/anime/ - Anime

unironically yes

>>14312
oh okay thanks

It's a masterpiece, go watch it. Anime series first, movie later.

It is probably more apolitical in the way that Terayama's, whom had influence on Ikuhara, works are, but as a work of animated art it's quite excellent. There are some funny allusions to classic shoujo in the televised Shoujo Kakumei Utena series also. On rewatch it's even better.

There's even a date-sim game based off of the series, and it's quite wild.

The troupe that did the music for Terayama's flicks supposedly did the duel music for the later parts of the Utena anime, for another bit of Terayama trivia.

Could Shounenou be considered leftist or fascistic.

its soundtrack was done by J.A. Seazer, who also worked with leftist filmmaker Shuji Terayama, who produced Throw Away Your Books, Rally in the Streets

But is terayama even leftist though?

>>14324
yes? why would you doubt he was

>>14337
otome games ARE dating sims…

>>14324
No. Like most nips he's apolitical.

>>14338
Not all otome games are dating sims.

>>14346
theyre literally a subcategory of dating sims

Anyways, this file here, that is reposted from that other thread on Ikuhara, seems oddly relevant to Utena.

>>14337
Most strictly defined, the game could be said to not be a "date simulator", but there are familiar game mechanics like "character routes" that have the player build up relationships with various characters from the Utena series. And IIRC the player can actually have the main player-character bed certain characters in the game?

>>14324
His work more likely comes off apolitical, inspired by the aesthetic of the Japanese New Left but not so purposely political in orientation to be a call to true revolutionary transformation of society in the way that the Soviet Union's revolutionary productions often did; the mentality at play is more of a "politics is not as useful as art at the transformation of society" and a "the world is like a play" sorts of attitude probably, and the very experimental productions explore unconventional theatrical practices and psychological topics like innocence.

When does the show get good? I watched the first three episodes and was painfully bored by it.

>>14372
Oldfag here, it's a bit like NGE, it's for a bit of a specific audience, and like most older media in anime takes thing slower and has a lot of dialogue involved. The latter is something that shouldn't be an issue if you're interested.
As a side note, I was never into Utena but I recognize its artistic metric.

>>14338
>>14347
A dating simulator is not the same thing as a VN. They often overlap or have similar themes and objectives, but they're separate things. Most otome games are visual novels, not dating simulators. Peopl in the west think every anime-style game about romance is a "dating sim" but that's wrong.

Dating simulators are like Tokimeki Memorial, Love Plus or Doukyuusei; VNs are like Clannad, Katawa Shoujo or NekoPara. All of these games are galge (the standard romance/erotic anime game with a male protagonist and female love interests, made for straight men) despite being in different formats.
In short, for it to be "simulation" it has to, logically, have simulation aspects (most notably stat building), not just plain reading endless blocks of text and occasionally picking a dialogue option or story action. Galge used to be almost synonymous with dating simulation but after the 2000s the dating sim genre has been dead and almost all galge are mainly visual novels nowadays.

Otome games are the same (but with the sexes inverted), they can be one or the other, but the vast majority of them, like galge, are visual novels, not dating simulators. An otome dating sim is like Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side, My Candy Love and RE:Alistair; an otome visual novel is like Hakuoki, Diabolik Lovers or Bustafellows. The Utena game doesn't seem to have any simulation mechanics, so it would qualify as a VN and not a dating sim.

If it must be political though…
Perhaps it's more than a bit of a stretch to say, but could the final few episodes of Utena, within context of the Western leftist milieu, be partially considered an allegory for the defeat of the New Left, through co-optation, degeneration, or glowie attacks and the descent of its politics, theory, and praxis into masochistic valorization of failure and vulgar rebellion, alienated from the popular masses from which traditional Lefts have based themselves? After all Akio could be like many of the jaded and nihilistic Western leftists, who constantly fight the same battles by the same failed methods, over and over, and groom the next generation of radicals into the same futile battles for their castles-in-the-sky, forever enthralled to the "beautiful soul"'s effectively unrealizable ideals, the proud radicals who seek to transform the world yet refuse any of the successes of actual socialist states because of their purported distance from the fanciful, chauvinistic, utopian idealistic delusions such imperial Western leftists are prone to.
And afterwards, when their proffered sword of revolution proves once again to be insufficient after the tumult of the '60s and '70s, the status quo ever more firmly reasserts itself, the campus returned to normalcy almost as Akio's Ohtori Academy seemed to have reverted; but at least, for the anime world's side, Utena's narrative concludes on an optimistic note, where despite Utena's failure to revolutionize the world her act did shift the overall situation to improve if ever subtly, which still could end up the fate or the ultimate political impact of the New Leftists.
Also, has anyone read Demian because of this cartoon?

Ikuhara deleted all his political tweets but once basically said "right or left doesn't matter, don't vote for people who want to censor shit"

Not Utena content exactly, but this possibly could be relevant…
>https://www.chinanews.com.cn/cul/news/2010/05-31/2314781.shtml
Director has some of what could maybe be called quasi-materialist remarks on the relationship of Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon and more women's entrance into the Japanese workplace at the time.

Could Akio have been saved by Hegel?

>>14372
>>14373
you can recognize the good direction on some episodes, and the complex character, even forgive shit like the bad animation and slide show episodes. But also have to recognize that nobody that is actually sane can get through 10 episodes that are basically 70% repeated footage with only 30 % that is different, holy shit the early episodes all have the same beats, the elevator sequence, the fight, the different speaches. That only ever starts to get better like halfway through. I know we were all amazed by the moving colors in the 90s, but this is simply unforgivable today

>>18118
Not the first time I've read something like that. Other scholars pointed out that a law passed in the 80s to help women stay in the workforce brought a new type of magical girl: the kind that fights evil with her powers, so sailor moon.
>>18224
>. But also have to recognize that nobody that is actually sane can get through 10 episodes that are basically 70% repeated footage with only 30 % that is different, holy shit the early episodes all have the same beats, the elevator sequence, the fight, the different speaches.
Those are part of Ikuhara's style. All his anime have such things, it's part of his charm as a director.

>>18238
That's bullshit, why isn't that a problem in the second half, or in mawaru penguin drum? Besides that what kinda directorial choice is it to have entire episodes of footage loops, like episode 7 I think it contained like 2 minutes of original animation, 1 at the beginning and one at the end and the rest was recycled animation loops, maybe I'm exaggerating a little bit, maybe It was like 4 min, but you seriously think this is a valid direction choice, what is it trying to say? Commenting on the futility of watching anime? Lmao

>>14310
it's a show about being gay with your aunt