ship_manifesto | Gojyo/Hakkai/Sanzo, Saiyuki

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Title: Angst, Violence, and Snark
Author:

mistressrenet
Spoilers: Minor, and kept as ambiguous as possible.
Email: mistressrenet at yahoo dot com
Personal Website: Mistress Renet's House of Insanity

What is this thing called "Saiyuki"?

Gensomaden Saiyuki is an anime (animated TV show) and manga (comic) based on The Journey to the West, a work of Chinese literature similar in fame and cultural impact to our Western Odyssey. Saiyuki is the original journey West the same way Oh, Brother, Where Art Thou? was the Odyssey; that is, a reinterpretation both simple and radical. The wise monk of the story is no longer so wise, and the monkey, pig and kappa (water spirit) have been replaced with a perpetually-hungry kid, a pig-headed widower, and a good-looking lech. But they're still going West, and they're still our heroes, and they still have a dragon-- albeit one that turns into a Jeep.

The premise is fairly simple: something's horribly wrong in the world and the youkai-- a Japanese word that corresponds roughly to 'demon,' but without the negative and Satanic inferences that word holds-- are going mad. The rulers of Heaven have ~~demanded~~ asked the monk Genzo Sanzo to stop the abomination that have caused the madness. They've also demanded he take three companions with him: Sha Gojyo, Cho Hakkai, and Son Goku. Though Sanzo would rather pull out his own fingernails with a pair of pliers than go on a journey with those three, he does it, because it's his job. And now you know the plot.

The best thing about Saiyuki is the motion of it; it's a balancing act, a wild rollercoaster ride of humor and angst and joy and pain with some enormously pretty men. The characters are also a lot more active than the leads in a lot of manga; sure they angst over their painful backstories, but they're not going to let it get in the way of their squabbling and ass-kicking. There's a lot of violence, a lot of snark, and a lot of something that might just be love.

And who's your OT3?

From the anime, snagged by fadingembers

Meet the boys (remember, this is Japanese name order, family name first, given name last):

Sha Goyjo, a loudmouth gambler with an eye for the ladies. Also a chain-smoker, drinker, and cynic. Loud and tough and fearless and hiding his vulnerability so well you'll never see how deep it runs if you don't pay attention. Half-human, half-youkai-- a child of taboo, he was never accepted by his youkai stepmother, and never knew much love or acceptance before running into the rest of Our Heroes. Not as uncomplicated as he likes to pretend.

Cho Hakkai, former schoolteacher, mild-mannered and sweet to a fault, with a constant, slight smile that can be off-putting at the wrong times; also capable of mind-bending amounts of violence. Tends to lose perspective when people he cares about are hurt or threatened. A youkai, he wears some pretty earrings as power limiters that give him his human appearance (youkai are pointy-eared and have long fingernails and interesting skin markings). Not as careful with his appetites as he likes to pretend.

Genzo Sanzo, more or less a monk and arguably the world's most lax Buddhist, another chain-smoker, drinker and cynic. He's not carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders, just one of the scriptures that helped build the place. Spent many years wandering alone, fending off people who were trying to use, rape and kill him. This has not given him what you would call a winning personality; he's short-tempered, often angry, and sometimes cruel. All too human in the end, he's not as cold as he likes to pretend.

Though those three are my OT3, any discussion of Saiyuki would be incomplete without addressing Son Goku, the Monkey King of legend, a sweet and genuinely uncomplicated guy who loves food and Sanzo in pretty much equal measure. Goku got locked in a cave for 500 years, and it's left him a slightly immature teenager, fun-loving and spontaneous and terrified of being left alone. He's sort of the pin on which everything turns, having gotten them all into this mess in the first place (though the characters themselves are blissfully unaware of this). A youkai, his power limiter is a gold crown and is extra-strong (as is Goku himself).

All four on the couch

Left to right: Gojyo, Hakkai, Sanzo, Goku. Note no one's wearing limiters; this is just the way some of the art is, not a plot point.

