Satan Drives a Red Convertible


Don't worry, this doesn't happen in the actual show. God help us all if it did. I just like the picture *snickers*

Yes, the long-awaited spoiler page. Finally, huh? Well, I suppose I should go right into it. I'll tell you the general plot of the end first, and then my take on it.

The turning-point episode was called Bara no Kokuin, the Seal of the Rose, and was episode 34. In this episode, the Shadow Girls (yeah, they really do exist!) give Utena three tickets to the Drama Club production. She pursuades Akio and Anthy to go with her (it's sort of a family thing, I guess). In short, the play is about the Rose Prince, who went around the ancient world turning girls into princesses. However, the only girl he could not turn into a princess was his own sister. So his sister turned into a witch, because that's what happens to girls who can't be princesses O_o. After turning into a witch, she imprisoned the prince in a castle.

A spinning castle. That floated upside-down in the sky.

*cough*

During the production, the view changes every so often to a shot of each of the audience members (all three of them). Utena is looking generally confused, Anthy has her anime-smiley-eyes this-isn't-happening expression on, and Akio is looking quite seriously displeased.

After the play, they go home and Akio and Utena sit on the couch together, the former quite in the latter's personal space. Akio asks Utena about her ring, and she says that she got it from her Prince. He mentions that she never even took it off "that night." *the author takes a moment to cringe* Then Utena says that she can't remember the Prince very well, and we finally get to see just what happened to her so very long ago.

Little Utena lays on a bare floor, surrounded by roses. A white-haired man with a cape (no, not Kunzite, silly! Dios!) walks up to her, and asks her what she is doing. She responds, "Nothing." Then asks him if he is the Grim Reaper. He says he does not bring death, and after a few moments, Utena tells him that he is pretty. Then he walks away. And she follows.

Dios leads her to the edge of the floor. Opposite them, there is a stone bridge and a platform with what appears to be something squirming on the end of about a thousand really sharp implements. "Who's that?" Utena asks.

"A witch."

"A witch?"

"The Rose Bride."

Dios goes on to say that she can not die, but only continue to suffer for eternity. It is her punishment for stealing a prince from all the women of the world. And now we get another flashback, showing Dios very ill from overwork, and thousands of people trying to break down the door to the barn where they are resting. He sits with his sister, a dark-skinned, purple-haired young girl.

"Anthy..."

The mob at the door demands that Dios come back out and fight for their daughters, but he is too ill. Anthy refuses to let him leave, because she is afraid that if he does, he will die. After a few minutes, she emerges from the barn.

"Dios is gone. He is mine and mine alone. I have sealed him somewhere where your hands can never reach." The crowd becomes angry, calling her a witch.

Back to Dios and Utena. Dios says that she sacrificed herself to save her prince, even though she was the only one who ever truly loved him. And what's worse, the prince who loved her was no longer the prince she knew, but had become the Ends of the World.

And all that was left was her suffering. Which was what Utena saw on the other side of the bridge. Utena crosses the bridge and tries to get to the Rose Bride, but is thrown back by a forcefield. She starts crying, yelling to Dios that he must save Anthy. Dios tells her that she can no longer be saved, and the only person who could save her is a prince she believes in. He cannot be that prince.

So Utena vows to become a prince, in order to save Anthy.

The first time this episode was broadcasted, there must have been mass hysteria in Japan.

Time passes, and Touga begins to seriously pursue Utena. He finally challanges her to a duel, the last duel that will determine who is to Revolutionize the World. Touga's terms to the duel are that if she wins, no one will ever try to win Anthy from her again. But if she loses, she has to be his "woman." Uh-huh. Can you guess who wins?

Utena receives a letter the day after she is victorious that she will be the one to go through the Rose Gates and gain the Revolution. It is from her Prince. The same day, she asks Akio for a date. And she doesn't wear her rose signet. Later that night, Anthy tells Utena she put poison in the cookies. And Utena tells Anthy she put poison in the tea. They both compliment the other on how good the cookies and tea are, and promise to have tea just like this ten years from now. Then Anthy tries to throw herself off of the dueling arena.

Yep, things're starting to heat up...

