lol are one of those characters who you thought "were as straight as boiled pasta" Ayame by any chance? Because seriously, I was definitely getting the gay vibe from him, I mean Takaya can say whatever she wants, his devotion to Hatori did NOT look platonic, there was definitely something more there.
Well, he is a snake! Snakes coil around all over the place.
I can see him being into Mine, but I read him as being cheerfully pansexual and not really caring what anyone thinks about it. One of the things bell and I discussed in one of our posts is how Akito latched on to all of the adult Juunishi men except for Ayame, and I guessed that one reason was because things tend to slide off Ayame like water, so it's harder to make a mark on him in that sense. (And especially so in the past, given that he became more inclined to self-reflection in the present.) That, and I'm assuming that Akito doesn't like effeminate men, given that she ignores Ritsu too.
But yeah, the fact that the series was all about unconditional love and acceptance and yet it didn't feature any LBGT characters was really disappointing and quite contradictory of its theme. Oh well, at least we can always hypothesize that perhaps some of the characters were bi, I still think Ayame is and honestly... I kinda feel Saki is a straight up lesbian! No joke, her feelings for Tohru reminded me alot of Tomoyo's feelings for Sakura and really I never took the whole pairing her up with Kazuma seriously. I don't think it ever became canon at the end and I firmly believe Saki was just joking around about having feelings for Kazuma, probably to annoy Kyo. XD
It's kind of hard not to read Hana-chan that way -- especially in her flashback chapter, where she thinks of both Uo and Tohru as her friends, but seems much more dependent on Tohru's kindness. The whole Hana/Kazuma bit was totally out of left-field for me too.
Yep, okay its now my very own little headcanon that Saki was meant to be lesbian and have an unrequited love for Tohru which was never fulfilled, putting her in the same camp as Momiji and Kagura. That actually makes me feel better about Takaya's lack of LBGT sensitivity, though I still wish there was at least one homosexual couple.
Word.
But damn, I'm surprised to hear that about other Shojo manga! Guess I'm glad those haven't ever really been brought over because I really can't stand it when series just completely ignore the subject all together and just act like their universe is a "perfect normal world where its all only straight people" yuck! :/
It's not only series where there's no queer characters/themes period; I'm also thinking of manga where they are introduced, only to be treated poorly by the narrative. And the frustrating thing is that a lot of series really do bring in tons of interesting ideas at the outset, and fulfill some of that promise, but then undermine it with regressive writing. This happens a LOT.
Oh yes, Utena is a masterpiece! It's simply breathtaking, though I agree with you on the manga, it was okay but not on the level of the anime. Which isn't surprising since the anime is the original work and the manga followed after. I've noticed that the work that comes first tends to be better than subsequent works in different mediums.
Re: Utena: probably still my favorite anime ever?!? I don't know, I haven't rewatched it in a while, but it is just so amazing. I can't imagine what my time in anime fandom would have been like if I hadn't stumbled on it.
And yeah, usually the source material is better, even wrt books-->movies and other adaptations. I think that when stories are adapted, a lot of attention had to be paid to the strengths and limitations of the medium, but a lot of the time, it's transcripted flat from one source to the other. (Like for example, I can't wait to see how Les Mis and The Great Gatsby are going to be adapted to film, but I'm also slightly apprehensive.)
Glad I wasn't the only one that was peeved with that little comment in the Fanbook, I thought that was completely uncalled for! But then again, I heard a rumor that Takaya gets extremely pissed if anyone makes yaoi or yuri doujinshi of her work and I think she even filed lawsuits against people who did that? If that rumor was true then I guess it's not surprising she made that comment in the fanbook.
Where did that rumor even come from? I've never heard of something like a lawsuit happening with any creator, much less with Takaya. I'm kind of skeptical, since copyright laws are so different from the West (and imo, more lax, given the rampant production and consumption of fan-marketed goods).
Really? You don't think Furuba is popular enough to get a remake? I thought it was the most popular shojo manga in America? Or at least that's what its logo was in all the Tokyopop editions. I've also heard it has quite the fandom overseas, I was always under the impression that it was one of more popular Shojo series, on par with Sailor Moon. But you're right, the anime by itself is a very good standalone product. The fact that it could produce such a fanbase of people who have never even read the manga really shows just how well done of a series it was from the material they had.
