Magi? in 2025?

CAN I FOR ONCE HAVE A FEMALE CHARACTER WHO’S A PRINCESS OR A QUEEN WHO IS OKAY WITH BEING EXTRA FEMININE AND BEING PAMPERED AND PRIMPED AND TREATED LIKE ROYALTY AND DOESN’T THINK DRESSES ARE STUPID BUT ACTUALLY THINKS THEY’RE PRETTY CUTE AND WANTS TO BE A STRONG WARRIOR AND KICK ASS BUT STILL WANTS TO THINGS THAT PRINCESSES AND QUEENS DO CAN I HAVE THAT PLEASE

THE FACT THAT HE GOT TO SEE HIS PARENTS AT THE LAST POSSIBLE MOMENT AND THEY HELPED HIM ALONGSIDE UGO MADE ME LITERALLY BURST INTO TEARS

It's interesting that 気にかける is used, which is like 気になる but lean more into the "look after" and "concern" kind of care. Basically it says he does have concern about Kougyoku but can't help teasing her. It's sweet that his descriptions are "the one who supports her dream" and "providing her consultation and talking with her in the imperial palace". And that gives a little more context to this tegaki.

It means he's genuinely trying to cheer her up here, but being an avoidant asshole with 0 emotional intelligence makes him unable to express himself without cracking jokes or being a dick to hide his vulnerability. Yet it's still shown. Judar's not the type to take shit from anyone, not even Hakuryuu, and he retaliates every jabs thrown at him. But everytime Kougyoku starts throwing things in a fit of anger (that he caused), he just takes hits without even activating his borg. Everytime Kougyoku steps into the picture Judar becomes visibly gentler. They have few scenes together, honestly it's not their fault the Haku-Ju-Kou group were confirmed to be the secondary trio right before the last arc and had to share every possible screentime with Sinbad's end of evangelion plan (also Ohtaka's tendency to shove her female characters sideline but I won't be talking about it), but all of them present that Kougyoku is also very dear to him.

It's interesting that 気にかける is used, which is like 気になる but lean more into the "look after" and "concern" kind of care. Basically it says he does have concern about Kougyoku but can't help teasing her. It's sweet that his descriptions are "the one who supports her dream" and "providing her consultation and talking with her in the imperial palace". And that gives a little more context to this tegaki.

It means he's genuinely trying to cheer her up here, but being an avoidant asshole with 0 emotional intelligence makes him unable to express himself without cracking jokes or being a dick to hide his vulnerability. Yet it's still shown. Judar's not the type to take shit from anyone, not even Hakuryuu, and he retaliates every jabs thrown at him. But everytime Kougyoku starts throwing things in a fit of anger (that he caused), he just takes hits without even activating his borg. Everytime Kougyoku steps into the picture Judar becomes visibly gentler. They have few scenes together, honestly it's not their fault the Haku-Ju-Kou group were confirmed to be the secondary trio right before the last arc and had to share every possible screentime with Sinbad's end of evangelion plan (also Ohtaka's tendency to shove her female characters sideline but I won't be talking about it), but all of them present that Kougyoku is also very dear to him.

Me and my evil kid who showed up one day

The brain worms are getting to me, I need exams to pass so I can reread magi and obsess over it, expect more fanart to come

龍ジュダ詰め

let’s be real. sinbad going “evil” was to be expected. absolutely no one in his life humanized/grounded him except for some of the eight generals and seredine. and seredine died. so many people who kept him grounded died. everyone else either revered him or feared him—always with an element of awe either way because he is powerful and a singularity and everyone acknowledged that. but they didn’t acknowledge the fact that he’s human and makes mistakes and suffers until it was too late.

hakuryuu is such a divisive character. i feel like people either love him or hate him. and there are people who liked him before kou arc and hated him after it, and people who didn’t care much for him before it and grew to love him during it (i’m the latter).

it’s pretty easy to see why, since i guess some people just are not into dark characters. one argument that shows up often is that hakuryuu didn’t get “punished” enough in the final arc, which is always super weird to me. many people in the series did fucked up shit and most of them are never punished for it, so i don’t understand why hakuryuu is such a big issue. especially when i feel like he was punished. basically he had to accept the fact that he failed at what he was trying to do, and that his previous way of thinking was wrong. he had to become humble. note how hakuryuu gets nothing he was initially going for, including morgiana.

