He never really raised her though. She was old enough to give birth to a child before she encountered Kiritsugu. He took her in and mentored her, but that's not really enough to make him her father, adopted or otherwise. And nothing in the VN or anime implies that either.
That's incredibly non-specific (given that one can carry a child to term while a remarkably young age, ick ick), and that it just doesn't change much.
Wade has a point. Who was Maiya, to him? Because in every way their relationship was inappropriate.
If she was his daughter of sorts, then he's fucked in the head because you don't do that.
If she was his tool, then again, don't have sex with guns.
And if she was livestock blah blah blah blah.
Basically, Kiritsugu took someone with very little humanity, stripped the rest of it out, put clothes on her back, a gun in her right and a spell in her left, and told her to go kill and die for him.
I agree with you on pretty much everything except this. If that's his fetish, who are we to say it's inappropriate? It's his own fault if he blows his nuts off one day.
Most of this in just assumptions. All we know about Maiya's situation is: She was once a child soldier, and once Kiritsugu ended the war, she followed him.
Did Kiritsugu make her do it? Did Kiritsugu tolerate her? Or did Maiya have to prove herself before Kiritsugu let her travel with him? We don't know.
Was Maiya still a child? We don't know.
We know nothing about the circumstances. Only that, eventually, Kiritsugu tool Maiya as an assistant.
As a side note, I've always pitied Kiritsugu. The whole 'Kill 1 to save 10' thing? I always thought that Natalie only taught him that as a coping mechanism, to help him get over his father's death. And then he had to kill her to save a bunch of lives, and... Well... His breakdown afterwards shows he wasn't in a good place. His 'Kill 1 to save 10' thing was the only thing that kept him moving. Until he met Irisviel, at least.
So many of Kiritsugu's problems could have been avoided if Shirley would have just not used herself as a guinea pig for an untested immortality potion.
But as far as it goes....I don't care how tragic your past is, once you sink to the depths of "banging my surrogate daughter I raised to be an emotionless killing machine so I don't lose my capacity to be a douchebag and hesitate to callously sacrifice my wife" then you forfeit my sympathies.
Yeah, pretty much. There's a tragedy to him, so it's hard for me to outright loathe him, but he's just... for real? For real? You seriously thought it would be as easy as 'blunt-instrument my way to the Grail, wish for peace on Earth, Grail does the heavy lifting and the complicated thinking, peace on Earth achieved'? Why?! When has anything good or easy ever happened to you? Jesus Wept, you're worse than Kayneth!
Considering his own backstory, I'm pretty sure it's a case of the blind leading the blind. He only starts slowly getting better after he meets Iri, and even then he's still not that great a guy.
Kiritsugu mentored Maiya, who ended up completely subservient to him, unsuited for any kind of normal life, and in bed with him.
Kotomine Kirei mentored Rin Tohsaka, and the worst he did was empty her family coffers, either because he cannot into finances or because he thinks poverty is good for the soul.
Kiritsugu cheated on his wife.
Kirei remained faithful to his until her death.
And when Kirei was handed a girl, his response was "Holy cow! A messed up guy like me is the last person who should be an influence on her!" And he gave Hortensia to others to raise.
I mean, Kiritsugu wanted to save the world and (post Gil) Kirei wants to see it burn for kicks, but dang if it doesn't seem that Mr. Rejoice's moral compass functions a lot better where close personal relationships are concerned than his rival's does.
Kiritsugu mentored Maiya, who ended up completely subservient to him, unsuited for any kind of normal life, and in bed with him.
Kotomine Kirei mentored Rin Tohsaka, and the worst he did was empty her family coffers, either because he cannot into finances or because he thinks poverty is good for the soul.
Kiritsugu cheated on his wife.
Kirei remained faithful to his until her death.
And when Kirei was handed a girl, his response was "Holy cow! A messed up guy like me is the last person who should be an influence on her!" And he gave Hortensia to others to raise.
I mean, Kiritsugu wanted to save the world and (post Gil) Kirei wants to see it burn for kicks, but dang if it doesn't seem that Mr. Rejoice's moral compass functions a lot better where close personal relationships are concerned than his rival's does.
I'm pretty sure Kirei impoverished Rin intentionally because it's what he gets off to, and his wife's last moments were spent wishing that he'd be the one to kill her.
Still, your conclusion is...illuminating. I think I need to sit down and process this.
Kiritsugu mentored Maiya, who ended up completely subservient to him, unsuited for any kind of normal life, and in bed with him.
