Well, that would work.

I know this is weird, but the thing that kept me watching past the first arc was the duel songs. I knew if they focused that much on character that watching would (hopefully) be worth it.

Wow, that looks more painful than movie Akio leaping across a car. Then again, I don't think even a device like this could persuade a person into liking that. >:

SleepDebtFairy wrote:

I got into SKU because I had just gotten into Princess Tutu, and several people said I would probably like SKU if I liked Tutu. I ended up loving SKU, even more than Tutu. Much, much more. It's probably the series I'm most obsessed with. And now I am checking out Serial Experiments Lain because some people said SKU fans might like it.

Then logically, Lain fans should like SKU, too. Gotta try that some time.
Also, if you like Lain you should watch Haibane Renmei. It's one of the most beautiful and unique animes out there. Haibane was also the first anime to make it into my anime top 2 list (well, actually there was only one other anime in that list before. I suppose it's not hard to guess what it was... ). Lain is great too, it makes much more sense as I'm watching it again, overall I'd say Lain is my 3rd favorite.

Anyway! So far I've made 3 Estonians watch SKU. Maybe even 4, but I dunno if he actually got a chance to see it. He was very interested in it, though.

I don't really recommend it to anyone, either. Open-minded people, philosophy teachers and those who want to see something different would most likely enjoy SKU. I depends a lot on the person. And sadly, most people get the wrong first impression of the series thanks to the first few episodes.
Then again, I was hooked on it the second I saw the spinning roses. I had never seen anything like that before, and after I saw the duels it became my instant favorite.

I simply suggested SKU to two of my friends who like anime.  One owns the entire series and really liked it (although I'm not sure at what 'level'.)  The other has only seen part due to Netflix not having a lot of the series anymore and her current inability to 'access' the rest by other means.  She likes it fairly well (particularly Anthy), but I'm not sure she'll ever become just a raging fan due to her tendency to go for things like Shaman King and Fullmetal Alchemist.  Not that there's anything wrong with either series, but they're much more action-oriented (with some depth, just not to SKU levels).  Still, she recently watched and enjoyed Haibane Renmei, so here's hoping she'll enjoy it by the end.

I personally didn't really love SKU until after the last episode.  And I didn't like many characters until the second time watching (i.e., I hated Nanami and Juri and didn't really care about Anthy until I saw where their characters went, and then I loved them the second time around.)  The best thing about SKU for me was the fact that I actually liked the title character as my favorite character.  The only other main character that I had liked at that time was Vash from Trigun, and I still preferred Wolfwood.  But with SKU, not only did I like Utena, but she was my fave.  Not to mention actually coming across an understandable and convincing villain in Akio!

Right, right, getting people to watch SKU.  I think going from SKU to Princess Tutu is much easier than going from Princess Tutu to SKU.  PT is pretty cool, and has certain similar elements, but it really lacks the "whoa" factor that SKU has, and I've found that PT fans sometimes can't handle that.  I know the girl who recommended PT to me (I was about to watch it anyway, but it was nice to have another recommendation for it) said I'd like it if I liked SKU, but she herself couldn't get into the "cracktastic" feeling of SKU.

SKU isn't something I'd recommend to anyone aside from close friends who would just immediately buy or rent it, so I wouldn't have much else to do with their viewing.  I can't really imagine watching it with anyone else, just because those first few episodes can be really hit or miss, and I don't like sitting there going "Don't worry, just give it time.  The awesomeness is yet to come."  Makes me sound a bit more crazy than I like to sound, even to close friends.   I liked those early episodes because I'm all into the shoujo junk, but someone looking for the purported SKU mindf*ck might get their doubts.  Most people I know just aren't as patient as I am when it comes to anime (no matter how bad it is, I will finish the series.)  The symbolism and everything else that followed up the ultra-shoujo moments, adding interesting depth the series, was just icing on the cake for me.  In some ways, I think I still love SKU more for the simple elements (maybe why I actually enjoyed the manga?) than the symbolism, etc, even though I love those added thought-provoking elements.

As for a plan, I really don't know.  SKU isn't a show for everyone, as I'm sure we all can agree, and sometimes I'm not sure I even want to share it.  It's just not easy to get, and quite often if you don't love it, you really dislike it, and I'd prefer to keep the opinion of the series much higher than that.  ^_-

Problems introducing people to Utena:

Bizarre aesthetics, even for shoujo. This could be comical if the show took itself a little less seriously, but it's not that sort of a parody.

