Roving Thoughts archives

My quick reaction to Ookami-san to Shichinin no Nakamatachi episode 1

Rather than just just email my comments to Author in response to his entry, I'll be Author-like and post something here for once.

The first fansub of Ookami+7's first episode has come out, and I've watched it now (partly because of Author's entry). Unlike some, I actually like the narration; without its injection of snarky commentary and the show's gleefully casual exploitation of Western fairy tales for our amusement, this would be a pretty ordinary romantic comedy anime with a vaguely unusual hook. As it is the show's atmosphere is deliberately over the top, making me interested enough to watch at least an episode or two more.

(How over the top? Well, the main part of the first episode is an extended Cinderella parody, complete with a bicycle-drawn pumpkin carriage. Said carriage is nowhere near the most amusing and absurd part of the parody.)

If you want your romantic comedies without sly asides to the audience, this is not your show and Aroduc's criticisms are completely on target. Otherwise and assuming that you don't want something too deep, the start is promising but as always first episodes can be terribly misleading and we don't know if the show can keep this up for more than a few episodes without the formula getting stale; parodying a fairy tale an episode this way could get repetitive really fast.

In praise of Sora no Woto

Sora no Woto is the most interesting show I'm watching this season. Despite having a cast that mostly consists of cute girls and telling fundamentally heart-warming stories, it's going in a more complex, deep, and serious direction than it initially appeared, and it keeps surprising me.

(I'm also pleased that one character's incompetence at her job was not kept as a plot point for very long.)

One of the interesting things for me is the intriguing and carefully mysterious setting, which Sora no Woto has been progressively revealing more and more about. However, I'm not sure if the show is ever going to actively explore it and answer our questions, or just keep using it as background material for the character stories. I wouldn't be surprised if it was the latter, since so far Sora no Woto has been more character oriented than plot driven.

(I'm not sure that other people will enjoy Sora no Woto, though, because it mixes light-hearted entertainment with a more serious background, and not everyone considers these to be tastes that go well together.)

Sidebar: an attempt at a summary description

So what's Sora no Woto about, beyond the bare summary? It's about a girl joining a small group of other girls (of assorted personalities) and fitting in, character driven stories, and through the stories we explore the mysteries of the setting around the characters. It has an intriguing setting with lots of things hinted at and a bunch of well realized secondary characters to go with the lead ones. The stories are heart-warming, and things are somewhat stereotypical but not to the degree that they annoy me. Music plays less of a role than the bare summaries make it sound.