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obsessedwithkirby · 1 month

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Your name is Kristen Wright. You’re barely 10. You’re at the outdoor funeral for your parents, a pair of genius scientists that Terra will never see again. You’ve spent the last two weeks giving false smiles to women and men who pretend to grieve them while spending every moment they think you’re not looking lauding them for their ‘foolishness’ and ‘hubris’. Sitting amongst a crowd of these intellectuals, your feel nothing looking at their crocodile tears, knowing they’re just happy there’s less competition for next year’s grants. Your new guardian grabs onto your hand in an attempt to grant you a modicum of comfort. You stare blankly at the sky above.

You’ve never felt so alone. You don’t think this feeling will ever go away.

Your name is Joyce Moore. You can hardly communicate anymore. Your best friend killed herself trying to replicate the experiment that gave you permanent brain damage. Every scientist at Rhine Lab now treats you like a child at best, and an animal at worst. Your parents have not come to see you. None of your colleagues seem to understand that you are still you, with a sense of humour, good taste in TV shows, and fucking feelings, god damn it.

You’ve never felt so alone. You don’t think this feeling will ever go away.

Your name is Ferdinand Clooney. You’ve lost everything you’ve ever worked for in a futile grab for power. The department of defense has you by the dick after saving you from a group of Pioneers who (justifiably) nearly beat you half to death. It’s playing fiddle to their whims or the rest of your life in prison - or, most realistically, a tragic accident report. Your aspirations aren’t within your reach anymore, and you know that it’s your fault. You will never be Kristen Wright, and it’s eating you alive.

You’ve never felt so alone. You don’t think this feeling will ever go away.

Your name is Parvis Ahrens. You’re not that old. You’re only 58. But you’re losing your mind. Every day, a little more slips away. You rely more and more on encyclopedic entries for information you took immense pride in knowing from your heart. You’ve spent the last few years focused on the pursuit of progress of all else. As part of this, you manipulated your star pupil in an attempt to permanently get her under your wing, outside of the influence of the Defense Director, a weak-hearted woman everyone else seems to think is cold as ice. She has years of life to change Columbian science. You don’t.

You’ve never felt so alone. You don’t think this feeling will ever go away.

Your name is Jara B. Wilson. You feel like you don’t see the girl who lived for you with so long in Kristen anymore. You’re a washed-up movie star, working for her cause above all else. Do you have anything that you’re working for for yourself anymore? She’ll be gone soon. You know that.

She hasn’t even left yet, and you’ve never felt so alone. You don’t think this feeling will ever go away once she leaves.

Your name is Nasti Londrey. Your people have never had a home. They might never have a home.

You’ve always felt alone. You will always be alone. That’s fine.

Your name is Justin Fitzroy Jr. Your dad died a week ago, and the cure has just been found for the hereditary illness that threatens to cut your lifespan in half. It was found by accident.

The sword of Damacles no longer hangs above your neck. Why then, do you still feel so alone?

Your name is Loken Williams. You reach out to a girl you tortured, who you know can’t remember what you did to her, because you’re going to die soon, and you need someone to remember what you did with your life.

Even if she kills you, at least you won’t die alone.

Your name is Trevor Friston. It’s been thousands of years down here. You just want to see your daughter again, and it will be another thousand until you do.

You’re very familiar with the loneliness that wraps around every single nanometer of your circuit board.

Your name is Dorothy Franks. Your whole family was killed in a Catastrophe. Your name is Elena Urbica. Your whole family, besides your twin sister, has disowned you. Your drive yourself head-first into the sciences to distract yourself from the loneliness.

Your name is Ho’olheyak. Centuries of ancestral memories swarm around your mind. Because of this, your lifespan was cut to a fraction of the life you should be living. You are obsessed with the history of your people, and you resent them from tearing your life away from you. You tear over books and tomes of history to find all means of unspeakable knowledge, hoping that somewhere in there you’ll find something that you can connect to.

You don’t even know you’re lonely.

Your name is Muelsyse.

You saw the writing on the wall. Saria and Kristen just had a massive fight. You’ve been drifting apart since college, but the only two people who you’ve felt a real connection to on all of Terra will hardly speak to each other anymore. Do you try and mend what happened between them? Can you? You don’t know what to do besides take all means to protect yourself in the fallout. You wish you weren’t so paranoid, so self-centered, that all you know how to do is ensure your own safety.

