Aoi Bungaku Series Eps 9 & 10 - Hashire Melos

It's been slightly more than two months since my last post and an alarming five months since my last review. I think I've been neglecting this blog for too long so here I am, with a new review of another story in the Aoi Bungaku series. I don't really have a fixed schedule when watching anime these days. Coupled with work commitments, it's getting difficult to write detailed reviews or synopsis as before. I'll just have to make an effort to post more regularly or else this blog will probably go to waste. I can't believe that it's been five long years since I started on this blog...

待つ身が辛いかね。待たせる身が辛いかね。 ~ Is it painful to be waiting? Or is it painful to be the one making somebody wait?

This message forms the basis of Hashire Melos which is written by Dazai Osamu. From what I remember, most of Dazai's stories are about the dark side of humans. This novel is probably one of those with a more "posititve" theme i.e. trust between friends. At the beginning of the anime, Sakai Masato's commentary did mention that this novel was written at a time when Dazai had just got married and was leading a peaceful life. Maybe that's why the mood of his works was different from those which he wrote during the last years of his life e.g. Ningen Shinkaku. According to Kazuo Dan, a friend of Dazai, Hashire Melos was probably written due an incident which happened in Atami.

Dazai was having a holiday in Atami and did not return for days. His wife was worried and asked Dan to go there and have a look. She even gave Dan some money in case he needed to pay for Dazai's bills. However, when Dazai saw Dan, he got his friend to participate in merry-making. In the end, both men used up the money which Dazai's wife had given to Dan. In order to settle the bills, Dazai persuaded Dan to stay behind in Atami as a "hostage" so that he could return to Tokyo and borrow money from another friend Ibuse Masuji. After waiting for days, Dazai did not return. Dan had to promise the hotel in Atami that he would come back to settle payment and rushed back to Tokyo to find out what had happened to Dazai. To his surprise, he saw Dazai playing shogi with Ibuse and had not even broached the subject to the latter. When questioned by Dan, Dazai said the above line which suggested he was also tormented for having to make Dan wait.

In the novel, the story is about Melos, a young man who tries to assasinate the king who kills people due to distrust in others. However, he is caught and faces the death sentence. In order to attend his younger sister's wedding, Melos asks the king to allow his friend to be a hostage while he promises to return in three days. The king doesn't expect Melos to return but Melos' friend agrees to it because he has faith in Melos. Subsequently, after overcoming many difficulties, Melos returns and saves the lives of himself and his friend.

In the anime, this story is relegated to the side in the form of an ongoing play. This is written by Takada, a scriptwriter who also does not believe in people like the king in Melos' story. He was asked to write the script for the play and is forced to come to terms with his past as a result.

Takada used to have a buddy Joushima in school and they arranged to leave their hometown for Tokyo. However, due to unforseen circumstances, Joushima fails to turn up thus causing the latter to be extremely hurt by the betrayal. 15 years on, Takada is still torn over the pain he suffered. However, when he receives news that Joushima is on his deathbed, Takada rushes back to their hometown and finally comes to terms with his past after knowing the reason for Joushima's no-show.

I like the presentation of this story. If it had been solely focused on the Melos story, that would have been a bore. By drawing parallels between Takada-Joushima and the Melos story, it is easy for the viewer to get emotionally involved and feel the pain that Takada is experiencing. In addition, we get a taste of how Joushima feels for not fulfilling the promise he made. The contrast of feelings is central to the theme: is it more painful to wait or is it more painful to let someone wait? By not over-simplifying the story to a mere replication of the novel, I think the anime version has done reasonably well to capture my attention, at the very least.

With regards to character design, this is done by Konomi Takeshi who created the Tennis no Oujisama series. Being a fan of Tenipuri, I find that the characters in Hashire Melos do resemble a mixture of those in Tenipuri. For example, Melos' body look like Akutsu Jin's but his face seems like a modified version of Shishido Ryo plus Ootori Choutarou. I'm not sure how others see it but I just get the feel that there are some similarities between both sets of characters especially the sharp chins. It doesn't bother me that much, just that I get a bit distracted trying to figure out who resembles who. I think I was more irritated to see the character design in Kokoro which had too much traces of Death Note.

It was a pleasant surprise to see some familiar names in the cast like Kiuchi Hidenobu and Takahashi Mikako who were also in Tenipuri. I like Kiuchi's potrayal of Takada very much but Takahashi may need to tone down on her kawaii-ness because it seemed terribly jarring to my ears this time. Sakai Masato did fairly well as Melos but I still like his performance in Ningen Shikaku the best, so far. I've still got two more stories in Aoi Bungaku series to watch so I'll come to a conclusion as to which of his performances was the best.

Based on the four stories I've seen so far, here is how I would rank them:
1) Ningen Shikaku
2) Hashire Melos
3) Kokoro
4) Sakura no Mori no Mankai no Shita

How would this ranking change after I watch the remaining stories? We'll see very soon.