I actually really love the manga. it was my first exposure to utena. i've been drawing in the manga style since i was about 6 or 7, and when i read the manga at..i think i was 10? i was totally blown away. i was first drawn in by the name (revolutionary GIRL?! sounds AWESOME!) and i waited for like a month or two for volume 1 (which can be a long time for a kid:)) and her art itself... i myself was really impressed and it made a HUGE impact on me, she's still one of my artistic inspirations:) as for the manga itself, it's def.not as deep, but i like it nonetheless, i dont have a problem with it X)

and i dont think she is against homosexuals. In the movie manga, i think it's pretty clear that they're a couple. (and the kiss! they kiss in the manga too..) also, in the boys of the black rose chapter, in the end where they hold hands, i think that portrays them as a couple. thats probably just my opinion, but i dont think she has anything against gays. i'm probably wrong, but didnt all that come from her comments int he last episode commentary? i think that she didnt want to make them outright lesbians, because i think she was thinking about her job in general. and she's writing for young girls, and wanted it to be more mass liked and mainstream for the sake of utena being popular. im not agreeing, because i love utena the way it is, but im just saying i can understand where she's coming from:)

W: Utena! Who do you like, Anthy Himemiya or me?
U: Wakaba, what are you talking...
W: Don't you see, you're always with Anthy these days. I don't like it. I belong to you!
U: Wakaba, you're my dearest friend.
W: Then what about Anthy Himemiya ?
U: How to put it...Anthy is kind of like family. When I'm with her and Chuchu I feel at peace, like I don't have to do or say anything.
W: Hmph! Isn't that the sort of thing that married people would say? That's even worse Utena. That means Himemiya is your wife!
U: [Well, she is my Rose Bride but I can't tell her that.]
W: If that's how it is, fine! I'll be the mistress, and I'll just fight the legal wife over you!

Revolutionary Girl Utena by Chiho Saito and Be-papas.
vol. 3 pp. 48-50

brian wrote:

At least one reviewer was a bit put off by her pro-lesbian agenda.
http://www.themanime.org/viewreview.php?id=466

Okay, being the one who gave the prompt, I don't really wanna get off topic but...Did that guy just say that Evangelion is bad?

I get that a lot of people wouldn't understand Utena, but for a supposed expert to knock on Eva is just...unheard of. (Maybe I don't read enough reviews?)

Seen wrote:

Didn't Saito get into an argument with Ikuhara over the lesbian thing? I never read the manga, but from what I could see in the summaries, it looked like it was mostly Touga/Utena shipping.

Never trust summaries. Especially English ones. (Really, the one on the first Utena manga makes it sound like a yuri version of Kyo Kara Maoh.)

Honestly, it's a bit of a toss-up between the two, no matter what canon you decide to look at. Saito seems to have liked Utena better with Touga, but I've also noticed there to be quite a bit of Utena/Anthy subtext in the manga, about as much as the anime. There just happens to be more Utena/Touga in the manga than there is in the anime. I'm not entirely sure why this is...

I don't think Saito is a homophobe - or if she was, then she got over it by at least around the time the movie was being made. (And she draws girl/girl kisses in both mangas with the lips seen to be touching on-page, which is more than a lot of shoujo mangaka are willing to draw.) It's worth remembering that, although the series and manga were simultaneous projects, the manga did start serialisation some months before the anime started airing; for all we know, Saito could've decided that manga!Juri would be straight long before the rest of Be-PaPas decided that series!Juri would be a lesbian.

Looking at the transcript for the infamous episode commentry again, two things strike me: First, it looks like Ikuhara wasn't upfront about what he actually wanted the Anthy/Utena relationship to be like until a fair bit down the line, which seemed to piss Saito off. Second, Ikuhara could very well have come off as a pervert at the workshop; of course, we as viewers watching the finished anime know that he can and does portray lesbianism in a respectful, sympathetic and nuanced manner, but I wouldn't be surprised if Saito had her doubts about a man's intentions in presenting two girls as the main romantic couple.

As for the (first) manga itself, based on this interview, I think there were two main factors that scuppered it. The first is that Saito didn't understand what kind of work SKU was supposed to be, which was at least partly the fault of Ikuhara not giving her straight answers about that. The other one is the magazine it ran in; Ciao is mainly targeted at 9-to-13-year-old girls and (based on the official site for it) has a rather twee image, so there must've been quite a limit to the degree to which SKU's stickier themes could be approached.

