I agree, I think that his personality on 0 with the cabaret was an act too, in my opinion Majima is both the Mad Dog and a serious person, the Mad Dog ain't fake, he likes to get crazy in battle too, but I totally ignore Majima personality in 1 and 2, because it just doesn't make sense with his character later on
@@leonardo25gabriel Also - even if this is unrelated to the psycholgical topic: Fighting Majima in Yakuza 1 is some BUUUUUUULLSHIT. I'm the one who'll need therapy for fighting that annoying bastard.
@@thekingmeruem >His time Play the Battle Review (basically the precursor to Climax Battles), either the Time Trial or Revenge tabs and tell me how your attempts go. GGs, got zoned and shanked for the entirety of the fight.
@@Fabio-ql5yf Majima in Yakuza 1 literally tries to kill people multiple times, threatens innocent people, etc etc It doesn't make sense with the personality he is presented in the rest of the series, he ain't a crazy sadist murderer, just crazy, they probably din't plan on his personality that much, so I understand
@@KingShibe Sure but in the single early scene he's in he doesn't act as crazy as he would eventually act later on (mostly because he got, like, 5 minutes of screentime before the 10 year timeskip). Also I guess it's 16 years total then, my bad
6 years is still a very long time and all he did was beat a guy up. At least in Kiwami Majima never kills anyone unlike the original where I'm pretty sure he actually killled one of his own men at some point. So they put some effort into making him a bit more consistent.
One thing that I love about your analysis is how this study of Majima show a LOT about Kiryu's own demise in the serie and why he got such a "darker" fate in the end compared to Majima (who had a shit life), Kaito or Shinada, which all got closures on their trauma/problems. Kiryu is an idealistic person with a set code of "honor" he follows, he is an empathic person who live through making the ones he loves happy, he lack personnal goals or ambition and only wish to support the ones that made him feel whole. Kiryu story has always been the issue between the romantisation of the yakuza/samurai and the crude brutal reality of the underground world. While Kiryu did succeed to do a lot of good things, like helping and saving Haruka, saving Daigo, helping indirectly Majima, avenging the "weak" who had been broken by terrible schemes, helping countless peoples in general... He also never got closure on many of his traumas. In the end, he lost his own "brother" who betrayed their paternal figures and "hated" him, his own "father" figure was the origin of him being an orphan, he is the reason the second woman he loved lost her parents (and ironically it is one of the few trauma where he got closures), he lost the love of his life, he "made" Haruka suffer because of who he is, he made all of the children in Sunflower suffer due to his origins, he lost the first real new friend he had for years after seeing Rikuya die in Y3, he didn't support the "son" he loved in Daigo, etc. Kiryu often fail to save "himself" and sacrifice himself countless time, ignoring who he is because "he can take it" but we all knows he can't (Yakuza 5 made a god damn effort of showing what happen to Kiryu when he go toward this extreme road. It is also why him choosing to 'attone' selflessly at the beginning of Y6 lead to again more issues). In the end, the incoming spin off game about Kiryu is VERY important in my eyes because I genuinely hope it is a game where Kiryu as a person get confronted FOR GOOD about this issue and force to fight/live for his own happiness and not the one of other. I really hope a character, be it Haruka, Daigo, Majima, Ichiban or Date, fucking punch him into having the right to be happy. It is why Majima is so important as a contrast. His sacrifices made him miserable too and the closure he got is what allowed him to finally be himself.
This was beautifully written and so well put! I hope it's okay if I draw on some of these ideas when the eventual Kiryu episode comes out? Of course full credit for those ideas will be cited in the video. Thank you again for the comment!
@@vgology Yes absolutely, there is a lot of things I certainly misunderstand or interpret in my own way. If I can add one things about this whole Kiryu theme... It is also why I genuinely love Rikiya and Nagumo relationship with Kiryu. I feel they are two ways to show how Kiryu's "kyoudai" genuinely give him a lot in their own way, reminiscent of how Nishiki was so important to Kiryu. Nishiki is the person that wanted to save Kiryu from the violence of the Yakuza world. He was willing to kill him to avoid him suffering, he threw himself to stop Kiryu from Killing Shibusawa as he knew it would broke Kiryu in the inside (which is even worse when we saw how Nishiki's first killing ended up breaking the loving person he was and started his new self). He was the person who didn't romantize the Yakuza's life, well aware that it is a lot about how you are perceived (something that then lead to Nishiki feeling dwarfed by Kiryu's charisma and strength). He was the man who showed to Kiryu that he had to make a choice in this life when it came to be a Yakuza, that someone who wished to wear "white" in a world of darkness would end up becoming just as black. Rikiya is so important because he is the one person who genuinely made Kiryu reconnect to the feeling of friendship when it come to the Yakuza world. Rikiya is loved by his community, he is a genuinely nice person with a bit of a naive streak but certainly not an idiot. He is loyal and someone who isn't scared to go through for someone he loves. Just like Kiryu, he is a mirror of what Kiryu is in some aspect (while having his own traits, being naive, prideful of his home, sometime hotheaded, younger). He is also someone who is way less straight laced than Kiryu, not even thinking twice about faking being a gay couple to enter the hotel room, immediately defending his homeland pride, not even letting one chance for Kiryu to push him away as he call him aniki. He is not without reminding Kiryu's relationship with Shinji. Rikiya die to save Kiryu and it is something that Kiryu struggle to tank because someone younger than him, that he opened to and liked, decided to DIE for him. And it show a lot about Kiryu's issue, Kiryu struggle to make himself happy because he struggle to