#Sorachi was afraid of success

[suchine-toki]

Thoughts about Kondō

Kondo started as a joke character who became more and more relevant in the story. He’s genuinely kind and has a big heart, which has earned him the undying loyalty of his comrades. He can also be extremely naive, as seen in Shinsengumi Crisis arc, he trusts others too much. This contrasts with his police work, in which someone more cautious and distrustful would be expected.

That's the serious side of him, but most of the time Kondo is an over-the-top character, usually the butt of jokes. He has no complexes about being semi or totally naked, or doing gross things, which makes him very versatile and fun. However, when talking about him it’s impossible not to refer to his infatuation with Tae, which largely defined his character.

He initially falls for her because Tae says that she would be willing to accept the less attractive parts of him (a hairy ass lol), which indicates certain self-esteem issues. In this way, for better or worse, his stalking becomes a running gag. While it never feels like anything dangerous, their interactions for most of the series remained in the limbo that comedy provided, with occasional moments of more seriousness.

Towards the end of the manga, it can be seen Sorachi understood that if he wanted to develop this relationship, he needed to break the old dynamic. This is how in Farewell Shinsengumi arc the change happens (and it's when I really started to like this couple). Later it’s known they spent two years together in which Kondo even cooked for Tae in her house and they managed to have a domestic dynamic, sadly off-screen.

I wish their relationship had stopped being stalker-stalkee much earlier, to appreciate how they gradually become closer, instead of it happening through a time-skip. Otherwise, it would’ve been interesting for Kondo to accept that his love is unrequited and get over it. Here he could stop chasing love or he could fall in love with someone else. Both cases would allow exploring other facets of him.

Despite this, although the love triangle in which he found himself dominated a good part of his development, his relationship with other characters and his role as leader of the Shinsengumi also received a lot of attention, in situations in which his personality got to shine. That's why I think that, ultimately, he was a well-rounded and well-developed character.

[nuisancehelicopter]

Ryoma and Gintoki Similarities

bored prodigies/ highly skilled person with troubled past.

actually very strong and quite experienced in matches/battle

defeats/confronts characters and cause them to grow. This make the opponents respect them afterwards.

Both are trying to find meaning and purpose in their life.

plot armor very strong.

Both have strong sense of justice/ideals that they weren't afraid to enact on everyone be it teammate, bystander or foe.

both don't really voice their thoughts all that much. They just did their thing while the others around them changed. We saw growth in them when they actually spoke their mind or when we were given a window to their thoughts.

Both their main teams were so lost when they were not around or they were not themselves.

both had the influence to make important gather to help out in dire times.

for #1

Ryoma was a kid pushed intensively into an sport by his parent from the time he was born. There was questionable parenting going on. This made him more relateable to kids and teenagers who grew up in strict households where grades/performance is priority.

For Gintoki to work as a character, he was written as an adult war veteran just trying to get by in life by doing any kind of job. He's relateable to many adults.

Like obviously Sorachi was the much better writer but you can see why he respects Konomi so damn much. He put Konomi Takeshi's song "Tenipuri tte ii na / Tenipuri is Good" on the final Shonen Jump chapter of Gintama after all! (this was before Gintama transferred to Jump Giga)

Sure it is still debateable whether Konomi achieved his story's "goals" at the end. The more amazing thing he did was provide a main character that deviated from the more popular type of loud, clueless, hotheaded hero and made that story a huge success.

Btw this was from a fun conversation on twitter today. I felt like a blindfold was pulled off my eyes. I couldn't stop seeing similarities between gintama and PoT anymore lmaoo

[suchine-toki]

I've a friend who started watching Gintama and every time they get to a new arc I'm like "Wow I never thought you would make it this far" lmao