Lucky Star - Episode 04 Discussion / Poll

[Kaoru Chujo]

The activity surrounding Lucky Star is intense on 2channel. The 54th thread of the main topic filled up with 1000 posts between 9:30 pm and 5 am Wednesday night-Thursday morning, Japan time. In addition, I see three anti- topics, with a total of 14 threads. This is a huge proportion of anti- threads, but I suspect that the old PR slogan applies: "I don't care what you say about me as long as you spell my name right."

Nanoha StrikerS continues to be far ahead, with over 70 threads. But Gurren Laggan, which had surpassed Lucky Star, is now back at 51 threads. Amazing what a little controversy can do...for both anime.

[Kaoru Chujo]

Originally Posted by FatPianoBoy

...Wasn't this episode directed by the old director? I wonder if they canned him for the 'budget-saving technique' and subsequent flamewar bit. I sure hope not, because given KyoAni's track record for self-parody, that'd be awfully uptight.

I doubt it, since it was he himself who storyboarded the episode of SHnY where Yuki read for three minutes (see this page). According to the on-screen credits, he did write the script for this episode, although someone else directed it. And he was still in overall charge.

I think we'll get a better idea of what's going on -- big breakup, little demotion, or removal of a burden -- if we continue to see his name in the end credits as storyboarder, scriptwriter, or episode director of future episodes. And as Kaioshin says, if the show loses its incisiveness regarding otaku, we'll be able to draw conclusions. But I haven't seen anything I'd call especially negative yet. It's all pretty loving, if you ask me.

Sorry for the double post.

[Kaioshin Sama]

Originally Posted by Kaoru Chujo

The activity surrounding Lucky Star is intense on 2channel. The 54th thread of the main topic filled up with 1000 posts between 9:30 pm and 5 am Wednesday night-Thursday morning, Japan time. In addition, I see three anti- topics, with a total of 14 threads. This is a huge proportion of anti- threads, but I suspect that the old PR slogan applies: "I don't care what you say about me as long as you spell my name right."

Nanoha StrikerS continues to be far ahead, with over 70 threads. But Gurren Laggan, which had surpassed Lucky Star, is now back at 51 threads. Amazing what a little controversy can do...for both anime.

Oh yes, ya gotta have your anti-threads for productive discussion. The Hell is up with 2chan.

By the way I think that's my slogan.

[Telliamed]

Originally Posted by Kaioshin_Sama

The Hell is up with 2chan.

That question is, when parsed a different way, its own answer.

13:40 -- They're standing outside a Misuho Bank (sic)

[Anh_Minh]

What happened to Akira's trademark overlong sleeves? She looks silly without them. (Instead of unsufferably cute.)

[Risaa]

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

What happened to Akira's trademark overlong sleeves? She looks silly without them. (Instead of unsufferably cute.)

I'm guessing she changed with the season, just as the girls all changed into their summer short-sleeved uniforms now. I also like her long-long sleeves over her short sleeves, but.. I like the girls' summer uniform over their winter one... aah, dilemma dilemma.

[Samatarou]

Phew! Having just read 8 pages of comments I finally get to chip in my two-penn'orth!

First the weak points..... I agree with <someone> that it's simply not credible that the sausages didn't know Kona-chan doesn't have a mother. How long have they been friends? Is Kona-chan a Karin whose friends have had a spell cast over them so they never wonder about her family?

Well that's about it for the weak points!

I notice Tsukasa seems to get flustered an awful lot when talking to people, classic moe behaviour, more and more I see Miyuki as just a decoy for moe. Actually for flusterment Tsukasa reminds me of Izumi-chan in the manga Living Game. And her little comment at 10:11 "so, I'm ok too" about her chest size was brilliant.

Re. Kona-chan's cosplay presents, I thought it a bit unbelievable that Konachan would splash out over 31,000円 (LC prices) on a present for Tsukasa unless she was trying to get into her knickers (which we can't discount given Kona-chan's unhealthy similarity to male otaku), so I did a price check and indeed, if you too want to buy Tsukasa a To Heart costume, you can get one for 13440円 or even 8400円 (summer version). I can just about see Konachan shelling out the latter for a birthday present, perhaps, though either she's rich or really likes Tsukasa!

