Tag Archives: Hyouka

Day 10 – ka: a fairy tale of the two

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薔薇色の | meron

薔薇色の | meron

It seems that for every year’s Twelve Days of Anime, I would dedicate at least one day on an anime that Kyoto Animation [abbreviated as ka on the title] animated (Day 10 on 2011, Day 4 and 8 on 2010), praising the excellence of their works. This year, not as much, as I was not totally sold on the two TV series that they made this year, Hyouka and Chūnibyō Demo Koi ga Shitai!.

Hyouka started off really show for me, and with me having close to zero knowledge and interest to the mystery genre aside from works by Ryukishi07, all I got out of the first few episode was the intelligence and reluctance of Oreki and the curiosity of Chitanda. The mystery solving part was interesting at first, but that initial interest in the show didn’t stay with me long, with me being bored out of the show as the episode count starts to go into 2 digits. However, it was around then I read several posts put the focus on the characters and less on the plot. Convinced by those posts and with people continuing saying how good the show was on Twitter, I didn’t drop the show. Then the School Festival Arc happened, things got more and more interesting, and then the end of the School Festival Arc happened, and I was literally blown away by how perfectly done that episode was, and once again showing how important the characters are in the show. The episodes afterwards was very light on the mystery solving part, instead opting for screentime showing the relationship between the four main characters. Hence, by the end, I was quite impressed of how well written the characters were. In hindsight, even earlier episodes were important, since it showed the relational transformation between the members, especially between Oreki and Chitanda.

Chūnibyō Demo Koi ga Shitai! instead, captivated me early on, with the whole plot about chu2 and Rikka being a bag of fun with her chu2 antics. That enjoyment had only intensified as we were treated to glorious fictional battles that Rikka has with her older sister and the introduction of Dekomori. However all that joke and giggles were swept away when Yuuta suddenly landed on Rikka issues and with him trying to ‘solve’ her problem for the duration of the second half of the show, which I think hurt my enjoyment of the show quite a bit. Compared to Hyouka, Chu2koi felt a lot more sudden for the change from the initial plot to romance. Hyouka was heavily about mystery solving in the first half, and it is through those arc that we see glimpse of the characters of the Hyouka members. While the relationship between Mayaka and Satoshi was clear from the start, we not only see the change in interaction between Oreki and Chitanda as the episode progresses, we the change in emotions that Oreki has for Chitanda, first from annoyance, someone that had entangled him, to a good friend that he ends up helping out for and finally to a possible girlfriend. However, while we did see hints of Rikka using her chu2 antics as a defense mechanism even before the drama starts, the hints were way too minor compared to the mind wooplash that follows afterwards, making the whole transition a bit too abrupt, making the disconnect between the fun first half and the Dekomori crying second half.

Chu2koi is in no way a bad show, with the first half was clearly one of the highlights of the winter season (before Garupan became amazing), and the second half reasonably handled, but the transition leaves more to be desired, especially since we have already seen how good Kyoto Animation can adapt more serious plots in Disappearance and Clannad. Similarly, Hyouka is not the perfect show either, as the fact still holds that I found the first half a bit on the boring side.

And that gem sitting in the corner? That is K-On Movie, now that is Kyoto Animation at their best of their abilities.

Summing up Summer 2012 Anime Season

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ちびキャララミバ / えらんと

Despite stopping Weekly Musings since the end of last term, I still have kept up keeping track of my weekly anime ratings in terms of a spreadsheet, mostly for my APR ballot. Since it is the end of the summer season, it means that I will be doing my final touches on my summer 2012 spreadsheet and starting my fall spreadsheet, let’s just tally up and see what I think was the worst to best show of the summer season.

