Seriously, everyone -okay, exaggeration- rants about how they find him to be a weak and clingy kid, even in the manga, with the skip that leads to him being a competent human warrior. Yet, still, people find reasons to keep him The Scrappy.
I mean, I refer to one of my fave works, Claymore Outtakes by Dany Le Fou. Raki suffers from double standards. Priscilla, with how she's been teetering between good and bad -hated for killing Teresa, liked for befriending Raki, hated again for the friendship being somewhat a lie- I can understand hatred for her. Riful, if there was any for her, I could understand it. Rigaldo is liked for being uber. But... disliking someone for being the SOLE main -at one time- normal character?
I mean no offense, but if writers hate Raki so much, why not change him up to a version they would like, instead of inserting OCs, and such? Granted, I may be no better, talking but not taking action, but still... There are other anime and manga to use to jazz him up. There are Youma? Use DMC or Naruto -not the characters- to change up Raki. Or, dare I say, Familiar of Zero.
3/8/2011 #1 ReportI won't lie about hating Raki and I do meaning HATING him.
I'm talking H-A-T-E here.
I would be lying if it wasn't partially because of how he acted when he was first introduced. Oh. My. God was he annoying! He couldn't do anything, the only thing of valued her offered was cooking and a 90% of his scenes had him whining or following Clare like a lost puppy. My main problem with him though, is his relation to Clare.
It makes no bleeding sense!
His crush on Clare is obvious from the word go, but the fact that she supposedly shares his feelings is just a case of poor writing. Claymore's great. Good action, good at hitting those emotional notes when needed, but this part just really really sucked. The relationship is just based on some kind of dream image Raki has of Clare, because he's known her for a few days (Not sure. Passage of time is kinda unclear.) and he knows fuck-all about her, and the fact that Clare just seems to feel sorry for him. The whole kiss seems to be just be to get rid of him.
Sure you could go with the extremely easily drawn conclusion of "She's protecting the person she loves", but if you examine the two of them a little you realize that Clare never shows anything even resembling a romantic emotion towards the little prick. When she does show anything in relation to him, it seems like she feel like his big sister.
This 'relation' annoys me for another reason as well. Clare had a perfectly good romantic interest! Sure, Teresa dying is Clare's entire motivation and her entire character is based around it. She had to die for Clare to be who she is. I understand that Clare has the dream image of Teresa I blame Kari of having with Clare. However, that image makes more sense here as Teresa actively tries to appear as a good person in Clare's eyes. Of course, there's also the fact that Teresa obviously carries feelings for Clare.
You can say that it's more a mother complex with Teresa, but with some of their scenes it feels like more than that. They actually have moments together with some real weight. They tried to repeat this with Raki, but those scenes are just the same things that have been done to death in other anime. It feels weak and it lacks what it had with Teresa.
Of course, I call him useless and after the time-skip he appears as a pretty capable warrior. This annoys me to no end. It's not like his relation with Clare, which just plain pisses me off, this is just something that annoys me. The reason for this is the following: He. Sucked.
Sure, he was trained by Isley. Problem being, that lasted all of a few days at most. I doubt he even had time to teach him basic swordplay. Now 7 years later it's suddenly "Oh yeah, I iz sword god now". Training for 7 years can do a lot, but not if you haven't learned a proper style. A sword is more than a sharpened stick that you can swing at random, hoping to hit something.
9/7/2011 #2 ReportI am in complete agreement i did not hate raki to much at the start just found him frustrating and usually tried to ignore him this has become impossible with recent developments with the sword and being infected and isly not all in that order mind you. My main focal point of hatred comes from the fact he is unnecessary and only seems to be there to increase the number of men in the show the same way the guy in card captor sakura was introduced because the creators where worried that without a male protagonist people would not watch. I mean i could probably write a fic where Raki and Clare never met and the story would not change much from canon. I now hate him with the passion of a thousand suns because i saw him fighting the next number 1 and 2 awakened kids as equals as frigging equals!!Being able to beat up a regular human fine being able to surprise and kill a regular yoma tolerable to fight and beat something miria had trouble with makes me want to reach into the story and punch his head in. Why could he have not died in pieta instead of jean then clare would have more reason to be depressed not that she needs it her back story is a hell hole and we would be rid of raki.
But yeah that is essentially it i used to hate him for being an unnecessary ad don and now i hate him a lot more for breaking the series rules and becoming something other than the morality pet he was supposed to be. I swear we are not far from him coming in and being a deus ex machina that saves clare and then the two go away get married and raise little claymore babies if that happens i am treating the end of claymore the way i do the Evangelian movies like they don't exist.
9/7/2011 #3 ReportIf he even mentions baby Raki's I swear to God I will find a way to turn myself in to a fictional character, purely to slap him and then shove that blade of his somewhere it was never meant to go.
9/7/2011 #4 ReportTotally understandable i would probably just ignore the entire second half of the manga and go ahead and rewrite i normally do not abide by fix fics but jeeze they do nay of what i suggested with him and that's it i will be completely turned of canon well at least the second half. I also cannot stand like i said his breaking of the rules i mean how does Priscilla putter her arm inside him suppress the giant parasite and why has he not awakened and gotten chopped up yet.Also am i the only one confused the the ghosts outfits i means could they not have chosen something like what clare wore when she was on the run that outfit was ass ass kicking awesome, the new ones seem more like they are there in an attempt to grant a cheap thrill and also where is the armor as in the metal stuff they are meant to protect themselves with they would all have lost less limbs if they actually chose something practical.
