The moe of Haruhi Suzumiya
Apr. 16th, 2007 08:09 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
petronia(Or, I continue to lag four seasons behind in my anime-watching. Soon we may start Honey and Clover! orz)
T and I watched ten episodes of Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuutsu last night. Afterward I summarized it as, "The story of how the protagonist and other characters constantly strive to appease the whims of a wilful and capricious god, whose displeasure risks unmaking the universe they inhabit. In other words, an extended metaphor for life with a tsunderekko girlfriend."
I proceed to write way more about this. XD
A character essay on Suzumiya Haruhi as tsundere.
The above is very articulate and addresses something that I think is poorly understood in "fangirl meta" circles, i.e. how these characters are perceived by their target audience and where the 'moe'-value actually lies. For instance (I may be arguing against a straw man but not an unreasonable one, I think), the opposite stereotype of the "Rei Ayanami clone" - Nagato Yuki, in SHnY's homage - isn't desirable because she's an emotionless, obedient doll the fanboy can pose like a figurine. These characters are often cyborgs, clones, dolls, aliens etc. but all that is only the plot-wise explanation for why they're so aloof, rational and undemonstrative. Back in college anime club I asked the male members what the attraction was, and was told in all honesty that they identified with Rei: they were introverts with geeky interests who had plenty of experience at being the quiet, socially sidelined one in the cast dynamic. At the same time these girls are presented as intelligent and capable, and the fact that they don't put everything of themselves out there at once is seen as self-sufficiency, which to an introvert reads as inner strength, as well as attractive mystery. All this excites honest admiration. At the same time geeky introverts are keenly aware of how lonely this kind of self-sufficiency can be, so they believe - and in a moe show are allowed to see - that these girls are vulnerable inside but will only show it to a Special Person. As with shoujo it's really about the reversal for the sake of the Special Person. XD
The tsundere character also excites admiration, because she's seen as vibrant, strong-willed, and confident - everything the male placeholder is often not. He complains of what she puts him through but at heart her attention is flattering. If she has a high opinion of herself - well, why would one be inclined to bow to the will of someone who has a low opinion of herself? XD As with the ojousama it's a case of akogare, looking up not down. Of course, the tsunderekko is also vulnerable before her Special Person, because she's a total emotional dork who doesn't know how to deal with love other than lashing out. It's a form of hurt/comfort internalized in the relationship (another example would be the shoujo "he loves me, he loves me not, oh joy he loves me after all" contrived misunderstanding).
Both these types can be cute - the prim seriousness, the flailing - but their primary purpose isn't to be cute. It's much less condescending than the big-breasted loli thing, to be honest.
I didn't really have to write all this out, because there are perfectly good for-girls equivalents. Men go for Ayanami Rei for the same reason women go for Mr. Spock. The shoujo counterpart to the tsunderekko is the male "romantic" interest who acts completely unimpressed with the heroine, frequently picks on and denigrates her, but cares deep down inside and will jump in to protect her if anything happens, etc. (Note that both forms of "tsun" abuse cast same-gender, not opposite-: wailing on victim with magical mallet = male, physical violence, sarcasm and put-downs = female, verbal violence.) In both cases, whether the behaviour is charismatic or irritating depends not so much on how the character is written per se, as on the reader/viewer's disposition and the other half of the putative pairing. If the guy the tsunderekko pushes around is a spineless good-for-nothing, then she looks abusive and unreasonable and one can't tell why either of them would be into the other. Same thing if the shoujo heroine is a useless wet blanket. Rukia out of Bleach is classically tsundere in a lot of ways but the guys go toe-to-toe with her and barely treat her as a girl, so I don't think the majority of the fandom reads her as such. In fact the normal complaint about Rukia is that she shows too much dere and not enough tsun. XD
Actually, IMHO the romantic comedy works best if you pit the two "strong" types against each other - the hyper/forthright/combative girl versus the aloof/unimpressed/sarcastic guy. The purest example I can think of is... the beginning of Kodomo no Omocha. XD;; Watanuki and Doumeki are also astonishingly classic, which is probably why people read them as MFEO ahaha. ...Well, needless to say you can have a male tsunderekko in a m/m pairing, ref. Wolfram out of Kyou Kara Maou, but it's hard to make the reversal in an m/f pairing because a guy bullying a girl or whacking her with a mallet is seen differently altogether. (Note that people who dislike tsunderekko often do so because they don't see a difference, i.e. they parse the girl as abusive, period.)