Last season I ranked the shows based on the total points it accumulated during the whole season (a point is gain from having a better episode compared to every other episode that aired in the same week), and even than I stated how that way of ranking placed Natsuiro Kiseki at a huge disadvantage, as I started that show half way into the spring season, it didn’t collect any points for the episodes that I didn’t watch as it aired (5 episodes). For this season, I first tried to just find the average points gained for each show and ranking it based on it. While that solved the issue that Natsuiro Kiseki had last time, there were still places that some shows might end up having an disadvantage on. For example, on the weeks that Olympics were held, several shows didn’t get to broadcast for those few weeks. The results is that the shows that were able to broadcast would not have gained an extra point if that show were better than the shows that were postponed. So additionally I tried a new different methods to rank this season’s shows. One is to only let each week’s top 5 get points and then calculate the rankings according to the average points, that way, even on a week with less shows, the maximum number of points that a show can get is 5. Lastly I ranked the shows according to each method (original method, or Method A, or the top 5 method, Method B, gave them points according to each rank from 12-0, took the sum and did a final ranking. Here are the results:

Method B Method A  Final result
Jinrui wa Suitai Shimashita 12 10 22
Smile Precure 11 11 22
Joshiraku 10 12 22
Yuruyuri ♪♪ 8 9 17
Tari Tari 9 6 15
Hyouka 8 7 15
Binbougami ga! 6 5 11
Space Bros 5 4 9
Saki Achiga 1 8 9
Eureka AO 4 3 7
Kokoro Connect 4 2 6
Sword Art Online 4 1 5
Muv-Luv Alternative: Total Eclipse 0 0 0

I swear that the top 3 being tied is pure coincidence, I didn’t force my result to be like that or anything >_>.

Jinrui wa Suitai Shimashita

I liked it the show very much, though I can’t really put my finger on especially why. In general though, I really liked the main characters, all of them have this sarcastic personality that just make the character not like any other generic character seen in other shows, which on top is helped by the wonderful (or lack of) performance of their voice actress. Yes I’m talking about Watashi and Y in particular, which both is a huge reason why I liked the show. Additionally, another big reason why I liked the show was because of the fairies. They love sweets, makes really nasty comments with a smile, does random stuff just because and are just adorable. The the whole series being colorful and wacky also helped me liking this show also. I’m still a bit iffy about the last few episodes, as it stopped being just fun and games, but recalling that the original novel was written by Romeo Tanaka, person behind Cross Channel and Yume Miru Kusuri (both really good visual novels), I guess the last few episodes are where we get to see the serious stuff underneath all the fun and games (similar to Cross Channel, which while was funny and wacky at time, really dives in to some really serious plot).

Smile Precure

What can I say? The show talks of friendship and each episode have the girls just having fun and fighting weekly monsters. After watching for 30+ episodes, I have come to like all 5 of them, so I guess I’m pretty biased toward this show. I guess my biggest issue with them is that the fighting scene is a bit too uninteresting, especially since the amount of them they still use to animate their final move.

Joshiraku

Written by the same guy behind Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei, Joshiraku has the same kinds of jokes that made me like SZS so much. Additionally, instead of being illustrated by Kumeta himself (as with SZS), it was illustrated by Yasu and is animated by JC Staff, which seems to making few good shows this year. I loved SZS, and hence why Joshiraku being similar to SZS enough, easily became one of my favorite shows this season. If you love puns and references Joshiraku is something that you should sometime, if not, you can still watch it for the moe girls. My only issue with this? Not enough people are subbing it.

Yuruyuri ♪♪

Despite having a perfect final two episodes, the quality of jokes for each episode differs quite a bit. I guess the main reason is that some cast are just less interesting than others, and when some episodes put more focus on the less interesting characters, I get bored and hence ranked this show lower than, say Joshiraku, which all 5 were almost always present. Despite that, I really enjoyed the show, and came in close in being the best show if it weren’t for those less than satisfactory episodes.

Tari Tari

Heck, the art was beautiful, the few times that the main characters sang were also pretty good, Wakana is cute etc. However, while I can’t really hate this show, there weren’t much there for me to like either. Yes I like Wakana’s arc and her in the last few episodes, but some of the other arcs were so-so (or how Taichi just got shafted). I donno, maybe they are just playing it safe with the show, as it have seemed to have done everything right, but nothing just seem to be that memorable for me other than Wakana (actually, even Wakana’s arc seemed to have ended pretty blend)…

Hyouka

I’m guessing most of you would be putting Hyouka as your favorite this season. No fault of the show, but I only warmed up to this show in the final parts where I finally realized something that everyone realized way before. Yes, the end of the school festival arc was KyoAni’s genius ability at work, and yes the final episode was very pretty and HNNNNGGGG-ing, but I guess I really didn’t ‘get’ the show until or near the end of the school festival arc. Call me slow but that made me rank Hyouka lower than most people had in the earlier episodes

Binbougami ga!

