Earth Girl Arjuna
Encyclopedia
is a Japan
ese animated
television series created by Shoji Kawamori
. The series follows Juna Ariyoshi, a high school girl chosen to be the "Avatar of Time" and entrusted with saving the dying Earth.
"Arjuna" refers to the legendary archer Arjuna
from the Hindu epic Mahābhārata, which explains why Juna's weapon against the Raaja is a bow.
Arjuna aired on TV Tokyo
from January 9, 2001 to March 27, 2001, totaling 12 episodes. The DVD release ("Arjuna: Director's Cut") featured remastered video and sound, and a previously unbroadcast "Chapter 9". Subsequent re-runs of the series on Animax
include the DVD-only episode.
. On the drive, they get in an accident and Juna dies. As the spirit leaves her body, Juna sees the dying Earth. The planet's suffering is visualized by worm-like creatures, the Raaja. The Raaja vary in size, from microscopic bacteria
to those entwining the planet. A young boy named Chris appears before Juna and offers to save her life if she will help the planet. She agrees and is resurrected.
Supported by SEED, an international organization that monitors the environment and confronts the Raaja, Chris hopes that Juna can save the world.
bead embedded in her forehead symbolizes her powers. Besides possessing powers due to her "Earth sympathy", she is an ordinary teenage girl. She has a difficult time understanding her purpose, and is unsure how she is supposed to help the planet. Her personal life is also distressed, both with her mother and sister, and especially in her uncertain relationship with Tokio, whose thoughts she cannot figure out, and who similarly never manages to understand her feelings. While she attempts to succeed in her job, she cannot understand the message Chris is trying to explain until the very end, when she realizes the meaning of "becoming one with the target" that she repeats from the beginning of the series.
Chris is a powerful entity who appears in the body of a young boy. His efforts to revive Juna left him crippled, but he can still leave his body
when the situation demands it. He is unerringly kind and patient with everyone, including Juna, despite her misunderstanding his words. He repeatedly admonishes Juna for trying to fight the Raaja ("Why do you kill?"), claiming he never asked her to do so.
Cindy is a young orphan whom Chris rescued, leading to her unwavering devotion to him. She is a telepath who acts as Chris' translator. She seems to take an immediate dislike to Juna; she is arrogant and rude towards her and says negative things about her even when she's not around. This is presumably because she feels that Chris's crippled condition is Juna's fault.
Tokio is a normal teenage boy, addicted to video games and fast food. He is greatly concerned with Juna's safety, not realizing he is powerless against the forces she must face. Though Tokio is witness to Juna's tribulations, he cannot fathom what she is going through. Though he doesn't understand Juna's situation, he is very patient and does his best to help and protect her, even in the face of a Raaja attack.
Sayuri is a classmate and friend to Juna and Tokio. She knows nothing of Juna's role as savior, but tries to help her deal with what she sees as nothing more than emotions from her confusing personal life.
Although she never says it directly, it is very obvious that Sayuri is greatly infatuated with Tokio, even though Juna, her best friend, is dating Tokio. She tries to fight her own feelings, swinging between pushing Tokio away by setting him and Juna up, and raging at Juna for not appreciating his kindness. With Juna absent off fighting Raaja, Saiyuri can't help herself from moving in on Tokio, but Tokio's response to her is minimal.
, the series is highly influenced by Hinduism
, as well as Indian culture
in general. The story was inspired by the Bhagavad Gita
, most notably in the character of Chris, who is modeled after Krishna
. Note that the series is set in a pantheistic
vision in which it emphasizes the connection between all elements of the Earth. In episode two, Chris's chakras are shown on the monitor screen which are also adapted from the Hindu concept of 7 chakras inside the human body. The antagonistic "Rajaa" (while mispronounced in the anime) refer to "Roga" the 'disease' caused by the wound on earth itself. Arjuna's bow, "Gandiva," is the real name of bow used in Mahabharata by Arjun and her mechanical companion "Ashura" is based on "Asura" powerful lords in Rgveda.
