Trigun Bookclub: pancake-breakfast: Trigun Maximum Volume 2: Covers + Chapter 1

Original Tumblr Post: Covers + Chapter 1

Table of Contents

TriMax Volume 2 Covers

TriMax Volume 2! This one has Wolfwood on the cover, which can only mean good things, right? Riiiiiiiight?

Stream-of-consciousness thoughts for TriMax Vol. 2, Chapter 1 below.

“Death Blue” is a very dramatic name for a volume. Do they mean “Blue Death”? Is this a Legato reference? I think he’d like being called the Blue Death. Wait, no, he’s self-conscious about his blue hair. Nevermind.
Also, this cover is hot.

Ok, so I translated the kana on the joke version of the cover to the side of Wolfy’s head, and to my great amusement, it reads something like, “This joke again?!” or “Not this joke again!!”
I’m gonna be honest; I think one of the things I struggled with on a first read of this was the continual blow-up doll jokes. These days, I find it hilarious. (I’ve even spent some time contemplating if I could cosplay as WW with the blow-up doll instead of the cross solely because the doll would be MUCH easier to store in between cons.) But when a younger Pancake Ray was reading this, they were fresh out of a sheltered Christian college and had very little experience with this sort of stuff. I also hadn’t quite realized my own asexuality at that point, so I really didn’t have a place for my sexuality (especially since I was still under the impression I’d “grow into it” or “just needed to meet the right guy” at that point) or the sexuality of others. Which made continual blow-up doll jokes particularly jarring, especially since my irreverent humor had yet to fully bloom.
Legato (that is Legato, right?) looks positively haunted on the back cover there.
LOL, now it’s a shojo ballet manga, huh? I’m here for it.

Ohhhh, so I guess the volume title wasn’t just a fancy and dramatic thing and there will actually be some sort of Blue Death person. I still think it will be Legato, even if he hates the name. I bet he’s spent the last two years in intensive physical therapy….
I really like the aesthetic of the volume opening page art here. Freaking gorgeous chiaroscuro. (Now it sounds like I know art words! I don’t; I just memorized that one because 1) I tend to adore the style, and 2) it came up in a Tabletop RP system I used to run.)

Eyyyy, it’s the big-eared mohawk guy from Episode 1 of ’98!
Man, they had this guy in some serious restraints.
Dramatic duo!
I wonder what those pipes on Vash’s stomach are for. They’re REALLY big in this title page art. I don’t think they’re always that big. Maybe they’re part of the heating/cooling unit the doc was talking about??
Earlobes seems way more calm than he did in Ep 1 of ’98. I guess hard time will do that to a man.
Ah, the giant boomerangs….
Oh, so he’s not gone entirely agreeable. And they aren’t entirely unaware of the risks.
I like the implication that he’s kinda controlling his right arm with his left one.
Oh, no. I recognize these guys from the previous volumes. Sheriff, his posse, and Earlobes are out of their depth. A single Gung-Ho Gun gave Vash quite a bit of trouble. You really shouldn’t mess with two at the same time.

Nightow, what is even happening on this page? There’s some shooting and some steam venting and some guys got burned, and… someone broke a bunch of light posts, I think? Was it the boomerang? Did the boomerang break them? Also, you do realize that each consecutive hit would decrease the boomerang’s momentum at least slightly, and thus it would be better (if perhaps less intimidating) to NOT hit a bunch of other objects in between you and your target?
Hahahaha, dark-haired boi just ducks and lets Super-Gimp take the bulk of the boomerang’s hit.
He’s been so small in all the panels where it’s shown that it’s very hard to tell this guy has a saxophone. So there you go, fellow readers. He has a saxophone. It’s in the above image, too. But again, smol. (I colored it here so we can all see it better.)

Well, if the sheriff had any guys in that house, he DOESN’T ANYMORE.
“Make sure they’re dead.” Sound advice.
“Not even a shred of meat left” seems unlikely.
Oop, that arm coming up from the bottom of the panel is NOT Earlobes’s arm. Pretty sure it’s Super-Gimp’s.
Eyyy, time for Sax Man to play us a tune! I’m sure it will be a nice one. After all, what spices up rubble and wreckage quite like a little jazz?
See? A pleasant little song….
~~Now all the TriStamp fans can take a guess at the REAL reason they’ve woven saxophone into the soundtrack.~~
Gods, this pose. Fill up that chest, man! Deeeeeeep breath!

I think someone is practicing drilling that is not in line with OSHA regulations here….
“Call off your attack!” Oop, too late.
I’m guessing Super-Gimp’s actual name is Gauntlet. It’s really hard to tell who’s speaking.
Oh, shit. Is it Legato? He likes doing the long-distance communication thing….
Holy hell, this is brutal. Yeah, this has to be Legato. Mild spoilers, but Sax Man doesn’t have this level of brutality in him. I could be wrong, but I don’t think most of the Gung-Ho Guns do… especially not partnered with the ability straight-up force people to do things.
Geez, the blood dripping out of the truck…. WE’RE IN A TRUE SEINEN NOW, FOLKS!!!
Freaking called it. He does look like a mess, though. What kind of physical therapy program is he on???
I like his face here. He looks too amused with his own plans. It’s very upsetting.

Eyyyy, it’s the doc!
Brad really needs to get over his disgust for outsiders.
Awww, they all love Vash and worry about his wellbeing! He might try not to have friends, but he does, even if they’re not as deep of friendships as he needs.
Uh, oh. Is Brad ok? Vash’s intuition is usually spot-on.
Bugs….
BUGS. D:
This is bad. These people shouldn’t have information on Vash’s friends.
Dang, Hanged Man pose for Vash? Ominous….