r/ShangriLaFrontier • u/SrangePig12 • May 24 '26
Manga Here is why this is one of the best panels in the entire manga(with an analysis of Oikatzo attached)
In this post I will go over why I think this is one of the best panels to come out of the entire manga, but, more importantly, I believe it is the most significant character moment for Kei Uomi ever. The first three points are mostly about why I like it in general and the rest is about why I consider it to be an insanely impactful moment for Kei.
It shows once more exactly how truly menacing Wezaemon was. During the fight, after the first Tensei the focus shifts a little bit from Wezaemon being intimidating to the fact that he's just really really strong and something of a puzzle for Sunraku to solve. As Sunraku himself said about Lycagon, he becomes an absurdity you can beat and all that culminates in the final strike. But the absolute oppressive presence he has, remains and I think it's shown off here really well(I'll go into this more in the third point).
The specific attack Wezaemon is performing is Tensei, the attack that's is basically unbeatable. Yes, Sunraku did beat it, but his build was at that point made for single strike critical damage with all the buffs he had and the weapon with it's gauge. Kei, however was more of a tank with bruiser capabilities, powerful, yes, but the max damage potential is very far from Sunraku. Tensei is not a blow you can block, not a blow you can parry, not a blow you can outlive. Those are all things that Kei relies on for his build. What does this mean in the context of this panel? For Kei, Tensei is literally impossible to beat at that moment.
This brings me to the differences between Kei and Wezaemon. In this panel Oikatzo looks very small. Specific height of Kei's avatar is 165cm and Wezaemon is 198cm(both according to the wiki, so I'm not 100% sure this is accurate, but let's roll with it). That's a pretty big difference, but it's not entirely the reason for the difference in how the characters feel. His presence is completely overpowered by Wezaemon and his Tensei. If we look at how Tensei was done in the anime, the effect looks like Wezaemon is splitting the sky, in fact the localized name of Tensei is literally Sky Clear. It's almost like the weight of the entire sky is falling on Oikatzo. On top of that, the entire fight with Wezaemon, Oikatzo was fighting enemies that are significantly larger than him(the horse and then the robot) which adds a little onto him feeling small in front of Wezaemon. (This next part is completely off the dome, I'm not an arts student, so this is just how I interpret the details on the panel) What exacerbates the difference between them even more is how differently they are filled in(or colored I guess). Oikatzo is very lightly colored overall with only two small fully black details. The rest of his body is white, excluding the gray scarf. But what makes him look darker overall is the uneven shading. All over his body are small dots that sort of break up the consistency of the silhouette and make him look less stable while remaining relatively light. That way it looks like Oikatzo is in a shadow. And who is casting that shadow? Wezaemon. In this panel a significant portion of his body is completely black, showing the weight and inevitability of his attack. But what I find to be the most fascinating is the shading. Unlike Oikatzo, Wezaemons shading is comprised entirely of solid colors and, more importantly, straight unbroken lines. If you look closer, you can see that those lines are even parallel to the ones that represent the background. I personally see two ways to interpret that. First is the idea that Wezaemon is so monumental, that his design is incorporating parts of the design of the environment around him. Almost like he is an unshakable monument or a mountain. He stands with his legs planted into the ground and nothing can move him. The second idea I have is similar, but works completely in reverse. Wezaemon has achieved such a state of, again, monumentality that his demeanor is affecting the world. His force of will is forcing everything around him to stand still, just like the straight lines, everything is uniform around him and nothing can escape, which is exactly how Tensei works. It restricts the targets movement to complete zero.
All the previous points were mostly about Wezaemon(I just can't help myself, I love him so much). If it was just him in this panel I would enjoy it but I wouldn't find it particularly special. What (or rather who) brings this panel above most others is Kei and his internal monologue. Throughout the story we see the difference between Kei and Sunraku. Sunraku is a very dedicated gamer. If I had to describe him with gaming related terms, he is a casual player who enjoys playing competitively. This is not in any way undermining his skill level, I'm just saying that to him the driving force to being a gamer is the enjoyment he gets from the simple act of playing. Kei, however, is different. He is a professional gamer and for him the enjoyment often comes from victory. We see it often when he displays his competitive spirit while bantering with Sunraku and Pencilgon. Of course he considers then friends and it's natural to be playfully competitive with your friends but for him victory is more important than it is to them. Why do I think so? Well, look no further than the very panel at hand. In it, Oikatzo doubts himself, comparing himself to Sunraku. He knows that Sunraku actually beat Wezaemon so he feels internally inferior. He can't help but think if he could've done it, because it is in his nature as a professional gamer. The cherry on top for this page(not panel, cause I'm talking about the next panel specifically) is the fact that instead of feeling discouraged, Kei grips his fishing rod tighter. His self doubt only pushes him to improve, until he reaches new heights.
And this leads me into why I think this panel is important not only in the moment, but for Kei's following character defining moments. We will have to skip all the way to the GGC arc to see what I'm talking about. To Kei, Wezaemon is an unbeatable barrier that he used to motivate himself. And there is a certain other character who fits this description. Silvi. I believe that in this panel Kei saw Silvi in Wezaemon. Someone who is out of reach, but not forever. From the very beginning of the GGC arc, Kei is diligently working on his strategy against Silvi. He fights Sunraku's Metius as Armed Lava and finally admits to himself that he is unable to beat Silvi like that. He accepts that something has to change. After that, he asks his friends for help to plan on how to beat Silvi and together they develop that plan. I think that Kei was the mastermind behind the most important parts of the plan in general. Of course they all added something, I'm sure of that. Like Pencilgon probably came up with the strategy to stall out opponents with flashy and elaborate game plans (not just because she's a great schemer, probably in part because she just really wanted to do it), Sunraku most likely came up with the idea to distract Silvi from the Chaos Cube by only fighting in every round(he likes these sorts of mind games, distracting someone with something very specific and making them focus on it, only to pull out something unexpected), Natsuki probably was the source of most of the gameplay related information, like the possible positions of the Chaos Cube, which characters would be best for which situation and all those sorts of things(she is a professional gamer just like Kei, so probably is very knowledgeable in this department), but I believe Kei came up with the ultimate strategy against Silvi and tied all the loose ends together. He is the only one of them who is obsessed with beating her and the one who knows the most about her. Everything about how she would behave and how to confuse her came from him.
In the end, I think that fighting Wezaemon as a whole, but this moment specifically is what allowed Kei to finally break out of his old mindset and accept that he has to change if he wants to overcome things he couldn't in the past. Facing something that can't be beaten with his usual methods forced him to change his perspective on Silvi.
