Question for the Oniisama e... fandom: is there an analysis about the narrative function of dolls throughout the story? There should probably be even more than one given that dolls are such a huge element, presented to the audience since the opening of the first episode so...
I'M SO GLAD YOU ASKED, I love the imagery of dolls in this anime so much it hurts.
To put it very, very shortly: they represent childhood, and generally the theme of the "past" along with innocence and purity.
Obvious spoiler warning under the cut β
This is mostly seen and explained with the fact that Rei sees Nanako as her "ChΓ©rie la PoupΓ©e". This element is part of the reason why Rei grows so attached to Nanako too. The doll, not only physically resembles Nanako (which is relevant too, we will get to that in a second), but just like the doll that Fukiko gifted her, preserves a certain kind of "purity". Rei percieves Nanako as someone yet untouched by the sufferance of growing up, she has yet to change and is still in that stage of life where everything is hidden behind a veil of tender naivetΓ©. Nanako is still exempt from the changes that time inevitably brings with it. We must mention that Rei is an incredibly static character, that is directly antithetical to change. In fact, she is not THE DOLL per se, as she does not align with its rooted purity and innocence, but she's instead the one who always keeps it close to her, as if she could go back to the time when the object was gifted to her, to when it was directly relevant to her life and not just a faint memory of what once was. (Because you know, Rei is morbidly attached to the Doll, as she is to the past).
Dolls , much like childhood, are something that the charcters must leave in the past in order to both grow up and move on from certain events, chaining them down and holding them back. The opening alludes to that in the form of this girl departing on a beautiful carriage, briefly looking back at the doll she is leaving behind, only to never face it again afterwards. Immediatly after she looks at the doll we see her meeting someone, presumably her lover, presumably the one she is going towards in the carriage. The doll is something still and inert, something that was once part of her life but that she must leave behind, it represents the childhood this girl is abandoning to pursue her love. (yes I do think that the color palette of this opening's young woman is relevant to Kaoru's character but this is off-topic atm).
Going back to the duality between Nanako and Rei's doll. They look similar, because Nanako is still immature and naΓ―ve, especially if compared to characters like Rei, Kaoru and Fukiko. For her character, the doll element alignes with her enrollment in highschool and her consequential first steps into this new adult world. We experience it through the harshness of the sorority, and we even get to see it whenever Nanako comments or is generally surprised about Mariko's maturity, and how much sge seems "more grown up" even though they are the same age. She has to leave behind the childlike wonder with which she left middle school and step into this new, real, adult world. This is also why Nanako is the only character associated to a doll. Everyone else has had a taste of the real world, she didn't.
So yeah dolls are very important and I could talk about them for DAYS.
We see a bunch of dolls in Fukiko's summer house room (the analysis of the rooms' structure too, it's incredibly interesting, maybe another time). It makes sense visually because it's a place stuck in time, but the symbolism behind the is so, so powerful. Rei has only one doll, one that FUKIKO gave her, one that chains her down to her, and to what she had done to her in the past. Fukiko has multiple, all stacked precisely as they were the day the Henmi accident happened. She cannot move on from that damned summer day. She cannot move on from the day Rei saw her crying. She cannot move on from the fact that she hates Rei for being the constant reminder of her father's infidelity - but at the same time she needs her close because she is the only one who has proven to be a source of constant attentions. To her Rei is a possession, much like, you guessed it folks, a doll. And so she gifts her one, in hopes that, just like one she doesn't change. In a sort of way, To Fukiko, her sister is sort of what Nanako is to Rei, but without a bunch of sweet sentiment behind it.
AMAZING ANALYSIS
