Princess Mononoke & Values

Welcome to Popcorn Psychology, the podcast where we watch blockbuster movies and psychoanalyze them.
My name is Brittany Brownfield and I'm a child therapist and I'm joined by
Ben Stover, individual therapist, Hannah Espinoza, marriage and family therapists. We're
all licensed clinical professional counselors also known as therapists who practice out of Chicago.
Even though we are licensed mental health professionals, this podcast is purely for entertainment
purposes and to fulfill our love of dissecting pop culture and all forms. Please
remember that, even though we are all licensed therapists, we aren't your therapist.
If you are struggling with mental health symptoms, please find a local mental
health provider. Welcome to today's episode of Popcorn Psychology. Today we are going
to be covering the nineteen ninety seven Studio Ghabli classic Princess Mononoke, which was
the top selling film in Japan for a great many years until it was replaced
by Spirited Away. But what we will acknowledge is that this is one of
the most beloved anime films ever and as we're going to dive into this film
today, we're going to start off by acknowledging that this is a really complex
film and very different than a lot of the other movies done by Studio Ghibli.
This one's pretty rough. It's PG. Thirteen. It has pretty significant
violence, pretty significant complicated adult and young adult over and undertones about society and
death and nature and capitalism. It's a very hefty movie. And something that
I was just explaining to Hannah Brittany that I don't know if our audience knows.
I'm sure many of you do, probably better than us, is that
a lot of their films or all of them, are all created with art
first and then narrative added later. So they create a visual, complete story
through storyboarding before they ever even add dialogue to tell the story. And I
think that's a really critical piece of information if you watch these films to understand
sometimes it's very clear that there's a visual aesthetic, a visual story and narrative
being told that sometimes it feels like the dialogue maybe catching up to a little
bit. Yeah, I agree, absolutely. So today we're going to be
covering values and how they are formed and how they change throughout time, particularly
through the critical aging points that people hit of starting to separate out from your
family and culture of origin and getting into a larger world that forces you to
change your perspective and adopt some truths that you may not have had, and
how that can become something that people start to struggle with at different phases of
life. And we definitely see that represented by some of the different characters we
see in this film, and we're going to kind of break down how we
see that play out amongst some of our characters here with Son Lady Aboshi,
Ashitaka and Jigo, and then as always treatment and final thoughts. However,
before we get any further, i'd like to remind you all that if you
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that. Before we talk about values and all that, let's do a quick
plot rundown of Princess Mononoke as simple as that can be. So in this
story, we start out with a demon attack on a Village's story takes place
somewhere around the thirteen hundreds in feudal Japan, and we see this exiled community
being struck by some kind of worm covered monster attack that turns out to be
a bore, and this boar is attacking in A young, handsome, athletic
prince comes writing by on his elk, his red elk, and slays the
boar, saving the town, but in doing so he gets cursed with the
same curse because the boar touches him. This leads to him being exiled from
his community and having to give up his home because they can't have anybody leave,
so he has to give up his identity as their prince and go seek
his fate, knowing that he very well may still die. And his name
is Ashitaka, who is our central lead character of the film, Our paladin
if you will, he is the force of good in this film. You
can look at me with nerd language judgment all you want, but that's what
he is. He is the Paladin. I will be relating all of these
characters to D and D archetypes. You're welcome. People don't know what that
means, Some people do. Some A paladin is a knight that is devoted
to a cause, or an order or a holy god and maintains their commitment
to their oath against all situations and comers. That's basically Ashitaka AnyWho. As
Ashitaka goes out into the world, he starts encountering a much larger world than
his small and almost exterminated community has kind of isolated from where he starts running
in to Iron Town and meeting Lady Aboshi and also meeting San, who is
in conflict with Lady Aboshi's sn is raised by forest gods and wolves, and
then Lady Aboshi is leading Iron Town but is also the representation of capitalism and
firearms development occurring throughout Japan, and it turns out to be one of her
musket balls that killed the God by the boor god that cursed Ashitaka, so
the plot starts to thicken. Ashitaka follows San into Iron Town as San starts
to attack Iron Tone, town trying to rescue the forest and keep the miners
and forgers at Irontown from going into the forest destroying it to get to the
iron they want from the grounds and from the mountains, which the animals and
animal gods that Son represents and is raised by want to stop them from doing.
And then there's a third faction here, which is the imperials, the
samurai and the local lord that are trying to also get their hands on the
iron. Because the backdrop of this story is sort of the fall of the
Samurai era, which was brought about by firearms, because samurai armor, much
like Knight's armour in feudal Europe, did not stop firearms. So their way
of life is getting exterminated and they're obviously resisting that. So we see these
rival factions clashing, but all the while people are trying to conquer death and
nature, which are two things that can't be conquered, and ultimately nature and
the circle of life went out in this film as it should, as it
should, and when everyone finally restores the balance of nature and realizes we can
all thrive, but we can't take more then we're due, and when our
time is up, our time is up and we got to stop trying to
fight that. We reached the conclusion of our film and a weirdly, I
want to say agnostic, but that's not the right term. I go anti
climactic ending. Son and Ashitaka develop a little romance. But it ends strangely,
is what I was trying to say. Yeah, I'm with you.
It's very very accepting of Son getting to have her life, but it's it's
a little strange like that. There is a resolution to the plot because what
happens is one of our friends, Jigo, we meet along the way,
who is a monk, is our roguish character. He is operating as an
agent of the Emperor, and his goal is to try to get the forest
god's head to stop death, to also stop the fall of the Samurai,
because if there's no more death, then if they can't get their hands on
the weapons, it doesn't matter because they can't die, and they maintain the
rule forever. Holy Grail stuff, Holy Grail stuff, and we see the
conflict there is. Ultimately, what happens is the monk betrays everybody, including
the forest animals, and leads a assault on the forest to try to cut
off the head of the forest god who represents the cycle of life and death
and succeeds in doing so, and then death starts coming for everyone until he
restores the head exactly. That's a good memory, Ben, Yeah, I
kind of said all that, well done. So values values with each of
these three factions or four, I guess if we're keeping track and can count,
which is questionable. I'm like, why, I'm not a doctor,
I can't count. But we see four very different sources of values coming into
this film. But before we talk about the four different kind of factions we
see in their values, we should we talk about how people form values in
the first place and why that's so relevant to their behavior. Exact immoon though,
because when I think about values, I think about motivators. Why do
we do the things we do? Where does that come from? Why does
certain things feel important to one person and not to another? Or even like,
why do we both think we're holding the same value but we're going about
it in very different ways? So values is really good. I talk about
values all the time with clients because I think it's important to understand why,
Like I said, why we do the things we do right? And a
lot of times when I'm talking about values, I will start sometimes all the
way back into someone's childhood, because I think where you're going with that,
Ben is a lot of times our values are formed by both our family of
origin and also the community around us, both like our micro community and also
our culture. Correct, all values for everyone are formed that way. So
when I talk about values, I usually talk about them in the in the
context of like having people sort of list their values, so it'll be things
like family, financial security, physical health, recreation, religion, spirituality,
friendship, parenting, all that kind of stuff, right, And so I
like I talk about values less in the abstract and more in the literal,
more in the concrete. But it can also be things like, well,
I guess physical health would be longevity. When people talk about like I want
to live longer, I value that, you know what I mean? So
I have people think about what feels most important to you, but then also
what are your behaviors attached to? And so that's what I think about I
think of values. I try to take it less abstract and more critical and
more concrete with clients to help understand why does something feel so important, Why
am I willing to do that? And when my partner gets on my ass
about something to so that to them seem small, Why does it piss me
off so much? Because it's connected to a higher value than Maybe they're not
understanding right, and values are very personal even though they are formed by the
culture around us. They also, in a lot of ways are very individual.
And what feels important to me might not be feel important to you.
And that doesn't mean that because I value something differently than you, that my
values are the white ones and your values are the wrong ones. And I
think what's so interesting about this movie is it does a good job of showcasing
how everybody thinks that they're doing the right thing based on their values. And
why people feel so insistent upon the actions they take in this movie specifically is
because it is tied to these higher values that we will talk about later.
Absolutely, these values that we see represented in this film really guide our characters
just like they guy all humans, and understanding values happen essentially across three layers.
There are some values that all things that are alive have the basic needs
survival, the biological needs, the core values of humans. Don't kill if
you don't have to make sure you're protecting your loved ones, your children,
make sure you're eating and sleeping. These are core values that everyone who's born
has, and every animal for that matter, protect your own. That gets
pretty relevant, don't you think in this film? Yes, absolutely, But
then we form also our own values off what we're taught by our parents first,
then by our education, by whatever religion people are brought up in,
whatever larger cultural identities are present in your value formation, all show up in
how you think about what you should do, why and when and what's important.