I think it was super popular when it was still in serialization, but it's still on the obscure side everything considered. Also, I wouldn't say it has a quarter of the impact and popularity Sailormoon does -- if I mention the latter to any of my students, they nod in recognition, but I'm pretty sure that Furuba is unheard of even with the geekier kids I know. Even though it won the Kodansha award, I think it had more recognition in the US overall? My memory is kind of fuzzy.
I still really really really reallly wish there'll be a remake someday, but oh well I'll just keep silently sitting here and hoping. :3
If it ever does, we can cheer for it together!
Ha-ha, I have no idea if Kyoko and Kyo have the same Kanji because I only read the English versions and I didn't know that's how you tell if the names are supposed to be similar. I'm still quite the beginner in Japanese, so I only go by hiragana and katakana. XD But really? You thought Ren was one of those unneeded characters? I thought she was pretty damn important since she was basically the series's main antagonist and most plot-oriented stories need a main antagonist.
Granted, she was an extremely underdeveloped one. For the kind of role she had she really should've shown up earlier in the manga or at least more often, I admit she definitely sucked as a villain.
Her role in the series is definitely important, but she's paper-thin as far as characterization goes. I think we basically agree, but we're expressing it in different ways.
Still, you bring up an interesting point: did Furuba need a main antagonist? For a long time, that seems to be the role that Akito plays, but as more of the characters' inner worlds are shown, the more it seems like the real antagonist is the Sohma curse itself. Furuba is definitely plot-oriented, but there's also an equal emphasis on character psychology and development. For example, the resolution of the story clicks not just with a literal turn in events (the curse breaking) but with emotional fulfillment and freedom as well. That's why I still can't help but think that inserting Ren as a villain was just...lacking, somehow.
Damn, with how you describe Yuki's character arc, I'm starting to see Machi as also one of the more "useless" later characters. Well, maybe not useless but it definitely would have made more of an impact if she'd just remained a side-character and was there to show how Yuki had finally found his place with a group of friends all his own. His whole involvement with the student council was about him taking charge of his life and moving on from the scars that his mother and Akito caused him. Him joining the student council and making friends with that whole group was basically him finally growing up and trying to make something of himself with everything that he's since learned with Tohru all ingrained within him.
The fact that Takaya decided to just ultimately focus on his relationship with Machi in particular definitely lessened the impact of his arc. That would've been absolutely brilliant if they just showed Yuki finding contentment in finally having friends that accepted and embraced the real him, since I think that's all he ever really wanted. He wanted true friends and unconditional acceptance, I don't know I never really saw him as the type that would end up in a relationship even before he was cast out of the running for Tohru's heart, I guess that's why the whole "she's like a mother to me" didn't bother me a whole lot.
It did click for me that Takaya thought of Yuki as the second protagonist of the story, after Tohru. That's why a lot of the student council focus chapters that baffled me while reading made sense in retrospect. If you look at it from the perspective of Yuki as "second love interest," it makes hardly any sense at all, but as a character with a solid (and separate) plotline of his own, it works perfectly. Maybe decoy protagonist is the right term to use here, since the amount of attention he and Kyou got were roughly equal until about volume eleven. After that, Yuki's development was mostly sans Tohru, and Kyou's was in conjunction with hers.
So with that established, maybe Takaya is just one of those writers who thinks that romance is a vital part of a main character's storyline??? Or maybe she didn't want it to seem like Yuki's development was overshadowed by everything else, and that romance would get more reader interest? Who knows.
Though ironically, I thought that would have suited Momiji's character more than Yuki's))
That would have been interesting!
But hey, at least we get happy singles with Momiji and Kagura... Though one could argue they're the characters with the saddest endings so maybe they don't really count?
They really did get the short end of the stick with everything, especially where Momiji's concerned. Out of all the Juunishi, Momiji is probably the one I feel most for; if any character deserved real happiness, it was him without a doubt. How do you feel about the way his character arc ends?
On a perfectly serious note, however, Kagura and Momiji seem very capable of ruling the entire world together one day. Through sheer cuteness and implausible age-denying abilities, if nothing else.
