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Suzi.
User deleted
Introduction:
It has been about 3 years since I've written on any forum ( French, English or Arabic) and probably 7 years since my last English post about Grendizer on DJinspace's forum ...
I truly miss those old days of great Grendizer discussions and debates, so I wish first of all to greatly thank you Joe7 for resurrecting our old passion by hosting Gerdha's posts here in English so we could reconnect and engage once again in those passionate deep analytical debates and discussions.... real Grendizer talk as I call it.
Surely, our real life responsibilities have increased as we grew older and our social circumstances changed, but our passion for Grendizer hasn't dwindled a little bit. Despite everything that happened and befell us, that flame is still burning brightly and strongly inside us just waiting for the opportunity to break through and shine to the world once more.
Reading my dear friend Gerdha's Naida and Rubina's comparative analysis has encouraged me to do what I once thought was undoable anymore i.e. to join another forum and engage in deep and fulfilling Grendizer discussions with people who share the same great passion for it as I do. So a big thank you goes to her too for igniting this dormant passion by allowing Joe 7 to present her writings in English here.
My skills in using the tools of this forum may still be rusty so forgive me if my post appears unorganised or not aesthetically presentable, I'm still discovering my way around it.
General Comments on the Comparative Analysis:
Overall I agree with most of the points that Gerdha has stated in her analysis except for a few of them which I will explain in the following sections. But I particularly liked the conclusion and the history of Duke's interior journey. It does make a lot of sense although there could be other theories to the disintegration of Duke's and Rubina's engagement without excluding Naida's role in it. I will talk about that later. Her article (post) about Duke's interior journey reminds me of an analysis of his personality that I wrote in Arabic on Kaizuland forum in 2012. I could translate it to English and present it here later if desired. I do disagree with some points that she has mentioned in her analysis of his interior journey but they are really trivial (will elaborate later), and I also disagree with the diagnosis of Daisuke/Duke's mental condition that she stated in the analysis of episode 25. I will elaborate on that further in the coming posts.
During the 6 years that I was a member of the Arabic forum of Kaizuland (2010-2015), I also wrote a detailed analysis of Naida's personality and her actions in episode 25, I could also translate it to English and present it here in the future if desired (or just the relevant sections for my reply to Gerdha's topic).
Since leaving DJinspace's French forum and Kaizuland Arabic forum, I have embarked on a journey to learn more about the Japanese culture, traditions and history that influenced the particular storytelling features of our beloved anime. My understanding of the Japanese traditional code of relationships has greatly improved, and certainly watching the Japanese version again with this acquired understanding has led me to a deeper comprehension of the significance of the dialogues and their intended purpose/meaning. I don't claim any expertise, I'm just an amateur that passionately adores Grendizer's story and its characters and loves to deeply analyse them and seeing in between the lines of the presented story.
In summary the points that I will be commenting on in the next posts are:
1- Naida's character and related issues
2- Rubina's character and related issues
3- Duke's mental state and related issues
Edited by joe 7 - 25/6/2018, 15:49
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Suzi.
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Naida: A Story of Love & Revenge
the sections written in blue are translations of the parts that I translated from my topic that I wrote about Naida in Arabic on Kaizuland forum on 7th October 2013; the sections in black are my new comments.
The topic I wrote about Naida on Kaizuland in 2013 was the 9th part of a series of articles that I wrote under the heading of: Grendizer Like You've Never Seen Previously, and it carried the subtitle: Love & Revenge.
I summarised Naida's character and story in a little poem whose translation is below:
A love flower bloomed in youth,
crushed by her lover's betrayal and flee
and shredded by the woes of war,
she transformed into a flame of hatred and anger,
vengefully retaliating against he who crushed her.
With the dagger of resentment she stabbed his heart;
A demon she became and beat him
with false accusations and lies that she invented.
She rendered him mad and delirious
He became imprisoned in the darkness of guilt,
lost in the subconscious, screaming in agony,
defeatedly fighting the ghosts of the past,
while the chains of guilt squeeze him sad
for a past that's lost and a present that's gone
As you can see my interpretation about Naida's character is not much different from Gerdha's. Even though she is also a victim, she is not an innocent party either; in other words, I find her not fully evil or fully good..she is a complex tragic character whose circumstances brought the worst in her and unleashed the deeply seated dark emotions that were lurking in her subconscious.
I agree with Gerdha that Duke's sense of duty towards his planet is the reason behind him accepting the engagement to Rubina at the expense of his love to Naida. I totally agree too that this made her feel betrayed and abandoned without much of a fight from his side to save their love relationship and future together. But I think that his conversation with her at the centre had aggravated that sense of betrayal a lot. In fact, it has re-inforced it, as beautifully explained and expressed in the images posted by Joe7 in Gerdha's post about sequence of events, her aspect after this conversation has changed into a hateful expression of anger and resentment.
Analysing the details of the conversation, Duke said that grew up like siblings. I just want to ponder on the effect that such words would have on a woman in love with a man and at some stage he returned the same emotions towards her. I'm sure she felt terrible; it's like another dagger in her pitiful heart...now that Rubina has gone and they're together again after the destruction of Fleed, he tells her "siblings"?!
What pain and humiliation she would've felt at that moment, especially that her love for this man was sacrificed for a failed deal in which her dignity, her planet, her family and her people paid a heavy price and vanished.
Daisuke was also speaking joyfully about Earth and its beauty and its people and the love on it, while she was silent in pain and sadness (was he insensitive to her pain or was he attempting to cheer her up?)
He also forgot her brother's name which means that he was not that important to him; he was just her naughty brother for him, while for her he was her dear brother who lost his life in the Fleedian War. Watching her angry facial expression when he asked her for his name, I thought that deep within her she must be thinking "to this extent you didn't care about the Fleedians, you traitor? Even those who were close to you, you forgot them and abandoned them to a doomed fate, running away with Grendizer to come and live peacefully on this planet while leaving us to be killed and totured by the Vegans?!"
In my previous topic about Naida, I analysed the reaction of Daisuke and Naida to Sirius' death just like Gerdha's..I was gobsmacked when I re-read what I wrote there and found that it was almost identical to what Gerdha wrote here in her comparative analysis!
I never read this comparative analysis prior to last week, even though I wrote my topic in Arabic in 2013! Maybe we have imprinted so much on each other during our previous discussions on the French forum that we come up with very similar ideas.
I guess I shouldn't be surprised; after all Gerdha and I are soulmates, we mostly agree and analyse things very similarly, sometimes identically even before we exchange our opinions with each other.
Daisuke's unusual and irrational reaction to Sirius' death gave Naida the weapon with which she could kill him. She told him that Sirius was killed by a traitor and this is not a lie; because in her eyes Duke Fleed's escape was treason, a betrayal that led to the death of Fleedians by the Vegans (among whom was her brother) as registered by Vega the great in her subconscious during the brainwashing procedure. His exaggerated fury at the mention of treason re-inforced her desire to avenge herself and her planet from him utilising her brother's death to the extreme.
She suffered for years in Vegan prisons, while he was living serenely and peacefully on this planet; and not only that, but instead of using Grendizer to defend Fleed, he escaped with it and was using to defend this strange planet just because he found refuge in it. As if she was saying to herself when she looked at him hatefully at the end of the conversation while red background appeared behind her (at 7:08 of the video of the episode ) "Ah! You're so selfish Duke Fleed!!! You sold me for Fleed, and sold Fleed for your own sake..and now you're singing me the praises of this strange planet that you're defending more than you've defended your own planet, and you want me to forget and live on it with you as if nothing as happened!!! You're not just a traitor, you're treason itself... You don't deserve to live..Death is the just punishment for traitors like you!!
From this conversation scene we deduce two things; Duke's mental state was not stable and this was what Naida sensed too and utilised it in her revenge; and Duke on the other hand was fighting a strong internal battle against his feelings of guilt towards his planet, Planet Fleed, and his people. By accepting the engagement to Rubina, he could not avoid the war with Vegan Allied Forces for Fleed, and he could not use Grendizer effectively to defend it against them. Certainly as a crown prince he felt immense responsibility towards his people but the war with Vega was too big for him to tip the scales in Planet Fleed's favour. So inside him grew a strong feeling of guilt, and his escape to Earth later enriched this feeling even though he knew that he had no other alternative .
When one's mood has hit rock bottom, one would be prone to believe any negative remarks told to him especially if they echo internally with emotions and thoughts harboured in their subconscious and that's what has exactly happened with Duke Fleed.
He was like a drowning person trying to survive. He swam for a bit and raised his head above the water only to be dragged down by a whirlpool, yet he managed to overcome it but only to encounter another one and so on until the whirlpool of Naida's accusations of treason swallowed him and dragged him deep in the darkness of guilt separating him from reality.
Sirius himself was not that of a significant person, but Duke was in a state of mind that would make him believe any accusation that resonated with his internal guilt towards his planet. But the begging question is did Duke Fleed feel any guilt towards Naida as he sacrificed her love for a political deal?