And that can be different person to person, depending on how they were
raised, where and when and by who. And then also life changes will
influence your values. When people become parents, a lot of times you will
hear them say, all of a sudden, my life in perspective radically changed.
A lot of times of people will say something along the lines of I
was really self fish and now I feel more selfless, right, And that's
because their value shifted from more like self serving to I have to take care
of this child and put their needs first, right. I think another thing
that also can shift values in a way that I don't think I always think
about as trauma. So then like when people go through trauma that bumps against
the value of what survival. So when you are having like trauma reactions later
in life that can be connected to the value of survival, Right, I
have to fight, you, I have to flee because those triggers now are
connected to my value of surviving, Whereas if you hadn't gone through a trauma,
you might not have connected that value to those things. Absolutely, yeah,
Absolutely Understanding trauma brings people from a point of view where they are perceiving
all the layers of value in a holistic way, every value you've ever encountered
that's meant something to you and snaps you back into the hardcore biological realities of
you could die right now, and that can be where we get moral injuries.
And while we're not going to discuss that in great detail today because it's
not necessarily a huge part of this film, it's important to understand that there
are things that we encounter in life that put us up against our survival and
oftentimes people have an idealistic way of teaching what we're supposed to do in those
moments that becomes very culturally bound. That has shit to do with what your
body will decide you're going to do because your body is going to perceive the
best solution and decide based on perception only when it's live or die right now.
Yeah, And I think the how that ties into this movie kind of
what you were saying earlier, Ben, this movie is pretty gory for like
an animated movie like this, yet to capitation violent. I guess that's the
way I'm looking for, arms falling off again kinds of stuff. And I
think that's a good example of how in an ideal scenario, we would value
the safety of others, right, Like, no matter what, I wouldn't
cut someone's head off, cut someone's arms arms off like happens in this movie.
But then if that's tied to my survival, that value will be reprioritized,
like the value of other people's safety and like not being violent will get
deprioritized from my value of survival. Right. And so a lot of this
movie, I think, does talk about how different people view survival and how
that leads them to do things that they wouldn't necessarily do in accordance with their
morality and values and other situations. Correct, And we see multiple moments where
people's core values what they've internalized from all those lessons show up and other moments
where they respond in a more primal way. Ashitaka is a great example of
that. It's not everybody in the world who will take an arrow or a
bullet for another person because they believe it's right, but some people will.
There are quite a few stories of Metal of Honor winners of people who did
not survive a conflict by jumping on ad that saved a whole platoon, But
it's not every person that would do that. How someone's values got internalized and
developed and actualized right in that moment of survival or not will determine what they
do, and they may not even know themselves. But seeing how complicated that
can become is really important to understanding a story like this, that life has
a way of pulling out our core values and also our survival instincts, and
those can be constantly in conflict before we take a break. What might be
interesting, especially from Hannah's perspective, would be how those start to collide with
couples, in particular, because this movie is all about conflicting values. That's
true if you have one person and a couple who is from a more individualistic
society and cultural background versus another who might come from a more collectivistic society.
That can lead to some pretty significant challenges. Absolutely, yeah, I feel
like, you know, I don't know that I do specific values work with
couples, but hearing you describe it that way, it definitely is a lot
of what I do with couples really is what do you think is important,
and what do you think is important? And how can we compromise right towards
something that is comfortable for both of us, or how can we share things
in a different way where to you, dishes are more important and to you
doing laundry is more important, and so how do we figure that out right?
And one of the ways that we can do that is the person who
is the most feels the most value towards something or feels like something is the
most important, you just do that. Then you're the person who gives a
fuck about dishes. Then you're the one who's gonna do them. You're the
person who gives a fuck about laundry, You're gonna do the laundry. And
so that's kind of that's one of the ways that I do that when I
work with couples and even with families, there's a lot of you know,
we've talked before about unwritten rules in families and how that has a lot to
do with the values of the parents and what the values of the parents are
and how that can affect their children and what they want their children's values to
be. So there's a lot of there's a lot of different ways that values
can connect to all different kinds of therapy. Absolutely, and we'll get into
that with each of our characters and how that makes sense in this film after
this break. All right, So we're gonna start with the title of the
film, Son or Princess Mononoke a young girl. So was she a princess
before she was taken in by the wolves? No? Okay, that's just
like a cutee nickname they gave her. She's a princess of the forest because
the princess of the Okay, so that's what okay, I think is Okay.
So we get introduced to Son, who is a young girl who has,
like we're talking about, raised by the wolves in sixteen seventeen. Oh
okay, I feel like it's hard for me to tell. With his animation
style, everyone looks twelve and a half. Yeah, like you're the twelve
and a half or you're a full adult. Yeah, and there's no in
the middle, right, thirteen hundred sixteen seventeen is pretty much full adult.
Okay, okay, that makes sense. Well, probably twelve thirteen, this
is probably full adult. Yeah, what we would think of is full adult.
Remember this time period, you know, sixteen seventeen, people are moving
towards child maybe yeah, maybe. Yeah. So she is a young woman
who is raised among the wolves and the forest and the forest gods, and
so we see in her right away that she is someone who is connected to
the values of that community. So Son is a young woman who is raised
among the wolves in the forest and the forest gods. And I think she's
a great example of even though she is technically a human right a different species
than her family that she's been raised with, she is connected to the values
of them. She is fighting literally tooth and nail for the vitality of the
forest, for the vitality of her community. She was once human, she's
not now. So that makes me think of with sund that she was also
abandoned by her family, and that's why the wolves took her in, and
so that's also so that's a trauma. Right, So that's a trauma that
she experienced, and because she experienced that, now she has a value that
she doesn't she hates humans. What's happened when she was a baby? The
wolves are attacking and through the baby and ran. The parents ran the wolf
says. It's like how in the second Batman movie, Penguin's parents put him
in the sewer and then he was raised by penguins. I'm so glad that
you said that doing your work for you, Ben. That will not be
the last Batman referenced today. I'm sure it will be. That's why he
wrote he rides so hard for the penguin. People do it? No,
No, the penguin, the penguin, the penguin. So yeah, like
what So? I think that that is a really important part of sons story
because it seems like it would be easier for her to lean into the values
of the forest in order to connect to her new family, to show solidarity,
to fit in, to adapt. Yeah. But more, I guess
more of what I'm trying to say is it would make a lot of sense
if you had a trauma where you were abandoned that the family that accepted you
like you're gonna like hardcore believe everything that they are giving you, like really
identify with, really identify, maybe over identify with it, almost because they're
the people who saved you, and it feels like you have to be you
have to be on their side. I guess I think that. Well,
I think that can be true whenever you work. Whenever I'm working with someone
who is taken from one community to another, maybe rescued by one community.
Is that they they want to well, they want to fit in, right.
That's also like the value of survival, right is like a lot of
times some people will asimilate, Yes, is to survive right to because that's
connected to being taken care of, Yes, to not being ostracized. And
she's someone who's already been ostracized, yes, and so to not have that
to her again, she like, yeah, you're right. Like I get
why she rides hard for the forest and the gods and the wolves is because
she needs to do that. And that's something where I don't even think that
she would be cognizant of that, Like that's one of those things where I
don't think she's thinking about that when she's doing all this. No, No,
she's Mowgli. Yeah, just you know, some of the things that
are important. She's Mowgli. She was taken in as an infant. She
doesn't know what necessarily what she's not. This is all she's ever been.
But everyone around her knows what she's not. So she has to fight to
prove yeah, she is, which can cause an overidentification with the adopted group,
and that certainly becomes true Ofsan. She is extremely aggressive. She's vicious,
which I kind of love about her me too. She's like a fair
little animal, she is. But she fights harder than the wolves do.
Oh yeah, she's spitting blood out of open wounds. She's climbing up roofs.
She's high, she's like all up on people's business's. She means it.
She is a druid at the very in D and D terms, she
is identified with nature. She will defend nature at all points. Nature is
better than anything else, and anything that intrudes upon that, yeah, absolutely
comes your way. And so, as we know, is what we've been
talking about. When you identify so strongly with a value, the people that
seem to be an opposition of that value are your enemies, your antagonists,
right, So obviously all the people that she's fighting against. All she sees
is how they are destroying what's important to her. All she sees is them
overcutting the forest and trying to destroy them. Right, Like there's in her
mind they are the villain and she is the hero. Correct. Yes,
even though she's actively taking life and doing the things that are against what she's
necessarily wanting. Because they have crossed a certain line of survival, that action
becomes warranted even though it's not necessarily within her full value system. Yeah.
