#roreku

[susiron]

@roreku

i have had this exact problem for a while and i didnt know it was a thing..

Yep! Tension-type headaches are a very real thing. They’re one of the most common types of headaches (if not the most common). The most common characteristic of tension headaches is given away by their name: a sense of tight tension in your head

[icecreambat]

is there any possibility to record your lecture at con? it's always so interesting to hear you talk about free!, you have a great grasp of the characters and the story itself imo, I'd love to hear your lecture, too!

hey there (again!)

i’m pretty sure all my lectures have been recorded; i’ve done three on Free! so far, the one i’m doing now is a round two on the most recent one (just better). unfortunately, all of them are in finnish (well, my lecture on S2 had english summaries cos akaashibokuto was sitting in the audience and doesn’t know moonspeak). i got asked about subtitles way back when i did my first one, and theoretically it’s not impossible but… well, i guess i’d have to look into it again, if and when i’d have the time (read: nerve) to listen to myself ranting and actually subtitle any.

that being said, i am kind of interested in writing about the subject of my most recent lecture in english, too. it’s mainly about sports anime and imagery, and how Free! fits into that equation – one of the key points being how western viewers have interpreted these differences as something obviously meant for a girl audience, although the reality is not exactly as black and white as that. the discussions i’ve had with moromi (who studies this shit) on the topic have been incredibly fascinating, and made me realize just how diverse the sports anime genre can be. so yeah, maybe you’ll get the same content –sans the terrible videos and my incoherent babble– in writing eventually, too.

[icecreambat]

ep 12 replies before i drown

strawberries-in-december replied to your post:huutonaurua vittu koko vitun jakso

i don’t know what this says and yet i feel it in my soul

"howling with laughter throughout this whole fucking episode"

just a rough translation

but yeah i was pretty stunned

logicandfeels replied to your post:last year before the finale i wanted to:throw up...

SO YOU THINK IT’S THAT GOOD OR THAT BAD??

I STILL HAVEN'T DECIDED TBH

roreku replied to your post:last year before the finale i wanted to:throw up...

this is the most relatable thing i’ve read since the ep’s aired

I tend to react violently to everything regardless of if it's good or bad, when i'm happy i punch things when i'm angry i punch things

and i always, always want to throw up

raptorwing replied to your post:last year before the finale i wanted to:throw up...

-pours you some sake- Let’s do this thing

my brain can't take this show

my heart can take it even less

g-script replied to your post:re: ep 12

I WANT THIS SO BADLY I feel like there’s a chance we’ll get that or at least I hope so - because Rin IS SO important to Haru but he doesn’t express that as easily as Rin does…

at this point i literally need him to sell me the rest of this dream he's found because there's still so many things i could put a pessimistic spin on unless i see haru literally bursting with the same energy he did in season 1's finale. and if he's gonna share this thing with rin (truth is i don't even know yet? do i even want him to? god i'm so confused), then they better have the same conviction cos... otherwise? i'm not sure it feels as deserved as i ideally want it to be. but then kyoani has always trolled me in the most magnificent of ways so YEAH I HAVE HOPE

g-script replied to your post:I loved all the Rinharu and the Engrish and aaahhh it was great. But did Haru's whole development seem a bit... forced to you?

I FEEL LIKE Haru was still so lost in this episode and still so scared that he was wearing Rin’s words and letting them sink in and affect them BUT NEXT EPISODE C’MON NEXT EPISODE Run after your princess Haru CHASE HIMMMM

this is very true!! like i wish rin wouldn't have been so soft and gentle because it made me ache to see haru react to it with more than confusion, but truth is that he really wasn't in that kind of place yet. of course it makes me super nervous if they're gonna make up for that later, but deep breaths deep breaths, all i want is for haru to apologize to makoto and to acknowledge rin being important and for the ending to feel rewarding in a way that doesn't sacrifice anyone's individuality ughhh /clutches chest and remembers the pain ep 11 caused me last year

lostlegendaerie replied to your post:re: ep 12 

if nothing else rin here was a goddamn godsend and fiNALLY AUSTRALIA PLEASE COME HOLD ME I STILL FEAR SO MUCH TOO SENPAI

i've given up trying to put into words how much i love matsuoka rin and how far he's come since last season because i think there's a constellation on the sky somewhere with his name on it

but the fear is eternal like the summer and won't end till the summer ends /holds you

