Suzuka ep.9-12 with manga comparison

September 25, 2005 | 21 Comments

I know I'm late. I've had an incredible workload in the real life over the last few weeks and simply couldn't invest the 4 hours it takes to make decent entries. To make up for it, I've decided to add an extra treat: All thumbnails of this entry have the corresponding raw manga frames linked, so just click them to get an idea how things are looking like the way the author wants. Especially in the abysmally animated episode 12, the difference is extreme.

Nevertheless, it's time to catch up, because the last scene of episode 12 tolls the bell for this show's golden times: We have successfully passed the weaker parts (at least those which are tedious to sit through) and are now reaching an arc in which the story fully takes off. Enjoy the shift in the dynamics and some amazingly satisfying developments. I'm sure you will!

Episode 09 Rating: o
Episode 10 Rating: +
Episode 11 Rating: o
Episode 12 Rating: +

The "stalker arc" establishes that Yamato doesn't give up and pursues Suzuka to the best of his abilities. Primarily this means giving his best in the track club, supported by Miki, who has developed a healthy liking for him. It was amusing to see the overconfident Kobayakawa, who he had duped in the P.E. tests before, lose to Yamato one more time. And what a result it was! 10.98 for an untrained runner! Miki's interest in Yamato increases and Honoka is ecstatic!

Unfortunately, the only person whose appreciation really matters to Yamato is Suzuka, and he isn't getting ANY of it no matter what. My heart bled for him to see his confusion after she shot him down without even a token word of recognition of his achievements, and his confusion and hurt was very understandable.

Miki scored big with me when she came clean about her interest in Yamato in a very classy way. Girl, you rock! And it was quite a treat to see her dissing match with Hattori. Both fulfil comparable roles as the sane, good friends to the main characters. Hattori towards Yamato, Miki towards Suzuka. The former has it much easier than the latter however, because while Yamato is very open and honest to Hattori, Suzuka's denial mode extends towards Miki aswell.

It's obvious that something is badly gnawing on Suzuka's bones, and more and more she loses a grip on her emotions, causing her sports performance to suffer. The worried Miki sees her friend struggle, but Suzuka insists that it's nothing - as always.

Suzuka's protection mechanism is what I call insta-denial. If anything happens which concerns her in any way, she responds in the way how she THINKS it should be "right" and NOT the way it really is. She keeps up her "perfection" image at all costs - but not just towards others, but towards herself aswell. The best example is the way she literally screams to herself that Yamato and Kazuki have no resemblance at all - which is obviously false. There cannot be what there must not be is her motto.

The depth of her pain becomes obvious in the small but impressive scene in which she first glomps her plushie close in solitude, just to smash it into the wall briefly thereafter when the hurtful remembrance of her past breaks through her weakened barriers.

I'll add one little tidbit here: I have a higher degree of compassion for Suzuka because I know that the background story from episode 10 isn't quite complete yet. A very bitter key detail is still untold, so don't damn her to all eternity just yet.

When Yamato finally finds out about the photograph, the stalker mode flares up once more before it dies. He learns about his former alter ego Kazuki when he talked with Suzune, Suzuka's older sister. Cool and intimidating she may seem, but she does care for her imouto quite a bit - and knows her all too well with all her edges and issues.

Yamato is crushed, because he finally has an explanation for Suzuka's hot/cold treatment: He's been reminding her of her old love, and in this way he has been "used" by her. When he tried to cross the line and become REALLY close, she backed off, because as much as he resembles Kazuki, he ISN'T Kazuki. Suzuka never was really interested in him as a person. Now - whether or not this is really true, this is how he feels about it, and it makes alot of sense. Based on THIS, his reaction to shoot off his mouth against her in the end feels VERY justified in my opinion.

I really enjoyed the Kazuki of old. Suzuka always had her cold perfectionist attitude and doesn't take any crap from anyone, especially not from those people whose attitudes run contrary to her own. The mini romance story between the two of them, ending in a confession which flabbergasted Suzuka so much to throw her into major confusion was short but sweet - and quite believable. And the bitter end scarred Suzuka emotionally quite a bit.

In the recent episodes Suzuka has been accumulating such a high degree of irritation and pressure that it's no wonder that she eventually snapped when Yamato whacked her over the head with his knowledge about Kazuki. Slapping him and then literally fleeing was her way of tilting. She snapped. That's it.

I mean, try to imagine you to be in her shoes. Her former love died in a tragic car accident, and suddenly Yamato enters her life - who seems to be pretty much a clone of Kazuki. Rocket starter sprinter talent, brash, laid back, always fighting with her, looking very much like him. She finds out that she enjoys spending time with him. And then he confesses, forcing her to snap out of her dream. And she reacts very much like she did towards Kazuki. "It's all too sudden".

The implicit accusation of Yamato ("You have been using me while you only remembered your dead crush") stung deeply. And she feels that there is some truth to it - this is the way I interpret the sad look in her eyes after she fervently denied knowing anything. She does know. She also realizes that she hurt Yamato quite a bit, and she feels bad about it. Now what she shows to the outer world is an entirely different issue ^_^

I'm also not sure that Yamato's implicit accusation that she consciously used him as a surrogate for Kazuki is really warranted. There's some grain of truth in it, but overall I think the fair verdict should be "not guilty" - at least not of _consciously_ misusing Yamato as a mere replacement of her deceased lover. Remember how often and how INTENSE her denial of any resemblance between them was. She didn't WANT Yamato to become a clone of Kazuki, but he WAS. Time and time again he reminded her of the past which haunted her, chipping away at her shell until it cracked (and until HIS shell cracked aswell, crushed by the realization).