And looking at why that's especially important to consider is there is no pure character
in this film. It makes it a really complicated one to watch because no
one is represented as a true hero. Ashitaka is the closest to a hero
we have and because he is the benefit also of being almost like an unbiased
third party correct, Like he's coming in fresh to this situation. Correct,
And he rides in and kind of adheres to what is almost closest to objectively
right and seeks to solve conflict and see the middle sides of things rather than
lock into his own perspective because the Samurai exterminated his race of people. Oh
and he has every reason to be very angry, and he doesn't choose that.
But when looking at Son, Son doesn't know necessarily who she is outside
of who she's been told she is, and she doesn't know who humans are
outside of the perspective of animals, which gets complicated really fast when she's at
least part human like, she's not someone who's been transformed into an animal.
But it's said by other characters in the film that the Wolf Goddess has kind
of taken over her soul. Oh I miss that? Oh same, okay,
okay, that she has some rain over it, and that's kind of
how she it's sort of the immortality ish kind of godlike features that she gets
is because the Wolf Goddess has a kind of controlling interest in her, which
is why after the Wolf Godess dies we see some values challenging done by Son
and she becomes a little less warlike. Also the war stops. But okay,
yeah, I guess at this time, me and Hannah can say that
this is the first and one I've ever watched this movie, so there might
be things we've missed that we could gain on a second watching. Yeah,
for sure. Also, it's really hard to see a Japanese Monk voiced by
Billy Bob Thornton. That was weird. Yeah, that was weird. That
was a weird that was a weird, uh weird take. That's weird flex.
Yeah, that's the word I was looking for. So it's weird flex.
And some of the really important dialogue and uh information may or may not
be true. And I think it's more or less true because when she drinks
the blood and it's I guess kind of taken on by the wolf, she's
kind of taken into that godlike status. So she's she's kind of she's a
demigod at like Hercules Percy Jackson. Possibly, sure, I mean, I
think what's coming to mind also with you saying this is how if we can
understand values, it can also help us access empathy in terms of perspective,
right, because you can kind of well you can see in the movie how
when Son comes into Iron Town, how they all view her as, like
I said, like this feral animal. Like they probably would use word savage
if they didn't use that in the movie, which is a very loaded term
in the United States. Yeah, because we used to use the word savage.
Is a lot white people. We use the word savages a lot to
talk about Native Americans First Nation people, right, And I think that's what's
also coming up for me and thinking about this is how when they say,
like history is told by the victors, how we can dehumanize others because we
are looking at it through this lens of like I don't understand them. Why
would they act like that? Right? And I think this movie is a
good representation. And like the son character of if you're looking at her from
the perspective of the Iron Town people, she would look maybe how the white
colonizers in America would think about the people that are already here, the indigenous
people of America, of like, why are they fighting us? Look at
them. They'll come in and they are aggressors and they'll hurt you, and
they'll like all the horrible propaganda we would talk about, right, because they
were only seeing it from their point of view, whereas Forsan and like when
we think about Indigenous people, like they're viewing the Iron Town people, the
white people as these colonizers that are coming in and they're trying to destroy us.
So of course we're going to act accordingly to preserve our culture, our
land, our lives, and how it is good to think of things that
way when we're trying to be culturally competent and yeah, just more empathetic that
like, we have to be aware of what perspective is driving the narrative.
Correct. It's really important to remember that in the simile you've drawn here,
that the people who were coming into the United States were taking from nature at
a rate that threw off the balance of the circle of life that led to
food and survival for everyone. And then just slaughtering the buffalo herds for their
tongues and leaving them to rot in the sun meant people would starve on the
plains because they wouldn't have enough herds to feed everybody, et cetera. Throw
off the whole balance of nature for greed, and that ties directly into this
story because it's a human greed issue. Wasn't Europeans versus Native Americans. That's
just North American history and South American history and African history and world history.
Yep. People come from other places and don't understand the culture, values and
balance of nature the ecosystem. Here's the word I was looking for that exists
in a particular region and think, ooh, well, this resource is rare
to us. Therefore it's valuable, so it's worth me killing them to get
it because it will advance my stature. Where they're going, what are you
doing here? Yeah? Or even the idea, which I know kind of
slides into talking about Irontown, of this idea that like living beings already are
already here using these resources. Correct, Like this idea from like the more
like Lady Oboshi point of view of like, oh, we found this place,
and so we can do with it what we will. It's ours now.
It makes us rich and totally deluding themselves of the fact that there was
already things people, human beings here and nature and nature well that's what Yeah,
nature here using this stuff, and like in the colonizers as history we're
talking about, there's already people here using these things, correct, and they're
using them to atterate that has made sense for a long time to their culture
and has kept their culture alive. They've worked out a delicate balance with nature.
And then industrialization tends to have the opposite effect. And looking at Lady
Abashi and Irontown, where they or what they kind of represent in this story
is the growing movement of industrialization and the power of greed over the forest and
the animal kingdom that had existed before, and how they're completely blind to the
impact that their greed has on destroying that habitat when there could be a balance
worked out, but they choose to absolutely ignore that. And the forest and
the gods come from their own perspective of having seen things work a certain way
for a very long time, and they're willing to fight against that. Yeah,
like everything, the Ape tribe says, we got to kill these humans
because they ain't letting us grow back the trees. We grow back the trees
they cut down the trees. They gotta go. And because the Bashi Iron
tribe of Iron Town, all of them, they are the villains. They
are a threat. They are an existential and literal threat to the forest.
They are yep. Yeah, So do we have anything else we want to
say about our friends son? All Right, we'll take a break here since
we've started talking about Iron Town a little bit, let's keep that up.
So Iron Town is led by Lady Abashi. What do we know about her?
She's a bad lady Abashi. She's a lady entrepreneur, which I wonder
it does make me wonder culturally at that time what that was like would have
been rare. Yeah, I assume so, but I also don't want to
assume that based on white culture that I'm aware of. So she is a
female entrepreneur, business owner. She is running this iron mine, right,
they are deforcing to mine for iron. I think I'm using the word deforced
right, yes, yes, and strip mining basically. Yeah. And she
is creating firearms, you know, and that is pretty revolutionary right at the
time, and not just firearms for the sake of firearms. The feeling I
got from her is that she was creating firearms so that she could arm the
people that she was supporting, as like a wait for them to protect themselves
too and tip the balance of power. Yes, I think that's kind of
what I mean. And so she's someone that is creating firearms, and she
could definitely be seen as like the villain, right, evil corporate lady comes
in starts fucking up the local ecosystem, cutting down trees pretty maliciously and unfeelingly,
unepathetically. She's like, this gotta go. She wants to kill the
forest spirit God, cut its fucking head off, pretty much. And she
also has moments in the movie where she's like, leave the women, fuck
them, we gotta go right. In a lot of stories, like I
think it would stop there, she would be just this very two dimensional villain,
right. I think what's interesting about her, kind of going back to
what we're talking about with like the complicated value systems of the people, is
that she takes care of people who are disenfranchised marginalized within the community. The
women who work Iron Town are women who were sex workers that she seems to
have saved from like the brothel lifestyle, and they are very grateful to her.
And then she also supports a lot of people who are suffering from leprosy,
which was one of those diseases at the time that was very connected to
karma and value, like character value, like people would say like you have
leprosy because you're bad or something like. It was part of a class system
kind of thing in a lot of different countries, actually, I think,
yeah. And so she takes in a lot of people that are normally disregarded
discarded by society, which makes her like a very interesting, complicated figure where
she's not all bad and she's definitely not all good. Yeah, but it's
it is. I did find it very interesting watching this that they complicate her
in that way specifically. Yeah, she's a complex character, for sure.
She sits in the kind of neutral, a true neutral alignment, where she's
willing to do good or bad whatever suits her and whatever suits her mission.
I think she by the look of her, the way she's drawn, she
looks like she was samurai. I believe she has two swords on, which
is a firm marker that she was samurai. She's obviously trained to make great
links in the film to indicate once she takes her robes off and stuff that
she's wearing very ruling class samurai style kimono and traditional dress of the ruling class,
and women were part of that class. There were female samurai, and
she carries all the markers of it. But it looks like something happened or
something obstructed her societally from obtaining her goals, and she's rebelling against it,
and she's finding outcasts from society to protect and to bring into her mission.