Repetitious. Part of the reason we're here is because we accept and appreciate the show's rituals, but it grates on some people's nerves regardless of the director's intent. Mustn't neglect that a lot of footage snippets got reused just to keep costs down, too, which does not reflect well in this age of digital animation.

Duel choruses. Blasphemy, you cry! Well, my musician roommate complains to me when I listen to them, especially the Banyuu Inryoku ones. "Will they kill the drum machine already?" "I hate it when the instruments play the same things as the singers."

Less-than-ideal DVD transfer. Especially bad in the first part. Oh, if only they would remaster the TV series!

I've had better luck starting people on the movie. It always amazes people, even if they have no idea what to make of it.

Last edited by Shiva Indis (07-18-2007 09:58:36 PM)

Kapria and I have pulled and all-nighter [well, now she's asleep, but I'm still up]. Because of my ranting and raving endlessly at her about thinking Shiori was a horrible bitch, she's decided that she wants to watch SKU. She fell asleep around the end of episode 26, but I'd say we did well for one sitting, considering she made me pause several times and explain certain things. I'm glad she's watching it, but I really wanted to turn it off several times. I'd explained more than once that SKU is not like normal anime. You can't think of it that way. You really can't just hate people one moment, then like them, then hate them. You have to accept everything, good and bad. For Touga, "I think he's sexy, oh my god, what a jerk! Oh damn, he's fine." or, the far more annoying perspective on Nanami, "What a bitch, oh my god, I hate her! Oh, now she's crying, poor girl. Man, she really loves him. Oh, what the hell, she's a fucking bitch, she needs to die. Aw, her brother shouldn't have done that, poor girl." Augh. I know she won't be able to accept the way SKU works right away, but it was really getting annoying. She feels so sorry for Anthy, and says everyone is treating her so badly, she doesn't deserve this, ect. I told her Anthy was probably the most manipulative bitch in the entire series, and she flat out told me that wasn't true! Excuse me, whose DVDs are you watching right now? That's what I thought. Anyway, she's decided that she likes ChuChu and Wakaba right now. I like ChuChu just fine, and I absolutely love Wakaba, but I really wish she would open her mind up just a little bit.

Oh, the funniest thing of the night was "Maybe after tonight, I'll be a fan like you." Hah, yeah, why don't you tack on about 4 years of backbreaking research and a good dictionary's worth of ranting and interpretations to last night.

I'm sorry if that sounded bitchy, but SKU is something important to me, and I want her to be more than those "fans" who hate everyone who isn't just sweet and innocent, and hate almost every character with any real depth to them.

I don't mean to be...hmm...argumentative, but just because people enjoy the series differently than you do, and prefer the "innocent" characters to the "not-so-innocent" characters (or what have you), that doesn't make them any less of a fan.  A different fan, but hardly "less" of a fan.  Everyone is different, reacts to things differently, and considers concepts like "depth of character" differently.  If that weren't the case, this world would be a terribly boring place.  SKU is a show that can be enjoyed in a million different ways--and I'd say none of those ways are particularly wrong.

I understand wanting your friends to understand on as deeply a level as you, but I think you're being a little harsh on her. You're expecting her to know things--like about Anthy's full personality--that are at the very end of the series. You seem sort of judgmental when she doesn't have the same opinion of Anthy as you do, or any other character for that matter. I mean, let's face it, it would be downright insane at the early part of the series to think Anthy is evil when the only hints that are there only make sense in hindsight.

And even if she sees the whole thing, she may still think Anthy doesn't deserve that treatment. Heck, while I know Anthy is far from innocent, I still personally don't think she deserves all that. You'd be upset if someone said that of Shiori, wouldn't you? Let her have her opinions. Just don't knock them down by saying how long you've studied it, etc. When it comes to opinions about symbolism and characters, no one is more "right" than anyone else. *resists urge to go into Literary Theory, nerd urges rising!*

If you're kind of snobby about this, then she's never going to get into it because it's never going to be "hers." If she's going to have to compete with you just to have an opinion of her own, then she's not going to talk about it with you, or worse, refuse to watch it anymore. Be sure not to put Utena over your friendship.

Again, this could not be to the extent that I'm warning against, but that's the situation presented in your comment. I just want to make sure that you all get what you want, and all end up happy.

Frau Eva wrote:

I understand wanting your friends to understand on as deeply a level as you, but I think you're being a little harsh on her.

