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DARLING in the FRANXX - it's literal

Mizu said:
What theories do you guys have as to why protag can't seem to pilot with anyone but the oni girl? Episode two had him seemingly work together with bluette for a few seconds, but it failed shortly after they got moving too. The attempt at recreating how he managed to pilot in ep1 with oni girl, via kissing his copilot, didn't end up doing anything either.

Kinda a shame, as I quite like bluette, but it seems her crush on protag shall be unrequited. Much like we'll never get an answer as to why oni girl slathers her food in honey.
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The show mentioned positive pulse and negative pulse. My guess is that these two needs to be balanced or at least within equal range. So it's likely Hiro is like an F1 engine and other pistils are more like normal sports cars, who just can't take in the energy fueled by said engine. Only 02 which regularly drain her partner and handle the energy provided by him.

Metaphorically, I consider Hiro's obsession with piloting, which the children are implied to have been raised for, to resemble how men in many Asian societies under pressure, either from families or peers, to have a relationship and get married. That's why 02, who Hiro are personally attract and want to pilot to prevent her from dying in the first attack rather than just want to pilot the FranXX like it is his duty to do so. Thus, it resembles him actually wants to have a relationship because of genuine attraction instead of being pressured into doing so.

On another topic, ED>OP. Fight me. I do like the sequence where Hiro get swallowed by Streliza's lion form and the mech transforms into its humanoid mode. Hope this does get featured in the show.
 
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"The MC-kun's reluctance to sleep with any other waifu then his Chosen One ruins his prospects as a solider and puts defense of humanity into question."

This is it. I've seen everything now. We have reached the pinnacle of human civilization; from here on out we can only go down. If tomorrow portals to Warp open all over Earth and Chaos Gods personally come on over to eat our souls, I will die content, knowing that I have already won.

Also, this was the most innuendo-laden 24 minutes I ever watched :V

Hykal94 said:
The first cour of the series will end with 02 being the pilot and Hiro accepting his new pegging fetish.
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That's the joke, but looking at symbolism and theories so far, I'm convinced this will be legit ending, or at least major part of it.

If you think about it, the Franxx system seems to be arranged in a very rigid familial kind of way, with the girl or rather, Bride being subservient interface, and the boy Groom provides her with energy, and makes all the decisions. Without consent of the would-be Bride you can't technically pilot a Franxx, but it's pretty clear that despite that it's the male who's expected to make decisions, much like in traditionalist marriage.

It only makes sense for Oni' and Hiro's relation to be reversed, with him being overeager subservient servant boy who feeds her lust for ZA BEASTO mode, his role being basically turned into a battery.
 
I mean, we never saw how they did it in Strelezia, so it is entirely possible that pictured below is in fact how things went down in the cockpit.
 
Sightedjt said:
I mean, we never saw how they did it in Strelezia, so it is entirely possible that pictured below is in fact how things went down in the cockpit.
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Yep that's what I'm going with. Partially because if they're going to use piloting and the pairs system as a way to explore relationships and sex between a bunch of teenagers without it turning into porn, then realizing that the traditional, idealized version of how sex and relationships work isn't what the real thing is like and that everyone's dynamic is a little different. I'm thinking that the reason why 02 doesn't outright wreck Hiro is because while there is lust and physical attraction there, there's also the fact that he just wants to pilot no matter what and he's willing to work with 02 when she wants to take the lead.

Or it could be that 02 keeps finding new Darlings that interest her and winds up killing them when the novelty wears off and communication breaks down.
 
Watched an episode, lost interest due to a number of reasons.

Seems really derivative, among other issues. And it's like a fight between a second year literature student and a hentai artist, both vying for creative control from moment to moment.

But, then, I saw images of episode two where the controls are literally handlebars on underaged girl asses and decided I'd really made the right choice dropping this. So, clearly, the hentai artist won out.

But yeah, it's Trigger trying to do themes, so...



Hopefully it doesn't do the Kill la Kill thing and have creepy sexualized male gaze going on during rape scenes. This is Trigger, so, I have no real faith in them putting themes above fanservice ever, or anything about fanservice.

I mean, you can have themes about the interactions between men and women and try to be subversive about norms in your culture, and that can include old man groping female subordinates and not thinking they'd done anything wrong by doing so, but when you do that and lovingly animate the ass getting grabbed and just do a standard she so frigid haha joke, you undermine what you're supposedly trying to do because you lack the necessary self awareness and self control.