There are two possibilities:
1- No, he never felt guilty towards because it was just "fun" and a " passing teeny crush" and nothing really serious. After all, he was the Crown Prince and she was just a "girl" from the "retinue" just like any girl who has a crush on him. It's true that his relationship with her was stronger than with others but still she could just be a passing fun, teenage age crush or even a good friend and sister, nothing more, so accepting Rubina's engagement would not cause him any concerns or guilt issues towards her
2- Duke Fleed did indeed love Naida at the time and was intending to marry her albeit the political circumstances of his planet back then imposed a different choice, and because of his young age and/or lack of experience he could not end his relationship with Naida officially and just ignored her pretending that his feelings towards her were just a teenage crush that ended. If this was the case then this would definitely lead to emergence of guilt feelings towards her especially that he would try very hard to subdue his love feelings for her alone as a respect for the woman that he accepted to marry.
I think that the second possibility is the most likely, and despite him getting older and becoming more mature he has not learnt how to confront those that he loved with such decisive
decisions as we have seen in episode 72 and 73 (and by this I mean Hikaru- his decision to accept Rubina's proposal in episode 72, and hiding his intention of a suicidal attack during his goodbye in episode 73).
So now the question that imposes itself is, if he still loved Naida all these years why did he say they were like "siblings"? Why didn't he call her "my love"? Why did he kiss her in the field then? I mean "siblings" and "lovers' kiss" on the field don't make any sense together. Does he love her as a friend or a lover? Does he see her as a sister or desires her as a woman?
I guess we have to delve deeper in his psyche to understand this contradiction.
We know that he was a counterpart in a marriage proposal with Rubina and whether he loved her or not, this is not my issue in this discussion here, but assuming that he has a high sense of morality, he would worked very hard to suppress his feelings towards Naida and transforming them into brotherly feelings out of respect for his future wife. However, did he fully succeed in doing this? If we assumed that then a lot of questions emerge,
why did he break off his engagement to Rubina?
Why his meeting with Naida was warm and flowing with emotions while that with Rubina was cold and hostile as if he was bitten by a scorpion asking her to prove her identity to him? Whereas with Naida it was him who exposed his identity as Duke Fleed to her without asking her for any proof that she was indeed Naida?
In my opinion he has succeeded to a great extent while on Planet Fleed to transform his feelings towards Naida to brotherly feelings, but what changed them completely to brotherly feelings on Earth was his love to Hikaru. Just like when the fire has extinguished and turned into ashes, the ashes cannot ignite again so was his feelings towards Naida, the love flame has died inside him that's why he said "siblings".
But Naida was a breath of air from his dear homeland that he lost, a memory from a beautiful past that was erased by political struggles, a laughter of childhood that was assassinated by the war, therefore he kissed her on the field as if he was kissing Planet Fleed in her person. Add to this his guilt feelings towards abandoning her for his engagement and her suffering as a result of the war... all this created immense confusion in his emotions resulting in psychological imbalance and irrational thinking and behaviour.
For Duke, the return of Naida was like a resurrection, she was the past and the planet that he lost.
And from the peak of happiness and joy, he slipped into the bottom of the pit of pain, despair and frustration when Naida confronted with his guiltiness and opened a wound that hadn't healed completely yet.
Naida in the peak of her anger and hatred had transformed into a demon as if the authors wanted to tell the audience that when anger and hatred take hold of a person, he/she spontaneously transforms into a demon that subconsciously and thoughtlessly takes revenge , and the more the hatred and anger increase one becomes the embodiment of evil until one becomes fully consumed by it all.
That evil that consumed Naida made her invent the lie about the Fleedian brains in the vegan monsters, selectively choosing the story of her brother to increase Duke's pain and torment.
Jiro Jiro could not have had Sirius' brain in it; it was the same monster that we saw destroying Planet Fleed, so definitely it didn't have it at any time.
I agree totally with Gerdha in her analysis about the Fleedian brain lie that it was a invention of Naida's own brain and not something that Vega has brainwashed her to believe. I wrote more or less the same analysis in that Arabic topic so I see no need to repeat myself and what we have already agreed on many years ago. But I would just add the following paragraphs.
Despite Jiro Jiro having her brother's brain being a lie invented solely by Naida, Duke believed it because he believed himself to be a traitor first. The hidden message that Naida sent him in her accusations was that he defeated Jiro Jiro protecting Earth, not Fleed his planet. From her point of view, he left Jiro Jiro killing and destroying Fleed while he fled onboard Grendizer. When Jiro Jiro came threatening his new paradise on Earth, he destroyed it; in other words "Earth for him was more precious than Fleed, and he preferred it.
When the control device was removed and Naida regained her consciousness, she saw an unknown face, a face of a woman, a friend of Duke who was scolding her for what she did to him while she was completely unaware of it. What I find interesting in this scene, was that Hikaru was scolding her while Dr Umon was comforting her blaming the device for her actions, as if the authors wanted to convey to us that Hikaru was like the voice of our conscience that rebukes us for all the bad things that we do, and the device is whatever we choose to use as a scape goat and put the blame on it instead of taking responsibility for our actions and admitting them.
In front of the cell she saw Duke screaming detached from reality and with his female instincts she realised that Hikaru loved him when she saw her tears and anguish for him. This friend, that he did not introduce to her even though the dress she wore in the field was hers. It was this girl that told her in the Centre that "there is love on Earth and it is the most important thing of all". This girl was definitely the reason that made him describe their relationship like siblings.
Yes indeed love heals everything that hatred , anger and resentment caused but among those accusations of treason and betrayal, there was one traitor only, and this traitor is her.. no one else.
She was then who betrayed her love and destroyed him with her anger, vengeance, doubts and unresolved internal conflicts.
The Vegan monster is approaching and would destroy Earth turning it into another Fleed, but Duke couldn't combat it because of her...she did this!
She had to fix it, but a traitor's punishment is death, she deserved death. So let her death be useful, let her suicide attack be a saving for Earth and Duke Fleed even if only once. Only then she would redeem herself from what she did to him and stand up by her love.
Maybe then that girl's heart that's full of love towards him would help heal the wounds she had inflicted on him, and feed him honey instead of the bitter myrrh she gave him to drink.
Maybe she with her love could bring him back to life and give him the happiness that he aspires to have, the happiness that she herself could not give him.
As for her and her love, they have a different destiny. She will burn herself to extinguish the flames that she ignited and burnt her lover. She will burn everything she did and said. She will kill herself avenging her lover... and so the flower of love that bloomed in youth has burnt!
As you can see Gerdha, we agree more on Naida than we disagree. I still think that choosing that method to suicide has more than factor. Certainly, she chose a horrible way to die in proportion to her immense sense of guilt, and desire to inflict maximum punishment for her actions, but also to prove to Duke her lies about the Fleedian brains in Vegan monsters.
I don't see that Duke for her was a toy (I see that Rubina considered him as such but not Naida). Naida's love to Duke may not have been completely selfless and suffered from doubts and uncertainties that marred its evolution. She most probably was attracted to his princely status and beauty, not the real man behind this royal status and and person that lay skin deep. This doesn't make her love "invalid" or "unreal", because it was real, maybe a bit immature and selfish for the majority of it but honest and very real- at least from her prospective.
He on the other hand may have not returned that love equally or didn't appreciate it enough. In a way, I blame him for toying with her emotions and not cutting them straight when he agreed to wed Rubina. Even hiding his relationship with Hikaru from her is a kind of deception. Although he might have had some very good reasons to do so.
Like you stated, maybe out of a previous experiences he was able to conclude that she was calculating and deceptive that's why he did not fully trust her.
For me love has two wings, respect and trust. Lack of trust means that love has a broken wing and it cannot fly, so his love to Naida was incomplete and unable to take to take off because of lack of trust between them. In a way, I feel that this lack of trust was on both sides, she definitely had doubts about him that Vega played upon during the brainwashing. They had unresolved issues in their relationship that led to lack of trust between them both. Therefore it was easy for their "love" to vanish and be defeated from the first obstacle.
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I will continue writing about Rubina and Duke's mental state in the coming days. That's it from me for today.
Edited by joe 7 - 25/6/2018, 15:51. -
Suzi.
User deleted
RUBINA: Intricate Politics and Delicate Affairs
Moving on to discuss Rubina's. She is a character adored and respected by many fans because of the errors in the dubbing of the dialogues of episode 72 in the various Grendizer versions. Many perceive her as a messenger of peace, the loving princess who sacrificed her life to save Duke's.... oh! I couldn't be more disgusted by these assumptions!
They are far away from the truth just as explained by Gerdha in her analysis. Since I totally agree with Gerdha's analysis of the character, I won't reiterate what was stated earlier.
But I want to do is elaborate on Rubina's possible role in the destruction of Fleed.
