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“Chotto ureshii dake da yo”
"I'm just kind of happy."


"Akari-sama makes me smile~" =D

Interlude

The ending of ARIA the ORIGINATION and with it, the ARIA series as a whole, has left me fumbling for words. The words to describe what I felt about the last few episodes, the ending and the series as a whole, have been elusive. However, I’ll try my best to do justice to this amazing work.

The ARIA series has been an amazing ride, especially if you consider that it was a rather scenic journey. ARIA was a series devoid of any noticeable plot, in the first couple episodes of ANIMATION, the cast and the world of Aqua is introduced, and in the final few climactic episodes that truly defined what anime is capable of.

So what’s in between? What fills the gap between introduction and conclusion? Short answer: nothing. Long answer: the slow unraveling of the world of Neo Venezia, the subtleties in beauty and tranquility that defined ARIA as a “healing” anime. We were shown their slow, progressive growth, not through countless training episodes and gondola physics, but rather by the day to day experiences that touched upon themes of love, life, the universe and everything.

Tip of the Iceberg

Simply put, ARIA is special. As a whole, it’s a fifty-three episode journey through the lives of its character, a grand slice-of-life about experiences and life lessons and growing up. It’s a unique work, because if you analyze it objectively, it’s filled with ironic contradictions. It appears to be childish, yet it’s squared directly at adults. As a story, somehow nothing is complex, yet everything is meaningful. The way it actively expounds its themes might leave it open to accusations of being didactic, but it’s so honest in its belief of its messages, that it’s completely disarming. A lesser series would have fallen on its face with this approach, and repulsed its audience by its over-sentimentalism, but ARIA somehow makes you embrace it. I’ll admit, I have only a bare understanding of how it has managed to achieve this. All I know is that it’ll be a long time before we see another anime quite like it.

It certainly helps that the characters are utterly charming. Like any good slice-of-life, ARIA is about all its characters, but very few anime can boast characterization that is as complete as that which ARIA’s characters have been afforded. Sure, the personalities are simple (Akari could smother you with congeniality) but the challenges they face are realistic, and each of their trials leave a permanent etch on them. Every episode is a lesson, but rarely do these characters have to be taught anything twice. The character development, particularly in this final series, is both rich and enriching, which makes the story a rewarding experience.


"Every story will become a part of you"



There’s an apparent philosophy behind ARIA’s approach, almost as if it’s beckoning its audience to watch something special, but asking for a simple admission fee of an open heart (Aika would hate this line). A daydream-like atmosphere set by the vibrant colour scheme and the gloriously detailed Neo-Venezia, as well Choro Club’s enchanting melodic tunes kick off each episode. However, the “something special” usually comes at the episode’s end, and usually accompanies an epiphany or a small bit of growing up in one or more of the characters. I think it speaks volumes of this show’s identity that its most impressive and memorable moments tend to happen when characters have a realization. “Something special” appears in almost every episode, and becomes more and more prevalent towards the end of the show, culminating in consecutive episodes of unforgettable scenes.

THE WORLD OF AQUA



Even after watching it, I can't shake the feeling that there seems to be something else going on under the surface. One thing that’s a bit unusual about watching Aria spread out like this means that, due to personal shifts in how I look at anime, and also spending time thinking about things, I go from watching it purely for hedonistic pleasure to watching it and starting to notice little things. And this particular thing I’ve noticed is the effect of technology on the human condition.



Consider: Aria takes place in a future where mankind has amassed the technology, resources, and other things needed, and terraformed Mars, melted the polar ice caps, and spent effort recreating the now-lost city of Venice on this wild new frontier planet and called it Neo-Veneiza. And, despite the very science-fiction backdrop (the climate controlling floating island, the underground power reactors), the series, for all intents and purposes takes place in 19th centuiry Venice. I mean, it’s not like Amano Kozue had to create her own fictional setting for Aria–she could have just plopped Akari, Aika, Alice, and the rest of the As straight in the middle of the actual 19th century Venice and the series would have been pretty much the same.


"Venice at Night"

But she didn’t. Instead, what we get is a vision of the future where technology has progressed to the point that it’s almost looped around backwards. It’s unknown what the situation on Man-home (nee Earth) is at the moment, because we’ve never been there, but I presume that it’s much more technologically developed than Aqua is at the moment. And, yes, it’s also been mentioned almost every episode that Neo-Veneiza serves more as a tourist destination than anything else–yet people choose, of their own free will, to live here, relatively simply, with a few “modern” conveniences , but mostly…as people have always lived.



