One is his college crush who probably had a crush on him the whole time, and the other is a girl who is feeling the exact same listlessness and loneliness that he is. And they both have images of him from prior to now that color their perceptions of him, heavily influencing if not overriding whatever objective judgment could be made about who/how he is presently. I think it makes perfect sense that they'd both be interested in him.
Because, to some not insignificant degree, their interest isn't about him but about themselves.
I was about to say the same thing "hisashiburi".. Yeah considering the age of these characters, it's not surprising either of them have interest in the guy. it's unlikely any new adult women he'd just meet would be interested, but kids form attractions to each other just because. glasses girl was a loner, all it took was someone to give her a genuine smile, and "thank you" acknowledgment seems to go a long ways in japan. The old friend has probably seen a better side of him when they were students, though how far her interest in him goes is tbd.
In any case, both of them formed their impression of him from years prior to the present day.
As for the show, I like it so far, felt like they fit a lot of content into 1 episode.
I think I would have definitely been into this more when I was younger. So far it seems like a nice anime about self exploration and growth that might have been healing to watch in my younger days. I feel bad though, because I want to love this anime. I enjoy the kind of laidback atmosphere of all these characters just meandering through life and their own issues, the music, the art, the acting... It's executed well in my opinion, but I might just not be into this kind of show anymore. I found myself rolling my eyes a few times. I'll give it a few more eps before I decide to really drop it though
The first episode was ok. The main guy has just finished college and is working in a restaurant, while his classmates are much more ambitious, and have better jobs. A teen with a crow on her shoulders keeps stalking him and seems to live him, but he loves his classmates that doesn't love him back. A typical romance anime so far. Nothing really stands out... maybe next episode will be more interesting?!
Idk why people don't like this show and I'm older than the average college graduate. Maybe still being in college is a factor. Still the writing is good and relatable.
The last show that I remember--and, for the record, I've probably said this about an anime before and forgotten--the last show I remember flying (in a good way) through plot that would normally get teased over several episodes was The OC. And that show was f***ing brilliant.
'Cus we've gotten a confession, a rejection, an indirect confession/direct rivalry, and a secret self-denial/confession--and we're two episodes in. I almost don't know what the rest of the story's gonna be, at this point. Which means we're either in for something unique or an absolute trainwreck.
So...very exciting.
We got a decent bit of parallel storytelling, with Shinako now having a younger unrequited partner, just like Rikuo. Which means we can start looking for the series overall to be weaving some kind of closed-loop tale, wherein we'll find a series of repeating patterns (Shinako's "going around in circles" writ large) until something happens to either break the pattern or finalize/close the loop. (At least, that's how I see it, at present.)
Interesting detail about Shinako, who took over main character status for the episode: she cut her hair--which is an interesting detail because girls getting a hair cut after a romantic situation is usually a sign that she's been rejected (dumped or turned down), but she's the one who rejected Rikuo, last week.
That said, she also had short hair when she was with Dead Brother, so she may just have been doing it as a way of hearkening back to that time (as she did with the cherry blossoms)--or, heck, just wanted to get a haircut--but it's a telling detail, unintentional multi-reason or otherwise.
The one problem I had with the episode was Little Brother showing up, because he essentially walked in to give us exposition, which is a lazy way to introduce information they could have more elegantly folded into the episode (as it has with a few other details).
Also--and this is almost exclusively a personal point of contention with shows in general--I hate when you expand a cast of characters after the first episode. Unless the point is that the "team" is incomplete until everyone is added over the first couple of episodes (as with Cowboy Bebop, for instance), it's all but always something done as an artificial means of elongating the storytelling.
I don't know how much of a role he'll have, from here on out. Early signs would point to him being the "spare" to pair Haru up with, when Rikuo winds up with Shinako...but we'll see. ("Early signs" being standard convention but also...he saw Haru running out of the park, which made him stop. In the biz, we call that foreshadowing. (That said, Haru hangs out with crows, a symbol of death, so...we also call that foreshadowing...and we got a death haunting Shinako and keeping her from being with Rikuo, so if Haru dies it could keep Rikuo away from Shinako...or drive them together as surrogates for each other's lost loves...um, close parentheses.))
Oh--and I like Coworker-san. He's funny.
Solid follow-up. Still very happy with what I'm seeing, so far.
Episode 2, this is going to be one of those shows...
What I'm expecting... Read at your own risk...
