Forum - View topicThis Week in Anime - Bedknobs and Bunny Girl Senpai
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Seagloom
Posts: 276 |
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Entertainment value. This Week in Anime isn't really a review column. It's very casual and more about getting a kick out of the columnists' reaction to a given series than insightful analysis. While there is no such thing as an objective review, I don't hold these columns to any serious standard because of the format. It's more like reading a chatlog as the disclaimer points out. If you want a traditional review of this movie, Kim Morrissy posted one last year when it hit Japanese theaters: animenewsnetwork.com/review/rascal-does-not-dream-of-a-dreaming-girl/.148244 |
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liquidblueocean
Posts: 25 |
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This wasn't entertaining, not even comedic. It was only people forced to watch what they already disliked beforehand, except for readers who like reading real pain or desperate jokes clutching for any negative jibe. I wish ANN wouldn't do this sometimes, but I guess not everyone can be available for a target market. It would be better to choose a different title in that instance tho. |
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Seagloom
Posts: 276 |
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YMMV, of course. There are readers that enjoy seeing someone trash content. Like those who vote for certain shows following the preview guide in hopes of seeing James Beckett perform an encore of his Hand Shakers reviews. Personally, I only occasionally read This Week in Anime depending on where I see it going and who is participating. Once you get a feel for the tastes of the four columnists it gets fairly easy to predict what you're in for at a glance. |
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grooven
Posts: 1424 Location: Canada |
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The movie was alright, but then the spoiler[Angel Beats!] similarities were just too much. And the prior did it much better. Then turned into spoiler[Steins Gate] for the second part. In the end, it was good, but I was expecting something that hadn't been done before.
The whole series in general just reminds me of borrowed a ton of Haruhi elements and mixed aspects from visual novels. Even the protagonist feels like a copy of Kyon. |
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Hiroki not Takuya
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a_Bear_in_Bearcave
Posts: 509 Location: Poland |
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First, negative TWiA are often entertaining, and this was as well, not that it was that negative even, as you can clearly read they did like some parts of it. Also, they didn't hate the TV series, they were just lukewarm about it and let's be fair, not without reasons. They also said the movie was worse then series, which - as someone who enjoyed the series and just watched the movie with disappointment - I definitely agree on. The movie started with jealousy driven harem shenanigans that were already annoying in the series - and if you pretend it didn't have with Araragi-style girlfriend + harem you are just being blind, and went on with too forced drama that was resolved without any consequences too anything. One of good points of Bakemonogatari series is that Araragi learns that being suicidal hero ready to sacrifice everything for others is not a good thing actually, but here despite being Monogatari-lite they clearly ignored that lesson. Anime fans should understand that reviews aren't places for circlejerks in writing, they for honest opinions, including negative opinions about thing you like, and it's absolutely OK. |
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Josephine Martin
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The two people who have written this chatlog article seem like they are trying way too hard to demean the series and movie. While reading the conversational article, I kinda got the picture of those middle aged neighborhood Women (Karens) slandering about something good that they cannot comprehend. I mean come on, are you seriously nitpicking with stuff like bland MC, Mai not doing anything throughout the film, Sakuta's selfishly selfless and self-destructive pathology, etc? But I guess it is okay with you guys when All Might and Deku talk about the same feeling of self sacrifice through self destruction but it is so tough to accept it when a powerless teenage boy like Sakuta does so to save the people he cares about. The article itself is not funny and no way smart but rather trying to sound like it. It's like Brian from Family Guy is having a conversation with Cartman from South Park.
Anyways, ANN clearly states that "The views and opinions expressed by the participants in this chatlog are not the views of Anime News Network." Anime News Network's official review by Kim Morrissy perfectly captures the feeling and essence of the movie and rates it A-. Better read that than this chatlog. PS: The people who are saying this is a Harem anime, seriously, watch the series or read the LN before making such comments. |
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Jack_Knight
Posts: 3 |
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I think Steve and Nick, the people who wrote the chat article did not understand the movie. Can't blame them though, it is a complex movie. Even I had to watch it twice to fully understand the complexities of the plot. And yeah, it was quite disappointing to see the stupid nitpicking they were doing. It is a clever movie, but if you can't be smart enough to understand it then just don't write pseudo-intellectual articles.
