“There cannot be a happy ending to the fight between the raging gods and humans. However, even in the middle of hatred and killings, there are things worth living for. A wonderful meeting, or a beautiful thing can exist. We depict hatred, but it is to depict that there are more important things. We depict a curse, to depict the joy of liberation.” - Hayao Miyazaki.
So what does it mean to you to see with eyes truly unclouded by hate?
“There cannot be a happy ending to the fight between the raging gods and humans. However, even in the middle of hatred and killings, there are things worth living for. A wonderful meeting, or a beautiful thing can exist. We depict hatred, but it is to depict that there are more important things. We depict a curse, to depict the joy of liberation.” - Hayao Miyazaki.
So what does it mean to you to see with eyes truly unclouded by hate?
Princess Mononoke Part 1
Gabby Browne: [00:00:00] This podcast is an association with Spotlight Studios, a family of podcasts driven to create unique, one of a kind content. If you have any interest in learning more, please visit Spotlight studios podcast.com.
There cannot be a happy ending to the fight between the raging gods and humans. However, in the middle of hatred and killings, there are things worth living for.
A wonderful meeting or a beautiful thing can exist. We depict hatred, but it is to depict that there are more important things. We depict a curse to depict the joy of liberation. Hi Zaki. So what does it mean to you to see with eyes truly unclouded by hate? I'm Gabby Brown and I'm here with Aaron Cower.
Hello, and Jonathan Van Sickle. Hi Gabby, and this is The Limelight by Spotlight Studios.
I've been struggling with [00:01:00] explaining the why of why I picked Princess Monaque by Zaki, I mean, that probably sounds weird, but let me explain. The movies directed by this man mean more to me and have singularly influenced me more than any other creator outside of myself. His art is something you can watch and be totally mesmerized from the first to the fifth watch.
I saw Princess Manke over 10 years ago now, and I'm still in awe. From the animation to the humanism that he brings to each character and creature, he imagined worlds that I want to be a part of. So it's more of a feeling that I don't think I can express or explain in words the importance of these films.
Like truly speechless. I still have Kiki's delivery service on VH S at my family home, but for years that one was my only favorite. Freshman year of high school, anytime my Spanish teacher was feeling like she needed a mental break, she would put on a Glee film, and that's the studio that was created for ha [00:02:00] Zaki.
We watched Totorro. How's Moving Castle? The Cat returns, princess Manque, all of them basically, and I was obsessed. Being from a small town, this was the culture shock I needed into a long, unhealthy relationship with animated films. I've always loved anime and cartoons, but I think it was the joy and expression of being able to share this experience with my teacher in class that made it so meaningful.
Plus, these movies are freaking weird, and I embrace weird with a passion. Miyazaki and Studio Giy made a nest in my heart. Yeah, they live there. I sold my soul to a mighty and powerful fire demon called Anna Bay. That's really what makes this so special for me. Monte Noke is not even my favorite Mia's Aki film, but it just goes to show you how phenomenal this man's catalog of creation is, and I cannot wait to discuss one of the most beautiful movies to ever go and grace the screen.[00:03:00]
The movie opens up with Ahi Taka writing Yaku, and he sees something, oh, what some else? Something's wrong. Something's wrong with the forest. And there are three little Forest Village girls that are there that are like, everybody's gotta get back to the village. Something's going down in the woods. Ashi Taka rolls up.
He goes up to the tower. And then that's when they first see him
Aaron Couser: Nago. Mm-hmm. Or what used to be nago. Who is nago? It's a God, right? Yep.
Gabby Browne: Nago is the god of the boars. He's the leader of the boar spirits. Got some weird
Aaron Couser: stuff crawling all around him. Evil
Gabby Browne: juice. We got some evil juice on Nago,
Aaron Couser: mesmerizing looking at it. Yeah, I know. I was obsessed. Just that scene, NAGO running around with, with the snakes, like it was like a two and a half minute clip.
Took a year and eight months. Just, just to illustrate all, all at all, [00:04:00]
Gabby Browne: boy is such a perfectionist dude. It's unbelievable. The ground beneath him was being burnt out, you know, rotting beneath him.
Aaron Couser: So it had to be very, uh, scary, probably seeing this huge bo god crawling towards your town.
Gabby Browne: But even Ashi Taka, he, he approaches it with respect.
He's like, yo, God, I, I, you are rageful and I see that, but. Please don't take it out on us. We don't want anything to do with you. We are humble village folk. We are the humble, am mishi tribe. Please don't
Aaron Couser: kill us. The rage inside Nagu couldn't listen. Nagu really isn't there anymore. Use it. No,
Gabby Browne: that's a, he's
Jonathan VanSickle: completely consumed, I hate.
Mm-hmm.
Aaron Couser: But Ashi Taka rises to the occasion, saves
Gabby Browne: the town by shooting Nago in the eye. Pew. Pew. Double
Aaron Couser: whammy. But unfortunately is dealt a curse on his arm. The
Gabby Browne: wormy stuff, the worm, the wormy got him. [00:05:00] I feel like Naomi, his Aki would not love me calling his do beautiful squiggles, his bad juice and worm his evil juice.
Wor the evil Wormy juice touches, touches off Shetaka's arm. We don't really know at that point what, what that means for poor. He's just hurting him. He's hurting uch. Oh, nameless God of rage and hate bow before you.
Now, it was down
for
Aaron Couser: the count, as you were saying earlier, they treat him with the most utmost respect. Mm-hmm. Even though he was about to come and destroy the the village
Gabby Browne: and that he wasn't even like a thing anymore. He was like this. This unreasonable entity. There was nothing there. Empty vessel. That's what Nago was.
He was an empty vessel
Jonathan VanSickle: of evil. And as he was dying, when he finally passed, his body almost disintegrates like underneath him. [00:06:00] That leaves us finding this piece of, or metallic, or
Gabby Browne: a wise woman finds it first, we will bury you. The whole spirit of the spirit's like, fuck you, dude. Like, and then he like melts.
Homegirls taking care of Ashi Taka at that time. And then the, the wise woman will goes and gets the bores and then the, the little metal thing out of the boar time is passed in the village thing with all the elders and the wise woman, and she's throwing some stones in a triangle. We're, we're throw bread, Missouri and Cann.