Is there anything on Terra for you besides loneliness?

Your name is Ifrit. It’s cold, and quiet, and you’re pretty sure you’ve killed everyone around you. Your eyes are blurred, you hands are shaky, and shards of black crystal stick out all over your body. Before you pass out, you think one thing:

Hell, you might be alone, but at least those bastard whitecoats got what was coming to them.

Your name is Olivia Silence. You pull yourself out of the rubble in a destroyed laboratory, where you see Saria looming over Ifrit, beaten half-to-death. You beat yourself up for thinking you could trust her - that she was there to protect Ifrit, and you. You can’t trust anyone in Columbia. You run to embrace Ifrit with your entire body, to protect her from the cold eyes of Saria standing above her. You look back at her with nothing but fear in your eyes.

You’ve never felt so alone. You have to get Ifrit out of Rhine.

Your name is Saria. You’re barely 8 years old. You went your father in tears, as a group of bullies came after you and destroyed your toy car. He tells you to stop crying. You’re not accomplishing anything by throwing a fit in front of him. He tells you to fight back - take responsibility for your weakness.

You’ve never felt so alone.

You won’t ever be this weak again.

Staring up at the sky, looking up as Kristen’s ark sends her out through the hole she tore in the false sky, you know that you were foolish to believe you could bypass your own weakness through sheer will.

And you’ll be lonely for the rest of your life without her.

#arknights #ooooooghhhghhhghh #very well written

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obsessedwithkirby · 3 months

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A Deep Dive of the Junna-Nana Revue in the Movie, or why you really ought to believe in others more

The Revues in Revue Starlight can be difficult to understand.

Usually that’s because of all the imagery and music and symbolism coming at you simultaneously, but this one in particular is confusing because Nana is just so hard to understand. She is absolutely terrifying in the movie, and last time it was because she had to protect her reruns, but we don’t know why she’s doing it this time. And don’t get me wrong, we just had a whole thing where Mahiru chased Hikari with murderous intent, but that was acting! So we keep waiting for Nana to drop the act, but she never does! Even when Junna is crying and has lost the will to fight, Nana just leaves her behind like she doesn’t even care!? What’s going on? Nana is Junna’s biggest fan! What happened to Nana? What’s going on?

So this is my attempt to lay out everything going on and try to get a better understanding of what was going on with Junna and Nana throughout the movie. It’s also part of my series of deep dives into each of the movie’s Revues, and while it should be able to be read as a standalone thing, I will be analyzing the Revue of Annihilation in this one, so I may touch on the issues everyone else is dealing with as well.

So to start it off, let’s take a look at what Junna’s dealing with at the start of the movie.

And I gotta say, girlie is going through it.

Admittedly she seems fine at a glance, but literally her first scene has her own acting being overshadowed by Karen’s brilliant performance of someone who feels lost after their friend leaves them behind. And if we’re being real, that really says more about what Karen’s going through than anything about Junna’s actual ability, but can you blame her for being discouraged by this brilliant display of method acting?

And it get’s even worse when you realize what they were performing. This is the play that they were going to see at New National. And from the poster and the fact that Mahiru and Futaba were practicing these lines, you can figure out that Junna was playing the lead role in this rehearsal.

So literally everything in the script is working to make her stand out, but she got upstaged by the supporting cast! Not only that, but she’s also gonna see this her own role played by a professional soon enough, so she’ll have to compete with that too soon enough.

If you take a look at her future plans, you can see that Junna plans on continuing to University, which is a big departure from literally everyone else who is planning on auditioning for Acting Troupes so they can become professional actors straight out of high school. But unlike them, Junna wants to study more about the stage right now to understand it deeper.

And this is a sign of the growth for Junna compared to the start of the series, since she used to be extremely impatient. She was obsessed with becoming the top star and pushed herself with extra practice to the point of passing out to try and make up for her lack of experience compared to Maya or Claudine, so the fact that she’s willing to take it slow and learn properly is much healthier for her in the long run. If you think about it, pre-character development Junna probably would have applied for a troupe immediately after graduating because that’s what everyone else was doing and she doesn’t want to fall behind, even if it wasn’t the best move for herself.

