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A romantic adventure story about Crown Prince Oscar, who is under a curse that prevents him from having an heir, and about the “witch” (although it would be more correct to call her a sorceress) Tinasha, with whom the prince falls in love and tries to convince her to marry him. Fantasy elements (dragons, magic, medieval surroundings and other attributes) are also present in the anime, but the emphasis is more on the characters and their very adult relationships.

Plot: In an effort to find a way to get rid of his “curse” placed on Oscar as a child by the “witch of Silence” Lavinia, Prince ... Oscar goes to another “witch” - Tinasha. The latter is known for granting wishes to those who are able to conquer her magical tower. Oscar, the first in many decades, easily copes with the task, demonstrating intelligence (when solving riddles), dexterity and strength. The classic elements of European fairy tales seem to be in place, including the beautiful sorceress Tinasha, whom Oscar finds on the top floor of her tower. The sorceress turns out to be quite friendly, kind-hearted and, to Oscar’s surprise, young (only in appearance, because she is over four hundred years old) and very beautiful. However, from a conversation with Tinasha over tea, it turns out that Oscar’s “curse” is not a curse at all, but a kind of blessing that protects Oscar’s future child so much that can kill a woman who risks conceiving a child from him. Tinasha is unable to remove the blessing, but offers an alternative solution - to find a woman who can resist the magic of the blessing and bear Oscar's child. Seeing how beautiful, feminine and kind-hearted Tinasha is, Oscar asks whether she herself is capable of resisting such magic and, having received an affirmative answer, asks Tinasha to marry him. The latter protests, but somehow hesitantly and even with elements of game (flirting) - instead of saying that she is too old to bear a child, infertile, etc., Tinasha says that not only she doesn’t have a husband, but there were never any men either. Of course, it would be difficult to inflame Oscar's desire to get her any more. Conquering an unapproachable beauty who retained her virginity for hundreds of years is much more desirable for a man like Oscar, who is accustomed to being first in everything, than conquering some magic tower or defeating an enemy in a sword fight. Therefore, when Tinasha, having rejected his proposal, threatens to erase his memory and throw him out of the tower, Oscar, for his part, also threatens her with his royal sword, capable of dispelling any magic. Since both opponents stand their ground and are unable to achieve what they want using force, Oscar offers a compromise - Tinasha must live in his castle for a year, searching for a way to remove Lavinia’s blessing. The sorceress, who clearly likes the manly and decisive Oscar, but who does not want to admit it either to him or to herself, likes this compromise - after all, it can justify her latent desire to get to know Oscar better. This is the beginning of the plot, which includes the development of relationships between the main characters against the backdrop of shonen adventures. However, it’s difficult to call this anime shonen, since the characters here are not shonen-like at all, and the narrative itself is rather intimate, more tied to the relationships of the characters than to their relationships with the outside world.

Characters: I would call Tinasha the main character - most of the time is devoted to her, and the author did the best job with her. Apparently, the author wrote Tinasha from herself, or from a close friend or relative, since female psychology is conveyed in the sorceress very reliably. So reliable that the anime often resembles a women's novel, with the eternal doubts and tossing of the MC, changes in mood, hidden narcissism that combines self-flagellation and self-doubt with the desire to manipulate Oscar, causing his jealousy, creating triangulations and provoking constant confirmations of love. Melodrama out of nowhere, female manipulations and misconceptions regarding male psychology and motivation are often tiring and annoying, especially in the middle of the anime, but, on the other hand, they give Tinasha’s character depth and realism, despite all the author’s efforts to idealize her. Tinasha, of course, for the sake of shonen clichés, was credited with some masculine traits, such as excessive strength and sword skills, but otherwise her character remained entirely feminine, as did her behavior - she cooks well, behaves modestly and, closer to the finale, listens to Oscar, without claiming leadership or even “equality” in decision-making. She ultimately transfers all burdensome male responsibilities to her man. The male character, Oscar, was not so successful for the author - one can see the author’s poor understanding of male psychology. However, the fact that the author is a woman who does not understand the fantasies of teenage boys saved the story from many of the sores and stereotypes of shonen. Oscar is not an eternally embarrassed, homely and petty, pathetic schoolboy with a harem of ethereal beauties lusting him, captivated by his “kindness” and “understanding,” but a decisive, manly, tall, strong and intelligent man, behaving with dignity and without absurd embarrassment, stupid humor and antics. In this sense, “Unnamed Memory” is more reminiscent of shjojo than shonen. However, you can’t call Oscar a shjojo character either - he’s not effeminately handsome and is too masculine for an audience of teenage girls. Such a manly, mature man would probably frighten immature girls rather than attract them. This is not a handsome “bad guy”, an unprincipled bastard with a “vulnerable soul”, whom only the female protagonist can reach by taming him, subduing him and forcing him to change and obey only her alone. So the main male character is either not a character of the fantasies of teenage girls and infantile women. Oscar copes well with Tinashe’s manipulations (except for the plot moves with provocations of jealousy in which Oscar’s behavior does not correspond to his character), is adamant, principled and controls himself, their relationship, and Tinasha herself, allowing her to relax and constantly sit on his lap, like a little four-hundred-year-old little girl. After all, in fact, all women, regardless of their age, are like that (I mean little girls, not old hags).

Disadvantages: I would include the ragged narration as a disadvantage - most of the plot of the novel/manga was cut out of the anime, without taking care of normal editing and gluing together the broken storylines. Often storylines begin as suddenly as they end, without any connections or transitions. Although I personally like the dim, subtle psychologism of the relationship between Tinasha and Oscar, when the development of the relationship is shown more through actions than through words and comments, but for many, especially those accustomed to cliched rom-coms, the romance between Oscar and Tinasha will be incomprehensible and questionable with questions like: where did the kiss come from?, etc. I also include excessive melodrama created by Tinasha among the shortcomings. A man with Oscar’s character, after some of Tinasha’s particularly outrageous antics in the middle of the anime, would simply break up with such a woman once and for all, despite all her beauty, eternal youth and femininity. Also I didn’t particularly like the art - the backgrounds are empty and expressionless, the animation is rather mediocre.

Pros: The anime is quite unique and doesn't fall into the usual genre clichés. Some aspects of anime that can be perceived as disadvantages are, to me, advantages. I liked the revelation of the relationships between the characters - without Shinkai's sentimentalism, but in an adult way, through actions and mutual understanding without words or comments. Just look at the scene of short mutual apologies, where the characters’ feelings are conveyed not through lengthy ranting, but subtly, through pause, silence and hugs. The female part of the audience may like the melodramatic elements - Tinasha's tossing and indecisiveness, her self-flagellation and reflections. The advantages I would include are the psychological authenticity of the relationships, great attention to character development, good dialogues (which is an incredible rarity for anime) and the end of the season. The last episode, although not without melodrama and plot holes, was a great success and made up for all the previous shortcomings of the anime for me. I would also note the excellent opening and, especially, ending.

In general, “Unnamed Memory” gave me ambivalent feelings - along with a number of advantages, which I would include the adult and serious tone of the narrative, a beautifully written female psychology and, for once, a normal, courageous male main character, the anime also has many shortcomings associated both with its production (quality of animation, truncated plot, etc.), and with the very features of the author that allowed her to so beautifully portray the relationship between Oscar and Tinasha. There is a lot of melodrama and plot holes, caused not only by editorial problems, but by the problems of the author’s narration, with her poor understanding of male psychology. However, the genre uniqueness of "Unnamed Memory" and the interesting ending clearly distinguish this anime from many others.

I really liked the final episode where Oscar is forced to deal with consequnces of an unfortunate magic accident. There is a great lesson there - forgetting or undoing your past, no metter how bad it was, is the same as forgetting and undoing yourself. Our past defines who we are, it's part of our personalities. As Oscar points out, only children would want to erase all the sufferings from their past, since by doing so they will erase them very selves.

The plot begins with the capture of the planet of the protagonist (Jinto), still just a boy, by the empire of “space elves” (genetically modified people). Not just a capture, but a surrender on the condition that the head of the planet, Jinto’s father, will become a nobleman of the empire (count) and will continue to rule the planet. The space elves themselves are indifferent to the captured planets. It is not at all clear from the plot why planets are being captured - apparently out of curiosity, since the anime is bashfully silent about tribute (taxes), pumping out resources and other unpleasant aspects of ... imperial conquests. However, the local residents, whose lives apparently have not changed in any way, for some reason hate the elves, whom they have never even seen. Meanwhile, our hero Jinto, the young son of a count, is growing up, and the time has come for him to go to the space academy - he is waiting for an elf warship that is supposed to pick him up. Overall, the start is quite exciting and promising. But then the fierce trash begins.

