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Old 06-03-2013, 11:41 PM   #26
Talon87
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Episode 09:

This week, I'll offer thoughts on the episode as I relayed them to Yuki in real time over Skype! There are absolutely no deletions or changes except I placed double carriage returns between segments (as you can tell just by comparing the time stamps). Makes it easier for you to discern the flow of things. Oh: and I deleted a segment between 11:43 and 11:54 where Yuki and I discussed PhotoKano real quickly.

Spoiler: show
[6/3/2013 11:35:51 PM] Talon: 2 minutes and 46 seconds into Aku no Hana Episode 09.
[6/3/2013 11:35:53 PM] Talon: Have you seen it yet?
[6/3/2013 11:36:06 PM] Yuki: I have.
[6/3/2013 11:36:34 PM] Talon: So, ... when Deo said that this series was the biggest case of Stockholm Syndrome he'd ever seen, I thought he was talking about Kasuga (presumably) falling in love with Nakamura.
[6/3/2013 11:36:43 PM] Talon: I had *no idea* he meant Saeki. ^_^;;;;;
[6/3/2013 11:36:49 PM] Talon: This is ... uh ... something. ^_^;


[6/3/2013 11:39:17 PM] Talon: *sees sneak peeks during intro*
[6/3/2013 11:39:23 PM] Talon: HIS *MOM* FINDS OUT!?
[6/3/2013 11:39:26 PM] Talon: Goodness gracious.
[6/3/2013 11:39:47 PM] Talon: (Though I thought it was Saeki's mom at first. But why would she be in Kasuga's bedroom ... >_>)


[6/3/2013 11:43:33 PM] Talon: Good lord! xfd; At 5m37s, the kids being escorted (sort of) home by the faculty.
[6/3/2013 11:43:49 PM] Talon: Kasuga *really* screwed up these kids' after school activities! haha ^_^;


[6/3/2013 11:54:52 PM] Talon: *unpauses Aku no Hana, apparently 8m40s thru*
Man, they sure got that classroom cleaned up quickly.


[6/3/2013 11:55:08 PM] Talon: *unpauses again*
Oh. It's a different classroom. ^_^;


[6/3/2013 11:57:04 PM] Talon: *pauses again at 10m21*
Man, this show! lol ^_^;
[6/3/2013 11:57:22 PM] Talon: It's almost as if now Nakamura has become Kasuga's proverbial devil conscience and Saeki has become his proverbial angel conscience.
[6/3/2013 11:57:43 PM] Talon: Nakamura: Kasuga's a huge pervert. >3
Saeki: Kasuga-kun's not a pervert! >(
[6/3/2013 11:57:55 PM] Talon: It's like Saeki will be waging war to try and bring Kasuga into the light
[6/3/2013 11:58:10 PM] Talon: just as powerfully as Nakamura's been waging war to drag him into the darkness with her.


[12:01:07 AM] Talon: *pauses at 12m38s*
Well at least now I can surmise how the mom finds out. (Though she seemed to already be beginning to wonder, poor thing. ^^; ) Way to go, Saeki. Let the whole neighborhood know with your shouting that it was Kasuga who did it. ^_^;;;
[12:01:20 AM] Talon: Saeki: Whoops. ._.;


[12:01:45 AM] Talon: 12m54
[12:01:46 AM] Talon: ...
[12:01:47 AM] Talon: ...
[12:02:01 AM] Talon: "I was ... I was ... happy about what you did with my uniform!"
[12:02:04 AM] Talon: ...
[12:02:16 AM] Talon: Well at least it's interesting. popcorn_jackson.gif


[12:07:02 AM] Talon: 16m37s, right before this:
Man, Nakamura can look really pretty when she's not looking like such an evil weirdo.


[12:09:06 AM] Talon: 18m31s aww, his poor mom
[12:09:09 AM] Talon: Say something, Takao.


