Fantastic Girls でーれーガールズ

Good day dear Readers.

I was planning on making an MV and another post over the weekend but then I remembered that SDCC was happening. Yeah, spent the whole weekend basking in the goodness that was given to us fans like that thing that has the words ‘Super’ and ‘Bat’ in the title yet missing ‘Wonder’. I think I spent two thirds of the weekend just on that thing! I read almost all posts about it on blogs, all tumblr posts, all reddit comments, 4-chan threads, reaction videos, I swear this movie!

The Redcoats and ZOOM are coming!

Yeah, in case you couldn’t tell I’m a huge DC fan. Who doesn’t love the Batman or doesn’t want to have Wonder Woman’s babies? But really, as GAR as the Dark Knight and ethereal as Wonder Woman were in that god of godly trailers, this is post about something completely un-related.

I just watched the Fantastic Girls movie online. I always do that with movies I am sceptical about before getting the BDs. I was set to go into this wearily ever since the trailers, also because of a certain movie like it that proved to be a let-down. Seems like I was once again right! Why am I never wrong about these things! I am getting so good at telling that movies won’t be yuri that I think I could make a living out of it.

Mystery person: Do you know of the new season of School? The poster was mighty interesting.

Me: Dropped half-way through the first episode. Don’t bother with this one, believe me.

*Months later and the series is a typical reverse harem of guys fighting over the same girl!

Okay, granted I had to watch a bit of the series to get the answer but series are different from movies. For movies, you could mostly tell from trailers and plot synopsis and when I watched the Fantastic Girls trailer, I had a bad feeling but in this world one could still get surprised so I watched the movie still. I mean, Ayuko and Takemi had so much potential and their chemistry was great but in the end, even though there were no guys in the end, this movie was 99.9999% straight!

I kid you not!

Yuki Mio Adachi Rika

Shirahane Yuri Aran Kei

Sasaoka Ayuko Akimoto Takemi

There is a lot of chemistry between Ayuko and Takemi but while that would have been enough to make this yuri, this movie I swear!!!!! I have never seen so much chemistry wasted! Do you know of that meme about ‘I can’t believe it is not…’? Well, I can’t believe this is not yuri! You won’t believe it too! I wish there were subs for this because I don’t think I will be able to fully relay how maddening this movie is! Without subs and understanding Japanese, this would seem like a yuri movie but it is not! Love the chemistry between Ayuko and Takemi? Sorry but that chemistry was poisoned! You don’t want to bask in it.

PS: Thanks a lot Rika, for the A-reum FEELS!

When I say ‘in the end’ I mean the current time. The movie is told in two different timelines; Ayuko and Takemi’s high school days (the 80s) and the current time where they are both adults. Seeing as nothing happened in their adult lives that could not have been done in their younger lives, I really didn’t see a point to the two timelines. If the adult life was the main storyline then the past would be useful as it is used as a way to explain things and fill in the gaps. But the past took up most of the plot and the present felt like fillers that weren’t at all needed. Takemi’s death was just so bland! Yeah, I know it might be a spoiler but really, I felt nothing at all!

I think this is the first time I have agreed with an Amazon rating. This movie has like a 3 star rating I think and it mighty deserves it. Not just because of the bait but the movie itself was just so plain. This is strange because the movie had something that I haven’t seen before. There is a twist that made me so happy to learn because it hinted at great things.

Great things that did not happen!

 
 
Your mouth Ayuko? Who are you, Kumiko?
 
 

Kumiko!
 
 
 
This scene!
 
 
 
This damn scene! Look at the love in Ayuko’s eyes!
 
  
 
 
Those reaction faces of Ayuko!
 
 

Hagu!

 

  

 
She has it bad!
 
 
 
 
 

  
 

 
 
Time even gave you a second chance and you wasted it!!!!!!
 

 
 
 
 

What’s even the use of meeting the parents now!

 
 

I thought it would work out!

 

 
All the frikkin useless drama!
 

 
 
 
All of this could have been great!
 
 
 
 

No~pe! It’s not a confession of love!

I have never seen such a waste of emotions and potential!

Before I mention that twist I need to explain the story first. Ayuko moves to a certain town from Tokyo. She was definitely not what I was expecting from a Tokyo girl but then again, this was the eighties. Either way she was still an odd ball to the girls that had grown up in this town. It is hard for Ayuko to adjust and getting used to the way things are done over there. She gets made fun of because of this but she is saved by a girl named Takemi.