connect to people (Thank fucking god he got Haruka and all the orphans around him) and allowing himself to be loved. He is the one who take bullet in the body, it is how his brain work. Loosing Rikiya is reminding him of being helpless to save the ones he loves (expressed in Yakuza 5, where he leave Haruka and the kids and then breakdown when Daigo get shot) but it also show that Kiryu is genuinely someone who need others to make himself happy. Then come Nagumo, and god did I not expect to love this character this much. What make Nagumo so important as a "kyoudai" is that he is one of the VERY VERY VERY fucking few characters that Kiryu learned to trust and see like a man he doesn't have to protect or monitor. Kiryu was always the protective and wise figures for many characters, level headed and with a high morality too. Nagumo is incredibly impulsive and can be dumb but he is someone who despite all of that deeply understands his responsabilities and the ones around him. He fight ALL THE TIME with his boys and yet he knows them way too well. But more than that, he is someone who respect others and respect himself. I don't wanna ramble too much but he is the ONLY fucking person where Kiryu basically accept to go on a "suicide" mission, they both drink together and go fight even if it means dying. There is no desire of seeing someone as "needing to be protected", Nagumo is the closest person I saw Kiryu treat as an equal outside of his fellow tojo friends (majima, saejima, daigo) and they both shared the feeling of loss and injustice. They are actually EXTREMELY similar in this aspect (like Nishiki & Rikiya). Nagumo is the sign of maturation that Kiryu got through when it came to accept people. Yakuza 6 is a lot about Kiryu's despair about loosing Haruka again and how he struggle to cope with it, it hit him with being a father (again), it is a game where one of the fucking minigame is actually Kiryu making FRIENDS. Something he never did outside of the cabaret club or side quests. Yakuza 6 is a game where Kiryu is push to his limits, but also where he is the most able/mature when it come to connecting to people. We went a long fucking way from Yakuza 0 where he was an idealist with no self care and only lived for some people to someone who learned to forgive himself (yakuza 2), to dare loving others (like TRUE love, not just being a genuine nice person because it is just who he is) in the end of Y2/Y3 and let them in his life again, to someone who learned to actually reconnect with people and have more self respect/know what he wish for (Y5/Y6). It is why Y6 end is so hard, because he again did the ultimate sacrifice to "protect the ones he loves" instead of doing what he wished and is now alone again. Despite doing SO MUCH for himself in Y6, in the end Kiryu chose a path of limbo where he is neither alive nor dead, not unlike the grey of his suit, he decided to be neither and therefore be/have nothing. ... Someone make this man be happy I beg of you, Ichiban please...
@@nevrankroaton Another great write up! You clearly have a deep understanding about the characters and the games and I loved reading your interpretation of everything. Thank you again for sharing! I hope my Kiryu video can do your comments justice
@@nevrankroaton that was beautiful and if anyone can bring someone from darkness to light, it's gonna be our beautiful hero kasuga Ichiban, while he and kiryu share a lot of characteristics like putting their friends first, ichi has shown a deep and mutual respect with his party, he never even hesitated to let saeko join the fights (which to my understanding are more like the clan battles in 6, y'know our group beating down the other group, than actually dragon quest) a specially impactful contrast was at the end of like a dragon, while kiryu chose to sacrifice 10 years in the joint (nice reference) and "spare" nishiki of his fate (which would ultimately would be nishiki's downfall), Ichiban convinced Masato to accept his fate of prison time so that he could pay for his deeds and start from 0 a stronger man with ichi at his side as an equal
@@TheTony257 tbh, can't wait to see how much Kiryu changes Ichiban to be more mature, while Ichiban changes Kiryu into more... Human. Afterall, as I quote him before his fight against Shibusawa, "There's only one room for a dragon".
I really don't think the mad dog is an act, at least not on the traditional sense. Majima's character arc in Yakuza 0 is about FREEDOM. He's trapped in Sotenbori in the caberet under Sagawas heel. When he gets back to his apartment he's being watched from all sides. He's unable to even raise his fist against a patron who disrespects him by pouring alcohol on him. He's caged up. That way near the end of the game, Majima is finally allowed to break out. Sagawa even says Majima "finally got out of the cage" and Majima himself decides to live as free as he wishes. It doesn't make sense for someone who's entire arc is about being free to suddenly trap themselves in a fake persona. I think people want it to be an act because they have trouble reconciling the fact that Majima can have crazy moments and serious ones. In reality, those two sides of him aren't that mutally exclusive. Just because he's batshit insane in one moment doesn't mean he can't also be serious in the next. That's freedom. Being able to choose what you want to act like depending on how it suits you is the epitome of how Majima wants to live. I mean even in his opening cutscene in Yakuza 0, he showcases that he has a flair for the dramatic when he says "Alright boys, give me one with a beat!" hinting that there's a way that'd he'd rather be acting like. In Japanese his course rough self even peeks through when he whispers "Shaa nai na" right before asking the band which is extremely informal in stark contrast to his painfully formal speaking to Sawaga and to his patrons as the lord of the night. That whisper is indicitive of the fact that his mad dog persona is actually part of his real personality. That he's being restrained and he just wants a chance to let loose. TLDR: Mad Dog being an act doesn't mesh well with Majimas want for freedom, at least in my opinion
I actually agree with your opinion wholeheartedly. And I think it's both and that's it's actually what his original personality is like and the reason why people think it's an act is because that's what he wants people to think.
