Pillow Talk 3

Naota Nandaba is the protagonist of FLCL. 12 years old, currently residing in the small town of Mabase and recently having lost his brother to the promise of baseball glory in America, Naota is bored. Mind numbing, head aching, grade school bored. This is not his problem though. If Naota were simply bored he’d just be every other young kid in a small town, no, Naota’s real problem is that his brother left. When his brother left it left a void in Naota’s life as well as those of his father, grandfather, and Mamimi. Not knowing any better and realizing that he can’t actually fix things by taking his brother’s place, Naota is half-thrust and half-jumps into the roles that his brother used to fill for all of these people, unsuccessfully. While Naota thinks he truly can take his brother’s place for these people, he can’t and fails to see that he’s only delaying the inevitability that they’ll have to face that fact that Tasuku (Naota’s brother) is gone eventually. Amidst the confusion and turmoil created by the consequences caused by his attempted emulation of Tasuku Naota is also trying to deal with his brother’s departure (he obviously misses Tasuku but attempts to cover any of this up except occasionally around Mamimi or Haruko). His interactions with Haruko often have Haruko playing the matronly/older brother role comforting, encouraging and praising Naota and Naota as himself instead of his Tasuku personality. The whole point of Naota’s character is to show that trying to grow up to early, for whatever reason, is silly.
Naota and Mamimi: Naota knows Mamimi because she and Tasuku used to date. Now that Tasuku has left Naota has filled in as a sort of pseudo-boyfriend for Mamimi (Mamimi’s take on the whole thing is explained in a previous post). “Dating” a high schooler has colored Naota’s perception of women however as he isn’t really shaken by Mamimi being physically intimate with him but they aren’t personally intimate at all (Naota doesn’t really understand Mamimi’s pain over Tasuku’s departure, especially initially when he tells her that Tasuku has an American girlfriend probably under the assumption that she’ll move on once there’s no hope for them) and he doesn’t know about people bullying her. This isn’t to imply that Mamimi and Naota aren’t close, but its more like a brother/sister dynamic rather than a boyfriend/girlfriend one with the exception of the physical aspect. Naota displays embarrassment when any sort of non-teasing physical activity occurs between female characters he has feelings for (when Ninamori rests her head on his shoulder he tells her to go home and he blushes profusely and gets flustered when Haruko insinuates she’s going to sleep in his bed and half jokingly asks him to have sex with her). Confused, he tries to kiss Mamimi after she refuses to go on a date with him (after gaining some self confidence by saving the city with his guitar and mistakenly thinking Mamimi is impressed and also jealous of Haruko when in reality she’s realizing she’ll have to move on and is sad that Naota is sort of ignoring her as a friend (she doesn’t have anyone else)). His inability to understand that Mamimi doesn’t just want a boyfriend to fill Tasuku’s role, that she liked Tasuku and is using Naota to help dull the pain of the extreme loneliness she’s feeling, and that physical closeness doesn’t equate to a personal relationship give us an insight into the fact that Naota is truly still a kid and doesn’t understand many of the aspects of “adult” (high school but adultish compared to him) relationships. This is important because he is just a kid and has been thrust into an adulty world of relationships which he has to learn his way our of. Because he‘s just a kid. Which is the whole point. But I’ll get to that later.
Naota and his father: Naota’s father used to be some sort of editor (I could look up the exact title but I’m not going to, wiki it if you really care) for a magazine about three months before the show begins. Presumably he opened a bakery after Tasuku left in order to be able to take care of Naota (you never find out what happened to their mom) and in the process has gone slightly stir crazy. Acting like a child, publishing a ridiculous (but accurate) “mini-zine of justice!” and treating Naota like someone much older than he is (like Tasuku), Naota’s father hasn’t handled the transition from being fairly literarily influential (major editor, there’s also mention of a book he also wrote about Evangelion) or the absence of two members of his family well. Naota attempts to keep him under control (often telling him to “stop acting like such a child”), but he’s only a kid and has difficulty. Naota’s father aids and abets Naota’s attempt to fill in for Tasuku by making ridiculous assumptions about him (for instance that he’s doing the “Fooly Cooly” (its implied that Fooly Cooly is something sexual in this instance) with Mamimi. And Haruko, even though Naota and Haruko hadn’t even known each other for a day). He lets Naota run off with Haruko and miss school with no resistance (although whether this is him being a nonexistent parent or him seeing that this will help Naota get over Tasuku/that Naota is in love with Haruko is questionable, although its less likely that it’s the second option). He makes no attempt to keep track of Naota’s whereabouts (he hangs out with Mamimi under the bridge frequently, goes off and fights robots, etc) and is for all practical purposes nonexistent as a parent. This forces Naota out of the child role and into a sort of self sufficient/caretaker sort of role. This is another instance where he has to learn that he isn’t Tasuku: he’s just a kid.
Naota and his grandfather: Same as the dad, except with baseball. There’s not very much evidence outside of the baseball game and his grandfather’s general attitude lining up with the dad’s because the grandpa is a very minor character. I just thought I’d mention it because it does exist.
