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Jellyfish Can't Swim in the Night was so good (hexbear.net)
submitted 2 weeks ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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No flaws. 9/10

Maybe a little too subtle on the lgbt themes but I also kinda enjoy it in a "I can understand what that means!" kind of way that makes you feel clever. Could have developed more characters with 2 cours instead of 1.

Should be compared to A Place Further than the Universe. I'd say Jellee's characters are slightly more mature and feel more real though.

Loved it.

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[-] [email protected] 8 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

It was great, right up until the last episode which fell so flat it retroactively ruined the rest. Like the climax of the series is what? One main character getting to play second fiddle to the worst people in the show, the other main characters getting to go "oh that was cool huh" and that was it, time for a timeskip montage that gives each of them some little extremely individual moment of further character growth. Kano and Mahiru's arc just sort of fizzled out without any sort of acknowledgement, and then it was over.

Damn, I really hate when my cynicism get vindicated. I feel like that's even worse than the disappointment with how badly it ended, just knowing that I shouldn't have been right to be cynical, but I was.

[-] [email protected] 3 points 2 weeks ago

Yeah the show clearly could have benefitted from a second cour to expand further. It does feel more like a mid-show peak rather than a finale.

[-] [email protected] 4 points 2 weeks ago

Maybe. I don't know if they just kind of planned poorly and struggled to advance the plot to hit the major events they wanted or if there was executive meddling or the like taking an axe to the story towards the end. Because like I said in another comment, it almost feels like a completely different story after episode 7, like someone came in and said "nope, too gay, cut it all out" and got rid of even any more yuri bait apart from a few fragments like just what Kano was focusing on while breaking down after her fight with Mahiru.

I don't mean to sound too bitter about it, I'm just disappointed with where it went, especially after all the glowing praise I had for it early on. It's sad, and I do wish there were more episodes left to maybe fix this, but at the same time I know that either the writers or studio intentionally made it the way it was and I don't believe the reason was they didn't have the time to develop Kano and Mahiru more given they both were basically just treading water starting around the 8th episode.

[-] [email protected] 6 points 2 weeks ago

won't write my thoughts on it since i still have to let it sink to have a better analysis, but i got the feeling that they didn't had clarity on what to do with the story. the series had some good ideas or plot points that were either forgotten or just set asside to be solved later. and the last episode felt like they skipped a whole season of character development. it really needed more time or a better planning since most resolutions felt incomplete.

and it's very hard to not call the series bait. they had a very good episode that cannot be read at anything other than romantic development and then they split the characters for the rest of the series just to reunite them at the end as just a simple group of friends. and the whole thing with kiui/nox was very well written but then it's just left asside

i really want to like the series but sadly I can only say it's dissapointing. it's probably better than the average "girls friend group" anime since it tried to pressent more serious themes, but it didn't do much with them

[-] [email protected] 6 points 2 weeks ago

Even though I didn't bother watching the show I heard that it did a bunch of queerbaiting only to have the characters be "really good friends!" Is that accurate?

[-] [email protected] 7 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Basically. There's a trans character and that was handled reasonably well, but the sort of core storyline of both Kano and Mahiru just sort of faceplanted towards the end in a way that feels so weird and drastic that I can't help but wonder if it wasn't rewritten. All the themes of defiance and openly chasing what makes you happy despite social scorn just evaporated completely, it tries to recuperate and humanize the two largely-absent and irrelevant antagonist characters for no reason and with no payoff, the two main characters grew more distant in a way that was narratively unsatisfying and didn't really lead into anything, and their reconciliation was tepid and disappointing. Like I can't stress enough that it feels like the story was building up Kano and Mahiru's relationship and personal character growth arcs, and then an eraser was crudely taken to the last quarter of all of that and someone else added some filler to connect the shreds of what was left.

It's really disappointing. Not specifically because it wasn't queer enough, but because the first seven episodes are great and poignant and sweet, and then with the exception of Watase's story in episode eleven the last four episodes are really weak and have the other three main characters in a sort of narrative stasis. It would have been fine for Kano's clear feelings for Mahiru to not be reciprocated, if that had at least been acknowledged. It would have been fine if it had been cut short by a dramatically meaningful conflict between them. But instead just a whole lot of nothing happened, emotions were flat across the board, and then it got a lukewarm ending without even the level of the earlier yuri-baiting moments.

[-] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

>an anime comes out

>people say it's super gay

>tell them that my coffee maker has one job

>show ends

>people were subject to coffee undertones

I find that the "cute girls doing cute things" disgost is usually a big red flag that says Q U E E R B A I T

[-] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

I'm gonna make a libre office calc sheet to keep track of queerbaiting anime at this point

[-] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

Post it if you do!!

[-] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

I don't watch much anime. This is all I've got so far. I added alt text/descriptions for explanations, which is obviously not visible here. Tbh I could probably combine technically gay/partial queerbait?

[-] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

Yeah probably. I'm sure tons of people here (Cromalin lol) could contribute as well.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 2 weeks ago

spoilerI felt like it hints that they're gay without ever actually exploring it. The two act like partners and then it never really goes into it, instead focusing on their music exploits with the idea that they're into each other just sitting in the background.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 2 weeks ago

Anything else happen with Watase?

[-] [email protected] 3 points 2 weeks ago

spoilerNo it switches up to Kano for the end really. The last thing we really see of them other than support for Kano is trying to meet up with the boob job lady during the ending credits which I think implies they're interested in surgery of a kind.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 2 weeks ago

Another rushed anime ending ooooooooooooooh

this post was submitted on 23 Jun 2024
28 points (100.0% liked)

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