One of my favorute lines from Majima is from Yakuza 5 at the begining of Saejima's part in the batting cages, Majima says "Ffter all these years I guess my fangs went 'n fell out. 'Course I wanna keep playin' the tough guy. But no one knows me better then I know myself. Gotta have the stones to face reality". officialy dropping the Mad Dog Persona (unless he absolutely NEEDS it). While Majima was never originally intended to be a complex character, I think its clear to see that as early as Yakuza 3, Majima was changed to be more indepth. In Yakuza 3 you see him switching between his normal self and Mad dog on the spot MANY times, and in 4 and 5 he never puts on his mad dog facade. Yakuza 0 didnt change his character at all, It just gave context as to WHY hes the way he is.
Tbh Majima from Yakuza 3 (mainly 4) onwards feels like a retcon for me, and I'm absolutely okay with that, because the crazy joker Majima from Yakuza 1 and 2 isn't cool as Majima from the rest of the series, they're just two different characters
@Leonardo Gabriel It's 100% a retcon because the writers changed between 2 and 3, but it was a very welcome and believable retcon since Y2 already showed Majima developing a stronger friendship with Kiryu. It isn't hard to believe that by the time Y3 rolled around, Majima would see Kiryu as his closest friend and ally and become much more grounded by him. It was pretty much logically where the character was going. This is compared to Sayama randomly deciding to fucking move to America, the bad retcon 3 made. Oh well, you can't win them all.
I kinda appreciated in Y5 that Majima's line about his fangs falling out was a bluff, as we saw later in the game when he's chastising Saejima for going soft. One thing the Mad Dog persona shows us throughout the latter half of the series is that it's not just a shield for him, it's an excuse. He doesn't ever really go all out until something that personally, deeply affects him is on the line -- which is why he doesn't challenge Kiryu until he's at full strength in Majima Everywhere, and why when he fights Saejima it's not a "test" or anything dumb like that. He's fighting because if he doesn't, Haruka will die and he can't let that sit. The Y5 fight shows this in gameplay too -- Majima does stuff in that fight that he NEVER did before, that was never a part of the Mad Dog persona. His quicksteps are faster, his attacks hurt more, even his Heat QTEs have tighter timings. For the first time in the series, he's throwing everything he's got at the one guy he trusts can take it. That's not the Mad Dog, that's just Majima, the guy we would watch grow throughout Y0. That's nuts.
Also check him out at the end of Yakuza 6 when ****SPOILER**** himself, Saejima & Daigo believe Kiryu to be dead. He's incredibly low key, sombre, more of the normal Goro you witness in Yakuza 0.
Yknow, after everything he goes through, it's really a nice thing to see Majima living a much nicer life later on in the series. Something I noticed about his appearance in Yakuza 7, his new version of "Receive You" (Receive and Turn You) just sounds a lot happier than most of the previous ones (Especially Receive and Bite You in my opinion.) I think this was a conscious decision to help paint modern Majima as a man untethered from his past, having made his amends with his brother and gotten closure on the most traumatic parts of his life. Also Majima can create shadow clones of himself and this is just canon and something he does on more than one occasion.
I thought majima was always just a little crazy before the mad dog "switch" is flipped. From what I've seen is oddities slip out during combat or when he's enraged, for example his fighting styles specifically the mad dog one, the games cutscenes seem to suggest that he gets the mad dog fighting style before the "switch" is flipped which makes it seem that the mad dog style is just a result of his already supposed craziness now I don't think he was full blown crazy like was after 0 when he was putting on the act but there was definitely some there before he put on the mad dog persona. Now for how he acts when he's enraged I can't really go off on because he's fucking pissed i probably wouldn't screaming at the top of my lung but i know people who probably would, now at the end of the game when he's storming the dojima hq the cutscene where he yelling at the dojima family members, in that moment he didn't care anymore he was letting go combined with the rage of makato getting shot, produced that ball of explosive rage the majima I think what we got in those final moments was the actual mad dog not some persona that he's subconsciously putting on the actual true mad dog.
I think Majima's particularly brutal fighting style is because of his torture, as Jana said. He also was a member of the Tojo Clan for a few years prior to the '85 hit, and we see that he manages to mess up a ton of Shimano dudes before he's finally captured in Y4's flashback. So he's clearly pretty tough and already pretty scarred by Y0, so I think him coming out the box with a fucking neck snap Heat Action makes at least some sense. I really, REALLY want a Majima spinoff detailing his adventures from 1989 to 1995 -- I would actually really like to see how his relationship to Mirei and Katsuya develops, and it's an adventure ripe for the picking, but I think it also might not be that interesting if we know that Majima is "just" the Mad Dog of Shimano by that point, doing the same stuff he was always doing.
Definitely with what you and others said that it was already lying just under the surface--but everything in 0 scraped that top layer off. We see in the scene where he breaks out of Sagawas control that he's calm, composed, but at the same time you can't call him anything but gone. He's the mad dog through and through, but the "mad dog" as we know it is more of a state than his true personality
Ever after figuring out how the mad dog thinks I still can’t figure how we can dumpster him in one moment and then turn around and see him sitting in restaurant waiting for us in the next
Majima's #1 trait is tenacity. He might not be the strongest, quickest, or most skillful, but he's not going down and staying down unless you kill him. You can only slow him up.
