Wait, wrong anime.

Anyway, Shuffle! 7 is the last of the character intro episodes as the last of the harem is introduced, Asa Shigure. We waste no time getting into it as the episode starts straight with her instead of Rin.

The Shocking Shigure really is apparently quite the chef, outclassing even her mother, who can’t seem to call anybody by their full name (see: A-chan, Ri-chan, etc) and seems to have stolen some fashion advice from Real Ayu.

Also, Asa’s Mom Who May or May Not Have a Name seems to be rather focused on her daughter’s prospectiveness as a marriageable person – I’m not sure of Japanese culture but I don’t imagine that people Asa’s age think about it seriously, given her reaction in the screenshot above.

Then again, there are those who make marriage promises while they’re still in single digits (ahem, Meilin), so it’s an all-or-nothing concept, I suppose.

Perhaps a reason for Asa’s shock is also the fact that pre-episode she was confessed to by the Mr. Popular, Takisawa something-or-other, of her class, who is a new character in this episode and will not make a return. Ayu Asa’s mom seems to be a typical anime parent that is great for exposition in that she notices everything, including the hints at the above, like the small gift box (perhaps a ring?) that Asa recieved from the challenger to the Harem Throne.

Speaking of, I was actually pretty surprised, as I had wagered on the gift being a little present from Rin for No Reason at All (Sure it Isn’t, tm).

Takisawa’s actually not that bad of a character, in that he is approximately the 3rd guy in this anime to not be a complete butt-ugly fanboy. Burn in hell, KKK/SSS/RRR.

Itsuki continues to be rather surprising as he continues to talk about his popularity with the women. Forgive me for the sparseness of the entries, I’m up to episode 18, which involves more Asa. Wink wink nudge nudge.

Mayumi the two-toned obvious bat strikes again, subtly informing everyone of the latest developments with Asa-sempai. Asa, despite not having a fanclub, is very popular in the school, and should be glad that only Takisawa has the guts to confess to her.

By the way, is Mayumi some sort of crazy confidant? How does she know all the secret admirers of Asa? Since, y’know, they’re…secret.

I suppose while I’m here I should elaborate on the awkwardness of harem anime, that seem to fall into two categories. Without fail, every harem girl is either a Social Outcast (see Kanon and Misuzu from Air), or Miss Famous (see TokiMemo Only Love, and, uh, Shuffle!). These types of shows aren’t much for the middle ground. Just once I’d like to see a normal girl in a harem anime. To Heart 2 has been the closest to achieving this at the moment, but it just hasn’t captured me in the way other animes have.

Or perhaps that is the reason?

Anyway, moving on with the story we get more awkward fanservice as Asa bemoans her popularity while, um, changing with Kareha (who’s shiny gimmick is getting annoying) in the girls’ locker room. Fanservice works well on it’s own, storyline works well on it’s own, but together, it’s just disturbing. A lot of H-Games, I feel, suffer from this issue.

Asa seems to strike a sort of disillusioned idol position briefly in this episode, as the popular girl who perhaps doesn’t want all the attention (or isn’t getting it from the one guy she needs). Shuffle!, however, doesn’t elaborate much on relations with people not named Rin however, so that point is left at that.

Takisawa is understandably nervous throughout this episode, as is evidenced in his apology in the beginning of the episode, when he first sees Asa, and in the Mr. Obvious line above. You have to feel at least a little of pity for him for being let down – the rejection scene was cut, much like Sacchin’s in the Tsukihime anime, probably on purpose.

The rest of the episode, Takisawa aside, is devoted to Rin and Asa development, as Asa drags Rin back to her place for a reason I can’t quite recall. They definitely are quite at ease with each other, as shown by Rin’s dangerous ‘what charm?’ line when Asa tries to jokingly come on to him. Rin and Asa do often seem a bit flustered around each other too, perhaps only because they bait each other so much.

Cut to our obligatory 5 seconds of Kaede time (and not a second more) as Rimu’s soap opera theory freaks her out. Rin? And another girl? Alone? Oshi~

Asa development is plentiful in this episode, as we see her surprisingly idealistic view of love – not to mention Rin’s naivety about it.