Like it was explained by Gerdha previously, Duke's shocked response to the proposed marriage between them on the boat trip on Fleed could well be because of his relationship with Naida at the time, thus he said "impossible" when marriage to Rubina was mentioned. I don't disagree with that, but what I disagree with is the sequence of the possible following events that followed.
Before I go on any further, I have always wondered what was the real purpose of King Fleed from wedding his son to Vega the Great's daughter? Is it to physically protect Planet Fleed from destruction by Vega? What about the principles and the direction of it foreign policies and relations with other planets?
What I mean, is that by agreeing to wed Duke to Rubina, he had agreed to become a Vegan political ally and Grendizer would be readily available to assist Vega the Great in his conquests in Space. That in itself may not be a problem had Duke Fleed not mentioned in episode 2 that his planet, Planet Fleed, was not interested in waging wars and was a pacifist planet. So in principle the King of Fleed would have indirectly agreed by this proposal to assist Vega in destroying and subjugating other planets in the Universe, and that contradicts the pacifist directions of Planet Fleed in its entirety.
It was certainly a big political dilemma for the King of Fleed to ensure the safety of his planet against Vega's expansionism plans, but that physical protection which would have been guaranteed by the marriage of Duke and Rubina would have come at the expense of the pacifist principles of Fleedian politics. I couldn't imagine that Duke could have had the option to decline assisting Vega the Great with Grendizer in plundering other planets once he married his daughter. So what was the King of Fleed really trying to do by proposing a marriage between his son and Vega's daughter?
Personally, I don't think that the King of Fleed was daft or stupid. He for sure knew very well that such marriage would make him, his planet and its mostly prized asset, Grendizer, at the mercy of Vega's aspirations to conquer the Universe violently. He would be like signing a treaty that made Grendizer and his son readily dispensable to Vega whenever he wanted to invade a planet, including a sister planet like Planet Morru, so what did he really want to achieve by such marriage?
From the dialogues of episode 72, we are told that it was the King of Fleed's idea of wedding his son to Rubina, yet we saw that Duke was completely shocked when he learnt this from Rubina during the boat trip. We know from episode 2, that the attack on Planet Fleed was "sudden" and "unexpected". We know from episode 71, that attack on Fleed was announced on loudspeakers altering the residents that they were being attacked by the Vegan Army (that in a way doesn't comply much with a "sudden" attack, because they "knew" the identity of the enemy), but we also learn that this was one of the early attacks on the Planet as it wasn't completely devastated yet, and Fleed was hosting a foreign royal, the Crown prince of Planet Morru, who happened to be Duke Fleed's best friend. That attack too did not seem to be on the capital of Planet Fleed, but how early was it I the timeline of the war? Duke also stated since Vega attached Planet Fleed, Planet Morru would be next on the list.
I think, the King of Fleed's main intention of this marriage proposal was stalling and delaying the inevitable war on Fleed until the completion of Grendizer so it could defend Planet Fleed against Vegan troops if they attacked Fleed. He was not really serious about wedding his son to Rubina, especially that he knew very well that this marriage would not benefit Planet fleet in the long term. Vega the Great wasn't serious either about this marriage but he accepted it in order to get easy access to Grendizer and the advanced technology of Planet Fleed that would assist him in his conquest to conquer the Universe. Sending Rubina to Planet Fleed would allow him to send a legal convoy to Planet Fleed that could easily spy on it without being noticed. This convoy would indeed find out the hideout of Grendizer and its making process. It would also find out about the personal relationships and the deep secrets of the members of the Fleedian Royal Family thus enabling him to blackmail them if they resisted in allowing him access to utilise Grendizer in his conquests.
It was obvious that Vega the Great had great trust and understanding with his heiress, Rubina, disclosing to her the purpose of sending her to Planet Fleed. Although, he did not anticipate that she would actually fall in love with (or have a crush on) the handsome heir of Planet Fleed who was at the time romantically involved with Naida.
I do think that the King of Fleed knew about his son's emotional involvement with Naida, but was he in approval of this relationship? Did he see in Naida a person fit and suitable to be the future queen of Fleed? Did he accept her a suitable wife for his son?
If we assume that while on Fleed, Duke Fleed had reasons to not find Naida fully trustworthy despite his infatuation with her, then for sure the King of Fleed with his experience would have noticed that too about her. As a father, his son's welfare and future mattered a lot to him, as did his kingdom and his people. He knew that while his son was so head over heels with Naida, he would not listen to any wise advice or objective reasoning about defects in her character because for him at the time she would have been just "perfect" in his eyes.
So here was the anguished father, the troubled king looking for a solution for the problems of both his son and his planet. Rubina certainly wasn't the perfect mate for his son either, but she was a reasonable solution for both problems: end his son's relationship with Naida since he was so blinded by love to listen to reason, and stall and delay the Vegan attack until Grendizer was completed so Fleed could stand a better chance of fending any Vegan aggression. It was certainly a gamble worth taking, after all his options were really limited. So he proceeded with his plan and proposed a marriage between his son and Rubina to Vega the Great, without informing his son. This was either because he anticipated total refusal from Duke without giving him even a chance to explain the delicate situation that Planet Fleed was in, or because he had no time or opportunity to do so prior to Rubina's arrival. I think the former is more likely.
King Vega sent his daughter to Planet Fleed, and she was fully aware that by such marriage her planet would gain total control and easy access to Fleedian technologies and Grendizer. These would service their expansionism plans perfectly. When she arrived and after a few days of formalities with the Fleedian Royal Family, she went on the boat journey with Duke where the famous dialogue took place and he discovered that he was made a party to an engagement without his knowledge. Certainly after returning to the palace, he would have gotten in serious and perhaps angry discussions with his father about that. But the King Fleed would have played on his sense of duty as a Crown Prince and explained to him the delicate situation of Planet Fleed in front of King Vega's aspirations. Duke would have agreed to the engagement out of his sense of duty towards his country; and because of his high sense of morality he would have worked hard at extinguishing his emotions towards Naida. The King of Fleed would have requested that Rubina stayed on Planet Fleed in order that she and his son got to know each other better before they got married, and in this way he would ensure that King Vega would not play behind his back and launch an attack on Fleed. Princess Rubina of course did not mind staying on Fleed beside her prince charming. The Vegan delegation that accompanied her (which was actually a spy unit) would have certainly found out a lot of things about Fleed, its strategic cities, assists, Grendizer, intricate relationships of the Royal Fleedian Family and other important politicians, etc...hence the knowledge of Vega the Great about Naida being Duke's ex-girlfriend.
Now that Grendizer's construction had been completed, it was time to set a wedding date. But The King of Fleed, as I explained earlier, wasn't serious about letting his son marry Rubina especially that he could see that his son couldn't warm up to her, and he certainly didn't want him to be a slave soldier of Vega the Great riding Grendizer to plunder the universe against the principles of his planet. Vega the Great would have sensed this too, after all, he was not stupid either. He figured out that the King of Fleed was stalling and would never let him have access to Grendizer. So he talked to his daughter about this, and since she shared his expansionism dreams, they agreed that she would leave Planet Fleed using the excuse that she needed to go back to planet Vega temporarily to prepare some things for her upcoming wedding. She probably left on the condition that her father would steal Grendizer and capture Duke Fleed alive since he was the only person who could pilot it. Vega the Great, did not want his daughter to marry Duke either, after all he wasn't that ambitious conqueror who would oversee the future empire that he aspired to build for himself and his daughter. But he needed to get his daughter out of Planet Fleed without raising suspicions in the Fleedian counterparts; he also wanted her to remain on his side so he manipulated her into believing that he would let her have Duke Fleed as a spouse albeit after some brainwashing and similar once he captured him.
Thus Rubina left Planet Fleed fully aware that it would be attacked and destroyed, and the Royal Fleedian Family were misled to believe that Fleed was still "safe", after all they believed that she was only on a short journey to Planet Vega and would be back soon. Political business went as usual on Planet Fleed, and it hosted the Crown Prince of Planet Morru. With all the information gathered by the spying Vegan delegation on Planet Fleed, Vega the Great selected the perfect timing to launch the first attacks. That which we saw in episode 71 might have been the second one since the identity of the aggressor was announced loudly on the speakers. Saying that, the first one might have happened a few hours earlier on a different part of the planet. Duke Fleed was certainly not in the vicinity of Grendizer, and until he managed to reach the capital where Grendizer was kept, many parts of the planet would have been ravaged mercilessly. When he finally reached the capital it was too late, Grendizer was stolen, the Vegan troops reached the Royal Palace and assassinated his parents in front of his eyes. Perhaps they attempted to capture him and his sister at that point but they failed. Running away in the midst of the fires, destruction and death, Duke, understandably, lost his rational thinking and all what he could think of was retrieving Grendizer to stop this carnage. He abandoned his sister in search of the elusive Grendizer that was stolen by Vega. After all when one is faced with such atrocities one sometimes makes irrational decisions triggered by the anxiety and the anguish of the situation. The flight or fight response sometimes generates unexpected reactions and incomprehensible actions.
