January 23rd, 2014.
Fighting is Friendship (Seriously)
Well, Hikari’s back, and things are already too comfortable, so we are going to have to keep shaking them. I predict a returnee each time the drama pauses. Well, let’s see Hikari being back, and Miuna falling for him, and everything. After we exhale due to being punched in the gut, it’s time for a deep breath.
Shorter Asides:
- Not gonna go overboard with wallpaper shots this time, but this one still called out to me. Ok, ended up taking a couple more, here’s a small album.
- Cute :3 That Akira is so cute.
Thoughts and Notes:
1) Things Stay The Same:
1) Hikari is still Hikari, but why wouldn’t he be? For him just two days have passed.
2) The more things change, the more they stay the same. In other words, the author has a formula for this story, so isn’t deviating. Everything here is about unrequited love relationships. People have a crush, but always for someone who wishes for someone else. Only the adults get to have their love reciprocated, and seeing as it’s Akari who is the “Mother” archetype it’s even more pronounced.
3) The talk of bravado, and how it’s healthy, but a front. Akari-chan, you talk of it now, but as Miuna had noted, as I had noted, this is how Hikari had always been. And yes, that he always had to keep up such a front is quite telling, and it probably had been a toll on Hikari in the past. Is it the dead mother? The move to the shore school? Everything. Hikari felt he had to keep a brave face for everyone else, that I suspect he didn’t get to shed that mask since your mother had died, and until the other day when he broke down in front of Tsumugu. Unhealthy, bottling it up for so many years, though I guess we could ignore the 5 years he was frozen :P
2) Things Can’t Stay The Same:
1) Sayu could be having so many thoughts – Doesn’t want Miuna to “leave her”, meaning she’s in the same position as Chisaki had been 5 years ago, of not wanting change. Feeling left behind and thinking of Kaname… anything from jealousy of Miuna to jealousy of Hikari, to just fearing Miuna will get hurt, though I don’t think that’s what’s going on here.
2) Oh Sayu… the whole delivery, the whole discussion with Miuna, “Aw, you’re scary!” and the way she looks at her crossed, so very passive aggressive. Very venomous even. Sayu is hurt, so she lashes out at Miuna.
3) Sayu’s words hurt Miuna, for two reasons that bring us back to what happened last episode when she overheard Hikari and Tsumugu. First, she sees someone she cares for being hurt, and second, she realizes she keeps thinking of herself, and of what makes her happy, and doesn’t even think how others might see things. To be frank, I don’t think Miuna’s in the wrong here, but hurt is hurt.
4) “Girls fight so quickly but then make up so quickly. I don’t get it.” – You lived the cliché of fighting a guy and then becoming good friends with him, he just gave you a ride, you dork.
3) Things Change:
1) Swimming down the ray of light, this shot is all about “two worlds reaching for one another.” So Miuna hadgrown ena. It should be surprising, but it makes all sort of sense. The saltflake snow levels had increased dramatically, and it really seemed that she attracted saltflake snow, right? Like fish-scales. Furthermore, humans had been given ena by the Sea God, but that means he could give it to humans. No, I don’t buy that they had it to begin with, or we wouldn’t have people without. So, the Sea-God is moving things once more, making sure there are more humans with ena? Or perhaps it’s something semi-natural that has to do with the saltflake snow levels? Dunno.
Also, I was really surprised Miuna couldn’t swim, is swimming something only the people of the sea do, or only them and fishermen? Dunno, that was really weird to me.
2) And just as predicted, the episode ends with all the kids being swell with one another. No, nothing is resolved, but the conflict is truly burning low, so it’s just the right time for Kaname to come back :P
Oy, in the preview, Kaname is going to live with Chisaki :o
Post Episode Notes:
Well, this was a fun episode. It was nice to see how things change, but how we replicate the same behaviours we always have. Well, for the most part. Seeing the same weird love-form develop everywhere makes one think that’s all the author is capable of :p
The characters feel solid, the interactions feel solid, and when all is said and done, this was still a “relaxation” episode, before the next hit comes, even with Miuna and Sayu’s “fight”. In fact, if anything, that fight was areduction in drama, because as I had just said, it was repeating the same themes as before, it was showing us all is normal. Change is scary, change is dramatic, and that argument had been anything but a change.
But now Kaname is back, and Miuna got an ena, so things are going to hit the fan, hard. I’m excited.
Geekorner-Geekulture. 
