| @23feanor @inim @whiteflame55 @filifjonkan @RandomFriday @Antalk @jdvz @JokerVentura @KainiusTheGreat @ruckes @kekekeKaj @OrlahEhontas The Fruit of Grisaia (2014) - April 2023 Group Watch
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inimMar 26, 2023 10:08 AM
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| Anime I can sink my teeth into. |
 Active Military, Prior Service and Veteran's Anime Club do not forget the sound of my voice until the day we reunite |
| Thanks for creating the thread :) |
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| Should be interesting, looking forward to it. |
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| Episode 1 Off and running with our lead, Kazami, being arrested and then sprung by the principal of the school he’s attending, Tachibana. He seems pretty hard edged, apparently got arrested for refusing to show the contents of his bag, while Tachibana seems rather easily rattled. The school itself is extremely small - only 6 students - and ages are… hard to determine. It’s not an ordinary school, despite Tachibana claiming it is, as it’s under constant monitoring. Something about Kazami prevents him from attending other schools. The dorms are huge and well furnished. He meets another first year, Sachi, who wears a maid outfit because, hey, people got fetishes and she’s fine with that. Kazami is tasked with being a caretaker of sorts, though he says it’s akin to a prison guard. That quickly transitions, for no obvious reason, into a set of full on male nudity scenes to… I guess make taking eye drops and drinking iced tea look sumptuous? He’s been through some training in the mountains (because of course he has) and makes a regular exercise schedule for himself. Apparently he has trouble with “sizable” (i.e. busty) women which will obviously in no way affect the plot of this show, as he immediately runs into a pair of panty shots ladies from his class, one of whom is *ahem* quite “sizable” while the other has to be held down for unknown reasons involving a brush. Amane and Makina, respectively. A blonde panty shot girl is next, Michiru, who is working on her speaking prowess to be a better representative, and he proceeds to tear down her fake ass personality and appearance before a random breeze somehow blowing inside of a classroom gives him a proper introduction to some stripes. The rest join them, including Sachi, who is now wearing panty shot school clothes. Still missing one: Sakaki, who is apparently chronically late and an avid reader. With her, the harem is set. And of course, she immediately tries to stab Kazami with a box cutter. Girl’s got no chill. After returning to the dorm, dude just assumes all the girls are masturbating simultaneously, like you do after class, and he enters his room right in time for Amane to remove her bra and a glowing effect to cover her assets. She seems confident, doesn’t cover up at all. Apparently she makes a regular habit of doing this. Kazami reveals that he had a sister who died (yep, this show doesn’t do subtlety and can’t seem to pick a lane on tone), and Amane probably knew her at some point because that might as well happen. She also picked the lock, meaning that she was there specifically for him. We flash back to some bus accident involving Amane, which likely involved Kazami’s sister. We also get little scenes with each of the girls in turn that suggests something odd about each of them, including a gas mask in Sachi’s room and what looks like explosives on her desk. And Kazami has a job to do involving a gun under his bed. So yeah, this should get interesting fast. Looks a bit tropey, but should be a good time. |
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| @whiteflame55 keep that bus scene in the back of your head, it will pop up again. I have watched all three but it has been several years since I did and cannot remember which anime tells the story. also, the arc w/ his 'Master' is a good one too. Enjoy. I am. |
| Active Military, Prior Service and Veteran's Anime Club do not forget the sound of my voice until the day we reunite |
| Episode 1. From the very first scene we get images of the girls along with statements. The theme of this show is that each girl is a rotten fruit that needs saving. This was the last show I began before my anime watching hiatus in 2015 ish, only saw a couple of episodes but remember the vibe quite well. We learn from the opening sequence that Kazumi has some connection to the military, i think they said 'military dog', so we've got an interesting back story to uncover. Kazumi is told this is a 'normal school' but the lack of students and presence of cameras pays lie to that statement. We get a bunch of Kazami in the nude, enough to notice his scars before he thinks back on his time living with his master in the mountains. Turns out his master was a woman and was "so soft i thought my brain would melt out my ears", looking forward to meeting this master. As @whiteflame55 already mentioned, lots of panty shots here. The screen size for this show is widescreen and the shots don't take up the whole 16:9 ratio like usual, must be a directorial decision. The whole tsundere act with Michiru was pretty funny. The panty shots and talk of masturbating in their rooms certainly set the vibe for this show. This show is on Crunchyroll but as expected it's censored, the boob shot is uncensored on the high seas although tbh the boobs aren't very well animated. The whole scene with Amane getting changed and Kazami not reacting to her being topless, even saying "nice tits", demonstrates right from the off this isn't your usual harem of girls, and Kazami isn't the usual beta protag-kun who falls over himself out of embarrassment when he sees boobs or panties. We also get mention of Kazami's deceased sister, which gets reaction from Amane when she hears her name, clearly some connection there. I'm getting Reiji from Phantom: Requiem for a Phantom vibes from Kazami, the cool detached and professional manner, also familiarity with women. |
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| @23feanor @Antalk appreciate the context for some of this. There's a good deal to take in with this show and I like how it's building out, seems like these characters have some pasts on them for sure. Episode 2 I'll keep these shorter in general. Among the girls, this episode is largely spent focused on Sakaki, who is still attacking our MC with a box cutter, but eventually is given a very small lesson in what he's capable of when he grabs her arm and begrudgingly starts developing something of a different bond with him, even putting her box cutter in a drawer. The rest of the characters largely get roles asking what's going on with him, which don't really go much of anywhere. Makina finds out that crayfish can turn blue when they are malnourished, so that's something. It's also stated outright that Sakaki was the first girl at the school, and has in some way vetted all arrivals beyond Kazami, which partially explains her standoffishness. We actually get to see how each of them arrived, giving some small hints of their backgrounds and personalities upon arrival. I like that. Apart from all that, Kazami runs into a busty blonde woman named Julia Bardera who gave him his cover story for his time at the school and who he clearly has problems with on some level. I'm sure she'll show up more, since she's his guardian and handler. He's got a decent story for why she's there, but their interactions might make it hard to keep up that cover. |
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| Aria is one years old today so we are off to the zoo! Episode 2. The character designs have a distinct Monogatari flavour to them, Sakaki looks a bit like Senjougahara and Kazumi a bit like Araragi. Sakaki clearly has an issue with guys and is an actual tsundere, very much like Senjougahara at the beginning of Bakemonogatari thinking on it. I wonder if Julia is Kazami's master, or maybe his handler? Mostly a set up episode. Amane is very interested in Kazami's relationship status and whether Julia was girlfriend so expect something to happen there. |
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| @23feanor have a good time at the zoo! Sounds like a delightful day. Episode 3 Hey, there's our first masturbation scene, and it's Amane while she sniffs Kazami's clothes and bedsheets right on his bed after she breaks into his room to smooch him in his sleep. That's... that's not creepy at all. Horny teens do be horny. There's probably more to this compulsion to break into his room, but as of right now, it's just hentai stuff. Kazami takes full advantage of this by literally singing a song with Makina about how Amane is a "bitch in heat." So yes, we're just going there now. And this is where we get into further character building starting with a classic "we're all made here" from Alice in Wonderland (yes, I know that's an instance of the Mandela Effect and the actual quote is "most everyone is mad here," but the point stands), starting with Sachi going to get milk directly from the source, Michiru using her pineapple-scented pigtails to "Alpha" and "Bravo" at Kazami's instruction to fail to scare off a cat when she didn't really want to do so, Kazami absently agrees to having a shark pouch made for him because women do be talkative that he agrees to wear every day causing him to spiral into a fit of despair about his lack of sleep only to have it taken by Makina for being sparkly and making weird noises, Amane sprains her ankle and asks Kazami to be her boyfriend out of the blue choosing instead to become his big sister when she's rebuffed before cooking him a meal. Kazami, for whatever reason, sees this as a normal life. Dude has weird standards for normalcy. |
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| Episodes 1-3 A mystery harem story set in a dapper private academy, which despite it's size only has 5 female students. Three of the girls are very stereotypical, Michiru (blonde twintail tsundere), Makina (shy loli with weird language), and Sachi (student president and obedient maid). The other two girls stand out more. Amane (horny onee-chan) who goes right after MC with full frontal nudity etc, in the best hypersexual manner. The polar opposite is Yumiko (yandere), an agressive and angsty loner who also goes for MC, but with a box cutter and kill intend. As outlined by multiple flashbacks, cut scenes and foreshadowing, each of the girls has a dark secret. It's safe to say that not everything is as it seems, Michiru's tsundereness is an act, Sachi is seen working on bombs in her spare time and so on. MC Yuuji enters the school as only male student, sent by his organization. He's clearly too old for a student, e.g. he drives a car, was jailed, and seems to be kind of a secret agent or hit man. He's very snarky and his inner monologue (mainly assesments and opinions on the girls) a main source of dark comedy. The other adults we meet are his Porsche driving boss JB (hot blonde), the school's head woman (quiet meganeko woman), and MC's master, a deceased woman who was his mentor and educator (from what humble start?). The episodes are filled with (longer) character introduction scenes, showing each girl's first interactions with MC. They all are fairly lascivious and everybody but Amane wears thigh highs. There are plenty of (rather hot / bend over) panty shots, but only Amane has the distinct honor of a full frontal boob nudity scene. Background The striking similarity in visuals and story type to Bakemonogatari was mentioned by everybody, and this is no coincidence. While officially only the character designer, Akio Watanabe worked on the show and his handwriting is all over the place. This is the guy who designed many Shaft characters, including all in Monogatari. He's no stranger to hentai, the same year he made this show he also made PeroPero☆Teacher (2014) and it's heroine Milky is a spitting image of Michiru. In addition to Monogatari and PeroPero, Watanbe is notorious for straight lolicon visual novel hentai, e.g. Popotan (2003) which he authored under pseudonym (defused in the anime version). Also working on the show are the original creator of Maid Dragon and the script writer of Made in Abyss. Nice team. The director is a freelancer and probably didn't have much influence in this all star