Quote:
Originally Posted by Himeji
I've got a question about that "Endless Eight" arc. Is it really eight episodes of all the same stuff, just slightly different each time? 
If so, doesn't it get boring? Should I watch this, or should I better skip it?
Please impart me with your wisdom, Haruhi experts  |
Oh boy, here we go...
Spoiler for Endless Eight Arc:
For the factual answers: The eight episodes cover the same period of time in a "time loop". Time "resets" at the end of each episode, and the next episode restarts at the same point in time. Each episode is entirely re-animated each time as if they were separate episodes; new voice acting, new musical scoring, new storyboarding... essentially, it's what happens if you give the same story outline to a bunch of different directors and tell them each to have at it.
If you are in a hurry, you should likely watch the first episode, any one or two of the middle episodes, and the eighth episode. This would give a pretty decent understanding of what's going on, and convey the basic sense of the arc pretty well.
I personally think that it's interesting to watch all eight episodes almost more from an analytical perspective. Seeing how each director did things differently -- the different storyboarding, the different musical selections, the subtly different character designs, the different way they act certain scenes... I think it's fascinating. And there's no doubt in my mind that the payoff at the end feels a lot more "triumphant" when you have an appreciation for what being stuck in a time loop might feel like.
A good number of people were infuriated by the Endless Eight arc because they felt they were being toyed with and that it was a waste of their time. The presumption on their part was that the time wasted on this arc could have been better spent animating further content from the series. This was later put into context with the announcement of the Disappearance Movie, which covers the arc that most novel readers were anticipating. The nearly-uncontested quality and success of the movie caused many fans to "forgive" the producers for Endless Eight... though some still question whether it was time-well spent. If nothing else, it stands as one of the most unique and memorable events in anime fandom over the last decade.
Incidentally, when watching the 2009 rendition of Haruhi, there is only one order -- the way it aired on TV, R2 DVDs (when the two seasons are assembled), and on the BD Boxset. The 2006 airing had a different broadcast over, but the 2009 repackaging basically renders that moot,
unless you wanted to try the original 2006 experience again. For all intents and purposes, the show makes most sense as a lead-in to the movie when watched as shown in 2009 (and that is arguably the primary reason for the 2009 re-launch).