This was an interesting episode. I mean, movie or no movie: the series is ending next week, so Kyoani can pour even more budget than usual into it. The result is a really well animated episodic story with weird build-up.
I mean weird build-up in the way that this episode on one hand develops Satoshi, it explains his actions of some of the previous arcs, and on the other hand it suddenly turns Mayaka and Satoshi into a couple. Now, I know that my memory isn’t the greatest with these kinds of things… but have we ever seen hints to that twist before? I mean, it’s not something that blossomed overnight: they’ve apparently been going on for more than a year now. And with the incredible attention to detail that this series has, I find it hard to believe that they’d never hint at this. So did I miss something?
But whatever faults Hyouka may have had there, it made up for it by giving a very different meaning to his part in the school festival arc. What he did there wasn’t jealousy, it was a battle of him trying to win from his obsession. He allowed himself to dabble a bit with trying to solve things, but he never went far into it like Oreki did. It makes much more sense: if he’s such a large sherlock-fan, then why doesn’t he try to formulate theories or brainstorm? Well, that’s why. And that’s also why Oreki’s plan last week went wrong.
Also weird was Chitanda. I mean, the usual progression for a character like her is to done down: as she grows up she becomes more mature in the process. She however is completely different and after the school festival arc, she suddenly got more extreme, acting more and more on her feelings than she already did before. The animators really liked to exemplify that with a particular few scenes.
Rating: 5.5/8 (Excellent)
Not exactly sure if Mayaka and Satoshi are a couple or not. Sort of left us on a cliffhanger at the end as far as I could tell. What we do know (and it’s been explicitly noted in the series from the beginning) is that Mayaka has a crush on Satoshi. I guess Satoshi explicitly said he reciprocates her feelings this time around, but he doesn’t want to accept them because he’s afraid of how he’ll change (or revert is a better word).
as for chitanda, i think she’s quite mature overall, but naive in her thinking. with her family background, she has to be the mature girl for the sake of reputation, but with the classics club, she’s been given more opportunities for her real self to appear.
You never caught onto the Satoshi Mayaka thing?
The basics for it got laid down in episode 2 where Oreki pretty much introduces Mayaka as the girl that’s been crushing on Satoshi since middle school.
On top of that there are plenty of cues in Mayaka’s behavior around Satoshi. Most recently is how she got all flustered and blushed when he saw her in her outfit on new years, the exact opposite reaction she gave Oreki.
For the love of God, how could anyone never “caught onto the Satoshi Mayaka thing”? Besides being explicitly said in episode 2 and hinted over and over, we had the second ending sequence where Mayaka follows Satoshi during the whole thing and blush when she finally handcuffs him! Are you gonna say that you NEVER watched the second ending sequence EVEN ONCE?
They’re not a couple yet. Satoshi’s just been leaving Mayaka hanging for a year…
There’s a large amount of Mayaka/Satoshi foreshadowing leading up to this episode. In fact it was getting to the point where I would’ve been really disappointed if they hadn’t addressed all of the hints they were giving us.
From the very beginning of their interaction there are strange glances and half conversations between Fukube and Ibara and the reflection of their personalities and relationships is a major sub-plot of the show in my opinion. The back story of the refused chocolate goes a long way to solidify the hints they’ve been dropping…
Fukube’s reluctance to enter into a relationship because of his personal uncertainties is such a 16 year old boy truism it was almost painful.
Its been subtle and slow, but so is the rest of Hyouka…
satoshi and mayaka have always had a thing so its not just random
“have we ever seen hints to that twist before?”
Mayaka and satoshi aren’t a couple but there have been several hints scattered throughout the entire show. From the episode when Oreki introduces Chitanda to Mayaka and said that she’s had a crush on him since middle school to the scene with the two at the end of the Kanya Festa arc leading up to this episode. You should rewatch some of the earlier episodes and the Kanya Festa arc (I suspect you were probably more caught up with the mystery that emerged in that arc).
“She however is completely different and after the school festival arc, she suddenly got more extreme”
I don’t think she got more extreme. We’ve seen her anxiousness to be helpful before when she ran around desperately seeking help for her club during the Kanya Festa arc. What we saw here was her trying to fix something that she thought was her fault and she was terribly upset. Given her personality, I would say that her reaction was to be expected.