The two hit it off right away and I swear this movie could have been the LIVE action version of Hibike, the way Ayuko was taken by Takemi and the way Takemi was such an alpha when it came to Ayuko. There are some great scenes that make you believe Ayuko just creamed her pants watching Takemi. The first is the very first time the two speak. Some girls, that might or might not have been friends with the two, one couldn’t quite tell (really, this movie was bad) were kind of bullying Ayuko when Takemi put a stop to it by shouting and demanding their attention.

Ayuko had put on the wrong tie for that day and thinking it was better to not have it than be made fun of because of it, she takes it off. When the three turn to Takemi, she too takes off her tie (in such a seductive way that Ayuko was internally salivating just standing there before the majestic beauty that was Takemi. Seriously, the way the scene was filmed it was KumiRei levels of scenery! Any sane person should have been shipping these two in the first few minutes of the movie!

It wasn’t just the tie scene too! Funny I call it the tie scene because the next scene is also about ties!

During break on a different day, Takemi is in the classroom watching Ayuko clean outside on the veranda. She calls Ayuko over who resists first because she was in the middle of doing something (Girl pls!) but Takemi doesn’t take no for an answer. She orders Ayuko to come over to her and sit in the chair she had just been sitting in.

Once Ayuko is seated, looking really awkward and nervous (understandably so) Takemi goes and does the thing! She comes closer and stands in front of Ayuko. She takes a hold of Ayuko’s tie and unties it from her neck! She lays it on the table as she explains something about ties to Ayuko that I could not understand (gay enough to grant me the power of language, this movie is not). To support her point Takemi takes off her own tie to demonstrate and when she is done speaking to a completely silent Ayuko, she takes Ayuko’s tie and puts it back around her neck and ties it properly.

As you can see btw, I am talking about the sailor-fuku ties not the shirt ties.

Takemi is in a sailor-fuku blouse without her tie on. She is leaning forward to do Ayuko’s tie whose head is literally under Takemi’s jaw! The silence from Ayuko was just so telling! I swear I was ready to be proved wrong about my worries and was expecting these two be have that kind of complicated relationship. And the scenes kept on coming!

Ayuko is into drawing manga and she is pretty good. Her works are a secret though, that is until unknown to her Takemi get a hold of her art book. The scene that Ayuko finds out that Takemi knows needs to be mentioned because this happens after Ayuko’s boyfriend leaves. They had been talking on the bridge and the guys looks like he was straight out of a shoujo manga. He plays the guitar, he is good looking and he is also nice like the way he patiently waits for Ayuko to be ready before they go further in their relationship (you all know what I mean by this!)

Takemi shows up on the bridge after the Dick is gone but when she wonders what Ayuko is doing all the way there far away from where she leaves, and suggests that Ayuko had been on a date, Ayuko denies it. Takemi brings up Dick and Ayuko is not happy to learn that someone found out about her secret. But she is happy to learn that Takemi loved her work. So much so in fact that at some point she even starts drawing for the sake of Takemi.

As the story progresses, Takemi learns that Ayuko is basing off her characters on real life characters. Takemi was already taken with Dick in Ayuko’s story and when she learns that Dick is actually real, she literally falls in love with him, even more despite never having met him.

This right here was the most irritating thing I have ever seen in a movie, ever! I am telling you now, I was this close to dropping this so hard because Takemi couldn’t shut up about how much she loved Dick! She knows that Dick is Ayuko’s boyfriend and yet she still falls in lust with him! Every time these two met she brought up Dick! She even asked Ayuko to introduce them sometime! Things got so crazy that she literally stated to hurt herself just because of Dick!

There was this conversation where she asked Ayuko if she would be mad if she were in love with Dick. Like, are you even kidding me? Of course she would be mad, Dick was her boyfriend! But for some reason Ayuko doesn’t react as strongly as I had thought she would. But you could see that she was starting to be uncomfortable around Takemi. At one point she even almost ditched Takemi on their date because the girl was just so out of it.

