Touga? Showing remorse?

But, seriously. That's an interesting point. I think it is indeed hard to fake widening your eyes like that. I think the only way he really could have done it, was if he knew to act surprised in advance. I can widen my eyes like that to look shocked if I tell myself to do it, but can I do it that quickly in a situation like that? No. Unless, like an actor, he knew ahead of time to do it. Was there a way he could have known Nanami had found out ahead of time? ..through Akio?

Or, perhaps, he is showing surprise and remorse. You never know. But given his actions later on, and what he says to Akio in bed, I'm not so sure about that. Then again, I need to rewatch a lot of things.

Last edited by SleepDebtFairy (03-17-2007 11:25:46 PM)

I should clarify.  I'd have no trouble believing that Touga feels a little bad about what he's doing to Nanami.  (Touga's one of my favorite characters, and I think that by the end of the series he's well on his way to redemption.)  But this seems like an odd way for remorse to manifest itself.  If something happens exactly the way you expect it to, feeling bad about the outcome does not make you show surprise.  It might make your eyes fall in misery; it might make your jaw harden in self-abnegation.  But surprise?  No, I don't think we're seeing remorse here.

YamPuff wrote:

Just a quick thought of mine, feel free to disagree.

You'll hear no such thing from me! This sequence has always been one of the scenes I've felt actually humanizes Saionji a bit. I mean, yeah, he's being a jerk and smacking Anthy, but if you read between the lines, you have to at least see it's not a joyous pastime for him. He does look disturbed after he does it, like it took a moment to recollect himself to get to the disgusting man shaking the nasties from his hand after smacking her. And before he does? That shoulder slump? He feels like a cornered animal, and more so because he expects to lash out that way, even more than Anthy expects it. Anyway I agree a bunch and yay for you!

Also you know I'd never really thought about it, but yes, Anthy is a gigantic bitch in this scene.

I got the same feeling from that scene! And you know, it's funny. I disliked Saionji in the beginning for being a wife-beater, but later down the line I realized it's much different from simple abuse. Saionji has never abused another girl. (Except, maybe getting a little rough with Utena during duels, but it's a duel) Not Wakaba, or Nanami. (Even when she was punching him) Just Anthy. (And, I'll leave it at that, since this has been explained a lot already. )

Hina the Prince wrote:

SleepDebtFairy wrote:

Saionji has never abused another girl. (Except, maybe getting a little rough with Utena during duels, but it's a duel)

I don't think that trying to kill her qualifies as a part of the duel.

But he wasn't definately seeing her as anything other than "Enemy!!!! Kill!!! Kill!! Kill!!"

Yeah, I'm  going to go out on a limb here and say that he abused both Anthy and Utena. He routinely smacked around Anthy and verbally abused her, what little we saw of the verbal abuse. (Hit her with the sheath of a sword, smacked her with enough force to send her to the ground, and worst of all, tried to blame her for the abuse.) I know this is Anthy we're talking about here. She knew what she was doing, she wanted him to hurt her. She wouldn't be as mentally abused by what he does to her because she knows exactly what he's doing when he pulls the card of: 'I'm the real victim here, you make me hurt you'. However, this in no way justifies what he's doing or makes it less of an abusive and violent act.

He kicked Utena in the stomach during their duel and tried to attack her with a sword because she got to Anthy before him. Also, uh, he totally backhanded Miki. And then there was the part where he completely tossed Wakaba aside with little consideration and what I saw as no intention to see her later after he was offered a free ticket back to the school. I honestly don't like Saionji-the-person, although I do like Saionji-the-character. I dislike people who think they have the right to physically abuse others if they do something that disappoints them or makes them upset. I dislike abusers who don't place the entirety of the blame on their shoulders, who try to make their victims feel guilty for being victimized. We see that in the above scene: Saionji telling Anthy that she's to blame for his behavior. Self-hatred or not, Saionji still seems to place blame for his actions and the way he is on Touga, Anthy, and Utena.

(Side note, I interpreted the hand shake as something else. I saw it as him literally shaking it in disgust that he had to strike her, as if she wasn't worth hitting or touching. It never occured to me as an 'I wash my hands of this', but that strikes me as almost more obnoxious in that it continues in the line of 'it's not my fault, I'm not to blame for my actions'.)

Ivy-chan wrote:

Yeah, I'm  going to go out on a limb here and say that he abused both Anthy and Utena. He routinely smacked around Anthy and verbally abused her, what little we saw of the verbal abuse. (Hit her with the sheath of a sword, smacked her with enough force to send her to the ground, and worst of all, tried to blame her for the abuse.) I know this is Anthy we're talking about here. She knew what she was doing, she wanted him to hurt her. She wouldn't be as mentally abused by what he does to her because she knows exactly what he's doing when he pulls the card of: 'I'm the real victim here, you make me hurt you'. However, this in no way justifies what he's doing or makes it less of an abusive and violent act.

