About THAT episode of Ultraman Leo...
Oct. 15th, 2023 12:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
akinoameSo one of these days, when I have the time, energy, and the ability to parse out JUST how much I can talk about it without risking confidentiality, I'd love to go in-depth on THAT episode of Ultraman Leo, specifically the apparent timeskip and how everyone just complains, "Oh, it's back to status quo," etc. But...that's genuinely how traumatized kids are. And I know from seeing it.
I went into it a little bit in my retrospective, but I think at some point, I need to write about that episode alone. Narratively speaking, it may not be satisfying--you, the audience, have just experienced this horrific moment and lost a massive chunk of the cast. You are in shock, you don't have time to deal with it, and now all of a sudden, here are Gen and Tooru living with a new family and apparently doing all right. But that's actually what happens in children with trauma. When they finally get to a safe place, it starts to come off of them and they begin acting like kids again. At the same time, you'll see moments when it's clear they are not used to being kids, and that's there with Tooru. I honestly think that's there with Gen. He's 20, not a child or a minor anymore, but he's definitely not ready to be an adult. He has twice been thrust into a position where he has to grow up before he's ready, and this second time he's barely hanging on. He doesn't have someone older to help guide him into it (even if impatiently and violently), and he's responsible for a child now.
Given how melodramatic 90% of Showa Ultra--especially Leo--is, this is a shockingly realistic moment, but I also see why nobody's going to see it that way (see my explanations of PTSD being pretty damn accurate in Ankh in OOO and Dan in Leo).
I went into it a little bit in my retrospective, but I think at some point, I need to write about that episode alone. Narratively speaking, it may not be satisfying--you, the audience, have just experienced this horrific moment and lost a massive chunk of the cast. You are in shock, you don't have time to deal with it, and now all of a sudden, here are Gen and Tooru living with a new family and apparently doing all right. But that's actually what happens in children with trauma. When they finally get to a safe place, it starts to come off of them and they begin acting like kids again. At the same time, you'll see moments when it's clear they are not used to being kids, and that's there with Tooru. I honestly think that's there with Gen. He's 20, not a child or a minor anymore, but he's definitely not ready to be an adult. He has twice been thrust into a position where he has to grow up before he's ready, and this second time he's barely hanging on. He doesn't have someone older to help guide him into it (even if impatiently and violently), and he's responsible for a child now.
Given how melodramatic 90% of Showa Ultra--especially Leo--is, this is a shockingly realistic moment, but I also see why nobody's going to see it that way (see my explanations of PTSD being pretty damn accurate in Ankh in OOO and Dan in Leo).