You would think (or at least most science fiction authors would want you to think) that the future is a place full of chrome and buttons and switches and laser beams and other exciting stuff, but Aria instead invites you to consider a future where people live like they do now, except in the future, and on Mars. Is it a statement that, no matter how advanced technology gets, and how much time passes, that people will continue to be people, and appreciate the same things? Is it a statement that, eventually, humanity will be freed of its need for new and better technology, and take what bits of it they need to survive and communicate with people, and do the rest themselves? Is Neo-Venezia populated by a bunch of far-future neo-Luddites?



Or did Amano Kozue just want to draw a lot of cute girls and draw their daily life of them being cute and charming and reminding everyone that life at one’s own pace is a life worth living (and didn’t want to piss off people in Venice too badly so she set it in Neo-Venezia which is totally not Venice because it’s on Mars and so therefore it is not the same and please direct your complaints elsewhere)? It’s like the Tootsie Pop question: the world may never know.



Spreading the Word

It’s difficult to explain ARIA to someone I’m trying to recommend it to. I’m often left telling them that: “It’s a calming experience unlike anything you’ve ever seen before. But be warned, it’s boring, but in a good way.” And that’s a pretty lame explanation “boring, but in a good way”? What does that even mean? The defining example of the point I’m trying to get across here is the time I fell asleep while watching an episode of ARIA, woke up sometime later, refreshed and relaxed, and proceeded to watch the episode again. That is the effect that ARIA can have.



However, with this comes a warning. ARIA is not a series that is meant to be marathoned, that is, watched all at once. The way you’ll get the most out of your ARIA experience is to watch it gradually, an episode or two a day after a stressful day at the office or to wind down from a tiring day at school. The slow pacing of the show needs to be matched by a slow pacing of its viewing.



ARIA'S Clothing

Furthermore, while they’re not really pertinent to a series like ARIA, I feel like I have to touch upon its technical aspects, just for habit’s sake. The animation in ARIA varies, there are some episodes which pay great attention to scenic detail, others that emphasize the beauty and grace of the undines through subtle fluidity in their movements, and others still that fail in both regards and rely far too heavily on chibi animation. However, as a whole, the style fits extremely well, especially when it comes to character designs, each having their own distinct characteristics.



The Ballad of ARIA

The soundtrack in ARIA is vital in composing the general ambiance of the show and enabled it to pull in its audience into AQUA. ARIA’s music served as an excellent representation of the city of Neo-Venezia and how the focus on the city succeeded in making us all familiar with the setting. While I watched the series, there never was any doubt how important the music was in sculpting ARIA’s wonderful, charming atmosphere and both Takashi Senoo and the Choro Club deserve accolades for their work on the soundtrack. Being the ARIA fan that I am, I wanted to learn more about how the process of setting ARIA’s music to the show worked and it wasn’t until now that I was able to find the time to watch “The Sound of ARIA” segment on the Extras DVD from the ARIA the NATURAL box set. This segment was conducted as a friendly chat between a moderator and ARIA’s main director, Junichi Sato, his wife and the show’s sound director, Yasuno Sato, singer/songwriter Eri Kawai, the Choro Club’s Shigeharu Sasago, and Takeshi Senoo.

Part 1: The Music Selection for ARIA

In this first section, Junichi and Yasuno Sato described the process of taking the music and incorporating it into the series. The general way of going about it isn’t too surprising; the director will ask for a general mood or concept like “a bright and sunny day” or “a blue ocean” and will usually leave it to the composers to come up with the music. But where ARIA differs from the normal anime series is that these requests caught Takeshi Senoo and the Choro Club off-guard. Compounding the difficulties was that Sato himself didn’t have anything concrete in mind when he made the request and it wasn’t until he heard the music that he was able to confirm that the compositions did indeed fit in with his vision of ARIA and then worked to make sure the music was able to express whatever was happening on screen.

