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Every JRPG boss battle is a reenactment of the most glorious moment in Japanese history (the expulsion of the Christian missionaries in 1622.)
Take a look at the concept art for Kefka's outfit and tell me it doesn't look like slightly camped-up 17th-century Papal regalia.
I mean technically the Christian’s were aligned with peasants too, Japan cracked down on Christianity for the same reasons it suppressed buddhism
weird feeling that that question might not require 90 minutes of video essay to answer
God is the first 'boss' we must defeat within. I read (idr where) interesting take of this from the western standpoint in Greek Mythology as a sort of economics take Saturn (ancient societies) defeating his parent Uranus (collectivist ancient societies) and in turn getting defeated by his child Zeus (artistocratic-feudal-and budding bourgeois society).
That is bullshit. I hate the idea that every myth is supposed to map to some very real thing that happened. And calling any iron age civilization "budding bourgeois" is asinine. You can't get that until complex steel tools emerge that significantly reduce the amount of labor needed to work a field, so feudal living becomes unsustainable.
No argument there, not to mention myths can speak to cultural symbols of multiple eras, get re-cast, forgotten and irrelevant, etc. I thought that was neat seeing some lib academic tying symbolism and economics together, though as you point out they fail their history of production pretty hard.
I'm gonna say I don't think economics and mythology will ever precisely map onto each other. Only thing like that is the prosperity gospel, and that's a school of thought running counter to most of Christian mythology.
i see how many chapter markers are and i know im dealing with a work of art
Am I the only one who likes having long video essays to listen to while playing video games or doing chores? It means I have to alt-tab less and it's something to listen to while my friends are at work or whatever
i do it with pirated audiobooks. let's me keep listening to something all day with no ads. also i finally got some bluetooth headphones so i don't have to run around with my phone on me, and someone tries to talk to me i can just pause by pressing the button on the side of the headphone.
u/SocialistWombat I listened to this twice and wasn’t able to pierce the veil. What this guys deal? Is the channel just baby’s first anticapitalism but for weebs?
Long story is this; Japan had several moments of monarchical rule under a crushing government that promised a 'good life' if you obeyed.
At one point the closet thing they had that promised an future under more equal turns (the buddist Ikko-Ikki) proposed that their 'gods' were false, that anyone can be one, however this had been utterly crushed during the sengoku period.
This cycle of 'gods' has continued into the modern age, with the latest 'god' being capitalism. And like all the gods before it seemed permanent and true. However, all gods die in time, and for some Japanese people that's within living memory (the removal of god-hood from the Japanese emperor). Therefore, to the Japanese gods are things that can, and should, be supplanted and ascended to when they no longer serve humanity.
TL;DR: 'Gods' are bullshit. The people are angry.
(As for this channel being strictly anti-captialist. Yeah, it does strike me as babbies first anticaptialism, but it does have some pretty fun insights)
I mean I “got” it (and I’m not referring to the acute early onset schizophrenia induced by listening to an hour and a half description of how insanely destructive capital has been to Japanese society sandwitched by sponsor plugs with a mid roll ad and plug in the description) but like the whole thing was delivered so inoffensively and with such neutral tone that I genuinely couldn’t clock if the cringey gamer metaphor conclusion was imploring the viewer to join a party and tear down the state or smash foreign idols or even just recognize your insignificance and reproduce your class.
Reading the comments didn’t clear anything up either because it was just a bunch of corrections about the director of Kirby games and true sexual pathology havers yelling “do xenogears”.
Like are they an anime trot? Amano/namura thought? Marxist-Leninist-Tominoist? I can’t come up with a banderite Japanese analog but you get the idea. Like are they even on some kind of political spectrum their essay can be set in or is their whole deal “this capitalism things not lookin’ so hot fellas”?
You kill Primals, which are basically gods, in FFXIV (though they often come back to life rather easily, faith and crystals permitting), but what happens around the goddess, Hydaelyn, is a bit more complicated in Endwalker.
spoiler
You basically play out a "why are people mortal and why can't the divine do more to help us" morality play, except it makes a lot more sense than typical Biblical interpretations.
