#They Were 11

[windstir]

based off a conversation with my friends

[otakween]

They Were Eleven, Continued: Horizon of the East, Eternity of the West (Musical)

This is such a weird manga to adapt into a musical. Like...an obscure sequel of a shoujo scifi from the 1970s? Why not! I can only assume it's more popular than I'm aware of. Then again, a lot of weird stuff gets adapted in Japan and that's part of what I love about Japanese media.

I definitely enjoyed this more than the all male production I previously posted about which covered the first book. This had the benefit of being a musical (which I'm a sucker for) and for having better aesthetics. Also, I think the sound quality was better because I had a far easier time understanding the unsubtitled Japanese. They had the budget.

Notes:

Very interesting to see an all male production and an all female production back-to-back like this with the same characters. I think it might be easier to pull off gender bending with an all female cast. So many women voice male anime characters that my brain is more easily convinced that they're playing a dude lol. I'm new to watching stage plays like this though, so not a very big sample size with which to judge.

I know absolutely nothing about Morning Musume other than that they're a big idol group that's been around forever. I have many questions. (How often are they cycled out? How many girls are there?) My primary question is...does singing ability matter or do they just scout cute girls? Some of the singing in this production sounded kinda...flat. I don't want to be mean but yeah, I couldn't help but notice.

The less than stellar singing might not really be the girls' faults because the songs were also just kinda awkward. Not terrible, just not very memorable. Every song kinda sounded the same to me and there weren't any huge standouts. The choreography was also very cheesy and melodramatic, but that was fun haha.

The special effects and costuming were really good (hair too). I could more easily distinguish between the characters this time. As for SFX I was impressed by the scene where the paper that the bad guy's holding catches fire. I was like "woah! How'd they do that?" lol

This diva:

My eyes were zeroed in on them whenever they were on screen and I was convinced "is this some token male that they invited to be in the show?" I did some research and they're that convincing because they're a former Takarazuka actress. Anyways, they're hot (and I'm dumb) lol.

The dance moves really made me laugh at times. A lot of arm wiggling mostly. There was one part where one girl had to spin in a circle while singing and her voice wobbled up and down haha.

Felt really bad for the actress playing Frol because her wig kept getting stuck on her face 😬

(She's stronger than me because I would be wiping my face with my hand constantly).

I don't know what a stage scream should sound like but some of the screaming in this was a little overdone I think. Like, too realistic or something? Kinda cool but out of place.

I really wonder if the audience was full of more They Were 11 fans or Morning Musume fans. I was a little concerned that the latter would be lost but then I saw that they did a recap/explanation before the musical for the uninitiated. I think I'd still be confused if I hadn't read the manga though lol.

It's authentic to the manga but it's kinda funny how this story becomes the Tada & Frol show when its not even their story. Like, poor King, stop upstaging him!

Tada and Frol share a stage kiss at the finale. I was like "boo! Kiss for real you cowards!!" but I get it. These young girls should do what make them comfortable. (How young are they exactly? I don't even know...)

So yeah, that's a wrap on They Were 11! For now anyways. There's actually a live action film and a drama CD, but I couldn't find those anywhere. I feel like I've become more knowledgeable about anime history :)

[kamievakiss]

just finished with They Were 11 ! some pages I loved :0 I absolutely adore Frol, his decision at the end really went against his character tho imo and made me really sad !! fwnbaw

[lanaphernelia]

[jado-kun]

[hinamie]

spiraling

[egophiliac]

DOGS

IN

SPACE

[cthulhum]

does anyone realize how crazy it is to have the actor of a mostly headcanoned queer ship say the fans were never crazy and they were right all along after 10+ years of everyone just absolutely going nuts over the said queerbaited ship

[dailyheavymedic]

day 10

[wolfythewitch]

Do you think Jesus ever felt homesick. Do you think he missed his mom

[bogcreacher]

silly

[otakween]

They Were 11: Horizon of the East, Eternity of the West

This is the sequel manga to "They Were 11." Another one shot with even fewer chapters than the first (nice). It honestly felt like highly condensed epic. Moto Hagio packed so much into a tiny volume and I salute her. This seems ultra obscure to me in 2024, but it got its own stage adaptation, which shows it had staying power in Japan. Glad to be introduced onto this hidden classic :) (see, going through all of MAL blindly has its perks!)

Ch. 1

Damn that was one chonky chapter! Really good though. I think a true sci fi aficionado would laugh at me if I called this "high sci fi," but it was very lore heavy for me. And I love lore so I was riveted lol

I think this was a really smart direction to take for a sequel manga. The scope feels somewhat narrower since they're focusing on one of the eleven's planets. If this series was bigger I think I would have enjoyed other such spin-offs on other planets. Learning about space culture is fascinating haha.

