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firstlightSoooo. Rikkaimyu 2nd Service.
I was never, ever going to like this myu as much as 1st Service. I have my biases and they are 1) Niou & Yagyuu; 2) Rikkai. In that order, actually. Uh. So of course I was going to be more enthusiastic about the part where they two of them play and where Rikkai is winning. *g*
That said, 1st Service felt a lot more coherent to me than 2nd. This my has its good bits and I do think it has some good songs but it's all over the place - full of flashbacks and asides and things which break up the matches, whereas in 1st Service more of the asides were before and after the matches or - in the case of the D1 match - flowed way more smoothly into the matches. The Golden Pair flashback worked; I didn't think most of the flashbacks along the same lines in this myu did.
This sounds really negative. What I mean to say is that there were bits I liked a lot but it felt like way less of a coherent musical than the previous one.
S3: I didn't like it first or second time I saw it, really... just. Bad songs. Really bad songs; strange things with rhythm not matching melody and general WTF-ness. Abuse of visual effects screen. The thing is, as Pez pointed out when we were talking about it this morning, it's a really hard match to stage. It's probably one of the best damn matches in the manga but that's because it's mostly devoid of silly special effects or whatever; it's just a really, really hard-played match between two people of pretty much the same ability. That's not ideal for a shiny gay tennis musical. I think that's pretty much what went wrong here.
But that doesn't excuse the songs. Renji doesn't sing much, by the way, and the main bit of music he gets is the strangest, strangest thing - I'd almost think it was a technical error if it hadn't been the same both times we saw it, with other music still running in the background. He didn't sing the song badly, I think, but the music was just too strange.
About Ono Kento - he does make a very serene-looking Renji, which is good. But damn, I think Renji is just one of those characters. Like Fuji. How the hell do you get someone to play him convincingly? I'm not sure it's actually possible...
Things I loved: D2 harrassing Renji in the background after he lost. Hee hee. Flopping down on either side of him and being nuisances. I can't remember exactly when this happened but I figure it's gotta have been at some point between S3 and S2.
S2: I like this match better but it's probably the worst for bittiness. I'm also still pretty traumatised by Kirihara's dancing at the beginning though the actual song itself I think I liked (when I could concentrate on it through the fear) - it's just. just. I can deal with inapropriate dancing from many characters. But not Kirihara. Apparently. XD;;;
But yeah, seriously fragmented match - during this match we have a flashback to Rikkai in winter when Yukimura collapsed (though I have glee over Rikkai in their winter uniforms, heh *bias*), a flashback to Kirihara getting owned by the three demons, Tezuka and Fuji's match in the rain, Tezuka training elsewhere and having his Fuji-sense tingling (hah)... at least. I might be forgetting stuff. Also, the interval is right in the middle.
But yeah, I still adore this Kirihara so damn much, with his evil little grin and his confusion after he loses and... skfhsdfklgh. I can just stare at him doing the Kirihara-smirk and have glee.
Better songs, but not especially memorable.
S1: I hate this match in the manga to start with but it had moments of awesome here. I guess it helps that I actually really do like Dori as Echizen, faaaar more than I like any other version of the brat - manga, anime or previous myu cast. Also that he is a really good singer now. Seriously.
This match also featured a lot of asides - Tezuka and Ryoma play their match by the train-tracks, there's a lot of stuff about Samurai, Yukimura lies in bed in the background and there is Angst. Probably not as many. But I still feel more like the songs really didn't flow as well into the myu? Hm. Maybe just me.
