I think the rest of the cast represent different aspects/stages and obstacles of Utena and Anthy's relationship (bonus: each aspect represented by the color code of the character associated with chakras:

Wait, WHAT?



At the end of "37 - The One Who Will Revolutionize the World" and at the end of the movie, most of the characters dissapear. And I started thinking about this. I read the lyrics of the opening, where they say they met "in the sunlit garden", while this has always been associated with Miki and Kozue and not with Utena and Anthy per se, I was just rambling in my head. I remembered when Utena and Anthy visited the sunlit garden, and I also remembered how we never see the end of this conversation:

Utena:  Hey, do you think this is "the" garden?
Anthy:  Hmm? Which garden?
Utena:  "The Sunlit Garden". You know, the title of that song Miki wrote.
Anthy:  I don't know. But that's just an image, right?
Utena:  Didn't Miki say that he and Kozue-chan played piano in a garden when they were little?
Anthy:  So he did.
Utena:  I wonder if it was this one? It's pretty desolate.
Anthy:  Well, it's a memory, so...
Utena:  That's probably true, but I imagined something more...
(Akio interrupts)
Akio:  More...what? What did she say?
Anthy:  Well now...I wondered that too.
Anthy:  I haven't a clue.

Pretty criptic. And that's when I started developing this thought:

Miki and Kozue's story revolves around different memories of their early childhood that fixated in their psyche forever. Utena's meeting with Anthy in her early childhood marked her personality forever, but she seems to have forgotten Anthy entirely from her memory. Miki's story represents the memories Utena and Anthy have of their meeting in their childhood, and how it affected their phsyche despite not remembering it.

Nanami's love towards her brother with an intense fixation is read as nearly incestous by some viewers, and while I personally don't fully agree with it, their story revolver around Nanami being manipulated by Touga, despite herself being quite controlling about him. Realizing she's being manipulated, understanding her feelings for her brother, and finally deciding to move forward seems to paralel Anthy's relationship with Akio.

Juri's story obviously revolves around passionate and secret love for a friend. It's irrelevant if it's reciprocate or not, because for that we should analyze not only Shiori's feelings for Juri, but also Anthy and Utena's feelings for each other and we can come up with different outcomes. But the theme is still present in all the show, it's present from the very opening, and Juri represents this other side of their relationship.



Touga and Saionji are a little bit harder to analyze. No wonder they are separated from the other three in episode 37, remaining in the shadows.

Touga represents the "self". Touga "is/was/should/wants to be" a prince, but it's not, or at least doesn't act like one. Instead, he's "perverted" by Akio's ways. This reminds me a little bit of Utena's own struggle to maintain her nobility, but not the characteristic itself but the identity that comes along with it. The differences between "wanting to be noble, wanting to be seen as noble, and wanting to be seen". Akio is the main challenge, where "princehood" is put into question, and makes Utena wonder what actually means to be a prince.

Saionji has two axis: one with his relationship with Anthy and another one with Touga. With Touga, it seems quite obvious his theme is friendship; loving a friend while being manipulated, loving a friend when they change, loving a friend when they might be gone already. The other axis is with Anthy, what it means to posses someone, to truly care about someone, to be able to read people's true intentions and emotions. He also represent what it is to be a foolish jerk, and to be honest this also applies to Utena in oh so many levels, including with Wakaba.

I checked episode "13 - Plotting a Locus", trying to match the titles with these ideas, and felt pretty dumb.



Sajionji "Friendship and Choice", Miki "Reason /alternative trans: cause", Juri "Love", Nanami "Adoration, /alt trans: worship", Touga "Conviction and Self"


Mikage and Akio, the main antagonists, might represent Utena and Anthy's bagage in different ways. Mikage, in my own head canon, is the shadow of Utena's dead parents (see here) while Akio is well, we know the story. Once they overcome the obstacles, they simply dissapear, as Mikage did, as everyone else did in the last episodes.


So what do you guys think? Food for thought?