And she is protecting and rescuing people from the dregs of society. She's rescuing
lepers and giving them jobs and giving them a place in society as opposed to
what would have happened at the time was to be banished to leper colonies on
the coast and you go them in a cave until your skin falls off.
But they say they she bandaged us, she cut our rotting flesh and like
gave us work. And she seems to hold great respect and doesn't seem to
fear that she's also going to contract this horrible disease. And these Yeah,
because if I remember correctly, the people who have leprosy are the ones who
actually come up with the designs for everything, Like they're the creative part of
the mine. I think, didn't they say they're the R and D Department.
Oh yeah, yeah, exactly, they're the gunsmiths. Yeah, yes,
right, and so they actually make the weapons and had the undertones to
her. She's rebelling against Samurai society and is recognizing the shift that's coming,
which we know happened everywhere. She's taking these people into fold and note,
we're driving progress forward. We can't stay stuck in these old ways. But
something in her value system must have changed to make her resent that so fiercely
that she's willing to fight against it and tip the balance of power to her.
So she has control now and she's trying to remake society in her own
vision, and she's taking women who've been cast into brothel life and giving them
empowerment. Sort of, yeah, I would say so. I mean,
I feel like the women feel very taken care of. They feel respected,
they feel they feel like they're being taken care of, like and I think
that that's something that I would imagine coming from a brothel in the thirteen hundreds
was probably a nightmare status. And so I feel like when somebody again,
right when we talked about earlier about trauma having an effect on your values,
it would make a lot of sense that these women would feel very strongly about
Lady Aboshi and feel and want to follow her and want to help her and
want to do things for her because she took them in and she is and
she's taking good care of them as point to a point for sure, even
though, like Britney said later on in the film, she says, leave
the women, don't worry about it. Mm hmm. She's willing to sacrifice
them. She was willing to sacrifice them in that moment. And I think
a part of that might be because her goal became bigger than the women it
always was. Yeah, I mean she says, I've done all I can
for them. They're on their own now, Yes, that's what she says.
Yeah, there's a caveat to leave them, but I've done all I
can for them, which is also false. Yeah, but within her value
system, she's justifying her manifest destiny. If you will to tip the balance
of power and complete this mission of exterminating the forest god who is making the
animal smart and capable of fighting against her and blocking her will, If she
exterminates that forest god, she can have a clear path to conquer the forest.
Yeah. And this is where you can even get into a more nuanced
discussion of values and motivators. Right is does she taken these people because she
genuinely feels like they deserve a safe place to be, that they deserve to
be taken out of these situations that maybe she'd been in it sometimes, you
know, like take them into a place where they feel more empowered. Or
does she know she's wiley? And does she know that if I take in
these kinds of people, they will be so grateful for me to me that
they will follow behind me no matter what she's that mostly because these are always
her servants, Like the women are treated well and they're treated well as compared
to being at a brothel, and it could be prepared to many places.
But also they're not doing great, you know, they're they're working four day
shifts, like they have their own little community. They're given some agency and
respect over their lives, but there's a huge glass ceiling and there's no way
to step up well. And also there's a ton of misogyny. Those guys
that work there talk mad shit about these women, right, They basically call
them horse, dirty horse basically and more subtle language, well not even really
not subtle. I said, like look out for the fishy smell or something
was it was, I remember exactly what they said. All I wrote was,
Wow, these guys are misogynistic. And so it's like it's like what
we're talking about, which that she will Obashi will create a sayer system to
a point, but she's not creating a system where she's like, don't talk
about women like that, you know, where there's more like true egalitarianism going
on. Are we starting to say that she is Lady Abashi, the breaker
of chains, the mother of forges, we're talking about Denaris. Yeah,
my main girl. Yeah, if she's your main girl, you missed the
point of that moment. I think the show missed the point. Agreed.
I think she was always going to take that route, but it was a
bad Yeah whatever that or on the tenth of never Yeah, exactly, but
exactly like Yeah, look at lady aboushi Is. She's complicated, but there's
clearly something that's causing her to start compromising both the values of the Samurai and
also the values that she's setting up for these people that allows her to pursue
her own sense of Why is the word ambition? I guess m is this
word I'm looking forward to. Her own ambition seems to drank higher than anything
else because she has placed herself and this mission above everyone else's needs her.
The representation she's sold to these peoples I'll keep you safe song as you serve
me. But when that clashes with her mission, she's quick to abandon them.
Yeah, because she'll find more showing her true value she places on them.
At least that part does Yeah, or even just like Hubris, right
of believing that which we can all fall into, of believing that our viewpoint,
and our greatness is what's most important. Like we are currently in our
society struggling with a lot of people like this, like the Elon Musks,
the Jeff Bezos, the politicians who are very much like I am, the
Way, the True, and the light. And so to keep me prioritized,
to value me is to value the future and society and my brain and
my ambition, like you were saying, Ben, and that other people are
more are well, are less valuable, are more disposable because they don't have
as much to offer the world. And so this is where like people can
also take values ideas and kind of twist them to fit their needs to do
bad when we all do this mental gymnastics to justify ourselves to ourselves, you
know, I'm sure there's stories that lady Obashi's telling to herself about why it's
okay that she's doing stuff that like looks on paper horrible. I'm cutting down
all these forests, I'm fucking up all these people that were animals that already
hear these gods, which that's tempting a lot of bad energy vibes, you
know, And what she must have to tell herself to make that okay,
as it aligns with her values and ethics correct. She's literally informed that her
weapons are responsible. That's how she Taka's entire point of talking to her is
informing her her weapons are killing the gods of the forests that are changing the
world for everyone, making them into demons that go into other communities and fuck
their shit up like pollution basically and poison including him like he's got proof and
she's like, nah, m hm, the samurai hurt me and fuck them,
Yeah, pretty much at all costs, which could be coming out of
a trauma that she experienced. Certain to be that hyper focused on the goal
the way that she is, I think it would make a lot of sense
that that would come out of trauma. Absolutely, Yeah, she was stripped
of something and yeah for sure, and she's taken power back. That's the
last fucking thing she does. That's what she's doing. And it kind of
makes me think of when I do values work with clients sometimes where I have
to kind of like throw down the hammer is are you really holding up to
this value you're telling me that you believe in or are you prioritizing your ego?
Like and then when I say you goo I mean how it connects to
like your defensiveness of yourself and how and that can show up as a trauma
reaction. It can also show up like we talk about with couples. This
is a good one. Do you want to be a writer? Do you
want to have a good relationship? Exactly? You could argue that's a valuous
conversation. Oh, certainly. Do you want to value your relationship or do
you want to value your ego? Yeah? And what that can next to?
Exactly? And yeah, And so I think with someone like Lady Abashi
and people in the real world to remind me of her, that's something to
contest with, right. And some people can't look in the mirror and really
acknowledge where they might be prioritizing values like my ego. Most people know that
that wouldn't be good to say out loud. It's not gonna feel good to
say. I'm not going to feel good to hear that. Like I actually
value my physical appearance, my status more than anything else money, Right,
And so we will connect sometimes those things to values that feel more palatable to
justify, like I said, justify ourselves to ourselves and others, Like I
said, like a lot of things that maybe we'll talk about this more with
Gigo is where we can be prioritizing things that are individual and self serving and
telling a story that like, no, actually, it's because like I'm so
important or my mission is so important or what I bring to the world so
important that I have to be doing this stuff and you all should be grateful
for it. Correct. Can you tell that I'm thinking of Elon Musk really
hard? I mean, there's a meme going on about him that or going
around about him for the past couple of years. It makes me laugh really
hard. It's a really unflattering picture of him taking a sun shower somewhere that
says bro had enough money to be Batman, but chose to be the Penguin.
The second Penguin refends one episode. The one I always think about is
everyone this is years ago, back when he's still kind of a good reputation,
is that everyone thinks Elon Musk is Tony Stark, but he's Lex Luthor.
It's like, well, I read that and it forever changed how I
thought about him. That was like started the crumbling of him in my mind.
Yeah, m hmm, yeah, makes sense. That makes sense.
And you know, when we see these characters like lady Abashi kind of represents
a fallen paladin, a vengeance paladin or oathbreaker is what would be called in
D and D where she's representing a promise but she stopped and there's consequences to
that and those have to be sorted out before you can get on the right
path again. And that's absolutely what happens to her. She must be humbled
from her ridiculous ideas that she's larger than this community that she represents, that
she's sworn an allegiance to protect, and then she stops protecting them and she
nearly loses her life. Yeah, she loses her goddamn arm. She does.
