A Dead Man's Search for Meaning

William Blake is man on a journey to find meaning by accepting his own death. In Cold Fever, Hirata is a man in the same search of the penultimate meaning in life, particularly in the wake of his parent’s tragic death. In both cases, both protagonists feel a paralyzing sense that life is cut short, and the wrestle to reconcile this in spiritual terms.
In Nobody’s emphatic romanticization of the transformative power of the real poet, the famous William Blake’s extensive works, Nobody crafts a persona that appeals to Blake’s sense of directionlessness. With the assumption already made of him, Blake simply decides to welcome it, and we see Blake gradually step more and more into the role as he finds meaning. On the other hand, there is this opposing notion of the outlaw identity being continuously projected onto Blake, again based on false pretenses. Blake’s first lethal shot was poorly fired from underneath the dead corpse of a woman in self defense of a murderer’s advances. Yet, the “Wanted” posters betray Blake’s lived experience. He has choice to make, and in the “kill or be killed” environment of the “Wild West,” Blake joins the ranks of outlaws. Toward the end of the film, we see these Blake effortlessly merge his newfound identities as he recites philosophical rhymes while simultaneously wreaking havoc with a weapon.
Nobody is both a character and a symbol, a not-so-subtle play on words. Nobody’s name is used to reinforce Blake’s directionlessness and quest to find meaning. The only direct reference to this symbolism is upon Blake’s entry into the cannibal’s camp. The men ask him if he comes alone, to which he replies, “I’m with Nobody.” The play on words can applied to Blake’s journey as a whole, in which a recount of basic plot summary would look something like this:
“While on the run, Nobody stops to save Blake’s life. Nobody comes after Blake. Nobody teaches Blake how to find meaning and accept his ultimate death as a spiritual progression to a higher state of being.”
Removal of the capital N in Nobody will expose the latent narrative:
“nobody stops to save Blake’s life, nobody comes after Blake, nobody teaches Blake how to find meaning..etc”


Without the guide, the sojourner is lost. Nobody’s character represents the purpose of his own role as well as the threat of what the quest would look like were Blake to be left to his own devices. As shown in the very first scene on the train, Blake is hopelessly unprepared for the environment that he has thrust himself into. The mere sight of gunfire is appalling and disorienting to our protagonist. He disregards the first attempts of a guide, the man on the train, who warns him that his quest is all in vain, that he should not have staked his life on the empty words of a paper contract. Only when Blake faced fatal wounds did he accept help from Nobody, which grew into a guide-seeker relationship.

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