Your lie in April

Episode 5

Well, it certainly can't be said that Your Lie in April isn't competently directed. Episode 5 had some of the best direction so far in a series that is consistently excellent on that front. There were glorious color palettes, dynamic close-ups, and most interestingly, some visual callbacks to earlier scenes that tell us more about how these characters feel about each other. (The show frames Kosei's thoughts of Kaori like his flashbacks to his mother, which has some intriguing implications.) Music was also used well this episode, even without a concert performance to unite it around. As usual, the psychological scenes were full of ambient minimalism with a touch of melodrama, like a major-key version of Evangelion's psychobabble scenes. All that stellar presentation is well and good, but what about the content?

This episode's greatest accomplishment is an argument in defense of itself. It establishes a strong argument against the idea that Kaori is being selfish about wanting Kosei as her accompanist, and that the show in any way promotes or is flippant toward emotional abuse. Your Lie in April understands far too well the abusive pressure Kosei has undergone and the toll it took on him, and episode 5 establishes that Kaori gets it too. She knows he's not an ordinary child prodigy and is also a potential liability to her competition career, but she needs him and needs to help him all the same. Actually, Kaori seems to understand what Kosei is going through a little too well, as if she's gone through the same experience.

It seems like Kaori is the "liar" of Your Lie in April's title. She's outright lying about her past to her friends, and possibly keeping information from them. She tells them when they visit her in the hospital that this is her first time passing out on stage, but in a later scene, Kaori looks out her hospital room window and says, "So I see. I passed out again." There are also hints that Kaori might have her own over-pressuring stage-parent, which is why she understands Kosei so well. She talks about her dad obsessing over her passing out—not unusual for a sick child, of course, but considering everything else, I have to wonder if there's more to the story there. I'm eager to find out just how much she's "lying" about and why.

This is the kind of thread I'd like to see the next few episodes of Your Lie in April explore further. On the other hand, as much as I gushed about Kosei's psychological scenes in past reviews, at this point I'm ready for Your Lie in April to move from there. It would be interesting if they were presenting new material, but it just keeps plumbing the well of "Kosei is frustrated that he can't hear music. He's really depressed and has some issues with his mom. He needs a push from his friends to live a little!" If there is criticism to be had of the show's approach to Kosei's issues, it's that it oversimplifies the "solution" to them. This hasn't bothered me yet because I suspect that in its 22-episode run, it will eventually do more with the issues, but at this point, I'm sick of hearing the same thing over and over. I worry that the show is overplaying its hand by presenting so much of this upfront.

Luckily, we also got new development on the relationship between Kosei and Kaori and their friends, Tsubaki and Watari. We saw more of how Tsubaki is reacting to all these events, and how she feels about Kosei and his apparent feelings for Kaori. Of course, this is going into well-worn love-triangle territory: "everyone wants the wrong person!" Tsubaki likes Kosei, he likes Kaori, she seems kind of interested in dating Watari, and Watari wants all the ladies (but mostly Kaori). It's the most cliché of Your Lie in April's plot threads, but I'm sure it can do something new with the concept once it really gets going. For now, Tsubaki is a fun, intriguing character who I'm eager to hear more from in coming weeks. She has a good balance of comic-relief traits and dramatic tension in her relationship with Kosei.

Your Lie in April is at a crossroads this week in terms of where it could go with all the different elements it's presented so far. The show has already developed its two main characters by leaps and bounds over only five episodes, but it could use its own push when it comes to other narrative momentum.

Rating: B+

Your Lie in April is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

Rose is a graduate student in musicology, who has written about anime and many other topics for LGBT site Autostraddle.com and her own blog. She tweets at @composerose.