And then she's like maybe, oh yeah. So what I kind of
wanted to ask both of you is, what do you think about her saying
well, we're going to do it better next time. Do you feel like
she'll be able to shift her values after having that experience or does it feel
like she won't be able to shull fall right back into that pattern? So
which experience, because I think that's an excellent question. What are you talking
about, like the totality of the whole experience or just the wolf head,
ripping, tortality, losing the arm just I think also the impact of like
death almost like encompassing everything. Yeah, the way I think of it is
like she has witnessed the bigness of what she was trying to conquer and she
got her ass handed to her. Yeah, pretty much. I agree,
pretty much. And I think that's an excellent question at the meat of the
story. Do I think that's enough to cause a value shift for her?
I do so do I That's why I was just curious what you both thought,
because I really feel like because also because it went so badly, So
it went so so badly that I think that that is enough for her to
kind of take a step back and look aside and kind of figure out,
like, I don't think that that value is actually serving me anymore, and
I think I need to do something different. I mean, it's it's what
we say all the time, right that people change when they're uncomfortable enough.
And if this ain't her rock bottom, baby, I don't know what it
is, you know, And this is the reason, like the real world
examples of this, white people come to therapy, right, like something catastrophic
happens that changes something really huge for them. They lose something very significant they
can't keep. They've learned a lesson that can't keep doing things the way they
used to. They cannot. And I just had one of those had a
spark, a spark at a teacher wants to tell me that I think she
like to watch the gears go on my head because they'll go like click clicklickick,
click and then lock onto something. And I just realized who, Lady
Abashi reminds me of Wanda Maxima. Yep, oh so so long okay song
as Sam Raimier, whoever wrote her story in Multiverse of Madness, isn't writing
her story? Yeah, I believe the answer to your question is would this
be a big enough event of actually facing down pure extinction and a world destroying
event enough to shift her values of realizing, Oh, you must in fact
accept the truth that death and life cannot be conquered by any living thing.
It is for the gods, and it can't. It's a spiritual thing.
You just it's just truth, hard truth. Can that be messed with,
conquered, defeated? No? And is that enough to cause a shift,
yes, But to me it's it almost harkens to like Wanda realizing the effect
she's having on other people in Wanda vision, realizing that her maintaining this narrow
vision of this reality, holding onto it and not accepting the truths of the
world, that no one can conquer death and life right absolutely, and then
that being enough to cause her to drop that and finally grieve whatever Lady Aboshi
is not facing in her life she's playing out in progressively more. I don't
know what the right word is. Dangerous, Sure, we'll go with that,
dangerous ways that have significant impact on radiating like layers of exponential destruction on
everyone else because she won't deal with her shit. Yeah. And also I
think because she free and lost her free arm, that that's a reminder to
her every day right to stay humble. You know, that's like a lot
of when you come from that more like ecocentric mindset like this happens a lot
of people when they have to do recovery from substance use. Right, is
that you have to keep mindful of, like your humility within the situation.
Yep I. How easily we can lapse into old patterns of behavior, old
ways of thinking, like sort of quote unquote the easy way out if you
will, even though it's not easy on you. And so I think that
if she hadn't lost her arm, if other things like that had happened,
I could see maybe her slipping back into it. But I think because it
had such a profound she's a profound reminder that's going to affect her every day
for the rest of her life. She's gonna have to change the way she
does everything that I think that might be enough for her to stick to the
change. I agree it has potential. Yeah, will it I don't know.
Will she follow the path of Wanda and retreat back into it the path
of Teddy in the Shutter Island story, where he comes face to face with
how bad a traumas and chooses to continue to ignore it, further retreat even
to the point that his ability to make independent decisions is taken from him and
he doesn't have to do it. Yep, it's a risk with her and
her the ambiguity, but she seems to have shown enough shift that it's hopeful.
When I was watching videos about the film this week, people did very
much talk about how she had a shift at the end, and how and
how they really felt like they really believed that she would be able to create
a more natural town this time. People felt very hopeful about that that if
things stay in balance, she's trying to use the natural resources of the world
that are given to us and the natural evolution that comes without destroying everything,
but only taking what can be replaced. If she learns that message and accepts
it, she would grow. And seeing as this is a teenager's kind of
story, it makes sense that that might be a lesson to learn at that
age. Oh yeah, do we have anything else we want to cover with
her? I feel like that was an excellent coverage of her character and ambiguity
of it. I'm good, Brittany is good. I'm good. I am
also good. Let's take a break here. So our our lead, our
paladin, our main guy. That's what I put in my notes. Yeah,
as played by Billy crud Up. I know, and in real life,
Billy crud Up and Claire Danes, who was the voice of Son Princess
Mononoke, they got together in real life. Hmm, it didn't last to
them, But that's interesting about how who they play in this movie. Yeah,
for sure, indeed. And the Prince is such an interesting character as
he's well the nature God is the Christ figure of the story, right,
yeah, oh yeah, for sure, for sure, even the even the
beginning of him getting cursed by the demon and then the only choice he has
is to leave his community and he can never come back, Like he loses
his complete and full identity automatically and has to go on this quest to not
die, which he might anyway, which he might anyway because it's demon stuff
and his culture. Right, I don't know what else to say, Like
he's fucking cursed by a demon. I mean that shit's fucked. Like you
gotta go and I never want to see you ever, right, due to
our laws, we can't even watch you, Like he got no ceremony just
to cut your hair, get out, Yeah, because you're you're gone.
You have to leave us. But looking at that's important. He has to
hold on to the truth that feel most secure to him, because that's all
he has left. Well, And it also makes me really curious if we
had got to spend more time with his village, with his people. I
assume that they have a really highly evolved moral value system because he is so
like we were saying, we were saying in the beginning, he almost like
rises above all the foibles that everybody else is falling into. Like, he
maintains this very empathetic, neutral, curious, open minded stance that is almost
like inhuman in a good way, like the jesus Y part of it.
Yeah, like rising above a lot of this stuff and having like a high
moral standpoint he does. He maintains is like lawful, good to neutral kind
of alignment where I'm going to do what feels like the most right thing to
me. But he was also like like, yeah, I'm sure his culture
does have a very set way of viewing things and has become more inclusive as
they were almost exterminated, they say kind of in the beginning of the movie.
There's only five hundred of them left, and they're getting weaker. Yeah,
they make she people right. Their genetics are getting weaker. They're essentially
it's unimplied they've reached the point of starting to inbreed and like trying to fight
against that and recognizing that their time on the planet as a cohesive tribe may
be coming to an end. Yeah, but it does make me curious because
they are so isolated. Is that why they're able to like someone like Oshataki
can exist that has such moral yeah, high standards, right, because I
guess the assumption is like they're just not as corrupted by everything else. Well,
and also I mean, yeah, I think so. But then also
they have to figure out how to compromise. They have to figure fure out
how to maintain a certain level of morality, I feel like, in order
to continue on with their journey of trying to keep their people and cooperativeness.
Yeah, they have to be cooperative. They can't. They really have to
compromise because there's not that many of them, and so they can't allow They
also can't experience the loss of making brash decisions, right, they can't murder
each other out of anger exactly. Oh yeah, so it holds them to
a higher stated their survivals tied to behaving, yes, and being good to
each other. Yeah, which is a great point. And what it also
makes me think of because when I was reading the Wikipedia page about this movie,
one of the themes other than like the obvious ones of like environmentalism stuff
like that, is like the loss of innocence. And when you were saying
about that with like that tribe and how they are isolated and so that kind
of also allows them to live in this way is how when we are younger
and our world smaller, if we are safe, right, Like I'm sure
we all know kids and teenagers that we've worked with where they're so sure of
everything. Everything's so black and white and right and wrong, and good people
do that and bad people do that, and it's very unnuanced, right,
Yes, And then as you get older and you leave, like Ashataki leaves
his little community and goes out into the world, he's exposed to all these
more complicated ideas, right, that sometimes you actually may hurt someone to save
someone else, like kind of like ethical trolley problem kind of stuff. Right.
