Ooooooh! This is a good thought! It adds another layer of meaning to the show!
Anthy could be the white rose, she is the "holder of the power of Dios". The concept of the prince must have shaped her perception of the world.

zeedikay wrote:

Touga is framed by white. He isn't associated with red until about The Sunlight Garden- Finale, when he's suddenly in the music room. (And ends up pushing Miki towards dueling...)

I have a theory precisely with this moment and with Touga in general (considering Anthy could be the white rose). Will develop later.

CarolineWellwater wrote:

Oddly... I think this still supports the idea pesimistamente was proposing.  Part of being a Prince is being willing to be the center of attention... you do have to act the part of a peacock.  As such, Utena would know that you have to play to your audience.  So, she would purposely put on such a show, as it would be expected of her to do so.

In other words.  Utena knows she's just giving the audience what it wants.

Oddly, one of the darker, self-epiphanies about this sort of situation, for me was from Into the Woods, where Prince Charming literally says, "I was taught to be charming, not sincere." ))

I wasn't refuting the idea, I was just trying to see how far it could be applied. There's a few more instances that seemed to pop out at me when looking though screenshots where the frames and roses occur, though only a few might be notable enough to say at the moment.

Although like other elements in the show, several instances of the frames and roses might be more symbolic nature than the rest in the Aiko/ Apocalypse Arcs. Take The Barefoot Girl, specifically when Mrs. Othori and Akio are alone in the lobby.

Perhaps playing Playboy and Princess?

And in The One Who Will Revolutionize the World, alongside the promise that Utena and Anthy will meet again for tea in ten years.



We all know that it wouldn't work out that way though, even if it might be a somewhat romantic wish.

Note that in both instances, red roses are the ones that spin. If we interpret the roses as points of view, it would be difficult to explain why Touga would know what happens when he's not there. Does this mean that Touga and Anthy both had very flimsy senses of self throughout the series, that their own symbols ended up being easy to apply to other characters? Or that he's a literal psychic, which probably would be pretty fun to defend as a theory on it's own.

pesimistamente wrote:

I think a spinning rose and the framed scenes have different meanings, since the framed scenes as points of view works very well, while the pinned spinning rose simply doesn't

Maybe the spinning roses just are related to the basic mood of the scene, or present what mood is being presented. Perhaps like the hands in Nemuro Memorial Hall seemed to show the presence of important events.

EDIT: I just remembered that the spinning roses also tend to act as a censor, usually for the duels, like so:

Last edited by zeedikay (03-10-2016 07:13:18 PM)

This is amazing and now I want to re-watch everything with this in mind.

zeedikay wrote:

Although like other elements in the show, several instances of the frames and roses might be more symbolic nature than the rest in the Aiko/ Apocalypse Arcs. Take The Barefoot Girl, specifically when Mrs. Othori and Akio are alone in the lobby. http://ohtori.nu/gallery/var/resizes/Se … 1380823951 http://ohtori.nu/gallery/var/resizes/Se … 1380823951
Perhaps playing Playboy and Princess?

The roses representing perceptions rather than roles still makes total sense here.

If red is Touga, we know Touga's perception of Akio is playboy. Successful seducer, like in this scene with Mrs. Ohtori. He identifies with and wants to be like Akio, especially in this way.

White may be Anthy (which would be ultra interesting when we recall we've also long considered it the Prince's color). Anthy's perception in this scene is more focused on Mrs. Ohtori, which could mean a lot of things. Either simply that she's well aware that Akio is with lots of women, that she's resentful of those women, that she feels Mrs. Ohtori is the more important one in the scene, etc.

In terms of that last, there's always been something about that scene that appeared to go two ways to me. On one hand you can view Akio as taking advantage of Mrs. Ohtori, seducing her in order to get something from her. On the other hand, Mrs. Ohtori is the one that has the power to give. If Akio doesn't please her, maybe she can easily take it away. One one hand, you can see Mrs. Ohtori coming to Akio like an addict. One the other hand, you can view it as her having Akio in his very own bird cage, which she visits at her whim.

This is emphasized by the roses-as-point-of-view.

We know that Touga was an orphan and that even after being adopted his parents were distant. It follows that he has a deep, compulsive need as a result for attention and affection, but difficultly bonding (developing genuine attachments). Not only does his focus on Akio in this scene resonate with Touga's desires, it also resonates with his insecurities. While Akio is indeed desired, he's also used.

Anthy is harder to pin down, but she always is. The part of her relationship with Akio that is based on possessiveness, focusing on Mrs. Ohtori is focusing on Anthy's continued inability to have Akio all to herself. The part of her relationship that is based on protectiveness, focusing on Mrs. Ohtori is focusing on Akio's continued inability to be free from the demands of others--even in his own home (which he has only through Mrs. Ohtori anyway), even about his own body. The part of her relationship with Akio that is based on resentment, focusing on Mrs. Ohtori is focusing on Akio's worse self, one way or another, either his manipulativeness or his underlying patheticness.

The older I get, the more cruel I think this show is to Akio. I guess it is his own fault, but still. It's sad.

Aelanie wrote:

...it does work out that way, and the final scene with the picture on the table is meant to represent that.

If that photo represents them being back together, why isn't it a new photo instead of an old one? It represents the importance of their relationship, and hope. Not certainty. If the message had been certainty, it could have been a more certain scene.

Last edited by rhyaniwyn (03-19-2016 07:03:16 PM)

Decrescent Daytripper wrote:

rhyaniwyn wrote:

White may be Anthy (which would be ultra interesting when we recall we've also long considered it the Prince's color).

Ep 3's opening fairytale has white roses with the princess/sad girl left waiting patiently in the breeze as the prince departs and turns pink when Utena chooses to be a prince.

Because of that very helpful post of Ikuhara's episode commentaries in the other thread, I've been reminded that Anthy is someone who still wants to be a princess.

So, I'm liking white roses for Anthy.

Haha I even got to think that somehow that could mean Anthy "hacked" Utena's memories the same way she did with Nemuro's. But that's also because I always believed that Touga is Utena's prince (as in the movie) and once she enters Ohtori, Touga's image is replaced with Dios (who is awfully similarly looking to Mamiya).

It's such a delightfully weird show. Any time you think you've got a hold on it there's Mamiya or not only can Utena and Shiori turn into cars, but Wakaba, and she doesn't even have to make a big deal about it. Kangaroo boxing.

pesimistamente wrote:

I mean we just don't talk about this enough.
*images*

Let's not forget that the former image isn't actually Mamiya, but Anthy posing as him and warping Nemuro's memory so that she can manipulate Mikage's actions in the "present". Anthy is Akio's (and by extension Dios') sister, so it follows that they share a lot of the same features when Anthy takes on this disguise. Come to think of it, her image of Dios was probably the basis for this projection of hers in the first place. Is there some significance in that choice? Perhaps, but it's also arguable that for the sake of the plan she just needed to look like a young boy, and Dios was the only form she could come up with.

pesimistamente wrote:

I mean we just don't talk about this enough.

http://ohtori.nu/gallery/var/resizes/Se … 1380853761

http://ohtori.nu/gallery/var/resizes/Se … 1380852875

This ressemblance maybe would forwards to the manga. In the manga, Anthe is who split Dios and Akio; and Dios is a illusion created by Anthy only because she wants to believe that the kind prince that her brother was still living somewhere, I strongly believe that when Anthy leaves the school Dios stop existing.