In the elven cruiser, not just anyone, but the elven princess Lafiel arrives for Jinto and, without any accompaniment, goes to meet Jinto at the spaceport of a world that was only recently captured and whose inhabitants are still hostile to the elves. That is, not only is the cruiser on board which the princess is not accompanied by other warships, but also the princess herself is walking around a hostile world without any security. All this absurdity, obviously, was put together by the author purely so that our Jinto would meet an elven beauty of the imperial family. But he could have met her under more realistic circumstances, already at the space academy. This means that common sense was sacrificed to “plot necessity” only so that some kind of personal connection was established between the charactes even before arriving in the capital, apparently through “adventures” during the trip. I note that this, unfortunately, is not the last sacrifice of common sense in Crest of the Stars and is far from the most absurd. “Adventures along the way” are not long in coming, since the other half of humanity “suddenly” decides to attack the elven empire, represented by the cruiser transporting our heroes. Well, you understand - not only was the potential heir to the throne of the empire sent to some shit hole on a cruiser without an escort to pick up an insignificant native, but the empire also completely lacks intelligence that could warn of an impending war. And for some reason the enemies decide to attack this particular cruiser. I understand that the plot required introducing the characters in such a setting, but couldn’t they have at least tried to think through the details and give the “plot progression” at least a drop of believability? For example, to say that intelligence warned the elves of an impending attack and they demonstratively sent the princess on a warship with an escort in order to demonstrate their power, but did not calculate the strength and determination of the enemy? The enemies attacked the princess's military escort, for example, hoping to capture her. But, no, the author doesn’t even try to make the “plot progression” believable.

It is clear that the cruiser is destroyed, and a couple of our heroes (because the plot requires that the adventure be only for two) escape on a shuttle with an important mission to warn the empire about the attack (apparently, either the telecommunications are not yet known to the space elves, or the postal the pigeons got sick). They end up on an empire-owned asteroid with a small population, ruled by an elf baron. It's clear that this is another stupid and completely unnecessary storyline. The Baron, as one might suspect, is trying to capture our heroes, because... The author again could not come up with anything intelligible. In general, the baron interferes with the execution of a military mission, seizes a military vessel, holds the count and princess of the empire against their will, explaining this by saying that he is afraid that he will be discovered by the enemy (sic!) and that he is not violating anything (when all of the above of his acts already deserve a couple of death sentences). That is, the baron, apparently, is simply a schizophrenic living in an imaginary world. However, likewise the author of this creation, because otherwise such a plot cannot be justified (drug intoxication?). Further, the baron threatens the princess with a weapon (apparently still believing that he is “not violating anything”), trying to kill her and, in fact, committing high treason. The princess organizes a rebellion of local slaves (which is very implausible, since the local 50 slaves of a power-obsessed maniac should have long ago developed Stockholm syndrome in relation to their slavedriver), and our “hero” Jinto is engaged in stupid rantings and, for some reason, tries to prevent the princess from killing the baron. Either he, instead of the aforementioned slaves, developed Stockholm syndrome, or he is some kind of “teenage humanist” with serious mental retardation. I am inclined to the latter version, since later in the plot Jinto’s stupidity will only progress (apparently, stress is taking its toll) and it is not possible to call him anything other than mentally retarded. In general, having mourned the murder of a crazy maniac baron, our hero calms down, and together with the princess they land on a planet where Jinto will finally have the opportunity to “be useful”... In no way!

Since, as we found out, our hero (or the author of Crest of the Stars) is mentally retarded, on the planet he not only reads idiotic morals to the princess, but also becomes active. And as you know, there is nothing worse than an enterprising fool. He begins with the fact that he stubbornly does not understand that the princess needs to go to the toilet (apparently, from the author’s point of view, this was a good joke, since quite a large period of time was devoted to it, or it was kind of a failed attempt to “break the fourth wall”). Having sold their things at a pawnshop and dressed up like locals, the heroes head to the city. However, the author again needs to somehow advance the plot. Therefore, “suddenly” a guy and a girl in a daylight are attacked by rapists passing by in a car (a common occurrence outside the city, as I understand it). The mentally retarded hero, although he has a weapon, but, as usual, turns out to be useless (the weapon, which he has never fired, “suddenly” runs out of charge), and the princess “suddenly” shows humanism towards the local degenerates, and simply wounds them, picking up the car (where and when did she learn to drive it as she spent all her life in space?). This is despite the fact that the characters know about the hostility of the local authorities towards the elves and that a hunt has been declared for the “elves” here (it is not clear why - the elves consider themselves a “space race” and do not descend to the planets) - yet another clumsy tool to "advance the story." It would be logical to kill the witnesses, but no! Our heroes are great humanists. As a result of this act of theirs, in the end they will have to destroy the company of soldiers. After all, the lives of three degenerate rapists who rush at everything that moves are more valuable than some company of soldiers who are simply doing their duty, defending their homeland. The degenerate criminals report the theft of their car by our mentally retarded “humanists,” and the hunt begins for the elf. Of course, it doesn’t occur to a guy with mental retardation that they will be wanted after the theft of a car, and so he suggests staying at a local hotel and waiting there... it’s clear what to expect - until the author comes up with another stupidity to ”advance" this ridiculous story.

The police, of course, are starting to check hotels, but the reporting of hotels to the police in this world seems to be as problematic as telecommunications. That is, hotels do not report their guests to the police at all, and the police simply make the rounds. But ahead of the police our heroes are found by the leader of a local anti-imperial group, who, by “coincidental coincidence,” turns out to be a maid serving the room of the very hotel where our heroes are staying (what a twist! how do you like this, Shyamalan?!). In a failed attempt to detain our heroes, the entire anti-imperial group is disarmed by the princess but, “suddenly” she becomes sympathetic to the freedom-loving terrorists (who, living in the empire, did not even bother to find out that their wishes were, in principle, impossible to fulfill according to the laws of the empire - apparently, they cared so much about their cause) and, under the influence of our idiot Jinto, she agrees to become their hostage (exactly like that - controlling the situation and owning a gun, yet not promising assistance in exchange for cooperation, but becoming “hostages”) - well, have you seen this, Shyamalan!? Having escaped from the hotel in time just before it was discovered by the police, our heroes (again “suddenly”) are ambushed by the military. Where the mentally retarded hero first tries to stop the princess from throwing a grenade at the enemy, but then he gets the hang of it and, together with the princess, goes on a rampage of humanism, shooting and blowing up that unlucky company of soldiers. The soldiers, in turn, demonstrate a massive cases of disease with the “imperial stormtrooper syndrome” so their fire does not even leave a scratch on our heroes. But when the heroes encounter the police, our idiot suddenly concludes that against the police with pistols, unlike soldiers with assault rifles and grenade launchers, they have no chance and must definitely surrender (because tension needs to be introduced into the plot!), and It’s better to surrender to the police than to the army (after all, everyone knows the “philanthropy” of police units during the war compared to these “barbarians” - soldiers of the regular army! The “philanthropic” Gestapo and NKVD are witnesses to this!). It is clear that this absurd plot device was needed only for the “warming up” and subsequent “sudden” release of the heroes by the “anti-imperial group” that was imbued with sympathy for the elves.

Meanwhile, the Imperial fleet, commanded by another and, unfortunately, typical for this anime, mentally retarded person, an admiral, in dense ranks with a distance of tens of meters between ships, goes into a frontal assault on the enemy. Everything is as it should be in a space opera cliché - no tactics, not a bit of common sense or believability. More precisely, the tactic was to “slowly advance from the front” to intimidate the enemy. When the enemy refuses to be “intimidated,” it becomes as much a surprise to the admiral as snow in winter is to some public utilities. But heroically fighting on spaceships in close combat (at least without boarding), the space elves win an “epic victory.” Our heroes (our idiot, for added melodrama, gets hit by the main villain - of course, in the shoulder) fly off on a rocket and a “happy ending” ensues. Perhaps getting rid of the torment caused by watching such an absurd story cannot be called anything other than a “happy ending”.

