Quote:
Originally Posted by Triple_R
This is what I think Okada/Kawamori are aiming for:
The first two episodes makes it clear that Amata and Mikono like one another, and are romantically interested in one another.
But then, time and time again, their attempts to move forward with a romance is interrupted by Kagura launching an attack to try and steal Mikono away, Zessica teasing Amata, or something else.
That might be a tad simplistic, but I think this is the general idea behind the writing here.
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I'd be able to agree with you more if Kagura and, by extension, Mykage were genuinely presented as threats. Mykage is
threatening but without knowing what he's actually planning (for all we know he may want to save both worlds and that Fudo's been lying) he's a sort opaque fluid that just sloshes around and move the plot when necessary and hasn't shown himself to actually be against Mikono/Amata, and we know he's pulling Kagura's chain. Kagura, on the other hand, is currently in the MoTW non-threat zone as every time he appears, he losses. I'm not sure how the audience is supposed to perceive him as a threat to Mikono/Amata when Kagura cannot win and, in the only moment he's ever had his hands on Mikono, the writers invert everything we actually know about his character and, to a degree, make him somewhat sympathetic a character. Fudo is a larger threat to Amata/Mikono right now than Kagura is.
What makes matters worse for the whole progression of the romance is that you have in-universe character remarking on how sssslllloooowwwww it is progressing, queue Andy and his advice to Amata to get his head in the game and confess, or, again from Andy, that Amata's lack of action will cause him to lose. Its lampshading a fact that should be apparent to the audience: in 16 episodes of striving to make a relationship, constantly overcoming the external threats (Kagura, Mykage), our two leads cannot jump the hurdle. You cannot even use Zessica as a point in this because after Episode 8, she stopped and gave them their distance (and before that, her actions were regularly a catalyst for stronger bonding between Amata and Mikono), and even in that span, with one of the supposed blocks wholesale having removed itself for the better of the couple and the guy she (Zessica) cared for, you had a failed confession (dragging their feet) and a movie date. That's it. For characters that were, initially, supposedly very strongly into each other, and with no external threat in the way, nothing happened...
You could, honestly, just as easily flip the entire *fight for the girl* theme and aim it at Kagura. Why? Because he has
never won, ever. He's this loser, chasing the girl, through torture, defeat, and pain... and he's your damn villain? That's not usually how a villain is supposed to be framed. He's supposed to regularly win and beat the hero, eventually steal the girl, laugh menacingly, and, after a long rescue arc, get beaten and the hero and girl reunited!
And what about Zessica? Your cockblock on the other side is built a sympathetic girl in love who can empathize with our hero and worry about his problems... what? No one else in this show even seems to give a damn about Amata's problems aside from Fudo.
Now, I must go teach some physics to some people who couldn't careless about what it is I am going to teach. I'll be gone for several hours.