[Categories: Anime Reviews]
Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya episode 1: First impressions
Okay, what exactly do we have here? With a title that for some reason forces me to check I’ve spelt it right every time, The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya is a comedy. I think. For all the overwhelming positive things I’ve read about this (plus some overwhelmingly negative ones) I can’t really form a solid opinion on it. The cast and story of the series is scarcely introduced in this episode because it is actually a show within a show.
The show in question is quite possibly the worst student film ever made. Now, I’ve had film student friends of mine play me short films made on university coursework deadlines and budgets that cover the cost of the videotape and a bus fare to campus but they would look like David Lynch in comparison to this. The whole episode is a showing of Mikuru Asahina’s Adventure, a godawful home movie that is supposed to be a magical girlfriend/fantasy/romance. The camerawork is shaky, the dialogue is dreadful, the plot is a mish-mash of every magical girl anime in existence and a running commentary is given by the camera crew to explain away the plot holes. Imagine the stereotypical ‘otaku’ anime fan being told to make their own anime show…you get the idea.
I actually found this really funny in places. The tale was so shockingly bad some moments had me in stitches - much like the film This is Spinal Tap. It was absolutely, embarrassingly cringeworthy. Of course anime parodies have been done countless times before but at times I was chuckling and literally sinking into my seat out of sheer embarrassment for the ‘actors’, including the hapless bunny girl in the lead (below). Suddenly, the end credits roll and we meet Haruhi Suzumiya and her friends in the movie theatre: they’re aghast at the travesty that she has roped them into and she is dead chuffed with it. End of episode.
This is all well and good but the creators of Haruhi Suzumiya have taken a big risk in essentially making one gag stretch almost the full length of the first instalment - some viewers might be put off entirely, others will watch ep 2 and find it to be nothing like they expected (this is assuming you find it funny in the first place, as some viewers inevitably will not). Personally I found it to be an amusing and interesting way of doing the oft-used ‘parodying other anime’ shows idea: some of the magical girl references went over my head (the genre doesn’t interest me much and never has done unfortunately) but overall it raised a few laughs and certainly made me curious as to what Haruhi Suzumiya is really like.
After watching this episode I don’t know what to make of Haruhi Suzumiya, I really don’t. The reason why so many fans took a liking to it purely on this ep alone is lost on me it seems - I’m not making any judgement until I’ve seen some more.
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