Shôjo kakumei Utena
Tags: psychedelic, avant garde, fantasy, romantic

Plot synopsis:
=== Anime story ===
The anime series is divided into four story arcs, in each of which Utena comes to face a different challenge at Ohtori Academy (Enoki Films calls it "Otori Junior High School"). In all of them, Utena must defend her title as the owner of the Rose Bride, with the intention of protecting Anthy. The duels almost always occur when someone with the Rose Crest ring challenges the current Engaged, though the Engaged may challenge other Duelists as well. No refusal is accepted. The matches occur in the dueling arena, a large, high platform in the academy's outskirts, which is only open to duelists. The Rose Bride pins roses to the Duelists' jackets. They then sword fight until one duelist wins by knocking away the opponent's rose with his or her blade.
(The story arc names below link to more details than given here as well as the episodes.)
Student Council Saga (Seitokai Hen)
Episodes 1 to 13. This first part of the series introduces Utena, Anthy and most of the main characters. It depicts how Utena ends up winning the Rose Bride, and her initial duels against the Student Council members. They in turn insist for various reasons on fighting in order to defeat Utena and win Anthy in order to gain the power to revolutionize the world.
Black Rose Saga (Kurobara Hen)
Episodes 14 to 24. After repelling the Student Council's attempts to take Anthy, Utena faces another obstacle, Souji Mikage. Disguised as a genius 18-year-old school counselor, he uses his powers of persuasion and knowledge of psychology to put people under his control by coaxing them to confide their deepest hostilities and fears. Almost always, these people are students whose problems stem from conflict with Utena, Anthy and the Student Council. He then sends them, wearing black Rose Crest rings on their fingers and frozen, black roses on their chests to fight Utena. This arc also introduces Akio Ohtori.
Akio Ohtori Saga (Ōtori Akio Hen)
Episodes 25 to 33. After solving the Mikage situation, Utena must fight rematches against the Student Council, whose members attain new abilities upon meeting Akio. At the same time, she finds herself the target of Akio's seduction, creating a rift between her and Anthy.
Apocalypse Saga (Mokushiroku Hen)
Episodes 34 to 39. As the conflict escalates, the dark secrets of the duels and Akio and Anthy's true intentions behind them are unveiled, and Utena confronts Akio in a final duel to free Anthy from his influence.
=== Manga plot ===
The plot of the manga starts off with Utena at a different school. She is seen as having conflict with the staff of her current school and they call in her aunt, who is an interior decorator. Utena's friend Kaido is introduced and the two seem to have a strong friendship. It is then explained that Utena may be as headstrong as she is because of her parents' death at such an early age. Utena gets a letter from someone who has been sending her letters every year when the roses bloom. She says it started after she was rescued by her prince as a little girl. Kaido is intent on finding out who is sending her the letters. Later on Utena meets a co-worker of her aunt's, Aoi Wakaouji. He seems to bear a strong resemblance as well as the same ring as Utena's prince. She is drawn to him but only to have her hopes that Aoi is her prince shattered when she catches him and her aunt in a passionate moment. From there the scene from her childhood is recreated right in front of Kaido's eyes. He informs her that he found that all the letters reveal themselves to be a picture of Aoi's alma mater, an exclusive prep school. From this knowledge Utena decides to change schools. She leaves a heartbroken Kaido, who it seems has feelings for Utena, to find her prince.

Review: I think people get too caught up in attempting to understand something foreign to realize that many elements in Revolutionary Girl Utena are not meant to be taken literally and at times, seriously.
If one can look past or even appreciate the strangeness, one can find a worthwhile story that's both entertaining and insightful.The main character, Utena Tenjou, is a student at a boarding school.
She meets Anthy Himemiya, a shy girl who is the Rose Bride, the key figure in a mysterious plot by the Student Counsel to "revolutionise the world".
To support the main story, there are many subplots and filled with colourful supporting characters, who add drama, humour, and complexity.The Student Counsel members often recite a poem with portions borrowed from Herman Hesse's Demian.
Like the Demian, Utena is about the antagonist's personal journey uncovering truth within their world and within themselves, through the transitional periods of youth.
Some of the ideas touched upon are the meaning of gender, gender roles, the meaning of self, etc.Revolutionary Girl Utena is one of my favourite television series.
I actually greatly enjoy the surrealism, with over the top drama that both pokes fun of itself and other series within the shoujo (manga and anime for women and girls) genre.