This really is an amazingly explained insight to a beloved character who's developed in such strange ways throughout the series. It does truly go to show how despite how tough these funny fighting men are, they still have so much pain.
Man, I've just discovered this channel a few hours ago and binge watched all your videos and let me tell ya this is the best channel I've found this year. Congrats for the research and effort you put on every video. I wish you the best.
Since I started with Yakuza 0 and loved Goro Majima for the character he was portrayed as (serious melancholic man with a wacky side coming through sometimes), I saw on the Internet a pic of Goro Majima after Yakuza 0, and started thinking that he was gonna be driven insane by torture. I really wasn’t looking forward to it, but thankfully, it wasn’t that.
Some of my favourite moments in the series are when you can see the mad dog come down in times when Majima has to seriously think, such as the boss fight with Kei Ibuchi (footage beginning at 6:53) where he isn't being 'mad' because he's fighting seriously with stakes and risk involved.
yes and no. the entier thing being all he is IS an act. however the thing is that craziness IS within him. its actually his anger we see from time to time in Y0 but also his love as well. using these two conflicting yet equally powerful and passionate emotions it makes it hard and practically imposible to predict or even understand much of anything does. this applies to Majima too. Majima finally lets his true drive out and just goes with it so he doesnt have to deal with everything since hes suffered so much. however he knows when and were he needs to focus and get serious, hence why he no longer acts all gitty at times
In my opinion the Mad Dog persona is a way to scare of anyone he cares about that isnt strong enough to protect them self from the life hes leading and thats why he like Kiryu so much as he was the first person in years that hecould count on
In my head, i always thought majima had a form of a multiple personality disorder due to his trauma , mostly because of kiwami where majima can show up in multiple costumes and act completely different
@@thatrandomcrit5823 Yes, acting is normal acting like Majima des is not. He can use normal things in abnormal ways to cope. Its like telling ppl I have ADHD too when they describe the symptoms. Yes every person can forget but will not forget almost every single time etc.
Its either an act, or its a defense mechanism to protect himself, or he really partially broken because everything went past the certain threshold some part of him become mad.
But there is still a chance that he is still sane and does all of this in purpose, for fun, and just because he wants to, right? I can totally imagine someone doing that for many years.
I mean, he is sane. He switches between normal majima and mad dog when it counts. When things are more serious he gets more serious. I think it's a mixture of what this guy said, coping but with a harsh environment where it's good to be unpredictable. Also, a bit of the fact that he also wants to be entirely free to express himself because he hated the idea of being trapped or someone else's prisoner.
So basically, this person who underwent loads of trauma and had their eye stabbed decides to dissociate into a knife-wielding lunatic in order to avoid their unresolved trauma? Hmm, familiar…
Something I remember: In the beginning of his first appearance in Yakuza0, at one point, he mentions something along the lines of ‘managing these girls is gonna put me in a nut house”. He then gets the mad dog fighting style after the Cabaret questline.
Some weird trivia I want to share. Noh theater is easily recognizable by the masks used, as opposed to the bare-faced theater of kabuki. Of one of the masks, Hannya is probably the most recognizable as a fierce demon. It actually depicts a fierce woman-turned-demon due to jealousy and rage, and more importantly scorning of an injustice done to her. Now that's not the fun fact I want to highlight. When you go into the etymology of Hannya, There are multiple hypotheses. The phonetics stem from Sanskrit प्रज्ञा, Prajna, mmeaning Wisdom of Buddha. Another theory tells that it comes from the line : "Ara osoroshi ya, hannya goe ya" ("What a horrible voice reciting the Heart Sutra [a sutra to repel demons"), implying a demon repelling demons, and I find that interesting. Another interpretation is a male monk named Hannya perfecting the role, meaning both 1 mastering the subtle masculine and feminine to bring out the role and 2, a kind soul bearing a demonic role. Which in a way describes Majima
Interesting theory, and I think it has way stronger point than "majima snapped and went crazy like joker" misconception that some people believe. Narrative wise, I think Majima was mad from the start, one thing about Y0 and Y1 Majima has in common is that he loves fighting, and it shows through how he already acts like a mad dog in combat from the very start of Y0. His calm composure was a mask to blend in with the society, something we all do so we can work together as a human and not be a weirdo outsider. Majima hated this, and joined yakuza thinking it would be different, but it turned out yakuza was pretty much the same, you have to live under yakuza's rules to survive being a yakuza goon, else you'll get punished for it, if not face death. While Majima was unhappy about this he still refused go back to being a civilian because that wouldn't change anything either. Throughout his adventure in Y0 he re-affirms his fondness of yakuza life-style by meeting and battling with the "mad" people he came to adore, they were living in the world Majima wanted to live. This is why he can't just quit yakuza and live rest of his life with Makoto as a civilian, his desire to fight would most likely end up with him leaving Makoto. So he cut ties with Makoto, embraced being yakuza, and he chose to be a mad dog who'd rather die early doing whatever he wants (which is what people he adored all had in common, they all died early enjoying whatever they wanted to do) than be a submissive dog who suppresses their desire and not be themselves just to survive in a circle (which was who Majima was at the start of Y0), a little ironic considering Majima become of the very few longest living Yakuza character.
