How terrifying is it to know that tomorrow, you won't remember today? Or that you don't actually have a tomorrow... because tomorrow is last week. And that this week is last week as much as it is next week. It's enough to make modern Western philosophy implode. Didn't T.S. Eliot have a poem or four about this?
This is one of the issues that comes up in Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu (2009). Assuming you didn't just throw a remote at the TV/mouse at the monitor in frustration and said "To hell with this shit."
Retrospect is quite a thing, especially when fans are left to compare a follow-up series to an original that was an undeniable cultural explosion. The first run of Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu pretty much shook the anime scene so strongly that even today, smatterings of people can still be found at cons dancing to "Hare Hare Yukai". A pretty influential series, especially considering that it basically cemented the dry, sarcastic everyman as a staple lead for self-reflective otaku-centric anime for years afterwards and that Haruhi-ism actually is a thing.
But that aside, it seemed pretty much a guaranteed hit for Kyoto Animation, doing a sequel to a juggernaut in the midst of several critical and commercial darlings (Clannad and ~After Story~, K-ON). Franchising seems like the best thing to do, and how could you possibly go wrong with Haruhi? Oh ho ho.
What you end up getting is a series that, also in retrospect, seems a lot better than what the fan outcry was at the time it was airing. This "second season" should not be viewed as an entity onto itself. The episodes fall into place when you consider its role in the entire Haruhi chronology. It all makes perfect sense when you think of it as a whole. Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu showed off its brilliance the first time by experimenting and mastering plot. 2006 saw the first series air out of order, yet the entire narrative functioned perfectly. It challenged its viewers the first time around. This time it might seem like a trial. The Endless Eight arc as it is known is perhaps the best way to drip-torture someone without water.
It's summer, the last two weeks of vacation, and Kyon, Yuki, Mikuru and Koizumi are trapped in Haruhi's infinite time loop. Think less Groundhog Day, more deja vu. The characters have no idea what's happening to them save for Yuki (for obvious reasons). And so we, and they, are presented the same events ad infinitum, ad nauseum.
It's the same thing over and over. And over. Again and again. And again and again and again.
The episodes aren't entirely copy and paste of one another. Clothes change, maybe one time you'll see them at a store, another at the poolside. But the vacation is burned permanently into our minds and possibly their DNA at this point: pool, shopping, festival, bug-catching, part-time job. Every summer cliche in the book, really. So here is the reason for the outrage: what kind of cheap trick is this? There might be two camps about this situation. Either Kyoto Animation is laughing maniacally that they got away with this or (even beyond their control) the studio dared to show something deeper to its audience. In any case, what other franchise could do something like this? This is Nintendo-Revolution-surprise-Wii levels of throwing an audience and dedicated fanbase for a loop.
And so, if it's the latter and not some cheap cop-out, where is any depth in these pool-filled episodes of repetitious service? The aforementioned questions of time and existence and ignorance.
It's astounding to consider what a nightmare it is to have no tomorrow... and how much worse it is to not even KNOW that. Knowledge is what we crave, always. It's a terrible way to exist when one doesn't know. What about Yuki, for whom time "passes normally"? What is it like to observe eternity before you? Not bad questions or propositions, although they come at the expense of tearing your hair out.
The episodes outside Endless Eight come as relief. Some of these cover the troubled and joyless production of the supremely funny "Asahina Mikuru's Adventure" (which is easily one of the best and most creative episodes of anime ever produced). The high point of these episodes is what they propose: everyone is not what they seem. Wait, wasn't that in the first series? Yes. But here's the kicker: everyone is not what they seem... to Kyon. For instance, think for a moment that Mikuru's unbearable blubbering is act she's putting on to fool him. Really consider it. Huh.
But that leads to the most important questions people seem more inclined to ask: is this worth it? It depends.
Is it entertaining? Not in the slightest. Is it even good? Who even knows? To say it's horrendous is as right as saying that it's brilliant. It's not either one of those things yet it's not passable or average. What is this anime, then? It's Haruhi.
Original review (2012):
Years having passed since the airing of Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu (2009), we can take a look back as to what exactly this series did and didn't do, and why it was received the way it was back then. For many fans, a second season for the mammoth "Haruhi" franchise should have been a blessing, yet while the anime was on air many viewers wound up cursing. Most frustration came weekly with the eight-as-infinity arc ("Endless Eight"), and many Haruhi-ites blasted Kyoto Animation for what appeared to be clear abuse to the fandom and blatant exploitation. Dust has settled since then, and now may be a better time to consider this series critically.
