(CR) Seishun Buta Yarou Series

[Mangonel]

Originally Posted by Wandering Soul

So in the end, the key was to make sure everyone became aware of her at once by doing something that couldn't be ignored, instead of the whole "asking random joes" thing they were doing up to that point.

Got to respect Sakuta for his confession. I, much like Futaba would have died of embarrassment if I did something like that.

That and lung capacity. Even on a dead calm day screaming to the 4th floor of a building some distance away and being audible is a feat.

[TinyRedLeaf]

I had already spoilt the story by reading the manga adaptation ahead of time, so I was curious to see how anime-only viewers would react to Episode 3. And I'm happy to find that it's been overwhelmingly positive.

That said, I kind of agree with germanturkey:

Originally Posted by germanturkey

wow, they went through that quick. i thought there'd at least be an ep of life without her until they brought her back.

The whole "mystery" was solved rather quickly and a bit too conveniently for my liking, in both the novel and the manga, as well as in the anime. This episode was slightly reminiscent of Your Name., and I believe it would have been better if more time was spent on how Sakuta dealt with not being able to remember Mai.

As it stands, the pseudo-science gimmick is easily the weakest part of an otherwise solid adolescent romance with two extremely likeable leads. It's increasingly clear that pop-culture interpretations of determinism will be to Seishun Buta Yarou what puns-based "oddities" were to the Monogatari series. I'm not too sure it would work well in the long run as metaphors for the more familiar issues of teenage angst, but I'll keep an open mind for now.

I think the way it worked for Mai is that, with her having decided to stay aloof from society, she increasingly faded from the public eye as an actress, and thus gradually ceased to exist as such.

But Sakuta's confession created another point of observation that validated her existence as an individual in her own right. She became someone who is loved and cherished by another person, regardless of her status as an actress. And once everyone else focused their attention on this point, the act of observation brought Mai back into reality.

Or, as Werner Heisenburg would have described it, the "wave function" of Mai's potential existences "collapsed" into the one reality where she was acknowledged as Sakuta's beloved senpai. And crucially, this one determined reality is different from the previous reality, where Mai kept a distance between herself and everyone else, because of her growing dislike of unwanted attention.

Well, the good news for me is that all the following episodes will now be as new to me as they would be to all other English-only viewers. I look forward to being pleasantly surprised.

[Frontier]

I'm gaining more and more respect for Sakuta as this series goes on. As soon as he learns what's the trigger for people forgetting Mai, he willingly goes night after night without sleep so that he doesn't, even at the expense of his health. He was still fighting back against sleep when Mai put sleeping pills into his drink to finally get him to rest .

I love how Sakuta just rolls with the bunny girl outfit in his room by just claiming he picked it up for Kaede. Such a rascal .

I don't even want to imagine things from Mai's perspective after even Sakuta forgot about her. Just thinking of her watching him on the train when he couldn't even see her is depressing enough .

I think that's definitely one of the gutsiest love confessions I've ever seen. Not often someone feels so strongly about someone that they'll declare their feelings in front of a whole school, although the situation was to the point where Sakuta had to go big or go home like that. And the Power of Love never won through small romantic feats .

I wonder how many people heard and remember the bunny girl line. Forget about rumors of Mai and Sakuta as a couple, I'm just imagining all the rumors and guesswork about Sakurajima-Senpai in a bunny girl outfit .

Classic cool-headed Mai wanting to wait until things have died down before getting into a relationship in the heat of the moment. Although maybe she just wanted an excuse to make him constantly declare his love for her before she agreed to go out with him ?

Looks like we're moving onto the Adolescent Syndrome of butt-kick girl from the last episode. I'm curious how much of a role Mai will have moving forward now that her arc and issue are finished and she and Sakuta seem to be on the cusp of getting together. I think they were only a few days off from when Mai said she would seriously answer his confession (although all evidence points to an affirmative on that front). A big part of the appeal of this show so far has been the developing relationship and banter between Sakuta and Mai, and Mai as the female lead, so it'll be interesting to see how that will be handled moving forward (especially when we're at what's usually the climax of most romance anime).

Originally Posted by germanturkey

wow, they went through that quick. i thought there'd at least be an ep of life without her until they brought her back. i was getting ready for it when she drugged him. my heart could barely take it.. she basically killed herself by letting go of the one person who could still see her.

And she still slapped him for forgetting her .

[Keila]

Originally Posted by Frontier

I wonder how many people heard and remember the bunny girl line. Forget about rumors of Mai and Sakuta as a couple, I'm just imagining all the rumors and guesswork about Sakurajima-Senpai in a bunny girl outfit .

