(L) Revolutionary Girl Utena

[dauthik]

I don't believe I have seen enough of the series to form any sort of opinion on the symbolism of roses. Also, I watched it all yesterday from 12 to 3 AM so the only thing I noticed at the time besides the plot was EVERYTHING IS PINK AND PURPLE. or perhaps lavender. *cough*

By the way, I don't know if anyone heard this yet, but Ikuni (director of Utena) is remastering the series.. n_n

Any chance of this being distributed in the USA? I was planning on buying the series through EBay, but if a remastered version comes out I think I'll wait instead.

[Kumani]

man...re mastering the series would be amazing! not only would it be better animation, but maybe a better understanding, storyline and ending. YES!!!

[Stephanie]

@dauthik
I have no idea if it will be in the US, and well.. Goodness knows how long the "remaster" is going to take.. Though I did hear (just heard, not sure) that it may be dubbed in English using real Actors and Actresses, but I'm not really sure about that info.. (my source is Utena Forum)

@Kumani
Better understanding? I don't think Ikuni would like his symbolisms to be easily figured out.. n_n
If you have any questions and are confused about something, you can ask here, this is Utena thread after all, and other fans would be happy to answer to clear up some thoughts of yours..

Better storyline? Yep, maybe, but even Utena now made in the 1997s are still awesome.. In my opinion.. A Classic! It's got musical, play, symbolism, etc.. It's complete!

I think the music used was a genre of "Gothic Opera" but I'm not really sure.

[Kumani]

well I agree with you there...BUT i really wasn't complaining about Utena, I love it how it is now, and like you said it is a classic and I would change nothing about it because I understood it and loved it. But also, after 10 years, it'd be nice to change things a bit.

oh yeah! and can some please PLEASE tell me what miki's stopwatch means?! it's so annoying and they never mention what it was for.

[Wavedash]

The director said it was symbolism representing Miki's repressed and tightly controlled nature.

[Stephanie]

Well, since I hadn't explained episode 39 in the page before this,

Remember how Akio said, "She failed to bring revolution afterall" and Anthy said, "That's what you think, will you stop playing prince in your coffin and leave your own world" or something like that.. Revolution DID happen..

*Kozue is playing the piano! (OMG! LOL!) but Miki is not paying attention to it, means he has moved on from the past, and the blonde kid is learning to be mature..
*Nanami's brother won the duel! But Nanami is calm and not "Ohh, BROTHER!!" means she has gotten over her obsession with her bro, and the two guys are friends again.
*Juri and Shiori are friends
*Wakaba is not a sidekick anymore, and all clingy to a friend.. She is now independent.








In other news, Many said "Mrs. Ohtori" is hot and that put a big question mark in my head..

I said, "With a short time of Mrs. Ohtori being shown in Utena, I would like to know why you would find her cool/hot/awesome/great.. Specially if she came to talk to Akio about Akio's recent behavior to her daughter only to flirt with her daughter's fiance.. x_x"

And, to summarize it, here's a link: Clicky!

You can click the other links on the right side giving more explanations to Mrs. Ohtori.. The adult bond she shares with Akio.. In the adult world.

[Kumani]

yeah that thing between Mrs.Ohtori was really strange with Akio...lol. I too, was paying attention to what happened to them afterwards, and that everything seemed better. Kozue was playing the piano I was like "WHAAAAAAAT?!?!" lol, so things did change.

Thanks Wavedash for telling me, I guess in some ways it kind of did represent him that way. And it was even funnier when Miki was teaching that to Tsuwabuki.

[Autumn Demon]

I did not expect this anime to be as good as it was. I had heard of it long ago but I had put off watching it until now because the animation kind of turned me off; the animation isn't bad, it's just not up to par with what's put out today. The story is really incredible though, it's definitely in my top 5 overall.

The best thing about the show had to be the level of detail that was put into each scene. There were often a lot of random, unrelated things going on in a scene that weren't directly connected to the story, they added a different level of enjoyment. It felt really artsy, which i normally don't like, but it was well done so it made the show a masterpiece.

[Alleluia_Cone]

I've heard much about this show and was surprised to see it ranked so high on Anime Insider's 50 Greatest Anime List (I believe it was ranked #5 actually), so I was wondering if anybody who has seen and enjoyed the show would care to comment on what makes it so great?