I don't think dissociation really makes sense. Majima's Mad Dog persona is him triumphing over his old, pushover self, always being commanded around and doing what he is ordered to do. And he watches other people throughout that time who are free and happy, just being as wild and happy as they want to be. And even before that transformation, we see what Majima is like when he isn't putting up a mask for business or the family. He passionately sings Karaoke, he learns breakdancing, he makes goofy faces. Majima strikes me, instead, as a guy who always wanted to be wild and just go with whatever impulses he had, but always felt like he couldn't, because it wasn't sensible. Then he meets a bunch of people who throw caution and sensibility to the wind and sees that this can lead to a happy, successful life, too. All those people die, but Majima sees that what mattered was how they lived, not that they died. And he decides to finally just do all the stuff he didn't do before, because he didn't think it was sensible. He's not putting on a mask to dissociate from himself, he is just throwing off his mental blockers and happier for it. There is never a moment later in his life where the "Majima mask" breaks and we see a miserable real Majima beneath. Because this is the real Majima.
I really am hoping that we get a Majima standalone game where we can get a deeper look into his personality following his transformation into the Mad Dog. The only time we ever get a closer look at Majima’s life was in Yakuza 0, more indirectly with plot points of Yakuza 4 & 5, but we haven’t gotten much of Majima as an independent figure. He is a character with a lot of trauma. He uses the Mad Dog persona to escape it for a bit, but deep down he still holds the same values of loyalty, brotherhood, and compassion.
0 Majima is a powerful character for me. I relate heavily and his psychological journey scares me while working through my own. Trauma is a hell of a drug.
Just 10 seconds in the video i want to say "sudden and out of the blue" has a 15 years gap, unless you meet him before prison, but it's still a 5 years gap, so not sudden at all
(spoilers for Like a Dragon Below) I just wanna say before I go off is I love the video and the ideas and theories you make, but I was SUPER upset at the end when you show the after credits scene of Like a Dragon. I had no idea Majima was in the game and I assumed i could just play 0-6 before watching this video. there was no reason to put that scene in the background and I just dont get why it was put there.
from my personal experience , i know a guy from middle school who was feared by every kid in school, he's a wild guy nobody have the guts to piss him off but he's not a bully, i actually don't like the guy but we have the same route home so everyday after school we went the same route and travel together with bunch of other kids but for some reason he's really nice to me, granted he called me fatty but i was indeed a chubby boy back then. when i was a senior and he's in highschool sometimes on morning when i wait for public transport on several occasion he rides motorcycle on his way to his highschool and he offered me a ride to my middle school shout out to my man B, he's a real OG
In some way, Majima has always worn masks to protect himself in situations that make him uncomfortable. His "Lord of the night" persona is also a way for him to deal with the pressure Sagawa places on him. It really fits his Hannya Mask theme of his tattoo and I really love that.
Would anyone else play a game with Majima as the protagonist regaining some sanity? Even if it was a spin-off, I think it would be great. He is one of the best side characters.
my man Majima have been through a lot in life, if there's any people out there who apparently had the same things happened to Majima, i pray the best for you
Thanks of these vide I found the the mokoto one and this one quite interesting and learned things which is Great! 👍 I wonder if your going to do one on Kiriyu? Or maybe after Like a dragon gaiden comes out?
One thing that i can add to it is that creating another role to step into is also a thing in sports, you create a persona that has a unbreakable mental strength and doesn´t feel pity for your opponene. Boxing champions both Dentoy Wilder and Mike Tyson talks about how his persona took over in the ring, in there they needed to not fear for their opponent and what could happen to them so they became merciless. Wilder even talked about how he was different from ``The bronze bomber´´ and how the Bronze Bomber wanted to kill someone in the ring but he didn´t. Tyson talked about how his life spiraled out of control when he let his ``Iron Mike´´ persona take over his normal life. Another Boxing champion Marvin Hagler also talked about becoming someone else in the ring a destroyer that didn´t care about his opponents. So there is precedent of using a role to avoid pity and doubt while on fights. But its not only for avoiding empathy, the basketball star Kobe Bryan also talked about using a ``Black Mamba´´ persona while going through his divorce, he let the Black Mamba worry about basketball and Kobe dealed with the divorce
In my opinion, especially with the mention of how he kidnapped Haruka and then stalks Kiryu, I think Y0 provided a framework to show that Majima is very aware of how capable and important Kiryu is, and did these things with the intent on seeing if Kiryu was still capable after being in prison for so many years. I think he makes this as clear as possible when you first fight him in Kiwami, where he pretty much points out that Kiryu's rusty (or something similar, right?). Honestly thought that was a pretty clever.
I actually think it’s a combination of disassociating and a second personality to be honest. What happened in my mind is that he went through so much trauma he began to disassociate from it to cope with it, and after that the trauma kept coming and coming, so in order to cope with it all he made a different personality in his head to take control. Something he could switch on and off and that he had control over. So that’s why he said “I’ll just flip a switch…” which from that point on he became a completely different person, and allowed that crazy personality he made that reminded him of all his heros to take over while the real majima became a less dominant personality in his life at least until she came back into his life and he took back control as he felt like he didn’t need to be that person so much anymore, unless there was a fight or war. That’s why he mellowed out. He turned the switch off and only turns it on when he needs to instead of having it on all the time like he used to.
