MikoGalatea (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
mikogalatea) wrote2018-12-15 11:52 pm
mikogalatea) wrote2018-12-15 11:52 pm
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Anthy/Utena's rocky start
Around 4 years ago, at Gaston's prompting, I posted a long list of pet peeves I had from the Utena fandom. Among many other things, one of the peeves I mentioned was fans acting like the Anthy/Utena pairing is a completely perfect love-at-first-sight affair with no problems to be overcome whatsoever.
I got an anon ask soon afterwards that sympathised with the pet peeve and also brought up how some fans think she got into the first duel to save Anthy as opposed to just getting back at Saionji over the incident with Wakaba's love letter. In response, I ended up writing a couple of paragraphs on how Anthy/Utena did not get off to a flawless start in-series.
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I think a lot of people don't take any notice of how much of an ass Utena could be to Anthy in the early episodes, especially the second one; there, Utena said "I don't care about the Rose Bride!" right in front of Anthy, then told her to her face that she was going to lose the next duel on purpose (which apparently meant she was okay with Anthy going back to a guy who abused her just so she could get out of the duelling game). She also made the same mistake as Miki in that she tried to decide what Anthy wanted for her, instead of taking Anthy's own wants into account. For those kinds of reasons, I'm willing to bet Anthy had a very poor early impression of Utena as a self-righteous hypocrite who cared more about her ego than anything else, and it was only in ep 12 (when she'd been separated from Utena, treated like dirt by Touga, and then watched Utena fight in a way that reminded her of Dios) that she decided Utena wasn't so bad after all.
I ship Anthy/Utena as much as the next person, but I swear the fandom idealises it too much sometimes. The relationship has problems that are highlighted by the narrative (case in point: Utena eventually came to realise just how badly she'd fucked up with Anthy) and those issues give the ship nuance and make the development that much more meaningful.
I got an anon ask soon afterwards that sympathised with the pet peeve and also brought up how some fans think she got into the first duel to save Anthy as opposed to just getting back at Saionji over the incident with Wakaba's love letter. In response, I ended up writing a couple of paragraphs on how Anthy/Utena did not get off to a flawless start in-series.
-
I think a lot of people don't take any notice of how much of an ass Utena could be to Anthy in the early episodes, especially the second one; there, Utena said "I don't care about the Rose Bride!" right in front of Anthy, then told her to her face that she was going to lose the next duel on purpose (which apparently meant she was okay with Anthy going back to a guy who abused her just so she could get out of the duelling game). She also made the same mistake as Miki in that she tried to decide what Anthy wanted for her, instead of taking Anthy's own wants into account. For those kinds of reasons, I'm willing to bet Anthy had a very poor early impression of Utena as a self-righteous hypocrite who cared more about her ego than anything else, and it was only in ep 12 (when she'd been separated from Utena, treated like dirt by Touga, and then watched Utena fight in a way that reminded her of Dios) that she decided Utena wasn't so bad after all.
I ship Anthy/Utena as much as the next person, but I swear the fandom idealises it too much sometimes. The relationship has problems that are highlighted by the narrative (case in point: Utena eventually came to realise just how badly she'd fucked up with Anthy) and those issues give the ship nuance and make the development that much more meaningful.