A pity

[flemmings]

After watching the first ep of Gankutsu-ou, I'm tentatively of the opinion that the Count comes across as a much more appealing figure later if you don't watch the first ep of Gankutsu-ou. I see how the action fits thematically with stuff the Count says later- and it sends a chill down my spine- but in the end it has a distancing effect on the whole after-relationship. To the extent that Franz x Albert looks not merely cast in concrete (another side-effect of ep 1; start from ep 3 and it looks quite arbitrary) it seems the OTP. And the Count dwindles into Mephistopheles.

Comments

[tammylee.livejournal.com]

Before this post I can honestly say I have never thought of Mephistopheles being at the end of a dwindle.
^_^

Now that my computer is running at full health again I shall have to catch up on my watching!

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

Not to spoil too much but-- yeah. Mephistopheles is actually a limited character. You know what he's doing, you know why he's doing it, he does it with style no doubt (maybe: Marlowe's version reduces him to circus ringmaster at points) but there's nothing large about him and nothing that can surprise. The Count looked like an unknown quantity in the middle eps: ambivalent and ambiguous. I'm sure the ambivalence and ambiguity remains when we start seeing him entirely through Albert's besotted eyes, but in that first ep we're seeing him through Franz's, and first impressions are what last.