Hello everyone, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I am beyond excited to continue our journey into Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken!, as I’ve once again put off my first viewing of this episode until this very moment. Last week, Eizouken managed to turn a topic I don’t actually have much interest in (giant robots) into another essential exploration of the creative process, as the show explored the finer details of seeking inspiration for new projects, dealing with difficult clients, and finding common ground within creative collaborations.
Asakusa and Mizusaki are in large part a strong team because they bounce so easily and happily off each other – in contrast, their negotiations with the robot club were far more tense, but still ultimately resulted in a design everyone was happy with. That negotiation process also highlighted some of the natural disconnects that tend to exist between audiences and creatives – in particular, how audiences often seek a “perfectly real” fantasy that can only exist as a personal feeling, and which becomes an impossible contradiction when introduced to sunlight. A great part of the artist’s job is to massage the sharp edges of that contradiction – to present a fantasy that is technically impossible, but still feels “real” and emotionally impactful, due to the many clever tricks of presentation Eizouken has so thoughtfully explored. Whatever creative design stone Eizouken wishes to unturn this week, I’m eager to return to this charming, beautiful, and incredibly generous production. Let’s get to it!
Episode 6
Asakusa opens their new project discussion by declaring she’s not accepting any of the compromises of their first project – there’ll be color, sound effects, and a story this time. Good luck with that, Asakusa
As someone who migrated towards anime and film from an education in literature, it pains me to admit that narrative is a luxury when it comes to short or amateur film, but it’s true. Many fledgling filmmakers end up aspiring to a narrative scope that their abilities or resources simply can’t support – as much as you want your first work to be an intricate and moving classic, you first need to be able to do things like convey one clear emotion or experience through cinematography and acting
Oh dang, the art club actually wants to help this time. That might end up being hard on Asakusa, who’s so particular about her design details
There’s a lesson in these offers of collaboration, too. Potential collaborators won’t be dazzled by how ambitious and interesting an unfinished project seems; it’s finished work, regardless of its scale, which will get your name out there, and potentially open doors to the projects you really want to create
Kanamori is so essential. Again and again, she pushes through some “but I don’t wanna” complaint by the greedy creatives in order to keep this project sailing
Mizusaki animatedly describes the absurd scale of labor that is professional animation. It’s said that you should only go to into creative fields professionally if you have to – that is, not because you think it would be fun, but because your sense of self and fulfillment in life is so contingent on creative production, you’d feel like an empty person if you weren’t creating. Things like this are the reason for that – even if she succeeds, Mizusaki will have to work far harder and with a greater degree of precision than at a comparable normal job, and be paid far less for it
It’s certainly not a great thing that creative industries are maintained largely through the callous exploitation of youthful enthusiasm, but art is unfortunately not particularly valued in our society
Kanamori’s next task: get the team their own computer
Beautiful night shots outside the school. It’s nice seeing this show embrace deeper colors for its night palette, since the daytime look is so heavy on pastels
We’re also getting a lot of realistically expressive Asakusa faces this episode. Asakusa is an interesting character in terms of animation design, because depending on a given animator’s preferences, you can either style her as an unusually realistic teenager, or a completely cartoonish gremlin. In contrast, Mizusaki pretty much always looks similarly “anime attractive,” which you could actually consider a design limitation. “They are pretty” does not tell you much about a person – more unusual designs offer a great deal more character insight (though this can of course be overcome through strong character acting)
Of course, any club drama anime or manga likely must include at least one conventionally attractive girl, purely for marketing reasons. More of the magical compromises of art production!
Kanamori takes them out for ramen. “It’s okay, I’ve just got ulterior motives”
Asakusa has started to implement cost-cutting measures into her initial concepting, like setting their drama before school hours, to limit the number of background characters. As you master any art, things like this come more naturally, and your work starts to require less editorial oversight
Oh man, this sequence of the robot team eating is really fantastic. The character designs feel distinctly retro – in fact, they seem fairly reminiscent of Patlabor designs, in terms of their increased realism of bone structure, and distinct facial designs
This is clearly Mizusaki’s character art on top of Asakusa’s storyboards, given the tight focus on hands and faces, and general adherence to realistic character models
Having Asakusa carry us through the storyboards like this really conveys how “narrative” in film is a construction of distinct visual moments, rather than a point-by-point description of a narrative event. Films that actually use their medium well cannot be effectively summarized; the visual effect is the “story,” or more precisely, the experience
I also like how the first quarter or so of the film is immaculately storyboarded, and then the whole second half is a series of scribbles that Asakusa supplements with “and then they fight!”
