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かわうそ@ついったー

Who is apparently AMAZING and likes Matoba with Natsume :3

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夏目友人帳13巻 by 腹筋

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🔥🔥🔥

випуск LaLa за 11.2024

this trio is always so unexpected 🌸

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I love chapter 112 (vol. 28) „Three Photos and a Strange Tea Party” 🫖

Matoba x Natsume is my OTP. As a fan of this ship and both characters, I love watching their relationship develop with each chapter.

Every time Matoba shows up, it feels like he enjoys meeting someone with powers as strong as his own. It’s also a nice break for him from his serious role as the head of the exorcist clan. Natsume seems to be leaning on Seji more as well.

If I ever write fanfiction, it’ll definitely be set about 10 years in the future, featuring Natsume running his own magical café, where Matoba is a regular patron. 🥰

Edit: I fixed some grammar; English is not my native language.

Edit #2: what I found!!🔥

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Lala 3 accompanying art

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Ur posts made me realize just how unintentionaly insensitive Taki is about Natsume especially compared to Tanuma & how the anime keeps erasing it. Tanuma who's as slender as Natsume,just taller, was added to Takis episode where Kai thought Natsume was after him & his friends called him names like beanpole which depressed Natsume. Tanuma & Taki laughed at him but in the manga it was only Taki. Tanuma however in Shibata chapter was: Natsume is not a beanpole! at same time Natsume defended him too

Feel better soon! A moment toned down & cut in half is, 1st time Natsume teased Tanuma & Tanuma teased right back in ch 66-67. Anime is more gentle,Natsume is sweet & Tanuma is mostly suprised & little embarassed. Manga Natsume’s expression is priceless, SMIRK, & Tanuma’s too, “somehow that really pisses me off”. Then Tanuma’s teasing, his HEH~ looked very pleased that the girl run away from Natsume & he also blushed along with Natsume who was flustered.Ofc they cut it, but its about women too?

Hello, nonnies, I hope it’s okay I put these together! I felt they were sort of related.

First of all, I forgot but you’re right, Nonny1! Taki really did think that was hilarious. She’s literally shaking, trying to hold in her laughter. At least she tried? But this is a great example of how Taki was never the delicate, sensitive flower the anime tries to make her. Cookies ≠ delicate.

Kai is apologizing here for calling Natsume “a pervert, a beansprout, and a cutting board.” (The depression part was earlier.) It’s really kinda genuinely terrible? Tanuma has teased Natsume before, so I don’t want to completely rule out him laughing at something this absurd, but you’re right he also got offended at a very similar insult: Shibata’s ひょろひょろ is a variation on Kai’s friends’ ひょろ男. The former means “tall and skinny” in a gangly, awkward way, and the second means the same thing but attached to the word for “male”. So basically, “scrawny” vs “scrawny-boy.” This is what was translated as “beanpole.” It’s actually quite sweet that they got offended on each other’s behalf, isn’t it? Natsume is very sensitive to the “skinny” remarks, but he was more upset at the idea that they were directed at Tanuma.

Interestingly, I feel like this story was actually peak Natsume/Taki. It had that scene where Natsume was watching Kai with Taki, and wondered whether he would “ever come to care for people earnestly” or “ever be able to make a family.” He clearly doesn’t come to any conclusion about who he would do that with, but given the context of Taki and Kai, it’s easy to see how it might be subtextually pointing at Taki as future wife.

But that never goes anywhere, and the further the manga gets along after this, the more Taki sort of… retreats relative to Tanuma.

Czytaj dalej

[olgierdou]

(I just recently read your posts about Tanuma and Natsume and you are so good at explaining it like omg✨) What is your take on Matoba? For the longest time I have really disliked him but after the recent special chapter I can’t help but wonder if there is more to him than “all youkai are evil and you should kill them if they’re useless” type of thing

Hello and thank you! 💕Sorry this took me so long to answer.

To be honest, as a Tanuma stan I don’t spend all that much time on characters that have very little to do with him. Which is mostly Matoba, funnily enough. I do have some opinions, though.

I see Matoba as a sort of spoiled prince, with emphasis on the fact that he actually does have responsibilities and takes them seriously. Matoba was born into power, but unlike Natsume and Natori he likes it.

I think a lot of the deal with Matoba is sort of… what naturally fell out of the style of story and the kind of role he plays in their world. I suspect that originally he was created to be a sort of human monster. With the series as a whole being thematically driven by yōkai, we’ve seen a lot of variety of their personalities, but fewer of humans. It makes sense that Midorikawa-sensei would have wanted to explore the darker side of humanity as well, and not just the ordinary darkness of abuse and neglect and so on. I’m not sure Matoba was ever intended to be completely bad, but he was certainly an extremist who felt justified in doing whatever it took to protect himself and his clan. And also didn’t see yōkai as truly sentient creatures, which is where he probably comes the closest to true evil. He reminds me a bit of Lady Eboshi from Princess Mononoke: a genuine antagonist who does terrible things, but also someone who has “good” intentions within a narrow point of view.

But Natsume Yūjinchō isn’t the sort of story that needs or would do well with a “Big Bad.” And Natsume’s not the sort of character to be even temporarily corrupted by someone like Matoba. So for Matoba to come back, he couldn’t just be blackmailing Natsume all the time. But for him to not come back would mean the threat would always be hovering in the background, which is almost like having a Big Bad. So seeing that they’ve settled into a kind of wary, somewhat respectful détente is important for defusing that threat. And I think it made sense at that point to shift more toward exploring his motivations and responsibilities and the kind of pressure he’s under (the eye thing!). Also that’s just more fun to write, haha. Plus Matoba being so powerful and so involved means he’s still useful as a medium to explore the way human magic works.

