Illusions fall away
Touga's schemes come to fruition as Utena struggles with the idea of fighting her "Prince" for control of the Rose Bride."Graceful and Ruthless; The One Who Picks the Flower" provides examples of:
- Almost Holding Hands: When Utena reaches the arena for the duel, Anthy reaches out a hand to her. Utena, still on the staircase, reaches a hand up toward her. They do not touch.
- Blaming the Victim: The student council discusses Nanami's duel loss during their meeting, and when Juri and Miki imply that Touga has mistreated Nanami, he replies that no matter who laid the trap, it’s the victim’s fault for falling for it. There is foreshadowing in this, since he's setting up an elaborate trap for Utena.
- Color Motif: The balloons in the student council scene match the theme colors of the main characters. And there are a lot of balloons, but only one violet one - Anthy's color. It rises behind Miki as he reacts to Touga's statement that "if one has deep feelings for a person, it's only a matter of time until those feelings trip one up."
- Cracks in the Icy Façade: Anthy makes admissions about wanting to be more than a solitary bird in a cage that seem heartfelt. But once Utena loses, she takes them all back at Touga's command.
- Dramatic Spotlight: When Touga announces himself as Utena's prince, the background of the rose garden fades away (even Anthy fades away) and only Touga and Utena remain, standing in beams of light. The scene is in soft focus, including the white roses on the spinning rose frame. The spinning roses are blurriest of all and positioned so that they are not fully in frame, indicating that while the nobility of the white rose is being invoked, something is wrong.
- Inelegant Blubbering: The voice acting for Utena at the end of this episode, especially in Japanese, conveys her devastation in a raw, adolescent way that often gets viewers
choked up. - Masquerading As the Unseen: Touga's lies to Utena about being her prince work because as much as the prince means to her, she doesn't remember his appearance. She doesn't remember that Touga saw her at her parents' funeral either, so she falls for his hot reading hook, line and sinker.
- Projectile Kiss: Wakaba winks in a flirty way at Utena and pink hearts pop out of her eyes. Utena just does an Eye Take as she watches the hearts drift across the screen.
- Repeat After Me: Utena does not seem to notice that by commanding Anthy to agree with her, she is undermining her point about Anthy wanting to be an ordinary girl. Touga absolutely notices, and laughs.Utena: You hate being treated as the Rose Bride, right? Tell him how you really feel!
Anthy: Yes. I hate being treated as the Rose Bride. - Sheathe Your Sword: Touga wins the duel by dropping his guard. Utena hesitates, but her momentum carries her toward him, and he cuts off her rose as she stumbles past.
- Silly Rabbit, Idealism Is for Kids!: Touga lays out the philosophy he's been acting under the last several episodes: Caring about other people is weakness. He makes Utena care about him, and uses it against her.
- Stay in the Kitchen: Touga denies both Anthy's and Utena's efforts to be more than they are:
- He actually tells Anthy to stay out of the kitchen on the basis that the Rose Bride minds the flowers; she doesn't cook even if she'd like to.
- When he defeats Utena, he attempts to spin it as a good thing—an opportunity to go back to being a normal girl.
- Through His Stomach: A same-gender variant; Wakaba makes a cute bento for Utena as a geture of affection.
- Wham Episode: Utena is defeated for the first time and Touga gains possession of Anthy.
- William Telling: Shadow players do a riff on the legend of William Tell, albeit with the "son" pointing out that it's the 37,919th time in a row the apple has been shot, with the "father" saying that they'll keep going until somebody stops them. There's some point about being trapped in a destined eternal horror.