The setting for the show, Kobe
, was chosen by creator Shoji Kawamori for his personal fondness of it, and the city itself plays a prominent role, with famous buildings such as the Kobe Meriken Park Oriental Hotel
and nearby Ferris wheel
showing up as common backdrops. The idea of living in a city is a main theme, with both Juna and the Raaja rebelling against how removed from nature modern life is.
An idea which Kawamori emphasized was natural farming. Not to be confused with the mere absence of chemicals that is often meant by "organic farming
", natural farming involves letting nature grow as it will, not removing weeds or bugs, or using any fertilizer
. The old man Juna encounters in episode four explains the need for this return to nature in order to sustain life in the long term, a sentiment directly from Kawamori himself.
Another theme of the show is that of the disconnect between emotions, thought
s, word
s, and actions. In episode seven, "Invisible Words", Juna is able to read the words in the minds of everyone around her, yet still cannot understand their intentions. She sees in Tokio's mind that he has been asking Saiyuri about a ring, and assumes that he has been cheating on her, when in fact the ring had been for her. Juna and Tokio's feelings never reach each other successfully. In episode eight, while talking on the phone, Juna finds her spirit in the room with Tokio. But despite her even embracing him, he has no understanding when she tries to say that she is with him. At the same time, Tokio actually says he loves Juna for the first time, even though he is at the same moment not feeling her love at all. This idea is later visualized in episode 10, when Tokio is having an argument with his father. Juna is able to "see" their angered thoughts flying at each other, and entirely missing, neither of them hearing or understanding the other. Also another theme emphasized in the show, is about abortion and teen pregnancy. In Episode 9, Juna learns that her older sister, Kaine, who is a college student and a smoker, is pregnant when she hears a little voice telling her "stop that. It hurts." It is revealed later that Kaine's boyfriend broke up with her. At the end of the episode, we see Kaine in her apartment, smoking and placing a hand to her stomach, possibly contemplating to keep the child growing inside her as she presses her cigarette to bits in an ashtray.
. Director Shoji Kawamori says he instructed Kanno that the music was supposed to sound feminine, despite some of its use in action scenes. She used Indian music
as a partial inspiration which matched that of the show. Other tracks are more experimental and otherwordly. The vocals were done by Gabriela Robin
, Maaya Sakamoto
, and Chinatsu Yamamoto. The soundtrack was released on the CD's Arjuna: into the another world and Onna no Minato
.
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
ese animated
Anime
is the Japanese abbreviated pronunciation of "animation". The definition sometimes changes depending on the context. In English-speaking countries, the term most commonly refers to Japanese animated cartoons....
television series created by Shoji Kawamori
Shoji Kawamori
is a Japanese anime creator, screenwriter and mechanical designer, having created or co-created such notable series as The Super Dimension Fortress Macross, The Vision of Escaflowne, Earth Maiden Arjuna, Genesis of Aquarion, Macross 7, and Macross Frontier. He is currently executive director at the...
. The series follows Juna Ariyoshi, a high school girl chosen to be the "Avatar of Time" and entrusted with saving the dying Earth.
"Arjuna" refers to the legendary archer Arjuna
Arjuna
Arjuna in Indian mythology is the greatest warrior on earth and is one of the Pandavas, the heroes of the Hindu epic Mahābhārata. Arjuna, whose name means 'bright', 'shining', 'white' or 'silver' Arjuna (Devanagari: अर्जुन, Thai: อรชุน, Orachun, Tamil: Arjunan, Indonesian and Javanese: Harjuna,...
from the Hindu epic Mahābhārata, which explains why Juna's weapon against the Raaja is a bow.
