chroniclesofgenesis

[chroniclesofgenesis]

Alien Stage and Religion

I watched the popular Alien Stage youtube series a while back and was interested about how often "God" was mentioned. Thus, I'm going to explore religion in ALNST in this post.

Keep in mind, I am not a fan and casually watched the avaliable videos and searched a few things up here and there, so my view...will be surface level. It will also probably be a reach, and none of it is canon.

I'll start with Anakt garden, a sort of music school for the human children, which teaches them musical literacy and prepares them to praticipate in the alien stage competitions. However, it uses a cult-like system to brainwash the human kids. They are made to believe in a false god called "Anakt". Which, apparently in the comics, Till's mother has prayed to before. Based off of this, I can assume that this God acts the same as a God from monotheistic and Abrahamic religions.

But our four main characters (Mizi, Sua, Till, Ivan) are unaffacted by the brainwashing. Because their love for others (Sua and Mizi's mutual love, Till's & Ivan's unrequited love) is more important to them than whatever Anakt God. This fuels their love for singing more than faith.

ROUND ONE: MY CLEMATIS

Mizi and Suaare the most religiously tied out of all the others. In this video, Mizi already speaks of a god. She mentions that on Earth, humans used to believe in a God and have religion; that things that couldn't be solved with human strength was just the will of God. And that these Gods (here she mentions it plural), lived in a place connected with the sky where humans simply could not reach.

She also explains that the moment humanity left, they forgot God.

Her statement is untrue. Humans are unable to forget a God or Gods. Religion and faith will always exist in humanity, because a desperate human being will look for a savior and for a God. She proves this by saying "if believing in God is human, if all I can do as a human is believe..." and she looks at Sua next to her on stage and thinks "my God, my universe".

Mizi sees Sua as her God, or I think it would be better to say as an "idol", aka a false God. The lyrics of the song also prove this as they sing in the beginning "Oh my Clematis, hope bloomed from the abyss, oh my Clematis, always be by my side."

It's fair to assume that to Mizi, Sua was that God, the one who gave her hope/made the hope 'bloom' like a clematis flower. The meaning of the clematis flower is also interesting; it means mental acquity, which could be interpreted that the feeling they had for each other made their minds clear & reasonable, causing them to be unaffected by the Anakt garden's brainwashing.

After Sua dies on stage beside Mizi, she

After Sua dies on stage, Mizi is left to sing "oh my Clematis, hope withered in the abyss" by herself. Her 'idol' had died right in front of her, and her hope vanished as well. My personal interpretation of this was that Mizi was 'punished' (not by the aliens, maybe an actual God or the universe), for believing and seeing a false God. The death of Sua in front of her forced her to realize that Sua was, in fact, not a God nor the universe. Only a mere human just as she is. It's somewhat common knowledge that many religions strictly forbid the belief in other idols or Gods.

I also believe that Sua acted like Mizi's God.

Sua is a quiet character, and in the MIZISUA video we see her eyes which are hollow with no emotion, she looks dead or like a doll. Later on, she is shown to be happy and much more alive when she is with Sua. The pleasant feelings she had beside Mizi, compared to the dull emotions in the past, may have been what caused Sua to keep Mizi in the dark about the way their world worked.

She may have wanted for Mizi to always be carefree and happy, to look at Sua with the eyes of love and hope. This also may have led Sua to unintentionally feel God-like, because Mizi saw her as her whole universe. When they sing together, she knows she's going to die, meanwhile it looks like Mizi is in the dark about this. My theory is that, Sua, as someone who is looked up to as a God, needs to sacrifice herself for Mizi. Her actions were selfish, ungodlike, in this way I see her more as an angel (off topic but it reminds me of that song that goes "always an angel, never a God" haha.)

It's actually really difficult for me to see them as lovers or girlfriends. I saw it more as co-dependancy with heavy religious undertones.

While we're on Mizi and Sua:

ROUND 5: RULER OF MY HEART

Mizi is standing on stage against Luka. And we see that Luka is provoking her by using Sua and reminding Mizi of what she had lost. Mizi becomes angry and uncharacteristic to her, she attacks Luka.

I'm tying it to my theory from above: Mizi remained to be innocent and happy while she had Sua as her 'idol' but once she loses that, she becomes aggressive and violent. It's like how many religious people are held back to commit "sinful actions" by their fear or strong love towards a God/Gods. Obviosly, consider this a stretch, it's easier to say that Mizi did that because she was traumatized.

Luka is the only character I actually found extremely interesting in the entire series.

