Nietzsche for Schizophrenics (Farfarello, Weiss Kreuz)
Title: Nietzsche for Schizophrenics
Character/Fandom: Farfarello (Weiss Kreuz)
Author: Penelope_z
Spoilers: Weiss Kreuz Kapitel, Assassin and White Shaman
Notes: Thanks to toscas_kiss, Olympia_m, mistressrenet, genkischuldich, lunarennui and daegaer for information, support and some giggling.
Have you not heard of that madman who lit a lantern in the bright morning hours, ran to the market-place, and cried incessantly: "I am looking for God! I am looking for God!"
F. Nietzsche, The Gay Science
It was a dark and stormy night, as they usually are. An empty church, with candlelight casting ominous shadows across the dark walls, a lone figure of a crouching man, a blade, bloodstains, and as the crap pseudo-goth organ music reaches a crescendo there is a close-up to a bloodshot amber eye slowly widening, followed by an ear-piercing howl. No this is not Hammer House of Horrors, this is Weiss Kreuz, this is Farfarello, and everything is pushed to extremes, morality, faith, violence, sanity. La, la, la rain of blood and toads…
A few warnings on this essay before I start, for all of you, unfortunate mortals that have decided to brave a reading. This essay is limited in scope, as my interpretation of Farfarello is based entirely on the anime series Kapitel and the manga Assassin and White Shaman. I have chosen to ignore any further canon sources, partly due to my lack of in-depth knowledge, as well as a personal bias towards the quality and importance of some of the material. I am aware that this is not an entirely excusable behaviour, but at the same time references to a canon that I ignore or vehemently oppose to, would probably not have a particularly positive affect on this essay either.
Furthermore, I am not going to attempt any introduction to Weiss Kreuz or the Schwarz group, seeing that three lovely essays on the other Schwarz characters have already preceded this one. I wrote an introduction to WK in my previous essay on the Schuldig/Yohji pairing and you can refer there in case you need some more general information. And lastly, this essay was written down on little bits of paper, including napkins, and then typed out on a laptop I had to borrow from my boss. Have mercy and don’t laugh too hard at the messy incoherence.
BASIC FACTS - The Boy with the Thorn in his Side
At First Glance
Looks are everything in Weiss Kreuz; the physical appearance of every character seems indicative of his personality, morals and importance within canon. Weiss are the obvious heroes, with beautiful, stubborn and honest faces, eyes like windows to the soul. Villains vary from the simply unattractive such as Reiji Takatori and the Estet triad, to the grotesque criminals of the week, hideous and clumsy, faces contorted in horrible grimaces. The less important a villain is, the more obviously he stands out in this bizarre racist code of aesthetics, a foolish monster, easily avoided and easily targeted.
Among this series of villains, Schwarz retain not only a human appearance, but they are also very attractive physically, their tone of voice, body posture and movements beautiful and alluring. Their appearance is an obvious indicator of their importance and status, they are not to be trifled with and dismissed easily, they will blend in, deceive you and seduce you. Farfarello though, immediately stands out from the other Schwarz, unable to blend as easily with the rest of humanity, attractive but obviously dangerous, a murderer at first glance.
Manga Version
Anime Version
So. Farfarello, with the looks of a beautiful nightmare, approximately twenty years old, Irish, slim and lithe but very fit physically, with quite impressive musculature, as he functions as the raw power of Schwarz. Multiple scars on his face and body, possibly self-inflicted, an eye patch, very pale skin, silver white hair and an amber eye in his anime version, red hair and brown eye in his manga incarnation. His face in the manga, and on few occasions in the anime seems curiously innocent and childish, almost sweet, with rounded cheeks, large eyes and full lips, a far cry from the sharp angles, slanted eyes and razorblade smirk of Schuldig or Crawford. Other times though, when his face is distorted by bloodlust, with a grin of anger and pleasure, he is looking positively demonic. Dressed in a blue vest and trousers, high boots, adorned with ear piercings and a leather collar around his neck, his appearance could be considered punk, if the Sex Pistols were vampires.
His real name is later revealed to be Jei, or Jay, while Farfarello, roughly translated as ‘elf’ or ’leprechaun’ has nothing to do with a type of Italian pasta and actually stems from a character of Dante’s Inferno; a member of the Malebranche legion of demons, who first appears in Canto XXI: And so, Malacoda designated ten devils to escort us, calling each one of them by their names: Calcabrina, Alichino, Cagnazzo, Libicocco, Draghignazzo, Graffiacane, Ciriatto, Farfarello, Rubicante and Barbariccia, the leader of the expedition. The choice of name indicates a surprisingly well-educated person, if Farfarello indeed chose the new name on his own.
The past
Farfarello is the only Schwarz character with an entire episode centred around him, as it often happens with the Weiss characters. Seeing that he is the member of Schwarz receiving the least attention throughout the Kapitel series, the sudden shift in focus feels odd. As Farfarello is the most extreme and incomprehensible main character in the series, it is perhaps an attempt to offer some rationalisation and explanation, some point of understanding for the audience, and possibly invite some sympathy and empathy towards such a completely alien being.
Three quarters of the Schwarz team are foreigners, a reminder that Japan was and remains a defensive and mildly xenophobic nation, and as I have already mentioned, Farfarello comes from Ireland. In the episode Schuld (Guilt) we see him enjoying a fairly happy childhood, in what looks like a small agricultural community, receiving an intensely religious education and being very close to his family. Until he suddenly discovers that his biological mother is not the woman who raised him, but a nun named Ruth, to whom he is also very close. Reacting very badly to the news, in a fit of blind rage, he murders his parents and his younger sister, and almost succeeds in murdering Ruth when he comes back to his senses, staring at his bloodied hands in horror and disbelief.
Jei loses all memory of the incident, a possible defence mechanism of his mind towards shock and is left to believe that a burglar murdered his family. This marks a complete turning point in his life, which is now focuses solely on revenge. But rather than seeking revenge against the imaginary criminal, Farfarello decides to seek revenge against God, who believes is the source of the pain and injustice inflicted upon him. At that moment, as the foundations of his entire worldview collapse with the realisation that God and the world and not infinitely kind and just, like a biblical prophet lost in the desert, he receives a kind of illumination, a ‘negative illumination’ if you prefer, that seems to reveal to him a new path and a new faith of destruction. Farfarello is born.
There’s a lack of information on what happens between that time and the beginning of the official WK timeline, but the hints lead us to understand that he was possibly a resident of Rosenkreuz for some time, as Schuldig and Crawford, and probably the third person to join the group of Schwarz. Bloodthirsty and murderous, he provides Schwarz with necessary physical raw power during battle, but is also prone to instinctive, irrational and independent behaviour for which he receives punishment. At the same time he shows an ability for self-restraint when realising the necessity, and does not directly oppose any of the other members. Within the WK episodes we see him accompanying and working alongside Schwarz to further the goals of Estet and their own, but still remaining truthful to his own primary agenda of destroying God.