we often think that “real punishments” are only those where someone is imprisoned or killed. in some situations, however, it’s the mental journey that a person has to go through that is way more punishing, and at the same time, way more healing.

hakuryuu loses. loses at love, loses at managing his country, loses at his philosophy of doing everything alone without anyone’s help. and on top of it all, he loses in all of those to the people he thought he was being tougher compared to, who he thought were naïve, mainly alibaba.

(and i’m not even going to address the history stuff because. yes, believe it or not, power struggles within imperial families like that, that got pretty darn violent, are period typical and not out of the ordinary.)

but hakuryuu has grown during the series. he takes these losses and lessons with humility. tries to become better. not enough? would he have had to go into a fit of rage and misery over his failures? would he have had to be publically disgraced before anyone was allowed to forgive him? would he have had to suffer more in order for his punishment to be adequate?

Ah, yes, Hakuryuu, my favourite Wasted Potential of Magi. And there’s a lot of these in here. Thanks, Ohtaka.

I feel like describing the issue with “not getting punished” is kinda missing the point entirely. Try “not facing the consequences of their actions”. At the very least, not from the perspective of the reader, who gets a timeskip, and has to just accept that Some Things Had Happened. Or they just get completely ignored, because who cares, apparently.

I’ll try to explain to the best of my ability.

Magi from the very beginning had an interesting and somewhat realistic approach to the whole actions and consequences thing, especially with a big portion of the cast being in some sorts of positions of power or the lack of it. It didn’t matter whether the action itself was good or bad, because there were certain limitations thrown at the characters, and for breaking out there were very real consequences awaiting. My first example would always be Alibaba almost becoming a slave to Budel or getting killed trying to eskape. Why? Because he used Budel’s wine to save a little girl (and the entire caravan), and later denied help from the other people in the caravan. It’s a good thing! He valued somebody’s life over some merchandise, and later showed humility regarding that! But it doesn’t matter, because there are Rules and Limitations, and he overstepped these, and hadn’t it been for Aladdin with Ugo there, he’d have either become a slave or dead. 

Basically. Consequences. They’re gonna happen. We live in society. Magi established that early on. And the thing about Hakuryuu is that he doesn’t face them for the most part, or at the very least Ohtaka skips them entirely.

Losing isn’t the only consequence to be expected from that stunt he pulled. And, frankly, two of these things you mentioned (love, managing the country) can’t be truly connected to his actions in the Kou Empire Arc, or at least not entirely.

Losing in love isn’t the consequence of anything he did, not really. Morgiana simply didn’t love him back, that’s all there is to it. His actions certainly didn’t help, but can’t be really blamed on that, so that’s unrelated to the issue.

The fact that he couldn’t manage his country isn’t a direct consequence. He lacked the ability, so more than anything it’s a consequence of no preparation for the role, and if you think about it more, most of the Kou siblings would struggle to handle this, too. Kougyoku certainly did, and from what we’ve seen, the only person somewhat capable of handling the foreign economic system is Koumei. So by the end you reach the conclusion that Kou in its entirety is facing the consequences for their previous militaristic & socialistic ideals.

If anything, you could say that his actions are what led to this situation in the first place, as without the civil war, Kou likely wouldn’t just randomly convert to capitalism nor would it let itself be forced to do so by other powers. But that’s probably all about it.

I’d say, that there are the three main issues regarding the consequences that I’ll be speaking of:

1. No consequences regarding the brainwashing. (Completely ignored)

2. No consequences regarding him killing Alibaba. (Completely skipped)

3. No consequences regarding putting his entire family at each other’s throats. (Almost completely skipped, but I’ll get to this one).

