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Ten minutes of midnight, Tuesday, April 21, 1992
RE: Ten minutes of midnight, Tuesday, April 21, 1992
#18
I admit I haven't read the entire manga; I only picked it up for SuperS and Stars because gosh was the anime doing a poor job of storytelling.  Seriously, what the hell was that "Congratulations, Shinji!" scene at the end of Stars?  The manga version of Stars is scary enough, what with all of Usagi's friends disappearing, one by one, and no one really acting like anything is wrong.  It's more existential horror than cosmic horror, but scary enough.

But you're missing my point, which is kind of subtle.  If Metallia is capable of driving the world mad as a side effect, and Usagi is more powerful than Metallia, then Usagi's power is truly terrifying.  Just because you aren't afraid of her doesn't mean her power isn't worthy of fear, in the biblical sense.  In a universe of uncaring destruction and zero-sum dog-eat-dog life, the madness of the Serenity family in opposing this creates a pretty nice world for its creatures. (yes yes, canon mumble mumble light and dark in balance, something something The Left Hand of Darkness).  Like, maybe the Shadows are right, or maybe the Vorlons are, but Usagi has the power to make them both leave.  Perhaps everyone is unable to see the grimdark truth of the world, and it is Sailor Moon's power that stands in the way of that for everyone -- why everyone isn't terrified like H.P. Lovecraft.

But let's step back a level and look at the audience's reaction to the show.  Usagi seems like a pretty great guy because she defends what seems like civilization, love, and pretty much our every day lives.  Nothing wrong with that, right?  Well, Lovecraft feels like life on Earth here is kind of an aberration of kindness and justice, and it's quite possible he's even right.  But you should read the article I linked to, though the summary is:

Scott Alexander Wrote:But here is an important rule about dealing with fantasy book characters.
If you ever piss off Sauron, you should probably find the Ring of Power and take it to Mount Doom.
If you ever get piss off Voldemort, you should probably start looking for Horcruxes.
If you ever piss off Phèdre nó Delaunay, run and never stop running.
Elua is the god of flowers and free love and he is terrifying. If you oppose him, there will not be enough left of you to bury, and it will not matter because there will not be enough left of your city to bury you in.
And Jacqueline Carey and Mencius Moldbug are both wiser than Andrew Cord.
Carey portrays liberalism as Elua, a terrifying unspeakable Elder God who is fundamentally good.
Moldbug portrays liberalism as Cthulhu, a terrifying unspeakable Elder God who is fundamentally evil.
But Andrew? He doesn’t even seem to realize liberalism is a terrifying unspeakable Elder God at all. It’s like, what?
The point is that we've invented this thing called classical liberalism, and because we all live amongst it, we don't really notice its power.  But since the Enlightenment, we've been living in a state of exponential technological growth and plenty, and it's all powered on the principle that we show kindness to strangers and respect their opinions.  I'm a liberal cultist, so I say, "bring it on!"  But even the vast, vast majority of conservatives only want to slow down the exponential growth, not revert to the world before 1500.  And maybe that's sane, because we have no idea what the end of all this is.  Our IRL society is in the grip of a massive force that no one can truly comprehend, being driven ever closer towards the so-called "Singularity".  All because of the forces of tolerance and niceness.

And then you look at Tsukino Usagi.  She is the very epitome of kindness to strangers, and tolerance, and trying very hard not to kill one's enemies.  You know, our modernist ideas of love and justice, because she certainly isn't fighting for the archaic divine justice represented by Themis.  If you oppose Usagi, she will more likely than not infect you with her way of thinking.  And if you oppose her to the bitter end, there will not be enough of you to bury, in spite of the fact that you're a Elder God from another dimension.

So I'm thinking, how does it even make sense to call Usagi genre blind to a cosmic horror story if she's the personification of a real world Elder God, with commensurate power?
"Kitto daijoubu da yo." - Sakura Kinomoto
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Messages In This Thread
RE: Ten minutes of midnight, Tuesday, April 21, 1992 - by Labster - 11-03-2017, 06:53 PM
[No subject] - by Black Aeronaut - 03-28-2017, 07:52 AM
[No subject] - by Bob Schroeck - 03-28-2017, 02:30 PM
[No subject] - by Deadpan29 - 03-30-2017, 05:18 PM
[No subject] - by Bob Schroeck - 03-30-2017, 06:16 PM
[No subject] - by ordnance11 - 03-31-2017, 08:40 PM
[No subject] - by Star Ranger4 - 03-31-2017, 08:43 PM
[No subject] - by Black Aeronaut - 03-31-2017, 08:51 PM
[No subject] - by Bob Schroeck - 03-31-2017, 10:39 PM
[No subject] - by ordnance11 - 04-02-2017, 05:58 PM

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