ARIA The ORIGINATION – Picture Drama 05

「アリスの怪談」 (Arisu no Kaidan)
“Alice’s Ghost Story”

At a Glance:
Out on the docks waiting for the summer fireworks festival to start, Alice decides to tell a ghost story to help pass the time. Being afraid of ghost stories, Aika is barely able to contain herself when Alice starts talking about a girl who mysteriously disappeared one night after playing at these docks with her friends. Realizing it’s just like the situation they’re in, Aika constantly interrupts the story by bringing up whether their friends can handle scary stories. After concluding that Athena is too dense to notice that they’re scary, Alicia is too composed to be scared, and Akira is possibly scared despite being reliable, Aika brings up Al, so Akari and Alice both look at her for speculations. With Aika embarrassed that they instantly associate Al with her, Akari brings up Akatsuki, who Aika somehow figures that he’d be scared for sure, but try to hide it.

Akari and Alice look to Aika again after this explanation, figuring that she’s the same, after which Alice continues her story because Aika isn’t able to stall it any longer. After Alice explains how the girl disappeared on her way home on a night just like this, her and Aika think Akari disappeared when she steps behind them. Alice then goes on how to explain how you can hear the girl’s voice coming from the ocean at times, which slowly fades off into the distant. Alice then thinks she hears something, so she tells them listen closely, when the fireworks start and freak them all out. She also adds that the girl disappeared following the fireworks and questions what’s going to happen now.

Impressions:
This picture drama was a lot more like your typical ARIA episodes, unlike the previous wacky one, so fans of the laid-back pacing that this series is known for should enjoy it. Although Alice got freaked out at the end with everyone else, I assumed she was just playing along to scare Akari and Aika. Every time she was able to start her story again, it kept changing ever so slightly to fit the situation they’re in now, which was funny because I figured she was just messing with Aika.

Well that pretty much wraps up coverage of these picture dramas for now (until the last two DVDs come out), which I couldn’t help posting about since I wasn’t around to blog any of the actual series. On that note, there’s also the DVD bonus episode (episode 5.5 of The ORIGINATION), which I only happened to watch yesterday. I’m contemplating whether or not to write up a post about it though, since I’m under the impression that most readers only want to read about stuff that’s new. While I realize that I should blog whatever I feel like, I don’t exactly have a lot of free time on my hands, so unfortunately I have to be a bit selective.

P.S. I updated the posts for the first and second episodes with full videos as well, so feel free to look back on those if you like.

Edit: Turns out there will be two more picture dramas following the release of the 6th and 7th DVDs on September 25th and October 24th respectively. I guess that goes to show how unreliable the information on MAL was. Thanks for the correction.

Cast:
– Akari (灯里) / Hazuki Erino (葉月 絵理乃)
– Aika (藍華) / Saitou Chiwa (斎藤 千和)
– Alice (アリス) / Hirohashi Ryou (広橋 涼)