Edit: For actually using sometimes excessive fanservice in a genuinely interesting way, try the Bakemonogatari series. It's actually kind of amazing as a whole what it did in terms of characterization as viewpoint characters changed and developed and how that actually had major shifts in where the camera was.

Even character design shifted in that to actually reflect characterizing of the viewpoint character. I mean, it made changes to bust sizes feel like a thoughtful touch. Except for nisemonogatari, that one was just... yeah, wish it never happened.
 
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Mizu said:
What theories do you guys have as to why protag can't seem to pilot with anyone but the oni girl? Episode two had him seemingly work together with bluette for a few seconds, but it failed shortly after they got moving too. The attempt at recreating how he managed to pilot in ep1 with oni girl, via kissing his copilot, didn't end up doing anything either.
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It's because in the middle of metaphor sex with Ichigo he goes "THIS IS WHAT IT FELT LIKE WITH 002"

Of course she's going to get turned off if you talk about another girl in the middle of your alone time together. You're constantly trying to compare her to someone else; no one wants to be a replacement for somebody else. Same reason behind why when Goro starts talking about piloting other girls Miku lets the robo drop to the ground.

(hidoi)

Dunno about Naomi yet, we don't know enough about their relationship yet. But since she survived episode 1, there's probably some reason behind it that we're going to explore eventually.
 
Yeah...Hiro seems to be more concerned with piloting than who he pilots with and sees piloting as being the only thing that gives him any value as a person. Sure with 02 there's the whole thing with her being injured in the first fight, but its more that she's the first person who's willing to actually let him pilot with them after it was assumed that he couldn't for so long.

I'm okay with some fanservice, and find the whole lewd-powered robot thing to be an interesting way of exploring intimate relationships between characters. But at the same time this could either be an interesting deconstruction of teenage romance via a mecha anime...or it could devolve into turbo fanservice trainwreck mode.

I guess my only other criticism is that the designs are a little too anthropomorphic for my taste, I think it might just be the eyes and more organic look. I mean Gurren Lagann had a mouth and facial expressions but it still looked mechanical.
 
Honestly, I just turned off KLK when the first episode ended. My contrarian nature was already in full swing when I started watching it, the nonsensical premise made me go 'what' instead of enjoying the action, and the fanservice killed what interest was left.

I'm thinking I should give it another go since I have free time, but with my backlog full already...
 
Agreed, KLK is the anime that got me back into watching anime and the ending moved me to tears. I cherish things that can still do that to me in this steadily more nihilistic and apathetic world
 
MagicianX26 said:
I'm thinking I should give it another go since I have free time, but with my backlog full already...
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Kill La Kill is a very mixed mileage show. If you like it, then you like it well enough to accept the over the top fanservice and inanity as creative decisions, perhaps taken too far, but not detracting from the show. If you don't, then all the fanservice and inanity just pile up and drag the whole thing down even harder.
 
Triggerhappy said:
Nope. Even Vandread wasn't this Trashy.
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Yeah, I don't know about that. While I don't really want to get into a fight over which very extremely transparent giant robot piloting as sex metaphor is the most full on, Vandread's crotch contact thing was on full display in episodes. Comparatively, after the initial start-up thing, all the interior cockpit shots in Darlifra very deliberately kept only the boys in the frame, so if you didn't know how it was set up you'd think it was a regular cockpit.

Of course, we know how it's set up and I found myself saying 'What?' out loud over and over again. Like, yo, they're literally being objectified, becoming the main console (???) and that's big hurdle to get over. But very shortly afterwards the show establishes that Ichigo is actually in charge of the whole group, and while I had premonitions of 'driving her ass' style fanservice, as mentioned the camera doesn't put the girl's body in the frame unless she's an active participant in the scene. So it's not actually being used to generate fanservice, despite it being pure fanservice in concept. In a way this actually makes it seem even weirder than it already is.

Better actually go somewhere with it, Nishigori ...

Though in that regard, the conflict in this episode spun almost entirely out of Zorome's fragile masculinity. He's constantly trying to self-actualise by reference to his prowess (while essentially telling us that he'd be a selfish boyfriend), and in that respect he's essentially one of those guys that sees sexual conquest as an essential feature of 'being a man'. He also pushes that extremely old fashioned view of sex as being something that a man does to a woman - he rejects Hiro's experience of piloting in the first episode because Zero Two was the one who took the lead. As he's the antagonist of the episode, he's pretty clearly a cautionary tale.

But the conflict in the episode actually escalates because Hiro is himself pretty fragile about his masculinity, too. Compare and contrast Goro.
 
