TRIGUN StarGaze: Episode 2 FULL LENGTH Reaction!
Added 2026-01-22 18:00:06 +0000 UTC
Comments
Thank you so much! I really enjoyed this episode as well! And I don’t blame anyone for crying this round! OOHHHH, So I have documented historical evidence of a static OP! Interesting! HOPPEREDDDD – I really enjoyed how they made his character for the show, here! The layers of emotional work, indeed! I love how you phrased the “tapestry,” here! Love your discussion of him in this comment! What a wild story it would have been if Jessica had not shown up! I think Meryl, Millie, and Wolfwood may have found him eventually haha! I love that discussion of how Hoppered cannot “Control” Vash becoming Eriks – so interesting to unravel those layers! I appreciate how much was in this revenge plot as well – truly something Nightow would approve and fits in line with the “Live to Suffer” mentality. So many layers and it was so well done!! Thank you so much for the kind words! Ahhhh, Eriks’ shawl being ACTUALLY Eriks’ shawl – ooohhhh, that click hadn’t clicked – I love that! And yes, Rem – ugh— my heart! Your line about “Thank you for letting me be your Eriks so you could be my Rem” is not helping the Hoppered and Vash shipping! XD I feel you in the ways that I was NOT expecting to be talking so thoroughly about Hoppered the Gauntlet at the start of the year, but HERE WE ARE! Yes, show, take it easy on us – maybe a little moment with Wolfwood getting run over by Meryl will add some levity – what a line! Thank you for the comment!!
Romaniablack
2026-01-25 01:20:25 +0000 UTCLoved the reaction and discussion! 🥰 I knew I’d cry again watching the reaction and I did; I cannot handle this episode. 🥹 Regarding the OP, yes, you were correct and I saw the same (more static) OP last weekend. There were some comparisons posted online showing that the episode aired in Japan with the same OP as ep 1, and speculation that CR had an older file or something, but I have not seen any official confirmation. Though as of writing this comment, I checked ep 2 again and it now has the same OP as ep 1 on CR, so probably just a mistake which has been corrected. Love the speculation about who’s gonna get to shave Vash and cut his hair! Same, happy with any and all potential iterations if that’s something we’re gonna get. 😆 Now onto Hoppered, my goodness... 😭 Just for the rendition of his character here, I adored these two episodes and the layers upon layers of emotional work they’ve shown with him! Most of all, I adore the way Hoppered’s identity gets so tangled up, and we see it tighten and unravel multiple times. There are so many layers of guilt, longing, protectiveness, punishment, anger, fear, coercion, redemption, atonement. A beautiful tapestry! I think in Hoppered’s eyes, Vash was simultaneously a replacement for Eriks, a reminder, a wound, and an object of yearning. And not just for Eriks or Vash, or even for the time Hoppered had with Eriks. But maybe for the kind of person he got to be when he was taking care of her (and then Vash), for the kind of life he thought he could have had, for the time he had a reason to be gentle and had the opportunity to be relied upon. 🥹 And I absolutely see a version of this where either Eriks or Vash!Eriks could have fulfilled this desire. Up until the moment of Jessica’s arrival and what that meant in the long run. While a lot of Hoppered’s anger is over Vash’s actions and the consequences, I also think definitely some of it is over the fact that Vash cannot fully become Eriks, even in terms of being the object of Hoppered’s care. The way the internal conflict is presented is so interesting to me, in ep 1 it seemed almost involuntary in some moments. Looking back at those scenes, maybe Hoppered was trying to control the anger so he could move past it, or the feeling of getting to be a caretaker again was making him literally forget who he was looking after in the moment and why. I love that it could be all of those things and more. 🥰 And even something that could be narratively relatively simple on the surface: wanting to ultimately punish Vash for what happened to Eriks and needing Vash to therefore be aware of the fact that it is punishment – is made so dense. To me it is all tangled up with Hoppered fighting internally with himself and his desire to be a caretaker, and how the need for punishment and coercive control are at odds. Hoppered punishes himself so that he can punish Vash, but the punishment is also salvation – for Hoppered, for Vash, for Eriks, for Jessica. And there is a beautiful paradox at the heart of Hoppered’s fury, he wants to punish Vash for surviving what Eriks did not, but also to force him to deserve being alive. He doesn’t want Vash to waste the life Eriks lost. If Hoppered’s cruelty in this moment (threatening Jessica, forcing a suicide-by-Vash, etc) can save someone later, then maybe Eriks didn’t die for nothing. Definitely not the ‘exposure therapy’ approach, yes! 😅 Excellent discussion around how much guilt factors into all of this, as well. And then the way simultaneously punishing and saving Vash is also atonement for what Hoppered sees as his failure to protect Eriks! 😭 In the end, Vash putting on Eriks’ shawl as both the red of Vash’s coat, but also the memory of Eriks, the result of Hoppered’s care, etc, all of it was so moving to me. Literally taking on the burden of suffering. I was really curious where the tagline of ‘Live to suffer’ was going to go and this was such a complex surprise! And, and, and… on top of all of that there’s the moment of Vash saying Rem’s name to Hoppered when he caught and held his hand! 😭 I know he is directly addressing his memory of Rem with the line of “Would everything have been better if I had never existed?” but I think it is also Vash saying: thank you for letting me be your Eriks so you could be my Rem. 😭 I am… flabbergasted. Also, somewhat actually at the idea that I’ve just written a near-essay about damned Hoppered the Gauntlet. This was definitely NOT on my 2026 bingo card. 🤣 Looking forward to next week and spoiler corner! (But take it easy on me, please, show!) ❤️
Sunspots
2026-01-23 12:14:18 +0000 UTC
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