This "second season" is not exactly even that. These episodes fit into the entire Haruhi anime in places so that when all 28 are viewed in chronological order, it all makes perfect sense. One thing that made Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu a fantastic series in the first place is its mastery with the concept of plot. Back in 2006, the entire anime series was aired out of order and yet the entire thing functioned to perfection. It counted on its viewers to keep up with it and so these later episodes may just feel like an intellectual insult. No longer does this anime choose to baffle and amaze us with clever use of plot; each arc that comprises this 2009 series transpires in order. Yet it is what these episodes are made of which provides the greatest challenge.
During the freshman summer of their school year, Kyon, Yuki, Mikuru and Koizumi find themselves stuck in Haruhi's infinite loop of the last two weeks of vacation. What occurs is entirely Groundhog Day but without the thing that made such a concept bearable to us viewers-- while Bill Murray's character remembers that he's repeating his day over ad infinitum, the cast here has no idea what is going on. The only ones with access to this information is the viewer (and Yuki for obvious reasons). So here we are confronted with eight episodes of the same thing again and again and again. The changes are minute but never within the dialogue or story. The only differences we observe are visual. Watching this in a marathon makes it hard to differentiate between these episodes-- maybe one time we don't see them at the store buying clothes. Maybe another time we see them swimming in the pool. But it remains the same to the point that their summer vacation can be memorised: pool, shopping, Bon festival, bug-catching, part-time job etc. Over and over and over.
It's easy to understand why this would drive anyone insane-- it's nearly torture. But then there's the much bigger dilemma with this scenario; why are the viewers the ones to suffer? While our patience wears thin and our grip on what is what becomes looser, the characters themselves live in this perpetual state, never going as nuts as we do. They discover over and over again what is going on and so they don't have the skin-clawing frustration of being stuck in a time loop. Except for one character, and she's programmed just to observe and not feel anything about her situation. Why does this happen? Is this a way to consider what it must be like to be completely oblivious in such a situation? How ultimately terrifying it might be to not even know that you should be afraid of a non-existent future? Is it about the unfathomable realisation that tomorrow you won't even remember today, and will return to ignorance? There were many better ways that KyoAni could have handled the Endless Eight arc to make it remarkable yet it never quite goes those places. It even could have showed us different aspects of the characters' days in the loop rather than the same reused settings over and over, yet it did not. Laziness? Money? Artistic vision? Who knows. What it does do is get under our skin. Sitting through every scene of every episode of Endless Eight should be rewarded, but with what? Or how?
The episode preceding Endless Eight also dabbles in concepts and configurations of time, but the remainder of the 2009 series opts to go even more supernatural and show more examples of Haruhi's power. The "Sigh" arc is focussed on the tense and joyless production of one of the funniest student-films ever made. Perhaps this was indeed intentional. Asahina Mikuru's Adventure can be considered one of the best episodes of anime period, and the production seemed to have been one that was light and fun. Yet the "Sigh" episodes reveal underscored and even unknown dramas within the SOS Brigade. The making-of was actually quite troubled and miserable for most involved. This arc also proposes the possibility that everyone is not quite what they seem not only to Haruhi and others, but to Kyon as well. While Mikuru's blubbering is nearly unbearable during the second season, we're confronted with the idea that perhaps she's faking it. Think about that for a minute.
Surely this anime is not what anyone expected and I guess that's just it being "Haruhi" by doing so. Other things remain familiar and solid; the characterisation (Kyon's snarky disposition, Yuki's impenetrable depths, Mikuru's hopeless and exploitable misfortune, and Koizumi's untrustworthy calmness) and good production values. The anime does use its animation and art to say things without words, such as Kyon and Koizumi's minute bodily movements or even Haruhi testing her hair in a ponytail when she thinks nobody is around. Unfortunately, the music doesn't give us another "Hare Hare Yukai" but then really, can we expect another? Should we want another? Perhaps we would have liked it that 2009 be like 2006, but then if it was, would it really be a Haruhi anime-- one defying conventions and expectations. In the years following, there have been many anime that used that Haruhi formula that was, during its time, fresh and new and exciting. In 2009, could it be what it used to be and still be all those things? Honestly, can you ask anyone if they've seen more than one anime do the same episode eight times in a row? I doubt so.
In the end we wonder: what exactly is Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu (2009)? What did it do for both the franchise and the anime medium? Was it merely a way to stick it to the die-hard fans? Was it a studio's way to use little imagination to make big money? Or was it trying to be different. To show move and affect the audience in unexpected ways. To elicit emotions out of a complacent viewer who expects to be rewarded and instead is challenged. And yet after watching the series, it's still hard to really say what it is or does. But it's amazing how the angry cries, when dissipated, leaves a silence in which one can observe something with closer attention. We do tend to hear noise easily.
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