While I do like comedy, I’m less of a fan to slapstick comedy than I’m a fan to puns and references (Joshiraku), and my ranking for this show shows that. The comedy aren’t bad, and I really like it when Momiji dresses up as characters from other franchise, but heck I will never put this above Joshiraku. Also, aside from the comedy, the drama part of the show weren’t all that original and was kinda meh.

As for the other ones: Space Brothers is getting a bit too slow for me to enjoy on a weekly basis, Saki Achiga only happened once so not surprising that it didn’t get that high (only one chance to gain points in Method B), Eureka 7 AO went from anticipation to interesting then right to annoying and a disappointment , Kokoro Connect ended up looking like it was making plot twists for the sake of making them making me stop caring about them, Sword Art Online was never that good for me, and Total Eclipse is just flat out horrible, why am I even still watching that show?

 

On why Hyouka episodes 18+19 is still solid

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How can you not like the last two episodes of Hyouka

Let’s talk about the recent few episodes of Kyouha Hyouka. Episode 17 was the conclusion of the school festival arc, and not only was my favorite episode of Hyouka, but  also one of my favorite episodes this season. After episode 17, we were given two arguably filler episodes, episode 18 and 19, both having a self-contained plot and with the main character cut down to Chitanda and Oreki (Mayaka and Satoshi appeared in episode 18, but both only had a minor role to the story). Obviously, not everyone is supportive of the past two episodes, for example, Kurogane blogged that episode 18 was boring and stated that KyoAni should have ended the series at episode 17. In contrast, Hyouka still seems much liked in the Anime Power Rankings, with episode 18 at second place last week.

Filler, or does it even matter?

Vanikawa of Desu ex Machina stated on Anime Power Rankings that episode 18 was a filler episode, and hoped that the last three episodes won’t be what episode 18 (welp, sorry to tell you that your hopes are destroyed, as  episode 19 has similar structure as episode 18, and preview for episode 20 also seem to focus on slice-of-life more). First, let’s define what does a filler episode mean in the first place. Doing a quick Google search reveals the following definitions: “A filler episode is generally an episode in which there is no plot development.” (Answers.com), “In media, filler is material that is combined with material of greater relevance or quality to “fill out” a certain volume.” (Wikipedia), and  ”Filler episodes are entries in a generally continuous serial that are unrelated to the main plot, don’t significantly alter the relations between the characters, and generally serve only to take up space. This could be considered Padding applied to a whole franchise.” (TvTropes). With those definition, I guess I can say that episode 18 and 19 is filler episode, since aside from starting and ending the episode plot, both epsidoes did nothing to advance the main plot, and aside from shipping Chitanda and Oreki even more together, it doesn’t alter the relations between the characters too much, so I guess it is a filler episode.

But then, I wondered, what is the main plot, since the whole show is structured in arcs, each with its own problems, conclusions etc…, and only might have some things that carries over to the other arcs, all showing that Hyouka doesn’t really seem to have much of a main plot other than “The Classics Clubs goes around solving mysteries”. The first arc is obviously important, since it shows the start of the Classics Club and shows how the team solved the most important article written for Hyouka, the very publication that is being sold in the school festival. The school festival arc is arguably important, since it shows the time lapse from the first arc, as they are now selling Hyouka. How about the other big arc, mystery film arc? While that arc shows quite a bit of Oreki and his change, it doesn’t advance the main plot much aside from developing the characters. Yet, despite that, I, and many people enjoyed that. Hence while episode 18 and 19 is filler, not only it is used for character development, something which KyoAni is very good in, it is not something that is new in Hyouka.

