Genshiken chapter 71 is out, and as part of the marketing of the simultaneously released tankōbon 11 there are several colour pages in the magazine, one of which includes this portrait of Sue Hopkins as Ritsuko Kubel Kettenkrad, the student council president in Kujibiki Unbalance. Most of the interest in the chapter revolves around Ogiue's writer's block or else the ongoing Hato x Mada storyline, but this picture was the thing that popped out for me.
Kuji-Un is the manga within a manga, read and discussed at great length by the club members in the earlier part of Genshiken's run, but by the fifth year it's a bit archaic, to the extent that when Hato cosplays Kaoruko Yamada at Comicfest he wonders if anyone will get it. Yet the Genshiken clubroom is plastered with Kuji-Un art, in particular an image of President Kettenkrad in the window directly behind the club president's chair. A picture of President Kettenkrad on the outside of the clubroom door is the focus of the last page of the original run of Genshiken. It is as if Kio Shimoku is saying: this is the eternal spirit of this group.
The character most famously associated with The President is Saki Kasukabe, who is manoeurved into cosplaying her in chapter 19. Despite not knowing or caring about Kettenkrad's character, Saki manages to embody her by confronting and thwarting an illicit videographer. The presidency of the Genshiken passes from the First President to Madarame to Sasahara to Ohno to Ogiue, but for most of the series the de facto presidency belongs to Kasukabe. It's Kasukabe who defeats Kitagawa when the latter attempts to dissolve the club, Kasukabe who dictates that the clubroom be cleaned up (though with disastrous results), and Kasukabe who knocks heads together when it looks like the deadline for the Comicfest doujinshi won't be met. If ever the First President needs to influence the course of events he goes to Kasukabe. It's Kasukabe who talks Ohno into taking the presidency, and you have to think that the craftiness that Ohno develops in that role comes from thinking, "What would Kasukabe do?"
On the surface Saki and Sue are as far apart as could be. Saki is a fashionable, social, normal person with little interest or comprehension of otaku culture, who at first just wants to get her boyfriend out of the club. Sue is at the opposite extreme, a foreigner whose knowledge of Japan is almost entirely taken from otaku culture (though she does know her Buddhist chants). She communicates by quoting manga, and cosplays possibly more than Ohno. She seems to be in her own otaku subculture, puzzling even the other club members. But often it's Sue's imput that sets the direction of the club. She came up with the solution to Hato's change-room dilemma, and she also had some romantic advice for Madarame which he may or may not ultimately follow. In the newest chapter, when the school festival magazine seems on the brink of implosion, it's Sue who mandates a new partnership between Ogiue and Hato.
It's very likely that Sue will never be Genshiken president. I think Ogiue's concern for the survival of the club will lead her to a safer choice, either Yajima or Yoshitaki. But I expect to see more of the eternal spirit of The President from Sue in coming chapters.
Comments