finally working through my backlog of stuff i wanted to say something about and also trying not to force myself to write an essay for each entry. there are also utena spoilers. impossible to not talk about utena in relation to this show.
the setup is a typical girl meets girl story: one day the planet kumalia exploded, sprinkled its debris down on earth, and bears gained sapience. bears and humans fought and so the wall of severance was put up to separate humans and bears, but it doesn't do as well a job as you might want, and so we open on kureha (our protagonist) and sumika (her girlfriend) gaze over a bed of lilies as a bear warning sounds. whatever will happen next!
i'm pretty sure i got these blu-rays because i confused it with penguindrum (penguins and bears are kinda close? i guess?? it was years ago) and damn i could not have been more wrong. instead of whatever masterpiece penguindrum is (i have not yet seen it but i've heard great things) i got an extremely messy show that has a lot of what i associate with ikuhara from utena: stories, the roles we take in them, lesbians, etc. but instead of a really enjoyable three cour show that is one of the best and most beautiful shows i've seen, this feels like ikuhara not knowing how to fit everything he wants into a single cour and instead of cutting themes or plot threads he tried to shove everything in and it ends up in a show that is a thematic mess.
the thing i like about good single cour shows is that they're incredibly tightly paced. kemono friends is a fun mystery paced out nearly perfectly over 12 episodes, granbelm mixes it's fights with quieter moments leading to a fantastic roller coaster, anohana uses it's 11 episodes to introduce and focus on characters in turn while weaving their stories together. none of these shows would be nearly as good if extended out beyond a single cour, but that's fine, they were made to be 12 or 13 episodes. yurikuma arashi somehow feels like both a show with 8 episodes of content and something that should have been 24 episode.
the first three episodes set up a formula: some events happen, the wall of severance calls a character and tells them to come up to the roof to prove their love is true, ginko and lulu are put on trial, lulu and ginko lick honey off of a naked kureha, and either a human is killed and eaten by a bear or kureha successfully defends herself and kills a bear. when used well, there's something comforting about the repetition of events. the duels in utena are a joy because utena climbing the stairs and her transformation lure the viewer into a sense of security, we know what's going to happen. the dialogue and song change during the duel, but ultimately utena will win and defend her right as anthy's groom. the true joy comes when a formula is disrupted, when utena finally looses a duel, or the first time she enters the elevator rather than climbing the stairs. but this only works when there's enough time to establish a pattern, it's something you can do in a long show but doesn't work in a single cour show because there's simply not enough time to both establish then break a pattern.
episode 4 on doesn't subvert the pattern so much as completely discard it. the invisible storm (a group of students who get together to decide who to socially exclude) gets more focus, then a teacher who's a bear in disguise and obsessed with putting things in boxes to keep them pure gets an episode. both are interesting ideas, but not given enough room to breathe. the invisible storm in particular is an interesting homophobia/school caste analogue because while there are human/human lesbian relationships almost all of the yuri we see is human/bear, with most of the bears being predatory lesbians.
i haven't even talked about the picture book kureha's mom left her, or anything about the ending, but much like the show my thoughts are all over the place. i think it's an interesting show, but a lot of what i find interesting is watching ikuhara try to figure out how to pace a single cour rather than the actual content of the show itself.