First one. Just. A topic never brought up again. Nothing. Nada. We don’t learn about the fate of the people he mentally tortured and used in his war. We never learn about the reaction of the people of Kou either. And there had to be something, don’t you think? What exactly did he do with these people? Can something like that even be reversed? Assuming the brainwashing itself was reversible, and, idk, they took out the plants from all these people’s brains, and managed to heal the damage. Somehow. Do you believe these people would be fine with all that? Or that there wouldn’t be any sort of reaction from society upon learning of it? There would be revolts, the first chance they get.

And even excluding all that, we see no negative reactions from the people of Kou, either. Not towards Kougyoku, who (unwillingly, but that’s a different topic) helped Hakuryuu get to the throne, not towards Judar, who just comes back like it’s no issue, not towards Hakuryuu himself, who isn’t treated with any distrust or hatred he very much deserves for all the pain he caused to his nation. And nations do remember, and can struggle to forgive for decades, at least. It doesn’t matter if he became humble afterwards. That doesn’t erase all the suffering he inflicted onto others. And in contrast to what Ohtaka might try to say, nobody really has to forgive anything. Hakuryuu demonstrated it himself, didn’t he?

Second one. Welcome back to Ohtaka and skipping literally everything important. When I say facing no consequences of that action, I mean, we jump from Morgiana expressing her distrust (and maybe some similar hints from Olba) and Kougyoku being careful around him, to everybody being okay with him, long forgiven and all that. Do you see what I’m getting at? The whole blank space in between these two strikingly different attitudes? Yeah, that’s the problem here. The only thing we really get is some comment from Olba regarding Hakuryuu trying so hard, that even he couldn’t hate him anymore. I mean, good thing to know, kind of a shame I’d never really seen him struggle as much as you say he was. Show don’t tell, you know?

And the last one, somewhat similar. We don’t exactly see him face his family, save for Kouen, and the whole thing isn’t exactly brought up in the Final Arc. Kouen and Hakuryuu had their talk, sure, but I don’t think we’ve seen anything from Koumei or Kouha, and Kougyoku, as I’ve said, has a more “long forgiven” attitude. And last but not least, Hakuei. Something once again skipped. Not only did Hakuryuu force her to choose between him and the rest of her family, which she loves dearly, but due to his actions, Hakuei ended up with a homicidal zealot in her head, controlling her body, and that’s something not truly addressed by Ohtaka. Because she just skipped that. Like so many things else.

These kinds of consequences. The consequences he faces alone. The consequences the people around him face, because he isn’t alone on the Earth, and his actions affect the surroundings. Aside from some things here and there, like Kougyoku being on the throne or Kouen, Koumei & Kouha being exiled, it’s as if the civil war itself had never happened, like he didn’t kill his friend. And Magi never before failed to show the results of one’s actions to such an extent.

I made a full big reply to this and posted it even, I’m not sure if you saw it, but regardless I chose to take it down because it’s not worth the argument and, well, my about says I’m really not interested in arguing. I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree on Hakuryuu. Kinda proved my original point tho in that, Hakuryuu is really divisive, and that some people want him to have public disgracing as a consequence, at least that’s how I understood what you were saying.

1. Saw that, started replying and left that as a WIP, because I went to sleep, heh, but I kinda wanted to add like two-three things, where only one has to do with that reply, and the rest are thing I wanted to add but forgot to.

2. Consequences and punishment aren’t the same thing. I mean, I made sure I wasn’t being an idiot, and checked the definitions just in case, and at best I’d say it’s a rectangle-square situation, where you usually can kiiinda use ‘consequences’ instead of ‘punishment’, but you can’t always use 'punishment’ instead of 'consequences’. I’m trying to think of a good example, but the best I can do right now is washing white clothes with something red on accident. The consequences is that my clothes aren’t white anymore. You can *kind of* call it a punishment if you want to be dramatic, I guess? But the actual punishment would be my mom yelling at me for ruining the clothes, and not the fact of the clothes being ruined. I hope it’s at leat a decent example.

3. It’s not that I want him to have a full-blown public disgracing, and, frankly, I never said anything about it. I want him to face the consequences of his actions, the lack of trust and him having hard time managing his country, and to be shown his efforts, a visible proof of Hakuryuu trying that isn’t a two-panel flashback of him whining/somebody’s comment. We never see him earn any of the forgiveness he was given. That’s the missing part. (Also, I do genuiny want to know what happened to all these people, it doesn’t need to be some public disgrace thing, just a simple acknowledgement that these things did happen, and hopefully what they did with that issue).

