| Episode 23. This is one of those situations where I can understand both views. Atsushi has just seen Kazuki try and kiss Risa and then finds them on a date together, to a umibozu concert making it even worse. You're going to be pissed if you're him (think I would've reacted in a similar fashion, but cooled down over the next couple of days). But, Risa has at least earned the right to offer her side of things and forgiveness for her error of judgement. Suppose it comes down to what type of person she is, and we, and Atsushi knows she isn't devious, and not the type to run around with other guys, she loves him. At least this was all cleared up quickly, and I think that's the first time we've heard Atsushi say how he feels out loud, oh wait, he kinda did on the park bench when she fell asleep, and that next time. But that was 'I'm better when I'm with you', this was an outright 'i love you' and can't let you go. At least he's said it now. I'm not a fan of Risa's inner thoughts here 'why is he so sweet to me, I don't deserve it', ummm, yes you do, and apart from this one mistake, which was a big boo boo, Atsushi has been a perpetual idiot and you've done all the work in becoming a couple. She puts herself down too much. On a sidenote, I was reading some ep comments yday and turns out Atsushi has a lot of fans, exclusively female from what I could tell. Calling him a dreamboat, and thirsting after him and his sullen, brusque nature. I think he taps into those girls who want to chase after a guy, and make him fall for them, even if it takes years. I don't understand this mentality personally. We see his behaviour as annoying and indecisive, they see it as cute and endearing and makes them want him more. Couldn't give two figs for Chiharu and her bf, plus the whole situation sounds made up. Given how reserved and polite Japanese people are, especially in public, can't imagine you have roaming playboys trying to pressure girls into going out with them. Heck, I've never seen that in the UK (outside clubs and pubs where it's kind of normalised, plus drunk people), so can't imagine it happening on a Japanese uni campus. All the girls would rally around and start harassing the guys more likely. This tired trope happens in so many anime though, so not just this show, ie the pushy guys corner our female lead and in swoops male MC to save her. Guys hit on girls, and they can be pushy, but not like that. And why does Suzuki sulkily say, 'oh just find a better guy at your top uni, I'm sure he'll do a better job of protecting you than I could', man up. He'd be gutted if she did just that. Oh, it was a clumsy move to drive her away. Just talk. Wouldn't staying with Risa be the biggest distraction ever. |
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| Interesting that female viewership likes Atsushi so much. Dude is infuriating, but I guess if you’re all about the chase, there’s something to it. I think most people don’t recognize just how long events are taking in universe, either. If this happened over the course of a few months or even half a year, I could deal. Different story over the course of two plus years. And yeah, can’t say there were roving groups of boys harassing women on my campus either. It’s a trope that really has no basis in reality. Episode 24 So yeah, Atsushi goes to Risa’s place to stay the night. We get to see interactions with her family, which are decently funny. They all think he can do better (damn, these parents are ragging on their own daughter). Atsushi seems serious about introducing himself to them, but that’s not going to happen yet. Risa gives him space to study, which he does for a bit before falling asleep. Risa gets to see him in all the stuff she got him, so that’s nice. They end up sleeping on the table together. Atsushi rushes out the next morning only to be confronted by snow. He seems ready to give up, but Risa’s in no mood, slipping and sliding on the bike together and I guess taking the train with him. Yep, super supportive. They get a free week afterward to hang out, but Mimi interrupts with a photo shoot as she’s a model. Risa ends up taking over for a reader model (right place right time) and actually looks pretty great with wavy hair, longer eyelashes and a dress. Girl can’t smile easily, but she does discover an interest in becoming a stylist. Pretty much everyone shows up this episode, with Haruka claiming to be Risa’s lover to mess with Kazuki. Nobuko and Nakao also tell him they’re Risa’s parents because why not? They discover that Atsushi’s upset about something and isn’t taking calls, suggesting that he failed the exam. Risa hunts him down and finds out he passed, a surprise to everyone. Going from worthy to joy for him, and seeing Atsushi appreciating her support through it all, is a nice way to wrap up this saga. AHK end up late to their own graduation, which is entirely on brand. Less on brand? Subbing in for the valedictorian to give a duo speech. (fun fact: I was my school’s valedictorian and I really wanted to give a duo speech with a friend of mine. For whatever reason, we had to audition and didn’t end up getting to do it (the salutatorian did), but we gave it at a less formal event