so i see a lot of discourse on whether or not itachi was retconned into being a heroic or good character, and i (being an itachi fan, as well as a kishimoto defender) disagree.
what always comes to mind is this 2 page interaction between kakashi and itachi in chapter 257 (well before itachi’s redemption)
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kakashi directly asks how much eyesight Itachi has lost. something kinda unusually personal for a battle. it doesnt seem mocking at all; kakashi knows the cost of the sharingan, and the paneling makes it feel almost like genuine concern.
itachi doesn’t respond immedietly, and instead we get this weird, almost vulnrable moment of silence. he looks down, pained. sort of odd for a character people swear up and down was pure evil devil incarnate until his "random redemption," but i digress. he doesn’t threaten, or get angry, like a true villain would in the face of their weakness; he just looks tired.
kishimoto rarely tells the audience character emotions or motivations, it’s all in the subtext and the little downward glances or averted gazes.
on the second page we see itachi start to ask a question. it seems like he may be trying to bridge a connection here by asking something hard for him to say ("kakashi…are you…?") he can’t finish the sentence. this is the closest we get to him reaching out, but whatever he was about to say is closed off by kakashi restablishing the aminosity of their relationship. ("i don’t make the same mistakes twice.")
it’s been shown before in kakashi’s character his aversion to open vulnrability; the first time we hear anything about his past from kakashi himself is right before sasuke leaves the village, and even then its cryptic at best ("everyone you are talking about is already dead .") itachi may have been about to offer a personal inquiry about the sharingan or their eyesight. but kakashi, surrounded by his students, shrinks back from the exposure and burns the tentative bridge between himself and itachi. instantly, the scene is reframed as a fight, not a conversation. naruto regains his footing, and itachi falls silent.
kakashi slinks back into his comfort zone, unknowingly slaming the door on itachi’s face. i dont think it’s a cruel thing, i don’t think be was trying to force itachi back into his role, i think it was merely a bad habit. showing the affects of pushing people away for your own comfort, as well as the cruelty of the shinobi world, snuffing out every last flicker of connection. the ache of almost.
so back to the point. this excerpt clearly shows kishimoto’s foreshadowing of itachi’s redemption arc in as early as the 257th chapter. it establishes him as a tragic character through this subtext and his silent moments. and he was NOT retconned.
Hii !! This isn't at all meant to come across as rude, but I genuinely would like to know what you see in sukugo as a ship?
I ask this because I think your art is so beautiful and cute and amazing, but I personally don't know much about the ship. I just wanna know more from sukugo shippers on why they see love between the two characters? Unless it's like a "just for fun" thing, which is also totally cool lol
Sorry if this comes across as rude I just genuinely love your art and you seem to love the ship a lot so I figured you may be interested in explaining why you like the ship
the shortest answer i could give is i see love between sukugo because gege puts it there. as in they are the two characters that has "love" being a main theme spelled out by the narrator in a whole arc centering around them .
(it's also 愛 ai, not even the 恋 koi one. gege used the kanji for unconditional, selfless, true love in that "the one to teach you about love" line)
but if you're interested in a longer explanation this has lore that traces all the way back to mid-2022 when elden ring came out, i had a post where i said i wished gojo had a redhead love interest to make a Rebis symbol with him. never in a million years i expected gege to actually make that real with shinjuku showdown 😭
Rebis, also known as Red king & White queen marriage, symbolises the intermingling of red sulphur with white mercury to create perfect gold. It's the unification of opposing qualities in alchemy. this is reflected not just in sukuna and gojo's character design, but their whole character arc and thematic relevance to each other.
yap session ahead
their domains: domain expansion is a sorcerer’s manifestation of their inner mental landscape and Sukuna and Gojo's meld together perfectly. For a while the omniscient cosmos acts as the cradle for an uncaring shrine, blue starry sky meeting the red blood sea.
Thousands of years and the only domain that is compatible with Malevolent Shrine is Unlimited Void, to the point that when Gojo died, Sukuna couldn't deploy his domain for a whole while and when he got it back, Yuta- the patron saint of mutual love in the verse, wore Gojo skin to run in back again.
Sukuna could deploy his domain without barrier which is unimaginable to other sorcerers cuz it’s like painting without a canvas. A king that conquers all just like the all-consuming purifying fire that he wields. Meanwhile Gojo could make the barrier of his domain so tiny it’s also unimaginable to others because they couldn’t imagine being trapped in such a small space. Gojo did because he has also folded into himself for the sake of those he loves his entire life.