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Jack_Knight
Posts: 3 |
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[quote="Hiroki not Takuya"]
It is your loss man. It is one of the best anime movies I have ever seen. But love it or hate it, I would suggest to experience something fully before having opinions on it. |
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lossthief
ANN Reviewer
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Well consider me curious! I'm always open to hearing others explain their opinions, so I'd love to hear what it is about this movie you feel we missed or misunderstood. |
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BodaciousSpacePirate
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I don't want to speak for the authors, but a ton of people find this kind of behavior a lot more endearing in Shonen Jump superhero stories than in a series that is supposed be occupying the same market space as Monogatari Series or Oregairu. Even if they didn't, acts of self-sacrifice are a tremendous appeal to the audience's emotions, and there are noticeable differences between the emotions that a narrative is trying to tap into when it shows me someone who "sacrifices himself for others" and the emotions that a narrative is trying to tap into when it shows me someone who "sacrifices himself for the people he cares about". To that end, I'd love to discuss the ways this film could be considered the Nadesico to Oregairu's Evangelion, or even the GaoGaiGar to Average Ability's Brain Powerd. 
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a_Bear_in_Bearcave
Posts: 509 Location: Poland |
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I've never seen in Hero Academia straight out recommendation of suicidal sacrifice. Confronting more powerful enemy that can easily kill you when this is only way to protect others is different then literally deciding to die so other person can get your heart. Besides, they're explicitly teaching kids they're not supposed to getting themselves in danger, and Deku is many times reprimanded for putting his body at risk. His mother almost takes him out of Academy 'cause he keeps getting in hospital, and he agrees with her right worry, while Sakuta is willing to leave his still recovering sister alone. If they didn't have her recovery arc before, would he still be willing to die? Mai could take care of her in his palce after all, so it's all good, right? And again, in Monogatari Series Araragi's self-destructive heroism is eventually confronted, mainly in Mayoi's later arcs, while here Sakuta's still willing to replay last few years after losing Mai to try and change fate, even though there were chance he wouldn't meet Mai on time and she'd just disappear, so he didn't learn a thing about being forced to accept his powerlessness. People defending the movie from critics should stop treating them as some dumb haters and imply it's just question of taste in genres. I actually really enjoyed the TV series - and the reviewers enjoyed them more them disliked them, as they wrote last time, and that was written before well-liked Kaede arc - and enjoyed movie too, even it was the 1.5 hours of the weakest stuff the series offered, enough to give it 7/10 (probably biased due too liking series). Not that disliking stuff means one can't criticize it properly, of course. The problem with movie was also that it was set straight after strongest arc in series, based on family conflict instead of tennage love problems, and where Sakuta actually *had* too accept his loss of Panda Imouto version of Kaede, and started with dumb harem shenanigans immediately setting to disappointment. It was nice to see Mai again, even if she was forced all movie too accept being second priority girlfriend after Sakuta's first love, but we've barely seen what happened to Kaede for example. Most of the crew barely showed up in movie, and Shouko as either sickly sad girl or mysterious homewrecker wasn't good enough replacement for previous arcs heroines. |
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Jack_Knight
Posts: 3 |
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There are no multiple timelines, just Shoko's dreams and the real life, this is the one where the story continues. You see: Shoko's thing (the little one as she is presented at the beggining of the movie 3 years ago) is that she can run future simulations in her dreams (that's the "Dreaming Girl" thing in the movie and novel title) so she can have a life where she gets a heart donor and continue with her life and do all the stuff she wants to (go to the University, have a husband, etc...). She also has the power to reset the simulation via back-traveling over it and tweak until she finds her ideal future. (As evidenced by we see her in the series meeting Sakuta on the beach but later he conforms that there was no one in the school by that name) In the first run she got Sakuta's heart and goes to the university, but wants to save Sakuta too so he can live a happy life with Mai, so she goes back in time (into the simulation) to start a new run. It doesn't matter if she doesn't live as she already encouraged and accepted her fate. In this 2nd run she plans to save Sakuta telling him that he will die and giving wrong info about the accident (she would know that if she gave him correct info he would sacrifice anyways for the Little Shoko) but things go different and it is Mai who ends sacrificing herself for Sakuta and giving her