9/7/2011 #5 ReportSorry bout the clothing rant back there, but yeah i could tolerate raki as a sort of adopted younger brother morality pet i mean that is essentially the morality pets job to be pathetic and need protecting, i didn't think him necessary but i could tolerate him then they throw all this other crap our way. Raki and to a lesser extent isley are actually my main problem with claymore fan-fiction i mean i look for a fic and almost all of them are about raki or isley. It is ridiculous and it is usually them gaining new random powers that make no sense and being a hero to the claymores and bleh tick me right off i did not start reading/watching claymore just to read about some two guys gaining random power up that's why i watch ranma. I also never understood why he left his village i mean at the end of the chapter the village elder seemed to care for him same for some of the other villagers next chap he is apparently thrown out for no reason and i think most people when pitying him forget he is like 15 in middle ages times that is essentially an adult and his story and tragedy are not particularly unique ones. So it is not like he needed clare around to provide for him except to protect him from his own stupid i mean really " I know i wanna find someone so i am gonna cross a desert without and planning or provisions". what great planning on his part. Clares back story on the other hand is much worse than his and she was younger when it happened and did she wonder around whining no did she wait for some guy with a sword to show up and teach her no she went out and made her self awesome i have no doubt had the organization turned he away she would have found some way to get it done or die trying.
9/7/2011 #6 ReportOkay first off, I don't agree with you on Raki Post time skip, but I will admit to saying that Raki of before was hard to deal with, but the fact was that I focused more on clare pre=time skip then anything else. But I find some of yor logic unfounded. Raki went to Isley's for, may I qute you, SEVEN years, Im pretty dam sure that he had more training then just a FEW days worth with Isley. As for Raki fighting the awakened twins on equal grounds...He wasn't. In the manga, Raki even SAYS, that they were going easy on him. He may be the strangest HUMAN, but until some latent transformation(Probably caused by Dae) kicks in, he's not a match for any claymore, save for clarice, and thats even a possible wrong.
2/4/2012 #7 ReportI don't remember him saying they where going easy on him and if he does get a transformation i swear i will cry i didn't strat reading Claymore for super powered guys i read it for super powered women who aren't incredibly annoying. Sure Raki trained with isley for seven or so years the point is that he is still human and should not be capable of doing half the stuff he does this isn't Street fighter. Not to be rude but i am worried that the manga has become to focused on building up a character who was unnecessary to begin with.
2/4/2012 #9 ReportHe does say it, just about when they finish fighting in that chapter, which I forget the number of. Technically, they didn't use the manga to build-up Raki. Remember there can not be things such as a stagnant character regardless of whether they are a side character, if they have a significant effect on the main characters or storyline. And last time I checked Raki was such a character. His relationship with Clare and Priscilla AND Isley being the most prominent
2/5/2012 #10 ReportWell i'll take your word on the fight chapter.
I agree there can be no such things as stagnant character truly i hate when that happens, my issue with Raki has always been that i felt him unnecessary. Then there is the level of importance he has gained with Clare i could understand it somewhat (though not like it) but on Isley and Priscilla i found it ridiculous and overall more a convenient excuse for Raki to become dangerous and Gary stueish. This is just my opinion and i respect the validity of your arguments.
2/5/2012 #11 ReportPlus there's also the fact that Clare probably would have awakened without Raki being here, and also when she was dealing withnophelia even though it was for Ophelia's amusement, Raki did give Clare the needed time to reattach her limbs. Else if Raki wasn't there, one of two things may have happened.
1) Clare awakens, and considering the manga, this is mor likely routee to have happened but same rules apply for when Raki wouldn't have been there to turn her back, IF Ophelia didn't outright kill her first, like with the other voracious eater.
or
2)She would have just died
2/5/2012 #12 ReportPossible but if Raki had not been there Clare may not have been placed in those specific situations, she was sent to Rabona out of spite because of Raki, and partly awakened because she was protecting him. She was sent on a mission with ophelia because she almost awoke partly because of Raki and if he had not been there at all may never have been given that mission and would not have had to split her time between defending him and herself and ophelia may have player with her the way she did raki instead.
2/5/2012 #13 ReportPossibly but, here is some food for thought. Remember that her handler is Rubel now while that doesn't automatically mean that he causes things to happen, he probably, even without the provoking of Raki's presence, would have sent clare ahead to some of those situations regardless, because of the potential of Clare's blood(IE Teresa's). Yet we also don't fully have an understanding of Rubel's agenda so he may have pulled the strings to Clare even going to those situations in the first place, the sick bastard that he is.
2/6/2012 #14 ReportPossible but those situation may have happened differently if not for Raki's presence in way we cannot predict, and Rubel only seemed interested in killing Clare after her partial awakening, i can see little practical purpose in sending her to die before that seeing as a rebellious warrior would cause problems for the organization and that would be convenient for him.
2/6/2012 #15 Report Reply 
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