Kotomine Kirei mentored Rin Tohsaka, and the worst he did was empty her family coffers, either because he cannot into finances or because he thinks poverty is good for the soul.
Kiritsugu cheated on his wife.
Kirei remained faithful to his until her death.
And when Kirei was handed a girl, his response was "Holy cow! A messed up guy like me is the last person who should be an influence on her!" And he gave Hortensia to others to raise.
I mean, Kiritsugu wanted to save the world and (post Gil) Kirei wants to see it burn for kicks, but dang if it doesn't seem that Mr. Rejoice's moral compass functions a lot better where close personal relationships are concerned than his rival's does.
Yeah. IMHO? The whole point of Kirisugu was he was a sad, bitter shell of a man who was destroyed by the choices he made. Fate/Zero was just the process of showing that to him and the reader. He's one of the harshest deconstructions of hard men making hard decisions. Every decisions he made, no matter how practical, cold blooded, or logical, earned him nothing in the end. (Good luck explaining that the the crowd who just looked at his actions and went "woah, this guy is awesome" though). I mean, for fucks sake, Archer was less broken then he was by the end, and likely a large chunk of that was that Archer still had things he cared about enough not to sacrifice for his dreams.
I mean, its pretty telling that the only times Kiri gets anything close to happiness is when he stops his insane quest.
Also note: the info on Maya giving birth to a child is from the LN. It was a bit of characterization that was cut off from Irisviel and Maya's last dialogue.
Basically, in between missions as a child soldier, the boys would sometimes come to the girls' barracks and have some "fun" (it's left vague whether it was mutually consensual) until Maya got pregnant and gave birth to a child she then abandonned. It's pretty heart breaking that one of Irisviel's last words to Maya were kinda like "Once Kiritsugu saves the world and you are no longer needed, why don't you try to find your child and make up for lost time, try to be happy?"
But I digress.
Good episode, but I'm left wanting more (not in the "MOAR!" sense of episode 3, but in the sense of "that's all?"). Rin's WTF face is epic, the pursuit is hilarious (also damn, she makes intense use of that gravity manipulation spell), and god damn they managed to give Rider that smexy, dangerous, animalistic vibe (also, dat cleavage! No need for volleyball sized boobs when you have such nice, well proportioned assets).
On the downside, I found the animation during Rider's slow close in on Shirou to be somewhat... clunky?
The dialogue at the end about the failure of Kiritsugu as a Magus mentor is also quite nice. Gives a lot of insight on the relationship between Rin and her own father, too, and what it means to her to be a Magus.
Kiritsugu is pathetic, sure. That's the whole point. He's broken and insane and fully aware of it, chasing after the one thing he believes can make his impossible ideals a reality. The fact that he's kind of disgusting should come as a surprise to precisely nobody.
...I can't imagine how... arduous the process to draw this frame was.
On the whole Kiritsugu thing, I find him to be boring. Badass? God, Kirei is much more badass than him. Depth? Waver has more depth than him, wait, no, pretty much everyone around him (all of whom he eventually screw) is more interesting than him. He doesn't even feel like the protagonist of the story, that honor fell to Waver Velvet, a no-name, whiny, book smart boy who would eventually become the badass that is Lord El-Melloi II (and in my headcanon, his wife is a tsundere~).
I mean, god, I find Jotaro Kujo, the most boring character in JoJo to be more interesting than him. Comparing Kiritsugu to Shirou is like comparing Jotaro to Johnny, they're on a different level altogether. Then again, it'll be entertaining to see all of those people's opinion when they get to the Archer fight.
What are your qualifications for a protagonist? Because I'm legitimately curious.
Like, I can empathize with everything else you're saying (even if I don't agree with all of it), but I would not, cannot dispute Kiritsugu's role in the story.
Sakura continues to be adorable with her impression of Taiga.
Was I the only one who thought Saber was giving Sakura a "You talking to me?" look, because she was interrupted while eating.
After Saber said she is happy to get to know Sakura, I know that's not what he was thinking, but I can't help seeing Shirou's satisfied look being equated to "Good, good. The harem is getting along."
Saber needs to stop looking cute and adorable and just dopeslap Shirou.
Boobs, legs....No, no, it was something important. Something about some anime with mythical heroes and-
Oooh, Rider's boobs. We need Hyoudou Issei to comment here.
DxD!Issei: THEY ARE PERFECT! RIDER'S OPPAI ARE PERFECTION ITSELF! ALL HAIL THE GLORIOUS OPPAI!
Thank you, Issei.