So we don't know a lot about Japanese culture. We'll say that right now. If I offended anyone for saying, throwing rocks in a triangle, uh, we'll see Crystals. Crystals, yeah. Stones and, and different things in the triangle. They're telling Ashi, takas fate. I'm afraid this is very bad.
Aaron Couser: The wise woman gives Ashi Taka.
Unfortunately, some bad news, the curse is not going anywhere. Mm-hmm. In fact, it's getting worse. [00:07:00] Mm-hmm. It's gonna get much worse. It's gonna go right to the bone and cause so much suffering and
Gabby Browne: misery. Mm-hmm. It's going to eat his soul. All and
Aaron Couser: then kill him. All the wise men of the town feel sorry for the young man because his wi his young life is gonna go away and he actually saved the town.
So his reward is, is deaf in suffering in a really terrible, a terrible way. And now he's getting banished
Gabby Browne: from the town in the English version. They had a very difficult time trying to convey the importance of hair for the Japanese culture. They changed the insinuation that he had to leave town because of the mark.
But in the actual Japanese version, he was forced to leave town and cut his hair. And because he cut his hair, he was no longer able to return. The Demonn mark was not necessarily why he was banished. It was because he had to leave. And if you have to leave, you are not a part of the tribe. You have to cut your hair now, you [00:08:00] can never return.
He's lost
Aaron Couser: his identity. He's lost his home. Yeah. He, he's about to die, but the wise woman gives him one final mission before he dies. Mm-hmm. Is to find out why this is happening. Mm-hmm. And to go out into the world mm-hmm. And try
Gabby Browne: to fix it. She gives him the iron thing and she says, Like this is what killed the bore.
This is what happened to him. This metal caused some form of hatred in him. And everywhere you go, she says, you must look with eyes unclouded by hatred.
This is what turned him into a demonn. There is evil at work in the land to the west. Prince Sahi Taka. You may find a way to lift the curse. You understand?
Jonathan VanSickle: Yes,
Aaron Couser: we know what caused the transformation. It was this iron town. We have a, a focal point of where he has to go. He needs
Gabby Browne: to go [00:09:00] find the place where of the origin for the iron. But then he also knows he has to go to the land of the gods as well to see and find out are there any other gods that are, are suffering this way, like what is happening to them.
So it's like a both sides. Scenario and he gets ready to go out of the village. They can't even look at him. They can't even look at him. They say, they say, Y, you're ashamed, man. Duck. We must save. After he literally saved the entire village. They're like, okay, get outta here. You cut your hair, get
Aaron Couser: outta here.
Well, maybe they do it to make it easier for
Gabby Browne: him to leave. You can see the ways of the samurai in this. Movie, but he made it very pointed to not be a Samurai movie. Samurai life was way too structured and everyone was gonna have too much of a mental image of what Ashi Taka was if he was a samurai. Ashi Taka is not a samurai boy.
He's just a boy. You know, he's just a boy who left his, who was removed from his village. There's amount, [00:10:00] amount of pride and amount of culture to his. Village, but it's not the same that if he were a samurai, you know? And so the rules are a little bit different for him, I guess. Yeah. That's
Aaron Couser: pretty important to know.
Yeah. Just cuz he doesn't follow that code. Mm-hmm. In a way. Yeah, definitely. Before he does leave the village, his sister comes and offers him a crystal dagger. I'm assuming is, you know, a great gesture because it, it's something that's so very important
Gabby Browne: to her. Mm-hmm. In the Japanese version as well. That was something that was difficult to translate.
Sister in Japanese, what they meant to call sister meant village. Female age is such a respectful thing and Japanese culture, you're on the same age. You're calling your brother your sister, even though you're not blood related. In the Japanese version, that was supposed to be a token of love. Giving him that dagger and was like an insane.
Innuation. No, you can never come back. But always remember me in the English version that's kind of totally lost. And you think that like she's her blood, he's his
Jonathan VanSickle: blood sister. Yeah. It's kind of like a [00:11:00] familial
Gabby Browne: or something, but Exactly. But in the, it was not, that was not his intention.
Aaron Couser: Ashi Taka stumbles upon a town being massacred.
Gabby Browne: He stumbles upon this commotion that's happening there. He doesn't know what's happening at first, but it is very obviously an attack, a Samurai attack. They're attacking everyone with swords and stuff, and Ashi Taka knows that something is wrong. This is not what he should be doing right now.
So he pulls out his bow and arrow and his arm kind of just takes over for him. It feeds on his little intention to think he's doing the right thing. And by that, he kills two samurai men, literally ripping off one of the man's arms with just an arrow and then perfectly decapitating another.
Aaron Couser: So what triggered that you
Jonathan VanSickle: think?
It's a reaction to hatred. Mm-hmm. Rage to any of those type of feelings. You know, murder human emotions that we get sometimes where it's fight or [00:12:00] flight. As soon as he tapped into it, extraordinary things began happening. It's really kind of shocking at this point in the movie. You're like, oh wow. Oh, we're going here to
Gabby Browne: the next already.
Exactly. And this is one of the only movies where HA does this. Like, especially in his jubilees, this is the only one that he really shows decapitation and some real freaky stuff. I
Aaron Couser: love the pace of it. He's not messing around. There's, there's no fluff.
Gabby Browne: Exactly. This movie took so long to make. There is no time for fluff.
You know what I mean? Right. Like the animation studio, we have no time fluff.
Aaron Couser: So as he moves safely into the next town, he is trying to buy some food for himself. The merchant thinks he's trying to, uh, to cheat him. Cheat him.
Gabby Browne: Yeah. There's also a crowd watching too. Uh, Shi taco kind of, he kind of pulls a crowd every time he's around. You know what I mean? The handsome fella, he's a handsome fella, but he also is so different.
It, you can tell that he is [00:13:00] from somewhere that. These people have never seen before. Exactly.
Aaron Couser: But one guy has seen someone like him before. A guy named Jigo.
