I guess this is a rant blog now cause I only ever open Tumblr when I feel like yelling about shit and no one around me is awake to hear it.
READ TAGS FIRST IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN EITHER TRIGUN SHOWS
For context Trigun (1998) is my favorite anime of all time bar none. The use of the Vash, Knives, and Wolfwood to explore the three philosophical outlooks (optimism, pessimism, nihilism) is something I think about so often. The way every thing and everyone is written in a way that feels natural, even the side characters are given three dimensional personalities that are often explored within the bounds of the episode they're featured in.
Even the character design of Vash is so intentional and tells you so much about him and says so much more as you learn. His arm being wrapped up and sealed away because he views its loss as a failure to stop his brother and because the technology used to replace it is just another way he doesn't fit in. It's a huge long reveal with a whole episode dedicated to why his arm is wrapped up like that. His large heavy coat that covers his whole body to hide the scars he's gained from every time he's had to sacrifice himself to do the right thing. Even the goofy hairstyle that he still keeps because that's what he thought was cool as a kid and how his "mom" did it for him.
Fast forward and now we got this shit
Why the fuck is he just and E-Boy??
It's not even a stylistic thing cause no one else in the entire fucking show dresses like this? It's also not because he's dressed like how they dressed before they landed on the planet cause Knives doesn't dress like that and in the flashbacks no one on the ship did either. SO where the fuck did he get this?
It's also just a boring ass design which is weird since it's a 3d model which allows the design to be more complex and not add much more animation time. Like take away the jacket and he's just The Rock minus the pearls. The gun just looks so out of place. Not to mention the prominent display of his arm which just pisses me off because it demonstrates how little they understand the character or reasoning behind the original story. Not to mention it's LITERALLY A SPOILER THAT IS NOW JUST ON DISPLAY AS PART OF THE DESIGN I GUESS.
And that brings me to the actual writing of the show
Who the fuck wrote this??
When I heard Trigun was getting a reboot I was hoping it would be a FMAB situation where they would be given the proper time to explore what happens in the manga and fix some of the pacing. For context the manga was coming out as the original show was being aired and the magazine it was being published in got cancelled about 6 episodes from the end of the season. As such those episodes feel rushed as the showrunners try to come up with an ending themselves. They did well enough that when the manga finally got picked up again, Yasuhiro decided to continue from where the show ended.
I know myself and a lot of other fans would have loved to see an adaptation of where the manga went after and a better exploration of the Knives, Wolfwood, Vash triangle that was rushed to get and ending.
But no, literally 12 FUCKING MINUTES INTO THE FIRST EPISODE OF TRIGUN: STAMPEDE AND EVERY MAJOR PLOT TWIST IS SPOILED THROUGH BULLSHIT EXPOSITION
Major plot spoilers for the original show follow, yes there are some above, but more are below.
Hey, you know how we slowly learn Vash's background and how him actually being an original settler and having a twin brother was a big reveal? Nope, literally the first scene of the entire show. Hey, remember how there's bits and pieces to allude to him and Knives being plants/angels, but it's never directly stated to keep that ere of subtlety? Yeah, Meryl just straight up gets told that's what he is and that he can fix the power plants cause everyone in town knows. Oh, how about the fact that no one truly knows who Vash is and how half of the entire show is people looking for him? Nope, everyone knows who he is and it's fine.
And even beyond that, the writing is just way more generic. The original show kinda made a point to never have pure evil villains, even one offs for the episode that never appear again. They're always given some deeper motivation and emotional drive that gets explored. How does Stampede handle this? Well, in the first episode a member of the peace keeping force tries to blow up the entire town Vash is in because he wants money. Obviously. No deeper meaning behind it, he is literally just generic evil villain. None of the subtlety of the original or moments to really let the audience think, just things happen.
Not to mention the borderline character assassination of Meryl and the literal assassination of Millie seeing as she literally doesn't exist now. For some reason.
In the original show Meryl and Millie are constantly used to subvert expectations. Initially the audience is lead to believe that they are naive and inexperienced kids hunting a dangerous criminal. Then it's revealed they're veteran agents of an insurance company who want to keep an eye on Vash cause he's causing them a lot of money, which is a funny subversion of the traditional investigator trope. Then it's revealed they actually have deep history and terrifying reputations amongst the underbelly of the planet and aren't the helpless damsels in distress you're initially led to believe they are. All of these things are used as vehicles to explore what the audience is preprogrammed to believe.
Anyway now Meryl is a naive, gungho journalist who has little to no real world experience. Cool. I guess.
And the issue is the new show is such gen-z/tiktok bait that it's almost consumed any mention of the name. Whenever I try to look up references for Knives I only get the new generic sci-fi bodysuit bullshit version of him.
And before anyone says, "well just be happy the show is bringing new fans, now the fans of the new show can be fans of the old show", you weren't paying attention. Again,
THEY SPOIL EVERY MAJOR PLOT TWIST IN THE FIRST TWELVE MINUTES OF EPISODE ONE THUS DESTROYING THE ENTIRE EXPERIENCE OF THE ORIGINAL SHOW
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