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I have finished watching Texhnolyze at last. I think I've tried it over eight times since early 2000s, but was always like: "Why did they chop his limbs off, what's with the girl in fox mask and this shady moustache guy"— the feeling miserable and powerless part is indeed strong, but it doesn't make any sense. Yet, it's what this show is all about and it's very unclimactic: those who weren't aggressive just died in boredom, and those who were — just killed each other.

The "everybody dies" ending isn't exactly new or fresh, nor it was when the show came out.
The visuals are impressive for the time, had it been produced later, it could be at least something like Ergo Proxy, which had a rubbish ending too, but is still more fun to watch with all the side stories.

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Also, maybe it's a sin to say so on Fedi, I was never a fan of ABe's character design, I have never liked Lain, Haibane Ranmei and Welcome to the NHK. There is nothing particularly bad about it, but I don't get what's to rave about either.

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@m0xee
the ending made sense consideting the show's main theme was dealing with nihilism, everybody dies but the people who tried to exert their will on the world at least had excitement in their lives whereas the ones who gave up their bodies died in shame and the ones who just sat around and maintained their bodies were passively brutalized. also erho proxy was kinda fun but the pretentiousness was just too much, at least texh didnt overtly reference trendy philosophy every episode.
@clayvaulin
Sorry for me using different account to respond. Five hundred character limit on this instance calls for splitting my reply into five or six parts and I'm not in the mood for that today😄

Poor wording on my side, it definitely looks finished — no cliffhangers, but, you just sit through last 5 or so episodes and watch events unfold exactly the way you expect them to. You want something new to be revealed that would make prior events make more sense — but no, nothing like that happens. Like when Ran tells Ichise that he'll destroy everything, you expect him to become too powerful and get out of control or something, but he doesn't do that, it's still Kano who destroys everything and Ichise simply destroyed the future that Kano envisioned by killing him 🤷
And that even looks like a sensible thing to do as this vision of future is too ugly. And he didn't even do it because he didn't like that future, he does it in a rage fit out of revenge for Ran.
There are a few nice scenes, like clerks watching railway in the upper world, cinema-like cuts and radio talk, but that's it. No sudden plot turns, no unexpected character developments — no revelations and no grand battle, the show just dies out like a candle. With rather insignificant (compared to what had happened earlier) events. It's when you expect one to die in a battle, but he dies out of blood loss, like the protagonist does 😅
Like I said, unclimactic. This could've been fixed by different pacing, but here they have revealed too much too early and the latter part gets too bland because of that. Maybe it's just not my type of ending, I don't know 🤷

You're right about Ergo Proxy, I've had the same impression when I've been watching it for the first time, they've put too much of it. Who knows why they did that, maybe to attract more viewers who like "deep" things 😄Anyway it wasn't too big of a turn off to me at the time. I've rewatched it a couple of months ago and this time I didn't notice these things at all, like: "Alright, here's the reference, who cares?"— this time I paid more attention to episodes and characters I rather didn't like on on my prior watch throughs, maybe because, although I didn't remember any details, I more or less what it ends with, maybe because I grew older, more tolerant and paying more attention to different things. Pino seemed very annoying to me before, this time I think she's fun. I hated the scavenger village episodes, but I enjoyed them this time, same for the episode in which they sit on the deck doing nothing waiting for the wind — very entertaining. Then the part in which they explore the attachment/affection thing, when they meet the android caring for the proxy of the "tree world" and Iggy grows some selfishness and gets enraged by Riru never returning his feeling, at the same time she didn't even know she should as he never shown that he wants something from her. It all intertwines quite nicely. Then the supermarket/lake episode… I still didn't like cartoon world and the game show ones, I still thing they are stupid 😂 Maybe I still don't get something.
And yet again, this finale: someone wants the next step of the evolution, but humans don't, they just want their old lives back! How unexpected! 🥱

@m0xee
@m0xEE
i agree that the pacing of texh is slow on the surface, but i think it needs at least one rewatch. the first time i watched it i was an edgy teenager who liked the "nothing good ever happens" feeling in the first episodes and the second watch was when i started noticing little details that only made sense knowing what happens later. the other major theme is the futility of utopianism, which goes with struggle being necessary to avoid nihilism. kano's world wouldnt have been anything like what he promised, his cyborgs were slowly dying due to some kind of brainrot (cant remember if it was an infection or something else) and he would be left alone. the surface was dying because they had achieved a utopia by exiling disruptive elements to lux. the stratification and lack of will to fight made the class complacent and allowed kano to take over.
i think the character drama is a much larger part of lux than the plot, they put a lot of emphasis on family and the corruption of what we normally consider family. doc's infertility leading her to technolyze people and become a mother to them, onishi acting like the big brother wrangling his younger organo rivals, the guy who gets fuck by his dad in a scene that reminded me of a homecoming in mafia/business movies. definitely a slower, less plot-driven show but i still think its very underrated and requires multiple watch throughs if youre not paying very close attention.
as for ergo proxy i might have to watch it again and try to ignore some of the references and edgy fashion.
@m0xee
@clayvaulin
I'll definitely rewatch in a couple of years. It's not a bad show, maybe just got my expectations wrong. First episodes are so overly dark and emotionally overwhelming that you think "Will it be like that all the time? I'm not sure I'm up to 22 episodes of such stuff",— makes it hard to even get into. You're right, the middle part is the best, it gets a bit calmer and more in the vein of traditional western-style drama and maybe you're right about the finale, it does fit the mood of the show, maybe it is the plot twist after all — that there is no plot twist😄
> kano's world wouldnt have been anything like what he promised, his cyborgs were slowly dying due to some kind of brainrot (cant remember if it was an infection or something else)
Yes, I do remember that, one of the former Organo members had his body reject the enhancement, I wrote it off as something idiosyncratic — maybe it's just his body, but now that you mention it, isn't it what they've had Raffia for? This should've never happened, you're right, it's probably a hint at everyone being susceptible to this.

Yeah, you should give Ergo Proxy a chance, a lot of these things are no longer trendy, no one's like "Whoah, Derrida and Lacan", "Wow, Radiohead (and contemporary western music in general) in a Japanese show" — who even listens to Radiohead nowadays? 😂
I was never a fan of either Radiohead or shows that are in your face about being deep and that made it easier for me to see past that. Anyway,It's just not perceived that way anymore — easier to pay attention to other things, which I think are there.

@m0xee
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