Power and pain
Taking into consideration the title of this essay and thinking in Nietzchean terms, the first concept that comes to mind when thinking of Schwarz is the term ‘Superman’ or ‘Ubermensch,’ the being that while rejecting any outside notions of values that serve as guidelines within the rest of society, creates his own good and evil, constantly reinventing oneself and transcending the limitations of humanity; a creature in whose eyes men are ’a laughing stock or painful embarrassment.’ Schuldig, Crawford and Nagi, with their respective abilities of telepathy, precognition and telekinesis, seem indeed a step ahead of humanity in the scale of evolution, powerful, unique, untouchable, a new race to inherit the earth, that probably cannot help but regard others as lesser, ape-like beings.
Farfarello does not fit the above descriptions of social Darwinism. His own source of power, the quality that divides him from the rest of humanity is not an ability, but rather an inability or disability; Farfarello cannot feel physical pain. In the scale of evolution Farfarello seems to stand a step behind rather than ahead, he is less rather than more, a sub-human rather than an over-human.
Naturally, there are obvious advantages resulting from the inability to feel pain, especially in the case of someone with such a violent and extreme lifestyle. We see him thrown off the hood of a running car and able to walk and function physically within seconds, defending himself effectively against Omi and Ken, while severely wounded by their weapons, hiding what looks like needles in his mouth, before attacking unsuspecting guards. There are numerous occasions when this inability seems to have saved his life, cowering or collapsing from pain would have led to his immediate demise. At the same time, like others members of Schwarz have also revealed at times, Farfarello’s uniqueness is not always desired, and does not come without consequences. ’I would like to feel pain, at least once’ he mentions, almost nostalgically.
Not much is known regarding his inability to feel pain, if Farfarello was born with it, or if it manifested later. The source could be psychological, possibly the result of the extreme childhood trauma; just as Farfarello’s mind completely suppressed the incident, building a protective cocoon in order for the character to survive, it might also have numbed his senses and blocked any source of pain and suffering from the world surrounding him. But the source could be the result of genetics, and indeed, the inability to feel pain is a true but rare medical condition, a genetic disorder called CIPA (Congenital Insensitivity to Pain with Anhidrosis).
This disorder is a very rare and untreatable sensory neuropathy, inherited and manifesting only when both parents have copies of the mutated gene, which causes a defect in the neurosystem responsible for pain and temperature sensation. Patients are not robbed of their sense of touch or any other of their senses, they can feel and understand the textures of objects, their smell and taste, but are unable to feel pain, heat and cold. Like Farfarello, case studies have shown the patients of CIPA to often carry multiple scars and bone fractures, and exhibit a tendency of self-mutilation.
It’s a sobering and depressing thought, the untouchable and indestructible creature of the series, with the hellraiser laugh, outside the romanticised and exaggerated context of the anime series, would probably be a rare patient, touched and prodded in labs by physicians, and very likely to die before the age of thirty.
VIOLENCE - As if pain and its subject could unite under the same scar
Towards oneself
The first mention of Farfarello within WK comes from Schuldig, remarking off-handedly that Farfarello has a love for blood and suicidal tendencies, when he is alone he tries to hurt himself. Later we see that Schuldig’s words were not false, there are occasions where Farfarello inflicts harm upon himself using blades, both in times of obvious emotional distress but also in times when he appears coherent and lucid. It’s possible that most of his scars might be a result of self-mutilation, and though it’s not known if he has gouged out one of his eyes himself, if thine eye offend thee, it’s not an entirely farfetched scenario.
Self-harm, a concept puzzling for people who have not experienced such tendencies and are therefore unable to fit the reasons within their own frame of reference, derives from a variety of motivations, quite a few of which fit Farfarello’s psychological profile.
Self-harm is often an attempt to escape from feelings of emptiness, depression and isolation from the environment, to become grounded in reality and reconnect with the body after a dissociative episode, to escape feelings of numbness, to finally feel something, feel alive. Farfarello seems at times to be walking on a tightrope of depersonalisation, he has completely severed the ties with who he was, and the foundations of what he has become are often shaky, as it is revealed with the return of Ruth and the almost return of his memory. As he is first seen in the manga, locked in a padded cell and restrained with a straightjacket, his gaze unfocused, Farfarello resembles a ghost while Schuldig struggles to coax an answer out of him. An attempt to feel pain is an attempt to break down the numbness, the barriers of his own mind.
Self-harm provides momentary relief from a bad psychological state, a coping mechanism towards emotional pain, which gives inner pain both a validation and a focus. The reasons for emotional pain might be outside one’s control, but the physical pain is not. With a knife and his/her own body a self-injurer can gain power again, inner pain now becomes a physical reaction that can begin and end according to one’s wishes. Though Farfarello in the anime often appears to be in a constant state of rage or excitement, laughing or shouting in utter glee, there are obvious moments of suffering and emotional pain. Much of the suffering is the direct result of his own actions, but in his own eyes it’s the outcome of an unjust world controlled by an unjust God. By driving the blade Farfarello regains control, power at least over his own body, since he has not yet power over the rest of the world. It also serves as a validation of his emotional distress. In Schuld he clearly mentions that he considers himself a victim ‘nobody has suffered more than me’ so the scars and blood could serve to intensify and validate the sense of victimhood.
Self-harm can also be the result of lack of feelings of self-worth, feeling the need to punish oneself for being ’bad’ or ’worthless’. Farfarello does not exactly feel the need, but rather the desire to be punished. “I am desecrating the body you have given me. Judge me! Make me a sinner!” he shouts to the sky in vain. Self-harm becomes an act of freedom, a rebellion against God and the religious teachings of his childhood. Farfarello longs for pain and punishment, because he longs to receive the consequences of his own actions, without a consequence the action itself loses all importance and meaning, a call that is not heard by celestial ears.
Towards others
Three quarters of the Schwarz group, excluding the rather morose Nagi, seem to be so damn happy the entire time that I am led to believe that seeking the world’s end must be a really pleasant hobby. While Crawford seems to delight in creating and executing plans, feeling sure and in command, Schuldig takes pleasure out of manipulating and tormenting others, Farfarello’s approach is rather more direct: he likes to kill.
He kills without toying with his victims or controlling them, he kills without smart jokes and sessions of torment, he just kills. Very straightforward in his approach, he seems often angry or disappointed when stopped by Crawford or Schuldig, who prefer to act according to common sense or more elaborate plans of torture. He kills usually with a blade, which he tends to lick beforehand, up close and personal with the victim’s blood splattering on his clothes, killing with delight and barely restrained excitement, completely caught up in a feverish battle lust.
He does though have more creative methods when the act of murder relates to his own war against God, he pours acid, which he calls ’holy water’ over the face of priests, and threatens to do the same to Ruth, before stopped by Ken and Omi. The obvious pleasure at hurting other, is in my opinion, not much different than the desire to inflict harm upon himself. It’s an act of rebellion against God or the world, being able to damage and destroy is a proof that he can control and influence his surroundings, that he is not helpless before faceless and unseen power. It also seems a bizarre way to connect to others, an attempt to feel, if not his own pain, then at least theirs.
WHAT HE WANTS - Man invented God in order not to kill himself
Religion and morals
Farfarello shares the anarchic desire of the rest of Schwarz to bring humanity to an end, or rather to eliminate any form of social order, but at the same time his primary agenda goes beyond that. “Death of God is my desire,” he declares.
