[suki]
Liking Goku is really a strange thing for me. Back in May 2000, when I had no idea what Saiyuki was about and all the posters and magazine adds were driving me up a wall, I quite hated him. I thought he was a loud mouthed brat with bad tastes in clothes. Not to mention that I usually don't like the "kid" member of any team. While I certainly don't hate them, neither Gundam Wing's Quatre nor Weiß Kreuz's Omi are my cup of tea. There's nothing wrong with them as characters, I just prefer older characters. Minekura states Goku's supposed to look eighteen, but come on people. He looks no older than thirteen. He gets beaten into the dust by Touga Kiryuu (Shoujo Kakumei Utena) and Kouji Nanjo (Zetsuai), strikingly handsome men who are supposed to be sixteen. No, I quite disliked Goku. No doubt about it. 

Then came that fateful day when I saw volume 7. There's a wonderful extra story at the end of this volume (and heads up mates, the story never appeared in G Fantasy; don't you just love surprises in your manga?). While I don't remember the title (I don't actually own volume 7, since the chapters compiled there I already had from my G Fantasy magazines), I was very touched by this story. And all of my parenthetical references are spoiling the sweetness of this moment, aren't they? 

The story takes place when Goku was imprisoned. While in jail he would sit and look at the sky (as he puts it "like an idiot"). Many birds flew by, and one little bird kept coming back to Goku's cell. This made him very happy, and he grew very attached to it. The bird died, though, and Goku was devastated. In his anguish he starts to scream at the top of his lungs, and it's this screaming that Sanzo hears and that brings him to Goku's cell. 

While the story is the kind of sweet tale that screams manipulative and pushing all the right melodramatic buttons, I still loved it. I felt sorry for Goku, and once I realized I was touched by his situation I felt very guilty. I was being harsh to him by hating him so much. I was acting in the exact same way I hated to be treated whenever I, as a kid, would cry and scream because I was lonely. It's a show, people will say, then ignore you. That hurts. Children don't react like adults. They're not going to sit around sipping coffee and saying things like I'm not sure what's wrong with me... I just feel a little on edge, I guess. They cry and scream and act like brats, hoping someone will see beyond the facade and reach out to them. Sounds corny, doesn't it? Like something out of Chicken Soup for the Saiyuki Soul. Good lord. But it's all true, and what I'm trying to say is that I understand Goku. I know why he's such a brat, and I've genuinely come to like him because of it. 

I think there's a lot of sweet vulnerability in Goku as well. I'm not sure if these are any sort of paternal feelings kicking in (my favourite character is, after all, Hakkai), but I can't help but feel for this kid. I was very moved by the scenes that take place after Goku's fight with Kougaiji in volume 6. Feeling very guilty for having lost control once his circlet was removed, he tries to apologize to Gojyo, whom he wounded badly. The apology, though, is very tense, almost ripped out from him. He's very rough and embarrassed by it, and this how I can tell that the apology is real and heartfelt. You can see that Goku is almost fighting back tears. What really moved me, though, was his inability to look at Sanzo in the eyes after he almost killed him as a demon. You can see that it pains and shames him deeply. He's afraid that he's pushed away the person he loves most with his own hands, and this scares him so much that he can't even talk. This is sad. It's endearing and quite human. You've got to have a pretty tough heart if you don't feel at least a little bit of understanding towards this kid. 
 

[saru]  [omoshiroii]  [joudan + 500 nen mae]  [top]