group. The whole project is clearly a multi-channel erotic franchise, designed and marketed by the book by Frontwing (MAL entry), who milk it to this day with new franchise material still being created in 2023. Beside the anime and the visual novel, Frontwing even released their own "Visual Fanbook" Doujin (nhentai IDs 193383, 193382, 284721) of 3x 160 pages of finest Watanabe erotica. So the panty shots in the anime are merely the tip of the ice berg, the rabbit hole is deep and full of smut. Premium smut by one of my favorite dirty old men, though. Fun fact: 284721 has a drawing of Yumiko in Hitagi Senjougahara's iconic pose found on the Bakemonogatari cover. So the observations are no coincidence, and Watanabe has self aware humor it seems. The narrative style is mildly non-linear and uses advanced techniques like unreliable narrator and POV narration; quality writing one expects from a famous professional like Hideyuki Kurata. Cinematography and camera are also good, mildly influenced by Shaft style but not as extreme and heady. Overall, the production quality is very good and professional. I like the setting of a "mainstream Monogatari" with extra soft porn a lot. The show took the first 60 minutes to introduce five girls and the MC, which is a solid pacing in mid tempo. The actual story should kick in soon, and I'm curious how they do it. The visual novel has of course multiple routes for each girl, with endings in which MC dies or becomes married with a baby with the girl (see Visual Fanbook for screens). AFAIK S2 focuses on one route, and S1 touches many routes in a mixed way. Let's see if the writer copes with this non-trivial challenge. EDIT: Just noticed that Watanabe directed Oniichan wa Oshimai! (2023) OP. Lolis in swim suits, bubbly and quick cut panty shots, check. This has strong PaniPoni Dash! vibes to me, another production Watanabe-sensei was involved in. A man, a mission ;) |
inimApr 2, 2023 4:09 AM
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| @inim thanks for the background info. The show does have a polished feel to the production values so far, including the panty shots, not too in your face but there nonetheless. Episode 3. I hadn't clocked the fact that Kazumi was older, not sure what legal driving age in Japan (it's 18), so he could be a 3rd year highschool student in Japan, but he definitely has an air of maturity about him, likely due to his training and line of work. Kazumi's 'Amane is a bitch in heat rolling around in a man's sheets' was hilarious. Kazumi's tone of humour is on point. This episode was pretty damn funny with the bush dog pouch and Kazami/Amane in the nurses office where he's like "sorry we're not hiring big sisters atm". Finally we hear Kazumi reflect on how isolated he's been feeling since his masters death, seems she was pretty important to him. |
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| @inim the background info is definitely a help, appreciate the context. I’ve been surprised so far by how this series has gone (in a good way), so we’ll see how it develops. Episode 4 We spend this episode with Michiru and Kazumi almost exclusively and learn a few key details about the latter. Beyond some strange sleepwalking habits, she apparently has some kind of multiple personality disorder. There is the one we’ve been seeing, which is more bubbly and ditzy, and then there’s another that is more somber, introspective and curious. Also, a bit fatalistic. There’s a kiss in this one, but it’s anything but romantic. The central plot point, however, involves the stray cat that Michiru named previously. She’s grown attached to it, making treats for it but pretending that she’s not caring for it. She’s a little cold to it later in the episode and it runs off. At the end of the episode, Kazumi finds that it’s been gravely injured, likely by a car. Michiru takes it in a cab to try and get it treated, but it’s too late and the poor thing dies in her arms. Animal deaths always get me. |
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| Episode 4 Focus episode for Michiru Matsushima, the blonde fake tsundere. While jogging, Yuuiji finds her sitting at the sea with the stray cat Meowmel. They discuss death and burial, when suddenly Michiru asks Yuuiji for a kiss (her first). They kiss but immediately after there's a dramatic shift in behaviour (also voice and body language) in Michiru and she pushes him away. She doesn't remember that the kiss took place, and thinks they just stopped short of it. Michiru then has a weird sleep walking type incident at night. The next morning, Yuuiji talks about the kiss last day but she can't remember. He demonstrates it and she's shocked. Given all these clues, it seems she suffers from split personality disorder (dissociative identity disorder in modern lingo). In particular her voice changes significantly, between soft spoken and contemplative vs. shrill and tsundere. Then Meowmel is hit by a car. Yuuiji finds him and Michiru is shocked. They get into a cab to drive him to a doctor, but he dies in Michiru's lap on the way. Michiru on the drawings has two attributes: a cat and a wristband, which have symbolic meaning in Watanabe's image language (dunno which, but attributes are common). They had discussed the nature of death, burial, and what's left after death earlier in the episode. So the death of the cat is probably symbolic for whatever dark secret Michiru has in her past. Overall, nice episode. The dead cat came out of left field, I didn't expect such seriousness in what started out as a light hearted ecchi harem show. The presentation, images and writing were fine. |
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| Episode 4. After the introductory arc we're onto an arc for each girl and the first one up is Michiru. So it appears she has a split personality and likely the reason she takes the pills we see her regularly consume from her shark pouch. I liked the part on the clifftop by the lighthouse where Michiru was asking about what happens when you die and then when Kazumi meets her second personality you realise why. The second personality appears and then disappears and never knows when, or if, it will resurface. The second personality of Michiru has green eyes and more sombre manner than the genki tsundere girl first personality. She's also quite bold and kisses Kazumi as she wants to know what kissing is like . episode ends with mr meowkitty getting in an accident and dying, which will likely have repercussions for Michiru next episode. |
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| Episode 5 For some reason, I didn't recall the pills, so thanks for pointing that out @23feanor. The episode starts with Michiru sprawled out on the floor surrounded by them, likely having overdosed. It's etizolam, a drug meant to address insomnia and anxiety disorders. It's initially unclear whether or why these were prescribed, but high doses won't kill you, even if they do apparently cause some anterograde amnesia (not cited in the Wiki article, but I found it here). Suddenly getting off of it apparently can cause withdrawal, as addiction to the drug can occur rather quickly. The important thing for this scene, though, is that it has a strong sedative effect, which explains why Michiru was conked out, likely to avoid thinking too much about Meowmel. Still, next time we see her, she's on her feet and looking fine, which is clearly another mask (this time put on by the "other" somber Michiru, who says that her other personality has chosen to fall into "a deep, deep darkness"). Sounds like Sachi is more aware of her circumstances than it initially appeared, as Michiru asks her if she did some specific cleaning she had requested. Apparently, this consisted of giving Sachi a box and telling her never to give it back or even talk about it, which she ends up giving to Kazumi. He somehow gets the box open, reading a journal found inside that Michiru's personalities had used to conversed. Apparently, the story behind this second personality is that a heart transplant she received also came with this personality (the somber one, who recognizes that she is not the first), but she doesn't want the body all to herself. Kazumi is able to force out the original personality, who asks to die due to her depression, and he claims he'll grant her wish. She wakes up in a coffin, drugged up on muscle relaxant (wasn't real, but placebo effect), that's already in a grave site by the ocean... holy shit this went fast... with Kazumi shoveling earth on top of her. Pretty sure she didn't ask to be buried alive, but I guess this might be an Ed Bighead from Rocko's Modern Life situation where he's trying to get her to care about life again. Still, dude has no chill. Michiru apparently grew up with black hair and was strictly raised to play the piano, based on the little we see of her background. Also, she has been suicidal for a while, ironically preventing the death of another girl when she planned to jump off the school building. They became friends, at least for a time - other girl was successful later (injuries on her face and damage to her uniform suggest that she was subject to abuse) and Michiru's had a heart attack after watching her friend jump to her death, requiring a replacement in the US... not sure why she'd be able to travel that far given how frail she was, but whatever. So, needless to say, Michiru's rather sensitive to the deaths of those around her. At some point, Michiru tried again to commit suicide with a razor, after which she made friends and entertained others through her fake tsundere act. It was also an act to distance herself from her own feelings, but that leads to a scene where she confronts her old dead friend who now has a scratched off face and... not really sure why they included partial nudity in this. Kinda undercuts the message. Anyway, back to the present, her other personality, as well as the ghost of her cat, convince her to live. So she does a Kill Bill and crawls out of the grave (Kazumi didn't bury her very deep, so she didn't need to learn martial arts to get out)... goddamn, 3 days later. Must be starving and dehydrated, and Kazumi had absolutely no plan B by his own words, meaning she could've just died down there. He went on his own hunger strike for those 3 days, so at least he had some solidarity with her. Apparently, that's enough by itself for her to fall in love with him, which she refuses to admit (embracing that tsundere lifestyle). After all that, he drives her out to a house somewhere (which he found through JB). It becomes clear that this is the home of the second personality, which apparently gives it permanent closure and it just... leaves, or at least rarely maintains any degree of control. It ends on a bittersweet note. There's a lot going on in this episode, and while I like the direction for some aspects of it, it does seem to rush some of the resolutions. Hard to say whether it's suggesting that the source of her heart is her dead friend, but if that's true, that just makes her getting the surgery in America even more bonkers. I would have been interested to see the touching reunion between heart personality and her family, but I guess we can't have nice things. Also, 3 days away seems like a long time, but we haven't seen anyone else yet. The melodrama in this episode felt a bit heavy-handed, and I'm still put off by the decision to bury Michiru alive in order to make her care about living. |
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| Episode 5. Michiru takes a non fatal overdose and when she awakes the next morning we see from the green eyes it's her second personality that we're witnessing. I like how this show uses chibi characters. So we learn Michiru had a heart transplant and her second personality appeared afterwards from the owner of the heart. This is, I guess, the problem with adapting a VN with multiple routes, we only get as shortened version of events for each girl that would take place over a longer time in the VN. We get Michiru's backstory and Kazumi had a pretty extreme plan for saving her, which is, burying her alive for 3 days! Kazumi abruptly takes Michir's second personality to the USA to meet her real parents, guessing again this is is stuck in here for closure but would have been at the end of the VN route for Michiru. Liked the Michiru specific ED. Good episode despite the tight pacing. |
