Yesterday, 8:11 PM
His and Her Circumstances - The Most Perfect Mixed Bag
Anime Relations:
Kareshi Kanojo no Jijou
In 1998, after making all of the money from Evangelion, Studio Gainax got together and said, "All right. Time to make a rom-com. And we're going to inject it with all of the personality." And that's exactly what they did when making His and Her Circumstances, one of the wildest rides anime has ever taken me on.
Kare Kano, as it's sometimes called, is a high school romance, but far from a typical one. For starters, this show sets a blistering pace. No, that is not a critique. I love me some momentum in my anime romances - it's one of my favorite things about Toradora too - and the pacing philosophy of this series seems to be, "why waste time on one idea when you can do lots of ideas?" And amazingly, it does that really, really well! It never feels rushed or underdeveloped, which I largely credit to the character writing: Yukino Miyazawa and Souichirou Arima are an absolute blast.
Miyazawa and Arima are the top 2 students in high school. Attractive, good at sports, smart, helpful, well-loved by both teachers and fellow students (Kaguya-sama, anyone?). But each of them has a dark secret to, or rather a dark reason for their success, neither of which I will spoil. Suffice it to say that they are my newly-minted favorite romantic duo in anime, and frankly, it's not particularly close. Not only are they incredibly sweet together, they are incredibly funny, mature (sometimes), thoughtful, and each excel on their own on-screen just as much as with each other. Their supporting cast features Tamaki from Ouran High School Host Club, a suspiciously Taiga-looking shrimp of a girl, and a smattering of equally fun family members and friends.
I said I attribute the excellent pacing to the character writing, but that's not entirely true. Shiro Sagisu's score deserves every bit as much credit as anything else, for one. But this show was directed by the man himself, Hideaki Anno, fresh off of Evangelion, and he injects so much life and personality into this series. Featuring the stark lighting and Dutch angles that Osamu Dezaki pioneered in the 70s and 80s, the full-screen text almost serving as punctuation that Akiyuki Shinbou would later make famous in Monogatari, the abstraction, random live-action shots, and sketch-lines that Anno himself made famous (or perhaps infamous) in Evangelion, the slow scrolls over colored-in manga panels that One Punch Man Season 3 would take all the wrong lessons from, and even an episode almost entirely animated on cardstock and popsicle sticks! And it's the funniest episode of anime I've ever seen! Some of this is deliberately in service of the characters, some of it is purely comedic, and some of it is, and I quote, "because Anno wanted it that way."
Episodes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 25, 15p2, 16, 17, 18, 25, 19, 25, and 24p1 of His and Her Circumstances are, bar none, the best comedy anime I've ever seen. And probably the best romance I've ever seen. It's up there with Nana, at the very least. However, eagle-eyed readers may notice that that's not all the episodes. Nor are they in the right order. Nor are they all even entire episodes!
Kare Kano, for all its enormous strengths, might be the most troubled anime production I've ever heard of. Anno, breaking down from the stress of directing, stepped down to a supporting role after episode 15, and while the next few episodes are still extremely good (the cardstock+popsicle episode is #19), the cracks began to show after that. But truthfully, even before then, issues could be noticed. Episodes 14, 15p1, and eventually 24p2 are all recaps. And episodes 20-23 are just, well, bland. They're not even bad, really. They're focused on a culture fest, a surprisingly chiché topic for a series which had skillfully avoided such things, and its execution is just . . . fine. I have to wonder if viewers at the time thought of these in the same way that Endless Eight would be seen a decade later.
Episode 25 (the mysterious jumping episode up above) is entirely anime-original, and could theoretically be placed almost anywhere, and it's hilarious. But it's the semifinal episode of the show! It feels aggressively out of place where it is. And the finale itself? Well, let me just say that it's a serious contender for the worst final episode I've ever seen. Once again, not because anything in it was outright terrible on its own, it's just, like, there. There's no finality at all. Say what you want about Evangelion's last two episodes, but those knew what characters arcs needed to be completed, and by golly they accomplished that.
So all that being said, where does that leave me when rating this anime? I'd normally expect to say something like "this is the hardest show I've ever had to rate," but it's actually super, super easy for me.
It's a 10/10.
Seems odd. My thoughts on this bear a striking similarity to Maison Ikkoku, which I gave a 4. Why would this be so different?
Well for starters, the quality is less stark. The best parts of Kare Kano run circles around the best parts of Maison Ikkoku (ok, maybe that's a slight exaggeration), and its worst parts are only kinda mediocre. Then there's the length. Maison Ikkoku left me in agony for 45 nearly-continuous episodes, Kare Kano left me in mild annoyance for 5. More deeply though, the rough episodes of Kare Kano can just be ignored. They depend on precious little from the preceding work, and there's nothing in them that retroactively ruins the masterpiece that came before. Said masterpiece even has its own ending! Episode 24 part 1 - an abstract, thoughtful, introspective, emotional look into the psyches of our young couple and how and why they love each other (sound familiar?) - feels like an epilogue all on its own. Even the show's creators said it would have been better as the finale.
So in the end, I'm not really torn at all. Is it inconsistent with how I usually rate things? Yep. I make a point of striving towards holisticity, after all, and I hardly expect that to change. But the things this series left me with - the fun I had, the tears I shed, the emotions it showed me, and the awe I felt - leave me very, very content.
