Annotated 45-4
Taro’s a psychopath. So he doesn’t interact normally. But pure indifference to others isn’t that much fun to read about. What sets the Joker off from a typical killing machine is that he has some recognizably human traits: quasi-romantic obsession with the Batman, possessive and toxic “love” for Harley, desire for the approval of an audience. And so it is with Taro. He irrationally hopes that his father’s last words will be something like “You…truly are my son…you have learned…all I had…to teach you.” Instead, they’re gonna be “Matsuyo? Matsuyo? What’s…UNGH! Why…?”
Love panel 3, which inspires us to experience Iwaya Iwatani’s death a little more intimately than most deaths seen in the series. Most of us knew this moment was coming…how could it not?…but it should still hit us a bit when it gets here.
It was important to me that we got Taro in power before America’s Election Day, 2016. Any little thing Flo and I could do to warn people about the dangers of a wildly immature tyrant in power, I wanted to do. Of course, that paid off, Donald Trump never became President, and America and the world lived happily ever after. All thanks to us! You’re welcome.
FB: Enjoy this completely harmless fantasy of a wildly unqualified child-person ascending to power through just the right combination of republican tradition, treachery and violence. And vote tomorrow.
Honestly, I felt it was very unrealistic that Taro actually became the absolute monarch. It would have been far more likely that the remaining Heads of Houses would have just taken the power back themselves. At best, Taro should have been just a figurehead under their control. And if he refused to cooperate, then paying someone to whack him upside the head with a shovel and dump his body off the pier would have been a pretty easy.
This. Within the logicof the setting, if Gastonia had been a culture that had an ingrained culture of obeying an inherited absolute Monarch, maaaaaaaaaaaaybe his ascension would have felt less like a contrived arse-pull
I just figured everyone thought they could use him as a puppet, underestimating just how much he would abuse his title when they where not around to delegate. I mean, why go through the trouble of becoming the next Caeser, winning over all the people and accumulating the clout when you can use the heir of the guy who already did.
this. it’s a story that’s played out several times in history, similar to how a certain large country recently elected what most of his own party thought would be an easily manipulated, useful buffoon to “lead” the country… but it turned out the buffoon was too headstrong, self-interested, and short-sighted to be easily manipulated. you can make someone a figurehead, but they still have *power* in that seat, and if you aren’t fast enough taking their hands off the controls it’s amazing how much damage they can do.
Did they though? That was the analysis from pundits and the left, but the party itself seems to have been pretty damn happy to have followed into lockstep with the guy and drink his kool-aid
The party has its priorities.
Those priorities just happen to be maximal grift and minimum thought.
They found the Kwizats Haderach of selfish, shortsighted greed.
The thing about that, though, is they don’t particularly care about winning over the people because they know the people will just go along with whatever they do. They’ve said so, and events have repeatedly proven them right. And they don’t need to accumulate clout, because they already have that just by virtue of being the ruling council. The fact that they basically just dumped all the power on Taro just feels completely out of character for them, particularly after how they tried to quite blatantly manipulate Syr’Nj and then tried to murder her after she refused to go along.
This is politics. Whether you have an unpleasant opponent assassinated or not only rarely depends on whether they are physically strong enough to defend themselves (as in Syr’Nj’s case), but mostly on whether they managed to move into a position where trying to have them assassinated would be either too risky, low priority or possibly simply a bad move for their opponents.
Iwatani has moved himself into such a place, and Taro inherits it. As long as he can get his own soldiers and guards to do what he says (which owning the Iwatani Estate helps with), any single person trying to move against him is signing their own death sentence. It also helps that the other council members are not really united on anything, either, and have zero trust for each other. Meaning if one of them suggested getting rid of Taro, the others might well play along but have him hanged afterwards anyway ==> risky move.
I’m well aware this is politics, thank you very much. That was my entire point. Taro’s political position was not nearly as secure as you make it out to be. Even given what he inherited from his father, he also lost a lot. Literally the only thing he had going for him was the protection of his father’s influence, and now that’s gone. And considering his complete lack of subtlety, he would swiftly waste what little influence he has by doing his usual antics.
Also, the remaining Heads of Houses’ position is much more secure than than you make it out to be. They’re entrenched, experienced, and know how to play the game where Taro thinks he can just bull-rush through to what he wants. It simply is not realistic that this inexperienced brat was able to climb over them.
Indeed. Taro’s still just a child, and the Ink on Iwatinia isn’t even dry yet. Realistically, a regency helmed by Bedard (or another ‘loyalist’) would have been about as much as Taro should have been able to achieve as a GOOD outcome from this. But… stripped of his Father’s accumulated protective intrigues in one calamitous move, the real end result of this fratricide should have been the declaration that ‘the nation of Miyomotoya will continue to take the measures necessary to protect the realm.’
Oops, meant to reply to 1001100×02 with that.
Taro’s a psychopath. So he doesn’t interact normally.
Hold on, hold on. You mean that, unlike his son, His Grace wasn’t a psychopath? The way I saw him, His Grace definitely was a more functional and more sophisticated psychopath, but he still was convinced he was the only real person in his life, and everybody else was either an obstacle, a tool or just an ornament.
And so it is with Taro. He irrationally hopes that his father’s last words will be something like “You…truly are my son…you have learned…all I had…to teach you.”
I totally misread that. I thought Taro was taunting his father on his deathbed, gloating in his face and finally letting him know how much Taro despised him for not being as hienous as he is. “THIS is how you do it, you old fool!”
Of course, that paid off, Donald Trump never became President, and America and the world lived happily ever after. All thanks to us! You’re welcome.
My alternate universe self is very grateful to both of you. In this blighted universe, though, the Trump Age is not over yet (q.v. the current GOP’s attempt to reverse time and send society back to the 1950’s, and Fox News blatantly cheering for Trump’s sugar daddy running amok in Ucraine) So, there’s still plenty of chances to make a difference in this timeline. Unfortunately.