Turning to Kagami, first I don't think it's surprising she would recognise the To Heart outfit, despite its low profile in the West it was considered something of a classic in Japan. Secondly it seems Kagami is a fumoffu fan, or at least a Bonta-kun fan, since it seems to be her room it lives in. I was thinking though, wasn't Bonta-kun already a known character when it showed up in fumoffu? ISTR Kana-chan was already familiar with it when she first saw it, so I always assumed that it was some familiar cartoon character or toy in Japan that fumoffu was referencing. When I think about it, Kagami and FMP's Kana-chan have similarly ascerbic personalities, and you could almost say that Kona-chan is Kagami's Sagara Sousuke when it comes to the chemistry between them.

Finally, my wish for more insteresting camera angles seems to have come true! Ep.4 was definitely more visually interesting than the previous eps.

[Risaa]

Originally Posted by Samatarou

Re. Kona-chan's cosplay presents, I thought it a bit unbelievable that Konachan would splash out over 31,000? (LC prices) on a present for Tsukasa unless she was trying to get into her knickers (which we can't discount given Kona-chan's unhealthy similarity to male otaku), so I did a price check and indeed, if you too want to buy Tsukasa a To Heart costume, you can get one for 13440? or even 8400?! I can just about see Konachan shelling out the latter for a birthday present, perhaps, though either she's rich or really likes Tsukasa!

For some reason, that scene really reminded me of a scene in Manabi Straight.. can't recall which episode, but it's the one in which Manabi is sick and Momo is with her at the hospital. It's revealed at the end that Momo was wearing a full-body suit/gas-mask thing (*hilarious* scene). Manabi says, "by the way.. where did you get that?"

"...Internet".

Both Momo and Kona-chan are eccentric enough that they get these strange things, and you naturally have wonder how they were able to find them and pay for them... It almost makes me want to believe that they somehow have connections and are able to obtain these things at a very low cost, like through an underground anime market or something.

[Anh_Minh]

Originally Posted by Samatarou

Phew! Having just read 8 pages of comments I finally get to chip in my two-penn'orth!

First the weak points..... I agree with <someone> that it's simply not credible that the sausages didn't know Kona-chan doesn't have a mother. How long have they been friends? Is Kona-chan a Karin whose friends have had a spell cast over them so they never wonder about her family?

They met in high school, so less than two years.

And I don't think it's that weird. I've never interrogated any of my friends about his or her family. If the subject doesn't come up on its own, why bring it up?

[Baka-yuki]

Originally Posted by Risaa

It almost makes me want to believe that they somehow have connections and are able to obtain these things at a very low cost, like through an underground anime market or something.

with Kona-chan, She probably does.

With this ep, dont really have any complaints. The one sceen with konata in her bed sometime between 2-5 o'clock wasnt the best moment of them all...
But there was more than enough to make up for it, especially the fact that Kona-chan uses any excuse to poke fun at kagami.

[Kaoru Chujo]

I think Kona-chan already had the To Heart uniform. She wasn't going to use it again herself, really wanted to see Tsukasa wearing it, and knew she could borrow it back whenever she wanted. Anyway, maybe it was stained or torn.

But I too think it a little odd that the twins didn't know Konata didn't have a mother at home. However, I don't have any trouble suspending my disbelief, especially since it's just barely possible that they never asked and she never said.

In any case, we are hardly dealing with real life in either 4koma or anime, just with cunning analogs of it.

[dkellis]

Originally Posted by Risaa

Both Momo and Kona-chan are eccentric enough that they get these strange things, and you naturally have wonder how they were able to find them and pay for them... It almost makes me want to believe that they somehow have connections and are able to obtain these things at a very low cost, like through an underground anime market or something.

The moment I read that, I had the immediate mental image of Kagami wondering exactly the same thing... and then Konata does her Dark Smirk.