This chapter was religion and politics heavy and they're intertwined on King's planet because it's theocratic. It's funny because most of the characters don't actually seem to believe in their own religion? They kept mentioning that the phenomenon that decides their ruler is probably just a natural occurrence rather than a sign from God. It seems like they play along when it benefits them...oh wait, that's just how it works in the real world LOL (jk, I know some people actually believe in their religions wholeheartedly IRL)

Lots of talk of progressives and conservatives which felt too real 😭 This fan translation was really good by the way! I can tell that some lines were localized really smoothly (like injecting slang and English expressions very naturally).

Funny seeing that Tada and Frol haven't changed much (well, not much time has passed). Frol's personality kinda reminds me of Miss Piggy or something. Very hot headed. I found them annoying in the OG manga but at this point, I see their appeal. They started this chapter as she/her and ended as he/him. It was really funny how much more popular they were as a boy. Accurate 😂

Why does Tada and Frol's pilot school just casually have a Goddess in their faculty? This series seems a little confused about how mystical it wants to be.

The thought of two planets wanting to go to war but both of them are too poor to do so is kinda a funny image (yet they found a way to go to war anyways I guess)

We get some Tada x Frol fluff and while Frol is in boy-mode no less :D <3

Frol declaring "we're here to pick up babes!" was really cute.

Ch. 2

The drama, the intrigue!! This chapter was mostly the gang on the run as fugitives but with also a big war-inciting incident. It honestly reminded me a lot of the current season of Arcane which I've also been watching as I read this. They both have this "point of no return" moment where it looks like there will never be peace between the two factions.

Although he's the "masculine one" I noticed that the mangaka puts Tada in some pretty girly looking outfits. It is a classic shoujo after all! Everyone looks ~fabulous~

Frol saying "YOLO" and crashing into the side of the academy building cracked me up.

I feel like the vibes of the Fourth being forced to poison the King feel very Shakespearean tragedy

We get another silly name with a woman named "Chu Chu" (how am I supposed to take her seriously? lol)

They nerfed Tada by making him instantly fall asleep after he uses his powers. I didn't really think they were OP enough to need nerfing, but okay...

Ch. 3

That was so majestic! Honestly, I didn't completely follow the (somewhat convoluted) plot but I don't think it mattered. All I really needed to know is who was bad, who was good, and that some corruption was goin down. Other than that, the vibes and the beautiful art did most of the heavy lifting.

This was kinda like the Fantastic Beasts sequels where the protagonists don't really have a reason to be a part of the plot, but they're there for the audience lol. Honestly, we could have probably just had this story just be all about King and his people, but I understand the desire to bridge the two stories with familiar faces.

Some of this gave me Game of Thrones vibes with the various kingdoms and politics. It takes place in space but felt smack in the middle of fantasy and sci-fi. Maybe because things were more planet-side this time around?

I really liked the design of the Priestess. She had an almost masculine look despite her really long hair. It was refreshing.

King marrying Chu Chu in the end was a little cheesy. Not everything needs to end with marriage -_- (well, it is shoujo...)

[megamindsupremacy]

So like, y'all know that popular Star Wars fic trope of Time Traveling Obi-Wan Kenobi where he dies and then wakes up in his 11ish year old body back in the Jedi Temple? You know how usually he wakes up, has a few minutes/hours of confusion, and then goes about trying to act like he was at age 11 while slowly fixing everything wrong with the Jedi Order? Personally I think he would not do that.

I think that Ben "Lived As A Wizard Hermit For Two Decades On Tattooine, Left, And Then Died Immediately" Kenobi would wake up as an eleven-year-old, have a panic attack, attack the nearest adult Jedi while accusing them of Doing Weird Sith Shit To His Brain, fucking flee, only then realize he has time traveled, steal someone's ship, go flying out of the temple to god knows where, continue panicking, crash into a random moon while distracted, nearly die, build a survival camp out of his broken ass ship and eat whatever bugs he can find, get kidnapped by pirates, overthrow said pirates, steal their ship, and then very calmly return to the Jedi temple like nothing happened.

Then and only then do I think he would start trying to act like a normal human person (while also dodging questions such as "what the fuck was that" and "where were you" and "is that a pirate's ship?"), except he'd be bad at it due to having lived as an Insane Wizard Desert Hermit for the past twenty years who has experienced enough trauma and time that he doesn't super well remember the details of his childhood, what with all of the wars and death and wars and such.

His acting convinces nobody, but nobody is sure what exactly to do about All Of That so he's for the most part left alone (after very vehemently refusing sptherapy), all the way up until he catches a glimpse of palpatine out of the corner of his eye and then its On Sight

[meo-eiru]

I CAN USE MY LAPTOP AGAIN

This is my response to the student relations who refused to answer my mails and calls through friday to monday only to just reply with "Go to the IT" and to the IT team who were nowhere to be found during work hours and caused me to waste half my day in campus:

[doctorsiren]

hiiiiii 🥰 can you stick Reigen in a dress? Thankssssss

yeah I can :)