Still, I was a little hesitant to be too critical of “Crest of the Stars”, since it is aimed at children and teenagers, and the space opera genre does not imply seriousness and thoughtfulness. But, on the other hand, the author of Crest of the Stars himself gave potential critics an indulgence by borrowing elves from Tolkien and transferring them into space. Even, copying the professor, he came up with his own “elvish language” based on Japanese. And if so, then there can be no leniency towards the stupidity of the plot and characters just because the anime is aimed at children and teenagers, and the story is created in the epic genre. Written in the epic genre for children and teenagers, The Lord of the Rings was not noticed for stupidity. After all, Tolkien was smart enough to portray in the person of Aragorn not himself, a university professor (although the writer had real combat experience in the First World War), but the personification of the king, as he can be imagined, the great hero of the ancient royal family, a descendant of the elves and Maiar, to whom in order to marry for the elven princess Arwen, even this was not enough, but he had to become the “king of men” by defeating the army of Sauron. The author of Crest of the Stars, it seems, portrayed himself in the emptyly ranting useless idiot Jinto, and saw Lafiel as a magical girlfriend. That is, the moral of the story is approximately this - a mediocre, unremarkable and infantile boy who accidentally received the title does not need to do anything special in order to count on the love of the elven beauty princess. Well, indeed why you have to become a noble hero and king, defeating the armies of Sauron, like Aragorn? Remain your useless self, you are perfect as it is. If Crest of the Stars instills this kind of morality in teenagers, then in addition to its leaky plot, it also offers a vile parody of morality. Or here are anime references to the noble traditions of the European aristocracy with its vassalage, combined with the “life-affirming” atheism of the empire. However, the European system of vassalage had a deep Christian basis, where an aristocrat stands above the commoner, but is obliged by the Code of Chivalry to take care of the commoner, serve him, administering justice, providing education, social assistance to those in need, build roads, provide protection from criminals, etc., for which services the commoner gives part of his harvest and must be loyal to the aristocrat. Above the aristocrat is the king, in much the same way as the aristocrat is above the commoner. And above the king and everyone else is God. And in this system, the king is also constrained by the orders of God (unlike the Asian system, where the emperor/king is a “god”) and does not dare to violate them. Hence all the oppositions against kings, which gave rise to medieval European parliaments and charters that limited the power of the king, which in the modern world grew into constitutions and “inalienable human rights” - all this is impossible in atheistic Asian systems, where, say, the samurai was a fry dependent on the shogun, received payment in rice and, in turn, treated commoners like insects, just as in China an official was completely dependent on the emperor, and a commoner was not even considered a person.

So both the plot and morality in this anime are extremely poor. However, their level is not inferior to ordinary space opera. But nothing stands out either. The only thing that can be considered a plus is some dialogues, especially in the first half, +1 point for them. So an average of 5 points plus 1 point for dialogues gives a 6 out of 10.

They say that with the advent of cinema, which at first was black and white, people who watched movies lost the ability to see color dreams - they were visited only by monochrome dreams. Only with the advent of color cinema and television in the 1960s did new generations again learn to dream in color. If we agree that dreams are the unconscious expression of our experiences, then the influence of television and cinema on dreams raises the question of how much our unconscious experiences reflect subjective experience, and not what we saw on film or television screens (and now on computer screens and smartphones). ... To what extent is what influences our unconscious drawn from reality, and not from an adaptation of someone’s fantasies - movies, animation or video games?

If you look closely at the works of Satoshi Kon, the idea of merging reality and dreams can be seen in almost all the anime he created. It seems that Satoshi was obsessed with it and constantly tried to express it as fully as possible using the artistic means available to him. Of course, obsessed with such an idea, Satoshi simply could not pass by the 1993 novel “Paprika” by his compatriot Tsutsui Yasutaka, which tells about an apparatus with which psychiatrists can infiltrate into the dreams of patients and cure them of mental disorders. The idea of this novel is very reminiscent of the idea of the novel “The Dream Master” by Roger Zelazny, published back in 1966. However, unlike the Zelazny novel I read as a teenager, Yasutaka’s “Paprika” seemed to me so clumsy and mediocrely boring, and the characters so disgusting that I could not bring myself to read this vile thing to the end, and therefore I will further refrain from going into detail comparison of the original source with its film adaptation, which was carried out by Satoshi Kon. Moreover, Kon bypassed and smoothed out the most disgusting parts of the book to the point of imperceptibility.

What he retained was the atmosphere of a nightmare dream, close to Kon himself, which is closely intertwined with reality, directly influencing it and becoming indistinguishable from reality. The audiovisual style of "Paprika" is indeed like a dream - from the wonderful, bewitchingly strange music, to the borderline absurd, and sometimes reminiscent of feverish delirium, plot, in which the transition between sleep and reality is often not distinguishable, and to the bright and colorful picture, often ominous and frightening, like a nightmare.

As for the plot, as far as I understand, the operating principle of the DC Mini “dream analysis machine” invented by Kosaku Tokito is based on Jungian analytical psychology. The psychiatrist, with the help of a machine, infiltrates into the dream, that is, the individual unconscious of the patient, into his “shadow”, trying to manifest it for the patient’s consciousness. This is what Atsuka Chiba does, but not directly, but with the help of her “shadow” (alter ego). Donning a wig and applying makeup, the stern, cold and purposeful beauty Atsuko transforms into "Paprika" - a cheeky, irresponsible young woman who visits patients "at home" with her DC Mini to penetrate their dreams. And the patients, in turn, literally penetrate her, as Atsuko, “for therapeutic purposes,” copulates with her patients (sometimes with several at the same time). The scene in the hotel at the beginning of the movie, when Paprika gets out of the “patient’s” bed in a robe, taking the DC Mini, is not part of a dream, but a retouched demonstration by Kon of Atsuko’s peculiar “therapeutic practices” in the novel. At the same time, Atsuko considers her sexual promiscuity, committed when she is disguised as Paprika, to be “not real”, since... well, she’s wearing a wig and makeup, and then the patients don’t recognize her on the street, or pretend that they don’t recognize her. However, distancing herself from these actions of Paprika, Atsuko does not hesitate to appropriate all the merits of her alter ego - after all, Paprika, not Atsuko, conducts sessions with patients. In general, Atsuko is okay with hypocrisy and double standards. In addition, she is secretly in love with the infantile genius Tokita, but represses her love into the unconscious (shadow) and cannot (that is, does not want) to accept it as easily as she accepted her penchant for promiscuity.

Besides the cold yet promiscuous, two-faced Atsuko, we have the incredibly childish, obese genius Takito, as well as sexually obsessed by Atsuko her colleague (let’s give Kon credit, in the anime he at least made this colleague a man), and another psychiatrist, a manipulative psychopath, dreaming of enslaving the world with the help of a DC Mini, and on the way to this goal practicing hentai tentacles on Atsuko. In general, we have a whole collection of sexual and other mental deviations - and all this, I note, is only among “psychiatrists.” The author of “Paprika” obviously tried very hard, “smearing” his sexual fantasies and mental deviations across the characters he created. I'm not even sure who in this anime (and book) actually needs medical attention. Atsuko's patient, detective Konakawa, against the backdrop of this whole company of insane psychiatrists, looks like a completely mentally healthy and adequate person.

The individual unconscious of all the mentioned characters is intertwined with each other and with reality, forming a kind of collective unconscious, over which one of them, the psychopath, is trying to seize control. But Detective Konakawa steps in and saves Atsuko from the tentacle monster (thus realizing his repressed movie fantasies). Atsuko finally accepts her “shadow” Paprika, merging with her inside another “shadow” - the robot Takito. Having gained integrity by merging with the “shadow,” Atsuko is reborn and defeats the monster by absorbing it into herself. The latter, however, gives rise to the suspicion that the entire nightmare dream shown to us is nothing more than a figment of the imagination of Atsuko, possessed by her demons. However, here it is worth paying attention to the oddities of double standards in Atsuko’s behavior, and the whole scene of the caranival of deviations no longer speaks of individually suppressed qualities, but of social pressure in Japanese society. Therefore, in addition to the psychological, it is also worth mentioning the social context of “Paprika”, developed in more detail by Satoshi Kon in “Paranoia Agent”. Contextualism and repressive conformism of Japanese culture do not so much psychologically drive the qualities of individual Japanese into the unconscious (this is more characteristic of the Christian guilt culture), but rather force them to consciously hide these qualities (which is characteristic of the Asian shame culture). Suppressed by social norms, unexpressed desires and experiences under the influence of social pressure find a “path to life” through an “alter ego” that acts “against the will,” a double life, a double morality. Or they are expressed directly by the body through psychosomatic disorders. Or the person simply commits suicide. There is also a socially acceptable option - immersion into the dream world. Driven into Japanese “cultural-corporate” ethics, a person suppresses his individuality and turns into a kind of robot, for whom it is only permissible to perform a socially useful function (is this where the frequent allusions associated with robots in anime and Japanese culture come from?) and to imitate, because there is no longer any room left to express “one’s own.”

The unnaturalness of such “instrumentalization” of the individual is obvious and the unexpressed desires and qualities of the “pseudo-robot” are brought to their extreme manifestations and, as a rule, are channeled through socially acceptable forms - through the “dream world” of anime and manga, with its cruelty, sadomaso pornography and “kawaii” - in general, the satisfaction of suppressed desires for every taste. However, if the throughput of socially acceptable forms is not enough, then the “sewer” can break through, releasing all the accumulated “crap” onto the streets of reality. Hence the nightmarish carnival - everything suppressed and hidden has broken through from the unconscious and suppressed into reality and is marching through the streets in an eerie march. And all this “shit” was absorbed by Atsuko. In addition, she also absorbed the opposing “repressive” shadow of a man who was trying to control the world. It’s hard not to assume that this is a kind of feminist manifesto (I note that the heroines of Satoshi Kon’s films are women and he is close to the female worldview). The woman defeats the repressive patriarchy with her boundless tolerance and absorbs all deviations, instead of suppressing and excluding them. Inclusiveness instead of excommunication.

