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Fave parallels from season 1 to 2

Ok, so I came to Japan to watch Utsukushii Kare Eternal and I saw it today. I don't speak Japanese and there weren't any subtitles but I wanna recap what I remembered in case other interfans want to know. I also haven’t read the novels so I only know seasons 1 and 2 of the story.

Spoilers very much ahead.

The opening scene is like the last scene of S1 where HiraKiyo are naked with a fuckton of tulle. But way more tulle in the movie than season 1. They're both also literally blanketed by the tulle. They are also laying around Hira's camera, and Kiyoi's necklace, and the duck. Hira goes to kiss Kiyoi and Hira is woken up from his dream and he's at work. Hira and Kiyoi are both at work and they are talking to the mentor and Anna about the other and it's a lot of intercutting scenes of them in the present both reminiscing and flashing back to season 1. No scenes from s2 are in the movie as I immediate recall. A few s2 scenes are redone like Hira saying "Kiyoi (sans kun)" near the other fans but it's different than the s2 version.

The HiraKiyo A plot as I think I understand it - Domestic happy life. Hira’s sister is moving into the house so HiraKiyo look for an apartment together. (I'm not 100% on if she's moving in but she shows up and she and Hira have a talk and then soon thereafter HiraKiyo are looking for an apartment together. HiraKiyo take a bath together and ngl it’s really hot. Kiyoi does his shy look away thing after Hira kisses his hand but Hira keeps kissing his hands and shoulders. Kiyoi is turned away from Hira and facing a mirror and Hira keeps kissing and moving up on him and the camera gets in close as Hira is kissing Kiyoi all over. The camera moves away to the other side of the tub while they smash and you hear Kiyoi moaning Hira’s name. And Captain Duck is swept out of the tub but the fucking lmao. I think Hira feels guilty about losing the house so he cooks a lot of food (part of this scene was the bonus scene at the end of the Utsukare Season 1 special edit version). Kiyoi does get Hira to feed him shrimp croquettes. Kiyoi hugs Hira from behind while Hira is cooking. The under the blue cover scene has Hira mounting and starting to go to town on Kiyoi but he stops himself and walks out dejectedly.

B plot is their jobs. Hira’s mentor takes some photos of Anna and later Kiyoi. Hira is an assistant for the Anna photo shoot (which honestly was fucking amazing. It was literally the expression “make love to the camera” it was in waterfall/pond and it was so hot and erotic and fun. Didn’t expect it but it was cool.) Hira doesn’t show up on the day Hira’s mentor shoots Kiyoi and Kiyoi is looking for him. Kiyoi continues to work with Anna but Anna gets pap’d with her secret bf and it seems like Anna having a secret bf is a big fucking deal. The fans outside the Anna Kiyoi set find out via twitter or something and then Anna cries alone a lot and the Kiyoi agency staff look very concerned and sad. Kiyoi and agent/manager/not as flamboyantly dressed one go secretly to Anna’s hotel and they have a talk. Then Kiyoi gets pap’d leaving Anna’s hotel so some people were speculating Anna and Kiyoi were together. Kiyoi is also facing some reprecussions from this speculation and he's super sad in his office perched on a windowsill reading twitter comments and posts about himself and Hira texts him and Kiyoi cries. Like the engine of the movie is the b plot after Anna gets pap'd with her secret dude and then people thinking she and Kiyoi are together.

That leads to the C plot/act 3 Hira’s stalker friend kidnaps Kiyoi. But for some reason he calls Hira to tell Hira he's kidnapped Kiyoi. (there was a lot of villanous monologuing while Kiyoi was bound and then the guy pushes him down and also kicks Kiyoi a few times before making the call. Hira goes full dark crazy Kira mode and shows up and beats the shit out of the dude. Kiyoi is pretty damseled in this scene and mostly just screams for Hira to stop and then Hira flips into cute "I live to serve you" mode and gets Kiyoi out of those ridiculously loose ribbons. Then the stalker dude is getting up and Hira is flipping back and forth really fast between Kira and Hira modes and ends up having to shove Kiyoi down and tells him to run while Hira and stalker dude fight. And Kira becomes like the terminator and is following the other stalker dude and beating him down but then he flips back into Hira and is walking back to Kiyoi while cutely saying Kiyoi over and over and other dude attacks Hira from behind and then stabs Hira in the stomach. Then Hira hallucinates Kiyoi coming to hug him (trailer scene) and it’s cut between that hallucination and Kiyoi literally screaming and crying cuz Hira is dying and then fade to black.