Arjuna aired on TV Tokyo
TV Tokyo
is a television station headquartered in Toranomon, Minato, Tokyo, Japan. Also known as , a blend of "terebi" and "Tokyo", it is the key station of TX Network. It is one of the major Tokyo television stations, particularly specializing in anime...
from January 9, 2001 to March 27, 2001, totaling 12 episodes. The DVD release ("Arjuna: Director's Cut") featured remastered video and sound, and a previously unbroadcast "Chapter 9". Subsequent re-runs of the series on Animax
Animax
is a Japanese anime satellite television network, dedicated to broadcasting anime programming. A subsidiary of Japanese media conglomerate Sony, it is headquartered in in Minato, Tokyo, Japan, with its co-founders and shareholders including Sony Pictures Entertainment and the noted anime studios...
include the DVD-only episode.
Plot
The story opens with Juna telling her boyfriend Tokio she feels too cramped in the city, and deciding to take a trip to the Sea of JapanSea of Japan
The Sea of Japan is a marginal sea of the western Pacific Ocean, between the Asian mainland, the Japanese archipelago and Sakhalin. It is bordered by Japan, North Korea, Russia and South Korea. Like the Mediterranean Sea, it has almost no tides due to its nearly complete enclosure from the Pacific...
. On the drive, they get in an accident and Juna dies. As the spirit leaves her body, Juna sees the dying Earth. The planet's suffering is visualized by worm-like creatures, the Raaja. The Raaja vary in size, from microscopic bacteria
Bacteria
Bacteria are a large domain of prokaryotic microorganisms. Typically a few micrometres in length, bacteria have a wide range of shapes, ranging from spheres to rods and spirals...
to those entwining the planet. A young boy named Chris appears before Juna and offers to save her life if she will help the planet. She agrees and is resurrected.
Supported by SEED, an international organization that monitors the environment and confronts the Raaja, Chris hopes that Juna can save the world.
Characters
Juna is a girl in the tenth grade, who is recognised by Chris to be the "Avatar of Time", to save the planet. A magatamaMagatama
Magatama , are curved beads which first appeared in Japan during the Jōmon period.They are often found inhumed in mounded tumulus graves as offerings to deities . They continued to be popular with the ruling elites throughout the Kofun Period of Japan, and are often romanticised as indicative of...
bead embedded in her forehead symbolizes her powers. Besides possessing powers due to her "Earth sympathy", she is an ordinary teenage girl. She has a difficult time understanding her purpose, and is unsure how she is supposed to help the planet. Her personal life is also distressed, both with her mother and sister, and especially in her uncertain relationship with Tokio, whose thoughts she cannot figure out, and who similarly never manages to understand her feelings. While she attempts to succeed in her job, she cannot understand the message Chris is trying to explain until the very end, when she realizes the meaning of "becoming one with the target" that she repeats from the beginning of the series.
Chris is a powerful entity who appears in the body of a young boy. His efforts to revive Juna left him crippled, but he can still leave his body
Astral projection
Astral projection is an interpretation of out-of-body experience that assumes the existence of an "astral body" separate from the physical body and capable of traveling outside it...
when the situation demands it. He is unerringly kind and patient with everyone, including Juna, despite her misunderstanding his words. He repeatedly admonishes Juna for trying to fight the Raaja ("Why do you kill?"), claiming he never asked her to do so.
Cindy is a young orphan whom Chris rescued, leading to her unwavering devotion to him. She is a telepath who acts as Chris' translator. She seems to take an immediate dislike to Juna; she is arrogant and rude towards her and says negative things about her even when she's not around. This is presumably because she feels that Chris's crippled condition is Juna's fault.
Tokio is a normal teenage boy, addicted to video games and fast food. He is greatly concerned with Juna's safety, not realizing he is powerless against the forces she must face. Though Tokio is witness to Juna's tribulations, he cannot fathom what she is going through. Though he doesn't understand Juna's situation, he is very patient and does his best to help and protect her, even in the face of a Raaja attack.
Sayuri is a classmate and friend to Juna and Tokio. She knows nothing of Juna's role as savior, but tries to help her deal with what she sees as nothing more than emotions from her confusing personal life.
