Little Busters - Episode 2 Discussion / Poll

[thundrakkon]

Originally Posted by Insane

Spoiler for Any kind soul can translate this? I'm curious:

It was in one of the group subs, so all credit goes to them. Here is what it is saying:


"There is a secret in this world. If you wish to know it, then clear all the tasks I give you."

[monir]

Originally Posted by relentlessflame

I wouldn't go that far. Actually, I have enjoyed a lot of anime with severely-flawed or awkwardly-presented stories if it manages to engage me in some way. It's true that I won't generally watch an anime just for its production values if I'm not engaged by the story at all (I've said it before: I'm not a fan of "anime" itself, I'm a fan of certain types of anime), but I think the production values are still very important, because it's essential to conveying emotions. Most of my favourite anime moments were defined primarily by the visual and auditory characteristics of the production, in addition to their context in the overall story..

(That being said... I'm not sure if it validates your stick figure point or what, but one of my favourite anime moments of all time is Miyako's voice mails in ef - a tale of memories, which is all just audio (music + voice acting) and on-screen text. So it doesn't necessarily take *much* more than stick figures, perhaps? But you did touch on SHAFT's stylistic approach too, so this isn't really much of an admission actually.)

I will say, though, that I am much more focused on the way a story comes together than on whatever happens in the moment. So as long as I can see the way the pieces are coming together, I can put up with a fair bit along the way. So in this show's case, though I can't say that it was entirely gripping as an anime-only viewer right from the get-go, I could quickly see the way the pieces are coming together. So in that sense, I am willing to wait it out. I'm willing to assume that, when the show's key moments do come, they'll be presented in a memorable way.


Well... it's pretty rare to encounter any sort of show that's universally well-received... But I suppose you will get a better overall reception if your production receives high marks across every objective metric (because then all that remains is subjective taste).



I think I get the overall intention of what you're saying, which is that nothing is "carrying" this production through this part of the story you don't find engaging. If there were any visual or auditory aspect of the production that was spectacular, you could stick with it even if the story isn't "all that". And given that you feel that you're a bit more biased towards audiovisual presentation elements, the show isn't satisfying to you. If the question is "can this anime be widely recommended for its worth as an anime at this point, without reference to the source material or the pedigree of the author?"... I guess it'd be a hard recommendation right now. As it stands currently, it's probably a bit of an acquired taste (because it depends mostly on a certain brand of humour).


I don't think "reading" is really the right word, because I've never been much of a reader. The only things I've basically found the patience to read have been certain visual novels and certain light novels. So I think the audiovisual aspect is actually pretty important to me too. But, I do place it all in the context of the story. Although I appreciate the art, to me it's more a means than an end unto itself. I suppose I could also say that I see these early episodes of Little Busters as a means to an end as well, hence my willingness to suspend judgement for longer. (Then again, I've always hated judging anime by the episode anyway -- to me, it's all connected...)

I will make one more admission that's probably a horrible thing to say in a Little Busters thread... but speaking of the importance of visual aspects, I did try a few times to start the Little Busters game (knowing that there likely something worthwhile as far as they story goes), but I just could never find the time and motivation to get past the first 10-15 minutes. A major reason, in addition to the sort of odd, abrupt start, is because... some of the character designs in the game (particularly of some of the male characters) just annoyed the heck out of me. That's not a knock on people who like that style... but I was "shallow enough" that I decided to move on to games with a more attractive (to me) art style. It's a "visual novel" so finding the visual attractive matters! So I do understand also what you mean by the importance of anime being in the audio-visual aspects. It's not an aspect I can ignore either in any visual medium either.

To my sheer luck, this thread just popped up in the General Anime section. I'm always amazed (and to my envy) how people in this forum make it seem so easy to articulate and convey their messages which I seem to struggle with often times. Several posts in that thread identify very easily a lot of the problem that I currently have with the two episodes of this show. You also highlighted and reaffirmed some of those problematic areas. Yeah, I agree subjective taste matters to ones own enjoyment, but at the same time a show will have a better chance at engaging wider range of audience when its execution is above average from all front of what makes an anime. Ef~ a Tale of Memories is such a good example of what an overall animation effort can be like and how the audio and visual aspect of things can affect a story-telling. I don't know if that story would be able to convey as well as it did (and was able to engage its audience as well as it did ) if we lessen the affect of the audio and visual, especially the auditory affect. It was a beautifully choreographed show that incorporated a very simple story masterfully to make the end product so enjoyable. Even for a moment I didn't feel like I was lost in that show as I went from episode to episode. I actually cared for the story told. True Tears would be another such example. In an essence, I can also cite the 2nd season of Clannad (from around episode 10 or 11) as another example of what can happen when an execution is purposeful to bring everything together. Aside for my own complain about how needlessly long that series was, that story blossomed so well when....

Spoiler for Clannad specific. Please use discretion if you intend to watch Clannad:

Ushio-arc started. My most favorite scene from that series was when Ushio goes to tell her dad that she just took a dump all by herself. She was so proud, but to her dimay she couldn't even get an acknowledgement from her dad. I was having hard time holding back my tears. I also started to understand for the first time about the driving theme of that series which was supposed to be about "family" all along. But that scene doesn't have any meaning if the ground work wasn't laid out properly in the previous five or six episodes along with the frst couple of episodes from the first season of Clannad. Everything else in between was..... hmph... filler.

Clannad was above average from a technical standpoint in its effort at overall animation. And yet, I thought the show missed out on a choesive plot point because of the sheer length. I still thought about the story and how each episode contributed to form the story once I was able to get past the animation effort. My point is that I can't even get past the audio and visual aspect of this show before I can even start wondering and caring about this storytelling.

Anyway, enjoyed this conversation a lot.

[s07195]

Definitely an improvement over the first episode. Although I thought the first part of the episode (introduction of Komari) was a bit forced, the rest was more natural. Liked the contrast between the 'world secret' bit and the rest of the episode. Very mysterious, and the deja vu-like part in particular caught my attention. Put that in context with Riki saying he wants these days so go on forever, and I feel that something very Key-like is going on here.