To be fair, 'in-universe' they've already had access to Mai in a swimsuit doing all sorts of poses, a bunny girl outfit (as interesting as that is) that they'd need to imagine takes a lot more effort than just looking up the swimsuit shots on the internet.

[Stark700]

I think in general so far, this show retains a mystique in regards to its social content while the character relationship between Sakuta/Mai is constantly developing. A hell of a confession by Sakuta in front of the school if you ask me for episode 2. That guy has guts.

Oh and I also find this quote rather interesting:

[kari-no-sugata II]

Originally Posted by TinyRedLeaf

The whole "mystery" was solved rather quickly and a bit too conveniently for my liking, in both the novel and the manga, as well as in the anime. This episode was slightly reminiscent of Your Name., and I believe it would have been better if more time was spent on how Sakuta dealt with not being able to remember Mai.

As it stands, the pseudo-science gimmick is easily the weakest part of an otherwise solid adolescent romance with two extremely likeable leads. It's increasingly clear that pop-culture interpretations of determinism will be to Seishun Buta Yarou what puns-based "oddities" were to the Monogatari series. I'm not too sure it would work well in the long run as metaphors for the more familiar issues of teenage angst, but I'll keep an open mind for now.

I had basically the same problem. While the dialogue was as good as before, the "because quantum!" and "reading the mood can change the world!" kept breaking suspension of disbelief for me. I try avoid getting hung up on such things but it was too much for me.

[4th Dimension]

Maan. I quite like this show, mostly as others have said due to the banter, but man is the art dirrection not satisfying.

Like who thought it would be a good idea to have both the MC and his best buddy have similar hairstyles and the same hair color. This makes them similar to be easilly told apart. And the colors are for some reason quite muted and brown, like it's from the brown age of videogames in 00s.
I have seen the manga, and it's the same there in the color panels, so apparently this isn't something the anime studio f-ed up.
Also animations can be really off key. Just look at him running through the hall in this episode. He is "running" in place!

As for the mystery itself it was interesting so far even though the resolution is kinda handed to him in the end. Hmmm... did he write that to himself? Or did Futaba come up with it and made a note for herself to give to him?

I don't think it's actually quantum related. This is a macroscopic issue. They only use the thought experiments as a usefull stepping stone for thinking of things. In Mai's case it seems that her dissapearing from the eyes of the people because she was "that Idol", and because she was avoided by other students, was mostly to blame. Somehow the most of the world ended up kinda hypnotized that she doesn't exist and ignored her.
In the end she was brought back because the gossip about her relationship with MC was too hot to pass up.
But this definitelly doesn't seem like a psychological issue on Mei's part. Something was suppressing people's perception of things.

[Blueknight78]

wow as a manga reader i really feel satisfied while this arc was small with 3 episosdes it still was almost perfect as the manga since manga does had few pages for each chapter and they adapted like 19 chapters with each one having between 15 to 16 pages, which make sense having around 3 to at best 4 episodes.

One thing bugging me is "why it's is tagged as "harem" when it is nos ta harem"??, some imporant notes which i learned for this serie

it's looks like the anime will adapt 5 volumes from the novel, then volume 6 and 7 will be a "movie".

may plot is not totally finished yet, but the others volumes until volume 5 will focus on others girls with mc heping then, then volume 6 and 7 will be back to main girl, again this serie is not a harem the mc only love may but she sill be sidelined a little for the others girl until her time come back again, while the novel not finished on the volume 7 (have more) peoples told which if the anime staff want to end the "anime serie" volumes 6 and 7 are perfect cuz most of the problems are closed up to that volumes and they ending was almost "closed" for the serie "something like volume 7 was supposed to be the last but they decided for the sake of money keep writing due to sucess".

[Psyco Diver]

Philosophy driven heavy dialogue series, that's all I can say about this one

[Haak]

I do think the climactic challenge for Sakuta came and went far too quickly but otherwise I thought it was just as superb as the preceding episodes. TinyRedLeaf may not like the supernatural personifications of "atmosphere" but as someone who vividly remembers his high school years involving such "atmospheres" I can actually totally relate and get behind it. I find it unique and creative.

I really don't know how the story can top this but I'd like to see it try. I hope we aren't going to get a pointless love triangle with the arse kicking girl through. I was under the impression that this kind of BS wasn't gonna happen here.

