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Goddamn... Thorfinn's face when he remembers. The art in this is incredible.
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Apr 25, 2015 00:27
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Punc posted:New Vinland Saga I bet Einar's right about the poison being a bluff, especially with how Full Eyes is having symptoms already. And more than how he's going to fight... I wonder how he's going to soothe her bloodlust while respecting what she's been through. I assume she's going to have her mind changed and join their merry party, but that's a pretty serious thing to have your mind changed about.
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May 25, 2015 16:48
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Soulcleaver posted:It's been awhile since we've seen an innocent happy village brutally murdered. Glad the author hasn't forgotten how horrible vikings are; it makes Thorfinn's journey to redemption all the more striking. This chapter is exactly what we could have expected. It was clear what happened was bad. Very bad. But here it is... drat. I like the continuing theme of women being arbitrarily pushed away from lives that would suit thim just because they're women. If it was just whatsername, she'd basically just be the token woman. Looking at this with a wider perspective does a bit more to show how widespread the damage was, not just to individuals, but societies. I'm also interested in the role of Christianity in this world. I have trouble thinking of it as anything but a bad/conservative/traditionalist thing in general, but I guess it would be none of those things to the first generation that converted. It probably would be really appealing if I didn't know what it would become.
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Jul 26, 2015 01:01
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pentyne posted:Violence and war results in stagnation of practical inventions and human ingenuity, but wide-scale war lead to massive improvements in infrastructure and trade and any technology with a semblance of usefulness to murdering the poo poo out of people you hate. You're looking at the wrong side of the conflict. In this chapter Askeladd's mercenaries have done something that will get them paid. Their lives are improved. Their little mercenary base-towns will have more resources to improve their lives in many ways. The ability for violence to profit the victors has never been in doubt. That's not the issue here. The sadly novel observation is how much better peace would have been. That's the best thing about Vinland Saga now. "Violence is bad" is a really, really basic uncontroversial position to take. But this story is doing a fantastic job walking us through it- looking at how it happens, what it does to us, and what we can do about it. And it's really incredibly well done. The story drags us so far down into the pain and guilt of it... Thorfinn's determination to break out of the cycle is something the reader ends up really invested in.
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Jul 27, 2015 06:43
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Well, I don't think anyone non-historical has plot armor, but all this back story about forgiveness makes it seem really likely she'll join the crew for a while. It'll help balance the (historically weighted and totally understandable) gender imbalance in the main cast too, which is nice because it's clear this story cares about gender (in addition to everything else that caused injustice and suffering at this point in history). Of course anyone could die for any reason before they reach either of their goals (Constantinople for this arc, and ultimately Vinland for the whole manga), but I doubt Hild will die any time soon. Not because it wouldn't be tragic/dramatic/whatever, but because there's so much her perspective can add to what our party is undoubtedly going to see as they travel the world. Thorfinn is on a quest for perspective right now as much as he's after the resources to settle Vinland.
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Sep 27, 2015 06:57
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Hypocrisy posted:I hope Thorkell is able to walk the path of peace along with Thorfinn, like he wanted to do in the past. It doesn't seem possible that someone like Thorkell will ever know peace, but I hope he gains some sort of understanding by the end of this.
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Mar 27, 2016 21:52
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MonsieurChoc posted:Isn't there a theory were the vinlanders eventually joined the local Natives? Like the Roanoke people? Hmm. The time frame is totally off by a century or so from the earliest estimates, but the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Confederation has in their founding story a mysterious peacemaker from the north who, with the help of a local chief, Hiawatha, came down and persuaded the tribes to stop fighting. And it worked. For hundreds of years there was peace between the tribes. (They still fought outsiders, but no one's perfect.) To modern sensibilities it'd be a bit weird to have a white guy come down and teach the natives how to live, but it would give Thorfinn a lasting legacy of peace in this story. Though if we're sticking to vaguely real dates, it could work out to be Thorfinn's grandson or something, which would make them fairly native at that point. I'm not sure I'd like that ending, but I just wanted to throw that out there in case it happens and in a decade or whatever I'll be able to go back to this post and say I called it.
