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EP. REVIEW: Revolutionary Girl Utena

The most heartbreaking moment in the whole series is when Anthy immediately starts addressing Utena as "Tenjou-san" instead of "Utena-sama" after Touga wins the duel, as if they are strangers. There's a more obvious physical betrayal at the end of the series, but this one struck me as more cruel. What could be worse than discovering that your closest friend was just pretending to like you from the very beginning?

So, what happened to these reviews? They got me to finally watch Utena, and I was watching at the pace the reviews came out, and then they suddenly stopped after changing schedule. Everything okay with Jacob?

They start back up on July 21st.

On its surface, this might appear to be a simple and silly morality play about the dangers of vanity, like "The Emperor's New Clothes" with an udderly absurd twist.

Of course, all these morbid messages are totally tenderized by the ridiculous reality of this episode's plot.

I don't think I was ever able to bring myself to hate Shiori. I just felt sad. Which would probably infuriate her much worse than being hated.

I have trouble imagining what she would be like if not for the way she keeps hurting herself and Juri. That aspect of her is so overwhelming that I struggle to think of what her neglected strengths even are. Which may just underscore her tragedy all the more.

Sort of off topic, but something I've been thinking about. I don't mean to defend current gender and sexual inequalities, but I sort of was wondering what specifically Jake's is meaning when talking about the status quo in society. Obviously I don't think that traditions should be imposed on people merely because 'that's the way it's always been', but is it wrong to identify with and derive value from cultural norms, so long as you don't force others to abide by it? Though, I would say it does benefit people to be self-aware of how their beliefs are shaped by their culture, even if they do ultimately identify with them.

I'm not sure if you're referring to a specific mention by Jake of the status quo, but you've kind of answered your own question there. In the world of Ohtori, everyone is imposed on, even our heroine, for all Utena's obviously good qualities. Touga is caught up in the idea of what a "prince" should be, Saionji is practically drowning in toxic masculinity, Juri is slowly dying inside due to a world that expects heterosexuality, etc., etc. All these ideas, of how people should act according to their genders, of how relationships are "supposed" to go, those are examples of real life status quo ideas--you only have to look so far as the pervasive "Men are from Mars, women are from Venus" silliness for that--which are being extracted from their real-life entanglements and placed in a microcosm, the school, so that viewers can more readily examine what those confines mean, especially for people who do not adhere to them.

There is no "not forcing people to abide by cultural norms" in this show--and yes, that extends to Utena herself as well--and that's in part because many, many cultural norms are simply taken for granted and not examined unless one is directly confronted with it, like many of these characters are.