Character, character, character

As I have stated on last week’s Anime Power Rankings, plot for episode 18 is not the best part of the show, but is how KyoAni decided to develop both Oreki and the relationship between Oreki and Chitanda (ie ship them together). KyoAni just really good a making shows with characters that we care about, especially with how they can make K-on, despite being a moeblob show, make me cry at the end of episode 20 of the second season, or how they succeeded to make Clannad After Story really tearjerking (except for the ending song), Hyouka is not different. While Hyouka was more plot heavy than something like K-On, the plot seemed to be there to develop and to change the characters, especially Oreki. Episode 17 was spectacular not only because of how the arc was concluded, but because of how much character development was put back in to the main cast before and during the revelation. Episode 18 and 19 was no different, as with each self-contained episode, it focused not only on the talent of Oreki, but also on the characters themselves.

In episode 18 and 19, we see both Chitanda and Oreki were warming up to each other, and how both of them are affecting each other, all leading up to the potential kiss scene in episode 19. For Oreki, we start to see more of him being active in solving mysteries, which while hinted before, became obvious by the last two episodes, and Chitanda maybe collecting Oreki’s talent in that she was starting to see where Oreki is going in episode 18. Most interesting is that Oreki even forgot his original intent of starting the theory making game as he was trying to deduce the meaning of the announcement, showing how completely immersed he was into it, as if he was enjoying it (though he would defend it with saying that he was completely immersed so that the whole issue can be over ASAP). This just goes to so how much he had changed since the beginning when he was pulled in by Chitanda to solve mysteries.

Actually, looking back, the love story between Oreki and Chitanda might have been another main plot for Hyouka. Oreki fell in love with Chitanda at first sight, decided to follow up with all of her curiosity whims, and because of her, became a least a bit interested in mysteries himself. As for Chitanda, she was really focused at her uncle’s mysteries at first, found Oreki and got him to solve the mystery and later fell for him because of his talent and personality. If that is true, then heck, these two episodes are really important.

Oreki and Chitanda were so cute in Hyouka 19. And if this continues, I will be a happy camper. - Lord Reiseng

In defense, I do think the last two episode does not stand up for episode 17, not because they are bad, but because episode 17 was just way too good. However, ending at the end of school festival arc? Not really, since I kinda want to see what will happen to Oreki and Chitanda also.

Weekly Musings – For the week ended May 6

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坂道のアポロン / マサト

Nothing too surprising this week. Space Brothers is becoming a bit better since they are finished with the more mundane astronaut test (for now), Apollon is continuously solid, made even better by connecting back jazz to the over plot, Mouretsu gave us a fine example of how to attack an opponent that seemed to be undefeatable at first, and worse of all, Upotte!! gave me a nasty aftertaste, with me reacting to it by dropping the show half way through it (since I dropped Upotte!!, there is one less possible points given to each remaining shows).

Sakamichi no Apollon  - Episode 4 (14 points): As if the staff of Sakamichi no Apollon have read Aftershok entry about episode 3, jazz became much more prominent in this episode, riding side by side with the love triangle plot. The emotional aspect of the development in episode 3 was shown in greater detail in this episode with the effects it has on Kaoru during the practice.  The idea of the rich (Kaoru) and the poor (Sentarou) was lighted viewed upon during this episode, showing how different, yet similar, their upbringings are. Along with their background, a bit about Sentarou’s reason for wearing the rosary was revealed. Lastly, the closeness that Karou and Sentarou has by the end of the episode can be seen in the live performance, where it was Kaoru pushing Sentarou (instead of Sentarou pushing Kaoru earlier) to play properly (though that friendship might be tested again later as it is hinted of the addition of another node in the relationship graph). Again, I shall point to Aftershok of Anime Instrumentality for a more in-depth view of the episode.

Fate/Zero – Episode 18 (13 points): I am pretty happy that my commentary landed on this week’s Anime Power Rankings, so I guess you can go there to read about my views on this episode…or I can regurgitate it…: While this episode of Fate/Zero is solid, it just doesn’t feel the same without ideologies being thrown around (as seen in the first half of the episode), especially this episode takes place after the defeat of Caster (14-15), the defeat of Lancer (16), and death of Tokiomi (17), all with huge amounts of different ideologies, personalities being mixed together. Hence, this is why I do think that the first part of episode 18 feels a sudden leap and at maybe even out of place. Yet, as I have said in APR, that thinking is just absurd, since the image in the first half of episode 18 is more close to what most of us experience than the whole freaking Holy Grail War (it is not like most of us are mages fighting to survive). This unease of the normality and hint of romance (Kenny has toward Shirley) help us to understand of how much Kiritsugu has departed from normality, and how he was cast into the world of mages and mage killings, all began by his dad’s research. Ya, Kiritsugu has some screws lost in his head when he decided to murder his dad, but comparing the past that he lived in and the hell that he went through in second half of episode 18 and onwards, you can’t really blame him for blaming his dad for messing up his life.

