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Utena's ending.
I Finally finished watching utena completely and I have to say this...I was disappointed.
I mean the ending was what you expected (I'm counting the movie also.) but it also left an unsatisfactory sensation on my mind.
What are your thoughts on it's ending?
I mean the ending was what you expected (I'm counting the movie also.) but it also left an unsatisfactory sensation on my mind.
What are your thoughts on it's ending?
Comments
Alas, if a single word were used to describe my answer, "brief" would not be among the contenders.
More than likely, we'll simply do a show on this topic instead of subjecting you to a many-page essay.
Well the ending does leave you with something think about. That makes it one of my favorite anime series also the other thing that makes Utena one of my favorites is the double side everything has I.G Anthy's personality or Touga's feelings for utena.
(side note: Did I mention I have a shirt of the back rose signet? It's a black on black design and It's what originally started making me watch the anime.)
Edit:Sorry for the stupid error.
Utena the series is crazy awesome. Watching it through once you should be able to "get it". But once you know the truth from the ending, you can watch it a second time and the show is completely different. It's sort of like watching the 6th sense for a second time, it's completely different.
If we don't do a show on this soon, there's a good chance I'll make a spoiler thread here to discuss it in greater detail. There are specific events in the show I'd need to cite to prove my point.
On that note, I suppose I'm going to have to watch this series now, huh? Tho I'm extremely skeptical; I keep hearing things about the movie and cars and things ...
/I kid kid.
//They have all have a fantastic orgy in the end.
Once you've seen Utena all the way through, the show is different from the very first. Immediately, you can see all sorts of things that before were puzzling but now make sense. Words characters say now suddenly have new meaning. You start to figure out what those spinning roses meant, and why different colours appeared at different times.
Let's take an example. I don't think this will spoil anything unless you've been preternaturally perceptive throughout the show thus far.
In the first story arc, there is a scene where Anthy, having been "kidnapped," appears captive in the dueling arena amidst extremely strange and seemingly unexplainable scenery. A cataclysmic event then occurs. Now, this being anime, it's easy to write off what happened as just some cliched overdramatic scene. Events like that happen all the time in animated shows. The audience moves on and just accepts what happened without a second thought.
Think about it more critically. It doesn't make sense what happened, does it? Hell, the castle in the sky doesn't make any sense. None of it does. Nonetheless, that castle is there, floating. It's not just a postulate of the setting that this castle appears in the sky. That's not "just the way this world works.'
One of the things that makes Utena great is that there are no "anime cliches." That scene wasn't just animated that way to be pretty. Castles don't just float in the sky. Anthy's Rose Bride powers aren't just some unexplained setting/plot device. These things are all explained. They're all self-consistent. By the end of the show, you come to realize that you could have taken all of those things at face value, not just as stylistic elements, and that the show still -works-.
Utena is a fairy tale. It is, independently and parallel to this, a tale of mental illness. It is allegory for adolescence. It is a straight-forward fantasy. It is a straight-forward science-fiction. Any of these is accurate. The show is entirely self-consistent within multiple frameworks.
I think he was there for a reason...
By the way, I made a conclusion about the movie/series connections without spoiling the TV series. (That much.)
Akio most loved thing sex and cars, both which in the series symbolize maturity, now putting that aside, when he takes people to end of the world don't you realized they are driving the same rode Utena and Anthy were driving during the movie?
Also since the movie is called adolescence of Utena, won't her turning into a car symbolizes her maturing?
Isn't that the same with Anthy being more...Horny?
By the way here's something to entretain you.
Anthy sleeps with the rose champion.
Utena sleeps with Anthy because she IS the rose champion.
Touga sleeps with anyone who is willing.
Saionji wants to sleep with Anthy.
Nanami does not sleep with anyone, but acts like she does.
Miki sleeps with no one, but quests for a shinning thing, and is molested often by Juri.
Juri wants to sleep with Shiori(who sleeps with everyone) but molests Miki.
Kozue is Miki's sister, and tries like hell to sleep with Miki.
Akio sleeps with anything that moves and some things that don't.
I didn't get it.
My impression is that it is a random show with weird stuff in it just for the sake of being weird, with ambiguous endings for characters that I didn't really care about. All the duels seem to have nothing to do with what is supposedly "really" going on in the show, and what is "really" going on didn't really make much sense.
Any help? Some people speak very highly of this show, but I just didn't understand what was so good about this. I'm willing to give it a chance though. What am I missing?
So how does this metaphor play out?
Utena can't possibly be only -one- metaphor, I think. It's one of those fun pieces of art that you can give several different meanings and have endless interpretations. I'd also recommend discussion.
Also, IMO, the movie isn't as bad as Rym thinks. He told me not to bother with it, but I did, and I liked it. Although that might be because I'm such a huge lesbian. My mind was thoroughly screwed, but no worse than it has been by several other media I've subjected it to. Just don't watch the movie in an attempt to figure out the series. View them as two entirely separate entities.
A discussion would be totally interesting! There is a bunch of stuff in Utena that could be symbolic of more than one thing, and a WHOLE LOT of things that aren't just flat out explained. Heck, there could be a whole discussion on the "Kashira" girls.
As far as the movie, perhaps I'll watch it someday, but I have to watch Firefly first. XD
In the indefinite wait until such an episode is released, at least there is quite a bit of existing Utena analysis out there that you can lose yourself in for hours on end. Most of the good stuff is housed at Empty Movement and its forum, In the Rose Garden. Topics range from broad series analysis to individual character studies to teeny-tiny detail analyses (seriously, there's even an essay excerpt at EM discussing a one-shot reference to two famous paintings by Manet and Titian in the Black Rose Saga). If there's a point you're curious about, it's bound to be in there somewhere; even if you don't agree with what others have come up with, it should at least give you food for thought.
Also, Utena has been re-licensed by Right Stuf. 3 DVD sets (instead of like 86 of them), remastered edition. Maybe this could be a good reason to spur you guys into doing a final thoughts episode soooomeday soon....
Prediction:Touga hates Nanami and will eventually kill her.