Whoa, such a difference from the previous episodes. This episode takes all the focus away from Minamo, Haru and Holon, and instead focuses on Souta and especially his father. As it turns out, he’s a businessman, and he’s the chief of the unit that keeps the metal up and running. Perhaps this was already revealed in a previous episode, but I’m having enough trouble understanding this series as it is, and this episode was particularly dialogue-heavy.
Having said that, though, this episode was really good. It’s a bit like a social commentary, and how much people have become dependant of the metal. In this episode, it only goes down for a few minutes, and it’s already featured in the news, and the responsible one (Souta’s father) has been demoted. Again, it makes sense: today, more and more people become dependant on the internet.
So, if I understood things correctly: everything started with that red phenomenon, we saw in episode one. Kushima then probably oversaw the creation of the metal, based on that red phenomenon. I think that that’s where the whole issue of cyber-diving comes from, as it’s starting to look like the metal is an extension of the ocean, like how in this episode, a virus managed to reach the main database through the ocean.
Souta’s relationship with his father was a breath of fresh air in terms of having parents who are very busy with their jobs. Anime usually make a very big deal out of this, but Real Drive handled it subtly. Of course, when he was young, and his mother left to Australia to raise Minamo with her own mother, he was left all alone, and of course he felt sad, but over time, he began to accept the fact that his father is a busy man, and instead he decided to help him whenever he could. Quite a change from Production IG’s previous major anime: Ghost Hound, where Masayuki and his family totally grew away from each other.
I’m really surprised at how little hate there is in this series. So far, the only real evil intentions came from Kushima’s boss (who Souta turns out to be sleeping with O.o) and the hackers from episode four. And yet none of them feel like real villains, like you usually see in anime. Usually, anime add in a little grudge here and there, to spice things up a bit, but in Real Drive, most of the conflict comes from people’s own interpretations to how they should live.
I’m really loving this series more and more, simply because it’s one of these series that attempts to do something new and innovative. It’s series like this one that keep pushing anime further, instead of repeating the same harem over and over. Seriously, what is so great about watching ten different series in which a guy gets surrounded by five or six different girls with different distinctive personalities/stereotypes? I can understand why you want to watch such a series once or twice, but what’s the merit of watching virtually the same thing ten or more times after each other? What seems to be that hidden charm of series as To Love-ru and Kanokon that I can’t seem to understand, aside from the obvious fanservice? Is this the “anime as escapism” that people seem to be talking about lately?
People have their own opinions and their selective tastes. A show like The third which you seem to be head over heels over, isn’t appreciated by other viewers, they’d call it “Shallow” “Repulsive” “Boring” “Bland”. While its one of the highest rated show on your blog. My point being is that everyone has their likes and dislikes, Kanokon and To-Loveru(Two very stoic and offensive shows, especially Kanokon) are up a lot of people’s alley, considering the amount of fan-service they both contain so they’d have a relatively high fan base. People would watch the same thing over and over again just to be safe and have some kind of stable entertainment, familiar ground if I may call it so. Others out of curiosity, anticipating how the next fanservicy show would top the last one.(which Kanokon is doing remarkably well on, I’ve stopped after the outrageous spanking scene) Anyways to each his own.
Who knows, really? Many could say it’s just personal taste, but I always think it’s not that simple.
Perhaps people just get enough of particular genres, and so force themselves to find other levels of storytelling to immerse themselves in. I didn’t used to care about character exploration or complexity, instead I wanted quick fixes of excitement or action.
Now that I have both sides and creative viewpoints, I want other types – such as sheer creativity.
The quuestion is: The people who only watch Kanokon and ToLoveRu and are ever going to watch Sekirei and Ikkitousen – are they ever going to lose interest in these?
Maybe it’s as Ivy said, some people don’t always need to move past what they’re familiar with.
And of course, I like stuff like Real Drive and Himitsu, but stuff like Soul Eater and Gurren-Lagann which are simpler will always be much easier to pick up and just absorb for me.
Sometimes I have to force myself to watch a show.
RD certainly is a breath of fresh air with its sociological theme and it’s diverse character types. Why this gets far less coverage than other shows is something that could be debated for a long time.
I think there’s something interesting in looking at attitudes to anime from a cultural perspective. While I can’t speak with much (or any) authority I’m from Britain and currently living there but I spent a few years living in the US and I think that television over there is a far more disposable medium due to the huge amount of choice available. I feel that this attitude to television could easily extend to anime. I haven’t quite thought this all through but I think JPMeyer’s post on the ‘worthlessness’ of anime sort of demonstrates this viewpoint.
I am *really* loving this show. The way it keeps shifting focus a little from episode to episode is fascinating. It’s impossible to really say who the “main character” is, but at the same time, it doesn’t feel like it’s just wandering all over the place either. (And I was just thinking the other day about the “lack of hate” you mention. It will be really interesting to see who emerges as the ‘villain’ of the series (if anyone).)
I really did expect this show to get a bit more attention. With the popularity of GitS, I thought that Shirow’s name-recognition would guarantee it a solid audience. What really freaks me out is the number of comments I saw early on that seemed to indicate that some people were dismissing the show simply because of the female character designs were too “rubenesque”. I guess those are many of the same people who are off oggling the boobies on the fan-service shows.
I don’t know. It was good now I don’t know anymore. I wounder why he will sleep with her it because he have to or because he want to. But again, I hate the idea of sleeping with your boss or anyone boss that matter. Thank for summary.
oh yeah another thing wuz up with the boss sleeping around with men. The first time we see her was in esp. 1 (i think) now with him. They are some kind of sex friend or going out. I don’t think so because in the esp. 1 he didn’t seem to mind her sleeping with other mens. I so confuse. Or is he force to sleep with her but again he is guy.
It would certainly be ridiculous to dismiss RD due to the female character designs. I actually don’t like chubby girls or women in real life but in RD the girls are stunningly beautiful and cute – despite or maybe because they are chubby. Well, but that’s just anime. Green or purple hair rarely (if ever) looks any good in real-life but in anime it’s almost always very attractive.
Though, to be honest, initially I checked whether the aspect ratio wasn’t wrong because girls are typically really skinny in anime.
Overall I tend to avoid “standard” shows like harem anime, shounen stuff like Naruto and most comedy. That’s just fluff stuff which is good enough for killing time but never really gets you excited, immersed or thinking. It was non-standard shows like Cowboy Bebop, Noir, Texhnolyze and Monster that drew me into anime and got me really excited about it. Basically, I only watch the other fluff stuff if I can’t find anything better for the moment. I couldn’t imagine limiting myself to this fluff stuff. I’d probably rather stop watching anime altogether if there are no more anime which are deeper, try something new and provide more than cheap entertainment.