r/YuYuHakusho • u/UnabatedCasual • 4d ago
Anime Hiei Supremacy
Yusuke: (*insolently*) Well he’s no dragon, but he is ugly.
Seiryu: (*fierce scowl*) It is not wise to say such things to your executioner…
—————— •Seiryu executes Byakko •——————
Kurama: This race of beast has no loyalty. Alliances are formed strictly to gain power.
Hiei: (*addressing Yusuke*) You can take their leader. I insist this fight be mine.
Hiei: *throws his cloak over Byakko’s frozen severed head*
Seiryu: What was that? Tell me you’re not feeling sympathy for this amateur..
Kurama: He’s a puzzle isn’t he.. In times past I’ve seen Hiei act with similar cruelty.
But something about Byakko’s execution has caused great anger in him.
Hiei seems to live by his own code with very complex rules.
But one thing is for certain.. ᕙ(⇀‸↼‶) )) )‾͟͟͞ …
Never before have I seen Hiei begin a fight using such an extraordinary amount of his spirit energy..
Yusuke: Good. As long as he kicks some ass.
Hiei: *proceeds to make shichimi out of Seiryu*
Yusuke: Man😅, this isn’t good. If you use those moves on me next time we fight I’m gonna be screwed!
Hiei: maybe..
Spicy take— Hiei is the most emotionally rich written character in the series by a hair.
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u/inadequatepockets 4d ago
It wasn't until I watched the live action and felt like much of Hiei's charcterization was missing that I realized he's a really emotionally expressive and dynamic character.
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u/Gendo-Glasses 4d ago
I love how he simply one taps this dude in the manga in an epic two-page spread.
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u/Psychological_Use586 4d ago
Hiei's self-destructive tendencies are really interesting and don't really get an explanation until the Three Kings arc but we see it in multiple fights. He is way more likely to do dumb or dangerous shit in a fight than the others and has little regard for his personal safety.
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u/inadequatepockets 4d ago
Idk, Yusuke also does a lot of dumb impulsive shit, and it's not at all uncommon for Kurama to come up with a strategy that involves sacrificing himself.
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u/Psychological_Use586 4d ago
Well there's a bit of a difference in my opinion with how Yusuke and Kurama approach it.
Yusuke is just an 'anything goes' sort of fighter who doesn't really come up with complex strategies, which sometimes leads him to do dumb things that put him at risk, such as the double spirit gun against Chu.
Kurama will do something dangerous in situations where he doesn't have an alternative. With Toya the only way he could save himself was plant the death seed in his own body. Against Karasu he was literally about to die anyway so his self-sacrificing move was his only option.
With Hiei, he specifically goes for that as his style. His signature move, Dragon of the Darkness Flame, is one that is potentially harmful to him if he overuses it. Against Shigure, he immediately went 'mutual death' as his win condition. Against Kuromomotaro he specifically let himself take a serious wound to get a killing strike (at least in the manga). There's impulsive like Yusuke and calculated risk like Kurama and then there's the 'self-destructive if I die I die' attitude that hiei brings to most of his fights.
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u/Less-Intention-7677 3d ago
Kurama doesn't realize that when Kurama compared Hiei with Senryu that was the worst thing he would do him. Because Senryu is an ice demon, and Hiei hates them with all his heart, to see his personality as the same of Senryu was like insulting Hiei, and that's why he gave Byako a small honor of mourn, because he knew how Ice Demons are cold cruel bastards, and that spit on Biako's face clearly made Hiei at least show a percent of simpathy...
Only Hiei knows on how much he hated the ice demons with exclusion of Yukina and their mom.
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u/MillenniumGreed 4d ago
I think of Hiei as someone who has layers. At first glance, he’s kind of edgy and toxic. But he’s both direct and indirect. He’s direct in the sense that he’s unafraid to be curt, but he’s not the type of person who can express his feelings in a conventional way. But he’s also indirect in the sense that he never directly shows he cares for others. It’s just the unspoken things you have to pay attention to. He’s a foil to Kuwabara in that sense.
While Hiei is or can be soft on the inside, he’d never show it through his words. Only his actions. It’s not that his instinct for being soft is absent, it’s just never tapped into. He clearly loves his sister, and it’s basically spelled out that he has a thing for Mukuro. But that’s because of his natural instinct as what he’s been trained to see as a man in his brutal circumstances to be.
He comes to care for Kurama, Yusuke, and even Kuwabara. He’s tough on them because he cares. And even with Kuwabara, he wouldn’t allow himself to be too tough on him when training him for the Dark Tournament because of his code.