If this is the solution proposed by Kon, then it is wrong. Fantasies of “dream masters” like Kon, their waking dreams, capable of influencing the viewer’s perception of reality through cinema and television screens, often completely replacing real experience, are probably intended to help in “freeing” the viewer from his “shackles”, through incorporation “liberation ideas” into dreams broadcast to the viewer (cinema, video games, anime, manga, music, etc.). Kon not only tried to apply wrong sollution to the problem, he tried to impose it on the viewer through artistic means. But the solution never lies in imposing a “useful” ideology on the viewer by indoctrination through “waking dreams” - the entertainment industry and the media.

As sentient beings, we primarily process reality through our consciousness, that is, by organizing facts into understandable narratives (stories). The very description of reality is at the same time its construction, since it gives meaning to the chaos of facts in order to organize meaningless phenomena into a structure processed by our consciousness. Therefore, narratives (stories) are our tools for structuring reality and comprehending it. Science creates stories (hypotheses, theories, laws, principles, axioms, equations) that help us structure and comprehend reality in the most verifiable way. Art creates stories (literature, film, fairy tales, paintings, poetry) that help structure and comprehend reality in a more immediate and personal way. However, stories, both in the form of art and scientific theories, can misinterpret reality either intentionally (falsely) or due to misunderstanding (mistake). Such false stories create a false picture of reality, thereby distorting the picture of the world. Once a narrative (story) is internalized by people, it becomes their worldview and they adapt all the facts to fit this internalized narrative. If a narrative is false, people will ignore and omit facts that contradict the narrative and/or misinterpret facts to fit into the narrative. Moreover, most people tend to internalize stories that appeas and flatter them. This is where indoctrination comes into play. The ideological narrative creates a “useful” for an ideologist interpretation of reality, appeasing wishful thinking of targeted audience. This creates a convenient lie that one can rely on to feel entitled, feel offended, victimized, and avoid responsibility. And so on until a collision with reality occurs. But even a collision with reality may not help if the story is internalized on a subconscious level. Indoctrination works the same way as psychological trauma or mental illness. By appealing to the desires of the target audience, ideology combines facts into a distorted picture of reality, which has its own logic, or does not have it at all, but is firmly incorporated into the subconscious. Similarly, paranoid delusions can be very logical and coherent, where facts are falsely combined into a fictional schizophrenic narrative. Getting rid of ideological indoctrination can be as difficult as of childhood psychological trauma, which can distort the perception of reality to such an extent that no amount of psychological help will help a fully grown patient. In a certain sense, ideological propaganda is artificially induced madness. A society instilled with a false interpretation of reality, an insane society, becomes dysfunctional and will gradually collapse. Because reality itself is not a social construct. The delusional belief of ideologues (including some philosophers, scientists, politicians, journalists, activists, and artists) in their power and right to replace reality with false narratives is the highest form of solipsism. All it will do is traumatize and cripple individuals and society to the point of no return. This is the danger of trying to bring ideology to stories, both scientific and artistic. And those who try to impose an ideology must be responsible for its consequences.

The current ideological narrative exploits a hyper-feminized tolerance, which many derive from the critical theory of the Frankfurt School and the works of neo-Marxists such as Marcuse and Derrida, and which René Girard has seen as a reactionary attempt to appropriate and distort the Christian concern with victims after the Nietzschean attempt to force humanity to abandon Christian compassion was defeated. Metaphorically Satan imitates Christ and tries to overcome Him by virtue signaling radical concern for victims. This narrative attempts to attribute a lack of compassion to "toxic masculinity," offering instead "all-salvation" through the feminization of culture and politics with a hyper-tolerance that absorbs all otherness and all deviance, instead of suppressing and excluding them. Inclusivity instead of excommunication, femininity instead of "toxic masculinity" will provide "heaven on earth." Such a narrative is imposed by fashionable ideology. However, this decision is obviously wrong. According to Girard, such a hypertolerance is designed to discredit and finally overcome Christian compassion. Like everything brought to absurdity, devoid of limits and rules, compassion turns into a cancerous tumor, a nightmarish terror that narcissists and psychopaths use to intimidate and corrupt people, and impose a totalitarian mindset ("repressive tolerance" by Marcuse). However, it is not necessary to push tolerance to the extreme to see the falsity of the universalism attributed to it.

The solution does not lie in social acceptance and tolerance of all “repressed” qualities and desires, including deviations. Perhaps, here I should explain what our “shadows” are. These are repressed "qualities" or desires that characters are unwilling to acknowledge, let alone display publicly. The repressed qualities torment people because they are not acceptable for some reasons, but people are afraid that the "shadows" are who they really are. For example, we all have moments in our lives when we catch ourselves thinking and feeling that our thoughts and emotions are, at best, creepy, if not monstrous. But this does not mean that we are all scoundrels and monsters (although some of us are). Once we recognize the existence of such thoughts and emotions as parts of ourselves, we gain the ability to subjugate and control those parts. This is what happens with proper awareness and acceptance of the "shadow". We do not become shadows, but by acknowledging the existence of shadows, we can control them rather than being controlled by them (becoming monsters). Accepting the “shadow” is like admitting your alcohol addiction, which is a necessary step to overcome it instead of becoming an alcoholic. Admitting that you are addicted to overeating is a necessary step to control your appetite and avoid gaining weight. Having a tendency to overeat does not mean that your true self is a glutton. However, if a healthy appetite, as a part of being human, turns into an unhealthy one, and you are unwilling to recognize that appetite as unhealthy, it can completely consume you, and gluttony will define who you are. So it is with the “shadow” - its awareness and acceptance means acquiring conscious control over it, instead of the shadow controlling you through the unconscious.

Fashionable ideology suggests a twisted "acceptance" of the shadow - instead of being aware of and controlling it, it is suggested to "tolerate" the shadow by surrendering to it, letting the shadow control you, and ultimately accepting it as your essence. It invites you to be consumed by your shadow. Accept your gluttony, say ideologues, instead of controlling it and enjoying food, let gluttony take over you, because it is not one of the mortal sins, but "body positive". Embrace promiscuity as your sexuality, instead of controlling it and enjoying sex within the confines of marriage, let it take over you, for it is not one of the deadly sins, but sexual liberation from the yoke of oppressive patriarchy. Accept your envy, because it is not at all a shameful desire to appropriate someone else's, to devalue other people's achievements, to be ungrateful and to humiliate those better than you, but a desire for equality and democracy, feminism and the fight against the patriarchy of white men. A person is inspired by the permissibility and unlimitedness of desires. All ethical restraining factors are declared "repressive". Why, say ideologues, restrain sexual desires within the framework of marriage, the opposite sex, or even the human race? Why have and commit to one woman when you can have sex with many different women without any strings attached? Why submit to a man, if you can simply use him through manipulation, get rich at his expense, and then devalue, castrate and leave him, and also pretend to be a victim and blame him for everything? All the hidden desires that a person relegates to his "shadow" are declared by fashionable ideology to be sacred and to be "released" and tolerated. They should be "celebrated".

Fashionable ideology exploits the worst in a person, declaring the shameful to be respectable and virtuous, the immoral to be ethical. All that is base and abominable is not simply tolerated, but is celebrated and proclaimed the height of virtue. All this is done with the help of mass media, politics, art and mass culture that distort reality.

Of course, special attention is paid to envy. As pointed out by C.S. Lewis, claims for equality, outside the purely political field, are made only by those who feel inferior in some way. What they express is an itchy, burning, twisted sense of inferiority (shadow) that one refuses to accept. And therefore resents any advantage of another; denigrates him; wants his destruction. One suspects that every simple difference is a claim to superiority. No one should be different. Under the name of envy, this desire has been known to people for thousands of years. But until now they had always considered it the most hideous, as well as the most comical of vices. Those who were conscious of envy were ashamed of it; those who did not realize did not spare it in others. The wonderful novelty of the current situation is that you can sanction it - make it respectable and even praiseworthy - by using the word "equality". Under the influence of this spell, those who are inferior in any or all respects can work harder and more successfully than ever before to bring everyone else down to their level.

This is a huge general movement to discredit and ultimately eliminate any kind of human excellence - moral, cultural, social or intellectual. And is it not noticeable how equality is now doing the work that the oldest dictatorships once did, and by the same methods? One of the Greek dictators sent an envoy to another dictator to ask his advice on the principles of government. The second dictator led the messenger out into the grain field, and there he plucked with his cane the top of every stalk that rose above the general level. The moral was simple. Do not allow primacy among your subjects. Let no human live who is wiser, or better, or more famous, or even more beautiful than the mass. Bring everyone to the same level; all slaves, all numbers, all nobody. All are equal. Thus tyrants have always practiced equality. But now "equality" can do the same work without any other tyranny but its own. Now no one needs to walk the field with a cane. The small stalks now bite off the tops of the big ones. And the big ones start biting off the tops of themselves, in the desire to be like others.

