The Movie of the Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya (Impressions/Reviews)

[Garby]

Originally Posted by Hooves

Well I think for certain countries, the release date was on August, but I think for some other countries, they probably extended it to September.

Eh? Several days ago the Movie (News and Anticipation) thread had confirmation of 12/18 posted.

You can still go to amazon.co.jp to see this for yourself (you couldn't when they first posted this), but if you go there, and set it to English mode, you can see that November has the first 2 Haruhi seasons coming to Blu-Ray, as well as Haruhi-Chan, and then December has the movie.

[quigonkenny]

When was it ever supposed to be coming out in August or September? We've known for a while that it would still be in theaters (or be just leaving them) at this time, and movie DVDs take longer to come out than TV DVDs. Smart money's been on December 18th from the beginning, due to the in-story importance of the date.

[Ithekro]

Since the DVD is not out yet in the United States I did a quick relook at the camrip that floats around. I'm still amazed that the film's quality it so high that I forget it is a poor quality camrip, even though I've actually seen it in a theater.

[Othello~]

You're lucky you were able to see it though . I'm was restricted because we had no money to travel all the way west. I would go to the New York one but even then it would be too much . This is how broke people live their lives, in pure agony. I just hope it comes out soon on DVD.

[Pikasprey]

I was exicited when I found out there was a movie. But I'm NOT watching a cam rip. I'll wait until the DVD comes out to North America thank you very much.

[Ithekro]

Or you could try to hope they have a showing relatively close to you at a convention say. Don't know if eastern Canada will have any showings, but there will be one in New York in October.

[drobertbaker]

Wow! Very impressive! 2 hours 43 worth, a regular half-season arc in a single sitting.

Spoiler for Movie impressions:

There was some deep and moving stuff there.

Kyon: all alone, completely powerless and clueless. And forced finally to show some emotion, make some decisions, and act. He even cried. And maybe died.

Yuki: totally beautiful; paralyzingly shy and exposed as a seething pyre of emotions and desires.

Haruhi: strapped down, but ultimately irrepressable and the inevitable catalyst of the solution by sheer strength of will.

A good mystery. A complicated plot that kept getting kicked up a level, tying in with other stuff, and even introducing more complications to the ongoing tale.

I swear I saw a shadowy face run by the window just at the end when Kyon is sitting in the classroom. Anybody else see that?

I must say I quite enjoyed this film!

[Dakota]

Originally Posted by Pikasprey

I was exicited when I found out there was a movie. But I'm NOT watching a cam rip. I'll wait until the DVD comes out to North America thank you very much.

Wow, I love your impression/review of this great movie. I feel the same way for Yuki's character too, her overall actions really fill in her character.

[Gamer_2k4]

Okay, I just thought of something. This is a 10-second thought, so please correct me where I go wrong (and I'm sure there are a few places).

Yuki's people recognize Haruhi as the potential for evolution, right? Haruhi is almost identical to them, except while they can only modify existing data, she can create data. She's essentially a half-step above them.

Spoiler for everyone else is doing it:

Now then, Yuki stole Haruhi's power to recreate the universe, right? Doesn't that mean she unlocked that potential for evolution that her people are so crazy about? I only ask because I'm pretty sure (I'll have to check when I get home) that that's how it's described in the movie. The more reasonable alternative, of course, is that Yuki didn't actually steal Haruhi's power; instead, she just modified existing data to produce a world where that potential for evolution no longer exists, forever sealing it out of reach of the ISDE.

As I type this, the latter option seems increasingly more likely, but I can't shake the feeling that the movie actually indicated that Yuki stole Haruhi's power. So what's the deal here?

[drobertbaker]

Spoiler for So what's the deal here?:

Yuki says:

"The spacetime alteration was done by harnessing Haruhi Suzumiya's ability to generate data, and partially altering the world's composition data. Consequently, the resulting Haruhi Suzumiya has no powers whatsoever. In that time plane, the Integrated Data Sentient Entity does not exist either. Haruhi Suzumiya's powers were stolen and used to alter past memory data between this point in time, and approximately 3 years 5 months into the future on December the 18th."

