Revolutionary Girl Utena S1E8: "The Great Curry High Trip"

This review was comissioned by @AKuz

After a long hiatus, I return to the amusingly surreal, if sometimes anvilicious, world of the School Lesbian Sword Flower Show. I'm half tempted to rewatch the first few episodes to jog my memory, but this series is memorably weird enough that I'm pretty sure the important parts are burned pretty clearly into my brain.

So, to recap. Utena is a tomboy high schooler with heroic aspirations and a ring that was given to her in her childhood by a demon or something. It recently turned out that the student council of her high school is a secret society of duelists who are competing for the hand of one of Utena's classmates, Anthy, who's like a goddess or something. Marrying her apparently lets you remake the world in your image. Anyway, eligibility to compete for Anthy's hand is apparently shown by possessing one of those rings, with Utena being the only non-council member to have gotten one, and Utena is currently her betrothed by virtue of being good at swordfighting and/or being possessed by the demon who gave her the ring again and getting a skill boost whenever she's about to lose. And um. Every villain of the week embodies some aspect of patriarchy or toxic gender roles. Also, there's a tower that leads up to the inverted Symphony of the Night castle in the sky on the school grounds, just a minor detail, no big deal.

The last thing that happened was...Utena fought a Nice Guy who the school president and his sister, Jaime and Cersei Lannister, kinda sorta weaponized against her and Anthy. Pretty sure that was it.

Also, as a minor note: apparently episodes 6 and 8 got switched in the production order, so I started watching what was MEANT to be episode 8 before switching to the real episode 6. I'll try to compartmentalize my knowledge, but that shouldn't be too hard since the only thing I really learned is that Nice Guy Miki will manage to partly restore his friendship with Utena sometime before then. Like I said, not a huge deal. Anyway, let's have a look at "The Great Curry High Trip."

Man, I forgot what a bop this intro song is. Still not thrilled about the show's visual style, especially the sameface issue that arises from everyone being drawn so uniformly jagged, but the songs are all really great.

This time, the OP is followed by a reprise of the narrated storybook-style flashback from the pilot. Not sure why we're being retold this now, but it works out pretty well for this review because it's been a long time since I saw episodes 1-5 so there are some backstory details that I'd forgotten. To recap in brief, Utena - who may or may not be from a literal royal lineage from somewhere in the world - was orphaned as a young child, and had a not-actually-imaginary friend who helped her through the grief. This "prince" looked a lot like a male version of Anthy, and shared her rose motif. He's been implied to be the entity known as "Dios." Anyway, he helped her through her grief and gave her a magic ring that he said would help her find him again one day, her strength and perseverance proving her worthy of the opportunity.

Some girls, the narrator informs us, would have interpreted this token as an engagement ring, and sought to make themselves suitable brides for the prince before finding him again. Utena took it very differently, and decided that to live up to the potential he saw in her, she would endeavour to become a prince like him.

Watching this backstory again having now seen a few episodes, it seems like Anthy and the Prince are either the same entity with different presentation, or else the Prince is cloistered in the skycastle that Anthy can supposedly grant access to when the day of the wedding ritual arrives. In the former case, the ring truly was an engagement ring (though the Rose Enbie seems to hand those out awfully liberally if so). In the latter case, the ring is a key to the outermost part of a sort of complex lock; having it lets you compete to wed Anthy, and Anthy (or, perhaps, the Sword of Dios she can draw from her body) can open the castle and let you meet the Prince again.

...hmm. If it's the second one, the Prince seems to have set things up so that only a skilled swordsman will have any chance of getting to him. And so that they will have a magic sword on hand. Kiiiinda seems like the Prince/Dios is planning to challenge the supplicant to a duel. Yeah, I think that's the final challenge; defeat Dios using the sword he left in Anthy to prove your worthiness to shape the new world.

Or. Oh. Uh-Oh. No, no, there's another, much darker, possibility that just occurred to me.