Is Hyouka actually ending next week though? Anime Calendar and ANN both say it’s running for 24 episodes.
When is people going to understand that ANN is NOT A RELIABLE SOURCE? And why would anyone go to a site where anime fans are mocked and made fun of anyways?
It’s pretty much stated the first time you see Mayaka, that she’s crazy about Satoshi. I mean it’s all over the school festival arc and the fillers as well.
Satoshi and Mayaka is the romance of the novel series really, but it’s really not like you get pages and pages of them looking at each other.
What the anime does that you dont really get from reading the novel is up the romantic tension between Chitanda and Oreki. In the book they sort of just struck a balance point where Oreki knows he has to and how to deal with Chitanda and Chitanda kind of just going to Oreki because he’s reliable. It’s mainly a “mystery” book first, so it’s likely they’d just maintain this above friend below lover status.
Actually now that I think about haven’t all of the characters been acting more extreme in this episode? Satoshi finally stopped avoiding the issue with Mayaka, Mayaka was love struck and fiery. Chitanda was consumed with immense feelings and Oreki actually cared about something enough to get him feeling/moving.
I don’t necessary think being mature means you are more docile, I like to think that it means your more in touch with your true self, and your emotions.
Sure plenty of hits though it wasn’t anything major.
Also let me get this straight. Satoshi, was basically depressed about being obsessed with wining/being better/the best since he always failed or that when he did win he felt empty, so he decided to just enjoy life/not be consumed. Yeah?
Every new episode of Hyouka keeps making me like it more. Looking forward to next week.
you’re*
Hint’s*
Damn!
Hints*….. I’m going to go lie down.
whatever guys. Just enjoy the show!
I loved Tomoe’s Valentine message. I didn’t know there was another japanese character that sounded so much like “Ai” (love). Does it really mean “pity”?
Yes – Tomoe’s message is brilliant, and that word does mean pity or grief. I guess Tomoe’s teasing her own little brother, and Houtarou’s comment to the chocolate – bitter – is also smart to end the episode.
Haha. It’s pretty apt. I mean, in the end, the only valentine’s day chocolate he got was from his sister. That Chitanda having a house rule about not giving gifts to people they’re close to. What a tease. So there’s no way to tell the difference?
Actually, what does that make the Chitandas and the Juumonjis? Chitanda delivered a gift to them. Hmmm…
Yeah, you definitely missed the hints.
Mayaka was crushing on Satoshi the entire show. This show does a bit with overt detail, but it also excels at subtle, realistic detail. Normally in anime, if a girl likes a guy, its thrown all in our faces and the girl acts like a moron all the time. But in this show: eye movements, subtle blushes, awkward pauses, weird shuffles responses and reactions. They all build up to show that one character likes another. And throughout the show, they’ve been showing those hints.
And you may think it’s too subtle, but it think they executed it well. It felt like a realistic interaction between one person that liked someone after getting rejected, and another that has very immature, but, again, very realistic feelings.
I’m a little shaken you didn’t get the whole Mayaka-Satoshi thing to be honest… It was so wonderful and felt so life-like through the whole series. THAT’s how teenage love goes the way it should. Not that strange horny-kind … thingie.
The problem with modern teenage romance animes nowadays is, just as Ofx360 said, that they don’t show subtleness at all when it comes to love between said teenagers. And it really, really bugs me… It always feels like a kind of “body-orientated” love, you know? However in Hyouka I feel like the characters are seriously connected.
Mayaka is really a sweet girl. I’m happy that Satoshi actually feels the same way about her, I’ve never been sure if he’d actually friendzoned her or something. o_o Well he kind of did, while not really. That’s what I mean: Teenagers just are strange like this.
