Eromanga-sensei – 04

…if only it were this easy…

Whoops! Well, look at that, I’m a day late on my posts – It was a busy weekend. So without further ado, let’s address the puppy-sized, but nonetheless elephant like, elephant in Sagiri’s story.

I seriously want to know how to make that soup! It doesn’t look hard, but I want that soup!

One of the things I’ve noticed about how this show opens, is that it pretty much tells you where it’s going to go in just the few minutes it allows itself; all that time ahead of the OP. Now, plenty of other stories or shows do that well, as it’s a darn good way to establish tone, and Eromanga-sensei is not some sort of exception, it’s just that, “while we’re here, let’s talk about how this one does it”. In a  few words, it’s discovery through a specific action. So when we come back after the OP we know that Elf made Masamune a nice meal, just so she could observe everything that there was to soak in about the whole situation, “How does the heroine of her LN feel about making her hero figure a meal?”. As we see in the next scene that takes on a whole new dimension. There is a touch of romance going on.

This is not necessarily romantic, but very much brother and sister

The short way around is simple; a brother is family, and he has your back, he supports you. The long way around is a bit more involved, and it winds it’s way through lewdness and jealousy – especially thinly veiled jealousy. Sagiri is a girl that has her emotions very close to the surface, and being shut-in probably doesn’t help all that much. So when she see’s Elf capitalizing on Masamune’s time, she takes it deep to heart, even after his very robust counter-argument. As a result she pretty much goes back to keeping him at locked door’s length. But as with motivation last episode, this chain of events just puts fuel into the young man’s writing machine. He may despair over how he fell behind a few years previous, but he doesn’t give into, and probably even uses that to keep himself on target. Something, not getting what you want to do is the best sort of friction, as it creates sparks you didn’t know could would be ignited in the first place.

Elf can summon the Demon of Distress and Failure

Which brings us to the ” super-duper-ultra-passionate 300 page love letter” that came out because of all that. It’s exactly what he told Sagiri he would right, and she was right to be embarrassed. But let’s take a small step to the right. For all it’s worth, I do love what they present as Elf’s general style of writing, always have. The show is making it out to be popular because it meets expectations. So her writing probably follows a few simple rules in that it’s not at all overtly personal or super-deep-cuts niche (for the given value of otaku niches), and it probably pitches itself to the right level of how serious it takes itself, without going to horribly overboard – again, given value, yadda yadda yadda. It has just enough peek-a-boo ecchi to it to not qualify as complete adult entertainment, and by that same token would not be for the under-13s – according to Japanese publishing standards. So by Elf’s measure, Masamune’s new story is a cut above that, above her work in terms of quality on one hand, but still somewhat clumsy and earnest on the other. It’s not about what the public wants, but about what he wants. I’m hoping they pay more attention to that shift in the future of the show, as Elf wanting to be popular is an interesting storyline.

I think that Fushimi-sensei just loves his dudes doing stupid gestures

But now let’s take a leap. Now on the other hand they do rather show that they want characters to grow in this one as Sagiri is looking to improve and expand her models and style to accommodate for many different forms of writing; again the friction from earlier is creating unexpected sparks. These are fine. But, the back end of this one just kinda jumps over some stuff, unless they’re playing Elf as a master manipulator it’s not going to work. I thought it was to easy for her to figure out who the fabled Eromanga-sensei was, that facet seems pretty forced, and it took me aback amidst what was some decent characterization. It was a bit abrupt to jump from Elf to Sagiri as well when it came to his thought processes Then came the puppy sized elephant, and that is the reveal that Sagiri is in love with someone. I know a left field is out the somewhere, but some indication it exists would be better for the story over all…maybe save this for later?

Is it the real life or is it just fantasy?

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All in all this was a good episode on the front end, and a pretty rushed one on the back end. That feel about right? It got a bit too abrupt and sudden. Masamune went from very shy about his goals, very inward, and then it was all outward, and he was gushing about future goals like any other kid his age, little buildup, no polish.  That’s not a problem by itself, but they pitched him different from that. It’s not a bad place for him to be, but I would have rather have seen some distance crossed. The same goes for Sagiri’s confession of something. While it’s all well and good that she’s stepped out of her room and all, this still feels like a ton of things are happening at once. They feel right, just timed wrong. Again, not bad that things are happening, but the first three episodes had a more steady beat to them. Ah well, “your feelings got across” Eromanga-sensei. Confession received!

My guess? She takes some steps forward, then some steps back

About skylion

All around nerd that enjoys just about any anime genre. I love history, politics, public policy, the sciences, literature, arts...pretty much anything can make me geeky...except sports. Follow me @theskylion