Rubina asked Duke to forgive her for her role in the destruction of his planet in episode 72 because she was fully aware of her father's plan and assisted him in executing it. She too wanted to enjoy ruling a big empire that spanned the universe and perhaps felt that the pacifist political principles of Planet Fleed would not serve this purpose, and would indeed be a big obstacle that hindered their ambitions. Perhaps she also thought that getting rid of Planet Fleed and its royal family would render Duke Fleed lonely and helpless with no other option but to surrender to her father's wishes and serve their ambitious plan of conquering the universe with Grendizer.
For her, Duke was a toy that she liked so much and wanted it all to her self. She didn't think about the impact that killing his family and destroying his planet would have on him as a person. She was so self absorbed and spoilt to know real pain and suffering. Even when she met him again on Earth she had no remorse or guilt feelings until Duke rebuked her for the destruction of his planet. She knew very well what Planet Fleed meant to him and manipulated him to agree to her plan without revealing to him her demoted political status at the time.
Her death was a mere accident that she utilised to her advantage to the maximum, manipulating Duke again to remain indebted to her forever. She asked him to name the first red flower that bloomed on Fleed, Rubina in memory of her and her betrayal to her father and her people. Maybe she thought that by doing this she would find some redemption for her role in the destruction of planet Fleed, but I would just love to see what would the reaction of the Fleedians be seeing their new King name a flower after the name of the daughter of the enemy who plundered their planet and killed their loved ones! She was truly selfish to the core and never thought about him as a person or his circumstances. Everything she did in episode 72 was about her and for herself, neither Duke Fleed mattered to her nor her father did. A princess she had been all her life and certainly didn't want to die a servant, but she did in the end die not just a servant but a traitor too!
Edited by joe 7 - 25/6/2018, 17:58. -
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Welcome, Suzi, and thank you for your analysis! 
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Thank you, Suzi, for your analysis on Naida and Rubina, very accurate.
However, there are some things that are not clear to me:
1) Naida is seen in your analysis as a substantially normal person, while, in Gerdha's analysis it is clear how anaffective and possessive she is towards Daisuke; she has a sick love towards him and an unhealthy and very rancorous mental state against him since at the beginning of their relation on Fleed.
2) Daisuke did not abandon Planet Fleed aboard Grendizer while it was still alive: he left Fleed when it had been completely destroyed and all Fleedians were already dead (he himself says so in ep 2, and he confirms it before in Naida's episode). So, Daisuke was not able to have guilt feelings for leaving a dead planet. He can have remorse for the damage he indirectly caused to Fleedians with his behavior with Naida and Rubina, but not for abandoning them.
3) Hikaru did not scold Naida for attacking Daisuke with a iron bar: she only answered her question without showing any bitterness.
4) Following your version, if Rubina married with Duke, Grendizer would have been in the service of King Vega. But, if that were the case, there would not have been any need to invade a planet to get the robot! In that case, King Vega would have forced Rubina to marry Duke anyway, since with that marriage, King Vega could have had Grendizer for free. After all, invasions cost money and men.
It would have been more logical to think that the King of Fleed really believed that the planet Fleed would become neutral with marriage, without using Grendizer in the service of King Vega: after all, the Fleedians already had Grendizer as a weapon of defense and King Vega had to fear it, since he had made an attack in the conditions in which Duke could not drive the robot.
And this already puts into question the hypothesis "Grendizer still under construction". Instead, I think it was fully functional, and, after the conquest of Fleed and the capture of Grendizer and Duke, the Vegans, perhaps with Zuril's guidance, reinforced the robot with some weapon or other, but Grendizer was already able to face the veghian invasion of Fleed. If not so, the construction of the facts would lack logic.
5) Moreover, the planet Fleed was not pacifist, but peaceful: it has a different meaning . "Pacifist" means a person who hates violence and war in every form, so he also refuses the use of weapons. "Pacific", instead, means a person who prefers peace, but accepts to fight when there is no other option. Dasuke has always been peaceful, never pacifist: therefore, I believe that also Planet Fleed was peaceful. In fact, a "pacifist" planet would never have built a weapon like Grendizer.
6) Rubina could not return to Vega in agreement with the Fleedians, who were sure she would be back soon. If that were the case, the Fleedians would have shown themselves to be very naive, if not stupid. Since Rubina was their life insurance, they would never let her go. They would have asked for guarantees, they could not even afford the slightest chance that Rubina really left them. Then, a hidden departure of Rubina seems more logical.
7) In your analysis you doubt of the sudden attack on Fleed because, in episode 71, there were Fleedian speakers that said of Vega invasion. I don't remember them, but anyway, even if they were there, I do not understand where is the problem. The Fleedians were able to easily recognize a Veghian spaceships. "sudden attack" does not automatically mean "unrecognizable attack".
8) In your analysis, you consider Duke Fleed, on his planet Fleed, as if he was the same person who was on Earth, then with his own moral caliber: but it is not so. This is demonstrated, for example, by the fact that his father had kept him unaware of his marriage to Rubina, thinking that Duke would rebel against the idea of sacrificing himself.. -
Suzi.
User deleted
Thank you, Suzi, for your analysis on Naida and Rubina, very accurate.
Hello Joe7,
Thanks for welcoming me to your forum
I was going to finish the last part of my commentary on Gerdha's analysis by writing my theory about Duke's mental state but I guess I will leave this to another time and answer your questions first.1) Naida is seen in your analysis as a substantially normal person, while, in Gerdha's analysis it is clear how anaffective and possessive she is towards Daisuke; she has a sick love towards him and an unhealthy and very rancorous mental state against him since at the beginning of their relation on Fleed.
There is no evidence in the anime that Naida had a disturbed mental state while she was living on Planet Fleed prior to its invasion and destruction by the Vegan Forces.
In fact the dialogue between Duke and Naida in the Centre when she was telling her escape story, Daisuke told her: "Also your suffering heart will heal, and you will be able to return to be the person you were". So Naida was indeed a "normal" person with a "normal mental state" prior to the Fleedian War.
Yes, indeed in my analysis Naida was a normal person while on Plant Fleed prior to the war but that doesn't mean that she was perfect.. Every character has its flaws and defects, and no body is a complete angel or a complete demon, everybody has their good and bad sides and that's pretty normal, isn't it? What matters is who do one clicks with and be able to deal with their defects.
Naida's love to Duke as I mentioned was selfish and immature for the most of it but it was real, you can agrue whether that type of love is healthy or unhealthy, but no one can deny that she genuinely loved him. I DO believe that Naida's love to Duke may have had immature beginnings with selfishness and possessiveness just like any new love relationship when it initially starts but it has definitely evolved into a more mature one albeit very late.
The reason I'm saying this is that unlike Rubina, she was able to let go of Duke when she realised that he was in love with someone else (i.e. Hikaru) and that Hikaru loved him in return. The evidence for that is the dialogue that took place between her and Hikaru in front of the cell where Daisuke was deliriously screaming. My Japanese isn't perfect and is at a really very basic beginner's level but when Naida said to Hikaru "You love Duke, don't you? ......Me too love Duke"; in the Japanese dialogue if I heard it correctly, she used the term Ai 愛 for love in both Hikaru's case and her own (she didn't not use Suki 好き which she has used when she was telling Duke that she loved him, and she didn't even use Koi 恋). From my studies in Japanese Language, I learnt that even though suki is the most common term used to express love, it actually means "like", "fond of", "preferred" and koi refers more to being affectionate with or in love with someone i.e. romantic love whereas Ai is the biggest and highest form of love, Ai is true love and is generally thought to be something two lovers gradually gain months after beginning a romantic relationship. So basically the difference between the two emotions is that "koi" is always wanting and "ai" is always giving as stated in one of the explanatory Japanese language websites.
Naida used the term Ai in her speech with Hikaru because at that point in time she realised the difference between being in love with someone and truly loving him enough to let him go. And that's what she did. Her love was genuine even if it was mad or immature at the beginning.
On the other hand, Rubina didn't let go go of Duke Fleed, she was possessive of him until her last breath asking him to name the first red flower that bloomed on Fleed after her. Now, that's truly possessive selfish immature love that hasn't evolved at all.2) Daisuke did not abandon Planet Fleed aboard Grendizer while it was still alive: he left Fleed when it had been completely destroyed and all Fleedians were already dead (he himself says so in ep 2, and he confirms it before in Naida's episode). So, Daisuke was not able to have guilt feelings for leaving a dead planet. He can have remorse for the damage he indirectly caused to Fleedians with his behavior with Naida and Rubina, but not for abandoning them.
Guilt is a very tricky emotion, it doesn't have to have a rationale to exist and it can engulf a person without any good reason if their mental state is fragile or is weakened by any factor.
