Anime/Kimi ni Todoke

Shoujo almost always starts the same way.

Except Ouran High School Host Club; then again, it is an Affectionate Parody.

I know. I am just a bit tired of monologues like this, possibly because they are annoying to listen to in Real Life.

I'll concede to that. Rousseau Was Right indeed for this one.

LOL at PinXKurumi.

What I like about Kimi ni Todoke is the anime with no ecchi flavor. Pure love story in the sense that the main characters do not realize that they are already in love with each other which is condsidered to be KAWAII

^ Tis a staple of most Shoujo actually, even Affectionate Parodies like Ouran High School Host Club have the two leads not realizing they love each other. Of course it helps that Tama-chan is an Idiot Hero.

edited 18th Jan '10 4:04:19 AM by Mapi

Plus,the Nice Guy is 1) the male lead 2) genuine. I can count the number of times that's happened on my nose.

Well, guess I'll be finding out what the fuss is about — my anime club's screening it this semester.

All right, I've now seen two episodes. Copying and pasting from my Twitter:

Kimi ni Todoke first impressions: too much narration, too many effects. I'd prefer it if it were more understated.

The whole "be a good person, don't let stuff get to you, and things will usually work out" thing is good though. Just overdone/overscripted.

Now what I'm wondering is, is it that it was less subtle than I would've liked, or that it wasn't subtle in the way I wanted it to be? 'Cause some of this seems to be a pattern with me and shoujo, and I'm wondering if a shoujo romance fan would have issues with aspects of, I dunno, CLANNAD or something that I wouldn't mind. Aside from the harem factor, I mean. Or maybe Maison Ikkoku. (This was what I was thinking about with the romance manga thread, BTW.)

edited 20th Jan '10 9:33:07 PM by ShayGuy

Well, it's more understated than most of the anime of this sort, at least. The first episode is definitely overdoing it a bit, though, and I do understand your objections. There's a whole lot of inner monologue in this show, for sure.

I found myself thinking, "Yes, yes, 'I Can't Believe A Guy Like You Would Notice Me!' — we get it already." I also thought about the differences from the inner monologues in My So Called Life.

Maybe it's ultimately a manga thing.

So... is there a better site to watch this on than animeboy? The sound quality there was pretty horrible...

There's always BitTorrent. Or do you not have installation privileges?

Forgot:

Well, it's more understated than most of the anime of this sort, at least.

I think I might need a point of comparison. Like, I dunno, Hana Yori Dango or something?

Eeeh, my folks don't want me using torrents because they're not perfectly safe, see.

They're as safe as anything else. More so, I'd think, because there are so many other computers verifying that the files are what they say they are. And if Eclipse snuck in malicious code — and I don't know why they would — it'd become known, and their (pretty good) reputation would be shot.

Though if you have an IRC client, XDCC is quicker anyway. (It's irc.rizon.net, and the channel is #eclipse.) And if you don't, it's a justifiable download, because it's just a chat program.

(Incidentally, Flagfox can be interesting — turns out their site's in Sweden. Makes sense, no?)

Ep 15 : Wow, Kurumi's characterization is impressive here. I like the idea that she won't be bothering with the mask anymore.

Oh, I don't mean unsafe in terms of viruses and stuff, I mean in terms of the fact that torrents can be followed back to you and thus get you persecuted...

Like I said, XDCC works too. But there's no chance in hell of anybody prosecuting you for torrenting fansubs of an unlicensed anime series, and I've never heard of anyone being prosecuted even for torrenting DVD rips of a licensed and released series.

(How would NTV even go about doing that?)

Further thoughts after a night's sleep:

• While I think this may have occurred to me before, this series bears a resemblance to a gender-swapped (including intended audience) Angel Densetsu.
• It scored pretty well with me on believable characterization. Sawako's "innocence" seems to mostly just be her being too fixated on "ZOMG people are talking to me and using my real name!" to even think about malice, and having too little of an ego to think about degradation. And Kazehaya — extroverted nice guy (lower case) being popular? Makes perfect sense; likable people tend to be popular almost by definition. Plus he largely seems to just be displaying common sense. I can imagine myself acting similarly, but with more snark. ("Date Kuronuma? Wait, where's the 'penalty' part?")
  • That last bit gave me a plotbunny: Sawako in the SOS-dan. Stick her in North High, let Haruhi hear the rumors, and the rest writes itself.
• "So she's overjoyed at providing a useful service (the test of courage, for instance), and they're amused at the fact that she's overjoyed, even though they don't actually care about her (though they might in the future, via exposure effect or whatever), so...wait, is this a win-win?"