At this point, I think Matoba’s most important role is to be a foil for Natori, who isn’t really fulfilled as an exorcist. Matoba’s under a lot of pressure, but he still loves his job, such as it is. I do think he’s mellowed out slightly, since he’s a pragmatist and pragmatically it’s clear that Natsume’s respect for yōkai has been a very effective source of strength. That’s a repeating theme whenever Matoba is involved—Natsume always surpasses Matoba by working with yōkai instead of exploiting them. 

Matoba’s interest in Natsume is primarily an interest in Natsume’s power and how that could benefit his clan, but I think he’s also interested in Natsume as nakama. That is, I think he sees Natsume as someone who understands what it is to have his level of power. I think he feels the same way about Natori, but Natori is too cynical to take that seriously. But his clan is more important than that, and he doesn’t seem all that interested in pursuing those who want nothing to do with him.

Basically, I don’t think Matoba is really changing. Not since he was first humanized, anyway. But he’ll probably be back a few more times, whenever the story needs someone who’s deeply involved in the exorcist world, and maybe he’ll mellow out just a little more. That’s pretty much all the thinking I’ve done about him, haha.

Also he kinda seems like the anti-Tanuma in some ways, particularly when you consider how Natori/Matoba contrasts with Natsume/Tanuma, but I’m not sure that’s a real theme. 

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Meta #3: The One Where It Gets a Little Weird

Please note: this meta is heavily focused on recent manga developments, so if you don’t want to be spoiled by it you should catch up on fan translations. Okay these aren’t spoilers anymore.

Also, while I think reading my previous two metas would be useful in understanding some of this, I don’t really consider this a continuation per se, since this is purely focused on developments in the manga. I really didn’t want to get distracted by anime issues, for reasons which will perhaps becomes clear. 

There are two recent stories with particular relevance to Tanuma and Natsume. (Well, three, in a way, but we’ll get to that later.)

Czytaj dalej

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Tanuma Kaname and the Anime Problem, Part 2: Counterbalance

Note: Part 1 is here.

So why is Tanuma the character who symbolizes “the path forward” in “The Other Side of the Glass”? The anime adds Tanuma into the festival scene with Nishimura and Kitamoto, creating an impression it’s mostly his awareness of Natsume’s secret that justifies his role, but as usual this ignores the existence of Taki. The manga gave a different justification: Tanuma is the character who is teaching Natsume to see beyond power; the “rook,” the shogi piece Natsume is too focused on, is the most powerful in the game. In truth, Natsume and Tanuma have been set up as soulmates from the very beginning, perhaps originally intended to fill the emotional gap left by Midorikawa-sensei’s desire to write a story without a romantic subplot. 

When I say “soulmates” I’m not referring to a fated meeting—though that’s a possibility. I mean that Tanuma is both irreplaceable and indispensable, someone who is so absurdly well-suited to Natsume and Natsume’s needs that he could go a thousand lifetimes and not find someone else who is capable of the same. And the same is true of Natsume for Tanuma. I mean that without Tanuma, Natsume’s deep affection for the Fujiwaras and others would not have been enough to stop him from running away. I mean that without Natsume, Tanuma would have wasted away from his yōkai sensitivity.

Czytaj dalej

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Tanuma Kaname and the Anime Problem

A sweet—and significant—moment in the middle of “Unchanging Form” that redefined Natsume and Tanuma’s relationship. Anime version: not found.

A BRAZEN THEFT

There’s a moment in “The Time-Eater” when a de-aged, amnesiac Natsume is sitting alone in Tanuma’s house, watching Sensei totter off in search of a cure. His friends observe him with concern. Taki comments to Tanuma that while Natsume’s transformation is difficult to believe, his “un-childlike, wooden” expression is still recognizable. After a brief acknowledgment from Tanuma, she rambles on that it’s good Sensei found their help, but wonders what will happen to Natsume if he can’t turn back. Then she sees Tanuma’s face, and her tone changes abruptly: she apologizes to him, saying she’s sure Sensei will fix the problem, there’s just not much they can do themselves.

There’s little ambiguity in this sequence: the change in Taki’s tone is visually apparent in the style of speech bubbles—from the soft curves of “normal” speech to the more angular lines of emphatic speech. And the use of a “…” speech bubble makes it clear that Tanuma is responding with silence, not just listening from the outside. Even Taki’s body language supports this reading, her fist awkwardly balled up as if to say “oh crap, I screwed up.”

The effect is to create a contrast. Though Taki had shown concern at an earlier point in the story, she now demonstrates an ability to emotionally detach enough to speculate about undesirable results—she’s the kind yet tactless bookish friend. Tanuma, on the other hand, is too hurt by the thought to speak. The implication is that Tanuma is more invested in Natsume as someone he can emotionally relate to—not just a friend to take care of or have fun with, but a mental equal to share life with.

This theme continues, sometimes subtly, throughout the story. Whether it’s gently checking on a frightened Natsume while Taki giggles about how fun it was to chase him, or single-handedly dealing with Natsume’s fear of being hated by his caretakers, manga-Tanuma consistently demonstrates a higher level of attention and emotional intimacy. He’s even the one to beg Natsume to “come back,” a symbolically important role. The implied intimacy is not one-sided—Tanuma is the only character Natsume is unambiguously shown to regain memories of.

Czytaj dalej

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[ID: natsuyuu screencaps of matoba and natsume riding in a car together, natsume glaring out the window. matoba, smiling, is saying the tails gets trolled text, "did you know that even with seat belts people die all the time in car crashes? i thought that was interesting." natsume looks at him bewildered and frustrated.]

wait have we. done this one.

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latest installment in the timeless Matoba Gets Owned saga