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| Episode 6 Onto the next girl: Sakaki. She's a real stab first, ask questions never kind of gal, very closed off to those around her. Turns out, her rich father's a prick and literally pays people to attack her in order to earn her obedience out of sheer terror. Kazami is tasked with protecting her and taking a beating to make it look good. Rather than doing that, he absolutely destroys three goons in a street fight. Sakaki is terrified by the experience, relaying the story of her background through exposition, which involves a physically weak mother, social isolation, and an expectation that she would have been born a boy. Nothing particularly innovative. Sakaki rejects her own femininity, her father has a boy with his mistress (the boy got sick and died), her mother commits suicide. So now, Sakaki is his heir, and rightfully sees herself as a tool of his company. This increased her social isolation, leading to an incident where she really badly cut up a classmate. Now what's more interesting is that it's also the origin story for the Academy. The reason why Sakaki was there first was because her father founded the school, creating a cage of sorts for her and limiting her contact with others to those pre-vetted. No wonder she's so stand-offish about new entrants she hasn't personally vetted - they could be coming at her father's beck and call. So Sakaki's father threatens to close down the school or pull out his daughter unless Kazami is expelled. Not sure why he feels he has to go that far, but there you go. This leads to a confrontation between father and daughter, into which Kazami and the other girls intrude. Still, it's Sakaki who maintains the greatest degree of control, pulling out a handgun that she bought online (not sure why they emphasized that line) and wasting several shots to prevent herself from being taken away. The whole situation becomes like a hostage crisis, with what looks like a SWAT team positioned outside. Wasn't aware this required that much attention, or why they think they can handle this with any vestige of secrecy at this point. It becomes clear over the course of the episode that JB was hired by Sakaki's father, and by proxy, so was Kazami, to affect her environment in specific ways, though it's still unclear precisely what those are. Sakaki straight up shoots her father in the shoulder to demonstrate her resolve before... running out of bullets and pulling a goddamn hand grenade. Yep, no chill at all. She's absolutely desperate, and prepared to end her own life with the explosive, which she apparently does. Apparently, she also left behind a last will and testament to keep the school open after she blew up. Not sure why her father, who showed no interest whatsoever before this in acceding to her whims, would choose to do this now that she's dead, but... character growth, I guess? Not sure what they buried (they said they got a body, but... where and whose? Messed up that they just stole a corpse to blow it up), but Sakaki steps out from behind a tree right after her father leaves her grave site and reveals that it was all a ruse. And everything just... goes back to normal, I guess. That's probably the most difficult part to believe: that Sakaki faked her death, then returned to the school that her father owns and is constantly surveilled by cameras and wiretaps (they say they removed all of them, but that would probably be noticed by someone) without anyone in his organization being the wiser. Another episode that has some very interesting ideas, but rushes the plot so quickly that it's hard to take it seriously. Pacing seems to be this show's major problem, rushing plot lines and resolutions to the point that we can have a whole arc within a single episode, including extensive backstory and character development, that all culminates in a powerful and emotional scene before landing things right back where they started. It's not impossible to do this well, though this show seems to be struggling to fit everything in a way that makes the most of its material. If this had been two episodes, I think I would have enjoyed it a lot more. In fact, that's true of the previous episode as well. Wonder if that will become a trend... |
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| Episode 6. Firstly, good review @whiteflame55, you hit all the story beats for Sakaki. I thought at the beginning of the episode there were some girls who said that it was Sakaki who was the child of the mistress and only recalled to her fathers house when his actual son from his wife died? Later we hear from Sakaki that she was the legitimate daughter of her father, just malicious rumours I guess. Yes Sakaki's dad was a dick, although he seemed to have a change of heart, but only after he thinks his daughter died, bit late by then really. Some of the plot threads are a bit beyond belief, like Sakaki's father not becoming aware that she's still alive when she's still living and studying at the academy he owns. Although these episodes are packed, to condense a whole VN route into one episode per girl (for Michiru and Sakaki so far), I haven't minded. I get what the anime is trying to do and for the most part does it well, although the pacing can be a bit off like when Michiru and Kazumi suddenly appeared in the USA last episode. It's certainly entertaining. |
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| I was trying to keep these short, though honestly, each episode has so much going on that I couldn't help but provide more detail. These aren't bad plots by any means, and I agree with @23feanor that it's quite the feat to condense so much material to the point that they can fit in an individual episode, but I don't think it serves the story well to accelerate the pacing in order to make it fit. It's not a massive problem, but it weakens the end product substantially. Episode 7 Sachi's episode. She starts the episode noticing the changes in Michiru and Sakaki (the former is back to being ditzy all the time, while the latter shows trust in Kazami that she absolutely wouldn't have had before), and questions whether she a) should be changing and b) is worthy of changing, suggesting that she blames herself for something in her past (something relating to a fire, apparently). She also pushes herself too hard as though she has to prove something, collapsing in the bath, and then offering to somehow get rid of a test that Michiru's unprepared to take. Meanwhile, Kazami has errands to see to, taking a subway to a park and perving on some kids while memories of his past (where he either knew Sakaki or someone just like her) flash through his mind. Sachi spends her time alone raising red flags, saying that she needs to "be a good girl," focusing very intently on covert activities on her computer, staring at the aforementioned gas mask, and making detailed maps and plans for the school. She uses said mask to mix chemicals that she got from... somewhere, before setting up a rather elaborate set of gas cans and chemical doers (similar to liquid nitrogen tanks I've worked with) around several points in the school. Turns out, they're explosives, and Kazami knew she was doing this, telling all the other girls to show up after she was done setting this up. Sachi is, needless to say, desperate to get everyone out before it blows and can't seem to stop it. Turns out, Kazami did know exactly what was going on, and programmed them to freeze when they reached zero. Didn't stop Sachi from throwing herself on one of them, potentially ending her life, so yeah, I'd piss myself too. The backstory for all this is that Kazami and Sachi did know each other once upon a time, though only the latter remembered it up to the point that Kazami took that trip to the park (not sure what sparked that decision). They had a bond of sorts, but he stopped showing up to see her. Her parents were generally busy and didn't have much time for her, either. They tried to do right by her for her birthday, but she ran away briefly and they found her, resulting in... yep, there's truck-kun, the answer to "how did my character get isekai'd", "how did my protagonist die in episode 1" and "what sudden and tragic fate did in my parents?" This time, it's basically the third one, as her father died and her mother is in a coma. Sachi blames herself for their not looking both ways when crossing the street (seriously, not your fault, kid), and took away from it that she had to be obedient. This also becomes a bit of backstory for Kazami, but he just said he was "distracted by family affairs," which could be a cover, so it's unclear what was going on in his life. He tells her she has to be selfish sometimes, and that her parents actively decided to love her and set aside their work, as though that's what caused them to get mowed down. Yeah... this one didn't work for me as well as the other two. It's a simpler story so it doesn't feel rushed for once, but it's never explained why she has all that equipment in her room or why she is apparently a pretty genius self-taught explosives expert, and the reason for blaming herself is pretty frustrating - I guess she's not thinking rationally about all this, but it's still baffling to come to the conclusion over several years that, after all that, your selfishness caused the death of your parents. It's a pretty weak backstory for a character who seems obsessed with helping others. I like that it's a connection with Kazami and that these are two characters who know more about each other than the masks they put on, so that's something. It's also nice that he set off fireworks to disguise the explosives being set off later, though I think someone will notice the smoldering hole in the ground where the explosives were. The ending is also sweet, with the wall of pictures and notes to Sachi prepared by her mother, who has been in her coma this whole time and who she never visited over the course of several years. Brutal. Also, I guess she just avoided ever going home to see this after the incident? Seems kind of strange, since she didn't go directly to the school after this. Kazami hugs Sachi, and we end on a beautiful sunset scene. Also, just one last note: does this mean that Kazami and Sachi are around the same age? They didn't look too different as kids. Really thought he was substantially older than all the girls, but that may not be true. |
whiteflame55Apr 5, 2023 8:36 AM
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whiteflame55 said: does this mean that Kazami and Sachi are around the same age? They didn't look too different as kids. Really thought he was substantially older than all the girls, but that may not be true. 23feanor said: I think it's particularily misleading with the designs and story elements in this show, anidb has the canonical ages and they are:I hadn't clocked the fact that Kazumi was older, not sure what legal driving age in Japan (it's 18), so he could be a 3rd year highschool student
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inim said: Yep, that's crazy alright. Don't really buy it, but I guess we're doing this now. Mind blown.whiteflame55 said: does this mean that Kazami and Sachi are around the same age? They didn't look too different as kids. Really thought he was substantially older than all the girls, but that may not be true. 23feanor said: I think it's particularily misleading with the designs and story elements in this show, anidb has the canonical ages and they are:I hadn't clocked the fact that Kazumi was older, not sure what legal driving age in Japan (it's 18), so he could be a 3rd year highschool student
Yea, really. |
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| Well colour me blue and call me an umbrella, I'm equally shocked by the canon character ages. Mind blown indeed. I thought Sachi and Makina were middle school age, ie under 15. Episode 7. I agree with @whiteflame55's summation of this episode. It didn't land quite as well as the episodes for Michiru and Sakaki. How does Sachi know how to plant bombs, the internet again, and what is the significance of the gas mask? Her parents not looking before crossing a road and getting hit by truck-kun was mildly stupid. It wasn't a life or death moment, her parents could have taken 2 seconds to check the road was clear before running over to their daughter, Sachi wasn't in any imminent danger, she'd just been missing for a few hours. The connection between Sachi and Kazami was nice. I liked how Yumiko asked Kazami to help Sachi, knowing that he'd helped her and trusting that he could sort out whatever was troubling Sachi. Also the decision to 'help with a test' leading Sachi to think of blowing up the school was a tad extreme. The scene in the factory with the bday messages was pretty sweet. |
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| Episode 8 Makina pays Kazami 70 million yen to be her father. Yes. Seriously. They only show us the scene where he accepts the job in fits and starts, but there’s little reason to drag out the scene like this, doesn’t really help the plot. Being nearly the same age really doesn’t help. And why yes, that is a loli character pinning her pseudo-adoptive father to the ground and open-mouth kissing him on the mouth to show her affection. God, this show is horny in some weird ways. Also, Makina makes some pretty lewd comments that are all strangely mechanical. At some point, you’d think she wouldn’t care if she used anatomical terms or not, but she keeps talking about holes and pipe. You see, her actual father was rubbed out by his wife and mother-in-law after he discovered some sinister political activities on their parts. Apparently, this involved Makina’s being kidnapped, during or after which she developed aphasia, a condition that results from brain damage (from strokes, tumors, infections or neurodegenerative diseases) and affects language. Due to that, she’s no longer a family heir, replaced by a younger sister. So Kazami trains Makina in combat, like a good papa. And he visits his master’s grave with her for good measure. We learn a bit about his master and Kazami’s history with her, all via exposition. Not sure why he keeps a fully stocked house up in the mountains and when he’s hardly ever there, though that may be JB’s work. We see a picture of his master, but it’s mostly obscured by light, save her generous proportions of course. We finally get back to Makina’s family drama when she runs into her sister by accident. Turns out she was her half-sister (same mother, different fathers) and they didn’t know each other well. Didn’t stop her sister from nearly dying, oh, 30 seconds after she is introduced in a car bombing. Kazami promises not to die (how very Team America: World Police of him). Chiara also gets introduced in this episode, JB’s secretary, a little white haired girl with a tan who fangirls over Kazami. Apparently, Kazami’s code name is somewhat legendary. Kazami is given an assassination target in Makina, suggesting that he’ll have to protect her with his life next episode. Overall, a weak episode with most of its development coming through exposition. It’s part of a two-part block, though, so maybe they’ve got a good reason to drag out Makina’s story a bit more, though I would have preferred this for some of the other characters. |
whiteflame55Apr 6, 2023 9:20 AM
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| Episode 8. This dual episode arc is focused on Makina. We learn why she has a childish manner, a mental disorder afflicted during a kidnapping (soon as I read aphasia my mind was taken to a striking and cary character called Aphasia Wye from one of Terry Brook's Shannara series), which took place due to her mother and grandmother political machinations, that were subsequently uncovered by her father until her mother/grandmother had him silenced in an 'incident'. What I took away from this episode was firstly the set up for next episode where we'll find out why Makina has been targeted for assassination to be carried out by Kazami (ofc he won't do it, but how will he keep her safe), and secondly getting some background on Kazami and his relationship with his master. She took him in when he was 11 (he said 6 years ago and if he's 17 now then that would make him 11 when they met), after rescuing him from a villain, his words, who was looking after him following his parents death. I'm guessing it was his master, Asake Kusokabe, who first taught him to be an assassin and introduced him to that world, although that's only a guess, maybe Kazami had military connections through his parents. The whole papa thing, especially the kiss, was definitely too much, but you can tell Makina has issues, she was visibly trembling when she asked him to be her dad, and when you combine the mental disorder and the loss of her dad, and being discarded as the family heir, you can appreciate why she might be a bit messed up. |
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| Episode 9 So, the episode starts by showing a flashback of Makina's dad's death, and... well, she was in the room, watched him be tortured, and found out first-hand that her mother set him up. Wow. That's some trauma. No wonder she has aphasia and is open-mouth kissing and sleeping half-naked with her surrogate father figure. PTSD much? Kazami ran off with Makina to save her life, as expected. And now he's dismantling their pursuers. At least he had the good grace to let everyone at the school know what was happening rather than just leaving them in the lurch. Little strange that none of them tries to stop this effort, seems like a lot of information to take in all at once and they trust him a little too readily, but fine, he's been there a while and has had three episode-long arcs with three of them, so he's built up some trust. There's a hint that his master might have done something similar that cost her her life, though it's not clear why he's going this far for Makina. We also learn why Makina is suddenly under fire: she called her mother directly with evidence of the very documents that got her father killed. Apparently, she has an eidetic memory and memorized all of them. My guess up to this point is that her aphasia was an act meant to protect herself and her half-sister, but now that the latter has been targeted, she prioritized saving her. Doesn't mean Makina wasn't affected by his death - no, the trauma is real, especially as we see that she sat with and talked to the corpse of her dead father long after it had attracted flies. Anyway, much of the rest of the episode is a game of cat and mouse with the agency JB heads vs. Kazami. He outsmarts them by hiding their body heat in a refrigerator, using some pesticide as a makeshift smoke bomb, and then setting off an actual bomb that looks to have been made out of a Tamagotchi. Funnily enough, the agency has nicknamed them "Rabbit" (Kazami) and "Alice" (Makina), obviously referencing Alice in Wonderland, though they stretch the analogy a bit far by saying that Kazami's a coward. Don't know many cowards who are willing to fight this hard. There's also hints at a new character nicknamed the Underground Professor, about whom we're given scant little information, though apparently he's integral to the organization's success. He does instruct them to use the apple sapling that Makina brought from school as a lure to capture her, which is successful. She fights decently, but gets shot and nearly bleeds out. Rather than just kill her, one of the goons kicks her a while out of frustration, giving Kazami times to arrive and save her. JB takes her off his hands, leading to a pretty shocking suggestion from Makina's mother that they use her as an organ donor to save her half-sister, who is in critical condition. Before that can happen, Kazami arrives to rescue her and take out her mother who... yeah, pretty thoroughly deserves it. He somehow manages to make it look like he shot and killed himself afterward. JB and crew get some important blacklist information, Kazami and Makina return to the school, and I guess everyone's happy except for Makina's sister, who is likely to die from her injuries. Wrapped up a little too nicely for my liking (seems like Kazami should get a little more heat for having defied and hurt/killed members of the organization, and the whole "he shot himself on the scene" thing is just plain never explained, so he gets away with murdering an important politician effectively due to magic), but I liked this one for the most part. |
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| Episode 9. This episode went harder than the others have so far. Makina's dad torture in front of her, Kazami and Makina going on the run, improvising traps, getting caught and Makina being shot, Kazami vs the agency and finally Kazami taking out Makina's mother, who sounds like she deserves it. Let me see if I got this right, so Makina provides info to the agency (mention of a blacklist) that gives the agency leverage over the Irisu group, which is sufficient for Kazami to be forgiven by the agency for killing so many agents. And finally there's mention of a criminal genius 'the professor' who's being held in a basement. And then all back to the dorm and school as if nothing much happened. I did like how Kazami told the rest of the girls what was happening and as @whiteflame55 already mentioned, he's now built enough trust with them all, after helping Michiru, Yumiko and Sachi, that they don't question what's happening. It seems Julia and Kazami are on the same wavelength in this arc, she acts for the agency but knows what Kazami will do and although she doesn't outright help him, she does feed him info and help clean up. Onto Amane next. |
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| Episode 10 JB kisses Kazami and Sachi overreacts, somehow leaping to the conclusion that he will rape her. Yep, that tracks. So yeah, this is Amane's arc. She's still breaking into his room, but now it's consensual... I think. She's actually pretty helpful. After a bit of teasing over JB's kiss, Kazami just pushes his own kiss on Amane, who claims she's never kissed anyone before. Seems like he's calling her bluff, since she's declared her love for him. So now she's his girlfriend, but he's not her boyfriend somehow. All this seemed like some weird mind game. But then Amane starts talking about Kazami's sister Kazuki and things take a turn. We're back to the bus accident that was flashed back to in episode 1, with Amane saying that his sister died that day. Amane was her classmate and survived the crash. She gives him a journal documenting that day, and we fully flash back to it. Looks like one of the tires burst and they skidded off a cliff. Apparently, she wasn't the only one to survive the initial impact. After getting off the bus with Amane, they work to save the rest. There are a couple of severe injuries, mostly small ones, making this a largely uneventful crash. Damn, they sure do build these busses and Japanese students sturdy. Even a puppy survived. They're conveniently out of cell phone range, so their accident may not be discovered for a while. Kazuki is no nonsense about everything and immediately sets to work exploring her surroundings. She sounds like she's well trained in managing hostile circumstances and almost purely logical in her approach, to the point that she seems cold and distant. When she is emotional, it seems performative. Yep, she's a lot like her brother. After helping everyone else with their injuries, it becomes clear that Kazuki injured herself in the crash when she braced her arm with a seatbelt, cracking it. Didn't show any signs of the injury before now, but there it is. Also, there's a dead kid on the bus and... honestly, I can't tell if there are others, but the teacher puts a tarp over at least one. Not sure why this is the first time we're discovering this, but I guess that wasn't terribly important information. Also, apparently Kazuki has an eidetic memory like Makina. Seems to be going around. So what we thought was the tragedy (the bus crash) was only the inciting incident to the tragedy (a prolonged period fighting for survival in the wilderness). We'll see how that plays out. Also, new ED that's just... a pan up of a still frame of Kazuki and Amane. Pretty boring, decent song, though. |
