But it really is InuYasha's story, though. We love the whole cast, but the story is InuYasha's coming of age, even in the manga. There's little side jaunts, and the characters are important, but it's not Miroku or Sango's or Kikyou's or Kouga's story beyond how it intertwines with InuYasha and Kagome's story. And it's more his story than hers, how he transcends his self-absorbed adolescent self with longings to be accepted by transforming his outer self into something acceptable by using the jewel, to transforming by growth and becoming the hero, the friend, the man who selflesslessly without a second thought jumps into a meidou to rescue the heroine and gives her up to keep her safe and whole, and in the end is rewarded.
Every one of the cast is involved in that transformation, growing themselves some in the process, until he is the perfect counterpoint to Naraku...and it's only then that Naraku can be destroyed. But RT uses them as tools to further her story. We care about them, like them, get intrigued with them, but it is his story, of how he grows into the man who can be the one that Kagome needs to destroy the jewel.
Anyway, in my litcrit mind, this is how the story works on the macro level.
It really does have some similarities to the Peach Boy story...In the story, the Peach Boy does rescue the princess the oni have taken captive with a bunch of characters he's picked up along the way, who bicker and fight and the group has to learn how to function together...but it's the Peach Boy who defeats the Oni King, frees the princess, but doesn't get the girl in the end...and InuYasha does.
Your mileage on analysis may very...I'm into motif and trope comparison...and the stories of the hero's journey into adulthood (ala Campbell's Hero with a Thousand Faces) is one of my favorite patterns...
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Every one of the cast is involved in that transformation, growing themselves some in the process, until he is the perfect counterpoint to Naraku...and it's only then that Naraku can be destroyed. But RT uses them as tools to further her story. We care about them, like them, get intrigued with them, but it is his story, of how he grows into the man who can be the one that Kagome needs to destroy the jewel.
Anyway, in my litcrit mind, this is how the story works on the macro level.
It really does have some similarities to the Peach Boy story...In the story, the Peach Boy does rescue the princess the oni have taken captive with a bunch of characters he's picked up along the way, who bicker and fight and the group has to learn how to function together...but it's the Peach Boy who defeats the Oni King, frees the princess, but doesn't get the girl in the end...and InuYasha does.
Your mileage on analysis may very...I'm into motif and trope comparison...and the stories of the hero's journey into adulthood (ala Campbell's Hero with a Thousand Faces) is one of my favorite patterns...