#QuestionOfTheDay #FavCharacterAtoZ

[ami_angelwings@urusai.social]

My #FavCharacterAtoZ that starts with B is:

Balsa from Moribito: Guardian of the Spirit

She's an expert spearwoman and bodyguard who swore to save 8 lives to make up for the 8 lives that were taken to protect her as a child.

But at some point she realized that taking lives to protect a life is contradictory, and all life is valuable - killing the disposable guards to protect somebody important doesn't balance things out. So she became so skilled that she can protect lives without killing people even in a heated fight against lethal enemies.

Later a spear is forged for her that channels that desire to protect life and allows her to "kill" a person's desire for revenge that put her in a situation where she had to kill him or he would kill others. She's just the best.

#FavCharacterB

[greyduck@wellduck.me]

@ami_angelwings I really like your pick (Balsa is indeed *awesome*) but I'm going to go with...

Boneclaw Mother, from Ursula Vernon's DIGGER comic. Absolutely the best no-fucks-to-give matriarchal figure in pretty much any storytelling medium.

[greyduck@wellduck.me]

@Z_Zed_Zed @ami_angelwings yessss, Breq is a great one, well picked.

[bigshellevent@toot.cat]

@ami_angelwings Detective Beans by @exocomics I mean look at him

[arcadiagt5@mstdn.social]

@ami_angelwings I am ABSOLUTELY going to ditto on Balsa #FavCharacterAtoZ

[thepi@urusai.social]

@BigShellEvent @ami_angelwings oh right yeah that's a good choice

[yon@sakurajima.moe]

@ami_angelwings Took me a whole day, but A2 from Nier: Automata.

It’s ripe with spoilers, and all the spoilers is why I like her so much. You get introduced to her and her background slowly, and then she plays a much more important role later on.

I really enjoyed how well written her story is and how well she fits into the narrative. I prefer her over 2B who can be a bit dull in comparison.

#FavCharacterAtoZ

[wincenworks@mastodon.social]

@ami_angelwings #FavCharacterAtoZ #FavCharacterB Barry Burton - he was too pure for that fictional world.

[wincenworks@mastodon.social]

@ami_angelwings #FavCharactersAtoZ #FavCharacterA Agent 47

[ertchin@mstdn.social]

@ami_angelwings Brak!

He likes beans!

(from Space Ghost: Coast to Coast, Cartoon Planet, etc.)

#FavCharacterAtoZ #FavCharacterB

[piku@blahaj.zone]

@ami_angelwings@urusai.social i'm gonna cheat a bit here since there's not many competitors for b and there are many competitors for k and anyways we hear him referred to primarily in a way that romanizes to start with a b but 爸/Mr. Kwan from 1000×RESIST

i again am not wholly sure how to properly articulate to transmit the depth of feeling he evokes in me but i feel like the best way to describe his is as intensely, beautifully, tragically human.

which i guess he arguably shares with many many of the characters from the game, but i do specifically love him

hes idealistic and traumatized and masks it all and lives and misses home and lives and dies and i don't know how to give this proper but he is real and loves you but cant do everything and is weak and sad and you love him
#FavCharacterAtoZ
#FavCharacterB

[ami_angelwings@urusai.social]

one of my favourite scenes in the anime is near the end of the series when the mikaido's hunters that Balsa fought and defeated at the very beginning (1v4) confront her as to why she didn't kill them when she easily could have and she says she had just agreed to save a life so it seemed counterproductive to take a life, and then the hunters say that if it was because she was looking down on them, they would have to settle things with her but now they realized they were always outmatched and agree to follow her orders in the coming fight.

I also just love how Tanda doesn't understand just how skilled his crush is, he thinks the Hunters are a danger to them when she's actually way better than all of them.

[ami_angelwings@urusai.social]

There's a lot of annoying anime fanboying over Balsa's mentor Jiguro on youtube clips of the show because he seems so cool and he killed all his friends (to protect Balsa as a kid) and he could also 1v4 people, but they don't understand that actually he failed in the context that he was forced to kill his friends to save Balsa, and Balsa actually surpasses him when she is able to save Chagum's life without killing his pursuers. She's put in the same position her mentor was when she was a kid, but she became even more skilled than him because she wanted to be able to save people without also killing more people.

I love that Moribito questions the whole "saving 8 lives to make up for the 8 that were taken for me" b/c even from the beginning I'm like 'but aren't you just killing more ppl?"

[ami_angelwings@urusai.social]

It's also interesting, they never directly address that her spear has magic powers but it's heavily implied. The blacksmith who forges Balsa's later spear is reluctant to reforge her spear, as he forged Jiguro's and lamented at all the death that happened at the hands of his creation. But after telling that story to the Mikado's guards (who he also forges weapons for), they tell him about how they fought a spearwoman in a similar situation but she did not kill any of them.

He then forges Balsa's spear after they leave, saying his greatest goal is to create a weapon that doesn't kill, but severs the bonds of karma.

And then later when forced to kill, Balsa's spear slashes through her opponent but leaves him without his desire for revenge. Balsa never really gets why.

[ami_angelwings@urusai.social]

I always figured that if Guts and Balsa ever met, their weapons would talk to each other. They both are specially created and connected to their wielder and channel their character.

[otherdracula@mastodon.social]

@ami_angelwings she is pretty great

[leojetskifuelnardo@mastodon.social]

@ami_angelwings

Angua, probably one of the most relatable characters Terry Pratchett ever wrote. Sarcastic werewolf would be an obnoxious power fantasy anywhere else, but Angua is lost and torn in a million directions in an amazingly mundane way. You'd never -want- to deal with what she has to, but you do every day just by having to get up in the morning.

#FavCharacterAtoZ
#FavCharacterA

[silvergm@dice.camp]

@ami_angelwings #FavCharacterAtoZ #FavCharacterB I promise not all of these are going to be #pathfinder Golarion gods, but I can't mention them without bringing up my personal favourite: Black Butterfly, Empyeral Lord of introversion, silence, and travel. She considers herself one of the Great Old Ones, but out of spite; she constantly fights cosmic horrors. She also encourages people to communicate non-verbally and appreciate moments of silence, something our world could really use.

[leojetskifuelnardo@mastodon.social]

@ami_angelwings Aunt Petunia's favourite nephew. Because he's us at our best AND worst: too stubborn and ugly to quit.

#FavCharacterAToZ
#FavCharacterB

[lalah@sakurajima.moe]

@ami_angelwings

Balto! This was one of my favorite childhood movies. I like how he goes from being ashamed of his wolf heritage to embracing it over the course of the story. I still hope to see the Balto statue in Central Park one day; that's been on my bucket list since I was a little kid because of this movie.

#FavCharacterB #FavCharacterAToZ