Although she never says it directly, it is very obvious that Sayuri is greatly infatuated with Tokio, even though Juna, her best friend, is dating Tokio. She tries to fight her own feelings, swinging between pushing Tokio away by setting him and Juna up, and raging at Juna for not appreciating his kindness. With Juna absent off fighting Raaja, Saiyuri can't help herself from moving in on Tokio, but Tokio's response to her is minimal.
Themes
As is clear from the title, ArjunaArjuna
Arjuna in Indian mythology is the greatest warrior on earth and is one of the Pandavas, the heroes of the Hindu epic Mahābhārata. Arjuna, whose name means 'bright', 'shining', 'white' or 'silver' Arjuna (Devanagari: अर्जुन, Thai: อรชุน, Orachun, Tamil: Arjunan, Indonesian and Javanese: Harjuna,...
, the series is highly influenced by Hinduism
Hinduism
Hinduism is the predominant and indigenous religious tradition of the Indian Subcontinent. Hinduism is known to its followers as , amongst many other expressions...
, as well as Indian culture
Culture of India
India's languages, religions, dance, music, architecture, food and customs differ from place to place within the country, but nevertheless possess a commonality....
in general. The story was inspired by the Bhagavad Gita
Bhagavad Gita
The ' , also more simply known as Gita, is a 700-verse Hindu scripture that is part of the ancient Sanskrit epic, the Mahabharata, but is frequently treated as a freestanding text, and in particular, as an Upanishad in its own right, one of the several books that constitute general Vedic tradition...
, most notably in the character of Chris, who is modeled after Krishna
Krishna
Krishna is a central figure of Hinduism and is traditionally attributed the authorship of the Bhagavad Gita. He is the supreme Being and considered in some monotheistic traditions as an Avatar of Vishnu...
. Note that the series is set in a pantheistic
Pantheism
Pantheism is the view that the Universe and God are identical. Pantheists thus do not believe in a personal, anthropomorphic or creator god. The word derives from the Greek meaning "all" and the Greek meaning "God". As such, Pantheism denotes the idea that "God" is best seen as a process of...
vision in which it emphasizes the connection between all elements of the Earth. In episode two, Chris's chakras are shown on the monitor screen which are also adapted from the Hindu concept of 7 chakras inside the human body. The antagonistic "Rajaa" (while mispronounced in the anime) refer to "Roga" the 'disease' caused by the wound on earth itself. Arjuna's bow, "Gandiva," is the real name of bow used in Mahabharata by Arjun and her mechanical companion "Ashura" is based on "Asura" powerful lords in Rgveda.
The setting for the show, Kobe
Kobe
, pronounced , is the fifth-largest city in Japan and is the capital city of Hyōgo Prefecture on the southern side of the main island of Honshū, approximately west of Osaka...
, was chosen by creator Shoji Kawamori for his personal fondness of it, and the city itself plays a prominent role, with famous buildings such as the Kobe Meriken Park Oriental Hotel
Kobe Meriken Park Oriental Hotel
is a hotel located close to Meriken Park, in Kobe, Japan. It was opened in June, 1995, only 6 months after the Great Hanshin earthquake destroyed much of the city. It is one of the more iconic buildings in the Kobe waterfront area called Harborland, and is often featured in pictures of Kobe,...
and nearby Ferris wheel
Ferris wheel
A Ferris wheel is a nonbuilding structure consisting of a rotating upright wheel with passenger cars attached to the rim in such a way that as the wheel turns, the cars are kept upright, usually by gravity.Some of the largest and most modern Ferris wheels have cars mounted on...
showing up as common backdrops. The idea of living in a city is a main theme, with both Juna and the Raaja rebelling against how removed from nature modern life is.
An idea which Kawamori emphasized was natural farming. Not to be confused with the mere absence of chemicals that is often meant by "organic farming
Organic farming
Organic farming is the form of agriculture that relies on techniques such as crop rotation, green manure, compost and biological pest control to maintain soil productivity and control pests on a farm...
