Review of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya

(This review only cover Suzumiya Haruhi Season 1, I will review Suzumiya Haruhi Season 2 and The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya seperately) I must admit, Suzumiya Haruhi Season 1 is a disappointment for me. What's worse is that Suzumiya Haruhi Season 2 is even worse to the point of disaster. What make it even way more worse is that The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya is the best firm I ever watch. Now, I'm going to act like Kyon and try to figure out, "What actually went wrong?". After all, The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya proved that this franchise have HUGE opportunity to be best series of alltime. I manage to come up with one theory after think about it for a night and it's actually surprising one.

"Suzumiya Haruhi franchise will be way better without Haruhi Suzumiya"

It might sound confusing and weird but I have a lot of thing to back this up especially from The Disappearance of Suzumiya Haruhi which obviously, Haruhi went missing. Let's me explain why.

First, we gonna need to take a look at what Suzumiya Haruhi franchise supposed to be. This is very subjective because people can (and likely will) have different expectation. One could say that Suzumiya Haruhi franchise should be comedy slice-of-lice with mystery as a part of background which is what you get in Suzumiya Haruhi Season 1 and Season 2. Some could even say that Suzumiya Haruhi franchise should be a mixed between romance and comedy which seem to be what The Disappearance of Nagato Yuki-chan is. I can't confirm because I don't (and will likely not) take a look at it even as someone who watch romance mainly. In my opinion (with strong evidence backing up), Suzumiya Haruhi series should be mystery completely (that mean comedy at minimal) running in slice-of-life background, exactly what happen in The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya.

Why Suzumiya Haruhi series should be pure mystery with comedy at very bare minimum while running in slice-of-life background? Because it work so well in The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya and for one simple reason, comedy mood don't go well when advanced mystery stuff happen. You want to be in thrilling experience, not laughing. What happen in Suzumiya Haruhi Season 1 (and Season 2) is not what I'm signing up for and not what Suzumiya Haruhi series is good at either. The author is very good at writing mystery stuff. He manage to built insanely amazing timeline for The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya and deliver full thrilling experience as if I will bite my nail if I don't control myself and as if I will cry from full of emotion. In contrast, he's not so good at building comedy. What actually happened in Suzumiya Haruhi series in Season 1 throughout Season 2 is "WE MUST CONTROL SUZUMIYA HARUHI OTHERWISE WORLD GONNA EXPLODEEEEE" and what did Haruhi do? Basically bully Asahina 24/7 and accidentally cause some change to the world's current stage based on her wild imagination. Sound fun right....? No, definitely not.

Let's get straight to the point. Haruhi herself bringing in WAY too much unnecessary filler. I don't hate her for appearance nor personality. In fact, I kind of like her in some way (Goddamn it she should be in some romance anime with mystery circling about it instead). However, some part of her personality didn't fit in this anime.

What's her personality? Weird girl. She questioning about an existence of alien (which, who know, might be actually exist in our universe). She want to know mystery stuff. She is questioning everything. She always having weird idea. She supposed to be perfect for franchise but you don't take one thing into account.

Without mystery, this girl will be annoying freak. She'll force MC to do any shit she want as if he's her slave. She will bully Asahina 24/7. She will be selfish. She will be self-centered and worst fact is, everyone need to follow her way. Now, let's count how many time that we didn't in major mystery? Literally majority of season 1.

Guy, we are in MYSTERY anime that mystery ISN'T a major role. We are now in (bad) comedy with mystery as just some background that can erupt sometime. Think about it. How does that make sense? And who's main reason why this anime didn't have as much mystery? It's Haruhi who bringing in random joke/bully in serious moment. Sure, some moment are getting serious but most of the time Haruhi is annoyer of series.

Wait. How will this anime be without Haruhi then? Without Haruhi and instead opting to find troublemaker, it might eliminate this issue. Some joke and comedy might be there but it will not be a main selling point because world is in danger situation and we don't even know who's the one causing them. After found troublemaker, continue story like Suzumiya Haruhi Season 1 but with more serious tone. This way, author also get to write more of story and also use main strength of franchise as selling point. This is my opinion and other might strongly disagree with it which is completely reasonable. After all, Haruhi herself is one of the main selling point of this series. However, is there any better way to utilize her or at least, make her less annoying and disrupt the overall flow of series? I'll leave you to decide this since this is very subjective.

And when you think more about it. You realize that story actually doesn't go anywhere. This is not as big problem as the first one but still a pretty big issue. Mystery anime like this supposed to have story going somewhere or at least some goal. The goal right now from what I've seen is basically waiting for "Data Integration Thought Entity" to find a way to stop Haruhi. In a meantime, Kyon and his SOS team gonna team to hold Haruhi from fucking the world up.

If you didn't know what I'm trying to say. We're now in soft-Endless Eight situation throughout the entire Season 1. You may already know Endless Eight, it's basically looping of same event and almost exactly same scene for 8 episodes. What's the difference here? We are in same situation of needing to find a way to prevent Haruhi from messing with world over and over again without any update from that team responsible for this. Kyon and SOS team gonna need to keep finding a temporary way to solve unexpected situation from Haruhi over and over again. Isn't this basically mean we will never find a way to the end? I'll leave you to decide if this is considered soft-Endless Eight or not.

In the end, Suzumiya Haruhi franchise is doom to fail from the very beginning by how they choose to begin story. It really is a subjective and I can see why people like it since Season 1 and might even include Season 2. However, I find a lot of their selling point (e.g. comedy, Haruhi) to be one of the weakest point while other part that author is really good about (e.g. mystery, thriller) is not one of the main selling point here. I find Suzumiya Haruhi Season 1 to be unfortunately wasted prodigy that just failed from picking their main selling point. What's worse is Season 2 is even worse than Season 1. Overall, I don't think Suzumiya Haruhi franchise is worth a watch for me. While The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya is the best firm that I ever watch by mile, it really didn't worth to watch Season 1 then need to be torture from Season 2 just to be able to watch The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya. With the whole Suzumiya Haruhi franchise left Netflix, the only licensor in my country (and probably whole SEA), I'm sad to say this but there's little to no reason to watch it anymore. It's not exactly a bad show but it just didn't worth my watch.