Genshiken vs. Genshiken Nidaime: Old vs New. My nostalgic ramblings and how changing views in Otaku culture show a great future.

Every now and then, the anime industry loves to poke fun at itself.  Sometimes, this self-awareness from the industry is like Watamote (the real name is way too long to type), where it makes us uncomfortable with how accurate it is to our own awkward lives, basking in our memories of awkward situations and episodes, completely departing from realism to the chagrin of those around us.  However, other times, the industry uses a softer approach, taking our wonderful memories of reveling in our nerd culture and both poking fun and celebrating their importance to us.  Genshiken and Genshiken Nidaime are anime of this latter approach.  Genshiken or, as it’s subtext defines it, The Study of Modern Visual Culture is a manga/anime about a college club of the same name and their experiences loving, hating, and discussing all of the merits of otaku culture.  The series takes all of the games, anime, manga, etc. that we know (as well as some fakes ones it invented so wonderfully that they were spun off as their own anime) and takes pride in using their likeness for comedic and celebratory effect.  In fact, a surprising thing from this series is that it doesn’t just parody other anime, games, manga, etc. with alternative names or other ways to get around copyright.  For most references, the series straight up calls out the names of the anime and shows actual gameplay of certain games.  Genshiken was always very upfront about what it referenced and used each name or character from a different series as a badge of honor, showing how the creators, like their readers, were also otaku of a high pedigree.

The creators knew what to do artistically to parody games, series, etc. and more importantly, the people who enjoy them.  Recently, when I looked through the volumes I have up on my shelf, I had forgotten how interesting the art style is.  Each character looks very different and no two have the same body type.  Certain characters are skinny with nerdy glasses, like Madarame, but you also have more heavyset and quiet characters like Kugayama.  Their bodies, faces, style of eyes, and dress all vary and show a diverse group of female and male otaku individuals, as well as non-otakus who actually had some fashion sense like Kasukabe.  This is something I’ve come to appreciate as for many more modern anime, certain similar styles seem to ring true throughout a lot of popular shows.  Many studios have their own art style and characteristics that prevail through all of their shows and many popular shows start looking very similar with trends in the anime industry asking for more “edgy” or more “moe” material across the board.  Genshiken even parodies the idea of industry trends with its own fictional show Kujibiki Unbalance!, which has an entirely different art style than Genshiken that directly parodies a popular style of the time of its release, with big doe eyes and squishy faces adorned by shiny, clichéd anime hair for all of its characters.  I appreciated this parody and Genshiken’s own uniqueness in the face of popular trends, something that Trigger and a few other studios like to carry on in their own works.

It was also a personal series for me.  As I read Genshiken, it was one of the first times that I started to understand my love of anime and other Japanese cultural exports.  I starting reading the Genshiken manga in high school, around the same time that I finally moved out of my introductory stages of Dragon Ball and Pokemon from my childhood to more mature series like Trigun, Cowboy Bebop, and Getbackers.  Inside of the pages of those volumes I found a group of like-minded individuals, commenting on the anime of the time and enjoying their nerdiness for the things they love.  It was a great experience and the characters were hilarious, each one an archetype for a certain type of otaku many people may know.  One character, Ohno, was all about cosplay, whether it was dressing up or forcing others to do the same.  Another, Kousaka, was a hardcore gamer that would be so into a game his eyes would just stop moving.  There were characters who loved Gundam and model building as well as some who loved to draw and make their own fan creations.  And yes, there were many who enjoyed the more adult aspects of otaku culture, with plenty of discussion and jokes surrounding the character’s tastes in hentai, games, and doujinshi and the adult doujin market at large.  There was even Kasukabe, who brought the perspective of someone from the outside looking in at these otaku and having a hard time understanding any of these people or why they loved things they did.  Each character brought something to the table and each one evolved with the story and their changing interests, becoming well-rounded as the series went on.  It was a great adventure and a wonderful introduction into a deeper world of otaku culture for me.  When I read my last chapter and put the book down, I thought that it was an end to a chapter of my own life.  The series meant a lot to me as it followed me through my years of high school and during my times of escapism from some harder times in my personal life.