Utena hauls Anthy back onto the platform, and Anthy says that she thought it didn't matter what pain befell her body, her heart would not feel it. She says that she is an evil woman, and that she took advantage of Utena from the beginning, even though she knew what might happen to her. Utena says she didn't about Anthy's pain and that she was only being conceited about being the Prince and trying to protect her. She even thought that Anthy had betrayed her, when she had seen her and Akio together one night. Anthy tells her to leave the school, but Utena knows that she can't.

Together, they go up to the dueling forest gates. "Utena-sama. You can still turn back." Utena shows her the rose signet, back on her finger where it belongs.

"Let's go."

The next episode is called The Ends of the World. It is episode 38, the second to last. It opens with Utena in the dueling arena, facing a huge rose-adorned orb with Dios (or a statue thereof) perched atop it. Just like in episode 13, remember? When Akio was talking to him? A door opens in the orb and Akio emerges, his hair down and dressed in a white uniform reminiscent of Dios'. Utena's eyes narrow. The Prince. "So you were Ends of the World after all, huh? You're the one who was behind everything." Utena demands to know why he has done everything, the reason for making everyone duel. He doesn't answer, only saying that he dreams of the castle, where the prince and princess will live happily ever after. He is the prince, and Utena is his princess.

According to Akio, swords do not suit Utena anymore. He will protect her. He draws the sword of Dios from her chest, and she transforms into a pink Rose Bride gown. "I will protect you," Akio says. "You will gain eternity and we will love each other forever." And Utena is almost caught by it. Until she asks what will happen to Anthy if they go to the castle together.

Akio replies that Anthy will be the Rose Bride for all eternity. Up to this point, Utena hadn't remembered any of what happened with Dios when she was little. I think she remembers right now. And she remembers what Anthy said when they sat together in the arena after she tried to throw herself off, and she wrenches the sword from Akio's hand.

"I'll free Himemiya from you!"

Akio shakes his head. Utena reminds him of his former self, and that's why she will never be able to save Anthy. He tells her that in the end, all the stuff about the prince and the castle said to hold eternity is just make-believe. And he will show her what is real.

Suddenly they are in the planetarium. Back in her regular uniform, Utena accuses Akio of doing... things... with Anthy, in this very room. He laughs, surprised that she is upset over something that she herself did. He has a fiancée, after all, doesn't he? She is just as guilty as he is. And, he says, she never even tried to understand Anthy. She should just be a good girl and come with him. "You can be a noble, beautiful princess. Now, won't you give me that sword?"

Akio sits on his couch, his back to Utena. Anthy rests her head on his lap. With that sword, he says, he will Revolutionize the World. But Utena doesn't care about anything like that. She only wants to know what will happen to Anthy after all this is over. "Aren't you her brother? Are you just going to abandon her?"

"Foolish lifeform." Tears well in Akio's eyes. "There was never any such thing as a prince in the first place."

By this time, I found it rather difficult to pay attention to the subtitles.

Akio tells Utena that the giant orb is Dios' grave, and that he perished when Anthy became a witch. The prince is dead, and Anthy is a witch. He once thought that she was a goddess, who sacrificed her body for him, the one she loved. But now, she is a witch, and she enjoys it. It is the only way she can be happy, and they love each other...

Switch for a brief moment to the Seitokai's observation deck, where every member that is or ever had been in the Student Council has gathered. (Except for Ruka, of course, he's dead.)

Utena and Akio begin to duel to one of the freakin' coolest duel songs the show has cranked out. Akio assures her that this isn't a game. It isn't like all the duels she's fought before. But before long, Utena is well and truly kicking his ass. He even falls a few times, until, at the last moment before she charges, he grabs Anthy by the arm and flings her at Utena. She pushes Anthy behind her in an effort to protect her friend. Anthy kisses her shoulder, her eyes narrowing in a very familiar and downright terrifying way, and runs Utena through the back with a sword.

Some cliffhanger. I think I would have killed myself if I hadn't had them all on the same tape.

The last episode opens with Utena lying on the floor. "You remind me of the Dios I once loved," Anthy whispers. "But you can never be my prince. Because you're a girl."

Akio sighs. "I told you this wasn't a game."

