That makes a lot of sense, I would say... The way I see it is that, regardless of how the transition happened, by the time Piccolo sacrificed himself to save Gohan, he'd truly separated himself from the demon king persona, and become practically a new man. But I see this as less of him getting away from a destiny laid out by his father, and more of him rejecting his own past, and becoming a better person.ABED wrote:I think we're getting caught up in the nomenclature. I and others aren't arguing that Piccolo Jr. is a clone or doppelganger, but he's clearly more than a mere son. He's not a typical Namekian either. He has all of Daimao's memories and his connection to Kami. He grew up to full adult in three years even though Dende takes much longer to reach maturity. He's also not a demon like his father as evidence of Raditz going to the afterlife, a point that Kami makes clear.Michsi wrote:I used the word "copy" because iIrc, they actually do use that word to describe Jr. in relation to his father at some point in the translated version. I think the actually word in Japanese means "clone" or "doppelganger" , but the point is that I don't think it's 100% correct.
Piccolo Jr. is both father and son, as trippy as that sounds. As I recall even the other characters don't talk about Daimao as if he was Piccolo's father.
The fact he grew fast is also really odd... I would say, further evidence that he's not a totally new being, but at the very least is some form of reincarnation of Daimao. The read that he's both the father and the son is interesting, but uhh... As you say, trippy. IDK, that's probably the best way to look at it; he's Piccolo Daimao, but he's been reincarnated into a new body, and had to go through an accelerated new childhood... And over the course of his first 10 years of life, he ends up totally uprooting the entirety of his beliefs system, identity, and way of life... So, if they were the same person at the moment of Junior's birth, Junior had become essentially a new man by the time he decided to fuse with God, not necessarily in a literal sense, but... There we go...
Except we do see him doing so in the anime.ABED wrote:There's little reason to believe Piccolo Jr. observed humans either before or after the 23rd TB. He lived in solitude and trained and dwelled on getting revenge. Actually taking the time to observe people is a flimy reason for such a reversal.
Fair. However, I still think seeing it as "he was given a soul" seems a bit crap to me, I still think the angle that his rebirth as a child was a change of perspective that resulted in a somewhat different individual who diverged more and more from his original path, until he bore little resemblance to his previous Daimao form just works much better within the style, tone, and such of the show, especially given how Tenshinhan and Vegeta's development went...ABED wrote:I understand where you are coming from. If he becomes good for any reason that's not volitional, it seems to undercut the progress he makes, but I disagree for two reasons: 1) He was a being pure evil created by the child of Katatsu shedding the evil from himself. It's an interesting philosophical idea, is Daimao technically evil if he didn't have a choice? And 2) Piccolo Jr. still does some evil things, including killing an island full of people, so he still comes a long way even if he isn't the same Piccolo Daimao.
Sure, that was why you created the thread, but actively trying to shut down a broader discussion, especially since no one with such knowledge has chimed in, is counter-productive, and honestly I think would potentially drive such people away...ABED wrote:That was the whole point of the thread! I'm ignorant of those aspects of JPN culture and so I was trying to get someone who knows the subject to chime in.
If no one has come along with an idea of the Japanese culture stuff you're talking about yet, then by the way you're talking about things, there is no other discussion to be had. Trying to get us to stick to this narrow little thing that none of us can speak to is just counter-productive for this thread as a discussion. Worst case scenario if we do move on and have the broader discussion is that someone with the relevant knowledge pops in, gives their two cents, answers your question, and nothing has been lost. So trying to stagnate the conversation just seems pointlessly rude to me.ABED wrote:Then you missed the point I was making. I wasn't positing a theory, I was asking a question. And I have said several times, I understand where you are coming from. What I'm dismissing is that I don't think we've gotten to that part of the discussion yet.
The way I see it is that as westerners, we don't get these allusions, and come to our own conclusions. Ultimately, authorial intent is worth considering in media analysis, but aside from what's literally in the text of the work, your own interpretations of the work are what matters above all else, really. Watchmen was intended as a deconstructionist work, and yet people like Zack Snyder see it as totally straight. Is that bad? No, not really, even in Snyder's case, all that could potentially do is somewhat alter the focus of the movie adaptation, but an adaptation is not the original work, it's the adaptor's vision of the original work in a different medium, so as long as the end result is still good, you've still done a good job...ABED wrote:There is thread about Tenshinhan's origins where Toriyama talks about Tenshinhan's third eye. "In certain parts of Asia, beings with a third eye on their forehead are thought to be godlike and are said to possess the power of true seeing. It seems that Tenshinhan, who was raised by the evil Tsuru-Sen'nin [Crane Hermit], lost the ability to use the myriad powers of his third eye for good purposes." So it stands to reason that Toriyama has borrowed other ideas from Asian religions/folklore and used them in his stories even if they aren't brought up explicitly. I don't consider that a cop out as much as possibly bad writing as even if it's understood by your target audience implicitly, it still hasn't been properly contextualized in your story.
And here, you see I'm digging into yet another facet of this conversation that doesn't directly address the question you asked in the OP. Does that mean I'm doing wrong here? Well, I'm not snubbing anyone else by doing this, I'm contributing to the conversation, providing another beat to our back-and-forth, so... As I would say about the authorial intent of a work, let's put aside the intent behind the OP, and just continue to have our discussion. If someone who can answer the original question pops in, there's nothing stopping them from answering you, in fact if that is a concern, ultimately you can just try PMing Kunzait, I imagine he'll be able to give you a very in-depth answer, so let's just move on from this meta-talk about how we should/could have this conversation, and just have the conversation.
