How would I describe myself as a TG fan? Well let’s say it’s something I never planned :D. I enjoyed the first season, but reading the manga had been a complete different experience for me and I suffered even more because of the more detailed manga story. And somehow after following a few TG blogs TG had been the first manga/anime where I actually didn’t ignore the metas on my dash and started to read them. Then it became worse every week because the longer you follow a story, the more you will get emotionally attached to the characters/the story (seriously I’m now even such a fan of the author. I will probably check his twitter even after TG ends :’D). Well and now it’s not possible for me to get out of this hell. Somehow I’m never getting tired of TG. It’s really “my fav series” and I wonder if there will be ever another manga story which can replace it for me 0)-(.
I’ve been busy with work recently, but I’ve wanted to mention Uta’s mon for some time, and I think we should be getting some Uta soon-ish? Maybe. Maybe it’s my wishful thinking because I’m bored out of my mind with Kaneki’s lack of character growth.
Ishida let us know Uta’s tattoos follow a theme (”I thought of a theme and just drew from there”) and that they are somehow important or at least related to understanding Uta as a character (”What’s on his back? I’m not telling you yet”).
So, one of his tattoos is a mon. Mons are family crests that were first only used by the wealthy and the samurai, but as the use of family names spread, the mon spread too. Your formal kimono would be decorated with a mon, for example, for your wedding (in the TG calendar, Matsuri’s kimono has an (unidentifiable) mon on his wedding day). Their history is fascinating but most people nowadays wouldn’t be able to tell you what their mon is off the top of their head.
Here’s Uta’s tattoo side by side with a mon it represents:
This is the 「虎杖」(itadori) mon. Otherwise known as Japanese knotweed (fallopia japonica). The japanese flower language assigns it with the meaning “Not what it seems” (figures, right?). “Itadori” means “taking pain”, and supposedly when you rub a stem or leaves over a scrape or bruise it’ll heal faster.
The itadori mon is easily recognizable because there are literally only two variations of it. To provide some scale, there’s some 6000 mons in total, and something like a 1000 different wisteria variations among them. So itadori is somewhat special. Itadori iirc is supposed to be one of the original mons – the ones used by those weathy families and samurais.
Fun fact! Itadori is so invasive that it can grow through concrete and asphalt. It can grow basically in any conditions. It just… survives.
So there you have it, a ghoul without a family but with a family crest and some more floral imagery in Tokyo Ghoul.
Relatable FE Quote or Something 