Roving Thoughts archives

2017-02-18

Where I think each Pure Illusion world comes from in Flip Flappers (part 2)

(This won't make much sense if you haven't seen Flip Flappers, plus it sort of has spoilers.)

To follow on my original entry on the sources of the Pure Illusion worlds, here are some additional notes that are really too big to be added on as an update to the original entry.

  • episode 3: As of episode 11, the episode 3 desert world is pretty strongly attributed to Sayuri, per @PeterFobian and @B0bduh. Nick Creamer's tour of the Pure Illusions worlds contains a longer explanation of the evidence (and some additional details).

  • episode 5: I'm basically persuaded by Emily Rand's argument in Yayaka's world (and a few stray thoughts on Flip Flappers' Pure Illusion) that episode 5's setting comes from Yayaka. And frankly it's just neat for it to be that way, because (as Emily Rand notes) there are a whole lot of thematic resonances and reflections between Yayaka and the setting. It's the kind of thing that makes me slap my forehead and go 'wow, it so totally makes sense'.

    (I'll also note that despite the horror movie overtones, the setting of episode 5 is not intrinsically dangerous. There are no monsters, no deprivation, no threats. If anything, the school is a refuge from the dangerous outside.)

  • episode 9: I'm not persuaded by Emily Rand's argument (from the above-mentioned entry) that the world here is (mostly) the twins. I stand by my views that it primarily draws on Yayaka, although I'm willing to believe that it's intended to reflect and draw on the twins as well. Another person also feels that the episode 9 world is likely the twins. But I still feel that the visual resemblance to Yayaka's locker room scene at the start of the episode is too on-point for Yayaka to not be deeply involved.

In a show as deliberately constructed as Flip Flappers is, I can't help but read something into the last-minute revelation about the source of the episode 3 world. What I personally see it as is a message from the creators to us that we're not overlooking clues to where all the worlds come from; for some of them, we don't necessarily have enough information because the show has simply not shown it to us, just as the show hadn't shown us the necessary information about episode 3's world until the last moment in episode 11.

As a result, I don't think any of the remaining uncertainties can be settled with evidence from within the show. If we find out for (relatively) sure, it will be through future interviews with the creators, BD booklet notes, and other external sources of information.

(Apparently the director wanted to add at least some additional things to the BD releases of Flip Flappers, so it's possible that BD versions of episodes will also reveal more things. But I haven't heard anything about that so far.)

FlipFlappersPIWorldSourcesII written at 00:09:17; Add Comment

2017-02-12

Some trivia on the bikes and gear of Long Riders!

Apparently the manga version of Long Riders! is much more explicit about what real-world bikes all of the protagonists rode than the anime was (as usual, the anime altered most brand names). This report on the manga volume 5 release names everyone's bikes, and this Reddit comment has more specific model numbers (and see also this Reddit comment on Ami's road bike).

The first surprise here is that Makino, the brand name of Saki's bike, is a real Japanese bike maker and is used un-altered in the anime. In fact, Makino has put together a web page on Saki's bike, with full specifications if you can read Japanese, and seems to be quite happy to be associated with the manga and the anime.

Ami, Aoi, and Hinako all ride unsurprising bikes. Ami and Aoi have basically normal aluminum frame road bikes, with Aoi's being more expensive (and having some carbon fiber parts); Hinako rides a more expensive, higher end carbon fiber bike that's nominally more of a race bike. The twin surprises to me are Yayoi and Saki. Yayoi is riding a custom-built steel frame bike, which is well out of the ordinary for road bikes. Saki is riding a carbon fiber road bike, which is perfectly normal as a bike but is unusual for her because stereotypically the type of randonneuer who wants to go to Paris-Brest-Paris will ride a steel framed touring bike (although apparently an increasing number of people are doing PBP and similar long brevets on carbon fiber bikes).

(You can get into a lot of arguments about whether steel frame road bikes are any heavier than aluminum road bikes, as actually kitted out in the field. Let's just say that if Yayoi wants a relatively light steel frame bike, she can get it. It won't be as light as Hinako's carbon fiber bike, though.)

As I discovered, the bike headlights Ami, Hinako, and Yayoi are using (especially in episode 11) appear to be the Cateye Volt 1200. This is a relatively high end bike light, but we already knew that Hinako and Yayoi liked to buy good but expensive gear. And it will put out 150 lumens for 15 hours and has swappable batteries, making the seven hour or so night ride in episode 11 reasonably sensible.

(It does raise the question of why Ami freaked out when her helmet light went out, since she could switch her headlight up to a much brighter mode. But, well, it's Ami.)

Ami, Aoi, Hinako, and Yayoi all use older style magnet based speed sensors for their bike computers. Ami has hers on her front wheel, which is the easy place to mount it; everyone else has theirs on their rear wheel, which is where more advanced people put it for various reasons. Saki has no sensor visible, which probably means that she has a modern accelerometer-based wireless speed sensor. Hinako is definitely using a GPS-based Garmin unit; I suspect that Yayoi and Saki are using a GPS based bike computer as well, and perhaps Aoi too.

(Theoretically GPS-based units don't need a speed sensor. But having one makes their speed readings more accurate, and we already know that Hinako and Yayoi buy good gear.)

One of the interesting questions is whether Ami is using clipless pedals or not. The anime never had any sequence of Ami trying to use these (and it's certainly a learning experience that's good for a certain amount of comedy), but her road bike's pedals are definitely dual-sided, where you can use regular shoes or clip in with special shoes, and in later episodes she's clearly using the clipless side and seems to be wearing special biking shoes that you use with clipless pedals. I suspect that the anime skipped this part of Ami's learning experiences in the interests of time, as it omitted other things from the manga.

(Everyone else is definitely using clipless pedals and shoes.)

This Reddit story links to several YouTube videos that match up various Long Riders! locations with their real world counterparts. Unsurprisingly, a lot of places in the anime are real places.

(I'm writing this entry down before everything Long Riders! related falls out of my head over time.)

LongRidersBikesAndGear written at 19:30:26; Add Comment


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