The first immediate concept that springs to mind is Nietzsche’s famous and famously abused quote “God is dead.” But there are some fundamental differences in the way Farfarello and Nietzsche perceive that same idea.
Death of God according to Nietzsche is a rejection of absolute values and of a belief in a cosmic order, the ending of the accepted standards of a universal moral law. God is the phantom of religion, an unreal supernatural realm, whose demise is supposed to be achieved through rationalism and science. The decline of faith does not lead to chaos, but into freedom, the world becomes a blank canvas upon which the individual can sketch out his own moral code and allow his creativity to flow freely. Death of God is a personal rather than a universal process, symbolic rather than realistic, constructive rather than destructive.
God is not a symbolic phantom for Farfarello. He has lost his faith in the good and just nature of God, but has not lost faith in his existence. On the contrary, God for Farfarello, changing shape from a vague ideal of goodness to the embodiment of the unjust and absurd forces that govern the universe, has solidified, become substantial and concrete, more real than reality, the only absolute truth in Farfarello’s life, just as the scars on his body are the concrete physical manifestation of his pain.
Death of God is not a personal process for Farfarello, a battle to be fought only within. Before killing a Catholic priest or attempting to murder Ruth, he repeatedly offers them escape if they reject the existence of God. His behaviour is similar to that of a prophet preaching to the unbelievers.
The behaviour of the other members of Schwarz is entirely dictated by their own, self-serving purposes. Farfarello is motivated by a personal need for revenge, but his goal has becoming all-encompassing, moving from the private to the universal realm. His reasoning “Why is there a God if there are so many people who suffer? Where is the justice and goodness in that?” is of course overly simplistic, but also reveals an odd humanism, completely absurd under the circumstances, seeing that it comes from a character who takes pleasure in the pain and death of others.
Schwarz are entirely comfortable in their own skin, accepting and revelling in the fact that their behaviour is evil and wrong. Farfarello is not different, but at the same time, one must take into consideration that his perception of good and evil, right and wrong seems to have been completely inverted. His actions are wrong, but are still based on his personal moral code and dictated by a higher purpose that transcends his own desires and limitations. His higher purpose is both absurd and destructive, but only to our eyes and not necessarily to his own. In conclusion, I believe that Farfarello is a deeply ethical human being. If his own perception of the world is the inverted image of ours, if right is wrong and wrong is right, then Farfarello must understand himself as an idealist hero, motivated by moral principles and working for a universal salvation, a rational man within an absurd world, the one-eyed in the Kingdom of the Blind.
Personality and behaviour
Is he mad or is his not? A man wearing a straightjacket, screaming while hanging upside down from the ceiling, a man licking knives and killing with pleasure, chasing after destructive and impossible chimeras does not seem at first glance a picture of sanity.
Farfarello’s behaviour is volatile and prone to extreme mood swings, crying brokenheartedly at a point and laughing at the next moment. He is obviously governed by his emotions and temper and shows no restraint in expressing both. At times we see him punished by the rest of Schwarz, though their measures could be interpreted as protection as well as punishment, protection from his own self.
Because Farfarello walks a clear path towards self-destruction. Most WK characters, including the four members of Weiss and Nagi seem to have been led and controlled in life by outside forces, their current predicament is not the result of what they have done, but what has been done to them. But Farfarello, up to a point at least, is a creature of his own making. Even if his choices have been forced or subconscious, he is still the outcome of his own actions. He has murdered his parents, brought his entire belief system to an end, suppressed the memory as a means of survival and focused his energy towards an entirely hopeless goal. Death of God is impossible for a believer. If one acknowledges the existence of God, one acknowledges his own limitations, and seizes all personal struggle in the face of something infinite and beyond one’s perception. But Farfarello struggles on, limiting himself with the barriers of his own faith, and at the same time impossibly trying to reach beyond.
None of all these seem examples of a particularly healthy mind, but at the same time, Farfarello is not a savage beast. He is almost always lucid and speaks intelligently and coherently, he is able to interact socially with the rest of Schwarz and proves a useful asset to the group. He obeys Crawford’s orders, even if they seem to go against his own instinctive inclinations, showing that he does have control over himself. Moreover, some of his comments reveal a particularly perceptive nature that is able to understand hidden motivations and desires. Even if he is not necessarily aware of the condition of his own mind, it does affect the clarity of his understanding of the minds of others.
The Knight of Bad Faith
I was trying to create a short description for Farfarello and came up with the above, a mingling of the concepts Bad Faith and Knight of Faith by S. Kirkegaard. Bad Faith is self-deception, the creation of some Other in order to relieve us from the responsibility of our own actions, like Farfarello’s God was created in order to allow Farfarello to become a victim in his own eyes, and to survive without the crushing burden of guilt and self-hatred. The Knight of Faith is a term created to describe the absolute believer, incomprehensible in his behaviour, because Faith itself is a paradox. An example of the Knight of Faith is Abraham, both murderer and believer, ready to kill his own son for no apparent reason other than faith. The Knight of Faith is mad, divinely mad, because faith itself is a leap into absurd, where all reasons and explanations belong to a reality that transcends our understanding.
Farfarello therefore, both murderer and believer, is also a Knight of Faith, behaving in a manner that seems incomprehensible to others, taking a willing leap into the absurd and the impossible. The difference is that the source inspiring him is not an outside godly force but an inner self-deception. The Knight of Bad Faith would be the loneliest of beings, if Abraham’s actions are intelligible to God only, Farfarello speaks in tongues that no one but himself can understand.
But hey, where is the smut?
Schwarz function together as a tightly knit, effective unit, but there seems to be a dichotomy between the obvious pragmatists, Crawford and Schuldig, who act with clear methods towards self-serving and apparently possible goals, and the possible idealists, Nagi and Farfarello, whose behaviour seems ambiguous, their goals unclear or impossible and the motivation behind them moving from the sphere of the personal to the universal.
Nagi and Farfarello at the same time, seem to be ignoring each other completely, Nagi seems almost afraid of him in the manga and has hardly any interaction with him in the anime. After all, Farfarello ends up murdering Nagi’s teenage crush, Tot, therefore one can assume that they are not probably in the best of terms. Nagi is a character who questions and doubts, not a good combination to Farfarello’s unyielding convictions.
Crawford and Farfarello seem to share a rather better relationship. Farfarello obviously recognises a leader in Crawford, as he obeys and follows Crawford’s directions even if they go against his own instinctive behaviour. Whether the reason is genuine respect is unsure, I believe that Farfarello trusts Crawford’s judgement but I am not sure if there is any real emotions of loyalty behind the fact. Farfarello is acting above all in favor of his own personal goals, and he could probably serve under anyone who would promise their realisation. Crawford on the other hand seems to at least understand Farfarello, when Schuldig mentions that he doesn’t not comprehend what is going on in Farfarello’s mind, Crawford explains that he can see and understand the parallels of his behaviour.