All four of them have lost whatever it was they wanted to hold onto most, some of them more than once. They are all living for themselves now--or so they claim, often and at great length-- but they are interdependent, too, and so much more fun together than apart. They support each other mentally and physically-- you get the feeling that they're all able to stand alone and know it, but don't really want to try it.

Sex aside, the dynamics between the three are always interesting. The rival-friend tension between Gojyo and Sanzo is just fun to watch; Hakkai and Sanzo's delicate, never-quite-spoken support of each other is almost sweet; and Hakkai and Goyjo are longing and need and love.

Gojyo and Hakkai-- who have spent years living together in Gojyo's extremely small house-- are married, so completely, utterly, hopelessly connected to one another that the only logical response to people who don't see any subtext in Saiyuki is staring in puzzled bafflement.

So why bring Sanzo into it at all?

Because Hakkai and Gojyo are married, and marriage? Is boring. Add Sanzo into the mix and suddently the angst and the confusion and the crazy balance-tipping ride that Saiyuki itself is is back, and the world snaps back into its usual breakneck, dizzy-making velocity. Sanzo's presence keeps everything just a little off balance and adds just that edge of the unexpected, a reminder of the violence that is never too far from the Sanzo party.

And from a practical standpoint, they all need each other: Gojyo reminds Sanzo that going off and dying is a bad idea, Sanzo slaps reason into Hakkai, Hakkai (mostly) keeps the others from trying to strangle each other.

The three of them are constant tension, a push-pull of anger and frustration and need and longing, things they never speak and sometimes don't have to.

And why isn't Goku here?

A lot of reasons, one being that Goku's such an uncomplicated kid he doesn't bring the same tension into the group that the others do. He's forgotten most of his angsty backstory, while the others are all painfully aware of just how much they've lost. And he's very young, which makes it harder for him to handle the dynamics of a relationship with more than two people (and also makes him seem a little young for a sexual relationship in the first place). I stick with the fireworks, myself. And the grown-ups...relatively speaking.

A Small Note for Newcomers

Saiyuki's world is amazingly complete; all the characters have extremely detailed backstories-- right back to 500 years ago, in Saiyuki Gaiden, a sequel based on Goku's early years and the other boys' previous incarnations. This can seem ~~impossibly complicated~~ slightly intimidating to a newcomer. But fear not-- the characters are so strongly and well-drawn that they're easy to keep straight and take to, and there are lots of useful websites that can help.

This is a nice yaoi-friendly overview (though more spoilery than mine), and another nice overview is here, along with some excellent fic.

There's also a slightly confusing number system in some fanfiction and Japanese fan comics, or doujinshi. San is Japanese for 3, therefore Sanzo = 3. Gojyo = 5, Hakkai = 8 and Goku =9. If you like, you can do what I did in the early days and just read everything with an 8 in it. ;-)

Fics:

There are a few more threesome fics out there but they're not up to my ~~damn fussy~~ demanding tastes.

Viridian5 has written my favorite 5/8/3, Rise, which has wonderful characterization in addition to the extremely hot smut.

Scribblemoose writes the boys quite well. Snowbound is a threesome that starts with Twister and gets smuttier from there. You should also read Extra, because sometimes you don't need a plot.

Fear, by hane. Past and present twin together, and it's very, very hot.

Transient, by xparrot, is magnificent. Not a threesome per se, but cracking with tension and the sexiest thing I've ever read that doesn't feature actual smut.

Maya writes mad brilliant stuff, and both the introspective Desire and the spoilery The Dark And Secret Places explore the dynamics between Hakkai, Sanzo and Gojyo.

Tosca's Kiss doesn't have any threesome fic up on her site, but Crimson on Clover is a nice if brief look at the relationship between Sanzo, Gojyo and Hakkai.

Note: Thanks to everyone on my flist for scoping for fic for me, and to fadingembers for the anime scan I used just before "Meet the Boys."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

wordsofastory.livejournal.com

Oh, great essay! You seem so in love with the characters. ^^

I just got the first volume of Saiyuki; now I'm definetly going to have to get the rest.

From:

Gojyo/Hakkai/Sanzo, Saiyuki

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