I wasn’t really sure what to expect from Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu (The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya) when I started watching it. What I saw was a poorly sung OP, a terribly acted anime, and lame production values. And I enjoyed every minute of it!
This first episode of Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu was really episode “00” as it didn’t actually take place in the “real world.” The episode was actually a film produced by Suzumiya Haruhi called “Asahina Mikuru no Bouken.” In it, events happen rather randomly, and the narrator struggles to try and explain what is happening. After the “screening” of the film, we see the members of the “SOS Brigade,” with Haruhi as their leader talking about how well the movie was done.
As far as their movie itself, it was really awesome. As a former Media Arts major (read: Film Student), it was great seeing everything that’s not supposed to happen in a movie being filmed in anime form. Especially funny was when a character would talk to another facing left, and the character talking back would also be facing left. Another scene involved the bunny girl running across the camera three times with gratuitous bounce zoom-ins. I also liked how the teachers yelled at the SOS Brigade for using fireworks on the school roof. And the eye beam special effects were hilarious!
The character designs were interesting for the movie. I think in the main anime, all of the characters will be wearing normal school kid clothes. All the characters fill a certain niche (energetic loudmouth, shy busty girl, quiet gray-haired girl), but they don’t seem that generic to me. They’re all actually fairly cute. I’m looking forward to seeing how the characters act in “real life” versus the film within the anime.
The OP for this episode is probably not going to be the op for the whole anime. It consisted of bad karaoke style singing and cheesy lyrics. I have a theory that most anime OPs sound like this before the sound engineers work their magic. Having recorded music in a studio before, there’s a lot of magic that can be done with audio software! The ED is not bad (compared to the OP), consisting of vocals from the three female seiyuu. The actual sequence for the ED is really cute and features some really good animation (I wish it was bigger). (If I get the new OP, I’ll put it in the MP3 section)
Download OP 1: “Koi no Mikuru Densetsu” by Yuuko Gotou
Download OP 2: “Bouken desho desho?” by by Aya Hirano
Download the ED: “Hare Hare Yukai” by Aya Hirano, Minori Chihara, and Yuuko Gotou
The real plot of Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu has yet to be explained, but for now, the anime is looking good. It’s nice to see an anime take a risk and do weird stuff every now and then. I’ll be looking forward to more bad anime, as long as it’s kept inside Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu as a wrapper.
If you actually read Japanese, check out: The Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu Novel
16 replies on “Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu – Anime First Impressions”
Thanks for the mp3s! I was really cracked up by the OP and now I can’t get the terribly tune out of my head… ok maybe having it on repeat mode is not a good idea… 🙂
[…] Only because Hung took some screencaps of a bunny girl -and I’m lazy-, I was able to watch this after a horrendous OP. As I listened to it, I wanted to rip my ears out. Why didn’t I just skip it? I was already in bed and in a comfortable position and I didn’t want to get out just to skip a few more seconds of gut renching singing. […]
please watch it again carefully.
there are many hints on the “fake” movie.
it’s not just only silly amature movie.
the story on the “real world” has already began.
And while I die wanting the mp3s… the links are dead. ~_~
For real? They work fine for me…
Now that there are more episodes of the show I know what I want to say about this show.
I like the purpose of the SOS dan. Would any one here like to start one?
There will be no extortion, but I’ll do what I can to gather some bunny girls.
Email me with SOS dan in the subject if you are intrested. [email protected] is my Email handle.
this anime is totally for people who read the novel, without reading the original work it just does not make any sense (or won’t until the it is finished) there are numerous hint in the opening movie regarding later(or in fact prior occurences, and it would be interesting see how they would go about to match all those in 14 ep(rumored anime length)
hint, very important to keep track haruhi’s ep # in preview
The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya…
If you’ve read just about any anime blog recently, you’ve seen someone writing about this show called “The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya.” Apart from the odd title, what is it that makes this show stand out from the rest, that……
i love that movie but that really is episode 10 i think hehe…the shows are really not in order…so thanks to wikipedia i did watch it in order and it made sense hehe..thanks for the mp3 it took me an hour to look for everything hehe
can somebody tell me ow can i get a DVD of this anime….
The anime is mixed up and the episodes are not in order. If you put in the right order everything would make sense. Because of the mixed up episodes, everyone started to dislike the anime.
sorry, episode 0 makes NO sense without reading the second novel.
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Thanks so much for posting the mp3s I downloaded so many other ones and couldn’t find the TV length versions anywhere! n_n
p.s great review
i love haruhi suzumiya for real!!