#sumire nakageno

[plant-akki]

NakaGeno Week 2023

Day 7: Free Day

Chosen Prompt: Meme

Wanted to join @juicewithtoast's trend at least on the last day 😂

[solitaire-dreams]

Good, Bad, Tru... Neutral Ending: What Makes a Good Anime-Only Ending?

Alternate Title: Me ranting about how much I loved Takagi-san's finale while looking back on what could have been for Nakageno's.

It's that time again, and another season of anime draws to a close. Whether you really liked it, or are waiting for your favourite sequel to return in fall (Isn't it fall already?) is up to you. And once again, I have stuff to rant about as I compare my two fav shows of Summer 2019: Teasing Master Takagi-San S2, and Naka no Hito Genome (The Ones Within).

Both of these anime ending up getting anime original endings to close out their run, and I couldn't help but notice how much more I enjoyed one over another. So, as a manga reader of both, I took it upon my procrastinating self to compile a list of questions to determine whether an anime-exclusive ending is horribly bad, unexpectedly amazing, or just okay.

SPOILERS BELOW FOR BOTH FINALES!

(Will be a multi-part post. I really should have expected that.)

But first, a brief summary of both just to recap. Feel free to skip.

Takagi-san's finale stars Nishikata and Takagi-san visiting a summer festival together. We have our typical games between the two in form of a competition at a fair ground game to pick up the most fish, and competing for the most points at ring toss. However, we get a lot more teases at romantic moments for the two as they wander around and hang out. We also check in briefly on almost all other important characters: Yukari's trio, Nishikata's friends, Takagi's friend, Mano and Nakai, Hamaguchi and Hojo, and even their sensei. The climax happens as Takagi and Nishikata get separated in the crowd just before the fireworks show, reaching a peak when the reunite just after the show ends. But my boy finally managed to hold Takagi's hand willingly, so all is well in the world for now!

Nakageno's finale starts of by adapting an extra from the manga that has the gamers wonder if Maki-Maki has a girlfriend after hearing him mention a “Sumire-chan”, with a little bonus scene to end it off. Then the completely anime-only content begins as Paka announces a bonus stage for the group. They can play in a RPG-themed arcade and bet coins to exchange for prizes after the stage ends in two hours. One of these prizes includes a ticket that allows for any wish of the user to be granted—as long as it is confined in Naka no Hito Genome. We see the characters gamble on a variety of games—tossing in some Mario and Dragon Quest references—before Aki falls in a pitfall on the real-life board game he is playing. In order to rescue him before the time limit ends, the rest of the group rallies together to gamble and win enough coins for the “Any Wish Granted” ticket to rescue him. They succeed and Aki is rescued, teasing at some important characters near the very end.

1: Has the anime built up to this ending? OR

Does it tie in with previous scenes, either anime originals or from the manga?

An anime-only ending feels less forced if there is proper build-up before the finale. Having scenes that either foreshadow or are references in the finale makes the whole narrative feel more cohesive. Both had the opportunity in episodes around the late middle to set up as Takagi-san's episode 7 and Nakageno's episode 8 were both episode with content not directly from the main manga chapters. Which did it better?

Good: Takagi-san

Takagi-san did an expert job of building up to its finale through the addition of anime original content.

Takagi-san has proven its ability to weave manga chapters together through the addition of anime-exclusive content this season as most skits had a small extra bit of dialogue that tied it to the one to come after it. But, what about episode 12 specifically?

First for foreshadowing and hype anticipation, Nishikata actually asked Takagi to come with him to the summer festival as the ending of episode 11. This provided both a great climax for episode 11, and build up for the summer festival in the next episode. Nishikata asking Takagi san out was even built up to by revealing in episode 11 that the fight Takagi had with her mom over their family vacation was to stop the vacation from happening during the festival.

Then, the episode tied back to not only the other plotlines they created for characters such as Yukari and friends, and Hamaguchi and Hojo; but episode 12 paralleled episode 7 very nicely.

Episode 7 served as a mid-season climax where all the skits revolved around an anime-only trip to go camping. The episode itself was fairly standard in format—ignoring the connected setting—with three distinct skits:

-Nishikata attempting to win a game where Takagi guess the type of snack through its flavour, only to end up losing because he can't get himself to feed Takagi the food he needed to win.

-Major hand-holding teasing through a fireside dance that claims whoever holds hands when the music stops will fall in love, with our two just missing out.

-And Nishikata watching the stars with Takagi after he sneaks out of his tent and has to hide from their teacher—something Nishikata nearly messes up as he doesn't believe Takagi's statement about the teacher at first.

The only thing really of note was the teasing about the hand holding, something that was teased all the way back at season 2's first episode where Nishikata held Takagi hand to stop her from falling into the river, and kept fresh in our minds through skits such as Ice, Arm Wrestling, and Revenge.

What happens in the finale?

Well, Nishikata tries to give Takagi one of his takoyaki, only to back out after she opens her mouth to feed it to her.