Gabby Browne: Yep. Mr. Monk,
Aaron Couser: he seems to know that Ashi Taka is kind of a special guy. Yeah. And he saves him from this merchant. What
Gabby Browne: are you trying to pull? This isn't money.
Give me back my rice. Little thief, excuse me, but might I inspect that in the English dub? He literally says, oh, he's
Aaron Couser: here. He knows that he's coming. Somehow he,
Gabby Browne: there's always just this insinuation. I think with him being a monk that he's like all knowing it's the combo of him being the monk, but also the emperor's monk, you know,
Aaron Couser: he's a very interesting character.
He is in control of, So many things in pulling the strings of so many things. Yeah.
Gabby Browne: The puppet master, we will say
Aaron Couser: the, yeah. There is no antagonist per se. Or protagonist per se,
Gabby Browne: because even old Jigo has his, his, you know, well, motivations mo not motivations, [00:14:00] but his positives.
Aaron Couser: Ashi Taka now feels connected
Jonathan VanSickle: to Jigo.
It's kind of like the first time that Ashi Taka kind of has a connection outside of his village, since he's been completely aster size, is this stranger recognizing this red Bull that he carries with him. They have some form of connection. I don't know. I feel like Ashi Taka is just very, he's very singular minded.
If he has one thing to do, and if person can help, great. If not, he's not really too phased. Yeah.
Gabby Browne: He's not motivated by anything other than finding the purpose to his curse, and I, you can kind of tell that he doesn't trust. Jigo. He literally leaves him in the morning. But
Aaron Couser: Jigo reveals two very important things.
Mm-hmm. Jigo says that the emperor is offering a hill's worth of gold for anybody who can help the emperor live forever. There you find what Jibo's purpose is. That's his main motivation. You can
Gabby Browne: tell he's very gold motivated. [00:15:00]
Jonathan VanSickle: Oh yeah. He is about
Aaron Couser: finance. He also says that the spirit of the forest is high in the mountains and shows Ashi Taka where to find the spirit of, of the forest and sends him on his way towards
Gabby Browne: that journey.
I truly think Ashi Taka dips on him in the morning cuz he is like, you're gonna sleep in or I just am not gonna wait for you either. Not even, I'm not gonna wait for you, but I also don't wanna say goodbye either. That's kind of my thing. Irish goodbye in a Japanese movie. There we go. And Ashi talk is there for that.
So he dips out? Yeah, he's on the move.
Anime is based off of the combination of human beings and cats.
That's why it's so pretty is because they wanted to create a beautiful form of. Art. That was nice to look at the combination of the forms of human beings and cats together.
Aaron Couser: What is it about anime that attracts
Gabby Browne: you, Gabby? Oh, uh, [00:16:00] so many different things. I think that there's a whole nother world you open up when you're allowed to create animation and.
Like the same thing that people are trying to do now with cgi, but it's not the same. Like we can't necessarily put human forms into this created world unless they're a part of the world. And that's why I love anime and animation in general, is because they were all formed together. We're not having an entire green screen where the actors trying to fake it, everything out.
You know, these characters were created for this. Specific environment, no one is even having to fake it. They were written together.
Jonathan VanSickle: Normal animation gives you that chance to kind of step into a fantasy. Mm-hmm. That chance to do something mystical. And the difference between American animation, I think in anime specifically, is anime really tells such unique and brilliant stories.
That I don't think we really have a format for here in the United States. Nope. The way that they conduct and build these stories and the way that they're [00:17:00] told is so fascinating and on a completely different level than any American creators really think as. And so I think Ja Miyazaki doing what he does in that realm is also a reflection of that.
The absurdity and the crazy amounts of imagination and creativity that goes into these films, but also the ingenuity and the storytelling aspect and how he can make you feel things and feel engaged with these characters that he paints for us, these extremely intricate and beautiful characters.
Gabby Browne: Absolutely, and that made me think of the difference between American and Japanese animation is. Japan has thousands of history on our asses. You know, they have the lore, they have the samurai, they have all of their ancient periods of mystical that us as a Western culture can't recognize. It's also learning about.
Someone else's culture that's so far outside of our own understanding and [00:18:00] being, I think about silly little anime is like in You Yasha, it's about this half demonn wolf boy who gets like shot to a tree and then comes back hundreds of years later. So much of anime is ingrained into Japanese culture in lore that it's.
Learning something while you're watching too, a little bit with some animes, but then there are some animes that put out the most realistic stuff, and they're just as amazing that way. There's a difference in anime than an American animation. I think there's only one American series that's ever done it well, and that's avatar.
The last Airbender as an anime, quote unquote. But that is literally not even allowed to be listed as an actual anime. It is an American animation. It's not an anime. An anime comes from Japan. That is what happens, you know? So even if like I were to sit down and create a cool anime, that's still an American anim animation.
Anime is Japanese, through and through. I didn't grow up
Aaron Couser: on anime. I grew up on. [00:19:00] Warner Brothers and Disney. Mm-hmm. And so when I started watching anime recently, now that I'm in my forties, I didn't like it, you know? Yeah. Because it was either a little way over the top or, or too much. Then you start learning and, and loving that theory and that style.
Mm-hmm. And I'm still an amateur about it. This is my first film of his, I've ever seen the difference between his anime and maybe. Other Japanese anime is his, is much more realistic in movement and in facial expression, in my opinion. Mm-hmm. Um, and it really brought me into the movie so much more and made it more believable.
Absolutely. And I was able to connect with the c the characters more either way is, is wonderful and, and it's beautiful in their own artistic style. I just fell in love with this movie based off his attention to detail and his love for every piece of art in the movie. I can't wait to watch more of them.
Gabby Browne: The sooner we get this [00:20:00] rice home, the sooner we eat, let's move. The oxen. We gotta protect. Don't let the oxen stir. Sorry. I have the lady Boshi
Aaron Couser: and, and, uh, her hall. She's always going to get food for her iron town. She's getting rice. You could see it in the, in the village that Ahi Taka was at before. The food wasn't very good.
They were spitting it out. Little details like that, she's going to provide for her village. She go actually goes out and collects and actually kills to secure the health of her village. This is a scene where you're basically introduced to that or bringing all that hall back into. Iron down, you kind of get a, a feeling of who she is.