To my surprise, I apparently was not the only one that read the manga.  Even though I had never heard of anyone else buying and enjoying this series at the time, an anime was adapted and made its way over to my side of the Pacific, though it varied in quality and was passed around to several different studios to work on.  Even though it was rough at times, and some of the studios made weird decisions on how to adapt it, it was wonderful to hear the voices of these characters as well as see how the anime incredibly got past the copyright censor just like the manga did, calling out each different series, game, and manga for parody and celebration.  (I recommend giving it a look.  Just please, please ignore the dub and stick to the sub.  The English voice cast is almost 4Kids bad.)  After the series wrapped up with two seasons and an OVA in between, I thought that this would be the end of a great story.  But oh how I was wonderfully wrong when I found out not just a few months ago that in 2009, the story continued with a second series and even a new anime that came out last year (2013 of this writing).  How I missed something for so many years that would have had me celebrating in the streets, I have no idea.  As I’m still reading through the manga, this next part is mostly a discussion on the anime.

Genshiken Nidaime picks up from where the series left off, previously, with many of the characters graduated from college and off working on their careers, leaving the younger members in charge.  Ohno, Oguie, and lovable, but possibly autistic, Kuchiki are left to try and recruit more members.  Unlike previous attempts (which were squashed by Kuchiki’s absurd but hilarious outbreaks) this one succeeds with several members joining and all but one of them female.  This plot point becomes the end all differing factor between Genshiken and Genshiken Nidaime, with all major differences stemming from this one decision by the creators.   While the concept is the same, Nidaime is a parody of more modern anime and modern anime fans.  So with that, they chose to have an almost all female cast.  I felt while watching through the show that this was intentional for two reasons.  One is for the obvious love of shows with all female casts now.  In a similar vein to harems and “moe” shows, this show has a female cast that allows Genshiken to both parody and appeal to the people who enjoy shows from the harem and “cute girls doing cute things” variety.  However, I also felt that given the respect toward the female characters and the variety of female cast members, this was also a decision to highlight a changing trend in otaku in which girls are also getting much more into the scene, if not over the same shows.  Representation seemed to be very much on the writer’s mind while making this new series and becomes integral to the plot later on with a certain character.

Nidaime’s plot revolves around continuing a few of the unresolved bits from the original series, with Madarame coming to terms with his feelings of loneliness, being stuck in a rut with his job, and his crush over Kasukabe, as well as Ogiue attempting to become a more professional mangaka and leading the new Genshiken.  The interesting thing is while these plots develop and help shape the story, they slowly become the “b” story to a new development in the story that is one of the most progressive things I’ve seen come from an anime/manga.  While Ogiue and Madarame seem to hog the spotlight for several chapters throughout the new series, a new character, Hato, slowly becomes the protagonist that we see all of the events unfold through.  Because of this, the audience is thrust into empathizing and understanding through a character that one doesn’t typical see treated well in a series:  A transvestite.

While this aspect of Hato’s character may seem odd, the story actual explains the crossdressing aspect well.  So much so, that I’d say that, instead of having a trap character around for jokes, the writer decided to do something much more progressive that leads to a much better story.  Due to emotional scars and a problem with identity, Hato decided to join a primarily female Genshiken group as a girl in order to better fit in until he is rather humorously found out within the first meeting.  Throughout the story, we get hints and small explanations to how this character’s psyche works and why they do all of the things that are so different from everyone else.  Amazingly in the story, the characters, aside from a few jokes here and there, are incredibly supportive of Hato, with even the most conservative of the group eventually accepting this person and recognizing him as their friend.  The cast even goes so far as to use pronouns pretty damn well when Hato is around or when they’re just talking about him to help Hato identify with which gender he’s sporting.  This was not something I expected from this series and its treatment of a situation that is usually derisively regarded absolutely surprised me.  Hato becomes the major focus from which we learn everything and because of this, we learn more and more about Hato and the struggles of someone who enjoys living as another gender, leading to apparently interesting discussions on the Internet about the transvestism and possibly transgender aspects of this character (seriously, some people have done some extensive analysis of this).

While this is a serious change from the first series, and there are so many changes in style, feel, and general plot, Genshiken Nidaime never gives up its roots or what made the original such a blast to enjoy.  The characters are still explored and grow as the series continues, the humor is still spot on, and the references are so unapologetically in your face that I still don’t know how they got around copyright.  I’m serious, they legit played five seconds of Bakemonogatari on the TV in the clubroom during one of the first few episodes.  Like, that shit was basically just ripped and photoshopped right on there.  They didn’t change a damn thing.  I have no idea how they didn’t get sued.  Not to mention they made so many references to Bakemonogatari that entire episode that I was laughing so hard.

