The Twelve Kingdoms Forum

My friends complain about Juuni Kokki lacking in long, worn-out duel scenes. I find those scenes flashy and unnecessary, but I would enjoy some more. What about you?

...A long duel between Youko and Shokou? Yes.

You mean like Dragonball Z, where, reportedly, a five-minute fight can last ten episodes? I don't see how the series would benefit.

Except for the occasional battle or rampaging Youma, the threats in the series are political; Youko has to deal with corrupt officials, tax law, irrigation projects and the like. Violent solutions to these kinds of problems - well Chuutatsu tried that. It wasn't noticeably effective.

Also, who would Youko have these fight scenes with? In the first arc, there were a lot of fights against youma, as it is, the local thugs wouldn't last two seconds and slaughtering the local police unnecessarily, who are mostly honourable but misinformed, would be immoral. Youko has her Hinman, which makes her a deadly warrior, but why would Shokou be a great fighter? He's a fricking administrator, a professional bureaucrat! His personal combat skills were utterly irrelevent to the threat he posed. In the original novel, he was grossly overweight and found trying to hide under his bed!

The Twelve Kingdoms is not like Black Lagoon, where the fights lead to plot and character development and are part of the appeal of the series. The conflict in the series is political and personal; I don't see how added fights would help.

No, I think not. What I enjoy in Twelve Kingdoms is the story, the characters, the atmosphere, the music...I feel that long battle scenes would ruin that.

You have good points. I just think the "final" battles(Youko vs Shokou, Shoryu vs Atsuyu) would be better if they were a bit more drawn-out. This is not some cheesy shounen series with fights just for eye candy.

Besides, I love the anime Shokou, turned from a Gahou clone in the series into a badass with his own ideals in the anime. ^^

Shokou wrote:You have good points. I just think the "final" battles(Youko vs Shokou, Shoryu vs Atsuyu) would be better if they were a bit more drawn-out. This is not some cheesy shounen series with fights just for eye candy.

Besides, I love the anime Shokou, turned from a Gahou clone in the series into a badass with his own ideals in the anime. ^^

I agree that it was a significant improvement. He was changed from a pathetic character and something of a cliche to an actually interesting and threatening character that also helped to illustrate the theme of the story with his rebellion against the will of heaven.

However, there are four reasons why having an epic duel against him would have made the story worse.
1) I think the fight against him was already dramatic enough. An extended combat sequence would have added nothing to our understanding of his characterisation and would only work if we were worried about who would win.
2) An extended fight would have taken away from the important point that he surrendered when he realised that heaven was going to punish him for his crimes after all, not because he was afraid to die.
3) How can the writers justify him having the skills necessary to challenge Youko, with her Hinman? He'd have needed centuries of experience, which would have severely curtailed his administering and peasant oppressing time.
and 4) It would have left the impression that Youko's combat skills are important and that she is the rightful ruler because she can beat other people up, not because of her intelligence, leadership skills or compassion.

I like your ideas, especially #4. :) Definitely. She is a good ruler because she has the courage to mix in with the crowd, and learn about her kingdom from the inside, not because she is a overpowered shounen heroine.

I guess it could work for more time if he took a little more to realize she is the queen. The battle was in the beginning of the episode. What could have been done is the battle lasting half of the episode. Nothing wrong: That was one of the series' best episodes the way it was. I admired Koshu's understanding of the need of keeping Shokou alive. Koshu is another reason I wanted more fight scenes. I really like the guy, wanted to see him doing more.