In one of her duels, Utena got an eleventh hour skill boost by being momentarily possessed by Dios via the sword. If he can do that, then maybe this is actually a Diablo 1 plot. Find the strongest and most skilled warrior, and lure them into his seat of power with his sword in their hands so that he can possess them for keeps and gain a physical body he can use for his own (doubtlessly malign) purposes.

More information needed. The more I think about this though, the more I suspect that Prince Dios will end up being the Big Bad rather than the Big Good. I'm not sure about this, but it seems much more likely than not at the current juncture.

After that refresher, we open on Utena, Anthy, and their classmates doing a cooking project in their home economics class. As they cook, they're being watched through the window by a binoculars-wielding Nanami and her posse. Apparently, Nanami hasn't given up on trying to pull some kind of stupid revenge prank on Anthy and/or Utena even after her string of failures. In this case, Nanami has gotten one of her minions to swap out an ingrediant.

I'm not seeing how this is supposed to sabatoge anyone's relationship with anyone else or prop up Nanami's social position, unlike her last few attempts. This is just pure spite now.

Also, using curry powder of all spices for this seems like it might be a private racist dig at Anthy. She *looks* Indian, even if she's actually a Great Old One or whatever.

Suddenly, Nanami gets an urgent update from one of her friends. They actually made a mixup of their own, and didn't switch whatever Utena and Anthy are supposed to be using with the hundredfold spice curry powder. They instead misheard her instructions, and got another powder that's supposed to be thousands of times spicier than normal and cause humans to combust on contact.

...erm. So where did this other curry jar come from, then? How many of these did they buy? I'm confused.

Well, regardless, someone in the home economics classroom/kitchen exposes the powder to organic material, reminding us all why the Geneva Convention prohibits the use of chemical weapons.

They hear an explosion, followed by hundreds of screams and then ambulance sirens. Nanami's face is frozen in horror as she realizes she's just become an accessory-before-the-fact to an act of terrorism using munitions-grade curry powder.

Cut to an emergency meeting of the student council. After repeating the common Japanese high school student government mantra about destroying the eggshell of the world and releasing an ascendant transhumanity in accordance with the wishes of their apocalyptic god-mentor, they get down to business. President Kiryuu Touga informs the others that there's been a disaster; an incident in home economics resulted in both the Rose Bride and her current claimant being injured. In fact, he says, there's a nonzero chance of one or both of them dying. Not even End-Of-The-World predicted this as a possibility, so they have no idea what to do now.

Um...if Anthy isn't harder to injure than a normal human, why was this possibility never taken into consideration? Seems like someone must have thought of this at some point, no? Especially with the amount of physical violence she seems to have inflicted on her on a semi-daily basis.

Well, anyway. Shit is fucked, and Touga doesn't even realize that his own incister is to blame yet.

Nice Guy Miki is sure that this is his fault for asking Anthy if she could make him "a really spicy curry." That's certainly in character for Miki, everything that any female in his vicinity does is his fault instead of her own, main character syndrome to the max with extra sexism on top. Touga has to gently calm Miki down while clearly working hard to suppress the urge to just throw the little twerp off the balcony. Then, just as Touga and Juri are trying to figure out how the hell they're supposed to explain this to End-Of-The-World, they get a phone update. Anthy and Utena have both been released from the hospital, and are in good enough shape to return straight to the dorms...or, their special private nuptial dorm, whatever, you know what I mean. Well, that's good, right?

Cut to Utena returning to campus that afternoon. She and Anthy have already parted ways, it seems. Utena's friend - can't remember her name, the one whose personality consists of glomping Utena and knowing all the gossip - runs up and glomps her. Utena, who has literally just gotten out of the hospital and is still recovering from third degree curry burns, collapses under her weight and falls to the pavement.

Didn't think that all the way through, did you Gossip Friend?

She hastily apologizes, agonizing over having not realized how weak she was and the possibility that she's reopened some curry wounds and sent her back to the hospital now. Utena isn't physically hurt, though. She gets up quickly, albeit quietly and shyly, and makes a stiffly polite assurance that she's fine, she just startled her.

Dang. There's something really wrong. Did some of the curry powder get into her brain? Gossip Friend realizes this, but Utena doesn't understand why she's freaked out. Curry brain confirmed.