I interpret this as Yuki manipulating Haruhi's power to create a world where Haruhi no longer had the power. I don't believe that from that point Yuki had Haruhi's former power. I think "stolen and used" above means temporarily used. Haruhi lost 'em (because they didn't exist in the new world), but Yuki didn't gain 'em.

So in fact Yuki brilliantly saved the universe by ridding it of this ultimate destructive (creative) power, but left the final decision to Kyon, who decided it was more fun the way it was.

Originally Posted by Gamer_2k4

Now then, Yuki stole Haruhi's power to recreate the universe, right? Doesn't that mean she unlocked that potential for evolution that her people are so crazy about?

I think yes, in the sense that if Yuki could do it one time, then any of her people could do it again whenever desired, like we would "steal" the power of a horse to pull a plough. But did her people want to have that evolved power, or were they just interested in observing it?

Originally Posted by Gamer_2k4

instead, she just modified existing data to produce a world where that potential for evolution no longer exists, forever sealing it out of reach of the ISDE.

The ISDE didn't exist in the new world either.

[jin jin5000]

Originally Posted by drobertbaker

Spoiler for So what's the deal here?:

Yuki says:

"The spacetime alteration was done by harnessing Haruhi Suzumiya's ability to generate data, and partially altering the world's composition data. Consequently, the resulting Haruhi Suzumiya has no powers whatsoever. In that time plane, the Integrated Data Sentient Entity does not exist either. Haruhi Suzumiya's powers were stolen and used to alter past memory data between this point in time, and approximately 3 years 5 months into the future on December the 18th."

I interpret this as Yuki manipulating Haruhi's power to create a world where Haruhi no longer had the power. I don't believe that from that point Yuki had Haruhi's former power. I think "stolen and used" above means temporarily used. Haruhi lost 'em (because they didn't exist in the new world), but Yuki didn't gain 'em.

So in fact Yuki brilliantly saved the universe by ridding it of this ultimate destructive (creative) power, but left the final decision to Kyon, who decided it was more fun the way it was. I think yes, in the sense that if Yuki could do it one time, then any of her people could do it again whenever desired, like we would "steal" the power of a horse to pull a plough. But did her people want to have that evolved power, or were they just interested in observing it?The ISDE didn't exist in the new world either.

dunno
the entire choice was set up by yuki on how kyon wanted the world to be normal or something and gave him a choice whether the world would remain same or be "normal" according to kyon's standards. Thats what I tl;dr'ed this and from reading novel

[Gamer_2k4]

Originally Posted by drobertbaker

But did her people want to have that evolved power, or were they just interested in observing it?

I would argue the former, since the whole draw of potential is the possibility of realizing it. Also, in the first book, Yuki says, "The Integrated Data Entity is very interested in all forms of organic life on Earth. It believes that by observation, it can find the solution to its own evolutionary dead end." In other words, though it wants to, the ISDE can't evolve anymore. Not knowing what else to do, it began observation. They were interested in observing Haruhi BECAUSE they wanted the evolved power.

Spoiler for spoily (and very angry) rant:

Originally Posted by drobertbaker

So in fact Yuki brilliantly saved the universe by ridding it of this ultimate destructive (creative) power, but left the final decision to Kyon, who decided it was more fun the way it was.

The kicker is that it's not until he makes his decision that he understands just how monumental that decision was. When Kyon presses Enter, he just wants everything to be the way he remembers. He wants to wake up from the nightmare. Problem is, that "nightmare" is in fact a fully formed reality with real people in it. Reverting the world means destroying those lives absolutely.

Granted, it's not his fault at all. He's put into the torturous position of decided which of the two fully realized worlds to silence forever. Can we blame him for choosing the one he's familiar with? If he picks the original world, he abandons the alternate one. If he picks the alternate world, he seals the fate of the original one. That's indescribably awful. That's not giving Kyon a choice; it's burdening him with a literal world of guilt.

I rant like this because if you look at it this way, Yuki's change is nothing less than abominable. I didn't catch it at first, and I'm sure most people didn't, but when I considered it more closely, it's just mind-blowing what Yuki did to the world. All of the time travelers, all of the espers, all of the aliens associated with the ISDE - gone in an instant, possibly never to return. That's a genocide of a potentially greater scale than anything we've ever experienced. And then to pass it off to Kyon, to say, "Okay, now that I've done this, you choose who to pull the plug on"? What is that? What the hell is that? That's despicable.