But if she wants to understand the stage, it’s a little odd that she’s applying to a literature department as her first choice. Keep in mind that Seisho is a music academy and her second and third choices are explicitly drama focused, so it’s a little strange that her first choice isn’t explicitly stage related.

But then again, Junna has always loved using quotes from literature, and she says she’s going to use what she learns to act in college, so it’s not like she’s completely given up! She says as much, in that all of this is so that she can become the star she aspires to be! Also she quotes William Shakespeare because of course she fucking does.

But I think it’s a little sad that the quote she and her teacher recite is about how some are born great, while others achieve greatness, and it’s pretty clear that Junna doesn’t think she’s the first one or that she’s the second one yet.

We see this lack of confidence surface again when Kaoruko accuses them all of having given up their desire to become a top star.

Obviously in the scene we know that Kaoruko is wrong here. Kaoruko even admits as much to Claudine after storming off from the room. She’s clinging to an idealized version of the past, so obviously the rest of them aren’t interested in becoming the top star of a stage that never existed. They are looking to the future instead.

But I wanna take a look at Junna’s reaction in this scene.

When Junna looked at her phone, she didn’t recognize the date, because she had moved on from the auditions, which is a little surprising when you remember how much weight she put into that initial loss to Karen. She was ready to complain to the manager about it too! But then again, Junna had matured since that first revue, and by the 10th episode when she got knocked out of the auditions, she wasn’t bitter. She instead chose to watch and learn from everyone else.

So she and everyone else is shocked to realize that Kaoruko actually still wants to participate in the auditions.

Although unlike everyone else who remains shocked, Junna is the only one who looks away while Kaoruko talks about waiting for another shot at the auditions. Because although this is coming from a place of hurt, Kaoruko accidently hit the nail on the head for Junna. She hasn’t been waiting for the next audition, since she doesn’t think she can compete with top stars as she is now. And from an outside perspective, this scene almost makes it seem like Junna can’t bring herself to look at the brilliance of someone who strives to be the top star of the audition.

But all of that was just my wild speculation about this scene. For all I know I could be reading way too into it, but Junna explicitly says as much to Claudine later in the train ride, so I’m probably not too far off.

On the train to New National, Claudine decides to reenact her conversation with Mahiru in the laundry room, but this time with Junna.

Just like with Mahiru, Claudine takes a look at her questions for New National. And Junna’s questions are… rough to say the least. They’re all about how to handle pushback from those around her or how to overcome hesitation about her career path. And like wow, this is heavy stuff. Can we go back to the power of love overcoming hardships? This got way too real for me way too fast.

Honestly that thing in her questions about her family makes me think her first choice college being a literature department instead of a drama department might have been a compromise with her parents so they would let her act in college. As I said earlier, girlie is going through it.

But Junna defends herself for having such a long list of questions, just like Mahiru did with Claudine earlier. And just like with Mahiru, Claudine remarks to Junna on how excited everyone is, because thinking of new conversation topics for every single person is hard.

But eventually Junna asks Claudine if she’s the one who recommended Futata to aim for New National. And while Claudine says she simply encouraged Futaba, she does ask if Junna is okay with not applying to New National.

Junna doesn’t directly answer that question, saying she’s no match for Claudine or Maya right now, but she’s going to improve to be their equal one day because she’ll keep learning and trying. Anyways that whole monologue is a nice call back to what she had been saying since the first episode, that she would work hard to catch up to the rest of them and reach her own star!

But don’t let her eloquence deceive you, she absolutely dodged the question on whether or not she was okay with not applying to New National.

Anyways, earlier I mentioned that the conversation was practically ripped from the laundry room scene before, but there was a notable difference. When Mahiru expressed doubts that she would be good enough to get into New National, Claudine didn’t try to comfort her, but Claudine tried to cheer on Junna when she expressed her doubts.

This is because despite their similar lack of self-esteem, at least Mahiru is at the start line and is willing to at least audition for the best troupe in the world. Mahiru doesn’t need Claudine to encourage or comfort her.

