i adore the way that the mononoke anime uses the medicine seller to both fill in for and alienate us as the viewers.
there are moments where he is there to ask the questions we want to ask, to work as a plot device that furthers the narrative of the arc. we fill a sort of kinship to his subtle reactions when the mononoke's story is being pieced together and the depths of human cruelty are exposed to him; the flickers of shock, of anger, disgust, irritation. even in the scenography, we are brought to look at the world from his perspective. for example, the introductory scenes of him in the zashiki-warashi arc, where we look at him from behind, while he looks at the inn. like we're being invited to observe alongside him.
then, sometimes even moments later, he pushes us away. whispers under his breath with no dialogue, leaving us guessing as to who and what he's talking to. where with a lot of other characters in the show, we get to hear parts of their internal dialogues, we never get that with the medicine seller. his thoughts are entirely seperated from us. in those moments, he's less of an audience surrogate and more his own character, like he's pushing us aside to figure it out ourselves.
which actually fits really well with his personality cuz he'll take the time to answer questions when he WANTS to but if he doesn't you'll be lucky to get him to tell you to duck before he starts throwing shit