Hm. It looks like a potential train wreck though. I sure hope typical teen romance goes a little more smoothly than this. It takes some callousness to be able to literally break up another girl’s feelings in order to avoid a resolution. And there’s some amazing depth and resilience to Mayaka’s feelings to be able to so gracefully accept what Satoshi did. Well, like Oreki, I kind of figured it was Satoshi from the start. Go way back to Mayaka’s introduction scene where Satoshi called Oreki and her their middle school’s best couple due to their constant bickering. I think Satoshi has some serious personal issues to work out before he’ll be ready to accept Mayaka’s feelings but on the other hand, he doesn’t want to lose what connection he already has with Mayaka. Like Jalapeno said, it’s a cliffhanger. My money’s on a time extension. Satoshi suddenly accepting Mayaka’s feelings feels too much like a cop-out after this week’s drama. I think somehow, Satoshi may have to have some kind of event that will make him want to bet his feelings one more time, this time on Mayaka, instead of solving mysteries without Oreki again like the Mystery Thief case. But that might be a story for another time.
I enjoyed this episode a lot and I was really looking forward to it. 🙂 I was very surprised that you claim you didn’t notice the hints about Mayaka and Satoshi…it was setup nicely throughout the series as other commenters have explained. I’ll be sad to see Hyouka end.
A great episode as always… hyouka is the only anime that i waits to watch every week. But the only flaw is Chitanda.
She is very annoying from her attitude, movement and voice…
This is the third annoying female character i ever saw in anime after shana and louis…well, they annoying for this so called ‘tsundere’…
chitanda’s almost whispering voice in early episode really annoy the hell of me…its getting little bit better though in latest episode.
Still, she like to stick her nose into people business and her movement is really forced. It’s not natural.
OH GOD ANNOYING…
Write this comment cause can’t stand it any longer.Need to channel this annoying feeling.
I also had a problem with her sometimes. She has had some really, really nice moments, but on the other hand I feel like the creators are overdoing it a bit sometimes… I like KyoAni’s character animation very much (in this episode especially, Chitanda looked very nice here I think~) but sometimes she moves waaay too bubbly and cutely. Like, no-one could do that irl without being told by someone ‘dude what was that about’ – cute girl or not. O_o Sometimes she’s depicted just too cute and pure for my taste. I didn’t really like her role in the festival arc either.
Uh… I still think she’s a nice and sweet character, and imo the voice actress fits her perfectly (even though I can understand why her voice would be considered annoying). I especially liked her the last few episodes – seeing her pouting over something Oreki said or making a lame, dumb/sarcastic joke herself is much more enjoying than some moe-ing.
Ugh I hate overly positive and compassion people with no sense boundaries, Don’t you? Damn you, naive goody two shoe cute girl that wont leave me alone….
Hm. I dunno about unnatural. This is probably one of the more realistic depictions I’ve ever seen of this type of “moe” character and I buy her completely, even though I’ve never met anyone like her in real life. The way she shot out at the Astronomy Club about the missing chocolate is the same “shoot-before-you-think” mentality that we’ve seen so many times before but in much cuter circumstances during the Kayna Fest. She’s ditzy and adorable to the point where it’s sometimes hard to take her character seriously but I think she showed a lot of elegant poise in the temple visit episode and this episode should have blown her ditzy image right out of the water. And I’m amazed at her seiyuu’s performance. I mean, if KyoAni were to somehow put Chitanda and Ritsu together in a scene, I think you’d have a hard time figuring out that they’re voiced by the same person.
she does more fluffy soft voice characters than Ritsu type characters really. You can say it’s more of her bread and butter. I mean she was Manami in Oreimo, Aria in SYD, and Wendy in Fairy Tail
Aria…that Aria. I’ve watched SYD so many times (trying to decipher what they talk about) but I never caught it. I have complicated feelings right now. XD Very interesting.
About the seiryuu, don’t take me wrong. Each of them performed greatly. All of them fit perfectly with the character.
My only problem is when they overdoing it. In early episode especially the episode where chitanda ate the wine chocolate, the movement look so fake and forced. If you do watch the series acted by akb48 idol, you understand what i meant. It’s almost they been forced by the director to act cute and moe.
It’s understandable.Maybe this is one of the fanservice to make people adored chitanda more. This is obvious because there isn’t any character have a problem like this.