As a simple example which I encounter in a lot of people is what they feel after losing a loved one to death of whatever reason. If the person died of illness after exhausting all the possible treatment avenues, those who loved him the most would feel guilty that they didn't do enough to keep that person healthy and alive even if that person willingly chose to lead an unhealthy lifestyle or refused certain treatments. Even if the illness was something like cancer that we still don't have cures for all of its forms, those who loved them the most would still blame themselves for the death (true, this is an abnormal grieving reaction, but that's what it is...guilt and self-blame even if one had nothing to do with it). Same if the person died of an accident, the surviving relatives and loved ones would also self-blame themselves that they should've done more to protect him/her or stop him/her from going or doing that thing the day he/she died. They feel guilty that they didn't spend enough time with the deceased or didn't do this or that, and may even feel guilty that they're still alive and that person isn't!
Daisuke's mental state was indeed very fragile after witnessing the atrocity and the massacre of his family and the people of his Planet. He for sure, even if he did everything he could to save it, would still have guilt feelings towards his Planet and his people that he hasn't done enough to save them. He may even feel guilty that he survived and they didn't. All these guilt emotions are expected to exist in any person in his situation. Even the soldiers at war who survive return with guilt feelings that they're still alive whereas their comrades died even if they had nothing to do with their death.3) Hikaru did not scold Naida for attacking Daisuke with a iron bar: she only answered her question without showing any bitterness.
In the Japanese version, the intonation of Hikaru's dubber gave me the impression that her reply was expressed in a surprised tone with a bit of condemnation for Naida's actions.4) Following your version, if Rubina married with Duke, Grendizer would have been in the service of King Vega. But, if that were the case, there would not have been any need to invade a planet to get the robot! In that case, King Vega would have forced Rubina to marry Duke anyway, since with that marriage, King Vega could have had Grendizer for free. After all, invasions cost money and men.
It would have been more logical to think that the King of Fleed really believed that the planet Fleed would become neutral with marriage, without using Grendizer in the service of King Vega: after all, the Fleedians already had Grendizer as a weapon of defense and King Vega had to fear it, since he had made an attack in the conditions in which Duke could not drive the robot.
And this already puts into question the hypothesis "Grendizer still under construction". Instead, I think it was fully functional, and, after the conquest of Fleed and the capture of Grendizer and Duke, the Vegans, perhaps with Zuril's guidance, reinforced the robot with some weapon or other, but Grendizer was already able to face the veghian invasion of Fleed. If not so, the construction of the facts would lack logic.
We can't deny that in episode 2 dialogues it was stated that Grendizer was constructed by Vega utilising Planet Fleed's advanced technologies, and we can't deny either what was stated in the dialogues of episode 25 that Grendizer was the protector God of Fleed implying that it was already constructed before the Vegan attack on Fleed and this is also supported by the dialogues of episode 49. So how do we the poor audience make sense of these inconsistencies in the dialogues? We just have to work on them like a puzzle hoping that the pieces match and fall into place.
Here is my theory, Grendizer was indeed a Fleedian invention constructed on Planet Fleed by Fleedians to protect their planet against any pending future invasions whether Vegan or else. Vega the Great would have definitely aspired to get hold of that horrific machine to add it to his conquering army. Making Planet Fleed an ally that would assist him with warfare on other planets was out of the question because this was not the principle of Planet Fleed foreign policy or attitude towards other planets. Vega the Great had to find another plan to get hold of Grendizer. Direct conflict with Planet Fleed in the presence of Grendizer was not an option either because he would lose.
When the King of Fleed proposed the engagement of his son to his daughter, he took advantage of the situation studying the construction of Grendizer and everyone that concerned it (albeit secretly through spies) awaiting the opportune moment to steal it. He may have also hoped that Duke wasn't in agreement with his planet's pacifist attitudes towards other planets and would share his conquest ambitions.
However he must have figured out during the engagement of Rubina to Duke, that Duke was not the "fighting aggressive ambitious person" who would endorse his cause and assist him in his conquest of the universe with Grendizer, but he wanted that machine at any cost. For sure if Duke were the type of person that he hoped him to be - an ambitious ruthless violent cold-blooded killer - he would have proceeded with the marriage plans especially that his daughter fell in love with him. Vega the Great was a cunning person, he knew very well that the King of Fleed was playing a game of time with the engagement proposal and he accepted and played along. The game could go either way, but Vega the Great didn't want to be the loser and was indeed a much better player in this political game. There was no chance for Planet Fleed to be neutral in the upcoming conquest wars if marriage between Duke and Rubina occurred. The King of Fleed knew the limitations of his small planet in the face of Vega's great ambitious plans. His only ally was time, prolong it as much as possible until maybe a miraculous solution could happen.
Perhaps, like you said during the negotiations of the marriage contract, the King of Fleed requested that Planet Fleed remained neutral in any upcoming war and would not engage with Grendizer in support of the Vegan army or the opposing side, but Vega the Great refused, otherwise why would he sacrifice his daughter to marry a man who he didn't think was worthy of the massive empire he was building for her?
I think that deep down Vega the Great would have never agreed to such a condition, but his cunningness made him pretend to accept it while he was devising a plan to steal Grendizer and punish the Fleedians for their refusal to assist them. So he may have signed a fake peace treaty and took his daughter to Planet Vega claiming that she needed to get some preparations ready for her upcoming wedding to the Prince of Fleed. And while the Fleedians were deluded that they were safe he attacked the planet and stole Grendizer then plundered it with the vegatron bombs.
His Vegan scientists may have worked on Grendizer aiming to disable the "one-pilot only" option that was assigned to Duke Fleed, otherwise how would any Vegan soldier be able to board it and use it? They may have also enhanced some of its features and that's what the dialogue in episode 2 was referring to.5) Moreover, the planet Fleed was not pacifist, but peaceful: it has a different meaning . "Pacifist" means a person who hates violence and war in every form, so he also refuses the use of weapons. "Pacific", instead, means a person who prefers peace, but accepts to fight when there is no other option. Dasuke has always been peaceful, never pacifist: therefore, I believe that also Planet Fleed was peaceful. In fact, a "pacifist" planet would never have built a weapon like Grendizer.
Pacifist in the English dictionary means:a person who believes that war and violence are unjustifiable.
Peaceful in the English dictionary means:not involving war or violence.
I don't recall what the original Japanese dialogue stated in regards this point (I will check it later though), but my understanding from the Arabic dubbing is that it was a planet that abandoned all reasons and causes of war. So whether it was peaceful or pacifist, the end point is that it won't engage in any war unless it was for self-defence. Duke Fleed himself struggled at the beginning of the war on Earth to bring himself to board Grendizer and fight the Vegans. We have seen this internal struggle in episode 1 in particular. So I tend to think that his stance in this episode was that of his planet as well, hence his hesitation to use Grendizer. Self defence is indeed different from unprovoked aggression and assault on others, and no sane creatures in the universe would not have any means of self defence, even if weak in comparison to the attacker. Even the animals in various types, forms and shapes and species have means of self defence. So how would advanced beings like the Fleedians not have any means of self-defence? They have purposely built Grendizer to fend off and scare away any invading attempts.6) Rubina could not return to Vega in agreement with the Fleedians, who were sure she would be back soon. If that were the case, the Fleedians would have shown themselves to be very naive, if not stupid. Since Rubina was their life insurance, they would never let her go. They would have asked for guarantees, they could not even afford the slightest chance that Rubina really left them. Then, a hidden departure of Rubina seems more logical.
Like I explained above, Vega the Great might have deceptively signed a peace treaty with the King Fleed to mislead them into believing that they were safe while he took his daughter back to Planet Vega prior to attacking them, so isn't a peace treaty enough of a guarantee for security and safety?7) In your analysis you doubt of the sudden attack on Fleed because, in episode 71, there were Fleedian speakers that said of Vega invasion. I don't remember them, but anyway, even if they were there, I do not understand where is the problem. The Fleedians were able to easily recognize a Veghian spaceships. "sudden attack" does not automatically mean "unrecognizable attack".
Ok, let me explain it better. On a radar one sees approaching planes, saucers, spaceships, unidentified flying objects, etc.. One doesn't immediately deduce that any of these things would attack them unless there was already an established state war between the involved parties or exchanged threats. One also doesn't get to recognise who the attacker is unless they identify themselves via direct communication or by certain signs or emblems on the crafts involved. Planet Fleed and Planet Vega were not in a war situation, on the contrary, at that stage there was a peace treaty between them. So the first Vegan attack was indeed unexpected and sudden.