Ford Prefect said:
Yeah, I don't know about that. While I don't really want to get into a fight over which very extremely transparent giant robot piloting as sex metaphor is the most full on, Vandread's crotch contact thing was on full display in episodes. Comparatively, after the initial start-up thing, all the interior cockpit shots in Darlifra very deliberately kept only the boys in the frame, so if you didn't know how it was set up you'd think it was a regular cockpit.
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Fair enough. Vandread's design is less trashy. But it's framing is trashier.

Darlings design is way trashier. We'll see if it's framing stays less trashy.
 
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What I'm a bit confused by is how innocent are these kids? They don't know what a kiss is, yet they're are some signs to indicate they are aware of the, implications of their partnership, like when the Twintailed girl chides Zorome for 'hitting on other girls'.

Are they in the dark and unaware of what these terms used to mean, or do they know that sex makes babies but just don't know what a kiss is?

Also, I know the whole asspiloting thing is probably taking up all the discussion but I just love the whole parasites thing. In the dark, grim future of whenever the fuck this is, you have to fight and die in the last generation's wars before they'll even consider you a mere parasite.
 
tankdrop24 said:
What I'm a bit confused by is how innocent are these kids? They don't know what a kiss is, yet they're are some signs to indicate they are aware of the, implications of their partnership, like when the Twintailed girl chides Zorome for 'hitting on other girls'.
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They're also confused by the word 'darling' - when Zero Two uses it you can hear them muttering about it in the background. Miku later teases Ichigo by making reference to 'darling' but I took that to be reference to how Ichigo has been supplanted as Hiro's partner. I think it's the same thing with Zorome - he 'flirts' with other women within the context of boys and girls forming FRANXX pilot pairs.

As a note, Ichigo and Goro get referred to as a 'double digit elites' (and Hiro is known to have been a former elite). Which, of course, makes Zero Two (Code:002) stand out ... but also their other caretaker, Hachi. By inference he must have been Code:008 at some point.
 
Oh, something I remembered now that initial surprise of all the innuendo's worn off: I believe that there was mention of 'no aging' in regards to Hiro piloting with 02.

Does that mean that her really injured partner that arrived with 02 is much younger than he appeared?

Edit: Maybe the whole 'no one survives more than 3 sorties with her' doesn't mean that they die from combat injuries, but have all their life drained.
 
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The interview with the seiyuu is quite something.

Q: Let's talk about the characters. What kind of person is Hiro?

Uemura: A serious boy who gives off the strong impression that he, more than anyone else, wants to ride the Franxx. Once described as a prodigy, he has high expectations [placed upon him], but he ended up as a dropout.

In this world, it is taught that riding the Franxx means everything. He's mentally deteriorating, increasingly so, and the start point of the story has him flunking out. He's a kid who has a lot of thoughts going on inside him.

At this point, he meets Zero Two. To him, Zero Two is his saviour and I think he believes the Franxx will take them 'somewhere', which is where you see his childlike nature coming out. Like a typical boy, Hiro shouts 'I'll definitely ride that robot!'
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Q: How about Zero Two?

Her facial expressions are endless – as a girl with a wounded heart and a painful past, her mindset changes upon meeting Hiro, and her mood swings are pretty intense which makes her a pleasure to play. Her personality also changes when she rides the Franxx; she becomes more masculine than Hiro so that kind of makes Hiro more like a heroine really (laughs).
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Q: As we approach the start of the series, tell us what we should look forward to from this pair.

Uemura: I think the scene of their first encounter leaves a big impression. Hiro has a lot of monologues, and you can hear his true feelings creeping into them as he gets twisted around Zero Two's little finger – it's easy to empathize with him though.

It's also fun to see how cool Zero Two is as she drags Hiro along with her, as well as how he tends to be in a daze when he's being manipulated, but I do think you should first look forward to seeing how they meet.

Tomatsu: Probably their master-servant relationship that's clear from the start (laughs); the first episode is one that lays the groundwork as everything moves at Zero Two's pace – I'd like for you to observe the innocent aspects of Zero Two.
...
Uemura: Director Nishigori mentioned that, didn't he? Hiro being shaken up by Zero Two all the time, yet he can't help but be curious about Zero Two's every move, casting doubt on everything [she does]. Quite a lot of those situations will crop up.

Tomatsu: She's got Hiro wrapped around her little finger, hasn't she~? Zero Two goes and does whatever she wants to, and Hiro has to be the one who slams the brakes. When they're not in battle, she's got a side to her that's rather catlike [sly] and innocent...
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And the doujins are already writing themselves now.

Sources for more interview with the cast here: Seiyuu+
 
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