Asahina Mikuru is a much more MOR sexual fantasy - the otaku moyen sensuel choice, as it were. Actually, I call her a sexual fantasy but the infantilized character traits of naivete, bashfulness, clumsiness, etc. as well as physical infantilization (loli) are designed to excite non-sexual protectiveness as well. The superiority of the viewer is reinforced in a way that's as near to parental as masculine. Steadfast devotees of the Way of Loli Moe claim it's not about sexual desire at all: when one says baby animals are cute and collects plush specimens thereof it hardly means one wants to have sex with them. Common fandom practice with characters like Asahina lies somewhere in between the two poles, baby-fied cute but with luscious adult bodies. In this sense it's interesting that Asahina comes in two ages, teenaged and adult, and there's wacky speculation she's actually Kyon's lolita imouto-chan grown up. ^^;
One of the things I find really charming about SHnY is that Asahina is treated as a real person and not a blow-up doll for the delectation of the viewer, even though she herself is indistinguishable from your usual blow-up doll for the delectation of the viewer (how many moe shows featuring combat robot maids from the future did Haruhi watch, one wonders?). She is really useless, in a way that's believably a handicap. Her "moe value" is textually, satirically criticized as exploitative: we go meta and watch the camera act as a pillaging male eye, watch her being shoehorned into costumes and told to act sexy, etc. Kyon assumes she has such a thing as emotional trauma. XD (Actually, because Kyon assumes, the audience assumes, so the computer society blackmail scene bumps the edge of not-funny, in a dark teen comedy way. There's also yuri subtext because Mikuru's main exploiter is Haruhi, who isn't male at all.)
As for Itsuki's nikoyaka-kei (I don't know what else to call it), I get the feeling I did the essay work back in PoT fandom with Fuji. XD The real question is why this type crops up in harem shows. Is Suzumiya Haruhi just paying homage to Evangelion? From 2007's vantage point it seems like Evangelion made all of the above up from scratch but surely this can't be true. Why does it work, anyway? ...I'm reminded of the genderswitch ficlet I wrote about Nagisa Kaworu, where I semi-consciously went for that moe show effect. If the Itsuki/Kaworu type were a girl (and probably in a lot of harem shows is a girl) she would be the free spirited one, not coyly sultry or aggressive but confident of her own physicality and desires: she doesn't mind if you look, and if she'd like to touch she'll let you know. The fact that this type turns up sometimes as an ever-smiling, all-knowing male equivalent may be a reification of how intimidating this can be. Or I may be wrong. I don't think fanboy theorists like to consider this one either. XD;
In further support of my argument: Suzumiya Haruhi no Ultra Relax. Anime would be improved if all ending sequences consisted of the cast doing a novelty dance. Twelve Kingdoms? Death Note? Monster? BRING THE PARA PARA.
T and I watched ten episodes of Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuutsu last night. Afterward I summarized it as, "The story of how the protagonist and other characters constantly strive to appease the whims of a wilful and capricious god, whose displeasure risks unmaking the universe they inhabit. In other words, an extended metaphor for life with a tsunderekko girlfriend."
I proceed to write way more about this. XD
A character essay on Suzumiya Haruhi as tsundere.