Anyway. This is the match I remember most songs from, which is probably a good sign. the FuRinKaZan song... yeah, I dunno, it entertained me anyway. All of Rikkai dancing along and... more special effects screen, but less irritatingly at this point than at others. Echizen sings a song about samurai and destiny and something like that and ok, ok, I admit I really liked Sanada and Echizen fighting with their racquets as if they were swords. I am silly. *g*
Kanesaki is suchaperfectSanada. I really, really like his expressions and unimpressed faces and all that. Sanada dancing is inherently funny, but hey. Kanesaki is sort of a big guy and it can't be overly easy... XD;
Higa: Higa still win. I am SO entertained by them; I love Chinen being creepy and Aoi being freaked out, I love the *sniff, sniff* "...Goya?!?" moment, I love arrogant bastard Kite, I love the crazy sorta-Okinawan music - mad but entirely fitting. I love Kite's "No problem." I love the way they acted at the curtain call, refusing to bow. I desperately want to see the rest of Higa now because I like them anyway and in the myu it looks like they're going to be vastly, vastly entertaining, and also quite camp.
And other stuff:
The members of Rokkaku switching around? Ok. Bane was far better than Davide, though I love both of them when they're part of an ensemble cast. But Davide, dude, he needs people to joke around with and be silly with. He didn't get to be silly, and he only made one horrible pun at some stage after Sanada lost. But Bane was good. 8D;; Still, Rokkaku are at their best as a mad ensemble.
Yukimura is there a lot in the background but it's all a bit silly really. I keep getting the he's not dead yet song from Spamalot stuck in my head and I want to smack myself. And his racquet... man, the way he won't let go of it it's gotta be either some kind of Sanada substitute or the lovechild of him and Sanada. No, I didn't need that thought living in my head, but as it's there you all have to have it too.
In general, there's far too much use of effects screens in this myu, I reckon. I liked the way they did the golden pair flashback last time and wondered if they might do something similar this time but they had video footage instead (back in the days when we had real tennis balls instead of invisible ones, and everything was edging towards sepiatone) which actually didn't really do it for me. The other uses were to project data percentages and other weird stuff during the S3 match, to show a backdrop of trains going past during Tez and Echizen's match (which wasn't strictly necessary but worked ok) and for the FuRinKaZan stuff.
So in general: mixed feelings. Which I suspect was alwaya going to be the case, but.
I still had a lot of fun watching it, though. :D;;;;
My last attempt at a writeup was very sleepdeprived, but for slightly more of what actually happened and slightly less of me rambling about my feelings on the matter, it's over here.
I was never, ever going to like this myu as much as 1st Service. I have my biases and they are 1) Niou & Yagyuu; 2) Rikkai. In that order, actually. Uh. So of course I was going to be more enthusiastic about the part where they two of them play and where Rikkai is winning. *g*
That said, 1st Service felt a lot more coherent to me than 2nd. This my has its good bits and I do think it has some good songs but it's all over the place - full of flashbacks and asides and things which break up the matches, whereas in 1st Service more of the asides were before and after the matches or - in the case of the D1 match - flowed way more smoothly into the matches. The Golden Pair flashback worked; I didn't think most of the flashbacks along the same lines in this myu did.
This sounds really negative. What I mean to say is that there were bits I liked a lot but it felt like way less of a coherent musical than the previous one.
S3: I didn't like it first or second time I saw it, really... just. Bad songs. Really bad songs; strange things with rhythm not matching melody and general WTF-ness. Abuse of visual effects screen. The thing is, as Pez pointed out when we were talking about it this morning, it's a really hard match to stage. It's probably one of the best damn matches in the manga but that's because it's mostly devoid of silly special effects or whatever; it's just a really, really hard-played match between two people of pretty much the same ability. That's not ideal for a shiny gay tennis musical. I think that's pretty much what went wrong here.
But that doesn't excuse the songs. Renji doesn't sing much, by the way, and the main bit of music he gets is the strangest, strangest thing - I'd almost think it was a technical error if it hadn't been the same both times we saw it, with other music still running in the background. He didn't sing the song badly, I think, but the music was just too strange.
About Ono Kento - he does make a very serene-looking Renji, which is good. But damn, I think Renji is just one of those characters. Like Fuji. How the hell do you get someone to play him convincingly? I'm not sure it's actually possible...
Things I loved: D2 harrassing Renji in the background after he lost. Hee hee. Flopping down on either side of him and being nuisances. I can't remember exactly when this happened but I figure it's gotta have been at some point between S3 and S2.