And before you say, "But the espers and the like didn't die; they just lost their powers," remember that their lives revolved around those powers. Their existence was completely uprooted and replaced with another, and I seriously doubt the new existence is anything close to the original one. They're not the same people at all.

[drobertbaker]

Spoiler for discussion:

Originally Posted by Gamer_2k4

I would argue the former, since the whole draw of potential is the possibility of realizing it.

So then Yuki indeed committed a terrible criminal act against her people by taking that potential out of the universe. Oh and also by wiping them out of existence.

But she has also solved their problem by demonstrating how they can use this power, so that any of them can do it at any time. Or do they insist on having the power personally and not being content just to use it?

Originally Posted by Gamer_2k4

The kicker is that it's not until he makes his decision that he understands just how monumental that decision was.

As I implied before, to destroy something is to create something else and to create something is to destroy something else. Shiva is both the destroyer and creator of worlds. Koizumi also has expressed his doubt in stopping Haruhi's destruction of the existing world because in reshaping things, she may be improving them. He admits that in stopping her, he is really only acting selfishly in preserving himself and his world and thus possibly preventing something better from being born.

So really, we are all constantly making this decision. Do we create change, thus annihilating the existing situation and bringing into existence something new and unknown? Or do we struggle to preserve the comfortable status quo that we are familiar with and stave off (destroy) the new that would otherwise come into being? Kyon actually had the advantage of us in that he clearly knew what the alternatives were. When we opt for change, we don't have the luxury of knowing the outcome. We DON'T understand just how monumental our decisions are.

In the end, Kyon opted for the familiar. He had more fun in the old world and was frightened, bored, and alone in the new one. The selfish choice, just like we all ultimately make.

[Gamer_2k4]

Spoiler for discussion:

Originally Posted by drobertbaker

So then Yuki indeed committed a terrible criminal act against her people by taking that potential out of the universe. Oh and also by wiping them out of existence. But she has also solved their problem by demonstrating how they can use this power, so that any of them can do it at any time. Or do they insist on having the power personally and not being content just to use it?

Does it matter? Their evolution has occurred before our own and independently of our own, and their reasons and uses for further evolution shouldn't even be relevant. The problem here is Yuki. She's like a spy stealing nuclear secrets from a foreign country, only instead of relaying that information back to her superiors, she launches a bunch of ICBMs at them instead. And furthermore, the only alternative to that is no change at all, leaving everything the way it is. Out of Yuki's three options (keeping the secrets to herself, using the secrets against her people, or actually freaking doing her job), she narrows it down to the two harmful ones. That's a problem.

Originally Posted by drobertbaker

As I implied before, to destroy something is to create something else and to create something is to destroy something else. Shiva is both the destroyer and creator of worlds. Koizumi also has expressed his doubt in stopping Haruhi's destruction of the existing world because in reshaping things, she may be improving them. He admits that in stopping her, he is really only acting selfishly in preserving himself and his world and thus possibly preventing something better from being born.

I would say that Koizumi's argument invalidates itself. If a god is really rewriting the world, yes, our opinions shouldn't matter one bit. We're inferiors, and we have no right to argue against our superior. On the other hand, if it really is possible to influence that entity's decisions, then how can you call them a god? To me, omnipotence is kind of a requirement for a deity. Add to that the fact that Koizumi doesn't even understand the anthropic principle, and I'd say there are serious doubts that what he says is anywhere close to true. Sure, changes to the world might result in a better one. But you know what? They might also result in a worse one, and you'd be right for opposing those changes.

Originally Posted by drobertbaker

So really, we are all constantly making this decision. Do we create change, thus annihilating the existing situation and bringing into existence something new and unknown? Or do we struggle to preserve the comfortable status quo that we are familiar with and stave off (destroy) the new that would otherwise come into being? Kyon actually had the advantage of us in that he clearly knew what the alternatives were. When we opt for change, we don't have the luxury of knowing the outcome. We DON'T understand just how monumental our decisions are.