Asa also hurts her foot in this episode which is only important to show her distrust of magic when Kareha tries to heal it, and to cause more tense Not-Fanservice-At-All when Asa trips and falls on top of Rin.

Rin has an amusing amount of looks of Utter Horror ™, the least of which is when he walks in on Asa in the bathroom, and doesn’t quite have the mental capacity to enjoy himself. I’m reminded greatly of the Makoto-in-the-bathtub scene from Kanon, except Rin is not as quite a smooth talker, and Asa doesn’t beat the crap out of Rin.

I think.

Last note of Asa for the episode is that she seems to use her genki mode as a cover up for when she’s feeling nervous/tense/etc. – does she not like to see others worry about her? Anyway, you’ll be getting plenty of genki Asa, in any case, for any reason…

-CCY

I’m up to Shuffle! 14 now in the Shuffleathon, and we’re getting to the real gritty stuff – I’ll mention that it is essentially a Primula arc then, but for the sake of the readers who are trying to remain unspoiled (all 3 of you) I’ll keep quiet and stick to the notes I have for the 6th episode, and ignore the advance knowledge.

Anyway, I bring up Primula as this episode seems to be the latest in a series of character introduction, and now it’s time for everyone’s favorite Shuffle! to shine.

Disregard the fact that she’s probably the only loli.

I have some vague mention of ‘backstory, yay!’ in my notes as the first thing about this episode – I don’t have a screenshot handy to remember what was vaguely hinted at about Primula in this episode (as opposed to latter ones – the rabbit hole goes deep), but I would imagine that the Nerine/Sia duo were stepping all over each other in the segment and generally keeping Rin – as well as you – in the dark.

Let’s just say there are reasons why Primula is so emotionless.

There’s a lot to do with Rimu and cats in this episode – for a while I was confused on her connection to cats (her first scene was at the Cat Crane Game machine), and noted that she was carrying around her favorite cat this morning (the one that appears in the OP). I’m not sure if it was always like that (like Mayumi’s two-toned eyes) but it’s more apparent now.

It’s also more apparent when she happens to tear a hole in the cat, complete with dramatic.
Triple.
Take!

Yeah, I shouldn’t have laughed. The cat as you would expect has some huge significance to Primula. It’s not a magical talisman or a living object (Kero-chan…) or anything silly but it does seem like something she’s had for a long time.

A connection is also drawn between her and someone that looks like Nerine (as the notes say), who gave Rimu the cat doll back when they were both even more loli than before. Yes, that’s possible.

And then we flip forward to the obligatory school scene where Itsuki flips off a bunch of innuendo-laced lines and mocks Rin’s pedophilia obsession, masking his interest in it by teasing Rin about it. OK, maybe that part wasn’t true but who knows? Itsuki’s quite the womanizer.

Although, I must say, he is a large improvement over the usual ‘harem’s perverted friend’, proving to be successful with the ladies and damn bishie even though he has glasses.

And even though I’m a straight guy. Eek.

He has a lot of great lines too, such as the one screen-capped, which seems like an obvious jab at dating-sim traditions and cliches, such as the one above which allows for convienent sexing of people like Akiha Tohno without breaking too many laws or moral boundaries.

But, on a tangent, I wonder how they legitimatized Primula as Officially Older Than 18 in the original Shuffle! H-game, since I would imagine she has her share of H-scenes. Because, seriously, are you going to tell me she’s that old? She is screamingly obviously The Official Lolicon Character.

Oh yeah, I suppose I should mention Primula stumbled her way to Rin’s school in a broken-cat-induced haze, where she is brushed off quite harshly by the Harem Master Rin who has too many girls to deal with a loli that is Not Legal. I hope.

Speaking of Harem Master, Rin seems to have quite the reputation now, what with Mayumi’s crack at Rin having ‘another lover’. I wonder who is the fanon True Girl For Rin in his school. That’d be interesting, shipping inside an anime.

Also, ridiculously funny about how Nerine and Sia go squee about being “Rin’s lovers”. Seems neither of them really minds that they’re not the only one in the competition.

So, anyway, Primula goes away and we finally get to the eyecatch, whereupon we are treated to the One Minute Flashback again (although it was across an eyecatch) where Rin feels really guilty about brushing Rimu off, and so he runs off in the rain (because somebody’s sad, of course) to find her.