For what it's worth, I find the first manga lacklustre, but happen to love the movie-manga (though the movie itself is still superior). Perhaps for some reason I have an easier time judging the movie-manga on its own terms instead of always comparing it to the animated version, but it could also be the case that Saito had a better idea of what SKU was actually about when she created it; plus, it helped that it was aimed at an older audience (I think it was in special spinoff issues of what's now known as BetsuComi) which allowed her to tackle the stickier themes more directly.

And just because I'm curious: How many of you guys have read any of Saito's non-SKU manga, and what did you think of it?

brian wrote:

At least one reviewer was a bit put off by her pro-lesbian agenda.
http://www.themanime.org/viewreview.php?id=466

That one reviewer - and a whole lot of other people on the internet - don't have the first idea of what they're talking about. They make these pronouncements without the first bit of knowledge about the background of Utena's development, and they don't even want to know the truth because it would shut down all their notions that they find so pithy and clever. It's willful ignorance.

There is no way to state definitively if Saito has homophobic tendencies or not. Given her seemingly rather traditional Japanese mindset, it's quite possible she does, but she would also never, ever say so directly. Keeping your true opinions to yourself and seeking harmony in inoffensive neutrality is the Japanese way.

She makes it clear in the commentary that her primary interest was in making Utena a financially successful, popular and profitable shoujo franchise. In this, she had the understandable - but erroneous - idea that a female/female romance would be an obstacle to that goal.

The success of Utena the series no doubt convinced her that this view was incorrect, which is why we hear nothing about any objections to the content of the Utena movie. However, her movie manga still ships Utena with Touga, hard. It's clear that that is her preference.

Ultimately, I think that her influence was not malignant, but I do blame her for not allowing Ikuhara to deliver what he could've delivered in the television series had he been free from her interference.

I will also agree that her work is formulaic and uninspired. As someone seeking mainstream commercial success, that's perhaps to be expected, but it is all completely by-the-book shoujo.

Last edited by Aelanie (07-16-2012 02:44:08 PM)

Aelanie wrote:

Ultimately, I think that her influence was not malignant, but I do blame her for not allowing Ikuhara to deliver what he could've delivered in the television series had he been free from her interference.

Saito and Ikuhara were not the only members of BePAPAS. If the others were opposed to Saito's objections they could have sided with Ikuhara and voted her down. This infers that there were other concerns and issues beyond the rather simplistic view that Saito is the devil.

In terms of Saito's standard shoujo story telling, I do agree that the series manga was weak. However, as well as marketing Saito had to deal with the limitations of the medium; most prominently, the length. Trying to hammer the whole of Utena into a limited five volumes strikes me as something rather difficult. It's also worth re-examining in contrast to the World Exists For Me, a manga that lasted all of two books before it was cancelled due to low sales. This series had a decent concept but it was an extremely shoujo series in every possible negative connitations of the word. It's obviously written by the same person/s who wrote Utena and has all the same glaring flaws. Annnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnd... while it was illustrated by Saito, it's made pretty clear in the notes that the bulk of the writing was done by Ikuhara.

As flawed as both the series manga and the movie manga were, I sincerly doubt that either of these are 100% Chiho Saito. Ikuhara would have had a hand in it; the other members of BePAPAS would have breathed down Saito's neck on many occasions.

While there were many weaknesses in the manga, there's a reason they are there:

1. There's timing. The manga was already being published by the time the anime went into full production. Babies grow up. I've utterly no doubt that the pitch Ikuhara gave Saito was a very different animal to the one that evolved into the series.
2. Length.
3. Marketing. Saito was there to help sell Utena to the target audience. Admittedly that target was altered to something rather older by the time the final storyboards were written up, but by this time it was really too late to redesign the whole manga series.

I wasn't aware of the magazine, Chiao, that Utena originally ran in but as far as I'm concerned it's really the last piece of the puzzle.

There were many, many, many factors that influenced the whole franchise. And to put it bluntly, suggesting that Ikuhara was so utterly spineless that he allowed the whole thing to be hijacked by one single late-joining member of BePAPAS is incredibly insulting to BePAPAS in general and to Ikuhara in particular.

Last edited by crystalwren (07-16-2012 04:49:35 PM)

crystalwren wrote:

In terms of Saito's standard shoujo story telling, I do agree that the series manga was weak.

Word, crystalwren.  Oh, and I like your post at 05:47:01 PM a lot, as it gets me looking at facades of the manga's creation I had overlooked before; that, and you wrote what you wrote in a reasonable manner.

Aelanie wrote:

It's good that I suggested nothing of the kind then, isn't it?

