Her Fury Hidden Within Her Beauty: Shinobu Kocho
It is unfortunate that even now in today’s age, many women in anime will still be written terribly. Almost all the time they are either given no actual development, they are simply thrown in for diversity, or their potential will be overshadowed, only there to be a placemat love interest who’s main purpose is to only benefit the main character rather than themselves.
Sexualization also tends to be a huge problem in many animes. For example, Tamaki Kotatsu from Fire Force, contains a recurring gag called, “Lucky Leacher Lure.” Creator Atsuhiko Ohkubo intentionally designed Tamaki to play into an aggressive fan service archetype. It is why she is constantly put in embarrassing and awfully unnecessary compromising situations. Though her gag is completely intentional, many fans criticized this, feeling as they take away from serious action sequences.
Not all anime have poorly written women. Sometimes the men will also have little to no development, especially when they are side characters. While this can be entirely arguable, this is also my own opinion. But, I believe Demon Slayer (Kimetsu No Yaiba,) can be used as an example for this case. For example, Obanai Iguro had little to no development. His childhood trauma was something crucial to his character, but the author took too long to explore this and he doesn’t stand out so much.
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Personally, Demon Slayer is a good starter anime, but it is not the best out there. While the characters contain their own different backgrounds, I didn’t really get attached to any of them, except one in particular. A character I believe is pleasantly written is the one and only Shinobu Kocho. Not only was I captivated by her ethereal beauty and butterfly theme, but she had depth that went beyond her looks.
Throughout her life, Shinobu hid the blazing fury she felt beneath a gentle smile, it was all for show. What she feels on the inside remains hidden away until Shinobu reveals the truth to the main character, Tanjiro Kamado. She feels a great amount of anger towards demons, specifically because demons have been the main source of her grief. Especially after Shinobu witnessed the death of her older sister who had been slaughtered by a demon of higher power.
At just the age of sixteen, she was given the heavy load of taking her sister’s place. Now holding the title of the insect hashira. For Shinobu it was proven difficult as she did not have physical capacity to decapitate a demon’s head off in order for it to disintegrate. Luckily, Shinobu was a smart lady, due to the fact that her parents had previously worked in compounding and selling medicine. With such a smart mind she had managed to concoct a deathly wisteria poison that could easily kill a demon.
With such an impressive achievement, fame or recognition wasn’t what Shinbou sought. Despite her sister’s final wish being that Shinobu leave the life of a hashira behind and live a normal life, Shinobu sought revenge. After her sister gave her key details about the demon she tried to face, it became Shinobu’s goal to give her sister the peace that was abruptly taken away from her.
Down the story-line, Shinobu hid the fact that she was essentially planning a self suicide. Though she wasn’t depressed nor was it on impulse, her intense trauma drove her actions from that point forward. Being fully aware that her combat would not be enough to kill the demon of higher rank, for over a year she injected herself with her own lethal poison in order to finish the job. The only one who knew about this plan was her adoptive sister, Kanao Tsyuri.
During her final battle Shinobu put up a good fight, using all the strength she could give. Even after her lungs were shredded into pieces, she still fought until her last breath. And when she could no longer give, she allowed herself to be absorbed by the same demon who killed her sister, knowing her plan would fall into place.
Like us, Shinobu was a flawed human who held insecurities and regrets. Deeply cursing her lack of muscles and small structure. Also loathing the fact that she could not fulfill her sister’s wishes and knowing that deep down, the grace she held was something that she couldn’t hold up as well as her sister did. Towards the end she was deeply reckless, only driven by her anger. It was after her death that she had found peace, reuniting with her sister and her parents.
Her writing is overall great with what she was given. There could, however, have been more room with improvement. While her key aspects happen, some feel abrupt rather than earned throughout the story. Her personality also could have been more explored through broader psychological development, but other than that she remains one of my beloved anime characters.