That last bit gave me a plotbunny: Sawako in the SOS-dan. Stick her in North High, let Haruhi hear the rumors, and the rest writes itself.

Hilarity Ensues. If I didn't already have more than two on-going fanfics to write...

I'm up to episode 2 noooow!

It's a bit of an odd anime to me? Maybe I'm just not used to shoujo. But somehow, I keep finding myself thinking, "okay, uh, so is that the last episode now or what." I mean, wow. The guy is already in love with her, she's in love with him, he's about as subtle about it as a brick to the face, and... and stuff?

I'm also not sure what to think of the premise. I can dig that Sawako doesn't know how to act around people and stuff, even though she has an atypical love for people for such an outcast, which I guess can be explained by a certain kind of lacking self-esteem, but... it's so unrealistic for her to be feared by everyone, isn't it? Especially since she's actually rather pretty. Does such a thing exist?

That said, she, as well as Kazehaya, are balls-to-the-wall, jackhammer-to-the-nutbladder ADORABLE. My head almost spontaneously combusted when he was all "oh no did she actually mean it like that, stay strong, my heart .___." and then he was all blushy and hid his face and curled up and d'aww. I mean seriously now guys.

Does such a thing exist?

I had a friend in middle school who was very pretty. Not "conventionally" pretty, but pretty. However, she was very tall, tended to walk with a slouch, and was chronically shy. People outside of our circle didn't treat her very well.

So Yeah. It exists.

Also her name and appearance remind people of Sadako from The Ring. This combined with rumors that she talks to ghosts and curses people who hold eye contact with her, and some will be afraid no matter how pretty she might be. :)

In school,I was the strange kid,teased by everyone,and thought exactly like Sawako,to the point of getting excited over someone speaking to me. So yes,people that innocent and withdrawn exist.

edited 21st Jan '10 12:10:28 PM by AckSed

... Now I want to know more about this lady. Hmmm, tallness in a girl, I can see how that would be a problem... Tall people in general might have a problem with how much they stick out, it's unusual for a girl, and the feminine persuasion tends more towards depression... Hmmmmmmmmm....

... Watching episode 3 now. Haha, man, maybe I should've started liveblogging these. D'AWW LOOKIT 'IM HE COULDN'T LOOK HER IN THE EYES FOR MORE THAN THREE SECONDS BWAHAHAHA

Oho, the competition's moving in...! ... .. ... ... ... .. .......... very, very slowly. But that wavy-haired girl spells trouble, I just know it.

Also, "To Kuronuma, dammit" is awesome. Finally some natural communication going on between the two!

Dear god the guy acts like me. WHO ME IM NOT SHY WHATRE YOU TALKING ABOUT

... I said trouble! The wavy-haired girl is trouble, not help! ... or is that a different girl... ... Nevermind that, here comes Maru-chan! And Maru-chan means Sawako acts even more adorable than normally! MWEEEEHEEE "He answered! ^^"

... Holy Christ, everyone's gathering around her now. I've said it before and I'll say it again: "So is this the last episode now or what?" Who cares. Yosh!-pose with a deadpan face plus melodramatic "I was useful to everyone!" is awesome! ... ... ...........Smile! Yay!

... wait, what. Oh, come on! The first episode that actually ends with a cliffhanger! Like, actual conflict arising! I wanted to STOP for today! Argh!

So, uh. Looks like I just made a mini-liveblog for some reason.

PS: I'm watching it in better quality on watchanimeon.com now!

Put it this way: If she had carried herself differently, she probably could have become a model. She was just really, really introverted and had terrible self-esteem. It doesn't matter how objectively attractive you are—many people like to exploit weakness. It was obvious that she slouched because she felt self-conscious about her height, so that was one of the things that people chose to ridicule.

Of course, it didn't help that me and most of my friends were also of poorer stock than some of the people in the school. Many of the popular girls weren't all that attractive, but they did have a habit of being quite wealthy.