When Ayuko tells her that she has no chance as Dick loves her the most, Takemi tries to play it off saying that she was joking but not even Ayuko bought that lie. The more Takemi ignored her feelings the stronger they got to the point of curving Dick’s name on her arm with a knife! She shows this to Ayuko and finally confesses her real feelings. Naturally Ayuko is pretty perturbed! The two have a falling out but then something even worse happens.

I believe at this point we have found out the truth about Dick but I shall leave it for a while. What happens is that Ayuko meets a boy who is the same age as her. Dick was way older than her and not in school I think so when I saw this Boy I just knew a triangle was incoming! I was like, oh great! Now Takemi is going to end up with Dick and Ayuko with Boy and we are going to have a straight end.

Why haven’t I dropped this shit yet?

And just like clockwork, Ayuko falls for the Boy and even goes so far as to knit hand gloves for him (winter was coming) as a Christmas present. Takemi and her are still not on talking terms. Takemi feeling really bad, she finally gives up on her love for Dick and instead chooses to support Dick and Ayuko. She too knits something for both Ayuko and Dick; two scarfs – one black and one white.

For some unknown reason, because there is no way that Ayuko had told Takemi about it and unless Takemi thought Ayuko lived in the restaurant there is no way she would have known Ayuko would be there but, for some reason when Ayuko and Boy are in the restaurant and Ayuko gives the gloves to the Boy who takes her hands and confesses his love for her, as soon as he does he looks to the side and before she answers, Ayuko follows his line of sight and there on the stairs stands a shocked Takemi! Ayuko pulls her hands away from Boy’s hold as if she had been burned!

Takemi is very angry for reasons unknown and all she does is come over and throw the bag of gifts at Ayuko before stomping off! Boy goes to collect the bag contents wondering what the hell that was about. He did not know who Takemi was. Among the things is a card and when he opens it to read it, Ayuko snatches it away from him and reads it. The card just says what I mentioned before, about Takemi supporting Ayuko and Dick and the scarfs. Reading that Ayuko dumps everything, leaving Boy behind (never to be seen ever again BTW) and runs after Takemi but she never catches her in time.

Why was Takemi so angry? She seemed ready to accept that Dick would never love her, she knew he was Ayuko’s boyfriend so why would seeing the two of them upset her so? Was she angry because she felt lied to by Ayuko in that She believed Ayuko was cheating on Dick because there was no ay that boy could have been Dick? From the present day we learn that Takemi didn’t know the truth then. That truth being that…

Dick never existed!

That’s right, Dick was just a figment of Ayuko’s imagination and only lived in her comic. Takemi did not know this all through out the young year together. Yep, those two were only a year together because I remember the teacher saying that they were third years and it was Ayuko’s first day. Takemi left to go to another city due to health problems before they even graduated.

Any way back to Dick, this means that all that pain of thinking we were bombarded by het was for nothing! Dick did not exists and Boy did not get to meet Ayuko ever again after that day when Takemi dropped in on them. They wasted a whole movie on Takemi losing her shit over an illusion and going so far as to make it a triangle by insinuating that Dick was Ayuko’s boyfriend and thus taking a whole lot of fun out of enjoying these two’s subtext! And get this – in the present, even though Takemi married, her husband died and she is sick with only a few days left for her. She dies towards the end as I mentioned.

So much potential, wasted! Not only did they waste a great relationship in Ayuko and Takemi but they had a great story concept which they fucked up real good in execution.

What a waste!

Oh well, at the very least I got a ship in Ayuko and Takemi and I can just close my eyes and come up with a better story for them than the one that they were dealt. Seriously, so much potential that got spoiled by Takemi going on and on about Dick, a person that did not even exist! Ayuko on the other hand had 98% more justification to be in love with Takemi than the Boy but alas, Japan has yet to embrace the rainbows, even though they have already had like, two gay marriages (Both of them were btn women too).

And did I mention that these two had no men in the end? Why not spin on that? Sure it was clear as day that Takemi was straight but she did a lot of things that could have easily swayed Ayuko. Since Boy, Ayuko was never mentioned to have any kind of guy and the way she dumped him to go after Takemi was just so juicy that I am scratching my head wondering how this could have gone so wrong! The two had a lot of good moments that one could just understand were Ayuko to fall for Takemi!

I would rather recommend a simple mv about Ayuko and Takemi on youtube than this movie! Actually maybe I will put something together quick to save people out there that want to ruin themselves by watching this movie!

*Adds project to list*.

What a waste!