I am interested in viewing the show if it sounds appealing but it is hard for me to gather anything about it based on the summaries I've read and the pictures I've seen. In fact, the only thing I can tell for sure is that it has some Yuri elements to the story. As for the animation, I do not mind if it looks dated; I've been watching anime since the late-eighties, if anything, old animation styling makes me feel nostalgic.

[gaguri]

I would say give Utena 3 episode try. If you don't like the early episodes, you probably won't like the rest. I don't think there's anything to complain about in visuals department, especially if you don't mind dated animation. What's great about these visuals is that they're very elegant and often have meanings behind them. And that's imo one of the strengths of this film, telling a story and exploring characters through images, it's something anime doesn't take advantage of as often (and there's the irony of anime as a visual medium). But it is Shoujo, so expect lot of pretty boys, girly fluffs and yaoi/yuri vibes. The series also gets too formulaic for my taste but I think many people don't mind formulaic shows as long as they're done good (and I think they are for most parts).

Also give Utena the film a try (better to watch it after TV though I think). It's a real feast for senses.

[4Tran]

Originally Posted by Alleluia_Cone

I've heard much about this show and was surprised to see it ranked so high on Anime Insider's 50 Greatest Anime List (I believe it was ranked #5 actually), so I was wondering if anybody who has seen and enjoyed the show would care to comment on what makes it so great?

Utena's ranking seems to be about right as it's certainly one of the masterpieces of anime. However, it's a little hard to describe since so much of it is wrapped up in symbolism, themes, and stark imagery, and nothing is as it first appears. If you've watched a lot of shoujo anime, you can think of Utena as a mix of Rose of the Versailles and Oniisama E, although it's probably most similar to Princess Tutu or (to a lesser degree) The Melody of Oblivion. As with the latter two, it has a lot of surreal imagery and uses the deconstruction of familiar fairy tales as a major theme.

Another of the major themes of Utena is the exploration of human foibles. Much of this exploration is done by showing us very familiar and blatant imagery: the gallant prince, the victimized princess and the dastardly villain. But such elements are often overturned, and the villain isn't necessarily so dastardly after all, and the circumstances of the rest of the players is much more complex than first envisioned.

I realize that these descriptions are horribly vague, but I'm a little unsure of how else to describe Utena's salient points without resorting to giving a synopsis of the show, and the overall plot is such a minor element of the show that such a synopsis doesn't seem all that useful either.

Originally Posted by Alleluia_Cone

I am interested in viewing the show if it sounds appealing but it is hard for me to gather anything about it based on the summaries I've read and the pictures I've seen. In fact, the only thing I can tell for sure is that it has some Yuri elements to the story. As for the animation, I do not mind if it looks dated; I've been watching anime since the late-eighties, if anything, old animation styling makes me feel nostalgic.

Don't read too much into the Yuri elements; they're a relatively minor part of Utena, and it's played more for poignant characterization than anything else.

[Kumani]

I DON'T GET! I DON'T GET IT! I DON'T GET IT!

people, not matter how much I watch this anime I still cannot understand the ending!

-Why did Anthy back stab Utena when she was gonna help her? WHY ?!

-Then at the end, when they meet up again, Anthy worries for Utena and tells her to leave? WHAT IS THAT!? YOU JUST STABBED UTENA A WHILE AGO!

-Did Anthy hate Utena? Telling her all that stuff and Anthy just suffered in the end.

-If Utena was hurt, did Dios give her a bit of power or something to help her regain herself?

-Why did Utena want Anthy's hand?

-Why the heck did Utena get stabbed by all those swords? Did she choose to switch Anthy's suffering by using herself?

Whoever can answer all of this in a really simple way, I'll thank them forever! lol

[NoSanninWa]

Originally Posted by Kumani

Whoever can answer all of this in a really simple way, I'll thank them forever! lol

Simple answer? Okay. Utena's quest wasn't really to save Anthy from Akio. Utena needed to save Anthy from herself.

Now for a slightly more complicated answer: Think of Anthy as a battered woman who doesn't know how to leave the man who is beating her. Anthy has always had the ability to leave Akio. Akio only has the power that Anthy has given him. As a result she will do anything he tells her, even if she hates doing it. Unfortunately many abused women really do such things in real life, so it isn't hard to imagine a character in an anime behaving with equal irrationality. As a result, Anthy did such things even though she hurt herself and Utena both.

