/jp/ - Otaku Culture

Finally, an update. Of sorts. Before I actually do the February update (man that was a long time ago), a recommendation for those of you who are Japanese-certified and want an introduction to the whole shitfest without watching 100,000 videos:

Yukkuris Discuss the History of the Kemono Friends Shitstorm
https://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm34965186 (First Half)
https://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm35007728 (Second Half)

It even goes out of its way to introduce the history of the phenomenon that was S1 and briefly introduces the game, so it's accessible to even those who know literally nothing about Kemono Friends or why anybody liked it, and even summarizes every major post-airing scandal. Honestly it would be a bigger public service to translate this particular video than anything else and while I'm too much of a flake to do it I'll see if I can't harass a sub group I know to do it.

And now, what was originally promised, the last week of February's videos, featuring more dissatisfaction with Kemono Friends 2 as a hole, dissatisfaction with particular episodes of Kemono Friend 2, and the usual mind-blowing galaxy-brained ingenuity that only Japanese people can muster.

February (Week 4) - Prelude to War, 400+ ML videos.

2/23 The gang from Kaiji watches the problem scenes of Kemono Frineds 2

- Kaiji is full of people daring audaciously, succeeding implausibly or failing spectacularly, and at every corner there's a reaction for it. And what better spectacular failure to witness than Kemono Friends 2? A digest of amazing (read: not amazing) scenes from Episode 6 decorated with Kaiji characters muttering, whispering, or generally losing their shit over what happens.

2/23 An analysis of the problems in the script of Kemono Friends 2 (Yukkuri)

- Another yukkuri explanation by a different uploader. Eventually goes on to produce a bunch more of these videos, but this is the first.

- THESIS ONE: in KF 1, character's overarching goals, intermediate goals, immediate goals, and character's actions are all linked. Characters act according to motivations and near their goals; each episode is set up overcoming an obstacle to that goal, exceptions being 3, 5, and 8. In KF2, the overarching goal and character's actions seem disconnected and unmotivated; the main characters seem to flail around and somehow land nearer to their objective than they did before. Loosely, the requirements of the plot puppet the characters around. Fundamentally, a good narrative links "objectives" to "actions" to "results" and KF2 doesn't do this. Cue a ton of examples fished from both seasons + Kemurikusa that purport to illustrate this point. (The E6 example illustrates the less-than-completely-helpful Kaban and gives a shoutout to the mastermind movie from earlier, eventually a lot of these videos will end up referencing each other.)

- THESIS TWO: it's hard to discern the personality and philosophy of characters in KF2. S1 illustrates that the "philosophy" (driving actions) behind Kaban's actions are: survival, gratitude, and curiosity. In S2 you can't figure this out because the disjoint between actions and results leaves you wondering what anyone's motivations are. "This is most obvious in the case of Serval, where forget about trying to get a handle on her character, what might possibly be going on in her head is so opaque that it's not clear that she has one at all." And characters respond to situations in ways that seem contrary even to the thin characterizations they do have. Tragic.

- THESIS THREE: If the theme of Kemono Friends 2 is "play" (referencing Kyururu's tendency to resolve situations through games) as opposed to Kaban's "insight", then that in and of itself seems like a nice balance from S1, but as play can only solve mental rather than material problems, KF2 is forced to fall into the structure where the primary obstacle in any given episode is then forced to be the fact that a friend actively won't let the party pass (reminiscent of the "problem friends" phenomenon from the other video). This fatal flaw in one stroke hacks away at competence, consistency, and the "gentle world" of S1. Sad.

- Forgetting even about KF2 being "Kemono Friends," even setting aside 9/25 and all that controversy simply fails at being a story. Presuming the director and scriptwriter weren't incompetent, they were rushed. "The best way to watch this series without getting angry about it is probably to mentally categorize it as simply as one countless secondary works." (Punchline: "If you really forced me to name a single good thing about Kemono Friends 2 I'd probably go with the sexiness of Bottlenose Dolphin's voice. I hope I hear it in my dreams.")