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So-Ra-No-Wo-To 01

January 5, 2010 @ 3:36 am · Filed under Anime, So-Ra-No-Wo-To

soranowoto_01_01

Kanata gets wet.

soranowoto_01_02

Kanata gets lost.

soranowoto_01_03

Kanata plays trumpet (terribly).

The End.

Proper thoughts:

  • It’s just like K-ON!. Only mellower. And with trumpets.
  • I keep expecting Rio to start shouting randomly in an ape-like voice. Or asking people to punish her.
  • Felicia = Mugi.
  • Why is Haruka Tomatsu singing the ED when I don’t see her in the cast list?

22 Comments

  1. Winter 2010 First Impressions – So-Ra-No-Wo-To | Jinx! Said,

    January 5, 2010 @ 5:16 am

    [...] not the only one who hates the retarded way this show’s title is spelled. I noticed Kurogane’s post on the first episode and from his commentary I judged that it might be worth checking out right [...]

  2. NovaJinx Said,

    January 5, 2010 @ 7:54 am

    Heh, that ED song sure bugged me too. I don’t mind Tomatsu Haruka but why is she of all people doing it? Maybe she’s gunning for a singer’s career, who knows.

  3. karuroso Said,

    January 5, 2010 @ 11:30 am

    hahah seriously…
    rondom guy: did you volunteer?
    the girl that resembles yui: yes!i wanted to learn music!

  4. Shadow Said,

    January 5, 2010 @ 12:21 pm

    This show should tide me over until K-ON Season 2.

  5. Rawr Said,

    January 5, 2010 @ 2:11 pm

    Is it just me or is kobayashii yuu in the wrong show? I swear, she can do a better job than this.. or can she? Not much of a seiyuu fanatic, but I imagine Romi Paku would do a better job with Rio than koabayashi yuu.

  6. lolokz Said,

    January 5, 2010 @ 3:21 pm

    woah!! great new anime..

  7. Maximilian Said,

    January 5, 2010 @ 6:00 pm

    Dunno how this will turn out, but one thing is for sure: I loved OP absolutely :D . I learned that lyrics and composition was done by Yuki Kajiura; no wonder I liked it. I loved her previous works( especially OSTs of .hack//sign and My-hime).

  8. Rei Said,

    January 5, 2010 @ 7:46 pm

    I rather quite liked episode one a lot :D Rio ftw. MAE NI SUSUME.
    Yuki Kajiura composed both OP and ED. And yes, where is Haruka Tomatsu?? D: She tends to sing in the anime’s she’s not in any more: like with sphere songs i mean, lol. Only one she was actually in was Sora no Manimani. But yes…. Cageyake girls unite.
    I like the Rio tackle.

  9. Kaisos Said,

    January 5, 2010 @ 7:55 pm

    What I don’t get is how the assistant screenwriter of Code Geass and the director of Elfen Lied can, working together, produce something as fluffy as this.

    It’s mind-bending.

  10. DocAstaroth Said,

    January 5, 2010 @ 8:29 pm

    I don´t know how character and story will evolve, but the OP is by Kalafina (Also responsible for the music in Kara No Kyoukai!), so… I´m sold!

  11. Kurogane Shiroikaze Said,

    January 5, 2010 @ 8:43 pm

    @Rawr: I’m actually sharing the same sentiments as you…. I’ve been poisoned too much by her performances in Gintama to be unable to take her seriously at all. So when she does a role that’s more “tsukkomi” than “boke”, it’s just kinda hard to accept… but we’ll see.

    @Maximillian: Yeah, the OP was pretty good. But maybe I’m a bit tired of Yuki Kajiura already…. I don’t find it fresh or exciting or anything.

    @Rei: I don’t think Yuki composed the ED. It’s kinda not her style. And she’s singing solo in the ED, not under a group or anything.

    @Kaisos: I am actually expecting greater things from the both of them in the future episodes. Maybe an episode where panties get stolen, LOL.

  12. Grimmer Said,

    January 6, 2010 @ 2:25 am

    Intro visuals were great at setting an atmosphere. The first scene in the train compartiment was brilliant. The rest got lost in the moe.

    I’m a sucker for pan shots of vast landscapes and display of tranquil city life , so some scenes were massively pleasing, but sadly enough it became all to clear that we’re being set up with a bland bunch of moe and zero story. This seems like the type of show where characters increasingly become caricatures of themselves with every passing minute/episode. I’m quite disappointed with the behaviour of the main character. Why can’t writers come up with a more complex/balanced character with more subtle/creative quirks?

    On the other side I’m glad that we’re confronted with an alternate universe where, for once, the writers don’t feel the need to show how ‘different’ everything is, by listing the differences in currency, geography, history,… with the ‘real world’.

    I’m no pessimist by nature but i sence it all going downhill from here.

  13. Tokkan Said,

    January 6, 2010 @ 5:47 pm

    Those are not trumpets. They’re bugles.

  14. Tokkan Said,

    January 6, 2010 @ 5:50 pm

    Oh, ok. The blue-haired girl, whatever her name is, has a trumpet. But “Kanata” is playing a bugle.

  15. Typewriter Said,

    January 6, 2010 @ 9:54 pm

    “Intro visuals were great at setting an atmosphere. The first scene in the train compartiment was brilliant. The rest got lost in the moe.

    I’m a sucker for pan shots of vast landscapes and display of tranquil city life , so some scenes were massively pleasing, but sadly enough it became all to clear that we’re being set up with a bland bunch of moe and zero story”

    I feel the exact opposite, actually. The moment Kanata does her quirks, I feared the show would get lost in moe. But the festival scene and the overall directional choices (BGM, enviromental long shots and focus on capturing mood of the city) made it clear to me that the any moe would take backseat to atmosphere.

