Forum - View topicSound! Euphonium (TV + movies + OAV).
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Vaisaga
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A bit disappointed they didn't stick with the novel ending, but I'm not particularly upset about it since there was no build up to it. Would have felt like an asspull.
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vonPeterhof
Posts: 729 |
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So yeah, there was no way to make the novel ending work on the romantic front without rewriting Shuuichi's arc almost from scratch. Granted, their relationship is expanded a bit in short stories in the fourth book and the fan book (I only just got to the story in the former and I don't have the latter, so can't comment on those yet), but those came out after the third book and there wasn't really enough time left to insert them into the last episode. A part of me actually wanted the anime staff to adapt the third novel's epilogue word for word, just for the sight of both Kumiko/Reina and Kumiko/Shuuichi camps freaking out and blaming "KyoAni" for half-assing it, but eh, what we did get is fine too 
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Vaisaga
Posts: 13224 |
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It's that sort of undeveloped aspect that an adaptation has the opportunity to expand upon so yeah, I will say KyoAni should have fleshed that out rather than dump in more yuri bait that doesn't actually go anywhere.
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vonPeterhof
Posts: 729 |
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@Vaisaga That was an option, but personally I prefer what the anime team ended up doing, as romance was never the main point of the book or the show.
If by "more yuri bait that doesn't actually go anywhere" you mean the stuff between Kumiko and Asuka in the final episode, I would agree that they lay it on a bit too thick at times. I don't think they were consciously trying to paint it as yuri (to me it seemed like they were trying a little too hard to work in more parallels to Kumiko's relationship with Mamiko), but it certainly did end up giving a yuri vibe that wasn't all that visible before. Still, I felt the conclusion worked very well. |
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killjoy_the
 Posts: 2459 |
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So I'm gonna be the odd one out and say the last episode was the worst of the season. It felt really lazy how it was entirely filled with flashbacks to season 1 scenes scattered about - it didn't really seem that they were making a single point, just 'hey, remember this plot point you didn't actually care about all that much?'. That and a freaking name drop.
There were of course good parts. Kumiko's talk with Asuka and the general feel of the graduation party the juniors gave the seniors in the first half were well done. |
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DuskyPredator
 Posts: 15457 Location: Brisbane, Australia |
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Episode 13 (finale)
Yeah, knew that Yuuko would be the new president, and Natsuki baking her up as VP. Character development, that is kind of what pushed Yuuko from her adversarial role into one I quite like, and it was not through doing any big scenes but showing awareness and depth of her character. The same sort of thing that made Natsuki awesome in the first season. But this final episode was all about Kumiko’s relationship with Asuka, and it was great, that Kumiko’s relationship with Asuka meant a lot, and in a totally non-romantic way. It is kind of like one of the other major parts of the season which was Kumiko’s love of her sister, a senior to look up to. Kind of great as Asuka was the character I liked a lot from the first episode, and reading the episode review, the observation that Asuka was a reflection of parts Kumiko did not like about herself, that is great. If there was something that was a little incomplete with this season, it might be the Kumiko x Reina side. The framing has seemed to be very strong on the romance side, maybe strongest KyoAni has done, but it just kind of fell a bit as Kumiko was distracted by other things as Reina found out about the wife thing. At the very least it seems to have been something from Kumiko’s point of view, something about her character, and it felt beyond the stuff Free did. All I can think is that it was not the focus here that maybe something that would go through the characters after show. It is as much worth discussion if we can talk about Yuri on Ice. I still really like Kumiko, she has been a draw since the beginning of the series. For other aspects of the show, it maybe even comes out that it is of such high quality that you just get used to it, such consistent good work with animation, framing, and everything else, means that as it goes on there is nothing that stands out from the rest of the series. I give a rating of Very good (8/10), the second season is a worthy sequel to the first, it sounds, looks, and feels great, with some more great follow up arcs. But maybe not the same power into arcs that were a big deal in the first season. |
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yuna49
 Posts: 3804 |
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I didn't see any evidence of a romantic relationship between Asuka and Kumiko at any point in this show. Kumiko's final speech summed it up well: She originally disliked Asuka to the point of hatred, then admired her in a senpai-kohei way, and eventually moved on to "loving" her as a friend. But then I've always seen Kumiko as heterosexual despite the scene on the mountain in season one. That was the real "yuri bait" in Euphonium, and as we saw, it doesn't go anywhere. I was disappointed that Reina dropped out of the picture this season. I would have liked to see her interact more with Asuka and Kumiko as they all have rather different personalities. Reina's crush on Taki-sensei was understandable but should have been dispensed with much sooner. It it distracted us from the more appealing features of her character like her determination and subtle wit. The whole Nozomi/Mizore arc was another unnecessary distraction that I found boring. The fact that it ends so abruptly and plays so little role in the remainder of the story just illustrates its unimportance. I would have sacrificed all of that to see more of Asuka's problems at home which were much too conveniently whisked under the table once she scored so highly in national exams. Aside from the music, and Asuka, I didn't get nearly as much enjoyment from this installment as the first season. I gave it a seven at MAL, compared to an eight for season one, but some of that score reflects Eupho's high production values. Otherwise I would have scored Eupho 2 a five or six. |
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vonPeterhof
Posts: 729 |
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On a more serious note, having just now revisited the episode I think I appreciate it better. The parallelism with the Mamiko resolution from the previous episode still feels a little heavy-handed, but I can see how Kumiko thinking of Asuka for more than half the episode is important buildup, and how her spitting out exactly how her feelings towards her senpai have changed is an important indicator of character growth, which has been much more pronounced in the anime than in the novel. |
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Gatherum
 Posts: 773 Location: Aurora CO |
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Well, I just finished Sound! Euphonium's second season. It's as good as a drama as the first season, though I couldn't help but feel as if the musical development of the band itself took something of a back seat this time around. It's not too much of a criticism since, in its place, we got a lot of individual character development and exploration.