And it's so hard to have those conversations with teenagers and kids because they
are so sure of themselves, which is they're supposed to be except for them
development developmental. And there's so little wiggle room sometimes around why people do things
that don't feel good or look good, right, And I think I wonder
if that's like the loss of innocence that is sort of exploring this movie too,
of like he's being exposed to this idea that things aren't always able to
be as clear cut as we would like them to be, right every side
is trying to kill the other and they are doing it for their moral reasoning,
right, and they aren't. People don't always leave you the option of
having like a safe and peaceful compromise they do not. Sucks, Yeah,
it does, it royally sucks. Yeah. He seems real comfortable with that
because when he rides into that battle, Yeah, whoever he sees his the
aggressor, he just immediately shoots with his boone because of his now demon arm
strength, Like their arms are just getting lobbed off by his arrows. And
that was bananas, bananas when his arrow would just like pop a head off
or pop off an armors, Like what the fuck? But again because that
demon energy, right, and he's I guess he's a palock, Paladin warlock,
multi glass, I got that demon. I feel like at this time
in the podcast, I should explain that Ben right now is leading a D
and D campaign that he has manipulated Hannah and I to be a part of
just such a strong language offering. Has offered to teach us how to play
D and D it so it's fresh on his noggin. Yes, which is
why I feel like you're using so much of these vocal words I am.
Also, you know a lot of my network uses him and now speaks it.
So you know, we we learned to speak it in the pandemic when
there was nothing else to do besides learn things none of us thought we'd ever
do, including D and D and golf and then golf. There was nothing
else to do for the three years. So I mean, we get it.
We watched everything. Listen, I understand that men have to create a
sport around taking long walks with their friends. Yeah, it's very sweet.
I mean we some of us just try to snuggle, but the others are
a little too masculine for it. Still, I mean that's why wrestling got
created, right, Yeah, I mean that was obviously usually done for men
to be naked with each other and exactly exactly. Yeah, so you know
you poor guys, Yeah, I know, just want a friend and nap
with me, like Chandler and Joey or not, but Joey and Ross.
My wife would yell at me for that anyway. Yeah. Looking at Ashitaka,
it's really important to understand, like he's got a really clear cut sense
of right and wrong, and he does have to start recognizing he can't just
ride it and start like dismembering people. Yeah, with his new you know,
god like pars because the demon force inside of him tries to take control.
Yeah, and that starts to be a valued conflict of He's getting this
rage to strike that's not coming from him, and he saw how that can
assumed the boor god and he doesn't. He's fighting to not become that and
to solve these problems before he loses his battle with that. And that's a
lot for a teenager to recognize. Of. Yes, in fact, the
world can scar you, damage you, and force you to act outside of
your will out of fear and anger. And you are not immune to that
because you decided you weren't going to be Yeah, And that's what egocentrism leads
people to think. One of my favorite questions to talk to first responders about
is in your early career and childhood life, who were you taught that bad
things happened to? Oh hmm, And they always have the same answer,
bad people. Who are those? Well that too, But I mean think
about how simple we teach children. Yeah, but when you ask them,
and now that you've been on the job for five years, who do bad
things happen to? Everybody, everybody, everyone, and then usually there's a
second term added to it is some synonym of indiscriminately. And it's easy for
you too, because we're all therapists. Yeah, we know, we don't
go on. That's something we talk about with clients all the time, is
like, sometimes bad things just happen, and not because you deserve it.
Are they deserved it or you did anything wrong? Just happens, And that's
really hard. That's a really hard lesson to learn in life. It's a
really hard end. It's a really mean lesson. It is acceptance, and
sometimes it's because of evil, and sometimes it's become a circumstance, and sometimes
evil latches on to circumstance a la Lady Abashi, where we struggle to find
the lines and he struggles to explore that because he gets kind of taken in
by her and sees the ambiguity of where she's at. Like finding someone's on
that neutral evil spectrum is that's tough to figure out, like okay, but
they are doing some good, but their basis like where do you? Is
this someone I need to exterminate? But then that you know, forest rage
in him is like kill this bitch yeah. Well, I think also an
interesting influence and maybe this is why they had the kind of like flirty romantic
stuff in it is that he starts to get a crush on someone who is
demonstrating a lot of behaviors that he maybe wouldn't have aligned himself with but are
now awakening in him. Yeah. So that complicates it too. That starts
to complicate his also sense of morality as well. It's a good point,
Oh, I can like someone who does stuff like that. Yeah, And
when you're younger, there is this more like hardcore sense of like we were
saying, bad guys good guys, of like, well, if they do
that, they're a bad guy, and I can't possibly like them, especially
if I'm the good guy. Yeah. And so that leads to what we
have talked a lot about this podcast before, dialectical thinking, and when I
have to use that with clients when they have a really hard time wrapping their
head around the fact that there's someone that they know or that they love or
maybe even themselves, we're like, how can I be both this say and
that it has to be a button there? And then I'm like, well,
you can put an in the middle, you know, of like like
Lady Abashi. This can be someone you've met who has done horrible things and
has done really beautiful things for people who really needed help, and both those
things can move for at once, and sitting in that is so uncomfortable for
us because we do like to choose a side because it's simple and usually promotes
survival. Yeah, who's the us and who's the then? Correct, as
at some point the world will force you to make a choice. You got
that, right, though sometimes that choice doesn't come or you can decide in
degrees a lah Switzerland without everybody bank here. Yeah, so nobody's gonna invade
us because we control everybody's money. But then you're you're still making a choice.
Yeah, A non choice is a choice. Silence is a choice,
you know. Non action is a choice. Right, and ash Taka really
chooses along the moral lines because that's the only identity he has left. Yeah,
is to represent I carry this burden of saving the world within me and
making making it to the forest gods that I can stop this curse from affecting
everything and me. Well, he also has the benefit of, even though
he's coming from such an isolated community, he also kind of oddly has the
benefit of like seeing the bigger picture because he's coming in from as an outsider,
right of like, this isn't just who's gonna win right here right this
area of the world, This has lasting impact, and that's connected to a
higher value of like the lively like the world right which we see now in
modern day world, which is climate change? Right, what are we going
to prioritize and people saying, well, we have to prioritize these things that
hurt the climate because that's kinect to survival, while other people are like,
what does that matter if we don't have an earth to live on? Correct,
if we're living on Kevin Costner's water World, Oh god, among the
worst films ever made. Oh god that in so long never saw it?
Don't will don't don't, oh we'll watch it? Oh God? AnyWho?
But the uh, I think you're right that Ashtaka comes in with an ability
to hold an end. He has the ability to hold the dialectical thinking both
things can be true simultaneously where other characters can't, which sorry, which I
think is connected to the bigger picture that his community had to always hold in
hand if we want to survive. Going back to survival. If we want
to survive, we have to figure this the fuck out. We gotta be
collective, like hyper collective. Yes, yes, anyway, go ahead.
Oh yeah, it's good. It all ties exactly together, and it's it's
important to recognize how him coming in with that outside perspective like you guys are
mentioning, allows him to tie that higher truth into break through people's values that
are now also getting corrupted by survival. That we have an enemy present.
Yes, this is not a cultural myth. We're perpetuating to prepare people to
deal with something. The wolf is at the gates literally, yeah, that
is our introduction to Lady Abashi's people, a wolf attack by son writing the
wolf pups and being told like, oh they're not they're big, but they're
not big, Like those are the pups? Wait till you meet mama.
Yeah yeah, and then they shoot mama. Yeah they do, but it's
still yet again works into this higher narrative, higher narrative, higher narrative that
ash Tuka is representing. You guys need to get off your bullshit and recognize
we're all gonna die. Yeah if you keep this up. And they're like,
no, but these people are trying to kill us, and of course,
the minute lady Abashi takes her guard and leaves the samurai led by the
local shogun attack and she is now forced to work with our boy, the
monk Jigo. Jigo, Jigo. So should we take a break there,
we should? All right, we'll be right back. So coming from a
super outward, hyper collective lens, let's narrow right back down to a super
individualistic lens, a super self serving lens, which is Jigo in the story.
And Jigo is such an interesting way to represent that because Jigo appears to
be the wise old man archetype and assuming yes he does worldly sees everybody,
knows everything, he knows all the secrets, he knows people's culture. He
recognizes Ashitaka for being of his the Amishi people's like I see that ball,
right and the bowl in particularly the bowl, Oh okay, A big interchange
about that that really lets ashi Taka kind of be seen as you know,
who he is and of his people, and he has a big conversation with
about that. But appears to be not a snake, but god damn,
is he the worst, the worst. But he doesn't reveal himself. He
appears to be just kind of like advisors kind of around. I kind of
like the he just seems to pop up right, kind of like maybe I'm
the clericy kind of person the connection to spirituality and morality, and I'm kind
of neutral to everybody. But he is most certainly not. He is on
his own side. He is a sneaky, sneaky sneak who is the sneakiest
snake there ever was. Yeah, and he's on a mission to get the
head of the forest God for the Emperor so that the Emperor in anger must
it needs to fear death and keep his reign going forever and then doesn't have
to keep fighting Lady Aboche anymore, which I think probably lends to the undertext
that it was him, or that it was the Emperor who cast out Eboshi
in the first place, or someone like him. Sure, and then it's
really complicated for her to trust Jigo, although Gigo probably was not revealing to
her that he's on the Emperor's team until the end. He's playing every side
he can, Yeah, I don't think so. I don't think she catches
on until the very very end where he finally reveals that he wanted it for
the emperor. I think that sounds right, and where he represents a particular
dangerous he doesn't care, he's chaotic, he doesn't care what happens to anybody.