Back to point, Genshiken Nidaime took what made the old series good and updated it with better art and animation (while keeping the same style), better story elements, and even funnier jokes.  All of this drizzled with hundreds of references and comedic call outs of anime and manga series of the time.  As much as I am nostalgic over the original series, I absolutely love the direction of the new series and the amount of care they took to updating the old, but keeping the heart of it intact.  I wouldn’t say Nidaime was a perfect anime.  Far from it, the anime tends to suffer from the often known problem of adapting a large series into thirteen episodes, causing problems with pacing and balancing the story against a large cast of characters all needing development.  However, I greatly enjoyed everything else about the show, particularly the jokes and wonderful characters.  Also, the manga (so far as I’ve read) gets through the problems of pacing and character development just fine.  I recommend giving Nidaime a watch and definitely a read.  Even if you haven’t seen the original, I feel Nidaime stands well on its own, but only more so if you feel adventurous enough to read through the original series.  Partially taking off the rose colored glasses for second, neither series is groundbreaking nor would I define them as outstanding works, but they’re just the right amount of self-aware, satirical, and humor-filled exploit mixed with interesting characters and a fun time to have made me laugh, and thoroughly enjoy myself.  I loved the series both back in high school when I read Genshiken for the first time and now, with Nidaime bringing me back to the same wonderfully geeky place filled with hilarious and heartfelt otaku.

Research and Inspiration for this Discussion:

Review of Nidaime by Miguel Douglas -

http://www.isugoi.com/genshiken-nidaime-review/

Review of Genshiken Nidaime by a Modern Josei -
http://modernjosei.tumblr.com/post/63340565446/genshiken-nidaime-genshiken-second-generation

Discussion on Hato’s possible sexuality -

http://transetheralbrimwylf.tumblr.com/post/57350005501/so-here-is-my-super-long-post-titled-hato-chan

And of course, wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genshiken

For Fun:

A small list of about a fourth of the references in Genshiken Nidaime -

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/anime.php?id=15288&page=22

Puella Magi Madoka Magica - Revisionism and How Studio Shaft “Felt Like Destroying Something Moe”

Let’s talk about genre for a second.  Now bear with me, I’ll get to the fascinating twists and the dark plot of Madoka Magica soon, but I want to get a little information across first.  For film genres, or any art form for that matter, there are a few different stages that a genre goes through. Generally, it starts with an Experimental Stage, where the genre is starting out and the rules haven’t been made just yet.  As an example, think of westerns before they all typically started having one man for good facing off in a high noon duel against the bad guy.  After they finally establish what works, the Classical Stage begins, which is where all of the tropes and ideas of a genre generally come from. Eventually, people get tired of those tropes, though, and start the Parody Stage.  For westerns, this was Blazing Saddles. This stage makes fun of the over-used tropes that start to appear within a genre.  Finally, we get to one of my favorite stages of any genre: the Revisionist Stage.  

If you don’t know what revisionism in media is, it’s when somebody wants to go back and completely rethink the genre, challenging the tropes and concepts, but still keeping the general ideas.  Some of the greatest movies, such as Dances With Wolves and The Dark Knight, have come out of this stage, revitalizing a love for their respective genres. The Revisionist Stage both takes apart every trope and celebrates what makes these genres so great.  This is where Puella Magi Madoka Magica comes in.  Madoka Magica is the perfect example of revisionism within its genre.  The entire point of this show is to take the magical girl genre of anime and turn it completely on its head (Or for those who already know the show, cut off its head).  A SPOILER WARNING for anyone that hasn’t seen the show, as it’s basically impossible to discuss this without giving away major plot points.  While I’d like to write each of these discussions with sparse spoilers, this time they’re simply too integral to this show and what it’s attempting to do for this genre.  As such, there will be MASSIVE spoilers being discussed that for those that haven’t seen the series or care to, will spoil the entirety of the show.  I also want to state that I will be ignoring the film The Rebellion Story, a sequel to the series, as that whole movie deserves a discussion on its own, particularly its incredibly controversial ending.  With that stated, let’s get started.

