Audience reviews
20 · Sample from the first available page, separate from the total number of ratings.
ThisIsNotAnAlt_
Revolutionary Girl Utena is boring. It might have a beautiful exploration and deconstruction of tropes like the "Prince", how adults corrupt and mold adolescents into role without considering their agency, personal responsibillity, not making your identity fixed on one person or concept without isolating yourself from everybody else but none of that excuses the fact that it's just plain boring, its biggest flaw being relying far too much on the the "villain of the week". Fine for a shorter anime but over 40 episodes it becomes ridiculous. The humour in the anime is very much one of its saving graces.
I can see the patriarchy reads for this and if thats what came into Revolutionary Girl Utena looking for, then that's definitely what you'll find. I personally am indifferent towards it, I th…
Read at the sourceJoePowerhouse
To be fair, you have to have a very high IQ to understand Shoujo Kakumei Utena. The plot is extremely subtle, and without a solid grasp of that one repeated filler scene of a cheesy rock song, most of the show will go over a typical viewer's head. The lyrics notating the different geological eras represent just how long watching 39 episodes can feel.
There’s also Utena’s metaphysical and gender-subversive character arc, which is deftly woven into the surrealist architecture of the Academy. Her entire identity is a recursive commentary on the absurdity of both crossdressing and post-structuralist philosophy. The true fans understand this.
Only true aesthetes can comprehend that the only episodes that aren’t filler are the filler episodes. The so-called “plot” is merely an illusion, a re…
Read at the sourcexXDAGGERHEARTXx
For almost two decades now Revolutionary Girl Utena has stood as my favorite anime of all time. One I rewatch every couple of years just to keep it fresh in my mind and the one I’m always trying to get more people to watch with me. It’s a masterpiece, a must-watch. The animation is stunning, the story is surreal and engaging with countless layers begging to be peeled back, and with characters brimming with depth.
This is the sort of anime you watch to spend hours discussing it. There’s always some new detail or insinuation or symbolism you didn’t catch last time. It never gets dull to rewatch because every piece of it is just so purposeful.
The subject matter isn’t for the faint of heart though it’s always handled with delicacy, never showing more than it needs to to make you understand…
Read at the sourcejjjawesome
Revolutionary Girl Utena (1997) is a complete, self-contained story of magical realism in 39 episodes. It series follows Tenjou Utena, a second-year middle school girl at a prestigious private boarding school, Ohtori Academy. Because she was so impressed by a prince who saved her as a much younger child, Utena's life goals are to meet her rescuer again and to be princelike herself. She is well-liked and athletic, wears a jacket instead of the typical girls' sailor uniform, and stands up for others. She gets caught up in a mysterious conflict among "duelists" (who happen to also be student council) at the academy, who who sword fight each other for control over Himemiya Anthy, a girl in Utena's class, who they claim is the key to accessing the power to "revolutionize the world." The duelist…
Read at the sourceAshParth
You know, I have to confess something when it comes to the magical girl genre. First of all, I did grow up with some shows such as Sailor Moon, Cardcaptor Sakura, and a bit of Tokyo Mew Mew. In the midst of going through my late teens and twenties, I've seen a handful more of the magical girls such as Magical Girl Spec-Ops Asuka, Magical Girl Ore, the Magical Boys of Fairy Ranmaru, and a little bit of Puella Magi Madoka Magica. I guess Kill la Kill also counts when it's themed towards clothing as well as parodying the genre for the sake of humor and how to use fan service in a clever way. In my current age, I have to admit that I am falling off of the magical girl genre. But it doesn't stop me from checking out such, especially on the indie side such as the Three Tomes and Pretty Please, I…
Read at the sourceTrMin228
I think this is a truly “subversive” anime. The setup at the beginning, where the protagonist wants to become the prince instead of the one who gets saved, already creates an different. She wants to be strong, yet her idea of strength is based on an “ideal prince.” The more she tries to prove herself, the more she realizes that she, too, longs to be saved.
She is a character trapped in the role of “the hero” imposed on her by society. Meanwhile, Anthy is labeled a witch simply because she resisted violence and tried to protect her brother. She is hated because she is forced into the role of “the one who ruins everything,” but if you look closely, she’s merely trying to survive that world.
Utena wants to save Anthy, but Anthy isn’t a princess, she’s someone society has crushed to the poin…
Read at the sourceRagingLight
Like many others, I first came across Revolutionary Girl Utena through Tumblr. I've been curious about the anime for some year and finally gave it a go in 2025. I had only seen a few non-spoilery gifs and posts praising the show for being very ahead of its time.
