barfkutsuou

[motorbike]

Comments

[arboretum]

laughing

i don't really have anything to say but this is a good post

also i am always mildly upset when people make fun of gankutusou (which they do with predictable regularity!), not because there's nothing to make fun of (ok! moving wallpaper! got it!) but because i like.... actually genuinely really enjoyed this show :( :( :(

even though seriously like the emotional climax of the show is when the protagonist's gay bff steals his gundam and then gets killed by this creepy blue vampire dude that the protag has had this weird straight bro mancrush on all season long, like what is even going on in your heads there gonzo, were the gundams really necessary, etc :'D

[motorbike]

Me too, I get mildly upset too, though it's like. It's so hard to pitch to people who aren't naturally into Dumas. Like if you tell someone, "it's an adaptation of Dumas," they should know right away what kind of intended audience we're talking about. I mean I was obsessed with Musketeers between ages 10 and 15. So I keep trying to reconcile how good is this show with how ridiculous is this show. It's a weird combo, like an opera. Not even a soap, just an opera. That's how Dumas stories roll.

(Weirdly this is also the. best. adaptation I have ever seen.)

Plus man I love me a series that really brings it with the ending. It was like EXPLOSIONS ARC DE TRIOMPHE BLOWING UP THE SPIDER ROBOTS FROM THE MATRIX GIGANTIC FALLING SUN WITH A CRYING FACE oh man oh man

And gundams. The best CG money can buy

[arboretum]

right! i don't even try for the most part; i'm pretty sure i've even actively discouraged certain people from watching it, just because i was so sure they'd hate it and then make a ton of noise about hating it, and it would make me sad :'D

I mean I was obsessed with Musketeers between ages 10 and 15.

wow it is like you are describing my life :o

also definitely by far the best adaptation i've ever seen (not that it has much competition given all other dumas adaptations i've seen have made me cringe), which maybe makes it even weirder that, uh, yeah, spider robots, giant falling sun, exploding arc de triomphe, space vampires and GUNDAMS, etc. :'D

it takes the framework of TCoMC and really makes something new and interesting out of it i guess is how i rationalize it? it's sort of a really good TCoMC AU fanfiction.

[motorbike]

Spiritually and morally, it's a good adaptation. I mean TCoMC was never a coming of age story obv and the Count was never a blue alien from "Eastern Space" (what? how) but the whole human virtue vs. human vice tipping scale really comes across beautifully. And yesss lol good fanfic. If I could write this coherently my soul would produce this :'D

[palais]

This is a very well-written post.

I wish Gankutsuou weren't so inexorably tied to an absolutely horrid time in my life, as it really is a wonderful show and I love it but am incapable of watching it without triggering unpleasant memories. Alas.

also i like villefort

[palais]

also i still love my baby downskutsuou

[motorbike]

I am super sad that the picture post where Catie drew Franz and Albert on the school bus seems to have gone totally down. Fuck. what a masterpiece

I want more Young Villefort comics.

[deadums]

rpi farnz

[schumers]

I have to agree with pretty much everything you said. I honestly hadn't thought much about the real POV being Franz, but it makes total sense. I always thought that, without him, the story didn't really work. He's sort of the setup for everything and, in a way, the ending for everything. He set up Albert's character as the naive, sometimes impractical young one, and his death is sort of the breaking of any real guidance Albert might have had. Of course he would have to die in order for any real shit to go down, because if he didn't, he'd be there to slap Albert and tell him to get his shit together. His death is the point marking the real downward plunge.

I agree with arboretum though, it was quite a gamble to have to kill off the real relatable character half way through. They still managed to make it work though and I applaud them for that. Did I mention how much I LOVE FRANZ?

Man, I really need to watch this show again. I've been meaning to buy the box set for years now...Anyway, thanks for the post!

[motorbike]

Farnz. What I like best about Fnarz is that he's really young too, you know? He doesn't have any idea what he's doing half the time, either, it's just that he's had to go through some shit in life so his maturity provides a better compass for what is and isn't safe. If he'd just sat Albert down for two minutes without getting hurt/upset they might have opened some kind of communication channel. I guess Franz's whole deal is that he doesn't dare trust Albert enough to be honest about why he's hurt/upset all the time, because he doesn't want Albert to find out he masturbates to thoughts of him or whatever, which makes Albert angry because he senses Franz is not telling him everything (as usual), which makes it all the harder for them to not yell at each-other for 5 min. Ugh teen boys

[deadums]

OH MAN reading this just makes the love I have for Gankutsuou blossom in my heart again lolll

I wish I had brought it with me when I moved! I had just (finally) bought the box set and everything. AAAA its been too long, I wish I had more to say but I honestly haven't seen past the first four episodes in forever (that's as far as anybody I sit down to watch it with can stand unfortunately. I always think the scene where The Count has Albert choose the pardon-card to be ridiculously tense and layered, it always makes me ready for the show.)

Did you see Romeo x Juliet? I am wondering if it matched all the layered tension that Gankutsuou managed. I never got through more than a few eps of that but I was hoping...

Man I just want to ramble lol, Ill stop now.

[motorbike]

Romeo x Juliet sucked pretty bad, I wouldn't bother with more of it. I mean I didn't watch to the end so if you do watch and if it manages to stop being terrible and pulling its plot and world building out of a hat in the space of 5 brilliant eps, idk.

I think people have to know what they are in for with Gankutsuou, if only because of the visuals. The first time through (I watched the whole thing in like 2 nights like oAo) I had to go back and watch the Luna part over because originally up to ep3 I had no. idea. who the fuck was even the main character or like, who was even doing what half the time. I thought I was watching a music video. It became less impenetrable once I'd been through the show once, but to open with 2 eps of Luna is yet another baffling/crazy move. They are super intense and original visually, but not really in an enticing way, I don't think. Lol it's like with this and the classy classy OP the show is straight up trying to separate the wheat from the chaff right away

[motorbike]

Actually! I really really like Albert and Eugenie's love story. And I appreciate that it's never sealed, that only in like the last second are you even sure they are going to date. Like, the show itself treats their romance as a teenage thing, but it's still an important teenage thing because it's such an earnest and sweet thing to happen between these perticular pair of people. Albert, who has ADD, and Eugenie, who always tries to put up a cool front. During the piano concert scene (SO GOOD SUCH DIRECTING AAA *_*) I even stopped hoping against hope that Albert would make out with Franz. For like a minute but that's a testament.