5:57 ...so that's why i constantly imagined putting my real self to sleep while a different person inside me took control and did the things i couldnt while still in pain... Fuck....
Ill say this much, Yakuza 0 tells the parallels between kiryus rise into the dragon of dojima, while also Majimas descent into the mad dog of Shimano Kiryus side of the coin tells how a young Yakuza grows from an abrasive and crude character at the beginning to a virtuous man willing to fight and honor his ethics even if it means going against his very way of life. Each boss, be it kuze, awano, or shibasawa represent a way of the Yakuza life, and use their ideologies and connections to being kiryus down. Kiryu has every opportunity to run, but he refuses, launching him into more and more peril, but he rises more and more until the fight against shibasawa, showing in all his might how much he's grown, but how the ideals from his adoptive father(can't remember his name😂) molded his path, and how willing kiryus is ready to fight the truly evil ways of the underworld Majimas side shows how much further and further he gets pushed into the meat grinder of nothing more of an errand boy, and how although he desperately wants back into the former life he once had, he's willing to see the light and maintain a semblance of his Morales like kiryus, albeit more less than righteous. His actions to save makoto instead of end her like the deal given to him by sagawa shows his mentality in such a crappy situation, but all comes to a head once he finally snaps after knowing makoto was going to be killed by dojima. The intro the fight in the dojima HQ shows not necessarily him going batsh*t crazy, but rather a glimpse of the mad dog personality finally coming to fruition. He fights and claws his way up to the top of the HQ, and despite all the torture and abuse he went through, he uses and channels his anger to fight and save makoto, but is willing to kill dojima for his actions, something kiryus would never do. The difference being that kiryus will fight to maintain his ethics and those in need, while Majimas will do the same but willing to do what's necessary Although the mad dog personality is just mainly him playing a facade and upholding his image in the Yakuza world, it's absolutely beautiful to see his Yakuza 0 self pop through the mad dog, shown in the ibuchi fight. He loves the thrill of the fight and shows through sometimes how he's willing to prolong the fight, but with ibuchi, he immediately goes in for the kill, with his eye showing the hatred he has for those like ibuchi, and willing to end them if he seems it the way I think the mad dog isnt a way for him to channel his craziness or a way to uphold what he told sagawa about how he wanted to live life the fullest, but rather an amalgamation of all his trauma and anger into a man who could be untouchable and a man who would never be pushed around ever again, but also show that despite his mad dog personality, he's still a man with all the trauma and brokenness that molded him before
What i love about majima is that at the beginning of yakuza 0 we see him as someone that would do anything to get back into the yakuza life, because Shimano banished him and locked him in an area where he can always be watched and his only way to get back in, is to use the cabaret club he was given to make money for the Shimano family, we see majima from the outside to be someone that pretends to enjoy it but from the inside hates the fact that he's being watched, he can't skip town and instead he's treated like a dog, but halfway through the game he meets nishitani he's someone thats the complete opposite of majima he can do whatever he wants whenever he wants, he knows that majima doesn't enjoy being a lapdog so he kinda helped majima develop the mad dog.
“To be dumb enough to try to feed A starving dog… Only A fool would let it live as such. Feed the beast of your heart, and it will claw itself back to the desperate hunger it wanted. Leave it to rot, and you’ll only die angry…” To quote War Thunder’s, “The Battle Is On!” Trailer… “You won’t survive. Not when it dives at 300 knots. (World War 2 Bomber crashes into A ball of fire as we track the Tail-Gunner’s face.). There is A beast inside you. (Time is rewound to before the crash, with the gunner opening its eyes as they begin to shoot at the bomber’s assailants.) It will fight back! (Next clip has A tank-driver within A tank that’s cannon has been torn off, accelerating as the entire top of the tank bounces off, with the tank then ramming into A group of other tanks.)
Oooooohhhhh The MadDog as Majima's Berserker/*Altered consciousn* that makes so much more since. It would explain the Jarring FlipFlopping he does for Compassionate at best if times, to Sadistic bastard playing with his Food. Checkout a book ~ ["Blood rites: Passions if war", by Barbara Ehrenreich.] A phenomenal read if you're exploring Warrior philosophy/Historical context for the, i cant recommend it enough. Especially if the "Red Moon" sings to you (metaphor: Drawn to Violence, Combat, or Martial Nature or Tendencies.)
I don't think it is an act, or at least, not *that* much of an act. After the events of 0, I think he clearly has had enough of Yakuza protocol and hierarchy limiting his actions and options, and has decided he'd rather be a loose cannon that is free rather than the straight edge soldier that lives in a cage by following orders. I think he genuinely enjoys cutting loose and going crazy and confusing everyone around him with his unpredictability. It's definitely partly a coping mechanism of dealing with the trauma of 0 and giving Makoto up, but also a reaction to his captivity and servitude under the Omi Alliance and being inspired by Nishitani's own wild way of life. That said, that super serious and intelligent pre-0 era Majima never really went away either, and can be resurfaced whenever he is needed rather than the Mad Dog.
It is an act, but it is an act of freedom. He’s making the conscious effort to do whatever he wants, when he wants, how he wants. It’s an act in that it is forced, but it’s not fake. Nothing about him is made up, only dialed up.
