Thursday, February 9, 2012

Ano Natsu de Matteru Episode 5--SHE KNOWS

Ano Natsu de Matteru Episode 5 Screenshot 1

I'm glad that I chose Lemon as my favorite character early on, since she's become one of the most interesting members of the cast.

Ano Natsu de Matteru Episode 5 Screenshot 2
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Ano Natsu de Matteru Episode 5 Screenshot 4

Right now, there are several possibilities. One, she's also an alien. Two, she's really observant. Three, she was also around when Kaito got killed/injured and therefore knows the situation. My money is on possibility number one, but regardless of how Lemon knows the truth, it was obvious that her "idea" to ad-lib a story about an alien that came to Earth for the movie was a thinly veiled way to let Ichika know that she's aware of her real identity. She even introduces Kaito into the movie after Tetsurou's Men in Black role, taking a slightly longer route towards depicting what actually happened. Whether it was meant as a warning or a friendly "I'm in on it, wink wink" is anyone's guess, though; we've seen before that Lemon likes her blackmail, but whether she's collecting it for laughs or for something more sinister isn't clear just yet. However, despite how obvious Lemon was acting about this (if you know what's really going on) I didn't get the feeling that Ichika picked up on it all, since she seems to still be distracted with maintaining a "normal" relationship with Kaito. That's probably going to change soon though, if the last scene meant anything.

Ano Natsu de Matteru Episode 5 Screenshot 5
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Ano Natsu de Matteru Episode 5 Screenshot 7

Again, I love the pacing of this show. It doesn't feel like anything is being dragged out, and the events are happening at an organic pace, not too fast and not too slow. The plot is character driven, advancing when a character discovers something new about another character and then acting on that information. I love these kind of plots. As I've also mentioned before, I'm a fan of the way this show frames its shots to only show a part of a character's face, if not hide it entirely, during scenes where they would most likely have an emotional response, leaving the viewer to infer their reaction from what they know about the character as well as their actions afterward. Take the last scene; we still don't know for sure if Tetsurou likes Kanna due to his denials, yet he comes to Kaito's house late at night to tell him that Kanna likes him. When he says this, his face is covered by the camera, so we don't know if he's telling him because he feels like Kaito should know or for some other, more conflicted reason. And standing outside the door is Ichika, who's face we don't see at all. I think it's a great way to increase the drama, since the framing picks and chooses what information to let the viewer know in terms of reactions. We're almost halfway done, and the drama is getting really good!

Images from Crunchyroll.com.

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