Forum - View topicErrinundra's Beautiful Fighting Girl #133: Taiman Blues: Ladies' Chapter - Mayumi
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Errinundra
Moderator
 Posts: 6525 Location: Melbourne, Oz |
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Here's some stats about the performance of Your Name in Australia to the week ending 27/11/2016, according to Box Office Mojo. It was the 8th highest grossing film for the week, with AU$355,919 (US$264,821) and the third highest new film, after The Founder (AU$877,512) and Bad Santa 2 (AU$589,641). Most telling, it had the 2nd highest taking per cinema. It was screened in 46 cinemas, averaging AU$7,737 per cinema, behind the rampaging Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (622 theatres @ AU$8,762). The Founder achieved its total in 274 theatres (AU$3,203 per theatre), while Bad Santa 2 its in 205 (AU$,2876).
@ Blood-, Your post is forcing me to pre-empt the argument I intend to present in this coming weekend's review of The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya, but it would discourteous to ignore you until then. It isn't my intention to convince you or anyone else that Kyon is imagining the events in The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, but I am arguing that he is an unreliable narrator. Say, in real life, a stranger comes up to you and tells you the same story that Kyon is telling us, except the stranger is maintaining that all the events happened to him and that there were equivalent characters to Haruhi, Nagato, MIkuru, Koizumi et al, and that he experienced all the same fantastical things. You would say he was deluded, or making it up, or had been living in a different universe. The same with Kyon. Every single thing that you saw in those two series was brought to you by Kyon. You either accept that he is untrustworthy or there really was a talking cat, laser eye beams, time travel and magical baseball bats. On the other hand, there is no evidence whatsoever that Haruhi is a goddess. We never, ever see her performing any miracles. Koizumi says she is, Nagato says she modifies physical data, and MIkuru says time travel can't go beyond the date Haruhi heard about North High. But, we only have Kyon's word that they made these claims. Only source of information is Kyon. The series does not judge Kyon. Nor does it make a pronouncement on the truth of what he says. We cannot establish the truth, but that's the point. My chief thesis is that the franchise is playing a deliberate and self-conscious postmodern game. Apologies if I come across as patronising, but central to postmodernism is the notion that the intentions of the author of a "text" can never be determined with certainty. Further, the reader of the "text" will bring their own experience, knowledge and interpretation to create an altogether different "text". Two readers (or watchers of the same anime) will create two different "texts" (or anime). That's all very nice, and people apply postmodern analysis to films, buildings, holy books, political movements and so on and so forth. In short, postmodernism is sceptical of everything (Kyon, anyone?) and narrative certainties can go to hell (the Haruhi franchise, anyone?). Since the rise (or scourge, depending on your taste) of postmodernism many creative works have explored the possibilities that it has opened up, playing with narrative uncertainty, unreliable points of view, parallel stories and the upending of expectations. I gave two examples - If on a winters night a traveller and The Crying of Lot 49 - in my reviews that pretty much play the same games on the reader as the Haruhi franchise plays on the viewer. I also provided examples of the signals in the franchise that warn us the we're in for a pomo rollercoaster ride: genre cross-referencing, the unidentified and unreliable narrator, the constant breaching of the Tolman Paradox as essential plot points, the endless eight episodes refusing to progress the narrative, and the bleaching of the hyperreal (Haruhi's movie) into the hyperreal (the anime world of Kyon) in the Sigh arc. This is narrative trashing on a grand scale. Only Paprika has the same crazy ambition. Let me turn this around. What makes you believe Kyon? Especially when doing so means accepting the existence of aliens, time travellers, espers, talking cats and laser eye beams? BTW, The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya won't resolve the question. Postmodernism is antithetical to resolution. BTW 2 - a couple of diversions regarding Umberto Eco (The Name of the Rose, Foucault's Pendulum, The Island of the Day Before), another noted postmodernist, theoriser on the hyperreal, and semiotician (the study of signs and symbols). 1. A reviewer once said of The Name of the Rose that if you understood it you wouldn't like it. That's a very smart-arse pomo statement. That is, if you think you have nailed down the narrative or the message then you will have missed all the fun. 2. Joke. What do you get if you cross a semiotician with a mafiosi. Answer. An offer you can't understand. |
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Blood-
 Bargain Hunter Posts: 23773 |
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Thanks for the reply, errinundra. And I didn't find it patronizing in the least. Like a lot of people, I recognize the sound of the word "postmodern." Like a lot of people, I don't really know what it means because I've never really read up on it, so your pithy and clear summation of some of its broad strokes is very useful.