Farfarello and Schuldig share a rather intriguing relationship. If Schuldig does not understand or enjoy Farfarello’s thoughts, they still seem to share a strange camaraderie, they are often seen together both in missions and everyday life, and Schuldig behaves at times in quite a protective manner. In the manga we see him threatening a guard that he will die if Farfarello gets hurt, and it’s also mentioned that the is the one putting the straightjacket on when Farfarello begins to exhibit suicidal tendencies. He also helps Farfarello to escape, picking him up in his car and interrupting his battle with Ken and Omi when it seems obvious Farfarello is going to lose. Possible sexual relationship? It’s all open to interpretation.
His mirror opponent in the group of Weiss would be Hidaka Ken, who does share some common characteristics with Farfarello, especially in the follow-up series Gluhen. In the absence of Farfarello in that particular series, Ken disturbingly seems to have almost absorbed parts of his personality, the unnecessarily violent behaviour, psychotic tendencies and obvious delight in killing. But even in the Kapitel series there are obvious similarities in their rash and instinctive nature, short-temper and preference for direct, short-range weapons. At the same time Farfarello shares some aspects with the leader of the Weiss group Aya Fujimija, mostly due to similarities in their tragic past, and their single-minded focus on revenge. But while Aya’s revenge is possible and within grasp and reason, Farfarello will never manage to fulfil his own. Seeing Farfarello through the Weiss perspective, he is everything Aya could have become if all hope was lost, mirroring a darker alternative reality.
So many people! There’s no one here and people everywhere, because essentially, I believe that Farfarello, even when apparently close to others, is a loner, isolated from any environment, even that of Schwarz. Farfarello perceives and understands the reality around him with different eyes, the only inhabitant of his own self-made world, making communication with others difficult or impossible.
In conclusion, my own fascination with the character stems from all the above. He is a vicious bloodthirsty killer and yet a victim, a butchered human being in the cocoon of his straightjacket. Farfarello is a complete paradox, the perfectly inverted image of the lone hero, bravely fighting for the love of justice and hopeless causes in an absurd and unjust world. He is the perfectly inverted image of the idealistic dreamer, living not for life itself, but for some greater idea, that will transcend life, refine it, give it a meaning and ultimately betray it. And in his own eyes and perception, he is both the hero and the dreamer.
He is locked in an eternal stasis, without a real past or future, like a wounded minotaur in a labyrinth of his own making, meandering in circles through the same dark paths but at the same time fighting for something that lies beyond his grasp, for a chimera beyond. Farfarello is reaching out for the stars if you like, and okay, with the goal to possibly crush them and pulverise them into astral dust, but reaching out nonetheless.
Not to mention that he is really quite hot…
THE FANDOM - Oh Lord, please, don’t let me be misunderstood
As a personal observation, entirely subjective, as it is based only on my own limited experiences within the Weiss Kreuz fandom, I would conclude that Farfarello is the character receiving the most unfair treatment at the hands of fandom. One would argue that Farfarello is not a character deserving a kind treatment, and that for a truly fanon victimised character we could probably refer to his mirror image in Weiss, Hidaka Ken. By the word unfair though, I am not referring only to the fact that Farfarello rarely receives the chance of appeal, justification and redemption offered to the other members of Schwarz within the fanon world, but that his personality has become over-simplified, distorted and parodied.
A part of the Weiss Kreuz fandom appears infatuated with Schwarz, and consequently the status of the team members, especially that of Schuldig, has been elevated from canon. From sideline figures they have moved into the foreground, their looks and attitude examples of iconic cool, their history explored and re-interpreted, their reasoning and motivations examined and often justified. These fanon tendencies unfortunately rarely include Farfarello.
As fanon searches to discover reasons and motives, Farfarello is already laid bare, a complete and bizarre personality that doesn’t leave much room for free association, and at the same time so alien that it does not leave much room for sympathy. As fanon searches for future possibilities, Farfarello is not a character that can easily change without becoming annihilated in the process, and neither is he a character particularly influenced by external circumstances, what barriers of the canon world falling would impact on someone trapped in the barriers of his own self? Farfarello is hardly the plasticine that the writer can re-shape according to his/her whims.
As fanon tends to underline and focus on everything that makes every canon character unique and individual, Farfarello, already a personality of extremes is prone to fall into parody, his fanaticism becomes idiocy, the pursue of impossible goals deems him an absurdity, his appearance and ferocious behaviour are magnified as he morphs into a murderous clown. Farfarello treated by Schwarz as a burden, a hapless creature that needs to be constantly restrained and treated as a child, Farfarello walking around with a blender (to possibly make fruit juice or grind small animals into a pulp), Farfarello as a mad and bloodthirsty beast unable to think rationally or as a fool tricked into the most ridiculous behaviour with the promise that “it hurts God” are all typical fandom clichés. The rest of Schwarz use and ridicule him, outwit him and outgrow him, while the writer struggles to find out what to do with the Farfarello problem now that Schwarz have become best friends with Weiss, should Crawford kill him as a sign of redemption from past sins and affection for Aya, or should they simply lock him in the cellar? Can’t he just go away?
But enough with me condemning a fanon that condemns Farfarello and let’s move to the good stuff.
Fanfiction
I’m very fond of Nicky J Mayfair’s Farfarello. In her fics Farfarello comes across as sharp and very observant in his understanding of the world, but at the same time imbued with a odd, childish innocence in the understanding of his own self, a stranger to himself almost, in strange paths of self-discovery as he reaches out towards another human being. His behaviour is mild, almost too mild, but the threat of violence always bubbles up under the calm surface.
Kara no Heya Farfarello/Schuldig
Itami Farfarello/Aya
Happiness Farfarello/Yohji
Jacque Koh writes a rather more ‘traditional’ Farfarello, fanatic and sadistic, treating acts of sex and violence as an almost religious ritual, with a very personal, distorted but intense morality and worldview, slightly pompous and incoherent at times, but thankfully not too much.
My Kitten and Me Farfarello/Aya
Viridian’s Farfarello, shares the same intense worldview and fanaticism but it does not affect his objectivity or narrow his understanding, he is rather more down to earth and imbued with something more, an occasional sense of humour and self-irony, a sense of fun.
Nerve Farfarello/ Schuldig
Thrill Kill Farfarello/Schuldig
Signal to Noise Farfarello/Schuldig
Psycho Trip Series Lost Hold Bare Farfarello/Aya
And finally, all the things that Farfarello could have been and is not:
Five lives Farfarello never lived by Daegaer
Fanart
Gorgeous Farfarello art by Rai
Farfarello art by Makusime
Farfarello image, Farfarello with Knife and a brilliant Farfarello in Gorey style by Angel
Farfarello in a rather more American comic book style by Trellia
A lovely b/w charcoal image by Vin
And last, a very funny vid, proving that Farfarello is probably as Irish as an enchilada.
Links
Farfarello.org Excellent shrine, with all that you possibly need to know, and a great source of material for this essay. Character profile, art, links, a lot of information and downloads.
Nephente at the Gate Fanfiction archive for Farfarello-centric stories, looks good and the writing is good as well.
