Quote:
Originally Posted by 0utf0xZer0
Identity crisis? What identity crisis?
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Of all the criticisms I've seen leveled against this anime, "identity crisis" is the one that resonates the most with me.
Of Hana-Saku Iroha's seven episodes, I found six enjoyable (if not very enjoyable), and I would have found even Episode Three enjoyable if in a completely different anime that was designed primarily to lampoon and spoof. So each episode is good (if not great) in a vacuum.
But there is a certain constant shifting in mood and tone that I see in this anime, and it can be a bit jarring and leave you wondering what exactly the anime is aiming for
overall. There's also scenes in which the anime arguably tries to do too much all in one go - such as trying to be both comedic *and* dramatic at the same time. And that's often very tricky.
To use a comparison that you'll probably get, 0utf0xZer0, and which acejem recently shared with me, I see Hana-Saku Iroha starting to have identity issues approaching what Angel Beats! suffered from.
My own view is that there's kind of a sliding scale of drama and comedy, and that this is most pronounced in a slice of life or romance anime.
From my perspective, this anime has ran the full gamut of that sliding scale, with episodes that felt much more dramatic than comedic to me (Episodes 1 and 2), episodes that felt almost entirely comedic to me (Episodes 3 and 7), and episodes right smack dab in the middle (Episodes 4 through 6).
After Episode 6 I felt that this anime had established a good identity for itself and had finally hit its groove by finding and establishing a nice balance between comedy and drama.
But the balance felt slightly off to me in this episode. I still enjoyed this episode, and I felt that the idea behind it was very good, but it does feel a bit tonally different to me than Episodes 4 through 6.
Hana-Saku Iroha is still a show that I definitely look forward to watching each and every week, and like Guardian Enzo said, the potential for greatness in future episodes remains. But I can't help but wonder what it would be like if it was a bit more like True Tears or Anohana.