The above is very articulate and addresses something that I think is poorly understood in "fangirl meta" circles, i.e. how these characters are perceived by their target audience and where the 'moe'-value actually lies. For instance (I may be arguing against a straw man but not an unreasonable one, I think), the opposite stereotype of the "Rei Ayanami clone" - Nagato Yuki, in SHnY's homage - isn't desirable because she's an emotionless, obedient doll the fanboy can pose like a figurine. These characters are often cyborgs, clones, dolls, aliens etc. but all that is only the plot-wise explanation for why they're so aloof, rational and undemonstrative. Back in college anime club I asked the male members what the attraction was, and was told in all honesty that they identified with Rei: they were introverts with geeky interests who had plenty of experience at being the quiet, socially sidelined one in the cast dynamic. At the same time these girls are presented as intelligent and capable, and the fact that they don't put everything of themselves out there at once is seen as self-sufficiency, which to an introvert reads as inner strength, as well as attractive mystery. All this excites honest admiration. At the same time geeky introverts are keenly aware of how lonely this kind of self-sufficiency can be, so they believe - and in a moe show are allowed to see - that these girls are vulnerable inside but will only show it to a Special Person. As with shoujo it's really about the reversal for the sake of the Special Person. XD
The tsundere character also excites admiration, because she's seen as vibrant, strong-willed, and confident - everything the male placeholder is often not. He complains of what she puts him through but at heart her attention is flattering. If she has a high opinion of herself - well, why would one be inclined to bow to the will of someone who has a low opinion of herself? XD As with the ojousama it's a case of akogare, looking up not down. Of course, the tsunderekko is also vulnerable before her Special Person, because she's a total emotional dork who doesn't know how to deal with love other than lashing out. It's a form of hurt/comfort internalized in the relationship (another example would be the shoujo "he loves me, he loves me not, oh joy he loves me after all" contrived misunderstanding).
Both these types can be cute - the prim seriousness, the flailing - but their primary purpose isn't to be cute. It's much less condescending than the big-breasted loli thing, to be honest.
I didn't really have to write all this out, because there are perfectly good for-girls equivalents. Men go for Ayanami Rei for the same reason women go for Mr. Spock. The shoujo counterpart to the tsunderekko is the male "romantic" interest who acts completely unimpressed with the heroine, frequently picks on and denigrates her, but cares deep down inside and will jump in to protect her if anything happens, etc. (Note that both forms of "tsun" abuse cast same-gender, not opposite-: wailing on victim with magical mallet = male, physical violence, sarcasm and put-downs = female, verbal violence.) In both cases, whether the behaviour is charismatic or irritating depends not so much on how the character is written per se, as on the reader/viewer's disposition and the other half of the putative pairing. If the guy the tsunderekko pushes around is a spineless good-for-nothing, then she looks abusive and unreasonable and one can't tell why either of them would be into the other. Same thing if the shoujo heroine is a useless wet blanket. Rukia out of Bleach is classically tsundere in a lot of ways but the guys go toe-to-toe with her and barely treat her as a girl, so I don't think the majority of the fandom reads her as such. In fact the normal complaint about Rukia is that she shows too much dere and not enough tsun. XD
Actually, IMHO the romantic comedy works best if you pit the two "strong" types against each other - the hyper/forthright/combative girl versus the aloof/unimpressed/sarcastic guy. The purest example I can think of is... the beginning of Kodomo no Omocha. XD;; Watanuki and Doumeki are also astonishingly classic, which is probably why people read them as MFEO ahaha. ...Well, needless to say you can have a male tsunderekko in a m/m pairing, ref. Wolfram out of Kyou Kara Maou, but it's hard to make the reversal in an m/f pairing because a guy bullying a girl or whacking her with a mallet is seen differently altogether. (Note that people who dislike tsunderekko often do so because they don't see a difference, i.e. they parse the girl as abusive, period.)
Asahina Mikuru is a much more MOR sexual fantasy - the otaku moyen sensuel choice, as it were. Actually, I call her a sexual fantasy but the infantilized character traits of naivete, bashfulness, clumsiness, etc. as well as physical infantilization (loli) are designed to excite non-sexual protectiveness as well. The superiority of the viewer is reinforced in a way that's as near to parental as masculine. Steadfast devotees of the Way of Loli Moe claim it's not about sexual desire at all: when one says baby animals are cute and collects plush specimens thereof it hardly means one wants to have sex with them. Common fandom practice with characters like Asahina lies somewhere in between the two poles, baby-fied cute but with luscious adult bodies. In this sense it's interesting that Asahina comes in two ages, teenaged and adult, and there's wacky speculation she's actually Kyon's lolita imouto-chan grown up. ^^;
One of the things I find really charming about SHnY is that Asahina is treated as a real person and not a blow-up doll for the delectation of the viewer, even though she herself is indistinguishable from your usual blow-up doll for the delectation of the viewer (how many moe shows featuring combat robot maids from the future did Haruhi watch, one wonders?). She is really useless, in a way that's believably a handicap. Her "moe value" is textually, satirically criticized as exploitative: we go meta and watch the camera act as a pillaging male eye, watch her being shoehorned into costumes and told to act sexy, etc. Kyon assumes she has such a thing as emotional trauma. XD (Actually, because Kyon assumes, the audience assumes, so the computer society blackmail scene bumps the edge of not-funny, in a dark teen comedy way. There's also yuri subtext because Mikuru's main exploiter is Haruhi, who isn't male at all.)
