https://ko-fi.com/boiraplena miri ☘️ | 27yo | n1 coralena freak | I may post nsfw🔞 content here but it'll be under a read more (and reblogs will be tagged as nsfw or suggestive)
It has been revealed that there's an intentional timeline (Temptation Stairway–> Dating Oblivion–> EDBBQ) so I want to talk about PoP as sort of a disconnected prologue to present the themes in EDBBQ. Meaning:
Following what I theorized to be the internalized male gaze of EDBBQ, it could've been preluded by the looming strong presence of patriarchal oppression in previous ENA episodes, as particularly shown in Power of Potluck.
I wrote an analysis of the animation from this perspective under the cut.
This animation stands out for it's very bared structure in 5 named acts and point-and-click game style of subtitles and frame. This style of literal framing gives off a sense of oppressiveness together with the birdseye POV (as if we're watching her from someone else's eyes) compared to prior animations. But, as you probably know, it's not there for the entire animation, only appearing when she's in the house surrounded by those that know more than her. I also wanna mention how several of the settings are reminiscent of several human organs, in which ENA would be travelling through them.
DESCRIPTION
ENA rings the doorbell of a turtle-shaped house and is immediately thrown into a literal gutsy journey. On a dirty corridor carpeted in red and flanked by taped-up metal doors we meet Ivy, a literally split-in-half feminine character that rushes ENA into the performance; not before judging her for not enjoying herself enough.
We follow ENA through several rooms in a backward journey from what was the anus/urethra, bypassing the intestines to what we could assume to be the stomach.
This place contains several feminine figures hurting, who yet claim that their tears are of joy. Their vulnerable positions and entrapment could lead to several sinister readings to it but I want to call attention to the effort they make to deliver their words. A growth covers the original mouth with a new one and then projects two new sets of lips forcefully detached from them... all as if to seem like these aren't their words, their truth, they're passing onto ENA. And just like the figures have their two degrees of separation, ENA has her sad mask of deluding happiness.
In the "stomach", the tears pool on the ground and sink down the drain as if to parallel the idiom of "swallowing one's tears".
And so they guide ENA to the source of their joy (?) and that'd be entering the performance aka walking through the red curtain to Act 2 or The Rising.
ENA appears to be observed by masculine-coded strangers in a dark street and does not find this ("element of womanhood") amusing at all. We could say the title of this act equates male attention with a "rising" or "ascension" into more (more human, more value, more responsibilities, more attractiveness...) but she seems to denounce the perceived positivity in this situation.
With acts 3 and 4 we are presented with the most cryptic of acts: Crescendo of a Descent. In it, ENA searches for an explanation for her discomfort and is only shown vague gestures and emotions while being asked to take part in. It ends with ENA rebelling against the situation for having been thrown into stage and not being given enough of a justification for it. Basically we can see how they're all manipulating and messing around with her.
Before tackling act 5 I want to talk about the naming of the acts, or rather, the artifical structure permeating the entire narration.
STRUCTURE BREAKDOWN
Here's what we're shown, with the actual traditional names of a 5-Act structure in parenthesis:
Act 1: Display ("Exposition")
Act 2: The Rising ("Rising Action")
Act 3 and 4: Crescendo of a Descent ("Climax" and "Falling Action")
Act 5: Therapy ("Resolution" –> actually namedropped by the therapist. It is also the only actually named act, the ending, the lesson. ENA's struggle is of no matter to the creator of the structure.)
We can see a lack of interest in allowing them to have a more descriptive name or appear in logical points; rather, it just feels as if they just act as a constrain to the story, a constrain to ENA's story/existence. In the same manner, acts 3 and 4 appear to have been "rushed" by whoever seeks to pressure ENA since they are presented together instead of separately.
The meaningless names of the acts, their random appearance and the rushedness of "Crescendo of a Descent" all point to a sense of irritation from the "narrator" itself. We increasingly get the sense that someone has been injecting these acts onto ENA's life. After all, it is right at the moment where ENA seems to start to show anger, rebel and oppose this strange atmosphere that act 3-4 is finished. And so we get to...
ACT 5: THERAPY
It being named "Therapy" seems to want to convince us that there's some kind of healing understanding from the part of the therapist when it literally starts with a roaring patronizing outburst:
Perhaps this phrasing feels more familiar:
"You will understand when you're older".
A closed argument. According to this one sentence there is no other way for her life to evolve, her fate has already been written (by him).
[I also want to mention the title for the EDBBQ track used in this trailer:
anemoia (noun): nostalgia for a time or a place one has never known.
Which, if we take it to mean what's referred to be her struggle in PoP, it makes it feel like perhaps it's just a joy she'll never experience.]
Back to PoP, whether that be having your period, having a child or being a servile wife, the patriarchal figure wants no discussion and cuts the rebellious thinking. Even if seemingly delivered in kindness, these are the only words exchanged before she's basically kicked out:
💀: Because it's a joy you still don't understand.
So... tell me... what's the flavour of today's voyage?