She commands with, with a great iron fist and, and rule for the greater purpose of her, of her people. But on her way home, she runs into coming this way. Move
Jonathan VanSickle: her nemesis.
Gabby Browne: Don't let the odds who panic, stay calm, take up your positions. Some [00:21:00] watcher sees, sees a couple white dots on the distance and up comes do, do two wolves.
And there is a young woman riding one of those wolves and we get introduced to her as the wolf girl. People are very afraid of these wolves, so they're trying to shoot them off with their, uh, rockets, I guess. The villagers at this point where the people who are transporting the rice have not seen the gods before.
They've not seen the wolves. This is their first introduction. The Lady Boshi has, she knows what they look like and she's knowing that those are the pups and not their mother. Exactly. So they are looking for marow, who is the large and in charge. Mother Wolf, the wolf of the God of the wolves. That was
Aaron Couser: it.
They weren't so big.
Gabby Browne: They're just pups. Wait till you see their mother.
Aaron Couser: Well, when comes, that's when Lady Ab Boshi brings out her special gun.
Gabby Browne: Yeah. Her special goon come on.[00:22:00]
Aaron Couser: Gets a clean shot on Morrow. Mm-hmm. Knocking Morrow, um,
Gabby Browne: off the cliff. Yep. But not before. Marow does some freaking damage. Yeah. Not
Jonathan VanSickle: before Marow completely. Just annihilates oxen men, whoever is in her way, just. Completely dominates. I mean, dozens of men in cattle. Yeah.
Aaron Couser: Shows the power of her God
Jonathan VanSickle: insane. Yep.
And then, then falls off the cliff and, but the lady knows as well after that, respecting the power of the God. She's saying one shot. Not gonna do anything. She's not. She's coming back one short, pent
Gabby Browne: kilo,
Jonathan VanSickle: God. Exactly. Just like that
Aaron Couser: one. One of her men goes, well, what about our men? She goes, well, they're
Gabby Browne: dead.
Leave them dead. Lady Bohi is about lady a bohi.
Tacos by the river. He's getting some water.
Jonathan VanSickle: Kind of StartOut [00:23:00] day. Yeah. Cools. Chilling out. Cooling down. King. King, yeah. Cool. King. These bodies, uh, from the battle that we have been watching earlier, start floating down the river. He realizes some of these men are still alive. And of course him just being the absolutely perfect hero of this movie saves these men, hikes 'em over his shoulder, brings them to safety, starts tending to their
Gabby Browne: wounds.
Yeah, it it, it was very funny cuz I did, I watched this with Sean last night and he had never seen it before. And it was a situation where Sean is such a video game player that he's like, Why are they, why is he not grabbing supplies? And I'm like, there's so many supplies going down the river. And I was like, Sean, he doesn't need them.
He only gets what he needs. That is what Aji Taka stands by. You know, he's not gonna take unnecessary things. He's literally fucking dying. You know, like, yeah, you can't really do anything there, but hi other people's lives. The lives of like survival for other [00:24:00] people means so much to him. One, he has such
Jonathan VanSickle: a respect for life.
Mm-hmm. He's going through his own situation, but he has the selflessness to help others at every, every turn of the way. In this movie, it's beautiful.
He first sees the two wolf pups. At the
Aaron Couser: river. But Marow, you know, Marow can see, I mean, he's hiding in the bushes, you know? Uh, AHI, takas, hiding in the bushes and marow. You can see her eyes, you know, they're all red too, you know, for, she's mad. She's angry. Angry. Mm-hmm. She's very mad. And she could sense this human, you know, staring at them.
You can see her head turn. And then there's Princess Manke, which is a beautiful shot of her trying to heal Marow by sucking some of the blood out of, is that what she's doing?
Gabby Browne: I, I think's trying to, she's trying to get the bullet outs. I think she's trying to suck the bullet out, but I actually don't know.
Like I honestly, this is, then that can be up for interpretation. She could be like, yeah, I don't think it's ever specific. It could be like a, because. You know, I'm sure they don't totally understand [00:25:00] what bullets are, like iron, whatever. I'm sure she could be thinking that there's poison in her blood and she's trying to suck the poison out.
Like something along those
Jonathan VanSickle: lines. I mean, as we see with Nago earlier, I mean that seems to be implied that this bullet, you know, poisoned him and turned him into this demonn
Gabby Browne: Asha Tuck a hops up and he goes, I am Ahi taco. He does the most like formal. Hey, I understand your God. I love and respect you. Can you help me?
Please lead me to the forest spirit.
Aaron Couser: And they basically just like, uh, just stare at him. Ignore
Gabby Browne: him and just walk, walk away. Yeah. No, I'm on. Or, uh, son goes lit. She usually literally goes, go away. Me's just like, Okay, cool. Okay. That's nice. I love that. Well, he
Aaron Couser: should be happy he just didn't come and kill him, I guess.
Gabby Browne: I know, honestly, but I mean that's, that shows too, like what, obviously they were not of a threat. Marow was very injured. Not very, but you know, she just, I [00:26:00] fell off a cliff. She probably doesn't want to kill one more human. A kodama. I never thought I'd see one of them here.
Aaron Couser: The Kodama Gabby. What in the world is a
Gabby Browne: kodama? Kodama are spirits and Japanese folklore that are inhabitants of trees. They are the little guys that keep the trees alive and happy. This is not the only movie that Zaki features Kodama in either. It's originally featured in his 1998 film. Toro is the ORI original introduction of the Kodama, but they do have a little bit of a bigger role in this movie.
They lead Ahi Taka and the two injured men to, we do not know where at first Goos, like really freaking out. Yeah. He's just
Jonathan VanSickle: like the little clicking and the, you know, the heads turning
Aaron Couser: over around, you know? Yeah. Yeah.
Gabby Browne: I, I, I don't know. So there's this, and it's incredible.
Jonathan VanSickle: The design is so,
Gabby Browne: I love it too and it's all like, it's so [00:27:00] funny that people are afraid of it, but of course ya cool is like playing it chill as hell.