Back on the Seitokai balcony, Saionji tries to take his rose signet off, but Touga stops him, saying that they must remain duelists until this is over. Nanami tells them that she's already taken hers off, and that she hopes they can forget this easily. Miki wonders if this is the sort of thing a person can forget.

Then Juri tells them a story, about how her sister fell out of a boat once and almost drowned. A boy jumped in to save her, but he was carried away and no one knew what happened to him (*coughcoughAdolescenceMokushirokucough*). Juri thought that her sister (who was saved by a nearby adult) was very cold for forgetting his name so soon, but now that she tries to, she can't remember his name either. Keep this scene in mind.

Anthy takes the sword from Utena's hand and brings it to her brother. She hesitates giving it to him, and he asks her if she regretted doing what she did. He had to hurt her friend after all. "Yes," he said. "It's all my fault. Do you hate me now? Maybe if I tried to be a Prince like in the old days, no one would have had to suffer. I always feel your wounds, your suffering, with my own body."

Anthy looks up at him. "You are he who chose this road, knowing the whole of the world."

"Knowing the whole of you," Akio says, "I love you."

I got a lot of the lines from that poem I wrote from this scene.

Anthy gives him the sword, and he advances on the Rose Gates, which have appeared at the end of a long walkway. Anthy says farewell to her "meddlesome hero," thanking her for a taste of what Utena called "friendship." Utena, lying on the floor and surprisingly absent of blood for someone who has been run through, begs her not to go.

As Akio crosses the platform, a shimmering wave grows under it. "The Million Swords that shine with humanity's hatred. They stir at the sight of the Prince's sword. It is the destiny of the Rose Bride to draw the swords from the Prince to herself."

A million swords impale Anthy, as Utena lays crying for Akio to save her. Once again.

There is a merry-go-round nearby, with a solitary figure on it, riding round and round. "You shouldn't move," Dios tells Utena. "I'll tend to your wounds later." He comes to her, telling her that she was very brave, but she should give up now. She doesn't have the power to help Anthy. She is a girl, isn't she? Such a gentle child. Are you crying?

You've tried so hard until now. You needn't blame yourself. I shall give you a kiss as your reward... this is your consolation.

Utena struggles to her feet as Akio hacks at the door with his sword, aware that every time he strikes the door it wounds Utena. She staggers towards him as the sword breaks and he informs her that the seal can never be broken now. He can always start over. The Rose Bride will be his forever.

Utena pushes past him to the door, clawing at it with her bare hands as Akio watches impassively. "Suit yourself. She certainly resembles the old me."

Akio goes back to the dueling arena and lies on the floor, having a nice pink martini. Or something. He tells her over and over that it's not possible to open those doors, and that Utena's sincerity means nothing. Power is the only means of survival.

She ignores him. Tearing at the vines and thorns that cover the door, Utena nearly collapses from her wounds. "Himemiya... don't you know how happy I was... just being together with you?" Her tears roll down her face, and fall...

And splash into a dark pool.

The Rose Gate opens. Even just a fraction of an inch. But it opens, and the Million Swords of Hate that have been shooting, without end, towards Anthy, stop.

Akio nearly has a heart attack.

Utena pries open the door as Akio shouts at her to stop. "Don't open that! You don't know what will happen!!"

Like she'll listen.

I think it would be better to just give you some dialogue here, rather than try to explain. Utena grinds the door open, finding Anthy floating naked, curled up, in the dark.

Utena: Himemiya... Himemiya...
Anthy: Who are you?
Utena: I came to save you.
Anthy: But, you're a...
Utena: I came here to meet you.
Utena: So don't be afraid of this world where we'll meet.
Utena: ...Himemiya... Himemiya... Himemiya!
Utena: Himemiya!
Anthy: Utena...sama...?
Utena: Himemiya... we finally...meet.

Now you know where the name of my page comes from.

Utena reaches in, begging Anthy to take her hand, as Anthy pleads with her to run away. "The swords! The swords are..." This goes on for quite a while, neither giving in, until Anthy slowly and cautiously reaches her hand out. They touch.

And are torn apart.

Remember the opening sequence.

Anthy and the coffin in which she lays fall downwards, through the clouds, leaving Utena lying alone on the walkway. "Gomen, Himemiya..." The swords turn and race towards her.

