Araburu Kisetsu no Otome-domo yo review
Oh maidens in your savage season, and it is definitely one of the better mari okada shows i've seen. this will be hella long because i have written about how much i love this show, so its only fitting i give this the love i have for it.
she's the author of anohana and also nagi no asukara, and kiznaiver ? but there are a lot of times where she sets up an amazing premise only to pull a very weak, and rushed ending without full consideration of the characters she's created.
in this show, despite the somewhat underwhelming major plot arc, and a dip in interest, there is never a moment that doesn't scream YOUTH at the top of its lungs.
the plot actually, more or less is a little bit of a disappointment - what started off with a great comedic moment and a lot of potential, especially in regards to navigating the murky waters of falling in love with your childhood friend and girls learning about love, ends up a little bit of a disappointment. Instead of navigating sexuality, Okada basically gives us the standard fare - a love triangle, which sort of undervalued a lot of the interesting aspects of exploring the topic, and put the pressure instead on the characters. Of course, Okada excels at giving characterization, but in a way, I wish she had pursued this in more of a Hoshiai no Sora - let the action tell you more about the characters with how they react, rather than throwing them against one another and hoping something good comes out of it.
Personally, I would have preferred to see the characters isolated in a different way - like giving Niina an actual thread that isn't reinforcing the way people feel about her, which is that she's always just stealing people's boyfriends. I also would have preferred if Kazusa was just allowed to be silly and cute with her boy Izumi, and also within that, actually raise important points about sexuality, and how you deal with the transition from puberty into wanting sex, and finding out about it. At a lot of points, the whole plot feels like, what could have been a great exploration about real topics (the first few episodes), ends up shifting into a story which simply says, remember teenage melodrama? Let's make it even MORE pointless, and tada here's a story! Nobody really changes, they don't evolve as people, they simply just 'are', and that's how it ends. Fabricated drama is pulled out of nowhere just to create tension, and pulled apart just as quickly for our amusement. Frankly, it's a shame that this is how the characters were used.
Plot aside, here's some rambling on the characters. you have the beautiful and troubled niina, the salacious hongo, the hasnt yet realized she's gay momoko, the pining kazusa and my favorite, straight laced sonezaki.
the plot actually, more or less is a little bit of a disappointment - what started off with a great comedic moment and a lot of potential, especially in regards to navigating the murky waters of falling in love with your childhood friend and girls learning about love, ends up a little bit of a disappointment. Instead of navigating sexuality, Okada basically gives us the standard fare - a love triangle, which sort of undervalued a lot of the interesting aspects of exploring the topic, and put the pressure instead on the characters. Of course, Okada excels at giving characterization, but in a way, I wish she had pursued this in more of a Hoshiai no Sora - let the action tell you more about the characters with how they react, rather than throwing them against one another and hoping something good comes out of it.
Personally, I would have preferred to see the characters isolated in a different way - like giving Niina an actual thread that isn't reinforcing the way people feel about her, which is that she's always just stealing people's boyfriends. I also would have preferred if Kazusa was just allowed to be silly and cute with her boy Izumi, and also within that, actually raise important points about sexuality, and how you deal with the transition from puberty into wanting sex, and finding out about it. At a lot of points, the whole plot feels like, what could have been a great exploration about real topics (the first few episodes), ends up shifting into a story which simply says, remember teenage melodrama? Let's make it even MORE pointless, and tada here's a story! Nobody really changes, they don't evolve as people, they simply just 'are', and that's how it ends. Fabricated drama is pulled out of nowhere just to create tension, and pulled apart just as quickly for our amusement. Frankly, it's a shame that this is how the characters were used.
Plot aside, here's some rambling on the characters. you have the beautiful and troubled niina, the salacious hongo, the hasnt yet realized she's gay momoko, the pining kazusa and my favorite, straight laced sonezaki.
niina wants to have sex - and it spikes the rest of the girl's interests in the topic and how they react to puberty/boys/growing up in general and friendships, and mari's development of each character is always what gets my heart.
hongo writes erotic books, and she find out that her 'cyber' sex partner is a teacher at her school because she wants to meet up with him to lose her virginity. I think the consideration of hongo's feelings are a really complex and interesting ride, she keeps trying to push herself onto him, and he just gives in to her desires and eventually she becomes a little too attached to someone who doesn't want her back - but the ending that allows her to get over the whole situation by saying "someone else will touch my face the same way you did" i think was an interesting choice. it was definitely a touching one - but leaves a lot of questions left unsaid.
on the topic of milo sensei, i find his character completely puzzling. what does he do? he just traipses around with high school girls, has a crazy sex brain to the point he's sexting online, but he's never a bad person, and he's completely in love with emi sensei. It feels like his character is always meant to be a mystery, we never understand why he does what he does, yet he has his own emotions and desires that are never spoken about. i do see it as facets of a person, yet it leaves me a little baffled to why he's there except to jumpstart hongo's exploration with sexual desire, and romantic attraction, and is somehow an easy plot device for them to rope up and calm them down. for some reason, the treatment he gets in the anime is slightly elevated than of the manga (despite being written by the same person) but yeah. im largely undecided on this one.