later. It killed, and the salutatorian was pretty boring and standard.) They give a performance that suits them, with Risa taking the helm and an affirmation of love with a promise to be together forever. The ED is replaced with scenes across the series. Oh, and Seiko appears to say goodbye. I liked this series well enough. There’s a good balance of humor and drama, the animation is singular and cute enough to stand out, and it has a few characters I think are pretty great, with Risa being the headliner and both Seiko and Nobuko being stand-outs. The romance even works decently well once it starts in earnest. Despite this, I have trouble seeing past its flaws. The willingness of the series to skip ahead months at a time makes some aspects more realistic and allows us to see changes over a longer stretch, but also highlights how slow some elements can be. It takes Atsushi an absurd amount of time, well over 2 years, to come around to even considering Risa as something more than a friend. It also means we miss out on elements that would have served to fill all that downtime in their relationship with watching other couples develop, really only seeing where they start, how lovey dovey they are, and some drama at the end. And none of this is helped by how things go south for Risa and Atsushi so sharply in episode 22, which just felt absurd after all that setup. They right the ship, but it takes away from what little time they had as a real couple and undercuts so much development on both their parts. Yes, I liked this, but I wanted to love it. Starting off with a pair who are already close friends could have short circuited so much of the development pre-relationship, but it slows everything down instead such that we’re left with just 6 episodes with them as a couple that abruptly end with graduation. It functions fine, but this series should be better than that and it just isn’t. Maybe it’s that I set my expectations too high, but I just didn’t stay as invested in this as I’d hoped. 7.3/10. Once again, thanks for the watch and all the great thoughts along the way @23feanor, looking forward to Fantastic Children! |
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| Episode 24. Forgot to mention this earlier, but Mimi's VA sounds way older than the 14 y/o she's playing. Sounds like a dusky older woman. It's completely miscast, maybe on purpose. Almost like when you have that gap with a baby talking like an old man with a broad accent, but not so blindly obvious. Mimi is funny, wish we'd had more of her and her foul mouth. So Risa wants to become a stylist. He passes and we end on graduation day. Fitting, as we started. I did enjoy this, but these two, well Atsushi, lost me during the 2nd half and can't say I was emotionally invested during this last farewell ep. Valedictorian hey, means you came top of your school, impressive. Some aspects of this romcom were different, Risa was brilliant, most of the time. She put herself down a bit too much, forgave Atsushi too readily, but as you say, they had their own dynamic. He was reluctant and she chased him, it's often the other way around with the boy chasing the girl, so I enjoyed this reversal. Atsushi was frustrating, and 2 years is a long time, especially for a teenager in the bloom of their youth, to waste dithering over whether he can change his perspective of his tall gawky friend to one of a romantic nature. He did, but could've drastically improved matters if he'd done so sooner. Some reluctance would've been understandable, worrying over changing their relationship, and weirded out by the introduction of a physical aspect, but not for so damn long. But then, maybe that's more realistic, sort of. Irl people are more like this than the staged romance, with gradual, well known steps, we usually get. People can be reluctant like Atsushi (but maybe not for 2 years) and persistent like Risa. Real life romance is messy and frustrating, so there is that. Just makes it tough to watch. Wish we'd got more of Seiko and Nobuko, although Nobuko did get a fair amount of screen time and her exasperation at trying to push them together was fun to watch. There weren't many sweet, wholesome moments, although that's not really their thing, but would've liked more than we got (bike ride here, talk on a bench there). Risa's dub VA was very good, as was the script with the funny 4th wall breaks, although we haven't had one for a while now I think about it. Personally I liked all the modern slang and localisations that were included, but it's the sort of thing that seems to rile most anime fans up. Comedy was very good, especially those faces and some of Risa's inner monologue, which the dub managed to get across with aplomb, was hilarious, had me laughing out loud. First half was an 8/10, 2nd half a 6/10, so I'm splitting the different and scoring it a 7.5/10. It's a good watch for romance fans. As always thanks @whiteflame55. Glad I can tick this one off my list, despite not living up to the early promise. Something completely different next, mystery sci-fi. |
23feanorAug 31, 3:01 AM
|
Reply to cipheron
Go to the show late, got busy and the days flew by, but i managed to finish the show last night.