Yes, we all make choices, and even the absence of action is a choice. But there's a world of difference between forcing change, especially drastic change, and letting events change the world naturally; it's the same difference between someone catching a cold and someone being intentionally injected with a virus. We might be repairing the Ship of Theseus every day, but Yuki sank it outright and built a new one. That's why it's a problem.

I agree that not all change is bad, and that resisting change can have poor results (not eating, for example). But it's BECAUSE we can't prevent change that makes the motivation behind it and the consequences that result from it so crucial. I can say Yuki was wrong for the same reasons I can say a criminal is wrong.

And I'm not blaming Kyon here; he was little more than a puppet in all of this. He was given two terrible choices and he picked the one that, to him, was best. What more can you do than that?

Originally Posted by drobertbaker

In the end, Kyon opted for the familiar. He had more fun in the old world and was frightened, bored, and alone in the new one. The selfish choice, just like we all ultimately make.

I would argue both that the choice wasn't necessarily selfish, and that we don't all necessarily make selfish choices either. Kyon was right to revert the world just as an engineer would be right to reroute an accidentally (or intentionally) diverted train. Sure, the train may still be intact, it may still be going the right speed, and it may still drop off its cargo at the end. But it's going to the wrong place. There was a right path for the train, and it's not on that right path.

[Ithekro]

Oddly I think you are over-analyzing this and making it out to be more than it it.

Consider the lives involved. Then consider what they likely were before Haruhi changed them the first time. We don't know how many times Haruhi has changed the world before Kyon meets her in High School. For all we know, the Alternate of Nagato's is the original pathway before Haruhi changed everything.

Before condemning anyone, consider Haruhi herself first.

Also consider one more possibility....Haruhi wanted "sliders" as well...dimentional travelers. Who's to say anything was destroyed as it is possible all still exists...in an alternal universe. From Haruhi's world she was making with just herself and Kyon at the start, to each world of the Endless Eight on September 1st....they might all still exist in one form or another.

[Garby]

Spoiler for discussion:

Originally Posted by Gamer_2k4

Sure, changes to the world might result in a better one. But you know what? They might also result in a worse one, and you'd be right for opposing those changes.

There's also the fact that these hypothetical changes are being brought about by an emotionally immature high school girl who doesn't even know she has the power to effect them. I'd oppose them too.

[Gamer_2k4]

Originally Posted by Ithekro

Oddly I think you are over-analyzing this and making it out to be more than it it.

I don't believe it's odd to think that at all.

Originally Posted by Ithekro

Consider the lives involved. Then consider what they likely were before Haruhi changed them the first time. We don't know how many times Haruhi has changed the world before Kyon meets her in High School. For all we know, the Alternate of Nagato's is the original pathway before Haruhi changed everything.

Before condemning anyone, consider Haruhi herself first.

At least in Haruhi's defense, it's unintentional. Yes, when everything started three years prior, it's very likely that a natural reality was replaced with a supernatural one (the only alternative that comes to mind is that existence itself began three years ago, as per one of the Organization's theories). But we can't blame Vesuvius for destroying Pompeii, can we? How can we turn around and blame Haruhi, then? We know for a fact that Haruhi only subscribes to her fantasies of aliens and espers and all because they're just fantasies. Remember how she felt in Remote Island Syndrome upon hearing that a murder had actually happened?

Yuki, on the other hand, knew full well what she was doing and did it anyway. Sure, you could argue it was the deterministic result of that "buggy data," but there are still ways to deal with that. If my computer has a virus, it doesn't matter if I don't know how to clean it. I can still take action like unplugging it from the network or shutting it down. Yuki didn't do anything comparable to that.

Originally Posted by Ithekro

Also consider one more possibility....Haruhi wanted "sliders" as well...dimentional travelers. Who's to say anything was destroyed as it is possible all still exists...in an alternal universe. From Haruhi's world she was making with just herself and Kyon at the start, to each world of the Endless Eight on September 1st....they might all still exist in one form or another.