Beautiful Pain Farfarello fan listing
False_stigmata LJ community - seems on hold though
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El Endo
Off to have some pudding. Merry Christmas to everyone…
Character/Fandom: Farfarello (Weiss Kreuz)
Author: Penelope_z
Spoilers: Weiss Kreuz Kapitel, Assassin and White Shaman
Notes: Thanks to toscas_kiss, Olympia_m, mistressrenet, genkischuldich, lunarennui and daegaer for information, support and some giggling.
Have you not heard of that madman who lit a lantern in the bright morning hours, ran to the market-place, and cried incessantly: "I am looking for God! I am looking for God!"
F. Nietzsche, The Gay Science
It was a dark and stormy night, as they usually are. An empty church, with candlelight casting ominous shadows across the dark walls, a lone figure of a crouching man, a blade, bloodstains, and as the crap pseudo-goth organ music reaches a crescendo there is a close-up to a bloodshot amber eye slowly widening, followed by an ear-piercing howl. No this is not Hammer House of Horrors, this is Weiss Kreuz, this is Farfarello, and everything is pushed to extremes, morality, faith, violence, sanity. La, la, la rain of blood and toads…
A few warnings on this essay before I start, for all of you, unfortunate mortals that have decided to brave a reading. This essay is limited in scope, as my interpretation of Farfarello is based entirely on the anime series Kapitel and the manga Assassin and White Shaman. I have chosen to ignore any further canon sources, partly due to my lack of in-depth knowledge, as well as a personal bias towards the quality and importance of some of the material. I am aware that this is not an entirely excusable behaviour, but at the same time references to a canon that I ignore or vehemently oppose to, would probably not have a particularly positive affect on this essay either.
Furthermore, I am not going to attempt any introduction to Weiss Kreuz or the Schwarz group, seeing that three lovely essays on the other Schwarz characters have already preceded this one. I wrote an introduction to WK in my previous essay on the Schuldig/Yohji pairing and you can refer there in case you need some more general information. And lastly, this essay was written down on little bits of paper, including napkins, and then typed out on a laptop I had to borrow from my boss. Have mercy and don’t laugh too hard at the messy incoherence.
BASIC FACTS - The Boy with the Thorn in his Side
At First Glance
Looks are everything in Weiss Kreuz; the physical appearance of every character seems indicative of his personality, morals and importance within canon. Weiss are the obvious heroes, with beautiful, stubborn and honest faces, eyes like windows to the soul. Villains vary from the simply unattractive such as Reiji Takatori and the Estet triad, to the grotesque criminals of the week, hideous and clumsy, faces contorted in horrible grimaces. The less important a villain is, the more obviously he stands out in this bizarre racist code of aesthetics, a foolish monster, easily avoided and easily targeted.
Among this series of villains, Schwarz retain not only a human appearance, but they are also very attractive physically, their tone of voice, body posture and movements beautiful and alluring. Their appearance is an obvious indicator of their importance and status, they are not to be trifled with and dismissed easily, they will blend in, deceive you and seduce you. Farfarello though, immediately stands out from the other Schwarz, unable to blend as easily with the rest of humanity, attractive but obviously dangerous, a murderer at first glance.
Manga Version
Anime Version
So. Farfarello, with the looks of a beautiful nightmare, approximately twenty years old, Irish, slim and lithe but very fit physically, with quite impressive musculature, as he functions as the raw power of Schwarz. Multiple scars on his face and body, possibly self-inflicted, an eye patch, very pale skin, silver white hair and an amber eye in his anime version, red hair and brown eye in his manga incarnation. His face in the manga, and on few occasions in the anime seems curiously innocent and childish, almost sweet, with rounded cheeks, large eyes and full lips, a far cry from the sharp angles, slanted eyes and razorblade smirk of Schuldig or Crawford. Other times though, when his face is distorted by bloodlust, with a grin of anger and pleasure, he is looking positively demonic. Dressed in a blue vest and trousers, high boots, adorned with ear piercings and a leather collar around his neck, his appearance could be considered punk, if the Sex Pistols were vampires.
His real name is later revealed to be Jei, or Jay, while Farfarello, roughly translated as ‘elf’ or ’leprechaun’ has nothing to do with a type of Italian pasta and actually stems from a character of Dante’s Inferno; a member of the Malebranche legion of demons, who first appears in Canto XXI: And so, Malacoda designated ten devils to escort us, calling each one of them by their names: Calcabrina, Alichino, Cagnazzo, Libicocco, Draghignazzo, Graffiacane, Ciriatto, Farfarello, Rubicante and Barbariccia, the leader of the expedition. The choice of name indicates a surprisingly well-educated person, if Farfarello indeed chose the new name on his own.
The past
Farfarello is the only Schwarz character with an entire episode centred around him, as it often happens with the Weiss characters. Seeing that he is the member of Schwarz receiving the least attention throughout the Kapitel series, the sudden shift in focus feels odd. As Farfarello is the most extreme and incomprehensible main character in the series, it is perhaps an attempt to offer some rationalisation and explanation, some point of understanding for the audience, and possibly invite some sympathy and empathy towards such a completely alien being.
Three quarters of the Schwarz team are foreigners, a reminder that Japan was and remains a defensive and mildly xenophobic nation, and as I have already mentioned, Farfarello comes from Ireland. In the episode Schuld (Guilt) we see him enjoying a fairly happy childhood, in what looks like a small agricultural community, receiving an intensely religious education and being very close to his family. Until he suddenly discovers that his biological mother is not the woman who raised him, but a nun named Ruth, to whom he is also very close. Reacting very badly to the news, in a fit of blind rage, he murders his parents and his younger sister, and almost succeeds in murdering Ruth when he comes back to his senses, staring at his bloodied hands in horror and disbelief.
Jei loses all memory of the incident, a possible defence mechanism of his mind towards shock and is left to believe that a burglar murdered his family. This marks a complete turning point in his life, which is now focuses solely on revenge. But rather than seeking revenge against the imaginary criminal, Farfarello decides to seek revenge against God, who believes is the source of the pain and injustice inflicted upon him. At that moment, as the foundations of his entire worldview collapse with the realisation that God and the world and not infinitely kind and just, like a biblical prophet lost in the desert, he receives a kind of illumination, a ‘negative illumination’ if you prefer, that seems to reveal to him a new path and a new faith of destruction. Farfarello is born.
There’s a lack of information on what happens between that time and the beginning of the official WK timeline, but the hints lead us to understand that he was possibly a resident of Rosenkreuz for some time, as Schuldig and Crawford, and probably the third person to join the group of Schwarz. Bloodthirsty and murderous, he provides Schwarz with necessary physical raw power during battle, but is also prone to instinctive, irrational and independent behaviour for which he receives punishment. At the same time he shows an ability for self-restraint when realising the necessity, and does not directly oppose any of the other members. Within the WK episodes we see him accompanying and working alongside Schwarz to further the goals of Estet and their own, but still remaining truthful to his own primary agenda of destroying God.