The best thing in hyouka compared to other anime in this season is character development and look like even the voice actor is improving along. Like i said, in early episode, chitanda voice got this screeching sound that reallly annoying. However the screeching sound is started to dissapear in latter episode even though not completely. If you sensitive to this kind of sound, you would realize it.
However i vote this anime is the best of this year after natsume yuujinchou. Always like this kind of anime.
I’m kinda surprised nobody has mentioned this, but all along I’ve actually had the impression that Satoshi was gay, or at a minimum unsure of his sexuality.
By his own glossy words he started fresh in high school. This means middle school was “back then,” and yet he still rejected Mayaka at the height of his obsessive time. So it doesn’t add up.
It would actually be a good character study to show a realistic teenager dealing with sexuality issues in a non-lgbt focused anime. But who knows how it will end up, haven’t read the novels.
Maybe that’s too much to expect from this demographic. Would that change your opinion of him?
Ordinarily I would say the topic never really came up but after Satoshi’s confession to Oreki at the end of episode 21, I would say he treasures Mayaka, although, yeah…it’s really uncertain if you could call that love. He thinks highly of Mayaka and wants to always have her around but that could be friendship rather than love. I’m not sure if he’s attracted to her the way Oreki is attracted to Chitanda. Then again, I don’t know see Satoshi showing signs he’s attracted to other guys like Oreki either.
I think there’s just not quite enough character development to say either way. Somehow, I don’t really care either way either. Satoshi’s an interesting character, whether there are reveals about his sexuality or not. Well, I think it would be nice for Mayaka if he were to fall for her. XD Dammit. 22 was such an open, to-be-continued ending episode. What happens after that? The “Little Birds Can Remember” series seems to be all about character development rather than mystery-solving, which is great for me, cos I like all the characters. It was really nice to see Irisu again one last time too. And….was that ARCHER?! XD
Now that it’s over, I’ll just spoil it. Because it would’ve been mentioned as a passing comment anyway if a movie about the 5th book was made. Mayaka and Satoshi indeed became a couple though it was not immediately after Valentines day, they sort of just came back from holiday a couple.
Mmm..leaving all the juicy details up to the imagination, huh. It’s a bit of a pity the story isn’t ongoing. There are a lot of interesting side characters that get very little development like Kaho, Mune (the school prez), etc. I was expecting a major arc involving Kaho to show up somewhere. And…wow…she looks good in a miko dress.
Lots of loose ends too. Kudryavka’s Order hasn’t been published. I was wondering if Tanabe might get Ayako Kouchi involved in reviving the project or perhaps act as a rival to coax Muneyoshi into drawing again. And then there’s Hyouka. It got published and all but I really do wonder if anything would fall out of the tree if it got shaken up, like the identity of the black rabbit and maybe even an appearance by Sekitani Jun. Would be nice if he were able to make peace with his troubled past. And of course, getting to finally see Tomoe’s face!! I kind of had a theory that she might have gone traveling all around the world trying to track down Sekitani Jun. Maybe she found him. It also might be interesting to see Houtarou grow enough to go head to head against Tomoe.
I have no reason to believe this is valid, but I have heard floating on some random forum that Chitanda’s uncles will make an appearance in an OVA episode. Though exactly how I have no clues, sinc eit would have to be an completely original story
Well, Hyouka got a high sell-through and made it into many hands. Some even got sold online, which means a potential nationwide audience. What if it were to fall into the hands of survivors of the old faculty who expelled Sekitani Jun, or the black rabbit. The black rabbit, possibly a person of power now, might reappear to try to cover up the issue by complaining against the Classics Club and expel it’s members for slander. In order to protect the Classics Club, Sekitani Jun makes a reappearance. Something like that? Haha..too shounen, I guess.
Sigh…I wonder if Houtarou will wind up with Chitanda. I hope he grows up enough to catch her properly or they might wind up in a 3 centimeters situation. She is something like a princess after all. An arranged marriage is very possible.
No more mysteries ? Just teen couples now ? Why is it still called Hyouka ?
you mean why is it called ice cream this entire time?
Where’s the rum and raisin?
Satoshi is gay. Period. No erase. His actions and everything about him tells it.