Cinematic television and lines of flight within Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, and The Grotesque Otaku: Kill La Kill and a singular resistance

Date

2019-08

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Abstract

This two-part essay explores the differences between two competing televisual experiences: cinematic television and anime-ic television. Cinematic television is a new form of television, which, I maintain, differs from than more traditional forms of television due to its unusual blending of a Hollywood style with exhibitionist filming techniques. This unique mix of styles, along with the tendency of viewers to binge watch television content today, imbues it with strong virtual potential that, in turn, fosters lines of flights. To illustrate this form and its virtual potential, I analyze the Amazon original series Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. Specifically, I argue that through its blend of editing styles the show invites viewers to reject modern happiness scripts and to embrace, alternatively, a nomadic modality. Comparatively, utilizing the work of Mikhail Bakhtin, I also explore limited animation’s ability to generate a grotesque aesthetic through its deployment of anime-ic movement. By analyzing a successful limited Japanese anime Kill la Kill as a case example, this essay explores limited animation’s potential to create a caricature depiction of a transcultural Otaku fandom that it subsequently critiques. Through limited animation’s depiction of movement and grotesque aesthetics, viewers are asked to embrace transgressive ways of being that resist late capitalist tendencies.

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Keywords

Television, Affect, Gender studies, Cinematic, Anime-ic

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