Umi is telling their whole life story — how she first met Yuu, how she introduced Yuu to her friends, how things started feeling off in middle school, how those same friends eventually turned around and ditched Umi just to hang out with Yuu, so on and so forth. It’s a whole ass soap opera. That last part sticks out to me, though. Could it happen? Sure. People can and have been a lot worse to their friends. But the degree of horribleness is not what I’m questioning. Rather, it’s the consistency.
So often in anime, writers and storytellers will deliberately render the side characters super horrible just to prop up the main character(s). And we’ve seen this sort of storytelling already in this show. We’ve seen how Maki’s entire class will hate on him for barely any reason whatsoever, and they do it openly. They do it without any shame. So now, we have Umi’s fake friends — people who have actually known her for years — deliberately cut her out because they’re jealous of her being Yuu’s best friend. I would really hate to wake up one day and find myself in an anime, ’cause it feels like 95% of the population sucks!
Again, I’m not saying that duplicitous, conniving people don’t exist. But from the time she met Yuu as a kid to when she finally meets Maki in high school, Umi never found another genuine friend? She never once made a true connection with anyone else? There’s also the fact that few people ever seem to fall right dab in the middle. People either love Maki (just two, really) or they completely dump on him (almost everyone else). People are either genuine with Umi (again, somehow, just two) or they are fake ass bitches (again, almost everyone else). Seriously, who’s the only normal person other than the main characters? That Nina girl? Even the teacher kinda sucks due to her complete inattentiveness. All I’m saying is that there’s a consistency to the NPCs’ horribleness that feels less than coincidental.
Umi eventually runs off once her emotions get to be too much. Maki soon follows after her. He is totally going to be the type of husband who praises his partner no matter what they do. She’s “incredible” for keeping her resentment bottled in? Look, you can interpret it that way if you want. I won’t. Maybe it’s a cultural thing again. Like wow, you’re so strong for letting people walk all over you all these years! Go, go, sacrificial maidens! Meanwhile, Yuu ends up having to feel guilty for not being mindful enough — for not recognizing that everyone was jealous of Umi. I guess it’s not enough to actively love and cherish your best friend everyday. If other people treat her like crap behind your back, and your friend hides her feelings by pretending that nothing’s wrong, it’s really your fault, y’know? But seriously, what more can we expect from her? What more could Yuu have done given the information that she had? Become a more cynical, less trusting person because other people can’t behave themselves? Moreover, if defending Maki was upsetting social harmony, how would Yuu protect Umi without committing the same “grave sin?”
We don’t actually get to see what transpires after Umi leaves. Maybe Yuu told the fake friends off, maybe she didn’t. Another consistent thing about this show is that the real assholes never really get their just deserts. Meanwhile, people who actually try to make things right are truly the ones who need to apologize! Hell, this story even tried to make us feel somewhat bad for Maki’s bullies, so I guess I’m not surprised that those fake friends got to leave the scene (and likely the rest of the story) quietly. I suppose a charitable interpretation is that fake friends ultimately don’t matter. Shitty bullies don’t matter. Just put them out of your mind. At the end of the day, it’s all moot as long as Umi and Yuu apologize to each other! Well, I’m not keen on Yuu shouldering part of the blame, but whatever, if that’s how they wanna cope with the situation, then so be it. All’s well that ends well, I guess… even if I don’t particularly like the aftertaste.
The rest of the episode is sappy shit, and since I’m not rooting for this couple, I’m going to just ignore it for now.
Stray thoughts & observations:
— If I call it contrived, then someone’s going to counter that all fiction is a contrivance. Totally missing the point.
— Weird how things work out when you’re open and honest.
— It feels like we’re trying to share the blame, and I just don’t agree.
— Maki floated the idea of him and Umi spending some time apart in order for her to mend her relationship with Yuu. But since Yuu vehemently disagrees with the idea, this never happens. Well, it’s not like you have to spend all your time with someone in order to fix your relationship with them. As a result, the idea was unnecessary to begin with. Still, a part of me wants to see it if only because I’m not the biggest fan of either character (nor their inevitable romantic relationship).
— Yuu wants to know what the duo get up to in their hangouts, and on the surface, that seems like a normal enough request. What’s weird is her literally sitting there like a log, not interacting with either Umi or Maki. You can see her feet just sticking out from the top here. It’s oddly voyeuristic. Yuu does eventually take her leave, but after how many hours of observation?
— If my friends ever slapped a controller out of my hands, I would seriously get ticked off. Joking around is one thing, but I draw the line at anything physical. Personally, anime girls are too violent for my tastes.