It has beautiful animation, wonderful storyline, character development, humor, and one of the chief reasons that this show doesn't have as big a following as it deserves, it's extremely surrealistic.
Some folks may find this show "bizaar", but I found this a deeply moving, thought-provoking, and at times absurdly hilarious show worthy of a watch by anyone who desires something a little bit more cerebral and twisted.Set in a school covered in a rose motif, Utena is the tomboy protagonist, beloved by all, who finds herself suddenly enmeshed in the secretive dealings of the student council, and finds herself suddenly "engaged", to a girl, no less!
You have kids playing at adulthood, and if you see Utena as a coming of age show, you can see between the lines of how all the characters are not trying to achieve a "revolution of the world" in that they're gonna start a civil war, but that they are actually just trying to reach adulthood, pressing beyond the threshold to the other side, which all but the heroine are unable to do.Sound cerebral?
The music is overall wonderful, especially the background music--The Sunlit Garden is perhaps one of the best instrumental pieces I have ever heard on a Tv show, and is worth a DL any day--and the voice acting is done well, even on the English dub, which I generally think are foul, cursed things, but Software Sculptors, the American distributor, did an okay job.This is a worthy series.
You'll find something new every time, and it'll still be enjoyable even on third and fourth watches.Oh, and though the box might say it's rated PG or PG-13, and that it's from the director of Sailor Moon, don't think that this is for kids.
Though the first 13 episodes are all right, beyond that the show gets a little too hard to understand--though when you're a kid all that stuff makes sense--and also has some undertones that some of the more conservative might not like their children getting hints of(i.E. homosexuality and incest).
Not only is it visually pleasing and funny (in its own way sometimes, I must admit), it makes the viewer THINK in order to get the story behind the characters and their odd behavior, something most anime fans today are forgetting to do.
But, Shoujo Kakumei Utena does have weirder (eerie) twists and mysterious (eerie) characters.
So if you want something different, something not one-dimensional,like Dragonball, let's say, take a look at Shoujo Kakumei Utena.
It's one of the best shoujo series around; after all, the girls in it all rule in some way or another..
an incredible story, but you have to watch ALL 39 episodes to get the full-impact.
This is a series where you can watch it over and catch new thing every time.
Although some may see it as somewhat pointless to the main plot line, the Black Rose Saga does wonders for understanding more about the minor characters.
This is most certainly NOT one for the little children!!^__^ The plot is full of symbolism, the story line is complex and can often touch onto twisted or morbid subjects, and the characters are deep.
Anyway, This is a GREAT series, personally, one of the top animes out there, in my opinion!!WAAAAAI!!!!
to put it in the most simple terms i can, Shoujo Kakumei Utena is among the best anime to ever come along.
Whilst I'll admit many people could never understand it, let alone like it, any fan of anime in general has to give this series a chance.
From the overall surrealism to the bits of sexual innuendo, this series delivers an intriguing world of roses, swords, roses, stopwatches, roses, princes, and did i mention roses?
The characters are a wide range of personalities, all linked to these duels(and thus the End(s) of the World) in some way or another.
The imagery is ongoing, and sometimes even takes me a second, third, even fourth watching to get it all(well, to get most of it, some of the series I believe is meant to never FULLY be understood.), and I dont usually need to see anything more than twice to catch it all.
While not for everyone, fans of deeper, even more provocative series' will find Shoujo Kakumei Utena a very entertaining anime series..
It's shoujo, it's drama, but it's also got action (sword duels, and they're just...awesome), comedy (yes, the quintessential Cute-Animal-Mascot, but even he's a little...different), and a plot that actually forces you to think.
This series is a very modern fairy tale with a whole lot of mystery surrounding the characters.
And what of the mysterious "End of the World?"  Well...you'll have to watch to see for not only the answers to these questions...but quite a few more that will come up!Though there are mature themes in this series, everything is handled tastefully through metaphors and such.If you get the chance to view this show, please do!.
When I first started watching the series, I thought it was sweet, girly, and fun.
Utena starts out with the childish dream that you can be a prince and make anything happen, but as the show goes from fantasy to reality (as deeply expressed in the last episode), it's all a bunch of lies and nothing comes easy.
The manga outfits and Utena's rose colored uniform appealed more), plus the opera/punk (yes, such a genre is possible) songs that play during the duels.
There are few technical inaccuracies in the duels (many of the moves the characters use in their fights could get them yellow carded) and Utena seems to be helped by Dios a little too much instead of winning them on her own, but it's worth it anyway..
