List of Saiyuki characters
This article lists the main characters from Saiyuki. Saiyuki is a manga written by Kazuya Minekura and published from 1997 to 2002. The manga saw an animated anime TV series adaption which ran from 2000 to 2001 and had a total of 50 episodes. A movie based on the manga was produced and released in 2001. The series also inspired a live action musical and a video game. The main characters are Genjyo Sanzo, Goku, Gojyo and Hakkai, who face a number of different antagonists throughout the manga series.
Main characters
Genjyo Sanzo
Zhu Bajie
Zhu Bajie, also named Zhu Wuneng, is one of the three helpers of Xuanzang and a major character of the novel Journey to the West. He is called "Pigsy" or "Pig" in many English versions of the story.
Zhu Bajie is a complex and developed character in the novel. He looks like a terrible monster, part human and part pig, who often gets himself and his companions into trouble through his laziness, gluttony, and propensity for lusting after pretty women. He is jealous of Sun Wukong and always tries to bring him down.
His Buddhist name "Zhu Wuneng", given by Bodhisattva Guanyin, means "pig (reincarnated) who is aware of ability," or "pig who rises to power", a reference to the fact that he values himself so much as to forget his own grisly appearance. Xuanzang gave him the nickname Bājiè which means "eight restraints, or eight commandments" to remind him of his Buddhist diet.
In the original Chinese novel, he is often called dāizi (呆子), meaning "idiot". Sun Wukong, Xuanzang and even the author consistently refers to him as "the idiot" over the course of the story. Bodhisattvas and other heavenly beings usually refer to him as "Heavenly Tumbleweed", his former name when he was a heavenly marshal.