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ninetydegrees
Re: this is gonna be long
on 2012-11-16 07:11 am (UTC)Well, he is a snake! Snakes coil around all over the place.
I can see him being into Mine, but I read him as being cheerfully pansexual and not really caring what anyone thinks about it. One of the things bell and I discussed in one of our posts is how Akito latched on to all of the adult Juunishi men except for Ayame, and I guessed that one reason was because things tend to slide off Ayame like water, so it's harder to make a mark on him in that sense. (And especially so in the past, given that he became more inclined to self-reflection in the present.) That, and I'm assuming that Akito doesn't like effeminate men, given that she ignores Ritsu too.
But yeah, the fact that the series was all about unconditional love and acceptance and yet it didn't feature any LBGT characters was really disappointing and quite contradictory of its theme. Oh well, at least we can always hypothesize that perhaps some of the characters were bi, I still think Ayame is and honestly... I kinda feel Saki is a straight up lesbian! No joke, her feelings for Tohru reminded me alot of Tomoyo's feelings for Sakura and really I never took the whole pairing her up with Kazuma seriously. I don't think it ever became canon at the end and I firmly believe Saki was just joking around about having feelings for Kazuma, probably to annoy Kyo. XD
It's kind of hard not to read Hana-chan that way -- especially in her flashback chapter, where she thinks of both Uo and Tohru as her friends, but seems much more dependent on Tohru's kindness. The whole Hana/Kazuma bit was totally out of left-field for me too.
Yep, okay its now my very own little headcanon that Saki was meant to be lesbian and have an unrequited love for Tohru which was never fulfilled, putting her in the same camp as Momiji and Kagura. That actually makes me feel better about Takaya's lack of LBGT sensitivity, though I still wish there was at least one homosexual couple.
Word.
But damn, I'm surprised to hear that about other Shojo manga! Guess I'm glad those haven't ever really been brought over because I really can't stand it when series just completely ignore the subject all together and just act like their universe is a "perfect normal world where its all only straight people" yuck! :/
It's not only series where there's no queer characters/themes period; I'm also thinking of manga where they are introduced, only to be treated poorly by the narrative. And the frustrating thing is that a lot of series really do bring in tons of interesting ideas at the outset, and fulfill some of that promise, but then undermine it with regressive writing. This happens a LOT.
Oh yes, Utena is a masterpiece! It's simply breathtaking, though I agree with you on the manga, it was okay but not on the level of the anime. Which isn't surprising since the anime is the original work and the manga followed after. I've noticed that the work that comes first tends to be better than subsequent works in different mediums.
Re: Utena: probably still my favorite anime ever?!? I don't know, I haven't rewatched it in a while, but it is just so amazing. I can't imagine what my time in anime fandom would have been like if I hadn't stumbled on it.
And yeah, usually the source material is better, even wrt books-->movies and other adaptations. I think that when stories are adapted, a lot of attention had to be paid to the strengths and limitations of the medium, but a lot of the time, it's transcripted flat from one source to the other. (Like for example, I can't wait to see how Les Mis and The Great Gatsby are going to be adapted to film, but I'm also slightly apprehensive.)
Glad I wasn't the only one that was peeved with that little comment in the Fanbook, I thought that was completely uncalled for! But then again, I heard a rumor that Takaya gets extremely pissed if anyone makes yaoi or yuri doujinshi of her work and I think she even filed lawsuits against people who did that? If that rumor was true then I guess it's not surprising she made that comment in the fanbook.
Where did that rumor even come from? I've never heard of something like a lawsuit happening with any creator, much less with Takaya. I'm kind of skeptical, since copyright laws are so different from the West (and imo, more lax, given the rampant production and consumption of fan-marketed goods).
Really? You don't think Furuba is popular enough to get a remake? I thought it was the most popular shojo manga in America? Or at least that's what its logo was in all the Tokyopop editions. I've also heard it has quite the fandom overseas, I was always under the impression that it was one of more popular Shojo series, on par with Sailor Moon. But you're right, the anime by itself is a very good standalone product. The fact that it could produce such a fanbase of people who have never even read the manga really shows just how well done of a series it was from the material they had.
