Dreams and Identity: The Central Theme of Stardust Telepath
An analysis of the driving concerns underpinning the narrative of the story — the fulfillment of one's dreams, and how that relates to the quest for a personal identity.
WARNING: Unmarked spoilers ahead. You Have Been Warned.
Dreams and Identity
Intro
At first, Stardust Telepath presents itself as another entry in a long line of relaxing Iyashikei published by Manga Time Kirara. A quirky tale of schoolgirl friendship set in a gentle, low-stakes world meant to heal the reader with its simplicity and life-affirming earnestness. Something in the vein of Is the Order a Rabbit?, Laidback Camp, Slow Start, etc. But, as the tale goes on, it takes an abrupt and shocking hard left into themes of existential angst, questioning one's place in the universe, and the dread of finding out you're not who you thought you were.While only the amnesiac Yuu Akeuchi's storyline involves a literal Quest for Identity, the search for an identity is the thread that connects all four characters together.
But first, what is an identity?
Identity Crisis
On its most basic level, an identity differentiates the individual from others. Individuals must navigate a complex network of human interaction to get what they need to make themselves happy. So by having or adopting a certain set of characteristics, mannerisms, and beliefs, they construct a "face" they use to integrate with others
. This "face" serves to give them distinguishing traits among their in-group — dedication, moral character, insightfulness, technical expertise, leadership, etc. The identity a person constructs for themselves need not be genuine. The Japanese coined the terms ''honne'' and ''tatamae''
to describe situations when a person feigns a culturally-acceptable identity, even if it doesn't represent their true feelings. A person's identity exists in relation to their place in the world and the people who inhabit it. If a being existed in isolation, it would have no need of an identity, or even the language faculty necessary to construct one (since language is, by definition, a way to share information with others). This hypothetical being would simply act according to its instincts, like an animal. An identity, then, is only useful in context with the perception, real or imagined, of other human beings. Dreaming of You
In Stardust Telepath, the question of identity is intimately linked with a person's dreams for the future. If identity is how a person presents themselves to the world, their dream is their end goal — the thing they interact with the world to achieve. What they orient all their efforts towards. Just as an identity is used to interact with others, in many cases people depend on others to make their dreams come true — which is especially the case for a large-scale industrial endeavor like launching a rocket into space. If somebody wants to make their dreams come true, sometimes that means helping other people make their dreams come true too. Working together for a common goal, where each individual contributes in their own way in the hopes of fulfilling their individual desires. Therefore, identity is the bridge between dreams.When You Wish Upon a Konohoshinote
At the beginning of the story, Umika Konohoshi has no identity. Although she made furtive attempts to connect with other people in the past, a fateful encounter with Matataki Raimon in middle school led to Umika completely shutting down. Wanting to reach out and become friends with Matataki, yet unable to vocalize the words in her heart, Matataki snaps at her, "Don't talk to me if you've got nothing to say." This one remark leads Umika to become an Elective Mute who literally cannot vocalize anything. She has nothing to say, nothing useful to offer other people, no place inside an in-group. So, her unconscious chooses to withdraw from the human race and instead dream of being rescued from its self-imposed isolation. Her inability to speak is a surface-level expression of her lack of identity.But in the present day, when Umika strives to make her dream come true, she is forced to confront Matataki again. In doing so, she finally gets the chance to say what she wanted to say all those years ago.
Burning Out Her Fuse Up Here All Alone
Matataki copied her own identity from the protagonist of the Ganbarion anime. She even wears a pair of goggle in homage to the Expy of Simon we see on its poster. Her self-styled identity as a mecha protagonist whose dream is to build giant robots has isolated her from her peers, who thought she was too 'boyish' to get along with, when they would rather talk about dramas instead. Instead of changing herself to fit in, Matataki doubled down on her otaku identity and withdrew from society the same way Umika did.But then, Umika expresses approval of Matataki as a mecha protagonist by complimenting the goggles she wears. After this, when Matataki warms up to the idea of friendship, she 'returns the favor' by making Umika the president of the nascent Rocket Research Association. Because Umika reinforced Matataki's identity, Matataki sets Umika on the path to forge an identity of her own as the RRA's leader.
