In my first post on FLCL I stuck to a general impression-style approach because, quite honestly, there’s too much to say about it in one go. Given the fact that it’s easy for the colourful and frenetic nature of the series to obscure the really clever things it does, I felt the need to concentrate on the characterisation. So here it is: the second half of my assessment of why FLCL is pure win, even now.
In most cases the point that stories are always about the characters is fundamental and obvious: remove that and all you’re left with is a cool-looking music video or experiment in artistic techniques at best, and a meaningless mess at worst. There’s more to FLCL than just the superficial coolness so the usual rules apply: when the after-effects of the explosions and WTF moments subside this series stays with you. Important things happen to those involved and, are meaningful because you care about what happens. The crazy stuff really just serves to emphasise why certain things are significant, albeit conveying the said significance of the feelings and events in an innovative and memorable way.
Naota is the source of my ‘spirit of adolescence’ impression of the series as a whole. He carries an air of Gen X cynicism, laconically describing Mabase as a boring town when everyone around him is either eccentric or emotionally damaged. His inadvertant brushing aside of Mamimi’s advances or the way he describes the steam periodically pouring from the Medical Mechanica facility as a bad omen is prophetic enough but seeing a factory shaped like a giant iron – a bloody IRON for fuck’s sake – and not seeing anything unusual in that says a lot about his character and, perhaps, the jaded teenage outlook he represents.
He never smiles, never shows innocent childlike curiosity; he is in some ways older than his years. I find this to be a little sad because he’s a kid who can’t appreciate the relatively carefree nature of childhood and believes the good times of life are already over. Of course, Naota isn’t quite a child: he’s in the halfway house of adolescence, which is a confusing time because, both physically and emotionally, everything changes…but not at the same time. I guess the unchanged facets of his make-up are trying to adjust to those that have changed. Maybe the disdain for both children and adults is a way of distancing oneself from these two demographics: he doesn’t feel he has anything in common with kids or grown-ups, and feels isolated as a result.
Looking at Naota’s adult role models, it’s hardly surprising he can’t look up, or even relate, to them. His father and grandfather act pretty immature and hardly set a good example; Haruko, the strange Vespa woman from outer space, is also an adult but she is so irresponsible and impulsive she might as well be a child herself. Surrounded by older people who ought to know better is bound to nurture a feeling of contempt in an impressionable teenager who already feels alone.
After all, Naota has already lost an important childhood companion in the form of his brother. His name is never mentioned as far as I can tell; we never find out much about him at all beyond the fact that he’s studying overseas, may have a new girlfriend over there and has left his previous girl Mamimi behind. I guess Naota feels a mixture of loss and envy for his elder sibling because good old Aniki, his hero and role model, has flown the nest for a flashy baseball career and has left Naota to suffer the boredom of remaining in Mabase.
Mamimi is fascinating. She’s more than just a lovesick jilted girlfriend, at least. I never really grasped her true feelings for Naota: is there a similarity between the brothers that makes her want to stay close to the familiar persona that has stayed by her side? Does Naota let her hang out with him because he cares for her too, or can he just not be bothered to get rid of her? Or is it the fact that they share a sense of loss over the Nandaba boy who left and seek mutual comfort in that?
Mamimi seems to be the sort of person who is reliant on the support of others, even to the point of leaning on a younger version of her boyfriend for company as some sort of substitute. Her backstory, hinted at in the Firestarter episode, suggests that she has her fair share of traumas and personal issues and seeks an escape from reality through some unlikely methods. She’s one of those characters I ought to feel contempt towards for being so prone to seeking refuge in fantasies and running away from the pain of real life, but for some reason I do actually feel really sorry for her.
I wonder if the robot creature that she unwittingly sends on a rampage inspired the plotline for Garakuta no Machi (Junk Town), a quirky Studio 4°C short in which another lonely kid finds company in a robot beastie with a voracious appetite for other mechanical objects. As in that OAV, Mamimi’s new friend is a symptom of her loneliness and ultimately this isolation spills out onto the human beings around her.
