Understanding Utena Vid
i cannot stand american pronounciation of japanese names god.
have you no ears on your head? it’s UTena not uTENa
it’s NaNAmi, not NAnami. UGH
fortunately this guy is completely followable and non-annoying at 1.25 speed.
and has some REALLY good points:
Childhood identity/ideals/false beliefs being incompatible with adult reality - thus crisis - thus revolution/destructive change is necessary
(as opposed to the positive view, that moving from childhood is an evolutionary process of layered construction of knowledge)
good thinking about adolescence
the duelists have been moved from no control (childhood) into a place where they have the illusion of control (adolescence) while adulthood is realising that they could smash their shells (false beliefs) themselves and don’t need help/rituals from End of the World
But akio is just using their dysfunction so they can fulfill roles
‘the two main triggers for the beginning of adolescence: sexual awakaning and the recognition of one’s own mortality, are not issues that institutions and authority figures are equipped to handle (with e.g. one-size-fits-all rituals - also bc those rituals were illusions to make them think eternity was achievable? and the dueling more than a scheme)’
true
school (academic achievement being so closely tied to self-worth) inhibits the self-reflection that is necessary for adolescents to become adults...hm...a bit of a leap.
yes and adolescents are very easily influenced and coerced and all that
i think that these are a lot of good thoughts on the adolescence themes in Utena, but doesn’t really connect them to how Utena actually brought about revolution - i.e. the whole selfishness vs. love. prince vs. love. theme. Utena and Anthy do learn how to talk to each other like adults, and confess how they feel, how they hurt and used each other, and they apologise. Utena essentially breaks through her prince ideal as part of her ego but she doesn’t at that time seem to yet give up the ideal of a prince. That’s only after it’s failed her, after Akio fails her, and Dios fails her, and she tries to save Anthy herself. That’s when she gives it up I think, and goes to save Anthy as only herself, as a girl, because she ISN’T a prince, as everybody keeps telling her (Anthy, Dios). Only when she thinks she has failed because she is not a prince she thinks.... But she HAS saved her, through simply wanting to save her from suffering, through persistence, through love. She leaves the coffin because she has overcome false memories of the romantic ideal of a prince, false belief in princes as saviours. (and yet becomes most the self-sacrificial prince...? a personal one, simply a person wanting the person she loves to be happy and to be with her)
