Ergo Proxy - 9: Shards of Brilliance/Angel's Share

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Shards of Brilliance

I began writing by once again going through and attempting to discuss each part that seemed interesting or relevant. However that led to me typing up nearly the entire script and furthermore my comments were more or less banal. I essentially finished the episode guide, but it was so poor compared to my real opinion of this episode that I decided to begin from scratch and try again, this time hopefully to capture a little of the real message I think this episode contains.

To me, Kazkis is the real center of this episode.

He is a figure of paradoxes. Agent of Light, with an ever-present smile, a beautiful tower and as many bottles of wine as he could desire. He is the very figure of a king.

But he is also a dark individual. Fermenting in his own despair, flickering out of sanity, and lord of a destroyed land, there is nothing left for Kazkis.

This episode is about war and destruction, love and loneliness, revelry and madness.



It contains many little details which are thrown in to help re-enforce the themes --- Kazkis throws more and more violently the glasses and bottles of wine throughout the episode. First drinking, then tossing the bottle, then breaking a glass, then breaking a bottle, and finally destroying rooms at a time.


The chandeliers are lit candles, and nearly every room has a burning fireplace.


The display of Asura and Charos flickers right after the first time Vincent gazes up on it.


--- But for me, the real good of the episode comes from Kazkis dialogue and philosophic ravings.

"War is pointless.
But being destroyed is not."

This sentiment resonates deeply with me. I too believe that war is pointless. Winning and losing I do not think there is much value in. Instead I believe it is in the effort and intention that meaning arises. Thus, despite the futility and worthlessness of destruction, I see being destroyed as one of the purest sources of truth there is. When someone finds a truth, a passion, an ideal that they are willing to sacrifice everything else for, the act itself is transient and brims to overflow with meaning.
And yet.
Such beauty may never come to be expressed if there were not great wrong to inspire it... as such, could it be partially Kazkis desire, as a mad artist, to create such great beauty through great destruction?

"Is that why you killed them?"
"You're joking.
They were left behind. And during the long sleep they tried to find their meaning. But they shied away from the fact that they had been abandoned and only found a way to live through mutual destruction."

War, I find, is always like this. No wars for real morals and real good are ever fought. Instead they are petty squabbles of devastating effect between groups of people believing that somehow winning will make them right. How can anyone find meaning from attempting to harm another? And yet... the human race claims to and does it over and over again. Admittedly they convince themselves they are doing it in a defense of what is true and right... but this too is always merged with delusion.

"This is my Asura as it really is. This is what you believed to have seen. Right?
It's just a monument. The citizens built it so that future generations would know just what Asura was like in the past. But it was a worthless effort."



What are monuments? They are to remind us of meaning, but how can they hope to do that? So often I go to see monuments and they hold no meaning for me. Nameless heroes astride great horses. Founders and trailblazers. War memorials stained with blood. And yet, unless I know the thing they are about, they are merely pretty statues. If I do know what they are about, then what purpose are they serving? I already know their meaning.
Pointedly included is the destruction of the last remnant of Asura - As Kazkis changes into proxy form, the display shatters.

"It was too much for anyone, but Monad still accepted those memories, in spite of the repercussions. Because Monad loved you.
But in this display of unrequited love. Monad completely lost you. No, not only Monad. You lost yourself as well. We are the sum of our memories. Erasing the memories etched into ones' own self is the same as losing oneself."

This too I strongly believe. To lose one's mind, one's personality, and one's life memories... is that not true death? Can anyone really claim that death is really only the churning of cells and the increase of entropy except in the strictest of definitions?
And what can a selfless love do, but seek the happiness of their love? Even if it means the destruction of that they love? Would it not be selfish to seek your own happiness over their own?

"Go ahead and suffer. All those who wander in the darkness seek the light. But when they reach the light they turn their eyes away from the blinding glare. You can even sense the pain. The truth is like that too. Someday your eyes will be burnt by the light of truth and you will know eternal darkness. That is the judgement that awaits."

This is one of my favorite lines from the series. It is a dire warning that to believe truth is always good or welcome is a folly. Not only must truth be discovered, but also accepted and faced. Which is not always so easy a task. And yet you are trapped. You must either burn yourself and live with the knowledge, or turn away and cast yourself away from truth. It is all too possible that there are many truths that make both options unacceptable.


--------------------


The rest I have so say are just mundane notes I wish to make - Pino says "ow" while she plays, when most likely she does not feel pain.

The greek statue that Pino looks up to right after falling seems to closest resemble Venus de Milo, and not Hestia/Vesta or Athena. This is surprising since Hestia is associated with the hearth and Athena with war. It isn't Bacchus or Apollo either, whom are associated with poetry, or light, or other relevant themes of the episode. It isn't even an exact portrayal of Venus de Milo, simply a similar piece. There are other such statues and artworks around the palace that seem to just be representing classical decor.

Asura has the symbols that Charos did, so it must be a sun and a moon symbol, not merely the phases of the moon.

[VIEW SPOILERS]

Angel's Share

The entire episode is a comment upon the despair of a Proxy's duty. Kazkis manages to find a way to accept it as a sort of glorious tragedy. He chooses to look upon it as a grand show of destruction and death as a kind of artistic beauty. He speaks reverently of fate, of how he found love out of grief, and how he was going to die with Senex in a final symbolic act.

Kazkis embodies the dark side of celebration - the moodiness and volatility of artists. The sadness of a king with no people to serve. The empty triumph of a warlord. The meaninglessness of power. The acceptance of fate.
So what is so bad about the Proxy's duties? They are asked to create a city and watch over it's people. The problem lies in attempting to succeed at such a thing. People are by their nature imperfect, and the proxies only weakness is that they cannot know their own true desires. They can do anything they wish, and it leads to happiness for awhile. Until the truth slowly creeps upon them.
The people they create inevitably fail or become unbalanced. Or else they are soulless puppets. There is no other way.
What purpose can the proxies have? They were happy to create kingdoms, but realized their own flaws - free to do anything they wished, they had nothing to strive for. Kazkis can drink and drink and drink with never a single sign of a hangover. And yet, what is the point of being a wine connoisseur if you can never be drunk? What is the point of having such power if there is nothing to try to achieve? There there is the fact that they are forever doomed to follow their orders. Finally there is the double blow of seeing the flaws of their creations and the knowledge that they must also be destroyed. This is a theme through almost every dome. For Kazkis, it is the sense of fate and the desire of a king and artist.
The people of Asura were most likely warlike and valued power as Kazkis seems to. Or perhaps they were partiers and artisans. Perhaps as a queen or goddess Senex always had lunacy lurking in her nature, or perhaps she was a kind and wonderful woman before she was faced with her own fate.
Whatever the case, Kazkis and Senex gave up and embraced insanity in their final moments. They rejected their lives and became overwhelmed with grief, turning to seek death and the final embrace of fate.

///Reactions:

I admit to a guilty pleasure of transformation scenes. As such, I also appreciate this episode for Vincent's first transition into proxy form.
But, in a more tasteful enjoyment, I love this episode dearly for its many implications about life, suffering, death, and truth. The poetry. The madness.

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Next:Episode 10:Existence/Cytotropism