Sunday 1 August 2004

Pic of the day: "You know, you can come a little closer. We are married after all." "I should have paid more attention in health class."

Onegai teacher

I had not yet begun downloading anime regularly when the series Onegai Teacher (please teacher) was aired. I came just in time to watch the sequel, Onegai Twins, which I have written about before. (In a list of anime where familiarity is imposed on the main character by circumstance.) I believe I have also mentioned that Onegai Twins was one of the inspirations for last years NaNoWriMo, although mostly in the physical design of some of the main characters.

Well, I've got my hands on the manga (comic book) version of Onegai Teacher. I have to say that, apart from the confusing last chapter, I preferred Teacher. Unless they padded the anime, this had much less fanservice (nudity or near-nudity that has no necessary function in the storytelling). The story is for the most part compact and fast-moving; in fact, I think it could benefit from the slowing down that usually happens with an anime compared to the original manga. There were times when I had problems understanding what happened, because so little space was dedicated to an event.

***

But Onegai Teacher is also an anime about a boy who gets familiarity thrust on him. In his case, marriage. Kei Kusanagi likes to watch the sky, and one night he sees an UFO. He runs to the place it went down, and sees a mysterious woman. The next day she shows up at school as their new teacher. She also had seen him, and decides to talk it over, explaining why she has come to Earth (she is a reporter and half human by birth). While they talk in an empty room, the door is locked, and they are found far into the night by a relative of Kei and the school's principal. To avoid the teacher being expelled and worse, they pretend to be married. The boy is legally old enough, because an illness had him in a coma for three years.

The result is that Kei moves in with his half-alien teacher, and most of the story takes place after this. They are playing a double game: Officially they are married, but they don't let the other students know. Presumably in order to not destroy Kei's romantic prospects for later when Mizuho has returned to the stars. However, as time passes, they develops real feelings for each other, even though they don't always agree on all things. What will they do now?

***

In a way, I "envy" Kei. (Not really, but as in "that would be kinda cool".) Being able to marry someone spontaneously, with the understanding that it need not be consummated, and that you are certainly not expected to be everything for the other and ensure their happiness in all ways. Sounds like something I could have done. I hate and detest the current idea of marriage as an obligation to be god to the other person. I agree with a writer in Psychology Today: "Marriage is not meant to make you happy, it is meant to make you married."

In Asia, arranged marriages have been common until lately. Perhaps that is why so many anime feature boys who suddenly find themselves living with someone of the opposite sex without any long and arduous process of acquisition. Although from what I have gleaned, to the degree that arranged marriages still happen, the woman is usually the one with the least say in the matter. Even then, both bride and groom are supposed to give consent, even though they may not feel fully responsible for the decision and may not have chosen exactly that person if they had only their own convenience to think of and not the good of the greater family.

For the most part, however, I think the popularity of this kind of anime is for the same reason that I like it. It is a nice daydream about having a family of your own without having to walk the long and torturous path that leads there. After all, Otaku (anime fans) are notoriously socially inept. As a Japanese newspaper quite seriously pointed out, Otaku don't know what to do with real girls so they prefer imaginary ones. I guess there is something in that. But perhaps having a good teacher helps. ^^