I feel the show is laying it on really thick that certain chapters of your life need to finish before being able to move on and that there is nothing wrong with a man & women being just friends. They've brought it up a few times in the first 2 episodes...
Our main protagonist will most likely end up with the crow-girl in the end (which seems obvious) but only after the teacher and the main protagonist try to have some form of relationship, to realize that they're nothing more than just friends. Seeing the state of the cast now, it'll be a while until we get to that point. Crow-girl seems to be 100% committed so it wouldn't surprise me if she's going to end up extremely miserable, looking to hide under a rock while trying to be supportive and positive towards our main protagonist.
It's obvious that the younger brother has a thing for the teacher as well, hence why he was trying to play the tough guy when confronting the main protagonist at his job, with the close up of the nametag.
Two minutes in I'm already annoyed. Is there any character here that isn't a complete cunt? I detest the main character, but manic pixie crow chick and 7/11 bro negging on the guy for not wanting to go out after being rejected is just douche-y.
Well, I guess teacher lady isn't so bad. Or at least I'd say that if she didn't bring this puffed up turd into the show
Two eps in and I'm kinda thinking this one might be one of those shows better left to marathoning later. I'm also thinking that just maybe it wouldn't've killed them to update some character hair bc Mr Convenience Store Coworker clearly just strolled in from 1997 and it's giving me flashbacks to high school in a way that's totally separate from the intended flashbacks to those heady days of youth (or whatever).
Take a hint, numbnuts, she's not that into you. You're up against a dead guy here, there's no way in hell you're winning this round, main character status or no. And I know she's annoying as shit, but Crow Girl's obviously the one the story's setting up for you, so I don't know... get with her already or something. Then, with any luck, we'll only have to sit through three episodes of this shit instead of uh... 18 episodes.
I'm also thinking that just maybe it wouldn't've killed them to update some character hair bc Mr Convenience Store Coworker clearly just strolled in from 1997 and it's giving me flashbacks to high school in a way that's totally separate from the intended flashbacks to those heady days of youth (or whatever).
True, which is why I didn't take it as an indication about the time period.
That said...the show's set in the '90s, if the other context clues are to be believed, so he's actually only slightly out of date with his look. (And if the adaptation is keeping to the original, we're dealing with honest-to-God 1997. Before, I imagine, some of our...um, cohort were born. (So...fire up the ol' "because that didn't exist, yet!" dispenser, in case anyone has questions.))
True, which is why I didn't take it as an indication about the time period.
That said...the show's set in the '90s, if the other context clues are to be believed, so he's actually only slightly out of date with his look. (And if the adaptation is keeping to the original, we're dealing with honest-to-God 1997. Before, I imagine, some of our...um, cohort were born. (So...fire up the ol' "because that didn't exist, yet!" dispenser, in case anyone has questions.))
Mostly I just think his hair jars bc almost everyone else has either basically realistic hair or anime hair that's kinda dated but doesn't immediately scream "this is a 90s anime character" in quite the same way. I have no objection to the show being set in the 90s - and I definitely agree that it is - but they could've dropped the headband that gives me bad flashbacks to what I could get my hands on in 2003 and I wouldn't've minded one single bit.
I just really hate that stupid headband style. It fading out of manga was a blessing.
Mostly I just think his hair jars bc almost everyone else has either basically realistic hair or anime hair that's kinda dated but doesn't immediately scream "this is a 90s anime character" in quite the same way.
Oh, totally: I had the hardest time reconciling Haru's design, in that sense. (And yet I just took Coworker-san's bandanna to be a dude making a bad choice (along the lines of @Franconator's observation about bands). Or potentially just being a huge fain of Poison. Odd what does and doesn't set off one's Spidey Sense, hm?)
Both are awful--and, yes, I wouldn't have given it a second thought to have modernized the looks even slightly. Perhaps fans of this extremely long-running or oft-hiatused series would have objected.
Oh! And now that we're talking about it...that totally explains Shinako's part! Like, why she parts her hair down the center instead of to the side! I kept thinking, "It's nice, but...I really wish she'd parted it on the side. This doesn't look quite right."