But Junna gave up before she even started, already deciding that she needs to learn more, that she’s not ready yet. Which is why Claudine tries to give Junna a push, just like she did with Futaba. But even when Claudine encourages Junna literally word for word the same way she encouraged Futaba, Junna is still hesitant to try to audition for New National, too scared to aim for the top star at the top troupe.

But that’s all in her head. Junna is underestimating herself. Sure Claudine was making a jab at Maya when she said Junna was just as good, but she really does think that Junna has what it takes. And much later during the Revue of Resentment with Kaoruko, Futaba explicitly mentions Junna as a stage girl who has something she lacks.

Junna covers up this insecurity of hers by claiming she’s only not a match now, and in the future she will be, so it’s not that like she’s completely given up. But even so, right now Junna has lost the recklessness she had at the start of the series, that courage to try and become the top star, no matter how slim the chance. The Junna we see on the train is not the same Junna who got mad at her classmates for giving up on becoming Flora or Claire even before the auditions because they were sure Maya and Claudine were going to win.

That Junna would have snapped at this Junna.

Anyways, there’s a reason that is the last meaningful conversation anyone has until the Revue of Annihilation.

But before that, let’s take a look at Nana.

In Nana’s career counseling, she says her current plans for after graduation are to either apply to New National’s acting troupe, or apply to be part of their production troupe, but she’s not completely sure which one to choose in the end. This is a nice reminder that although Nana’s pretty knowledgeable about the auditions and revues and everything, she’s also trying to figure out her own future, just like everyone else.

It feels important though, that Nana mentions that she knows she will have to choose, and that eventually it will end.

But unlike everyone else who is guiding the new students in their opening scenes, Nana is instead helping out Class B, essentially guiding the existing students instead of new ones.

Although, I gotta be real with you guys, I kinda forgot that Nana’s initial goal was New National.

When I rewatched the movie, I actually did a double take at this scene since I completely forgot that she applied there, and not the Royal Academy for Theatrical Actors where she ends up in the epilogue. And while this may be attributed to the fact that I am illiterate, I think part of it is because we don’t really see Nana get excited about New National with Maya, Mahiru, and Futaba.

The entire time before their field trip to visit New National, the three of them are talking about it non-stop since it’s their dream troupe, but not Nana. She’s thinking about something else the whole time.

As for what she’s thinking about, we can take a guess.

If we go back to the scene where Karen and Junna are acting in front of potential students, Nana is in the background watching, and it’s pretty clear that Nana definitely relates to Karen. In Karen’s performance of someone who is lost because their friend has to leave them, Nana is the one who finishes Karen’s line, “Why are you leaving?” by adding “my friend.”

Nana’s whole subplot in the show was about how she didn’t want her friends to change and leave her behind, making her alone again like her time in Middle School. And while she made peace with the idea that they would all eventually grow and evolve as stage girls at the end of the show, the threat of them growing apart is still very real, especially as they all graduate and go their own, separate paths.

And unlike every other girl in their class, Nana and Karen are the only two without a clear plan for the future. But while Nana is at least attempting to narrow down her options and aware that she has to make a decision soon, Karen left her future plans sheet blank.

This separation of Nana and Karen from their classmates continues even into their next scene at Seisho. While Karen is who-knows-where, Nana had left to do laundry before she can hear Kaoruko’s rant about how pathetic they all are for not being interested in the audition this time. However despite being physically separated from the group and not participating in the conversation, Nana is somewhat aware of what’s going on with everyone.

Nana doesn’t come in and take part in the conversation though. She chooses to wait outside, despite not being busy with the chores.

This is a switch between Maya and Nana’s usual roles in the show, since usually Maya would be the one to be separated from the group in the show, and Nana would be the one infodumping about what’s going on. My working theory is that Nana feels guilty about what she will have to do later, so she’s trying to isolate herself from her friends before the Revue of Annihilation.

Even on the train ride, Nana only talks to Karen, the sole person in their train car who won’t take part in the upcoming Revue. And it isn’t like the two of them are having some important conversation either, since Nana is paying attention to Junna and Claudine’s talk.

When Junna talks about how she doesn’t plan on aiming for New National right now, Nana stares, although I gotta wonder if she is staring in disapproval or concern?

Keep reading

#revue starlight #really really really good analysis #loved reading this

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