Kill la Kill Episode 7 Notes

November 14th, 2013.

Discussing power structures, Hegelian observations, and assimilation versus replacement of old power structures.

Well, Mako the seedy gang-leader? Let’s see how much fun we can have this week :D

Shorter Asides:

• During dinner and while going to shower, the track playing was a slow speed and more melodical version of “Don’t Lose Your Way”. Gave the right nostalgic feel. The sound direction of this show is spectacular.
• Nanjing Lily, say what – Ryuko isn’t impressed? This is what happens when you lower your standards and just make any random group into a club. Poor Ryuko, having to do Satsuki’s job of weeding the weaklings for her.
• Well, that does seem like a fight club! Thankfully, it seems to be a free for all, so they’re clearing one another out for you, Ryuko. Oh, I spoke too soon.
• How fitting Mako’s weapons are all golden.
• The death of a dream is never a pretty sight.

Thoughts and Notes:

1) Fighting the System? Fighting Within the System!

1.1) Social Mobility Via Clubs:

1. “They’re all desperate.” “More Stars means a better life.” -“Man, this academy’s system is seriously messed up.” – Push people to an atmosphere of fear and necessity, then give them a way out, which is a gamble, and no matter how much you rise, there’s always someone ahead of you, and you always want more, needmore. Enter the western culture. I even designed a game about it.
2. Ha! She starts a club. I also love how one of the top 4 doesn’t approve of what Ryuko says, then Satsuki appears from on-high, with her (AMAZING!) theme song playing, and like the sun from above countermands her underlings. Ryuko chimed in a moment after I thought that, but she wasn’t as impressed.
3. Aww, seeing the Mankashokus get comfy in their new place is cool, and heart-warming, but what will happen if they lose? :3
4. You know what the other side of the coin is, right? Every club president Ryuko beats goes to the slums, if they’re not kicked entirely out of the city, which makes it worse than when they’ve been simple single-stars. Ryuko’s pre-emptive strike also means she goes after club-presidents who only accepted the outfits to get ahead and not to fight her. She’s right now operating and destroying within the system.

1.2) Those Who Stand at the Top:

1. Don’t be a hater, Ryuko, you’re just striving to the top like everyone else :3 I mean, doesn’t Satsuki look like a saint? How can you not like her? It’s like the sun is shining out of her a– snap!
2. Ha! And you call yourself an intelligence officer, Inumuta? I said as early as the episode began, that Satsuki is using Ryuko to do her dirty work for her, to clean out all the weaklings. Also, when the system fails, and it failed twice, both in defeating Ryuko, and in subverting Mako, you gotta rebuild it! Stronger than ever!
3. How can you resist that Satsuki smile, eh?

1.3) Self-Defeating Assimilation! Self-Disarming Struggle!

1. A-yup, due to acting within the system, Ryuko didn’t take the system down, the system took down Ryuko’s spirits ;_;
2. “Will they destroy this academy or be assimilated into it?” – Ah, the smell of fresh Hegelian philosophy in the morning! Every thesis spawns its antithesis, and then they end up in synthesis! Every regime spawns its end. But in this case, is Ryuko the antithesis to the school philosophy, or is the school philosophy going to assimilate and devour Ryuko? Of course, it’s quite possible that in the end Ryuko and Satsuki will somehow combine their philosophies and something new will arise, which will at some point spawn its own end. The only real question is whether the end is the end of the system, or just of those standing at the top? Because right now it seems that should Mako reach the top, she’ll just maintain the system, merely replacing the face on it.
3. Ha! Brilliant! BRILLIANT! The gun that appears in the first act shoots in the third! Now the pushed onto desperation, by her success, by fear of losing it, is Mako, who will fight her friend, to keep what she has, because she is desperate. How perfectly Orwellian, how fucking genius.
4. “Prosperity will lead to greed, and greed will ead to their eventual downfall!” – This takes me back to episode 1 – “You pigs in human clothing!” – This is exactly what she meant, they’re pigs, and have no dignity. “Truly, they are pigs in human clothing!” – I feel so smart, you guys (I take my notes as I watch, and it always feels neat to write a note only for the characters to say the exact same thing but moments later :>).
5. “Pigs, which must be tamed by force!” – And force is also Ryuko’s method, and she had been going along with the rank-game of school, so she is definitely operating within Satsuki’s system, a system for pigs. Or as we said last episode, “Those who only know one method, in the end will lose to it.” – And Sanageyama, who had some non-force moments in the end.

2) The Mankashokus – A Story of A Rise and Fall:

Hm, the slightly “sad” music as they moved to the new place high up on the hill, made me think of noir films, the music as people go rotten inside :3

And yes, now we’re juxtaposing Ryuko working hard, slaving, for a family that is no longer a family, for people who are no longer the people she liked.

Post Episode Notes:

Aside from the first episode, this is my favourite episode of KlK. We’ve had an awesome fight sequence, we’ve had a lot of philosophy thrown our way, we saw the way things work, in real life, in the show. We’ve seen that if you’re a pig in a human’s clothings, the Goku uniform, you’re still a pig.

Sometimes, you’re a pig because you try to walk on two legs and strive for freedom. Furthermore, the Goku uniforms enhance what is already there, and if that’s a pig, then you’re just going to become a mega-pig.

Gotta love Satsuki, and hot-damn, but the show’s writers surprised me with a couple of curve-balls, even though at least one of them was obvious in retrospect (Mako fighting Ryuko). I did see what the characters are thinking a few times in advance, and it feels good to know my hunches with this show aren’t too far off.

I wonder, maybe this whole show should be looked at via Hegel after it ends :3

Return to the Kill la Kill Episodic Notes page.