I think it was super popular when it was still in serialization, but it's still on the obscure side everything considered. Also, I wouldn't say it has a quarter of the impact and popularity Sailormoon does -- if I mention the latter to any of my students, they nod in recognition, but I'm pretty sure that Furuba is unheard of even with the geekier kids I know. Even though it won the Kodansha award, I think it had more recognition in the US overall? My memory is kind of fuzzy.
I still really really really reallly wish there'll be a remake someday, but oh well I'll just keep silently sitting here and hoping. :3
If it ever does, we can cheer for it together!
Ha-ha, I have no idea if Kyoko and Kyo have the same Kanji because I only read the English versions and I didn't know that's how you tell if the names are supposed to be similar. I'm still quite the beginner in Japanese, so I only go by hiragana and katakana. XD But really? You thought Ren was one of those unneeded characters? I thought she was pretty damn important since she was basically the series's main antagonist and most plot-oriented stories need a main antagonist.
Granted, she was an extremely underdeveloped one. For the kind of role she had she really should've shown up earlier in the manga or at least more often, I admit she definitely sucked as a villain.
Her role in the series is definitely important, but she's paper-thin as far as characterization goes. I think we basically agree, but we're expressing it in different ways.
Still, you bring up an interesting point: did Furuba need a main antagonist? For a long time, that seems to be the role that Akito plays, but as more of the characters' inner worlds are shown, the more it seems like the real antagonist is the Sohma curse itself. Furuba is definitely plot-oriented, but there's also an equal emphasis on character psychology and development. For example, the resolution of the story clicks not just with a literal turn in events (the curse breaking) but with emotional fulfillment and freedom as well. That's why I still can't help but think that inserting Ren as a villain was just...lacking, somehow.
Damn, with how you describe Yuki's character arc, I'm starting to see Machi as also one of the more "useless" later characters. Well, maybe not useless but it definitely would have made more of an impact if she'd just remained a side-character and was there to show how Yuki had finally found his place with a group of friends all his own. His whole involvement with the student council was about him taking charge of his life and moving on from the scars that his mother and Akito caused him. Him joining the student council and making friends with that whole group was basically him finally growing up and trying to make something of himself with everything that he's since learned with Tohru all ingrained within him.
The fact that Takaya decided to just ultimately focus on his relationship with Machi in particular definitely lessened the impact of his arc. That would've been absolutely brilliant if they just showed Yuki finding contentment in finally having friends that accepted and embraced the real him, since I think that's all he ever really wanted. He wanted true friends and unconditional acceptance, I don't know I never really saw him as the type that would end up in a relationship even before he was cast out of the running for Tohru's heart, I guess that's why the whole "she's like a mother to me" didn't bother me a whole lot.
It did click for me that Takaya thought of Yuki as the second protagonist of the story, after Tohru. That's why a lot of the student council focus chapters that baffled me while reading made sense in retrospect. If you look at it from the perspective of Yuki as "second love interest," it makes hardly any sense at all, but as a character with a solid (and separate) plotline of his own, it works perfectly. Maybe decoy protagonist is the right term to use here, since the amount of attention he and Kyou got were roughly equal until about volume eleven. After that, Yuki's development was mostly sans Tohru, and Kyou's was in conjunction with hers.
So with that established, maybe Takaya is just one of those writers who thinks that romance is a vital part of a main character's storyline??? Or maybe she didn't want it to seem like Yuki's development was overshadowed by everything else, and that romance would get more reader interest? Who knows.
Though ironically, I thought that would have suited Momiji's character more than Yuki's))
That would have been interesting!
But hey, at least we get happy singles with Momiji and Kagura... Though one could argue they're the characters with the saddest endings so maybe they don't really count?
They really did get the short end of the stick with everything, especially where Momiji's concerned. Out of all the Juunishi, Momiji is probably the one I feel most for; if any character deserved real happiness, it was him without a doubt. How do you feel about the way his character arc ends?
On a perfectly serious note, however, Kagura and Momiji seem very capable of ruling the entire world together one day. Through sheer cuteness and implausible age-denying abilities, if nothing else.