As for Itsuki's nikoyaka-kei (I don't know what else to call it), I get the feeling I did the essay work back in PoT fandom with Fuji. XD The real question is why this type crops up in harem shows. Is Suzumiya Haruhi just paying homage to Evangelion? From 2007's vantage point it seems like Evangelion made all of the above up from scratch but surely this can't be true. Why does it work, anyway? ...I'm reminded of the genderswitch ficlet I wrote about Nagisa Kaworu, where I semi-consciously went for that moe show effect. If the Itsuki/Kaworu type were a girl (and probably in a lot of harem shows is a girl) she would be the free spirited one, not coyly sultry or aggressive but confident of her own physicality and desires: she doesn't mind if you look, and if she'd like to touch she'll let you know. The fact that this type turns up sometimes as an ever-smiling, all-knowing male equivalent may be a reification of how intimidating this can be. Or I may be wrong. I don't think fanboy theorists like to consider this one either. XD;
In further support of my argument: Suzumiya Haruhi no Ultra Relax. Anime would be improved if all ending sequences consisted of the cast doing a novelty dance. Twelve Kingdoms? Death Note? Monster? BRING THE PARA PARA.
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no subject
Date: 2007-04-17 12:50 am (UTC)Eh... I am not sure about fanboys not considering Itsuki. It seems to be acknowledged on 4chan, although that might just be the resident fangirls. XD
(Although, you don't talk as much about Kyon. Isn't he actually the part of the formula that really needs to be changed for the thing to work well? In that the weakest part of these harem shows is typically the lead/cipher.)
no subject
Date: 2007-04-17 05:02 am (UTC)Actually, someone did tell me once that the Kaworu-type is just another harem pick, period - along with the tsunderekko, the megane-ko, etc. you have the option of bishounen or loli-shota, if you swing that way. Hilarious but I can't quite bring myself to... I mean, seductive as the idea is that maybe I'm overthinking this completely. XD
Kyon really deserves another post that goes more into the show. My theory at this point is, I guess, that what Haruhi subconsciously wanted out of him is a "fellow traveller": another normal human who understands (Kyon notes his "is your hairstyle repelling alien invasion" question as the tipping point in establishing their relationship). I mean, on a smaller scale Kyon is like Haruhi, he thinks he's normal but he's not actually normal, because a truly average person would be flipping out a lot more. He's Fujioka Haruhi, in other words. XD Or Nanako out of Oniisama E; I remember I said once on Shioul that I didn't get why everyone made such a big deal over Nanako, and Remiel said it was because someone who is that much of a weirdo magnet but can unblinkingly and unjudgmentally accept the shitstorm of weirdness is actually v. special.
no subject
Date: 2007-04-17 05:29 am (UTC)All I have to say is that theory explains some of the stuff I saw on 4chan.
Yeah, he IS abnormal, or, by the standards of the genre, he is abnormal. Like if all the other characters are in the game, he's out of it. It's pretty much the aggressive mundanity. (In the novels, during Tanabata, Kyon's dream for the future is... to own a house with a yard or something like that.)
no subject
Date: 2007-04-17 12:50 am (UTC)I have to admit, I'm actually not that fond of Suzumiya because she's a tsundere, which is surprising, given that I'm quite fond of her character type usually. I think it may be because of what Kyon points out - that everyone around her indulges her because she's God, that things are so easy for her but she's never learned to appreciate it. Also, way too willful for my tastes. xD (I've got wacky theories that Kyon might actually be 'God', but. that's another matter entirely. xD; ) On the other hand, I actually liked Asahina, though I had to turn the volume to mute for that xD, and I don't usually like her character type at all. I really did like SHnY's portrayal of that character type; I also found it kind of interesting that, of all the characters in the show, the only one who was straightforward and willing to give Kyon information was Itsuki. (Which, when you consider he's like a Fuji- or Kaworu-type...)