He kicked Utena in the stomach during their duel and tried to attack her with a sword because she got to Anthy before him. Also, uh, he totally backhanded Miki. And then there was the part where he completely tossed Wakaba aside with little consideration and what I saw as no intention to see her later after he was offered a free ticket back to the school. I honestly don't like Saionji-the-person, although I do like Saionji-the-character. I dislike people who think they have the right to physically abuse others if they do something that disappoints them or makes them upset. I dislike abusers who don't place the entirety of the blame on their shoulders, who try to make their victims feel guilty for being victimized. We see that in the above scene: Saionji telling Anthy that she's to blame for his behavior. Self-hatred or not, Saionji still seems to place blame for his actions and the way he is on Touga, Anthy, and Utena.

(Side note, I interpreted the hand shake as something else. I saw it as him literally shaking it in disgust that he had to strike her, as if she wasn't worth hitting or touching. It never occured to me as an 'I wash my hands of this', but that strikes me as almost more obnoxious in that it continues in the line of 'it's not my fault, I'm not to blame for my actions'.)

I had completely forgotten about the time he slapped Miki, and just how much he abused Utena during duels and whatnot. But, yeah - Saionji is a very abusive guy. I like what you said about "hate the person, but not the character", because that's my opinion of Saionji, too. Hell, most of the characters in SKU, for that matter. I hate people like Saionji, but as a character, I find him interesting.

Tamago wrote:

YamPuff wrote:

Episode 2 part where Saionji and Anthy interact and he slaps her and the aftermath

Well we do know that Anthy has at least two main reasons not to give Saionji a straight answer, one because she needs to keep him interested in duelling so he can be used again to help forge Utena's 'Prince's sword' and two, because when you have passive-aggressive traits, the prevention of closure for Saionji is her way of striking back at him... which begs the question, why not do to Saionji what she does to Nanami and have him suffer from strange animal centric disasters as well?

Well, that would mean more fillers. (Not that I wouldn't find it amusing) But Saionji seems easier for Anthy to torment with passive-aggressiveness alone. Also, I find it interesting that Anthy started playing tricks on Nanami with her animals right when Nanami was trying to sneak strange animals into her and Utena's dorm room to give her a bad reputation.

Last edited by SleepDebtFairy (03-23-2007 01:33:40 AM)

I think Saionji snaps whenever it appears that somebdy is stronger than him, (Anthy manipulating him/when she doesn't do as he says, and when Utena duels him) probably because of his superiority complex with Touga.

brian wrote:

satyreyes wrote:

You do not get close to Saionji.  You stay the hell away from Saionji and pity him from a safe distance.

Well put.

Here is another example of his immense cluelessness. He seems to be the one and only person who never figures out that Anthy and Utena switched personalities. Even Wakaba knew that.

He called up to the castle, "Come to me!" and was almost killed by imaginary debris.

He wanted to be a hero in a contrived rescue of Anthy and got turned into the villain. He never understood that it's not real heroism if it's contrived. He came back announcing he could not trust the letters but his resolution did not last long.

He is way worse than Nanami in cluelessness and jumping to conclusions.

Saionji can be cruel, and I stand by what I said, but I'm going to go ahead and be a Saionji apologist for a second

First, Saionji may not be not as clueless as you think!  We start seeing glimpses of an almost accidental wisdom in Saionji by episode 2, where he said -- just after Utena drew the sword -- "That may be the sword of Dios, but it has no power by itself.  In the end it must be wielded by a great swordsman."  He may not know it, but at that moment he came closer than anyone else to grasping the true nature of the dueling game.  Later on, we see his belief in eternal friendship, which persists in spite of everything he's been through; his faith is well-placed, though his vision of what eternal friendship looks like may be very different from Utena's.  And yes -- while Miki was the first to decry the dueling game, Saionji was the first to question End's motives, and I don't think he ever really trusts the letters again.  His resolution doesn't last long because... well...

Matt Groening wrote:

ROBOT DEVIL: It so happens I'm in the mood to make a deal with you.

BENDER: Forget it!  You can't tempt me!

ROBOT DEVIL: Really?  There's nothing you want?

BENDER: Oh.  I forgot you can tempt me with things I want.

I'm also not sure Saionji wants to be a hero, at least not in the way you mean.  He wants to be the Champion Duelist, he wants to be the One Engaged, he wants to be Touga, but he does not want to be a prince.  There is very little altruism in him, and I don't sense that he envies it in others.  He tries to steal Anthy because he wants Anthy.  He's not considering the feelings of others -- not even Anthy's, I would argue.  Touga is the one to accuse of confusing contrived heroism with real heroism.

