How To Watch Shows That Make No Sense: FLCL and Literary Theory
By Soham Dey
(This article was written while listening to the FLCL soundtrack album by The Pillows. I highly recommend that you read it while doing the same)
Confusing anime with absurd premises and plots that barely make sense that somehow still manage to be cool as fuck is basically a sub-genre of its own — a sub-genre that hosts some of the hottest and most long running debates in the anime community. From Sarazanmai and Sonny Boy in recent memory to plot-fuckery classics like Neon Genesis Evangelion and Mawaru Penguindrum, every generation has had their fair share of confusing anime that fans try desperately to squeeze meaning out of. Among these, one of the most popular and often discussed anime with a name as weird as its plot is FLCL, or Fooly Cooly, or Furi Kuri.
Released as an OVA in Japan in 2000 and in 2003 on Adult Swim in the US, FLCL still remains a widely known, acclaimed and discussed anime. Produced by Studio Gainax and Production I.G, FLCL follows a 12 year old boy Naota as his life is turned upside down by a mysterious, scooter riding, bass guitar wielding, possibly alien girl named Haruka.
This show didn’t make sense. It really really really didn’t make sense. It began with a pink haired alien girl and a 12 year old horny boy popping boners from his forehead and pulling guitars out of it and ended with a massive mecha battle between a giant cowboy and a mech suit that is a reincarnation of the alien’s ex and — yeah, I think you get the idea. Still I finished the show in one sitting. Still, it gave me goosebumps, got me excited, sad, nostalgic and happy all at the same time. Still, it’s considered one of the best coming of age anime to ever come out, supposedly containing intricate metaphors and complex themes.
When I opened MyAnimeList to mark FLCL as completed and rate it my finger wavered. I honestly didn’t know what to feel about this show. Was I supposed to watch fifteen YouTube theory videos before I understood the show? Was I not supposed to understand it at all? For a long time, I had no answers. But help often comes from unexpected places — in my case it came from literary and queer theorist Eve Kovosky Sedgwick, an author of one of the many extremely confusing readings I had to do for my extremely confusing Introduction to Literary Theory course.
My answer on how to watch shows like FLCL comes from Sedgwick’s 2002 essay titled “Paranoid Reading and Reparative Reading, Or, You’re so Paranoid You probably Think this Essay Is about You”. ‘Paranoid Reading’ is essentially reading a text, or consuming any form of media from tweets to movies, from a position of suspicion — you have a paranoid assumption about the text in mind. Essentially it is reading from a ‘defensive’ position, where you are constantly searching a work for clues that ‘expose’ and affirm this assumption. Twitter is a great example of paranoid reading; the twitter mob that reads every tweet in order to find something ‘cancellable’ in it is paranoid.
I feel like a lot of anime like FLCL, that have the stamp of ‘deep’ on them, are watched paranoically. Each scene, and each character is analyzed and searched for some sort of deeper meaning; people will literally mansplain to you why Shinji from Evangelion wanking over Asuka’s comatose body is a literary masterstroke. A show like FLCL, which is labeled as a ‘classic’, is definitely watched ‘defensively’; people either watch it to find deeper meanings and metaphors in order to defend its status as a masterpiece or people watch it in order to prove how nonsensical and unenjoyable the show is, to debunk its status. While I think both these approaches are perfectly good ways to watch and enjoy a show (I love my over-analytical viewings too and besides not once in her essay does Sedgwick say paranoid reading is bad, she simply emphasizes that it is perhaps not the only way) this was not how I wanted to treat FLCL. I didn’t think it was a literary masterpiece; neither did I feel like the show was overly pretentious and utter garbage. I needed a third way, which Sedgwick provides in her essay — ‘Reparative Reading’.
While paranoid reading comes from a place of negativity and suspicion, reparative reading comes from positivity and love. Rather than simply ‘avoiding pain’, avoiding surprises and always forcing a text to fit your own beliefs, reparative reading focuses on ‘seeking pleasure’, approaching a text without expectations and with an open mind, ready to be surprised. Reparative reading focuses on affect, or feelings, rather than knowledge like paranoid reading. Focusing on what you feel, rather than what the show means is a different, reparative way of watching such ‘confusing’ shows. I decided I wanted to treat FLCL reparatively.
Okay so I’m just going to gush a little about FLCL and the things it made me feel now. While it may not have made much sense, not once in it’s 6 episode run was FLCL boring. It always managed to make me feel something. Perhaps many of the narrative metaphors went over my head, but I still managed to feel and understand the themes of growing up that the show was trying to convey, through its art, music and dialogue. The show looks and sounds really good and really nostalgic. The animation is fast paced and hyper yet the soft colors bring such a sense of nostalgia to the show. The soundtrack is the same — the entire show is scored by rock bangers that include both fast paced riffy songs as well as sweet nostalgic ballads. FLCL manages to be funny, action packed, absurd, poignant, bittersweet all at the same time while juggling a plot that seems like it was created to be as confusing and nonsensical as possible, and honestly, that’s what makes the show so impressive and memorable for me.
To conclude, it’s okay if you don’t understand the literary meaning behind a pink alien girl whacking someone with a bass guitar and it’s okay if you don’t want to watch theory after theory to enjoy it. Not everything needs to be decoded and watched with paranoia that you’re missing out on something — especially not anime. So the next time you watch a show that makes no sense but is still entertaining, don’t sweat it! Just sit back, enjoy the affect and remember that a very famous literary theorist has got your back.