Nishikata loses the ring toss game because he assumes Takagi is bluffing about seeing their teacher during his throw, only for him to appear and startle Nishikata enough to ruin his toss.

And though the special event of the fireworks has ended, Nishikata decides to willingly hold Takagi's hand.

This gives this final episode—and especially its climax—that emotional payoff we've been waiting all season to be fulfilled.

For an anime original ending, the studio should prepare and build up to events of the final episode early on, either through the addition of anime only content or re-purposing manga chapters to fit the finale.

As for Nakageno...

Bad: Nakageno

There was no build-up to the anime only content of this episode before it began. Any foreshadowing of events happened within the episode itself. This makes the events feel more rushed and self-contained, rather than a climax that the show built up to and prepared for. The fact that this game has to be a bonus level to avoid modifying the number of chromosomes won also doesn't help.

And episode 8 has no benefits to make this episode feel more natural in the series progression. Episode 8's content wasn't from the main chapters of the manga, but it came from extras that provided their own self-contained stories and skits; truly acting as filler and confusing manga fans and anime onlys alike on its adaptation into the anime.

The closest thing we had to build up for the events of episode 12 come from the one right before it (episode 11), with Sumire-chan being mentioned and Aki's mother being teased while he's in the pitfall.

However, the ending does not even capitalize on the emotional impact Aki could go through seeing his mother as the scenes are vague and leave you with more mystery with answers. Though, I guess that could have been the purpose? To tease at his backstory? But it doesn't help the build up.

If an anime original ending comes out of nowhere, with no scenes building it up or tying it closer to the other episodes, it will lack the proper build-up and narrative cohesion it needs to stick the landing.

Please stayed tuned for part 2!

[plant-akki]

Underground Gang!

• Nanami's the guy in-charge of their makeup but he got recruited to act too because the director found his personality... interesting. He barely had to act differently from how he's like at default save for when he's handling weapons (dainty hands & all 😂)

• Like mentioned, Zakuro looks up to Sakura for being a talented actress from a young age. Though because of her busy schedule, the two were kinda.. distant to each other. Zakuro was overjoyed when they got to work together for this project but then realized he didn't.. exactly know how to act around her & neither did she with him.

• Hiro was another kid who looked up to Sakura & got into acting because of her, though he treats her more as a rival & tries to best her whenever they have scenes together but in the end, he just keeps getting flustered with the way Sakura easily takes his quips in a stride.

Tokyo Gang! (+ Sumire & Rectory)

• Hinoki was an actor that Karin worked with when she was five. They hadn't worked together ever since, until NakaGeno anyway.

The group wanted to keep his presence a surprise so all the scenes where he was included were done when Karin wasn't around. (Since the director wanted to make their reunion to be genuine to an extent).

• Shizuha's an actress who's in a lot of projects that Karin was also in. They were on friendly enough terms that Karin was willing to talk to her about her past experiences as an actress. Shizuha, remembering that Hinoki had been looking for a new project to take on & Karin expressing sentiment of wanting to work with him again, made an arrangement with the director to have him be included in the cast of NakaGeno.

Shizuha's a bit more devious than her role in the series but otherwise, she's pretty much generally the same. Same goes with Hinoki minus the hyperfocus his role had on Karin's role. (Funnily enough, Karin talked more about Hinoki than the other way around, mostly because the time they worked together had been her debut role)

• Sumire's an actress that gets paired with Makino a lot in other projects. Though this time, it was some random child (one of Himiko's brothers with a wig) who had scenes w/ her.

(Makino jokingly remarks that their streak was finally broken, Sumire lightly smacks him for that). Makino's 18-19 in this au while Sumire's in her early 20s.

• Rectory handles their costumes but got interested to join too after seeing how lively their group was during practice sessions. She even dragged Ichiya, her boyfriend, with her when they auditioned.

They found out that Ichiya was naturally.. more skilled at acting than Rectory. She was the one enthusiastic about it but for some reason it was all a miss for her.

Rectory was frustrated at this & kept talking about how bad her acting was & while Ichiya didn't deny it, he told her about her good points instead. They found out eventually that her main insecurity was her face & how boring & plain she thought it was. Ichiya had to admit that her quirky personality didn't really.. match her face & he would've never found out about it if they never became partners in college since she was the type of girl that was easy to miss in a crowd. (Actually this gap was what made him drawn to her lol).

The group had been thinking of a way to deal with this insecurity of hers, when Akki made the suggestion of her &.. other people wearing masks. That way, no one had to see her face & she can freely act the way she wants to w/o having anything hold her back.

There was a huge improvement after that, although they found out too that she was quick to revert when she didn't have a mask on. Which was okay, they let her continue on like that, all the while making steady progress to improve her acting without a mask on, since the director wanted to set a crucial moment for once she does take it off in the series.

(It was Rectory's idea that Ichiya be part of her mask gang too, mostly because she wanted to be together with her boyfie 💖 )

NakaGeno but it's a play & Akki is an actor who has to act shady for his role as the lead

yes the text is from A3