Awareness of and acceptance of the a “shadow” in no way means its acceptability and submission to it. On the contrary, it means preventing a shadow from controlling consciousness and gaining control over the shadow itself. For example, Atsuko's awareness of her repressed sexuality does not mean that sexual promiscuity is acceptable. She simply should not deny and suppress her sexuality, but accept its existence and learn to control it, turning it into a morally acceptable head start - getting married and “tormenting” her husband with sexual harassment. Takito's awareness of his infantility does not mean that he should avoid all responsibility and henceforth behave like a child in everything. He should accept his infantility and channel it into creativity, into new inventions, without spreading it to other aspects of his life, where he needs to behave like an adult man. By the way, if there was a way out for the main antagonist-psychopath who was trying to control the world, then the solution for him would be to realize and accept his low level of empathy by finding socially acceptable forms of self-realization. For example, it is known that surgeons, judges and law enforcement officers have increased aggressiveness. However, they channel their sadistic and psychopathic tendencies into socially acceptable and useful forms. After all, not everyone would dare to cut living flesh with a scalpel, detain an armed criminal, infiltrate a criminal organization, or send a person to prison for decades. Thus accepting shadow means turning what could be vices into virtues, instead of becoming enslaved by vices.

Nevertheless, at one time “Paprika” charmed me not at all with its, perhaps erroneous, moralite. You can get purely audiovisual pleasure from this anime, without really thinking about the meaning. The plot is quite dynamic and twisted, with elements of suspense and mysticism characteristic of Satoshi Kon. Well, Satoshi’s directing and editing are simply amazing - on the level of the old Hollywood masters. Add here good animation, a beautiful picture, a beautiful main character (in both of her guises) and excellent music, season with a fair amount of surrealism and you get “Paprika”, ready to charm and entertain you even if you are not ready to think about the plot.

What would happen if Sergio Leone, in collaboration with Luis Bunuel, filmed in animation form a book by Stephen King, written by him in the mid-1980s (during the period of Stephen’s severe drug intoxication), where the main character would be Zorro, fighting vampires in the Wild West? The result would be surreal trash, but decadent, aesthetic trash. It would be "Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust", or something very close to it. As much as I, to put it mildly, am not close to the stories of Kikuchi Hideyuki, how secondary the plot is, how vulgar the characters are, how intellectually and morally powerless the narrative is, ... so much captivating the decadent aesthetics of this anime are. Just as sweetness can be found in pain, so in the destruction of ethical and aesthetic beauty, in decay, one can find decadent pleasure like "Belle De Jour". Perhaps this is what catches “Bloodlust” - the visual aesthetics here are extremely consistent with the ethics of storytelling. It has a peculiar “beauty of ruins”, a borderline sadistic pleasure of destruction, the withering of goodness and beauty. It fascinates, just as a poisonous snake fascinates its victim, just as the viewer is fascinated by the animation of a bouquet of roses withering as Meier approaches to take Charlotte to the “underworld.” The animation, I note, in “Bloodlust” is amazing. The references to Leone's western film aesthetic are animated masterfully, D against the backdrop of a full moon looks as good as Zorro against the setting sun, and it all comes together with a gothic design fused with art nouveau. Eclecticism? Definitely, but it works in "Bloodlust", paired well with an equally eclectic narrative. We can say that this anime is an empty shell, a pretty rotten one, but you can’t deny its visual peculiarity.

What does the "Barefoot Gen" tell us about? About the horrors of war? Yes. About the nuclear nightmare? Also yes. However, it still seems to me that one of the main, if not the core idea of the “Gen” is the need to have your own position and be critical of the dominant social norms and standards, no matter how difficult it is. Therefore, this anime is political not only in the aspect of anti-war pathos, but also in the aspect of critical positioning of a person in relation to the authority and validity of government actions.

It seems that the key words of the film ... were spoken by Gen's father shortly before the bombing: "Traitor, coward... I'm proud if they want to call me those things... You know, sometimes it takes more courage not to fight than to fight, to don't want to kill when everyone around you are calling out for blood... If you boys remember nothing else that I teach you I hope you'll remember that...".

And this is not just a youthful senseless “rebellion for the sake of rebellion” or decoration of one’s own permissiveness with a beautiful word like nonconformism - this is a conscious position in life - it must be said that it is a very difficult and thankless position, requiring enormous willpower and courage. Especially in Japanese society, with its total contextualism and “kawaii-repressive” elimination of significant personal differences. Perhaps this idea is what, for me, distinguishes the "Barefoot Gen" from other anime - where the standard of Japanese moralizing is "inclusion in context", "Gen" asserts a critique of context. Again, this is not as easy as it seems. To imagine the complexity and danger of such a position, it is enough to look at the political reality around us or try to transfer such criticism of the context to, say, Russia, North Korea or Iran.

The visual design of the anime is also of interest. I am glad that there is no fashionable “stylization” of death. The aestheticization of the inhumane within the framework of “dehumanized art”, I think, is a sign of the era - even, perhaps, a sign of a serious illness of the era. Not so in the "Barefoot Gen". The “childish” style of drawing, which at first creates a carefree mood, sharply contrasts with the spectacle of a nuclear explosion that burns out eyes, melts skin and turns “cute” anime people into disgusting walking corpses. I think everybody who watched "Gen" was struck by the image of the girl crashed by a slab, on whose face the contrast “childhood innocence” - “terrible death” is clearly shown. Perhaps, the “end of childhood” brought about by a nuclear explosion shows the viewer the need to think about their carefree life and the fact that this carefree life can end at one moment, including due to the thoughtless conformism and infantilism of the viewer himself. Let's not draw parallels here, they are too heavy.

It seems that the Japanese are not being allowed to forget the cruel lessons of history. And they are not told that the Americans are to blame, or even the stupid “Japanese government,” although the guilt of both is undeniable. No, the main reproach, it seems to me, is addressed to Japanese society: “This war can’t be right, but it’s only the cowards like me who dare say it. If there were only a few more of us.” But the fact of the matter is that among the Japanese there were no critical mass of “cowards” capable of saying “no!” to the war. And this is the problem and fault of society itself.

Nevertheless, the "Barefoot Gen" is a life-affirming anime. The strength of spirit of the main characters is simply amazing. Episodes involving carp fishing and caring for an irradiated artist are indicative. The belief that “the wheat will break through” is simply implanted in the audience’s heads. And dead relatives will be “reborn” in a stray boy or even in a hopeful tuft of hair on his head.

Perhaps, the advantages of the "Gen" give rise to its shortcomings - the protagonist's family is shown too idealized. Although, perhaps, this is exactly how his family is seen by a seven years' old. It’s difficult to give an unambiguous assessment of the “Barefoot Gen.” It seems to me, that this anime falls out of the usual range of “creations” of Japanese animation, the “value” of which can be measured. The “Barefoot Gen” is beyond comparison and is its own criterion and assessment and, I think, is worthy of being watched by everyone who expects something more from anime than entertainment and another immersion into the dream world.

It seems that Japan has (or rather, had) its own Jonathan Swift. Of course, it is difficult to compare the talents of Satoshi Kon and Swift, but the sharp social criticism from the perspective of humanism, expressed in satirical form in "Paranoia Agent", allows to draw a parallel between these two "island dissidents".

I think if R. Benedict wanted to criticize the “shame society” with the help of artistic images, she would have made “Paranoia Agent”. But at the time of the author of “The Chrysanthemum and the Sword,” anime had not yet been filmed and Walt Disney’s ideas were just waiting for their “reincarnation” (or ... “borrowing”) in Japanese animation. Instead of Ruth, the society of “contextualists” who have lost their individuality was ridiculed, if you can call it that, by the Japanese “Westerner” Satoshi Kon. Benedict identified one of the main properties of Japanese culture so clearly and simply that it seems that the Japanese are still reflecting on her book, and the concept of a “shame society” has become a kind of methodological basis for the analysis of social phenomena (see for example Yujiro Nakamura “Evil and sin in Japanese culture").

It seemed to me that Satoshi Kon reflected on the concept of “shame society” in his “Paranoia Agent”. The essence of the difference between a “shame culture” and a “guilt culture” as Benedict described them, is as follows: a society that inculcates absolute standards of morality and relies on men’s developing a conscience is a guilt culture by definition. But within the shame culture there is no reason to worry about a wrongdoing “until people find out.” Where shame is the major sanction, a man does not experience relief when he makes his fault public even to a confessor. True shame cultures rely on external sanctions for good behavior, not, as true guilt cultures do, on an internalized conviction of sin. Shame is a reaction to other people’s criticism. Benedict noted that social pressure in Japan, even if accepted voluntarily, demands too much from the individual. He is required to hide his emotions, renounce his desires, and always see himself as a representative of a family, an organization, a nation. The rules are particularistic and situational. They require subordinating one’s own will to the ever-increasing duties to neighbors, to family and to country.