My least favourite thing about it was probably spoiler[Reina's obsession with Taki. The first season gave us hints at an infatuation--and even a confession of love for him (though not to him)--but given its execution, their respective positions, and her relationship with Kumiko, it was easy for the viewer to assume it was just an infatuation. Season 2 ramped it all the way up to complete romantic angst. There wasn't anything necessarily wrong with this, and was really more of a shipper's issue than anything else. It just lessened the impact of the whole Kumiko-Reina shoujo-ai thing for which they were pushing previously. It's like it was dropped, entirely and awkwardly.] Ultimately, though, I wasn't too upset about it because the show spoiler[gets all the other relationships "right" and pretty much replaces the Kumiko-Reina lean anyway (more on that further down). I was super afraid that they were going to shoehorn a romance between Kumiko and Shuichi, which would have been tantamount to pettiness because while the latter was shown to have some feelings for the former, Kumiko was never shown to be anything but dismissive and awkward around him--and not in a she-thinks-she-might-actually-like-him-but-is-too-proud-or-shy-to-admit-it kind of way. This clear lack of chemistry was maintained all the way to the end, and I was relieved and thrilled at this because few anime have the strength of restraint to keep that up. And yes, I am aware that such a romance is given greater credence in the light novels, but that only extends my appreciation of the anime adaptation for leaving it out.] What I was very happy with was spoiler[the handling of Asuka. She was, all around, the most complex and probably best character in the series. Her arc sparked some genuine sadness, especially since the viewer wasn't made to be certain about whether or not she would return to the band. It was also, logistically, one of the best-handled arcs I know, since it also addressed the tension between Kumiko and her sister, and used the punchline thereof as the catalyst for Asuka's resolution. Two birds, one stone, but neither of the birds felt underdeveloped. I was slightly bothered by the direct involvement of Kumiko at some level in every major conflict in this season (she really didn't need to be involved in the Nozomi-Mizore debacle), but this conflict was used to grow Kumiko herself as well, from a passive observer to someone with an emotional stake in the things happening around her. It was fitting that she was ultimately the person to convince Asuka to rejoin the band, and it was thus fitting that Asuka would seem to become the new object of her affections.] That last point may be the overly-passive (in the grand scheme of most works) shipper in me, but in witnessing spoiler[Kumiko's confession to Asuka at the very end, I felt much more convinced of the former's affections than of the Kumiko-Reina "confessions of love" in the previous season. Asuka's answer was very...Asuka (she's almost like the Han Solo of the series in this regard), but even seemingly unrequited, and even if there wasn't a whole lot of time to develop Kumiko's realizations that led to this confession, it somehow didn't feel forced. It felt like a worthy turnout for a series full of Kyoto Animation's somewhat infamous homo-baiting. It's been suggested that it was more of a sisterly confession than anything, and I could see that, but as a convinced Asuka-Kumiko shipper, I like to think it was a bit more. This is one of those times when I am really not bothered about the idea that I have simply taken the bait. It was also one of a couple of things that allowed the series to continue its trend of not tying itself down to the ostensible four main heroines. The series essentially ended with Asuka, Kumiko, and a small Reina cameo, with Hazuki and Sapphire hardly even having much screentime this season.] The show was definitely not shy about its flexibility, and that earned it extra points for me. I am not sure if I will give it a 9 or a 10. Probably the latter, since I left it satisfied with every story thread. It was melancholy, but complete. |
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