But lose the fight and then effectively ally with them.

I love Mononoke, but Miyazaki completely blunted his radical edge after Nausicaa in a way that I feel ultimately undermines the message of several of his later films. Mononoke is very much a tragedy in all three acts but it's like they just ignored or pretended that wasn't the case in act 3 to put a bow on everything so that it could be marketed as a family movie.