Iwa ni Hana

Cover image of 'Remember the Time' （溯时). This photo belongs to a series entitled 'Mr Butterfly: Hallucination of Life' (蝴蝶先生), in which he appears in a white dress.

I am a huge fan of the Chinese cosplayer Huang Shan [黄山]. I finally got my copy of his most recent cosplay album Remember the Time [溯时]. Among others, he cosplayed the Sengoku-era general Imagawa Yoshimoto [今川義元]. Below is my rough translation of his observations of this historic personality:

“We often see the common stereotype of Imagawa Yoshimoto as a clown, but at the time he was also known as “Tokaido’s champion archer” as well as “the man closest to the Shogun”. I believe the real him was quite different from the stereotype of him as a foolish, fat man. It is also my guess that he was not even fat when he was young!

“How much courage does it take for an individual to persist on a kind of aesthetics that does not belong to his times, a kind of aesthetics that has been left behind by his times?

“Perhaps he just wanted to see poetry gatherings in the sakura season as a pass-time popular not just among aristocrats at court. The spirit of aristocracy was embodied in his entire person. Maybe his way was interpreted as foolish, or even idiotic. But I think in the times he lived, it was an amazing thing that he knew what he wanted and pursued it. Compared to a lot of people who were lost on the way to power, Imagawa Yoshimoto was a person of greater depth.

“He was only born in the wrong times. Therefore he should not be blamed.

“If he was born 500 years earlier, perhaps you would see this man dancing, at a splendid feast in the Heian capital of Kyoto – with beauty and joy, and faithful to his ideals to the last.” 

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I have decided to start a sub-blog dedicated to Mawaru Penguindrum. It is more convenient to dump all episode commentaries and news/gossip/rumours in one place.

I think I owe this to Ikuni for having produced such a fabulous show as Utena. I really do.

The sub-blog is here. The RSS feed for entries is here and the RSS feed for comments is here.

Comments with spoilers in no particular order as usual:

1) There are many shadow statements in Level E.

 i) Mankind being seen by aliens of advanced civilization as backward and therefore warrants statutory protection under interstellar law
-> Aboriginal peoples being seen by developed countries as backward and therefore warrants statutory protection under national law

The above is an interesting rebuke of the SF tradition of aliens as invaders.

ii) An alien species which reproduces itself by the male devouring the female has intellectually evolved to the point where the concept of love becomes an obstacle to pure act of reproduction
-> The human species which reproduces itself through sex has intellectually evolved to the point where the concept of love becomes an obstacle to pure act of reproduction

From the perspective of biological survival and/or maintaining population growth (which is a great social issue in Japan, among other places), the idea that you should have babies only with The One is a bit of a drawback.

iii) God -> The Idiot Prince

The Idiot Prince remains unnamed to the end – very much in the tradition of the Biblical God whose name is not known.

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As usual, random comment with spoilers in no particular order:

1) Initially, I thought the stars in Himari’s bedroom were just some kind of decoration for cuteness’s sake. But what was I thinking? Every fan of Utena ought to know by now that in the world of Ikuni’s animation, nothing (and I mean nothing) ever appears on the screen by accident. I finally got what he was getting at when Ringo’s bedroom appears at the beginning of Episode 3, because the “theme” there is the sea. Himari is associated with the sky, whereas Ringo is associated with the sea.

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