Something I noted about Gintama 272 (also, hi there, Dreamwidth)

[rainsometimes]

(Trying to get back into the swing of posting to Dreamwidth, so here's the repost of something I put on Tumblr yesterday.)

Rewatching the "Jōi reunion" arc (episode 271 and 272), there was something that stuck with me about Katsura's and Sakamoto's reactions to the real flashback:

Assuming the true flashback we finally got to see was largely correct, Katsura and Sakamoto really didn't have anything to do with Kurokono getting allegedly blown up. It was all on Gintoki and Takasugi for having secretly put explosives in the temple in order to spring a trap on the enemy.

But for all that there’s a lot of comedy in how they're all failing to keep their cool and are really freaking out over the revealed memory – and about the possibility that they've been summoned to this reunion by a ghost – Zura and Sakamoto don't try to pin this squarely on Gintoki. Not long before this they were pettily demanding to be repaid for small amounts of money Gintoki allegedly owed them since over ten years ago, but there's a limit to the comical pettiness. It's all "we did this", "we forgot he was there and then buried the memory (and oh god, is his ghost out to get us now??)", not, "You're on your own now, Gintoki! *flees*". Or even, "Oh no, it was all the fault of those two brats but Kurokono might not realise that and be after us two as well!" Nope.


(Of course, since Kurokono was revealed to have lived after all, maybe he was in on the secret plan and Gintoki just forgot that, in the present day. But that's tangential to my point.)

What do you think?

Comments

[naye]

Haa! I hadn't actually thought about this in a serious light, what with the entire thing being a Kuroko no Basket parody (I've seen like... three episodes of that show, and it was enough to make the Gintama references hilarious). But - yeah, that's really very telling about their relationship. ♥

[rainsometimes]

Yeah, the whole thing is mostly played for comedy, but I felt that some of the real flashback itself and the reactions to it are made to come across as a little more serious. Just a little.

(I was particularly struck by how it didn't seem to have registered for any of them right at the time that "hello, our comrade was just in that temple that blew up", as they were swept away in the excitement of the moment. It actually felt pretty believable to me, psychologically speaking... Arguably callous but perhaps also a necessary compartmentalisation.)