Yujiro Nakamura identified the following main differences between the cultures of “shame” and “guilt” in this approach:
1) in contrast to Western “guilt cultures,” Japan is a “shame culture”; its distinctive feature is that a person is acutely susceptible to the assessment of his actions by others,
2) unlike “guilt cultures”, based on the experience of personal guilt, in “shame cultures” the moral factor becomes a feeling of shame caused by the inability to maintain balance and the inability to follow well-known, clearly articulated instructions for correct behavior,
3) the highest virtue in the “shame culture” is “to know shame”; a person who knows shame is truly virtuous, which corresponds to the concept of a decent person with a clear conscience in Western ethics.

So giving this what kind of social phenomenon is the “Bat Boy”? There is a specific Japanese nervous disorder when a person is seized with paralysis and cannot move for hours, and sometimes days. This is the “Bat Boy”. When your entire value system is based on the opinions of others, the only way to avoid social pressure (shame) while “saving face” is to “demonstrate” the objective reasons for your real or possible deviation (deviation from the prescribed social norm of behavior). Simply put, a person is always just a person and is characterized by personal shortcomings; he cannot always be “ideal”. But since “contextualism” interprets your value only in terms of a socially useful function and the only basis for personal identification in a “shame society” is opinion of others, you cannot just go and say - I am who I am, and my value is my value, rather than a socially useful role; or - I don’t care about this job, I’m a person, not a robot; or – yes, I'm guilty, I made a mistake/showed weakness, it does happen to everyone; or - well, I can’t go to University (one of the most common reasons for suicide in Japan), but this doesn’t make me worse/better than others, it’s just that my calling is in something else; or – I don’t/like it and I won’t/will do it, etc. Maybe he would want to say something like this, but “contextualist” doesn’t know what he wants to say and how to do it. Thus unarticulated experience under the influence of social pressure finds a “path to reality” in an “alter ego” that acts “against one's will.” Or expressed directly by the body through psychosomatic disorders. Or the person simply commits suicide. Another way to avoid pressure is to immerse yourself in a dream world, say anime...

Driven into the Japanese “cultural-corporate” ethics, a person loses his individuality and turns into a robot, capable only of performing a socially useful function (a nod to the allusions to robots in anime and Japanese culture) and imitating, since there is nothing “of his own” left. The unnaturalness of such “instrumentalization” of personality is obvious and the unexpressed emotions of the “pseudo-robot” are channeled through socially acceptable forms - for example, through the “dream world” of anime and manga, with its cruelty, pornography and “kawaii” - in general, the satisfaction of desires for every taste. That’s why a “wave of dirt” swept over Tokyo when Maromi (the embodiment of kawaii) disappeared - this very dirt had nowhere to “channel” (“The unsatisfied desires of Maromi’s fans gave the "Bat Boy" unlimited power”). In general, dreams are evil, but still you can’t live without them, because otherwise unarticulated desires will “overflood.” However, the theme of the balance of dreams and reality, as well as a person’s self-worth, regardless of the social context, is more clearly demonstrated in the wonderful “Paprika”.

In all episodes of “Paranoia Agent,” the Japanese’s dependence on the opinions of others and the terrible consequences for the individual that such dependence leads to are critically comprehended: personality is replaced by imitation; loss of significance in the eyes of others (popularity) leads to self-destruction; the suppressed “alter ego” finally splits the soul; sympathy gives way to exploitation of a popular theme.

What solution to the problem does Satoshi Kon offer the Japanese? I think this is shown quite clearly in the last episode - Tsukiko stops worrying about shame in front of her father (an allusion to society) for her weakness, and feels a personal sense of guilt for the crushed dog. So the “Bat boy” says goodbye to Tsukika. Actually, the latest episode of “Paranoia Agent” can be suspected of promoting “Western values”). (That’s why I called Kon a “Westerner.”) When the heroine stops worrying about her father’s approval (the stern father appears here as a symbol of the rigid Japanese society), i.e., social approval/disapproval of her action, and experiences a completely Christian personal feeling of guilt, a replacement of ethics occurs shame to the ethics of guilt. Thus, the relativistic morality of the “shame society” (until people know, there is nothing to worry about), is replaced by the Christian morality of “personal guilt” (an apology to the dead Maromi is a kind of confession). In a system of social regulation based in shame, a person will not experience relief from confession. Moreover, it is very difficult for a person in such a society to admit to committing an unseemly act. It is this complication in the articulation of experiences that creates the "Bat Boy". When does concern about the external assessment of your behavior disappear and there is no need to "isolate" the "bad" particle of one’s “I” (which, in this case, takes on its own life and turns into an “alter ego”) and the emphasis shifts to the absolute significance of actions and the impossibility of hiding them from oneself, then the need for an “alter ego” and the very basis disappears his existence - the "Bat Boy" disappears.

Of course, the division into “shame” and “guilt” as criteria for dominant behavior within different cultures is quite arbitrary. Shame is also experienced in Western societies (often without guilt). Rather, here we can talk about a specific Christian consciousness, for which it is important not so much external adherence to the requirements of the law, but internal honesty with oneself in the awareness of the evil committed (rejection of “pharisaism”) and the desire to improve, even if about your “evil” others don't even know.

As noted by (Konchi Ichikawa, Yujiro Nakamura), Japanese culture can be seen as a culture of situational ethics, as opposed to the Christian ethics of moral absolutes. In a culture of shame, morality is only a relative norm. The nature of situational ethics is that a person needs to fit into a certain situation, and good and evil differ depending on the specific circumstances. The peculiarity of the “shame culture” is that its bearers do not live according to absolute, once and for all established criteria, but according to relative, situational criteria. This way, of course, it’s easier to live, but it doesn’t really work out in practice. Often some kind of relative criterion, due to custom or external circumstances, acquires constancy, becomes absolute, and begins to put pressure on people. This is where the leveling, standard-forming forces of Japanese society lie.

This “relativity of evil” in Japanese culture, the concern that for the Japanese, evil becomes such only when others find out about it and condemn it, is the subject of reflection by Satoshi Kon in “Paranoia Agent.” After all, social disapproval does not destroy evil, but only drives it “underground,” where it seems to go unnoticed. So we get a certain “duality” of people and objects in the series, when socially approved behavior and behavior outside of social control are contrasted (when the only restraining factor disappears - shame): a policeman during the day - a robber and rapist at night, a modest employee during the day - a depraved slut at night, etc. But such “locked” evil either leads to self-destruction (Takeo Doi “Anatomy of Dependence – A culture of Amae”), or, sooner or later, breaks out in mud streams onto the streets of Tokyo. And not just as a metaphor in the anime by Satoshi Kon. As Yujiro Nakamura notes: “When the patriarch of Aum Shinrikyo Asahara, relying on Diamond Chariot Buddhism, preached the usefulness of killing, his extremism caused confusion among most Japanese. It seemed that they were hearing such heretical views for the first time, supposedly dating back to Tibetan Buddhism. Meanwhile Such a point of view on Evil in general and on murder in particular is historically not alien to the Japanese... That is why Japanese society succumbs so easily to mass sentiments and fads; a person himself does not notice how he finds himself involved in some kind of collective madness. It is impossible to establish who is actually to blame for what happened... For the time being, Japanese society managed to quite cleverly avoid the contradictions inherent in the ideological gap between Buddhism and Christianity, but conditions in the world have changed. Time itself demands that we take this seriously understanding the problem of Evil and Sin in the broadest sense, including in the field of view both the theory of knowledge and the Buddhism of the Diamond Chariot..."

Did Satoshi Kon manage to comprehend social problems in such a way in the artistic images? I think, partly, yes. And the proposed solution, as for me, is obvious - only a shift to the position of “guilt ethics” (gaining Christian consciousness) of the main character allowed her to get rid of (or rather to incorporate) her “shadow”. Of course, the problems raised by Kon are not specifically Japanese. It’s just that in Japan they are most clearly expressed precisely in the aspect of the “culture of shame,” which, it seems to me, is a kind of “escape from oneself.” After all, it is much easier to subordinate one’s “I” to certain social rules, group interests, a state, a nation, an idea (or to justify deviation by the social environment, human “nature,” etc.) than to accept personal responsibility for one’s life and one’s actions. As Ruth Benedict noted, when a Japanese takes any action, in accordance with certain regulations, he assumes that people will certainly understand his behavior down to the most subtle nuances. From here are born the confidence and sense of security that serve as the Japanese’s life support. And with his entire upbringing he is oriented towards this style of behavior. In one sense or another, everyone has a similar temptation - to adapt either to the social environment, or to a convenient worldview, to an advantageous position - in a word, to everything that will relieve us of personal responsibility and justify our atrocities. And only thanks to this, nightmares of mass murders and atrocities are possible - be it the atrocities of the NSDAP, the CPSU (b), the CPC, Russia or any others committed in the name of the “idea”, “nation”, “state”, “emperor”, “fuhrer" or a particular social group.

