Carmilla and Utena parallels, Part 1
May. 6th, 2015 03:45 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
amelia_petkovaMeta time! Have my thoughts on all the similarities between Revolutionary Girl Utena and Carmilla (just the web series, not the book). This ended up split into multiple posts, because it got really long. Major spoilers for both works are behind the cuts. Also, excuse any times when I’m a bit vague about elements from Utena because it’s been a couple of years since the last time I watched it.
Let’s start with our leading ladies, because Laura and Carmilla are so much like Utena and Anthy that it’s not even funny.
Laura and Utena
Where do I even begin? They’re both new students at odd schools, with way more nobility and good intentions than common sense. At the start of the story they’re completely confident about how the world should work, when nothing could be farther from the truth. It’s amazing how naïve they are in the opening episodes. While Laura can be passive-aggressive when she’s annoyed at having a terrible roommate like Carmilla (she thinks telling a “study buddy” that Carmilla has contagious cold sores is good revenge) and Utena is just straight-up aggressive (going after Saionji with a wooden sword), both characters have the ultimate goal of protecting the people they care about. They even face their final battles head-on, after they’ve been mostly disillusioned and they could easily survive by walking away from their situations. Utena doesn’t have to go off and face Akio, and Laura has been bluntly told that all she has to do to survive is to not interfere. Utena could be said to be a bit more optimistic about the outcome (before she is literally stabbed in the back, at any rate) but I think the way the girls go off to meet their fates is more similar than different. With magical swords, no less.
Carmilla and Anthy
Carmilla and Anthy may have even more in common than Laura and Utena. Both girls are involved in rituals that have been happening again and again for who-knows how many times (there’s no way that the current Student Council at Ohtori is the first time Akio’s gone through this process). The whole thing has been going on for a long time—Carmilla states that she was turned into a vampire at the end of the 17th century, and I don’t even want to guess how old Anthy and Akio really are.
Both girls also function as lures. Carmilla flat-out admits that her assigned duty is to act as bait. After the experience with Elle and the coffin she tries to scare off prospective victims when possible, but her role hasn’t changed. Later in the series she admits that she knows her efforts are meaningless, since the Dean’s other minions just take other girls instead. As the Rose Bride, Anthy as bait is even stronger by living with the current Champion and being completely subservient to him or her. She has to make it so that the Duelists will want to continue fighting to keep her (as well as gaining the power to revolutionize the world).
On a depressing note, both Carmilla and Anthy have been stuck in coffins. Anthy’s coffin is mostly metaphorical, but Carmilla was stuck in her coffin of blood for decades (approximately from the 1870s through World War II). Yet even after her physical escape, Carmilla continues to be trapped in a metaphorical coffin as much as Anthy. She can’t bring herself to leave it and go against the Dean in the belief that the world could be a different and better place. Everything sucks and it always will even when she tried to fight it in the past, so why bother fighting now? If “screwing with Mommy Dearest’s minions” keeps her from going insane, that’s enough. Anthy can’t bring herself to leave her coffin, either. She spends the majority of the series living with Utena and watching her fight against injustice again and again, but during the last duel she is still unable to resist Akio. And because Carmilla and Anthy can’t/won’t leave their coffins, they betray the ones they love. Carmilla lets the Dean take Kirsch and tries to prevent Laura from interfering, while Anthy literally stabs Utena in the back.
Let’s start with our leading ladies, because Laura and Carmilla are so much like Utena and Anthy that it’s not even funny.
Laura and Utena
Where do I even begin? They’re both new students at odd schools, with way more nobility and good intentions than common sense. At the start of the story they’re completely confident about how the world should work, when nothing could be farther from the truth. It’s amazing how naïve they are in the opening episodes. While Laura can be passive-aggressive when she’s annoyed at having a terrible roommate like Carmilla (she thinks telling a “study buddy” that Carmilla has contagious cold sores is good revenge) and Utena is just straight-up aggressive (going after Saionji with a wooden sword), both characters have the ultimate goal of protecting the people they care about. They even face their final battles head-on, after they’ve been mostly disillusioned and they could easily survive by walking away from their situations. Utena doesn’t have to go off and face Akio, and Laura has been bluntly told that all she has to do to survive is to not interfere. Utena could be said to be a bit more optimistic about the outcome (before she is literally stabbed in the back, at any rate) but I think the way the girls go off to meet their fates is more similar than different. With magical swords, no less.
Carmilla and Anthy
Carmilla and Anthy may have even more in common than Laura and Utena. Both girls are involved in rituals that have been happening again and again for who-knows how many times (there’s no way that the current Student Council at Ohtori is the first time Akio’s gone through this process). The whole thing has been going on for a long time—Carmilla states that she was turned into a vampire at the end of the 17th century, and I don’t even want to guess how old Anthy and Akio really are.
Both girls also function as lures. Carmilla flat-out admits that her assigned duty is to act as bait. After the experience with Elle and the coffin she tries to scare off prospective victims when possible, but her role hasn’t changed. Later in the series she admits that she knows her efforts are meaningless, since the Dean’s other minions just take other girls instead. As the Rose Bride, Anthy as bait is even stronger by living with the current Champion and being completely subservient to him or her. She has to make it so that the Duelists will want to continue fighting to keep her (as well as gaining the power to revolutionize the world).
On a depressing note, both Carmilla and Anthy have been stuck in coffins. Anthy’s coffin is mostly metaphorical, but Carmilla was stuck in her coffin of blood for decades (approximately from the 1870s through World War II). Yet even after her physical escape, Carmilla continues to be trapped in a metaphorical coffin as much as Anthy. She can’t bring herself to leave it and go against the Dean in the belief that the world could be a different and better place. Everything sucks and it always will even when she tried to fight it in the past, so why bother fighting now? If “screwing with Mommy Dearest’s minions” keeps her from going insane, that’s enough. Anthy can’t bring herself to leave her coffin, either. She spends the majority of the series living with Utena and watching her fight against injustice again and again, but during the last duel she is still unable to resist Akio. And because Carmilla and Anthy can’t/won’t leave their coffins, they betray the ones they love. Carmilla lets the Dean take Kirsch and tries to prevent Laura from interfering, while Anthy literally stabs Utena in the back.
