アニ・ノート

I was reading what Omo wrote about Kamichu, and thought, “man, this is long-witted”. I was impatient to know what he actually liked about the show. My own relationship with Kamichu is overshadowed by the quest to find an anime as great as Azumanga; the lofty promise of Kamichu’s early episodes; the disappointment and the failure to reach the summit. I rooted for Yurie Hitotsubashi, I really did. If not for Manami Amamiya, I’d still be wondering if it were even possible, or must every series fall short.

The money quote is in the very end:

And perhaps “arthouse” is the right qualifier for Kamichu. It hasn’t transcended below the ceiling of common, everyday sensibilities in the way how Azumanga Daioh (or better yet, Yotsuba&) was able to translate its strange worldview in a way we all understand. It paints a picture of adolescence that is wrapped and coated by its slice-of-life tension (ie. not much) and all that ZOMG-She-Is-God nonsense that is a little bit “out there” to say the least. But for those of us who can see beyond that, Kamichu is a masterful reprise of a childhood to remember and the fun people had growing up. It’s just too bad most people are hung up with the details, like myself, to go far enough and see Kamichu for what it is.

Personally, I think that the perfidy of the promising story being suspended because the creators had no clue where to take it is no small detail. I have a nasty suspicion that desire for milking was present as well, considering the unusual number of DVD-only episodes. Not that I’d want to argue with Michael about this. He had his say, and so did I. Only I’m a bit sad that he was unable to persuade me to break out my expensive R2 DVDs and give Kamichu another chance.

TheBigN resurfaced today with a summary for Kamichu. It’s quite long and attempts to build some interesting comparisons, to which I don’t have anything to add. But I’d like to pick on this:

And while off sometimes, you couldn’t really have major complaints about the animation, art, and music.

Actually, I totally can. Animation was bad in a number of sequences. I have a few screenshots from the Christmas episode where it looks like concept art inked with a bucket fill tool. He says “sometimes”, but I think the low quality spots were in fact rather common. And even when high-line-count and properly inked, it still failed sometimes (real “sometimes” now though). For example, in the transfer episode, the welcome back sequence was outsourced to someone who blew the art. Not only the welcoming party didn’t adhere to the standard, the art was simply ugly. The instances of excellent art and animation happened, but overall, Kamichu is an uneven work.