There are definitely some unsung members of the Gegege no Kitarou family. As even the likes of Sundoake-baba get their own episodes, Ittan Momen and Nurikabe tend to stay very much in the background – occasionally popping up for comic relief or (mostly in the case of Ittan Momen) proving logistical support to Kitarou and Neko-musume. That’s a shame because both are played by really wonderful (and legendary) actors – Ittan Momen by Yamaguchi Kappei and Nurikabe by Shimada Bin.
Without question this was Wally Wall’s biggest spotlight episode of this incarnation of the Gegege franchise. And Shimada delivered an especially fine performance I thought – it’s always hard to convey nuance and emotion when you’re distorting your voice this much, but he really pulls it off. This is very much a close to the heart episode for GGGnK, touching on so many of its core themes – the decline of village life in Japan, environmental destruction, and of course Nezumi-Otoko causing trouble. The series is also vigilant about observing Japan’s holidays and major festivals, and seems to have a special affection for stories about bamboo.
Talking of bamboo, that fascination is actually not specific to GGGnK, as the Japanese in general seem to imbue a very strong sense of sentience to it for some reason – it pops up in folklore all the time. So a character like Seika (Kanemoto Hisako – Ika-chan making her GGGnK debut) is definitely cut from classical Japanese tradition. Here, she’s a spirit of a bamboo forest that takes human form every spring, and she’s in the process of trying to protect the forest from (you guessed it) one of Ratman’s harebrained schemes.
In this instance, Nezumi-otoko isn’t actually involved in some short-sighted human business endeavor – he’s just using that as a pretense, his real goal being to free Ashi-Magari (Handa Yuusuke, a regular in this version), who Seika has sealed in a cave after he targeted humans. Seika is targeting humans this time, but only to drive them off – she actually considers herself the guardian of their wishes, as her forest has been used as a Tanabata wishing ground for hundreds of years. As the local villages slowly die out the wishes get scarcer and scarcer, but Seika refuses to leave her post – as steadfast as a- well, wall.
Nurikabe enters the picture when Seika sees him suffering from the proverbial thorn in the paw, and offers him some bamboo salve for his wound. Soon he’s bonded with Seika in a rather touching way, quite taken by her devotion to the wishes of others. Wally Wall’s wish is that Seika have a wish of her own, but she’s never thought about it. And she’s busy defending herself from the frame job that Nezumi-Otoko is pulling on her – though events are sped along when Ashi-Magari tricks Nurikabe into breaking the seal and freeing him. Naturally Wally springs (in his own lumbering fashion) to the defense of her honesty, though why Kitarou would need to be convinced that Ratman is the one lying is beyond me.
I quite enjoyed seeing Nurikabe get a chance to sparkle here, and the bittersweet conclusion of the Seika storyline was very effective. I’d like to see Ittan Momen get a similar opportunity, because Yamaguchi is another one of those seiyuu who gets stereotyped as a comic actor (because he’s one of the very best at it) but is actually capable of delivering much more.
ED6:
