As I had guessed might happen after the last episode, this season finale was a stand-alone episode, unrelated to the main story that had concluded in episode 12. Still, it wasn’t pure comedy like I had predicted, and the last half was a heartwarming way to end the season and to tie together the most important threads of this show.

The episode starts off seeming like it will be focused on 3 of the “new” characters in the series (actually shown before, but never introduced), kind of like in the 1st season of Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei, which introduced Mayo Mitama and Ai Kaga in the final episode. But it went back to the main characters halfway through, so we only got a couple brief gags out of the Last Samurai, Billy, and Jacqueline.

There’s not too much to say about that half. I can’t say I enjoyed the new characters too much. The real highlight was Nino’s hair, which, as I’ve written before, is easily the best hair on anyone, ever. There were some funny moments, and Mikuru Asahina Yuko Goto provided a fitting voice for Jacqueline, but the new characters didn’t get enough screen time. Perhaps that was the problem, because it took me a while to like some of the main characters as well, including the Chief, Star, and Maria.

The real “finale” was the 2nd half of the episode, which tied together some of the key themes of this show. There was, of course, the theme of lost childhood. Riku never got to be a child, and that made him all the more eager to make sure that that wouldn’t happen to Stella and the metal headed brothers. It affected me to see him work for 3 days straight to make sure that this happened. He was surely a changed man from the neurotic, self-focused person he had started the show as.

Then there was community, with the members of under the bridge coming together to put together an amusement park for the kids. Even at great cost to their health, as in the case of the Chief, who had to wear an extra suit over his normal Kappa suit. The 3D theater gave me some good laughs, starting with the mere fact that there WAS a 3D theater. I also loved the in-joke of having Nino starring as the Princess Amidala lookalike – Nino’s voice actor Maaya Sakamoto had voiced Amidala in the Japanese dubs of the Star Wars prequels.

And finally, there was the romance. Sitting on a bench during sunset alone with your lover holding a balloon while she listens to you talking about your past – it doesn’t get much more romantic than that. I was disappointed that that was pretty much all we got between those 2 in this episode. As I wrote previously, I was hoping to learn more about the back story of Nino.

I did really love the final montage, narrated by both Nino and Riku. It was probably the best one of the show, and it brought everything back to the river, and how it was the connection that fit Nino and Riku together. With the little emphasis on romance in this episode, it did feel a bit out of place, even if it felt right for the finale.

And, of course, this is the season finale, not the series finale, as following this episode was the announcement that there would be a 2nd season of Arakawa Under the Bridge. So I’m hopeful that the story of Nino and Riku will continue to be told, and that, just like Riku’s dark and painful past was explored in this season, Nino’s own past will be told in the next.

Season End

Well, the show may not be ending, but the season certainly is. As I wrote in my post after the 1st episode, I went into the show not knowing what to expect, merely being a fan of the cast, the studio, and the director. Reading that post again now, I’m a bit surprised how much that seemingly innocuous 1st episode had revealed about the rest of the show. I had been pretty much spot on about this being an “absurdist character comedy” with “the relationship that is sure to develop between Kou and Nino” being the main story point. I didn’t see coming the exploration of Riku’s father issues, or how important the overall sense of community would be in the show.

It was an enjoyable show overall. A lot of people seemed to greatly enjoy the comedy in this show, but I thought that it was pretty hit or miss. Angel Beats!! and Working! were both funnier this season. The show’s strength was in the more dramatic, character focused moments. Many of the scenes Nino and Riku shared were very heartwarming, and Riku’s past felt genuinely painful. And though the the ending of the main conflict was rather abrupt, it still managed to provide more scenes that affected me.

So yeah, despite the varied cast of wacky and entertaining characters, I was always more interested when Nino and Riku were the ones on screen. That’s why I feel that it was a shame that their relationship didn’t get to go forward as much as I had hoped. Combining some decent comedy with very good character development that fell just a little short of expectation, Arakawa Under the Bridge was a solid, good show, but I hesitate to call it great. My hope is that this 1st season was the START of something great, because when the show was firing on all cylinders, it really was something special.

Notes

• As usual, there are plenty of screenshots on Tenka Seiha and Random Curiosity that are worth a look.
• The ED single, Upside Down Bridge by Suneohair, was released on June 23. Here is a YouTube link to the full song.
• There was a shot of 4 mysterious people somewhere way underground. I’m guessing that they will be the antagonists of the 2nd season.

The finale of Working!! was extremely similar to every other episode of the series, and it delivered exactly what we’ve come to expect from the show. It had clean, character-driven humour, with some slapstick and development thrown in for good measure, topped off with fun music and solid production. It was these similarities along with a distinct lack of closure that made it feel like the show really didn’t want things to end. We were even introduced to a new character! But I’m not complaining. (After all, since I’ve loved the rest of the series, I suppose it’s only natural that I loved this episode too.) And I’d be absolutely rapt if Working!! got a second season. Oh, and…

Okay, down to business! The new character we met was none other than the mystery meganekko in the OP, who’s pretty much done everything around Wagnaria except speak. It turns out her name is Maya Matsumoto, and despite her protests, I’d call her just as strange as all the other staff members. Matsumoto tries so, so hard to be typical; she’s essentially obsessed with being (what she deems) normal and leading a normal working life. Ironically, it’s this that makes her so bizarre: coupled with the odd behaviour of the rest of the gang, she ends up acting incredibly strangely because of this wish. She’s great fun to watch and she actually fits in really well with the rest of the staff members, probably because she tries so hard to be unlike them. Soma’s “She a bit strange, isn’t she?” comment made me laugh out loud and really capped things off with her perfectly.

On the topic of Matsumoto, she’s almost marketed as an antithesis to Aoi: Aoi wants drama! Matsumoto wants normality! It’s funny, though, because both of them end up creating a lot of excitement. Even more ironically, Matsumoto creates drama in a much more overt way than her counterpart, who prefers subtler methods (even though it tends to be painfully obvious who the perpetrator of her schemes is). What’s best about this all, though, is that Working!! makes the character-clash work. Both Matsumoto and Aoi are really funny, and it seems like both have been/will be great additions to the show. I say ‘will be’ because Matsumoto really hasn’t had enough time to shine yet: I think I like her, but I want to see more of her before making a judgement on her character (I heard that she plays a large part in the special, but don’t quote me on that!). But as for Aoi…

She was my favourite character of the season, and this episode only cemented that. At first I was nervous about her addition to the show’s cast, but she ended up being the standout of the gang. Her antics were hilarious, her personality was endearing and quirky, and she was pretty damn cool to boot. What I liked about most about her character, though, was the way she interacted with all the other staff members. Whether it was with her bluntness, craziness or cuteness, she was able to provoke fantastic reactions from each and every one of her fellow part-timers, and I honestly think that her addition directly or indirectly led to each character’s funniest moment of the series. I’d also say that the best female vocal performance of the show came from Aoi’s seiyuu, Ryou Hirohashi, and that made things even more enjoyable.

