Reply1990-98 - Eiji

Something that I love and appreciate about Ash Lynx that I don't see many people talking about is his lack of desire for personal revenge. It's such a small and obvious detail, that I don't think we stop to think about it enough, but Ash is not consumed by revenge. Even after everything that happened to him, we never see him express a desire to kill or torture Dino, or anyone else who hurt him, we just wants to be free. Even with researching banana fish he's just trying to figure out what's wrong with his brother so that he can cure him, his motive is never revenge. Wanting to destroy and make Dino suffer would be a completely understandable reaction, yet all he wants to do is prevent other children from experiencing the same things he did.

The only times we see Ash express a desire for revenge, is when people he loves are hurt. This is seen several times with Eiji, such as when he's shot and he chases the men and shoots them with rage in his eyes, or when Shorter dies and he kills Dawson as he begs for mercy. This is why at the start I emphasised *personal revenge*. But I just think that his overall lack of thirst for revenge and just deep desire to be free is an extremely important facet of his character, that really just highlights who he is on the inside beyond all the violence and suffering, and is also very telling of his strength.

This is also one of the reasons why I dislike the "yut lung is just ash without eiji" rhetoric, because I feel like it does such a disservice to both their characters. Yes, they've lived through similar trauma and are in several ways parallels to each other, but they're different people with or without someone to support them. First of all, before Eiji, Ash did have someone, Shorter, and he had other people he cared about such as Skipper and his gang. Obviously none where as influencial or life changing as Eiji was, but painting him as being completely alone before meeting Eiji simply isn't true. Secondly, Ash and Yut lung are very separate people with separate personalities and with indivual nuances to their stories despite their similarites. One of these is the desire for revenge. As I established Ash isn't consumed by personal revenge, but Yut Lung very much is, his entire first arc is his search for revenge agaisnt his own brothers, whom he wants to kill.

Yut Lung isn't Ash without Eiji, he's just Yut Lung. He's a different person with different responses and reactions to the world around him, and of course, having someone to love and care for him would be monumental, but he'd still be a completely different character to Ash, and in my personal opinion, would have a harder time accepting that love than him (as we see briefly with his connection with Sing).

Of course there's also differences in their stories that I think are worth noting. I won't do it on this post because frankly I've been procrastinating making lunch and I need to do that rn. But reducing Yut Lungs's character to an "ash without eiji" is truly tragic in my opinion, and not only a disservice to him as a character but also to his story. Yut lung isn't just there to be a parallel to Ash, and I feel like we sometimes forget that. Anyway I'll get more into the nuances of Yut lung's character, and the nuances of his and Ash's stories and they way they both parallel and differ from each other if y'all want. If not I'll probably forget, and it'll just live in my mind, keeping me awake at 4 am.

Here’s another work of Eiji by Ayumi Yamada✨

I'm so happy she keeps sharing her incredible Banana Fish artworks with us!🥰

Found on Blue Sky. Check out her (new) account there:24-ayame (she announced it on Twitter).

Please follow her on Bluesky or Twitter (@24_ayame).

Banana Fish fic recs

It feels like it's been years since I posted one of these; my bad

Almond Milk: Barista Sing falls for a haughty new customer. Rating: General Audiences

Chaos Theory: Ash's posthumous impact on the people who cared about him. Rating: Teen Audiences

Dusk Til Dawn: Howl's Moving Castle AU. Fun Fact: I watched HMC for the first time, just so I could read and understand this fic, and it was worth it. Rating: Teen Audiences

golden fly-boy: Eiji makes it to the Olympics, with Ash by his side. Rating: Teen Audiences

The Hands of a lover, and other synonyms for comfort: Ash may not be able to define his relationship with Eiji, but he knows that it doesn't hurt. Rating: Teen Audiences

If you'll return to my side: After breaking up with Eiji, Ash goes to Max and Jessica for advice. Rating: General Audiences

porgi, amor, qualche ristoro: While enjoying the winter holidays in Izumo, a commercial triggers bad memories for Ash. Rating: Mature (mentions of Ash's past trauma/CSA, description of severe anxiety attack)

Postcards: Ash Lynx is dead; Eiji starts recieving random postcards from him. Rating: Mature (mentions of past abuse/assault, graphic depictions of violence). I highly recommend subscribing to Special Agent Rick Henry, FBI, which is this fic's companion piece, written from Ash's perspective.

The Song of a Dull Knife: a jet-lagged Eiji rushes to visit Ash in the hospital. Rating: Teen Audiences

What Is and What Can Never Be: The only way to save Eiji is for Ash Lynx to die, and Ash knows it. Rating: Teen Audiences (not as sad as it sounds, I swear)

Previous List

Make sure to check all tags before reading these; I try to give summaries so that you know what you're getting into, but double check. And if you can, give a comment/Kudos for any fics you liked. Enjoy!

Bonus: here's some official art to cry over

ash lynx my boy👏

i’ve wanted to do smth like this for a while and finally got around to it

Ash & Eiji sketches from Akimi Yoshida’s 40th Anniversary book

Going to scan these for better lighting and other pages tomorrow…

(Not my personal scans but clear images 4 archive!)

So I….got into banana fish recently..and now I can’t stop drawing Asheiji:”)) 

by your side.

Eiji lost his found family as quickly as he found it.

Goodnight.

currently thinking about the crushing reality that eiji is definitely afraid of pumpkins now too. and not in the same way ash was like little kid afraid, more like the sight of them reminds him so deeply of ash and a really fond memory between the two of them that it is actually really painful for eiji. so he has ended up taking on ash’s fear. halloween is super hard for eiji. he always tries really hard to enjoy it but he never really can. he dresses up and tries so hard to pretend to be someone else just for one night but he just sees ash everywhere on halloween

behind the scenes of hirokazu kore-eda's monster (2023)