Cut over to Anthy. She's being cornered by the trio of bitches who have found a reason to smack her upside the head in almost every episode thus far. I thiiiink they're the same as Nanami's posse? I think? I'm not sure. Well, they're here to do more face slapping, which is a fucked up thing to do right after she got out of the hospital, and quadruply fucked up if they actually were the ones who sent her there in the first place. Anthy just gives them a contemptuous glare when they start harrassing her, this time. Then, when one of them slaps her, Anthy wheels around and smacks her back so hard it almost knocks her over.

Anthy's response to the objection stated above is, basically, "Cool story snowflake, keep interacting with me and getting slapped won't even be the tenth worst thing that happens to you in the next minute."

I'd call this a definite improvement in Anthy's general way of doing things, except that now that I've heard both of them since they got out of the hospital I can tell that they've switched voice actresses.

It looks like Anthy and Utena have been Freaky Friday'd.

By fucking curry.

That's an entirely different kind of WTF than I've been trained to expect from this show. Honestly, this entire episode so far has been like that. It's acting more like one of those silly slice of life comedy animes with full-on Loony Toons logic. Except for the student council scene, which just makes it even more "huh?"

What follows is a montage of Utena!Anthy climbing fences and being really good at basketball, and Anthy!Utena daintily sipping tea and spending all her free time in the greenhouse tending the rosebushes. They must still be answering to their current bodies' names, for no one to have realized it yet, and they probably have some of the bodies' memories if they're able to not immediately realize it themselves. It's less like the usual Freaky Friday yithian brainswapping deal, and more like they've switched skills and personalities while retaining their memories. Seriously what the fuck was in that curry. Besides cumin, tumeric, coriander, chili powder, and C4, I mean. The montage turns into a photo album, of pictures that Nanami has been having her minions take of the two over the course of the following days.

Holy fuck she's obsessed with them. When did that happen? Maybe this is just the first time she wasn't able to settle one of her petty grudges in short order, so she's getting bent out of shape about it. Also, why are her minions still her minions at this point? Eh, I guess people in this world necessarily have a higher tolerance for crazy shit. Or it's just symbolic for something about toxic femininity, whatever. Looking through the pictures, Nanami and Co determine that Anthy and Utena have somehow switched personalities since their injury and hospitalization.

It's an insane conclusion to draw, but it's also just about the only one they CAN draw short of the two having decided to undergo extensive plastic surgery just for the lulz. Nanami lampshading how WTF this is doesn't make it any less WTF.

Writers, trust me, you don't need to have a character explain to the audience how silly this is. :V​

We do get an explanation for why the posse is sticking by Nanami throughout this obsession of hers, at least. Apparently people are willing to pay money for those photos. I'm not sure WHY they are, considering that they can all already see Anthy and Utena being each other themselves, and could probably photo them easily enough on their own, but whatever. Nanami is more annoyed at the two of them than ever for getting so much (positive) attention from the student body.

Before she can say anything though, Miki shows up and is cringe.

Pictured above: Joss Whedon, age 13.​

It's too bad Miki is a skilled fighter. Teenagers like Nanami are normally the natural predator of teenagers like him, and watching him get hung from the flagpole by his underwear would be so very satisfying right now.

Miki leaves. Nanami whines for a little while. Then her brother, who appears to have been surreptitiously listening in using his finely honed stalker creep skillset, makes his presence known. He'd been wondering why the hell Anthy and Utena have been acting so weird recently, and the theory he just overheard his sister and her friends discuss seems like the least unlikely explanation for what they're all seeing.

He of course can't mention the Rose Bride stuff in front of people who aren't in the know. Nanami doesn't know why he'd be paying attention to these two younger students in particular aside from "having a crush on one or both of them." Which he does, but that's not why he's looking into this. Either way though, it just makes Nanami even more butthurt.

Then he suddenly asks her a stern question.

I can't decide what's weirder: the fact that he'd immediately assume that, or the fact that he is correct to do so.

