Utena Thread

This show was crazy. Haven't seen a thread about it in a minute and just finished it, so I'm making it.

Love this.

I get the relationship stuff but what the fuck was Dios? Some kind of god? What was Akio going to do when he could revolutionize the world?

lesbian trash.

Dios was Akio's past self. The one Anthy sacrificed herself for/loved. Also Utena's prince.

I know that but what was Dios himself? From what i gather he was a highly revered prince with some power (unless all of it was only a metaphor).

Dios was simply a prince who went around saving a lot of women. He gained his power himself but was worked so hard by saving the women he nearly died, leading to Anthy sacrificing herself for him.
Dios and Akio are the same character, with their names being a clever reference to Lucifer: a fallen angel.

Plan on watching Adolescence of Utena user? It's a pretty interesting take on the series, my only compliant is how much less of a bastard they make Akio. RGU has the most perfect ending to an anime ever.

If Dios was a god than Akio is a devil. Dios was the prince archetype incarnate to put it simply, I'm pretty sure the show never truly states what he is.

As for Akio, probably expand his reach to beyond just the school. The term "revolutionize the world" becomes a lot more interesting when you remember that revolution also means to go around in circles. Check out ohtori.nu for more in depth analysis/resources

I dunno, I always thought of his figure as an illusion/reminder of past ideals that no longer exist in Akio.
When he existed, he had some sort of important power which those townspeople wanted.

What was your favorite duel?

It's a tie between Wakaba's and Juri's final duel for me.

Fuck yeah I need to watch Adolescence of Utena. I'm just gonna give myself a little bit of time to let the series digest and then watch it.

My favorite duel was Juri's last duel, Touga's last duel, the FINAL duel and finale in general as well as Touga vs Utena round 1.

>Overly long metaphor or something about muff diving

You ever think about just how fucking well written the characters in this show are?

His important power was his sword: the sword of Dios. It was the most powerful due to the power of his noble heart. When Anthy sacrifices herself for him though, he stops having such a noble heart and chooses not to be Dios anymore.

Juri's arc is mind blowingly good.
I especially love the first shadow girl's scene in her episode with the one complaining about the zoo and not going because she was sick, while the other simply replies "You really wanted to go, didn't you?"
Good shit

The Wakaba duel will always be my number 1. It ditches any pretence of having fight choreography and focuses on what the show does best- delivering raw emotion.

If we're counting the movie though, I'd say that Juri's movie duel is my favourite as far as a conventional duel goes. The fact that the duel is set on a walkway means that the animators have to get more creative with how the characters move. On top of that, the duel theme is amazing and the way it synchs with the final strike is 10/10.

never post that again

so who was in the wrong here

Top ten questions science still can't answer

Get that nasty crap out of here how dare you post that shit.

Touga a best boy

that's not how you spell Miki user!

Why couldn't she just rationally explain to the angry mob that he was sick?

What kind of black magic was JA Seazer using to make the duel themes sound so good? I don't think I've heard any kind of music that sounds even remotely like them (other JA Seazer albums not withstanding).

They'd still force him out. They're the same people who threw like 100+ swords into a little girl, so...

...

>tfw you fail at having any real problems
Being the onion prince is suffering.

Now that you've reminded me of this duel I want to make webms.

anthy and akio are a sort of buddhist spirit (hence the bindis, but have japanese names)

they control the gates that spirits pass through to enter into different stages of enlightenment

hence the time dilation, the memories being lost, miki recording the time constantly, etc.

...

goddamn Wakaba was ruthless during this duel.

the duels are boring because utena never loses

juri's are the only interesting ones

I am emotionally invested in saionji though

lots of drugs and disharmonics

he made plays for the 60s communist protests before they got beat up for being retards

yeah, the sakuga was off the charts for this particular duel, I wonder who was the animator.

>the duels are boring because utena never loses

She never really wins either though which makes it interesting

anthy

is there a reason fat people attack skinny people and blacks attack europeans?

people hate things they cannot achieve

...

uh.... she does though

...

best arcs
1. nanami
2. mikage
3. saionji
4. juri
5. dios
6.besto tomodatchi
...
10000000. utena

Juri's final duel is heartbreaking, and has the best song imo. Mikage's is a close second

I mean... if you call getting your soul sword stolen from you and almost becoming a Rose Bride a win...

no. but the duels mostly have no tension

>$130 for the 20th anniversary blu-ray boxset collection

fug

Sakugabooru says Yoh Yoshinari. No wonder.

honestly, that's a great price.

So did Miki and his sister fuck?

Didn't he also do the key animation for Asuka's fight against the MP Evas in Eoe?

Considering getting this so hard right now since I just finished the show and it's half off on Amazon. My heart is torn on if I should or not

fuck this bitch
i genuinely hated her, more than akio, even

Nah but Kozue definitely wanted his dick. I'm not sure how requited their love was since Miki seemed infatuated with the past Kozue, not the current one.

Same situation here user. Think I'm gonna wait til my next paycheck and bite the bullet because FUCK I want those rings.

OP here, how would you all rank the different Utena sagas?

Mine goes:
Apocalypse Saga > Akio Saga > Student Council saga > Black Rose Saga

That being said, I loved all of them. Black Rose had a great ending, but I enjoyed the introductions of the SC just a bit more.

miki is infatuated by the idea of purity. he could see his sister turning into a real person, not an ideal, so he ran

he is kind of a reverse akio, hence he is the only other one to notice that time doesnt progress in ohtori

Apocalypse > Black Rose > Akio > Student Council
i'm conflicted on the akio saga; half of it i really like and half of it i don't

apoc>black rose=sc>akio

utena's arc is pretty bland desu

I can see why you wouldn't like some of Akio's, but man, shit got really real.