It's definitely this. Japanese Chocolate companies imported Valentine's Day as a marketing opportunity, around which they created a ton of additional lore that just doesn't exist outside Japan as a way to sell more chocolate.
Keep in mind the existing "lore" probably doesn't make as much money as they could have. For example industries like greeting cards, flowers, jewelry gifts don't really benefit from Valentine's day in Japan because those things aren't associated with the day the way they are in the West.
So while it seems clever i think they largely developed this by accident. In the 50s and 60s they marketed chocolate to women and told them they should give the chocolates to their loved ones on Valentine's Day. This created the lore that only women give the chocolate gift. HOWEVER it excluded men, who could have been a big-spending demographic. That then left the door open for "White Day" in which men by white chocolate as a return gift. But this wasn't so much a stroke of genius as them cashing in on a very obvious missed marketing opportunity by excluding male gift-givers from Valentine's Day.
So while on the surface it could all appear insidious and clever, really it's not that much.
Well Amanchu was written by the same creator, and the first season of that is pretty great, but i don't think it kept up momentum into the second season. Maybe there was pressure to get another season out after the first one but there wasn't enough source material to crib one together. Still: first season is really good and definitely something for Aria fans to check out.
Yokohama Kadaishou Kikou is the other clear comparison, although you also need the manga for the full effect there. Other stuff by the YKK mangaka is good too.
Sora no Woto also has some similar vibes here and there, and is also similar to Haibane Renmei in some respects.
It sounds awful to me. Lots of American gen-z humor added into a series set in Japan 20 years ago, 4th wall breaks etc that aren't part of the original source material sound like things that would keep pulling me out of the story and make it feel more fake. It's fine for joke dubs such as Ghost Stories where the source material plainly sucked in the first place, but i don't think it has much place in actually good shows to try and cram this kind of additional humor in, if it wasn't there already. Some of the stuff described goes way past localizing some jokes and references so that people will get them.
I'm watching some old DVD subs that are more of a straight translation. I usually prefer that they don't get "creative" with "localization" because firstly, it's really jarring and negatively affects my enjoyment and how much I can actually getting absorbed into the story with constant reminders that don't fit the setting, and secondly if they're changing the dialogue, what context from the manga did they remove? I don't want to have to check out multiple version to work out what happened so i prefer if they minimize the tendency to do that stuff. Usually a straight DVD sub or simulcast sub doesn't give them too much leeway to mess with things vs give a straight translation.
23feanor said:
where it sounds like chocolate companies have got some sort of scam going
where it sounds like chocolate companies have got some sort of scam going
It's definitely this. Japanese Chocolate companies imported Valentine's Day as a marketing opportunity, around which they created a ton of additional lore that just doesn't exist outside Japan as a way to sell more chocolate.
Keep in mind the existing "lore" probably doesn't make as much money as they could have. For example industries like greeting cards, flowers, jewelry gifts don't really benefit from Valentine's day in Japan because those things aren't associated with the day the way they are in the West.