They are both doing such advanced techniques to the power system that’s out of reach for everyone else, but they are also doing it in the opposite direction of each other, in a way that’s reflective of their life philosophy. Two equals standing at two polar axis.
their approach to becoming strong: they are both jujutsu nerds, but Sukuna's thirst for knowledge & self-improvement is in service to himself, while Satoru seeks to give knowledge & encourages growth in his students. If his community is strong, he is strong. Therefore in that month of preparation before the big fight, Gojo was shown training Yuta & Yuuji rather than digging more on Sukuna.
How they approach life and make their choices is a mirror to their own personal stories & struggle. It's these little push & pull of meanings that makes them so compelling as a pair.
There's a meta commentary here about how since Sukuna kept possessing Gojo’s students & gaining their memories, whether he knew he was doing it or not, he reacts to/ follow the lessons Gojo gave out. Him using Gojo’s hand sign & techniques later on is also a part of this larger theme that Gojo had unwittingly been like a teacher to him too. It makes the “the one to teach you about love” “I want him to understand” lines hit even harder.
I elaborate more here on why Sukuna's upbringing and curse is its own can of worm that makes his interaction with Gojo so poweful. Gojo who kept rescuing cursed children and protecting them is the kind of protective figure Sukuna never had, and I always felt like a part of Sukuna's resentment to the students and Yuuji in particular does stem from that (i do understand if ppl say this is a reach, but !! i'd like to show you guys the character that i believe is one of the main inspiration Gege took to develop Sukuna:
yes, the main character from the BL Gege once recommend The Night Beyond the Tricornered Window. when his love interest chose to protect innocent civillains instead of him (because he's already strong), he literally asked "why protect them, and not me?")
fish metaphor: the fish imagery in the sukugo fight is always so peak since ningyo flesh in japanese mythology is said to grant immortality + the "scale of the dragons" incantation in sukuna's world slash is a throwback to the fish scales lines. there are layers to this:
according to the myth of Four Divine Beasts in Sinosphere culture, control over dragon grants one's control over aquatic life, specifically fish
there's also the myth of a determined koi fish that swims upstream and is rewarded by the God to become a dragon. it's one way to show how Satoru transforms from a nameless fish to a dragon in Sukuna's eyes throughout the fight. which, again, runs another parallel to the alchemy imagery where the royal beast lion transforms into its true form after a dragon’s death, like Sukuna did after Gojo died.
you see how many parallels and analysis we can have of the sukugo fight with just one line here? it's how gege crafted this fight with such concise and powerful imagery that makes it go so hard.
gege has always been building up to sukuna vs gojo since the beginning: probably a hot take, but to me sukugo chemistry is what JJK0, the very first 3 chapters & HI arc built up to 😭 (their fight is literally a constant throwback to their first meeting)
“love to the strong” “a curse must be exorcised using another curse” “love is the most twisted curse of all” being centered around Gojo means the biggest fight of his life, the one he’d put his everything into would ofc be him facing off someone he wants to convey such a thing to.
The line Geto said about being jealous in that airport was there for a reason. The recognition & affirmation of “love to the strong” that Gojo showed Sukuna was what he wanted. But then he got blindsided right after when Gojo said if he’d been there with the students cheering him on, Gojo would have been satisfied too, cuz once again Geto got a reminder that Gojo’s love wasn’t just about strength, but community & support of all the “flowers” in his life as well.
THAT is the type of love Gojo was trying to show Sukuna. The understanding & sympathy, never stop seeing humanity even in the “monstrous”. The type of kindess Sukuna wasn’t graced with as a child, leading to the cursed existence he was trapped in now. Hell, the first line we got about how Sukuna used to be a human was from Gojo himself!