[12:12:35 AM] Talon: end credits rolling
[12:12:37 AM] Talon: GEEZ.
[12:13:04 AM] Talon: This series is so WEIRD, but if not for that (or maybe because of that, and if not for me and my tastes? lol), it'd probably be anime of the season. hahaha
[12:13:17 AM] Talon: These people are all sorts of dysfunctional though. ^_^;
[12:13:24 AM] Talon: Kasuga falling for such an abusive woman.
[12:13:34 AM] Talon: Saeki falling for such a guy.
[12:13:45 AM] Talon: Nakamura being just play broken.
[12:14:05 AM] Yuki: Everyone has Stockholm Syndrome?
[12:14:35 AM] Talon: Well, at least two of the three do! lol
[12:16:49 AM] Talon: Reading Deoxys's safe-for-Talon bits in his latest post, it seems he *was* referring mostly to Kasuga after all. lol
[12:17:01 AM] Talon: But good lord does the Stockholm Syndrome thing apply to Saeki too!
[12:17:10 AM] Talon: Saeki: I was happy he stole my gym uniform. ;~;
[12:17:26 AM] Talon: Saeki: We're not breaking up, Kasuga-kun! ;-;
[12:18:22 AM] Talon: >has dated him all of one time
>has been his girlfriend all of one week
>discovers he's the guy who stole her gym uniform
>discovers he's the guy who trashed the school
>discovers he's into really weird French philosophy about the nature of evil

Saeki: So ... dreamy. ;-;

Okay now. Let's try some more structured thoughts.

Spoiler: show
Saeki, an Angel on Earth:
So, this girl ... this girl. Not only is she beautiful, not only is she super-smart, not only is she the admiration of all the girls and the desire of all the guys, ... but she's got the capacity for forgiveness of an angel. No human could be that forgiving. Goodness gracious. Even if Saeki isn't who Deoxys was talking about when he mentioned Stockholm Syndrome, it sure does seem to apply to Saeki! Pretty incredible that she's still willing to date Kasuga even after all he's done. She is the obvious catch, Nakamura's occasional cuteness in the TV series be damned. (She's far cuter in the manga, but even still, Saeki is clearly the superior choice thus far.)

Nakamura and what lies beyond:
It's pretty clear that the series intends to set Kasuga up with Nakamura -- I've been calling this since, what? Episode 01? Episode 02? I forget, but pretty damn early on. And I'm sure you all have been too! -- but the thing is, it's still not really clear to the viewer why Kasuga should pick someone who is just so abusive towards him, verbally, emotionally, and sometimes physically. Nakamura not only insults Kasuga but this week stretches her abuse to include Kasuga's mother ("What an idiot," she says of her, while Mrs. Kasuga is desperately searching for her runaway son). And we're supposed to accept that Kasuga will pick Nakamura over Saeki? Don't get me wrong! There are compelling reasons for him to fall for Nakamura. Reasons like "she gets him" / "she truly understands him" or "they've spent so much time hanging out together" or "she's the only person he feels like he can be completely honest with", etc. But Saeki has demonstrated such remarkable tolerance for Kasuga that it's not like he can claim to be incapable of sharing his true feelings with her too. We're going to need something more persuasive than that to justify why Nakamura ends up being the chosen girl and not Saeki.

And I suppose the answer to that riddle might lie over those hills Nakamura is egging Kasuga on to traverse with her. So we'll have to tune in next week to see what the deal is there. Although given we hear Saeki's voice in the sneak peek, it's pretty likely that the two do not run away from town together but instead back to their respective homes and go to school the next day. (Dunno. Guess we'll find out.)

Kasuga's mother:
I felt bad for her. What a nightmare that must've been, worrying that your son's erratic behavior was the result of stress brought on by the police investigation because *OMG* he's the culprit ... only for worry to give way to terror as you discover his ink-stained clothes in the washer, hear damning testimony from the girl who visited your house as she shouts it up at his bedroom window, and see him barrel past you as you confront him ... only for terror to give way to the sort of fear that only a mother can know: the fear of never being able to see your son alive again because he's run away from home under such dire circumstances and you're afraid he'll do something rash and get himself killed. The poor thing bikes up and down all over town, desperate to find her dear boy, but to no avail. What makes this so sad is ... he saw and heard her. He had the opportunity to call out to her and put her heart at rest, even just a little bit, but no. He kept quiet and eloped ran away together with Nakamura. Man ... more than anything Kasuga's done so far in this series, THAT was the single evillest.
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Old 06-04-2013, 12:09 AM   #27
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Oh no, I was totally referring to both of them.

