When I talk to someone who’s just started RGU, it can be difficult to articulate the purpose of certain scenes without giving later plot points away. Nothing encapsulates this dilemma more than Anthy getting slapped.
Throughout the first arc, Anthy is slapped at least once per episode, often more. With the synopsis I give people about RGU as a master of subtle manipulation, they’re usually like, “Subtle???” (because this show cannot be recommended without discussing that aspect. “Oh, but spoilers—” nope. Ensuring people aren’t triggered comes first). This is also coming from someone who nearly dropped the show because I was tired of seeing a brown girl get physically abused every thirty seconds. The student body (mainly Saionji) slap Anthy, say she’s worthless and publicly humiliate her, to which Utena steps in as her prince on a white horse to defend her honor. Anthy is treated like shit, Utena saves her, repeat.
Then she loses the dual to Touga, and the vibe completely shifts. There’s sort of a running bit amongst live-bloggers where they keep tally of the number of times Anthy is slapped, but that only really happens in the first arc. Anthy accepts Utena’s kindness not because she believes she deserves it, but because Utena tells her to accept it. Even the cathartic moment where Anthy slaps back is revealed to actually be Utena. With this revelation, Utena wins back Anthy, and though the episode most definitely marks a turning point in their relationship, Utena still, and I cannot stress this enough, wins back Anthy to regain her own confidence.
The second arc begins, and Akio enters the stage. Saionji, the show’s biggest encapsulation of Anthy’s overt physical abuse, is expelled. Touga, the big bad of arc one, is completely absent. Utena thinks she finally has a handle on the situation, that her and Anthy are now on equal footing, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. This big, heroic, “I know exactly who I am” moment against Touga only marks the end of the first of four arcs.
The first arc sets up a type of abuse you clearly see and object to, only to pull the wool over your eyes with Akio. Akio, who never publically mistreats Anthy. Akio, who invites the engaged into his home, into the trap he’s spent years setting up. Remember when Anthy used to stay up late in the dorms watching infomercials and eating chips? I do.
So, yeah, when I tell people to stick with the show, I don’t mean because it gets better. It gets far, far worse, in both covert and realistic ways, and that’s precisely the point.
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