23: "The Terms of a Duelist"

The climactic duel scene. I agonized over the dialogue between Mikage and Utena, and over Akio's dialogue in the last scene. I edited it over and over, right up until the eleventh hour, just before recording began.

The last scene. The original plan was for it to be Tokiko on the phone with Akio.

"Why hello, Tokiko. Have you thought about what I said? That's right… about Professor Nemuro. He was lying to himself, clinging to his past with you."

It was all an illusion that Mikage himself had created for his own sake.

"Yes… that dream that he let 100 boys die seems to be another lie he told himself to keep himself in the past. It's just like magic isn't it? Why do you suppose so many people believed a false rumor like that? Perhaps they wanted to believe…that miraculous power dwells within friends."

The illusion Mikage wanted to see. Were the Black Rose Duelists people his illusion resonated with?

"While you cling to your memories, time stops. Perhaps that was the eternity he found, though… Yes… good idea. If you'll come and fetch him, I imagine he'll be released from the memories."

Tokiko symbolized the lost "real time." and she said she would come for Mikage. The time had finally come for him to be released from his /illusion of his lost time./

But.

Was that really all right? I thought it over.

The story in episodes 11 and 12 about the dueling game. Episode 23 picks up where it left off in laying the groundwork for the final episode.

Wasn't Mikage's fate the same fate that Utena would eventually meet? In which case, shouldn't it be crueler?

I tried making the person on the other end of the phone line Mikage himself.

"The path you must take is no longer prepared for you. Now graduate from this place."

Those who reject that place are, conversely, rejected by it as well. This is the nature of systems: the moment you reject them, you are forced to realize they're the very ground you're standing on. Mikage noticed the trick behind the system, and he hurriedly attempted revisions. But the adult who'd created the system just said, "let's not," and unilaterally brought the curtain down. The system of illusion was finished. Mikage could no longer exist there. That's why he disappeared from the memories of those who'd interacted with him.

People's happiness or unhappiness shouldn't be determined by struggles over the divide called the "Rose Bride." Utena rejects the duel system.

However.

In due course Utena will be rejected by the duel system and that place, and /no longer be able to exist there./ This foreshadows the final scene of the series.