Though, I keep meaning to get around to reading the novel translations, to see how they did that, because I've heard the manga adaptation kinda sucks. *g*
no subject
Date: 2007-04-17 05:23 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-04-17 05:31 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-04-17 04:10 am (UTC)(this is also me acknowledging that I totally agree with you and uh, have nothing to add, except for the yes to the subversion of a lot of the "moe" that is being expressed in the show especially re: Mikuru; I almost feel the reason that the Itsuki type shows up in harem shows is because with a girl who would be like them, it is too easy to be "comfortable experimenting" with such, or it leads to intersection with other "harem" types, and making them male allows the main harem male to reject these advances for the kind that he, in essence, fated to pick at the end of the show: the tsundere, the lolita-type, the Rei, etc etc.)
no subject
Date: 2007-04-17 06:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-04-17 04:31 am (UTC)I can't imagine a female Kaworu, actually. The selling point or that kind of character is that he's (perceived by others as) effeminate, but isn't bothered by that fact. And it's not only a Real Men Wear Pink, secure-in-my-identity kind of thing, but actually turning "female weakness" into strength -- by using it as a weapon against other men. You can't get that with an Acchul Gurl.
Nagato: Thanks for the clarification, that was really illuminating. I wanna take back all the disparaging things I said about Guys with Robot Complexes now.
Asahina: Remembering that article written by the Love Hina guy about how it's all about nurture and being a big brother. SURE IT IS, I say.
Kyon: I love Kyon. I think he's awesome. The reason I couldn't get into the novels was that the Kyon of the novels complains in a less entertaining way.
I like pointing moe-fingers at others while claiming "parody" or "quality" or "depth" exceptions for myself. SHnY makes this really easy to do because it has all three. Plus, baseball. XD And time/space/existence paradoxes.
no subject
Date: 2007-04-17 05:59 am (UTC)I'm inclined to be skeptical of the nurturing claim too, except I see it stated in various forms so often that I can't really believe these guys are lying or in denial either. XD I think in practice it is true, or true of some and not so true for others, or partially true for most. Kind of like making blanket statements re: why fangirls like slash or h/c. I mean, is h/c or smarm about sex, or isn't it? A lot of people say it isn't about sex, but about intense platonic love/friendship. But an outsider could look on and say, well that's why there are all these NC17 fics about guys doing each other in your fandom then? The real landscape is all kind of mixed up.
I haven't even gotten into the show's metaphysics. XD But I suspect if I thought about it too hard I would find it was tragedy mascarading as farce.
no subject
Date: 2007-04-17 07:20 am (UTC)I dunno about Kaworu and Rei, but there's an awful lot of trivia on the Evangelion wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neon_Genesis_Evangelion) page, and most of it seems to say that everything in that series was borrowed from somewhere else.
But I suspect if I thought about it too hard I would find it was tragedy mascarading as farce.
That's what I said! (http://obakesan.livejournal.com/138544.html?thread=898864#t898864) Though (nominally at least) I'm still writing that story about how having no free will isn't really like having no free will.
(Itsuki talks Kyon through it: "I was always the kind of person I am now, Haruhi just brought out something that was already there." (Kyon: "You were always the kind of person who might spontaneously develop psychic powers?!"))
no subject
Date: 2007-04-18 04:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-04-18 02:52 am (UTC)Moe Check
http://check.animeblogger.net/
And here are some entries that are relevant to this particular entry:
http://check.animeblogger.net/2007/04/12/without-a-sound-the-silent-moe/
http://check.animeblogger.net/2007/02/13/the-secret-of-seating-arrangements/
http://check.animeblogger.net/2007/01/31/hare-hare-haruhi/
BTW, he's on LJ as dkellis.
http://dkellis.livejournal.com/
In return, I'm reccing this journal entry to him. Enjoy!
no subject
Date: 2007-04-19 02:47 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-04-20 08:57 pm (UTC)p.s. Kyoto Animation's project for this season: Lucky Star (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rofLfSP0qvk&NR=1)