    I really can’t comprehend why people would make a close parallel to K-ON! just by watching the first episode. So far it’s feeling much more like ARIA.

  16. Kurogane Shiroikaze Said,

    January 6, 2010 @ 10:07 pm

    @Typewriter: Remember, K-ON! was a slice-of-life story at first too! With the same art style, it’s not hard to draw the comparisions. Well, I would say it’s roughly K-ON!’s setup + ARIA’s atmosphere + a bit of Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou’s mellowness.

    @Tokkan: Thanks for the clarification. They look pretty much the same to me and it doesn’t help most subs are translating them as “trumpet” anyways.

  17. Grimmer Said,

    January 7, 2010 @ 3:18 am

    “I feel the exact opposite, actually. [...]”
    The danger does indeed lay in the main character so I guess it can only get worse…since pretty much every show gets more and more “main character”-centric with every passing episode. in Aria the main character rarely takes the center of the stage…this show on the other hand has got anything but a subtle main character, she’s bound to oppress the atmosphere in the long run. The genki is poison.

    ” [...] I would say it’s roughly K-ON!’s setup + ARIA’s atmosphere + a bit of Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou’s mellowness.”
    I loved Aria and Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou…
    KO-N! was very much not my thing.
    I fear a blend like that leads to self-destruction. Aria and YKK work because they avoid everything that KO-N! is lolz. Would some peaceful pan shot be anything but a boring intermezzo in KO-N! ? Would ostentatious cuteness be anything but disruptive to the flow of YKK?

    Time will tell.

  18. Random_Anon Said,

    January 7, 2010 @ 3:28 am

    Sora no Woto isn’t as easy going as todays current market. It’s about brutal, terryfing war, in which small girls fight as soldiers. They struggle with their lives, try to overcome the impossible, whilst all the time, hoping for a better day.

    First episode starts by showing us a sobbing girl lost in the ruins of her home, wanting to find her parents who apparently died in such a grotesque way she begins to reject acceptance to the sad news. She is found by a female soldier, whose sad expression and white substance on her beautiful, fair face makes the viewer immediately realise that she was raped just a minute ago and doesn’t want to let the same thing happen to the young girl.

    The next scene shows the same young girl, but this time she’s grown up, wearing a military uniform and waking up in a train, after waking up she is given a can of sweets by soldiers who are riding with her. In these hard times she has to pay with her body in order to get some small pleasure, and those men take full advantage of it. Right before the girl wants to get off the train, soldiers decide to ask for her name. After a night spent with her tiny body they finally know, that she’s called Sorami Kanata.

    After running away from enemy soldiers at full throttle, the girl reaches her destination. She is assigned to the ‘Time-Telling Fortress’ at the city of Seize. The name of the city holds substance, as she has to seize the opportunity of her life and become a full-fledged soldier who will fight for her beloved country.

    After a leisure walk in the city, Kanata begins to see in what way war changes people. The people are tired of living, afraid of the next day. The only ‘toys’ that are left for them is puddles of old blood that paints the streets. They use it to have some fun and forget about their problems and hunger. A horryfing scene of people throwing blood at each other while laughing appears before viewers very eyes. This surely isn’t a comedy.

    After Kanata is soaked with the old blood of her fallen commrads she’s taken in by a blue-haired woman whose eyes are full of pain. She gives her a bath, washes her clothes and keeps painful memories to herself. Kanata doesn’t know this, but the woman, named Rio, is one of the soldiers she’s going to work with.

    As you can see, ‘Sora no Woto’ is a deep anime with lots of terryfing moments, which remind us to keep the peace at all costs – because the price of the war is too high to pay. In order to fully appreciate this piece of art, viewers should spend some time thinking about the meanings of the many little, outwardly worthless moments shown in the series. They all connect into one big picture, full of sadness and hatred. ‘Grave of the Fireflies’ has now a great rival.

    This is So-Ra-No-Wo-To.

  19. Grimmer Said,

    January 7, 2010 @ 3:38 am

    That inspired a ‘lol’.

    Anyway, in the best case scenario you get something close to Spice & Wolf so it’s worth sticking around for a couple more eps.

  20. Typewriter Said,

    January 7, 2010 @ 12:19 pm

    @Kurogane
    Well, I guess it just irks me that some people dismiss it as “lolK-ON with trumpet and atmosphere”. That’s like saying Beck is “lolK-ON with guys and plot” and Taisho Yakyuu Musume as “lolK-ON with baseball and feminism”. I do understand that the artstyle is a huge factor in the comparison, though.

    @Grimmer
    My point is that I don’t really see any focus on ostentatious cuteness from episode 1 alone. If you are strictly talking about the character designs, then I would argue that ARIA’s characters also have visuals and quirks obviously designed to appeal.

    But yes. Time will tell.

  21. Kurogane Shiroikaze Said,

    January 7, 2010 @ 9:52 pm

    @Typewriter: Well, thankfully for you, I am not dismissing the show yet! In fact, I almost never drop shows based on the first episode, unless they have yaoi/scat/pretentiously long henshin scenes/total adaptation decay.

    In fact, I am going to watch So-Ra-No-Wo-To solely on the fact it’s an anime original show, with no adaptations to bias towards and expectations to fulfill… apart from being good that is.

    @Random_Anon: Lol, I read that and I kinda realised the episode can be interpreted exactly that way!

  22. Borgun Said,

    January 22, 2010 @ 2:51 pm

    Hey, Valkyrie Chronicles featured girls of the same age range in combat fatigues sporting miniskirts and longstockings and the unit’s pet was a winged little piggy. Not to mention Alicia’s habit of field-baking. This show is still a long ways from that.

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