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| We get 1-2 episode arcs per route (harem girl) of the visual novel, so far for Michiru (2 eps), Sakaki and Sachi. The pattern is similar each time. A girl has a traumatic event in her past, which makes her do weird things in the present. Yuuiji then analyzes the situation and helps the girl to overcome her trauma. Then they hug and/or kiss, and we all know what happens in the VN after that. The means Yuuchij uses here are not supernatural, but so extremely unrealistic for a 17 year old student that it borders magic. For example, he organizes a real female human corpse to fake a suicide, he just takes a girl to the USA for a few hours of visit and back again in no time, and he drugs and buries a girl for three days. The pattern comes over like a mix of Bakemonogatari and a Key visual novel. Unlike those two, there formally is no supernatural element or entity involved. As Bakemonogatari is full of supernatural things, at least at the symbolic level, it's closer to Key. Of course Yuuiji's solutions won't stand a critical review, they are practically impossible. I personally can live with this, where is the difference to Bakemonogatari and Key w/r to "realism"? I can see why you guys dissect, but I'd say after seeing three instances I no longer expect realism. Enjoyment wise, Michiru's story was the best. Runner up is Sachi because of the wholesome end in the storage room. I'm looking forward to the longer arcs (2 and 3 eps) coming up now. This is because I agree the breakneck pacing required to put a whole visual novel route into 20 minutes is exhausting and leaves murky parts they have no time to explain. Despite the dense story telling, the emotions come over rather well. Thus the writing isn't bad given the hard constraints it needs to meet. Episode 5 (Michiru) Michiru had a heart transplant, and since two personalities live inside her. In addition, she was suicidal but met another suicidal girl. The two friended and mutually dragged themselves out of the depression. Until one day, the other girl killed herself without warning, which broke Michiru. At the beginning of the episode she's shown attempting to overdose herself with Diazepam. There are a lot of symbols and near supernatural story elements in it, such as the black cat and the transfer of a "soul" via a donated organ. The show itself pull the joke on this all being elements of a B-horror movie. So probably this is merely psychological, and left vague for the effect. Yuuiji's intervention is twofold, and pretty drastic. He drugs Michiru so she can't move, and then buries her alive for three days. In a not-so-well-written plot twist, the drug is declared a placebo, though. Michiru hallucinates and the two personalities inside her come to terms. The black cat and the question "where do we go when we die" certainly represents the other girl. In the images, Michiru has two characterizing items: First, the cat. Second, the wristband she exchanged with the other girl. A somewhat murky and unclear detail is whether the heart transplant is from the suicidal girl or not. My reading is that it's not. Rationale: That part of the story took place in a Japanese school. The heart surgery took place in the USA, and Yuuiji takes her to the parents of the heart donor, clearly in the USA. The anime decides to symbolize Michiru's currently active personality by changing her eye color. This obviously is "magic", but the problem here is anime only. In the visual novel, her change in personality is represented by switching from Katakana to Hiragana, a rather elegant solution which also avoids pseudo-magic Episode 6 (Sakaki) Sakaki is the heir of a tycoon family, and her crime is to be female. Her mother couldn't give birth to a boy and committed suicide when she learnt how Sakaki's father fathered a boy with a mistress. After that boy died, Sakaki was re-instantiated as heir but at the same time locked away at Mihama Academy, an institution founded by her father just for this purpose. In the story, her patriarchal dad decides she'll be sent to a US school, because Yuuiji and the girls have a bad influence and make her too rebellious. The whole thing escalates quickly and ends up in a Mexican standoff in front of the school. Sakaki fakes her own death (by hand grenade) using a stolen corpse (yuk). Her dad's heart is broken and he comes to terms with her, from his POV post-mortem. Her last will is to keep the Academy running and so he does. She returns and lived happily as a formally dead person ever after. Episode 7 (Sachi) Sachi is an orphan, her parents we run over by car on her 10th birthday. She blames herself to have caused this with her "selfishness", the classic form of self-hatred in Japan it seems. The story is that her parents run a small enterprise and work like dogs, so Sachi is a lonely child. Her and Yuuiji were sandbox buddies back in that day, the classic childhood friend route any eroge needs. In a fairly weird sub-arc, Sachi works hard to set up a bomb and blow up the school to avoid a test, which doesn't really fit in well in the one episode form of her arc. Of course it's Yuuiji to defuse the explosives in time. Which gives room to tell her backstory. On her 10th birthday, both parents take a day off but Sachi reacts with anger. She rejects the offer to spend a nice day together, runs off, and while her parents try to find her the accident happens to them. Right before Sachi's eyes of course, truck-kun is a cruel master. Yuuiji's contribution in this arc is to find a storeroom in which the relics of the birthday party her parents planned are stil standing. This includes a letter in which they express their feelings of love and understanding how lonely Sachi must be, and apologize. Sachi accepts it and finds peace in this matter. |
inimApr 8, 2023 4:21 PM
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| Episode 8-9 Léon: The Professional (1994) is one of the best movies of all time according to IMDB's ranking. The Japanese admire it so much they even made sure a lesser remake named Wasabi (2001) was made in their country. And it turns out, Makina's arc is another one. Makina's arc starts with her paying ca. $0.5M to Yuuiji to become her "Papa". She's got a weird idea of that, including kissing and sleeping together naked. Thank you eroge VN, the world needs more loli hentai. We learn that Makina comes from a wealthy business family and witnessed how her dad discovered corruption initiated by her mom. Her real dad then is tortured to death over it right before her eyes, as a result of which she contracts aphasia (speech impediment). At least the German subs all the time tried to point that out with misspelled and slurry subtitles. Her mother learns that Makina has an eidetic memory and remembers all the evidence against her, so she locks her away in the Academy. Makina's new papa as a result does what every good dad would do: he trains her as an assassin. She gets sniper training, and grave visit at Yuuiji's own master. The scene where the pro and his loli student first bond over a sniper lesson is taken straight from Léon. Sarina, Makina's imouto who followed her as heir, is seriously hurt in a car bomb assassination attempt. Their mom tasks Yuuiji's agency with murdering Makina and of course Yuuiji is assigned the task. The two of them flee and we get a sequence of events where they outsmart their hunters. Eventually after another escape, Makina forgets her beloved pot plant, goes back to the hotel, and is seriously injured by a gunshot. In Léon there's a very similar arc, just that papa is injured. Yuuiji manages to get her out and with the help of JB into a hospital. In the hospital, Makina's mother shows up and asks if her internal organs are unharmed because Sarina is in need of a transplant. The ultimate bitch move. JB witnesses this and like Yuuiji changes sides. He assasinates the evil mommy, abd JB's organization backs it up with another fake corpse and cover up story. Both Yuuiji and Makina return to the academy and are welcome by the harem girls. Overall, the arc which wins a lot when one knows Léon: The Original. It's mid to lower mid within what the show had so far. One word on the loli-papa romance. Leon has the same vibe, so I guess that's why it's here and as an eroge it's straight in your face. Even in Leon, a French movie, there's a scene which was cut for the "international" version aka US. It's a 12 year old Mathilda (Natalie Portman!) cosplaying in front of a mirror trying to seduce Leon. IMDB writes: According to Jean Reno, he decided to play Léon as if he were "a little mentally slow" and emotionally repressed. He felt that this would make audiences relax and realize that he wasn't someone who would take advantage of a vulnerable young girl. Reno claims that for Léon, the possibility of a physical relationship with Mathilda is not even conceivable, and as such, during the scenes when such a relationship is discussed, Reno very much allowed Portman to be emotionally in control of the scenes. Also see: https://www.movie-censorship.com/report.php?ID=1342The scenes you found offensive (wet kiss, scantly clad in bed) are also straight from Leon, and they were the ones cut in the international version. |
inimApr 8, 2023 9:11 PM
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| @inim I'm getting deja-vu, we've discussed Leon before in relation to its influence on a group watch show before (Phantom maybe?). It's very interesting for me to learn that such films have cult followings all around the world, as I remember that Leon and Taxi (written by Luc Besson) were firm favourites for armchair critics/ self declared elitists when I was at uni in 2001. As I think I've mentioned before, my brother liked the movie so much he got me a hoody for xmas with an image of Leon on the front that I still have to this day, although you can't make out the image after all this time. I watched Leon a long time ago so didn't pick up on the homage paid to the film in Makina's arc, but as soon as I read your post above you can see how closely they based this arc on the film. inim said: This is because I agree the breakneck pacing required to put a whole visual novel route into 20 minutes is exhausting and leaves murky parts they have no time to explain. Despite the dense story telling, the emotions come over rather well. Thus the writing isn't bad given the hard constraints it needs to meet. Think you're right, the show has done well to convert a VN into an anime and condense so much material, whilst keeping the emotional beats on point. Episode 10. One thing I'll say about the opening sequence i do find a bit distasteful is the way anime often talks about rape so casually, like here when Sachi asks "am I going to be raped now" in an almost inquisitive manner. At least Sachi isn't saying it in a suggestive manner. I think I get desensitised to the subject of rape in anime, hentai and doujins but every now and then you'll see the subject mentioned in a show like this and I'll think 'wtf Japan'. But this is based on an eroge VN and guessing that includes rape at some point. This is Amane's arc including a frankly weird interaction in his room, where Amane offers herself on a plate to Kazami, then they go through a strange discussion about how she will be his girlfriend, but he won't be her boyfriend, as he doesn't hold romantic feelings for her, but he does like her. We then get to the nub of why Amane has such a fascination with Kazami and it turns out she knew his sister, Kazuki, and was the sole survivor from a bus crash. The flashback I thought was interesting. So 4 of the kids died in the crash and 8 survived so far, but they'll all trapped in the wilderness (I didn't realise how big and empty some parts of Japan were until watching some youtubers like Abroad in Japan) but why would a training camp be in such a remote location. Anyway, there's 8 kids and a teacher remaining so will we get a situation like the film Alive, where some of them get eaten to provide nourishment for the others? Unlikely, but next episode will involve a fair number of deaths apparently. |
23feanorApr 9, 2023 2:10 AM