I think it’s well known that Japan is one of the stranger cultures out there.  Specifically for anime, there is a fascination with magical teen girls that’s become a small obsession within the industry.  Early versions of this genre are shows like Sailor Moon, which most people on this side of the pacific know, and even earlier is Sally the Witch, which is considered the first magical girl anime.  Hilariously enough, this strange concept for a genre owes a lot to America, as Sally the Witch was directly inspired by the Japanese dub of the show Bewitched that became popular amongst Japanese girls in the 1960s.  The major ideas about this genre are the fact that preteen and teen girls obtain magical powers to fight for good and justice against evil, typically with a cute animal sidekick of some sorts, and there’s an indomitable feeling of hope and companionship among the other magical girls.  Most shows nowadays also depict transformation scenes where the girls suddenly undress and have their fighting costumes magically adorned onto their bodies.  Since most of these shows are for a younger audience, the girls involved luckily are never shown fully nude during these choreographed segments, though the transformation sequences tend to drag on longer than is comfortable.  You can basically consider this the anime equivalent of the changing scenes in the 1950s Superman cartoon show.  Just, you know, without the phone booth.  And, uh, underage girls instead of The Man of Steel.  Like I said, Japan is weird.

The interesting thing about this genre is that it hasn’t really changed terribly much over the years, other than a shift to also target a male audience besides the traditional young female viewers.  We would see a parody every now and then, but there wasn’t anything around to revitalize the genre and challenge its tropes.  Because of this, the genre stagnated for a while until our beloved Madoka Magica came out in January of 2011.  Puella Magi Madoka Magica was created by Shaft and director/writer team Akiyuki Shinbo and Gen Urobuchi, a studio and writer/director team well-known for challenging norms and depicting darker worlds.  The show is the brainchild of a simple idea:  What would happen if you took a traditionally children-focused show and remade it for a mature adult audience?

Here is where things get interesting.  Shaft specifically wanted to make everything not what it seems to be with this series.  When advertising the show, the trailers and commercials depicted a happy magical girl anime, showing the life of Madoka and her friends as they accept help from a cute mysterious animal called Kyuubey, who gives them magical powers to fight evil.  The series attempts to lull the audience into believing it’s a happy and innocent tromp through the fields of the magical girl genre (also known as mahou shoujo) with the first few episodes depicting just this, cutesy characters and an overall happy feeling.  From the start, however, there’s always an underlying ominous vibe to everything that occurs, particularly spurred on by the camera work and background music.  Here’s a quick synopsis of the first three episodes to show what I mean.

As the first few episodes unfold, we see Madoka pondering over a dark dream she had and can’t remember well, but still continues to enjoy her time with friends who make her laugh.  Then, we meet the new student Homura.  Whereas the typical new student is shy, Homura is cold and immediately takes charge of any scenario she is in.  Madoka remembers her from her dark dream the night before and attempts to talk to her, but only ends up more confused as Homura tells her to stay the same if she values her life and all that she holds dear.  As events move forward, Madoka and her best friend Sayaka rescue Kyuubey, a mysterious but adorable creature, from being killed by Homura.  Suddenly, a strange evil power envelops and attacks them, but they’re saved by a girl named Mami.  Mami thanks them for saving Kyuubey and tells them about what is going on.  Mami is a magical girl and explains the existence of a hidden war against evil.  Random suicides, murders, cults, and many negatives of the world are apparently brought on by witches, evil beings that prey on humans.  While the magical girls stand for good, they don’t always work together or see eye-to-eye.  Thus, Homura seems to be against Mami and Kyuubey.  Madoka and Sayaka are fascinated by the idea of magical girls and decide to help Mami.  The now recovered Kyuubey tells them that they can only become magical girls by making a contract with him, but as part of the contract, he will fulfill one wish for them.  However, Sayaka and Madoka are warned to make sure it’s something important as they only have one.  While contemplating this, the two go on different witch hunts with Mami, saving people, becoming closer with Mami as time goes on, and warming up to the idea of standing up for good by becoming magical girls.  Until one witch hunt during episode three, where Sayaka becomes trapped and Madoka and Mami go to rescue her, finally becoming friends during their struggle.  Mami, overjoyed by this, fights her way to the witch and Sayaka, finding power in friendship.  As Sayaka and Madoka take cover, Mami battles and shoots the witch.  Suddenly, it transforms into a huge monster and devours Mami’s head.  She falls to the ground, dead.

