Finally, the anime I’ve been waiting for, well, forever! I’ve been a bit sketchy about it not being done by KyoAni, who are pretty much the only company that has ever done VN adaptations right. But I’ve decided to give J.C. Staff the benefit of an open mind, and so I’m going into this first episode with absolutely no bias.
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Well, you can keep your lack of bias because J.C. Staff gives me convulsions. I don’t even know how they tricked me into trusting them and getting excited for this adaptation. If they screw it up I’m going to lose it.
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My own excitement will kill me here, I swear. And it’s not like I can even pretend to not have a bias towards the visual novel. Look at my damn name. Either way, I have put down the torch and pitchforks and encourage everyone to do the same for now. We’ll mass the swarm later.
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By the way, was I the only one that thought Kyousuke coming out of the dark woods felt a bit ominous?
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He looked a bit too much like “God” to me. I have a bad feeling that shit is going to go down when I get back to the visual novel.
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To whoever thought there wasn’t any hint at darkness in the series, it’s right there. I’ll just leave it at that, since everything I say would be a spoiler.
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Holy shouta, Batman… Hocchan, you’re going to make Riki say “uguu”, right? Right? Never heard her voice a male before, but it sounds alright.
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Well at least it was accurate. Painfully…accurate. Ugh…
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Rather funny how different he is in comparison towards the other Key male protags. Especially in comparison towards the two manly archetypes he hangs around with. To be fair, he was actually even more feminine in the VN in my eyes. I’ve gotten used to it by now.
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Yeah, the other Key protagonists are pretty alpha.
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You haven’t seen alpha until you see Riki clock 20 cats in a row while playing baseball. Or was that just when I did the baseball minigame?
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Speaking of Riki being surrounded by alpha males, HERE’S MASATO AND KENGO FIGHTING OVER STUPID SHIT. 😛
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IT WAS NOT STUPID. KENGO TRICKED MASATO, YOU HEARD THE MAN.
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This scene was almost entirely faithful. Almost. In the VN the translation was ‘Burdock fell from my eyes’ that Masato misheard. In the anime, it’s ‘Snails that fell from my eyes.’ I’m pretty sure the people who subbed the anime tried to localize the joke. It didn’t really bother me while I watched it, just kind of a thing to point out.
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You know the whole argument where subtitles are more faithful to the source than dubbing is? Yeah, me neither.
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Leave it to Kyousuke to make it a fair fight. BATORU SUTAATO!
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Water pistol vs. cat!
Enter cat-lover Rin!
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It makes me happy to see how faithful it’s being at least. Almost word for word exactly the same thing with only a few extra comments and one extra high-kick to the dome was missing! I was a bit worried at how the fighting would look completely animated. I’m not entirely sold on it yet, so we’ll see.
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Nunchaku vs. eel pie? Gee, I wonder what will win here.
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Are nunchuks that big? Pretty sure that’s a three-section-staff.
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Uhh, watch the scene again.
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I’ll look into that when I take the screenshot. (Note-to-self, never blog from memory…)
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The Little Busters! Defenders of justice! Fuck bees and their honey! And fuck Masato too, apparently!
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I am fairly certain the poor bastard did not understand the magnitude of the task he signed up for.
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Bees! and FIRE! One hell of morning-after that must have been.
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We’ll call our team… Little Busters!
I’m pretty sure they were in the school when they said this in the VN. Didn’t take away anything though. One of my favorite scenes from the beginning of Little Busters. It might be because my favorite opening song plays after this. Who knows.
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They were actually outside in the VN too. Regardless, it was still in a different place. The way Kyousuke declares they will form a baseball team called Little Busters is pretty awesome either way.
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That overhang is practically inside the school, it’s a far shot from sitting 200 feet from campus in front of a tree for sure.
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I thought the remix of the VN’s opening theme was pretty awesome. The way J.C. did the opening sequence wasn’t too shabby either.
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The fact they kept the soundtrack intact throughout the anime just made me happy in general. That battle loss music when Rin got wrecked was hilarious.
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I don’t know what to say because of how heavy my bias is to the song and how amazing the OP was. I think I could listen to this OP on anything and I’d still like it, so.
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AWESOME.
Kyousuke’s definitely going to get a perfect mark on his homework.
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They missed a couple quotes here but they got the best ones. I hate time-constraints on stuff like this because it makes the comedy not as funny as it could be. Not really a gripe on J.C’s part, more of adaptations in general. I would have liked it if they kept Kengo’s quote of; “You were eaten by the eel pie instead.” though. That would have been stellar.
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SASAGAMI SASHIMI-SAMA.
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SALAMI STAYSINGEAR.
