Revolutionary Girl Utena

I forced my parents to get me rgu on blu ray for my birthday a few months back (the world is a cruel place for not having it avialable in english literally ANYWHERE on the interent D: ) --- but I digress, I've been obssesing over it on and off ever since!

So what even is Utena?

Revolutionary Girl Utena is a shoujo anime from 1997 that sits in a sweet spot of being obscure enough that you can't find it in english literally anywhere online, but also popular enough to have a million bajillion video essays about it. Those video essays are WELL DESERVED though ---wip---

just finished watching ep 27, nanami's egg and my brain is going kinda haywire over it so here are some unorganized thoughts

• Egg as period: this was the first thing that really stood out to me about the egg - the way Nanami wakes up confused only to find something completly unfamiliar under the sheets, something that no one has told her about even existing but seems far to strange to ask anyone about, lest they all figure out she's a space alien! NOOOO! To me it comes off as a lot of people's experience with getting their period for the first time, it's strange and scary and can kind of feel like you're dying. But it's such a stigmatized topic that you can't really talk about it. The episode also shows Nanamis anxiety about being a late bloomer, as if when her bodily functions decide to kick in has any bearing on her as a person. But Nanami absoloutly can't afford to be a late bloomer, she is so desperate to be seen as a grown up and be taken seriously for once that if anyone were to discover her she'd lose all the respect she's been working so hard to get. I think this reflects the way a lot of teenagers, especially at the start of puberty, crave independance and respect, to be seen as more than a child. Getting your first period then marks this strange inbetween where you are no longer a "child" but also clearly not experienced enough with "grown up" things to truly be worthy of respect yet.
• Egg as innocence/virginty: This is mainly in the latter half of the episode, particularly when Touga talks to Nanami about them having gotten along so well thus far because nanami "is not the kind of girl who lays eggs" aswell as when he calls such behavior "shameful", and when Nanami begs Saionji to give her back her egg in the woods. I think both of these exist in larger contexts that make them not entirely about innocence but I thought they were worth bringing up! Touga's absolute masterpeice of a line is said a little while after Nanami says she "prefers girls", (refering to having girl children), which Touga misinterprets as being about Nanami being a gay ass homosexual. Touga goes on a very homophobic and... christian(?) tirade about god making men and women for a reason. I think "we have gotten along so well because you are a girl who doesn't lay eggs" could just be more homophobia :(, about how they have gotten along this well because they are one totally cishet man, and one completly, 100%, cishet woman - just the way god intended, yippie! But it could maybe be read as "we have gotten along so well because you have been pure and untainted", I think Touga's line about Nanami's action being shameful also supports this reading (It's also very possible that it's both, lesbians DO be having sex). Onto Saionji, the way Nanami begs him just reads to me as her desperatly wishing to go back to before she "lost her innocence", back when she was the exct kind of girl everyone wanted her to be, with the way she thinks her egg has been stolen by Saionji ---wip (I need to go to sleep now :( ---