10/10
Shout-out to the rewatch group on r/anime, they were a lot of fun to discuss the series with.
Kare Kano, as it's sometimes called, is a high school romance, but far from a typical one. For starters, this show sets a blistering pace. No, that is not a critique. I love me some momentum in my anime romances - it's one of my favorite things about Toradora too - and the pacing philosophy of this series seems to be, "why waste time on one idea when you can do lots of ideas?" And amazingly, it does that really, really well! It never feels rushed or underdeveloped, which I largely credit to the character writing: Yukino Miyazawa and Souichirou Arima are an absolute blast.
Miyazawa and Arima are the top 2 students in high school. Attractive, good at sports, smart, helpful, well-loved by both teachers and fellow students (Kaguya-sama, anyone?). But each of them has a dark secret to, or rather a dark reason for their success, neither of which I will spoil. Suffice it to say that they are my newly-minted favorite romantic duo in anime, and frankly, it's not particularly close. Not only are they incredibly sweet together, they are incredibly funny, mature (sometimes), thoughtful, and each excel on their own on-screen just as much as with each other. Their supporting cast features Tamaki from Ouran High School Host Club, a suspiciously Taiga-looking shrimp of a girl, and a smattering of equally fun family members and friends.
I said I attribute the excellent pacing to the character writing, but that's not entirely true. Shiro Sagisu's score deserves every bit as much credit as anything else, for one. But this show was directed by the man himself, Hideaki Anno, fresh off of Evangelion, and he injects so much life and personality into this series. Featuring the stark lighting and Dutch angles that Osamu Dezaki pioneered in the 70s and 80s, the full-screen text almost serving as punctuation that Akiyuki Shinbou would later make famous in Monogatari, the abstraction, random live-action shots, and sketch-lines that Anno himself made famous (or perhaps infamous) in Evangelion, the slow scrolls over colored-in manga panels that One Punch Man Season 3 would take all the wrong lessons from, and even an episode almost entirely animated on cardstock and popsicle sticks! And it's the funniest episode of anime I've ever seen! Some of this is deliberately in service of the characters, some of it is purely comedic, and some of it is, and I quote, "because Anno wanted it that way."
Episodes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 25, 15p2, 16, 17, 18, 25, 19, 25, and 24p1 of His and Her Circumstances are, bar none, the best comedy anime I've ever seen. And probably the best romance I've ever seen. It's up there with Nana, at the very least. However, eagle-eyed readers may notice that that's not all the episodes. Nor are they in the right order. Nor are they all even entire episodes!
Kare Kano, for all its enormous strengths, might be the most troubled anime production I've ever heard of. Anno, breaking down from the stress of directing, stepped down to a supporting role after episode 15, and while the next few episodes are still extremely good (the cardstock+popsicle episode is #19), the cracks began to show after that. But truthfully, even before then, issues could be noticed. Episodes 14, 15p1, and eventually 24p2 are all recaps. And episodes 20-23 are just, well, bland. They're not even bad, really. They're focused on a culture fest, a surprisingly chiché topic for a series which had skillfully avoided such things, and its execution is just . . . fine. I have to wonder if viewers at the time thought of these in the same way that Endless Eight would be seen a decade later.
Episode 25 (the mysterious jumping episode up above) is entirely anime-original, and could theoretically be placed almost anywhere, and it's hilarious. But it's the semifinal episode of the show! It feels aggressively out of place where it is. And the finale itself? Well, let me just say that it's a serious contender for the worst final episode I've ever seen. Once again, not because anything in it was outright terrible on its own, it's just, like, there. There's no finality at all. Say what you want about Evangelion's last two episodes, but those knew what characters arcs needed to be completed, and by golly they accomplished that.
So all that being said, where does that leave me when rating this anime? I'd normally expect to say something like "this is the hardest show I've ever had to rate," but it's actually super, super easy for me.
It's a 10/10.
Seems odd. My thoughts on this bear a striking similarity to Maison Ikkoku, which I gave a 4. Why would this be so different?
Well for starters, the quality is less stark. The best parts of Kare Kano run circles around the best parts of Maison Ikkoku (ok, maybe that's a slight exaggeration), and its worst parts are only kinda mediocre. Then there's the length. Maison Ikkoku left me in agony for 45 nearly-continuous episodes, Kare Kano left me in mild annoyance for 5. More deeply though, the rough episodes of Kare Kano can just be ignored. They depend on precious little from the preceding work, and there's nothing in them that retroactively ruins the masterpiece that came before. Said masterpiece even has its own ending! Episode 24 part 1 - an abstract, thoughtful, introspective, emotional look into the psyches of our young couple and how and why they love each other (sound familiar?) - feels like an epilogue all on its own. Even the show's creators said it would have been better as the finale.
So in the end, I'm not really torn at all. Is it inconsistent with how I usually rate things? Yep. I make a point of striving towards holisticity, after all, and I hardly expect that to change. But the things this series left me with - the fun I had, the tears I shed, the emotions it showed me, and the awe I felt - leave me very, very content.
10/10
Shout-out to the rewatch group on r/anime, they were a lot of fun to discuss the series with.
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johneaston
| Yesterday, 8:11 PM |
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