I saw this a while ago posted on mixi, but since I haven't seen any topics about it posted here, I thought I'd pass the news along.

It would seem, according to Ikuhara's blog, that there is a remastered version of the Utena TV series in the works; an earlier post from the beginning of this past year seemed to be doing its best only to give vague hints as to the show's identity (colour of the hair of certain characters, etc.), but a more recent entry from the second of this month more or less gives things away -- there's even a photo accompanying it, straight from the studio! No word (to my knowledge) as to a release date, but the whole process seems to be taking quite a bit of time. If they're going through the episodes in order, though, we may have another good six or seven months of waiting time before things become any clearer.

Forgive the literalness of the translation, please. Ikuhara doesn't like full sentences, it seems.


http://www2.jrt.co.jp/cgi-bin3/ikuniweb … e=20071202

The other day, in a certain video studio in  Kouenji, I did work, seemingly with no end, until the last train.


Just as I suspected, everyone in the studio has been reading this blog (lol).
The contents of my posts have been compromised....
Fine! "If that's the case..." -- with that change in attitude, I went so far as to take some pictures.


Talked about the "Blade Runner" DLP that I saw the other day.
About how I was surprised at how beautiful the screen was. That everybody should watch it for reference...etc.


The episodes worked on.

Episode 21  Bugs (midway through to the end)
Episode 22  Memorial Hall.
Episode 23  Conditions.

Episode 22.
The screens were brighter than I had remembered. I thought the work was going to be wind up being very hard, but things progressed more smoothly than I had expected.
K-bayashi's artwork is very clear and bright. Just because it's a dark episode, that doesn't mean the artwork must be dark, too.
It's not... just a mere recollection; the coloring captures the sense that time has completely stopped, that you're in a dream.
The visual image is [inspired by?] a production of Kitamura　Sou's "The Night of the Blue Comet." When I was a student, I encountered this work while going around watching lots of theatrical productions, in search of the "Post-Terayama." A greenhouse built of glass. Researchers clad in white scuttling about the Sanitarium adjacent to it. What is their research? Is "That Night" the eve of the world's destruction? At last, when they look up, what meets their gaze is the comet, trailing through the sky. Is that the flash of the world's destruction...? That was the gist of it (at least I think so; I could be wrong). The visuals made an impression on me, and might have had an effect on the episodes in question.
The card that appears repeatedly, on the edge of one's range of sight, is an ever-present icon of "death." The many coffins in the underground room. The atmosphere is akin to that of "Jacob's Ladder." During a meeting with Continuity [director? supervisor?] M-moto, I have the feeling we talked about that. Some people take having their work revised negatively, and lose motivation. If we made the revisions on this side, M-moto might have quite the project. "Fix them" "I won't" -- we argued back and forth like this for a while. It was quite a hard conversation. In the end, I said "okay, fine," and took back the continuity plans.

However.

When we did retakes of the finished continuity, M-moto was furious. "That's not at all like what we planned for in the meeting!"
I'm sorry, it was bad of me to change things after the fact, but I really wanted acrobatics that were a little more refined. It depends on the person, but there are cases where we revise the continuity on our side, and their are cases where we do a retake and have the continuity director himself make the revisions.
M-moto stayed on with the project, but when I remember that time, even now my heart hurts.
I'm often asked what the "pointing finger-markers" mean, but of course I can't write that here.


Episode 23.

Here too the screens were brighter than I had remembered. Work too progressed relatively smoothly.
H-moto-kun from Continuity had seen "Jacob's Ladder" (or I had lend him the LD, perhaps), so things were settled quickly.
However, in the finished continuity, the horror color was too strong (well, yes!), and we did a retake. "You told me to do it this way!" -- just as I expected, I met with resistance (par for the course). "Romantic colours, like being dumped by a girl, that sort of thing..." -- that's the sort of conversation I think we had. When talking about girls, H-moto-kun suddenly leans forward, gets in your face, intent. So, with H-moto-kun, I have the feeling that we always talked about girls. The pictures inside the frames on the walls of the Memorial Hall, this time round, are clear and bright in HD. The scene of the party of the people sleeping in the Memorial Hall. Very "The Shining." But, also the scenery of one of our staff drinking parties (lol). M-kura-P [?]'s passionately singing karaoke, holding the mic in one hand, now reproduced in high quality (well now). But, HD [i]is[/is] pretty impressive. To think you can see so well.
This episode isn't just the end of the second arc, it also sets the stage for the final episode.
The most cruel thing is perhaps "being forgotten".... I had been thinking a bit about that.
A Prince who has forgotten an important thing. The princess, who had always been praying, at last her heart freezes over....
With those as my keywords, I turned to thinking about the development in the third arc.

Last edited by atolm (12-15-2007 08:36:47 PM)