Been doing a Trigun rewatch (Stampede, then Stargaze, then OG and Badlands Rumble). It’s so fun. Might delete this later
Stampede and Stargaze: I didn’t like all of the pieces, but there were many things I think it did fantastically. The worldbuilding was more thorough, the animation was possibly the only good 3d anime I have ever seen and really was great, the way they made new plot beats with nods to all the original events and moments was well done. I thought Stargaze did a great job of making Knives a full character with more nuance. On that note, I thought Knives was overly dramatic and end times preacher-y, but if you think about it he’s someone with godlike power who grew up so fast that his interest and attachment to the Bible was a major influence on functionally his most formative years, so if he attached to certain parts and themes in it… basically, I’m saying characters in this are generally caricaturish in a way but you can kind of see how all his ingredients add up to a guy who tries to kill humanity while talking about floods and god and purification and other nonsense. I thought making Wolfwood basically have a canon “Oh I’m in love with Vash” moment was at once cool and kinda pandering. Sadly many of the characters annoyed me (Elendira is like nails on a chalkboard). Aside from Knives gang and Legato, Wolfwood and Knives himself are the most different characters between the two versions; in both powers and character I like Knives much more in the new one and Legato much more in the old one, but Wolfwood I can’t decide. Oh I also liked what they did with Rem. I really enjoyed the show, and the MUSIC. There are some excellent songs from that, at least Knives’ theme is absolutely perfect.
OG and BR: It’s so good, it’s so classic. I actually like some of the humor and dialogue moments better than the new series, but the dialogue is much stiffer and less natural in some places and it DOES have that extremely casual and thick misogyny of old shows, which the new show did a pretty good job of scrubbing without changing characters. I like the Plant powers more in the new one, it makes more sense to me than Vash and Knives randomly having super cannons connected to special revolvers. I thought the Wolfwood and Milly romance actually made sense, but was super rushed. In a show of a hundred episodes I definitely would have put them together, but it felt like that happened instantly because the writers went “OH SHIT if we’re gonna Dead Wife this guy we need the Mourning Husband ASAP so make it happen now!” I never really saw the Meryl and Vash thing, in either series; I was glad they didn’t make it more of a thing, but even the first time I watched Trigun I remember thinking that they were much better as friends than whatever crush thing they were going for. It may be because I don’t like Meryl that much but I just don’t see it.
My main complaint about both shows is that the argument just feels so weak. I don’t think there is anything inherently wrong with a pacifist or forgiving main character or theme, and I of course think that is objectively the moral viewpoint, but to me the way Trigun presents reasoning for and against it, especially in the new series, leaves me WAY more convinced by Knives and early Wolfwood than by Vash. Because they present actual evidence! On the other hand, Vash just goes “No, killing is absolutely always wrong no matter what” and that’s it. No argument. Nothing whatsoever to back it up or support the statement. Thus, in every single argument on the subject that he ever has, even when it turns out his way, he absolutely fails to convince me. And that’s the thing; you could say that there IS evidence to support his argument based on his success record (see it works!) and his scars (he isn’t pretending it’s easy, he works for it). But he never uses that evidence to support his point. And more importantly, the fact is that both his success at saving people bloodlessly and the fact that he got out alive with only terrible scars are due entirely to luck, completely superhuman abilities, and plot armor (his approach is written to be successful). There is nothing at all to show that it would work for anyone other than him or in any other situation. On the other hand, Knives and Wolfwood bring up points that are applicable even without special powers or plot armor, like “Don’t make promises if you have no way to keep them” (to which Vash says “Nuh uh!”) or “Sometimes you have limited options even if you don’t want that to be true,” (to which Vash says “Nuh uh!”) or “People who remorselessly enslave and torture others to death are actually bad people,” (to which Vash says “That’s sad but it doesn’t mean they’re really bad people”). The old series was much better on this because there were less scenes of Vash completely losing arguments, and more of him struggling to hold himself back from killing. I like Vash! And I like both shows! A lot! But on that admittedly central thesis, I think if I was on the fence and for some reason chose a sci fi western cartoon to inform my morality, Trigun would do a better job of making me question my pacifism than my violence.
Overall though: love Trigun. Didn’t know it was by the writer of BBB, which I love even more (I could rave about how great that is too but my rewatch of it has passed so I won’t).