The price cut is really good and the individual arcs on Blu Ray is so expensive it equals about the same price... honestly about to bite the bullet as well

How can one man be so suave?

130 for 39 episodes isn’t that bad. I’m considering it. Fancy merch is around that price plus you have to pay for shipping from Japan.

B E S T G I R L
E
S
T

G
I
R
L

That isn't Nanami

That was Iso Mitsuo if I recall.

He isn’t and you know it.

Agreed.

It's actually the only part of the manga worth discussing and Ikuhara alludes to it a little in commentaries.

Basically actual gods or rather a species that was revered as gods and the basis of our myth.

as big of a shit saionji was i ended up feeling a lot for him because he was shaped into the worst fucking guy because of his extreme jealously and inferiority complex with touga, that touga made even worse because he was jealous and resentful of saionji's innocence. what a shit lord.

I ordered it just for the art book.

So did Akio fuck every one of the duelists?

kill yourself my man

saionji is probably one of the nicest guys n utena. the difference is that he is unafraid. he mostly avoids the petty drama of the council

he never lies or manipulates others, if he has a grudge he states it, and the only thing he seeks is something eternal

he is even very kind to akaba

he never even uses others until the moment he discovers the rose bride has no soul (true.)

he had been led into believing that anthy desired an eternal hero.

Yes

I have to agree. Honestly, I never really felt too much hatred for Akio because it was hard for me to like Anthy in the first place.

Reminder that this show is simultaneously a critique of gender roles and a critique of feminist critique of gender roles. It's genius.

How is it this underrated? It for the magical girl genre and female anime in general (think rose of versailles) what EVA did for mech anime and boy anime in general. Easily top 3 most important anime ever made.

Dios was the personification of the prince archetype seen in girl anime.

In fact, ever character was such a personification. Every conflict in the show arises from the character's failure to be what they are supposed to be (the damsel in distress, the knight in shining armor) and so on.

I suppose one could also argue that the show is thus a critique of those roles all together and not actually of the failure of real people to fit those roles.

Maybe not Juri cause he didn't talk about the roaring engine which is a metaphor for his penis.

For idiots like you, sure.

>Utena
>underrated

it's about the class struggle

Utena:
some school life

identical sword fights with no cause, other than time for sword fight

some symbolism

that scene

the ending: which didn't even matter at that point, cause it's all symbolism. was there ever really a school? was there ever really any of that shit? or was it all just symbolism?!?

only good character was Nanami
best episodes were Nanami Episodes

nice tard spacing tard

>utena
>underrated

thanks man, I like spacing things out like that, brings order, looks good.

Wakaba is the only good character in this overrated piece of shit, written by a complete hack.

Nice abuse of spoiler tag

>a critique of feminist critique of gender roles
wait someone explain this to a brainlet, I already knew about the feminist stuff but I wasn't aware of this

she was all right, but not really a character, though she should have been.

there just wasn't any time for good characters in this show, what with those behind-the-curtain play scenes and the repeat climbing-the-tower scenes... the fat had to be trimmed

>nigga you literally too good for this shit. go home

Basically what this guy was saying . All the bad shit that happens in the game is because DIos can't save the damsel in distress, Anthy doesn't want to the evil outsider, and Utena wants to be the knight in shining armor even though she's a chick.

If everyone met their prescribed gender roles, there would be no problem.

What's other anime like Utena? A shoujo that doesn't follows the typical girl-meets-boy romance and has some depth to it. I tried Mawaru Penguindrum but I didn't like it very much.

Touga's second duel. I'll never forget how satisfying was to watch Utena recovering from his existencial crisis and owning him. The music was perfect too.

Looking for a shoujo like utena is exactly like looking for a mech anime like eva. There are none. Akemru hoga eii yo.

Oniisama e?

There a download for the movie in 1080p anywhere that isn't AB or bakabt?

the school is a sort of buddhist limbo, but not for the dead. but a place for all souls trapped in samsara, hence time does not move

good posts

to add

juri refuses to accept her feminine nature and becomes brittle and helpless
saionji cant accept full duty
miki cannot leave the nest in earnest, torturing his sister
I forgot touga
nanami is probably going to be the first one to leave after utena

Yes, they did during the Akio arc, nest box scene made it obvious.

And they even got together at the end, just like Jury/Shiori.

People tend to have surprisingly bad understanding of their relationship and Miki's character arc.

miki's character arc is that he cannot treat his sister as a real person

I'm not sure if there is evidence they ever got further than uncomfortable obsession

Am I the only one who didn’t like most of the duels? The vast majority of them literally just went

>utena gets beaten down
>maybe dodges the finishing attack, probably with The Backflip
>O MY POWER OF DIOS
>utena wins instantly

That being said Utena vs Touga 3 was kino

how did fukiko know that nanako had a relationship with takehiko in the first place? apparently that's the reason why nanako was admitted to the sorority, but fukiko had no idea until she found nanako's letter to takehiko

Rose of Versailles
Oniisama e
Princess Tutu

Your welcome.

The duels aren’t about the fights themselves, but rather about the internal conflict that occurs within the duellists as they fight. I would go so far as to argue that Utena isn’t even a protagonist for the majority of the series and just exists to be a punching bag that the duellists can project their personal demons onto- This is particularly true in the BR arc.