(It actually makes sense, since Medusa and her sisters were made on humanities wish for perfect goddesses. IIRC.)
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Shirou, Shirou, Shirou. When are you going to stop focusing on the "proper" order of things, and develop some survival instincts?
Shirou: "So about our fight, wanna finish it?"
Rin: "Nah, I'm good for today. Let's go back to my crub so we can make-"
Shirou: "Woah, woah, woah."
Rin: "-Sure that your injuries are treated. What? What did you think I was talking about?"
Yes, I know that's not how it happened. I'm improvising, since Anime Misunderstandings, are thankfully absent here.
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Shirou causally mentioning his actual skill level. ` Honestly, I almost think he's doing it to get a reaction out of Rin.
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Finally, that last conversation involving Kiritsugu.
Rin: "He put being your father before being a Magus."
Damn, as much as I dislike certain aspects of Kiritsugu, I like that part about him. Sure, he screwed Shirou over because Shirou didn't have the skills to be prepared for the Grail War, but its not like Kiritsugu had anyway of know the future.
Feel really bad for Rin though. That look when she was a kid and all alone. Damn, just damn. `
What are your qualifications for a protagonist? Because I'm legitimately curious.
Like, I can empathize with everything else you're saying (even if I don't agree with all of it), but I would not, cannot dispute Kiritsugu's role in the story.
This is just my opinion but, for the character to be called the protagonist, he should be the main focus of the story. If the main focus isn't on him, then I can't really call him the protagonist. As it happens, with how the story being written like an actual war epic (props to Urobuchi there), everyone's role are divided rather equally. But then, we actually got more focus on Waver than Kiritsugu.
I'll admit, that Kiritsugu did a lot of things. They are, however, largely inconsequential. You can replace him with pretty much anyone and get a similar result. He's also not active for most of the story too, mostly staying in the background and only appearing at the end of the fight. The one time he takes the main stage before Iri's kidnapping was the first fight against Keyneth.
I don't know, I might just be rambling but he just... doesn't have much of a presence throughout the story compared to, say, Saber, Velvet, and Kirei. It's like he's just a footnote, only there for the sake of Kirei, Saber, and Shirou, to bring about Fate/stay night. I might be wrong but that's how I honestly felt about him.
Edit: @A Nation's Virtue
Citation on that? Because the anime has her as a child soldier Kiritsugu found wounded on a battlefield and nursed back to health.
Just saw this. Act 13 Part 4 of the Light Novel. She mentions that she has a child that is somewhere out there, probably still fighting. She doesn't know who the father is as she'd been raped by the other soldiers in the army.
Yeah, pretty much. There's a tragedy to him, so it's hard for me to outright loathe him, but he's just... for real? For real? You seriously thought it would be as easy as 'blunt-instrument my way to the Grail, wish for peace on Earth, Grail does the heavy lifting and the complicated thinking, peace on Earth achieved'? Why?! When has anything good or easy ever happened to you? Jesus Wept, you're worse than Kayneth!
On the other hand, expecting to just wish at it without knowing how you want it to be fulfilled is pretty stupid. That's Wishology 101, you make a wish that is as detailed as possible in its execution because otherwise, nine times out of ten, it will be fulfilled in the worst way possible.
Just what did he expect when he thought he could make the wish to make the world peaceful, anyway?
you make a wish that is as detailed as possible in its execution because otherwise, nine times out of ten, it will be fulfilled in the worst way possible.
Actually even the untainted Grail won't let him achieve world peace unless he knows exactly how(or he can throw a shitton of magic at it). A global curse on everyone that does violence might be possible or maybe a magical lobotomy that removes all violent thoughts.
On the other hand, expecting to just wish at it without knowing how you want it to be fulfilled is pretty stupid. That's Wishology 101, you make a wish that is as detailed as possible in its execution because otherwise, nine times out of ten, it will be fulfilled in the worst way possible.
Just what did he expect when he thought he could make the wish to make the world peaceful, anyway?
I don't know, maybe Magic? Or extremely potent Wishcraft, which does not work in any way like you described? It's literally just imagine the result, and then pump as much prana into it as you need to achieve your goal.
I don't know, maybe Magic? Or extremely potent Wishcraft, which does not work in any way like you described? It's literally just imagine the result, and then pump as much prana into it as you need to achieve your goal.
World Peace is not a simple, one time thing that can be accomplished by simply teleporting everyone who was fighting back home.
He doesn't have a clear enough grasp of what the world would look like 'peaceful' to actually accomplish world peace, even with Wishcraft and unlimited energy.
Rider.