And Ahi talk is like, well, if yakus not afraid, there's no reason to be afraid it. Exactly, baby. Of course, the humans are afraid of the unknown and the animals can tell the instinct of harm versus no harm. Yaku is the best character. They are led to their mother tree, which is in the middle of. The forest, this beautiful, beautiful space.
Aaron Couser: Well, it's a place
Gabby Browne: of healing. It seems like healing. Yeah. He says this is a magical place. He notices some tracks on the ground. This is where the wolf girl and the wolves probably live, and then he notices another track. It looks almost bird-like, but it's fresh. Yeah, it's fresh. It's very fresh. And then he gets this sensation, he's looking up and there's this beam of light, and you see this backlit reflection of all of these animals walking across.
And then you finally see one that definitely does not look the [00:28:00] same, but you can only see it being backlit. You do not know what it looks like. Yeah.
Jonathan VanSickle: You, you see deer, you recognize all these familiar silhouettes, and then you see something that you're like, what
Gabby Browne: is that? That's not normal. But his arm also knows that that's not normal cuz his arm starts, he gets reacting, starts freaking out, get the squiggles are squiggling and they're squiggling.
And so he does not know how to calm this shit. It's trying to reach for weapons and stuff and he just drowns that guy. Mm-hmm. Throws it in the water. The
Aaron Couser: wounded men also are laying in into the water as well. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Basically heals
Gabby Browne: them. Not totally though. Krokus like, I'm healed. And he is like, no, it's still broken, still broken.
They leave the forest and those little dudes helped him. The KO helped him, they did cut through the forest and they almost beat the people back to Irontown. They got back at the exact same freaking time. They couldn't believe
Aaron Couser: it. Yeah. Which is, that's shocking. It is. It is like a miracle because they said any human that [00:29:00] have gone through that forest has always died.
Yeah,
Gabby Browne: exactly. They're shocked and. Kind of scared, but krokus like y'all guys, I don't know, like Carku is literally just an oxen driver and I don't understand how he has so much like pull with people. He must be like a very popular person in the village. I, I've always never known be beat a political stance or economic stance of the cattle drivers.
Yeah, exactly. But apparently Krokus. Telling everyone, Hey guys, he's great. What? I got the word for him. And everyone trusts him. Everyone's just like, okay, like let's let this stranger into our village. All of the ladies are like, Hey stranger, how's it going?
Jonathan VanSickle: I can't get enough
Gabby Browne: of them. Oh no. But this is the first introduction to the vulgarity of the ladies, which I'm absolutely obs.
He's handsome. Yeah, no bad, but he's so young. That never stopped you before. Quiet out camera. You know what, if we're gonna have a thousand [00:30:00] movies Sexualizing Women, let's sexualize Ashi Taka. Hi Miyazaki. Let's do it. I'm here for it.
Forgive me for keeping you waiting Stranger.
There's one person in the beginning, I think that we don't know their opinion on Ashi Taka. And that's Lady of Bohi. Lady Bohi, and she says, Meet me in my, meet me in my room in an hour. I'd like to thank the stranger. When
Aaron Couser: Ashi Taka meets a boshi, she asks him what he's doing there, and that's when he says, I'm here
Gabby Browne: to see with eyes.
Unc clouded by hate. He's showing that he's there to be truly the middle man. He's not there to take anyone's. Sides. He is there to help everyone come to the best conclusion of everyone's story. That's what he is there for. He wants to help regardless of who they are. And she
Aaron Couser: laughs. Yeah. She's got Cackles, uh, when he says [00:31:00] that, um, because she knows probably how impossible that is to
Gabby Browne: do.
Yep. And that's when she was like, let me show you what suffering, you know, I guess. Now let me show you what suffering is. Because he hasn't
Aaron Couser: seen it. He hasn't seen it like mm-hmm. Like this yet. Like she
Gabby Browne: has, she asks him if she wants to see a secret, and so that's like, she fully, fully trusts Ashi Taka at that point.
Cuz she's like, I'm literally gonna show you my biggest secret and Gonzo's like, what? And, and she's like, watch the ladies Gonzo. She takes him to her private garden, which no one else has ever seen before. Everyone is too afraid from the city to come there. That's how feared lady a Boshi is. This is my garden.
None of the townspeople. Dare to come here. Follow me if you wish to learn my secret. He goes to the secret garden, and that's when we're introduced to the lepers
Aaron Couser: lady a boshi puts the lepers in the [00:32:00] most beautiful place. In Irontown? Yeah. In this garden.
Gabby Browne: They're, they're, they're respected and revered by her.
And that's all that matters. She gives them a purpose. Yeah, and they, she says it's her secret project. Also, another underlying insinuation that I read online that everyone in irontown may be suffering from leprosy and the people who are working in the mills are, that are doing really, really hard work, are just led on an earlier stage of leprosy and that everyone is.
Sick. And that's why they don't mind the very difficult work that they're doing. And that's why towards the end you see the lepers and the women literally together side by side, side by side. And so that was like a theory that, yeah, that everyone in Irontown actually is suffering from leprosy. And that lady, a boshi, just has a kind heart, a kind heart, a soft spot for the ladies.
Well,
and
Jonathan VanSickle: that's exactly right. We're showing that lady a boshi, although. She's this killer of the [00:33:00] gods and of nature. She does have this side where she's taking two of the lowest classes of society, these lepers and these women who used to work in brothels, and she's taking them in, and she's not only taking them in, but giving them a better life.
Giving them a promise of future and just, you know, a, a reason kind of makes her endearing. Mm-hmm. You know? Mm-hmm. You have, you have this conflict within you. You're like, I'm not sure how I feel about this
Gabby Browne: person. And Sos Ashi Taka. He has that conflict himself.
Aaron Couser: During this visit to the lepers, Ashi, takas arms starts to to rage a little bit.
He can't control it probably cuz he's seeing now he's seeing a different, uh, side of humanity that he is never seen before. And it, it makes him angry.
Gabby Browne: He's seeing some, he's seen some forms of hate too. He's like, you're gonna kill another God. You're going to, you're gonna make, you're making even deadlier weapons.
