User blog:BigBadSquid/PE Proposal: Ogura (Manga)



Remember when we proposed and approved several manga alterations of characters who lacked any of their mitigating factors from the regular media, such as Ganondorf (Manga), Bellum (Manga), and Ansem, Seeker of Darkness (Kingdom Hearts Manga)? I found another possible contender.

What's the Work
This work is from the manga adaptation of Densetsu no Starfy (The Legendary Starfy) by Yumiko Sudō. We follow the Pufftop prince Starfy and his friend Moe the clam in their adventures. Then Ogura shows up, and things go downhill FAST.

Who is Ogura? What has he done?
Ogura is an evil magical eel that seeks to conquer all of Pufftop to his control. He was sealed away within a magic jar for his crimes, but at the beginning of the game, Starfy accidentally breaks the jar, allowing Ogura to escape. This cat and mouse chase would continue until the third game, where Starfy discovers that Ogura is in slavery to an evil demonic monster called Evil. After losing to Starfy and friends, Evil smites Ogura for his failure and turns him into a monster. When Starfy and friends were only one Evil Crystal short of getting rid of Evil, he declares that he will destroy the world to create another one. At the end of the game, Ogura has a change of heart and uses his own Evil Crystal along with Starfy's to destroy Evil once and for all, sacrificing his life in the process.

...None of that happens in the manga. Because Evil doesn't exist in the manga and is not using Ogura as a clone, that means Ogura is doing everything on his own for his own sadistic goals. This version of Ogura lacks any sympathetic backstory; he's played far more seriously and remains a permanent threat from the day he was born to the day he dies.

Not much happens in Volume 1, as its played light-heartedly and full of laughs. Then Starfy drops the magic jar, and Ogura pops out. He quickly escapes, only because of how depowered he was considering how long he spent within his magic imprisonment. He's back to full force once Chapter 1 of Volume 2 happens. The chapter establishes Ogura's far more psychopathic personality when he actively destroys many buildings and attacks many innocent starfish people before heading to his main target: Castle Pufftop. As he enters to seize the throne, Starfy tries to stop him, resulting in Ogura grabbing Starfy and nearly STRANGLES him to death, all while mocking his foolish bravery. Luckily, Moe causes the castle to rock by causing a burnt cake in the oven to explode, as it causes the replacement jar to fall over and suck Ogura back in it. He tries to take Starfy with him, only for Starfy to be saved by Moe.

In Chapter 2, Starfy has an argument with his parents that escalates in him pushing Mama Star into the shelf that holds the jar, smashing it and once again releasing Ogura. He takes an opportunity this time and abducts Mama Star, imprisoning her to his evil castle. Starfy and Moe go out to rescue Mama Star. She leaves a tape in a bottle at sea revealing the location of Ogura's castle, but the wizard eel intercepts.

Starfy and Moe reach the castle in Chapter 5, where Ogura is there to welcome them in. He shows off his latest invention: a brainwashed Mama Star, who quickly gains the upper hand in nearly killing Starfy and Moe. Ogura sits back and laughs, but it's not until Moe distracts him and Mama Star long enough for Starfy to grab the bottle and gets Ogura back in it, returning Mama Star back to normal.

His next appearance is in Chapter 7 (6 is filler) where during a celebration party, Starfy accidentally cracks the jar against a table, but Ogura is sleeping. The end of Ogura's tail sticks out of the jar which a mysterious man named Shuuri-jiisan offers to fix with a certain type of clay found at the end of a hazardous area. Starfy and Moe nearly manage to die, but they still get the clay and give it to Shuuri-jiisan. Suddenly, the cloak comes off to reveal Shuuri-jiisan was Ogura, who wanted to trick the kids into getting themselves killed, and fooled them by leaving the tip of his tail in the jar to make it look like he was still inside it.

His next appearance is in Chapter 9, where Starfy and Moe are out looking for Ogura and arrive in a forest, meeting an old and wise tree named Yugodrajii who knows where Ogura may be hiding. As Starfy and Moe climb up a mountain, Ogura appears and sets the ENTIRE forest just for the thrill of it. Starfy manages to put out the fire, but Yugodrajii dies. Thankfully, a planted branch grows a new Yugodrajii.

In Chapter 10, Starfy discovers at the top of the mountain is a village that Ogura terrorized by implanting landmines throughout the town, possibly to kill Starfy and as many others as possible. Starfy and Moe help the residents deactivate them.

Finally, there's Chapter 11, the finale. Starfy and Moe return to Pufftop having been unable to find Ogura. He's been missing for a rather long time, making Starfy worry that he will never be able to catch the evil eel. When a Pufftop guard gives Starfy a newer, longer jar, Ogura sees it as a threat and snatches the jar, using it on Starfy. He wakes up in an alteration of the world except there is nobody. No animals, no plants, nothing. Ogura appears in front of him and capitalizes on this by telling Starfy that all of his friends have died because of him and throws him into the ocean to die.

Ultimately, a rope descends from the real world into the jar's world to save Starfy when everything begins collapsing into a void. Ogura falls into the void and thus dies. Starfy cries about this, but not out of sympathy, more like how a young child just witnessed a death.

Mitigating Factors
Unlike the game series which gives Ogura a tragic Fredrian excuse and lets him die with a redeeming death, the Ogura from the manga acts under his own will and thrills to destroy and cause as much chaos as possible, not under the Evil's orders. He goes far beyond even what his regular game counterpart commits, such as strangling an innocent child and brainwashing a mother to kill her son.

Now, there can be a slight factor given to his onscreen body count, which only includes a tree. His ATTEMPTED body count nullifies this by going much further, including Ogura setting a forest fire, setting landmines in a peaceful village, and commits numerous ways of attempting to kill Starfy simply for standing in his way.

Heinous Standards
There are only two heinous characters in the Starfy series: Evil and Mashtooth. However, I think we can bypass them since 1): The manga does not follow the games and is its own standalone work, and 2): They are both your "destroy everything" power-hungry greedy villains with tyrannical positions. The manga version of Ogura, however, I honestly think might be worse than the two, as he's shown not only destroying things, but also tormenting the heroes by implanting live landmines to kill many, setting a forest on fire, and even by brainwashing Mama Star to kill her son for him. Not even Evil committed something like that. In the end, he inherits both Evil and Mashtooth's worst traits from the games into this manga.

Final Verdict
Even if this guy only kills a tree, strangling a child and brainwashing a mother to kill her son without remorse sounds heinous enough to meet the standard. The game version of Ogura is tragic, but the manga version is the complete opposite. Sounds like a keeper to me.