[Zavie]

Originally Posted by felix

However, I really don't see how there's any reason in the series so far to believe Rita is real "family" for Mashiro, or even that friendly with her. These are the semantics I see,

• It wasn't "Mashiro, leave Sakurasou, and come back to your family in England."
  
  
• Nor was it, "Mashiro, leave your manga, and come back to your worried friends over in England."
  
  
• And not even a, "Mashiro, come back to England, *I* need you, and *I* am worried about you."
  
  
• What it was was, "Mashiro, leave your friends at Sakurasou, all the hard work you've put in, your manga, and abandon Japan (along with your current life) because a lot of strangers want you to paint back home in England, and you're worthless with out them."

You then have (the very quick) scheming, plotting and meddling.

She's not asking Mashiro to make the choice, she's not making Mashiro see some goodness of looking at her fandom, she's forcing Mashiro to choose her. At best she's her former de facto family; ie. room mate, single person to talk to, etc. Someone which one would be happy to see, but at the same time, not necessarily too close. Hence the hug, and prompt door to the face.

I actually agree with you on the matter of how we see thinsg differently from the episode. The bullet points you made above, I honestly don't see Rita in any of those above.

And sorry, but I don't like the way you worded Rita's intention (or action). It just makes it sound so bad imo. It is in truth we still don't have the whole picture of Rita's motive yet, so I don't want make a claim. For me, now that I thought about it, there's a hint to the fear factor in Rita's action. Ultimately, I think she's just afraid that Mashiro will let go off the paint brush forever, given her talent, she is worried about that, and she went out out of her way genuinely because she cares for Mashiro and there's nothing wrong with that. I'm a bit upset that people just don't see her caring side, but instead just judge and doubt her intentions/actions. I think a lot of people here just taking it for granted, but coming herself all the way to Japan from the UK is actually not that small of a deal financially, physically and emontionally (I came to UK to study as well, so trust me on this). For a person to go that far, I just find it is really hard to call that person not genuine.

I just think that Rita just wishes to see Mashiro paint and be successful in her life then be happy, that's just simply the way she believes so. I don't think Rita tries to do this for the world, but for Mashiro (maybe a bit of her own self-satisfaction as well), It just her own way of caring for her. Convincing her to going back to London is just a simple solution Rita came up to supress that fear I said above. If Mashiro can show a bit of compromise and tell Rita that will continue fine art seriously even in Japan and Sakurasou. I think it would play out very differently and Mashiro would not even need to go back to London.

If you have impression that Rita flirting with Sorata is forcing Shiina to go back, then sorry, I personally don't even take that whole thing seriously. For me it's just a harmless prank she played on both Mashiro and Sorata (admitedly they are quite fun to tease). I mean when Shiina confronted Rita near the end about her sleeping in Sorata's room, Rita let it go quite easily imo, if she really wants to take advantage of Sorata being Mashiro's weakness, she would have done it differently.

Adn when she took the folks to the gallery, that is just one basic trick of persuasion, to get more people on her side, that way she can convince Mashiro more easily. We do this all the time in real life, wisdom of the crowd, as always.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying Rita is necesarilly lying here, and even if she is there's obviously truth in what she's saying, but Rita is not the art world, her views are simplistic at best. Listening to Rita is not synonymous with listening to "the world", it's just Rita, and what Rita wants.

I never said Rita is the art world, nor the world. What you said is exactly right, it's just what Rita wants, and she have right to express that to Mashiro so Mashiro can understand it, given I don't doubt Rita being close enough to Mashiro to do that. Mashiro still has the final call for her decision (that final call would be when Rita has to go back). But the problem is right now is Mashiro showing no sign of understanding nor empathy, Rita has no idea if she got her message to Mashiro, therefore she have to keep trying. If she could turn back and say "I understand you Rita, but I want to stay here in Japn to draw manga, because..." or similar, things would be very different. When you are silent, it can imply lots of things, not just disagreement.

With regard to your last point, about how if at first, and second you don't succeed, "try harder", in my views that's considered extremely disrespectful and rude; especially when it's something the other person has no claim on. The whole cartoony "universal simplification theory" of one's life, morals, and values, is also not part of the values I was brought up with. People are not just these amercan movie stereotypes.

I'm talking from my experience, believe it or not, it can be like that. There're lots of way to convince people, talking is just the basic and it can work fine. If you do truly believe in what you do, you can always find that there's a lot of approachs to persuasion.

You can always ignore others and go on with your life. It still can work out that way too, but for me it is just not ideal. I want to do thinsg I love with the blessing of the people who cares for me.

Mashiro already answered this. She chose Sakurasou, therefore there should be no doubt which is (relationship wise) more important. And from the dialog it would seem Rita had alone-time with Mashiro for at least a year, so for it to be so bad they would avoid each other one would assume Rita wasn't "looking out for Mashiro's well being" until recently; the counter posibility being Mashiro is a total heartless bitch—and we got plenty of proof that's not true.

Why does she choose Sakurasou? Why is it important?

Why Sakurasou is more important than the life she had lived comfortably in London?

Why Sakurasou is more important than using her talent to be successful in life?

Do you feel happy in Sakurasou? If so, why? What is it in London that we lack?

Those would be my answer for Mashiro if I were Rita, I think I would need to hear the answer from Mashiro's lips, not somebody else telling me.

And I'm sorry, but I don't get your part about them avoiding each other or Rita did looking out for Mashira bit.