As for Sota and Inami, was I disappointed that we didn’t get closure with regard to their relationship? Yes and no. On the one hand, I’m a big fan of this pairing and would’ve loved for them to have gotten together. On the other, I feel as though the ending they got stayed true to the spirit of the show, and honestly, I don’t know how I would have felt had they become a couple. Also on the plus side, there were definitely signs of forward momentum in their relationship, with Sota even referring to Inami as cute (is the minicon within him dying?). This really served to highlight the amount of growth he, and indeed all of the Wagnaria staff, have gone through, and I loved that.

This episode was sort of a sentimental experience for me because each part of it reminded me of an element of the series that I loved. Matsumoto’s scenes highlighted the zaniness of the characters. Sota and Inami’s scenes underscored how impressed I was by the character development. The jokes reminded me of how I laughed out loud so many times.  Everything with Aoi spotlighted why she’s my favourite character of the season, and every time another character popped up on screen, they reminded me of how much I enjoyed watching them and their interactions with everyone else.

I want to take the opportunity now to come back to something I said about the very first episode of the series, when I was still unsure about how things would turn out.

The fate of the show is really going to depend on the strength of the characters.

Now at the end of the Working!!‘s run, I can truly say that I feel the series has succeeded, and this has been due to its characters. They were all awesome and easily likeable (despite a couple taking a while to grow on you). The show did everything right with them, too. It knew them. It was sure of their quirks and personalities, and was able to derive humour and even the occasional bit of drama from them because of this. I loved them all, to varying degrees, and so I loved the show. Similarly, I like to judge character-driven shows I’ve been watching week-to-week by how much I’ll miss the characters. It’s probably obvious by how much I ramble on about them, but I’ll miss the crew of Wagnaria a whole lot. I’ll miss Inami’s punches and Sota’s faux pas, Yachiyo’s yuri love and Kyoko’s laziness, Sato’s macho exterior and Soma’s blackmailer’s heart, Poplar’s energy and Nazuna’s smile. And as for Aoi…

Suffice to say, I’ll certainly miss all parts of Working!! and will be eagerly awaiting the upcoming DVD special. The series was a huge amount of fun and highly satisfying for me, and I’d have no qualms about calling it my favourite show of the season.  Despite the slow start, it had charm, warmth, and a good amount of eccentricity, but most importantly it had its characters. I hope I can unearth another gem like it in the anime-summer!

This is the game that never ends.  Yes it goes on and on my friends!  Some people started playing it not knowing what it was, and they’ll continue playing it forever just because…  What’s that, it ends with this episode?  And they won?  Awesome!  Watching this game was like playing a bad round of 2Fort.  One team decides to turtle up so it takes forever for the game to end.  The turtling team wins, not through a fantastic offense, but because one or two players outmaneuvered the enemy team and scored all the captures.  Then everyone celebrates because the game finally ended.  This Team Fortress 2 metaphor continues, but I’ll help you keep up.

Tsubaki clearly plays the maneuvering role on the turtle side, ETU.  He has made a long string of excellent plays, sometimes on accident and other times on purpose.  All of this has built up his confidence throughout the round, and now he’s finally entered The Zone.  I will tell you, being in the zone is an amazing feeling.  It’s like playing a Sniper and racking up a double-digit killstreak in the middle of a match.  From one or two shots you suddenly launch into popping the heads off everyone who dares move.  No one can get by you as you quickly consider every evasive strategy and compensate for it.  Your sixth sense even kicks in as you deftly turn around and gut the Spy who was so close to ending the rampage.

Tsubaki has become a beast of a player in the span of a few minutes.  He can now clearly see the entire field, hear the roar of the crowd, and even picks up the instructions coming from the coaches.  His unstoppable momentum makes Carlos literally look like he’s standing still on the field.  He can’t quite seal the play, but one of his allies has used his charge to get into place and finish the game.  Tsubaki easily clinched the MVP award for this game.  However, there’s one problem.  No matter what you do, you will eventually exit the zone.  You overlook something, or you let an opponent get into your head, and suddenly your streak has reached its end.  Tsubaki has done quite well for himself, but like last week, I wonder if he’ll fall again, and how hard he’ll take it.

Now of course, a vital flaw exists in a stonewall defense.  A team with good offensive coordination can get over whatever barricades and traps you build.  You can block players, trick sentries, and play a game of cat and mouse good enough to leave anyone’s head spinning.  Since the defensive team has to rely on a very narrow offensive scope, getting through just once can potentially doom them.  In addition, scoring can throw off the defending team’s game, as happened several episodes ago.  Fuwa points out ETU can’t keep going forever by digging their heels into the ground.  I don’t imagine Tatsumi will continue turtling.  He simply used it because his players could actually carry out this strategy.  However, Fuwa somehow thinks he punch through their defense when they meet later in the season.  He will have quite a problem on his hands, and his name is Itagaki.

Itagaki has gone the opposite direction from Tsubaki.  The root problem here is he plays like he must validate his existence on the team.  He complains all the time about never having the ball.  I bet he even cries into his pillow at night because of those nasty Brazillians won’t play with him.  He completely overlooks that he refuses to pass the ball to them.  He never tries to sync up with them, so why should they bother including him?  Now, Kuro has dominated Itagaki and the Nagoya player only wants his revenge.  There’s something to be said about a Soldier who runs straight into the enemy base, firing rockets willy-nilly.  It’s distracting.  You still have to do it in concert with the rest of your team.  The suicide play not only fails, it leaves the door wide open for Tsubaki’s charge.  Given how they portray Itagaki, I’m not sure this is a personality flaw Fuwa can cure.  Sometimes all you can do is wait for a ragequit and hope a better player joins the team.

With ETU finally scoring a win, everyone has become quite excited for the future.  The team owners finally have some faith in Tatsumi.  The journalist girl finally hits paydirt with a massive scoop on their first victory.  The photographer guy has plenty of amazing shots, and knows this team can continue supporting his job.  The old guard even wants to bring back the rest of their fellow fans.  We’ve reached the halfway point in Giant Killing, and now it looks like this show has finally gotten on the road.  I’m looking forward to the future as well.

This is it. It’s finally here. The wait is over. On Friday, 6/25/2010, the final episode of Bakemonogatari was released as a streaming video on Shaft’s website. The 15 episode series took just 1 week shy of a full year to complete. The final episode was released 122 days, or just over 1/3 of a year, after the previous one.

Let us bask in this moment just a little more.

Okay, that’s enough. Part of the big deal of having a new episode released is that there new content to watch, after all. And as the finale to perhaps the most popular series in the last year, there was plenty to look forward to. The conflict between Tsubasa’s Cat and Koyomi finally came to a head, creating some excellent tension-filled moments that were finally released by Shinobu’s triumphant return. And the denouement following provided a hopeful conclusion to this cynical series, a conclusion that I found to be both touching and enjoyable.

The conversation in the 1st part of the episode between the Cat and Koyomi was the real “meat” of the episode, with it providing us with the climax and conclusion of the Tsubasa Cat story arc. If you’ve watched this far, you know that there’s far more to these character interactions than just the conversation, and this one was no different, filled with the visual treats that have pretty much defined what Bakemonogatari is. I especially loved the shift to the more malicious facial expressions by the Cat, which helped to shift the mood in a much darker and more serious direction. The typical Shinbo/Shaft cinematography was used very well here, with the zoomed out shots and the contrast between light and shadow also adding to the more stark atmosphere.

In terms of the content, the conversation picked up right where it ended the last episode, with the Cat repeating her line that Tsubasa was in love with Koyomi and that if he fell in love with her, she could disappear. It immediately darkened the mood, seeming to send a shock to Koyomi. It came to no surprise to me that he tried so strongly to deny this, first laughing it off as a joke, and then trying to pass it off as a misunderstanding before finally facing the fact. Koyomi’s inability or unwillingness to accept the stark, cynical facts about others had been in full display in the Suruga Monkey arc, after all.

And like in that arc, we got a heroine who felt malice towards Koyomi, actively wanted to hurt him. I loved seeing the Cat play around with Koyomi, trying to manipulate his feelings by putting doubts in his mind about why he was with Hitagi. And the imagery of the real Tsubasa going to gently caress Koyomi during some of it was a nice touch.

It was satisfying to see Koyomi start to push back against the Cat. That’s the episode became just as much about Hitagi as Tsubasa. One of the oddities about the Tsubasa Cat arc was that Part 2 had felt completely out of place in the sequence, being purely about Hitagi. I had excused it with the reasoning that they wanted to put an ending into the last TV released episode, but this episode brought it back, with the repeat of Koyomi’s line about liking Hitagi (“All of it. There is nothing about [her] that I don’t like.”). It was great that this was one of the 1st things that came to his mind when confronted by the Cat regarding his feelings for her. Tsubasa Cat Part 2 had been an excellent episode and ending to the TV run by itself, but it was made all the better by being put into the proper context by this episode.

And there was something fitting about the intermixing of the cuts of Hitagi back at the school, preparing for the culture festival – in Tsubasa’s place. I guess it was seeing her involved in and taking care of what was ostensibly something that belonged to Tsubasa, a metaphor for Koyomi and the Tsubasa Cat episodes in general.

I loved the call back to that scene in the beginning of the 1st episode, in which Tsubasa and Koyomi were working on the culture festival together. Even as the argumentative dialogue continued – syncing up to the characters’ mouths in the flashback – it brought back memories of a seemingly more innocent time, before we knew of this intense conflict brewing within Tsubasa, before even Hitagi had entered the picture. It served as a reminder that the Cat was just one aspect of this kind girl who was very good friends with our hero.

The Cat was that jealous, selfish side of Tsubasa, and she decided that if she couldn’t have Koyomi, no one could; i.e. to kill him. I had pretty much forgotten the violent, problematic part of the Cat when she latched onto Koyomi and sucked his energy in a flash of lightning. In a way, the Cat’s actions felt more cruel than Suruga’s, despite the fight being less violent (though there was plenty of gore this time around as well). In Suruga’s case, at least she wanted to kill Koyomi out of self interest, but in the Cat’s case, it was purely out of spite.

Suruga Monkey had had a pretty clever ending, with Hitagi coming to save Koyomi and to negate Suruga’s incentive for killing Koyomi. I found it interesting that, at the moment of truth, Koyomi once again thought of Hitagi’s promise to kill whomever killed him, and that was what convinced him that he wanted to live. And this time, it was Shinobu who came to save him.

What an entrance! And what a twist; she was there all along, lurking literally in the shadows, just waiting for Koyomi to call out to her for help. Because we didn’t get to see the beginning of this story – i.e. the events of Golden Week that had Koyomi turn into a vampire – we were left in the dark as to why or how Shinobu is in Koyomi’s shadow and why she came out only when he called her. There were more allusions to the Koyomi Vamp story, including showing pieces of the flashback montage that opened the show, but not enough to shed any light on these issues. Still, it was great to see Shinobu come back and to reach some sort of understanding with Koyomi, even if I had no idea what it was.

And she never spoke! I’m not sure if she even had any groans or other such non-verbal noises. It seems like it was just a troll to have Aya Hirano listed as Shinobu’s voice actor from the beginning.

The conclusion of the Tsubasa Cat story did feel a bit incomplete. The Cat was dispatched, but the source of Tsubasa’s stress – her unrequited love for Koyomi – was not taken care of and remains a possible problem. Then again, none of the other stories had neat or tidy little endings. Koyomi’s wondering of how much Tsubasa knows about the incident and acknowledging that she needs time to organize her thoughts was as much as was needed.

The Tsubasa Cat ending – with the Fire Sisters morning wake up sequence – flowed right into the series ending. After the beautiful ending to the TV broadcast run provided by Tsubasa Cat Part 2, I wondered what the “true ending” to the series would be like.

Well, it wasn’t quite as beautiful and certainly not as romantic, but it was a proper and satisfying conclusion to the whole series. Perhaps Shinbo went a little overboard with his trademark shots here, but the final montage was just a joy to watch. I don’t know, just seeing the 4 main high schoolers of this show – Koyomi, Hitagi, Tsubasa, and Suruga – exploring Oshino’s empty home together was pretty cool. The music was excellent as well, working with the imagery of that empty school building to give us the feeling of a breath of fresh air, or of the dawn after a dark night. And even though it all felt a bit bittersweet with Oshino’s leaving, the overarching feeling was one of hope for the future, of moving on. When the 4 gathered to talk one last time about Oshino being a good person, they were laughing and smiling, celebrating his memory instead of mourning their loss.

That sense of hope was perfectly represented by the final scene, of Koyomi taking Hitagi out on their 2nd date, her riding on the back of his bike. It was the image of 2 young lovers just starting on their journey, much like the TV ending in Tsubasa Cat Part 2. And Koyomi got to give us a final bit of narration:

I’ll probably run into more oddities in the future. But that’s okay. I know the truth. There are dark areas in this world, and there are people living in those places. For example, there’s even someone living inside my shadow. Tomorrow is the culture festival. Our class’s project is… the haunted house.