Another instance of someone’s inner feelings manifesting themselves as something outrageous and destructive is that of Eri Ninamori, whose Class President façade falls away in spectacular fashion in the third episode. The treatment of her character is an example how the story slows down a bit to catch its breath and flesh out the personalities of the characters portrayed; she finds something of a kindred spirit in Naota, which is a noteworthy moment because connection and understanding is such a rare thing in the FLCL universe.
The way that Eri’s circumstances are portrayed does feel like a flash in the pan but it says a lot nonetheless. Amidst the madness, there’s a character who seems to have both feet on the ground; the sane person in a crowd of unstable people. It reminds me a bit of the Monty Python movies or Blackadder actually, in which an intelligent and rational person is continually exposed to irrationality day in, day out. No wonder she loses it a bit.
As you get away from the central characters the amount of insight diminishes. Even so there are still occasional details that stick in the memory: as a parting shot I can’t not pass comment on Amarao. As the Chancellor of the Exchequer will testify, a pair of Epic Eyebrows definitely does not compensate for other personal attributes that may be lacking. The moment where one of his eyebrows comes unstuck and falls solemnly to the ground was a moment that carried far more pathos that it possibly deserved.
I hate you, Bakemonogatari was supposed to take the place of FLCL in my Top 5. With that post, how am I supposed to do that ?
I think a lot of Naota’s story can be summed up as disillusionment with the idea of adulthood, which is why Amarao losing his eyebrows was a weighty moment even though he was not a fleshed out character — that was his purpose in existing.
Naota thinks that as long as he’s unenthusiastic and cynical, he’s acting adult-like, but the discovery that other so-called adults are doing essentially the same thing (faking it) reduces his concept of growing up to a pair of fake eyebrows. Perhaps his brother (who actually does have a name though it’s not really mentioned: Tasuku, hence Takkun) was the only mature one around, but a more likely story is that he left before Naota had a chance to start to come to these realizations.
To me it’s another chapter of the Gainax Manifesto, that you should grow greater but not grow older. When you become an “adult” that means you’re either a cold bastard (Gendo), a guy who makes supposed “tough decisions” instead of doing what’s right (Rossiu), or… not really an adult at all, just an overgrown kid with faux eyebrows. When you think of what giant otaku Anno, Tsurumaki, etc are, it makes sense.
Ninamori’s episode is easily my favorite; to me it sums up the whole pain-of-adolescence story the best, while at the same time playing the symbolic weight of “getting hit by Haruko’s bike” for laughs in the dinner table scene. And then the magic moment when Canti swallows Naota synced to the opening chords of “Little Busters”… you can’t stop the awesome.
Love the post, I think I might go watch FLCL again now…
What made this whole series work for me was Naota’s behavior; he thinks that his town and his life sucks and is very boring when all kinds of wonderful and strange things are going all around him.
You’re completely right about Naota being in the “halfway house of adolescence”; Naota is surrounded by what should be at least three different objects of sexual attraction who come on to him in one form or another at various times but he’s too immature to do anything but either act indifferent or ignore the situation. I don’t think that Naota is really cold or indifferent but that’s the only way he knows how act when he’s confused or uncertain.
It’s no mistake how FLCL remains one of anime’s classic stories. While the animation might have aged, the visual style and narrative edge might now be overused, and the boisterous J-rock soundtrack is now more familiar than novel, great characterization will always be relevant. “Gainax Manifesto” sounds dramatic and overblown for a rather simple outlook on life, but it does seem like an essentially valid one to me.
In a book I once read written by an exceedingly philosophical video game designer, he talks about the difference between games and stories. The former focuses on action, and great ones emphasize the importance of decisions and logic, teaching one to weigh options and make more effective one’s decision making process. The latter, at its core, is about characters, and the great ones focus on characters’ thoughts and feelings, teaching empathy among other themes. FLCL is one of those great stories.
Proud to join such a list of confirmed FLCL fans.
Naota – among all the frightening transformations around him – robots sprouting from his head, fathers turning into android zombies, etc, the worst transformation is from adolescent to adult. Ick.