niina - what a wild ride she is. we find out that she's been groomed by an older man - saegusa, and that she has a huge psychological complex of wanting to be interesting, or desired. the sort of almost etheral, otherwordly, suicidal vibes that i got in the first episode are a bit of a red herring, she's just a really hot, really attractive girl who gets the Humbert Humbert/Lolita treatment, and she ends up scarred from the fact that he kicked her to the curb after she came of age - in which she laments the short lived life of being desired and wants to finally come into her own. for me, niina was a really difficult character to relate to, and while i expressed a lot of sympathy for her situation i found myself really struggling to like at a lot of moments. people who have grown up attractive, and had to present themselves a certain way to deter romantic/sexual interests from a lot of people will definitely understand and relate to her struggles, but this storyline personally left me the least ~fulfilled~ - but she is a super pretty and delicate character.
momoko, our sole gay character gets a pretty good treatment in the anime. while a lot of lesbian/queer female characters often get brushed off in anime (if it's indirect, it's typically queer baiting, when it's direct like ikuno from DITF or Sanae from KnH they usually get brushed off after crushing on a straight woman) she gets a bit of solace in this show. from the weird, creepy dude who turns out to have been negging her, she spends a lot of time agonizing over her big gay awakening - is she in love with niina? why doesn't she like guys when everyone else around her is losing their mind over men? why can't she get over the fact that niina wants to be with ... well, not her? I really liked the way she asked all those questions and in that subtle, indirect way it gives space and legitimacy to a lot of women who have also felt that way and to allow her to have some sort of reprieve by telling niina and being acknowledged by the straight girl energy, it's a kind and touching conclusion for her character.
kazusa, i totally headcanon as bi - by the way. pun fully intended. by seeing her own struggle against how ridiculously hot and attractive niina is and her picture perfect boobs, it's such a mood. yeah she hates how hot niina is, and she'd fuck her too is the conclusion of the conversation izumi and kazusa end up having but also they love each other more than they want to fuck niina - which is a beautiful end which will no doubt spark some weird kinky threesome ideas somewhere out there. obviously, kazusa's struggle and her relationship with izumi spark the whole bingo bango of the entire show, she wants to be with him, he gets caught jerking off (which was comedic gold thank you) and then they try to find a way to reestablish the boundaries of their relationship during the process of realizing their feelings for each other, all the while niina trying to pry them apart. for me, kazusa is an uninteresting 'protagonist', but she's cute and entertaining and her crush is an endearing and amusing story progression to watch.
izumi - a shout out to him - is a struggling boy who's just trying to get his blood back into his brain. i like that he says he wants to treat kazusa right and i find his character design super cute too so i feel it - but he functions more as a plot device rather than as a real person imo, he's just there to give the girls their motivations and he just reacts as the author needs him to for max melodrama. he's not a bad character per se, but the amount of - or lack thereof- time spend on him makes him a pretty flat character.
sonezaki - my favorite and literally nobody can tell me otherwise. if i sound biased during this section it's because i am and i'm 100% projecting how much i feel onto her. i identify so much with her and i was so terrified that this would change - because stories can go way off the rails sometimes - but i was really happy that they kept her a little extra, a little dramatic and still radiating ace energy and it's pretty much how i feel. seeing her being ridiculed for how she looked (mood) and generally unwanted and being called weird and a little whack (mood) from her classmates, it honestly warmed my heart that she finally had someone who liked and accepted her (thank you amagi) and eventually she was able to develop this relationship with this wholesome, pure boy who put up with her tsundere shit because she was trying to be cool but on the inside, had never been happier that someone was giving her attention and wanted to be with her. her weird outrage whenever anyone brought up sex and any sort of sexual attraction and her straight up shock about amagi having touched boobs honestly screams ace energy to me, and especially when she felt really taken aback in any situation about it and with amagi at the love hotels, honestly felt like she just wasn't interested and didn't even register that it was a problem. lastly, when he gives her a little kiss on the forehead and she gets super flustered and happy about that and they never mention sex again with her and she's still with amagi in university - i really loved this ending and i'm so happy that they eventually gave her these moments - also her friendship with jujo was really sweet. (and jujos like, nerd looking bf who was obviously really into lewding).
I have seen youtuber MOTHER'S BASEMENT arguing that there should have been asexual representation in this show because they've given momoko space to be queer, but i would argue that the show really does give some leeway to ace characters, because the show never outright needs to say that these girls are ace, gay, straight, or bi - it gave them representation by showing their stories instead of slapping a label on them which is arguably, more meaningful than just saying, we have an ace character and just leaving it.
additionally, asexuals lie on a huge scale, some are aromantic as well and reject both romance and sex, whereas some of them still want romantic relationships and to be accepted as they are - and i'm not sure whether or not Mother's Basement has that personal experience with asexuality which is why they've brought it up, or if this was someone else's opinion who lay more towards the, asexuals also reject romance side of the spectrum.