Wakaba taps her foot impatiently outside of Akio's tower. She had hoped to study with Utena... "I guess she's not here."

The camera (or... whatever) scans across Ohtori, and we hear a bunch of girls talking about what they want to do after school.

Shadow: Hey, aren't women supposed to be good at nabbing handsome guys?
Shadow: Get a load of this!
Shadow: This little tramp just started going out with the man of her dreams.
Shadow: She's the one who kept going "Utena-sama, Utena-sama" all the time.
Shadow: Hey, you got a problem with that?
Shadow: Hey, who was Utena-sama again?
Shadow: What, don't you know?
Shadow: Remember? She's that girl who always dressed like a guy.
Shadow: She got hassled by the teachers all the time.
Shadow: Oh, now I remember. Her!
Shadow: But didn't she get hurt real bad and hospitalized a month or two ago?
Shadow: Huh? Hospitalized? I heard she got betrayed by a friend or a lover or something and switched schools.
Shadow: I heard she got in trouble with the Chairman of the Board of Trustees and expelled.

All of which could be true.

The scene switches to Miki, showing Tsuwabuki how to use his stopwatch. He will be assisting with Miki's role of scribe next term. In the background, Kozue sits at the piano.

At the kendo clubroom, Saionji and Touga are dueling. "I heard you've been taking more classes in your major lately," Touga says. Saionji replies that he wants to get back the stuff he had lost while "playing." Nanami announces that their tea is ready.

In the fencing club, Juri shouts, "Next!" Shiori appears in with a dueling mask. "Hai!"

Wakaba stands by a window, commenting to her Onion Prince on the nice weather. She is randomly glomped by an energetic friend.

Finally, we see Anthy, her hair up in its normal style, in her normal little uniform, with Chu-Chu on her shoulder. She walks down a corridor, and up to Akio's office. He talks to her while typing, saying that it hasn't been long, but everyone has almost completely forgotten about "her." Apparently, she didn't cause the Revolution after all. He's going to have to start over. "I'm counting on you, Anshi."

She smiles. "You don't know what happened, do you?"

As Akio looks up in confusion, she continues. "It's all right now. Please go on playing the 'Prince' in your comfortable coffin forever. But I have to go..."

Akio stops typing. "Go? Go where?"

"That person hasn't vanished. She's merely left your world." Anthy takes off her glasses and sets them on Akio's desk. Chu-Chu does the same with his earing and tie. She turns to leave.

"What are you talking about?!"

She stops at the door.

"Chotto matte! Anshi! Anshi!!"

"Sayonara."

*there is suddenly a deafening cheering sound from the direction of Japan*

Anthy, in an adorable little pink travelling outfit and a beret, stands with Chu-Chu at Ohtori's gates. "Now it's my turn to go to you. No matter where you are, I'll find you for sure...

Wait for me, Utena!"

Cue ending credits and Rose Revolution, the damned happiest song in the entire show. You can see why.

And just when you thought it couldn't get any better...

A faded picture sits on a table, of Utena and Anthy. Akio has been obviously cut out. It focuses in on their hands, clasped. In the background, you hear their voices...

"Hey, if anything is ever troubling you, I want you to tell me about it," Utena says, echoing the same statement she made seemingly so long ago. "That's the kind of friends I want us to be.

And someday, we'll..."

Anthy's beautiful voice comes through. "Some day, we'll...?"

Text appears against a rose background.

Someday, we'll shine together.



I was in bliss for about a month.

Phew, that took longer than I thought it would... Anyway, there's the end, in less detail than it should be. Amazing, ne? It's positively impossible to do it justice by just describing it like that, but I tried.

So, in short, Akio was Dios. Or at least, his former self was. And Dios was Utena's prince. Dios was Akio's good side, the half of his personality that was pure. Ohtori Akio was the other half. The god who had chosen to be a devil. Lucifer. You can't help but feel sorry for him.

Well, I can't. But I'm weird like that.

I feel sorry for Akio. It's not his fault, really... it's Anthy's. And the people who wanted Dios to work himself to death. But what Anthy did, she did for love. And it backfired, like messing with fate so often does. Just ask Oedipus. Anthy imprisoned Dios in order to save him, but perhaps it wasn't completely selfless. She couldn't be a princess. So she wanted the prince all to herself.