I feel that it summed up the series well. It was about acknowledging the dark, ugly side of everyone that they try to hide from others. As sad or as cynical as these things may be, the person holding these things is still a person. There is still hope in that darkness, like the all-white, pure image of Shinobu living inside the shadow of Koyomi. It was a line that represented the theme that tied together all 5 different stories in this series, and a wonderful way to close it out.

Series End

So, after 15 episodes and 358 days, Bakemonogatari is over. So what was Bakemonogatari? Was it worth the time? To be honest, I’m a little sad to see it end, partly because now it means I have no excuse to avoid answering these questions. Due to having such a big gap between watching the last 2 episodes, I feel like I need to watch it again with less time between episodes before I can have anything to say about the series as a whole. I don’t feel like I can add anything right now to what I already wrote in this post. That is, it is a series of 5 fantastical stories that Koyomi Araragi experiences in the span of just a few months, each with its own heroine, tied together by the common theme of the darkness that people hide from others.

But the show was certainly much more than that. There was something about it that resonated with viewers, including me. I’m not sure yet what that is. At the very least, it was a unique ride, filled with stunning visuals and excellent music. It provided a couple of the most touching and heartfelt scenes I’ve seen in anime while still remaining true to its cynical theme. And even if that was all it was, it was enough to make the series my favorite in recent memory.

Notes

• The online stream’s video quality was rather low, which is why the screenshots look so crappy. The Blu-ray release is on July 28.
• As most of you know, Bakemonogatari is based off of a novel by the same name. There are 2 more novels that follow it in the series: Kizumonogatari, which contains the Koyomi Vamp story, the prequel that explains the events of Golden Week; and Nisemonogatari, which contains 2 sequels, Karen Bee and Tsukihi Phoenix, presumably about Koyomi’s little sisters. According to the article on Wikipedia (with no citations), 2 more sequels are in the works.
• The Blu-ray and DVD releases had audio commentary by the voice actors, in character. Each release had 2 of the heroines speaking to each other through the episodes (e.g. Volume 1 featured Hitagi and Tsubasa, Volume 2 featured Mayoi and Tsubasa, Volume 3 featured Suruga and Hitagi). Unfortunately, no one has subbed these in English yet, as far as I know.
• At 15 episodes in 358 days, the series had a mean of about 25.6 days between episodes. I’m guessing that that’s some sort of record.
• With its sudden release on the 25th, Bakemonogatari’s finale joins the finale of 4 other series ending in the 4 day period between 6/24 and 6/27 that have Hideki Hiroshi Kamiya playing starring roles (update 7/1/2010 0843: Thank you Son Gohan for pointing out the mistake – Bayonetta must’ve been on my mind). The others are: Durarara!! (Izaya Orihara), Angel Beats! (Yuzuru Otonashi), Working!! (Hiroomi Souma), and Arakawa Under the Bridge (Kou “Recruit” Ichinomiya). Of those 5, Bakemonogatari, Angel Beats!, and Arakawa Under the Bridge had him playing the main protagonist.

The Embodiment of Scarlet Devil Result Screen OMIGOD OMIGOD OMIGOD!!!!! I FINALLY DID IT! I FINALLY BEAT A TOUHOU GAME!! Compared to other people, my stats up there are piece of garbage, but DANGIT IT’S MY FIRST TOUHOU GAME COMPLETION RESULTS AND I’M GONNA COMMEMORATE IT!! Oh man, this game is hard. Seriously. Compared to [...]

The finale of Angel Beats! was, like the rest of the series, a mixed bag for me. Several questions were left unanswered but despite this, I still felt quite pleased with the ending. I also felt that, with less to cover in this episode, the pacing was better here and even though we didn’t get all that much closure with regard to the plot, I do believe we got closure with regard to characters… well, at least some of the characters.

This episode largely focused on the relationship of Otonashi and Kanade, with the former actually confessing his feelings to the latter. I did like this scene, but I think that had more to do with Kanade’s response than it did with anything else. Kanade having Otonashi’s heart was, in my opinion, a very clever plot twist and not one I saw coming. While I wasn’t a fan of Otonashi’s hysteric moment after she disappeared (the overacting!), this was easy to let go of because if I was going to ship any couple in the series, these two would be it. I think it’s also because of this that I loved the post-credit ending, with the two of them being reincarnated together. Sure, it was predictable, but I thought it was really nice – dare I say ‘beautiful’? – and probably the perfect way to close things out. It was also handled excellently.

All of that being said, though, I do have a complaint about Otonashi and Kanade’s relationship: I don’t feel as though there was enough build-up. There was so much crammed into the show’s thirteen episodes that I don’t know if there would have been room to do more, but while their interactions were cute and definitely hinted at a possible romance, Otonashi’s “I love you.” seemed almost out of the blue to me. Comparatively, Working!!, another show airing this season, has done so much to develop its main relationship (and I feel it has been doing this very well, too). Granted, Working!! also has generally much less going on, so maybe I just want too much from Angel Beats!.

It was a rare Angel Beats! post that I didn’t talk about Yuri, and this final post on the series is not going to be an exception. Last week, I voiced my annoyance at how Yuri seemed to be turning into nothing but a typical tsundere. Here, the trend continued and her new personality was even commented on by the rest of the group. They noted that after she stepped down as SSS leader, her behaviour changed dramatically and she’d become decidedly un-leader-like. I agree. Otonashi, however, passed it off as Yuri being more of a girl, and this pissed me off a whole lot. Becoming more like a girl? Really? Yuri was a girl before: she was a strong girl! And I liked her a lot. I admired her courage, determination and fantastic leadership skills, and I even thought she could serve as something of a role model. By the end of the series, though, she’s become just a stammering, blushing blob and hardly different to any other tsundere out there. It can be argued that the strong independent leader wasn’t her ‘true personality’, and that’s fine, I accept that. But I really don’t enjoy it when being weak is considered to be more feminine. (Congratulations! You have stumbled upon another of Raph’s pet peeves.)

This ranting aside, I do have to note that this was probably just designed to make Yuri more moe, and moe characters are par for the course in Key shows (and as I said earlier, ‘moe’ wasn’t a word you could use to describe just the female characters). This brings up something I found interesting: to me, it seemed as though as the plot tapered off in Angel Beats!, there was more emphasis on moe. It certainly happened to both female leads: Kanade’s awkwardness and shyness, which I feel was previously played up more for humour than for anything else, became nothing more than a moe character trait. I think this even applied to Naoi as well, with him becoming even lovelier to Otonashi as the series went on and with his tearful last goodbye.