Spoiler: show


Oprah: You get Stockholm Syndrome! And you get Stockholm Syndrome! And you and you and you! EVERYONE GETS STOCKHOLM SYNDROME!
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Old 06-10-2013, 09:40 PM   #28
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Episode 10:

Spoiler: show
Oh my God, WOW.


So, this week's episode was pretty damn good. In fact, throughout like 90% to 95% of it, I felt like it was either a) a season finale or else b) a series finale. It was both that good and it had that much of a feeling of finality to it. Pretty damn crazy that we're going to get not one but two epilogue episodes. I'm kind of curious, conflicted as to why the author stretched the manga out past seven volumes though. I assume what I just witnessed was the end of Volume 3? (May investigate later, as I did last time with Episode 07 and Volume 2.) Kinda crazy that this is "only the beginning" then, given there's more than half of the series' volume to go ...

VS.

VS.

I'm not feeling up for essays right now, so I'll let the pictures do most of the talking for me and keep my thoughts brief.

A, it's about time it comes out that Kasuga has feelings for Nakamura and that she reciprocally has feelings for Kasuga. Been calling this development since Episode freakin' 01, and it's been pretty damn obvious since none too long after then.

B, the entire time Kasuga kept refraining from picking Saeki (whenever Saeki would ask him to pick her over Nakamura), I kept thinking to myself:
  1. "Man, if I were Saeki, I'd dump his ass by now! "
  2. "Man, this is way too close for comfort! Take out the romance and the gender differences and you've pretty much got here Saeki Talon, Nakamura Blastoise, and Kasuga Kuno. "
C, sure enough, Kasuga Kuno answers:


And D, sure enough, Saeki isn't accepting that copout:


"Huh? "



"Fine. (Good-bye.)"

So after Kasuga's emotional (and truly awesome to witness) speech about how he's such an empty person and thus the world's biggest shitbug ...


... he becomes an actual shitface when the muddied, stomped-on cover of Saeki's copy of Flowers of Evil is plastered to his face!

But even if Kasuga's speech failed to win Saeki over ...


Her face pretty much says "I love you so much."

... it manages to win over Nakamura.

... which, I guess? , is the author's way of proving that these two really do belong together? But man if I don't feel Kasuga fucked up. (Okay, essay time. ) Saeki was, to the bitter end, an angel. What sort of girl does what she did? Excuses herself from dinner and goes biking off into the mountains on what could very well be a wild goose chase as she desperately tries to locate her boyfriend of less than one week? What sort of girl is as patient and forgiving as Saeki? Even when it became painstakingly clear to everyone but Kasuga that he had feelings for Nakamura, she still wasn't wiling to give up on him. Only once he bawled about how he couldn't possibly choose (ugh -_-; ) did she say, "You know what? Fuck this. I'm tired of this. I don't deserve this sort of rejection. I deserve better." PREACH, SISTER, PREACH! (MAAAAAN if that doesn't resonate with me!)

But what was so, so fascinating about this episode, and overall the choice that Kasuga made (or had Saeki make for him, as the case may be), was that it was basically a choice between living the perfect storybook life and living the life not lived. A choice between having a beautiful, loving, normal wife in a sleepy, normal town in sleepy, normal Japan ... or having a wild, volatile relationship with a wild, volatile woman who excites him, terrorizes him, surprises him, and makes him love being alive. Or at least, that's how the author seems to portray it. Symbolically, the author has Saeki not understanding Flowers of Evil, which is representative of her inability to live outside the mundane world occupied by 99% of people. While Kasuga later admits to not understanding the book either , the symbolic idea presented by the author is still one of "If Kasuga chooses Saeki, he is choosing a boring, normal life; if he chooses Nakamura, someone who is a true 'pervert' and who gets something like Flowers of Evil, then he'll grow wings and be able to truly be alive." Or something. Portrayed that way, it's easy to cheer for Kasuga picking Nakamura (even though he failed to, and tried to have both ).

