Fushigi Yuugi: First Star I See - Romance

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The title of this page refers to the alarming tendency these characters show to fall in love at first sight. It is also a horrible pun, of course (sei-star). Let’s take our couples one at a time.

Miaka and Tamahome

I didn’t, actually, take these two as love-at-first-sight so much as siblings-at-first-sight. Tamahome even says so, at one point; that he’ll be her big brother if she needs one (Ep 3) and that Miaka seemed like a little sister at first (Ep 31). He certainly teases her like one, during their initial go-round over whether he’ll help her find Yui. Admittedly, it doesn’t take long for them to move on to romantic love. By the end of Episode Three, we have his first proclamation that he will always protect her. That seems to be the lynchpin of their relationship. I was relieved to see that it’s mutual. As we see first in Episode Ten, these two both have (suffer) an imperative desire to spare each other pain. Tamahome berates Miaka for putting herself in danger, Miaka insists that he shouldn’t risk himself to protect her. This cycle of conflicting imperatives finally results in a flat declaration from Tamahome: “I live to protect you. I live only for you” (Ep 12). Despite how high on my squick scale the idea of equating love solely with protection rates, this scene still made me feel better about Miaka’s soppy adoration of Tamahome. At least it’s mutual. It’s a start. I was also entertained that, while Tamahome is upset that Miaka put herselt at risk fighting Soi, Nuriko and Tasuki compliment her fighting ability (Ep 30). We do have some countervailing opinions that favor spunk over safety; I liked that.

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Soi and Nakago

This one, on the other hand, is notably un-mutual and put my hackles up in a big way. Here’s Soi, a very powerful woman who can not only call storms but also control sexual magic (generally the province of foxes, I believe), and she’s hopelessly stuck on an ice cube. I mean, really, how would you like to be told “there’s only one who can fulfill my needs, and you’re not her”? Now there it is, all laid out–what Nakago desires is power and Soi can’t provide enough. I can understand gratitude to the one who freed her from a life of abuse as a low-class prostitute (devotion at first sight, perhaps), but this is ridiculous. She even dies for Nakago’s sake (shades of Yumi). Now, he does carry her body away with him and back to the capital. I presume he decided her service deserved a decent burial, but it struck me as a serious case of too little, too late.

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Yui and Tamahome

Another un-mutual love, though from the other direction. I’ve seen a number of debates over whether Yui really loved Tamahome or not. This is a sadly reductive way of interpreting a complex character (complex characters/motivations seeming to be the specialty of this show). Personally, I think she probably did feel something. But I think only some of it was her own emotion. At the very first, Yui and Miaka gaze up at their rescuer with identical expressions of relief and wow-what-a-hunk-awareness. There’s the first-sight seed. But Yui is pissed off that he asks for money, while Miaka just fishes around for some. The first point at which we have some indication that Yui likes Tamahome is in Episode Seven. Yui notes that she “feels the same pain and anguish” as Miaka, Miaka having just stabbed herself with a plate shard and Yui having felt the pain and found blood on herself. This moment is juxtaposed with Yui’s discovery of Tamahome’s name and her blush as she speaks it aloud. The implication is that Yui is also feeling Miaka’s love. And, let’s admit it here, she reacts to the hero of the story she’s reading exactly as most of us react to the hero/heroine of the stories we view…now doesn’t she? Anyone got the brass to put her down for that? Yet another moment to remind us of our own presence and reactions as the audience–they’re all over the place. Once Yui gets Tamahome into Kutou, she tells him “after she betrayed me I can’t let her have you” (Ep 18). This is the first of many indications that the competition for Tamahome, at least on Yui’s side, is really about Miaka. At the last, Yui admits she was just angry that Miaka had left her for Tamahome, though she did love him (Ep 50). It’s a complex answer for a complex character.

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Yui and Miaka

I’m not suggesting that this is a romantic love, though it would be dead easy to write fics in that direction given the material we have. I do think it’s very clear that Yui and Miaka love each other. Between the examples cited above, we have Yui’s statement “I’ve driven away the one I love with my own hands” (Ep 22); a picture of Tamahome quickly gives way to one of Miaka. Tatara insists to Yui that that she really does love Miaka; Yui says she doesnt love Miaka, the one she really loves is… and trails off (Ep 43). Nakago even asks her, “who is it you love, that girl or Tamahome?” (Ep 46). When Miaka is dying of having stabbed herself, it’s Yui who directs her back to life and tells her to listen for her friends (Ep 6). It’s Yui’s strong feelings that draw Miaka back to their world. As Miaka says, “we’re connected. Strongly. Deeply!” (Ep 7). When Miaka returns to the book world, she goes back for both her loves. “I’m coming Yui-chan, Tamahome” she says (Ep 8). And as Yui says at the very end, “I know you better than Tamahome” (Ep 50). Really, this love story is easily as beautiful as the one between Miaka and Tamahome, and I think it’s given equal weight.

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Yui and Nakago

And then there’s the really weird one. It’s in Yui’s interactions with Nakago that we see most clearly just how unblanced she is by/in the book world. Right up until the end she takes it for granted that Nakago will do whatever she says, despite scenes like the one in Episode Twenty where she smacks him one. Nakago tells her that he’s doing this (using Tamahome to torment Miaka) to make her happy; she responds, “Do you really think this makes me happy?” On some level, Yui knows that Nakago is toying with her. Yet he’s the one she runs to when in pain or doubt. It makes a certain amount of sense, if we assume that Nakago has been playing serious mind games with her–not an unreasonable assumption, given what we do know about his efforts to condition her into distrusting Miaka. For example, despite the power and ruthlesness he displays quite casually he never does anything to threaten Yui until the very end. Given that he saved her from an assault and stands as her protector, and that he shows Yui what he’s capable of without ever directing the danger at her, it is equally reasonable for Yui to think he must have some reason for protecting her from himself as well as other threats. After all, if he wanted something from her wouldn’t he just force it from her…if he didn’t love her? And since Yui has had a very clear experience of needing a protector, her will to believe in Nakago’s affection and devotion clouds her awareness that he’s manipulating her. For a good account of at least one goal of said manipulation, see Sarah Davis’ page on Yui, I Wish.