Well, Angel Beats! is now over and it’s certainly been a wild ride. This ending didn’t deliver answers about many elements of the afterlife world or the side-characters (they all disappeared before the end, damn it!), but while I’m disappointed at that, I think it was well-done and definitely enjoyable. The series can’t be counted among my favourites by any means, but to the show’s credit, it was extremely entertaining. Interestingly, I also totally believe I enjoyed the show more for blogging it and watching it as part of the aniblogosphere. Reading other blogger’s posts on Angel Beats! was always really enjoyable – and the series certainly spawned a lot of them – and talking about it with online friends was fantastic too, no matter what their opinion was.

Finally, and also on that note, this is the first series I’ve finished blogging and I’ve had so much fun! I want to thank you guys for reading and commenting, and I hope you’ve enjoyed this as much as I have.

Reimu and Yukari This is a story by Kamereon {Pixiv Link} and it’s one of the saddest yet most beautiful and touching story I’ve read. It is also one of the best freakin’ troll I have ever experienced! I don’t wanna spoil or ruin it, if you haven’t read it, you can see it all [...]

What a long and varied ride Durarara has been!  We began with a rollercoaster of overlapping plot points as we introduced the characters.  This built up to Mikado’s dramatic reveal as the leader of the Dollars.  Then we had all the possessed madness as Anri took a level in badass.  Finally, we ended with three mopey teenagers learning the vital lesson to trust in each other.  So where exactly does this episode leave us?  The director essentially pressed the reset button.

Dotachin pops out of the shadows, saving the day and owning the Yellow Scarves in the process.  Horoda fell into the same pitfall Mikado did: he didn’t make an effort to screen his members.  His fault is even more egregious when you realize he said the Dollars had just gone into hiding so they could plot against his gang.  It ultimately proves to be his downfall, as he loses all of his guard to the surprise attack.  Then he tries to get away, only to run into Shizuo on the highway to freedom.  The reaction we get out of this is priceless.  Horoda far underestimated Shizuo’s ability to stubbornly refuse to lie down.  Shizuo gets his revenge, and it sets them up for the traffic cops.  With the loss of their leader, the war soundly ends.

Of course, Anri isn’t quite done yet, because she wants to go after the mastermind.  Izaya proves his omnipresence when he reveals he chose his mook based on her ability to control him.  When you get down to it, the two really aren’t very different.  They both want to learn more about humanity.  Izaya wants to do it because he wants to see how people react, and Anri does it because she really doesn’t understand people’s feelings.  They leave us with a big plot thread to tie into the next series: Izaya wants to fight Anri.  Since she failed in assimilating him into her collective, I’m sure she still wants to pursue him as well.

As Mikado’s ending narrative drones on, we figure out exactly where the events from the past series have led.  Absolutely nowhere.  Nothing significant has changed on the surface.  Anri and Mikado still walk home from school every day.  Dotachin’s group still runs around feeding their otaku urges.  Shinra and Celty continue to pursue their slightly odd relationship.  Kida and Saki have finally gotten together as a proper couple.  Shizuo continues to collect debts with Mr. Tanaka.  Mika and Seiji continue to grow their relatively creepy relationship.  And Izaya?  He’s still a creep who enjoys gathering information and manipulating people.

It feels like a weak ending, especially for a series who spent most of its time acting big.  It makes Ikebukuro into a sandbox town.  As highlighted, people come and people go.  These people might cause a stir in the city for a short time, but eventually, everything levels out once again.  Status quo truly is God in their universe.  We are used to seeing our anime end on a crescendo of awesome, but Durarara subverts our expectations and delivers a realistic ending.

The city acts just like one in real life.  It might have fantastic aspects, but doesn’t every city in the world have some oddities?  Regardless of what an individual or even a group does, how often does a city really change because of it?  I’m sure Izaya would enjoy testing out exactly how resilient the people and their city are, but it will have to wait for another season.  The ending leaves us with that vital dual resolution.  Yes, the current crisis has ended, and Ikebukuro has returned to a state of equilibrium.  But as we’ve seen more than once, it only takes a few sparks to upset the balance, and Izaya has already set the stage.  I hope to see some more of Durarara and its world in the future.

Source: Chartfag Alright, time to do this list again! What catches my interest this time around? Rather than commenting on ALL of the series that will air, I’ll just say what catches the least bit of my interest and keep it short. Let’s judge a book by it’s cover and start this thing!!! Amagami SS [...]

Wait, whut!? I’ll be honest, I have absolutely no idea what the hell was going on these past three or so episodes of Daimaou. One thing for sure is though, I know Akuto wants to take down god. Other than that, I didn’t quite know what was going on, especially on that mess of an [...]

So this episode actually concludes the father-taking-over-under-the-bridge saga. The title of episode 99 (the last story-based episode), “Conclusion,” pretty much puts the nail in that coffin. The way the story ended was a bit unexpected and abrupt, but it was a strong episode nonetheless, with the 1st half being as funny as I’ve seen the show be, and the 2nd half being extremely heartwarming and sugary sweet.

As written in Tenka Seiha, this felt quite anticlimactic. As I had wondered about after the last episode, the Chief did indeed disappear for a reason. But him being a very rich/influential figure in the business world was too much of a deus ex machina. Too convenient. Same goes for Riku’s father’s sudden change of heart after hearing that ringtone. Instead of the confrontation between father and son I was looking forward to, we were instead given a man acting behind the scenes and a calm conversation between Nino and Riku’s father.

But I don’t want to take away from what a great episode this was. The whole falling star gag was absolutely hilarious. The moment Maria stepped into the picture, I could tell exactly where she was going with it. Never really found her sadism all that funny, but I guess I enjoyed seeing Star being the victim. And just how heartfelt and honest everyone was about wishing upon the falling Star and Riku. I appreciated the call backs, with the metal headed brothers wishing for the destruction of the lab, and Stella wishing for world domination.

And thanks to the Chief’s backroom dealings, Nino’s wish does come true! But, in a sense, Nino actually made her wish come true with her conversation with Riku’s father. Well, the conversation itself actually didn’t do all that much. Nino seemed surprisingly lucid during it, probably moreso than at any other point in the show, as she was explaining the contrast between her worldview and the one that Riku used to have and his father currently has. Her line, “When [Riku] feels full, it makes me feel full,” felt very motherly. Which is fitting, because it was the fact that she reminded Riku’s father of Riku’s mother that was responsible for his decision to stop the development project.

That leaves me wondering again why Riku’s mother is no longer a part of their lives. Riku’s father’s reminiscence of her tells me that it was under sad circumstances, either death or her leaving him. The latter seems somewhat more likely, given Riku’s father’s hope that Riku would be able to make things work with his lover, unlike himself. And again it felt a little too convenient, given that we never really got to know Riku’s father’s character other than as a malicious villain. Then there’s the question of the phone number from the end of last episode. Clearly the phone number was genuine, but why did it get forwarded to a time broadcast that time, why didn’t Riku’s father answer it that time, and why did Riku decide to call that number again?

It doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. But then again, it doesn’t really have to. The final scene as Nino answers Riku’s call was exceedingly sweet, with Riku inadvertently declaring his love for Nino to her. It was wonderfully directed, with the orange hue of the dusk sunlight giving everything a softer, more romantic feeling. The shots were framed very well in classic Shinbo style, and I loved the parallel imagery of the two lovers’ shadows as they (kind of) talked on the phone.

With the main conflict resolved, I can only guess that the next, final episode will be an irrelevant gag filled one, like what Shaft did with Natsu no Arashi! I’m still hopeful that there will be more development into the relationship between Nino and Riku, as we were left hanging only partway complete. But even if that doesn’t happen, if the show can finish strong with a very funny episode, I’ll be happy. With Shaft, there’s always hope for a 2nd season, after all.

Notes:

• The pre-OP scene was narrated by Riku and Nino for the first time. It featured imagery of Nino looking up at Riku, the very opposite of what we’ve consistently been shown in the series thus far. Nino’s narration also made it seem like she was looking for help from Riku. The episode itself still had Nino saving Riku, but I’m hoping this is a sign that the next episode will have a little bit of the opposite, to balance things out more in this relationship.
• The last episode number was episode 100, the post-ED Arakawa talent show gag, and it featured Riku for the first time.
• The preview actually featured the Kappa taking off his mask for some Kappa Noodles! And Nino actually said something very preview-like, which was quickly negated by Riku’s comments, which means that, yes, we have no idea what the next episode will be about.
• Random Curiosity has a good assortment of screenshots, as usual.

FLCL is a show that really needs no introduction. In the US, it gained a lot of popularity in 2003 thanks to its airing on Cartoon Network with an excellent dub. But of course, this 6 episode OVA existed for quite a while beforehand in Japan.

In fact, it was 10 years ago today, June 21, 2000, that the 2nd episode was released on DVD. While I didn’t watch it until over a year later, I figured that this 10 year anniversary was a good time to write a little something on the 1st 2 episodes of this show. Why didn’t I do this on April 26, the day the 1st DVD came out? Well, to be honest, I didn’t even think about the fact that this year is the 10th since the release of FLCL until a few weeks ago. But it turned out pretty convenient for me, because I had experienced the 1st 2 episodes together as a set.

I first watched it in the fall of 2001. I had heard about this little 6 episode OVA some months before, but it took me a while to get curious enough to actually download it. This was in the days before bittorrent, and downloading shows still took some commitment, both in time and effort. I managed to find someone sharing it on IRC and downloaded the 1st 2 episodes and watched them, one after the next. Then I watched them again. And again. And again.

Okay, I don’t remember how many times I watched those 2 episodes of FLCL before the 3rd episode finished downloading, some days later. Somehow, those 2 episodes grabbed my attention in a way that no other piece of work had before – or since. I don’t know why then, and I’m not sure why even now. I could tell you why I still consider that entire 6 episode OVA to be the best work of motion picture I’ve ever seen, or how masterful the direction, cinematography, and pacing of the show was, especially in the last half of the show.

But just the 1st 2 episodes? It was an incomplete body of work to me at the time. yet I had already fallen in love. In retrospect, I think maybe the mood of the episodes captured me. Yes, the art, the story, and the characters were unique and compelling. But it was the atmosphere that these 2 episodes were absolutely drenched with that made me feel so strongly about the show.

Note: for the purposes of this post, I chose not to rewatch the episodes. Please excuse and point out any errors I might have made.

It started with the very first scene of the show. Mamimi and Naota together under the bridge after school. Just by the way they interacted in those couple of minutes, I could tell what a plain, boring scene this was for them. It was something that happened every day, and the frustration Naota felt at the constant same old became my frustration. The glistening wavelets on the river and Mamimi’s playful bite of the earlobe from the back looked special, but Naota’s words and reaction rendered them meaningless. And as the camera zoomed out from Mamimi and Naota to show an overview of this boring town that trapped these characters, the haunting tune of The Pillows’ One Life began to play and hit a crescendo. As magnificent as everything looked, it all felt too comfortable, as if it was something that I had seen before countless times.

Another scene that took ahold of me was the well known Never Knows Best scene. Again, the music was absolutely integral to the mood of this scene. I remember feeling very emotional the 1st time I saw it, but I had no idea why. It felt like a beautiful climax to some cute love story, just inserted in the wrong place. The darkness of the night, the faint sounds of the cars passing over the bridge, the peculiar tune of Bran-new Love Song, that dead look in Mamimi’s eyes as she stared at the out of breath Naota. They could have run at each other and kissed, and it wouldn’t have felt out of place.

But they didn’t. This was actually a far more depressing scene, as Naota struggled to tell Mamimi the truth about his brother, and Mamimi refused to face the fact that she surely already knew. It was sad to see them like that, especially given the new information that Mamimi was living off scrap bread from Naota’s father’s shop. To feel so strongly about characters about whom I knew so little, it’s no wonder I felt so confused. And it’s a testament to how well the scene and the whole episode leading up to it had been directed.

There were places in episode 2 that hit me hard as well. The standout scene, the one that I think of when I think of Fire Starter, is the Hybrid Rainbow scene that finished the 1st half of the episode. It wasn’t depressing, but it was powerful. Juxtaposing Mamimi’s discovery of Canti with Naota’s trip to the beach, it was filled with a sense of wonderment.

It was a scene filled with hope. The rain had just stopped. Mamimi was discovering a new idol just as the sun was coming out. And the music came to the front at just the right moment, the energetic, Engrish based chorus shouting out while the rays of sunlight hit Canti as if he were the lion king. In the case of Naota, he was earning his reward for saving Haruko. His monologue showed that despite the fear he showed in the ride to the beach, he had enjoyed it. The scene ended with the shot of a rainbow over the sea that was glittering with the sunlight that had just come out. What joy Mamimi and Naota must have felt from these diversions from their otherwise lonely and plain lives?

Perhaps that made the night scene in the 2nd half of the episode that much more impactful. Right after the show revealed the reason behind Mamimi needing a new pair of shoes earlier – being bullied – it hit me with another depressing scene, in which Naota was following the bare footed Mamimi. Like with the Never Knows Best scene, the darkness felt pervasive. The repeating strums of the guitar in the background was haunting. And as Naota went through his memories sand thoughts to discover that Mamimi was actually the arsonist, I was presented with this sad, bullied, abandoned girl whose sole sources of light were the glow from her cigarette, from the screen on her game system, and from the mass fires she set all over town. The feeling of pity and sympathy was something that stayed with me long after the episode was over.

