- Azumanga Daioh
This is a strange little anime. There’s nothing inherently wrong with strange; Osaka is strange and weird and wonderful. The people of Myself Yourself are strange and creepy and painful.
On the day that Sana is to move away from his friends, we are given snapshots of each of them as they were once upon a time. Cheerful and soft-hearted Aoi bakes a cake, and smudges the icing with her tears. Shuri knits a mitten, a single one, offering it to Sana in the midst of an affectionate altercation with her twin brother, Shuu. Shuu gives Sana a hand-made fishing lure, and later runs after the train that Sana rides out of town, yelling a farewell message that is drowned out by the sound of the moving train. Nanaka ties up her hair with her favorite hair-tie (because it was given to her by Sana), and plays a simple violin piece, stopping in the middle with a plea that they wait patiently until she can complete it.
When Sana returns, he is a high schooler; though he remains mild-mannered on the surface, he has issues that made it impossible to remain at his previous school. His friends have changed, too, and the story is told by flipping each of them over in turn, revealing their creepy or painful underbellies. No one is exempt, not even Asami or the senile grandmother that everyone visits at the senior center.
Call it the Agatha Christie syndrome. But ever since the judge in And Then There Were None turned things upside down on fateful stormy Indian Island, writers have tried to capture that legendary element of psychological suspense by this flipping hat-trick. Oh, you think you know Asami? Flip! Nanaka of the stern visage, complete with a black crow cawing and shedding black feathers over her head? Flip!
The payoff should be a thrilling and fascinated shiver at the strangeness of it all. When Sana opens the mailbox and finds those letters within, filled with silent screams for help (knowing the reason why Nanaka is an orphan), I did shiver. But the biggest flip of all is the ending, where everyone is gathered together for a moment of feel-good closure. That was…fascinating.
Three obligatory remarks:
First, the animation is excellent. Even when the story becomes insufferably oppressive, little Sana and Nanaka are drawn to charming effect. The red mailbox on a road just outside of town, next to green fields and dark woods; the golden sunset over the sea as the twins visit their mother’s grave; the city streets that are both familiar and foreign; the cool nightscapes with the light-house flickering at the convergence of sky, mountain and sea – they are a pleasure.
Second, the music. Serious dialogues are accompanied by solo guitar, with single violin added during Nanaka’s monologues, there’s a cello with a heart-beat percussion accompaniment during the fire scene, and an awesome trumpet theme for the Animenger episode. It’s well done.
Third, the voice characterizations. What was the problem with this anime again? Right, the story. The seiyuu were excellent, too. Fujimura sensei playfully voiced by Megumi Toyoguchi steals every scene.
Grade: C
