Summary Key Points:

[spoiler]

• Shujin reaccounts his childhood as the boys head over to Shounen Jump to submit their manuscript for Two Earths
• They meet the Editor Hattori, who says that its a decent work, and points out some flaws in their manga, and gives them his e-mail
• Saiko and Azuki end up sitting next to each other in class

[/spoiler]

Opinions: (A)

Note: Due to the fact that I’m currently following the manga, and that the sub situation with this show is kind of bad, I’ll be dropping this show and jsut doing a full series review when the series ends! Sorry for any problems this may cause!

Another solid episode from a series that continues to give and give. I think one of the primary things that makes this anime worth watching is how indepthly things are explored, even more so than they were in the manga.

Perhaps one of the most interesting things in the episode was actually seeing the story from Two Earth’s in the amount of detail that we did. We got to pretty much see the entirety of the one-shot that the boys worked on shown to us, and it was an interesting story in and of itself. It was interesting that this story was made with the faults in mind, and it actually takes some talent to break some common rules in manga making to be able to make something like that.

Two Earths was indeed an original and interesting story, but the subject matter and the way the story played out didn’t suit a manga, or so the Editor believed. I’m inclined to disagree personally, as I’d enjoy reading a deep, thought provoking manga and I think there is indeed room in the manga industry for something like that. Would it be a smashing hit though? Especially in a magazine like Shounen Jump? Probably not.

One of the series primary characters, Hattori, was also introduced this week. All in all, I believe they did a fairly decent job with hattori, but one thing that did slightly bug me was the voice. It wasn’t horrible, or bad, nor did it not fit him, but it wasn’t as much of a perfect fit as Shujin and Saiko’s were. I guess the way I imagined his voice in the manga is slightly different from what the creators and the japanese studio imagined, but it does work. Its just not as PERFECT as the other voices that I’ve seen for Azuki, Miyoshi,  Saiko and Shujin.

Hattori was impressed by the potential that the boys have, but they obviously weren’t ready to make their debut this fast. I think its more realistic, especially in a creative medium, to have at least one failure before you get into the swing of things. I think the comment about Saiko’s drawings was pretty dead on, as they really did seem like illustrations, more so than comic art at times. They were good, just not in the “Graphic”, outlined style that manga is generally in.

On the love side, Azuki and Saiko ended up setting right next to each other, and we know that’s going to lead to some interesting drama moments, especially since they decided they weren’t going to interact with one another until their dreams came true, which I’m sure a lot of viewers think is exceedingly dumb. All I say is, bear with it, it does get annoying at times, but it leads to some great moments later on!

The other big thing that happened, or the big moment, was learning about Shujin and his childhood. It was fairly interesting to see that his mom had forced him to study hard, because she wanted him to make up for what happened to his father. I completely agreed with what Shujin did after realizing that he was just being used, and his mom backed off soon after. Parents do have a tendency to see themselves in their children, and even try to make their children become the things that they couldn’t. It annoys the hell out of any son or daughter who’s put in that position though. I thought this moment in the story was really realistic and down to earth, I’m sure quite a few people can relate to it too.

Speaking of moments, most of them were animated fairly well this episode. I didn’t see any glaring errors  or things that made me want to chuck something at the screen. Most of the episode was fairly still images though, as we got to see Two Earth’s in manga form. All in all, good episode!

Preview:

Seems like there’s going to be some drama in the love area next episode. Yay? XD We’ll also get to see Nizuma Eiji! Look forward to next week!