The above final scene from the third episode was so shocking that when it aired in Japan, many viewers were horrified (There was even a new word that spawned online and spread outside of Madoka fans called Mamiru, meaning “To be guillotined like Mami” or “A horrible death”).  From this point on, the veil is lifted and the show dramatically makes a turn for the dark (The ending song even changes from happy and fun, to a dark, hard rock song). We discover over the rest of the series a complete deconstruction of the genre and what it means to be a magical girl.  Kyuubey is likened to a demon as we find his contracts trap the girls' souls into gems in order to give them power.  The territorial disputes among the magical girls are spurred on by the fact that the only way to purify a soul gem and continue living is to use grief seeds dropped by fallen witches.  We also see that every wish that is granted has a twist to it in a similar way to the mythological evil Djinn, causing pain to those who wish for it.  In possibly the largest twist in the series, we also find that Kyuubey’s true name is Incubator and a magical girl is merely a fledgling form.  As Kyuubey puts it:

“On this planet you call females who have yet to become adults, girls. It makes sense then that since you'll eventually become witches, you should be called Magical Girls.”

And so, the Kyuubey is out of the bag.  Every magical girl is killing a matured form of their sisters and every little girl that Kyuubey has blessed with power will be consumed by hate to spread despair to humanity.  And for what?  What purpose would this whole elaborate scheme be for?  For Kyuubey and his race of emotionless creatures, humans are merely food, and the emotions that they express are fuel for their power.  And why young girls as the progenitors of this chaos?  As they’re developing and going through puberty, they’re the most emotional of all humans and output immense amounts of emotional energy for the Kyuubeys, particularly their grief and despair.

These revelations start taking their toll on the main characters, who with the exception of Homura, barely knew the full extent of what they signed up for.  And speaking of Homura, her story becomes the story of the entire series, as we see the reasons behind her actions and cold words show an even darker world.  Homura’s power is to manipulate time and these girls that she’s distanced herself from were her friends, particularly Madoka.  However, she’s watched possibly hundreds of times over all of her friends die, and every time she attempts to fix things, it gets worse, with each girl dying more violently than the last cycle through time.  Certain scenes show the girls begging for death rather than to become a witch.  She finally cannot take anymore, and decides she has to fix things from the outside looking in, forsaking friendship, but slowly as each death seems more and more unavoidable, her grief and despair start to take over.  It’s only when Madoka steps in to attempt to fix things that Homura even considers that there is hope.

In doing all of this, this series answers every trope of the magical girl genre with a dark twist.  Where there were cute girls saving the world, there are now children desperately trying to fight a forever stronger evil.  Where there was a cute animal sidekick, there is now an emotionless devil in a stuffed animal skin that steals the souls of our main cast.  And where there was optimism and an indomitable spirit of hope, we find evil and an inevitable fall into despair for all who become magical girls.  Even the reasons for the girls to take up this mantle are seen as truly selfish rather than for a greater good.  Mami did so to save her own life, Homura did so to be stronger, Sayaka did so to save the boy she loves so he could love her, and the list goes on.  All of this contesting of tropes is further shown by the art style for the show.  In traditional mahou shoujo, the animation is very moe, or cute and endearing.  However, Madoka Magica only keeps this for the characters themselves.  Every witch labyrinth that the characters find themselves in is unique and borrows several pages from Tim Burton’s favorite playbook, but multiplied tenfold, contrasting with the cutesy style of the characters and the picturesque, but typically dark cityscapes of the real world.

Every idea of the genre is challenged and reflected on, with the show asking why it’s always been this way.  Shaft wanted us to reflect on the implications of these tropes, the reasons for these girls wanting to do good, as well as the realistic expectations of sending adolescent girls to fight evil and how they’d come to terms with the death, hate, and warped perspectives they’d face each day.  This series is dark and unapologetic, showing us violence and darker themes.  There may rarely be blood and not much that could be considered gore, but the implications of what’s happening (the suicides, decapitations, murders, and the deaths of the main cast) are still there, giving the show a psychological thriller aspect.  As an example, this scene shows where the death of one of the members drives Mami to insanity and to start killing a few of the members of the group before they all turn into witches.

