Midori no Hibi ep.2

April 11, 2004 | 5 Comments

Gah! I really hate technology sometimes or rather I hate video codecs technology. I just downloaded this episode and realised that I can't watch it on my Macintosh computer because the video was encoded using WMV3 codec which Macintosh can't recognise. So I had to actually open the file on PC (which also has to have Windows Media Player 9), watch and screen grab the episode there, then process them on my Mac. Thankfully the episode really worth all of the troubles. Having said that, I hope next time I can find an episode that's been encoded with DiVX 5.1 or anything that is not WMV3 codec so I don't have to go through the same problem again.

Anyway, I'm very impressed with this particular episode. I never expected that the episode will try to compress 3 chapters of the manga (chapter 2, 3, and 4) into one anime episode. I thought that it'll pull a Chobits in the sense that the anime will try to drag a chapter by padding it with additional and unnecessary scenes. Thankfully, that's not the case, at least not in this episode. I do think that there will be a lot of reshuffling of the manga chapters in order to make the anime flows better. In fact, I can't see how they'll end the series in 26 episodes unless they reshuffle the manga chapters a bit because there's nothing conclusive around chapter 24-28 of the manga. My guess is that some chapters will be featured earlier in the anime while others will be featured at a later stage.

The episode itself starts with Midori waking Seiji up so that he can go to school in time. There's an additional scene inserted here of Midori trying to cook a 'delicious breakfast' for Seiji which of course turns into a comedic moment. As the two leave the house to go to the school, Seiji once again meets with Shiori who wonders why Seiji hides his right hand. However, Shiori is quite pleased with her own idea that maybe Seiji is just hiding some porn books, much to Seiji's relief and frustation. Seiji is even more annoyed when he finds out that Midori has made herself a piece of clothing that has the infamous "I Love Seiji" tagline printed on it. As a result, he decides to bandage Midori so that his classmates think that he's injured from a fight instead of having a girl on his right hand.

At school, Seiji's 'injured' right arm immediately becomes the topic of conversation around the school. Miyahara somehow believes that Seiji is injured because he punched the car of the Yakuza with his right hand. Hearing this, the class rep, Ayase Takako becomes really annoyed and decides to tell them off. Ayase also tells Seiji that maybe Seiji deserves to have his right hand injured as some kind of karma for what he's done to his victims. Seiji is sad and angered to know that everyone in his class seem to think that he's the sort of guy who uses violence to solve his problems. But he decides not to make a scene with Ayase and instead chooses to find a solitude at the rooftop of the school with Midori. Their solitude, however, is disturbed when Seiji hears noises coming from a bunch of gang members who have arrived at his school yard to pick up a fight with him.

Meanwhile, Ayase thinks that she can handle the gang members just like she 'handled' Seiji and decides to tell them off. She, however, turns out to be wrong because the gang members end up making fun of her, slapping her, and forcing her to come with them, much to her horror. The sad irony is that none of her schoolmates care about her at all. In fact, some of them think that Ayase deserves what she's getting now. Ayase panics when she realises that she's all alone and about to be abused by the gang members. But thankfully for her, Seiji decides to help her and beat up the gang members. But because he is still bitter because of her earlier remark, Seiji pretends that he didn't fight to help her.

Seiji's problem is also far from over because he later finds out that the same gang members have held Miyahara as a hostage to bait Seiji to another fight. As Seiji races off to help Miyahara, Ayase who's still in shock because of the recent incident finds the letter that the gang members use to bait Seiji to save Miyahara. Ayase is angry and wonders why Seiji goes for a fight again after she thought that he's different from other delinquents. She decides to come to the place to confront him but once she arrived there, instead of finding Seiji beating up his opponents, she finds him getting beaten up by them. Thankfully for Seiji, just as the gang members about to deal the biggest blow on him, their leader tells them to stop the attack because he doesn't want to beat up a person who's not even fighting at all.

After the gang members left, Miyahara angrily asks Seiji as to why he doesn't even try to fight a bit. Seiji tells him that it's because the gang members took Miyahara to get back at Seiji. Because of this, if Seiji had beaten them up again, there's a possibility that they'll drag other people that Seiji knows into it. Seiji simply doesn't want other people to get hurt because of him. Hearing Seiji's honest confession surprises Ayase whose admiration for Seiji has now increased even more than it was. And the next day, Ayase decides to move her desk closer to Seiji's so she can know Seiji better instead of ostracising him like the rest of the class. Seiji is, of course, confused with Ayase's sudden change of attitude. Midori, however, notices that Ayase seems to have a bit of a crush on Seiji.

The last part of the episode actually deals with chapter 2 of the manga and that is the revelation of what happened to Midori's actual body. As Seiji goes home from school, he passes by Midori's house and decides to initiate a conversation with the household again. Prior to this, the series also briefly shows another supporting character for the show: that of Midori's childhood friend, Shingyouji Kouta. Anyway, much to Seiji's surprise, instead of being rebuffed, he actually is invited by Midori's mother to come in and to top it off, she strangely knows his name. Once he's in, however, Midori's mom explains that she knows Seiji's name because she knows that Midori has had a crush on him ever since middle school. Midori even has many photos of him stashed next to her bed.

The show then reveals that Midori's actual body is in some kind of a coma. Midori has been sleeping for 3 consecutive days now for some unknown reason. Despite her grief, Midori's mother managed to tell Seiji that Midori has always wanted to talk to Seiji but she had never been able to muster the courage to approach him, let alone talk to him. But Midori really wants to be able to tell Seiji about her real feelings for him so she and Seiji can walk and talk together. As she recounts the story, Midori's mother can't help but crying for her daughter's condition. Feeling sorry for the grieving mother, Seiji wants to tell her about his and Midori's condition. Midori, however, decides to hide inside his jacket, making it impossible for Seiji to show the miniature Midori.

Once Midori's mother gets out of the room to get some tea for Seiji, however, Midori reveals that the reason she doesn't want her mother to know is because she thinks her mother will be sad if she sees Midori in this condition. Seiji at first agrees that they'll hide this fact for now but then thinks that they will not have to hide it if Midori returns to her body and proceeds to open the blanket, revealing a naked Midori. Hilarity then ensues as Midori tries to cover up Seiji's eyes and as if the situation can't be more dire, Midori's mom and her maid returns to the room with the tea just as Midori, or the way the others see it, Seiji's right hand, attempt to cover Midori's naked body with the blanket. Of course everyone thinks that Seiji is a pervert who tries to take a peek at Midori's naked body and the maids and butler proceed to chase him off to the gate.

As Midori and Seiji return to Seiji's house, however, Midori can't help but crying because she realises that her condition has upset her mother. Seiji reflectively becomes protective of Midori and tries his best to console her. Back at Midori's house, Midori's mother tell her daughter that she'll try her best to protect Midori so she wish Midori will wake up soon. The show then shows Midori writing in her diary, hoping that her mother doesn't worry too much about her, ending this excellent episode. I personally think it's unbelievable that the series manages to compress three chapters of the manga into one neat episode and still retains all of the humour and emotional elements from the manga. I hope the anime will continue to do a good job in reshuffling some of the manga chapters in order to make the anime flows better as a whole.

© memento 2003