ef: esoteric femininity
Of the myriad things the letters ‘e’ and ‘f’ can stand for, that one stood out today. For that matter, of the myriad new shows this season, many solid entries, too, ef stands out like neatly folded (or unfolded, for that matter) underpants.
It is an unintentional effect, but maybe that is because my brain really lives inside my balls? When the blood gets flowing, my mind makes way not for fleshly instincts but ascends. Like a leaping whale breaking the surface of the sea, a momentary clarity that pierces through complexity to reveal its simple underneath, or in reverse, reconstruct the intricacies of a simple, elegant principle in motion.
Like how the gaze of a thousand men and women that pierced Nagi Hirono’s naked body? I think there’s something to be said about that, the scene, and why it’s there. As terse as some may do so.
Thematically, hoping to state the obvious, ef catches the attention of its viewers with a striking view of its heroines. Okay, bad pun. Can we even call the way ef present them as “view”? I think the women in the show are the reason; they are what makes ef such striking visual amateur-avant-garde-SHAFTxSHINBO festivals. It’s like, you can’t put a tropical fish in a freshwater tank; and girls like Miyako, Chihiro and Kei (and Nagi, Yuko and Mizuki, hopefully), their issues, and their charm points have to be framed in their own special way.
Because women like them don’t exist in the vacuum of our real world. Or when they do, they don’t stand out like a single rose out of a patch of brier. It’s not like Chihiro’s memory of Renji, at any rate.
The game of finding and producing moe blobs and selling character appeal to the moe-otaku crowd is not always won by logic or reason, so the popularity of ef (Yay? Chihiro made it past Saimoe ‘08 QF?) in the same character-driven, character-appeal-driven market stands strong because of the unique characters, their equally unique characterization, and a shameless plea towards the esoteric. Make no mistake; it’s not because they are “better” characters by logic or reason. The femininity displayed in ef is still mostly ordinary; I would point them out if I was better equipped to analyze what makes an anime girl an anime girl, but I’m not.
But that is not important. At the hands of an artful storyteller, even the ordinary is radical.
Doubtless, people will continue to turn that around and say that you’re dressing up the same old characters with some fancy graphics. But those people are probably watching those same interchangeable characters in another series without fancy graphics, and besides — execution has to count for something or why bother?
Besides, something about that esoterica made the characters (Miyako esp.) seem all the more real in contrast anyway.
In a way you are right, but I think ultimately I’m saying something more. Basically as much as one could say ef being a pig with lipstick (lol I said this a year ago), it’s actually something more than dressing. There’s something in between all of that, and to be able to see it is what makes ef so attractive, regardless if we can verbalize what it is or not.
Oddly I didn’t much care for any of the ef girls but was a fan of the guys. Hiro and Kyousuke are among my alltime favorite characters and of the girls, Chihiro is the only one I care about and just because she is adorable and has an eyepatch >.>
Well aren’t you the queer one…. Joking aside, I think what I said about femininity applies to the guys too to an extent. I just wouldn’t couch it that way.
I don’t know what to think about “amateur avant-garde”. Is being a professional avant garde a good thing?
I’ll probably write more than one word, but only after I figure out what the point of those scenes was. If it didn’t sell well - I don’t see an obvious budget increase like x365 had - maybe it’s just marketing.
Honestly, being avant-garde is rarely a good thing.
I get the feeling it sold well, but as you know that doesn’t translate to production value so obviously. For what it is worth, episode 1 did look notably better than the average episode last season.
I agree, I’m certainly not one of the people who’d call it lipstick on a pig. I do hope to actually be able to verbalize what you’re talking about this time around. Either way, melodies is off to a good start.
As for avant-garde, I’d disagree that it’s not a good thing. But avant-garde by nature exists to push the boundaries, and unless you’re getting your kicks purely from seeing something totally new (which I admittedly do) it’s not always great entertainment. I think ef has a way to go before I’d call it truly avant-garde. But it does have an experimental edge — at least in the context of anime, which usually pulls from a pretty standard bag of tricks.
I don’t think avant-garde works always push boundaries. Some do, some don’t. But experimentation is one thing; selling it is another.
ef is probably as avant-garde as you can get without turning into something just plainly weird for mass consumption.
ef is probably as avant-garde as you can get without turning into something just plainly weird for mass consumption.
Well, Kaiba, but that’s probably far less mass-consumption than ef. But avant-garde isn’t for mass-consumption, it’s more for those who have consumed massively, and are looking for something new.
But I think talk of “avant-garde” is a distraction. ef takes a lot of standard elements — you could see Chihiro as being parodied by that “ultimate moe character” image in NHK (blind, bandaged, wheelchair bound maid-android….) — yet still passes through the cliche to something very interesting. On top of that, they play with images and how to make images work to tell their story. It’s less avant-garde than producing something that interests the animators themselves.
I bet their staff meetings are really interesting. I’ll bet their wastebaskets could be mined by other studios looking for new ways to tell a story with imagery.
>> it’s more for those who have consumed massively, and are looking for something new.
Yeah, and sadly that’s the common condition today, not the rarity.
Why “sadly”? It makes a market for experimentation, which I think is a good thing.
There is always a market for good experiments. But things don’t change the way you think they do until it can absorb failed ones as well.
It keeps me wondering if I’m ever going to “get it”, and that’s good for something I guess. :P
I don’t know, for most of us it’s love on first episode. Not sure how or why.
Well, I do love it. :)
But that doesn’t mean that I get it though. :P
Does it really matter?