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Jun 26, 2016 21:21
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I reread the last couple of chapters to get the flow back (it's too bad that the chapters are so short these days), and I liked the quote ending the chapter before last, "You cannot live among a herd of sheep. At least, not within the Baltic Sea." It felt like it was implicitly contrasting this sea, with its cycles of revenge and politics, filled with death-loving warriors, with the idea of Vinland. It did a great job setting down the thesis of this Baltic Sea War arc. As for this chapter... the panels of Thorfinn's scarred hand over his face were really effective. As was that last panel of him sadly hunched on a rock... especially after his burning rage earlier. I'm enjoying this internal conflict, and the weight of the past. I'm glad Hild was there to say, "If you say you'll avenge your father, I'll avenge mine," not just for Thorfinn's sake (he probably didn't need to hear it), but for the audience's sake too. We all think Floki's a jerk, and we're probably more than okay with the idea of him being killed. Hild's line reminds us what this is about for Thorfinn. I'm not sure how this will resolve... it'd feel like a cop out if Floki somehow died anyway as a result of Thorfinn's actions. Like if he somehow gets his revenge without compromising his principles. So I legitimately do not know where this story is going. It's really interesting.
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Aug 26, 2016 21:58
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I love the befuddled reaction to their vaguely modern sensibilities. I like the perspective that these kinds of things may be a given to us today (even people who don't care realize they're transgressing norms to some extent), but they are not a given in human society throughout history. Those ideals needed to be invented/discovered and enforced in order for them to spread. I also like that Thorfinn had a quick and sensible answer to what about the need for order! It's a compelling reason if he cares about the welfare of the common folk. Some violence might be justified in order to protect them from chaos. Thorfinn might be sympathetic to that need, but that's Canute's job. Thorfinn is trying something else.
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Oct 26, 2016 01:48
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So as for the events in this chapter, Shonen villain kidnaps our pacifist protagonist's friends to force him to fight.  But as for how it was presented, Hero Full Eyes!  So on the balance, great chapter.
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Feb 26, 2017 17:52
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Ride The Gravitron posted:That works be funny just to have two people who want to kill thorfinn on the voyage
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Apr 29, 2017 23:48
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Honestly, the biggest badass in that fight was the random guy who walked between Thorkell and Garm and shouted "it's a draw!" I can't believe that actually worked. I still don't like Garm, but his line about the best thing in the world being a death match made him come off like an obsessive otaku or fetishist or something. He's... kind of pathetic. Which is more interesting than him being a dumb plot device and contrived antagonist which was his previous status in my mind.
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Jul 27, 2017 05:24
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Rodenthar Drothman posted:At the suggestion of Dr. Sunshine, I'm crossposting this from the general slice of life thread! I really like stuff like historical slice of life stories that do a good job bringing a setting to life with sweet personal stories.
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Jun 9, 2018 02:31
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Plutonis posted:I found a cool manga about being a logistics officer in early 20th century not-Muscovy I don't regret reading it. It's a very cute manga with an interesting premise. I only got through the first volume so far, and it might develop more after that, but it seems like something written by a tech-obsessed military fanboy who just likes cute things.
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Jan 9, 2019 05:08
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JosephWongKS posted:New Vinland Saga - https://mangadex.org/chapter/529430/1 https://imgur.com/a/FwCd2dH I've been really enjoying the random soldier perspectives we've been getting now and then and this chapter is no exception.
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Jan 28, 2019 22:09
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https://mangadex.org/chapter/571746/1 I thought it was good. 
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Mar 28, 2019 01:27
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Some lovely Icelandic villages in this chapter. I absolutely adore all the background work in this whole manga, and it's striking to see those sparse villages after a dozen chapters in Jomsborg. My greatest hope for the anime is that they put as much work as they can into the background art. If there is lovingly drawn pretty scenery and cozy houses, I'll be content.
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Jul 1, 2019 22:35
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Oh no! Only two chapters are translated. What a tragedy. I'm happy the Thermae Romae guy is just straight up doing Roman stuff without the framing device holding him back. It was a fantastic framing device, but you could tell that eventually he just wanted to do a story about Romans, and I'm glad he's getting a chance.
