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「颯爽と、平塚静は前を歩く。」 (Sassou to, Hiratsuka Shizu wa mae o Aruku)
“Gallantly, Shizuka Hiratsuka Moves Forward”
The Ship that was Never Meant to Be
When Iroha bantered with Hachiman in the Audio Visual room, it made me wish she was the end girl. Cheekiness, chemistry and flair. Iroha has it all. She also offers Hachiman an out to his difficult situation in terms of no longer having a reason to associate with Yui and Yukino – have everyone join the Student Council. Too bad Hachiman’s not interested in her. But I can understand him here. When one person truly likes another person, it’s not like they’ll half-heartedly settle for alternatives on a random whim. And if they do, they’d certainly be morally challenged – which Hachiman is not. So while the interactions between Iroha and Hachiman are really fun, they merely present a pipe dream eulogizing the long-sunken ship. Alas. Though Hachiman does make an extremely spicy joke to Yukino this episode, about how her shoulders can’t possibly hurt due to the lack of weight in a certain area of her body – which he immediately back peddles on when she frostily asks him to repeat what he just said. That said, I think this joke could apply to every female character we’ve seen – except Mamagahama and Kawasaki.
Haruno with some Choice Words
To surmise, prom is a huge success. Yukino’s mum even comes in to congratulate her at the after party. However, Haruno rains on the parade. She reveals that she feels like shit, and though she cares for Yukino, resents the idea that Yukino could easily attain freedom – something she’s desperately sought out for 20 years. It doesn’t seem like she’s going to actively impede Yukino. To me, it seems like she wants to make sure that Yukino is truly deserving – which is why Haruno has opted to make life difficult. And it’s fascinating that she’s also seeking out genuine things – which mirrors Hachiman’s wish, indicating that perhaps she never grew past being a hardcore cynic with trust issues.
Codependency vs Interdependency
I must have fooled myself because I was expecting some real progress once prom was over and done with. And Yukino came so damn close too – with her intimate expression and soft caressing of Hachiman’s shirt. Yet once again, Hikigaya manages to dodge progress by fleeing from Yukino as if he’s Neo dodging bullets in the Matrix. Hell, even Haruno calls the trio out for using codependency as an excuse to justify being distant, so as to avoid any kind of direct confrontation where an unwanted subject matter might come up. Fortunately, Hiratsuka sensei is there to pick him up – taking him to a baseball batting cage to blow off steam, before sitting him down at a bar to dispense her sagely wisdom and advice. Having known the trio for a year, she expresses optimism to contrast Haruno’s cynicism. Namely her belief that their relationship is more than just codependency.
As much as I respect Hiratsuka, I’m not sure I agree with her. The trio’s life essentially revolves around each other, they have no hobbies/interests outside of each other, and their identities come to a stand-still when apart, to the point they just naturally gravitate towards one another. But I could agree that there’s a good chance the trio could develop a healthier set of relationships based off interdependence. Yukino and Hachiman have both taken steps in the right direction. Though ultimately it comes down to clear and effective communication. Hachiman will need to properly reject Yui and properly confess to Yukino to resolve the final piece of the puzzle. And whether he can pull this off in the remaining two episodes remains to be seen.
Anyway, that’s about everything I wanted to discuss. As always, thanks for reading this post – and see you next week to find out how Hachiman will apply Hiratsuka’s advice to his current situation.
Preview
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Image links are broken.
Thanks for letting me know. Should be fixed now 🙂
I’m gonna be sad when this show ends. Iroha really pushing to be #1 especially in this ep but ya i just hope that there is an actual conclusive ending and its not just the status quo they keep saying is a bad thing.
I’ll definitely be feeling sad once Oregairu comes to an end. But I will also feel relieved because the show is starting to run past its natural course.
Man that show moved up so fast for me, before I knew it we nearly at the end and I don’t feel like much has happened at all
There’s definitely a lack of tangible progress in terms of relations and story. I wonder how they will wrap this up in a satisfactory way within two episodes. Let’s hope the writer or anime studio have one final trick up their sleeve.
Also none of the pics links are working btw
Thanks for letting me know. Should be fixed now 🙂
Great season so far another love triangle
These people should do what they want regardless of what haruno thinks as long as it makes them happy. Why is her approval so important to them. There is clearly more to their relationship than just defining it with codependency. There are much more layers to their relationship that summing it up with just the word codependency isn’t enough
Many teenagers are impressionable and would pander towards people that they admire. Japanese culture has a veneration towards seniors too, especially with Haruno being an alumnus of their school and a student council president who was famed for her competence. Not to mention Yukino’s status as Haruno’s younger sibling. With these cultural considerations in mind, and the familial relationship in question, there are many contextual reasons as to why the trio try to pander towards them.
Also, if a relationship features all aspects of codependency, it is codependent. It can have more aspects than codependency, but it doesn’t change the fact that it’s underlined by codependency – which is a huge issue and not particularly healthy. So I do think it’s important for this issue to be addressed. What do they do if they all go to different universities – continue to be tied at the hip? Suffer a fracture in relations? And even if they find a way to grow past codependency, it won’t be easy compared to if they were to address the problem right here, right now. There’s also the white elephant in the room – the fact there are romantic feelings in the mix. So yeah…
I find all this talk of codependency to be absurd. The three main characters are not codependent in any meaningful way. It’s just crap writing at this point, and grasping at straws. This lack of meaning is probably what’s driving this season’s mediocrity.
Haruno has trolled the characters and now trolls the viewers.
I agree that this codependency crap is driving S3’s mediocrity. But I do think that the trio’s relationship exhibits many common symptoms as assessed within the field of psychological studies:
https://positivepsychology.com/codependency-definition-signs-worksheets/
Which in turn would suggest that you could define their relationships as being codependent in nature.
I don’t think that article is evidence of anything (except an intent to sell). The author couldn’t even write his own degree correctly and isn’t qualified to be authoritative on the subject. He does note that despite apparent consideration, codependency has been excluded from the industry bible — does it really exist? The purpose of this article is to proffer the company’s services. Take our questionnaire, “… Not a substitute for clinical diagnosis [but] it can be a good starting point.” Remember that, “The most effective treatment… is therapy.” Fill out the worksheet which is “… Designed to get people thinking about codependency in their own lives.”
He offers mostly vagueness: low self-esteem, stress, depression, anxiety (all in bold). Those conditions probably correlate to many issues.
That said, there are some clues within. For example, “… The ways in which someone feels they must care-take for another’s emotional state.”
That isn’t happening with these characters — at all. Each character has issues but codependency isn’t among them. Reading several of the references as well as the abstracts for other papers has only made this clearer to me.
FWIW, the wikipedia article is more useful (as are any of the references) and includes a more coherent list of criteria (provided by one of the referenced authors).
It was always crap LN writing, wake up. 8man actually could have been an interesting character if he was done true to the projected image instead of melting like an ice cream the moment bitches noticed him. Can’t have that, breaks the harem bullshit lol.
Pointless sister is absolutely pointless. Both of them, lol.