What makes me believe Kyon? Well, as I already mentioned I have my personal bias that this show is more interesting to me if the dramatic stakes it raises (uh-oh, keep Haruhi happy or God (heh) knows what will happen) are "in-world" real. Second, since I do not use postmodern theory as a critical filter, I rely on "in-world" cues when assessing a character's reliability. Kyon tells me (repeatedly) that Haruhi is a colossal pain in the ass who gets on his last nerve. The show gives me lots of in-world cues that this is, at best, only a segment of his true feelings for her. I do not detect any in world cues that Kyon is making up the fantastical stuff. But as you make clear, those cues come from the theory of postmodernism itself and your belief that the show is hitting various marks that a believer in postmodernism would recognize. Postmodernism is a dog whistle I don't hear. Because I consider you quite sharp and because I know you've watched the franchise multiple times, I thought I'd check in to see if there were non-postmodernism in-world cues that simply blew by me. For example, in the first episode of the Melancholy Arc when Kyon is introducing himself to us, he tells us that he was such a prosaic kid that he didn't even believe in Santa Claus (not terribly unusual in the Japanese context, I wouldn't think) yet, at one time of his life, he did yearn for the existence of things like time travellers, espers and aliens (Jesus, I rewatched the episode a few days ago and already I wonder if this memory is true - I'm pretty sure he did cite those three specific examples). So when he gets to class and Haruhi stands up to say those are examples of the only type of person she's interested in meeting, you could - even as a non-pomo - interpret that as a fantasy on Kyon's part. Under the sway of a girl he himself describes as incredibly beautiful, he decides to impose his own special brand of Kyon fantasy revolving around her which unloops (heh) for the rest of the show. From there, you can posit that the whole thing is a fantasy or you can posit that all the mundane stuff that doesn't break the physical rules of reality actually happened "in-world" but the laser beam stuff, etc is Kyon's embellishment. For somebody like myself, I would have needed more potential in-world cues like this to convince me that the show might be going for some genuine ambiguity over whether what we are seeing is real or not. Anyway, it's been an incredibly interesting discussion for me and I thank your review for sparking it! |
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Touma
 Posts: 2651 Location: Colorado, USA |
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Even though this is addressed to Blood- and my thoughts are much the same as his I still feel compelled to respond. I believe Kyon because it is part of the suspension of disbelief that is necessary for me to enjoy science fiction. The Haruhi novels are science fiction written in the first person. Kyon is the author. If I do not believe him then there is no point in even trying to read the books or watch the anime. If everything was happening in Kyon's imagination I do not know what genre that would be, but it would not be science fiction and I would not be interested in it. The stories would lose their appeal if Haruhi was not really a god and Yuki was not really an alien and Mikuru was not really a time traveler, and so on. That is what makes me believe Kyon. |
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Errinundra
Moderator
Posts: 6525 Location: Melbourne, Oz |
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Haruhi agrees with you and Touma and Alan45. That the franchise has her saying that is yet another pomo link between our otaku lives and her hyperreal one. We want a more interesting story so Haruhi and Kyon willingly give it to us. The best part is that I happily enjoy the franchise as a straight up story. That makes the first season very good in my estimation. The pomo fun takes it up to the next level, excellent. |
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Zin5ki
 Posts: 6680 Location: London, UK |
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Do you happen to remember this old website, out of interest? |
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Crisha
Moderator
 Posts: 4290 |
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That super mature moment when you're reading someone's very detailed and thought-provoking analysis and switching out each 'm' for an 'rn', and snorting about it (because gosh darnit those two look too similar in sans-serif font). And then you decide to post your supah-mature thoughts in said thread. Here's a pomo interpretation for you: This is all one long wet dream in Kyon's head, and everything will end once it reaches a climax. *badum-tish* ------ Okay, now that I've contributed absolutely nothing, I will say that I prefer Blood-, Touma, and Alan45's literal interpretation of the material, since that does make it more interesting. But I do appreciate and like the ability to interpret it as errinundra has done here. I think it does add some fun levels of complexity to the material. I think franchises are more fun when fandom analyzes and posts theories on the material. Like, say what you will about the gameplay from the Five Nights and Freddy's franchise, but the in depth analysis at piecing together the threads in each game to build up the lore is absolutely fascinating to me. Then again, I'm a sucker for details, and I'm seriously the type of person that likes looking for them and sorting them out to make sense. |
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Errinundra
Moderator
Posts: 6525 Location: Melbourne, Oz |
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I feel like a prophet in the wilderness. My day will come.