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Sep 17, 2019 00:14
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Lt. Lizard posted:Huh, and the current arc is actually the longest. Well then. I'm very interested to see things finally head for Vinland, and I don't think there would have been much thematically to add to Thorfinn's story in Miklagard. The stuff we did see was all very relevant- tying up old plot threads, showing new ideals interacting with old and all that. Nothing like that was going to happen in Miklagard. But god drat did I want to see Thorfinn and friends bumbling around Constantinople. I dearly hope there will be small fun flashbacks at some point, even if I understand why it wasn't really part of the proper story.
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Nov 10, 2019 17:26
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That Works posted:Honestly for a sec thought they were ending the series on that one. Not that it needs to end there, but that would have in a way been a good ending. Definitely a very emotional chapter, without much happening. It's good to reflect right here at the cusp of heading into the unknown. Though I like how Thorfinn keeps emphasizing that they'll be trading back and forth. He's not cutting himself off from everything his little utopia, he's expanding the world. Or at least that's still the goal. I'm taking solace in the fact that this has not been following the Sagas very closely, but I still fear for the fate of Thorfinn's settlement.
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Oct 26, 2020 23:15
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I don't think there was anything thematically relevant in Constantinople. It was an understandable destination to take our characters back into the Baltic where the thematically important stuff went down. I think the author was probably rushing to get to exactly the kind of chapter we just had- chapters about exploring and understanding. The whole rest of the manga seems like it was just to give context for what perspectives the Norse were bringing with them.
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Oct 25, 2021 05:01
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I think the specificity of the vision was for the readers to contemplate and go  about.In terms of the plot, Misqe'g Pi'gw believes the Norse are bad news. That's a plausible conclusion to reach, with or without specific knowledge of nuclear weapons. If he's more fervent and certain than would be "rational" for what his character "actually" knows, well, he had a vision. The fact that his vision is accurate and not a mad dream is just dramatic irony, as far as the plot is concerned. Though it's obviously a lot more meaningful as far as the themes are concerned. Reflecting on this chapter: The Norse in the Misqe'g Pi'gw's vision aren't Thorfinn's Norse. There's time for Thorfinn and some of the settlers to learn to live a more balanced life. The tragedy is that Thorfinn can't create the refuge he wanted. He wanted a utopia on the edge of the world where it could thrive, out of the way, as a kind of final Iceland, where people can flee to to avoid conflict. Except the world has no edges. The best he could do is take his loved ones and join the Mi'kmaq... their descendants would probably be better equipped to deal with small pox. If they avoid being killed, driven into land too marginal to survive, or sent to Canadian residential schools, maybe they could still be dreaming of making a better world today... Vinland Saga never really could have a happy ending, but I didn't think it would be quite this bleak. I do wonder if there's anything positive to say at the end of all this. It feels like there should be, considering how far Thorfinn personally has come. Incidentally, I've been reading The Dawn of Everything recently. It's a very insightful reexamining of assumptions about the nature of humanity, looking closely at the recent archaeological and anthropological evidence. There's a lot in it specifically about how Native Americans saw Europeans, and the interesting critiques they had about European society that later generations pretended was just Enlightenment thinkers putting words in the Americans' mouths to present a European critique of Europeans. But there's a lot of interesting stuff there about what struck the Native Americans. I guess there's a huge gulf between Thorfinn's Norse and the Jesuits who recorded what later Native Americans were struck by, but there's an interesting parallel in how unimpressed Americans were by European ways of doing things. Sometimes "primitive" people actually did have the power to imagine the political repercussions of different ways of doing things, and their rejection of European ways could be the result of reason and understanding. That's not to say Misqe'g Pi'gw would literally be able to reason out nuclear weapons, but the ability to see the writing on the wall was not necessarily beyond someone in that kind of society. I guess if I had a critique of this chapter it would be that by emphasizing the perspective of a modern reader to such a degree, the perspective of someone like Misqe'g Pi'gw does get somewhat muddled.
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Dec 29, 2021 02:16
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Plutonis posted:Hild built a threshing machine several centuries before our timeline...? On that note: New chapter of Vinland Saga! Hild holding on to her anger for all this time to the extent that she has felt like a bit much, but drat if I wasn't moved by Thorfinn's reaction anyway.