When everyone thought of Sukuna in fear and hatred, the Sukuna in Gojo's eyes to the bitter end is never a malicous grinning calamity, but someone calm and dignified with his gaze forwards. And despite thinking Sukuna could not reciprocate his feelings in kind, he gave Sukuna everything.
meanwhile mr yearnatron3000 Sukuna over here already sees Gojo as a goal to reach since the beginning:
after Gojo died he legit started comparing everyone else to him and thinking in terms of "me and gojo satoru vs anyone else"
(if i write about the meaning behind the incantations of World-Bisecting Slash, this would become a real manifesto, so please see this here. basically, Sukuna made Gojo's whole existence a part of his technique. if that's not the most romantic thing in the world idk what is)
side note from character design perspective: the spelling of Six Eyes is "Rikugan" and sometimes it's used as a title to refer to Gojo (the same way Ryomen is for Sukuna). so we have: Ryomen (Two Faces) - Rikugan (Six Eyes) / Sukuna - Satoru.
what i mean is in a roundabout way sukugo do have matching initials
marketing from JUMP and song lyrics be like: in the the JUMP promo video for vol 25 (which they have private now for some reasons... but i think it's because they are fr going to make the sukugo fight anime rollout the biggest blast ever), they have a banner that coins Sukuna and Gojo as "the existence of an equal"
be it a demon god or a child prodigy, ultimate strength comes with solitude. the only thing they have yet to obtain is an existence equal to themselves. so, how long will you entertain me now?
they also have some crazy contrasting wordplay to introduce them:
鬼神 (demon god) / 神童 (child prodigy) -> share the same 神 (divine)
堕天 (fallen one) / 天才 (genius) -> share the same 天 (sky)
In the soundtrack of the JJK Phantom Parade game (Avant by Eve - came out a few months after the sukugo fight), the lyrics “my yearning towards you alone cuts through space like a heartfelt wish” is always accompanied by Sukuna and Gojo imagery:
for the “like a wish” phase, the word is 希う which has a very beseeching and imploring connotation, so it reads like being able to cut through space and reach that unique person is all he’s ever wanted. Eve cooked like crazy with this ngl
and in JJK Modulo, Gege made "wish" an actual manifestation of a technique possessed by Maru and Cross - the alien twins that everyone jokes that they look like Sukuna and Gojo's lovechild.
talking about lyrics, here are the character songs gege picked out for sukuna and gojo... idk what to even comment on this 😭
that concludes my presentation on why sukugo changes my brain chemistry (i think). there are more obvious ones like "cut me open and see my love buried in this flesh", the legendary "you were magnificent/ cleared my sky", etc... but i want to touch more on the less discussed imagery here.
i hope this could offer you a great look in the very normal brain of a sukugo-pilled person !! thank you for liking my art and giving the ship a chance ! ⸜(｡˃ ᵕ ˂ )⸝♡
no dude it's so cool how attached you are to that character who is singled out and ostracized due to the external monstrousness that clashes with their internal spark of humanity. and i love how drawn you are to themes of horror and love, nature versus nurture, otherness, isolation, and the abject. i bet you have normal feelings about your own personhood
so i've been thinking a lot about shisui and itachi's mangekyo shaninagn; specifically, the abilities unique to them, kotoamatsukami and tsukoyomi. and i've kinda realized that the abilities are literal reflections of the other and also speak on the characters themselves in really interesting ways.
(i'm sure someone has pointed this out before but oh well)
kotoamatsukami intrinsically manipulates the victim's internal self, invading their minds and possibly changing their actions, but not their experience. it slides in through the self but doesn't touch the senses. the victim's surroundings and experience stay normal, but they don't. a cage made of themselves.
tsukoyomi on the other hand, affects the environment around the target (an illusion, yes, but still the victim's surroundings.) so tsukoyomi has no intrinsic power over the victim's internal self, it can only produce an effect through like trauma via torture or otherwise sensory experiences. it's a physical cage.
literally direct reflections of the other!!
and, of course, itachi and shisui are like two sides of the same coin, which is embodied in their mangekyo sharingan. itachi is known to adapt to his world, and when he was idealistic, he wanted to change it structurally. shisui is extremely idealistic and emotional, and he tried to make things better by changing people and putting all of his faith into them. while it seemed like itachi never put his faith in anyone besides shisui. in other words, you could call itachi a structuralist and shisui an interactionalist (two opposite sociological theories) kotoamatsukami changes the world by changing people, and tsukoyomi changes people by changing their world.
In the Countryside I Saw a Ghost
"On a hot summer evening in the countryside of Vietnam, my father was followed home by something... It told him that from now on, the voice in his head would no longer be his own."
i did these drawings a few months ago for a dance/performance project my friend was developing...
The thing about a really good ship is I need it to be equal parts sweet and fucked up. It's like a lemonade. you want it half sour and half sweet because the two flavors are complementary. The love needs to be there so it can wreck their lives or they need to be wrecks so they can fall in love