Asakusa isn’t good at storyboarding action. This is where Mizusaki’s specialties come in – you can create an incredibly compelling action scene through focusing largely on the shifting of a body’s weight, and the impact of its body in motion. Action scenes are a place where Mizusaki’s focus on tiny details of movement that convey larger physical truths can really shine; though we tend to prioritize the larger-than-life narrative context, we’re often most moved by the kinetic weight of bodies in motion, rather than the context those bodies are placed in
Kanamori just passes out in the ramen shop. She doesn’t complain, but she works as hard as either of them
Kanamori never carries much money personally, so she can never loan anyone anything. Amazing
And now she gains even more power, as an enforcer of the student council. Happy to see her briefly interacting with her deadpan student council rival again
These two are a strong pair because they are both entirely pragmatic. Kanamori needs sound effects and this girl needs the sound club to stop being a problem: bingo, mutual interest
But once again, Kanamori’s browbeating is neatly complimented by Asakusa’s genuine enthusiasm – like with the robot club, she immediately shares this sound enthusiast’s passion for their art
Asakusa once again breaks down how simple a few aesthetic tricks really are, like the ever-present cicadas that aurally signal summer
“Damn, you’re dumb.” Kanamori is just incredible. As another episode dives into the endless negotiations and other practical concerns of anime production, she effortlessly steals the show
Brilliant sequence here, as Asakusa effectively tortures this sound engineer by demonstrating how they’re currently using the same “hard shoes running down a linoleum hallway with slight echo” sound effect for all of their walking sounds, including boots tramping through mud and feet on grass. This is a funny gag and a unique visual setpiece, and at the same time makes clear for any audience the important of appropriate sound design. Sound design can seem like a minor thing, but watching feet pass over grass accompanied by that echoing TAP TAP TAP really brings home its importance
And having laid out her full argument, Kanamori offers her deal: your club can survive, but you’re now stored within the Eizouken, and you must work as our general sound advisor. Kanamori abusing the Eizouken’s one meaningful resource: their massive amount of storage space
Doumeki is the sound engineer’s name
More distinct color palettes for early morning, focused on cool blues, as the sun isn’t fully up
“Four days of delays, and then three days of progress.” Working with Asakusa is not easy – she’s only productive in manic spurts of creativity, and then she flounders, making it difficult for Kanamori to effectively schedule things. The eternal conflict of trying to schedule around creative inspiration
Now we meet the art club. I love the wide diversity of character designs across this show’s supporting cast, as well as the diversity of vocal talents, too. Like with character designs, anime voice acting has a tendency to get pigeonholed into a few specific vocal types, undercutting its potential as a dramatic tool
Handling all these business meetings has forced Asakusa to carry her emotional support bunny around with her
Asakusa is very uncomfortable carefully explaining her rough concepts. The questions the art club are asking her fall beyond even her own conception of the narrative – but unlike the robot club president, she actually knows the fault is on her end, and thus she gets self-conscious. Kanamori lets her cool down by playing in the dirt
Shots start from as close to Asakusa as possible as she fades into total creative expression, then expand outwards, as her thoughts themselves expand to encompass the entire scope of their current project. Asakusa is outright dictating her thinking process here to make it parsable to the audience, but I feel a close kinship with this moment as one of those intimate moments you share with your own thoughts over the course of a creative project
And now she wants to ditch the giant robot entirely, and fight the crab with a buggy instead. Damnit, Asakusa
Asakusa’s passion is grounded, seemingly realistic mechanical design, and giant robots are never even close to realistic. Just trying to square their contradictions in her head gives her anxiety, and what she tends to love about her own works is explaining the mechanics of how they work. Given a project where the mechanics just don’t make sense, she loses her passion and panics
Kanamori lays down the law, and Mizusaki adds the more sympathetic “creating a giant robot anime means committing all sorts of crimes”
“Your only choice here is to draw the kind of giant robot that you would be satisfied with!” Kanamori’s tough love is exactly what Asakusa needs. This is the moment when the project manager can no longer allow her creatives to simply do whatever they want, and follow their passion – this project has already been approved, and this project must be completed. The burden is on Asakusa, then, to find a version of this giant robot that still ignites her passion
And she does it by revamping the robot interior – a change that means very little for the finished result, but everything for Asakusa’s ability to invest in it
And Done
The giant robot anime continues apace, as the team secures a sound engineer and background art studio! Eizouken is genuinely pulling together an actual production team at this point, and it’s wonderful to see. This episode was lighter on the fanciful artistry stuff than usual, but that made perfect sense – it was largely dedicated to practical negotiations, and that meant Kanamori got to steal the show once again. At the same time, this episode also explored Asakusa’s lopsided passions and insecurities with precision and great sympathy, illustrating a convincing portrait of a young artist who’s not yet fully confident in their abilities, and consumed by doubts regarding their inspiration and output. Eizouken isn’t just illustrating the general fundamentals of storytelling – it’s putting them in a specific human context, as all three of our heroines learn to balance their passions and work effectively together. I can’t wait to see what they come up with next!
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