Day 1 – There’s No Crying in Anime: The Returning – The 12 Days of Anime

I was so happy with the posts I wrote last year for the 12 Days of Anime with zero preparation on my part that I decided to see if lightning will strike a second time. Throw in feeling rusty-ish with blog writing and I’m sure this will end well 🙂 .

One of the best ways I’ve found to continue enjoying the watching of anime is to have one mind-blowingly awesome anime among the rotation. Two or three would be better but one starts risking their brain melting from the overload at that point. For much of 2012, 2013, and then into 2014 Hunter x Hunter owned that spot; but, it eventually had to end and for Fall of 2014 I suddenly needed that something awesome. Yuki Yuna is a Hero and Rage of Bahamut: Genesis shocked me with how easily they immediately worked together to get me over Hunter x Hunter ending; the fall season also saw the seed of their successor begin to sprout – Shirobako.

By the winter of 2015 Shirobako had all the pieces in place to dominate it’s competition and it did with the seeming ease all true masterworks display. With an absolute desire to minimize how often I use these 12 Days of Anime to talk about Shirobako I’m going to pick one of my favorite moments for today – the moment that left me a quivering, blubbering ball of tears and snot. (Cute picture, right 🙂 .)

In the second half of Shirobako we saw four of the five main focus characters making solid progress in attaining their dream careers. The sole unlucky one was the want-to-be vocal actress, Shizuka Sakaki, who turned to drinking alcohol in her darkened apartment and talking to the television as a means to console herself. I’d honestly decided they were going to leave her story there as a hook for the second season (which is still not been green-lit, I’m just saying) until a last minute character was created to resolve a problem with the plot of the anime that the other four of five characters were working on. (Yes, an anime about making an anime.)

The implications for Shizuka Sakaki were obvious but, even still, it was always possible that I was hoping for something too much and then reading too much into this development. I tried to hold my expectations in check and mentally prepare myself for all the possible outcomes.

These preparations proved inadequate. That moment when she was indeed picked to voice this character and confidently began delivering her lines I just completely lost it. The reaction by Miyamori in the anime was tame compared to me; in addition to the quivering blubbering ball of tears and snot there was a whole bunch of fist pumping and celebrating that one can only get away with by making sure no one can hear you or see you.

Incidentally, it really says something about the professionalism of Miyamori with how muted she was able to keep her reaction to. (As an aside, can you tell I like asides, Miyamori showed a lot more integrity in not trying to help her close friend land a speaking role than I think I could muster.)

I don’t know if I can say this is my favorite anime moment from 2015 or even the “best” (however you define that term) moment but it was definitely the moment the most resonated emotionally with me from 2015.

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