I have such mixed feelings about Mirei... I understand how obsession was due to her upbringing and I do think she cared about Haruka and Majima to a degree... But she handles it all so wrong... She wanted to be loved...and she might have been able to find it on her own...but then she's willing to screw over people and manipulate anybody so she can vicariously live through Haruka. If she had honored her contract and paid the trainer, she might have lived... Then everyone just...ignores what she did. Speaks of her with a lot more than deserved. I'm not calling her a bad character, bit her whole thing just rubs me the wrong way...
He's not acting. Pretend to be something long enough and it just becomes what you are, reflexive coping mechanism or not. He outright explains his behaviour in his very first appearance, and it's more obvious with the context from Yakuza 0: he sees what he lost in Kiryu, and wants to see if he'll hold on to it.
I think he is 'demasking'. He has always had part of this side inside him and wished to express himself freely. I don't think its pure trauma, it's actually him letting loose. Part of it is an act or he plays it up, like most yakuza do, because you have to show strength if you want respect.
At least when Majima is batshit crazy and happy he can be reasoned with and is a generally non-violent person surprisingly. It’s when he gets sad and depressed that he is really dangerous. It’s then that he gets violent for no reason and he just lashes out not for fun but out of anger. All in all, he can be far worse than the Mad Dog of Shimano persona. It’s when he gets sad that he lets his dark side out.
He jus' like me, fr fr. In seriousness, when it comes to playing the Crazy person, you MUST make sure to take off the mask in serious situations. Else you run the risk of ACTUALLY going crazy, the bit becomes reality, etc. But the good news is, you tend to stop caring about WHAT people say or do whenever you do crazy shit, because at that point, why NOT commit to the bit? It honestly saved me too, when I was being followed home one night after a walk. When the dude got closer, I pissed myself and asked for a hug while talking about how my Clockwork Elves are being eaten by my Benadryl spiders. Dude did a 180 BACK immediately. Works everytime. Walking home wasn't fun however, but you just don't care.
Maybe it's a "mask", or that's what he want become. I think he affected by Nishitani, Nishitani's crazy lifestyle resemble a lot to "Mad Dog" Majima. I truly think Majima want to become someone like that, someone who lived and died like an idiot, but a fine man.
This was probably a bad Idea ince I'm till on my very firt playthrough of my frist Yakuza game (Yakuza 0) but it sure explains a lot. I still want to see it unfold. The drama of Majima's character is some of the finest I've seen, and I absolutely love it. Tho I still believe ht's better off with the long hair
I really didn't like 0 because i was waiting for that moment for the Mad Dog to finally snap, and it just never happened. i felt like i was playing an impostor of Majima which realy disappointed me
no shit, The Grand owner majima wasn’t hiding the mad dog. the mad dog was a result of meeting people like nishitani, lee, etc. as well as getting back into the yakuza, and breaking free from his years in sotenbori. one of the chapters is literally called gilded cage.
@@vgology thank you man! Really appreciate that you took the time to respond to a random comment as well. I really enjoy your videos because I feel like these kind of deep dive videos only get done on the same mainstream games over and over again
I think Majima took on the personality of Nishitani to protect himelf and Makoto. The Ending of Yakuza 0 is among the Saddest in Video Game History for me.
The real reason is the first two games were done so poorly character wise that they wrote themselves into a corner trying to get out of it. Yakuza 0 is them creating the characters as they wish they could have been.
Majima is a lot like Batman in the sense that you have to ask yourself: Does Bruce Wayne disguise as Batman or does Batman disguise himself as Bruce Wayne?
He's a very serious person but he chooses to just go completely unrestrained and unfiltered. The Mad Dog Of Shimano ain't an act, it's his exact feelings and thoughts but unrestrained by reason, not to say he doesn't keep the Mad Dog on a leash though.
I'd like to point out that majima was likely ordered by shimano to deal with kiryu. He never harmed haruka, and was later said to be holding back so kiryu could regain his strength. By kidnapping haruka and shooting date it makes him look serious, but he's not after killing Kiryu. He's definitely not crazy if he's able to plan ahead like that.
The Fact that Mad Dog persona is less of an act but more of a coping mechanism for Majima to deal with his trauma makes it all the more tragic and depressing. We always get to his "real side" whenever we get to play as him or when he's talking to Saejima But whenever he's near Kiryu or any other characters he switches to Mad Dog to cope and help himself. So it is nice to see him mellowed out a bit on later entries cus its slowly healing him and Kiryu also unknowing helped him the most to deal with his trauma so you know damn well Majima is really thankful for Kiryu even if he won't admit it.
I think this is the most accurate answer tbh. The last question would be how much it's intentional and how much it's not. Because you know, Majima does some very weird fucking things while being the Mad Dog. I can't picture this guy willingly crashing contruction machinery into a building to get to Kazuma. That feels like this side of him acting a bit on his own, with "real Majima" thinking about it later and saying "woops"
Nah he just doesn't give a fuck anymore he does what he wants after being what felt like a slave for a long time he stopped being a pawn and became a king especially after watching that nashi dude die for him he straight up jacked his style
Yes, it is. It acts as a shield to Majima. Acting like he does conceils his true motives from his enemies, while protecting his feelings from further hurt. He plays up the trope of "Obfuscating stupidity" by adopting Nishitani's personality for himself, a man who gave his life to protect Majima's.