Power and pain
Taking into consideration the title of this essay and thinking in Nietzchean terms, the first concept that comes to mind when thinking of Schwarz is the term ‘Superman’ or ‘Ubermensch,’ the being that while rejecting any outside notions of values that serve as guidelines within the rest of society, creates his own good and evil, constantly reinventing oneself and transcending the limitations of humanity; a creature in whose eyes men are ’a laughing stock or painful embarrassment.’ Schuldig, Crawford and Nagi, with their respective abilities of telepathy, precognition and telekinesis, seem indeed a step ahead of humanity in the scale of evolution, powerful, unique, untouchable, a new race to inherit the earth, that probably cannot help but regard others as lesser, ape-like beings.
Farfarello does not fit the above descriptions of social Darwinism. His own source of power, the quality that divides him from the rest of humanity is not an ability, but rather an inability or disability; Farfarello cannot feel physical pain. In the scale of evolution Farfarello seems to stand a step behind rather than ahead, he is less rather than more, a sub-human rather than an over-human.
Naturally, there are obvious advantages resulting from the inability to feel pain, especially in the case of someone with such a violent and extreme lifestyle. We see him thrown off the hood of a running car and able to walk and function physically within seconds, defending himself effectively against Omi and Ken, while severely wounded by their weapons, hiding what looks like needles in his mouth, before attacking unsuspecting guards. There are numerous occasions when this inability seems to have saved his life, cowering or collapsing from pain would have led to his immediate demise. At the same time, like others members of Schwarz have also revealed at times, Farfarello’s uniqueness is not always desired, and does not come without consequences. ’I would like to feel pain, at least once’ he mentions, almost nostalgically.
Not much is known regarding his inability to feel pain, if Farfarello was born with it, or if it manifested later. The source could be psychological, possibly the result of the extreme childhood trauma; just as Farfarello’s mind completely suppressed the incident, building a protective cocoon in order for the character to survive, it might also have numbed his senses and blocked any source of pain and suffering from the world surrounding him. But the source could be the result of genetics, and indeed, the inability to feel pain is a true but rare medical condition, a genetic disorder called CIPA (Congenital Insensitivity to Pain with Anhidrosis).
This disorder is a very rare and untreatable sensory neuropathy, inherited and manifesting only when both parents have copies of the mutated gene, which causes a defect in the neurosystem responsible for pain and temperature sensation. Patients are not robbed of their sense of touch or any other of their senses, they can feel and understand the textures of objects, their smell and taste, but are unable to feel pain, heat and cold. Like Farfarello, case studies have shown the patients of CIPA to often carry multiple scars and bone fractures, and exhibit a tendency of self-mutilation.
It’s a sobering and depressing thought, the untouchable and indestructible creature of the series, with the hellraiser laugh, outside the romanticised and exaggerated context of the anime series, would probably be a rare patient, touched and prodded in labs by physicians, and very likely to die before the age of thirty.
VIOLENCE - As if pain and its subject could unite under the same scar
Towards oneself
The first mention of Farfarello within WK comes from Schuldig, remarking off-handedly that Farfarello has a love for blood and suicidal tendencies, when he is alone he tries to hurt himself. Later we see that Schuldig’s words were not false, there are occasions where Farfarello inflicts harm upon himself using blades, both in times of obvious emotional distress but also in times when he appears coherent and lucid. It’s possible that most of his scars might be a result of self-mutilation, and though it’s not known if he has gouged out one of his eyes himself, if thine eye offend thee, it’s not an entirely farfetched scenario.
Self-harm, a concept puzzling for people who have not experienced such tendencies and are therefore unable to fit the reasons within their own frame of reference, derives from a variety of motivations, quite a few of which fit Farfarello’s psychological profile.
Self-harm is often an attempt to escape from feelings of emptiness, depression and isolation from the environment, to become grounded in reality and reconnect with the body after a dissociative episode, to escape feelings of numbness, to finally feel something, feel alive. Farfarello seems at times to be walking on a tightrope of depersonalisation, he has completely severed the ties with who he was, and the foundations of what he has become are often shaky, as it is revealed with the return of Ruth and the almost return of his memory. As he is first seen in the manga, locked in a padded cell and restrained with a straightjacket, his gaze unfocused, Farfarello resembles a ghost while Schuldig struggles to coax an answer out of him. An attempt to feel pain is an attempt to break down the numbness, the barriers of his own mind.
Self-harm provides momentary relief from a bad psychological state, a coping mechanism towards emotional pain, which gives inner pain both a validation and a focus. The reasons for emotional pain might be outside one’s control, but the physical pain is not. With a knife and his/her own body a self-injurer can gain power again, inner pain now becomes a physical reaction that can begin and end according to one’s wishes. Though Farfarello in the anime often appears to be in a constant state of rage or excitement, laughing or shouting in utter glee, there are obvious moments of suffering and emotional pain. Much of the suffering is the direct result of his own actions, but in his own eyes it’s the outcome of an unjust world controlled by an unjust God. By driving the blade Farfarello regains control, power at least over his own body, since he has not yet power over the rest of the world. It also serves as a validation of his emotional distress. In Schuld he clearly mentions that he considers himself a victim ‘nobody has suffered more than me’ so the scars and blood could serve to intensify and validate the sense of victimhood.
Self-harm can also be the result of lack of feelings of self-worth, feeling the need to punish oneself for being ’bad’ or ’worthless’. Farfarello does not exactly feel the need, but rather the desire to be punished. “I am desecrating the body you have given me. Judge me! Make me a sinner!” he shouts to the sky in vain. Self-harm becomes an act of freedom, a rebellion against God and the religious teachings of his childhood. Farfarello longs for pain and punishment, because he longs to receive the consequences of his own actions, without a consequence the action itself loses all importance and meaning, a call that is not heard by celestial ears.
Towards others
Three quarters of the Schwarz group, excluding the rather morose Nagi, seem to be so damn happy the entire time that I am led to believe that seeking the world’s end must be a really pleasant hobby. While Crawford seems to delight in creating and executing plans, feeling sure and in command, Schuldig takes pleasure out of manipulating and tormenting others, Farfarello’s approach is rather more direct: he likes to kill.
He kills without toying with his victims or controlling them, he kills without smart jokes and sessions of torment, he just kills. Very straightforward in his approach, he seems often angry or disappointed when stopped by Crawford or Schuldig, who prefer to act according to common sense or more elaborate plans of torture. He kills usually with a blade, which he tends to lick beforehand, up close and personal with the victim’s blood splattering on his clothes, killing with delight and barely restrained excitement, completely caught up in a feverish battle lust.
He does though have more creative methods when the act of murder relates to his own war against God, he pours acid, which he calls ’holy water’ over the face of priests, and threatens to do the same to Ruth, before stopped by Ken and Omi. The obvious pleasure at hurting other, is in my opinion, not much different than the desire to inflict harm upon himself. It’s an act of rebellion against God or the world, being able to damage and destroy is a proof that he can control and influence his surroundings, that he is not helpless before faceless and unseen power. It also seems a bizarre way to connect to others, an attempt to feel, if not his own pain, then at least theirs.
WHAT HE WANTS - Man invented God in order not to kill himself
Religion and morals
Farfarello shares the anarchic desire of the rest of Schwarz to bring humanity to an end, or rather to eliminate any form of social order, but at the same time his primary agenda goes beyond that. “Death of God is my desire,” he declares.
