Hiii, I've got an ask for you 🫣
What is the most interesting end for Mizu in your opinion and if you could guess, what do you think the writers will do?
1. Doomed by the narrative all the way (her story starts sad and ends in a even bigger inevitable tragedy)
2.She gets what she wants but will never find true happiness (maybe lose someone she loves in the way)
3.Gets what she wants and finds contentment and even happiness.
Secret fourth opition?
Hope you are well😁
Hiiiii <3 <3
OOOH this is an interesting one, and right out the gate I would 100% immediately choose Option 3 here, which is that Mizu gets what she wants and finds happiness and contentment.
Now I am a SUCKER for tragedy and bittersweet endings, they are soooo juicy like don't get me wrong (the novel manuscript I'm working on is literally a doomed-by-the-narrative type story!) but in my opinion, though all stories can be tragedies, not all stories necessarily should be.
This is because a story's ending, and what makes an ending satisfactory, is heavily reliant on the promise that it sets at the very beginning.
A narrative promise is essentially what the story is telling us to expect when we start the first episode or read the first chapter or click the start button on a game. As such, the promise is usually given to us in two primary ways.
First is the story's tone. What sort of language does it use? What sort of art direction does it employ? Its music, its camera angles?
In BES, the story starts off with some dynamic long shots of Mizu walking with her back turned to the camera through the snow, the wind whooshing and dramatic music in the background, while words fade in and out on the screen:
In 1633, Japan closed its borders to the outside world. Citizens would never see a white face, nor any face that was not Japanese. A child born mixed race would be considered less than human. Pitiable. Monstrous. From these times rose a legend. Of a swordsman. Of a sword. Of revenge.
The music ends in an epic crescendo. Cue title screen.
From the above line, we can already see that the tone is that of a dramatic, epic, action-filled story about revenge. From that first scene, we see Mizu's confrontation with Hachi, and from this we already see the promise that this is a heavily-stylised action martial arts series that will be violent and gritty.
On that note, its fight sequences also follow video game logic a lot of times, and overallm a lot of things are not very realistic or necessarily 100% historically-accurate. This, together with a lot of casual dialogue and humour littered throughout, makes it a story that doesn't take itself too seriously. It's rather blockbuster-ish in that sense, and while very well written and rife with beautiful imagery, symbolism, and nuanced characters and themes, it is not intended to be high literary work by any means.
And while Mizu's backstory is indeed very tragic, the story we see in the present is very tonally different, chock-full of one liners and silly lines (thank you, Ringo and Taigen, my silly boys, for that) as well as flashy action scenes and montages set to rock music. The tonal shift between the past and present stories is also in part what makes The Tale of the Ronin and the Bride stand out so prominently among the 8 episodes.
Besides the tone, a story also delivers its the promise through its character arc, which is presented to the audience by showing us a variety of things related to the protagonist, such as:
what the character is missing in their life: for Mizu, it is love and acceptance;
their desires: revenge, because as we see from her backstory, she has been unable to obtain love/acceptance;
what's preventing them from achieving it: Mizu adamantly believes that she is a monster who is not capable of loving or being loved, and this is why she pushes Ringo and Taigen away in present day;
and their flaws: Mizu is stubborn, narrow-minded, and is driven purely by hate and anger. Taigen tells the viewers this very clearly in Ep7 when he says she's killing Fowler "Not for honour. For hate." And also in Ep8 when he says to Ringo, "Mizu doesn't care about anyone but himself and his revenge." Mizu's "ember" is her anger and desire for vengeance.
Thus, from all this, we can come to a conclusion that the show's promise is something along the lines of
Mizu gets her revenge +
Mizu unlearns her self-hatred and stops letting her anger be the only thing guiding her +
Mizu stops running from people who care about her so she can finally get the love and acceptance she's always craved.
IMO, only by fulfilling all three of these promises would the story have a satisfying payoff.
Whether the revenge will be directed to the white men, though, is up for debate, as there are a lot of theories going around that maybe the white men aren't as evil as she thought and none of them are even her fathers, that Mizu's true enemy is Lady Itoh and the shogunate, etc. The third point, regarding love and acceptance, is also a point of discourse, because we don't know who she'll end up with, or if she'll end up with anyone romantically at all, whereby the story opts to make it an open ending focusing on platonic/found-family bonds rather than any romantic one.
Whatever the case, it doesn't necessarily matter, and I'm open to pretty much all directions the writers may take us as long as SOME revenge is achieved, blood is spilled, colonisers get their dues, AND Mizu gets to be loved and happy.
BUT if you ask me for my ideal version of that payoff... I think it's no surprise to anyone when I say I want Mizu to live a nice peaceful and secluded life, in which all her past adventures fade into myth and legend (as implied in the opening text).
Because while I'm almost certain Mizu is related to some royal or important bloodline, I don't think Mizu would find happiness in a life in the palace. She has never wanted greatness, has never even hinted at wanting power or anything like it. She craves belonging and the freedom to be herself, and to be loved for all her flaws and dualities. These are things she needs to grow and be a better person as well. A life of politics and intrigue inherent in being a royal heir, or in being a samurai loyal to the shogunate (even if it is under Akemi's future administration) would offer no such freedom or sense of peace for Mizu.
So yeah! Peace and quiet and happiness, maybe living on a farm like she did with Mikio. But of course that life wouldn't mean anything if she were to live it alone, because remember she wants and needs love and belonging. As such, I think the one most suited to give her that would be Taigen (for a variety of reasons).
This life could be with or without their bestie Ringo, depending on if Ringo decides to travel and find his own greatness, and it is implied that Ringo does leave Mizu's side to go on his own adventures, as hinted by the creators wanting a spin-off centered around him.
And also Mizu and Taigen go to visit their mutual ex-girlfriend Akemi sometimes for like special occasions or something.
I hope that answered your question, and thank you so much for the ask!! <3 <3 And on that note, my inbox is open for more if anyone else would like to pick my brain about this show, or anything else for that matter really. I may take a while to answer them considering how in-depth I like to go on these, but I love getting any and all these asks regardless :)