(The other 3 members are playboy Touga, intelligent Miki, and the mature yet beautiful Juri.) There, the two commence in a sword duel over the master of the powerful Rose Bride, fellow student Anthy Himemiya.
Utena wins, only starting her strange journey into the world of the Student Council & their odd mission to change our existence as we know it...
THIS IS A GREAT ANIME SERIES FOR ALL SHOUJO FANS!
The cover said "suitable for most audiences," it was from the director of the popular "Sailor Moon" series targeted to children, and it looked like the sort of fairy-tale princess fun my daughter enjoys.
Instead, I got hit with a stealth attack by the counter-culture.All of which is a shame, because the series contains elements that my kids love: exciting but bloodless sword fights, a noble tomboyish heroine who stands up for the downtrodden, a sinister mystery to solve, the beautiful fairy-tale castle environment the story takes place in.
The show could easily have been what its marketers pretended it was, had not the director had a social agenda.Viewing "Revolutionary Girl Utena" was like bending down to smell a bouquet of roses and discovering a scorpion within..
Basically, the story follows Utena Tenjou, a student at Ohtori Academy, through her dealings with The Student Council and a mysterious girl referred to as "The Rose Bride".
What starts out as a pretty to the point, normal looking series soon warps into a strange tale about human nature and the woes of adolescence.+Great artwork+Indepth storyline chock full of symbolism+Awesome soundtrack-Sometimes hard to follow.
Utena is one of the more original television series, animated or not, to be released in the past several years.
Judging by the lighthearted nature of the first episodes from "Revolutionary Girl Utena", one would think that it is something like "Sailor Moon" (in fact, the creator of this series used to work on that anime show) but it eventually turns into something much more complex and darker, involving adult themes and creepy plot twists.There is a sharp contrast between the comical, almost childish beginning with what happens much later in the story, but I won't spoil the surprise for those who haven't seen this anime yet.
"Shôjo kakumei Utena" is one of the most intriguing anime series I already watched.
Sadly I couldn't finish all episodes, but I watched the majority of them and I already know how the whole series ends.
A lot of mystery surrounds all the characters and many episodes seems quite surreal, but I guess this is what makes it original.
LoL)People need to pay attention on the metaphors that is all the time present in this anime.I think '' Utena''has one of the most amazing soundtracks already produced and it's not coincidence that I have three Cd's of it!My favorite characters are Utena and Touga,by the way.
;) (This is one of the things I love in this anime...the amazing surprises and revelations that come with it!
A long time ago a little girl called Utena lost her parents.
There she won in a fencing duel and won Anthy, who is the rose bride..."Utena" is the darnedest thing.
The director Kunihiko Ikuhara ( always made the best episodes in "Sailor Moon" )is a wild genius that likes the surreal and so this anime looks much more like Hideaki Anno's "Shin Seiki Evangelion" or Jean-Luc Godards "Weekend" than an normal, romantic shoujo show.
But there were too many supporting characters who took away too much time from Utena who was suppose to be the main heroine.
And don't get me started in that episode when Nanami want's to put snails and snakes into Anthy's closet but other animals appear from there too!
Could it be that Anthy and Utena are one person, living in fantasy and traumatized by incest?All in all, "Utena" is a very good piece of intellectual anime but it wasn't what I expected.
Surreal, postmodern, feminist, Jungian- these are just a few of the words used to describe the strange but beautiful series Revolutionary Girl Utena.
The art is beautiful, though the constant reuse of Utena climbing up the stairs to the arena every episode gets exhausting after the third or fourth time.
At the time the story takes place Utena is at middle school and things are about to get strange!
One day she challenges the captain of the kendo club to a duel; he tells her they will meet atop the strange tower behind the school here she learns that he intends to fight using a real sword that he draws from the chest of Anthy Himemiya; 'The Rose Bride'.
Over the course of the series Utena must face a succession of challengers and learns more about Anthy and 'The End of the World' a mysterious character who writes letters to the student council instructing them what to do.I've heard this described as the 'Neon Genesis Evangelion of Shojo anime' and I can understand why; especially towards the end when things get even stranger than they were already this wasn't a bad thing though; it kept things interesting.
Early on I feared it would be too repetitive as almost every episode featured a duel which always began with the same song as Utena climbs the tower then feature the same scenes as she draws her sword from Anthy; strangely the more I saw these repeated scenes the better I thought they were; both because they emphasised the repetitive nature of Utena's life at the school and because the song was rather catchy!
