manhwa: 13th Boy +Fringe

[meganbmoore]

As of yesterday, I am current-ish (through vol 5-there may be more now) with the manhwa 13th Boy.  All I have to say (aside from "Yay!  Girl-bonding!  Weird girl-bonding, but who's complaining?") is that this has every standard shoujo RomCom trope ever (with a bonus talking cactus named Beatrice that turns into a bishounen during the full moon) and

Comments

[lady_ganesh]

One of the things I really liked about S2 was that Walter seemed to have damaged the Otherverse, and many of the Otherverse folks are interesting and sympathetic. (I am only a few episodes into S3.)

[meganbmoore]

This is true, but Walter is still presented as the one we're meant to root for (and sympathize with more) and the Otherworld folks are very clearly the antagonists who we should want stopped even though, once you remove "My world and my heroes!" perceptions and break everything down to the base elements and events, the reverse makes more sense.

[raffaella]

I don't want to spoil you, but it gets more complex than that, don't worry. I'll add something, though: Walter trip damaged the otherverse and his culpability is acknowledged, but Walternate kept sending agents and shapeshifters on the other side for years (for understandable reasons, and that's acknowledged too) and every time he's done this, it has further deteriorated his world. He knows that. It doesn't let Walter off the hook, but I don't think there are any clear bad guys here and I think the show is clear on that. But you need to watch season 3 first.

Have you watched the season 2 finale already?

[meganbmoore]

Yup. The season 2 finale was where I realized why I was getting so uncomfortable. (I actually find myself preferring Walternate to Walter. More honesty to the narrative there, IMO. With Walter, we have a much more tolerable version of The Vampire Diaries POV of Damon, where the character's Pain is meant to be more important to us than the harm the character causes. Save that Fringe is at least willing to acknowledge the things Walter has done and Walter, though technically causing more damage in the long run, is less deliberate and malicious about it. Walter is a borderline sociopath with an obsession and no real desire to cause harm. Damon is a sadistic murderer and rapist who craves power and control who just happens to be a sociopath to boot.)

[raffaella]

I understand what you mean, but I was thinking of the scene where Walter and William Bell are driving towards Boston, and Walter sees everything destroyed and blighted around him, asks if he's the one who did this, and William Bell simply answers: "yes". No qualifiers, no excuses, no "you didn't know what you were doing".

And it gets even clearer in season 3, where you get to see the alternate universe people dealing with all the shit that affects them and that they aren't responsible for. Even Walternate becomes more nuanced. Walter himself continues having to face further consequences to what he did, and even has to acknowledge that it was convenient for him to see Walternate as the bad guy, because it sort of justified kidnapping his son a posterioriSo it doesn't make me uncomfortable the way TVD makes me uncomfortable, because I actually don't think that the narrative is trying to make me feel that Walter's pain is more important than the thousands, possibly millions of lives he's wrecked. Of course, he's one of the main

[animeshon]

I totally agree with your comment about the alternate realities being like colonialism. There's an interesting conversation with one of the Olivia's about whether the actions of the alternate world are fair or not that I kinda liked. I hope they explore it more but I'm making myself wait until I can buy the whole of Season 3 on DVD.

[woodburner]

I think the show gets pretty explicit about the fact that the "good guys" and the "bad guys" really are all a matter of perspective. The narrative expects you to like pretty much everyone on the other side (except Walternate, and even then you're supposed to find him understandable).

You've got a point about the colonialist aspect though; I hadn't really thought about it.

[meganbmoore]

That really is the thing about modern colonialist fiction, though? It shows both sides, yet you are very clearly meant to side with the colonialists and root for the main colonialist representative, and then a major Other in power is shown to be more corrupt/fallible than the underlings to give the perspective validity.

[woodburner]

Well idk; I mean, what the otherverse folks want to do is something that's pretty clearly DNW all around. I think if the situation were in reverse and the altverse team were the heroes, the narrative would expect us to want the heroes to recognize that this was a really bad solution (unless the narrative was written by L Ron Hubbard or something). I don't think we're supposed to be rooting for either side to win so much as we're supposed to root for neither side to die. Although the set up is maybe problematic in that our "side" is clearly and definitively at fault and yet is still "right" (being that none of our heroes particularly want to destroy anyone). Maybe if it was from the other perspective, it wouldn't be a problem. Idk, I'm not very good at thinking about these things.

For the record though, I think that (so far, at least) we are supposed to find Walter equally morally reprehensible as Walternate, even though we're supposed to find Walter likable - all of his rationalizations are supposed to be seen as, well,

[nutmeg3]

I do like Walter, but I don't think he's entirely admirable, if that makes sense. He's very damaged, and I think that provides my path toward "getting" him. Interestingly, the current season has provided a much more nuanced picture of the alternate universe, on the characters' parts as well as for the viewers. I think things are paralleling the way people (often, anyway) have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo and protecting what they know, and then minds and hearts begin to open. It's very interesting to watch the changes.

[lady_ganesh]

One of the things I thought was really interesting, esp. in S2, was the way they showed broken, damaged Walter is more sympathetic and in some ways a better person than not-ill Walter is.

[nutmeg3]

ITA. Walternate is very cold, and though I understand why he's as driven as he is, his singlemindedness and the damage that he's causing are only compounding the mess left by Walter's original actions.