Briefly: RAM 1 & 2
Jan. 8th, 2008 10:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
narcasseSince I’ve already indulged in my diatribe about the poor quality of the English language Trinity Blood novels it seems like it might actually be time to focus on the story itself instead because somehow it’s sparked some rather unexpected reactions.
Now it may be a product of the fact that I’ve analysed and overanalysed the more prominent characters to death and back already or the fact that the anime was seemingly rather unfair to certain characters but as far as RAM goes so far two characters that stand out as being relatively endearing are actually Hugue and Leon. The anime doesn’t exactly give either of them much background and the manga likewise hasn’t been too helpful in that respect but the novels have actually be fairly good in fleshing them out as definite personalities. In the case of the anime the fact that it was a hybrid of RAM and ROM with the RAM pieces seemingly being incidental to the plot really didn’t help matters because what that appeared to do was make Hugue a rather bland lone samurai setup and make Leon relatively annoying. Yet in the novels as far as I could see Hugue really does have a wonderfully tragic anti-hero backstory and Leon is genuinely funny.
When it came to RAM 2 I actually stopped reading Silent Noise after a few pages and skipped to the Sling Blade sidestory instead. And I’d actually like to find out more about Hugue’s entire situation. I’d also like to find out more about Leon’s background. Sadly, novel version Noelle didn’t really strike me as someone I was too bothered about but having managed to get past my “Why won’t he bloody shut up” reactions to Isaak; I suspect that I am moderately pleased to discover that he appears to be just plain loony. He seems to take great pride in speaking in what he believes to be an overtly clever manner and being generally pleased with himself and it’s hilarious. It also seems to be more of an opium dream effect rather than a pedestrian sort of self-importance too which is nice. Which is something I noted in Caterina during her encounter in From the Empire but then it suddenly struck me as odd that she’d come across as so self-indulgent in that one encounter only for that attitude not to surface elsewhere. When she’s talking to Kate she’s analytical and relatively calm, when she’s with Abel she’s teasing, when she’s with Alessandro she’s nurturing and protective etc which would be understandable if there seemed to be underlying core characteristics over which were layered subtle changes in interaction dependent on who she was with but there really don’t seem to be. And there really is the answer to the riddle of Caterina; she changes dependent on who she’s with, not just on the surface but integrally which may well be a product of her constant attempts to judge a situation and affect a suitable response to it. Except in her case she’s gone to the extreme of actually changing who she is dependent on who she’s with, something which in the manga Ion seemed to suffer quite badly from. All of which leads to my thinking that Caterina just got a whole lot more interesting and makes her entire Eisen Dame persona, which is constantly reinforced in the narration; really quite the touch of black humour. It’s actually something I should have noticed sooner considering that it’s a literary device that I’m not unfamiliar with.
Aside from sparking an interest in characters who shouldn’t die any time soon, RAM also made Endre Cuza far more endearing that he’d been in the anime and I was actually disappointed when Memlinc died. Endre made a lovely one-shot villain, though I’d been hoping that Memlinc would have a greater longevity but since there’s seemingly another power working in the shadows there I can only hope that whoever that turns out to be will be just as entertaining. I’m also curious as to whether or not the tattoo in the palm of said shadowy figure’s hand is actually at all similar to the one that’s shown on the back of a hand (which may or may not belong to Radu) on the title page of Act 23. Because if it is then there’s the distinct possibility that the extremists have their own symbol too which would be rather charming.
And seeing as I never did manage the analysis of this image that I’d been meaning to do a while ago since it occurred to me the other day that there really wasn’t too much to analyse anyway once I’d settled on the larger flowers being chrysanthemums; fic seemed like the better option. I may not have the relevant novels yet but I’m certainly hoping that novel version Ion will be as sane and sensible as I’ve heard he is after all.
Now it may be a product of the fact that I’ve analysed and overanalysed the more prominent characters to death and back already or the fact that the anime was seemingly rather unfair to certain characters but as far as RAM goes so far two characters that stand out as being relatively endearing are actually Hugue and Leon. The anime doesn’t exactly give either of them much background and the manga likewise hasn’t been too helpful in that respect but the novels have actually be fairly good in fleshing them out as definite personalities. In the case of the anime the fact that it was a hybrid of RAM and ROM with the RAM pieces seemingly being incidental to the plot really didn’t help matters because what that appeared to do was make Hugue a rather bland lone samurai setup and make Leon relatively annoying. Yet in the novels as far as I could see Hugue really does have a wonderfully tragic anti-hero backstory and Leon is genuinely funny.
When it came to RAM 2 I actually stopped reading Silent Noise after a few pages and skipped to the Sling Blade sidestory instead. And I’d actually like to find out more about Hugue’s entire situation. I’d also like to find out more about Leon’s background. Sadly, novel version Noelle didn’t really strike me as someone I was too bothered about but having managed to get past my “Why won’t he bloody shut up” reactions to Isaak; I suspect that I am moderately pleased to discover that he appears to be just plain loony. He seems to take great pride in speaking in what he believes to be an overtly clever manner and being generally pleased with himself and it’s hilarious. It also seems to be more of an opium dream effect rather than a pedestrian sort of self-importance too which is nice. Which is something I noted in Caterina during her encounter in From the Empire but then it suddenly struck me as odd that she’d come across as so self-indulgent in that one encounter only for that attitude not to surface elsewhere. When she’s talking to Kate she’s analytical and relatively calm, when she’s with Abel she’s teasing, when she’s with Alessandro she’s nurturing and protective etc which would be understandable if there seemed to be underlying core characteristics over which were layered subtle changes in interaction dependent on who she was with but there really don’t seem to be. And there really is the answer to the riddle of Caterina; she changes dependent on who she’s with, not just on the surface but integrally which may well be a product of her constant attempts to judge a situation and affect a suitable response to it. Except in her case she’s gone to the extreme of actually changing who she is dependent on who she’s with, something which in the manga Ion seemed to suffer quite badly from. All of which leads to my thinking that Caterina just got a whole lot more interesting and makes her entire Eisen Dame persona, which is constantly reinforced in the narration; really quite the touch of black humour. It’s actually something I should have noticed sooner considering that it’s a literary device that I’m not unfamiliar with.
Aside from sparking an interest in characters who shouldn’t die any time soon, RAM also made Endre Cuza far more endearing that he’d been in the anime and I was actually disappointed when Memlinc died. Endre made a lovely one-shot villain, though I’d been hoping that Memlinc would have a greater longevity but since there’s seemingly another power working in the shadows there I can only hope that whoever that turns out to be will be just as entertaining. I’m also curious as to whether or not the tattoo in the palm of said shadowy figure’s hand is actually at all similar to the one that’s shown on the back of a hand (which may or may not belong to Radu) on the title page of Act 23. Because if it is then there’s the distinct possibility that the extremists have their own symbol too which would be rather charming.
And seeing as I never did manage the analysis of this image that I’d been meaning to do a while ago since it occurred to me the other day that there really wasn’t too much to analyse anyway once I’d settled on the larger flowers being chrysanthemums; fic seemed like the better option. I may not have the relevant novels yet but I’m certainly hoping that novel version Ion will be as sane and sensible as I’ve heard he is after all.
