anime, mostly

[rushthatspeaks]

Not doing well with the grief over the cat. Really feeling lousy most of the time. Just very bad.

Also we are in Los Angeles for a family wedding and I wish I felt up to coordinating with L.A. people and honestly so far I have barely been up to leaving the hotel for wedding stuff, so there's that.

I've been watching the new Ikuhara anime, Sarazanmai, which is at least pleasantly distracting, because I have no idea what on earth it is about or how he got a major television network to air it. Like, I thought I knew a fair bit about Kunihiko Ikuhara's id, but, as with any major artist, there is always more there?

Ikuhara's two settings seem to be Great Classic That Changed My Life (all forms of Utena, the Sailor Moon R movie, Yurikuma Arashi-- okay, maybe not a classic, though I think it will hold up over time, but it is one of the anime that has made me cry hardest) and Bzuh??? (Mawaru Penguindrum, which has some interesting ideas but did not stick the landing).

So far Sarazanmai is probably both? I mean as of episode three I think it's very good, and also I am confused even for an Ikuhara series.

Things Sarazanmai might be about:

-- toxic masculinity
-- adolescent struggles with Emotions, How Do
-- a love letter to the neighborhood of Asakusa
-- the way the Japanese government intentionally drove Japan's single indigenous species of otter to extinction
-- kappa
-- toxic heteronormativity
-- having the animation budget to do all the prettiness Ikuhara has ever wanted and not been able to afford
-- let's have duel songs again, too, why not

Things Sarazanmai is definitely about:

-- butts

I mean, it is really about butts. As in, I looked up an interview with Ikuhara to see how he had gotten the butt-stuff-related content on the air, and he was all 'oh I just didn't tell the studio about the butts until they had already written me the check', and I was like well, good job, but what did your pitch even look like without the butts, because they are the one thing I can actually determine the show is, in fact, about.

This means that the show has... okay, there's a thing my household used to call the Lone Wolf and Cub problem, because the extremely long and incredibly good manga Lone Wolf and Cub has volumes that are smaller in dimension than most manga volumes, meaning that it's very tempting to take it with you in a bag and read it on, say, public transit. But you must never do this, because, while vast stretches of the series are Buddhist philosophy and gorgeous landscape art and adorable toddler, whenever you are on public transit, someone will look over your shoulder and there will be, oh, literal nun-raping, and they will stare at you as if to ask who let you out in public and why. That is the Lone Wolf and Cub problem.

Sarazanmai has a different but related problem, in that, if someone were to walk in at the wrong moment while you are watching it, there is no way you could ever possibly explain what is going on, and it would be horrifically embarrassing to have to try. Because of the butts. It is a great candidate for Worst First Anime Ever.

There are supposed to be eleven episodes. If I ever figure out what the show is doing, besides, um, folklore-based proctology, I will be certain to let you all know.

Comments

[skygiants]

The thing that really impresses me about that article is the part where he's like 'oh, I just kept expecting that eventually somebody on the production team would stop me, and nobody ever did!' I can only conclude that if you sign up to work with Ikuhara at all, you go in with the pre-emptive expectation that he will present you with something incomprehensible and you prepare your "well, this might as well happen" response in advance.

(Interestingly, I actually felt like Mawaru PenguinDrum stuck the landing, but did not stick absolutely anything else.)

[starlady]

So, I have heard from Japanese Twitter that episode 6 is "god-level" and has to be seen to be believed. What could be coming, I don't know, but I am looking forward to finding out.

Also, I think toxic heteronormativity is definitely a thing it is about. I think it may also be about redevelopment in Tokyo for the Olympics but I'm not sure about that yet.

I actually really enjoyed Penguindrum all the way through, but I still need to see Yuri Kuma Arashi. I should rewatch Utena, I bought the LE Blu-Ray and everything.

[landingtree]

I want to watch this in order to become less confused. Even though it sounds like that isn't really going to be a helpful approach.

I was pointed to Revolutionary Girl Utena by bits of your journal where you mentioned it glowingly in passing, years ago, before I'd read any of the bits which would have told me anything else about it -- or seen any other anime, give or take Miyazaki. As a first anime, it was extremely strange. I started watching and just about didn't stop for three or four days, emerging occasionally to go to school or to say something like, "Body-switching curry?" About half that time I spent annoyed with the pacing and/or the small animal, but the other half of the time caused me not to stop, and has clearly stuck with me even though I don't remember many of the details, because I still whistle tunes from it at least once a week, and find the tunes moving, and I still have to weed my writing for randomly-sprouting rose symbolism. I really should watch it again and see what happened.

[heavenscalyx]

I still have to weed my writing for randomly-sprouting rose symbolism

I just don't bother any more. *points to user name and icon, which have remained unchanged since I started LJ in 2002*

ETA: Also, I shrieked when my wife read me the Utena reference sprinkled into Yoon Ha Lee's Machineries of Empire. Shrieked, I tell you.

[landingtree]

Also, I shrieked when my wife read me the Utena reference sprinkled into Yoon Ha Lee's Machineries of Empire.

I'm very curious. I've been unsure if I wanted to read those or not, and that definitely falls on the 'yes' side of the scale.

[heavenscalyx]

Don't get too attached to anyone in the first book, but the second book and so far the third book are even better and more satisfying. The characters are nearly all very likable mass murderers (because military-political space opera), mostly with consciences about it.

[sovay]

folklore-based proctology

I mean, I haven't seen that in a TV show before, but I'm not totally sure I want to.

Love.

[heavenscalyx]

Much sympathy on the handling of cat grief. When we lost our Very Special Kitten No Really She Was The First Cat We Got Together 20 Years Earlier, we discovered that playing Diablo 3 for a couple of weeks helped turn our brains off. I know that this is more difficult for people who have to provide caregiving for smol humans, but if videogames are at all your jam, I highly recommend them for all sorts of pain management. (I survived my shoulder freezing after I broke it with a lot of wee-hours-of-the-morning playing of Plants vs. Zombies.)

[jmtorres]

Hey, I live in the LA area, and niqaeli will be coming out to visit me tomorrow. How long are you here for? Would you be up for us coming to your hotel for a meal, even if you aren't up for going out? Feel free to ignore me if this is exactly the kind of coordination you are not up to. No pressure!

[rushthatspeaks]

Wedding today/tonight, and we leave late afternoon tomorrow, but would you guys be interested in breakfast/brunch tomorrow? My hotel won't work, as it is under renovations and barely has a lobby let alone a restaurant, but I am sure there is somewhere that will give us food (possibly somewhere one of you knows about)?

My email is this username, no caps or spaces, at gmail, for further coordination purposes.

Also, thank you, you were quite high on my list of People I Want To See But Oh God Wrangling Things Oh God.

[kate_nepveu]

Sympathies.

Also, my goodness.

[nineweaving]

Much sympathy.

Nine