nenekobasu

[nenekobasu]

it's tough for me because i'm done with volume 5 and i really like kuon, but i know he doesn't make it which means somewhere along the line his story disappeared and that's how it must have been for many where blue lock wrote characters who care and dream and hope and dropped them from the main story quietly where no one could see them die, and according to blue lock's worldview such characters were dropped because they couldn't prove themselves worthwhile. anyway i think that blue lock is the type of manga that knows love exists, that has its characters love things, that knows how to imitate love or pretend to love, that even understands love to some degree but at its core it doesn't feel love. it may be part of blue lock's charm that it doesn't truly love anyone

#kaiserposting

[nenekobasu]

blue lock characters can be ranked by how much they value love?

some characters seem unaware that love even exists... isagi is such a character, but arguably he's like that because he grew up with unconditional love, whereas hiori who was never given love is intimately attuned to it. or maybe isagi is the way he is because blue lock as a manga doesn't feel love, like it knows how to imitate love and understands that love exists but it doesn't feel love towards anyone. blue lock values love without loving anything so its protagonist cares deeply without loving anyone

#kaiserposting

[nenekobasu]

#mononoke

[nenekobasu]

Chilly swim❄️

#pokemon

[nenekobasu]

stageplay kappas

#sarazanmai

[nenekobasu]

Mistakes were made, that you can never take back

#hikaru no go

[nenekobasu]

kiki’s delivery service (1989)

#kiki's delivery service

[nenekobasu]

Nodame Cantabile New Edition 13

#nodame cantabile

[nenekobasu]

Barret Wallace studies because I love him, and there is not nearly enough fanart of him.

I will fix that for you, king. 😮‍💨💖💖

#ff7

[nenekobasu]

#cowboy bebop

[nenekobasu]

manshine isagi was so goddamn cool it felt like he was invincible. nothing phased him nothing could stop him for long he was in control of nearly everything when he got in the zone and what made it even cooler is that he did it off a respect for everything on pitch recognizing them as their own protagonists while coldly manipulating them still, he was such a cool guy and this is the isagi that blue lock boxed up and stored in the attic. of course an isagi who plays as the ultimate midfielder-defender isn't an isagi who can become the best striker but blue lock because it's blue lock made the midfielder-defender isagi the coolest most Peak isagi in the world, unimaginable evil on the part of kaneshiro and co. but to get back on track manshine isagi wasn't just a guy that was cool at the moment of the shot he was cool because he was present and in command throughout the entire process. two-gun isagi wishes he could be half as cool as isagi was in manshine, i miss the cool isagi when will the cool isagi come back from the war

#kaiserposting

[nenekobasu]

isagi in ch.184-5 was cooler than isagi two-gun. i'd fight isagi himself on this in fact i'd be willing to throw fists with him if he tried to disagree

#what is he gonna do to me? he's fictional #kaiserposting

[nenekobasu]

in every way at every point the result is the same: if only manshine didn't exist, i'd feel so much better about [gestures towards everything else]. if only isagi hadn't peaked and been so cool that one time we wouldn't be having these problems, it's crazy okay out of every nel match manshine (manshine!) is the outlier the option on the multiple choice question that doesn't belong.

it took lining his goals up for it to really hit me, all this time i thought of his last ubers goal as the aberration but all along manshine was the true blight upon isagi's overall progression. that manshine goal is the isagi W blue lock singles out to wipe away and render narratively irrelevant, that's so fucked up i won't be over this for a while

#noa helped him! egojin cheered for him! it's fucked up okay this manga is so mean in the quietest ways #kaiserposting

[nenekobasu]

cross flow (barcha)—>heart of sword (manshine)—>dreamers (ubers)—>two-gun (pxg)

isagi's nel progression over all 4 games, throwing away his goal—>abandoning his goal but being its center—>abandoning the center for his goal—>scoring his goal. as a sidenote all of these are anti-kaiser goals so add them together and isagi has defeated kaiser a total of four times

the first three isagi goals emphasize his partnerships (kunigami to yukki to hiori) while two-gun contains elements of these past partnerships in isagi's use of kunigami-hiori: once again isagi uses a kunigami no one else knows, and once again isagi shares vision with hiori. in this sense too isagi's pxg goal is a culminating moment for his nel arc journey

(the tragic outlier of this progression is isagi-yukki goal. in manshine, "protagonism" is isagi's "master piece" (that's the furigana) while in barcha and ubers isagi thinks of kunigami and hiori as his "last piece" of the match— for all that isagi manipulates yukki he's never once thought of yukki as a puzzle piece, and isagi is made of puzzle pieces. isagi incorporates kunigami and hiori into himself, but his goal with yukki came from a mutual respect of each other as individuals and protagonists. just as egojin omitted manshine when tracing isagi's development, here too isagi's manshine goal can be scrubbed from his journey)

#kaiserposting

[nenekobasu]

blue lock puts teenagers in cages and forces them to fight so in part it's about growing up and what it means to either be a child or adult. barcha showed how bachira evolved from a free-spirited child to a relatively disciplined adult which is unquestionably framed as a sign of bachira's progress as a player, and his evolution connects him deeper to his mentor lavi who bachira used as a springboard to find himself, bachira thematically is an adult and this is a good thing that makes bachira cool

ubers because it's reverse barcha presents another set of definitions for child and adult, the match constructed around the mick-snuffy story the message of which is that becoming an adult is the predictable 'safe' option while remaining a child is the risky but admirable choice. barou and isagi though in contrasting ways follow in mick's footsteps, barou by choosing to stay a brat and isagi-hiori by choosing to ride on a dream (ch.238: DREAMERS), both scoring goals that were gambles, in this match it was refusing to become an adult that was portrayed as cool and winning. isagi too became disconnected from his mentor noa when they turned their backs on each other in contrast to bachira-lavi

it's such a weird situation, not only is bachira an adult and isagi a child but between them the definitions of child and adult aren't shared so they just aren't connected. they've grown to inhabit separate thematic spheres. this is what happens when they're separated, this is why they shouldn't be separated

#kaiserposting

[nenekobasu]

having finally read volume 5 it feels as though isagi in ubers was looking for a bachira replacement, a partner who believes in what he sees and feels what he feels and understands what he wants. maybe he just misses bachira. maybe isagi and bachira should never be separated again for the rest of their living days

#kaiserposting

[nenekobasu]

noa doesn't retire from pro football he just goes to saudi

#kaiserposting