anobody likes vandread

[vash the man-slayer]

vandread is a cool anime i wanna know how good is it so can u rated from a scale from 1 to 10...i give it a 8.5 u?

[Duuz]

Well, I have been slowly getting this series over a long period of time. I say slowly because I've been getting other series that I have rated a priorty over Vandread. As a result, I'm not quite done with Vandread. I completed Full Metal Panic first.

And now with Maburaho and Girls Bravo and just 2 more boxed sets of Urusei Yatsura to go. Vandread is still low on my list.

The series it's self reminds me however of other anime series to a certain point. You might rate it highly, but I think I'd give it a 5 or a 6.

[darkdriver]

I like how the studio used computer graphics for the mecha animation. And I like the complex premise; it tells me a lot of thought went into the series before they started designing characters. (An all-woman society would be a lesbian society while an all-man society would be an asexual society...someone's doing social commentary! )

[Duuz]

I like how the studio used computer graphics for the mecha animation. And I like the complex premise; it tells me a lot of thought went into the series before they started designing characters. (An all-woman society would be a lesbian society while an all-man society would be an asexual society...someone's doing social commentary! )

If that was true, then why is Dita so fancinated by Mr. Alien as she calls him? There have been other anime that have an all female society, Gall Force and they were very asexual as well. Only as there were no males any where. They were at war with a race of bio-constructs known as the Paranoids. And then the Paranoids and female Solinoids high command decide the way to end the war is the introduction of a third lifeform to stand between them. A lifeform which is the merging of Solinoid and a Paranoid. This lifeform would be known as Man.

[darkdriver]

Uh, duuz...you answered your own question.

Dita is fascinated by the males because they are aliens to her. It's the same sort of relationship as between Elliot and E.T. between those two--and I would say that's one of the major themes of the anime.
The females grow up in an all-female society...which, because the women can become pregnant and need a mate to support them, is a lesbian society. Women, through medical technology, can impregnate one another and have their own families. Though some have what we call "masculine" qualities, they would consider such qualities as being "protective" or "aggressive", depending on the context. The all-female society is one that is family-based, as there are homes, communities, and so on.
The males grow up in an all-male society...which, because the men cannot become pregnant and therefore rely on biotechnology to clone and grow more males for their society, is an asexual society. Since reproduction is something relegated entirely to machines, the men see one another as replaceable creations and are thus very aggressive in their fields to make certain they are not replaced.

If one really wants to go into a deeper layer in this anime, one could say this anime is about the conflict between Communism and Capitalism, the ideology that says all people are property of the state to be used and disposed of at the whim of the state, and the ideology that says all people are their own persons with basic rights that come together to form rules to govern themselves. What the makers are saying is that both groups have to come together to save themselves, or both will be destroyed by outside forces that see both groups as inferiors to be removed from society at large.

Like I said, it's a complex premise. Each sex sees the other not only as being different but also as a completely alien species, with strange organs, the uses of which are unknown to the other.

Sure, there's fascination between Dita and 'Mr.Alien'; there's even some degree of love. But it's not romantic love--the same kind of romantic love that the other females in the series have, that is. As even Dita's words indicate, she doesn't love a male; she loves an alien.
And that's some strange lovin' going on there.

[Duuz]

Don't forget the blonde Dura? Also want to have a baby with Mr. Alien, his name is Hibiki right? And there are quite a number females that are beginning to get a normal liking to the males. I guess we're seeing different things in the series.

BTW why are there 3 threads for Vandread now anyways?

[darkdriver]

I didn't forget Dura. I just didn't include her either.

Dura is a celebrity wannabe. She wants fame and glamor...and she'll do just about anything to get it. "Anything" includes having a strange halfbreed alien baby, just so she can claim the fame from having such a child. She has no emotional commitment to Hibiki; she just wants a halfbreed alien baby for mooching fame.
No different from someone wanting to have the first of anything in the real world just for the bragging rights of being first. Thing is, Neither of them understand the ...ahem, 'biology' that's involved in creating a halfbreed alien baby.

As for the interest of the other females in the other males...that cam be chalked up to a growing respect for them and their spirit. If you get a chance, check out the movie "The Last Starfighter" sometime (should be a cheap rental). I saw it in my younger days, and the same thing happens there: a comradery develops between aliens thrust into a situation beyond their control and thus dependent on each other for their very lives.

Thing is, you're having a hard time seeing this because the "aliens" are both humans, just different sexes. Thus, you're looking at this from the viewpoint that it's a tale about men and women being forced together to survive against a force that wants to kill them. Nothing wrong with that; no doubt the makers of the series knew that many watching it would view it in such a way.

But to really understand the depth of the series, think of it this way: what if the women were 'greys' or 'little green men' or the reptilians from "V" or any other nonhuman spacefaring race from any science fiction source you prefer? Then think about the interactions and request and back-and-forth between the two groups.
I like this series because it is this deep: it makes the sexes into alien species with independent cultures utterly strange to each other.
That's the beauty of Vandread.