But I don’t want to present FLCL as if it were some depressing, moody show. Because it’s not. It had those aspects, and it used them to powerful effect. They certainly left on effect on me. But if that’s all there was, I doubt I would have watched those 1st 2 episodes obsessively like I had. And the most common word associated with the show wouldn’t be “lolrandom.” Indeed, I haven’t even mentioned yet the most recognizable character from the show, the very face of FLCL, Haruhara Haruko.

Haruko herself was more of a catalyst than anything else in the 1st 2 episodes, as her character remained shrouded in mystery and unexplained fantasy. She was an enigma, but she made possible the some of the iconic scenes that also fascinated me.

I think my favorite scene with her in those 2 episodes was her introduction. Yes, you’ve read countless times already just how lolrandom it was to have a woman come out of nowhere on a yellow Vespa, trying to hit the main character with a guitar while yelling a variation of “itadakimasu!” But, well, there’s a reason that people remember that scene. Thinking back to it now, I can’t help but crack a smile, even though I didn’t find it all THAT funny at the time. I remember noticing that Haruko was swinging the bat left-handed – I was and am a big baseball fan – and wondering if that was something that would remain consistent or was just based on convenience of the animators (turns out, director Kazuya Tsurumaki had made her a lefty on purpose). The opening scene in which Naota criticized the way Mamimi was holding the bat probably primed me for that thought as well.

And that line, “Stop, the native girl!” I found very funny for some reason. Maybe it was the poor Engrish. Or how it reflected Haruko’s view that she was in some foreign land, whose populace could be called “natives” from her perspective. Or just the physical gag of seeing her hand spin around and around in an impossible manner, something Mamimi clearly took note of. In any case, with the sporty high tempo Runners’ High playing in the background, it was an energetic and wacky introduction to a character who also fit that description. The violent high speed sketched scenes, the Matrix rip-off featuring the kiss (ironic because Naota had just purposefully avoided an indirect kiss), the cut to the trailer in which the “actors” discussed filming that scene – they showed that anything could happen in this show.

Like another well known scene from the first episode, the manga-style dinner scene. I learned later from the commentary that Tsurumaki had done this to make an otherwise plain dinner scene interesting and dynamic. And it had worked on me. I wasn’t particularly impressed by the scene, but it somehow captivated me. It was fast, it was different, and, at times, it was funny. The show had grabbed, no, demanded, my full attention. It is an iconic scene from the series, one that people remember, one that got me watching those 1st 2 episodes again and again.

Then there are the action scenes. They were effortlessly beautiful. That is to say, the production quality was very high, but the show didn’t try to flaunt this fact. Rather, it used the music, choreography, and cinematography to create fun and memorable moments, ones that I wanted to watch over again. Even back then, I knew just how corny that moment was when Canti turned red and stopped the oncoming robot, just as Little Busters started playing. But god damn it, it was still fucking awesome. Despite every cell in my brain telling me I was supposed to be bored, it still sent chills down my spine. And when Haruko ended the 1st fight by smashing Canti in the head with her guitar, Naota’s inner monologue said exactly what I was thinking at the time: “Amazing!” I don’t, and I didn’t, consider the action scenes to be highlights of the 1st 2 episodes of FLCL. But they served as fittingly over the top climaxes to the episodes and provided me with incredible moments that I wanted to experience again.

Maybe in all the drilling into the scenes I’ve done, I might have glossed over the main thrust of FLCL. That is, it’s a pretty straightforward coming-of-age story. Being a growing teenager myself, perhaps I latched onto it as something I could sympathize with. The full story wasn’t told in the 1st 2 episodes, but already, there were changes that Naota was going through. It was seeing him take a swig of the canned coffee at the end of the 1st episode. Listening to him commit himself to Mamimi at the end of the 2nd. Those horns, especially the particularly phallic looking 1st horn, that were so clearly metaphors for an adolescent’s uncontrollable erection. No one will accuse FLCL of being subtle. But I found that brashness refreshing. When something changed in Naota, when his character developed just a little bit, it was simple and easy and, probably due to that, satisfying.

Then there was Mamimi, who was a high schooler like myself. I wasn’t bullied, and I didn’t have to go through the kind of shit she had to. But somehow I could connect with her loneliness. It stuck with me as something universal. The desire to be loved and wanted. Her desperation that showed through her latching onto Naota, then the cat, then Canti. I could sympathize with the dead look in her eyes and her almost forced ambivalence to everything around her.

I cared for these characters. I loved them.

Maybe that’s why I had been obsessed with these 2 episodes. With minimal effort, the show had accomplished in 2 episodes what few shows could ever do. It was a pleasure simply to watch Mamimi and Naota in those 2 episodes, see them interact with each other, with Haruko, react to the things happening around them. They didn’t feel real, but they felt lifelike. Unconsciously, I rooted for them. Unconsciously, I shared their pain, their joy, their confusion. I wanted to feel that again, to understand what I was feeling, and why I was feeling it. Maybe it was just a perfect storm of who I was at the time and what the show was about. After writing this post, I’m not sure I’m any closer to understanding why I had felt compelled to watch those 1st 2 episodes of FLCL over and over again. But I kind of feel like I am.

Anyway, that’s my experience with Furi Kuri and FiSta. That’s my attempt at explaining just a little bit of what I got out of them. I guess if you’ve read this far, my question would be, what was your experience with them? Did you get anything out of those episodes, and if so, what?

Note:

• I just noticed that Anime Diet also had a post on the 10 year anniversary of FLCL.

Between birthdays, Father’s Day, trying to protect my garden (slugs, groundhogs, rabbits,  Japanese beetles, and a lack of rain) and finally getting to four different spring anime shows (Working, Rainbow, Night Raid and Hakuouki:   Shinsengumi Kitan) – I haven’t had the chance to post anything or reply to any of the recent comments like I’d want to. I have a bit of time, though, so I wanted to post a couple of observations I had about the latest episode of Angel Beats.

I like reading reactions to episodes such as episode 12 to Angel Beats because I get to see who else saw what I saw and who saw something different. For the screen shot below,

I’m glad many other people did not enjoy having  a new character appear this late into the show, since my sister and I felt the same way. He seemed familiar for some reason, though, and today I remember why. We do know the identity of this character, he was shown in episode 23 from Cowboy Bebop.

So it has to be him.

-

There’s nothing new about mentioning how Angel Beats has a knack at reminding viewers of other shows. I won’t mention the obvious ones, it’s been done, but I found a new one in episode 12 and this time it’s a video game. I’d probably dismiss this connection but my sister had the same exact thought at exactly the same time so I’m not completely crazy.

