Editing Talk:Rin Tezuka/@comment-74.69.69.109-20160904035259

Like a lot of you, I initially found Rin's "good ending" painful and unsatisfying. More of a non-ending. But after thinking it over a bit, I changed my mind. I want to offer a reading of the ending scene that I think gets at how beautiful and touching it is. Spoilers ahead.

In Rin's "neutral ending' (which, by the way, I thought was way more brutal than her "bad ending"), Hisao has a conversation with Sae in her gallery about interpreting art. According to Sae, "Everyone interprets art as they will, and interpretation is as much in the eye of the beholder as in the intentions of the creator.... Experiencing art is always personal, only interactive by chance or circumstances." In other words, there is an unbridgeable gap between mind of the artist and the mind of one viewing his artwork. You can venture a guess as to what the artwork ''means,'' or what the artist was feeling when he made it, but you can never know for certain.

In this sense, Rin is kind of like a work of art. (In fact, I don't think it's an accident that in the cover for Act 3, she's posed like the Venus de Milo.) Like a work of art, she can't just tell you what she's feeling with words. All Hisao can really do is watch her and try to guess. And the moments of real connection always seem like chance occurrences.

So in the art room, after Nomiya yells at Rin, she explains to Hisao that her paintings are her attempts to express her feelings without words: "I thought.... that all that is inside me could become a picture if I tried really hard." But Hisao explains that even if Rin's paintings are true representations of her feelings, there's still this unbridgeable gap between the artwork and a person viewing it, in this case him.

Later, in the final scene in the clearing, Rin asks Hisao if he loves her. He replies that he doesn't know. She asks him what that means, and he says he doesn't know that either. Next she tries saying "I love you," but ends up sticking her tongue out and laughing nervously – because the word "love" tastes weird to her. She tries to explain how she really feels, but all she can get out is, "I... don't think there's a word for this." The point is that the word "love" is just like a painting. What does it mean? Can it really express what you feel inside? And if it did, could someone hearing it really have access to your feelings? No, just like a work of art, the word "love" leaves an unbridgeable gap between the one who speaks it and the one who hears it.

Then Hisao kisses Rin. While they embrace, he begins thinking anxiously about the future, like he always does: "Rin's spirit, her passion, her strength.... How should I treat them? Where are they headed to? Is that future irrevocably different from mine?" But the next line is key: "That anxiety will never loose its grip on my heart, but I think I could learn to live with it." I think he's anxious because he knows he can never bridge the gap between them and really understand what Rin is feeling. But he's willing to live with that anxiety if it's the price of being with her. Next Rin explains that Hisao's kindness frightens her. I think that's because she can't fully understand it, and it makes her feel vulnerable, somehow. But Hisao asks her, "Is that bad? Even if you are afraid?" And she answers, "No. I'm alright with it. It's fine if it's you." Rin is willing to live with her fear if that's the price of being with Hisao.

The ending is still ambiguous, but then so is their relationship. In fact, I think it's intentionally ambiguous. Neither Rin nor Hisao can know for certain what the other is feeling, but they're committed to staying with each other, whatever the cost. They just have to trust that it will work out somehow. We're in the same boat: we don't know for certain that it'll work out between them. We just have to trust that it will. I find that really beautiful; and I, for one, think they're headed for a happy ending. –T