#honestly this outlook betrays a really obnoxious outlook on people

[rhywhitefang]

tumblr recommend underrated media without implying that liking anything that more than 1% of the general population has heard of is a moral failing of some kind challenge failed

[the-twewy-sequel]

TWEWY: The Animation - Episode 2 Review

Like a bolt from the blue, it’s time for the TWEWY Anime Review!

The Reapers' Game continues, but what kind of "game" is this really? And what do you get if you "win"?

With first impressions made, I had a fairly positive outlook for TWEWY: The Animation's next episode, and with the focus being the expressive and (imo) relatable Shiki, it felt hard to disappoint.

Why is this the case? To start, Shiki is a good foil to Neku in both character and knowledge: she knows basic details about the game that Neku has forgotten and is not only willing to explain things, but is also patient in doing so. As a result, her generally calm yet outgoing demeanor is able to effectively "drag" Neku along for a ride that he's reluctant about (although he of course doesn't have much choice in the matter). After all, Neku might not be friendly, but it's just naturally hard to see someone nice and smiling who is arguably putting up with you and go "yes, I'm going to actively be difficult for them"... unless you're actually a difficult (and maybe bad) person, I guess.

This slight flexibility—Neku showing that he's at least willing to talk to her and say, let her look at the shop windows without complaining a lot about it—is what keeps Neku from being an obnoxious, overly edgy protagonist here. I mean, we don't even really know why Neku is the way he is, but it's clear that he's not completely unreasonable about it, and Shiki allows Neku both the space and opportunity for him to think about various things.

No, I don't have a lot of these. But I do take some screencaps so I have stuff to post with the reviews.

While I could continue to go on about this, the core of the relationship is basically the same as it was in the DS game, with some details changed for pacing and such—Neku's button or whatever never gets fixed, and we haven't really had fashion and stores that players can go into mentioned yet, but all of that is fairly tied in to the original game's gameplay, so as story elements they aren't totally necessary right now.

Instead we get to see a noise battle on Spain Hill and Shiki using imprinting to resolve the conflict between Ai and Mina, which seems to have been "streamlined" a bit for the anime adaptation. No Reaper Creeper or "memes" I guess, but honestly, this might be for the better: while these little changes are definitely adding up and turning this show into more and more of its "own thing", I do think that for people not familiar with the game, they usually aren't realizing that there was a bit more to it before.

Maybe they are though? I can't actually say for sure, so feel free to let me know in the comments if you hear things!

That being said, the game master still not appearing in front of Neku and Shiki—not to mention the change in the reveal about players being dead and coming back to life—could definitely be considered bigger and more notable changes. It might be a bit weird seeing Neku and Shiki fight with Higashizawa when they haven't really met so far, and the pacing of Neku and Shiki's interactions, along with details like Shiki looking at her phone all the time, have definitely been kind of pushed together and reassembled to "get the point across, but in a fairly different way".

Instead of Neku helping to cheer Shiki up and motivate her towards getting that "second chance", Neku only just finds out about players being dead in the first place... not to mention the weird events with the red skull pins that didn't seem familiar at all. I think the anime has been trying to "build up suspense" and a sense of a greater threat here that wasn't exactly present in the original game as much, but one also has to consider that by losing Higashizawa provoking Shiki, the theoretical fight against him later on (assuming it still happens) might not be as interesting or compelling when we didn't really interact with him before. Actually, if I remember correctly, he was also the one who (basically) revealed to Neku that all players were dead, too.

Clearly there are some concerns here, and your face may look like Neku's does above as the TWEWY animation shows that it will take various liberties in order to keep the show interesting for more general audiences. And I get it, I really do: there's a certain "punch" to having Neku find out he's dead at the end of an episode, and you need to give something for people to look forward to in the next ones.

However, although abbreviated, I still felt the events around Shiki's relationship with Eri were both touching and encouraging, and despite being a bit different, Neku's lines didn't feel too off-character, so it's not like I've felt betrayed by anything yet.

Yet at the same time, it's clear that for all the little details they try to include, there will also be a lot missed, and we'll have to go in to the rest of this show without too many expectations for what exactly will happen—we're still missing a certain big event (Week 1 Day 4) that I suspect will happen next episode (a shift in the order of events to allow Shiki's story to be told first, I presume)—I just hope the core themes and characterizations that make TWEWY "TWEWY" aren't somehow lost in the process.

If you aren't looking irritated like Neku, you might be looking like this instead: happy at the show's joys, yet sad for what's been changed and lost. Ahh, yes... a most bittersweet smile indeed.