The last remark, of course, goes beyond the scope of the artistic interpretation of "Paranoia Agent", but, it seems to me, it is connected with the dominance of moral relativism and the thoughtless dependence of many people on dominant views, ideas, assessments that are not questioned and not verified with moral imperatives, because “everyone does/thinks so.” And while Satoshi Kon proposed that the Japanese become a “guilt society,” isn’t the whole world gradually turning into kind of “shame society” - when there is no absolute evil (sin) and it (evil) exists only when it has become known and (most importantly) condemned (shamed) by others?

The second season of "Nagatoro" is both similar and different from the first. Senpai and Nagatoro change - accordingly, their relationship and the tone of the anime itself change. The "freaky" romcom is gradually turning into a "family romance". The flirtation of falling in love, with its endless fun and ease, cannot last forever - falling in love will either develop into something more, gradually fading away and giving way to true love, or, contrary to its nature, it will survive, mutating into something disgusting, mercilessly binding two tormentors who will take without giving, be jealous, suspicious, annoyed, fight for dominance and enjoy inflicting pain ... and humiliation on each other. Fortunately, in the case of our heroes, falling in love gradually dies, freeing the hearts of Nagatoro and Senpai for a more mature feeling of love. Perhaps it is this choice of the way to develop the relationship between the characters and the atmosphere of the anime itself that is played out in the first episode, when instead of following the openly BDSM manga with licking the heroine’s shoes, Senpai simply wipes the stain with a handkerchief.

As the story progresses, Senpai becomes more and more self-confident, plays sports, reacts less and less to Nagatoro's teasing and begins to notice more and more how vulnerable she really is, hasty in decisions and dependent on him. He gradually takes control of the relationship into his own hands. Nagatoro herself is also trying to change - her thoughtless jokes and teasing are becoming more and more inappropriate and increasingly causing harm to herself. She realizes that in a developing relationship, she herself needs to grow and offer something more than her usual lightness, cheerfulness, sex appeal and childish carefreeness. Therefore, Nagatoro behaves more and more seriously and responsibly, trying to balance the charm of her natural spontaneity with serious work on herself and on her relationship with Senpai.

Of course, the jokes and teasing have not gone away, but they have become less frequent and mild as the characters' relationships changing. In addition, Senpai implicitly and unconsciously (or maybe consciously) joined the game, either embarrassing Nagatoro in the episode with putting on tights, or playing up her recklessness and previous teasing in the episode with an invitation to a date, offering to go to a horse race or a dog fight. However, in general, banter is increasingly giving way to mutual care, simplicity and efficiency of the daily life of a couple trying to build a serious and long-term relationship. Therefore, on the one hand, in the second season there is less of the fun and lightness of carefree love flirting on the verge of a foul, which was in the first season of “Nagatoro”, but, on the other hand, there is more warmth and mature love in the relationships of the heroes, and, as it seems to me, in the author’s attitude towards his characters. Thus the second season has its own charm, different from the first. And the fact that the two seasons turned out to be so different, the fact that this anime is not stuck in place by exploiting the theme of falling in love, and is not afraid to develop (in the entirely right direction) along with the development of the relationships of the main characters, in my opinion, is the main advantage of "Nagatoro".

It would seem that “Nagatoro” has absorbed hackneyed anime clichés: there is a shy to the point of pain, homely, fearful and weak main male character - an introvert (Senpai) and a main female character who shows an incomprehensible (and extremely unhealthy) interest in Senpai - a hyperactive girl a grade younger him, beauty and athlete (Nagatoro or "Demoness"). Nagatoro's interest in Senpai reveals in a quite unusual way - through all kinds of bullying (mainly of a moral nature, but not without assault), vulgar ridicule and bringing Senpai to tears with humiliation. However, the huge amount of time that the Demoness spends on bullying, ... often of a sexual nature, and her obvious outbursts of jealousy towards Senpai, indicate Nagatoro's interest in him. The latter, although he sluggishly protests against ridicule, sexual harassment and humiliation, also experiences pleasure from the constant attention from the Demoness and from her sexual provocations. It would seem that everything is clear - we have a rom-com with ecchi elements, with clichéd characters, romanticizing the codependent relationship of a couple of sexual perverts who have found each other, with an obvious abuser, Nagatoro, and the victim of her harassment, Senpai, and they show us ordinary sadomasochism, which does not cross the line of outright BDSM -pornography only due to the age restrictions of anime.

However, there is something in this anime that catches and captivates even those who do not experience a perverted attraction to sadomasochistic games. Here you should pay attention to the first episode, in which a short flashback explains the passivity and timidity of Senpai. He recalls how, from early childhood, he was constantly teased, beaten and humiliated by his peers, from which he stopped resisting and tried in every possible way to remain invisible to others. Especially for people like Nagatoro and her friends. Senpai says that Nagatoro is the same as his past tormentors, but immediately admits that he partly enjoys her bullying. Why is this so? Perhaps the mechanism of such psychological defense is similar to Stockholm syndrome. The victim of the latter, as a result of psychologically traumatic violence, begins to associate himself with the aggressor, thus trying to relieve the stress of his own helplessness and may well fall in love with the abuser. And as one of the “admirers” of this anime put it, Senpai turned out to be the winner, who made his bully fall in love with him. Isn't that what every victim of Stockholm syndrome wants?

However, it is extremely mistaken to believe that between Nagatoro and Senpai everything comes down to perverted sexual desire, Stockholm syndrome and there is no real love. Just the opposite - ridicule and teasing are an indispensable attribute of falling in love. Falling in love, like sex, is an eternal subject of jokes. It is wrong to think that ridicule is always hostile. Lovers are always making fun of each other. It turned out that the humiliation experienced by Senpai, upon meeting Nagatoro, was transformed into a love game. Humiliating jokes have become part of flirting. An abstract “bully”, before whom the main character felt helpless, turned from an unclear threat into a specific sexy girl, sincerely in love with Senpai and never bringing his bullying to something that could truly harm him. On the contrary, Nagatoro protects and entertains Senpai in every possible way, trying to help him overcome his long-standing psychological trauma and adapt socially. A “bully” not only became unarmed and safe, but became dependent on Senpai and began to “serve” him.

The same applies to the hero’s shyness. As Kant said, laughter is an affect that arises when tense expectation turns into nothing. All the complexes and sexual fantasies that weigh on Senpai and oppress him, Nagatoro, with her provocative jokes, pulls out, making them visible and funny and, thereby, disarming them, destroying their power over Senpai and liberating him. In the process of ridicule, in the form of a game, Nagatoro provides Senpai with everything that he secretly dreams of. The heroine persistently heals Senpai’s mental wounds, exposing them and making them harmless.

So, everything that Senpai was afraid of, that traumatized and oppressed him, turned from an invincible monster, against which Senpai was powerless into an energetic and attractive girl, head over heels in love with the protagonist, who was stunned by this situation. Perhaps, for many, such a girl - a “savior”, “safe”, playful and emphatically sexy, but at the same time innocent and bashful (yes, contradictions to fantasies are not a hindrance), who is sincerely in love with them, who destroys their fears by ridiculing and pulls them out of the shell of loneliness and dullness of everyday life, is the subject of sweet dreams. Something same to a “Prince Charming” for girls. Therefore, there is nothing surprising in the popularity of Nagatoro even among the public not prone to sadomasochism.

But that's not all. The author of "Nagatoro", skillfully conveying the experience of falling in love that he apparently experienced, involves the audience in the depicted love game. They, together with the heroes, engage in a light and cheerful love dance, through empathy with the heroes, overcoming their own fears, complexes and embarrassment, worrying and laughing together with Nagatoro and Senpai, and experiencing catharsis with them. Coming into contact with love through anime characters, viewers experience the lightness that accompanies it. After all, even when everything is so bad for lovers that, looking at them in real life, you cry - in poverty, in the hospital, on a prison visit - their joy amazes us and touches us in a way that few other things can. Perhaps it was this joy and lightness that captivated me most in “Nagatoro”. This is what distinguishes “Nagatoro” from other romcoms, where love coexists with melodrama and excessive sentimentalism, while lightness is often absent altogether, turning love into a “bittersweet” perversion of a genuine feeling. The undoubted skill of the manga and anime writers, as well as the Japanese voice actors, in how they successfully conveyed the fun and ease of falling in love deserves high praise.

Despite the well-known clichés (types of the main characters, conventions of Japanese romance) and the unevenness of the narrative, "Insomnia" definitely stands out from other slice of life romances and leaves a pleasant impression. The character design is the first thing that draws attention. Makoto Ojiro managed to create her own, original style of drawing, which is very well combined with her style of narration. Like the story, Makoto's drawing is quite original, but not catchy and pretentious, but calm and pastel. Like the story, her art lacks a bit of stability and elaboration.

