Alice, period), so maybe it'll still enter my headcanon through a backdoor somewhere.

Now Elly.

I really like her design. Like, quite a bit. Maybe it's mostly that picture on the character sheet, I haven't really researched further than that. But yeah, that is a snazzy combination of stuff.

Now that Yuuka is more of a strange force of nature living in a field of sunflowers, a gatekeeper seems pretty unnecessary. However, the new flower theme raises another opportunity. Scythes might be associated more with grim reapers these days than anything, but that doesn't change the fact that the "weapon" used to be a simple gardening tool. Elly's outfit isn't far off from a Southern belle of some sort, either. Maybe she's a gardener or a farmer... or something else. Hmm.

Rika, she's pretty cool. I like the mental image of her as some sort of reverse Tarzan, a lone human living among the highly advanced nega-savages of the Kappa settlement for the sake of living amongst likeminded people. Adapting to their strange customs, she has taken on swimming as a hobby, shies away from human contact, and is always very careful when bowing so as to not spill the contents of her headoh wait.

Genji is a talking flying turtle with a goatie and that's all I need to say on that matter.

edited 17th Nov '10 2:56:30 AM by Fawriel

Nope!

Sanae was completely convinced that it was, but it turned out to just be an advertising balloon for the Kappas' little technological bazaar, moved around by steam from the Nuclear Reactor. Imagine an enormous Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm-Flailing Tube Man... that looks like a giant robot.

Really, the main "theme" of the stories in Hisoutensoku was various people seeing it and mistaking it for something else. Cirno thought it was a Daibandaroci (SP?), then she thought it was Alice's Goliath Doll, (and then Alice thought that her account of the Goliath Doll was talking about some threat for said doll to fight). Meiling thought it was TAISUI XINGJUN.

I have a message from another time...

"Behold my true form, and despair!"

(that's what it reminded me of, anyway)

The theme of Hisoutensoku is everyone making a big deal out of nothing. It's basically a Macy's Day parade balloon.

Basically the Kappa were having fun making a steampunk robot the size of a building, and everyone got excited for the wrong reasons.

As fir Shinki accidentally her home with mass pre-nonlethal danmaku, maybe that's why she hasn't shown up in the Windows Era yet, she's too busy nursing her daughters back to health after nuking them all, and she also has to rebuild the whole place. Maybe Mima's sticking around to help her with the reconstruction.

The three finest things in life are to splat your enemies, drive them from their turf, and hear their lamentations as their rank falls!

Makai seemed alright in UFO. Or maybe it was because that rural village was too far away from the battle with Shinki to get accidentally.

I have a message from another time...

Or perhaps her accidental barrage damaged the seals enough that by UFO, some of Byakuren's Angels could escape and begin the process of fully unsealing their mentor and Big Sister.

edit: From now on, I think I'll refer to the Girls who form Byakuren's Flock as her Angels.

edited 17th Nov '10 9:35:05 AM by AceOfScarabs

The three finest things in life are to splat your enemies, drive them from their turf, and hear their lamentations as their rank falls!

The Myouren Temple Posse was sealed in Hell. Utsuho's geyser was what released them.

edit: And I'll keep calling them the Myouren Temple Posse.

edited 17th Nov '10 9:35:38 AM by Enlong

I have a message from another time...

The Big PC-98 Showdown!! Round 2
Highly Responsive to Prayers
In a subseries that is already the oddball of a now much larger series, Highly Responsive to Prayers, the very first Touhou game, is the oddballest of them all – in spite of its highly awesome name. The reason is its gameplay, which is more reminiscent of Arkanoid than it is of the Touhou games we are used to now.

The game is also very light on the plot side, featuring only a prologue introducing Reimu and her shrine, which was built near the entrances to both Makai and Jigoku. In other words, hellmouths. When the shrine is destroyed one day, Reimu decides to lay the smackdown on some demons. Ping-pong those bastards to death, Reimu! You can do it!
Shingyoku

Appearance/voice:

Theme:
The Positive and Negative

Write-up:
Shingyoku, the very first boss in a Touhou game ever!

Taking the form of a yin-yang orb, then a female and then a male priest, it is the gatekeeper of the Hakurei Shrine, or perhaps rather of the hellmouths? The prologue tells of powerful priests and shamans who have in the past created a powerful seal to close them off – a seal that has now weakened in power.

Perhaps Shingyoku's purpose in blocking Reimu's path is to test her strength... as the remaining spirit of the many people who sacrificed their lives to create the seal.

---

Yuugen Magan

Appearance/voice:

Theme:
Highly Responsive to Prayers (also the credits theme), Angel's Legend (shared with Mima)

Write-up:
YuugenMagan is a thing Reimu meets in Makai. Five independently floating eyes connected by electricity. Where the electricity meets, the vague shape of a person in a kimono can be made out...

