#well thats a lie. ahiru has seen some more stuff that characterizes fakir.

[metanarrates]

dumb question: could you elaborate on what you meant when you mentioned the character relationships regressing in princess tutu?

honestly, maybe "regressed" wasn't exactly the right word. the progression gained in s1 still exists - ahiru has gotten to know a bit more about rue and believes that rue is still somewhere in the kraehe persona, fakir no longer wishes to deny mytho his heart, and most critically, fakir and ahiru are now allies. none of those major developments have been set back.

however, literally all these relationships have flattened by virtue of the show simply not choosing to focus on them. rue appears to no longer feel ambivalent about princess tutu (which is sort of gestured at as being part of her retreat into the kraehe role/the raven's daughter, but there's no actual attention drawn to it.) we get next to nothing about how fakir feels about mytho other than "well we gotta get his heart to him and solve the raven's blood problem." I DO think fakir and ahiru have gotten closer, but their relationship is a rather straightforward friendship. it's still a little complex, but it lacks the drive and relative complexity of s1.

this would not be a problem if fakir/ahiru was a background dynamic to all the other ongoing dynamics, btw. they don't need to always be in a fraught ideological struggle. I think their dynamic is cute! but given that there's just very little complexity in any relationship in the show at this point, it does feel like a regression. ptutu has always been a kid's show, and so I never expected a crazy level of complex characterization, but there was a sense of forward momentum and struggle between clashing personalities and motives in s1 😭 compared to that, s2 has felt so empty.

well, except for one dynamic. and that's between rue and raven's blood mytho.

i will say straight up that this dynamic is WEIRD. not for any actual reason of the dynamic itself (in a vacuum it's a fascinating dynamic) but for the writing surrounding it. ive talked EXTENSIVELY about how much I hate the choice to make mytho be possessed by an Evil Self, and this is another extension of that. we know raven's blood mytho is just meant to disappear like a puff of smoke by the end of the plot. in essence, this undercuts literally any and all screentime he gets. we know that, because he is a plot obstacle, he is just not supposed to be taken seriously. his scenes with rue are meant to establish HER as a poor little meow meow, and not to establish him as a genuine character with motivations and feelings of his own.

and of course rue, come season 2, has been established as being pretty much entirely princess kraehe. her motive to possess mytho has been further fleshed out as being part of her backstory as an emotionally abused girl who wishes to free her father and gain a happy ending with mytho.

I do feel this comes out of nowhere and undercuts some earlier stuff with her character. however, it's not a horrible change. even if it's not what I wanted or liked about her, it DOES say stuff about her and lend texture to how she views mytho. however, some of this was unintentional by the writers. rather than being only tragic, she just seems pathetic and sad. I'm wishing for her to both break free of her father AND break free of her idealization of mytho. both her father and raven's blood mytho treat her like shit, and she doesn't care if regular mytho loves her so long as she can possess him. i want so badly for that mindset to go away for her, but from what I know, it doesn't.

all that aside, that brings us to the one dynamic relationship in s2 so far, and that's between rue and raven's blood mytho. as discussed, he is basically a new character. he doesn't feel like he is at all related to regular mytho, even inversely. the only other character he Could be related to is the raven, but given that he's not literally the raven possessing mytho's body, his characterization tells us very little about either character. so... not great for the idea of Existing dynamics progressing. they had to invent a new guy for rue to have character development with!

I do like it. they're mutually using each other, which is interesting. I like their little plotting sessions, and I like rue's continual wish that he will at least love her a little, even though she's mostly concerned with actual mytho rather than him. they feel like fun, toxic allies, and you get a great sense of how they view each other. they're both characterized quite interestingly in their moments together. their mutual ruthlessness is put on great display.

but well... we get a good sense of how rue feels about regular mytho. we know exactly what she sees in him. mytho himself? we don't get his viewpoint on hardly anything.

now, this is justifiable from a watsonian standpoint because of his heart situation. he isn't himself, and is spending most of his time fighting against his evil alter ego. but s1 mytho also had an incomplete heart, and we got a good sense of how he viewed other people! he went from unquestionably allowing fakir and rue to overrule him to asserting his own emotions against them. we see that he was drawn by princess tutu. it seemed like he liked fakir and ahiru at least somewhat. and even before he had his heart back, he still pretty obviously had interests and had his own viewpoint on fakir and rue.

now? nothing. we know he wishes to see tutu, isn't interested in rue's attempts to control him, and that he dislikes his raven's blood persona. that's it. we don't know how his views on anyone else have shifted. a lot has happened - it would be really natural for his perspectives on everyone to change! but we don't see evidence of it. the only time we see the Real Mytho is when he is desperately struggling against the raven's blood.

so yeah. theres just less dynamism between any of the four main characters. it's really not great.

#narrates #ptutu #NOBODY is experiencing a complex thought about another person minus rue and thats only towards mytho #well thats a lie. ahiru has seen some more stuff that characterizes fakir. #but its not very much :(