End phase/finale - Hira survives lol. Hira and Kiyoi help Anna out of her situation by having Hira’s mentor do a photo shoot with this random j-pop idol looking guy who ends up being Anna’s secret boo thing. Cougar fr. Then the end scene is a wedding themed photo shoot for Anna and idol guy. Then they ask Kiyoi to join them. Then mentor guy tells Hira to shoot Kiyoi and at first Hira can’t but then Kiyoi tells/commands Hira in Kiyoi's Dom voice and then Hira does and then they have a long photo shooting sequence and that’s where Kiyoi shows off his body. Hira graduates and he and Koyama (who is barely in the movie) have a "I'll see you around" kind of goodbye and then Hira goes to the riverside where Kiyoi is, a cherry blossom petal falls on Kiyoi and he picks it off like s1e1 and Hira is taking pictures of him and Kiyoi calls Hira stalker and they chat and then Hira leads them back to the school. And Hira confesses/declares/has a lengthy monologue at Kiyoi - he definitely tells Kiyoi directly that he likes him, while Kiyoi is like crying but smiling and facing Hira's confession directly. And then they’re about to kiss (all of their mouth to mouth kisses are interrupted or offscreen) and the teacher from season 1 is there at the school (for some reason at this unspecified date and time) and he is chastising them and then chasing them and Hira leads Kiyoi through a long series of slow-mo runs through the school while they switch/flashback into their old wardrobes - their full formal blue uniforms and their causal white/beige school clothes. And then they end up outside and have another water hose fight and that transitions into then hooking up at home? mouth kissing for the only time in the movie in a lot of tulle again. The ending sequence is their most high heat scene. Hira is kissing Kiyoi's chest a lot and a lot of mouth and neck kisses.

other blurbs

all Hira narration

No Kiyoi narration but Kiyoi did have a handful of scenes without Hira

Hira had a lot of scenes with him at work with his mentor and the other guy

Hira and Kiyoi I think re-have their season 2 fight about Hira thinking himself more as a fan than a boyfriend. Hira sleeps on the roof of his work building and then cooks ramen for mentor guy.

I think mentor guy might have had a thing for Anna and was maybe sad she has a boo thang and maybe Hira tells mentor he's dating Kiyoi so Kiyoi for sure isn't dating Anna.

I don't know if Kiyoi or Hira told other stalker guy they're dating. But both Kiyoi alone and Hira and Kiyoi exchanged words with him during the kidnapping scene.

the scene where Hira gets the "I kidnapped your boyfriend call" was really fucking well done. Hira is walking up stairs away from the camera when he gets the call and they drop the lights and make it super dark and that pans up into Hira's bangs and his Kira expression/kubric stare-esque and it was super cool

I think Yusei wears a shirt for Kiyoi that he also wears in his other series. The cloudy white and blue dress shirt.

The end sequence of Hira shooting Kiyoi was really fun and hot. Kiyoi takes off his tie and has it in his mouth with his shirt unbuttoned but tucked in so it's framing his abs. Apparently Riku directed that scene and I would personally like to thank him for his contribution to the arts

Kiyoi's theme wasn't in the movie a lot. The movie has its own OST and the movie songs share some melodies with the s1 ost but it was a lot of new music

the color grading was blue af. A lot of blue in the lights, glass, wardrobe, sheets, etc etc

I think Hira has told his sister that he and Kiyoi are dating.

Hira, Kiyoi, sister, and nephew all welcome and greet Anna after her scandal and Anna might hide out at Hira's place for a bit until Hira and Kiyoi do their surprise with bringing the idol into Mentor's studio

Kiyoi looks hella fond and proud when Hira interacts with Anna at Hira's house. And right in front of Hira. Later when Kiyoi and Anna are alone, Kiyoi says something including that Hira is gross and Anna agrees and Kiyoi blusters at her and she fondly apologizes

Ok that's the majority of what I remember. I am gonna see the movie again, so I'll update if I remember or see a scene I didn't recap here

Thoughts on UtsuKare S2 EP3

The fact that I see that many people find Hira annoying feels like a truth because often neurotypical people think and feel like neuro-divergent people are self-centered, inconsiderate, and therefore annoying.

I don’t know if some peeps here watched Extraordinary Attorney Woo Young-woo one of the main conflicts was similar to this. WYW didn’t want to get together with LJH out of fear of making him feel lonely and how it will be hard on him to love her. Woo Young-woo’s autism is very much parallel to Hira’s neurodivergence in Utsukushii Kare.