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| @inim I appreciate all the insights into Makina's arc and how it relates to Léon: The Professional. I'm familiar with the movie, though I'll admit I haven't seen it yet, so the details on how the movie changed from the international version. @23feanor I didn't recall seeing an actual number of deaths from the bus accident, though from this episode, it seems the number of dead is 3, not 4. And yeah, things are likely to get messy this episode. Episode 11 It's nice to see that the other girls aren't all useless - some of them are providing useful advice and even trying various tactics to contact civilization. The whole phone on a string and kite tactics were intriguing, albeit fruitless. Still, Kazuki is easily the best survivalist in the bunch, even shoring up their supply of food by finding edible grasses. Definitely concerning that there's a dog with them for that very reason... One of the other girls tells Amane something she can use against Kazuki, which is probably a reference to her past. That won't go well. Amane and Kazuki are also starting to bond this episode. Amane has liked Kazuki (seems platonic, but I'm not sure) and expresses that, while Kazuki retreats, not used to this kind of thing. They have a brief conversation regarding Yuuji (I'll keep to his first name to distinguish them) where Kazuki expresses her affection for him. This is also the first time we see Amane break down over being stranded. Honestly, thought more of these girls would be despairing like her, particularly after 3 days. In all, it takes 6 days for things to start to go awry in the group. A couple of days after rationing began, food starts to go missing. Not sure what puzzle Kazuki is referring to, but by judiciously placing pieces of carrot together in a way that resembles the originals, she makes it appear that they have more carrots than they did before. Infighting starts at day 7 regarding treatment of the girl with the broken leg. And... yep, there's a bit of yuri baiting as Kazuki sucks on the back of Amane's neck due to some random bleeding. Later, Kazuki outright says that she loves Amane. Their teacher leaves to go further afield at day 9 (not like he's done much of consequence that we've seen). By day 10, one of the students who was more grievously wounded has an infection at the site, despite Kazuki judiciously sterilizing tools. It's obviously bad, given that there are maggots, which indicate dead tissue. Fun fact: maggots are one of two organisms that have been designated as medical devices to remove dead tissue from wounds (the other being leeches, which are used to reattach fingers and such by bringing blood flow back through), though generally it's a bad sign when they show up naturally. This is also the day where the girl with the broken leg declares she wants to die. She's had a difficult time having to stay largely still and being seen to in all private ways by others. Day 11, things are getting testy. One of the girls is suffering mental impairment from malnutrition. The dog's on its last legs. The search for food and water sources is desperate and requires them all to take risks to their health, resulting in diarrhea that worsens their malnutrition. Day 12, the dog dies... of course. And, of course, Kazuki suggests eating him. At this point, given how desperate they are, it's the right call. Not saying I'm happy about it, nor are most of the girls. They even show the dead dog's face to the camera before Kazuki smashes it with a rock... yeah, she's a bit of a sociopath. They eat, no one's happy about it, even if it helps them. Well, things are only going to get worse from here. Buckle up. |
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| Episode 11. I thought there were 12 kids and one teacher and I counted 8 survivors plus teacher but must have missed one if there are 3 dead. Yeah I didn't like this episode and found the slight yuri bait out of place. |
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| @23feanor Yeah, I'm not enjoying this. The weird yuri baiting aside, this is largely just hard to watch for its own sake, and while I like shows that can pull that off well, I'm not enjoying this. Seems to really rub our faces in it. This story is honestly making all the other ones look cheery by comparison and, just a reminder: two of those stories involved using stolen corpses to fake suicides, one had a girl buried alive for three days to face the half naked ghost of her dead friend, and one had a girl watching her father get tortured and die in front of her on orders from her mother. All rather happy in retrospect. Episode 12 Several girls collapse or become entirely unresponsive, due to having eaten something poisonous, succumbing to injuries or lacking basic nutrition. No one's talking about eating each other yet, but I doubt we're far off from that - it's heavily implied that that's where their minds are when one of their number dies (not clear of what). Their teacher finally makes his way back to the group, having failed to reach civilization. One or two days later, two others die, one of sepsis (the one with maggots on her wounds) and one of suicide (the one who ate her dog). At this time, one of the other girls is eating maggots that are infesting her wounds... yay protein? And speaking of protein... yep, we've made it. Their teacher "caught a deer," which is code for "he's been butchering at least one of the bodies of the dead girls." Kazuki is the first to figure this out, giving an excuse about hepatitis and refusing it, and Amane thankfully follows her lead, despite not knowing. Kazuki is also aware that this places them in a precarious position where they could be on the menu next, so she leads Amane out to try and escape. Then Kazuki makes a really bad choice: she shows Amane that the president and teacher are fornicating in the forest (seriously, WTF) before it's revealed that yes, he has been butchering the bodies of her dead friends. Not sure why Kazuki thought Amane wouldn't be so surprised that she would make some noise after seeing this - she's supposed to be the logical one, but I guess she doesn't know Amane that well after spending most of every waking hour with her for two weeks. So now they're being chased through the forest by... how to put this... their horned-up teacher who likely went partly insane during his travels and is now ready to just straight up murder some teenage girls under his care. Kazuki takes him out dexterously, but they're now faced with other girls from their group who also knew what was going on. Alright, brief pause. Is the assumption here that everyone else was in on this scheme? Kazuki keeps saying that the people who ate the meat are all demons, but that assumes that they all knowingly ate their friends. It becomes a lot easier to just abandon everyone if they are all complicit, but that seems unlikely. Was Amane really the only one in the dark? They discuss the possibility that some of these girls have been deceived, but it really does look like everyone else is in on it. Anyway, back to the gruesome. Kazuki relates this all to lions eating zebras, which... this is cannibalism, right? It's like lions eating lions. And... why is there a crotch shot in the middle of this episode when Amane falls? And why is there a from behind panty shot of Kazuki when she decides to stand and fight? Goddamn this show is weirdly horny. Then everything becomes remarkably convenient for allowing the outcome that we know was coming: Kazuki has drafted a path out of the forest in her free time, which she never tried before and never suggested to anyone else, and instead of following it, offers to be a decoy to let Amane survive, despite the fact that the latter is on her last legs and may not make it over whatever distance is required (made all the more improbable by the fact that she never eats the food she's given by Kazuki, so she's likely traveling after several days without any food). She also becomes delirious from malnutrition and lack of energy, but somehow follows the directions anyway, finding her way to a lettuce patch and just chowing down. Despite being the sole survivor (seriously, did no one go back to check, or did literally everyone else die in the time it took her to get back to civilization? Either way, I call BS), Amane is treated terribly as it's implied that she participated in cannibalism to survive. She blames herself for surviving at the cost of others, which is partly true for Kazuki (though she actively decided to do it), but everyone else was literally out to kill her. So, now she views Yuuji as the perfect means of punishing her for surviving, deciding she would be a replacement for his sister and take any abuse he wanted to dish out. She claims to have fallen in love with him and asks that he kill her as punishment, which seems contradictory to her whole "replacement" strategy, but whatever. Yuuji accepts, smacks her on the head, and turns her into his slave instead, saying he's her "king and owner." Gross. I hate it, but she seems fine with it. His internal monologue says she needs to be accepted, but if this is his version of acceptance... Well, at least he's trying to find ways to help her, I guess. Strong reason to believe that Kazuki's still alive at the end - didn't see a corpse (Yuuji says they found her body, but not her head... no one does DNA or fingerprint analysis to confirm, do they?), so likely didn't die. It's unclear how far after all these events this is occurring, but they decide to search for clues of Kazuki's survival regardless. On their way, they run into a creepy guy who's a "fan" of Amane. Yep, not a fan of this. Nice symbolism in the ED, though. In particular, there's a pomegranate at the start and end that likely symbolizes death, though at the beginning it's cut into pieces on a clean plate and at the end it's patched with band-aids and surrounded by blood spatter. |
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| Episode 10-12 Amane's arc is based on survival horror (human cannibalism variety) along the lines of Lord of the Flies (1954) and her trauma is survivor's guilt. Another girl is introduced, Yuuiji's older sister Kazuki. She died in the events of this arc, and we get a triangle of Yuuiji, his dead sister Kazuki and Amane, who was saved in the survival situation by Kazuki's selfless sacrifice. The two girls bonded before, almost to yuri baiting level. Despite it's length of three episodes not much happens in this arc. The backstory is: A bus with a school basketball team crashes into a chasm. Multiple girls are injured, there's little food, and cellphones don't work. For some reason no rescue team finds them either, as if the crash barrier they breached is hard to find. The (lack of) realism in this show was bemoaned already, so I'll just accept the Lord of the Flies setting without asking. The most seriously injured girls die, one commits suicide, and some of them flip mentally. Malnourished leads to a dense atmosphere and strange behaviour. The group's sole adult, a teacher, left into the primeval forest their location borders on, with half the food. He promises to return with help. After about 14 days, the pet dog of one of the girls dies and is eaten. Amane and Kazuki are the POV characters during all this, and unlike the rest of their group they stay fairly sane and composed. Kazuki is portrayed as a prodigy kuudere, reminding me a little bit of Shiro from NGNL (2014). The dark secret the two uncover is that the teacher didn't really leave, but snapped and lives in the forrest. Some of the girls conspire with him. He degenerated into a ogrish cannibal, fucks the girls in his harem, and slaughters the rest. Also rather than burying the corpses of the deceased, he stores them for consumption. Amane and Kazuki are noticed watching him and a few girls, they run and Kazuki sacrifices her to enable Amane's escape. In the framework story around this long flashback there's Yuuiji and Amane talking about their romantic relation, and the mandatory hugging and kissing at the end. They go the the location of the tragedy and unearth a message box there, with a letter from Kazuki. She explains while they indeed were all eating human flesh in a soup, that contained a toxic substance killing them all. Only Amane's rejection of the soup saved her, she knew she'd die anyway. How convenient. Overall, the longest character arc, but not the best, that's still Michiru's. The lack of realism and ham-fisted story elements continue to hurt the backstories. E.g. a bus not being despite crash barrier damage, malnourishment after just 14 days, the ease with which Amane finds the cabbage field, and the ease with which they later find the place and the box. Yea. |
