Things Are Easy When You're Big in Pajan

Abstract

Things Are Easy When You're Big in Pajan Shawn Edrei (bio) The Complete Okko Humbert Chabuel Edward Gauvin, trans. Archaia www.archaia.com 560 Pages; Print, $39.99 "It's like Samurai Jack," my friendly local retailer said as he slid the massive volume into my hands. As comparisons go, that was a surefire way to get my attention, but it turned out to be somewhat inaccurate. Glancing at the cover, one might indeed assume certain similarities to the Cartoon Network series: the protagonist's square jaw, persistently-stern expression and laconic personality evoke the iconic animated hero, and Humbert Chabuel's elaborate artwork reveals as striking and magical a landscape as any you'd find in Genndy Tartakovsky's designs. But The Complete Okko is not a story about a solitary character trapped in an unchanging status quo, fighting a single figurehead of evil; its depiction of bushido and the culture that created samurai and ronin is not nearly as sanitized or simplified; and Okko himself is shrouded in ambiguity as to his intentions and moral compass. It is a time of crisis for the Empire of Pajan (an anagram that will fool no one), as constant warfare between four great houses threatens to tear the land apart. All manner of demons from Japanese mythology, from oni to tengu to yurei, are running amok. In the midst of this chaos, the wandering ronin Okko and his companions—masked giant Noburo, sake-swilling monk Noshin, and young page Tikku—find themselves traveling across Pajan, hunting supernatural creatures and aiding noble houses suffering from mystical afflictions… provided they have the coin to pay for said services, of course. The narrative of Okko is structured as a set of five cycles patterned after the Buddhist philosophy of godai: Water, Earth, Air, Fire and Void, the latter referred to here as Emptiness. Hub's meticulous use of these themes is truly impressive, as each element is woven into the plot, the setting, and the introduction of new characters. Water finds our heroes visiting a city floating over the ocean, while Earth sees Noshin and Tikku climbing up and down mountains visiting a set of religious orders, each more stubborn and impenetrable than the last. Air brings the threat of violent hurricanes just as Okko's mysterious past catches up with him, and Fire goes all out with political intrigue set at the foot of a volcano, on a night lit up by fireworks. The Cycle of Emptiness, which concludes the saga, appears here in English for the first time, and—somewhat fittingly—eschews the elemental parallels for a chain of nested flashbacks. Here, Hub's penchant for detail is on full display as we trace our protagonists' lives from their earliest days and discover a few surprising truths and unexpected encounters along the way. These are all framed in the context of a final journey for Okko, whose injuries (accumulated throughout the previous four stories) have finally overwhelmed his combat prowess. While all the cycles are, at their core, personal stories rather than grand adventures, Emptiness is perhaps the most intimate of Chabuel's tales: Our heroes are deeply flawed, the villains—if Okko can indeed be said to have any at all—are doomed in their petty pursuit of empty revenge, and the answers to long-running mysteries satisfy our curiosity in the most melancholic of ways. If Okko is like Samurai Jack in any way that matters, it's that they both create vibrant, magical worlds that almost effortlessly draw their respective audiences in—but Pajan is a darker place than Aku's future dominion, more densely populated by imperfect men and women whose stories touch Okko's for only a brief moment in time. Some emerge unscathed from the encounter; others are dragged down by the sorrow that seems to shadow our anti-hero's every step. [End Page 5] Shawn Edrei Shawn Edrei recently completed his PhD and teaches at Tel-Aviv University. He continues to explore digital narratology and the ways new technologies change how we think of storytelling and authorship. An avid gamer and observer of online fandom dynamics, Shawn recently co-edited...