Yeah, he's just looking out for him. Somewhere along the story of
his life. For whatever reason, he decided that his value is number one
New Maruno, right, and that's it. And that's it, and he
is and we also are taking other stuff, and we also know the least
about him. Yeah, I would say we have the least amount of background
from him as well, so we also don't really have a lot more awareness
besides what he shows in the film as just being self serving, right,
And he's representative of a lot of characters that seem to exist throughout some of
the stories of your and Japanese movies seem to have this characters show up.
And even though the last Samurai was kind of dances with Wolves with Samurai,
never saw Avatar with Samurai. But there's definitely a character in there who's representing
a little bit later in this process of firearms coming in of the westernization of
Japan. It happened after Commodore Perry started bringing Western uniforms and military culture and
the samurai really resisting heart as they're facing their own extermination. That's the central
point of this one. But there's always a character like that, like the
guy in three hundred who turns over the Spartan goat path to the Persians,
the kind of deformed character, yeah, who can't hold the shield and the
Spartans reject him, and then the Persians welcome in in and give him a
harem, which I think is also how you can become self serving. Like
that is, if you feel ostracized by a community, if you feel like
no one's taking care of you. I mean, that's also like a lot
of people that suffer from like pathological narcissism. A lot of times that's a
product of trauma, right, you know, and they're not just borne that
up their own ass like they it's like I have to take care of me.
I have to take care of number one because no one else is going
to right and I need to be hyper prioritized to and how much that's connected
to your survival. Correct. And this character is represented in media all over
the place. You see it over and over again. They're frequently carry some
status in society, but not enough that they get jealous and they get really
close to power without having any really close to money without having enough and no
recognition, they start to seek that and start taking matters into their own hands
for their own means. And I think you of Game of Thrones, there
were two characters in particular who are among the most powerfully dangerous characters in the
series that fit this archetype very very well. Who am I thinking of?
Little Finger? Ding? It's one And you wouldn't say with Saraus, would
you, Varus? Varus? Is that you're thinking of, Oh, look
at me, well done, well done? Yep, exactly. I think
he's Those are great parallels too, little Finger, especially what a bastard?
Yeah Varus too? Yeah, oh yeah, for sure. I think because
we get more of a backstory of Faris, I can have more empathy for
why he does the things he does. The Little Finger feels like more of
this character where you just don't know, yeah, and so you can kind
of fill it in with a lot of just like more of that moral black
and whiteness we've been talking about. And this character sits, it doesn't care.
He's going to do whoever's going to pay him, and he's going to
organize his forces to do the shady thing and think you see they kill all
those bores that the boar god leads into war, and they do it deceptively,
which is very against the balance of nature destruction with mines and gunpowder,
killing mass numbers of them, which is very against the seam of this killing
something to eat. It seems to be relatively regarded as okay. Killing thousands
of them in one fell stroke could shift the balance of power, while deceiving
them and then wearing their skins to get close to the animal god feels real.
Gross. Oh real gross. I forgot about that partial just see me
too, me too. And it also didn't like how they moved they were
wearing those skins. I don't think you were supposed to. Yeah, yikes.
But I think recognizing that there are ways that people form values that are
connected to no one and nothing but themselves in these stories always represent the most
dangerous and least predictable character, and it's important to remember, like who you're
letting close to you, who you're letting provide context to the world, and
watch carefully what people do, not so much what they say. But I
think Gigo is a really interesting character to look at. It, and it's
important to include as we're looking at values versus acceptance. He's accepted he'll never
have enough, so he does whatever fuck he wants. Yeah, and if
he's someone that has experienced ostracization himself, then it becomes a thing of like,
I've accepted that people, I'm not gonna be part of a group anyway,
so I might as well get mine. Yeah, pretty much, you
know. And also too, I would say, depending on the cultural he
grew up in, like our culture, American capitalistic culture, we also do
a lot of moralizing of that very linear way of success. Yes, like
the way that we like believe we're mere talk so when we're not. But
also like the way that we assume billionaires are millionaires earned that, you know,
because they're better, smarter, whatever, And if we just idolize them
enough and try to form our life around them, that we can do what
they did and we can have enough money. We just haven't wanted to bad
enough. I literally my last note when watching this movie was my paraphrasing of
the John steinback quote that everyone thinks that they're a temporarily embarrassed millionaire and that's
why people will like vote against their interests and act against their interests because we're
not a We're I'm not an actual poor person, I'm a temporarily embarrassed millionaire,
right. And I was like, that's such a I think about that
quote all the time. It's pervasive throughout history, in our own history right
now, pretty pretty firmly entrenched in millionaire billionaire worship exact, ammouondo anything else
we want to say before we shift into treatment, Nope, I think it's
a clear picture of how these values collide in the ambiguity and lack thereof all.
Right, let's take a break here. So treatment, we've kind of
like touched upon treatment here and there, you know, we were talking about
Lady Abashi and stuff. Something that came to mind for me in thinking about
treatment was thinking about the groups of marginalized people that are in Iron Town and
how much they're willing to do things that we would maybe describe as a moral
because they have connected their resources getting their needs met and their survival and their
dignity to Lady Abashi and this Iron mind, right, and how that is
a way that people will get stuck in these cycles. And then like,
even when we've talked before about why people will do like criminal behaviors right and
join gangs, join gangs. Yeah, that's a great example. And how
I think from a treatment, from a more broader treatment lens, I think
what is helpful to actually cut through this kind of stuff is having social services
programs for people so that they can have dignity resources get their needs met,
so they don't have to rely on people with slippery moral values, and then
they don't have the desperation factor where they're willing to compromise. Maybe they're even
their own values for their survival, you know. So in this situation,
part of maybe being able to hold that compromise between like Iron Town and the
forest is having resources that can come in and lift up the community so that
they can't be corrupted by lady Abashi and her agenda where they don't feel like
they have to. I think a lot of what we see in our country
too, like why people want to keep doing coal mining and stuff like that,
is that they don't have resources to do something else, right, and
so you have to provide people with an opportunity to get their needs met in
other ways so that we can evolve all together and make choices that are good
for the collective. We can't just be like, just get on board,
forget about the fact that you don't know how to make a living besides relying
on fossil fuels, you know, because we need to help climate change.
What does climate change mean to me if I can't afford to take care of
my children? Right? So I think it's just good to know that in
order to help people grow and help communities grow, we do have to go
in and provide resources that help people be able to make more values based decisions
that aren't just survival value. So that's kind of what I wanted to highlight
because sometimes people will be like social services, social services, like why do
we need things like that? Because that is a deep part of asking for
change as an individuals. You have to make sure that people get those needs.
Bat Yeah, absolutely absolutely. And I feel like something else that I
want to add to that is they have to be well funded social services.
A big part of the problem in our country is that they are not well
funded. They are not properly funded, and so that then creates a scarcity
experience for a lot of people. There's a lot of people who need this
kind of support, and we in this country one of the values that we
have is not about poor people. We don't give a fuck about poor people.
We don't give a fuck about marginalized people. We say we do,
we say we do, but we don't. None of our actions match that.
And so also, you know, all three of us have worked within
agencies and had all different kinds of experiences, and I think a big part
of what I always hoped could be better is the is the funding of some
of the social services, that it could be more consistent, that it could
be just not based on donations. If we had to run something based on
donations only, like, that's not going to be enough. It's just not.
Nope, it's not. And it produces the same problem over and over
that the most qualified staff leave, leaving only the least qualified staff who are
also the most burned out to work with the highest need people. Yeah,
it's fucked and none of us do it anymore. And none of us do
it anymore because we don't have to just fucked. Yeah. Yeah, and
you see some of the best people stay and do that, but they choose
poverty or near poverty to probably the mission. And having well funded, well
resourced, well educated staff and well societally elevated and received social services that are
given a status with a society that's not oh you know, well that's good
for you. Yeah, it's good for you. You're taking care of those
people they really need help. Yeah, AnyWho like looking at the importance of
that and how much shamee it can create. It creates class mobility, which
doesn't exist in this story. People get stuck in the world that they have,
which the example of people that are coal miners or farmers or whatever other
devalued class that is also simultaneously incredibly necessary for society to function. It creates
a big problem that people also are taught that poor people are bad and that
you may be poor, but you're not as poor as them. And if
you like your children to eat, you got to keep doing what you're doing.