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Episode 13 Kind of an epilogue for Amane's arc. First, her and Yuuiji visit the place of the bus tragedy. They find a note in a buried box, hinting that Kazuki is still alive. The main part then is a hostage situation in the academy. The father of one of the girls who died in the bus tragedy has snapped. He enters Mihama Academy armed with a rifle, takes the five girls hostage, and ties them to chairs. He wants to rape Amane before he kills her, thanks once more edgy script. Meanwhile Yuuiji at 900m distance is in sniper position. His target is a 10 cm wide window in the schools bathroom. This is required because the other windows have their curtains blocking view. The hostage taker takes Amane to the loo for the rape, Yuuiji fires, and kills him. After this there's a teaser for season 2 and Labyrinth of Grisaia, where the next seasons' antagonist enters Japan on boat. |
inimApr 10, 2023 5:09 PM
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| Episode 12. You've both covered the points from this episode so not going to add much except to say I agree with all your concerns. The other girls arcs included far fetched point like the corpses and obtaining bomb making materials so easily online, but this arc for Amane just took it too far, why did the rescue team not notice where the bus went off the road, and if Kazuki knew the route for escape why had she kept this to herself when things were going Lord of the Flies? Not sure why the show picked Amane's arc to extend, would have preferred to see more from Sachi, Makina or Michiru. And sounds like we've got one last episode for Amane to go. Up until the Amane arc I've been quietly enjoying this show. |
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| @inim The Lord of the Flies comparison did come to mind as I was watching these episodes. I did not catch that the teacher actually hadn't left - I assumed he had left and went insane during his time away. That fills some plot holes and generates others. It now makes some sense why so many people were in on it (they're more likely to have discovered him if he was hanging out in the woods), but now it's all the stranger how Amane remained in the dark this whole time. It's somewhat understandable why Kazuki wouldn't share her knowledge of how to escape with the others (they'd already turned rabid and she didn't trust them), but her decision to wait until they were literally fed their dead classmates as the opportune moment to escape makes even less sense if she knew all this was going on for days. I also can't get past the fact that none of the girls ever wandered far enough into the woods to hear the sound of cars passing on the road. Maybe that was far away from their campsite (it gave a "??" for number of days Amane had been traveling last episode), but she was also incredibly weak from lack of food and practically falling down already. The distance can't have been that far. Episode 13 As @inim has already detailed this episode, I'm going to keep this to general thoughts. I think the whole "everyone died of a skin disease developed by the girl who was bed-ridden" is too convenient and largely nonsensical. I doubt there is an organism that could do what she's claiming this one did - growing on someone's skin and then rapidly killing people who ate it. If they made a soup out of her, presumably they boiled it, killing off whatever organism would have caused this. I guess they weren't too concerned with best cooking practices when they were starving, but still, hard to believe. Also hard to believe is that it's been years since this incident and no one else discovered this information. They set up a memorial and everything. Were investigations just pitifully ineffective or did they just not care about delivering that info to Amane? Either way, pretty fucked up. It's also really unclear what happened to Kazuki and why she would have vanished. As for this dude who shows up to take revenge (he's the father of the president - that girl that was having sex with her teacher last episode), it's very unclear why he chose to wait so many years to take revenge. It's like he was waiting for Amane to come to terms with her demons before he took action, and for some reason, chose not to target Amane directly, but rather those around her. Also unclear how he found the school. The whole sniping strategy meeting is interesting, though it's a bit absurd that, despite how incredulous JB is about Yuuki sniping from the lighthouse, they already had a camera set up there and aimed at exactly the window he could use for the purpose. Makina's... a marine? I don't think that's meant to be taken literally - more like she's a marine fangirl and knows Morse code, but still, weird way to phrase that. Lot of piss in this episode. Again, show: weirdly horny. Anyway, all's well that ends well. Everything worked out for the best and there's no reason to be concerned about anything ever again- Yep, two dudes on a boat with a rocket launcher. Seems legit. I've made no secret of my issues with the show, but I'll say that despite my frustrations with some of the elements, I enjoyed some of these arcs. Makina and Michiru stood out as having some pretty great ones, and having the former get a two-episode stint to develop her certainly helped. I didn't even mind Sakaki's all that much, despite the many leaps in logic. There's a charm to both Michiru and Sakaki's arcs that is almost helped by the pacing problems - the story just steamrolls past them, and I can get behind that. The fact that Amane's arc dominated this season - it had as many episodes as all three other characters combined - and it leaves me with a sour taste, unfortunately. This series is in some ways better than I was expecting and in other ways worse, so it's hard to get a good bead on it for scoring purposes. Putting this season at a 6.3/10 for now (need to get some distance from these final episodes before I can know if that's accurate for the whole season) and hoping for better as we go forward. |
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| Episode 13. That was probably the best episode from Amane's arc but only because of the sniping action. The dad of the president suddenly turning up all these years later makes no sense. So final of the five girls has her issues saved and all is well, until at end we see a guy with a rocket launcher appear on the horizon in a speed boat, guessing he's after revenge for something and Kazami is his target. There was a lot I liked about this show, nice character design (thanks mostly to influence and staff from Monogatari), polished production, neat and clean animation and ok OST. I didn't mind the fast pacing or unanswered plot points from the brief arcs for Sachi, Michiru, Yumiko and Makina, as each arc covered the bare essentials and hit the necessary emotional beats. The final 5 episode arc for Amane was just too long and boring. I debated my score as I do like this show, but as @whiteflame55 mentioned the final drawn out arc soured my experience, so have given it a very high 6/10 (6.9). Onto the prequel next. After living in the city centre for nearly 20 years we're moving to the suburbs on Friday so my posting may be a bit erratic over next few days until we get sorted and internet up and running in the new place. |
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| The Labyrinth of Grisaia: The Cocoon of Caprice 0 They use some CGI in this one (thankfully not much), which looks pretty mediocre. Not the worst I've seen by a longshot, but their compositing needs work. Much of the beginning regards a hostage situation where Yuuji saves Chizuru, so a first meeting of sorts. It becomes clear that at least part of the reason why Yuuji ended up attending the school was really his personal choice. From there, it becomes a backstory about Yuuji and his family. It's nice to see an established tension between Yuuji and Kazuki resulting from the latter being a prodigy and the former, at least when he was younger, being perceived as average. Their relationship is quite sweet. The relationship with their parents is a different story - it lacks any depth and they're basically just caricatures. There's a scene where he comes home to the sole source of food being a random piece of bread on a plate with a bite taken out of it, saying that they treated him harshly. WTF even is that? I got a good chuckle out of it, and I don't think that's what they were going for. There are a couple of references to events in the season, like Yuuji talking about Sachi (who he met around this time) and the guy in the red suit from the end of the season showing up to give him chocolate. Turns out, he's also the guy who takes Yuuji in after things go very wrong later in the episode, so dude's his foster father. And... hey, there's child nudity and incest. Was wondering when you both would get here. Monogatari comparisons abound and the scene goes on way too damn long as they run through all the logical reasons why it shouldn't be, but still pursue it anyway. Gross. I had been enjoying this OVA... I guess this does serve as a means of showing how manipulative she can be, but it's gratuitous and unnecessary. Once we catch up with the bus crash, they talk about having "confirmed" Kazuki's death, though as we've already been told... no one did. They didn't find a body. So they're just straight up lying to us now. This leads to more abuse from Yuuji's father, leading his mother to leave with him. This is probably the point at which Sachi stopped seeing him at the playground. Yuuji's father eventually finds him, rapes his mother and chokes her out (more gross, and done with way too much in the way of obvious fanservice shots) before Yuuji intercedes, killing his father with a bottle. Then his mother tells Yuuji to run away, carving her husband up with a kitchen knife and hanging herself. Yep, now there's murder suicide, now with more gratuitous nudity. Huzzah! And Yuuji's take-away is that he drove his mother to it. Yuuji's fostered life is... not an improvement. Despite an opulent home, he's forced to wear a wig and dress like his sister, then be subject to sexual assault because I guess this is what the show thinks we want to see. Super gross, especially when he licks his hand. Later, they mention he's got a baby mill going here to boot. Man, it's like they have a bingo card for every truly despicable thing you could do and they're trying to cross them all off at once. More sexual and physical abuse, followed by somehow killing a dude, then getting drafted into into terrorist training camp, where he was subject to beatings from his fellow trainees. Watching a hand-to-hand brawl between a young boy and girl as he flashes back to scenes of his mother's rape and death is really what this show needed. Oh, but don't worry: she was kind to him, so of course she dies shortly thereafter. So Yuuji becomes a killer, dressing in drag as his sister to off various men because, hey, what's a little more trauma? Seriously, dude should be an out and out psychopath by now. This is when his master comes into play, who was working for the same organization that he currently works with. She finds him in a cell underground, and presumably goes on to mentor him. Yep, I hate it. It's all the worst things about this series amped up to 11 and it's just here to push the envelope as far as they can. I have no clue why this OVA is rated this highly - I guess some people like this kind of edge, but I have no interest. Agreed with @inim on the score: 4/10. I know there are specials - I looked it up and there are a number of short "specials" listed that look like they're designed solely for the purpose of anything from ecchi to hentai. I might bring myself to watch and rate these later, but I doubt any of them would even rise to this level. |
