(no subject)
I finished Simoun! One of those blink-and-you-miss-it yuri series from a few seasons back with a moe-tastic art direction and a confusingly fascinating premise. (Fighter pilot priestesses in a world where everyone chooses their sex when they come of age).
Some thoughts on the end!
-okay, at least one or two of Wapourif's crew are older women! Also, helmsmen on the ship, women. A lot of the general personnel, women. Doesn't change the fact there's a very definitely annoying MEN SHOULD RUN THE COUNTRY AND WOMEN SHOULD GO INTO THE CHURCH thing going on here, but I can attribute it to this country being a creepy theocracy. To some degree I guess it makes some annoying sense. If you can choose your gender why not have it also be a choice in vocational options? It doesn't make it right but then I'm not sure we're supposed to agree with everything Simulacrum does. We're shown to sympathize with Argentum really early on (given an Argentum soldier narrates the beginning of the series) and ultimately the truly 'happy' ending is given to the characters who bucked tradition and decided not to choose at all. I don't really think we're supposed to really mourn the dissolution of Simulacrum and its stupid stupid voluntary patriarchy all that much.
-Okay, I see why Mamiina's death did make some crazy sort of sense. She didn't want the priestesses to be killed for letting her escape! So she came back so they could say they'd captured her and thus wouldn't be! Which turned out to work in their favor since these same priestesses were the ones that ultimately let Aeru and Neviril go! It was MEANINGFUL. ... okay it was also still rushed and bespoke a lot about Mamiina's brand of crazy but I'm glad at least it wasn't entirely a moment of Mamiina that was DUMB.
-also: Yun! I really liked her plot-lline in the end, although I think most of the cast suffered from its size. To that end: Aer and Neviril had great development that got completely rushed to death at the end. I wasn't as sold on them as the series was clearly trying to set up. Which is a pity as they were both really well-realized characters for a good deal of the series.
-that said, you want to know who I was sold on? Guragief and Anubituf. Holy crap, guys. I was not expecting them to be validated in canon so thoroughly. I actually sort of would've preferred to watch THEIR series. The one where they were Sibylla together and Guragie had been planning to be a lady because she wanted kids and wanted to stay in the church but then chose to become a man because she wanted to have a career with her partner and not get left behind :( and Anubituf was kinda disappointed but kinda okay with it because at LEAST THEY COULD STILL WORK TOGETHER and it was really awkward with a lot of charged late night talks in their quarters until they both realized they could actually still sleep together even though they were both men and I may or may not write this fic.
(runner up in this category is Morinas and Wapourif. I'm glad she got to be with him AND got to still be a mechanic. .... yeah I came out of a yuri series shipping the het and the m/m pair. I fail at life but hey Wapourif technically had boobs? ... I actually wanna know exactly how the hell the anatomy works with the transformation into a dude btw)
-also my fanon! Wauf! Totally wanted to be a woman too! Totally still actually thinks of himself as one! But became a man so he could have a ship. I'm sorry he was such a sweet old grandmother to everyone (I actually like the weird weird thing they did with choosing to cast NO MEN for this series. it was bizarre but it kinda worked)
-I also liked that the most archetypically male Sybilla chose to be a woman and the most archetypically female Sybilla chose to be a man. That was cool! What was not as cool was how they chose to characterize post-timeskip Paraietta. I can actually buy her running an orphanage. It really was in her character to protect and care for people like that. I was just a little weirded out she was suddenly Every Anime Mother Ever about it. I am going to just assume that's just her Teacher Voice and when she lays down the law with troublemakers she's awesome again. At least Rodore seems to be in a high up position politically! And she gets to wear pants!
What is it with series and the odd one out in love plots becoming kindergarten teachers/founding orphanages? It's popped up more than once in Japanese media.. (Gurren Lagann, Final Fantasy 6...)
-Ah well, I'm just glad they pulled Paraietta together again towards the end. I think she was really poorly used in the second half of the series
-I was happy to see Erif again. Again, for all the problems with the narrative (mainly stemming from it being...well, one of those yuri series with that very specific aesthetic. See also: all that 'wooing' that could really more be called NON-CON) the writing was really pretty strong when it came to the world building, and overall themes, and Erif was a character that existed largely as an introduction to those themes. So seeing him again was really a nice throwback to what this series was about.
-AND IT ENDS WITH THOSE ACCORDIANS. GO FIGURE.
My overall consensus: problematic at points but generally positive! I think this series is a good testament to how confusingly solid writing and worldbuilding can make a series watchable even with a limited budget and very questionable art direction. Aer was an interesting gender neutral main character. The sci-fi/theocracy bent was pretty dang novel. The ending was subdued, but largely appropriate and overall most of the cast was likeable if a little neglected due to the sheer size of it. It read a lot more like a novel than an anime, which sort of worked for me (and I could mostly ignore the awful, awful moeblob designs). I'll rec it to anyone who likes war dramas and weird genderbending sci fi. Although it doesn't go quite as far with it as it probably could have. Still, worth the watch!