It has nothing to do with being "spineless", it has to do with making a compromise. He made one, for the sake of the project. If anything, that's a compliment on his leadership. The person who wouldn't compromise on the matter is Saito. "If that's the route you're taking, I quit!" was her stance by Ikuhara's account, and she doesn't contradict this. He placated her, the unreasonable element, and yet still didn't surrender what he saw as his vision, because in his own words, he "did it anyway".

I suggest you think other people's comments through more carefully in future.

And I think you need to understand the mechanics of a group project, and also of marketing. Ikuhara and Saito were NOT the only members of BePAPAS. The both of them had one vote each. Therefore, the other members of BePAPAS would have been the deciding factor of whether or not Saito's objections would be carried or denyed. Saito is a bog standard shoujo artist; easy to find, easy to replace, even if you need to find someone who had/has the same amount of popularity and marketability. And ultimately, the entirety of the franchise rested on whether or not it could be marketed. Whether or not it could make money.  Whether or not it was wirth the investment. Neither Saito nor Ikuhara nor any other member of BePAPAS were the people who made the final decision of ANYTHING. It was the people who were laying down the money. If they thought that the project would or would not be successful if certain themes or storylines were featured, then the project would not have gone ahead.

Saying that the entire franchise was at the mercy of Saito- or any one single person involved- is extremely, how should I put it, simplistic. It's also massive disservice to the other members of BePAPAS and to everyone who worked on the project regardless of their level of influence.

Right, Aelinie, I'm stopping this right here. Not because I agree with you in ANY aspect, but because this is getting unpleasant and is beginning to go against both the rules and the spirit of the forum.

I wish to emphasise that I am not conceding. I have a strong background in the aspects of financial management of any group project, the politics of said group project, the wrangling of geniuses and how all of these interact. I have also spent many hours reading the background material regarding the creation and influences of SKU, and discussing- and often arguing- all this with others re: the way all of these things affected the course of the series.

I strongly disagree with both your opinions and how you are framing your responses. But I am not continuing this conversation out of respect for both the moderators and the other members of this forum.

crystalwren wrote:

Right, Aelinie, I'm stopping this right here. Not because I agree with you in ANY aspect, but because this is getting unpleasant and is beginning to go against both the rules and the spirit of the forum.

I wish to emphasize that I am not conceding. I have a strong background in the aspects of financial management of any group project, the politics of said group project, the wrangling of geniuses and how all of these interact. I have also spent many hours reading the background material regarding the creation and influences of SKU, and discussing- and often arguing- all this with others re: the way all of these things affected the course of the series.

I strongly disagree with both your opinions and how you are framing your responses. But I am not continuing this conversation out of respect for both the moderators and the other members of this forum.

Very graceful of you to take the time to soliloquize on how much more right you are before magnanimously bowing out, I must say. The fact is, we neither of us will ever know the real truth of the matter. We are speculating based on the relatively few details that have been revealed to us, and obviously have arrived at very different conclusions. Your touted "expertise" on the subject is little more than an assertion that your fan-fu is stronger than mine, and as such, comes off as quite childish.

I didn't attack your stance as being an insult to the creators, as you have mine. That is the difference between us. This debate could've proceeded more civilly if you'd left aside your unnecessary indignation toward an imaginary offense against them. I meant none, they certainly can take none from anything said here, and it is not your place to do so on their behalf.

Last edited by Aelanie (07-16-2012 08:35:58 PM)

Lurv wrote:

MikoGalatea wrote:

Like I already said, I personally enjoyed the movie-manga, though admittedly a good part of my love for it may be bleedover from my love for the movie itself, and I'm not pretending it's flawless by any means. It's billed on the very back cover as a very liberal adaptation, so whatever you may think of it, it's at least interesting to compare and contrast it with the movie proper. I know the way one reveal was handled differently made me think a little more about movie!Shiori's characterisation, for example, but that's just me.

Well, you got me interested now. I don't necessarily hate change, since it can be fun to see something new to the story.

I agree. Some changes work and some don't, but it's nice to have another interpretation; it would've been boring as heck if the adaptation was just a carbon copy of the movie it's based on.

The weird thing about my bolded statement there is, Shiori isn't even in the movie-manga. I just couldn't help noting how movie!Shiori had a fairly muted reaction to something that shocked movie-manga!Utena to tears. But perhaps I'll save my elaboration on that for the "differences between versions" thread; I've been meaning to do a more thorough comparison between the movie and movie-manga anyway.