But the thing is, I reject the author's symbolic take on these two girls. ^^; At least in part, I do. And I reject Nakamura's evaluation of all three of them. I don't see Saeki as a bad or a wrong choice. In fact, I reject the notion that life with Saeki means not truly living life. That's just some poisonous seed planted in Kasuga's head by Nakamura. How could you complain if you were married to the world's #1 wife, grew up to become a successful surgeon or lawyer or some such, had children who loved you, had the admiration of your friends, colleagues, and neighbors, and were considered a major asset to your community? That's the path I see for Kasuga if he picks Saeki. He could become a heart surgeon. He could become a defense attorney. And he'd have the best wife in the whole wide world right there, supporting him every step of the way. How is this in any way a wrong choice? How would Kasuga in any way be rooted to his shitty hometown just because he picked Saeki? Who says they can't move!? Who says they can't leave the country!? It's just nonsense, suggesting that picking Saeki equals picking a boring life in their dead-end town. For all you know picking Nakamura means that. For all you know she's just some psycho pill-popping lunatic who's going to be verbally and physically abusive towards you for the rest of your life. And you choose that!? You pick Nakamura over Saeki!? You're nuts, dude. You're fucking nuts. And that's precisely why you and Nakamura deserve each other.








This episode was a real work of art. The animation was amazing ... well, the technical side of things was amazing for this series (it's still pretty ehhhhh compared with the best studios' works ^^; ), but the artistic side of things, the aesthetic side, was just phenomenal. It was like watching a masterpiece of cinema. Just sublime. This is an episode I could easily watch again and again just for the art direction. What an episode. What an episode!

Interested to see where we go from here. The implication would certainly seem to be this:
  • Nakamura is pissed that Kasuga didn't come out and pick her but secretly she still likes him and is able to forgive him for being weak. (After all, he wouldn't be Kasuga if he weren't a spineless wimp!)
  • Saeki is done with Kasuga. She may even hate him now, who knows. We'll just have to wait and see. I doubt she'll ruin Kasuga though ... unless that's the dark direction the show takes? And Kasuga's implicit rejection of Saeki for Nakamura drives Saeki to transform from angel to demoness? Man, if that happens, that would be dark! Hoping it doesn't happen though since Saeki's such a nice girl and really does deserve better than friggin' Kasuga.
  • I wonder if the police will naturally suspect Kasuga, Nakamura, and/or Saeki of the classroom vandalism given that they all are in that class and given that their apparent running away from home took place the day the authorities began their investigation.
But like I said above, this episode honestly felt to me like a season or even a series finale, so anything we get from here on out will feel like icing on the cake to me. As far as I'm concerned, it's as though I already saw the finale to Aku no Hana. And it was amazing.
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Old 06-18-2013, 03:37 PM   #29
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Episode 11:

Spoiler: show
Once again wasting half of the episode to not push the plot forward at all and instead choosing for artsy-fartsy walking slowly through a field of evil flowers while fire burns in the distance. Nice, but not worth wasting 10 minutes over. Episode all but confirmed Kasuga's stockholm syndrome for Nakamura is pretty much a crush in some twisted way. I don't know. Sure seemed like it to me. I can't comprehend it.

Only two episodes left - I have no idea how they are going to end the series honestly. I'm seriously thinking they're going to do a made for TV ending simply because in all honesty there's no reasonable stopping point in the story in the chapters that follow the one that just aired. They just... I have no idea what the fuck they're thinking. If they had reasonably paced the show a little faster in each episode instead of taking their dear sweet time (although I admit episode 10 was perfect in length), there are a few good places they could stop HAD THEY JUST GONE FASTER, but now there's just no way they will pull it off in two episode's time, so I'm almost 99% sure they're taking this for a made for TV ending. I just don't see how they wouldn't be at this point.

Anyway, okay episode, felt too much like filler for the most part though.
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Old 06-19-2013, 12:39 PM   #30
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Episode 11:

Spoiler: show
This week's episode definitely felt like it corresponded with the first chapter of a new volume. It also felt kinda drawn out, not unlike Episode 08 which corresponded with the first episode of Volume 3.