[kamijimoe]

man you've just decapitated poor hazuki nagisa.. WHY

hahah yeah, I really wanted his hand in that picture

 and i just realised i’ve been tagging him as kaworu LOL thanks

[hazeldough]

LATE REPLIES BC I WAS KINDA IN THE ZONE WHEN I WAS WATCHING TSURITAMA + TUMBLR DIDNT SHOW ME ANY NOTIFICATIONS OF THESE, I'M SORRY

wadanochi replied to your post: tHEYRE ALL BECOMING FRIENDS I LOVE IT

akira is the best i kid you not

i was getting so happy when he was doing his turn around from being a real shady character to being a part of their friendship circle, and how he was backing haru up at the end when Duck was trying to get Haru 

roreku replied to your post: this anime makes me so happy this bett...

honey, you’ve got a big storm coming

holy shit..................... it was a literal big storm

nice.

wadanochi replied to your post: okay so i paused at the right moment ...

he is wearing a tiny speedo

okay im looking at a bigger version of it w/o the big play button and

could have really fooled me, if i hadn't looked closer and if you didnt tell me...

[rinmatsuokas]

i hope they jump in the sakura pool and then lie ill home for a week but without any regrets because it was so worth it

Yes I agree!!

[icecreambat]

On season 2: Endless summer, round 1

hi airin!  before any more of the pv comes along and spoils s2 for us, would you maybe be interested in making a list of things you think would happen in s2, and then when it ends we could look through it and see what’s been true and what’s not?  for example, last year, somewhere in the end of july, i said that haru and rin would hug in the season finale, and they totally did, right? and as for the s2 i think that there definitely would be some sakura pool diving. considering your amazing analyzing skills, i think you will be great at this! - have a nice day!

— roreku

So I think I speak on behalf of all of us when I say that the preview clip for s2 has left most of us in a state of simultaneous excitement and dread, and I know that I spent basically a day being unable to put those feelings of terror into words. I am, of course, talking about this clip which roreku was also referring to, talking about the "first and last endless summer." I actually tried communicating my feelings of thrill yet unease over this last night, which more or less amounted to two things: what I wish happened and what I can theoretically see happening. Yet when it comes right down to it... neither one are specifically straightforward or simple; I'm going to try and break this down regardless, and then we can all laugh at how way off the mark I was with everything afterwards. In some ways, I'll be relieved if I am.

Here's what we know:

At the end of S1, we know a few things for certain: Rin's staying in Samezuka, he's out to follow "his own dream," Rin and Haruka (and by extension, supposedly everyone else) are friends again. What this means is that we have cleared out one conflict –i.e. Haruka and Rin's fall-out–, which allows the show to focus on a conflict of another kind: as the S2 promo implies, they're going to run with the idea of graduation and 3rd year of high school (for Makoto, Haruka and Rin anyway), and everything that this transitional stage in their lives entails. And here's where things get complicated: unlike S1, S2 won't have a High Speed! to fall back on to contextualize what may or may not happen in the end.