Now having watched it, I can go ahead and agree. This anime clearly had impact on many future animes that explore similar themes. The first that comes to mind would be Madoka Magika and Attack on Titan (yes you read that right) due to how Utena explores the themes of abuse, free will, and freedom.
However, it pains me that I cannot give this anime a high score.
But I can still recommend the anime. But WITH MANY, many "but"s and trigger warnings.
Why is that? Well I can confidently say that many people will not get the point of…
Read at the sourceCool_Hand
There's a girl wearing boy's clothing... haven't we seen this light fare before? But that's the point. The show wants you to think you've seen this all before. By the end, the light is gone and you're not sure of anything you've seen before.
Utena starts off innocuous enough, even the fight scenes are mundane. They reuse artwork so often that I'm not sure there's more than 3 fights the whole series. Please stick with it.
I find the meat of the series in the subversive narratives cloaked in its surrealist imagery that become increasingly prevalent in the latter parts of the series, incisive and impossible to ignore. And yet, it's hard to pin down the precise meaning of the critiques, each buried deep beneath the show's subtext. And to me, that's what is most compelling about this show. I…
Read at the sourceSCLFI
The Heike Monogatari, a work equally concerned with the mechanisms of power and their destruction, opens with the following line: “In the sound of the bell of the Gion Temple echoes the impermanence of all things. The pale hue of the flowers of the teak-tree shows the truth that they who prosper must fall.”
Revolutionary Girl Utena, for all of its stylised, post-Showa sensibility, manages to find a connection through the ringing of bells, where they are used to indicate the opening and ending of battle, in a ritual that functions as a way to actualise impermanence and change every time they are heard. But for a series that suggests and emphasises impermanence at a thematic level, it is remarkably static in its pacing and episodic format, and would have benefitted from a more modern direct…
Read at the sourceAgentBishop
You’ve probably heard it before:
“A masterpiece that inspired generations of strong female characters. A philosophical giant in anime that challenged gender norms…”
Whenever I see praise that over-the-top, I get suspicious. Usually, good feminist stories get criticized even by feminists for being too real, too messy. But this? This had the glow of untouchable “progressiveness,” which to me is a red flag.
And sure enough, by episode one, I had my doubts confirmed.
Utena shows up in a boys’ uniform (kind of), dunks on the entire male basketball team, and defeats a trained swordsman with a wooden sword — all while winning ownership of a mysteriously submissive minority girl who barely talks. The girl literally lives to serve whoever beats her master in combat. Symbolism? Sure. But also pr…
Read at the sourcerozzingit
I don't have any nostalgia goggles for Utena. I didn't watch it at a young age. It wasn't a formative experience for me. What I did have was two friends who loved it and sat down to watch it all with me in my 30s. And I can say that, despite its rough edges, Utena is absolutely masterful in the task of telling the story it set out to tell.
It's always important to meet a story where it is. Utena is a fairy tale. It's a metaphor. Plenty of what happens is clearly presented visually as one thing that we're not meant to take as a literal representation. The point isn't to worry about what exact details are true and what aren't, because the point of the story is the themes and emotions underneath.
Utena is, at its core, about two things: the place women hold in the world, and the cycles of a…
Read at the sourcek-0da
I really don't feel like I am qualified to write a decent review on this anime. So to that end, I'll try to separate this review from any analysis, because this is really a story that invites multiple rewatches.
Utena is good. Utena is a damn good anime, and I'm genuinely shocked it somehow comes in at #360 in popularity.
Start with what I'm least qualified, which is the animation: some episodes (The Nanami early focuses especially) can be off-model. However, it's never impacted the story in a way that I think holds any merit. Barring that, the animation is gorgeous. Everything looks beautiful. The direction in this series is masterful, and something that should really be examined. I recommend watching Utena with a friend, as I did, to bounce ideas off of each other at what each little…
Read at the sourcebergars
Oh boy, it's one of those.
A thematic piece of characters with dubious morals, and gray zones of horrible acts. A drama that starts off as a “fight of the week” sort of thing, but slowly evolves, morphs, into a disturbing showcase of traumatic events. A story with no proper explanation, or a straight-to-the-point narrative. I have an idea of what just happened, but I could be legitimately wrong about everything. However, this isn't about a story, but about thematic depth.
Coming of age. School, love, friends, family, sister / brotherhood. Those are all fun things to explore, aren't they? Many slice of life anime touch upon those with care, with love, with enough to fill a heart to the brim. The anime was following the themes with a little more spice into it. Infidelity, unrequited love…
Read at the sourceMojoJ0j0_
Shoujo Kakumei Utena, or Revolutionary Girl Utena, is the best drama/shoujo anime that I have ever watched.