Pretty crazy that a month went by with no visible actions undertaken by either Saeki or Nakamura. Pretty crazy that Saeki, if she is in fact plotting revenge, resisted the temptation to out Kasuga to the investigators immediately.

The episode got pretty weird around the two-third to three-quarter mark. That field of AnH flowers with the red sky. ^^; I didn't realize it was all a dream until the part where the flowers disperse and Nakamura begins to talk to him. I figured he'd really gone on a crazy sojourn through town barefoot.

Not a big fan of the end of the episode. "I pick Nakamura because she needs me in order to survive. I reject Saeki because she can manage just fine without me," is what it sounds like. And that sounds pretty bad. Unhealthy.

The smashed picture frame of Baudelaire seems to suggest a rejection of the teachings of Flowers of Evil or of Kasuga's admiration for Baudelaire. But what exactly that means, I have no idea.

Now to respond to Deo ...

Spoiler: show
I don't mind it as much, but you thought so too, huh? Yeah, it is going to be rather unfortunate if art ends up ruining art, i.e. if the staff's trying to be artsy-fartsy ends up forcing a terrible TV ending upon us, but I'm hopeful that that won't be the case. Not too worried. They only have two episodes remaining, so I could see them ending things with a cliffhanger (however minor) and having us meet up again in the fall for Season 2. If they do foist a made-for-TV ending on us, we'll just have to hope that it's not too bad.
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Old 06-23-2013, 05:41 PM   #31
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12

Watched the raw this week. You know, I decided to read the chapter while the episode was playing and I was amazed at how spot on the scenes were, nearly panel for panel. I know I shouldn't be given it's a direct adaptation, but the rotoscoping part sort of changes that. Also, chapter 19 transitions to 20 at 15:50 in and ends on page 12. Here are some examples:

Spoiler: show

















Now for thoughts on the episode:


Spoiler: show
So, it was okay. Kasuga meets Sawa's dad and granny, they seem like a normal family. It's possible Mr. Nakamura is alcoholic or something, but just because he's drinking a beer doesn't really mean anything. It's unclear why Sawa acts the way she does, but I suppose next episode might give us a few insights into her life.

I don't think they will do a made for TV ending anymore. I feel like they would have had to set that up this episode, but it doesn't look like it. There actually is one, only one, plausible place they could stop, but I don't know if they'll make it there in time, and the only way they would do it is if they indeed get a season two or an OVA. So, my bets on a TV ending are a lot slimmer now. I guess we'll see.
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Old 06-24-2013, 01:30 PM   #32
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Episode 12:

Spoiler: show
Woooooow. So we got to meet the parents this week. Well, her dad and grandmother, anyway. And they seemed like such sweet, innocent people. The plot, it thickens!

I was on the edge of my seat for most of the second half of this episode. It got off to kind of a slow start, though, and it even pretty shamelessly wasted our time with a copy+paste of the final minute or two from last week's episode. But from the part where Kasuga chases after Nakamura while reading the letter all the way on forward to the end, it was edge-of-your-seat television. Especially the end with the door!



THE DOOOOOOOR!

The animation in this series torments me. On the one hand, sometimes it looks like absolute dog shit. On the other hand, sometimes it looks remarkably good. And sometimes these two extremes are juxtaposed, as in the sample below!



The poorly-drawn character art on the left is immediately followed by the beautifully-drawn character art on the right.

Going for a live-action look though was definitely the right decision in my opinion. Nakamura in the anime (pictured above, right) looks a hell of a lot better than Nakamura in the manga (pictured in Deoxys's comparison post). And I don't mean that she's more attractive -- I mean that the emotions are so much better conveyed in the anime than in the manga. Nakamura in the manga, from what little I've seen of it, I could never take seriously. She just doesn't seem that angry or that psychotic or that evil or that tormented or {whatever}. If I had read the manga first and had never seen the anime, I honestly wouldn't have even pegged Nakamura for such a dark person. She'd just strike me as a bit of an eccentric. Even the clothes-undressing scene in the library would have been shrugged off as "oh, you silly manga, you! " It was only by seeing it in television, with her realistic look and sound, that I was like, "Whoa, this bitch is nuts! "



Far more expressive than in the manga. Even when that expression is expressionlessness.

