Completely gorgeous.
Is it just me or does Saint Juste's appearance (and general attitude) closely resemble that of Morita Douji?
hxxp://plaza.rakuten.co.jp/ekatocato/58000
hxp://ekatocato.hippy.jp/gazou/2doji5.jpg
I hope hope hope a US company eventually licenses it.. it would be amazing to have non-VHS fansub rips of it.
I think it's the definitive anime about a middle class girl stuck in a tangled web of lesbian lust and French words.
Cream Lemon Escalation predates it, I think.
Oniisama E manga was written in the mid-seventies. Also, definitive does not mean first.
The anime ends very positively for something which started with so much angst and melodrama, not to mention that I'm fond of most of the cast.
But I still haven't understood if Rei's death was accidental or not :P
Funny. I stumbled upon a page which said that Morita Douji worked with JA Caesar. ^_^
>>5
Yup. J.A. Seazer has done tons of work outside of (and many many years before) Utena.
He did arrangements for Morita Douji's Mother Sky and several Kazuki Tomokawa works.
Of course he also did the soundtracks to almost all of Shuji Terayama's (Ikuhara's biggest inspiration) films and performances which were always amazing. This sort of work is most similar to Utena's music.
He is an incredible composer and was WAY ahead of his time.
The 1971 punk/psych/whatever sounds of Throw Away Your Books, Rally in the Streets sounds very contemporary. Maybe still ahead of even our time.
I like to think Rei's death was accidental.
Her life had suddenly become a beautiful thing.. although she had been so reckless in the past, I don't think her recent change of mind would allow her to throw away such a delicate thing.
I've tried watching it. I'd need to be a bit more bored to actually follow it, though. Not that the show is boring, but it's definitely not something to just kick back and relax during.
I think that once you get past the beginning it becomes much less horribly depressing. Sure there's still at least one suicide attempt or OD per episode, but Nanako is generally fairly happy. I haven't seen all of it, so I can't really say whether it goes back to soul-shattering desperation.
>>6
Concerning Rei, my very first impression was that she couldn't cope with so much happiness all of the sudden, she wasn't used to it, and that, maybe, she though that as her life couldn't possibly be better, then she could as well disappear now while she was experiencing what she had longed for her whole life.
There's one thing that reinforce the suicide thesis, it's the preparations she made the day before : telling to Kaoru to get back her book, asking Nanako on a date, etc. As if she knew and wanted to leave to people who cared for her some memento behind her.
And an accident seems so contrary, so unlikely given the flamboyant nature of a character like St-Just. Or maybe, just maybe, it was done to show us how life has been unfair to her to the very end.
Now all the facts point in the general direction of an accident.
Life can be so undramatic, at times... :P
>Now all the facts point in the general direction of an accident.
>Life can be so undramatic, at times... :P
Like Buffy's mother. An interesting dramatic choice.
I love this series, in a sick kind of way, but I have to watch it by myself as no one in my place will watch it with me. hmph.
torrent plz
Can anyone remember literary or historical references in Oniisama E?
I just remember Nanako saying she enjoys Marquis de Sade (was it 120 Days of Sodom that she says she likes the most? Amazing) and of course Rei's being Louis Saint-Juste.
I know there is a lot more. Especially parts where Rei or Kaoru are reading something and it gets (very) briefly discussed.
I finally finished it today, after like 11 months (!). It was good. Maybe excellent. Not sure yet.
Definitely recommended for any Rose of Versailles/Utena/Marimite fans. Marimite fans should probably wear some armour or something, it can be quite a heavy series at times.
I suspect this anime is one of the reasons some people keep ranting about how much digital/modern/whatever anime sucks - I imagine many people think this is the best anime ever.
Oh, I almost forgot. Trains. Trains. Trains. Birds. Birds. Birds. Sunshine. Rain. Rain. Rain. Rain. Trains. Trains. World's longest series, every ep is 75 min long in a good way.
>> I finally finished it today, after like 11 months (!).
Haha I think I've got you beat!
I downloaded up to I think episode 26 maybe four years ago. I finished those ones but the rest was absolutely nowhere to be found. It pained me to know that such beauty was somewhere waiting for me but I couldn't find it.
Finally I found the Animesuki torrent of all the episodes a while ago and was able to finish it.