What is wrong with you? This is only going to spread more hate. Did I not just tell you my goddamn damn mission? Seriously, [00:34:00] that was my mission. And his arm reaches for his sword. He's like pulling, no, no, no. He says, no evil squiggles. You stop it. But
Aaron Couser: in the far back corner, you see the most affected leper in the group.
Jonathan VanSickle: My
Gabby Browne: lady OSA
Aaron Couser: has something to say. Life is suffering. It is heart. The world is cursed, but still, you find the reasons to keep living. All these people are cursed. They're all gonna die, but they find a reason. They find a purpose to keep living on a day-to-day basis, especially at scene through the lepers.
Their purpose now is to make the guns. They're great at that. That's a gift that they have inside them and it makes them want to live and continue to live in this society.
Gabby Browne: These lepers have not been shown any type of respect, I'm sure for years, and this is the first person that's not like, I hate the thing, the word of giving them a purpose.
They have a purpose already without Lady of Boshi. They don't, but the motivation, the [00:35:00] love that they need by someone else outside of themselves. I think that that's, that's the part that I'm like, man, a boshi, I can't hate you. I like really can't hate you like you are there for your people. It makes it tough.
The Lady of Boshi is a very difficult character,
Jonathan VanSickle: so this is where we get our first big introduction to. The industry of these humans and their ways. Evening. Alright. If I worked the bellows for a while.
Gabby Browne: Well, I guess so. Unlike the human he's ever witnessed before
Jonathan VanSickle: you Yeah. You start to, you start to understand they don't have the same level of respect for the earth, for the environment as the culture that he came from.
It becomes evident at this point that they'll do whatever it takes. To get the resources to get more powerful and grow their
Gabby Browne: civilization. You're seeing Ashi Takas interactions with everyone around him, like he has little blips of feeling [00:36:00] anger towards these people, but he's also super respectful of them as well.
He literally talks to the women and he's like, I'd like to see where you guys work. I like, want to see what you do in this city? Like Ashi Taka is truly the most humble king. When the forest has been cleared and the wolves wiped out, this desolate place will be the richest land in the world, and Princess Monia will become human.
Princess Mank, princess of the spirits of ghouls beasts and ancient gods. The wolf stole her soul and how she lives to kill me. Lady a boshi. Her outfit is so different than everyone else's in the film, and it's insinuated that she was a sher bi oshi, and those were. Female entertainers in Japan during the Heon and periods, and they sang songs and they danced, but they dressed in traditional men's clothing.
And Hao came up with this [00:37:00] lovely backstory for lady a boshi. Insinuating that she was kidnapped by pirates and escaped that life to come and create irontown, and chose to reclaim and repurpose that attire as the leader of her new city and not as a woman who has to degrade herself. For men and I in town, baby, this is how it works.
The men are sexy and the women are workers.
A boshi at this point is defending. I don't think that a boshi has gone out of her way to attack the wolves or son right now just because like they're the ones on the aggressive attack, like they're literally traveling through, which is also an interesting point to make out that like Lady Abo, she's literally building weapons just to defend quote unquote, until she goes to get the spirit of the forest.
Aaron Couser: Even though Marow got shot and is wounded, their mission is to [00:38:00] save the forest. And they know the only way to do that is to kill lady a boshi. The wolves are
Gabby Browne: coming, it's the
Aaron Couser: wolf. That's
Gabby Browne: when son and the wolves, they do the run, run, run, run, run wolf pop up, and then she jumps and she stabs her spear and she flicks and she goes, Hops right over.
Right over the fence. Yeah, right over that giant fricking fence. And that's the part about Irontown too. It is not a pretty place. This is a fortress. They even say that there are spears, wooden spears coming out of the ground pointed at people. This is a place that was meant to be safe. Unbreakable San said, nah, son said I can get it in here.
Easy. Son said I can be a sneaky girl.
Aaron Couser: Yeah, we, and we see her skill. Mm-hmm. You know? Mm-hmm. We see all her fighting skill and her EVAs evasive maneuvering. Well, whoa. Well
Gabby Browne: wait a minute. You just jumped from the ground onto the roof by yourself. You're not really human, are you? And
Jonathan VanSickle: as she's jumping between rooftops fighting different henchmen, they, they [00:39:00] find themselves son and Ashi Taka in a battle with each other.
And he's saying, he's like, I don't wanna fight you. I'm, I'm your friend. I want to talk to you. I want to help you. She doesn't care. Once again, singular mentality. She's on a mission to a absolutely end lady. Lady abo she's
Gabby Browne: life, I mean, redemption for tomorrow. That's all she has in her mind. Anytime Ahi Taka helps the other side, the other side says you're on their side.
Ahi. Takas not on the side. That's the point of the movie. He's on, not on his side. He's on ASHI tacos, getting rid of his evil arm side. That's all he's there for. He's there to make everyone's lives a little bit better. The Gonzo sword thing, he's so pissed. His squiggle arm literally takes Gonzo sword and just like bends it.
Like it's a little like, too, like a little piece. A metal. It's like, I loved that part. And Gonzo's like this big, bulky man who's just like, what in the hell? And there's some stiff squiggly worms still left on the sword after that. [00:40:00] Bill, can you hear me? Princess of Beasts, if it's me, you want. Here I am. He yells for San when she's on the top of the roof.
It's a trap. Don't do it because Lady Bo, she's in the middle of the square. Like, what you gonna do? You gonna come for me? And then san's like, yeah, I actually am. And, and he yells It's a trap and he tries to save her, but she gets hit to the point that she likes, starts rolling down the roof, like she gets hit near her feet.
And falls and starts rolling down the roof. And they tell her to aim where? Where she falls exactly.
Jonathan VanSickle: We're sh we're showing the ruthlessness. Cause at this point, she's completely defenseless. She's about to tumble from stories above. She's not messing around. She's aim where she falls. Aim where she
Aaron Couser: falls and they shoot her right in the face.
But she has that mask on. Yeah, that clay mask. It destroys the mask. And it's just now, Son,
Gabby Browne: Ashi Taka rips the roof, the giant board off of the roof and just chucks it in front of them in sun and then jumps down from the roof and gets in between, and [00:41:00] he's like, stop it. Everybody's stomach.
Aaron Couser: This is what hatred looks like.
