Honorary Sidekick: Princess Hinoto

Film: X (or X/1999) (English title)
Ekkusu (Japanese title)

Voices: Yuko Minaguchi (Japanese) (Feature film)
Stacey Jefferson (English) (Feature film)
Aya Hisakawa (Japanese) (TV series)
Bridget Hoffman (English) (TV series)

* I know I have mentioned this many times in this article but I want to make my point clear: the manga is INCOMPLETE. It was put on hold due to a dispute and finishes at Volume 19 Chapter 5.

* I know I mentioned Hinoto in the manga and I would love to put up pages from the manga to prove my point. However, Clamp have stated that fans do not upload or post images from the manga. I will respect their wishes but when I mention specific points, I will type in the volume number, chapter number and page number. There are many pages where you view/download the manga for free. Just go onto Google have have fun!

The Character

The thing that first struck me when I first saw "X" (the film...I did not see the TV series for the first time until about 7 months later) was that Princess Hinoto reminded me of a china doll. After seeing the film and TV series, I still feel the same. She is a dreamseer who is employed by the Japanese government whose dreams have never failed to come true which makes her a perfect asset to running the government.

She has long white hair and red eyes. She is blind, deaf, mute and crippled; the only way she can communicate with anyone is telepathically. She is assisted constantly by two female servants (Sōhi and Hien) as well as Seiichirō Aoki's nephew, Daisuke Saiki who is besotted by her.

Her powers as a dreamseers are her biggest strength in the battle between the Dragons of Heaven and Earth as well as the advent of Kamui. However, it is also her biggest weakness and although all her dreams have always come true, some of her dreams can be vague and open to interpretation. For example, she cannot determine whether the true Kamui will become a Dragon of Heaven or a Dragon of the Earth.

In the film, there is little to know of her except she has a younger sister, Kanoe. Also, she assists the Dragons of Heaven in any way she can, even teleporting Kamui away from near death by Fuma. She later holds her drying sister in her arms and then teleports Kamui to the final battle ground before she dies.

In the manga and anime, she is far more complex for several reasons. Because of the fact that her dreams have never been wrong, she conceals several facts from the Dragons of Heaven. This is not out of spite but purely to protect them. The first of these is revealed after Kotori is killed by Fuma. Hinoto reveals that she knew that the Kamui of Earth would kill Kotori, regardless whether Kamui (Kotori's love interest) or Fuma (Kotori's brother) would do the deed. Hinoto found that revealing this beforehand not only would have not affected Kotori's death but that it would have been too painful for Kamu to take. She only conceals the fact that she has foreseen that the Dragons of Heaven will lose the final battle.

In the anime, episode 22 ("Betrayal") could be seen as Hinoto's crowning moment. At the start, we see Hinoto crying over what has happened and what is going to happen. She is tortured by the fact that her dreams are coming true and it does not help that she is tormented by her sister, Kanoe who is helping the Dragons of Earth purely to spite and torture Hinoto. This episode is important for we also see a side to Hinoto not mentioned in the film but appears in both the anime and manga: Dark Hinoto.

Dark Hinoto is literally her dark half, mostly played in Hinoto's own consciousness. In the episode, "Betrayal", it is revealed that it is Hinoto who is behind several attacks on Kamui by using charms called shikigami (most of them happening within the first half of the series, with the last intervention being in episode 20 ("Ripple") when she stopped Kamui and Sorata from helping Arashi and Yuzuriha from Fuma by telling them that the Dragons of Earth will appear in two different places. However, after a spell sheet is left behind, Kamui is able to figure out that there are two sides to Hinoto: one that is fragile, like air or water but the other, a sense that comes from the spell sheets, is dark, passionate and evil. In the manga, Kamui suspects her of foul play and relays this to Sorata who, in turn, confronts Hinoto (Volume 19 ,chapter 5, pages 12-14). There is no outcome to this confrontation as it is at the end of that chapter that the manga comes to a halt.

In the manga, Dark Hinoto uses shikigami more often in particular to prevent the Dragons of Heaven from aiding each other but she has also committed acts not mentioned in the anime or film. Byt he end, she has taken Lady Arashi into her dreams, stating that when Arashi woke up, she will become a Dragon of Earth. (Volume 19 ,chapter 5, pages 6-8). When Kanoe steps into Hinoto's dream, she is killed (Volume 19 Chapter 3 pages 13-17). However, it has become a debate on who actually killed her; whether it was Hinoto, Dark Hinoto or even Fuma for he is seen holding up her body (Page 17)

While her evil persona is controlling Hinoto's body, the good persona is trapped in the dreamscape. This is true in both the manga and anime. However, there is closure for Hinoto in both the film and anime. In the film, she dies when a building crashes on her. She is the penultimate person to die. In the anime, her good side is trapped in the dreamscape and kills herself. thus taking her own life in the waking world as well so as to end her possession and save Kamui. With her death, the protection around the Sacred Sword becomes nothing and this leads onto the Final Battle played out in the last two episodes of the series. .

In the manga, her dark side has taken over and her last scene is when she is confronted by Sorata about her actions, claiming she is not the Princess and demanding to know where Arashi is. Of course, as the manga was put on hold due to a dispute with the publishers, we fans can only hope what happened next and pray that the manga will be complete.

The voices behind the character

In the feature film, Yuko Minaguchi brings a softness to Hinoto and brings out a gentle vulnerability in her. There seems to be genuine sadness in her voice towards the end of the film as I personally feel they should be.

Stacey Jefferson, on the other hand is deeper and louder. She sounds more authoritative and assertive in her voice. Towards the end, with some phrases, she sounds robotic and slightly unconvincing in comparison to the better performance of Minaguchi

In terms of the Japanese voices that have portrayed Hinoto, Hisakawa is overall better but then again, the film does not show many sides to Hinoto. In the film, she is more straightforward whilst in the anime, she is complex which meant a diversity of ways to do the voice. She sounds more fragile compared to Minaguchi.

Bridget Hoffman is calmer than Hisakawa overall and is definitely less authoritative than Stacey Jefferson achieved. She definitely sounds more fragile and is more natural in how she says the lines. When it comes to the revelation about Kotori's destiny to die, she shows more sadness than Hisakawa but the Japanese TV Hinoto is more genuine with her words.

For both Hoffman and Hisakawa, their strength seem to be when they portray Dark Hinoto. Hisakawa brings out a beautiful contrast between the good and bad Hinoto. It is really hard to tell that both are voiced by the same actress unless one really listens. She is dark, yet soft, almost as seductive as Kanoe in the film. And of course, who can forget the beautiful OTT performance of Dark Hinoto's last performance? The laugh....the OTT speech....need I say more? :-)

Whilst there is a difference in both characters when it comes to Hoffman, it is not as great as the Japanese version. Hoffman tries to be more Kanoe-like, laying on the seductive voice very thick. Hisakawa also does this as well but it is done without gaining any resemblance to that of Kanoe. The final moments of Dark Hinoto seem to be more OOT than that of the Japanese version but bizarrely, it works.