18 episodes, after watching the first 2 on YouTube of all places I couldn't help myself, I needed to know how the story ends. Look. People did not like the ending. That's not a spoiler. But the ending was very divisive. Hell apparantly a lot happens that really pissed off fans who were there from Day 1. Something about the characters wore them out after 100+ chapters. So if the anime adapts all of the Manga, the ONLY way I see it being more than the run of the mill anime that people forget, is if they change the story and have an Anime-only ending. From what I have read online the Manga was a trainwreck filled with delays and a bunch of the problems that the manga had were similar to that of Food Wars, if you know you know. Which is a shame cause the first 2 episodes are fantastic. Also did I see fucking WHITE FOX in the end credits. WTF. I wrote some spoilery things down below so read at your own will. If you guys want more of this kind of internet journalism that no one asked for also let me know.
so apparently this 113 chapter manga took like 7 years or something to finish, the author added too many unlikeable characters and by the end only Rikuo and Haru were the only decent characters left, but strangely were often given far less screen time than the multitude of annoying side characters. People felt cheated after it ended and said that they wasted years of their lives following a manga that was not worth it. All they got was a kiss scene in the penultimate chapter when they were looking for a lot more. It seems that the Author saw the initial popularity of the series and milked the shit of it so that he could prolong it and make $. LOOK I DON'T KNOW WHAT WILL HAPPEN. DON'T KILL THE MESSENGER.
I didn't read anything past that, in your post, and I don't mean to sound like a dick when I say this...but could you put the whole thing you wrote in a spoiler tag, please? I know (or assume) you didn't get into specifics until the stuff you already spoiler tagged, but I think even those first couple of sentences reveal more than they should to people who might not want even a hint of spoilers. Or, at the very least, that I didn't want.
I appreciate you wanting to warn us off the show because the internet didn't like the ending of the book this show is based on, but half the people in this thread hate the show already and the other half are, I'm sure, more than happy to come to hate it on their own, if that is what's going to happen.
18 episodes, after watching the first 2 on YouTube of all places I couldn't help myself, I needed to know how the story ends. Look. People did not like the ending. That's not a spoiler. But the ending was very divisive. Hell apparantly a lot happens that really pissed off fans who were there from Day 1. Something about the characters wore them out after 100+ chapters. So if the anime adapts all of the Manga, the ONLY way I see it being more than the run of the mill anime that people forget, is if they change the story and have an Anime-only ending. From what I have read online the Manga was a trainwreck filled with delays and a bunch of the problems that the manga had were similar to that of Food Wars, if you know you know. Which is a shame cause the first 2 episodes are fantastic. Also did I see fucking WHITE FOX in the end credits. WTF. I wrote some spoilery things down below so read at your own will. If you guys want more of this kind of internet journalism that no one asked for also let me know.
so apparently this 113 chapter manga took like 7 years or something to finish, the author added too many unlikeable characters and by the end only Rikuo and Haru were the only decent characters left, but strangely were often given far less screen time than the multitude of annoying side characters. People felt cheated after it ended and said that they wasted years of their lives following a manga that was not worth it. All they got was a kiss scene in the penultimate chapter when they were looking for a lot more. It seems that the Author saw the initial popularity of the series and milked the shit of it so that he could prolong it and make $. LOOK I DON'T KNOW WHAT WILL HAPPEN. DON'T KILL THE MESSENGER.
Ep. 2
I am not sure what to think of this anime so far. There is great potential for a story about letting go of the past and creating relationships, but I do not know where this is going.
One idea for looking at stories is to see if there is/are questions at the core of the story. One example is a martial arts movie that asks "Will Jackie Chan be able to win against a drug lord?"
I do not know what the question/questions are the focus yet, but I am willing to wait for them to appear.
I'm loving it. I always love a good ole romance with a love triangle AND WE GET A MANIC -PIXIE - DREAM - GIRL?! Oh how I love them. Pretty much my favorite trope in all of story telling of every kind of media. Throw a manic pixie dream girl at me, if you want me to like something. bonus points if she's cute as heck. Check mate. We not only get that but adults having emotions and regrets about adult shit and life in general. Do I relate real hard to that? Yes, yes I do. Stop reading my diary anime. D:< or well....maybe don't cuz I kind of like this shit but still. XD
Also I'm so excited that you @interregnum also like this show, because I kid you not, while I was watching both episodes I kept thinking " I bet Interregnum would like this....I wonder if he's watching it." and here you are. I knew I could depend on a Real Girl Bro. *fist bump* :D
I hope this shit makes me cry. Give me all the emotions. Throw this manic pixie dream girl and her crows through the ringer with this boy and let me savor every moment of it. This season looks lack luster from the outside but once you start to dig into it there are so many sold shows so far. Lots of shows with potential at the very least. I also have high hopes for this one.