I feel this is lightly sarcastic, "Why are you here again?", "What's the matter with you now?" but ENA doesn't seem to catch it or doesn't care. She needs answers.
🎭: Abysmal! Tastes like I'm in a real cosmic stew.
These words betray a painful feeling of existential dread, of her sense of self being slowly boiled-eroded into the oblivion of the cosmos
💀: I sense that there might be a touch of exaggeration in your joy.
She was not expressing joy in her words, and her tone was expressing sarcasm. Being in a "cosmic stew" could not be anything positive. This figure doesn't seem to listen to her words.
🎭: Well, the timeless journeys through these play(s) always are familiar. Everytime, I aknowledged the enjoyment and pleasure... and all I got were incomprehensible feelings... and this lousy mask."
She refers to what she calls "enjoyment and pleasure" except we know she never liked it. She calls it that only in the presence of the therapist, too. It's as if her feelings had been redefined by him to the point she lacks the words to call her pain as pain. And so we could interpret that she is speaking of self-repression and feeling excluded due to her "incorrect" feelings.
💀: You've been coming here persistently– over and over. The truth is, though, you will never find fun in this place.
We see a concession from the therapist, perhaps in the hope that ENA will stop questioning. The response to ENA's repression is validation and the aknowledgement of who she is as essentialy clashing against "this place", or rather, "this path chosen for her". If we follow my theory that'd be the path chosen for her by the patriarchal expectations.
🎭: Perhaps you have other suggestions?
💀: Fun is quite the elusive varmint– isn't it? But remember: it is never lost forever. Often, the greatest of fun can be found in the little moments.
Literally saying "Happiness is in the little things". He eludes the question with an empty platitude that could even imply that she has no option but hang onto the little moments of the only viable path. Even if true it completely disregards ENA and her current questioning. He threw in a little validation, a little happiness, enough to immediately attempt to move her thoughts away from her will to question.
🎭: *sniff* like... how little they are?!
She speaks of few/short fun moments and yet tries to find them adorable for its lack-there-of. Essentially, romanticizing having a starved spirit. Fittingly enough, the ENA in DBBQ seems to find fun in her exploration escapades, the way she interacts with the world and petting all manner of creatures in between the many interactions that demean her.
💀: You need not return here anymore. This is your Resolution.
Namedrop of the traditional name for the last act, practically showcasing to us the control this patriarchal figure has been holding over ENA. This constraining structure looming over her thoughts essentially kicks her out of creating more dissent inside his literal frame.
In addition, the phrasing of "here's your Resolution" sounds less like a therapy session and more like a court ruling a sentence on her.
WOMANHOOD AS AN ASCENSION INTO SUBMISSION
I want to point these other imagery elements that point at the nucleus of her troubles radicating on a recent rise into "womanhood", a label that is socially-understood to be when an afab person gets their first period:
The "entrance" (from what looks like the urethra) into her questioning is a red carpet.
On act 1, she appears rubbing her back/lower back (a common painful spot during menstruation) as she complains about not recognizing this strain of "joy".
When someone gets their period, a lot of hormonal changes and neural connections occur, and it can cause sudden and intense mood swings together with bursts and plummets of energy. ENA speaks of "Connections and bonds (...)" likely quoting people who may have shown joy at seeing her with these new predicaments while she does not find any joy in her situation.
The exploration of the innards of a physical body (as shown within the first act) might indicate that Ena is trying to go to the root of her discomfort and understand why adults are happy while she has to act as if she understands and isn't in pain and/or discomfort.
Many cultures celebrate when girls get their period because it "makes them into women," as they now can have children and continue the family legacy just like they did. This puts a lot of pressure to perform happiness or look for it by these confused children, as adults claim motherhood as the most important life mission for a woman. At the same time, it seeks to dissuade any questioning regarding the dangers/responsibility/morality of imposing said motherhood. Essentially, we are talking of a socially-enforced grooming into desiring a patriarchal cisheteronormative life.
After all this, she exits from where she entered, in which ENA is confronted by Moony and this new character she drags around like a backpack performing masculinity... perhaps for ENA? In which it proves completely useless as we see it lose its appearance to reveal some pathetic businessman that Moony immediately chooses to hide.
I feel the social conditioning of womanhood equating bodily changes to maturity has pressured Moony into acting more mature than her age so she just kidnapped a guy (?) off the road to be her romantic labubu. Then, said guy attempts to perform masculinity for ENA as his own version of maturity for a few seconds until he gives up. The result is the dissonance of what feels like a trio of early teens trying to act like what they think adults all are while still playing ring rong run.
My initial hypothesis was that what I interpreted as internalized misogyny in EDBBQ could've been foreshadowed by PoP. And seeing how ENA had "been coming here persistently" she could very well have been trying to fight it the only way she knew: relying on knowledgeable adults to guide her towards better alternatives.
But, of course, we know those were precisely the ones vouching for that lifestyle as the only correct one.
gamechangershow
vaporwave
andulkaphoto
theartofmadeline
pixelskylines
kianamaiart