Speaking of Anthy. My theory on her is an odd one, but it fits my needs, so I like it. If you've read my fanfic Where Eternity Dwells you've gotten a little taste of it, but I'll spell it out here.

As the Rose Bride, Anthy was doomed to be in pain forever. Dios even said that the Rose Bride was the embodiment of Anthy's pain. I believe that as part of her punishment, she radiated pain. Which is why everyone was constantly whacking her around. She made other people feel pain, and they inexplicably took it out on her. The only person this didn't work on was Utena, and that's because Utena was special. Utena was Anthy's prince, she drew the Million Swords of Hate towards herself to prove it. She brought the Revolution, even though Akio (in his infinite wisdom) didn't realize it.

After what happened, everything sort of... went back to normal. Even for Ohtori, this was majorly normal. People who had before been fighting (Juri and Shiori, Saionji and Touga) were friends again. Everyone got what they wanted. Miki got his sister to play the piano again, Juri got to be around Shiori and have Shiori be decent to her, Nanami got to be around her onii-sama and Saionji his only friend back. Even Wakaba got her Onion Prince. The only person who didn't get exactly what he wanted was Touga. He wanted Utena. He got her, too, but only for one night. But he wanted to save her, he wanted to protect her. And even though he didn't do the saving, she ultimately was saved.

After it happened, no one remembered Utena. If they did, it was only a vague recollection. But Anthy remembered. And that is the most important reprocussion of the Revolution. Anthy was free. She no longer had to be the Rose Bride, she was no longer under Akio's control. And she was the only one who realized it. So she left.

She left him, plain and simple. She left Akio, the person she had tried to save, for Utena, the person who had saved her.

And I like to think that she found her.

Hey, you're probably thinking, what happened to the rest of the cast during this big long ordeal? Well. I'll tell you. With respect to Saionji and Touga, anyway. I think I went enough into Juri and her problems with the Shiori and Ruka pages... and anyway, if you want to know more about Juri, I'd suggest you go here: Arisugawa's Locket It's got eight tons of Juri stuff, and even though I love her and think she really kicks ass, I'm not that terribly interested in her. Not like Touga and Saionji, anyway ;)

Saionji was rather pissed at Touga when he came back to Ohtori after being expelled and living with Wakaba. Understandably. In the first episode that we got to see the new gondola going up to the dueling arena and the new duel style, Saionji got shown the Ends of the World. He was washing the floor in his kendo room when Touga came in and talked to him about Utena, then did Akio's little cue speech. Moments later, we see Akio driving down the road with Saionji and Touga in the backseat. Touga asks Saionji what he wants, and when Saionji replies in his usual grumpy manner Touga suggests that maybe he wants eternity, as in "eternal friendship." Then Saionji gets shown the Ends of the World (I'll leave that up to your imagination) and the next day, he grabs Anthy and challanges Utena to a duel. He loses. Surprise. But in this duel, something different happens... The Sword of Dios disappears, and Anthy pulls it from Utena's chest. Weeeird.

After Saionji gets hit by one of the dozens of Akio-Cars running rampant all over the dueling arena and therefore loses, he and Touga become a lot closer. Well, they still say they don't like each other, but they're together all the time. Come on. They talk about deep things like "not needing this farce anymore" and hang around without their shirts on. In one particularly interesting scene, Saionji asks Touga what he wants from Ends of the World, and why he keeps "kissing his ass so much." Touga responds that he wants to be like Ends of the World, to have that kind of power.

Hearing this, and looking upset in his own little Saionji way, the Green One asks "Are you so sure?"

What? You mean Saionji actually knows more about something than Touga does? Maybe it's intuition. But Saionji sees something that his red-haired friend doesn't, and that is that Akio is not the kind of person you want to model your life after. Lusting after that much power is damn dangerous, and even Saionji realizes it. It's odd that Touga doesn't. At least, not until Utena gets too caught up in it for his liking.