I've imbibed enough literary theory to sound pretentious but not enough to explain my self precisely and clearly. I get that you're taking the piss, Zin5ki, but the big question is whether the author of that article is doing the same. Like me they're pretentious and they do express themselves precisely, but they're even less clear than me. I guess what they're saying is open to creative interpretation by the reader. 
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Touma
Posts: 2651 Location: Colorado, USA |
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@Errinundra
I ask this simply because I am curious about it. When you watched Haruhi did you see everything as being in Kyon's imagination or was some of it real in his world? Even though I prefer to take things literally, in this case, I do think that we are all free to interpret stories in our own way. I believe that the creators decide what they put into the story, but we can decide what we get out of it. If that is different things for different people I see no problem with that.
I was not snorting, but I was wondering why Errinundra was using "poRNo" so often. At first I thought it might be a usage of the term that was not familiar to me. It did not help that "poMo" was a word that I had never seen before, and I probably have porno on my mind way too much. I finally took a much closer look and realized that it actually was "poMo" and decided that it must be a short form of postmodern. Then things made sense. The misunderstanding was entirely my fault of course. 
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Blood-
Bargain Hunter Posts: 23773 |
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You know, willag, I had hoped the example I have set for you lo these many years would have paid off. I had hoped my thoughtful erudition, unblemished by any hint of the sordid or tawdry, would have had a salutary effect on your moral fibre. I see now that I was sadly mistaken. So very disappointed.
... Anyhoo, I'm off to jack it to some tentacle pr0n, but I'll probably have more to say on the subject later. |
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Zin5ki
Posts: 6680 Location: London, UK |
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But the content of that website is automatically generated in its entirety! One merely needs to press refresh for another algorithmic lampoon! |
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Alan45
Village Elder Posts: 9841 Location: Virginia |
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I more or less have to go with the literal interpretation of a book or show. My mind has a blind spot for symbolism, alternate interpretation or other views. I simply cannot come up with this stuff myself. When someone tries to explain some deeper analysis of a work, it is like looking at those blurry photos that purport to document big foot, Nessie or flying saucers. I can usually see where that interpretation came from but the evidence could just as well support multiple other views or nothing at all. For me Moby Dick is simply a book about 19th century whaling, and an excessively long boring one at that.
Normally when I see an analysis of something I've seen or read I just sigh and move on. In this case, for the reasons stated above, I was impelled to comment. Personally, I would go even further than Blood- concerning Kyon's attraction to Haruhi. I think he is being as honest as he can. I doubt he has worked out his feelings, at least until the movie and is not about to admit to us what he hasn't acknowledged to himself yet. |
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Crisha
Moderator
Posts: 4290 |
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YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY, SEMPAI NOTICED ME! Are you proud of my two-fold joke? It was punny, porny, and post-moderny! Be disappointed in me as much as you want, sempai, just please never ignore my desperate, pathetic attempts to please you! 