In an established state of war between two countries, both sides know each other's identity and expect attacks from one another. For example, when the attack on Hiroshima with the atomic bomb happened, and according to Wikipedia:
During the night of August 5–6, Japanese early warning radar detected the approach of numerous American aircraft headed for the southern part of Japan. Radar detected 65 bombers headed for Saga, 102 bound for Maebashi, 261 en route to Nishinomiya, 111 headed for Ube and 66 bound for Imabari. An alert was given and radio broadcasting stopped in many cities, among them Hiroshima. The all-clear was sounded in Hiroshima at 00:05. About an hour before the bombing, the air raid alert was sounded again, as Straight Flush flew over the city. It broadcast a short message which was picked up by Enola Gay. It read: "Cloud cover less than 3/10th at all altitudes. Advice: bomb primary." The all-clear was sounded over Hiroshima again at 07:09.
from the above it was obvious that the enemy was detected and identified and the raid alerts were sounded. True though that the scale of the attack and its consequences were totally unexpected but the attack itself was not sudden or unexpected because Japan was already in a state of war, and being attacked is a daily normal expectation of its inhabitants.
Planet Fleed on the other hand had a peace treaty with Planet Vega and their heirs were going to get married to each other soon, so why would they expect the approaching Vegan saucers to attack them in that city where Duke and Morru were unless those Vegan saucers and warships attacked another city earlier?! The sounded alert in episode 71 suggested that they knew that were under attack by the Vegan Focres, so it is very likely that the attack started in another nearby place and progressed quickly to that city.8) In your analysis, you consider Duke Fleed, on his planet Fleed, as if he was the same person who was on Earth, then with his own moral caliber: but it is not so. This is demonstrated, for example, by the fact that his father had kept him unaware of his marriage to Rubina, thinking that Duke would rebel against the idea of sacrificing himself.
The fact that the King of Fleed hid his intentions of wedding him to Rubina is not evidence at all that Duke did not have the same high moral calibre he had on Earth, otherwise Duke wouldn't have agreed to marry Rubina in the first place after his father explained the fragile political situation of planet Fleed to him. He wouldn't have risked his life either to retrieve Grendizer from the Vegans after they stole it. In fact if he had no high moral calibre he would've done exactly what Naida falsely accused him of doing which is saving himself at the expense of his planet and his people. He could've even negotiated with Vega the Great a deal to survive on Planet Vega as a respected royality, couldn't he?
I did explain that the King of Fleed hid his intentions from his son initially because he feared that his son's emotions towards Naida would blind him to see any reason or hear any justifications before Rubina came to Planet Fleed; it's not because he didn't trust or doubt his son's high moral calibre and high sense of duty towards his planet; after all Duke Fleed was the crown prince of Planet Fleed and he would've have been raised with high sense of responsibility and morality towards his duties and services to the Fleedian people.
If you have a more convincing evidence that Duke did not have the same high moral calibre on Fleed that he had on Earth, please show them to me, because what you mentioned did not convince me at all that he didn't.
It has been my pleasure in engage in such an interesting discussion with you Joe7, and I thank you again for welcoming me on your forum.
I shall write my analysis and comments on Duke's mental state on another day.
Edited by Suzi - 2/7/2018, 02:45. -
.
More than 7 years have passed by since my last post in a public forum about Grendizer. I feel somehow a bit emotional now writing a message here.
So, first of all I would like to heartily thank Joe7 for providing a place where to safely discuss about this wonderful anime.
Indeed I would like to comment the comments (LOL) but I know that Suzi has more ideas to share so I'll wait to read them. And hopefully other friends will join us here in sharing their own comments.. -
Suzi.
User deleted
More than 7 years have passed by since my last post in a public forum about Grendizer. I feel somehow a bit emotional now writing a message here.
So, first of all I would like to heartily thank Joe7 for providing a place where to safely discuss about this wonderful anime.
Indeed I would like to comment the comments (LOL) but I know that Suzi has more ideas to share so I'll wait to read them. And hopefully other friends will join us here in sharing their own comments.
Hello My Friend!
Long time has passed since we engaged in discussion posts like this...I feel emotional too writing this now...
Indeed I still have one more point in your analysis that I want to give my opinion on it and I will get to do this in the next post.
And like you, I heartily thank Joe7 for gathering us again in his forum, hope others can join too.. -
Suzi.
User deleted
Duke Fleed: PTSD OR BPAD?
Before I continue let me explain the above acronyms
PTSD = Post Traumatic Stress Disorder
BPAD = Bipolar Affective Disorder (previously known as maniac depression)
There are two types of BPAD:
Bipolar I Disorder (which involves one or more manic episodes or mixed -manic and depressive- episodes, and may include a major depressive episode),
Bipolar II Disorder ( in which the patient has one or more severe major depressive episodes with at least one hypomanic episode. Hypomania is a lesser form of mania. There are no manic episodes, but the individual may experience a mixed episode.)
Leaving this medical jargon aside for now and going back to Gerdha's analysis in which she stated that Duke was suffering from manic-depression based on his presentation in episode 25. Firstly, I salute her because coming to this conclusion as a non-health professional is awesome in itself, however as a clinician I disagree with this diagnosis.
I admit that as a clinician, the presentation of Daisuke's "euphoric " state puzzled me for a while because it did not really fit with an episode of mania - the way I saw it in patients in real life, and I couldn't really consider it as hypomania either.
However, in my job you assess the person as a whole from every aspect to establish a diagnosis, and looking at Daisuke's history and presentation throughout the whole anime not just episode 25, his condition fitted very well with a diagnosis of PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) mixed with Depression (the mental illness)
PTSD was first identified in returning war veterans and was later found to exist in any individual who had been exposed to a traumatic or a stressful life event. In the past it used to be a subcategory of Anxiety disorders but now it is considered a category of a mental disorder in its own right in the classification of "Trauma and Stress-Related Disorders".
As clinicians, we are governed by the DSM-5 criteria in diagnosing mental illnesses and disorders ...and yes, it can be utterly confusing, because sometimes the differences can be very subtle.
Below are the DSM-5 Criteria for diagnosing PTSD (I will write Daisuke's presentation in the anime against each criterion)
for simplicity of language an explanation I used this website:
https://psychcentral.com/disorders/ptsd/po...-ptsd-symptoms/
Criterion A: Traumatic event
Trauma survivors must have been exposed to actual or threatened:
. death
. serious injury
. sexual violence
The exposure can be:
. direct
. witnessed
. indirect, by hearing of a relative or close friend who has experienced the event—indirectly experienced death must be accidental or violent repeated or extreme indirect exposure to qualifying events, usually by professionals (non-professional exposure by media does not count).
Duke had both direct and witnessed exposure to major trauma on Planet Fleed. He witnessed the death of his parents and his people, the burning and destruction of his planet, and was threatened by death himself several times (on Planet Fleed several times - see flashbacks of episode 2 during the attacks on Planet Fleed itself and while fighting the Vegans with Grendizer after retrieving it from them, episode 30, and episode 71 while rescuing his friend).
He also sustained serious injury while on Planet Fleed that threatened his life (the radio-infected wound of his right arm)
So he has indeed fulfilled Criterion A.
Criterion B: Intrusion or Re-experiencing
These symptoms envelope ways that someone re-experiences the event. This could look like:
. Intrusive thoughts or memories
. Nightmares related to the traumatic event
. Flashbacks, feeling like the event is happening again
. Psychological and physical reactivity (such as increased heart rate) to reminders of the traumatic event.
A person needs to experience at least one of the above intrusive symptoms to satisfy this criterion, and Daisuke has experienced all 4. From nightmares and flashbacks to memories and melancholy and anxiety whenever he saw a red moon. Even meeting the orphan in episode 19 stirred his emotions and memories of his lost homeland and reminded him of his "loneliness" on Earth.
Criterion C: Avoidant symptoms
Avoidant symptoms describe ways that someone may try to avoid any memory of the event, and must include one of the following:
. Avoiding thoughts or feelings connected to the traumatic event
. Avoiding people or situations connected to the traumatic event
Daisuke in episode 1 was totally avoiding having to ride Grendizer because it reminded him of the tragedy of Planet Fleed. He repeatedly said while in the grass field at night "I don't want to board it!". When he saw the red moon in the Centre, he simply asked them to alert the Defence Forces.
In episode 24, Dr Umon told Dr Space that Daisuke loved the farm more than the Universe, and I think that Daisuke was intentionally avoiding having to work in the Centre in the years prior to the attacks on Earth, because the Centre always exposed him to Space and reminded him of his planet.
Criterion D: Negative alterations in mood or cognitions
This criterion is new, but captures many symptoms that have long been observed by PTSD sufferers and clinicians. Basically, there is a decline in someone’s mood or thought patterns, which can include:
. Memory problems that are exclusive to the event
. Negative thoughts or beliefs about one’s self or the world
. Distorted sense of blame for one’s self or others, related to the event
. Being stuck in severe emotions related to the trauma (e.g. horror, shame, sadness)
. Severely reduced interest in pre-trauma activities
. Feeling detached, isolated or disconnected from other people
The person must have at least 3 of the above symptoms occurring or worsening following the experience of the traumatic event to fulfil this criterion.
I could recognise at least 3 symptoms of Criterion D in Daisuke.