There are two things wrong with the new world being an alternate reality. The first is that there would be no reason for Yuki to bring Kyon along; his alternate version would already exist in that world. Furthermore, there would be no need to make a choice between the two worlds. Yuki could leave the original one and enter the alternate one, and everyone else could stay the same.

The second reason lies in the solution to the problem. If Kyon was simply in an alternate reality, he would just have to reinsert himself into the original one. Everyone would be all "where were you the past couple of days," but there would be no major problems. However, that wasn't the solution. Kyon had to go back and prevent that alternate reality from ever forming. If it was just a parallel universe, there would be no need, since he and everyone else would be completely unaffected. The only task would be to bring Yuki back to the real world.

[ijuinkun]

I think that Koizumi's "branching tree" diagram is useful in this context. Essentially, the timeline split at the critical point, and the only way for somebody to get from one branch to the other is to back up to the critical point and take the other path--you can not go between branches without having "sidewise" time-traveling abilities, in contrast with the forward/rewind of the time travel methods described thus far. Therefore, once Haruhipowers had been sealed away within the Shoushitsu timeline, there was no escape from it except by rewinding.

*snip*

That said, the only difference in the world that significantly affected the "mundane" people was the juggling of the schools whereby Kouyouen Academy became co-ed, North High lost 3 classrooms (1-9 and presumably 2-9 and 3-9 which would be without a ground floor under them with the loss of 1-9 if they had remained), and the relocation of people resulting from that. A few dozen (hundred?) Espers got their lives changed as well. The big BIG changes from the cosmic perspective were the loss of the IDSE and the Canopy Domain--the main data superpowers--and possibly all other data life forms, and also whatever alterations to the future era that Mikuru's people are from (potentially affecting anywhere from the would-be time travelers themselves all the way up to all of mankind).

On the gripping hand, though, and this is pure speculation, Yuki did not necessarily have to alter the entire universe. Given humanity's lack of interstellar reach, she could have fashioned a solar-system-in-a-bottle, where everything inside the solar system is the "new reality" and the stars are just a projection of electromagnetic and gravitational images. In short, the new Earth would be inside of a "Closed Space" in Haurhi terms, without any need to rebuild the other 99.9999999999999+% of the cosmos other than sealing out any intruders.

[Vallen Chaos Valiant]

Originally Posted by drobertbaker

Spoiler for discussion:

In the end, Kyon opted for the familiar. He had more fun in the old world and was frightened, bored, and alone in the new one. The selfish choice, just like we all ultimately make.

He was given the right to make the choice. If you can't make a selfish choice, is it really a choice?

[Hooves]

Originally Posted by drobertbaker

Spoiler for discussion:

In the end, Kyon opted for the familiar. He had more fun in the old world and was frightened, bored, and alone in the new one. The selfish choice, just like we all ultimately make.

If my message is simply a repeat of what you all are discussing, please tell me so I can delete it for simple repeating.

Spoiler for Discussion:

Just like we all are, we are not used to changes that are made towards us, especially if they come unnoticed. Kyon was not really used to this new world that Nagato made for him, he couldn't get along with Asahina without getting severely beaten. Haruhi was nowhere in sight, so there was nothing fun to do in this world. There was no Koizumi in sight as well, so there was generally nothing to talk about and explain how they could solve this.

His old rival "Asakura" is back to life... That literally sent him into shock.. The only person he actually got along with early in the movie was Nagato herself, since she was still in the S.O.S Room (which was the Reading Club's Room) it was obvious that she was there from Kyon's thoughts. But Nagato was not enough for Kyon... Even though Kyon thought this world might be good since he wasn't dragged into the nonsense brought by Haruhi Suzumiya, but it was really clear that he actually "enjoyed" the times he spent ever since Haruhi shaped his life in the old world. So when he was given the choice, it was not really a selfish choice, even though Nagato wanted to stay in the new world she made for him. He just wanted everything to be back to normal, and unchanged.

He would still have fun with everyone, so it was completely different from the new world. Also when Asakura stabbed Kyon, has it been clarified who the shadowy figure was? Was he Koizumi from the old world somehow appearing in the new world, and bringing things back to order? Or was it a member of Koizumi's organization? Or another faction that was secretly observing?