He finds her standing by the closed arcade again (what is the time schedule on that thing?) and also finds her breasts. Rimu’s cute with hair down but the gratutious fanservice is a bit scary at times given my above rant on How Old Is Rimu Anyway – just in case you, the viewer, did not get the fact there Rimu has nothing on under there, in the rain, you get treated to a slow, full-screen pan. Yay.

Oh, and if you’re wondering, yes, you get more Rimu fanservice of the same caliber in later episodes although it’s not as completely out of place, arguably.

Although Rimu’s rack appears to be a Plot Point as the girls drag Rin on a underwear hunt to find suitable clothes for Rimu. Does that really happen in real life? (not the Rin dragging-along) Scary.

Rin goes through a sequence of nosebleeding to death and the fanboys get more fapping opportunities as we have many scenes of Rin’s harem asking him how they would look in various massive-cleavage outfits.

Notably absent, unsurprisingly, is Primula, who is probably being shuffled around behind the scenes, and Kaede, who is perhaps more modest, sane, and shy than all the other girls combined. I give her bonus points for that.

Eventually Rin runs away and goes to the Silky Game arcade, which will show up many times as The Place Where I Met Primula. I’m not sure what the song playing today is but last time it was the OP song so I imagine there’s another cameo here.

Rin decides to go buy a cat plushy for Rimu and sneaks in a what?-dam reference to the giant mecha show which is apparently ungodly huge in Japan (I’m reminded of the Haruhi reference to it – is every anime obligated to have one?).

Anyway, stuff happens back at the Harem Hunt and I assume since I didn’t get a shot of Primula in her new outfit that it was a little risque, which is backed up by the notes that Kareha-senpai got all shiny again (which is freaking annoying. my, my, my, die), and that Kaede swooned/passed out. Clearly she is feeling the incredible threat to her position as the Destined Girl at the moment.

If you only knew this was the start, Kaede.

And that’s about it for the episode as Rin comes back with a mysterious souvenir gift for Rimu, which, as you expect, is a cat. A cute one. But not as cute as Rimu with the cat, which is a sight that would make 99.5% of viewers melt.

Primula freaking smiles for once. It’s awesome.

And a Plot Point. Keep your eye on it.

Overall, I liked this episode, and hated the gratuitous fanservice (although this would prove to be only the start). This is argubly the first episode when I started liking and connecting to the Shuffle! heroines as opposed to just acknowledging the harem – Rimu’s pretty cute in this episode and Kaede gets some sympathy points (which I fear is going to be a recurring theme).

Carry onward, episode 7. Next up: The Shocking Shigure.
-CCY

Once again, I find my ability to hate anime nullified. As much as the first two episodes of Shuffle! did very little, I find myself hooked to a strangely functional combination of fanservice and plotline. I think it’s time for a Shuffle!-athon.

Mind you, I’m blogging these many episodes behind – I’ve got frameworks for up to episode 10 so far. So if I sound like I know more than I’m supposed to, that’s why (but also spoiler issues, too).

We begin with a flashback, and urges to compare it to pretty much any other eroge (don’t most have dream sequences). The art seems a bit off compared to normal, which is either me hallucinating or a stylistic choice. Kaede’s the focus of this flashback, and she seems to be saying something important that is either getting drowned out or blocked out…

And then Rin wakes up and has an amusing scene where he tries a little too creatively to dodge the fact that he cried out Kaede’s name in the dream (right in front of her face). I’d be a little suspicious if I were Kaede, as the last time I remember a cover-up with this much enthusiasm it was Shiki after the wet dream sequence in Tsukihime.

I mean, aliens, seriously? Now we know the bad liar around here.

What would be really interesting though is if the two of them had synchronized dreams, a la Yuuichi/Ayu in Kanon. Maybe it was just suspicious to me about how Kaede dodged the question of her dream.

It’s very worrying how dedicated Kaede is to Rin – if I were watching this blind I couldn’t see how she would be anything other than dedicated girl…

I didn’t quite understand the earthquake scene, although it was a little funny how Kaede and Rin panicked. I suppose it’s justified as earthquakes in Japan are common and serious business. Wonder if Primula’s prediction and subsequent stoppage of the earthquake meant anything…special powers?