And you can't look at the world beyond that because that's not relevant to
you and people like us, And that creates a really dangerous dynamic that keeps
people kind of like is happening in Iron Town. Yeah, they are operating
against their own interests because they're not willing to go backwards because if they go
backwards, they know how bad it is, and they're not willing to give
that up. They don't believe they have class mobility. They're sex workers living
another life, right, That's what they They and lepers cast out. Anybody
else will just exterminate us or throw us on a rock. Yeah, which
is what's so funny about that is that there's more of them than her,
Lady Obashi. They can rise up almost always. She gives them guns,
but they would never turn them on her. Oh, there is what she's
doing. I hate to say it. She rolls high on that charismas stet.
Yeah, she sure the buck does not twenty right? Was there anything
else? Did you just speak D and D Look at you? You know
everything I learned is against my will? That's false. You guys played DD
before I did. We did? We did? We did? They're misrepresenting
here any years before I played? For that matter? Yeah, like two,
that would be more than one, So plurals appropriate cut this out anything
else for true move We want to talk about any other specific characters that we
wanted to get further into. I don't think so. I feel like the
plot resolves a lot of things. I think having social services in some kind
of regrounding to a value of some degree of spirituality, not religion, but
spirituality and recognition of that there are things that are bigger than you, kind
of like when we were talking about with substance use, people must accept that
they are not bigger than the substance they're trying to use and their body's chemical
affinity to it, and that they, like everyone else, are susceptible and
in twelve step language, particularly more susceptible to fall victim to the power of
the substance. And I think the opposite also is true with in a good
way, with spirituality that people lose connection with is that there are things that
are bigger than us. There is a natural order that is larger than any
of us, and we must accept our place in that and that we can't
destroy the earth on which we live if we would like to have a place
on which to live, I would say the only thing maybe treatment wise,
but they'll kiva is really short, is they probably could do with like a
mediator of some sort a third party that comes in to help with the compromising
between Iron Town and the forest. Yeah, I think it's always it's it
is really hard to not get in your own head about your Like we're talking
about survival your needs. And so that's why people will go to therapists to
do like co parenting, coaching, and mediation, because they sometimes need a
third party to direct the conversations, to keep it on track, to keep
it constructive. So I could see, like maybe as Ana should talk key
type, being helpful, ongoing, someone with an outside perspective that can keep
them on goals. Yeah, and the mission statement solid and a drawback yet
again to the reminder that none of us are bigger and none of our immediate
needs are bigger than the world we should live, and we can not sacrifice
that. So we must come back to this idea we're all playing on a
level playing field, and let's de escalate so we can approach things from that
standpoint yet again, because the minute they lose track of that, we get
war. So we will take our last break here and be back with final
thoughts. All right, and go first. Okay, I now that I've
talked about this movie, I I feel the same way I came in,
like very like take it or leave it. I do want to watch it
again, Sam, because I do feel like kind of what we're talking about
in the beginning, and I probably said something very similar Spirited Away, to
be honest, So this is only this second time I've watched Mayazaki movie,
the other one being Spirited Away for this podcast when we did it there.
And so like this style of animation, this kind of storytelling, it doesn't
really isn't something I seek out and watch myself. I just don't connect with
it emotionally for whatever reason. I think it's just like a preference thing that
don't really have a lot of control over, so it's hard for me to
grab onto it. And maybe for the reason you brought up earlier, Ben,
with how they create the movie and the art, is the way that
my brain's trained to consume things through this culture is just has a hard time
adjusting to it, right as Yeah, So I do think I would want
to watch again to see what I can appreciate now that we've talked about it
and I've already seen it, and I feel like kind of the way way
about Spirited Away. So I don't I don't know if I would ever watch
this movie a ton. I'm interested to watch it one more time to like
see what I get out of it in a second watch. I do really
like the character of Princess mononok I love a little girl, well in my
mind, she's a little girl, but like a young female character who's kind
of like bananas. Like like I said, she reminds me of Louise Belcher.
I like like those kind of characters. Maybe because I'm in aries,
I like connect to that kind of vibe. But I do think it's very
cute. I can definitely say people love it, and like I said,
it's one of those things that just isn't like my type of art, but
I can see the beauty and why other people love it so much. And
I also would be curious what one of these movies would look like on the
big screen and how like all encompassing, Like I could see that being a
very different experience than watching it at home. So those are kind of my
thoughts on Princess Monon Okay, Okay, I'll go next. So I feel
pretty similar to how Brittany feels. I feel like after talking about it and
getting a better understanding of the characters, and I definitely want to watch it
again. I don't know if I can say that I like it and I
want to watch it again because I feel like it also deserves another shot of
to really experience it now that I kind of am not trying to figure out
what the fuck is going on the whole the whole fucking time, which is
kind of which is kind of what it felt like. I think I thought
I was started away too, like my brain was trying so hard to like
keep track of what's happening, but I wasn't like experiencing it almost exactly.
That's a lot, Yeah, it's yeah, it is so so again,
like I totally understand why people love this film, and I'm excited to give
it a second watch. And I think that it was really interesting to talk
about this film today, So I'll go next. This film is near and
dear to my heart. We watched this at like a Operation Snowball staff sleepover,
like we all kind of like were in a basement kind of bonding and
working before we did this huge I don't know how to even describe Operations Snowball,
but like where we were peer teens kind of like working on creating like
large group, small group weekend experience where we were the staff facilitators and we
had to learn to bond because we're going out to be dealing with people's real
emotions to not only the skits that we do, but also the speakers and
the whole experiential kind of like Tavistock Group program that I was part of in
high school and even junior high. And we needed to bond and we had
kind of a sleepover at one person's house to do this, and somebody brought
up watching this movie. And I'd never seen anime stuff really outside of Dragon
ball Z, which one of my friends really liked. DBT never did it
for me. I was like, Dad, I don't get this. That's
fine. I know people love it. It's okay, It's just not for
me. But this one, this movie struck me. Like the beauty of
the art and the incredible animation and the storytelling was huge, and I think
watching this was something that just broadened my mind, even though I think I
was fifteen and I watched it and some of it was is overwhelming. Yeah,
the messaging and the oppressive realities, it's a lot, and there's a
lot of watching that go really bad in a really found the violent way in
this film, and it caught me off guard and expect any of that from
this and watching it again now as an adult and looking back on it without
the egocentrism of being fifteen. You see a little more echoed truth that we
have all realized as people who are helpers, who sit and listen to people's
stories, that there are truths and these are it. We must take care
of our world. We must recognize that none of us can and conquer death,
and we must recognize that everyone has their own agendas. And if we
have any hope of peace, we must be able to both understand and recognize,
but also stay true to the growth the world affords us. Like the
opportunities for growth the world affords us, we cannot stay stuck in the messaging
of our elders, because the world will grow and change. There's a Hebrew
proverb I found doing restart. I think for this podcast or maybe for a
paper that I was writing, But there's a Hebrew proverb that as a non
Jewish person I wouldn't have come across, but it said, don't confine children
to your own learning for their of a different time. Oh. I like
that. I like it a lot. And this movie kind of covers that,
Like, Yeah, at some point we will have to go into our
own world and face the truths that were hidden from us, that either our
elders didn't know or didn't want us to perceive yet. But the balance of
understanding, you still get to find your own path and do what's right for
you, and that can change things, but not everything. But the Yeah,
I really I like this movie. I don't know how often I'll seek
it out because it's a lot. It's all. It's sensory overload, it's
emotional overload, it's hard truth all over and then just complete sensor overload and
watching it and the TV that it both is huge with a huge sound systems
a lot too. Yeah, I was really getting me overwhelmed. Maybe it
was just fund system. So the one speaker was right over my shoulder and
I'll be like, well, spooky, pooky, yeah, yeah, yeah.
When I had a kid and I, you know, wasn't going on
vacation, so I bought a really nice sound system for my TV. And
it's it's a lot like, oh, have you had a Have you had
an Atmas sound in your house before? I know I have not, but
I want it. And then you like feel the sound all over your house
like you do in the movie theater, but the screen isn't nowhere near is
big and not expected pot shit. Well. On that note, as always,
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