Mouretsu Pirates – Episode 18 (12 points): A course that I really liked last term is computer security (as you might have seen from my several more security related posts) and hence I will jump at anything that can be viewed a security-related way; this episode of Mouretsu is an example for this. With the Bentenmaru under attack from Jenny uncle’s ships, they decided to discuss various tactics that can force her uncle to be retreat. Knowing that the uncle himself cannot be easily exploited, they went after Jenny’s fiance, and finally, with the help with the original Bentenmaru crew, used solid proof detailing the shenanigans between the uncle and the fiance’s dad. So instead of trying to win hazardously, the utilized the Principle of Easiest Penetration, and found the easiest method to find dirt to force the uncle to retreat (or to nullify the marriage, so the pursue is useless). Then, the original Bentenmaru simply hacked into Hugh and Dolittle and found useful documents against Jenny’s uncle, again pointing to the importance of data security. Finally, during the raid, Bentenmaru broadcasted the raid live, hoping that when the proof were revealed, everyone can know, similar to how a whistleblower will leak some information through Wikileaks, hoping that the the target origination cannot deny or silence people from the information (since it is so readily available). All these good use of strategies just make me leap for joy. Chiaki going gun crazy this episode was pretty good also.

Smile Precure – Episode 14 (12 points): I liked both Kyoto episodes, with the previous episode focused on the failures of Miyuki and this episode focused more on the other four character, with Miyuki taking the back seat. This episode we see more of Nao more delicate sides (and her vast expressive expressions), with her not taking hunger that good, while we see Yayoi being all hyper thinking the whole trip as a RPG game, and they both shine in this episode. I also liked the contrast between Miyuki/Yayoi and Akane/Reika/Nao, where one team was actually enjoying the trip, while the other team was basically running all around trying to find the other two…Why you make them suffer so, Miyuki ;A; Lastly, the battle scene was pretty interesting, with Akane, Reika (almost out of character) and Nao flying around, ‘playing’ around with Akanbe. Again, refer to Baka Laureate for more about Smile Precure.

Space Brothers – Episode 5 (11 points): Finally we are done with the examination part, and Mutta gets to go to visit the Huston NASA Space Center to visit his brother. We see more the interaction between Mutta and his brother, and the personality of each and such. Nothing much is really happening, but it is good to visit the relationship between the two brothers.

Tsuritama - Episode 4 (10 points): I guess I’m finally warming up to this show. From seeing the APR results and seeing people talk about this show on Twitter, I know that a lot of people are liking this, but for the longest time, I’m just confused on how people find this so excellent. After reading a post from The Untold Story of Altair & Vega, and being more observant of the stuff talked about in the post, I guess I understand more of Tsuitama and both the relationship between the character and the character change (mostly of Yuki) that happened in the previous and this episode.

Nazo no Kanojo – Episode 5 (9 points): I think last week’s episode was kinda awkward, so it is good to go back the the more cutey, simple love between the two character for this week.

Hyouka - Episode 2 (8 points): As I have said from last week, I watch and enjoy this show is because Oreki’s personality. This episode, we see the disconnection that he has with the rest of the world around him, feeling how distant away he is from the three other characters while they were chatting; I would be lying if I said that never had the mentality of the world being distant and that I’m just observing it.This connection to my older self [mind you, I would like to think that I'm less distant from people nowadays] is just what make me want to watch Oreki more, and by extension, Hyouka. It seems that not only am I connecting to Oreki’s personality, but lostty of Anime Princess can also relate to Oreki.

