AMV: Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle - Syaoran's Unyielding Wish
Medium: Sony Vegas Pro 8
Song: 「ゆずれない願い」 "Yuzurenai Negai" - "Unyielding Wish" (Magic Knight Rayearth Opening Theme 1)
Singer: 田村 直美 Masaaki Endoh (Jam Project)
Album: Enson2 ~ Cover Songs Collection Vol. 2
Composer/ Original Singer: 田村 直美 Naomi Tamura
Romaji: Takayama Miyuki at animelyrics.com
English Translation: Takayama Miyuki, Wish-chan. I wanted to create the "best translation" though I don't know if this is that. The original translations by Takayama Miyuki from animelyrics.com were very good, and I referenced that heavily, but there were some lines that I cross-referred to Korean translations for.
tomaranai mirai wo mezashite
yuzurenai negai wo dakishimete
Aiming for the unstoppable future
and embracing the unyielding wish
umi no iro ga akaku somatte-yuku
mujuuryoku joutai
kono mama kaze ni sarawaretai
The color of the sea is being dyed crimson
In a state of free-fall... [No gravity condition]
I want to be swept away by the wind like this.
itsumo tobenai HA-DORU wo
makenai kimochi de
KURIAshite-kita kedo
dashikirenai jitsuryoku wa
dare no sei?
I've always cleared impossible hurdles
by this feeling of not wanting to lose, but
whose fault is it if it's still not the best I can do?
tomaranai mirai wo mezashite
yuzurenai negai wo dakishimete
iroasenai kokoro no chizu
hikari ni kazasou
Aiming for the unstoppable future
and embracing the unyielding wish,
I'll hold the unfading map of my heart up to the light.
dore dake nakeba asa ni deaeru no?
kodoku na yoru
hajimete genkai wo kanjita hi
How long do I have to cry before we meet in the morning?
The lonely night...
The day I first felt my limitations.
kitto, koi ni ochiru no wa
mabataki mitai na
isshun no jounetsu dakedo
ai ni tsudzuku sakamichi de
tsuyosa oboetai
Surely, falling in love
is a momentary passion like a blink of an eye, but
on the uphill path that leads to love,
I want to remember my strength.
tomaranai mirai wo yume mite
kuchi wo tozashi hitomi wo hikarasete-kita keredo
motto ooki na
yasashisa ga mieta
Dreaming of an unstoppable future,
My mouth was shut and light shone in my eyes, but
I was able to see an even greater kindness.
tobenai HA-DORU wo
makenai kimochi de
KURIAshite-kita kedo
SUTA-TO RAIN ni tatsu tabi ni
obiete-ita
I've always cleared impossible hurdles
by this feeling of not wanting to lose, but
whenever I stood at the start-line
I got scared.
tomaranai mirai wo egaite
ude wo nobashi kokoro wo hiraite
Sketching out the unstoppable future,
stretching my arms out and opening my heart
tomaranai mirai wo mezashite
yuzurenai negai wo dakishimete
iroasenai kokoro no chizu
hikari ni kazasou
Aiming for the unstoppable future
and embracing the unyielding wish,
I'll hold the unfading map of my heart up to the light.
I worked on this AMV on and off for the past month as it's been about a year since I made my last TRC AMV, Saga~This is My Raod. I initially was making another AMV, but somehow I ended up with this one instead. "Yuzurenai Negai" or "Unyielding Wish" aka "A Wish that Cannot be Yielded," was the opening theme song of the first CLAMP anime I ever saw, Magic Knight Rayearth, and till this day probably remains in my top 5 favorite opening themes of all time. I first saw this anime back in 1996; Magic Knight Rayearth was one of this anime that I knew immediately, simply from watching a 10-second trailer, from the first notes of the opening theme song, that I knew I was going to love. Fantasy, drama, romance, mecha, pretty girls, a bishounen male cast, beautiful music; this anime packaged everything I loved. Sometimes, the theme song completely represents the anime, and "Yuzurenai Negai" is a song that does that.
Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle initially seemed to follow the format of Magic Knight Rayearth, three individuals (well, plus an unconscious Sakura) journey to different dimensions for a mission, especially when the three mashin from Rayearth are used as Syaoran, Fai and Kuragone's kudan. I like this version of "Yuzurenai Negai" by Masaaki Endoh even better because his voice really compliments the guitar riffs and captures the exhilarating vigor of the song, whereas Naomi Tamura's original version captures more of the wistful tone (check out the acapella version; it's very beautiful as well). I thought the lyrics really suited Syaoran. Masaaki Endoh is from the Jam Project, a group of talented musicians who often participate in anime projects. Part 2 of the video is a trailer with Yoko Kanno's "Prologue F," my favorite bgm from Macross F. I was going for a "movie trailer" effect, or TRC (what everyone thought it would be) in 1 minute. And of course, I couldn't resist putting the orchestrated version of "Yuzurenai Negai" for the credits. A sign that a theme song is a good theme song is when the orchestrated version is even more beautiful. I remember hearing the "Yuzurenai Negai" strings version on one of the latter episodes of MKR Season 1, at an age when I wasn't really aware of the function of background music, and that tune to me was the most poignant thing about the whole anime. I was thrilled to find the MKR OST years later. I think I sometimes enjoy making the credits sequence more than the actual AMV.
The most difficult part was gathering all the different episodes sub-free or cutting out the subtitles (the process took up much memory on my hard drive). But besides that part, making AMVs is very enjoyable process to me and I usually end up being much more appreciate of the production and thought that went into creating each frame of an anime, and I end up picking up a lot more details than I would just passively watching that episode. For example, I didn't really notice how much emphasis was put on "holding hands" in the anime. Having somewhat of a hand fetish, it was interesting compiling all these clips. When I make an AMV, I try to tell a story rather than just paste together a random assortment of clips to music. The last TRC AMV I made, Saga, was intended to relay sort of the epic nature of TRC, which is why I focused more on the OVAs which is post-Clone!Syaoran revelation. I wanted to make another AMV which focused more on the prototypical adventure-theme aspect of TRC, which represents the earlier half of TRC, back when everything was jovial, spirited and happy, aka before the Record Arc. Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle is a manga which I think really has two parts and the atmosphere and tone of the manga drastically changes from the Tokyo arc onwards. I bet I wasn't the only one who felt cheated upon learning that the "Syaoran" that we all grew fond of through the course of the manga and anime was a "clone." It's been a year since the manga ended, and I am still grappling to really understand the totality of the manga and waiting for xxxHolic to perhaps tie up some more loose ends. Somewhere along the way, TRC switched from the typical shounen adventure to a twisted Jungian philosophical study of character archetypes where are hero pulls a Jekyll and Hyde. I still hold my belief that though CLAMP tricks us in the end of the TRC manga with a pseudo-happy ending for "real" Sakura and Syaoran," aka the Tsubasas, it doesn't change the fact that Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle is the chronicles of "Clone!Syaoran" or to me, the original Syaoran, the hero (or anti-hero) of this story. Anyhow, I hope this AMV helps recall happier times.
I also included the English lyric translations on my other TRC AMV, Saga~This is My Road. The two AMVs are meant to be viewed together, "Yuzurenai Negai" as Part 1, "Saga" as Part 2, as they sort of counterbalance each other and represent the two faces of TRC for me.