By taking the thousand swords of the word's pain, Utena sacrificed for Anthy. When Anthy saw Utena taking the pain that she had always borne herself, she finally understood the meaning of the pain she was bearing. Because she couldn't stand to see Utena feeling the pain she knew so well, she finally woke up and took control of her life, not to save herself, but to save Utena.

[Kumani]

Okay okay... I get the whole thing about Utena saving Anthy so she can save herself.

So what you're saying is that no matter what is was, what Akio told her to do, Anthy did. No matter the outcome of it.

So then, when Utena sacrificed hefself for her, she saw the pain she was going through and decided to free Utena and end it all once and for all.

It sounds sooo complicated, but alright...

[anselfir]

I started utena with a sense of pilgrimage. 8 eps in, for today. i am trying my best to give the show a serious viewing, really take note of meaningful gestures and detail. ranks at top tier for now, not quite elite. the potential is certainly there.

[Navel]

It gets better in the second half, so go on. The key is to understand this is a coming-of-age anime, for all the characters involved there. And some of them don't succeed and remain the way they are, while others do. Those that don't succeed at evolving, are symbols of various stages people trap themselves into.

[ohtori_akio]

I am glad to see that this anime is still getting discussed on this forum. My favourite series, so I own the DVD collection released by CPM. My question is though, I have been downloading the Anime Fin fansub of it hoping that it includes the duel songs in karaoke mode. Does anyone know if it does? The CPM version unfortunately puts the subtitles over the song lyrics in the first 13 eps, and in the later episodes, they only have the English lyrics...

[4Tran]

Currently, I'm rewatching a bunch of my favorite (or the weirdest anime) out there. So far, I've finished Touka Gettan, and I'm now rewatching the Utena TV show for the first time in about six years. I've just finished the first arc, and it's like I'm watching it for the very first time. I'm just flabbergasted at how good the show is, and how well the elements work together. I'm particularly impressed with how well so many of the scenes/cuts are framed, and how effectively the fight scenes use their sparse animation. I've got a rather big backlog, but I can't help shoving more Utena DVDs into the tray. Ikuhara Kunihito may be nuts, but he's also undoubtedly a genius.

Oh, and this has to be one of the best casts assembled on a single credit page:

DVD note: the first couple of DVDs have really terrible-looking covers, their subtitles are very hard to read, and the authoring isn't very good. The next second set have much better-looking covers, so hopefully they will have better production values as well. I do wish that I can watch the remastered Utena DVDs, but I sort of doubt that it'll make that much of a difference.

Side note: I think that the memory of this show is one of the reasons why I dislike a lot of the surreal/abstract/artistic touches used by a lot of anime. The problem is that I like these touches when they are made well, and if they fit the tone and mood of the scene and overall work. This is done wonderfully in Utena, and most other shows suffer greatly in comparison. And it might by this very difference that raises my hackles when I see potentially good tools put to relatively poor use (SHAFT, take note!).

[sa547]

One time I hardly heard of Utena, except being whispered by those I known such as Strike Fiss and other few guys who'd watched it in cons, thinking it goes the lines of Sailor Moon, and been whammied afterwards. Often I heard guys calling it the "other Evangelion" because of psychological themes incorporated into the series.

It wasn't until personal involvement with Marimite caused me to explore other titles in the so-called yuri category that had me wearing "yuri goggles", and then an opportunity to study Utena appeared when the local anime channel (daring good bastards, hehehehe) aired it up after midnight, usually in Tagalog dubbing.

Never mind that the dubbing could be hit-or-miss (understanding that dubbers -- I know them -- hardly had the luxury of anime consultants to help with the script), from first episode Utena was mind-blowing, like being thrown back to the days of psychedelia or a surrealist painting running at 16-24 frames per second, with the rock-opera soundtrack rivaling Hair. True, today's studios should (re)study the artistry involved in its production.

Then there are the variety of characters (girls or beefcakes), each has his or her reasons and motivations, either for just being there or trying to defeat Utena, but of all those duelists, Nanami was epic comedy gold.

Overall, Utena is on my to-acquire list.

[Shiroth]

Heh, i'm not surprised you posted in this thread 4Tran.

I'm basically just going to shadow what 4Tran said. This show is one of my favorites of all time, for oh so many reasons that people will know of if they've experienced the series for themselves. A one of a kind show at it's best.