So I could hardly call myself a big fan of Japanese anime before I watched this series and now after having finished it, I still do not really think I can call myself a big fan. In the months I have been at university I have become a lot more open minded about it. Basically I don't feel I personally can say 'I don't like anime' because I've come to realise that it is such a massive form of media, it would be like saying 'I don't like TV'. There is so much of it, and it is so diverse that there is really something for everyone. I now like to approach different types of media with the simple idea that it does not matter what format it is in, as long as it's got good characters and good story then I'll watch it.
The Melacholy of Haruhi Suzumiya is basically unlike anything I've ever seen before, let alone anime. It's centred around a high school student with the nickname Kyon (his true name is never mentioned). He meets a new girl in school called Haruhi Suzumiya who apart from the tendency to behave erratic and an apparent bipolar disorder is just a normal high school student. Or so it seems. Out of boredom she decides to create a club called the S.O.S Brigade of which she drags Kyon into, along with three other high school students. These three other high school students all appear to be typical anime stereotypes, the silent bookworm, the smug, mysterious transfer student and the ditsy, attractive student. But actually these people turn out to be extraordinary in different ways and then it is revealed that Haruhi, the most extraordinary of all, without realising it, is actually god and although without knowing it, anything she thinks of becomes reality.
The premise is bonkers yet I feel very, very clever and as the series goes on the series only becomes more and more complicated and more and more deep. The reason it is unlike anything I've ever seen is because the creators of this show have obviously dedicated a huge amount of time and attention to every minut detail and instead of following a predictable format that you think might occur in the very first episode it completely u-turns and takes you in a completely different direction. Firstly, the tone is like a yo-yo, one minute it's all happy, bright colours, upbeat jazz music with the characters playing baseball. The next, our hopelessly lively protagonist is discussing the insignificance of their existences or causing another character incredible distress.
The creators obviously pay huge attention to detail because it's not all just arty over-the-top shots, although it has to be said there are many arty, over-the-top shots. They all add to the tone, for example, there is a final scene in an episode that feels strangely unnerving, even though nothing disastrous or traumatic happens, it's all built up by the shots and background sound. The episode ends with a shot of a clock ticking but it's angled like the frames is resting on the second hand and we, the viewers, follow the clock round for a good twenty seconds, then it ends. Nothing jumps out, there is no creepy music in the background, it is simply the work of the animators incredible attention to detail.
Secondly, this show is unlike anything I've ever seen before because to me it seems to happily break all the rules of traditional storytelling. What I mean by this is that a typical episode of television to me has a beginning, middle and end, there's a conflict, it's resolved, a character learns their lesson, everything goes back to normal etc. Yet in Haruhi, there's an episode where a good 20 percent of the run time is taken up by a static shot of a central character reading a book alone in a room while outside we hear the voices of some sort of drama class rehearsing. It doesn't seem to have any connection to anything and I can see why it might have bored some people to death, but to me I was fascinated by it. It reminded me of a lesson I learnt from someone where they said when it comes to making a series, don't be afraid of the quiet. So much of real life is made up of the quiet, sitting in a room, staring, not everything has to matter. But we never see that on TV or in movies, we assume everything has to matter.
To me that wasn't even the biggest example of rule breaking. To me that came in series 2 that was released 7 years after the previous, when 8 episodes were essentially the exact same episode just slightly different each time, e.g. the clothes of the characters would be different, the dialogue might be slightly altered and the shots were different. But basically, it was exactly the same episode 8 times in a row. This angered fans and even though I found it fascinating as I'd never seen anything like it. They felt they were being cheated by having to wait seven years for the second series and then waiting a week for each episode to be shown exactly the same episode every week. But, going back to the incredible attention to detail thing I mentioned, this was all for a reason that was revealed later in the movie. But at the time fans didn't understand this, they simply felt like they were being conned or 'trolled'. But it has to be said, animation, particularly by Haruhi Suzumiya standards is incredibly expensive and time consuming. I highly doubt they created The Endless Eight just to infuriate fans of the series.
To conclude, it isn't perfect, but as a work of art Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya is an incredibly inventive, different and brave series that can be enjoyed, amazed, saddened, infuriated and baffled by anyone, not just anime fans.
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