Does it matter to the plot of Princess Jellyfish if Kuranosuke is trans?

Though Kuranosuke’s identity is not important to the plot, I argue that it is an essential element for the viewer to fully understand the pitfalls of the typically ‘feminine’ beauty that is presented in Princess Jellyfish. (I am not a follower of the manga, so I will only be talking about the anime series here).

Coming in at #1 on Top 5 Themes in Princess Jellyfish is ‘beauty.’ At its core, the show follows Tsukimi, a girl who has a very narrow view of beauty which is hyper-feminine. However, this is taken at face value. Consistently throughout PJ, beauty is linked with femininity. When Kuranosuke gives the sisterhood makeovers, they always become more feminine. Additionally, most often when Tsukimi admires Kuranosuke’s attractiveness, it is his feminine qualities. Conversely, when she admires Shu, it seems to include more abstract qualities, like the fact that he is generally alluring. In fact, we do not really get specific things Tsukimi likes about Shu, whereas, with Kuranosuke, we are given physical descriptions (like pale skin, long limbs, delicate features, etc.) In this way, beauty and femininity are not only linked, but grounded in physicality.

This has various implications for the show, the first of which being that it reveals the preoccupations of our main character. Tsukimi does not seem to care about the broad spectrum of beauty that many recognize in the world. Instead, her concern relies upon her identity as a woman. Tsukimi has no reason to question her gender, and she has a very typical ideal of beauty that she wishes she could emulate. Her struggle does not include a search for personal identity, or a curiosity over what beauty mold she can fit into. Instead, Tsukimi is aware of the mold she “should” fit. For this reason, the nature of her struggle is that she thinks she cannot fit it, and therefore perceives herself as ugly. The resolution of the show neatly addresses this struggle, when Tsukimi realizes she has been able to fit the mold all along.

So where does Kuranosuke come into all of this? If the protagonist has no need for concerns over gender identity, then where could a supporting character with these struggles be useful to the plot? Kuranosuke is introduced as the perfect ideal for Tsukimi of feminine beauty (a concept that is encompassed by the term “princess” in the show). His male identity is only revealed later in the first episode, initially seeming to be played almost for comic relief. The narrative purpose of this, however, is clear—Tsukimi is now pushed to confront her perceived ugliness head on. Tsukimi is given a model for beauty for the first time since her mother’s death. She cannot carry on viewing beauty as an abstract thing that she cannot participate in.

Kuranosuke being male is essential for this realization. Tsukimi sees beautiful women constantly, but her fear response is to freeze up. However, her reaction to Kuranosuke is more one of disbelief at first. How can a guy be a princess when I can’t? The fact that Kuranosuke is male snaps Tsukimi out of her general mode of “ignore it and run” when she sees someone who is beautiful. This is also the first signal to Tsukimi that her definition of beauty may be flawed. She has subconsciously connected beauty and femininity, but she is forced to confront that this may not universally be the case.

Now, how does this connect to Kuranosuke possibly being trans? Until this point, Kuranosuke’s identity has nothing to do with him filling the narrative role of changing Tsukimi’s outlook—he only has to be a male that dresses as a woman. This would mean that, for the structure of the show, his being trans or not makes no difference. In fact, it is only his sex (male) that matters for Tsukimi’s realization.

In fact, Tsukimi seems not to notice much of Kuranosuke’s conflict throughout the show. While the audience is shown scenes of Kuranosuke being rejected by his father for his clothing, as well as his separation from his mother, Tsukimi does not seem to be privy to much of this information. Generally Kuranosuke’s problems appear for the benefit of the audience, not for Tsukimi at all. If this is true, we can begin to see the purpose of a trans Kuranosuke from a writing standpoint. In the femininity-beauty duality, Tsukimi and Kuranosuke struggle with opposite sides of the issue. Whereas Tsukimi is a woman who does not feel beautiful, Kuranosuke is a beautiful person who cannot fully express femininity. This creates a much more complex picture of the drawbacks of this strict femininity-beauty duality, which the audience can benefit from.

As a tangent: if you are not convinced that the show wants to explore the negative sides of this duality, the introduction of Shoko Inari makes this clear. She is a woman who seems to have mastered femininity and beauty, but has chosen to weaponize them to get ahead in a ‘man’s world.’ It is possible that Ms. Inari would not have been able to achieve such a high status in the workplace without using this method. This sets up a very nuanced opposition to Kuranosuke’s character if we view him as potentially trans. Inari’s struggles stem from the fact that she is a woman who has scraped her way up the corporate ladder by any means necessary. Kuranosuke, however, is someone who is in a position of privilege by being a man. Inari’s plot line shows the harsh reality of the power that Kuranosuke might be giving up by dressing as a woman. While he should of course pursue the gender expression he desires, PJ does not hold back in showing the unique problems that women face, and highlights the strength that it would take for Kuranosuke to willingly step out of a place of male privilege.

Ultimately, the series does not actually answer the question of whether or not Kuranosuke is trans. However, it certainly shows moments of doubt in Kuranosuke, such as when he is angry at himself for walking straight into the women’s bathroom, or when his childhood self is shown asking his mother, “what if I had been born a girl?” While specifically addressing the issue would have been great for representation, at least the writers show enough internal struggle in Kuranosuke to portray him as a foil character to Tsukimi. Having this opposition to the experiences of our main character is something that I think PJ would be incomplete without, and it is undeniable that the show would not have been the same without any pushback against Tsukimi’s views on beauty. In this way, while a canonical use of the word ‘transgender’ is not essential, Kuranosuke’s struggle with expressing femininity as a person born male is a crucial piece of Princess Jellyfish.