", natural farming involves letting nature grow as it will, not removing weeds or bugs, or using any fertilizer
Fertilizer
Fertilizer is any organic or inorganic material of natural or synthetic origin that is added to a soil to supply one or more plant nutrients essential to the growth of plants. A recent assessment found that about 40 to 60% of crop yields are attributable to commercial fertilizer use...
. The old man Juna encounters in episode four explains the need for this return to nature in order to sustain life in the long term, a sentiment directly from Kawamori himself.
Another theme of the show is that of the disconnect between emotions, thought
Thought
"Thought" generally refers to any mental or intellectual activity involving an individual's subjective consciousness. It can refer either to the act of thinking or the resulting ideas or arrangements of ideas. Similar concepts include cognition, sentience, consciousness, and imagination...
s, word
Word
In language, a word is the smallest free form that may be uttered in isolation with semantic or pragmatic content . This contrasts with a morpheme, which is the smallest unit of meaning but will not necessarily stand on its own...
s, and actions. In episode seven, "Invisible Words", Juna is able to read the words in the minds of everyone around her, yet still cannot understand their intentions. She sees in Tokio's mind that he has been asking Saiyuri about a ring, and assumes that he has been cheating on her, when in fact the ring had been for her. Juna and Tokio's feelings never reach each other successfully. In episode eight, while talking on the phone, Juna finds her spirit in the room with Tokio. But despite her even embracing him, he has no understanding when she tries to say that she is with him. At the same time, Tokio actually says he loves Juna for the first time, even though he is at the same moment not feeling her love at all. This idea is later visualized in episode 10, when Tokio is having an argument with his father. Juna is able to "see" their angered thoughts flying at each other, and entirely missing, neither of them hearing or understanding the other. Also another theme emphasized in the show, is about abortion and teen pregnancy. In Episode 9, Juna learns that her older sister, Kaine, who is a college student and a smoker, is pregnant when she hears a little voice telling her "stop that. It hurts." It is revealed later that Kaine's boyfriend broke up with her. At the end of the episode, we see Kaine in her apartment, smoking and placing a hand to her stomach, possibly contemplating to keep the child growing inside her as she presses her cigarette to bits in an ashtray.
Episodes
| # | Title | | Original airdate |
|---|
Music
The anime's score was composed by Yoko KannoYoko Kanno
is a composer, arranger and musician best known for her work on the soundtracks for many games, anime films, TV series, live-action movies, and advertisements...
. Director Shoji Kawamori says he instructed Kanno that the music was supposed to sound feminine, despite some of its use in action scenes. She used Indian music
Music of India
The music of India includes multiple varieties of folk, popular, pop, classical music and R&B. India's classical music tradition, including Carnatic and Hindustani music, has a history spanning millennia and developed over several eras. It remains fundamental to the lives of Indians today as...
as a partial inspiration which matched that of the show. Other tracks are more experimental and otherwordly. The vocals were done by Gabriela Robin
Gabriela Robin
Gabriela Robin is a singer and lyricist, credited for lyrics and vocals on many songs composed and arranged by Yoko Kanno.She has long been rumored to be Kanno's pseudonym. Robin stated in a print interview that she was going to sing in front of an audience for the first time at Kanno's...
, Maaya Sakamoto
Maaya Sakamoto
is a Japanese singer-songwriter, actress, and voice actress. She made her debut as a voice actress in 1992 as the voice of Chifuru in the anime series Little Twins, but is more well known for her role as Hitomi Kanzaki in the hit anime series The Vision of Escaflowne...
, and Chinatsu Yamamoto. The soundtrack was released on the CD's Arjuna: into the another world and Onna no Minato
Onna no Minato
Onna no Minato is one of two soundtrack albums by Yoko Kanno for the anime Earth Maiden Arjuna.-Tracks:# Gold Fish - 1:58# Enka - 3:05# Mawaru Spoke - 3:19# Butter Sea - 3:42# Veggie - 1:36# Shizukana Seikatsu - 2:27# Didn't it Rain - 2:35...
.