I understand dollface wanting her friend to understand SKU the same way she does too, that's why I don't think it's necessarily being harsh. I think we can all agree that for a lot of us, SKU is almost....intimate. We aren't necessarily just sharing a cool TV show with someone when we show it to them, and dollface has definitely stated repeatedly she's one of us that sees SKU as the former. It's understandable that she would be a bit touchy about sharing it with a friend that's not quite seeing it her way, she's sharing more than the series, and it's not the series being misinterpreted that she's having trouble with. I can see it being like standing in front of a mirror with someone, pointing at your reflection, and having them grossly disagree with what you say they're looking at. Or worse, not even trying to understand what they're seeing. But that could be anyone's mistake, you can't always trust people to realize that you're talking about yourself, not Shiori. We do, but we're all doing that on here.

Edit: Yasha is being a complete pain in the ass while I write this, looking over my shoulder at my laptop and stealing bites of my blueberry pancakes that J made. I should beat her.

Last edited by Giovanna (07-22-2007 01:36:39 PM)

I can understand that, to some degree. Of the two people I tried to introduce the show to back in uni, one only focused on the shallow things (and although I can do the patented "ZOMG AKIO IS SO FUCKING HOT!" squee with the best of them, I do want to go deeper...in more ways than one, I swear! ) and I fell out with the second before he could see the whole thing. Although he seemed to get it, which makes me sad. Maybe one day I'll ensnare someone in the web...

It may be that your friend doesn't understand how personal this is for you. It's understandable, most people wouldn't expect you to be so deeply affected by a "cartoon". It's also something you may not be able to express in a short amount of time. Try to be patient with her, hopefully she'll get it eventually.

Actually...but that goes in another thread.

dollface wrote:

You really can't just hate people one moment, then like them, then hate them.

This stood out to me because it's pretty much exactly how I feel about my boss. And with characters, you can't really make up your mind about the whole character until you've seen the whole character.

As for sharing and whatnot, I first watched SKU about a year ago now. I've only shared it with ali so far and she hasn't seen all of it yet. I don't expect her to adore Ruka but I do think she'll have a little more sympathy for him than most Juri or Shiori fans do. But then, I'm not as invested in him as a lot of fans are in their favorite characters.

I understand that it is very personal to you guys, as it is to me. I had an experience when I tried to show an ex-boyfriend Utena, who I figured would appreciate it since he's such a symbolism snob. I think the point at which I snapped was when he called the chick speech "retarded." I...urgh, he wasn't allowed to watch it from then on.

But I think some things are unreasonable. The series is very, very close to me; you can see its influence in just about any creative endeavor of mine. But it's almost like sharing your writing. If you want to actually share something so close and personal to you, you're going to have to suck it up to a certain extent and accept that people may see fault with it. If you're incredibly defensive about it, then no one's going to want to deal with the emotional maelstom that comes with viewing it. Something can be close to you and you can still not take things personally as long as its contructive. Hell, I think the same thing is appropriate of even literary theorists getting way too bent out of shape over disagreements of theory(like Harold Bloom, the crotchety old baby *shakes fist*). I don't make distinctions with anything. There's just a point when things start bordering on wanky. Also, note that what I'm saying here in this paragraph does not necessarily speak of the dollface situation, since I was not there and am not qualified to say that this actually applies. I'm just saying that a line exists in general.

But as far as the actual situation goes, it's very hard to tell who's doing what from comments. It's all a question of degree. If she's constantly bagging on Shiori for absolutely no reason--especially if she's not even on-screen--then that's rude when she knows Shiori's your favorite character. It's always rude to go on and on about how much you hate something your friend likes--it doesn't matter if its anime, music, or anything else. That's annoying to anyone, ever. But if she makes a comment just when Shiori is doing something, well, bitchy? I think that's reasonable to react. Even though my favorite is Touga, I can watch him being a bastard and say, "God, what a skank." Infact...I usually do. So take whatever I say with a grain of salt, all according to the situation.

Although this all brings up something I've randomly been feeling lately...I've honestly just been getting the impression that no one can say anything bad about Shiori here without getting a lecture about motivations. I understand her motivations, I sympathize with her teenage angst, but can I just say that she acts like a crazy bitch sometimes? I know it's mostly because she's been maligned for so long by many fans, but...it seems like the board is overall pretty accepting of all the characters. It seems like a similar thing with Juri fans back in the day, who could never admit that it's pretty much her own fault she's still moping around like an emotard. But this could just be an impression, and I'm just gauging things.