He was feeling detached, disconnected and isolated from people (as in episode 1 when Koji arrived to the farm with TFO, and as in episode 3 when he kept playing his guitar while everyone was busy preparing for the farm's feast). He was stuck in severe sadness whenever memories of Planet Fleed came and we could see this in several episodes. He also suffered from distorted severe sense of guilt and self-blame for the atrocity that befell his planet as we have seen in episode 25 when that resonated with Naida's accusations to him.
I could argue and add that he also had some memory gaps relating to specific events of the war on Fleed that he gradually remembered when the right triggers occurred e.g. the name of Naida's brother that he forgot, abandoning his sister amidst the destruction of his planet as seen in the flashback of episode 49, and remembering in the episode of the rats that Vega the Great also used animals in his war on Fleed. Also the story of how he initially got his right arm wound while rescuing his friend in episode 71, he did not mention that in episode 30 when he stated the cause of the injury- true it's the scriptwriter's fault but for the sake of argument I will add it because it fits perfectly (LOL!).
So in this case, he has experienced 4 symptoms of the above criterion and he satisfied it too.
Criterion E: Increased arousal symptoms
Increased arousal symptoms are used to describe the ways that the brain remains “on edge,” wary and watchful of further threats. Symptoms include the following:
. Difficulty concentrating
. Irritability, increased temper or anger
. Difficulty falling or staying asleep
. Hyper vigilance
. Being easily startled
At least 3 of the above should have been experienced.
I could recognise 3 easily in Daisuke!
.We have seen him in several episodes struggling to get a decent sleep at night and that's without any Vegan threat or attack.
.His behaviour in episode 25 and 63 was typical of the 2nd line of symptoms listed above (he was quite irritable with both Naida and Kerika and easily slipped in to anger holding the former violently and slapping the latter unjustifiably). It's worthy of note that the script writer of both episodes is the same person (and that is Mr Mashima). Even with Hikaru in episode 23 when she discovered his secret he easily lost his temper and slapped her angrily.
. Daisuke was also hyper vigilant as demonstrated in episode 2 when Koji was watching him in secrecy behind the gate of the Centre before they fought each other, and in many other episodes awaiting any sign of a pending Vegan attack. He was also hyper vigilant in episode 9 when Mineo came to stab him at night, and in episode 25 when he jumped on top of Naida in the middle of the night to stop her from approaching Grendizer in the hanger.
Criteria F, G and H
These criteria all describe the severity of the symptoms listed above. Basically, they have to have lasted at least a month, seriously affect one’s ability to function and can’t be due to substance use, medical illness or anything except the event itself.
I think Daisuke satisfied criteria F, G and H perfectly too. His symptoms lasted not just one month, but several years, and have affected his ability to function in some instances with the stress they caused him and these symptoms were definitely not due to substance abuse or medical illness but the traumatic event of destruction of his planet and its inhabitants.
So therefore Daisuke/Duke Fleed easily fitted a diagnosis of PTSD.
So now the important questions are:
1- that elated mood that we saw in episode 25 when he met Naida was it mania, hypomania, or something too small to qualify to be defined as either of them?
2- in episode 25 we saw Daisuke suffering from an episode of Catatonic depression like Gerdha skilfully explained in her analysis and we know that catatonia can occur in patients with Bipolar Disorders (previously known as manic-depression) and in Schizophrenia, but does it occur in cases of PTSD?
The answer to question 2 is yes, catatonia can occur in patients with PTSD so the presentation of Daisuke in episode 25 as a sufferer of PTSD having an episode of catatonia is medically correct. And yes, until today catatonia is treated by ECT (electroconvulsive therapy = electric shock to the brain) as stated in the episode. The only difference is that ECT is delivered much safely nowadays than back in the seventies.
So let's answer question 1, what can Daisuke's "euphoric/elated" mood in episode 25 be? It's definitely not mania- mania is so much stronger and crazier and the patients who have Bipolar I Disorder do struggle to function normally without medication
Could it be hypomania?
It could possibly be hypomania... if so, then is he a sufferer of Bipolar II disorder as well as PTSD?
It's not uncommon for one person to have two co-existing mental illnesses such as Mixed Anxiety and Depression, after all Daisuke did have features of Depression in addition to his PTSD (which is not an uncommon presentation, and in fact I have seen it in many patients).
But are we misreading the "normal" mood of Daisuke - i.e.- when he is not sad or depressed or irritated - as euphria/elation or hypomania? I mean, are we so used to seeing him angry, depressed, and sad to not believe that he could have "normal" periods of happiness? After all in episode 9, he was happy, not just happy but he was dancing too (compare that to his behaviour and attitude in episode 3). So was that also "hypomania"?
Why didn't anybody see that as "unusual" or "abnormal" too? Personally, I don't think that his behaviour in episode 9 was abnormal but he was indeed very happy.
So is this "happiness" is just brought to him by friendly alien visitors because he didn't feel that "alone" on Earth being an alien as well, and can relate to them from that aspect?
After all, Mineo was a friendly alien too, in fact, she was the first friendly alien he encountered in the anime, and he sobbed at her death too.
If meeting Mineo whom he didn't know previously made him happy, then definitely meeting Naida his childhood friend and ex-girlfriend whom he thought was dead would send him to the moon and back with happiness, so would I consider this hypomania?
I don't think so, but let's check symptoms of Bipolar Disorder to find out.
For a person to qualify for a diagnosis of Bipolar, one needs to have at least 3 symptoms of mania and at least 4 symptoms of major depression as listed below of the DSM-5 criteria.
During a manic or hypomanic phase, bipolar symptoms include:
.heightened sense of self-importance --- Duke didn't have any of that at any time in the whole anime
.exaggerated positive outlook --- could have been his conversation with Naida when he was telling her about the beauty of Earth to comfort her, and with the dying Rubina when he told her that she wouldn't die.. but still he could’ve said that just to comfort her
.significantly decreased need for sleep--- he struggled to maintain a good long sleep but never did not need to sleep
.poor appetite and weight loss---- don't think this applied or we saw it
.racing speech, flight of ideas, impulsiveness---- didn't see any evidence in epode 25 of that
.ideas that move quickly from one subject to the next---???!! didn't see evidence of that either- talking with Naida about their memories on Fleed naturally led them to talk about Naida's brother and this death, it's not like he was talking about Fleed and suddenly started rambling about coffee!
.poor concentration, easily distracted--- didn't see that either
.increased activity level --- I think his activity level was normal, unless one considers dancing in episode 9 unusual! LOL!
.excessive involvement in pleasurable activities --- The horse ride to the lake with Naida was not really "excessive". It was just an outing similar to many others that he did in other episodes, such as going to a festival with the Makiba Family and also camping with them, horse riding with Hikaru in some episodes or by himself - so no no excessive activity in episode 25
.poor financial choices, rash spending sprees---- ??! we were not told in the anime if he did any of that
.excessive irritability, aggressive behaviour r --- yeah we have seen that a lot, but these are also features of PTSD
During a depressed phase, bipolar symptoms include:
.feelings of sadness or hopelessness --- Yes, he has been experiencing a lot of sadness
.loss of interest in pleasurable or usual activities-- ok, he sometimes didn't enjoy being with people or doing things with them and preferred to be alone
.difficulty sleeping; early-morning awakening -- he had that too
.loss of energy and constant lethargy --- did we ever see Daisuke lazy? Danbei always accused him of laziness LOL!
.sense of guilt or low self-esteem-- yes he had feelings of guilt indeed
.difficulty concentrating, trouble thinking and making decisions --- ummm .. not sure we saw enough evidence of that except maybe in the flashbacks of episode 49 when he left his sister amidst the raging fires in pursuit of Grendizer- certainly that wans’t a rational decision
.negative thoughts about the future --- ummm .. sometimes but not without good reason
.weight gain or weight loss --- unknown but very unlikely
.talk of suicide or death--- talk of death yes, because of his situation in the war and because of his deadly wound which is not unreasonable, but suicide as suicide out of hopelessness not for the purpose of war as in episode 73 never!
From the above, I don't think that Daisuke satisfies the criteria for a diagnosis of Bipolar. With only 1 or perhaps 2 symptoms of mania/hypomania, I can’t label him with this diagnosis. He does have prominent features of depression though
Therefore, I tend to believe that he suffered from PTSD mixed with Depression , not bipolar.
I hereby conclude my comments on Gerdha's Nadia and Rubina comparative analysis, which is indeed a magnificent piece of analytical writing even if I disagree with small parts in it. So thanks my friend for re-igniting our passion.
P.S. edited to add, that if any reader felt distressed or upset by what I mentioned in this post regards mental illnesses and their symptoms or felt the urge to self- diagnose, please don’t do that and go consult your doctor. I won’t apologise for stating the medical facts and certainly my intention is not to cause distress in anybody, it was just for the mere purpose of analysing a character’s behaviour and presentation. But if you felt distressed by reading my post, then accept my apologies for unintentionally causing that and I suggest you seek medical advice in your earliest convenience.