*This review may contain some spoilers, but only minor ones*
RGU's story is very interesting and unique, but also feels very familiar in a way at the same time. Everyone knows of stories about a prince on a white horse that vows to save a princess from someone or something evil, but RGU uses this type of story in a very unique and exciting way, in which a girl vows to become a prince to save a princess, who is actually supposedly a witch, from the prince who saved her and inspired her as a young kid, which is actually the villian.
The characters in the story are also very well written and different from each other. In many episodes, characters can be used to represent something w…
Read at the sourceoujigirls
This is my second viewing of RGU because the first time I watched this, I was much younger and didn't really 'get it'. I thought it was confusing and had an unsatisfactory ending (← me not paying attention). However, other fans discussing the themes and plot at length wanted me to give it another go because it really is an overlooked story that benefits from a rewatch. They don't make em like this anymore.
Please go into this series as you would with the likes of, say, anything by David Lynch. At it's core, this is a story about gender, abuse, and the deconstruction of traditional tropes found in most romance and anime (and yeah, yuri). Visually, it's also a treat and peppered with operatic prog rock.
Read at the sourceSpecial_Edition
It's certainly iconic. Everything sticks to you and it's awesome at points, but I can't help but feel that it does not live up to the expectations created by others' impression.
Its directing and music make for a spectacle that lasts for the duration of the show, with memorable characters and locations. But this style of directing can make some episodes hard to understand, so I don't think absolutely everyone should watch the show.
At the end of the series, I felt like I still didn't know the characters despite spending 39 episodes with them, and thanks to the close to surrealist storytelling, I couldn't understand the story properly, despite there being a episode specifically for exposition.
It's definitely worth a watch, but keep your expectations in check. Have fun and enjoy the ride.
Read at the sourcevanillaine
ZETTAI UNMEI MOKUSHIROKU
I watched this anime with the "Utena is Evangelion for girls/shoujo" thought in mind because someone mentioned it on twitter and I later found out that there are considerable amount of people saying the same thing about Utena. Well, is it? I think it is, for me at least.
Is it good? In short, yes, it is good. BUT there are some things you should keep in mind if you're considering watching Utena because if these things bothers you more than it bothers me, you'll probably hate it. Hence why I put Mixed Feelings on this review.
The battle was quite good, Utena and the supporting characters were all interesting. Personally out of all the duelists, my favorite would be Juri and definitely not because of her entire character is driven by heart wrenching angst (definit…
Read at the sourceKrenZane
!! SPOILER-FILLED !!
Revolutionary Girl Utena overflows with the use of literary devices seamlessly intertwined with storytelling most appropriate in the medium of animation, rife in beauty from creative writing and colorful production consistently organized throughout 39 episodes to fashion out one of the most engaging stories I've ever encountered, bombarding my insides with sensory pleasures and crowding my brain with incessant contemplation in attempts to connect the disjointed dots together as the tale unfolds. The visuals bellow its stunning quality from the very first episode alone, and I could go on about how lovely the aesthetics are. With technical expertise bringing forth shimmering style and a fulfillment of conceptual and thematic aims, Revolutionary Girl Utena makes for one…
Read at the sourceEguy321
Small spoiler in this Article. But not major spoiler
STORY:
Was pretty good the characters looked like very sex and the small monkey was cool. And awesome sword fighting was Unique. I like utena.. she is awesome and cute; to the extent in top 10. Im not love of lgbtq though so that take a lot of points (aproximately 8) from the show.but i like the sound of the monkey so its okay i guess. I like akio ootoori, hes so cool, so is the green hair guy. In my oppinon i think this remind me of steve universe which is a very awesome show. I think the fairy tale remind me of redo of healer and shield hero which adds back many points that it lose Overall
the story is nice but. Chinees. CRAFTMANSHIP:The art is ok they are sex; even despite even haveing hair very much like liberals. I like these old…
Read at the sourceMaiJara01
One of the best animes ever written, no joke.
This is an abstract anime, which may not be for everyone, it's a love letter to adolescence and growing up. I love how three-dimensional all characters are despite how little some of them talk. this is a show about school and building relationships but in a dramatic light, having your period is represented as having a literal egg in the character's bed.
Honestly, I didn't know what was going on at a certain point in this show but I still enjoyed it, it was also funny in a particular and specific way. It's a staple of dark/mysterious Mahou shoujo.
LOVE IT.
Read at the source