For the rest: Jormongand (7), Eureka 7 AO, Sankarea (5),  Zombie desu OTD, Accel World (4), Tasogare Otome x Amnesia (2), Saki Achiga (1), Medaka Box (0)

And least:

Upotte – Episode 5 (Dropped): This show thrives on moe and references to guns. So in episode 4, while the conflict between M16A4 and L85A1 was weird and made me close to dropping it (it is not moe anymore), I could have laughed it off by saying that M16A4 is the stereotypical American being all mean to others and to say it is a reference between the conflict between the real guns themselves. In comparison, I see no references to back up Sako’s sadistic personality other than the fact that she is based of AK’s as far as I can tell (which does not make sense either, since Gariru was normal). I stopped around the scene where Sako was repeatedly shooting Funco at close range.

Weekly Musings – For the week ended April 29

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夫として、父親として、/ 椿屋

This season is my second season participating in Desu ex Machina‘s Anime Power Rankings, and it seems that I tend to have different tastes from most people. Seeing that I’m now a NEET and hence have more time to write about stuff, and viewing this as an opportunity to view more anime blogs, I have decided try to keep a “weekly musings”, talking about  the current season shows that I have watched and have ranked against each other. Since the ranking that I have made for the shows are mostly for APR, it will be based on the timetable that APR has given (ending in Saturday night, with some Sunday shows included). I will list the show in descending points, where each point is given to a show that I feel is superior to another show (for example, if I watched 12 shows this season, the max points that a show can have is 11). Without further ado:

Fate/Zero – Episode 17 (15 points): While less awesome than last episode, we were finally shown what is inevitable for anyone that went through Fate/Stay Night. In a sense, this episode was one that might relate to Fate/Stay Night more than any other episodes (Rin’s scene and the dagger Azoth). I particularly liked Reverse Thieves’ post on this episode.

Tasogare Otome x Amnesia – Episode 3 (14 points): As I have said in my post about Tasogare, I really liked the implicit social commentary about the idea of how people view others based on what they know of them already, no matter if those info are correct or not. I like stuff like this, so I’m just biased for this show. The fact that they were able to turn a generally boring (for me) genre, horror to make it more romantic and fun is also a plus. As suntzuanime did mentioned, there is an issue why Teiichi is seeing Yuuko the way he is seeing Yuuko, I figured that it would be something that is revealed at the very end, like a twist that was hinted back at the end of episode 1.

Sakamichi no Apollon  - Episode 3 (13 points): I tend to agree with Aftershok of Anime Instrumentality’s views about this episode: while I agree that the plot is really well done, a part of me want it to be more about jazz.

Moretsu Pirates – Episode 17 (12 points): I know, the last (including this episode) might not have been the best, with the Yacht Club messing around and such, but you know what, I liked seeing the Yacht Club learning and such. This episode was another episode of them being bold and doing stuff, yea, they might be way more clumsy then the normal crew, but it shows the difference in experience that is independent to character and talent, but how the latter two can help fast track the former. Ya, that yuri scene was still pretty lolwut.

Hyouka - Episode 1 (11 points): Hatters gonna hate, according to APR seems that the first episode of Hyouka was not well received. I liked it. I like Oreki’s personality, not because he is fabulous and such, but that I can relate to his personality to an extent, of just going through each day finding the easiest path to do anything, though the end of episode 1 might suggest that he might be slowly opening up to Chitanda,because he actually likes her or that he, from experience, knows that it is easier to go along than to try to go against them. Lastly, the animation is really good.

Space Brothers – Episode 4 (10 points): While still solid, it was still a pretty mundane episode.

Smile Precure – Episode 13 (10 points): Wow, this really should be higher…maybe I still don’t want to confess that I’m actually enjoying this show etc… This was a pretty fun episode, with seeing how Miyuki fails in so many different ways, and the other four girls trying to support her in their own ways. Krizzlybear of Baka Laureate did a good job in pointing out the different interesting parts of this episode.

Eureka Seven: AO - Episode 3 (9 points): To be honest, nothing really stands out much for me in this episode aside from the girls going on future nico nico douga, blogging and singing karaoke as Miku/Ranka (?).

For the rest of the shows: Tsuitama (8), Sankarea (7), Jormongand (6), Nazo no Kanojo (5),  Accel World (4), Zombie desu OTD (3), Upotte (2),  Medaka (1), Saki Achiga (0) since I’m just going to talk about the top floor(# shows/ 2) shows for the week