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Feb 26, 2022 08:54
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Captain Invictus posted:new vinland saga Actually, it just occurred to me, if we have to have (history spoilers) Thorfinn go back to Iceland to be a merchant, we do have a spare Thorfinn right there in Round Eyes. The issue of his wife and kid are a bit sticky, and Round Eyes is actually the most involved with the Lnu so far, but I could see there being a twist where our Thorfinn and his friends join the natives when his community falls apart, and Roud Eyes leaves for Iceland to tell a modified version of the story that eventually becomes history. That might straddle a sad and happy ending in a satisfying way. As for this chapter- I think it was a bit simplistic and anachronistic for things to split along gender lines. The woman encouraging her husband or brother to righteous violence is practically a stock character in the sagas. Not being encouraged to participate in violence by your society doesn't mean you're free from falling into the trap of seeing the need for it. Admittedly the sagas were written for and about aristocrats and landholders, where violence is required to maintain a family's status, but the idea that all ordinary women think war is dumb, even defensive war in this case, doesn't really ring true for me. I will give the author credit for emphasizing that men don't have to participate in violence, and emphasizing that the obligation of violence is something that hurts men. I would have appreciated more ordinary men on Thorfinn's side, as I think the only man actually standing with him was his buddy Einar. I think what's being said about violence is interesting, but what's being said about gender is a bit simplistic, even if I do like elements of it.
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Jul 24, 2022 22:17
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Captain Invictus posted:NEW VINLAND SAGA. It's tragic, but a good story. In this tenuous situation there were people on both sides who didn't want peace, even if they had very different reasons. I wonder how this is going to play out, and what kind of conclusion everyone is going to take from it. It's too nihilistic for this to just be the end of Thorfinn's dream, especially since we saw how close it was to working out. But I can't see how anything will work out after this.
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Aug 26, 2022 13:24
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Aoi posted:So, chapter 200 of Vinland Saga has been out for about a week. Sydin posted:I'm very curious to see how Yukimura approaches the ending. Considering his personal views on violence I can't imagine he's going to go with a totally downer ending about conflict being unavoidable, but unless he plans to completely veer away from the Sagas this story is going to end with Thorfinn ultimately failing and having to go back to Iceland with his tail between his legs, and then dying shortly after. I certainly don't envy having to navigate such a tricky narrative situation. PringleCreamEgg posted:I have been desperately hoping for Vinland Saga to end as alternate history rather than historical fiction since probably around where season 2 of the anime will end. I don’t want a bittersweet or tragic ending, I don’t want Thorfinn to fail and I don’t want Thorfinn to die thinking he made peace only for the genocide of the native americans to happen. I want Thorfinn to make peace with the natives and we get an aside that Christopher Columbus died on his way to the new world (died badly). But yeah, the Sagas suggest things will get bad on a much shorter time scale, and I hope that doesn't happen in the way history remembers.
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Apr 21, 2023 14:57
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Captain Invictus posted:new vinland saga It's really sad that even just giving up is something Thorfinn is likely going to have to overcome a lot of challenges to accomplish.
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Aug 28, 2023 21:11
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As a side note, I've been reading a book, Indigenous Continent, about the history of North America concentrating more on indigenous agency than traditional histories. The native warriors getting together and going "we don't actually care about these people, but their metal axes are pretty sweet, so let's figure out how we get as many of those as possible" rings very true to history. The next step would be, "let's create an alliance with these strangers to fight our enemies," which would have been an interesting dilemma for Thorfinn to face, but it seems like things aren't going to get that far. There were also definitely indigenous groups who figured out that all these new diseases were associated with the newcomers and took precautions, including violently keeping out outsiders, so to be honest this all tracks as historically plausible, even if it's happening on a far smaller scale and much quicker than how things went down when later Europeans showed up.
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Aug 28, 2023 23:08
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Hypocrisy posted:Vinland Saga Chapter 206
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Sep 28, 2023 00:43
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Nov 26, 2023 07:18
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Plutonis posted:Ivar wasn't clamoring for war as much as he wanted armed deterrence instead of Thorfinn's absolute pacifism. It was his buddies who wanted to started poo poo with the Lnu. Ivar wouldn't have lost his hand if he hadn't insisted on holding on to the power to easily kill.
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Feb 26, 2024 20:32
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PringleCreamEgg posted:There’s still time for everything to work out fine and this end up as an alt-history series, right?
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Feb 26, 2024 21:24
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