---- I don't think I was fair in my statement above about the literal interpretation being the more interesting one. Frankly, I think off-the-wall theories (and non-off-the-wall theories) and alternative interpretations are extremely fascinating to read about and can greatly enhance the experience. But in terms of a story - as one who loves fantasy, supernatural, and sci fi - I personally find gods, aliens, time-travelers, and ESPers more interesting than a boy bored with his life and making up such fantasies in his head. ---- EDIT: Also, too much Haruhi fans in this thread. Ahem... KYON X YUKI 4LIFE! Booyah, anarchy. Appropriate AMV is appropriate - Ship Happens with Haruhi as lead crack!ship fangirl. |
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Blood-
Bargain Hunter Posts: 23773 |
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*studiously ignores willag-kouhai*
So I watched The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya tonight and absolutely loved it. I look forward to your review of it this weekend, errinundra. There is one part that confused me, but I'll see if it is addressed in your review. If not, I'll have to ask the question to you and the assorted reprobates who haunt this thread. |
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Errinundra
Moderator
Posts: 6525 Location: Melbourne, Oz |
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@ Touma,
Your question does not compute. Error on disk. Shutting down. . . . . Re-starting.... Let's get meta 1) The Haruhi franchise is a full-on, deliberate, self-conscious PoMo anime. (I now use PoMo for the sake of those with Freudian eyes). 2) A feature of PoMo things is that narratives are unstable. The viewer/reader/whatever cannot be certain of what is really going on. 3) The franchise goes further and presents us with a hyperreal world that bears no resemblance to any real world, with aliens, espers, time-travellers etc etc. 4) Due to 2) it becomes impossible to determine whether the hyperreal world is Kyon's, Haruhi's, or anyone else's for that matter. 5) The franchise frequently draws parallels between its hyperreal worlds and our hyperreal worlds as otaku. 6) The franchise thus poses this question to its otaku fans: which of the following narratives are you going to accept; A: That Kyon is reliable, which requires acceptance of talking cats, laser eye-beams, goddesses, ie the viewer embraces their inner otaku and their hyperreal existence; or B: That Kyon is unreliable, which requires adoption of Haruhi's point of view - that none of these things exist, as much as we wish they did. 7) There is no right answer. There is no privileged interpretation. I'm not saying that Kyon is imagining things. He is a narrative tool in an elaborate sequence of PoMo gags. *** No. That reading is wrong. Re-booting... The Haruhi franchise is a convoluted harem anime. Will Kyon get the right girl - Haruhi, or Nagato, or Mikuru, or (heaven forbid) Ryoko Asakura, or Koizumi? (Did you know that Koizumi makes a move on Kyon at a hot spring in The Disappearance of Nagato Yuki-chan?) He, getting back to Kyon, thinks he loves Mikuru, but will he realise that Haruhi is his true heart's desire before things become terminal. *** No. That reading is wrong. Haruhi is a monstrous goddess who molests innocent moe girls, terrorises computer nerds, and who will destroy our lives if we don't appease her with offerings of abeisance. *** No. That reading is wrong. Kyon is a con-artist who simply wants to entertain us with a sequence of fantastical, but fictional, anecdotes. *** No. That reading is wrong. Errinundra is a boring old fart, throwing good money after bad in an effort to save a sinking argment. *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** Touma, answering your question in a more conventional manner, when I watch the franchise I simultaneously enjoy the multiple interpretations that are available in the same way that, when listening to a great song, I simultaneously enjoy the melody, the underlying musical structures, the lyrics, the rhythm and the skills of the performers. It's the genius of the franchise. @ Zin5ki, That's cute. I'm relieved that I wondered if the site was taking the piss, without actually refreshing the page to confirm it. I like the way it drops all the right PoMo names, much like... ahem... I did. @ Blood-, I re-watched it again on Sunday night and enjoyed it immensely. Because I'm spending so much time on these blessed posts I'm not sure the review will be finished for this weekend. |
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Blood-
Bargain Hunter Posts: 23773 |
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errinundra: the solution seems simple enough: take time off work to on the review. I'm sure your employers would understand.
Speaking of which, I think you should apply to ANN to become a reviewer. If you're going to put all the time and effort into them as you clearly do, why not get paid for it? Plus, your reviews would then get a wider readership which I feel they deserve. And since I'm already making awesome suggestions, here's another: willag has in the past stated a love of performing mindless, repetitive tasks. So how about getting her to create an index of your reviews in the OP of this thread? It would be great to have a list of all your reviews and links to click on that would take a reader to whichever one is selected. I see that willag inspired this thread in the first place so it would be fitting for her to do this grunt work. |
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