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Suboshi and Yui

Suboshi, on the other hand, offers Yui something real, albeit certainly not as polished as Nakago’s front. We see two clear examples of how Suboshi feels about Yui. The first goes rather astray, as he kisses her and she flees in shock and horror. Well, can you blame the girl? The second works out rather better, probably because Suboshi seeks to offer comfort rather than express passion. He embraces her from behind (a more protective and supportive position than coming at her from the front), and simply tells her that he’ll always be there for her. Above all, Suboshi makes the same statement about Yui that Tamahome makes about Miaka: that he loves her no matter what may have happened to her, eg rape (Ep 36). More about that on the Fascination page. I find it interesting that all this stems from Yui’s gesture to comfort Suboshi when Amiboshi has been (temporarily) drowned. She offers understanding. After a brief detour, Suboshi offers it back. It strikes me as a much better basis for an affectionate relationship than the emotional blackmail between Yui and Nakago. Though I will allow that both Yui and Suboshi share with Nakago a tendency to rage. All three are very in touch with that particular reaction to injury.

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Miaka and Nuriko

Another relationship built on mutuality. The writers/artists went to some trouble to present these two as alike. Right from the start, when they trade slaps in the fight over Tamahome and Hotohori (Ep 4), their reactions are established as similar. Their reunion in Episode Twelve features them clasping hands and bouncing up and down while remarking, “You’re just as gay as ever!” and “You’re just as stupid as ever!” Give you three guesses who’s saying what. Their trip out on the town for festival (Ep 26) and their matching desire for dessert rounds out the silly-girl similarities nicely. By Episode Thirty-two, Nuriko’s attitude has shifted a bit. This is the point at which he says outright that he loves Miaka. At first this is in the context of loving everyone in the team, but also in the context of feeling more manly. I was interested that dying for a person or cause is equated with manliness. Not that this shift alleviates anyone’s confusion. As Tamahome says, Nuriko talks like a woman, but seems like an older brother. In this episode, we also get the slightly equivocal statement from Nuriko that the woman in him loves Hotohori, but he’s always loved Miaka. I took this to mean he loves Miaka with all sides of himself, though the review in the next episode specifies loving Miaka as a man. Then again, when Tasuki says he could never figure out whether Nuriko was a man or a woman Miaka offers the classic line, “Neither; Nuriko was just Nuriko” (Ep 33). The closing sequence for this episode shows Nuriko in Miaka’s world, shopping, driving, etc. together. Half the time it looks like a date, half the time it looks like best girl-pals out on a spree. I put it to you that Nuriko can’t be nailed down all the way, and that’s what we’re supposed to take away from this character. I mean, will everyone please take a good close look at Nuriko’s earrings in this shot? And is that a symbol for balance? Dear me, I do believe it is. But he definitely loved Miaka. How? Well, like I said…

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Hotohori and Miaka

Meanwhile, we have Hotohori languishing in unrequited love. Talk about love at first sight, he decides they should be in love before she even shows up! In some ways, I see this as parallel to Nakago and Soi–the tragic, doomed, but true love that cannot be. Hotohori certainly shows the sincerity of his feeling for Miaka. Episode Twenty-one features him doing a funky power thing to save Miaka from drowning, followed by his avowing intention to “spend my whole life protecting you.” If that’s the measure of Tamahome’s feeling, it seems to hold equally true for Hotohori. He’s pretty clearheaded about it, though. You note that he doesn’t fall for the mirror-Miaka when she bats her eyelashes at him. Even though she’s saying exactly what he wants to hear, he knows the ‘real’ Miaka wouldn’t say it that way (Ep 6). Despite being unspeakably vain, he does seem to have his head screwed on right.

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Nuriko and Hotohori

Sufficiently right, at any rate, that something in him does seem to have taken note of Nuriko’s own unrequited love. Sufficient notice, at any rate, that he marries someone who’s practically Nuriko’s double. Curious though, the statement that the artwork makes about that. Take these two pictures. Houki is leaning on Hotohori, but also facing away from him, and for his part he’s just standing there looking down at her. Not a lot of action, or even interaction. The picture with Nuriko is a lot more animated. Nuriko, of course, faces out; I have trouble imagining Nuriko hanging onto anyone unless he intended to trip him and beat him to the ground. Hotohori, though, is also looking more alive; he stands more casually with arms crossed, and is inclining toward Nuriko. I especially like the touch of his hair being tied with a ribbon patterned so similarly to Nuriko’s robe while Nuriko’s robe is trimmed in a motif very similar to Hotohori’s robe. They really do make a cute pair. A fact that seems to strike Hotohori, as well, big surprise, as he notes with amaze that there’s actually another man as good looking as he is.

2/03 Righty-ho, people, now we all get to see the occasional drawbacks of cleverness. A correspondent has informed me that the first pic is, in fact, of Nuriko not of Houki. This more or less invalidates everything I have just said about the Empress. So, instead let me interpret these pictures as two different phases of the relationship between Hotohori and Nuriko. Their relationship as Emperor and concubine (left) in which they each act out parts that don’t necessarily involve much genuine communication, and their relationshp as seishi (right). The lack of regalia-type dress in the second pic offers some support for thinking that this one shows their less formal interaction.

Was that a good save, or what?