Touga duels Utena in the last duel before Akio, and he has a darn good duel song, if I do say so myself. Touga's first two duel songs really weren't that great, but his last one... just rocked. It's my favorite duel song on the third CD, tying with Mikage's and Miki's. Saionji acts as his Rose Bride (*dies of happiness*), and Touga of course loses. He did have a chance, though, unlike everyone else... But this time, Utena was not disillusioned by him. She knew that he was in love with her, and that she wasn't in love back. Or at least, in my estimation she wasn't. Anyway. After they lost and crashed their motorcycle (*hysterics*) Touga (the only conscious one at the moment) yelled to Utena to take care. She was now the one who would Revolutionize the World, and she must not open her heart to Ends of the World or the Rose Bride. Who the former was, she still didn't know. But it was plain that Touga understood the danger she was going into, and that's something.

The 37th episode, in which Utena found out she was the chosen one, was one of my favorites. Not only because we got that fascinating bit of Anthy-territorialism (she said to Chu-Chu (regarding some toast) "Oh, that was yours and not mine, wasn't it?" right when Utena was asking Akio for a date) but we also got almost every member of the cast acting... nearly content! Utena played badminton with Miki and Juri, both of which joked about being in love with her. They were laughing together, for Dios' sake! How can you not love this? And even better, Saionji and Touga rode a bicycle together. On the Seitokai balcony. It was adorable. They had just received their letters from Ends of the World saying that Utena had succeeded, and that they were all out of the running. Goodbye letters, in essence. They rode the bike, Touga pedaling and Saionji leaning on top of him, and wondered what would happen if Utena didn't want the Power of Dios. Saionji asked if Utena knew who Ends of the World really was, and Touga didn't answer, commenting that it had been a long time since they had ridden a bike together. "Yeah," Saionji said. "I wonder how long..."

Happyhappy.

And now, to delve deeper into the weirdness that is Anthy... I have decided that she was probably the most powerful of the entire cast, even Akio. Maybe they were equal. But the thing was, Anthy never showed her power outright. She never flaunted it like Akio did, but used it to... subtly get back at the people she didn't like. I.e, Nanami. You notice that almost everything that happens to Nanami has something to do with Chu-Chu... and personally, I think that Chu-Chu was Anthy's familar. She is a witch, after all. Just look at this picture...


(domo arigatou to Blood Soaked and Honor Bound for the image!)

God, I wish I knew what that said... Does that shadow look familiar to you? Like, maybe, Dios? Or Mamiya? And guess who was really Mamiya... I nearly had a coronary at the end of the Black Rose Saga, when Akio was talking to Mamiya about how he shouldn't feel sorry for Mikage because Mikage never really existed. Akio is standing, looking out of the tower, with his hand on Mamiya's shoulder. When the shot goes back to both of them from a different shot, it is Anthy who is standing with Akio's hand on her shoulder. She turns to look at the camera with a very creepy expression, and it doesn't help that the music that plays at that moment would give Bram Stoker the creeps. Eeeeek.

Yes, she is a very odd little girl. And I had to watch the infamous Nanami Egg episode about five times (*dies laughing* Saionji in an apron!) before I figured out that the reason Chu-Chu was missing that entire time was because he was in Nanami's egg... I mean, was Anthy trying to psych her out, or what? And you'll noticed that every time someone gets slapped, Anthy is in the vicinity. She just exudes this urge to be violent. All that eternal torment stuff. And the curried rice episode... It was Anthy's cooking, not the curry! She wanted to switch bodies with Utena in order to escape her fate. And when Nanami came back with the spice from India, she slipped on a banana peel that Chu-Chu conveniently dropped and shattered the container. Hmm.

You can tell how much I love her by how I've analyzed her practically to death ^_^ She gets these looks... you've probably noticed. Her eyes narrow and they take on this look that's half blank, half deadly. Namely, when she runs Utena through, and when she and Akio are... ehm. Especially that time that Utena caught them, and she was standing there naked with her hair all in her face. Look of death. Also, that time that she and Utena were talking, and Utena was about to remember something very crutial, and Akio walked in and asked if he could "borrow" her. Of course, Anthy just said "Hai, onii-sama!" and that she didn't mind at all, but when they left, her cute little expression just melted into scaryness. And even in the end credits for the first part of the show, she's got that look...

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