heart to Shoko. Shoko did not expect this. She managed to save Sakuta but at the cost of Mai's life. Shoko still isn't happy with this future as Sakuta feels a deep grief for Mai's death, so she starts a new simulation run but now makes Sakuta go back in time and do the job himself. In this 3rd run neither Mai nor Sakuta die but Shoko will do as she hasn't got a heart donor. This is where Sakuta realizes that he meeting Shoko is what is making her worry about the future and hence got her Puberty Syndrome so to make sure she never has it ,he has to never meet her. They are still in the future simulation, Sakuta knows it and he also knows that the future simulation will end soon as Shoko is dying there. Sakuta and Mai realize this and hence they cry their hearts out because they know they are in a simulation and so Mai offers the pencil to Sakuta and tells him to write her a message on the questionnaire. Sakuta draws a flower on it meaning that young Shoko had done a great job (ganbata na). The simulation finishes, little Shoko never meets Sakuta on the beach nor with Hayate under the rain. But this little Shoko has a renewed hope, courage and a new outlook at life. At the beginning of the movie we see young shoko struggling to finish the questionnaire of "My Future Goals", but after finishing the simulation and meeting Sakuta and Mai, she has found a new will to live. She may die soon in a few years but she does not regret it because she has experienced a life and love that not many people have the good fortune of knowing. Hence, we see the same scene towards the end of the movie but Shoko completes the questionnaire, then smiles and says "Sensei, I finished it". The drawback of the simulation is that everyone who participated in it and are entangled will keep fuzzy memories of it's events as cognitive dreams in real life (this also happens between future simulation runs). These fuzzy memories are the ones that trigger the characters to do stuff like Sakuta getting enrolled in Minegahara High School Beacuse he dreamed about an unknown girl from that school meeting him at the beach, Mai accepting the main role in that movie about a girl with a heart disease because she dreamed of a girl with it (Shoko) and so. The movie raised heart disease awareness so there were more heart donors available and Shoko got one from someone else who wasn't Sakuta or Mai. Then on January 6th during a date and walking on the beach they sight Shoko and her parents, and he gets to remember her due the fuzzy memories (Just like he remembered Mai in the first volume). I could go into further more details but that would be very long here is the crux of it. The Japanese film goers were also given a short light novel something that we in USA and Canada did not get. This short LN acts as an epilogue to the film and clears up the confusion of Shoko's syndrome. PS. I have also read the next volume 8. It is not like Sakuta has remembered everything about Shoko and her simulation. He has remembered her name and some good memories. He has no memories of Mai's death or other negative things. Last edited by Jack_Knight on Fri Apr 24, 2020 11:21 am; edited 2 times in total |
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Josephine Martin
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Before replying, I will make this clear that I am caught up to the latest volume 10 of LN which released in February, 2020. Read Jack_Knight 's summary above. It is a concise and to-the-point summary of the movie. Also, Sakuta would have met Mai and they would have dated either way. That was etched in stone. When Shoko tells Sakuta the truth in the hospital and Mai arrives there she also tell them that in her first run of future simulation, after Sakuta meets with the accident, it was Mai who informed the young Shoko that it was Sakuta's heart that she received, thus telling us that in the first future run too Mai and Sakuta were dating. So, in two full simulations plus one real future of the end, everything remains same except Shoko herself. Anyways, in the series, Sakuta meets Mai before he meets Shoko ; so nothing would change upto the point where Shoko meets the cat Hayate in the rain. Only her decisions change but they don't have the consequences on other people's lives. Only the people who were in close contact with Shoko had the dreams in real future. Again, I stress, it is the same timeline and not multiple timelines hence other major things like relationships do not change. The close peers like Sakuta and Mai take minor decisions in benevolence towards Shoko, like Sakuta donates money to charity (highly possible that a heart transplant charity) and Mai taking on the role in the movie that spreads awareness. That indirectly ends up saving Shoko's life. Do not worry about Kaede, the author hasn't forgotten her. The entire volume 8 of LN is based on the post amnesia Kaede along with character resolution of young Shoko. 
Also also also, do not worry about Mai...the entire Volume 9 of LN deals solely on Sakuta, his relationship with his mom and a whole lot of Mai (believe me, if vol 9 gets adapted then everyone will have their minds blown). Sakuta also matures a lot in the next 2 volumes. 
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a_Bear_in_Bearcave
Posts: 509 Location: Poland |
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Thank you both for the extensive write-up. I'm glad there seem to be good material ahead. |
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