Another recently read book – odd anime catalogue – the author was pointing out that the sound design of FLCL was way ahead of most anime and totally shaped the viewing experience – not just The Pillows rocking out (bless ‘em) but the churning washing machines, buzzing streetlights, cars on overhead bridges – went back to watch it again, and he’s so right.
Excellent insight. I agree 100%.
It’s funny that this is THE anime for a certain generation of English-speaking anime fans, probably the ones who grew up with the early days of Adult Swim in the US. Makes me wonder if it has nearly the same influence for the Japanese.
Mamimi started out as my favourite character due to pure identification and in all honesty she probably still is.
Haruko is a force of nature, unstoppable with ambition and intention, and Mamimi is a direct contrast to this – trapped in stasis with no real drive and unable to move forward as a result. This is partly due to her co-dependence, as you said, but a lot of it has to do with her complete lack of prospects. Her vengeance mission in the later episodes demonstrates how deep and crippling her ennui is with even the slightest offence being something she festers over and acts out against. She’s near insane during those scenes and it demonstrates how suffocated she is by her surroundings. It’s also the preceded by her giving up on Tasuku, who abandons her to go on adventures away from Mabase and acts as this sort of betrayer and inspirational figure all of once. Betrayer because he leaves her, but inspiration because he shows it can be done.
In many ways Mamimi is the real victim of what Naota laments about regarding Mabase and its nowhere prospects. He’s scared of what might happen but she’s already there, living it. She’s the only character that genuinely feels like they’re trapped and her flights of fancy are all desperate acts to rise above the tedium. She burns it down (Endsville), summons the apocalypse, facilitates the MM iron to wipe it clean. Every quirky action is actually a tragic grasp at something better or exciting. It’s an overblown GAINAX analogy for anyone who’s ever felt like they’ll never get out of their shitty little town and away its shitty opportunities, but it’s very effective and fundamentally true.
On a slightly less depressing note, though, she’s also the only character who we know definitely escapes. I found the ending, her photo in the magazine, so powerful because of the relief I felt that she gets free of it all. I think at the time it gave me a bit of hope.
@Smankh: sorry! Bakemonogatari is better than most things I’ve seen lately, but FLCL is better than…almost everything!
@Otou-san: I like the idea of a Gainax Manifesto challenging what ‘growing up’ means. I know they’re an organisation run by geeks and catering to a young audience, but I really like the way stories such as FLCL question how to go about behaving like a proper adult. I guess it crops up in anime a lot, but Gainax have done some of the most memorable examples.
@Chris K: yeah, Naota’s cynicism is I think the result of not really knowing how to deal with certain situations. Half the time he’s acting like he couldn’t care less, but often he’s just unsure of what to do as well.
@kadian1364: that sounds like a really neat summing-up there. I noticed a difference in storytelling approach to visual novels and the anime adaptations, now you mention it. The story might be the same but the emphasis is somewhat different; I guess there’s an even bigger difference between full-on games and their adaptations (although adaptations of video games are rarely as good…maybe this is the reason why!).
@ojisan: I’ve always thought that Gainax excel in making OAVs rather than TV shows; Gunbuster and FLCL are classics to me. What I noticed about Gunbuster 2 though, even though it’s not as good as its predecessor, is how much attention was paid to the little details: stuff like the rustle of clothing and the sounds of footsteps, and FLCL is the same I guess. Animated films rarely go to so much trouble to include anything more than dialogue, BGM and the most noticeable sound effects.
@2DT: I wonder too. There seems to be an emphasis on new titles but it’s hard to gauge how the older ones have stayed in the limelight. There’s a fondness for the really old classics, but I don’t think FLCL is quite in that area either. It’s kinda in between.
@Hige: I’m glad I’m not the only one whose attention was caught by Mamimi. Part of the reason is a subconscious feeling that she’s too easily overlooked by the other characters (not to mention the viewers), but whose eventual fate is perhaps the most poignant.
I often wonder whether I’ll ever tire of watching this…the relatively short length helps I guess. It just gets everything right.
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