Last edited by satyreyes (03-23-2007 09:46:11 PM)

Ragnarok wrote:

satyreyes wrote:

He tries to steal Anthy because he wants Anthy.  He's not considering the feelings of others -- not even Anthy's, I would argue.

After his car ride with Akio he no longer considers Anthy's feelings. Whereas, in the first arc he agonizes over them. The problem is he completely misreads her and has no idea how much of an act Anthy's persona actually is. He approaches her in the second episode before challenging Utena to a rematch, not like a former champion but as a dumped boyfriend. It's almost as if he's ready to run away with her right there, if only she'd 'admit' that her heart belonged to him. The exchange diary, his wanting to take Anthy to the castle in the sky and his ignored musings on 'secret love' are Saionji clinging to his belief that, deep down, Anthy does care about him. He wants to save her much the way Miki does, though he won't stick to playing by the rules of the dueling game when that fails to work.

The comparison between Miki and Saionji's motivations is very interesting!  I think you're right that their motivations are similar, but I draw the opposite conclusion. 

As you say, Anthy pretty much lets Saionji delude himself into thinking she wants him.  This is an easy thing to do, because Saionji expects reality to conform to his desires.  Even when Utena-in-Anthy's-body scribbles insults in the exchange diary, Saionji's faith that Anthy loves him does not change.  He doesn't agonize over her feelings.  He knows she loves him; what's to agonize over?  So in a way, the question of whether Saionji wants to "liberate" Anthy primarily for her sake or primarily for his own sake may be unresolvable, because in his mind, what is good for him is good for her.  But I can't bring myself to believe that Saionji would give up on kidnapping Anthy if he could somehow be convinced she didn't care about him.  He would make her care.  That means his desire to "free" her is certainly not an act of altruism, but one of selfishness.  That's not to condemn him, but it doesn't make him a prince, and I think deep down he knows that.

Miki's way of thinking about Anthy is much the same: he wants her for himself, and, with minimal help from Anthy, concocts the belief that she is miserable and that only he can "free" her.  Aside from being repulsed by how Saionji treated his Bride in episode 1, Miki never really expressed concern for Anthy's psychological well-being until it became tied in with his own.  At a guess, I'd say Miki's motives are slightly more altruistic than Saionji's -- he gets thrown totally off-balance when Anthy cheers for Utena during the duel, while I think Saionji would've shrugged it off as Anthy not knowing what's best for her -- but ultimately, his sympathy for the Bride remains manufactured.

By contrast, Utena's desire to free Anthy is genuine.  There's a healthy dose of selfishness mixed in there, as episode 12 proves, but Utena thinks of Anthy as a person.  Where Saionji wants to chain Anthy up somewhere so they can be "eternal friends," and Miki envisions an empty, compliant "shining thing" that will sit beside him in the garden forever and ever, Utena wants Anthy to love her of her own free will.

Last edited by satyreyes (03-24-2007 01:09:35 PM)

YamPuff wrote:

I considered that as well but it just doesn't fit in with his desperate pleading to know her feelings towards him and his look of horror after he slaps her. If she's not worth hitting she certainly isn't worth being his bride.
I don't find his 'its not my fault' line obnoxious, I find it more...escapist? Not wanting to deal with it or handle the guilt. Trying to justify it because he feels bad. He couldn't handle the fact that he's a jerk because he doesn't want to be one.

satyreyes wrote:

Saionji's faith that Anthy loves him does not change.  He doesn't agonize over her feelings.  He knows she loves him; what's to agonize over?

That's not entirely true; the scene I posted above has Saionji doing just that.

Saionji'd like to hear Anthy say she loves him, because Saionji more than any other character in the series is insecure and needs to feel validated by someone else's love.  That's where his self-deceit over Anthy's feelings comes from.  But note that his inability to extract a love confession from Anthy has absolutely no effect on his conviction that she loves him or his plans to reclaim her.  He wants the confession as an ego boost, and maybe as something to rub in Utena's face.  I don't think it's because he wants to be morally superior.

Saionji shaking his hand after slapping Anthy is Saionji agonizing over his own feelings.  He knows he shouldn't hit people, especially people he loves, and hates himself for being so hair-triggered.  He isn't afraid Anthy won't love him anymore.

In spite of all of it, I do like Saionji.  I wouldn't want to have lunch with him, because he is too close to a certain image many guys (and some girls) hold of what a perfect guy would be like, but I very much hope he finds peace.

Last edited by satyreyes (03-24-2007 01:24:44 PM)

I think that every time Touga shows surprise, it's genuine.  Exactly what he's genuinely surprised over is debatable, but there's no way he's that good an actor at his age.

I think sometimes Touga is given too much credit for manipulation.  I think he may jump on board with some events as they occur and put on a front that he planned it all/was in on it all from the beginning.