Shigatsu wa Kimi no Uso – 06
What is Tsubaki more sad about losing?
Can you get fired up for a competition? Or can you even stop thinking about the rest of your life to play?
Slipping Away
“Hey, maybe we should go out”
I felt the main focus this week was on Tsubaki, who’s trying to make sense of her feelings. But that’s not the easiest thing to do when you’re not even being honest with yourself. With Kousei fully within Kaori’s orbit while he’s preparing for his competition, Tsubaki definitely feels a little bit on the outside. Even when Kousei is playing the piano at home, where she can hear it, she seems to feel like she’s not really involved, only listening from afar (even her mom says “Maybe I’ll take some snacks over to him”, not “Maybe you can take some…”. In fact, this feeling of being shut out is what I think drives her to answer Saitou and suggest that they start dating.
Showing up at the wrong time
She’s really feeling the closeness between Kaori and Kousei, but she feels like she has to defend Kousei. She’s gone from the person who feels like they’re in that position of being able to pick on someone to the person who has to defend him. And she even feels like Kaori is going too far, a role reversal from before when Tsubaki was the one who OK’d the harassment of Kousei. But she’s also got her own things to prepare for, as the softball regionals are coming up. But her worries and feelings lead her to make a critical mistake, ruining the chances for the team to advance.
How Does Kaori Feel?
Oh, hey, Tsubaki’s room is right there
The other side of the coin is Kaori’s change with respect to Kousei. If Tsubaki has become the outsider, the one looking at Kousei from afar, does that mean that her place at Kousei’s side has been taken by Kaori? In many senses I think it has, and it’s not just coincidence. At least that’s what I infer from one particular event (which I’ll get to in a little bit). For the most part, one could view Kaori and Kousei’s interaction as platonic: they’re together because of a shared interest in music, and Kaori’s will to drive Kousei back into performances. Even the situation that gets Kaori into Kousei’s house and in his clothes is more innocent than Tsubaki takes it for.
Kousei comes to console Tsubaki
Heck, even the situation that ‘breaks’ Tsubaki and makes her realize how much she wants to be with Kousei, between him and Kaori, is more innocent than she takes it for, when Kaori insists they go root for her at the softball game. But maybe it’s the casual innocence of Kaori sliding up next to Kousei that really drives home to Tsubaki how she has been pushed to the role of the outsider. But if that’s all that happened, maybe you could think that this is just a misunderstanding on Tsubaki’s part, that it’s just the gregarious and outgoing Kaori being gregarious and outgoing, not actually pursuing Kousei.
The quick turnaround
But then we get that event (and there’s even a followup): when Tsubaki and Kaori are walking home together, and Tsubaki gets a bit defensive about Kousei. They split up, and Kaori waits just long enough to go back without being seen by Tsubaki (who I think doesn’t really want to see anyway). That particular action indicates to me that Kaori is very much interested in Kousei, not just as a fellow musician, but in wanting to be with him. And there’s that followup thing I mentioned: At the end, when Kousei meets Tsubaki after her defeat, he says that Kaori told him to go console her alone. Tsubaki’s happy about it, but to me it calls back to her earlier thought: “There is no ‘me’ in that ‘we’.” Who is directing Kousei’s time and thoughts? It’s not Kousei, and it’s certainly not Tsubaki.
Even though Tsubaki was only in about half the episode, this was very much her episode. Is she doomed from here out? Unfortunately, given the trajectory of this style of anime (and pretty much every story like it), she likely is; pigeonholed into the role of the childhood friend who loses the eye of her expected koibito, even as the rest of the world (played by Kashiwagi in this instance) thinks that they are still a match. I would love to see her mount a comeback, tho, and give hope to all those girls who lose out.
About Highway
Proving that you don't have to be young to love anime, I enjoy all genres and styles of shows. If it's not hurting anyone else, you should never be ashamed of what you like!
POWUH: Meta Resident with 1692 comments
At this point I think there’s only one way Tsubaki and Kousei will end up together. There are still those fainting episodes Kaori has had and the possibility (likelihood?) she suffers from ‘heroine mysterious fatal illness.’ So if she dies in the end Kousei may turn to Tsubaki for consolation and that turns to love.
POWUH: 900-999 with 915 comments
Kaori having a fatal illness would explain why she’s so outgoing and desperate to make her own music the way she wants, and why sometimes she’s so desperate and cries for no reason.
Though I don’t want to believe in this theory. This season already had it’s fair share of people dying in only one anime.
POWUH: Meta Team and Spammy Tamer with 7115 comments
Boy, I sure don’t hope for Tsubaki to be the rebound relationship, especially if it’s because Kaori got sick and died. Bleh.
Actually, I can think of many realistic / authentic ways for Tsubaki and Kousei to end up together, should the story want to go that way, without needing to knock off Kaori or turn her into an axe murderer. People fall in and out of love all the time. The thing that can fascinate and captivate you in someone can wear off or become the thing that annoys you about them.
Now, do I think the story will do this? Probably not. I’d like to see it, but then I’d always like to see something fresh and somewhat different (Damn you, Sakurasou!). Just as an example of liking to see something different: one of my favorite silly harem shows is Hoshizora e kakaru hashi, which I’m sure I’ve mentioned before. Is it really good? That’s up for debate. It’s an eroge adaptation, and since I’m playing the VN, I can see how the adaptation is a lot more interesting than the VN. But what usually happens in eroge VN adaptations? MC builds a harem of all the girls, ends with harem ending with no couple, no relationships, just focus episodes and uncertainty for the future. This happens in nearly every VN adaptation. But not for Hoshizora. There is a definite end to the series after one cour, there is a definite couple, and what’s more, the feelings of (some of) the other girls are acknowledged, and while they’re rejected, it’s done with what I think is class and tact. The rest of the girls don’t ever fall in love with the MC in the first place, just stay friends.
So it’s possible to do something different, and pull it off (people complain about that show because they think the ‘wrong’ girl won, but I’d rather have that than nobody win). It just takes a little creativity and the fortitude to commit to doing something different.
POWUH: Meta Resident with 1692 comments
When I first raised the possibility of Kaori dying I did say it was an overused trope. So I agree with you about it being Bleh.
It wouldn’t necessarily be that Tsubaki gets Kousei on the rebound. People who lose a loved one, whether by death or it just wasn’t to be, usually find love again with someone else. Does that automatically make it a rebound relationship? Especially in a case where love developing had always been a possibility?
I would like to see an anime for once have the childhood friend end up with the hero. I would prefer Kousei comes to realize he’s only fascinated by Kaori and that his love is Tsubaki. But given the way anime go and the well-worn path this one seems to be traveling down in regards to the childhood friend, it’s looking like there’s only one way Tsubaki will get him. Another Bleh.
POWUH: and LOLi Defender with 10998 comments
One of the bits I loved the most was Kousei’s very well animated, that is not anime exaggerated, kick to Tsubaki. Yeah, I know, it’s sounds awful on the surface to say something like that, but in a the narrative sense it squared quite a bit away. He got some payback, and I think it underlines just how exaggerated, and thusly not as real as one would think, the other moments of violence have been.