So while it seems clever i think they largely developed this by accident. In the 50s and 60s they marketed chocolate to women and told them they should give the chocolates to their loved ones on Valentine's Day. This created the lore that only women give the chocolate gift. HOWEVER it excluded men, who could have been a big-spending demographic. That then left the door open for "White Day" in which men by white chocolate as a return gift. But this wasn't so much a stroke of genius as them cashing in on a very obvious missed marketing opportunity by excluding male gift-givers from Valentine's Day.
So while on the surface it could all appear insidious and clever, really it's not that much.
23feanor said:
Ah, the Aria franchise, you're in for a real treat there. There's nothing else in anime (at least that I've seen and I've searched for anything that has the same vibe and not found it) that's quite like it
Ah, the Aria franchise, you're in for a real treat there. There's nothing else in anime (at least that I've seen and I've searched for anything that has the same vibe and not found it) that's quite like it
Well Amanchu was written by the same creator, and the first season of that is pretty great, but i don't think it kept up momentum into the second season. Maybe there was pressure to get another season out after the first one but there wasn't enough source material to crib one together. Still: first season is really good and definitely something for Aria fans to check out.
Yokohama Kadaishou Kikou is the other clear comparison, although you also need the manga for the full effect there. Other stuff by the YKK mangaka is good too.
Sora no Woto also has some similar vibes here and there, and is also similar to Haibane Renmei in some respects.
23feanor said:
'and you Miharu, you and your bf ended up together by the end of the 1st episode, in my anime...', these 4th wall breaks are amusing.
'and you Miharu, you and your bf ended up together by the end of the 1st episode, in my anime...', these 4th wall breaks are amusing.
It sounds awful to me. Lots of American gen-z humor added into a series set in Japan 20 years ago, 4th wall breaks etc that aren't part of the original source material sound like things that would keep pulling me out of the story and make it feel more fake. It's fine for joke dubs such as Ghost Stories where the source material plainly sucked in the first place, but i don't think it has much place in actually good shows to try and cram this kind of additional humor in, if it wasn't there already. Some of the stuff described goes way past localizing some jokes and references so that people will get them.
I'm watching some old DVD subs that are more of a straight translation. I usually prefer that they don't get "creative" with "localization" because firstly, it's really jarring and negatively affects my enjoyment and how much I can actually getting absorbed into the story with constant reminders that don't fit the setting, and secondly if they're changing the dialogue, what context from the manga did they remove? I don't want to have to check out multiple version to work out what happened so i prefer if they minimize the tendency to do that stuff. Usually a straight DVD sub or simulcast sub doesn't give them too much leeway to mess with things vs give a straight translation.
| @cipheron Glad you got round to LoveCom, it's a good show, but could've been better. I think what I find galling about valentines day in Japan is the way that giving chocolate, particularly obligatory chocolate, has been woven into the fabric of societal norms. I watched a Japanese youtuber a while ago and they said you feel so pressured to buy everyone in the office obligatory chocs, and most of this pressure comes from marketing, but filters down to people. And if you're the only one in your office/school who doesn't buy the others chocs, you feel like an idiot. So ofc most people buy into this pressure and buy the damn chocs, and they're really expensive, all gift wrapped and fancy. That said, we do have the same thing with xmas cards in our offices over here in the UK, where in years gone by i used to buy cards for all my colleagues feeling social pressure, but gave up, saying it was giving in to marketing and bad for the environment, sent emailed xmas cards instead. Amanchu is on my ptw list, heard it's good, but not in same league as Aria. YYK is brilliant, first one, which was cel animation at its peak, is a masterpiece of SoL. Sounds of the Sky was very good, but none of them are quite on the same level as Aria for me, Sounds of the Sky being the closest with its mix of SoL and story. Given the humorous nature of LoveCom I thought the funny 4th wall breaks were a decent addition. Some of them were very well written. I might care about breaking my immersion in a serious show, but not this. Also not so bothered about the exact verbatim translation from manga, as long as you get the gist of what's being said. @whiteflame55 watched subbed and there were no major differences, apart from a Japanese idiom being removed, which didn't really make sense to us anyway, so the dub probably made the right decision. |
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