I feel like you can see the benefits of that realistic approach here in Episode 12. In one of the earliest scenes in the episode, Kasuga goes to class and see Saeki talking with her girlfriends. While that same scene surely played out in the manga just fine, and while the core idea is still the same, I feel like getting to see this --


-- really sold for me just how unsettling Saeki's behavior is. You have Kasuga all depressed, you have Nakamura all depressed, and then you have Saeki with this huge, sincere-looking smile on her face. Doesn't look like a mask at all. Looks like she's genuinely having fun and loving life. That's a bit nuts considering how broken up she was about Kasuga originally and how scared a normal person in her position would be that Creepy Kasuga might try something again.

I have no idea what lies in store for us, but speaking as someone who hasn't read the manga I feel like this week's episode was a very natural second-to-last episode, and I definitely get the feeling that next week's episode will be / should be either the end of the series or else the end of the season, more likely the latter by a wide margin.
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Old 06-30-2013, 06:05 PM   #33
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Well that was a really weird way to end the season.

Spoiler: show
I was wondering what the hell they were doing in the last five minutes or so... why they were showing all of those things. At first, I thought they were going to skip a few chapters and end the season on one point, the point I said a few posts earlier that I thought would happen (but didn't). Then I realized they are teasing next season. And to have that much rotoscoped already, I imagine they've already shot all of the second season on film already and are in the process of making it an anime. I have to admit, that was pretty neat, though I wish they hadn't teased a few of the things that they did. I'd like to see a Talon analysis from all of the teases though

Then...



So yeah. Aku no Hana season two is coming soon for sure. Maybe even this Fall? I was surprised by how far ahead they teased, so I feel like it's a definite possibility. If not, Winter maybe? Oh well.


So, Kasuga wants to make a contract with Nakamura this time, huh? That's about all we really got out of the episode. Everything in Nakamura's journal, we already knew pretty much. She didn't say anything about liking Kasuga though, so maybe she doesn't? Who knows. It did cross my mind that they would end it on Kasuga asking Nakamura to make a new contract with him and then do a cliffhanger, but I didn't think they would do it because that would just seem chintzy. But the way they executed it made it work!


See you all in Season 2!

Last edited by deoxys; 06-30-2013 at 06:18 PM.
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Old 07-01-2013, 01:48 PM   #34
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Episode 13: Good lord at all of the spoilers in those final minutes. It's like Akagi all over again! T_T Why do you spoil stuff like that, studio? Either show things at a proper pace or else don't fucking show them at all. You have loads of viewers who have made a conscious decision to not read the comic yet because they want a full experience. Why pull such a dick move and deprive them of all that?

Spoiler: show
Maybe because, owing to people calling this series "super dark", I called most of them?

Kasuga rape of Saeki, check. (Maybe. We just see him on top of her on what looks like his bed, holding his hand over her mouth to silence her. They both still have their clothes on, so ...)

Saeki going all psycho, check.

Saeki accrediting it to Kasuga introducing her to the book Flowers of Evil, check.

I fuckin' called all this shit, man. [/boasting about calling developments that were obvious given leads from manga readers] Though yeah, the rape one could just be a red herring without any actual sex to it. But it's pretty damn clear that Saeki goes nuts.

Not really sure why they blended the flashbacks together with the flash forwards like that though. One second we have Nakamura in the rain, the next second Kasuga is setting a copy of Flowers of Evil on fire in a scene that we've never seen before.

The scene of Nakamura and Saeki hugging with one of them vaginally bleeding and Saeki weeping is ... uhh, pretty strange. O_o Hard to imagine them being friends/confidants who cry on each other's shoulders. I doubt they do, so ... I wonder just what on earth that scene's about.

Not really clear who the baseball bat girl is. It seems like something more up Nakamura's alley. Also, Nakamura appears to be wearing the same white tank top as the baseball bat wielder. Who is she beating with a baseball bat though, and why? (Kasuga? For doing stuff with Saeki, maybe?)