However, the show isn’t without its celebration of the genre.  It deconstructs many things about magical girl anime, but in doing so, also attempts to pave the way for future entries.  Puella Magi Madoka Magica may be an incredibly dark show, but its ending message is hope and love can conquer all, showing this with one final wish that breaks the rules of the game and finally ends the constant loop of death and despair.  Not everyone comes out happy (or even alive for that matter), but good does conquer evil, even if it takes an immense amount of suffering to get there.  We see twists and turns galore, but with an adherence to the very fundamental elements of the genre.  There are still girls battling evil with magical powers, there is still a feeling that friendship conquers all, and there is still an idea that hope is not a useless thing, but is sometimes all you have.  The goal then, seems to be not just to deconstruct, but also rebuild from basic groundwork what a mahou shoujo anime should be, outlining thoroughly what needs to change and what can be left unchallenged.  It’s a beautiful show, in its art and animation, as well as its clever writing and amazing story.  It’s a popular pick for many, but it’s one of my favorites specifically for everything it did within its genre and for being among the greats that will be thoroughly evaluated and celebrated for years to come.

Research and Inspiration for this Discussion:

Breaking the Mold:  Puella Magi Madoka Magica Flips the Magical Girl Genre on its Ear -

http://www.popcults.com/puella-magi-madoka-magica-anime-review/

Headless Mami -

http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/headless-mami

The Girls Who Walk Away From Kyuubey - http://stormingtheivorytower.blogspot.com/2013/07/the-girls-who-walk-away-from-kyubee.html

TV Tropes:  Puella Magi Madoka Magica - http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Anime/PuellaMagiMadokaMagica

Wikipedia -

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puella_Magi_Madoka_Magica

Why We Like Fiction That Makes Us Le Miserable -

http://theafictionado.wordpress.com/2013/03/21/why-we-like-fiction-that-makes-us-le-miserable/

Kill la Kill - Feminism, Sexuality, and WHY IS EVERY EPISODE MORE INTENSE THAN THE LAST!?

Let’s talk about feminism and sexuality.  For those that inwardly groan at the mention of these sometimes over-discussed topics, I can promise you that there will be massive fan-service and tons of ridiculous action.  Fair?  But a warning up front:  Given the show we’re discussing, this isn’t exactly going to be safe-for-work at all times.  I’ll also try to be vague about many particular instances in the show, but this will be a spoiler warning for anyone who hasn’t seen, or cares to see, the show.  Now that we have our NSFW tag and SPOILER ALERT included, let’s begin.

So, for anyone that doesn’t know, Kill la Kill is an incredible but incredibly polarizing anime that came out during the Fall 2013 Anime Season and ran until Spring 2014.  The story follows Ryuuko Matoi, a character who is set on seeking revenge on the murderer of her father.  She tracks down leads to arrive at Honnouji Academy, an incredibly militaristic school ruled by the class council and their class president Satsuki Kiryuin.  Satsuki controls the populace by instigating a class system based around school uniforms with different percentages of “life fibers” that enhance the abilities of the wearer.  The more life fibers a particular piece of clothing contains, the more powerful it is.  Soon after heading home from the school, Ryuuko finds a gift from her late father, a living sentient uniform, Senketsu, made of pure life fibers that gives her insane amounts of power.  Together, with her new companion, she decides to take on the entire school to find her father’s killer and upset the status quo.

This probably sounds a little weird but cool.  Kick-ass female characters duking it out against each other while blowing the climax of any other action anime out of the water with the sheer amount of epic action scenes.  A feminist Michael Bay would be proud.  So what’s the problem here?  Why are people on both sides so up in arms about this show, saying the show represents female empowerment and others screaming that it's sexist?  What do people have against it?  Well… Possibly the “uniform” that Ryuuko’s father gave to her, for one.  At this part of the post, you should start checking to see if the boss can see your computer.

Clearly seen, not much left to the imagination.  This is one of the big reasons people scream misogyny at this show.  “The main character has no clothes!  How lewd!  Obviously it’s just sexualizing women!”  And to those who don’t understand the show very well, this is probably what you'll get out of it. However, let’s look at the rest of the cast for a second…

I have a feeling you can’t quite call this misogynistic if everybody is getting in on this super-hot orgy.  Joking aside, what we see here is more of a ridiculous use of nudity and sexual themes for all sides of the gender spectrum.  This is one of the things I love about Kill la Kill.  It sounds weird, I know, but bare with me.  Two of the major themes of Kill la Kill are obviously nudity and sexuality.  Both are topics that many people may not like to discuss and I absolutely love how this show blows the book wide open.  The reason we have a bunch of nudists is because the show is all about clothes and the lack thereof.