The first immediate concept that springs to mind is Nietzsche’s famous and famously abused quote “God is dead.” But there are some fundamental differences in the way Farfarello and Nietzsche perceive that same idea.
Death of God according to Nietzsche is a rejection of absolute values and of a belief in a cosmic order, the ending of the accepted standards of a universal moral law. God is the phantom of religion, an unreal supernatural realm, whose demise is supposed to be achieved through rationalism and science. The decline of faith does not lead to chaos, but into freedom, the world becomes a blank canvas upon which the individual can sketch out his own moral code and allow his creativity to flow freely. Death of God is a personal rather than a universal process, symbolic rather than realistic, constructive rather than destructive.
God is not a symbolic phantom for Farfarello. He has lost his faith in the good and just nature of God, but has not lost faith in his existence. On the contrary, God for Farfarello, changing shape from a vague ideal of goodness to the embodiment of the unjust and absurd forces that govern the universe, has solidified, become substantial and concrete, more real than reality, the only absolute truth in Farfarello’s life, just as the scars on his body are the concrete physical manifestation of his pain.
Death of God is not a personal process for Farfarello, a battle to be fought only within. Before killing a Catholic priest or attempting to murder Ruth, he repeatedly offers them escape if they reject the existence of God. His behaviour is similar to that of a prophet preaching to the unbelievers.
The behaviour of the other members of Schwarz is entirely dictated by their own, self-serving purposes. Farfarello is motivated by a personal need for revenge, but his goal has becoming all-encompassing, moving from the private to the universal realm. His reasoning “Why is there a God if there are so many people who suffer? Where is the justice and goodness in that?” is of course overly simplistic, but also reveals an odd humanism, completely absurd under the circumstances, seeing that it comes from a character who takes pleasure in the pain and death of others.
Schwarz are entirely comfortable in their own skin, accepting and revelling in the fact that their behaviour is evil and wrong. Farfarello is not different, but at the same time, one must take into consideration that his perception of good and evil, right and wrong seems to have been completely inverted. His actions are wrong, but are still based on his personal moral code and dictated by a higher purpose that transcends his own desires and limitations. His higher purpose is both absurd and destructive, but only to our eyes and not necessarily to his own. In conclusion, I believe that Farfarello is a deeply ethical human being. If his own perception of the world is the inverted image of ours, if right is wrong and wrong is right, then Farfarello must understand himself as an idealist hero, motivated by moral principles and working for a universal salvation, a rational man within an absurd world, the one-eyed in the Kingdom of the Blind.
Personality and behaviour
Is he mad or is his not? A man wearing a straightjacket, screaming while hanging upside down from the ceiling, a man licking knives and killing with pleasure, chasing after destructive and impossible chimeras does not seem at first glance a picture of sanity.
Farfarello’s behaviour is volatile and prone to extreme mood swings, crying brokenheartedly at a point and laughing at the next moment. He is obviously governed by his emotions and temper and shows no restraint in expressing both. At times we see him punished by the rest of Schwarz, though their measures could be interpreted as protection as well as punishment, protection from his own self.
Because Farfarello walks a clear path towards self-destruction. Most WK characters, including the four members of Weiss and Nagi seem to have been led and controlled in life by outside forces, their current predicament is not the result of what they have done, but what has been done to them. But Farfarello, up to a point at least, is a creature of his own making. Even if his choices have been forced or subconscious, he is still the outcome of his own actions. He has murdered his parents, brought his entire belief system to an end, suppressed the memory as a means of survival and focused his energy towards an entirely hopeless goal. Death of God is impossible for a believer. If one acknowledges the existence of God, one acknowledges his own limitations, and seizes all personal struggle in the face of something infinite and beyond one’s perception. But Farfarello struggles on, limiting himself with the barriers of his own faith, and at the same time impossibly trying to reach beyond.
None of all these seem examples of a particularly healthy mind, but at the same time, Farfarello is not a savage beast. He is almost always lucid and speaks intelligently and coherently, he is able to interact socially with the rest of Schwarz and proves a useful asset to the group. He obeys Crawford’s orders, even if they seem to go against his own instinctive inclinations, showing that he does have control over himself. Moreover, some of his comments reveal a particularly perceptive nature that is able to understand hidden motivations and desires. Even if he is not necessarily aware of the condition of his own mind, it does affect the clarity of his understanding of the minds of others.
The Knight of Bad Faith
I was trying to create a short description for Farfarello and came up with the above, a mingling of the concepts Bad Faith and Knight of Faith by S. Kirkegaard. Bad Faith is self-deception, the creation of some Other in order to relieve us from the responsibility of our own actions, like Farfarello’s God was created in order to allow Farfarello to become a victim in his own eyes, and to survive without the crushing burden of guilt and self-hatred. The Knight of Faith is a term created to describe the absolute believer, incomprehensible in his behaviour, because Faith itself is a paradox. An example of the Knight of Faith is Abraham, both murderer and believer, ready to kill his own son for no apparent reason other than faith. The Knight of Faith is mad, divinely mad, because faith itself is a leap into absurd, where all reasons and explanations belong to a reality that transcends our understanding.
Farfarello therefore, both murderer and believer, is also a Knight of Faith, behaving in a manner that seems incomprehensible to others, taking a willing leap into the absurd and the impossible. The difference is that the source inspiring him is not an outside godly force but an inner self-deception. The Knight of Bad Faith would be the loneliest of beings, if Abraham’s actions are intelligible to God only, Farfarello speaks in tongues that no one but himself can understand.
But hey, where is the smut?
Schwarz function together as a tightly knit, effective unit, but there seems to be a dichotomy between the obvious pragmatists, Crawford and Schuldig, who act with clear methods towards self-serving and apparently possible goals, and the possible idealists, Nagi and Farfarello, whose behaviour seems ambiguous, their goals unclear or impossible and the motivation behind them moving from the sphere of the personal to the universal.
Nagi and Farfarello at the same time, seem to be ignoring each other completely, Nagi seems almost afraid of him in the manga and has hardly any interaction with him in the anime. After all, Farfarello ends up murdering Nagi’s teenage crush, Tot, therefore one can assume that they are not probably in the best of terms. Nagi is a character who questions and doubts, not a good combination to Farfarello’s unyielding convictions.
Crawford and Farfarello seem to share a rather better relationship. Farfarello obviously recognises a leader in Crawford, as he obeys and follows Crawford’s directions even if they go against his own instinctive behaviour. Whether the reason is genuine respect is unsure, I believe that Farfarello trusts Crawford’s judgement but I am not sure if there is any real emotions of loyalty behind the fact. Farfarello is acting above all in favor of his own personal goals, and he could probably serve under anyone who would promise their realisation. Crawford on the other hand seems to at least understand Farfarello, when Schuldig mentions that he doesn’t not comprehend what is going on in Farfarello’s mind, Crawford explains that he can see and understand the parallels of his behaviour.