A pair of protagonists is quite typical - a gloomy, insecure, hyper-reflexive ... psychasthenic guy, exaggeratedly suffering from learned helplessness, and his girlfriend - a cheerful, active, athletic, careless sanguine girl. The only thing they have in common is that both suffer from insomnia and, by chance, become members of the astronomical club. One more thing - this couple of lovers becomes sleepy from each other, which in their case, paradoxically, is a mutual compliment ) It is obvious that Isaki (the girl) is attracted by stability and reliability of the guy, and the guy (Ganta) is attracted by Isaki's cheerfulness and liveliness. And, unfortunately, it is also obvious that, due to the conventions of Japanese romance, confessions occur only at the very end. This is such a "hackneyed" cliché that it can't even be considered a spoiler. But the secondary characters, with whom Makoto seems to have allowed herself a certain freedom from cliches, are pleasing - especially the mature and reasonable Tao and the eccentric geek girl Yui.

As for the story, it turned out to be somewhat chaotic. It seems that after starting the story, Makoto could not decide for some time what and how she wanted to tell. This shift from calm, Seinen storytelling, to melodramatically exaggerated shojo-style platitudes, to geeky meditativeness (the technical details of camera setup, shooting the night sky), may well alienate some viewers. At times, the plot is filled with reflections and experiences of the main characters about their lives and short excursions into the stories of other characters, and at times it becomes empty and simply boring. But, in its second half, the story does decide what it is (calm, meditative Seinen romantic slice of life with a contemplative protagonist, his sweet, cheerful girlfriend and a pinch of geekiness), and ends with a completely successful ending. Even a certain personal growth of the boy is shown, when he, contrary to his obedience and responsibility, decides on an act that violates the rules, a "rebellion" against someone else's will. For his girlfriend, of course.

In general, "Insomnia" is a pretty good representative of Seinen romantic slice of life. What gives it some originality, apparently, is the fact that this is a Seinen created by a woman who could not help but bring the originality of her vision to this genre. As well as her own, peculiar, drawing. Although both the narration and the art style of Makoto are still unstable and raw, they undoubtedly have their own individuality. Just for this "Insomnia" definitely deserves attention.

"Where there is life, there is conflict. And talking doesn't always solve everything" the "fairy" Maedasaki instructs the protagonist in his dream. "Reideen" is full of conflicts. Between aliens and humans, between giant alien "robots" and Reideen, between Reideen and the army, between the army and military intelligence, between departments of military intelligence itself... But the main conflict of "Reideen" is internal. This anime is in conflict with itself, unable to finally decide what it is and what it is about. As a result, it loses the battle to itself. Those mecha lovers who are attracted to action will find "Reideen" boring and overextended. Combats ... are rare, Reideen's transformation animation cutscenes are frequent and lengthy, and the movements of the giant machines are slow. Fans of trash, entertaining stories and humor will not find either one or the other or the third in "Reideen", but they will find it too serious and grave. Fans of melodrama, blood and boobs will also be disappointed with "Reideen" - there are no emotional anguish, no dismemberment, no kawaii girls suffering from breast hyperplasia. Fans of romance will find only a very crumpled hint of it, hastily built into the very end of the series. Those who are interested in serious anime will be repulsed by the indestructible stupidity of the protagonist, often manifested in completely illogical (like fleeing from the alien base ship when it was defenseless and could be easily, safely and methodically shot down) and stupid actions, fragmentation of the narrative and gaping plot holes (incompleteness of separate storylines, "magic" with dressing up of the MC, which can only be attributed to sclerosis or hack-work of scriptwriters, etc.).

The protagonist, Junki Saiga, is also stuck somewhere between narratives - between his strong, bold and determined "prototype" from the original 1975-76 series and the ever-doubting, timid, stupid, whiny and weak modern days anime protagonists modeled after Ikari Shinji. He should be taller and more mature than his classmates, an excellent and aggressive kendo swordsman, fighting on equal terms with swords with an experienced alien warrior Roxel, controlling Reideen like an extension of his body and receiving physical damage when his "robot" is attacked, but he is actually depicted as a rather frail nerd, who at the beginning does not even try to fight, being one-sidedly beaten up by ordinary punks and is not even able to get angry at a deliberate "friendly fire" by the army. At the same time, there is no limit to the stupidity and passivity of the protagonist - most of his problems come from his own slavish obedience and revealing all Reideen's secrets to the government. Like the hero of the original series, he yells "Ruuuydin! Faido-in!", but it looks completely ridiculous with his character and in a remake that wants to be serious. Just as ridiculous is the futuristic moped in the remake in which the sportbike of the protagonist of the original series was "turned" into.

"Reideen" cannot decide what story it is trying to convey to the viewer. There are many “hinted” stories, but they are all fragmentary, loosely connected to each other and not shown properly. Starting with the detective story of the mysterious death of Junki's father, the anime soon completely "forgets" about it. Political intrigues within the army can not be taken seriously against the backdrop of the epic stupidity of the protagonist, who, like a suicidal, plays giveaway all the time, cannot distinguish enemies from friends, and only in some completely incomprehensible way (often miraculously saved at the last moment by alien enemies, performing the role of deus ex machina for the MC) manages to escape death. The title theme of Junki's "growing up" is rather vaguely illustrated and mostly only voiced by the other characters in the anime. The romance line, which is barely traceable for most of the episodes, then suddenly develops rapidly, leaving a feeling of crumpledness and understatement. The key theme of the hero's acceptance of himself and his responsibility is not sufficiently emphasized and is raised only in a couple of episodes, ending with a short comment by Midorino. In general, Midorino voices almost all the key morales in the "Reideen", which, given the small amount of screen time allotted to her (in her human form), blures the message of the anime.

And yet, I liked the remake of "Reideen". Largely due to the things which are not in it and what many will consider a disadvantage - there is no anguish of passion, blood, fan service, trash, intoxication, hurricane action, kawaii, saucer eyes, cellulite oppai, blue, green and other pink hair, stupid jokes and sentimental nonsense. The Art Nouveau 3D animation of Reideen and its transformations is quite beautiful. In general, the drawing and animation in "Reideen" is on top from the very beginning - for example, the animation of movements in the second episode in the hospital, when Junki, while fleeing from the "zombies", slips on the turn. The design of the characters is especially good - without the grotesqueness and colorfulness inherent in anime, but with a certain stylization for the Art Nouveau or even mannerism - the figures and faces of people are beautiful and slightly elongated, but not exaggerated. The anime has a pleasant opening with a city-pop song and a green-eyed beauty Midorino posing in various clothes, as well as a blue-eyed, golden Reideen shown in the ending which is made in the Art Nouveau style. Seiyuu are all good - the main and secondary characters are voiced superbly. Some of these secondary characters are also well written - especially Hoshikawa and the obsessive Shiori.Roxel is quite stereotypical, but nonetheless interesting with his imp cat. I liked the repulsive for many viewers “inhibition” of the movements of “robots”, because it conveys the size and mass of gigantic machines. The same applies to the "prolonged" transformation - this is exactly how military equipment functions, which always requires time to deploy. The romance line, although rather crumpled, pleases with the lack of melodrama and, especially, how it ended for the annoying stalker Shiori, the obsessive childhood friend of the protagonist. The main character behaves with the girl he is in love with, quite believable for his temperament. At first he is gathering his bravery and looks for an opportunity to get close, some sign that she likes him, and only after that he gains the courage to speak.

Although vaguely, here can be traced the main line of the anime which is Junki's coming of age - from a kid obedient to someone else's will, avoiding responsibility, by the end of the series he transforms into a capable guy who knows what he wants from life and is able to act contrary to the opinions of others (one can only hope that growing up also helped him get rid of stupidity and he was smart enough not to tell the military about who Midorino is). In general, if you omit the fantastical assumptions like giant robots and aliens, "Reideen" is a coming of age story. In the story-dream of episode 22, everyone calls the MC only by his last name and he needs to find himself, become a person, by recognizing his name, encrypted in an anagram in the name of his "magic sword" - this is the only way he can defeat the monster and save the princess. Throughout the series, Junki gradually "finds himself", while literally (through communication) and figuratively (by symbolically fighting with the help of Reideen) interacting with Midorino. By contrast, his childhood friend Shiori doesn't "grow up" and, unlike Midorino, doesn't help Junki grow up (and deal with problems), and therefore, eventually, loses him. The contrast between Midorino and Shiori is emphasized in the episodes with Junki's "supermoped" falling - where Shiori remained indifferent, Midorino hurries to help Junki to lift the moped. While MC grows up, he learns to overcome his "limits", take responsibility, not be afraid of conflicts, but, defending himself, solve and even create them, if circumstances so require, resisting the will of others. The need for a "symbolic crutch", which was Reideen, disappears, and Junki gets his princess. Both with the moral message (albeit poorly illustrated) and with the ending, the series is all right, and the animation and art are quite capable of bringing aesthetic pleasure. The characters are written worse, especially "suffered" from the screenwriters the main character. But, nevertheless, the characters here are noticeably more interesting and behave more believably than in most other anime, especially in the "mecha" genre. So, despite the serious problems with the narrative and a very narrow niche, "Reideen" deserves the attention of connoisseurs of aesthetics, allegory and unhurried narration.