Review of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya (2009)

How terrifying is it to know that tomorrow, you won't remember today? Or that you don't actually have a tomorrow... because tomorrow is last week. And that this week is last week as much as it is next week. It's enough to make modern Western philosophy implode. Didn't T.S. Eliot have a poem or four about this? This is one of the issues that comes up in Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu (2009). Assuming you didn't just throw a remote at the TV/mouse at the monitor in frustration and said "To hell with this shit." Retrospect is quite a thing, especially when fans are left to comparea follow-up series to an original that was an undeniable cultural explosion. The first run of Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu pretty much shook the anime scene so strongly that even today, smatterings of people can still be found at cons dancing to "Hare Hare Yukai". A pretty influential series, especially considering that it basically cemented the dry, sarcastic everyman as a staple lead for self-reflective otaku-centric anime for years afterwards and that Haruhi-ism actually is a thing.

But that aside, it seemed pretty much a guaranteed hit for Kyoto Animation, doing a sequel to a juggernaut in the midst of several critical and commercial darlings (Clannad and ~After Story~, K-ON). Franchising seems like the best thing to do, and how could you possibly go wrong with Haruhi? Oh ho ho.

What you end up getting is a series that, also in retrospect, seems a lot better than what the fan outcry was at the time it was airing. This "second season" should not be viewed as an entity onto itself. The episodes fall into place when you consider its role in the entire Haruhi chronology. It all makes perfect sense when you think of it as a whole. Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu showed off its brilliance the first time by experimenting and mastering plot. 2006 saw the first series air out of order, yet the entire narrative functioned perfectly. It challenged its viewers the first time around. This time it might seem like a trial. The Endless Eight arc as it is known is perhaps the best way to drip-torture someone without water.

It's summer, the last two weeks of vacation, and Kyon, Yuki, Mikuru and Koizumi are trapped in Haruhi's infinite time loop. Think less Groundhog Day, more deja vu. The characters have no idea what's happening to them save for Yuki (for obvious reasons). And so we, and they, are presented the same events ad infinitum, ad nauseum.

It's the same thing over and over. And over. Again and again. And again and again and again.

The episodes aren't entirely copy and paste of one another. Clothes change, maybe one time you'll see them at a store, another at the poolside. But the vacation is burned permanently into our minds and possibly their DNA at this point: pool, shopping, festival, bug-catching, part-time job. Every summer cliche in the book, really. So here is the reason for the outrage: what kind of cheap trick is this? There might be two camps about this situation. Either Kyoto Animation is laughing maniacally that they got away with this or (even beyond their control) the studio dared to show something deeper to its audience. In any case, what other franchise could do something like this? This is Nintendo-Revolution-surprise-Wii levels of throwing an audience and dedicated fanbase for a loop.

And so, if it's the latter and not some cheap cop-out, where is any depth in these pool-filled episodes of repetitious service? The aforementioned questions of time and existence and ignorance.

It's astounding to consider what a nightmare it is to have no tomorrow... and how much worse it is to not even KNOW that. Knowledge is what we crave, always. It's a terrible way to exist when one doesn't know. What about Yuki, for whom time "passes normally"? What is it like to observe eternity before you? Not bad questions or propositions, although they come at the expense of tearing your hair out.

The episodes outside Endless Eight come as relief. Some of these cover the troubled and joyless production of the supremely funny "Asahina Mikuru's Adventure" (which is easily one of the best and most creative episodes of anime ever produced). The high point of these episodes is what they propose: everyone is not what they seem. Wait, wasn't that in the first series? Yes. But here's the kicker: everyone is not what they seem... to Kyon. For instance, think for a moment that Mikuru's unbearable blubbering is act she's putting on to fool him. Really consider it. Huh.

But that leads to the most important questions people seem more inclined to ask: is this worth it? It depends.

Is it entertaining? Not in the slightest. Is it even good? Who even knows? To say it's horrendous is as right as saying that it's brilliant. It's not either one of those things yet it's not passable or average. What is this anime, then? It's Haruhi.