[Sushi-Y]

Holy cow, is Hinamizawa famous for producing people with superhuman powers or something? People getting tossed/blown against walls like they're made of paper...

But still, hurting my beloved Satoko... Shion... 許せない

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Now then, for some general comments.

To start off, I'd like to say that the flow of the episode was not bad. It's much more composed compared to the earlier chapters (where events flew by at light speeds) However, there were a few points in the episode were the development would suddenly jump ahead, leave you hanging for a bit before you can catch up. For game players like me, we can follow the story easily enough (by filling in the missing spots with what we already know from the game), but I wonder if the anime watchers can keep up with the story. It's also possible that all the swappings between Mion and Shion can become confusing too.

Oh the other hand, the animation quality was quite stable. Satoshi's design and voice were both pretty spot on (Kobayashi Yuu was a slightly surprising choice though ( ・ω・ )). Shion was very cute too. ^^

Spoiler for episode specific comments:

Shion's escape from the boarding school, which took probably an hour in the game, was easily accomplished within 30 seconds in the anime.

As I expected, it was a bit of a bummer that dai-san's beautiful piano tracks from the game can't be heard in the anime. But well, it can't be helped.

The first half of the episode did a good job portraying the loving relationship between Mion and Shion, which is quite important, so I'm glad they didn't skip too much on this. Surprisingly, they even animated that famous(?) little tap to the forehead that Shion gave Mion in the library. ^^; From that scene, we can tell that Shion is really the extroverted caretaker, while Mion is actually the insecure shy one.

The meeting between Shion and Satoshi was a little different from the game (Shion was playing around by pretending to be crying from the delinquents' threats, that's when Satoshi showed up to "rescue" her), but overall it was nicely done.

(For game players) Satoshi petting Shion on the head for the first time was... *sigh*

Shion's talk with Rena felt a little out of place, especially without Shion's internal monologues. Although Rena doesn't know that it's actually Shion, for Shion, it was her first time meeting Rena. At the bus stop, Rena suddenly asking Shion if she likes Satoshi felt like it came out of nowhere, when the question could've been softened with some small talk first. As for Rena's knowledge about Oyashiro-sama as an "experienced person" herself, all of it alarmed and frightened Shion. It would've been nice to hear Shion's monologue here about how her instinct tells her to never go up against Rena.

Finally, Shion's hatred for Satoko felt slightly pushy in the anime. In the game, the flow was:

Shion likes Satoshi
↓
Shion learns that much of Satoshi's hardship came from having to cover his little sister from abuse at home
↓
Shion hates Satoko for being so dependant on her brother all the time, dragging him down

But in the anime, there hasn't been much portrayal showing "Shion loves Satoshi" (partly because of the lack of monologues, so we can't tell her thoughts), so her sudden explosion of anger at school against Satoko's crybaby attitude felt a little over-the-top.

Oh yeah, Kanai Mika-san cried for a whole 2 1/2 minutes... wow... ^^;

Overall, despite some minor complaints, not a bad episode to start off Meakashi with. Next week, Shion is going to be up against that painful kejime machine...