The Totally Epic HikaGo Reread - Vol. 1
May. 12th, 2010 12:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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Happy Wednesday, everyone!
ARE YOU READY FOR SOME HIKARU NO GO?
Yes? Excellent. Let's get this party started - to the comments with your thoughts, observations, revelations, etc!
(A reminder - there are several people who are reading the series for the first time, let's try to keep spoilers to a minimum.)
(A reminder - there are several people who are reading the series for the first time, let's try to keep spoilers to a minimum.)
A question - how did the one volume/week work for you? Was it doable, difficult, ridiculously easy? Do we want to stay with it or kick it up to two volumes a week (or down to chapters a week)?
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
To get things started:
Date: 2010-05-12 05:13 pm (UTC)* It's always so interesting to go back to the start (or near the start, I know Obata did a couple of things before this) of someone's artistic career and look at the progress they've made. The start of HikaGo looks nothing like the end of HikaGo (or, say, DeathNote).
* Although, early art or not, the man knows how to make a game of Go exciting.
* I continue to be super amused by Ogata's nosejob + makeover.
* I need more HikaGo icons.
Re: To get things started:
Date: 2010-05-12 05:39 pm (UTC)Urks, yes. Most definitely!
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Date: 2010-05-12 08:59 pm (UTC)When I was reading vol 1. for the first time I got completely off track when Hikaru started to want to play for himself. I like to try to guess where a story is going and here I guessed wrong: I believed Hikaru when he accused Sai of possessing his body:
http://www.mangafox.com/manga/hikaru_no_go/v01/c000/167.html
From then on I imagined all sorts of crazy outcomes (I knew nothing of the manga beforehand and had no idea what to expect), particularly as I wasn't certain that Sai was a 'good guy' (haunting by force, Go by bribery etc.). So I imagined Sai possessing Hikaru and then perhaps going after Akari, who he notices even though Hikaru himself couldn't care less, and who is obviously interested in Hikaru (and perhaps would therefore be in Sai disguised as Hikaru). In Heian times she would have been of marrying age of course. Then I started to wonder what this book had been doing in the children's manga section of the library where I'd found it ° _°
I was happily completely wrong but, as one of the stranger ideas that the story left me with, it has stayed with me.
Thank you for organizing the reread!
*A descendant of the Fujiwara? ^=^
Re: To get things started:
From:eeee!
Date: 2010-05-13 01:59 am (UTC)Sai is very pretty! I love how he kind of hovers over Hikaru. It's awesome - those scenes are beautiful. And he really loves Go. That guy who cheated was a total douchebag. :|
Akira is very cute! But I really haven't seen enough of her to make a real impression. *G*
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Date: 2010-05-12 05:23 pm (UTC)Ogata, oh my. I love that character so much and later he gets so attractive, it's hard for me not to wince at the early drawings. But yeah, part of what fascinates me about long manga (or comic) series is the artist's development.
I adored Sai right away, the panels that show him kind of floating over Hikaru are so beautiful.
Also, I love the recurring theme of "goban as universe".
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Date: 2010-05-12 05:30 pm (UTC)<3 Sai - there are so many ways to screw a character like him up (too annoying, too 2D, too serious) and they avoided all of them.
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Date: 2010-05-12 05:51 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2010-05-12 06:53 pm (UTC)http://img268.imagevenue.com/img.php?image=82770_vlcsnap_01037_123_75lo.jpg
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Date: 2010-05-12 06:00 pm (UTC)oh hikaruuuu. Look how much he's changed from his first impression, when he just comes across as this bored dorky kid who's barely listening to Sai, even though Sai has all these DRAMATIC PANELS and EPIC GO TALES, Hikaru's like LA LA LA PENCIL ON MY NOSE LA LA LA
sdkfljsdfdsf; he grows up so much over the course of the series, oh, my heart.
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Date: 2010-05-12 06:06 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2010-05-12 06:16 pm (UTC)(Goddamnit all my HikaGo icons are at LJ ...)
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Date: 2010-05-13 01:40 am (UTC)PS is this watching-campfire party going to happen? I totes want it to but I get why it'd be kind of a logistical nightmare.
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Date: 2010-05-13 03:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-05-12 06:09 pm (UTC)This is related to re-reading and re-watching the first few episodes, and reading
Hikaru no Go transcends that. It's not just a board game. It's not just people competing over territory.
I have to admit that I never saw it as ironic in any way that these characters, these people would care so much about a board game in the first place.
I didn't need to be drawn in, I didn't need to be convinced.
But: I'm biased. I spent most of my time in school competing in the IMO (International Maths Olympiad), up to the national level. There were rivalries*. There was passion.
