#mika and the temple of queue

[jediofbooksandsnacks]

Caged in Psycho-Pass

So, I wanted to talk about the feeling of being caged in Psycho-Pass and the Psycho-Pass movie, mostly in the movie. It’s a motif that shows up a lot with both Akane and Shinya. This is a long and screenshot-heavy post, so I’ve placed it under the cut.

For a quick reminder, it shows up as a theme in the S1 anime. Please also keep in mind that hounds can be caged. So, here is Akane, talking to Kogami after Makishima kills one of her friends:

(I mean, Ko’s reading napalm-loving Heart of Darkness and is taking in some kind of get-better-juice that is the same color as Makishima’s eyes--I might suspect we know where this is going.)  Anyway, that’s only one example, I think there are more? In particular, though, it’s in the ending theme:

“Nobody knows the troubles I seen.”

Hard to get more caged than that. 

So, caged in the movie. Here is Akane, feeling caged in her apartment:

“Aim carefully and eliminate the target.”

You can see the Dominator in the shape of the window and see how it cages Akane to her promise to Sibyl in the shadows of the blinds. Sibyl asked a lot of her in sharing the brain continuum (brainiuum?) and asking one person to shoulder that burden is ethically and morally A Lot. Which is how Sibyl is breaking Akane down, too.

Plus, Akane thinks she is the only one who knows this secret. Keep in mind that Akane doesn’t know that Sibyl told Mika, the mirror-verse Akane, about the pickled brain situation in season two. (I kid about Mika. I just want to see her get some real development in the show.) So, Akane is cut off from her family, her friends, her coworkers--all of her pillars of support.

So, when she discovers where Shinya is, she goes off after him. (Go get your man, Akane.) And who wouldn’t want to escape from the cage of these heavy expectations? (Just like Shinya did.) Who wouldn’t want to tell him everything, even if that would break her promise? (Which she can’t do at the point.) Who wouldn’t want to recapture their old relationship, whether it was a mentor/mentee or something romantic?

So. They go to the temples in Cambodia, which are structured with slats along the sides. Like this:

Temples of Cambodia: The Heart of Angkor is on point with the iron bar slats for this metaphor. It’s like they are stuck inside a temple acting as a defacto cage. And here they are, walking through that temple:

“Ah, nostalgia.”

I had to brighten some of these in order to see them--sorry if the colors are wonky. So here it is, acting as a metaphorical cage. He asks about Gino, here, bringing up all of their iron-barred, hunting-dog, Enforcer histories. He hasn’t let go of the old, and she’s mainly there to bring him in. So, not much has changed between them. And then they go to a funeral for the fallen soldiers, so. (I really hope that is not foreshadowing.) Yeah. Not exactly a happy occasion.

Then, later:

*queues up In Your Eyes*

(That’s a link to my previous post about eye color. Here’s a link to the actual lyrics to the song.)

Super awkward! In this image, the chairs he’s trying to sleep on (and totally failing) are also caged, putting up another Inspector/ Enforcer barrier between them. He’s caught up in and caged by her unexpected presence (you might say it’s arresting) and the rising (!) memory of his life in Japan, and she’s caged by her memory of smart, insightful him and then that ringing, final gunshot (and now how he won’t come back); it’s both the barrier between them and it ties the two of them together, now, for better or worse.

(“...in sickness and in health, for better or for worse.” There’s a whole marriage thing going on here, too. I might post about that later.)

(I could write an essay on this scene.)

ANYWAY. When she gets up and heads outside, he follows her, here:

“Tell me your sorrows, Kogami. Cuz I am definitely not hiding a thing.”

Caged by the temple, again. Notice that she is in a white shirt and he is in black, signifying their relative stances right now. She’s good and pure but is holding a life-altering secret, he is guilty and sad and is trying to make peace with his decision to become a murderer and everything that came after. She is hiding something, and he is vulnerable, here, which I like. He acts all tough, but he’s a mess inside. Frankly, she’s a mess inside, too. Thanks, Sibyl.

And then (last one):

“She came here for a booty call and I didn’t even put out. WTF am I doing?”

(Ok, I kid. This post leans Shinkane, but YMMV.)

So, this is near the end of the movie. It lingers, which sets my spider-fiction senses on high alert, but I have a feeling he’s thinking about things. He’s once again caged by the shadows in his environment, this time after Gino bears down on escaped Ko with all of the weight of the still-serving latent-criminal Enforcers making heavy his right hook. Also: his father. (I’m not sure if this is brotherly-Gino or rival-Gino, but that was a nice jab, Gino.) Gino tells him to stay away from Japan, to stay away from Tsunemori. And, well. Yeah.

So, both are caged by a set of expectations--Akane by her promise to Sibyl, Shinya by the weight of his past non-Sibyl approved (killing) actions. Plus, remember how I said that hounds are caged? Shinya realizes he can’t escape that, even now. Maybe later he can, but not now. 

I haven’t seen Sinners of the System, yet, so I can’t comment on those. And bring on season three.

Phew, that was long. Thanks for sticking with me to the end.

[kahixo-arc]

Person: So you're dating ****?

Mika: Yeah.

Person: But you have a date with ***??

Mika: Yeah.

Person: **** is okay with you being with ***?????

Mika: ...yeah.

Person: But that's like, wrong isn't it?! Aren't you worried what people will say about you? :(

Mika: [stares off into horizon]