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| We're moving tomorrow and our internet got cut off a day early so having to hot spot for the moment, very annoying, it's moments like these I realise how much we rely on the internet, nothing works without it, no tv, radio, laptop. Will post again in a few days once settled in at the new place and internet all set up. The Labyrinth of Grisaia: The Cocoon of Caprice 0. Will keep this brief. I didn't find this special quite as bad as you guys. Given the tone of this show I was expecting incest and rape to show up some time. My main issue with this special was that it looked like it'd be about Kazami's past with his master, Asako. It was informative to get some details about Kazami's backstory but as you've both pointed out it was over the top edge fest. Basically up until Kazuki starts fondling her brother in the bath it was ok then went downhill fast with the dad raping the mum (in silhouette), then mother commits suicide and then the icing on the cake the guy in the red coat who likes Kazami to dress up like a girl and touch him up (guessing worse happens that isn't shown, that's one hentai tag they didn't hit thankfully). I also have no idea how Kazami is as normal as he is, maybe thanks to Asako, hoping we get to her story with Kazami in S2. This could have all been accomplished with a more concise flashback in an episode, extensive edge fest wasn't really necessary. I rate this same as for Rainbow, too much shock value, high 5/10 (5.8) |
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| @23feanor hope the move continues to go smoothly. Will say, in regards to the OVA, that Rainbow was better from my perspective in that it balanced (at least in later episodes) a lot of the shock value with genuine character development and well-told stories. This felt like just shock value piled on itself over and over again, and there wasn't enough substance beforehand to really provide balance. Season 2, Episode 1 (or Episode 14 - likely just going to continue the numbering past this point) Well, given how little I liked the OVA, I'm actually excited to return to the series proper in hopes that we can put that mess behind us. At the end of the OVA, the girls piece back together a document that contains Yuuji's entire history and so we're spending the start of this one with them coming around to these revelations, including filling in the gap between the end of the OVA and his arrival at school. So, let's hope that's less depressing. Yuuji is absolutely broken at this point, which seems about right. Dude swats a fly and throws up from the mental anguish of it. But then they get him a puppy and... guess we're getting two dead dogs in this show. Fun. His master slowly becomes a mother figure to him, emphasizing his personal growth and pushing him away from violence for the sake of it. We do finally find out what their organization is: an anti-terrorism organization called the Central Intelligence and Research Second, or CIRS. Yuuji receives a shiny new sniper rifle, but PTSD gets in the way of his being able to fire it. That changes when a bear intrudes and… yep, kills his dog. So John (yes, he stuck with that name despite the dog being female) ends up becoming food for a pair of cubs, and he doesn’t end up killing the bear, though he shows a willingness to return to killing. He resolves to be able to kill to protect those he cares about, though his master still keeps a tight lid on him to stop him from killing, telling him that he’s a tool who needs to follow orders and must save others. Not a bad start. The death of John was sad, but not gruesome, and I’m appreciating how his master is going about his development. |
whiteflame55Apr 13, 2023 8:50 AM
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| The completionist in me compels me to watch the specials. I'm... glad they're only 3 minutes long each. Takizono Basketball Club no Nama Cream Party! Vapid, sexual for no damn reason between kids (most of whom will become cannibals and die), and... hey, ends in incest. What's not to hate? Have little to love, but hey, it is what it says in the title. 2.5/10. The Fruit of Grisaia: Grisaia no Tokuten A set of shorts done for each of the girls. And yes, they get sexual fast. Bunny girl Yumiko uses carrots lewdly before getting interrupted by Amane. Michiru goes to the beach and has a wardrobe malfunction before getting a sexy massage. Then she's nude in the bath with Yuuji. Sachi bathes Yuuji with her tits before jerking off... his shower head. Basically indistinct from hentai. Makina gives a bunch of randos a profanity-laden verbal lashing (that's strangely partly censored?) before showing off her tits in a series of exercises and grinding on a pole. Amane in a yukata gets sopping wet in the rain and gets fondled by Yuuji before realizing that she imagined it. And... well, why not end with incest? Kazuki plays doctor with a young Yuuji. This leads... exactly where you think it does. And we get pin-ups of all the girls for... well, these have gotta scratch someone's fetish. 2/10. The actual nudity makes it worse and few of these girls behave like they normally would, all for the sake of really basic ecchi/hentai. Oh well, at least I see bedrock now... I hope... |
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| Episode 15 We find out that Yuuji's master claims to have taken his virginity, then he is instructed to take advantage of a drunk JB. All this happens when he's much younger with two much older women. Yep, this might as well happen. I'd say I'm not sure why they did this, but... we all know. Time skip. Yuuji is now near his present day age. His master appears to be in deteriorating health (current guess is Parkinson's). There's a special mission that she cannot do, so it falls to Yuuji. Apparently, he was successful. JB's pissed that he's being used again, referencing a poem by Saneatsu Mushanokōji: Persimmon and Yuzu Though exposed to the same winds and rains Thou art sweet, whilst I am sour Thou art red, whilst I am yellow While people praise thee They do not forsake me either So, Yuuji goes to a training camp in the US. He takes to it easily enough, doing a lot better than Daniel, a guy who takes a liking to him and largely just gets him in trouble. Millie, a girl in the same unit who's also handy with a sniper rifle. A tomboy and a bit of a tsundere, she challenges him to a sniping competition. He completes the first term, ends up on a ship as a private with Daniel, Millie and some dude who's into playing lewd loli dating games in public. They are sent to the battlefield. Some people gonna die. |
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| Episodes 14 & 15. Am having to use a hot spot for next few days so will have to keep this brief. I like these episodes, we've heard so much about Asako from Kazami it was nice to finally see their back story together. Also yes more sex, although this time it's two older women with a teenager, not at the same though. Imagine if this were an older guy and a teenage girl 'teaching' her how to have sex, it would be disturbing, but when it's a younger a guy with an older woman it seems ok, well at least to me as he wasn't forced. Think I've mentioned this disconnect in our group watches before, funny quirk of gender roles. |
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23feanor said: Absolutely, Why the Hell are You Here, Teacher!? (2019) would be considered some of the worst pedo ecchi, but in widespread gender role reading it becomes the "hot teacher" fetish. At least under German law it shows even very severe cases, due to the aspect of relationship between those under protection and an adult in responsibility. I'm always in a dilemma watching anime which plays this or other tropy fantasies such as rape or domination. I've no silver bullet, just wanted to share that I share your thoughts and discomfort here. Maybe I'm more successful at reminding myself that it's fiction, as I definitely watched a lot of dubious and edgelord stuff. I even actively seek it.Also yes more sex, although this time it's two older women with a teenager, not at the same though. Imagine if this were an older guy and a teenage girl 'teaching' her how to have sex, it would be disturbing, but when it's a younger a guy with an older woman it seems ok, well at least to me as he wasn't forced. Think I've mentioned this disconnect in our group watches before, funny quirk of gender roles. |
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inimApr 15, 2023 6:51 AM
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inim said: 23feanor said: Absolutely, Why the Hell are You Here, Teacher!? (2019) would be considered some of the worst pedo ecchi, but in widespread gender role reading it becomes the "hot teacher" fetish. At least under German law it shows even very severe cases, due to the aspect of relationship between those under protection and an adult in responsibility. I'm always in a dilemma watching anime which plays this or other tropy fantasies such as rape or domination. I've no silver bullet, just wanted to share that I share your thoughts and discomfort here. Maybe I'm more successful at reminding myself that it's fiction, as I definitely watched a lot of dubious and edgelord stuff. I even actively seek it.Also yes more sex, although this time it's two older women with a teenager, not at the same though. Imagine if this were an older guy and a teenage girl 'teaching' her how to have sex, it would be disturbing, but when it's a younger a guy with an older woman it seems ok, well at least to me as he wasn't forced. Think I've mentioned this disconnect in our group watches before, funny quirk of gender roles. I loved Why the Hell are You Here Teacher 2019, think I rated it a 9/10 (just checked and yes I did), as I am one of those male students who loved sexy teachers when growing up and guessing that hasn't changed, even now. And yes UK laws are same, remember seeing a news piece not long ago about a female teacher (mid 20's and fairly attractive iirc) and 15 y/o male, who ended up running away together. They got caught and she ended up in prison, think they made a tv show about it. When she got out they resumed their relationship but she was barred from teaching. Thinking on some of the hentai I've seen over the recent years I also think my views have been somewhat warped by anime/hentai/doujins (personally i think it's important for myself to be aware of this fact, and not start to think hentai/anime/doujin behaviour/tropes, such as some of the material in this show, is normal, or becomes noramlised, and that it is fiction, although tbh having a daughter has somewhat changed my views on a number of things such as porn, ie I would never want her to see some of the hentai from my list or know that I watched it, so some shame and guilt creeping in lol) , and I also share your moral dilemma when watching this sort of stuff. |
23feanorApr 15, 2023 6:59 AM
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| I actually have seen the last couple of episodes as improvements. Less horny, more focused on character development. @23feanor @inim it's definitely something I've thought about, and this show's putting the dynamic of a boy with two older women front and center, so they're making it difficult not to think about it. I guess this is supposed to titillate for some people, but it's all about power dynamics and the line that separates what we're seeing from a form of domination is right there. Never really understood it. Episode 16 Daniel's gonna die... next episode, I guess. Pervy dude is Robert and, yep, he's into eroge alright. He joins their group with Millie and Edward, a dude Yuuji coached in sniping. Yuuji still struggles to kill while getting exposed to atrocities - strange how little of this they're willing to show considering what they've shown us before. They're led by a platoon leader named Justin Mikemeyer (can't tell whether that's a reference to the Halloween franchise or Mike Myers of SNL/Austin Powers fame), who has more than a few screws loose. They were playing "The Ants Go Marching" over much of this scene - guess that makes sense for a military unit. He inspires them to run away like bush dogs, calling them the Bush Dog Platoon - an improvement over the Unwanted Child Platoon. They're largely relegated to planting landmines and getting into small skirmishes utilizing traps. Yuuji has a hard time shooting people because of PTSD as he literally vomits blood, but the power of comradery and seeing the enemy (really unclear who they are) as inhuman allows him to muscle through. There's a weird scene where Yuuji is practically manic as he's shooting people, which doesn't make a whole lot of sense given what we know of him, and now he just seems fine with shooting anyone. Yuuji heads home and, of course, the first thing we get is a post-sex scene with his master. He's been through a lot and... I think he's only 16 right now? Hard to believe. |
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