THE TOP 4 ‘WHEN MARNIE WAS THERE’ THEORIES

I mean we had 1 hour and 33 minutes to speculate about Marnie’s identity…

‘When Marnie was There’ is a 2014 Studio Ghibli movie written and directed by Hiromasa Yonebayashi. The film follows a young girl called Anna Sasaki. She’s an asthmatic who is sent to stay with her foster mother’s relatives by the seaside in the hope that the clear air will help her breathing. While there, Anna comes across an abandoned mansion where she meets Marnie, a mysterious young girl. As Anna’s summer progresses, she comes to learn more about Marnie, and eventually also learns the truth behind her own biological family.

However, throughout the movie we are given plenty of time to come up with theories about who Marie really is. And here are 4 theories that are all plausible, before finding out the truth at the end of the film:

1. Marnie is a ghost

   
   I mean this thought comes to everyone while watching the film…

2. Anna is time-traveling
   This theory was pretty much conceived when Marnie told Anna that she is real, and the fact that when they are together Anna experiences everything as if it was happening years ago  

3. Marnie is Anna’s mother
   When Anna and a young girl named Sayaka visit the mansion and begin to learn more about Marnie’s diary and her life, the audience begins to consider that Marnie might not just be regular girl – that she might have more to do with Anna’s family than anyone knew…

4. Marnie and Anna are in a queer relationship
   Before the last ten minutes of the movie when we find out Marnie’s identity, we get to watch Marnie and Anna’s relationship grow. In certain moments, you can interpret their relationship to be something more than platonic. Anna and Marnie have a moonlit boat ride… They pair dance… Anna gets jealous when Marnie dances with a boy…
   This theory is very popular because well, it strikes a chord with people. Many queer children feel different like Anna does, they doubt themselves like Anna does and they may even ask themselves if what they are experiencing is real like Anna does.
   Anna seems to experience two different realms – one with Marnie and one without Marnie. When Anna is with Marnie they are outside the heteronormative nature of society, but it is a place which can only exist in their imaginations…
   However, building upon this idea, we see that Marnie begins to lose her contact with Anna as the film progresses and moves towards a straight storyline. One can explain that Marnie keeps calling Anna ‘Kazuhiko’ because Marnie essentially decides to ‘move on’ or ‘grow up.’ She decides to leave behind her relationship with Anna to instead marry and have children with her childhood friend Kazuhiko. And so in the end, Marnie follows the expectations society has for her.
   For the full explanation on this theory visit Baby Dyke Diaries’ blog! They explain it very thoroughly and it’s a really interesting read: https://babydykediaries.wordpress.com/2015/07/17/queer-childhood-in-when-marnie-was-there-omoide-no-marnie/

10 FACTS ABOUT DEATH NOTE YOU SHOULD KNOW

“Because I was bored” – Ryuk

1. L’s surname, Lawliet, is pronounced as ‘low light’

   

2. Ohba had to kill of Naomi Misora early. Initially, he wanted a cool female character to balance out the heavy-male cast but she ended up being too smart – piecing the Kira case together faster than he anticipated

   

3. The font L uses is Old English Text MT

   

4. L holds objects the way he does to get minimal fingerprints on them – a habit he picked up from being a detective for so long

   

5. Light and L are pretty much depicted as opposites – right down the fact that Light uses a PC and L uses a Mac

   

6. In episode 2, when the International Criminal Police Organization begin their meeting you can see that they each had a sign that said their nationality and name on them. All the names are actually names of famous soccer players from each of their respective countries

   

7. After Light and L’s fight in episode 18, many fans asked if L was using capoeira (which is a form of dance fighting). Ohba hadn’t intended for L to be using similar techniques, but he liked the idea so much he declared it canon

   

8. In the Death Note pilot manga, there’s a special tool known as the Death Eraser. It can erase names in the Death Note and revive everyone who had been killed by the Death Note

   

9. Although in Death Note 13: How to Read, L’s intelligence is ranked below Light’s and Near’s, when Ohba was asked about this he replied saying that the smartest is actually, “L, because the plot requires it”

   

10. Near and Mello were almost L’s twin sons. Ohba had considered this, but the idea was later put aside as he felt it was too out of L’s character. Although… Mello did inherit L’s sweet tooth and Near was given the hobby of stacking objects as a development from L’s habit of stacking sugar cubes

    

 

4 DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE TOKYO GHOUL MANGA AND ANIME

You know… aside from most of the storyline of √A

WARNING: SOME SPOILERS AHEAD

1. The obvious one – in the manga Kaneki forms a resistance against Aogiri, while in the anime he joins Aogiri
   
   This really is what propels the anime and manga in different directions regarding the storyline of √A. However, both conclude in the same way, presumably so that the director will be able to use content from the manga in RE:

    

2. Some of the chronology has been changed
   This includes events such as when Kaneki meets Tsukiyama (in the anime they meet after the death of Hinami’s parents) and the fact that Jason is introduced way later in the anime

    

3. There are also more trivial differences – such as Kaneki and Rize talking about their blood type on their way home and Kaneki ‘fighting’ back against Rize by trying to stab her Kagune with a pen

   
   There are some more major differences made though, and they negatively affect character development. It’s more the smaller things adding up that really make the difference… Despite this, both the anime and manga do have the same conclusion

4. The anime is heavily censored. Most noticeably in the scenes where Jason tortures Kaneki…
   Apart from fight scenes being blacked out in parts to avoid too much carnage and gore, many have stated that this censorship means that we miss out on a lot of the emotional content too. This statement is quite justified as the anime completely leaves out some of the things Jason did to torture Kaneki… The anime favours a more condensed, action-filled storyline while (arguably) the manga’s strong suit is its character development, particularly that of Kaneki’s