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You’re both idiots. It’s clearly Sasesaga Sasalami.
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I see you like the salami too.
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Oh ho ho!
Kyousuke reading manga. Wow. Damn. Isn’t that so dreamy?
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I’ll say what Dan was thinking. You sir, are a flaming homosexual.
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I said nothing of the sort.
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It hurts when people take me seriously.
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Looks like we’re doing Komari’s route first.
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WHERE THE HELL IS HARUKA, WE’RE OUT OF SEQUENCE ALREADY?! IT’S THE FIRST EPISODE, SHIT.
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Chill your shit, Haruka came in and stole a freaking book. Komari is the first new Little Buster. It makes sense in adaptations-sense. Haruka will probably get her scene when she gets introduced. I’m not sure if Komari’s route will be first or if she’s being introduced first due to sequence. Who knows?
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That book scene could have happened and then we don’t hear from her until we’re supposed to again. I mean, they introduced Kyou pretty early in the Clannad anime, and she didn’t even get an arc!
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Well, thing is, I’m not sure if It’d fit the time constraints is all. I think there trying to give the girls good screentime before everyone joins the Little Busters. I’m not sure how it’d go for people not sure who Haruka is, to just catch a glimpse and then she’s off.
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It’d be worth for the textbook scene which I will now refrain from spoiling. I’d make myself puke thinking about it too much anyway.
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The ending song they chose is pretty nice to listen to. Like all the other Little Busters! songs, it’s sung by Rita.
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I think I might just be a Rita fanboy. Damn it. I hate my own fanboyism sometimes.
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Sorry, I still have the Angel Beats! ending song stuck in my head. I am in no state of mind to make a judgement for at least another week. Let’s talk about something else, please.
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First Impressions
The first episode was better than I expected it to be, because usually anime adaptation of visual novels aren’t this word-by-word or as faithful unless it was KyoAni. I don’t know why people are complaining about the anime right now. Either they’re fanboys of KyoAni, very purist about the visual novel and would have hated it regardless, or they are VERY misguided on what the story will actually be like just from exposition.
The blogging community and just anime community in general has my jimmies all rustled for this. It is almost a repeat of exactly what happened when Clannad came out. The critics came out in the fucking swarm and tried to rip it to pieces because of the incredible amount of content it missed. And then came the KyoAni fan-base to smite all that judged the company that could do no wrong. This time, we have the same scenario, except a different company, and the same KyoAni fan-base is now blaming J.C for everything. We switched from love to hate and company name. Congratulations everyone, we’re growing.
You know, I don’t mind people not liking what I don’t like, but the amount of cloud-grasping for reasons to hate it simply because it’s J.C is astounding. If you didn’t like it, you probably wouldn’t like the visual novel either. Some of the jokes and comedy got lost, but not everything makes it over in an adaptation. As one of the people who read the VN and has a conscious bias towards it, I honestly think it was very true to the VN and I actually am surprised to say I am looking forward to the next episode.
Don’t get me wrong. I am terrified. I hope, pray and beg that J.C does not screw this up. Little Busters! is probably my favorite school-life VN and my favorite Key product. (Do note that “favorite” does not mean “best.”) I was ready to start bringing out the pitchforks with everyone else to start torching J.C., yet this surprised me. It was good. It is the beginning of the marathon.
I remember all the comments about how moe and dumb Clannad looked, and then it turned into this. Now everyone is saying hilarious things like “Unlike moe Little Busters!, you could totally see the underlying darkness in Clannad. Like Nagisa being depressed.”
Here I was thinking that Kyosuke’s scene earlier was a huge dark hint. I was thinking that Nagisa’s depression was more storytelling then some sort of dark undertone to the incoming tragedy. Well, shit. I must go consult with the oracle. He’ll know what to do.
Look. Stop being stupid. This was a good first episode. Is it time to start throwing up the fireworks? No, of course not. None of the Key anime before it started out as instant successes and monsters, and neither will this. Time will tell. It’s not time for celebration, but it’s definitely not time for any freaking pitchforks either. If you don’t like it and you haven’t read the the VN, that’s fine! If you don’t like it, have read the VN and hate that they missed stuff and/or don’t like how its animated, that’s fine too! But holy hell, let the KyoAni comparisons fucking die.
At the very least, let’s compare it to the visual novel like good little fanboys, alright?
I can’t even be assed to refute or, God forbid, READ that monstrosity. I think I should spend that energy on reading the visual novel before the anime goes by. I mean, it’s still the first episode, all I can say is that they haven’t screwed up yet. Screwing up in the first episode would have been quite the spectacle.
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In memory of Epic Win Blog. Rest in peace.