[Lex79]

Originally Posted by 4th Dimension

As for the mystery itself it was interesting so far even though the resolution is kinda handed to him in the end. Hmmm... did he write that to himself? Or did Futaba come up with it and made a note for herself to give to him

I think Futaba wrote it, it wouldn't make sense for Sakuta to write such a note, sneak it into Futaba's textbook and then have her handing it to himself when he already has a diary.

[Applehell]

I liked episode 3, but I agree with most here about the resolution coming too quickly and easily. It's little hard for me to buy that Sakuta could planned this all out himself to that degree and the philosophical and quantum related elements aren't meshing that too well with conclusion. But man does this show nail it's emotional beats to point I can overlook all that. The relationship between Sakuta and Mai is what has been carrying this series for the first 3 episodes and their development has compelling all the way through. I'm not sure how the next episodes will measure up and kinda of dreading a discount monogatari situation, but for now this show has climbed up in my good books.

[MeoTwister5]

Personally I think the setup for the first three episodes would have made a good foundation for an actual 13 episode run. The resolution came a bit too fast even though it was wrapped up nicely and logically, or as logical as any of this can get. There is of course that question of how he managed to remember Mai even if all he had were vague hints about some person whom he "loved", though I guess that's not really a concern for this part of the tale. At the end of it all, with the problem of perception shaping reality as it is, all that was needed was to change people's perception to allow Mai to exist again.

Of course Sakuta only did this in the school, so for all we know she only exists for her school mates. The rest of the world is another problem altogether, unless we expect him to like get on national TV and scream his love for her for all Japan to see.

The next arc focuses on but kick girl and specifically mentions Laplace's Demon, which if we distill out all the physics jargon, boils down to an issue of fate and (pre)determinism. In the same way that Mai's story had to deal with the nature of perception and consciousness affecting her existence, I assume this issue of Adolescence Syndrome will try to tackle the issue of a girl trapped in a predetermined series of events that she cannot escape no matter what, maybe even beyond what we'd think would "logically" change her outcome from a specific cause. That is to say that her own free will or action changes nothing because she's on course to a predetermined outcome.

This next arc will have some pretty big shoes to fill IMO.

[kari-no-sugata II]

Hmm. Theta has some interesting things to say about this series:

Direct link to the section: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLXKIdNryKI&t=907s

Basically, he's saying that we shouldn't see the science "arguments" as being real but really as a metaphor. He makes some good arguments about this and other things and if this is indeed how to see them then it makes me feel better about this series...

[kari-no-sugata II]

ep4: some nice zingers again this week... but... hmm... our MC sure likes trouble huh.

[FlareKnight]

Sakuta's life just never gets any easier . Darn it all the guy wants is to enjoy his lovely dating future with Mai. So of course a problem comes into the picture that utterly throws a wrench into things.

On the positive side at least his own feelings on the subject aren't changing. Though man I couldn't help but laughing when the one time he wanted time to loop didn't happen. They'll have to figure out some crazy path through this.

[Haak]

I absolutely laughed my arse off when that time loop just broke at the worst possible moment for Sakuta after he Tempted Fate. That was just too perfect.

Though my fears about there being a bullshit love triangle are getting bigger and bigger.

[Frontier]

It's nice to see that Mai and her relationship with Sakuta hasn't been tabeled with the onset of a new arc and a new girl with Adolescent Syndrome. The pair are back to their usual banter and are right at the cusp of finally going out, only for Laplace's Demon to get in the way. But I guess that gives Sakuta even more incentive to fix this situation .

Wait, so Sakuta and Mai have already had their first kiss while he couldn't see her? I wasn't quite sure if she was just saying that to get a reaction out of him or if it really did happen. But now I really want some kind of OVA or flashback showing what was going on with Mai while Sakuta had forgotten her, and where and when their first kiss was. Although if we can get an actual on-screen kiss sooner rather then later, I'll be satisfied enough .

The one time someone stuck in a time loop is actually happy about being in a time loop...the loop ends. Hilarious .

So Futaba is in love with Kunimi? Not very often it's also the male best friend character unknowingly in a love triangle himself. I'm rooting for her even if neither she nor Sakuta seem to think she has much of a chance with Kunimi already having a girlfriend. I mean, obviously Futaba comes off better compared to the first impression of Kunimi's girlfriend, although for all we know he's actually pretty happy with her .

I think Koga's a cute Kouhai, and Nao Toyama helps make her sound very endearing, even if I think her insecurities and selfishness are causing Sakuta more trouble then they're worth. Though Sakuta really enjoys messing with his young Kouhai .