One idea about clothes explored in this show is the word-play between “fashion” and “fascism”; the reason being that they sound similar in Japanese.  We see that the Honnouji Academy creates the uniforms and uses them in a way to keep control over the students through a class system.  We also find out that the rebel group against the school is referred to as Nudist Beach and, just as their name entails, are men and women that forsake clothes because they are a symbol of being controlled and buying into this class system.  It’s a bit of an anti-consumerist message as fashion and clothing are equated to the same political ideas behind Nazism, but it also sets the tone perfectly since the ideas of nudity and clothing are central to the plot of this show.

In fact, even the name of the show has to do with clothes.  Kill la Kill, or “Kiru la Kiru” as it would be said in Japan, is actually a clever pun on the Japanese words for “cut,” “kill,” and “wear,” as they all can be pronounced in a similar way in Japanese.  We can assume from this that the title is not just about killing the killer of Ryuuko's father, but also can be thought of as “cut to wear,” referring to Ryuuko’s uniform being lessened in actual skin coverage in order to become more powerful.  This also holds true for some other members of the cast as well since, as the show goes on, each character is wearing less and less but is also becoming more and more powerful.  We also see many other puns on the ideas of clothing.  A primary example of this being whenever a character is defeated and their power-giving uniform is torn to pieces, the words “'stripped' of the will to fight” appear on-screen.

So with the ideas of rebelling against the clothed establishment, as the show continues, we obviously have a bunch of nudists and a severe lack of clothing during the show.  This brings up the topic of the naughty bits and sexuality.  Luckily for the faint of heart, no matter how the camera pans, there’s always something to defend our eyes from full-frontal nudity.  Also, in this universe, women apparently have no nipples and men’s penises have a tendency to shine pink light that’s too bright to actually see the crotch.  But even if the physical parts aren't there, the themes definitely are.  Kill la Kill is unapologetic in using its characters to give us all complicated feelings about the topics of sexuality.  This is definitely apparent with the many shots of Ryuuko in less than proper poses, particularly at the beginning of the show.

And here is where one of our major problems arise.  With our main protagonist (Ryuuko) and antagonist (Satsuki) both wearing their Sunday’s best birthday suits throughout the show, along with having the camera trying its hardest to accentuate this, we have massive amounts of sexualization of our main characters.  I scream this every time I see this in JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, but the difference here being that JoJo’s isn’t an ecchi.  Ryuuko and Satsuki are two high-school girls, not manly men that make me feel incredibly non-muscular in comparison.  And let’s face it, what we see here is blatant flaunting of girl parts for the sake of fan-service, regardless of if it’s worked into the story to make sense.  Trying to argue that point is like trying to argue a bikini episode in every anime is a perfectly benign and intelligent idea.  This may be a common trope throughout standard anime shows, but that doesn’t excuse it simply because it upholds tradition.  

However, let me introduce you to two of my favorite characters from Kill la Kill:  Ryuuko’s teacher and higher up in Nudist Beach, Aikurou Mikisugi, and one of the student council members, Ira Gamagoori.

These two characters earned a spot in my list of favorite characters for a multitude of reasons, one of the most notable (for purposes of this article at least) is because of their ridiculous nature.  We’ll start with Aikurou as his sparkling appearance catches my eye.  Let me state this with absolute certainty:  As much as Ryuuko and Satsuki tread the line of too much fan-service, this man is firmly well past that line.  I’m pretty sure he could compete with either of the two leading ladies for the most amount of sexualization in this anime.  There is not a shot of this man, outside of when he's disguised, where his clothes are not falling off of him.  And yet it fits him because of his role in the story.  As one of the leading members of Nudist Beach, he obviously is not comfortable in his own clothes.

But nudity is one thing.  This…

This is something else entirely.  And that’s the point.  He’s a ridiculous character, but he drives home the wonderful fact that this isn’t just a sexualization of the female cast.  If it was, you wouldn’t see a nice divide of feminist arguing over if it's sexist or not.  If it was, you wouldn’t see me defending this show (I’m looking at you, High-school of the Dead and High-school DxD).  The ecchi part of this anime is overblown at times, but it shows equal opportunity for both genders. It also fits within the themes of the show, which is that clothing is optional and an unabashed celebration of the human body is what’s popular in this world.

As another example of these themes, just look at one of our other male cast members, Ira Gamagoori, in his transformed uniform.  An upstanding gentleman in all aspects of life except for his fighting style.