S2: I like this match better but it's probably the worst for bittiness. I'm also still pretty traumatised by Kirihara's dancing at the beginning though the actual song itself I think I liked (when I could concentrate on it through the fear) - it's just. just. I can deal with inapropriate dancing from many characters. But not Kirihara. Apparently. XD;;;
But yeah, seriously fragmented match - during this match we have a flashback to Rikkai in winter when Yukimura collapsed (though I have glee over Rikkai in their winter uniforms, heh *bias*), a flashback to Kirihara getting owned by the three demons, Tezuka and Fuji's match in the rain, Tezuka training elsewhere and having his Fuji-sense tingling (hah)... at least. I might be forgetting stuff. Also, the interval is right in the middle.
But yeah, I still adore this Kirihara so damn much, with his evil little grin and his confusion after he loses and... skfhsdfklgh. I can just stare at him doing the Kirihara-smirk and have glee.
Better songs, but not especially memorable.
S1: I hate this match in the manga to start with but it had moments of awesome here. I guess it helps that I actually really do like Dori as Echizen, faaaar more than I like any other version of the brat - manga, anime or previous myu cast. Also that he is a really good singer now. Seriously.
This match also featured a lot of asides - Tezuka and Ryoma play their match by the train-tracks, there's a lot of stuff about Samurai, Yukimura lies in bed in the background and there is Angst. Probably not as many. But I still feel more like the songs really didn't flow as well into the myu? Hm. Maybe just me.
Anyway. This is the match I remember most songs from, which is probably a good sign. the FuRinKaZan song... yeah, I dunno, it entertained me anyway. All of Rikkai dancing along and... more special effects screen, but less irritatingly at this point than at others. Echizen sings a song about samurai and destiny and something like that and ok, ok, I admit I really liked Sanada and Echizen fighting with their racquets as if they were swords. I am silly. *g*
Kanesaki is suchaperfectSanada. I really, really like his expressions and unimpressed faces and all that. Sanada dancing is inherently funny, but hey. Kanesaki is sort of a big guy and it can't be overly easy... XD;
Higa: Higa still win. I am SO entertained by them; I love Chinen being creepy and Aoi being freaked out, I love the *sniff, sniff* "...Goya?!?" moment, I love arrogant bastard Kite, I love the crazy sorta-Okinawan music - mad but entirely fitting. I love Kite's "No problem." I love the way they acted at the curtain call, refusing to bow. I desperately want to see the rest of Higa now because I like them anyway and in the myu it looks like they're going to be vastly, vastly entertaining, and also quite camp.
And other stuff:
The members of Rokkaku switching around? Ok. Bane was far better than Davide, though I love both of them when they're part of an ensemble cast. But Davide, dude, he needs people to joke around with and be silly with. He didn't get to be silly, and he only made one horrible pun at some stage after Sanada lost. But Bane was good. 8D;; Still, Rokkaku are at their best as a mad ensemble.
Yukimura is there a lot in the background but it's all a bit silly really. I keep getting the he's not dead yet song from Spamalot stuck in my head and I want to smack myself. And his racquet... man, the way he won't let go of it it's gotta be either some kind of Sanada substitute or the lovechild of him and Sanada. No, I didn't need that thought living in my head, but as it's there you all have to have it too.
In general, there's far too much use of effects screens in this myu, I reckon. I liked the way they did the golden pair flashback last time and wondered if they might do something similar this time but they had video footage instead (back in the days when we had real tennis balls instead of invisible ones, and everything was edging towards sepiatone) which actually didn't really do it for me. The other uses were to project data percentages and other weird stuff during the S3 match, to show a backdrop of trains going past during Tez and Echizen's match (which wasn't strictly necessary but worked ok) and for the FuRinKaZan stuff.
So in general: mixed feelings. Which I suspect was alwaya going to be the case, but.
I still had a lot of fun watching it, though. :D;;;;
My last attempt at a writeup was very sleepdeprived, but for slightly more of what actually happened and slightly less of me rambling about my feelings on the matter, it's over here.