[Vexx]

I've always gotten the impression that this is the first year Kona and the twins have had classes and known each other (high school first year). Therefore, they're still discovering lots about each other. Kona just never mentioned her mother until it came up while they were looking at one of her photo albums.

I'll query my son or other students about their friends and find out they have no idea what their last names are, if they have parents, what they plan to major in, if they have jobs., where they live, do they subscribe to a religion, what kind of music they listen to, etc etc etc

It makes me wonder what the hell they actually talk about sometimes...

(well.. according to L*S, they talk about food, kidnapping, collecting cards, wedding dreams)

[dkellis]

Heck, I wouldn't be surprised. I've known several of my friends here in college for about four years now, and some of them still have trouble remembering my surname. (Maybe it sounds too "foreign".)

For most of them, I barely know their family situations. It just doesn't come up whenever we hang out, and yes, we do indeed talk about stuff like food, collecting anime merchandise, gaming, the latest news (and bad jokes regarding it), random sayings which make no logical sense, little things that won't interest anyone else.

Maybe the reason why I love Lucky Star is because it reminds me so much of the conversations we have. Perhaps if one doesn't have those sorts of conversations, the enjoyment factor will not be there.

[Skane]

Aye, unless one has ties with the parent themselves, it is not that uncommon to have friends not ask about your family status. I mean, they didn't become friends with you due to your parents. Also, it is considered rude if you pry too much into someone's family life unless you are really, really close with that friend.

Cheers.

[Mirrinus]

Think about it. How long did Yuuichi know Ayu without ever asking her about her father? Actually, when'd Yuuichi ever ask anyone about their parents?

[Risaa]

Granted, they're darn popular, but not everyone here might know who Yuuichi and Ayu are (I do know of one person who even said to me, "it sounds as if this person is referencing another anime"). Also, being that they're anime characters, I think that's a pretty weak example (please don't take me wrong - I'm not trying to attack you personally). I mean... just like regular TV shows, a lot of what characters do and talk about are done off-screen. I certainly wouldn't want to have to watch every conversation ever taken place between characters!

(A little embarrassed to admit, but my friends are pretty much all online friends. My point is, my case might be different from "normal" people's cases.) I usually don't ask my friends anything personal - that sort of stuff just comes up in conversation every so often. I know about all my friends' families and things going on in their lives (their majors, any jobs, etc) because I've talked with them for years and though I never asked about any of that stuff, it always eventually came up. The only way I ever found out my friends' last names is that I asked them for their names and addresses. (We started sending each other Christmas and birthday presents a few years ago. *happy-go-lucky* I love when they send RL cookies! <3)

[krln99]

Kona and Kagami are two sides of the same coin. One is just passionate about over achieving and school life, the other about games, manga, and anime. They're both pretty smart, though Kona is probably naturally smarter but just doesn't focus on school.

But they really do like a lot of the same things and are great friends, which is why despite their badgering of each other, they immediately carry on like it's nothing.

[Michael Hopcroft]

Originally Posted by krln99

Kona and Kagami are two sides of the same coin. One is just passionate about over achieving and school life, the other about games, manga, and anime. They're both pretty smart, though Kona is probably naturally smarter but just doesn't focus on school.

But they really do like a lot of the same things and are great friends, which is why despite their badgering of each other, they immediately carry on like it's nothing.

Not to mention Kagami's dad is an upstanding pillar of the community and Kona-chan's dad --- isn't.

Spoiler for Ep 4's revelation:

In fact, kagami seems to be imagining the worst about Kona's dad -- she seems to think he's actually ******* her. Which, of course, is utter nonsense; only in porn doujins to girls who are molested by their fathers turn into happy sex-crazed perverts, just as ****-**** isn't a part of real school life that often.

At least, I hope not!

[nikorai]

finally watched this episode. voted for 9, i almost wanted to give it a 10.
speaking of family issues from my experience people at school rarely bring the topic. its the same even at my place when you get the same community at school for 10 years and then study in a certain group for 5 more years in the uni