Vote of No Confidence
Once the RRA has been founded, Umika decides the best way to create an identity for herself as president is to copy Kei Akizuki. For six chapters, she proclaims she's going to be a "cool club president" like Kei is. But when she goes onstage to deliver her speech at the championship qualifiers, she experiences the crushing realization that she is not, and never will be, Kei Akizuki. Umika borrowed another person's identity to individuate herself to the crowd, yet that borrowed identity fell apart as soon as it was tested in public.After getting over her initial despair, Umika resolves to watch the recording of her speech over and over again, to numb herself to the pain and to learn to view herself as others see her. In chapter 25, when discussing that moment with Yuu and Haruno, the author frames the panel with Umika's face conspicuously reflected in the screen of her smart phone, rather than a closeup of her face. This serves to emphasize that Umika's identity's as the leader the RRA is not something that exists for her own benefit. It exists in the perception of others — her clubmates, the crowd at the championship qualifiers, everybody who will view it through a camera lens. She is the face of the RRA to the world at large; the RRA is a reflection of her, and she is a reflection of the RRA.
Reflect on It
Another way the author uses reflections to highlight the manga's theme of identity is in chapters 38 and 42. As Yuu Akeuchi's belief in her own identity as a "good alien" crumbles, Okuma repeatedly uses Reflective Eyes to show us Umika and Yuu from the perspective of each other. Umika is unshakeable in her belief that Yuu is a good alien, while Yuu slides into despair because she believes she's a bad alien. By framing the characters as the other sees them, she reinforces the idea that identity exists in the perceptions of others, even if it doesn't reflect a person's actual feelings.Furthering this theme is the beginning of chapter 32, where a melancholy Yuu stands outside their homeroom watching Umika practice a speech. Half of Yuu's face is reflected in the glass, superimposed over Umika, while Yuu traces her fingers along the glass to symbolize the emotional divide between them. Then, in the final panel, she pops up from under Umika's desk in full-on yonkoma mode, with a Super-Deformed face and a little heart at the back of her mouth. Although Yuu is acting the way Umika expects her to, in this instance her "normal" personality is just a Stepford Smiler-type mask she wears to conceal the turbulent emotions brewing in her heart.
The Girl Who Fell to Japan
Initially, Yuu seems to take her lack of past in stride. Whereas the other three are burdened by misfortune in their past, she is a positive, cheerful influence who dedicates herself to helping her newfound friend achieve her dreams. This is the clearest indication of the manga's Rousseau Was Right subtext — that as a tabula rasa, humans (if we count Yuu as "human enough" for our purposes) are naturally predisposed towards being kind and helpful to each other. Without any darkness in her past, she constructs an identity naturally inclined towards helping others.This all changes during the "bad alien" arc. Unable to recognize her feelings of jealousy and codependency towards Umika, she is gripped with fear that she isn't actually a benevolent do-gooder, but rather an evil invader. "Good" aliens don't feel those kinds of emotions, she thinks. When she finally gets a clue to her past, only for it to be snatched away from her, she wails about her "dream" being to know who she is, to remember her past. Until that point, she hadn't been overly concerned with her amnesia. But when it threatens her friendship with Umika and the identity she built for herself, the desire to know who she "really" is becomes a burning drive that sends her into a spiral of self-loathing, culminating in her physically assaulting Umika while she gloats about how evil she is. When she returns to her senses, she runs away to isolate herself from her friends, just as Umika and Matataki did.
Play it Again, Haru
Yuu isn't the only character who conceals her true feelings behind a false persona. Haruno Takaragi was initially framed as a girl who is endlessly supportive of other peoples' dreams. But, in volume 3, we learn she invented that personality when she was emotionally wounded as a child. She and her friend Megumi practiced their hearts out for a piano concert, only for Megumi to abruptly end their friendship when they lost. Devastated, Haruno decided she didn't want to have a dream for herself it threatened to hurt her feelings.On the advice of her grandfather, she created a new identity for herself as an enabler — somebody who tirelessly works to support other people and teaches them that having fun is what's important and It's the Journey That Counts. But after the RRA utterly bombs the model rocket championship, Haruno realizes she was just running away from her emotional wounds and starts to believe her indifference towards winning may have been insensitive to the others. She casts off her old identity in search of a new one, claiming she wants to find "something only I can do."
