META (OF THE GOLDEN WITCH)

TONY T. - Writer

Originally published in Vol. 57 Issue 6 - Underwater

Without love, it cannot be seen.

While I try to avoid it, I generally have a tendency to be cynical towards most things.  Within the realm of otaku media, for instance, I think that there’s a far too prevalent inclination for works that work within the meta of storytelling, which attempt to be narratives in addition to trying to say something about the nature of fiction.  It goes beyond the overt.  I would argue that the trend of isekai alongside the trend of magical high schools which preceded it fit into this framework rather snugly.  With most of these shows following the same basic mold, the one or two slight deviations from that structure are often marketed as what makes that specific entry somehow uniquely subversive or impactful.  To me, these distinctions in writing and marketing are generally not very impactful regarding the actual content, and more so serve as superficial tools to distract the audience from realizing they have seen more or less the same thing they’ve seen fifty thousand times before.  A show like Shield Hero stood out to audiences for having a dark tone, but aside from that slight tonal shift, not much of the series was actually impactfully different from other isekai contemporaries.  To clarify, I’m not decrying the abundance of repetition.  It’s true that most of what I’m talking about suffers due to being repetitive of existing media.  However, you could pretty much say that about most narratives that have ever existed.  The classic example illustrating this would be the hero’s journey, which has been repeated numerous times to great success.  What I’m somewhat lamenting is, ironically, the overabundance of blatantly obvious cynicism in these works.

This isn’t to say that I dislike these types of series.  I’d like to think I’m not so cynical as to outright denounce the majority of anime.  Meta is not something I hate completely, although I do think the discourse around it is often marred by uninteresting discussions that add little.  Rather, I think metatextual elements, parts of a series that touch upon the viewer’s understanding of that series’ place within a greater cultural landscape, are generally only something that can work if stumbled upon more naturally.  The classic example: Neon Genesis Evangelion.  Evangelion is lauded for its approach to storytelling, both in its realistic characters and in how it makes audiences consider its narrative in a far larger way beyond the scope of a two-cour television show and follow up movie.  Considering its influence, it’s notable that the original Evangelion series, along with The End of Evangelion run for only around 12-13 hours or so in total.  Where Evangelion is impactful is in how its shift to these more introspective metatextual elements is rather gradual - the show slowly moves to those aspects around the middle mark and only really gets more involved with them towards the final two episodes and the second half of End of Evangelion.  The reason why Evangelion’s usage of these ideas is relevant comes down to a certain level of subtlety.  I highly doubt Anno Hideaki approached the series with the grand existential statement that the series ultimately has become remembered for.  Said statement naturally grew with the series’ production and slowly became utilized as the series progressed.

Contrasting Evangelion to the Japanese light novel scene really highlights why I find the former to be impactful.  The majority of Japanese light novels are targeted towards the same young adult demographic which made novels like Twilight popular in the West.  As such, those that utilize meta aspects do so as an express concern of their construction given the implied need for bluntness to appeal to that audience.  Whether or not it’s intended, there’s a sense I get that many light novel authors, as well as authors of adjacent media like visual novels, set out to be meta on purpose with the means of reaching that point as more of an afterthought.  For example, while I actually quite enjoy No Game No Life, there are points where the story structure seems to have taken for granted that the audience is already well aware of the tropes surrounding isekai and otaku culture as a whole.  To clarify, I’m speaking on the fundamental structure of the story - while referential elements are also a topic I have both positive and negative opinions on, this article is already poorly structured enough and I’ve already written multiple Gintama articles before.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with the No Game No Life school of directly approaching meta as it pertains to the strength of the narrative, though I do think that it limits the scope of the audience a work can reach as only people familiar with isekai and otaku media will understand.  Additionally, while a tongue in cheek tone can be useful, I find that sort of approach to meta to be detracting from its impact.  In some ways, a complete dive into metatextual thought can somewhat distract from the point of the work itself, drawing attention away from the main story in favor of a somewhat unnecessary tangent.  When Urusei Yatsura: Beautiful Dreamer makes the viewers ponder the meaning of its existence as a piece of media, it feels meaningful because it is but one portion of that film’s overall message (which I’ve written about multiple times before).  It’s gradual, with the feeling that the self-referential comments within the film were arrived at after great consideration from the staff.  There’s a natural feeling to the meta as it doesn’t feel like it was the express intention from the start, but rather something that was arrived at by nature of Oshii Mamoru thinking deeply on Urusei Yatsura over the course of the film’s production (again read my articles on it).  I like meta as the side dish, rather than the main course.

