{"id":7,"date":"2007-01-31T17:16:47","date_gmt":"2007-02-01T00:16:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.elsweb.org\/craiggrazianohmygod\/2007\/01\/31\/the-myth-of-it-all\/"},"modified":"2007-03-13T20:10:19","modified_gmt":"2007-03-14T03:10:19","slug":"the-myth-of-it-all","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.elsweb.org\/craiggrazianohmygod\/2007\/01\/31\/the-myth-of-it-all\/","title":{"rendered":"The Myth Of It All"},"content":{"rendered":"

In adding to the evidence that Yojimbo<\/em> is dealing with a more mythic narrative than The Glass Key,<\/em> I think viewers need to look no further than a striking difference between Sanjuro and Ed. While both of them are very clever and witty, Sanjuro\u00c2\u00a0(a trained warrior)\u00c2\u00a0is more apt to follow through with the threat of\u00c2\u00a0physical violence than Ed is. Ed constantly\u00c2\u00a0relies more on charm (a\u00c2\u00a0characteristic that Sanjuro lacks, or simply ignores) to win his battles. Charm and wit\u00c2\u00a0seem quite acceptable for Ed’s world. Likewise, strength and wit are extremely beneficial to Sanjuro. If we relate the fight in Yojimbo to Lucas’ Star Wars<\/em>, who is that character replacing Sanjuro? Obi-Wan Kenobi, who is\u00c2\u00a0certainly one of the most spiritual\/mystical character in the film. Charm?\u00c2\u00a0That’s for the mercenaries.\u00c2\u00a0Han Solo is Ed Beaumont. He lacks a real history or mythology and works with gangsters. Sorry to get on a slight sci-fi tangent…. and no, Chewbacca is not Paul Madvig. Is Sanjuro a mercenary? Or is he a force that not even money can direct and change?<\/p>\n

The story of Yojimbo itself hearkens even further back, over centuries really. This idea of a figure being able to play two opposing sides, profiting from their mutual destruction is evident in Greek and Norse mythology, with trickster gods pitting two superiors against each other and reaping the benefits. The Anansi stories of Africa and Native American trickster tales are as equally influential. The difference is that Sanjuro is not sneaky like these earlier figures. As the hero, he manages to find usefulness for his training. He asks for little in return and does not linger once his job is complete.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In adding to the evidence that Yojimbo is dealing with a more mythic narrative than The Glass Key, I think viewers need to look no further than a striking difference between Sanjuro and Ed. While both of them are very … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-glass-key"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.elsweb.org\/craiggrazianohmygod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.elsweb.org\/craiggrazianohmygod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.elsweb.org\/craiggrazianohmygod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.elsweb.org\/craiggrazianohmygod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.elsweb.org\/craiggrazianohmygod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.elsweb.org\/craiggrazianohmygod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.elsweb.org\/craiggrazianohmygod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.elsweb.org\/craiggrazianohmygod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.elsweb.org\/craiggrazianohmygod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}