The knife girl seems 92% likely to be Saeki. Revenge by knife seems more up her ally than a baseball bat, and the way the knife wielder holds the knife seems feminine and filled with trepidation. Nakamura is way more confident, so I doubt it's her. Furthermore, I expect Kasuga and Nakamura to wind up as the final couple, so it seems likely that Saeki's brought the knife to the summer festival with the intent of stabbing either Kasuga, Nakamura, or both.

Wuh oh at the police getting involved. Good luck, Kasuga.

For a split second, there's a scene of Kasuga getting a vicious five-finger scratch on his left breast. The gaps are retardedly large, too. Dayum. O_o

The knife wielder's fingertips are ashy gray, blackened by something. In another scene, we see those same hands clasping the hands of someone else wearing what looks like a men's track suit pair of pants. And that person's hand has gray on it too. It honestly reminds me of the time Kasuga and Nakamura clasped hands as they walked home from school after vandalizing the classroom. If I wasn't so confident the knife wielder was Saeki, I'd just write this off as Kasuga and Nakamura holding hands again. But if it's Saeki whose hand he's holding, then what does it mean? Why did she bring a knife to the festival then if seconds earlier she and Kasuga held hands, suggesting a calmer, happier state of mind?

It occurs to me that the gray on (presumably) Saeki's hands, which from the moment I saw it reminded me of watercolor water when you try to clean your brush in it, is probably stains from paint from the psycho paintings she's doing in her atelier.

So what about the rest of the episode? Well, sadly there wasn't much.

Spoiler: show
By the time the OP credits ended, it was already 6m29s and Kasuga had done little more than to enter a room. The flashbacks and flash forwards started at around 13m05s. That left us ... with only six minutes and thirty-six seconds of new, non-spoiler content.

I was surprised by Nakamura's keeping a diary. Seems like a very stereotypical thing of girly girls to do, not a foul-mouthed, unfeminine psycho like Nakamura. I expected the diary to contain evidence of her being in love with Kasuga ... and it sort of did? But nothing explicit like "I <3 Kasuga" that I get to point to as proof positive. More like evidence that Kasuga's existence was significant to her, with or without sexual tension or romance behind it.

When Nakamura caught Kasuga reading the book, that was a definite "Ohhhhhh shit! " moment. But you knew it was coming. I'd have been surprised had she not charged into her room like a rhinoceros and caught him reading her diary.

Overall, I'm not sure how to feel about this episode. I understand that it wanted to get me excited for Season 2, but I was already excited for Season 2. Now I'm less excited because so much has already been spoiled. I'm torn now between reading the manga or just waiting. Do I read because it's stupid of me now to be a "THPOILERS! " spoiler-avoiding purist? Or do I hold off because there's still a lot of surprises left in store for me? I can't tell, and since I can't tell I will probably continue to avoid spoilers ... but man am I going to feel like a jackass for sitting out your guys' Spoiler Club meetings if it turns out that this episode already pretty much spoiled me on all of Season 2.

I sure do wish Season 2 were starting next week. Sucks to have to wait on this.

Last edited by Talon87; 07-01-2013 at 01:54 PM.
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Old 07-04-2013, 10:21 AM   #35
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So it was officially confirmed that there will be a Season 2?
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Old 07-04-2013, 10:29 AM   #36
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Quote:
Originally Posted by kaisap112 View Post
So it was officially confirmed that there will be a Season 2?
Before the ending credits roll, it says:
Quote:




or 第一部 元 which means "Part 1 ~The End~" or "End of Part 1".

While it's not necessarily confirmation of a second season, it strongly points to one. Why say "End of Part 1" if you have no plans to animated a Part 2? Why even arbitrarily invent a division into parts in that case? The only reason for the animation team to declare that what we just watched was "Part 1" is if, in their minds, the following content constitutes Part 2. And the only reason for them to share this viewpoint with us if they indeed plan to do a Part 2, or if they know that some other studio's been given the rights to and plans to act on them.
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Old 07-04-2013, 06:08 PM   #37
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Not to mention as others have pointed out, all of the flash-forwards at the end means they have already filmed those scenes. I read somewhere they only used half of the budget of season one, but I don't have a source on that or know how accurate that is. So I'd say it's literally all but confirmed.
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Old 10-10-2013, 06:35 PM   #38
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Took this photo at the bookstore a couple of weeks ago. Wanted to share with you guys that (apparently! ) the first five volumes of the Aku no Hana manga are already available for purchase in English.