She's a very stubborn and very proud young girl. She'd instantly deny the truths even to her own beloved sister, simply because it contradicts what she considers "proper" - even if it was true to begin with (see the Fantasy Land visit). She did the same with the Kazuki-Yamato resemblance, and this is blowing up in her face now. And just like she fervently denies it to Suzune, she also denies it to Miyamoto-senpai. But when her face turns to the side, her eyes are filled with worry and regret. She knows she messed up badly. But admitting weakness is something she never learned...

During the track meet Suzuka made something very Yamatoish by shooting off her mouth against the current sprinter king, and she fails to back off even when she should, causing things to escalate quickly, finding her bullied by Arima and a bunch of his groupies. Here, Yamato did something admirable when he overcame his own resentments to stand up for her (where were her other teammates?). Of course, she thanks him in her usual way, with derogatory insults. This girl...

Hattori had a strong scene here, he knows perfectly how to handle her. It was his brilliant way of delivering the punchline to her without triggering her usual insta-denial defense.

"And because of that, the anger of the number one high school sprinter is completely aimed at Yamato now", omitting the obvious "...instead of you".

This is when she fully grasped what the heck had happened here. By pretending that Yamato was simply being an idiot who did things for NO reason, he's forcing her to face the truth without making her snap back in denial. Yamato doesn't know how lucky he is to have Hattori around.

A very funny moment occurred when Suzuka couldn't take it anymore and cheered him on. "WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING, YOU IDIOT??" This is so her...

So Yamato lost in the end. But at least he got Suzuka to treat his wounds. Which leads us to a very instructive scene: Suzuka is currently there, and he has no clue why. To fill the void, he starts blabbering about Cicadas (the other form of "nice weather today, isn't it?"), because he doesn't know what else to say. When Suzuka remains quiet he freaks a bit and starts a small self-bashing tirade about him shooting off his mouth, IMHO because he expects this to be what Suzuka is thinking right now.

And then the surprise happens - Suzuka does NOT follow up on Yamato's foolishness. Instead, she purposely steers the talk AWAY from his self-chastising. On a meta-level, this is her saying "stop that, I don't want to diss you or hear you diss yourself". Instead, she resumes Yamato's talk about cicadas, indicating a NORMAL, everyday talk between them.

Yamato is very surprised about that, but he's glad that their relationship seems to be back to normal. Therefore he follows her lead and continues likewise. And to top it off, Suzuka finishes with "Be back to the training again, alright?". With this simple sentence, she makes two things perfectly clear:

1) She accepts that Yamato is a valid full member of the track team
2) She has forgiven him for past transgressions and wants to go back to normal

In the end, Yamato doesn't understand anything at all - how typical for him - but he is glad that things have "normalized" between the two of them again.

So we're back to old times. Yamato continues to pursue Suzuka and Honoka continues to pursue Yamato. While Suzuka is generally aware of Yamato's feelings, Yamato is perfectly clueless that our favorite Miko feels very attracted to him. Honoka still can't figure out what exactly the deal is: Is Suzuka interested in him or not? She tries his hardest to find out and develop her own connection to him at the same time.

The animation in this episode is embarrassing. Some frames are done so poorly that I think I could have done a better job. Pathetic. You should definitely compare at least the pictures of the pool sequence with the original - and weep.

The synchronicity of Honoka's and Yamato's efforts are underlined in crystal clear beauty, and so is their futility. Miki is just having a good time and fails to realize what's going on, foiling Yamato and Honoka in the process several times. But who could really wish anyone like her any ill? ;)

In the end of the pool day, we have another rerun of the fireworks confession scene. But this time, the two of them aren't holding hands, it's Yamato who grabs Suzuka's arm in impulse... and Suzuka shakes herself free. Yamato learns in a bitter way that he didn't make any progress at all, just the opposite. But what's more important: Honoka watched the scene with big eyes. And she decides to act.

The next day, she asks a surprised Suzuka to walk home with her. Slowly she steers the talk to the issue she wants to settle, and that is Suzuka's relationship with Yamato. True to her usual denial style, Suzuka tries to shrug it off with an "it's nothing". But this is exactly what Honoka needed to hear.

In a very powerful scene she confronts Suzuka by asking her if it was okay for her to confess to Yamato. Weakly Suzuka asks why she's telling her that, even though she knows - she isn't stupid. Forcefully and emotionally Honoka bursts out that she has liked Yamato for a long time, before Suzuka even met Yamato. But she always felt that Suzuka seemed to like him, indirectly implying that getting the go-ahead from Suzuka is important for her to proceed. This kind of consideration for others is a very special trait of Honoka which locks me firmly in her camp throughout the entire show. Her growth, or more precisely the revelation of more and more facets of her personality throughout the episodes from now on is one of the main reasons why I so love this show.

Suzuka is stuck between a rock and a hard place. Deep down inside she feels that she DOES care for him, but her insta-denial perfection defense triggers one more time. We see her struggle, but eventually she tells the lie and states not to care for him. And of course, Yamato has to hear that, causing Honoka to freak and flee the scene.

Here, something surprising and satisfying happens: Instead of getting depressed again, Yamato takes it like a man and walks on, accepting this explicit rejection with calm and grace. But Suzuka is visibly unhappy, trying to take back the words, and thus confirming that she DOES like him after all. But too late... she is left standing in the evening dusk, looking sad and lonely.

Conclusion

Yamato's change to accepting-cool was a bit surprising and convenient, but I'll gladly take it. It will be interesting to see how he is going to readjust his priorities in the future, because at least for now it seems that he has abandoned his primary goal, and that was to impress Suzuka to win her over. Honoka finally has the answer she seeked, and she's developing the courage to act on it. Suzuka has maneuvered herself into a corner.

Let the games begin!

© memento 2003