Naota and Haruko: For all practical purposes Haruko serves as Naota’s surrogate Tasuku as well as an object of a sort of worshipful romantic love (the kind that would never GO anywhere but is still love nonetheless, like the admiration for a big brother except transformed into a romantic sorta thing). She takes him on trips (they go on her moped multiple times, once by the ocean and then later they go on an extended trip which causes Naota to miss a significant amount of school). Begrudingly, Naota allows her to sleep in Tasuku’s bed at night, keeping Naota company (not the sexual kind), talking and stuff. She makes Naota lunch and takes care of the bakery when he’s away (taking on a lot (but not all) of his Tasuku-persona’s responsibilities involving his dad which frees Naota up (a little bit) to be more of a kid). Despite his baseball prowess, its clear that Tasuku never taught Naota to actually “swing the bat” (it has a number of meanings, but here it’s a pretty literal one). Masterful at the game herself, Haruko gives Naota impromptu batting practice one night ( a lesson I’ll go into shortly). Haruko does all the things for Naota that disappeared with Tasuku which lets him revert back to the little brother role sometimes, though not entirely, and be a kid; and Naota responds to this by treating her like Tasuku. Unintentionally, Naota says Tasuku’s name when he sees her swing her bass for the first time (reminding him of his brother playing baseball). After her departure with Kanti and sudden return, Naota starts crying when he’s alone with her, asking her why she had to leave (clearly meaning not only her, but Tasuku as well: Naota is just a kid after all and doesn’t understand why his brother would abandon him). Her proxying of Tasuku is part of the reason Naota tell Haruko, “I love you” at the end of the series. It acts as a sort of closure for Naota, admitting that he loves his brother and misses him as well as understanding that its foolish to try to replace him. Romantically, he does have feelings for Haruko as well and by this point has learned that despite the consequences you should do/say what you feel because you may not get a chance to at a late time (he’s learned this from Tasuku leaving, then Haruko’s sudden departure and return as well as Haruko’s lifestyle in general). This is one of the two major lessons (at least that I see) Naota learns over the course of the show. Through his unsuccessful efforts to replace Tasuku, tumultuous interactions with Mamimi (especially her rejection of his attempted advances), Tasuku and Haruko’s departure, as well as all the crazy supernatural events in the show he’s learned that you need to just let things be and roll with them. “Whatever happens, happens” (in the words of Spike Spiegel) and that’s not a bad thing. In order to enjoy life for the wonderful thing he comes to learn that it is you need to just sit back and let it drive while enjoying the scenery and traveling companions it dumps on you. In her response to her own question of whether Naota would like to accompany her in her chase of Atomsk, Haruko illustrates the other thing Naota learns (which sort of goes with the first one) namely that he’s “still a kid.” Naota, in his attempts to care for all of those left reeling in the wake of Tasuku’s departure has, in his eyes (although in reality he hasn’t) cast of his childhood in order to be his more adult brother. Haruko shows, and tells, him that he is in fact still a kid and should enjoy his childhood while its still available for enjoyment. She tells him that they’ll get Atomsk “next time” imply that there’s still plenty of time to do adult things later on but that for now he should just have fun being a kid. FLCL isn’t really about growing up (like so many people I’ve heard claim it is), Naota matures a little (telling Haruko he loves her) but the area he matures in really just lead him back to his nature as a child (again, sort of growing up but not significantly). Therefore I say that FLCL, for Naota at least, is less about growing up and more about learning that its okay to let growing up happen at its own pace and that you don’t need to be in a hurry to get anywhere you’re going in life.
Naota and Ninamori: Ninamori is the actual love interest in FLCL. Yes Naota loves Haruko in some sort of weird brotherly love/older babysitter-school kid crush thing and I have no doubt that he genuinely loves Haruko. But seeing as how that’s an impossibility considering the fact that up until perhaps the last two minutes or so of the show Haruko is using Naota for her own ends and only after she sees that A) Naota’s love is pure and B) pure love makes for the most powerful channel to N.O. (allowing Atomsk to come through in his true form) does she become genuinely affectionate for Naota, Ninamori is the only love interest with a possibility of panning out. Not only does she have feelings for Naota (as well as he for her although both are hesitant to show it, especially Naota) but she’s similar to Naota in many ways. Her parents are detached and often embarrass her (although both of these things are taken to a much larger extreme than they are for Naota). Ninamori rigs the votes for the class play (for personal reasons) but also so that her and Naota will be co-starring giving her more of a reason to interact with him. She displays genuine affection for Naota, especially when he begrudgingly reciprocates by allowing her to sleep over/jokingly chatting with her (before the accident with Haruko’s bike)/ apologizes for his father’s magazine exposing her father’s scandal, and Ninamori displays jealousy towards Mamimi and Haruko (asking if Haruko sleeps on the top bunk of Naota’s bed every night, saying Mamimi “doesn’t look very bright” after Naoa’s friends tell her that Mamimi is “Naota’s wife”). In the very last scene we see that Ninamori and Naota’s friendship has blossomed (she does the thing Mamimi does when she picks his drink before he can and it’s a kind he doesn’t like because he’s still a kid). Ninamor and Naota also share the fact that they’re in some sort of deep emotional pain (Naota over Tasuku and Ninamori over her parents issues (she says she told her parents how she felt and then cried in one episode) and try to mask it by acting more adult/aloof (Naota’s always saying that there’s nothing to do and that everything is no big deal, Ninamori mimicks the second one whenever her parents issues are brought up and tries to brush off the issue by claiming that “at least she has a lot of money” and is a “Nuevo-rich princess (which is something her father’s secretary, who she sees as someone who does “adult” things, because of the secretary’s involvement with her father, said to her and by mimicking it she’s trying to be adult)).