And I wouldn't be too bothered by your food going to your butt, Koga. Although probably for the best not to let too many people know you let a guy kick it .

I'm curious if her Adolescent Syndrome is more directly connected to her social anxiety then just a simple confession, so if she's stuck in a situation where she's worried she'll lose her friends or school status the day's end up repeating. I guess the key to "curing" her Adolescent Sydrome is to finally get over her fears or embarrassment at being alone .

I wonder if Koga's friends are actually legitimate friends. That one girl didn't seem to think there was anything good enough about Koga that a guy would actually go out with her .

The "fake boyfriend" routine is never a good idea, but I guess Sakuta couldn't help himself with Koga's pleading and being reminded of the social ostracizing Kaede went through that caused her Adolescent Syndrome .

I guess it makes sense that Mai being Mai would expect Sakuta to come to her to explain what happened instead of Mai having to actively seek it out herself, although since Sakuta doesn't actually know where she lives I'm not sure how he was supposed to see her outside of school (although I doubt that really mattered to Mai).

[frubam]

Episode 4 was SO GOLDEN =03! Loved everything about it.

First off, Sakuta and Mai have such amusing character banter! I always enjoy just seeing a conversation between them two because of how balanced the back-and-forth is between them; it never feels like one char is being pulled 'a mile a minute' by the other. Chemistry is really on point with these two.

Second, I rofl'd at how Sakuta on the second repeat day just immediately said what he needed to get Mai to go out with him. It almost felt a bit manipulative, but it was certainly funny to see him jump straight to it.

Then the third day; when he shrugged off the misunderstanding, then jump straight into the next day... that's perfect comedic timing right there =03. While in obvious hindsight, you would know that he'd get screwed, the transition happened so fast, you didn't have time to think until the punchline was already delivered.

I find Sakuta's and ̶H̶a̶n̶e̶k̶a̶w̶a̶ Futaba's relationship interesting. She's in love with Kunimi, but kinda gives an impression that she's a loner. Despite this, she can talk with Sakuta fairly well, being so comfortable as to give him her phone # and be his go-to Adolescence Syndrome knowledge tank in moments of need, even though she proclaims that "him saying 'Hi' to her would make her sick". Also the fact that he knows she loves Kunimi, although that might just be Sakuta's ̶c̶o̶m̶m̶o̶n̶ ̶s̶e̶n̶s̶e̶ analytical ability to see her interest in Kunimi. Hope they have time to explore their past relationship with one another.

Love that the new ending has the different focal girl instead of just Mai =03.

[TinyRedLeaf]

Originally Posted by frubam

I find Sakuta's and ̶H̶a̶n̶e̶k̶a̶w̶a̶ Futaba's relationship interesting. She's in love with Kunimi, but kinda gives an impression that she's a loner. Despite this, she can talk with Sakuta fairly well, being so comfortable as to give him her phone # and be his go-to Adolescence Syndrome knowledge tank in moments of need...

Just a minor clarification: Futaba didn't give Sakuta her phone number; Kunimi did, back in Episode 2.

Coming as it does after the roller-coaster ride that was Episode 3, "Tomorrow Does Not Come for the Young Rascal" is inevitably a step down in terms of tempo and dramatic momentum, as it develops the next mystery, but this time involving Tomoe.

The confession scene between Sakuta and Mai was from the epilogue of the first volume, though, and it was an endearingly cute as I'd imagined it.

Besides the lovable banter between the main couple, the one other major thing that continues to delight me is the quality of animation, throughout the episode. The variety of crowds in constant motion and the distinctive details in the background art are testament to a high amount of effort that I don't usually expect to see from studios other than KyoAni. It makes me wonder about the degree of freedom and support that CloverWorks is getting from its parent, A-1. The studio is practically brand new, with fewer than 10 titles to its credit at the moment, of which only three — including Seishun Buta Yarou — are either completed or in progress. It's certainly a new group worth watching out for.

As for the ED, I find it interesting that it's set again at Katase Nishihama beach, with Enoshima in the far background, but this time at dawn, instead of evening, as was the case with Mai. I guess the plan would be for each subsequent arc to move forward to another time in the day, while remaining in the same location.

I would hazard a guess that the beach has a certain significance for Sakuta, as that was where he met Shoko Makinohara, his first crush. It's also possibly where he threw away his mobile phone, as shown in the OP. If the teaser preview for the Seishun movie this coming spring is anything to go by, it would appear that Shoko is tied to the beach in some way, because that seems to be the only place she ever turns up.

YouTube

https://youtu.be/S5MTNeZ1H3M

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