Keep reading

Same energy

today on everything i love and that is perfect about utsukushii kare (bc i just binged rewatched both seasons), i find it so fantastic and perfect how they, not even advertently, show how hira and kiyoi grow out of their high school personas, bc that is so a thing that happens and is something i find hardly any media really navigates as well as i see it here. high school is very much a rigid place, and in it you play your part; the popular kid, the class clown, the nerd and so on, but outside of high school, after high school, when you grow up and enter the wider role, there aren’t those roles to fulfil. you have to be you, and to do that, you have to figure out who that ‘you’ is, whether thats something you’ve always known or had inside and just kept buried or hidden, or thats something you’ve yet to discover and have to find, and then go on to actually be that, and shed all of that behaviour you learned or picked up or hid behind in high school. 

idk if this is a universal thing, but it is something that especially speaks to me, being more of the hira, the loner, unpopular, shy kid. that role offers a lot of safety in high school, which is weird to say bc its not a place you aspire to be nor is it particularly enjoyable, but in a way it spares you of further ridicule. if you just fill that role and don’t do anything that acts outside of it, you can get by just fine, then high school is done and you move on. thats what utsukushii kare shows so well. the way hira is treated in high school is never really that outright bullying you stereotypically think of, which i love bc thats not really what high school is actually like. really, it is more of what you see in the show. this lower level stuff that you kind of just go along with even if it is objectively mean. the name calling is not loud insults, its those pet nicknames that follow you and remind you of the things you dont like about yourself, the things you’re embarrassed about. its the established hierarchy that you are at the bottom of that signals to you everyday that you are less important than everyone else. and hira goes along with it partly bc of kiyoi but also bc its safe and, dare i say, comfortable, bc hira has not just not known different, but doesnt wish to either, which is how he settles into his dynamic with kiyoi. 

on the other hand, kiyoi’s place as the popular kid is something he is more visibly uncomfortable with, at least to me, and you see it even before you learn about what his real dreams and interests are. the way he acts with the people that surround him, he is never exactly like that. his treatment of hira especially is kinder while still hiding behind that film of treating him as the group’s lacky, but when people treat hira unkindly, he steps in, and i like to think this is from a place of him just being a good person and not just a defensiveness of hira bc of however he feels. its weird bc he does want to be admired so his place shouldn’t feel so wrong, but i think its from a place of wanting to be admired for his merit, for who he is, not out of any control or fear. he wants to be level with people when it comes to reality, and praised for the things he can do well, his abilities, not just some abject superiority others think he possesses. and i cant tell you how much i love this character for this whole ‘cool guy who’s expected to be so cool and not care about anything but actually really wants to do well at stuff and has a passion for acting and dancing and performance and just wants to be loved’. like that is one of my favourite character tropes ever and utsukushii kare does it with kiyoi to absolute damn perfection, which is only added to when you think about the queerness underlying it, kiyoi acting as this stereotypical straight popular high school boy who’s too cool for everyone but really not only is he not straight and have these complicated feelings for a boy, but he also loves performance and theatre and i love that those two things aren’t separate and it makes so much sense. there is just this young queer boy who wants to be liked hiding behind this veneer of coolness and popularity and its fabulous. 

so when they do get out of high school, we get to see kiyoi embrace that side of him that he always kept hidden, not just doing what he loves, but actively pursuing it, trying hard, putting in the effort and dedication and i adore that. it lends itself so well to the mantra of ‘trying your best is the coolest thing you can do’ which i wholeheartedly believe. not caring isn’t cool. caring is cool. trying your best is cool. and not only does it make kiyoi more admirable as a character, but it feels like kiyoi is a lot more comfortable and welcoming of the admiration he gets, bc now it feels deserved, and its funny that that manifests through him being humble and playing himself down bc thats the very human thing to do when you’re praised, but it also parallels the way hira downplays and degrades himself which is actually, in a twisted way, him thinking highly of himself, which we see discussed in the last ep of season 2. 

bc when hira leaves high school, he still clings to that role, even though there’s no one around him maintaining it. for him to be lowly, there has to be someone around him thats above him, but there isn’t now, which is why he clings to the dynamic he has with kiyoi above him bc it carries over and maintains his safe space. and what we see in season 2 is kiyoi removing that, asking hira to not raise him up just so he can put himself down, he wants to be level. and with kiyoi trying to take away that safety, that leaves hira having to figure out what his place actually is in the world, a world he’s always removed himself from. that’s why his discussion with noguchi is so important, bc kiyoi has struggled to be direct and put it into words with hira, either bc he struggles to say those things or doesn’t want to be so harsh with hira, but noguchi has no issue with holding back, nor feels any need to be gentle. he tells hira flat out you are selfish and ignorant to a fault and think so highly of yourself that you think you are the only person in this world. and thats what hira needs, a real challenge, someone who sees his mindset and twists it to show all the negatives of it. its never what hira intended, but its the message he sends to others; by belittling yourself, you give other people’s words and thoughts no weight or importance, thinking you know better. by removing people from your photos, by hiding behind the camera, you are not escaping the world, you are saying the world is only for you. there is only one plane to exist on, and by trying to be there alone, you deny everyone else of their existence. the option is not to not participate, its to participate alone. and what i’d hope continues in the story (idk what the movie is about at all) is a journey for hira to find how he can be involved at the same level as everyone else, to step out of the safety of self inflicted isolation and join in, feel comfortable finally taking up space and find who he is outside of high school. 

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promotional video for the theatrical release of utsukushii kare in south korea