Here's what I wish happened:

Given that Haruka and Rin are friends again, I wish the show would take this into account in a way that the drama CDs / other material has done post-series. I wish we would get to see these idiots growing together as friends, trying to take back everything that the first season "wasted" by having them repeatedly misunderstand each other's every action. Apart from that, I wish we'd get to see friendship dynamics continue to evolve with all the main characters, and that Nagisa and Makoto in particular (not to mention Kou) gained some kind of individual agency and development; I'd give anything to see Rin and Makoto hang out, or generally witness scenes that enforce how all of these characters are capable of being a positive influence in each other's lives. I wish we saw an actual conflict through everyone coming to realize what adulthood actually entails, and how the choices we make in our teens are not necessarily the ones that last us through life. The only person I realistically see pursuing swimming career-wise is Rin, so I'd be more than thrilled to see how this translates for the others – does Haruka ever discover other things in life (such as his artistic ability), how do these kids deal with the concept of change, and which parts of their friendship eventually become worth holding onto? Since S1 was so heavy on the various aspects of friendship, I can't imagine S2 not following along that path, but whether it focuses on individuality or group dynamic is really up in the air so far.

Here's what I theoretically feel might actually happen, though:

New characters. Whether these are throwbacks to High Speed! or not, I can't say; given that Rei was such a good balance to the original Iwatobi Fantastic Four, I'm not averse to completely new characters – in some ways I probably dread them less than having people like Aki or Sousuke pulled in from the past to create conflict/drama. Because if anything I'm 90% sure about, it's that there has to be a conflict; as much as I'd personally rather prefer a slice-of-life type of exploration of their third year (with the conflict not manifesting in a person, rather than the themes surrounding said year), I'm doubtful that this will be the case. We're probably looking at another 12 episodes that need a coherent frame around it, and where that frame in S1 was the reparation of Rin and Haruka's friendship, it's really hard to say what we'll get this time around. Looking at things from a purely narrative perspective, there needs to be some kind of tension, and the easiest way to accomplish this is through either a conflict of interest or a conflict of personalities. Theoretically, we can deal with the conflict of interest even within this group of characters, but it's unlikely that that's the extent of it. Something always needs to shake up the status quo, and more often than not, it's a someone.

Wait, that didn't answer the question at all!

You're right – in many ways it didn't. I think this is because apart from brief glimpses into drama CDs etc, we literally don't know how the group dynamic is going to work post-series yet. We don't know how close Rin and Haruka are going to get, and if that's going to affect their futures. We have a way of theorizing how characters like Makoto are going to act based on their prior behaviour (if what one of the directors off-handedly once said about the possibility of Makoto distancing himself from the group at a later age has any bearing on S2 is another topic altogether, but probably a moot one since we're not dealing with the immediate future rather than the prospect of it), but not having to support Haruka 24/7 might change up things for him a lot too. The then-to-be 2nd years might be the least likely candidates to be subjected to change, but everyone loves a passing-on-the-torch narrative, so that might factor in on it as well.

Either way, I do feel that once again it really boils down to how much Rin's presence in Haruka's life is going to alter his future (if at all), and whether Rin's future is in turn affected by all of his friends. I mean, we could literally get anything: we could have Haruka who chooses to pursue art alongside swimming, we could have Haruka who is content to do absolutely nothing alongside swimming, we could have Haruka who follows Rin along on his path, we could have Haruka who moves in with Makoto and they start a cat café together – shit, I literally don't know. It's impossible to even say yet whether Rin will opt for the Olympics at all, or if Makoto ever figures he might want to do things that aren't at all related to his friends. All I can say with confidence after the preview is that these questions will, in some way or another, probably be at the forefront of S2, and that I'm both looking forward to it and dreading it a lot. I mean, it could go so many ways. Just like the finale.

And I hate hate hate hate and love love love love Free! for subjecting me to such emotional torture because I'm still left guessing. The payoff could be amazing if KyoAni has even the slightest idea of what they're doing, but until then I'm stuck in a perpetual state of "hope for the best and fear for the worst." Or maybe I'm just saying that because having already planned out a theoretical 3rd year for these kids in fic, I'm not sure if I see 100% happiness in the distance – and I'm not used to being the person subjected to that heartbreak, as opposed to causing it. So yeah, I'm biased, but I'm hoping that through analysis like this I could work my own bias out of it (and remain less pessimistic about the ~realities of life), so if there's anything anyone wants to chat about / theorize over / just plain guess at, my askbox / fanmail is always open!