Nope , you’ve forgot all the ‘stupid dumb people’ who sacrificed themselves as moron (kinda as Majima said to Shibusawa before he get killed and showing to him his new style of living). He just wants to live his life to the extreme and obviously coping Nishitani (for me he is the proto Mad dog…not awano as many friends say to me) obviously conglomerating all the styles mostly breaker style and less thug. On the psychologic side is you see he has this big point to overcome Kiryu even if Majima is the strongest character and has a big resistance (see the fight with Ichiban he wasn’t tired)
It's not that it's an act, its kind of a "I thought about doing this, it is dumb but I can do it, so fuck it haha" If u think a little you can see that he's not acting, is just a way of keeping his mind working and busy enough to not deal with his trauma His doing things that he would really do and gets truly excited by it, but he almost never take things seriously, cause the moment he stops, his mind will focus on those memories and experiences that he never truly overcame But after Yakuza 4, we can kind of see that he became less of a crazy maniac, he encountering and make amends with Saejima was something that he helped him deal with part of his own pain, that's why he takes a more serious approach but still acted as a crazy man In Like a Dragon, he's way more serious but he never abandon he's mad dog way of acting What I mean is: Majima Mad Dog it's not a acting, as time passes and he "heals" his wounds he gets more mature and controlled, cause he doesn't need to let his impulses take the best of him as a way of avoiding his suffer and grief. That's why in LAD he acts more careful but never stops acting weird and doing Majima crazy things
No it's not. He even got the same mindset on yakuza 7 but he had no reason to in most scenes. It's not that he acts stupid. He goes feral and has fun while doing that's why he keeps fighting kiryu beacuse he has fun or just makes majima constructions because he wants to. He grew up and got more relaxed as grew older but he still loves to fight.
I dont even think majima "loved" mirei park, it seems he kinda used her for a coping mechanism but made love to her because she believed it was real. Thats why in yakuza 5 she tells haruka that sometimes the fans "love" is fake, she says that because she has been through it herself with her fans but mainly majima, and to warn haruka not to believe that fake love. Of course when she got pregnant majima definitely wanted it but she didnt so he lashed out, he almost tried to force himself to love her but couldnt
This is an excellent point! Thank you for writing it up. I definitely agree with you, the relationship with Mirei was definitely a product of coping, and although I think he did care for her, he never truly loved her. Thanks again for the comment!
I can't blame him, as the pain of your child being taken away would be too much for most people. Especially if it was by somebody you were supposed to be close to
Honestly, that romance is so weird for me, it only serves as a plot device to bridge some random connection between enemy forces to make it involving Haruka. And i don't think it goes that deep for Majima and Mirei, its as blunt as it is, I've seen enough RGG writing skills to see through their intention, Mirei wanted to progress with her career and had to leave romance life behind, it's as straight forward as it could be with Mirei wanting Haruka to leave Kiryu behind like she did to Majima. With all that crap about rubber bullets and Katsuragi left unscathed to shoot Yasuko, I will never trust RGG to have such capacity for deep meanings They write things to be as convenient as possible, it's like the joke when a literature teacher rambles about a poem author using the color purple for sadness and regret while the author just likes purple because it rhymes
@@lycanbladefang4768 i remember hearing a fan theory that it was actually katsuya who loved park but he knew she loved majima, who didnt love park back. So katsuya (using his acting chops) simply hid his feelings for her so she could be happy, kinda like what majima did to makoto in 0 in some weird way. What ANNOYS me is we dont get to see majima's reaction to park's death, that too shinada's reaction to Fujita's death. Almost like that character bond was for nothing
@@lycanbladefang4768 I'm annoyed with Y5's plot being an expansive mess specifically because of this -- if we remember that Y5 was released before Y0, Mirei no longer looks like a coping mechanism and does actually look like a completely random twist connection. I'm glad that RGGS at least added SOME implied meaning to Mirei's relationship with Majima through Makoto (I believe it was definitely intentional), but it sucks that it's so hamfisted when taken as-is, prior to Y0's recontextualization. One thing I'm hoping for (and I think I'm already disappointed by because Kiryu is returning as a dual protagonist, and all of the baggage that that represents) is that Y8 onward will have some better storytelling now that the director of the old convoluted series has stepped down. But, I guess we'll have to see. Maybe I should just play Judgment until that gets all tangled up in bullshit.
we all have that Mad Dog inside of us, but it will take perfect timing of events for it to show. in Majima's case all of those moments were all aligned for him.
I know that Majima is usually considered to be one of the best characters among the community and I honestly think stuff like this contributes a lot to it.
In his ending in Yakuza 0, he mentioned that he was inspired by many people during his journey (Wen Hai Lee, Nishitani, Sagawa and also awano i think), when we think about it, Awano were enjoying the leisure lifestyle (which majima is very familiar since he was the manager of the grand in osaka), in the end i think majima didn't wanted Kiryu and himself ending up carried away by leisure lifestyle like awano (that's probably the "philosophy" or the "metaphor" behind the majima everywhere) His Mad Dog persona (i think) is mix of the craziness but not inhumane of Nishitani, the caring and protective attitude of Wen Hai Lee and the Gung ho attitude of sagawa, not to mention what he has been through While kiryu's inspiration is from the "never give up, always back up" of Kuze, the calm and composed attitude of Shibusawa and the caring for what he loves the most from Tachibana
Yes, it is. It comes from the trauma suffered in 0 and he created it so no one could predict him ever again. In a way, the unpredictability made him a king-maker of sorts