Part 2: Themes of ARIA

The second segment focused on the late Eri Kawai and the role she played in writing the themes for the series. One aspect about her music that continues to surprise me is that the lyrics to songs like “Coccolo” and “Barcarolle” are pure gibberish and that she picks the words based on the sound they make and whether it goes well with the melody. Seeing that Athena’s songs are beautifully sung, the important takeaway is that music doesn’t depend on understanding the lyrics so much as being able to feel the emotions coming forth from the performer (something that I think non-Japanese fans of anisongs have learned to appreciate).

For songs like “Undine” though, the lyrics are indeed real and surprisingly, the use of real words created some difficulty since Kawai had a limited amount of experience of writing Japanese lyrics. But after a good amount of persistence, the song came out really well and its flowing melodies and it’s an understatement to say that the OP helped to create the expectations for the series’ overarching atmosphere.



Part 3: How the Songs Were Used

The third segment went into making sure that the animation would sync up with the music and that wasn’t all too surprising. The process generally touched on what would happen if the piece was too long and how strongly Sato felt the music had to work in tandem with the series to express the sentiments that he wanted people to get from watching ARIA. The most interesting detail to come about from this section was in hearing Takeshi Senoo talk about his work on the ED “Smile Again” sung by Akari’s voice actress Erino Hazuki



Senoo’s intentions for “Smile Again” was to create the feeling one gets as summer comes to a close and that image, combined with the image of Akari in his mind, resulted in a track that was fairly easy to write. According to Senoo, one of the high points was in seeing the finished product play along with the animation and Senoo marveled at how neatly it all came together, especially when he saw President Aria turn into that constellation at the end. He also added that Erino Hazuki was able to perform that song capably by expressing the emotions that fit in with the theme of summer’s end.

Part 4: Zuntaka Pokoten

Before the discussion concluded, the group talked about the song “Zuntaka Pokoten” which can be heard in the first episode of ARIA the NATURAL as Akari and Ai were following Cait Sith. As it turned out, Sawada of the Choro Club was in charge of the piece because it matches his style which tends more towards ad-libbing. The conversation then went into each composer’s relative strengths. Sasago was often left in charge of most of the music, but Senoo’s forte was in the heartfelt, emotional tracks. Given my thoughts regarding Ristorante Paradiso’s Soundtrack, I think Senoo’s added touches were vital in making ARIA’s music as wonderful as it was since the emotional moments was what I felt was missing from Ristorante but was most definitely present in ARIA’s music.



As the presentation came to a close, Junichi Sato wanted to emphasize the importance of the music since he truly believed that it would make or break the series. Furthermore, the emotion that he wanted the listener to keep in mind as the listener explored the soundtrack was the kind feeling that shone forth through the music. Overall, the segment was a very enjoyable watch and while there were a lot of elements one could guess at in terms of how the soundtrack process worked for anime series, being able to hear the composers in their own words was invaluable and allowed me to further appreciate their perspective regarding the music and the music’s power to deliver that calm, peaceful atmosphere that captures the essence of ARIA so effectively.

ARRIVEDERCI

It’s easy to believe that one is watching a series of disconnected, episodic slice-of-life adventures, but in this series it becomes clear that everything in ARIA connects to an overarching story about the lives of its characters. Recommending ARIA, in the traditional sense, is wrong, since its appeal probably isn’t universal.All I can say is that I’m thankful I saw this, it’s impacted me in a way few other anime have.



No, thank -YOU- ARIA. Thank you for bringing that warm and fuzzy feeling to my heart for 20 minute installations at a time.

With absolute confidence, I crown ARIA as my favourite anime of all time. It may not boast adrenaline fueled action, complex story elements or a touching love story, but ARIA’s atmosphere sucked me into the world of Aqua. Fleshing out its settings and its characters, ARIA evoked emotions I thought my heart was no longer capable of feeling, as corny as that may sound.



The only remotely negative thing I can say about ARIA on the whole is that I’m sad that it’s over. It’s difficult accepting that no matter how good it is, no matter how much money the DVD sales bring in, we will likely never see anymore ARIA ;_;

So with no hesitation, I recommend the ARIA series as compulsory viewing to any self respecting anime fan. The series is in fact so good that I’m going to break my usual pirate ways, I’m going to buy the ARIA DVDs. Even though I’ve seen the entire thing and I have all the episodes archived on my HDD, it doesn’t matter, a series like this is a rarity and it deserves every cent of support that it will squeeze from my wallet.





The exact same face I made while outside moments after my completion of ARIA...