He is clearly shown as the spawn of Satan. A manipulative, scheming and cunning individual. Luka knew about Sua's and Mizi's interesting and complex relationship; Sua being a God-like figure to Mizi. It's difficult to say from what perspective Luka is singing his lyrics from.

I believe that verse 1 and the first chorus is sung by him but as if he is pretending to be Sua. Him imitating her voice and 'transforming' into Sua in Mizi's mind as he sings, confirms this.

The lyrics talk about a "perfect subject" and "when our darkness overlap (let me take it away from you)" it's like he is mocking Sua for acting like a God, and Mizi for being the faithful subject. When they sing the chorus, repeating, "ruler of the heart", it's like he is telling Mizi that Sua was ruling over her heart and now that she is dead, her heart is empty.

Then in verse 2 when he sings "make me your God, I can give you everything", Mizi hallucinates of Sua running by and then of the dead Sua. I believe that, once again, he was singing and mocking Sua.

He made Mizi fully acknowledge once more, that she made Sua her God, a God that ended up causing her pain rather than taking it away. In this way he mocked Sua and her death as well.

With the repeat of the "ruler of my heart", following right after, it aggravates Mizi, because she knows he is right. She is angry at him for mocking them both and she attacks him.

On the other hand, you can look at it through him singing the lyrics himself, rather than through acting like Sua. If you look at him like he is the spawn on Satan, you can see that he is trying to provoke her by getting Mizi to view him as a God now that Sua is gone. He kind of reminds me of that snake from the Adam and Eve in the biblical story. Trying to lure her into darkness. He succeeds when she attacks him, and he smiles at his little victory as she is being dragged away.

FINAL: BLINK GONE

(I skipped talking about the All-In video because I don't have enough material nor enough interest in the relationship between Hyuna and Luka.)

Luka, unlike Till, is seemingly laid-back and doesn't view Till as much of an opponent. Honestly, nothing religious here either, probably due to Till being on the stage as well (sounds weird but I'll explain Till later). Luka only gets slightly shocked when he sees the reignited hope in Till's eyes after Till notices Mizi in the crowd. His plan went slightly askew and it looks like he gets kind of angry before Till finally loses.

it's the only time he's really shown any emotions aside from when he sees Hyuna. It's very obvious that Luka likes the control he has over other peoples' emotions and feelings. He finds joy in tormenting others and most likely feels like a God-like figure. Unfortunately for him, he has one constant reminder of his human nature, because he has an underlying condition only humans can have which causes his blue-purple fingers.

I'm interested to see what his story is and what exactly is going through his mind. But he's not really part of the main characters so it leaves me a bit sad.

Alas, I have no more to say about the little blonde serpent.

*Also, this was my least favorite song in the series and I didn't look much into the lyrics.

IVAN AND TILL

Ivan and Till are much more interesting than Mizi and Sua in my opinion. However, I don't see any religious undertones at all. You can say Till wanted Mizi to be something like his saviour but I would disagree.

I believe these two characters are so much more interesting and complex through a psychological perspective.

If you remember, at the very beginning I talked about Anakt garden and how the four characters weren't affected by the cult brainwashing because of their love for each other.

I take it all back now.

Mizi wasn't affected because she viewed Sua as her God.

Sua wasn't affected because she viewed Mizi as her savior from despair.

Ivan wasn't affected; I believe Ivan is the type to not believe in things like a God or Gods or maybe even hold hatred for a God. He's just so unaffected by the religious stuff, he wants what he can see and feel. He wants Till. His feelings towards Till are interesting because in Black Sorrow he sings about how to him Till is a black sorrow. There's so much more too...

Till seems to be the most rebellious of them all. I can imagine it's probably why he's not affected by the Anakt garden. His love towards Mizi is the most reminiscent of one you would see on Earth. It's one where he wants to know more about Mizi, be beside her, see her, protect her, etc.

Well, if you dig far and deep you might find some religious symbolism for Ivan and Till (a friend mentioned that Till has lot's of cross imagery, I'm assuming in the comics). However, in my opinion, it'll be less interesting than figuring them out in a psychological way. Especially Ivan, who's incredibly mysterious.

ALIEN STAGE; SWEET DREAM

Finally, my favorite song in the entire series (alongside Nowhere, which at the time of my writing isn't officially out).

Sadly, I have not much to say about it. I don't understand why they sing about a Lord and the father. All I could come up with was that when they sing "my father, my universe" we see the children standing in Anakt garden and singing. Which leads to the interpretation that maybe this video is showing how Anakt garden works (their brainwashing methods) and that these children are singing in praise to the false Anakt God.