However, if one felt upset that I diagnosed Duke Fleed with a mental illness and that has shattered the image of the “perfect flawless hero” one had in their mind previously, then I won’t apologise for that. I would suggest re watching Grendizer without any childhood nostalgia. Duke Fleed is far away from the idealist perfect flawless hero.
Edited by Suzi - 3/7/2018, 02:10. -
Jerome Vlna.
User deleted
Hello to all, after some difficulties to be able to post on this forum, I'm very glad to be a member, as I was with Gerdha and Suzi nearly a decade ago elsewhere. So glad to see that the passion has not fade away albeit maybe different as we grow older and therefore gives us the possibility to analyse Grendizer in a different light. As I'm French, we celebrated yesterday the 40th anniversary of the arrival of Goldorak in our lives. I've decided to watch the dvds again in VO as we have them here with both versions.
What's interesting is that indeed the French version was adapted (quite well for the French public) but quite far away sometimes from the original one. We've discussed that at length some time ago, haven't we Gerdha? Yet, what strikes me as relevant is the new translation from VO on those DVDs that gives light in French to what Gerdha wrote in her different analyses and as I've been used to I must agree with many things she says. Unfortunately, I don't have the time to develop or write again what I had in previous long-disappeared posts from the old forum. I guess it'll come back from time to time in my new posts.
What I want to underline today is that definitely, there's a turning point in the series with episode 25 and Naida. Before that, one might consider that the depth of the characters is quite shallow. The storyline is more or less the continuation of the ones of Great Mazinger and Mazinger: what I mean is,that, even though Grendizer is an anime of its own, the stories are basically the same, a new character (Mineo, Miyuki etc. that we only see once) a tragedy and a conundrum (an impossible choice or thing to do), a fight and that's it. Yet it's also the beginning of something else that definitely becomes relevant with episode 25. We are as some say in a typical Greek myth where the hero has to prove himself (that's also another layer of understanding of Grendizer, the Greek-Roman mythology underlying pattern, think of the story of Troy, of Ulysses/Odysseus and you'll see that Duke Fleed/Actarus has common traits: clever, he uses ruse, he's lost his way to his planet and must therefore accomplish heroic feats to find innner peace, he's not a simple character as he's conflicted and sometimes not that nice as was Odysseus). In Ep 25, we find more about his past and love comes in, in a very Greek tragic way. That's why even though I totally understand what Suzi says about Duke's PTSD (which is obvious in our modern psychological diagnosis with our current knowledge), I don't think that the Japanese teams that conceived the anime really put those very words to what they were creating at that time in the 70s. PTSD was only being discovered with the return of the Vietnam war vets in America and it took some time before getting public knowledge and even common medical knowledge. So of course, he must be suffering from PTSD but that's not, to my point of view, what they wanted to show on Grendizer as they didn't have words or medical expertise to express it.
Yet, they had the necessary knowledge about Greek tragedy and recent history (some said that King Vega was the portrait of the Soviet leader, Brezhnev and that Grendizer shows the fight between totalitarianism and democracy, which is very important in Japan as well and let's not forget that democracy was imposed there by foreigners, namely the US, Duke could be a metaphore for that too as well as his fight etc. but that's for another post.)
That's why what Gerdha wrote is relevant and enables us to further undertsand the underlying motives of this tragedy. To me and without realizing it to many (kids in the 70s and adults now), Grendizer is our modern time Odyssey, or Eneid with subjects that are relevant to our generationS and will remain so :
1) what is it to be a modern day hero with technology etc.
2) basic feelings such as love, friendship are especially relevant as life is tenuous;
3) what we have lived in the past is a part of us and we need resilience to overcome traumas;
4) the planet is our home and we must preserve it;
5) politics and political strategies are not on the same level and are regularly conflicting with human and humane values;
6) life is unexpected and we must prepare for this daily challenge: in that sense Vega is just a metaphore of all the dangers in life
7) dealing with loss etc.
I could go on...that's why Grendizer has become over the year so important to many and is now a part of common cultural references: artists use 'him' as a subject, words from the anime are commonly used (for instance a golgoth (Enbanju) in French is used to describe a guy who is very strong and muscular).
What's important in Grendizer is the metaphores that are intertwined within the basic story lines that give lessons of life exactly as Homer or the authors grouped under the name Homer did, it was a way of talking about our common origins, feelings, defects as humans. What better strategy than to use a foreigner, a semi-god (Duke here) or Ulysses/Odysseus 8 centuries BC. When you're not completely the same, it's easier to give you qualities that are not necessarily common place in a human, and yet the author manages to teach you something about yourself.. -
Suzi.
User deleted
Hi Jerome,
great to see you again Jerome!
It has been a long time indeed! I can't believe it's been almost a decade! Time does fly for sure.
I do have a comment about what you stated here:QUOTEThat's why even though I totally understand what Suzi says about Duke's PTSD (which is obvious in our modern psychological diagnosis with our current knowledge), I don't think that the Japanese teams that conceived the anime really put those very words to what they were creating at that time in the 70s. PTSD was only being discovered with the return of the Vietnam war vets in America and it took some time before getting public knowledge and even common medical knowledge. So of course, he must be suffering from PTSD but that's not, to my point of view, what they wanted to show on Grendizer as they didn't have words or medical expertise to express it.
The symptoms of PTSD have been recognised much earlier than the the in the War Veterans of Vietnam. It may have not had the same name though.
I came across this interesting history and timeline of the diagnosis of PTSD. I thought that it was first identified in the veterans of WWI, but I discovered that it was recognised centuries earlier.
Check this website:
https://historyofptsd.wordpress.com/timeline-2/
The earliest recognition of disease is recorded in 1678 by a Swiss physician calling it "Nostalgia". In 1700s, another one divided the disease into 3 stages. During the American Civil War, the physicians also reported on the stresses of the Civil War Soldiers. In 1871 it was called the "irritable heart" by one doctor, and in 1905 it was officially recognised as legitimate medical condition by the Russian army by the name of "Battle Shock". it was known as "Shell Shock" and "War Strain" in WWI. In 1919, Frued an this colleagues wrote a book about it, in which they called it "War Neurosis". In WWII, it's name changed to "Combat Exhaustion", and they started treating it with some medication.
In 1952, it was included in the DSM-I criteria as "Gross stress reaction", but it was dropped from DSM-II in 1968, only to gain public awareness post-Vietnam War and become included in DSM-III in 1980 officially by the current name "Post Traumatic Stress Disorder".
I guess what I'm trying to say is that the disease symptoms had been recognised since centuries ago, and Japan being a warring nation throughout its history, its soldiers (whether in the Samurai era or the modern era of the 20th Century and its wars) for sure would have experienced similar symptoms. Whether they admitted its presence or not, is different story.
I am sure that the Japanese authors of Grendizer were very well aware of the symptoms of this condition even if it was given a different name at the time, after all many of them have lived with surviving WWII Japanese war veterans, and they themselves may have had relatives or family friends who have personally experienced the tragedy of Hiroshima and Nagasaki which are referenced in Grendizer a lot by the tragedy of Planet Fleed.
Like you and others mentioned, Grendizer carried a lot of references and indirect criticism of the events of WWII and its effects on Japan in particular. For sure the authors portrayed a true image of the disturbed psychological state that war survivors had in reality...Some may have even experienced it first hand too! After all, Grendizer was just made about 30 years after the end of WWII, and that was one hell of a bloody and violent war! As children, most of these authors and script writers would have grown up with parents and grandparents who lived through that war itself and would have personally seen its atrocities first hand. I believe, that they were just trying to shed the light through the character of Duke Fleed on a real problem that the Japanese society was trying to suppress and hide (or even deny its existence). I mean, even until today, Japan has a high suicidal rate but very little has been done by its government and its medical associations to tackle this issue effectively.
I can't comment on your Greek mythology analogy because unfortunately I forgot a lot of its details. I read it once as a teenager and don't recall much except vague stories and names here and there. If it's not for movies like Troy, the Golden Fleece, etc.. I wouldn't have remembered a thing LOL! I know very well that these movies are not an accurate interpretation of the real mythology stories either, so ..I will leave the commentary on that to someone who knows it well.. -
Jerome Vlna.
User deleted
thanks Suzi for those enlightened comments on PTSD. Indeed wars have always left behind their lot of psychological wounds. . -
Suzi.
User deleted
you're welcome Jerome
Indeed wars leave a big trail of physical and mental destruction! And we humans just never learn.... -
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Welcome, Jerome: I thank you for your post on my forum. I will reply as soon as possible (even to Suzi). Have a good day! . -
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Hi Jerome!!! It's such a pleasure reading again your interesting posts!
To all: I have read all the comments; it might seem incredible since the analysis I wrote with Joe7 is very long... but indeed there are still many ideas I'd like to share.
Maybe I'll write them in pieces... otherwise it would take me too much a long time.
I'll be back soon
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