Farfarello and Schuldig share a rather intriguing relationship. If Schuldig does not understand or enjoy Farfarello’s thoughts, they still seem to share a strange camaraderie, they are often seen together both in missions and everyday life, and Schuldig behaves at times in quite a protective manner. In the manga we see him threatening a guard that he will die if Farfarello gets hurt, and it’s also mentioned that the is the one putting the straightjacket on when Farfarello begins to exhibit suicidal tendencies. He also helps Farfarello to escape, picking him up in his car and interrupting his battle with Ken and Omi when it seems obvious Farfarello is going to lose. Possible sexual relationship? It’s all open to interpretation.
His mirror opponent in the group of Weiss would be Hidaka Ken, who does share some common characteristics with Farfarello, especially in the follow-up series Gluhen. In the absence of Farfarello in that particular series, Ken disturbingly seems to have almost absorbed parts of his personality, the unnecessarily violent behaviour, psychotic tendencies and obvious delight in killing. But even in the Kapitel series there are obvious similarities in their rash and instinctive nature, short-temper and preference for direct, short-range weapons. At the same time Farfarello shares some aspects with the leader of the Weiss group Aya Fujimija, mostly due to similarities in their tragic past, and their single-minded focus on revenge. But while Aya’s revenge is possible and within grasp and reason, Farfarello will never manage to fulfil his own. Seeing Farfarello through the Weiss perspective, he is everything Aya could have become if all hope was lost, mirroring a darker alternative reality.
So many people! There’s no one here and people everywhere, because essentially, I believe that Farfarello, even when apparently close to others, is a loner, isolated from any environment, even that of Schwarz. Farfarello perceives and understands the reality around him with different eyes, the only inhabitant of his own self-made world, making communication with others difficult or impossible.
In conclusion, my own fascination with the character stems from all the above. He is a vicious bloodthirsty killer and yet a victim, a butchered human being in the cocoon of his straightjacket. Farfarello is a complete paradox, the perfectly inverted image of the lone hero, bravely fighting for the love of justice and hopeless causes in an absurd and unjust world. He is the perfectly inverted image of the idealistic dreamer, living not for life itself, but for some greater idea, that will transcend life, refine it, give it a meaning and ultimately betray it. And in his own eyes and perception, he is both the hero and the dreamer.
He is locked in an eternal stasis, without a real past or future, like a wounded minotaur in a labyrinth of his own making, meandering in circles through the same dark paths but at the same time fighting for something that lies beyond his grasp, for a chimera beyond. Farfarello is reaching out for the stars if you like, and okay, with the goal to possibly crush them and pulverise them into astral dust, but reaching out nonetheless.
Not to mention that he is really quite hot…
THE FANDOM - Oh Lord, please, don’t let me be misunderstood
As a personal observation, entirely subjective, as it is based only on my own limited experiences within the Weiss Kreuz fandom, I would conclude that Farfarello is the character receiving the most unfair treatment at the hands of fandom. One would argue that Farfarello is not a character deserving a kind treatment, and that for a truly fanon victimised character we could probably refer to his mirror image in Weiss, Hidaka Ken. By the word unfair though, I am not referring only to the fact that Farfarello rarely receives the chance of appeal, justification and redemption offered to the other members of Schwarz within the fanon world, but that his personality has become over-simplified, distorted and parodied.
A part of the Weiss Kreuz fandom appears infatuated with Schwarz, and consequently the status of the team members, especially that of Schuldig, has been elevated from canon. From sideline figures they have moved into the foreground, their looks and attitude examples of iconic cool, their history explored and re-interpreted, their reasoning and motivations examined and often justified. These fanon tendencies unfortunately rarely include Farfarello.
As fanon searches to discover reasons and motives, Farfarello is already laid bare, a complete and bizarre personality that doesn’t leave much room for free association, and at the same time so alien that it does not leave much room for sympathy. As fanon searches for future possibilities, Farfarello is not a character that can easily change without becoming annihilated in the process, and neither is he a character particularly influenced by external circumstances, what barriers of the canon world falling would impact on someone trapped in the barriers of his own self? Farfarello is hardly the plasticine that the writer can re-shape according to his/her whims.
As fanon tends to underline and focus on everything that makes every canon character unique and individual, Farfarello, already a personality of extremes is prone to fall into parody, his fanaticism becomes idiocy, the pursue of impossible goals deems him an absurdity, his appearance and ferocious behaviour are magnified as he morphs into a murderous clown. Farfarello treated by Schwarz as a burden, a hapless creature that needs to be constantly restrained and treated as a child, Farfarello walking around with a blender (to possibly make fruit juice or grind small animals into a pulp), Farfarello as a mad and bloodthirsty beast unable to think rationally or as a fool tricked into the most ridiculous behaviour with the promise that “it hurts God” are all typical fandom clichés. The rest of Schwarz use and ridicule him, outwit him and outgrow him, while the writer struggles to find out what to do with the Farfarello problem now that Schwarz have become best friends with Weiss, should Crawford kill him as a sign of redemption from past sins and affection for Aya, or should they simply lock him in the cellar? Can’t he just go away?
But enough with me condemning a fanon that condemns Farfarello and let’s move to the good stuff.
Fanfiction
I’m very fond of Nicky J Mayfair’s Farfarello. In her fics Farfarello comes across as sharp and very observant in his understanding of the world, but at the same time imbued with a odd, childish innocence in the understanding of his own self, a stranger to himself almost, in strange paths of self-discovery as he reaches out towards another human being. His behaviour is mild, almost too mild, but the threat of violence always bubbles up under the calm surface.
Kara no Heya Farfarello/Schuldig
Itami Farfarello/Aya
Happiness Farfarello/Yohji
Jacque Koh writes a rather more ‘traditional’ Farfarello, fanatic and sadistic, treating acts of sex and violence as an almost religious ritual, with a very personal, distorted but intense morality and worldview, slightly pompous and incoherent at times, but thankfully not too much.
My Kitten and Me Farfarello/Aya
Viridian’s Farfarello, shares the same intense worldview and fanaticism but it does not affect his objectivity or narrow his understanding, he is rather more down to earth and imbued with something more, an occasional sense of humour and self-irony, a sense of fun.
Nerve Farfarello/ Schuldig
Thrill Kill Farfarello/Schuldig
Signal to Noise Farfarello/Schuldig
Psycho Trip Series Lost Hold Bare Farfarello/Aya
And finally, all the things that Farfarello could have been and is not:
Five lives Farfarello never lived by Daegaer
Fanart
Gorgeous Farfarello art by Rai
Farfarello art by Makusime
Farfarello image, Farfarello with Knife and a brilliant Farfarello in Gorey style by Angel
Farfarello in a rather more American comic book style by Trellia
A lovely b/w charcoal image by Vin
And last, a very funny vid, proving that Farfarello is probably as Irish as an enchilada.
Links
Farfarello.org Excellent shrine, with all that you possibly need to know, and a great source of material for this essay. Character profile, art, links, a lot of information and downloads.
Nephente at the Gate Fanfiction archive for Farfarello-centric stories, looks good and the writing is good as well.
Beautiful Pain Farfarello fan listing
False_stigmata LJ community - seems on hold though
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El Endo
Off to have some pudding. Merry Christmas to everyone…