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REVIEW: Zero's Familiar [Omnibus] GN 1-3

Technically, that's not what the passive voice means -- it's "Object was Verbed" (optionally: "by Subject") as opposed to "Subject Verbed Object."

Let's just call it what it is: an abusive relationship. A spade is a spade is a spade. No one would be hesitant to call it out if the genders were reversed.

Shay Guy wrote:

Technically, that's not what the passive voice means -- it's "Object was Verbed" (optionally: "by Subject") as opposed to "Subject Verbed Object."

You got me. This is what I get for trying to simplify.

zeo1fan wrote:

Let's just call it what it is: an abusive relationship. A spade is a spade is a spade. No one would be hesitant to call it out if the genders were reversed.

Absolutely. It's one of the things that has consistently made me question the other aspects of the franchise that I enjoy. (That and my unnatural hatred of Sierra.) I had a paragraph about that, actually, but I took it out because it was too rant-y.

I've always attributed Louise's physical abuse of Saito to her culture.

Halkegenia is effectively 12th century Europe, and no one in 12th century Europe would bat an eye at a noblewoman whipping a peasant. Saito is hardly the only peasant depicted as getting the short end of the cultural stick in Zero no Tsukaima.

As a big fan of this series, Zero no Tsukaima is a story about two people coming to understand and love one another from across massive cultural barriers and widely differing self-images. Louise's whipping of Saito is just a natural outgrowth of that cultural gap.

You're giving this story way too much credit, dude.

zeo1fan wrote:

You're giving this story way too much credit, dude.

Did I not identify myself as a big fan of the series?

I think you're giving it far too little, but I don't suppose we'll ever find common ground on this issue, yes?

I happen to know the late Yamaguchi-sensei was a big European history buff, and I'm sure that played a big part in his planning for Zero no Tsukaima. Other than simply trying to make an appeal to ridicule, you really haven't demonstrated any counterpoint to my assertion.

Writing stories about settings where what-we-would-call-abuse is normalised is a choice the author made. Is a choice the author can be criticised for, is a choice that the work can be criticised for.

... on this level, Zero no Tsukaima fails because it's not reflective enough, or rather the characters aren't reflective enough. They might come from some medievalesque context, but the author who's literally putting words in their mouth didn't, and should have known better.....Rather than the writer just have all the characters find the status-quo the author provides for them fine and 100%

If you want to see something that handles the same sorts of material without falling into the problems here, I strongly recommend a look at the DearS manga -- haven't seen the anime -- where you've got characters actually thinking about the setting and critiquing it, finding some parts of it good, for them, finding other parts of it good for other people, and working to change the parts that hurt them or others.

I've always attributed Louise's physical abuse of Saito to her culture.

Halkegenia is effectively 12th century Europe, and no one in 12th century Europe would bat an eye at a noblewoman whipping a peasant. Saito is hardly the only peasant depicted as getting the short end of the cultural stick in Zero no Tsukaima.

As a big fan of this series, Zero no Tsukaima is a story about two people coming to understand and love one another from across massive cultural barriers and widely differing self-images. Louise's whipping of Saito is just a natural outgrowth of that cultural gap.

Hey, I'm grateful we're at least getting this released in English. Never thought it was gonna happen to begin with.