Or maybe it was just an excuse for Kaede to glomp Rin.

In better and worse news, the fanboys are vaguely less eye-searing this time, and they have a decent theme, and they’re vaguely funny to boot. Can’t imagine the self-esteem crash they would get from being destroyed by the very idols they worship, though XD

This seems to be adding up to be a Kaede episode as we watch her be ignored. A lot. Like, almost like everyone’s trying to. I guess if you’ve got 5 girls in your harem you can let one or two go. Especially if she seems to step aside herself…

Unless she comes back with a box cutter in 15 episodes.

Sometimes I wonder when I missed the entrance exam for the school with the unwieldly proportioned teachers with great dry wit. Sia and Megumi’s reactions were priceless too.

Now if I had more of a critical thinking mind I could analyze the hidden depths of Nerine’s quote. So basically if her feelings are like a muddled, soft omelette, then her feelings are confused, mixed up, and very…em, squishy.

If those are referring to her feelings at all.

Stuff happens, and Kaede falls sick, which is very bad. Why? We all know that if there are 3 phases of anime health:
1) Perfectly fine.
2) Minor illness.
3) Death.

And so putting Kaede at level 2 (they call in a doctor, too?) we find out that it’s one of them sicknesses that lasts about an episode until she gets better through more attention by Rin.

She needs to get sick more often, then.

And in the meantime Nerine ends the life of many innocent chicks. I have a feeling that omelettes are going to become a running gag, kind of like panty shots and resulting innuendo. That quote’s from Nerine, by the way, who doesn’t seem able to operate anything. She appears to be the smart-with-no-sense type; although she didn’t have any problems with the finals such mysteries as cooking lay beyond her grasp.

But the real chef here is not Sia, but the Shocking Asa Shigure (as named)! What is more surprising than that is how embarrased she seems of that title and adoration. Asa looked like the last person to be caught acting like Hisui (Tsukihime), but perhaps she has more character than the genki girl who beats the crap out of Rin…

She seems to be the only one aware of Kaede, though.

Primula continues to be mysterious and quiet, having a scene where she picks plants for no reason. It turns out that it’s a medicine recipe as her medicine makes Kaede ‘all better.’ At least, we can assume it’s the medicine and not magic, but who really knows?

There’s another earthquake, flipping the lights off and on for no good reason. I really want to say these are more than a plot device, perhaps foreshadowing for episodes to come but I have no concrete evidence for that. Maybe it’s just time for more Kaede glomping.

Luckily her melancholy seems to be over for now at the end of this episode but the signs of unrest are beginning to show in the harem, Rin should be watchful…

-CCY

Shouldn’t I just skip like 16 episodes of Shuffle! and just go forward to sad Kaede time and blahblahblah ending stuff with green-hair? That’s really, what I know about this series and why I keep watching it. Just to see how Kaede can compare with emo-Nayuki for the sad rejected (despite ‘First Girl Wins’ trope) character.

But then again, I’d be missing out on 16 viewings of that spiffy opening. I tend to judge anime a lot by their openings – or the music at least. The animation in Shuffle!’s OP isn’t anything out of the ordinary – it looks to have spoilers x 1000000 in there but I can’t really say for sure yet. Also, it lacks dancing :P But it’s a decent rock-ish song that’s been stuck in my head for a few days now.

And considering it pushed out Lucky Star’s 1 minute 10 seconds of caffeinated karaoke, I call that impressive.

Shuffle! continues to speed onwards at rapid pace. While the supernatural aspects of the story haven’t seems to kick in yet they are readily apparent as Nerine (blue hair) proves she shouldn’t be messed with. Man, harems sure are dangerous these days.

Also, collateral damage, hmm?

I was more surprised at the fact that this wasn’t a continuation of Sia’s arc, as it so seemed to be at the end of last episode. Not sure if this may end up pulling a To Heart 2 where it focuses on all the girls for an episode and then launches into something…different.

