Episode 103

EPISODE 103

父の遺言・遠い日の想い (Chichi no Igon・Tooi Hi no Omoi)

A Father’s Last Words—Memories of a Distant Day

First Broadcast: October 29, 1994

Equivalent Manga Chapter(s): chapter 163 (WSJ #18, 1994, April 18), first half of chapter 164 (WSJ #19, 1994, April 25)

Summary: Yusuke has vastly powered up, and can now easily defeat Hokushin and the rest of Raizen’s followers.  He goes to take on Raizen again, but Raizen has gone mad from hunger and attacks him.  After subduing Raizen (who’s getting constantly weaker) Yusuke demands that he explain why he stopped eating humans.  The truth is that 700 years ago Raizen met and fell in love with a “Kuda-Kusushi” woman, an ancient kind of doctor, and vowed not to eat until he met her again.  However, she died giving birth to their child (Yusuke’s ancestor), and he hasn’t eaten since.  After explaining this and his views on the relationship between the three worlds, Raizen finally dies.  Yusuke and Hokushin set off the see Yomi.

Anime/manga differences after the jump.

Differences from the Manga

(What's all this about?  Read here)

• The episode starts with a brief scene of Raizen tormented by hunger and remembering his lover, before moving onto Yusuke fighting Hokushin and co. (chapter 163 opens with Yusuke’s fight).

• Raizen actually manages to tear off and eat a piece of Yusuke’s flesh in the manga; he even comments on how good it tastes.  In the anime he only bits into Yusuke’s shoulder, and Yusuke throws him off before he gets any further.

• The anime expands on Raizen’s flashback to how he met Yusuke ancestor/quasi-mother/lady person.  It shows Raizen being chased by humans during the night.  You’d think he’d, I don’t know, simply kill these people or eat them or something, but instead he runs away and breaks into the lady’s house.  Though she recognizes him as a demon, she sees that he’s injured and offers to heal him.

• The human woman Raizen has a relationship with is a “Kuda-Kusushi”, a term that seems to be unique to YYH.  “Kusushi” is an archaic Japanese word for a doctor.  “Kuda” however is made up of the kanji for “food” and “escape/remove”, a combination not used in any real words (as far as I can tell), and I’m not sure what it’s intended to mean.  The explanation of the job is also a bit different between the two versions, implying that the term does not have a self-evident meaning (otherwise you couldn’t really casually redefine it).  In the manga, Raizen explains that at the time diseases were thought to be caused by karma or demons, and so curing them was the work of mystics and priestesses.  Out of all these, the Kuda-Kusushi used the most severe method.  They’d eat the rotten flesh of people who died from a disease, giving their body immunity to that sickness.  Then they’d offer their own flesh and blood as medicine to people suffering from that same ailment.  Apparently this was incredibly effective.  In the anime on the other hand, Raizen says that a Kuda-Kusushi is what would be called a pharmacist or a doctor nowadays.  They swallowed poisons and pathogens, giving themselves immunity, and then used their flesh and blood as medicine.  So in other words the anime skips over the whole “eating the dead” aspect of the job.

• The manga gives a more direct view of the Kuda-Kusushi woman’s naked body (it’s still covered in shadows though), while in the anime Raizen’s hair blocks most of it.  On the flipside, the anime is actually more explicit in showing Raizen and the woman sleeping together.

• In the manga Raizen says that the day will come when humans will travel to other worlds as casually as they vacation to other countries, and at that time human-eating demons will just get in the way.  In the anime he only says that one day human-eating demons will get in the way.

• For some reason, the anime colors Raizen gray after he dies, as if he turned to stone.

• After Raizen dies and Yusuke decides to go meet Yomi, there’s an anime-only scene with Yomi and his council.  Yomi can no longer hear Raizen’s stomach growling, and asks Kurama what he thinks this means.  Kurama says either Raizen has given in and eaten somebody, or he’s died.  However, it’s still too early to judge which, and they should monitor the situation more.  

• Chapter 164 opens with Yusuke and Hokushin approaching Yomi’s city, Gandara.  Yusuke yells for Yomi to prepare some tea for him and they head in.  In the city, Yomi observes this and tells Kurama he has an interesting friend, then speculates that Raizen has died.  He tells Yoda to get things ready for Yusuke’s arrival, while Kurama thinks to himself that Yusuke’s actions could decide whether or not a war breaks out.  After this we see Mukuro’s mobile base, Mukade, with her and Hiei standing on top.  Hiei informs Mukuro of Raizen’s death (he’s apparently able to learn this via his Jagan) and says Yusuke is going to see Yomi.  Mukuro asks what Yusuke plans on doing, but Hiei doesn’t know and can’t even predict.  Mukuro tries to probe out where Hiei’s loyalties truly are and what course of action he’s likely to take.

• The anime rearranges these events somewhat.  Following the anime-only scene of Yomi and Kurama discussing whether or not Raizen had died, we get the scene with Mukuro and Hiei.  Here though the scene cuts off after Hiei says that Raizen has died, and switches to the scene of Yusuke and Hokushin arriving at Gandara.  Then there’s the part where Yomi tells Kurama his friend is interesting.  The scene cuts off without the rest of what Yomi, Yoda, and Kurama say (that part comes next episode) and instead it cuts back to Mukuro and Hiei, and we get the rest of their conversation, where they discuss Yusuke.  Notably, Hiei has a Hirui Stone around his neck in this anime version of this scene.  There’s then some anime-only shots of Yusuke and Hokushin walking through the streets of Gandara as the episode ends.

• The episode ends about 9 pages into chapter 164, although the page with the rest of the Kurama/Yomi scene isn’t adapted until next episode, due to the scene rearrangement.