While Nanami stammers out her insistence that she's as baffled as he is and that her own interest in these two is purely coincidental, Anthy and Utena reveal that they've been secretly listening in as well. Somehow.

They accuse "you guys" of causing them to switch personalities, presumably assuming that the student council did some esoteric bullshit and used the president's little sister and her friends for a bit role in it.

Touga truthfully tells them that he knows nothing about it and that he doesn't suspect the other councillors. When Anthy and Utena don't buy that and keep on pushing, which finally breaks Nanami's brain and gets her to proclaim that her brother would never care about a pair of worthless little bitches like them to fuck around with their body/soul separations, it was all her! Her and her alone, muahahahahahaha. Yes, she actually does the evil witch cackle. She then snaps out of it and realizes just how deep the shit she just stepped in is.

In her brother's words, she's REALLY gone and done it this time.

Well. Bizarre conversation follows that has Nanami trying to turn everything around and say that she didn't do any of this ON PURPOSE, just ignore the fact that she was cackling like a supervillain about it literally three seconds ago. She just wanted to surprise Anthy with this uniquely rich and flavourful curry mixture she discovered, she didn't realize that it was weapon curry and not food curry, honest, please don't be mad at her. A cutesie rendition of Motzart's 11th sonata plays as she whines and wheedles and does her best to act innocent, adorable, and stupid.

I feel like the show's soundtrack has already used this song. Was it in connection with Nanami, the previous time(s)? Like, her lietmotif, basically? It's a pretty silly song for such a deranged and violent character, but I mean...this is Revolutionary Girl Utena. It would be strange if something wasn't strange.

Then, Nanami proposes such a batshit thing that...okay, I'm starting to wonder if I even have the capability to analyze this series if this is the kind of moon logic it follows. To be fair, it's just this one episode so far that's been this hard to wrap my head around, so maybe this is just an outlier. But anyway! Nanami says that if they repeat the process with another dose of that special curry powder, that should switch Utena and Anthy's personalities back again right?

And, everyone else agrees that it's their best shot.

-____-

Did they already forget about the part where that curry fucking EXPLODES? They were hospitalized and almost died from that, last time. Does no one remember?

Either no one remembers, or they're willing to risk a fiery death by overspiced seasoning detonation and guarantee another hospitalization from one in order to switch their personalities back. They agree. Touga tells his sister that all is forgiven as long as she does her best to undo the damage that she (accidentally, he's sure!) caused. However, until she does so, she's also not allowed back home again.

I'd assume that by "home" he means the dorms, since he's the student council president. But, given their relationship, I wouldn't be surprised at all if he also meant their family home (assuming the world outside of the school even exists. I'm not sure at this point). Or hell, maybe he can - by virtue of his authority as student council president - exile her from the country until he feels like reinstating her citizenship. Who even knows.

"I won't let you back home until you fix this" isn't something you'd express gratitude for, on its face. This might well be meant to reinforce just how much of a cult leader Touga is, toward his own family members no less. But, on the other hand, the fact that she knows what she did, and that what she did could have easily passed for a terror attack, well...in light of that, this actually is pretty reasonable. Again, ignoring the bizarreness of her brother having the amount of power that he does and what that implies about the worldbuilding such as it is.

Then Nanami's friends remind her that the spice comes from India, so she'll need to go there to get some. Which...she promptly does.

Wait wait wait.

How did they get that stuff in the first place if you have to actually go to India in person to buy it?

Did one of her friends happen to take a vacation in India recently?

Is this the second trip that she/they is making for this express purpose within the last few days?

Did they really use the entire can? They don't have any of it left at all? How the hell did they trick Anthy and Utena into putting that MUCH of the powder, regardless of what they thought it was, into what they were cooking? You don't put a full can of any spice into a single dish.

Nothing makes sense even within the story's internal logic. And this story's internal logic was already pretty goddamned permissive.

The halfway point of the episode is marked by the shadow puppets doing a little skit about how what goes around comes around.

Which I'm guessing means that Nanami's tribulations are only just starting. So far Anthy and Utena have had it worse than her, but I think that's going to change by the episode's end.

Splitting it here. What the fuck am I watching.