On that note, I think the José Cuevas article on Shokugeki no Soma is probably one of the Konshuu articles I have the most mixed thoughts on.  You can clearly see my attempts at sneaking in implications that the article is a hyperbolized version of what could be someone’s actual opinion.  This was perhaps a good way to introduce José Cuevas, as an exaggerated character serving as both a parody of what I considered to be the overly reductive mainstream discourse on animation, whilst including parts of my bad writing tendencies, featuring numerous references and tangents that go nowhere.  There’s a sense of defensiveness towards the actual opinion expressed.  You can probably tell in that article that the thoughts towards Shokugeki no Soma were indeed things that the person behind José Cuevas actually believed, hidden behind a veil of supposed irony and mockery.  As a whole, there’s many things in that article that could have been improved, yet there’s also things that I think were fun and added to the joke of that persona.  Not to say that the writing in any of these articles is anything even close to passable in a serious sense especially given how they largely consist of rambling pontification with about a million different theses flying around, but that article was fun to write.  Putting yourself into the shoes of a different person with somewhat divergent sensibilities is something that is extremely valuable in providing perspective.

This brings me to Umineko no Naku Koro ni, which I’ve written about before, though not in much depth.  In many ways, its approach to meta elements was the exact thing I was looking for, even as someone that generally dislikes the medium of visual novels.  While the entire story is, in a sense, one big statement on the value of narrative and how fiction can be in many ways powerful, Umineko’s way of approaching meta serves not to devalue the existing story but to enhance it.  Initially, the Ushiromiya family and their associates seem like caricatures in the first viewing of the Rokkenjima incident.  The adults are almost entirely out for their own self gain, lusting after the great fortune of the family patriarch, whereas the cousins are moralistic.  That layer of the story, focusing on Ushiromiya Battler and the events of October 4-5, 1986, becomes much more complex and detailed when Battler and Beatrice analyze the various pieces in play.  They develop better understandings of the different individuals with their varying intentions by viewing the event from different angles.  There’s the sub narrative of Ushiromiya Eva and her pride in the family name.  The abusive dynamic between Ushiromiya Rosa and her daughter Maria is simultaneously disturbing yet fascinating with overlain emotions of love and hatred.  Almost every character has a layer to them beyond what may be initially observed.

The further layer of Ushiromiya Ange looking at the events of 1986 in hindsight from 1998 adds more to this.  Even Ushiromiya Kinzo gets somewhat humanized as an individual who was never allowed to live in the way he wished, someone who has done terrible things and completely faults himself for them.  The various witch figures exist to facilitate this dynamic, with even Ange, a witch in her own right, having her emotions and motivations analyzed in a similar fashion from the perspective of the witches.  The last layer, that of Kotobuki Yukari considering her past as Ange ties all of this together, as the dynamics between Ange and the Hachijos in the later portions of Umineko expand beyond simply presenting a story to presenting every story imaginable.  The meta of Umineko is a sort of tool that the author utilizes to expand his story into something that is so much more.  And even then, after Umineko has presented every level of its meta possible, it returns to resolve the fundamental mystery at its core, the identity, or rather identities of the elusive Golden Witch.  Whether it’s Beatrice, Lion, Shannon, Kanon, or someone else, Umineko’s meta provides an insight into how the disparate ways a person may view themselves can be profoundly important.

There’s a sense of detachment that I get when media gets too metatextual, almost as if the creator is attempting to signal that they are beyond what they are making.  In contrast, Umineko manages to portray almost everything with some level of pathos with interesting motivations and relationships.  Meta is integral to the story, yet the main point of Umineko is not its meta, but rather the sympathy and empathy that meta allows the audience to experience.  Umineko thrives so much because there’s always a greater point to why the story’s introspection - meta isn’t just used to make some half baked self-celebratory statement about why this story is greater than all others it is grouped with.  Rather, Umineko proves that it is great by using its meta to enhance the story and to highlight the importance of storytelling in general.  Meta is far too often abused in modern media with no greater message behind it.  Just look at this article’s tangents.  In spite of this, Umineko would not have nearly the same impact had it not used meta to enhance the viewer’s understanding of the various universes that the author creates, all in service of a greater moral message containing great pathos.  Without meta, Umineko’s brilliance cannot be seen.