Who is it? What is it? Nobody knows. Although, Yukari's Demon's Eye "Laplace's Demon" spell card might hold an answer...

---

Elis

Appearance/voice:

Themes:
Oriental Magician, Magic Mirror (shared with Kikuri)

Write-up:
Elis, the "Innocent Devil" living in Makai. As with almost all other characters of this game, next to nothing is known about her.

Is she a vampire? She can turn into a bat, at least. Is she a demon, or a witch? An assortment of strange coincidences surrounds her. Or are these coincidences at all? For one thing, she is the first character to use the magic circles that are now a staple for many characters. The music of the stages preceding hers is called "Oriental Magician"... a title often given to Marisa. And "Magic Mirror" is remarkably similar to "Maiden's Cappricio"...

---

Sariel

Appearance/voice:

Themes:
The Legend of KAGE, Now, Until the Moment You Die, Death Will Take You With Me/Civilization of Magic

Write-up:
Saying anything for certain about Sariel is going to be hard. Even the picture to the right is going to be more than speculative, as the sprite is rather ambiguous about gender and might as well be male, like his religious namesake. As this is Touhou, however, let's refer to her as a girl anyway.

The angel of death. She is the final boss encountered in Makai. During the battle, the background changes numerous times: from a starry night, to a river with two floating yin-yang orbs, to what appears to be an inferno with human arms reaching out of the ground, and a collection of orbs showing Reimu and her shrine at another point in time. After the battle, she falls... but is revived by the yin-yang orb in the good ending and returns as a small fairy.

The real question is, of course: What is the significance behind her name? Is she an archangel, like Sariel in Judaic and Islamic traditions? Or an angel of death, as in some Judaic-Christian texts? In The Revelation to John, Sariel is the angel of the church of Sardis, and has an immense knowledge of magic, magic rituals, and magic powers that give him the ability to lead others astray. The new name of her second battle theme seems to agree with this interpretation...

---

Kikuri

Appearance/voice:

Themes:
Blade of Banishment, Magic Mirror (shared with Elis)

Write-up:
Kikuri is a bronze plate with the image of a woman on it.

Nice.

She's the second boss encountered in the Jigoku route of the game. She's apparently a reference to Kikurihime, who mediated the dispute between the two Shinto creator Gods Izanagi and Izanami. Other than that, nothing is known about her. Or it.

---

Konngara

Appearance/voice:

Themes:
Swordsman of a Distant Star

Write-up:
The final boss of the Jigoku route. Who or what is it? Male or female? An oni, a dead person, a yaksha?

In true oni fashion, she(?) fights Reimu while holding a sake plate. Some think that the horn indicates that she's indeed an oni... On the other hand, the blood dripping from it in the original sprite indicates something entirely more gruesome... that her head was impaled on this spike.

At least one text refers to Konngara as a yaksha, which are quasi-deities of a generally tutelary and benevolent character, but can also be a lot more malevolent... Which would at least explain what Konngara is doing in hell.

But what is an "Astral Knight" anyway?

---

This took entirely too long. While there's not much to say about these old characters, the fact is that I don't know anything about these first games and have to try to make the best of my sources while trying to understand things myself... and even when there's nothing concrete to say, I still try to make a character sound interesting. And the music is not easy to find, either.

edited 17th Nov '10 10:06:13 AM by Fawriel

Shingyoku is the spirits of Reimu's mother and father and Konngara is one of the four Devas of the mountain.

edited 17th Nov '10 10:08:46 AM by Zudak

So does that make them... Hell's Angels?

... I actually kinda like this idea.

edited 17th Nov '10 10:10:10 AM by Fawriel

I've seen some people theorize that Konngara is an oni, what with the horn. Kind of unlikely though, as the other three were all named for specific oni in folklore.

Oh, and I'm gonna crib Tacitus' style here and say that Elis is Flandre and Marisa's lesbian progeny sent back in time.

^^Cool, I just now came up with it.

edited 17th Nov '10 10:11:06 AM by Zudak

YEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!

edited 17th Nov '10 10:11:32 AM by Enlong

I have a message from another time...

Hmm... Sariel is Future Badass Cirno sent back in time Terminator-style.

Who knows, maybe Yuugen Magan was Reimu's first encounter with the Yakumos without her being aware of it. The purple eye-things hint towards Yukari, but she doesn't usually dress in a kimono. (Ran?)

The flying loli component of it seems to be made of energy, so it could just be a magical construct of some kind created by Yukari.

Astrally projected body?

Or something like that, yeah.