timepiececlock (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
timepiececlock) wrote2003-08-18 01:31 am
timepiececlock) wrote2003-08-18 01:31 am
Trigun episode 5 - Hard Puncher
Luckily for me, I remembered that the episodes are playing on Sunday nights too, so I won't miss recording CB's episode "Ballad of Fallen Angels." There's just something about watching somethign on tv, isn't there? I've already seen Trigun and have most of it on DVD-- but this feels like a special viewing because it's on tv.
Episode 5 is the Trigun episode that really marks a change in the thematic style and the first real conflict. The situation in this episode starts to take on the shades of gray that are present in nearly every epsiode after. The confict is two-fold: a town full of good, honest people who are not normal killers end up holding Vash at gunpoint (mostly women, interestingly enough-- I loved how this show didn't shelve the female characters into background scenery), because the money from his bounty would save their town and possibly some of their lives. Then, as a third party is involved, it becomes a hostage situation, and the hostages Vash has to save are the same people who held a gun on him earlier.
A lot of things happen:
-Vash fires his gun for the very first time in this episode.
-Meryl accepts that the man they've been chasing really is the legendary outlaw.
-Vash is confronted about his guilt in having $$60,000,000,000 bounty, and the destruction of a major colony city that brought the price down on him... and the jovial nice-guy has nothing to say.
-We are shown the lengths even non-violent people will go, and see why the bounty price brings more destruction, perhaps, than Vash himself. Well, except for that pesky city he completely leveled once upon a time.
-The ready violence in even the most innocent people on this colony planet is brought to light, establishing the mood of society they've all created on this planet, and the suffocating depression that underlies everything you see.
-Vash saves everyone. No one dies. A pattern of Vash's behavior is established.
This was always one of my favorite episodes. Not only does it have a lot of cool screen shots, but the series goes from comedic to lethally serious in one 20-minute episode. It pops back into comedy at the end again, and the audience can breathe a sigh of relief because "everything was ok." But the darker undertones never really leave the series once they appear, and this is the beginning of the glorius downward spiral that is Vash and Trigun. After this, nothing is quite simple any more.
From a story point I really loved it when the Nebraska leader says, "There's no way you could have survived all of this for this long without hurting SOMEONE along the way. The sixty-billion double dollars on your head is proof of that." I loved that moment, and how Vash doesn't say anything, because it reminds us, the audience: this guy is dangerous. We've spent 4 episodes getting to like him in his happy-go-lucky, cowardly but heroic ways, and now reality is back in the picture. He is an outlaw, and he has the biggest bounty in history. And that means he's guilty of something truly horrible that you don't even want to associate with the funny guy who likes kids and will be friends with anyone.
Next episode: Freaky Flashbacks! Fragmented bits of Vash's past are explored, and fate comes to balance the scales in the form of a lady with a big friggin' hat and the soul of a justice demon.
Episode 5 is the Trigun episode that really marks a change in the thematic style and the first real conflict. The situation in this episode starts to take on the shades of gray that are present in nearly every epsiode after. The confict is two-fold: a town full of good, honest people who are not normal killers end up holding Vash at gunpoint (mostly women, interestingly enough-- I loved how this show didn't shelve the female characters into background scenery), because the money from his bounty would save their town and possibly some of their lives. Then, as a third party is involved, it becomes a hostage situation, and the hostages Vash has to save are the same people who held a gun on him earlier.
A lot of things happen:
-Vash fires his gun for the very first time in this episode.
-Meryl accepts that the man they've been chasing really is the legendary outlaw.
-Vash is confronted about his guilt in having $$60,000,000,000 bounty, and the destruction of a major colony city that brought the price down on him... and the jovial nice-guy has nothing to say.
-We are shown the lengths even non-violent people will go, and see why the bounty price brings more destruction, perhaps, than Vash himself. Well, except for that pesky city he completely leveled once upon a time.
-The ready violence in even the most innocent people on this colony planet is brought to light, establishing the mood of society they've all created on this planet, and the suffocating depression that underlies everything you see.
-Vash saves everyone. No one dies. A pattern of Vash's behavior is established.
This was always one of my favorite episodes. Not only does it have a lot of cool screen shots, but the series goes from comedic to lethally serious in one 20-minute episode. It pops back into comedy at the end again, and the audience can breathe a sigh of relief because "everything was ok." But the darker undertones never really leave the series once they appear, and this is the beginning of the glorius downward spiral that is Vash and Trigun. After this, nothing is quite simple any more.
From a story point I really loved it when the Nebraska leader says, "There's no way you could have survived all of this for this long without hurting SOMEONE along the way. The sixty-billion double dollars on your head is proof of that." I loved that moment, and how Vash doesn't say anything, because it reminds us, the audience: this guy is dangerous. We've spent 4 episodes getting to like him in his happy-go-lucky, cowardly but heroic ways, and now reality is back in the picture. He is an outlaw, and he has the biggest bounty in history. And that means he's guilty of something truly horrible that you don't even want to associate with the funny guy who likes kids and will be friends with anyone.
Next episode: Freaky Flashbacks! Fragmented bits of Vash's past are explored, and fate comes to balance the scales in the form of a lady with a big friggin' hat and the soul of a justice demon.