After giving my consideration towards all of these characters, which is the main fixation of this show anyway, is that it's a really lovely story. the last episode in particular had me tearing up, the idea of literacy and the descriptions of abstract colors, such as youth's blue, and momoka's peach (momo means peach) and moon's grey doesn't quite work as a game but it sure as hell works to pull your heartstrings - the representation of colors, ideas and the desire of these girls to really live out their lives and their truths and figuring things outs, was such a punch in the heart for me.
So despite my hangups towards some of the stories and the way they've chosen to tell them, each character has brought me along a really raw, and authentic story about figuring out relationships, which stays with you long after you've left high school.
thank you mari okada for another great show, and it'll be one i recommend for seasons to come.
kazusa, i totally headcanon as bi - by the way. pun fully intended. by seeing her own struggle against how ridiculously hot and attractive niina is and her picture perfect boobs, it's such a mood. yeah she hates how hot niina is, and she'd fuck her too is the conclusion of the conversation izumi and kazusa end up having but also they love each other more than they want to fuck niina - which is a beautiful end which will no doubt spark some weird kinky threesome ideas somewhere out there. obviously, kazusa's struggle and her relationship with izumi spark the whole bingo bango of the entire show, she wants to be with him, he gets caught jerking off (which was comedic gold thank you) and then they try to find a way to reestablish the boundaries of their relationship during the process of realizing their feelings for each other, all the while niina trying to pry them apart. for me, kazusa is an uninteresting 'protagonist', but she's cute and entertaining and her crush is an endearing and amusing story progression to watch.
izumi - a shout out to him - is a struggling boy who's just trying to get his blood back into his brain. i like that he says he wants to treat kazusa right and i find his character design super cute too so i feel it - but he functions more as a plot device rather than as a real person imo, he's just there to give the girls their motivations and he just reacts as the author needs him to for max melodrama. he's not a bad character per se, but the amount of - or lack thereof- time spend on him makes him a pretty flat character.
sonezaki - my favorite and literally nobody can tell me otherwise. if i sound biased during this section it's because i am and i'm 100% projecting how much i feel onto her. i identify so much with her and i was so terrified that this would change - because stories can go way off the rails sometimes - but i was really happy that they kept her a little extra, a little dramatic and still radiating ace energy and it's pretty much how i feel. seeing her being ridiculed for how she looked (mood) and generally unwanted and being called weird and a little whack (mood) from her classmates, it honestly warmed my heart that she finally had someone who liked and accepted her (thank you amagi) and eventually she was able to develop this relationship with this wholesome, pure boy who put up with her tsundere shit because she was trying to be cool but on the inside, had never been happier that someone was giving her attention and wanted to be with her. her weird outrage whenever anyone brought up sex and any sort of sexual attraction and her straight up shock about amagi having touched boobs honestly screams ace energy to me, and especially when she felt really taken aback in any situation about it and with amagi at the love hotels, honestly felt like she just wasn't interested and didn't even register that it was a problem. lastly, when he gives her a little kiss on the forehead and she gets super flustered and happy about that and they never mention sex again with her and she's still with amagi in university - i really loved this ending and i'm so happy that they eventually gave her these moments - also her friendship with jujo was really sweet. (and jujos like, nerd looking bf who was obviously really into lewding).
I have seen youtuber MOTHER'S BASEMENT arguing that there should have been asexual representation in this show because they've given momoko space to be queer, but i would argue that the show really does give some leeway to ace characters, because the show never outright needs to say that these girls are ace, gay, straight, or bi - it gave them representation by showing their stories instead of slapping a label on them which is arguably, more meaningful than just saying, we have an ace character and just leaving it.
additionally, asexuals lie on a huge scale, some are aromantic as well and reject both romance and sex, whereas some of them still want romantic relationships and to be accepted as they are - and i'm not sure whether or not Mother's Basement has that personal experience with asexuality which is why they've brought it up, or if this was someone else's opinion who lay more towards the, asexuals also reject romance side of the spectrum.
After giving my consideration towards all of these characters, which is the main fixation of this show anyway, is that it's a really lovely story. the last episode in particular had me tearing up, the idea of literacy and the descriptions of abstract colors, such as youth's blue, and momoka's peach (momo means peach) and moon's grey doesn't quite work as a game but it sure as hell works to pull your heartstrings - the representation of colors, ideas and the desire of these girls to really live out their lives and their truths and figuring things outs, was such a punch in the heart for me.
So despite my hangups towards some of the stories and the way they've chosen to tell them, each character has brought me along a really raw, and authentic story about figuring out relationships, which stays with you long after you've left high school.
thank you mari okada for another great show, and it'll be one i recommend for seasons to come.
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