Still no official word from the anime team one way or another about when the second season will begin. I see a lot of fans online who aren't even sure that there will be one. I guess only time will tell. Here's hoping we at least hear something by January.
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Old 01-15-2014, 10:10 PM   #39
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A friend of mine -- someone with somewhat picky tastes when it comes to anime, indeed someone who has all but given up on watching anime because of the lack of titles suiting his tastes -- surprised me tonight with word that he's begun to watch Aku no Hana. I recommended the series to him last year, though I cautioned him about how he may want to end up waiting until Season 2. At the time, his response to this seemed to suggest that he might never watch it, and that if he did it would only be once Season 2 came out. But sure enough, here he is, watching Aku no Hana with still no Season 2 in sight.

This news made me want to revisit the ending of Episode 07, one of my favorite scenes in the first season. Man, it is every bit the work of art now that it was then. Makes me want to re-watch the series from start to finish myself ... but I'll pass on that given a) backlog of other deserving animes, b) lots of other things on my plate, and c) I think I'll re-watch it once Season 2 is on the horizon.

Argh, I wish there were some word on Season 2. Confirmation that it is in the works. Confirmation that we all misinterpreted the ending of Season 1 and that there are currently no plans for a second season. Anything. Just confirmation one way or another about the second season.
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Old 01-16-2014, 12:54 AM   #40
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I hope they give it a real art style at least. Remake does seem imminent given the success of the original.
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Old 01-16-2014, 08:44 PM   #41
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Status update: I just learned that my friend finished all of Aku no Hana (the anime) today. He's understandably hungry for Season 2. For a working man who had all but given up on anime to have devoured 13 episodes in under 36 hours, I knew this had to have been well received.

My friend opines that Season 2 "has to be rotoscoped," interestingly enough. I'd be okay with either, and Doppel indicates a hope for a stylistic reboot, but my friend's views must surely give the director and mangaka some joy -- or they would if either were ever to see them. But as that is doubtful, they'll just have to go through life not knowing that somewhere, thousands of miles away in a small city in America called Lafayette, there lives a man who believes that the decision to rotoscope Aku no Hana was not only the right decision but indeed the only decision. I'm looking forward to discussing this and other points with him some time over the next few days, whenever we next meet up.
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Old 01-16-2014, 09:10 PM   #42
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That sounds like the "learned to love" effect at work. It's like Stockholm Syndrome's second cousin twice removed, then added back post parole.

See also:

Touhou
Higurashi no Naku Koro Ni
Kaiji
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Old 01-17-2014, 04:53 AM   #43
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I checked that classroom scene video Talon linked, and am I imagining it or does the animation/rotoscoping get better in quality over time? That scene didn't give me a headache like the first few episodes did (I mean that literally). In fact, if the show keeps a quality like that up for the rest of the season, I might be tempted to watch it.

Although I have to say that in that scene Kasuga couldn't have sounded more pathetic even if he'd tried. Scribbling on the blackboard going "w/aaaaaaaaaaaah ;A;" got really annoying. =.=
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Old 06-02-2014, 09:41 PM   #44
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While searching to see if a second season of the anime had been confirmed yet, I discovered that the manga ended last month. According to an ANN news story dated April 05, the manga was going to end "next month," which would be May 2014. It's June 02 now. Which should mean that the manga is officially over. Which should in turn mean that if we're ever to get a second season, the prime time to confirm it would be in the next few months.

This search was motivated by accidentally loading up Flowers of Evil's eerie, hypnotic ending once again. It's such a strange, horrifying piece that is both cacophonous and beautiful at the same time.
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Old 06-02-2014, 10:18 PM   #45
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I read the last chapter of the manga. It's definitely out there. I'd say Aku no Hana definitely ended itself on a very "profound" note, as it sparked a lot of intelligent debate.
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