Also, there’s something about that cat. It’s everywhere. Originally, I thought it was part of Primula’s arc, as she shows up with it in the OP, but with it in the eyecatch, alone in the OP by itself and now in the flashback Nerine, it might be more all-encompassing than I thought. It remains to be seen if it grants 3 wishes also.

Shuffle! has done away with most of the angsting of most romance shows, in that the female characters all have an established huge gigantic crush on Rin. There’ s no ‘do I like him, do I not’ (see: Syaoran from CCS) here. Still, they didn’t have to resort to the obviousbat here.

Also, about the second picture there, the girls in Shuffle have too many names, I swear. We’ve got Kaede/Kae-chan, Shigure/Asa-sempai, Sia, Nerine/Rin-chan (and I thought that was a translation error), and Primula/Rimu/that one thing she was called in the second episode. Geez.

An oddity here is the flashback in this episode…to all of one minute ago. I understand that this line certainly be an important one, but I doubt we would forget it that fast. As long as it doesn’t end up like Nayuki’s snow bunny, showing up 20 times in an episode, I’ll forgive it. Besides, I figure Rin should already know the status of everybody in his harem (infatuated beyond belief). The line in question here also reminds me of ‘infinity plus one’.

What is it with anime and cooking scene? I must be missing the whole ‘make a lunch box for your beloved’ scene in America. Shame. But this feels like the tenth time I’ve heard this line, and I’m not sure what I can attribute it to as 90% of the romance anime I’ve watched have a cooking episode.

Not the brightest line to say to a girl with a knife. I was surprised how Rimu seemed to confront Rin so readily after glomping him for an entire episode 2 episodes back. Not sure if it’s because she doesn’t know personal skills, or if she’s bitter? Abandoned from Rin’s childhood (think Mai, or pretty much any other Kanon girl for that matter)?

And the iconic line from this episode. The whole omelette scene made me burst out laughing. Turns out harem leads have a way to stand up for themselves after all, if only in trivial situations.

Also: why does Midoriba get to partake in all the bento awesome, being the resident ecchi? His line where he gets a different lunch from a girl every day, supposedly. Maybe it’s because he, along with Rin and the harem’s parents, is the only guy with a face that is not entirely fugly.

-CCY

(apologies about the low image quality; I’m screencapping them off Youtube)

What I’ve noticed about Shuffle! is that it certainly seems to move a lot quicker than other harem anime.

2 episodes in we already have what seem to be the main harem completely introduced (Kaede, Sia, the blue-hair one, and Primula/Rimu/loli jailbait/whatever, and the green-haired sempai that no one sees coming), and now with the third episode we have what can technically be termed the fastest meeting-to-confession, ever.

Although Kaede was rather possessive in episode 1 when fighting off the Defence Forces. Speaking of, we could do much better off without these otaku; as funny as their obsession may be, it’s a pain staring at them – I don’t care if we really are that damn ugly in real life, we don’t need that photorealistic depiction.

Also, that stampede-chasing-harem-lead joke’s already done to death in TokiMemo Only Love. (despite it coming later chronologically XD) Why is it that the harem characters are so immensely popular at their schools?

While I’m busy breaking the time-space universe now would be a nice time to notice that even Shuffle! contains some retroactive Kyonisms, defined as ‘hyperbolic statements that could very end up being true in this situation’. Rin and Kyon, after all, do share the same VA.

If you want to talk about story I suppose that it is getting somewhere. If this is organized in arcs then Sia is up first, and it’s only thanks to that fact that I’ve figured out her name by now.

With the amazing trio of childhood friends in Shuffle! I have a feeling that I’m going to be seeing lots of annoying flashbacks to when Rin was busy being more of a pimp at age 8. Funny that. Maybe I’m just tired of all that stuff; it seems to be dime-a-dozen that in visual novels (eroge?) that the protagonist has no memory of his pimpitude as a child, presumably because something traumatic happens, like your entire family getting killed or somebody falling out of a tree.

Still waiting to pass judgment as I liked this episode more than the previous one, and I’m hoping the story picks up and really gets going in the next episode or two. I know where (who) this story ends, so I’m really interested in how, how the bloody hell do we get there.

I leave you with the girl so obsessed about final exams that she manages to change her eye color. One of them, anyway. I will have to watch for signs of this around finals week at our school.

-CCY