Yeah. This is what pure hatred looks like, fighting each other when it doesn't seem like it, it, it should be necessary.
Gabby Browne: There's no
Aaron Couser: resolution here. He says that they both have a demonn in them. Ashi Taka through the sparring, has lady Boshi in his arms, and he gives her back to the people. I'm
not
Gabby Browne: your enemy.
Yeah, I'm not gonna, I, I just knocked her out. Dude, I'm not gonna hurt her. I'm taking the wolf girl. But you can, you can have a boshi. She's just knocked out. Everybody chill. This is like the scene where you really, truly see the strength of his curse. I walked in through this gate this morning. Now I'm going to leave the same
Jonathan VanSickle: way as he's walking away.
They're like, Don't move. Oh yeah. Shit. Like don't move. Like stay. Right. You cannot leave with Princess Manke. This is, you know, our sworn enemy of this town. He doesn't care. He just turns, starts walking. [00:42:00] At first they don't shoot at him, but
Gabby Browne: it was an accident through
Jonathan VanSickle: a little nerve, little accident. They shoot.
Gabby Browne: Like right through his heart,
Jonathan VanSickle: basically. He's completely unfazed and just keeps walking. And this is, yeah. This is when you really see the people like starting to understand his true power. Yeah.
Gabby Browne: And then he lifts a gate that was meant to lift for 10 people. Yeah. And he's bleeding out and homeboy's like, you're gonna die.
Jonathan VanSickle: So like, even if we wanted to, we can't open this man. It's like, and he's like, no, I've
Gabby Browne: got this. I've got this. And then he of course opens the door and he's like, okay, ya cool. You're good buddy. You gotta come through. Ashi Taka is thinking of his cursed arm first, but he's truly thinking about Yaku first.
Like if we're being real here, that's his buddy. So yeah, ya cools out and they have the wolf girl and they escape. Ashi Taka is basically like he's barely staying awake. He passes out, stop it, leave him. He's [00:43:00] mine. And then that's when one of the wolves comes over and just starts an arn on his head. I was like, that was one of the most dog animations I've ever seen in the film.
Like, ah, that was so good. And son's immediately like, stop it. He falls off and then she wakes up and she's like, what are you doing? And then she's like, you're on their side. And he's like, I'm on their side. He goes, you know, you're beautiful. Right. And she's never heard that before. Yeah, no, definitely not.
I mean, she's literally only ever been around like animals. That's their introduction, their first like speaking introduction besides her telling him to, to go away. This is our forest, the human. Give him to us, give us the.
Aaron Couser: Is this where the apes show up? Oh
Gabby Browne: yeah. This is where the apes show up because they start throwing, oh, start throwing rocks at the wolves.
And son's like, what in the what in the [00:44:00] hell? Like, this is disrespectful. You guys are monkeys and we are wolves. And that is not how this works. Now this hierarchy works. And he is like, give us the human. We want to eat the human. This is how we gain our powers. And so sounds like you guys are being dumb.
You're you're being stupid right now. You will not gain the powers that will turn you into something else if you eat people.
Aaron Couser: He's got the
Gabby Browne: squiggles inside of him. Yeah, he does. You can start to see those red eyes and like in the background. He's got some squiggles. You, no one needs any squiggles. Man. I'm really gonna start talking about hate and say it the squiggles.
It makes it feel a lot better. Oh, that's, Say, yeah man, I'm feeling really squiggly today, Aaron.
They go to the forest, uh, to the, to the mother tree, and that's where son chooses to heal. Ashi Taka, or help with his healing, which
Jonathan VanSickle: brings him out to the middle of this. Lake. Mm-hmm. To a, to an island. It's
Gabby Browne: truly not even her, like it is her [00:45:00] decision to help him, but it's not her decision if he lives or dies.
Exactly. Like she's choosing to give his life to the Forest Spirit and see what the, for if the Forest Spirit deems him worthy, like, let's see what's gonna happen here.
Aaron Couser: But somebody knows that he's gonna be there. Um, Familiar
Gabby Browne: face. He may or may be wearing a different outfit this time, but you recognize that old belly Bob
Aaron Couser: hanging out in the trees in a bear suit.
But he makes a very important revelation that he has a pardon from the emperor for cutting the head off the forest spirit. Mm-hmm. So now you know that he is wanting to cut off the head of the forest spirit for his own. Financial gain for the emperor to stay young forever
Gabby Browne: being immortality of the empire.
We've really talked a lot about religion in this, without talking about what the religious aspect of this movie was, but [00:46:00] this is when you finally see the first people actually acknowledge like, we can't look at that. That's, that's, you can't look at this forest spirit that's sacrilegious. You can't do that.
Like that's, that's, that's a wrongful doing, and that's because. This entire movie is based off of Shintoism, which is one of the most wide religions in Japan. The literal definition of Shinto means by the way of the Gods. It's practiced by at least 5 million people still today, and the followers of Shinto Shintoism believe that there are spiritual powers that exist in nature, in in the world.
When you see so much of like architecture in Japan, all of the like big red, beautiful arches, those are natural Shinto shrines. And so there's so much of Shintoism that goes into this. And then another cultural reference or another thing that has so much Shintoism in this is Legend of Zelda, breath of the Wild.
You can take so many ploys back [00:47:00] and forth from these two different art pieces cuz they truly are just art pieces. The Legend of Zelda takes so much directly from Princess Manke. You can see so many parallels. We haven't even talked about the definition of Manke yet and how, why they don't even say it in the movie at all and why American audiences are very confused, why it's called Princess Manke when her name is song.
In ancient tradition, Manke used to be dead spirits that would come and inhabit the bodies of women specifically, and it was like this weird. Almost esque lore. It was like more of a negative comment connotation. And what Hao intended for this movie was that he kind of switched the definition or made it a more modernized definition in the sense that modern nok is meaning the walker between two worlds.
You're human, but you are raised by literal wolves. You have godly power somewhat, but you're not, [00:48:00] you're a truly indescribable. Lonely creature. You are singularly that, you know? Mm-hmm. That was what he wanted for his, his definition of Monk, the Tale of Genji, which is considered the world's first novel ever.