Just imagine in ATLA, assuming you watched, but I genuinely can’t be sure, so I won’t use names, though it’s an easy guess, when X approaches the group they caused a lot of pain and trouble for, we don’t get these four episodes of them slowly learning to trust each other, instead we immediatrly jump to everybody being buddy-buddy with each other.

And that’s kind of the problem with Hakuryuu, and at least three other characters that I can think of, and I assure you, I’m just as annoyed at that, as I am with him. Basically, Ohtaka skipping 1/3 of their character development, important parts of their developments. We just get the finished product. It’s cool if not everybody’s bothered by that, but as a writer and somebody who loves this series a bit too much, I can’t be satisfied with just that.

4. I mean, I believe Hakuryuu and Sinbad are the most divisive characters (or one of the most) in the fandom likely because they’re the two characters who pulled the most aggravating shit while having quite a lot of focus on them. They’re part of the main cast, so it’s hard to gloss it over like with Kouen etc.

Also, I recall you saying that it’s always Hakuryuu being accused of that, and hardly ever anybody else, but, honestly, I’d seen maybe one post regarding the topic? And far more people complaining about Alibaba, Morgiana’s treatment, and maybe Sinbad. Idk.

Anyway, hopefully I explained things better this time, but all of it really boils down to Ohtaka skipping 1/3 of the character development, and calling it a day. That’s kinda the whole issue.

And that’s all from me. If that doesn’t explain my problem, I’d very much like to just agree to disagree, and never go back to that discussion.

I feel like Hakuryuu (and to be honest, most of the entire kou gang) suffer a lot from just not being part of the main gang. Ohtaka skips a lot of screentime for important character developments, especially when it's a character outside the main 3.

This is also a phenomenon that just becomes more and more prevalent the further the story goes, partially because the cast of known characters just expands by that much, and partially because the story just ramps up in speed in general.

Now, I do feel like Hakuryuu suffers from this probably most out of all characters, specifically because you can easily consider him part of the main cast. He at some points gets more screentime than other people from the main gang (That's also because Morg gets shafted near the end but that's a talk for another time) but in the terms of what gets actually gets shown vs what gets skipped, he gets side character treatment. We get to see his states of being, like his antagonistic role and his brainwashing era, and then that gets moved past quite fast in order to get him in his next state.

I feel like this choppiness in between his states can make his character quite make or break. Like said before, there's a lot of people that only started liking Hakuryuu after certain points, or people that started hating him after certain points. We get shown these states with not much in between, and are left to fill in his feelings and the potential (mental) repercussions.

From what I've seen, this is where the make or break point comes. We're left with nothing much but crumbs for the very important bridges in between these states, and how (or if) the reader fills this in can really determine what way you end up swinging when it comes to liking or hating Hakuryuu. I feel like his hate (and even his love tbh) would have been a lot less bad had we seen more of his slow growth towards the extremes he ends up embodying.

tbh Sinbad was the original aura farmer.

Look I love unconditional devotion love stories as much as the next person, but there's really something so deliciously raw about conditional devotion.

I have served you and I have loved you for decades, but I will not give up my principles for you. You cut out part of my heart and took it with you down that path that you insist on walking, but you walk it alone. Even when the bleeding, gaping hole you left in my chest kills me, I will not follow you.

judar from hit show magi: the labyrinth of magic sosu

The sillies

Someone said that Hakuryuu understands Judar best and Kougyoku has loved him for the longest time.... When I think about it, Kougyoku is the first person to love Judar for who he is and has never thought about using his power as a magi, it's even emphasized in the last battle, and in turn Judar also just hanging out with her because he likes (teasing) her. They just care for each other without any ulterior motive and it's, precious that they are surprisingly pure.

I'm trying to practice drawing characters, I've never drawn before. So if i missed anything in their design, please forgive me. But anyway here's my attempt at drawing Ren Kouha, from Magi.~ (I wanted to drawn him for a long while)

The image is a lot more clear in the the game...