Coincidence? I think what made me think Kingdom Hearts was the design of the Shadows (or should I say Heartless!!) and how it was 3 vs. dozens of Shadows in the screen shot and how the Shadows were relatively easy to kill. I’m still undecided; is Hinata Donald and Naoi Goofy or vice versa?

Filed under: anime, episode review, general anime interst

For the last two weeks, ETU and Nagoya have been competing for supremacy on the field.  This week, they continued their struggle.  Next week, guess what?  Yeah, they will still be playing.  I have a criticism for Giant Killing now, and its all about the pacing.  Condensing all the losses apparently means they feel they can spread out this game over four episodes.  It generates a weird rubber band effect for the plot flow.  That’s a more general complaint about the series, though, so let’s talk about the episode.

We finally learn a little more about Tatsumi’s amazing strategy to combat Nagoya.  Remember Carlos, the other guy in the Brazillian trio?  Yeah, I’m sure he rings a bell.  He has played defense for most of the game, but now he moves up field to close the offensive gap and get their attack’s rhythm going.  As soon as he said those words, I knew Tatsumi would attack the new gap in their defense.  Sure enough, they scrape by on breaking the assault and drive the ball straight up the field in a staggering counter attack.

At first glance, it looks like the writer just needed someone to throw a spanner into the gears and pulled up Carlos since he’s actually named.  After all, if he is supposed to be the best player on Nagoya’s team, where on earth has he spent the entire game?  I went back and checked the previous two weeks’ episodes.  Guess who stopped Tsubaki’s attack on the goal in episode 10?  Guess who stole the ball twice in episode 11?  That’s right, Carlos did it.  Carlos spearheads all the defensive plays we see Nagoya make.  This also leads into how Tatsumi’s gambit worked.  Pulling him out of defense means the rest of the team must pick up quite a bit of slack.  They aren’t up for the task, and ETU capitalizes on their moment of weakness.

Again, the series gives Tsubaki a massive turn in the limelight.  In the previous two episodes, he stopped three assaults on the goal.  The experience gave him a big boost of confidence, his major weakness.  Newly bolstered, he now plays better than ever.  He plays so well he even scores the first goal of the game.  I understand what Tsubaki’s role is.  He parallels Tatsumi when he used to play rather than manage.  His floater position means he has to act with his best instincts in every situation.  On the field, Tatsumi played using his intuition as well.

However, I feel like they have given him too much success too quickly.  I know he needed a jump-start to his confidence meter, but didn’t he already have it?  Now he gets to score the goal as well?  Part of me wishes Akasaki or Sera had scored instead.  On the other hand, this potentially sets him up for another failure sometime later on in the series.  Since Tsubaki and Tatsumi parallel each other, it could lead into an interesting highlight on the manager’s past.  Maybe the diamond of the former ETU didn’t play so brilliantly all the time.

Finally, we have the impressions of the people watching the game.  I love how the series cuts away to show how these fringe characters react to the current gameplay.  Their reaction to Tsubaki’s goal was priceless.  Everyone off the field just stood there with their mouths open, then suddenly went up in one massive cheer.  No one in the series expected Tsubaki to score, not Tatsumi, not even me.  They kind of play the viewer avatar during the games.

The more significant characters, the journalist and the photographer, give us a little insight into the manager’s game.  The former recognizes his confidence at the beginning of the game, and the latter points out his blatant display of confidence when ETU presses the attack.  They don’t do anything particularly effective in the series, but using them to give those subtle bits of information to the viewer is cool.  I can’t wait to see the reaction when ETU finally wins a game.

For the last two weeks, ETU and Nagoya have been competing for supremacy on the field.  This week, they continued their struggle.  Next week, guess what?  Yeah, they will still be playing.  I have a criticism for Giant Killing now, and its all about the pacing.  Condensing all the losses apparently means they feel they can spread out this game over four episodes.  It generates a weird rubber band effect for the plot flow.  That’s a more general complaint about the series, though, so let’s talk about the episode.

We finally learn a little more about Tatsumi’s amazing strategy to combat Nagoya.  Remember Carlos, the other guy in the Brazillian trio?  Yeah, I’m sure he rings a bell.  He has played defense for most of the game, but now he moves up field to close the offensive gap and get their attack’s rhythm going.  As soon as he said those words, I knew Tatsumi would attack the new gap in their defense.  Sure enough, they scrape by on breaking the assault and drive the ball straight up the field in a staggering counter attack.

At first glance, it looks like the writer just needed someone to throw a spanner into the gears and pulled up Carlos since he’s actually named.  After all, if he is supposed to be the best player on Nagoya’s team, where on earth has he spent the entire game?  I went back and checked the previous two weeks’ episodes.  Guess who stopped Tsubaki’s attack on the goal in episode 10?  Guess who stole the ball twice in episode 11?  That’s right, Carlos did it.  Carlos spearheads all the defensive plays we see Nagoya make.  This also leads into how Tatsumi’s gambit worked.  Pulling him out of defense means the rest of the team must pick up quite a bit of slack.  They aren’t up for the task, and ETU capitalizes on their moment of weakness.

Again, the series gives Tsubaki a massive turn in the limelight.  In the previous two episodes, he stopped three assaults on the goal.  The experience gave him a big boost of confidence, his major weakness.  Newly bolstered, he now plays better than ever.  He plays so well he even scores the first goal of the game.  I understand what Tsubaki’s role is.  He parallels Tatsumi when he used to play rather than manage.  His floater position means he has to act with his best instincts in every situation.  On the field, Tatsumi played using his intuition as well.

However, I feel like they have given him too much success too quickly.  I know he needed a jump-start to his confidence meter, but didn’t he already have it?  Now he gets to score the goal as well?  Part of me wishes Akasaki or Sera had scored instead.  On the other hand, this potentially sets him up for another failure sometime later on in the series.  Since Tsubaki and Tatsumi parallel each other, it could lead into an interesting highlight on the manager’s past.  Maybe the diamond of the former ETU didn’t play so brilliantly all the time.

Finally, we have the impressions of the people watching the game.  I love how the series cuts away to show how these fringe characters react to the current gameplay.  Their reaction to Tsubaki’s goal was priceless.  Everyone off the field just stood there with their mouths open, then suddenly went up in one massive cheer.  No one in the series expected Tsubaki to score, not Tatsumi, not even me.  They kind of play the viewer avatar during the games.

The more significant characters, the journalist and the photographer, give us a little insight into the manager’s game.  The former recognizes his confidence at the beginning of the game, and the latter points out his blatant display of confidence when ETU presses the attack.  They don’t do anything particularly effective in the series, but using them to give those subtle bits of information to the viewer is cool.  I can’t wait to see the reaction when ETU finally wins a game.