It explains that the monks are the spirit of the dead that control living bodies of women the first novel ever written. That's awesome. Wow. Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Aaron Couser: Great. Great research, Gabby. Thank you.
The Forest Spirit. Arrives.
Gabby Browne: Yep. And we, we see him initially as the night walker. So at night, the spirit of the forest transformed into this giant sea through blue squiggly guy. But he still kind of has the same antlers as the Elk s creature. He is as the spirit of the forest. This
Jonathan VanSickle: one? Yeah. Walks on two legs.
Mm-hmm. Across like [00:49:00] strides across. Mountaintops.
Gabby Browne: Mm-hmm. He's transforming back into the spirit of the forest and blah, blah, blah, blah. And they see, they're like, whoop, that's where he lives. That's, they're literally pointing out the exact spot bef
Aaron Couser: before the forest Spirit comes and heals. Ahi Taka, we see the, a new gang of Boars coming into the picture.
A new chess piece. Akoto. He is the new bogo. Now that Nago is gone. Yeah,
Gabby Browne: he's ready for some revenge. They all thought Akoto was dead cuz he's like, I thought he died a hundred years ago. Nah, he's still 11 and thriving. He turns his head to the right and G goes, thinks he sees him. But little does he know that bitch blind.
He can't see anything. He can't see anything.
Jonathan VanSickle: The bullet
Gabby Browne: wound's gone. Forest spirit coming down. You [00:50:00] finally see big boy's face the face of a human, on the body of an elk. He heals the hole, but he doesn't heal the curse. He wakes up after being healed by the forest spirit and knows that his wound in his side has been healed, but immediately looks at his hand and there the mark is still on his hand.
But of course the first person to greet him when he opens his eyes is ya. Cool? Because Saan said, Hey, I'm gonna take this rain off of you. You're free to go but ya cool. Is such a cool dude. He does not wanna leave his side.
This is a movie about misinterpreting the other. I'm sure son's mental thinking is that all animals being held by humans are imprisoned. You need to release all animals. There's no way that they can have a. Communal relationship where then a, she's healthy coexist. She re, yeah, healthy coexistence, and then she releases Yaku and [00:51:00] Yaku stays, and she's like, what?
You're friends with this thing? It's his chosen decision to stay with old, old Ash Taka and those shows. She's also like, this is probably a pretty cool dude, you know? Mm-hmm. The Forest Spirit saved him, is. His Red Elk wants to save them. Yeah. And
Aaron Couser: well, and And ya Cool. Is basically telling son Ahi TA's entire
Gabby Browne: backstory.
Exactly. Cuz she can talk to animals. Which is really freaking
Aaron Couser: cool. Which is really important cuz now son is getting more trusting of Ahi Taka and his intentions and what he's doing because of Cool. Yep. Explaining it to her best
Gabby Browne: wing man ever
Aaron Couser: son. Really? Does care about Ashi Taka because she regurgitates food to keep him alive.
Gabby Browne: Baby birds him
Aaron Couser: and make
Jonathan VanSickle: him strong again. Exactly. Tries to feed him some kind of, it looks like some kind of bark or something. Yeah, it looks like bark. You know, some kind of medicinal bark. You can't even chew that shit. He can't chew it. So she chews it up. Yeah, spits it in his mouth, is the [00:52:00] way that the animal kingdom and All right, simple.
This guy can't chew it up. He has to get this. That's the
Aaron Couser: only way. And it worked.
Gabby Browne: We are here to kill the humans and save the forest. Why are they humans here? Morrow? Humans are everywhere these days.
Jonathan VanSickle: This is where we're introduced to the board.
Gabby Browne: It's not a Koto that comes out first. It's like all the other Bo.
Mm-hmm. Like pop up into the woods and they're like screaming. They're mad. Yeah. They're pissed off. You didn't do anything for nago. You're protecting a human. Your own daughter is a human. Disgusting.
Aaron Couser: Yeah. They did not understand why the Forest Spirit
Gabby Browne: would choose to save Ashi Taka and not
Aaron Couser: a, a Spirit God.
Gabby Browne: Yeah. He's a literal God, you know, and this is just a freaking human. So they're pretty pissed about that.
Aaron Couser: Pissed, but also probably lost, you know, in, in their own rage. Everything that they probably thought is like not making sense [00:53:00] anymore. Mm-hmm.
Gabby Browne: That's when he reveals. That Ashi Taka is actually the one that killed Nago, and that's when Akoto comes out to get some vibe checks to make sure he's telling the truth.
And so he goes over and sniffs him up real good and he can tell that he's telling the truth, which I guess that's a pretty cool power that gets you out a lot of weird situations, I guess, when you're an
Jonathan VanSickle: ancient blind Bo guy. Yeah. And you're like bores
Gabby Browne: are known, sniffing for the truth. Yeah. Like the little truffle
Jonathan VanSickle: pigs
Aaron Couser: and stuff.
Yeah, exactly. Sniffing the truth. Mm-hmm. Anytime I start sniffing somebody, I could escort it out of the building. So that's
Gabby Browne: Aaron. We've talked about the sniffing. I do not ask for the help of the wolf
Aaron Couser: tribe,
Jonathan VanSickle: the bores after, you know, telling the wolves, they're like, well, if you're not gonna help us, we're going, we're going to fight these humans.
Insurmountable odds. They have these weapons, these explosions, and they say, we don't care. We are proud and we are going to war with these
Gabby Browne: people and we will fight [00:54:00] regardless of if every single board dies on the battlefield. We want to give them a war that they will remember forever. This will change the existence of humanity.
That's what the Boars wanted with this war. Because
Aaron Couser: they want humans to feel the suffering of what they have
Gabby Browne: felt. He really wants them to suffer as they have suffered, and there's so much suffering and there's so much hate. And Ashi Taka is, is at his weakest point, the man of the hour. The man whose eyes are unclouded by hate.
The only one who can see through the lines pays bas out. And if we want to tune in to hear more of our deep dissection into Princess Modern. Okay. Tune in next episode for Part two
Spot Play.
All of our resources will be found in the show notes or on the website. Please check them out if you have any questions.[00:55:00]