If you were wondering what special power he gets with this interesting uniform, it’s probably what you’d expect from the look of it.  When he’s taken on enough pain inside of his bondage suit, he explodes in power and transforms into a monster with hundreds of whips to give back just as much pain as he received.  This show isn’t even being metaphorical here.  The man orgasms and then goes from a submissive role to a dominatrix one in this weird bondage game.  There’s no member of the female cast that even comes close to this when it comes to sexualization of their powers.  I’d also like to point out that he’s probably the only character to pull this off and it not come off as creepy, somehow.  Stoicism and nobility do wonders for certain characters.

So we’ve gone over the equal opportunity of the sexy factor in this show, but now we find ourselves with the question… Why?  Why all of the over-the-top sexualization and nudity?  Well, for the nudity, it’s an element of the show that’s deeply integrated and discussed.  Early on, Ryuuko learns that the secret to unlocking the full potential of her uniform is to accept herself and her body without embarrassment, which allows her to symbiotically link with Senketsu as if he was “her skin.”  In this way, our female protagonist becomes unashamed of her body and is proud of herself, regardless of who sees her wearing her uniform.  Also, as mentioned earlier, the idea of nudity in the show is to cast off fashion and the oppression of those who make the clothes and the clothes themselves.  This becomes more literal as the show goes on when actual suits of clothing start to fight against the rebellion of nudists.  These are interesting ideas and while the use of nudity can be jarring, the show pushes the point that it shouldn’t be.  The natural state of a human being is naked and it shouldn’t be something we’re ashamed of.  At one point, a monologue about Adam and Eve feeling embarrassed after eating the apple is directly linked to the modern obsession of clothes in a consumerist market.  It isn’t just nudity for a quick joke.  There are actual themes and reasons for it.

As for the sexuality, that one is a little tougher to answer.  It is used for jokes many times over to add to the absurdity of the universe within this anime.  However, we also see it used to drive home points that we may not be comfortable with.  For instance, there are a couple of very uncomfortable scenes involving Satsuki’s mother, Ragyou, that depict how twisted and evil the character is being within the show.  Ragyou Kiryuin is shown to physically and sexually abuse her daughter, and I’m not going to lie, I was incredibly uncomfortable and a bit disturbed.  This was intentional, however, as the creators of the show were hitting home how completely disgusting, manipulative, and honestly fucked up this character's mindset is.  I know for me, it worked.  I couldn’t stand the character, and it also helped us sympathize with Setsuki, her daughter, who wasn’t even really explicitly shown on the side of good until the last half of the show, particularly the last few acts of the last half.  Did the couple of scenes need to be so uncomfortable?  Probably not, but neither do half of the scenes in Game of Thrones, yet that’s heralded as a modern masterpiece, even though it uses very similar techniques to emphasize evil characters.  As for the less disturbing and more in-your-face moments of sexuality in the show when it’s not used for a joke, I’d argue that Kill la Kill follows the idea that sexuality is simply not talked about when it should be.  Having it shoved in our faces (literally) forces us to acknowledge that it’s there and sensuality is a natural part of the human body.  As such, we should be aware of it and cope with the ideas of sensuality as they’re not going away.

To end, Kill la Kill in my opinion, is one of the best animes I’ve seen come out in a long time.  Its use of empowered female characters (on both sides of good and evil), equal treatment regardless of gender, as well as nudity and sexuality as au natural ideas of the human body give it a big feminist thumbs up from me and another thumbs up for being an awesome show.  I highly recommend it to anyone who’s not afraid of a little skin and who loves incredible action and thought-provoking themes, and I didn’t even cover half of the ideas brought up by this show.  Things like the importance of family on our behavior and our future, a comparison of the life fiber uniforms as a wearable technology to the real life craze of wearable technology, as well as the idea of who we really are as people and what makes a human actually human are all discussed very well by this show.  If you disagree with me, I’d love to hear a discussion about why, and if you actually read this whole thing, you are a saint and a scholar and I love you.

Research and Inspiration for this discussion:

Is Kill la Kill a Warning About Wearable Technology - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eO-0Aq2lTxM&index=15&list=PLIk5ISEUUL3ZVlll-1pVCyM8OoVOcTlz3

Kill La Kill: How the year's most polarizing anime became a smash hit - http://bit.ly/1z2nraA

Fashion, Femininity, and Fascism, but Family Foremost: The Themes of Kill la Kill - http://bit.ly/1z2nt2e

Kill La Kill Is A Rare Breed Of Anime - http://bit.ly/1z2nx1Y

Kill la Kill: The Fashion of Fascism - http://bit.ly/1z2nAuD