I never thought being passionate about a board game was ridiculous or laughable in the first place.
HikaGo doesn't just rob you of your irony. It sands down a layer of jadedness.
* Yes, I *did* have my very own eternal rival. ;)
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Date: 2010-05-12 06:38 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2010-05-12 06:41 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2010-05-12 06:48 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2010-05-13 01:22 am (UTC)The whole thing was about our *love of football* and our passion for the game, and trying to get together to work as a unit to create the best, most pure form of that game that we could; we were searching for football's version of the hand of god every lunch hour.
So for us, it really was 'all about the game', in that sense. We didn't get to experience the rivalry thing in the same way, though there was some internal friendly competition.
I never saw the love of this game as ironic either. And the way Hikaru gets interested, by being exposed to this intense love for something he thought was boring and uninteresting, resonates with me so well because that's exactly how I got involved in the daily football games (well, minus the being haunted by arguably the best player in history thing).
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Date: 2010-05-12 06:24 pm (UTC)Opening credits on http://onkoona.livejournal.com/2642.html
Closing Credits on http://onkoona.livejournal.com/2898.html
Ep 1 part 1 http://onkoona.livejournal.com/3130.html
part 2 http://onkoona.livejournal.com/3451.html
check in a little later and the rest should be up too
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Date: 2010-05-12 06:25 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2010-05-12 09:05 pm (UTC)(Though now I want to rewatch the anime, too. >.>)
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Date: 2010-05-12 09:48 pm (UTC)I'm really excited about the reread too! And really happy to be sharing it with everyone else.
(There's been some talk of rewatching the anime, possibly with live Campfire chats! Which would be a blast but logistically challenging.)
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Date: 2010-05-13 01:34 am (UTC)I love Hikaru's character; he's so nonchalante about being haunted, about this ghost with such a passion for something that he defied death and waited a hundred years just to play this game once more... god, so powerful a premise, and Hikaru is just like "meh, Go's BORING" *lol*. I love how we get to see Hikaru captivated not by Go, at first, but by these people who love and are VERY SRS about the game; it's their passions that make him feel like he's missing out, something that I totally relate to and love. The first time I read this manga I was so pissed at Hikaru, for being so selfish *lol* Now I can appreciate the moxy it takes to tell a haunting spirit that their 150 year passion will just have to wait until Hikaru doesn't have something better to do.
And speaking of passion, I love that Hikaru and Touya encounter one another so early and IMMEDIATELY get under one another's skin; Touya is PISSED that this kid who's never played before totally schooled him (lol literally, get it? get it? *is shot*) and Hikaru is all starry-eyed by Touya's intensity, even before he understands how freaking GOOD Touya is (the bit where Sai totally kicks Touya's butt and then Hikaru tries to show that he gets it now, that he doesn't think taking Go seriously is dumb, he wants to make Touya feel better and not be thought of badly... so cute!). It's so fun to see this early rivalry, and to know how it changes....
I started reading it, and the seven year old son of my roommate came in the room, and he was like "what's that?" So I told him, summarized the premise, and began reading aloud to him; he was immediately interested and I realized all over again how powerful this manga is. Then he saw the image of the front cover, announced "He (Hikaru) looks sick in colour", so I had to tell him about the anime, and we watched the first episode. He had trouble getting over Sai's looks in colour ("he's wearing lip gloss *giggle*") but halfway through the first he was making me promise we'd watch the second episode together too, and had me explain Go to him (which was actually a problem, since I am a terrible HnG fan and never learned even the basics of the game really well, so I failed miserably at that--he'd wanted me to show him why Touya lost the first game against Hikaru).
tl;dr HnG is LOVE.
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Date: 2010-05-13 01:48 am (UTC)MY PITIFUL REACTION TO THIS POST, BASICALLY I AM JUST LIKE YES *DRAWS HEARTS AROUND* EVERYTHING
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Date: 2010-05-13 05:47 am (UTC)checking people i come to know that the mayor part of the male fans learn to play go and we the females start to read or/and write fanfiction
What do you think about it!
I'm really happy rereading this!!!
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Date: 2010-05-19 04:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-05-19 05:03 am (UTC)my iTunes is psychic, I gave up on having the music in my head and turned it on and it was timed pretty well for a few songs, AND THEN IT PLAYED "HIGH WALL" RIGHT AS TOUYA SURRENDERED AND FELT THE WALL IN FRONT OF HIM
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Date: 2010-05-23 05:40 am (UTC)Also, I think Hikaru may actually have superpowers, considering his apparent ability to shoot pebbles shaped like go stones horizontally from his fingers.