While this probably won't appeal to very young viewers there is little to cause offence if slightly older children wish to watch; the duels aren't to the death or even intended to wound they may fight with real swords but victory is secured by cutting a rose from the chest of the opponent.
I watched this show growing up, the first time liking it, thinking it was strange and eccentric for all its symbolism and over the top characterizations, and gradually appreciating its real meaning the more I grew up and experienced relationships in which events and personalities of people started overlapping with that of characters of the show.It is very well thought out, almost every choice in concept, story and direction is intentional.
Watch this anime for the Revolution of the World!.
(Warning: This review does contain some spoilers after the SPOILER space, so if you want to watch the series to find out what happens, you might not want to read after that point)Shoujo Kakumei Utena (Revolutionary Girl Utena) is an anime that doesn't really get the popularity that it deserves because the series is kind of hard to follow.
There are many characters, all driven by their own motives to bring revolution to the world by dueling to be "engaged" to Himemiya Anshi (Anthy), the Rose Bride.The entire series is extremely surreal, and very much a "shoujo" anime.
Some people might not like some of the men in the series having long hair(Touga, Saionji, Akio), but I think it adds character.
Roses are also a constant motif in the series.The music is wonderful, and the opening theme song is one of the best I've ever heard (Rinbu Revolution).
Each duelist has his or her own song, which relates to each of them in some way.All in all, I think that this is an anime worth watching if you can handle the surrealism and follow the twisting plot through all 39 episodes, but I suggest skipping the movie, Adolescence Mokushiroku.SPOILER* ** *** ** * ** *** ** *Utena is the main character, who was comforted by a prince on a white horse after the death of her parents when she was very young.
Becoming a prince is Utena's driving force throughout the series.After Utena's best friend Wakaba has her feelings terribly hurt by the Student Council Vice-President/Captain of the Kendo Club (resident wife beater/major jerk), Utena challenges him to a duel.
After she beats him, she is "engaged" to the Rose Bride.Utena becomes entangled in the affairs of the secretive Seitokai (student council), and becomes the friend of Anshi and her monkey-mouse Chuchu.
Utena is the Victor of the Duels, but does she become a Prince like she dreamed of?
Well, you'll just have to watch the series and find out.
Not the best anime ever, but worth watching !.
This series has become one of my favorite even if I've only seen the first twelve episodes...
I love weird anime (my favorite of all times is Lain).
So logically I like Utena a lot :)The thing I liked first was this self-derision, this way to use every shoujo cliché they can...
Well, I guess Touga is my favorite character in this series...
Even if I like Utena herself a lot.
And her story is cute ^o^Well, I would not recommend Utena to someone new to anime, it's far too surrealistic !
But for someone with quite a culture in anime it's quite funny, and for someone who likes weird, oniric stories it's...
First, the Technical aspect: The ANIMATION in Revolutionary Girl Utena is very well done, for it's time.
Another constantly repeated scene is the 30 second elevator ride the Student Council takes in almost every episode, reciting the same 4 or 5 lines about breaking the world's shell.The SOUND is not noticeably bad or good.
Ending Song is forgettable.One of Utena's biggest problem is it's CHARACTERS.
However, unlike series such as Saikano, She -The Ultimate Weapon- or movies such as Grave of the Fireflies, Utena does not earn these tears, nor do I think it deserves them.One redeeming quality in the character department is the shadow girls.
Anthy is not very engaging in the early episodes, but at least she's sympathetic, in that she has not fallen for any of the cruel men in the series.
However, I will restrict myself only to events in the first couple episodes.By the end of episode 1, Utena is the top duelist, making her the default fiancée of Anthy, the Rose Bride.
Thus does Utena's episodic "duel of the week" nature reveal itself.
In nearly every episode, another duelist tries to win the Rose Bride.
The basic structure goes something like this: A character is slighted by Utena or Anthy, intentionally or unintentionally, resulting in a challenge.
This gets very boring very quickly, as it does in every DragonBall Z episode I have ever seen.Among the flaws in Revolutionary Girl Utena[, there is 1 that is fatal, bringing the series to a startling halt.
What little interest I had left for Revolutionary Girl Utena resided in Anthy's innocence.
Unfortunately, it is not, and I was so upset by it that the rest of the series was ruined for me.After episode 15, we realize that this terrible incident involving Anthy is not going to be resolved anytime soon.
There are no sympathetic character's left, save Utena, who spends the rest of the series being steadily broken down by all of the evil people around her.