So it was pretty obvious from the start that Chihayafuru and Natsume Yuujinchou would have the best final episodes of this season. But what about the ending? Ironically the best shows this season are both based on manga that are still on-going. Natsume Yuujin-Chou solved it wonderfully. Chihayafuru’s ending did some things really well, but at the same time, it unfortunately also did what I feared for ever since this show was announced: it made me hungry for more. There is so much potential with that ending… that we’re never going to see animated.
But don’t get me wrong though, I loved this episode. Perhaps it wasn’t as intense as the previous episode, but it really brought this series to a great closure, while pushing the charcters even more forward. And yet again it does that for every single member of the main cast. The King match taught the characters a lot about themselves that flowed so naturally from the rest of the series. This episode emphasized even more how different the playstyles of these people.The creators also brilliantly used Arata at the end. Finally he is thinking in-depth about karuta again, and ironically it was Taichi of all people who he needed to remind to do this as well. Everything fitted together amazingly.
And yet, then the second half came, and that teacher suddenly made the deal that the club will lose their position if they can’t recruit five new members. Five new characters will be joining the Karuta club to add to the current main cast!? Talk about potential here! I mean, fleshing out such a large cast is difficult and all, but this is Chihayafuru: if anyone can do it, it’s these guys. This is by far the series that is in most need of a sequel, out of the entire season.
Overall though, I absolutely love sports series. And yet, I have no interest in sports series whatsoever. In fact, I find myself not looking forward to most sports series, because of their premises. And yet, for some really weird reason, the majority of them is incredibly well executed. And this standard just keeps on going. Sure, we have a Knight in the Area once in a while, and I wasn’t really charmed by Major either, but for those series in return we have such beauties as Chihayafuru, Cross Game, Ookiku Furikabutte, Giant Killing, Touch, Shion no Ou, Hikaru no Go, and that list just goes on and on. Net season will have two new sports series: one shounen jump adaptation and a NHK show about a kid and his football team. These two series are really going to challenge this trend, but heck. I have been pleasantly surprised by so many sports shows already. It’s entirely possible.
Rating: *** (Awesome)
even if they dont animate a second season, if they release the manga here, it will get cozy place at my bookshelf
this was the best show this season for me
I always prefer this kind of endings (where they find a nice place to stop, but it’s obvious the story continues) instead of some sort of rushed attempt to provide a sense of closure.
But yeah, I want more too… Anyone has any sales numbers? Is it a possibility?
No, financial failure.
A good way to judge a show’s financial success to class ratio is to visit most of the popular anime blogs (like Random Curiosity).
Simply put (and a bit sad for the industry), shows that get lots of comments tend to marketed at kids and generally suck balls, but they get a lot of viewers. Great example would be the number of comments Guilty Crown got vs Natsume Yuujinchou. Sure, half the comments for GC are probably negative, but most of those still probably watched the show.
Depressing, really
I’m afraid if we solely relies on sale numbers only, we’ll never get any 2nd season at all. It’s one of the lowest sales of fall season w/ Un-go, Gundam Age, etc. If I’m not mistaken it’s around 2-3K per vol, I need to check the list again, but yeah it’s around that number. Just like Armpit said in the shoutbox, it looks unlikely/almost impossible since the sales are low, the manga sales didn’t have significant increase unlike AoEx, Fairy Tail, KimiTodo, etc but we can still hope, right. Though it’s very2 small possibility.
Hope there’s a main character next season that can match Chihaya, going to be hard getting through the week without a dose of beauty in vain.
I on the other had, despise most sports manga/anime, yet I found this series exceedingly good. It’s all about the characterization. It avoided most of the pitfalls associated with typical sports manga (like a group of guys group-crying while yelling “must get stronger!!” or lightning following Chihaya everytime she places a card) while giving anyone who has attempeted something (sports or otherwhise) the ability to relate to the characters. Sure, the romance could have been handled better and you could accuse them of overdramaticizing a simple card game (I dunno, never played it, but it’s a possibility), but those faults would lie in the original manga, not the anime reproduction.
Makes me wish they actually started animating this show after the manga ends.
Overall, 8/10. I’m way harsher than PSgels, so that’s actually a very very good score.
Loved this ending! I especially liked how everyone is starting to find their own goals in karuta, and not all of them are master/queen based. I’m hoping Desk-kun becomes the teacher of a karuta society.
There were so many parts that made me laugh out loud.. and so many parts where we saw how much the characters had grown.
The music was a lot more passionate in this episode, and some great tracks.
I loved loved loved it and all the characters, second season will be a dream come true, and i will have to keep an eye out for the manga
<3 <3 <3
(so much fukui, the twins voices were cute!)