Some thoughts on the end!
-okay, at least one or two of Wapourif's crew are older women! Also, helmsmen on the ship, women. A lot of the general personnel, women. Doesn't change the fact there's a very definitely annoying MEN SHOULD RUN THE COUNTRY AND WOMEN SHOULD GO INTO THE CHURCH thing going on here, but I can attribute it to this country being a creepy theocracy. To some degree I guess it makes some annoying sense. If you can choose your gender why not have it also be a choice in vocational options? It doesn't make it right but then I'm not sure we're supposed to agree with everything Simulacrum does. We're shown to sympathize with Argentum really early on (given an Argentum soldier narrates the beginning of the series) and ultimately the truly 'happy' ending is given to the characters who bucked tradition and decided not to choose at all. I don't really think we're supposed to really mourn the dissolution of Simulacrum and its stupid stupid voluntary patriarchy all that much.
-Okay, I see why Mamiina's death did make some crazy sort of sense. She didn't want the priestesses to be killed for letting her escape! So she came back so they could say they'd captured her and thus wouldn't be! Which turned out to work in their favor since these same priestesses were the ones that ultimately let Aeru and Neviril go! It was MEANINGFUL. ... okay it was also still rushed and bespoke a lot about Mamiina's brand of crazy but I'm glad at least it wasn't entirely a moment of Mamiina that was DUMB.
-also: Yun! I really liked her plot-lline in the end, although I think most of the cast suffered from its size. To that end: Aer and Neviril had great development that got completely rushed to death at the end. I wasn't as sold on them as the series was clearly trying to set up. Which is a pity as they were both really well-realized characters for a good deal of the series.
-that said, you want to know who I was sold on? Guragief and Anubituf. Holy crap, guys. I was not expecting them to be validated in canon so thoroughly. I actually sort of would've preferred to watch THEIR series. The one where they were Sibylla together and Guragie had been planning to be a lady because she wanted kids and wanted to stay in the church but then chose to become a man because she wanted to have a career with her partner and not get left behind :( and Anubituf was kinda disappointed but kinda okay with it because at LEAST THEY COULD STILL WORK TOGETHER and it was really awkward with a lot of charged late night talks in their quarters until they both realized they could actually still sleep together even though they were both men and I may or may not write this fic.
(runner up in this category is Morinas and Wapourif. I'm glad she got to be with him AND got to still be a mechanic. .... yeah I came out of a yuri series shipping the het and the m/m pair. I fail at life but hey Wapourif technically had boobs? ... I actually wanna know exactly how the hell the anatomy works with the transformation into a dude btw)
-also my fanon! Wauf! Totally wanted to be a woman too! Totally still actually thinks of himself as one! But became a man so he could have a ship. I'm sorry he was such a sweet old grandmother to everyone (I actually like the weird weird thing they did with choosing to cast NO MEN for this series. it was bizarre but it kinda worked)
-I also liked that the most archetypically male Sybilla chose to be a woman and the most archetypically female Sybilla chose to be a man. That was cool! What was not as cool was how they chose to characterize post-timeskip Paraietta. I can actually buy her running an orphanage. It really was in her character to protect and care for people like that. I was just a little weirded out she was suddenly Every Anime Mother Ever about it. I am going to just assume that's just her Teacher Voice and when she lays down the law with troublemakers she's awesome again. At least Rodore seems to be in a high up position politically! And she gets to wear pants!
What is it with series and the odd one out in love plots becoming kindergarten teachers/founding orphanages? It's popped up more than once in Japanese media.. (Gurren Lagann, Final Fantasy 6...)
-Ah well, I'm just glad they pulled Paraietta together again towards the end. I think she was really poorly used in the second half of the series
-I was happy to see Erif again. Again, for all the problems with the narrative (mainly stemming from it being...well, one of those yuri series with that very specific aesthetic. See also: all that 'wooing' that could really more be called NON-CON) the writing was really pretty strong when it came to the world building, and overall themes, and Erif was a character that existed largely as an introduction to those themes. So seeing him again was really a nice throwback to what this series was about.
-AND IT ENDS WITH THOSE ACCORDIANS. GO FIGURE.
My overall consensus: problematic at points but generally positive! I think this series is a good testament to how confusingly solid writing and worldbuilding can make a series watchable even with a limited budget and very questionable art direction. Aer was an interesting gender neutral main character. The sci-fi/theocracy bent was pretty dang novel. The ending was subdued, but largely appropriate and overall most of the cast was likeable if a little neglected due to the sheer size of it. It read a lot more like a novel than an anime, which sort of worked for me (and I could mostly ignore the awful, awful moeblob designs). I'll rec it to anyone who likes war dramas and weird genderbending sci fi. Although it doesn't go quite as far with it as it probably could have. Still, worth the watch!