This and it's probably singing about Sua and her death based off of the "white dress, dyed red" lyrics, refering to the white dress Sua wore in the first stage. If you want to go further, you can say it was Sua singing about Mizi and how she viewed Mizi as her savior as well, and as a God, hence the "my father, my universe" and "Lord, when this song is over, come and save me from this please".

In which case, Mizi and Sua would be viewing each other as their God, (a 'love' doomed from the start sadly). It's an interesting view as well but I won't dig deep into that.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Overall an interesting project. Major respect to the creators, it's very creative, has great art and amazing music. I'm sure the comics are fun too and add a lot more insight to this, unfortunately I'm not interested.

If anyone actually read this, and is a bigger fan of Alien Stage, please tell me if I was wrong somewhere. Maybe the creators confirmed something as canon but I said the complete opposite haha.

All of the images are by VIVINOS from youtube.

[chroniclesofgenesis]

Anime with religious theology/symbolism/imagery

A personal list (Updated Dec. 12, 2024)

In alphabetical order;

Berserk

Blassreiter

Chainsaw Man

Chrono Crusade

Death Note

Ergo Proxy

Gabriel Dropout

Gankutsuou: The Count of Monte Cristo

Haibane Renmei

Hells, 2008

Hellsing

Mardock Scramble

Monogatari

Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, 1984

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Night on the Galactic Railroad, 1985

Rage of Bahamut: Genesis

Samurai Champloo

Sunday without God

Tenshi no tamago (Angel's Egg), 1985

Tower of God

Trigun

Trinity Blood

Vatican Kiseki Chousakan (Vatican Miracle Examiners)

Zetsuen no Tempest

[chroniclesofgenesis]

Devilman: Crybaby, my take on it's religious refrences

In terms of religious allegory/refrences: 10/10

In terms of entertainment: 4/10

It's not an anime that I would typically enjoy as I am not a fan of nudity/p0rnography in anime at all, if the anime was not heavily under the inspiration of religion, I would not have watched it to begin with, but I didn't even end up finishing it.

To start with I love the opening way too much, it's what made me watch it in the first place but it set the bar a bit too high I think. I love the fragment where (what looks like)a reference to a biblically accurate angel occurs for few seconds with ryo's eyes. And the angel towards the end with 10 wings is stunning (or Ryo's angel form).

The first episode already had a few crosses; right before the sabbath club scene outside and during the scene it showed up two times, I'm pretty sure. The scene where Akira becomes the 'devil'man and his black silhoutte with wings, horns and claws with a red background and cross right behind him was beautiful. It seemed like the scene was saying that this is the god-like figure who came to save you. Him killing the demons right after kind of reaffirms this, it's as if he went on to punish those who sinned.

The whole world in this anime is depicted as a world without God's love. People becoming these demonic monsters is like people losing theirselves and their mind to their deepest darkest desires. How ironic that the one to 'save' them is a devil depicted as something of a Christ/God/saviour.

Oh and the beautiful painting of 'The Last Supper' by Leonardo Da Vinci in all of the dinner scenes is beautiful, maybe to understand why it's there I'd have to finish watching the anime, but I wonder if it's foreshadowing or symbolic of something that happens later on? And do the friend benito flakes that served Akira as reminder of his parents or his sudden huge appetite after turning into a devilman have something do with it or am I just overanalyzing.

Now the beautiful sountrack! I love it so much especially the song "Smells Blood" with it's inaudible lyrics that repeat "God can't stop me, we are coming, you are one of us, remember" and "I don't need God, because I'm him". Ah it's amazing although it plays during the scene where they search that creeps room illegally which didn't really make sense but it's great nonetheless (I'm pretty sure it plays during other scenes as well but I couldn't really tell). Not to mention the other songs with Christian inspired names like "The Genesis" and "From here to Eternity". They all sound really good too.

Without even finishing watching, I figured Ryo was an unusual character, lack of empathy, cold killer, unphased at the sabbath scene (him turning Akira into a devilman?) But once I read spoilers saying he was Satan/the fallen angel with a hermaphrodite form I was ecstatic, it's beautiful and so funny, to think that Satan himself would have such a pure white form while the devilman christ-like figure would look way more like satan himself.

Overall it's saddening that I wasn't able to enjoy and finish the anime, the blunt and straightforward Christian imagery and refrences was amazing. It was so out in the open which made me continue watching it for longer than I would have, had it been more subtle. It's a unique anime as I've yet to see one that's based on religion as heavily as this one.

Not to mention the way the anime portrays the complexity of humanity and relationships was great as well. And the many other cool (non-religious) metaphors and stuff that happens within the anime. The animation on the other hand...left me unamused. The anime was also just basically nudity the whole time, it was a hard watch for me.