Entry 038: ".hack//Sign" Ep. 16-End

Dear Internet,

                There, ".hack//Sign" is done with.  I spent two days suffering through this show to scratch it off the backlog.  You can go back and read the last entry that I wrote because a majority of the issues that I took with it in the first 15 episodes is the same that I took with the second half.  

                The pacing of this show is absolutely terrible.  Nothing moves or happens for long segments of the time.  Instead, the show places the bulk emphasis onto character development instead of action oriented plot.  In my last post, I did not include a tag or label for "Action" despite "Sign" being listed as such on Wikipedia.  I withheld that tag because action occurs so very little in the entire course of the show that saying "Sign" was in the Action genre would be like saying "Green Eggs and Ham" should be labeled under suspense because Sam would not eat the eggs.  Past episode 15, the plot does move forward, but it happens all at once, sort as if it was making up for the fact.  There are only about 5 episodes, from 20 on, where the various characters enact with the world around them and actually battle monsters.  I will admit that there was some fighting going on in earlier episodes but those were either meant to be minor distractions or speed bumps as threatening as a shoebox.  The emphasis of the show is not action.  That is essentially what "Sign was going for, but it just highlights the vast waste of potential its setting had for itself.  

                The background sets are something that "Sign" had going for itself.  The artwork is well made and sets the mood instantly with bustling cities, thorny forests, etc.  Towering upside down castles compose a mixed up dungeon that showcase the insanity that rests before the cast.  A ruinous landfill city makes the perfect backdrop for the garbage remains of data.  The areas do have a sense of fantasy about them, but only three or four stand out.  The dozen or more other settings are passed by with little to no care.  There is no sense of spatial awareness brought about by the plot.  The only settings that matter are ones where one cannot usually get to.  The manner that the characters travel is never given a full explanation.  Instead, everyone seems to just beam up with some sort of transport ring.  The city introduced at the beginning of the show never feels special because you can just clink your heels to get back to it.  Other than for Tsukasa, dying has no deep meaning for any of the cast because at worse they get a slap on the wrist by being transported back to a gate and lose some "EXP," which none of them seem to care about.  This lack of danger until episode 25 means that there really is no tension unless you care about Tsukasa, which the story never really got me to do.

                The story wishes to portray Tsukasa as a victim.  And in most applications, it fits.  Tsukasa seems to have suffered tremendously outside of the game world.   Between beatings, a coma, and people dying close to her, Tsukasa has had it rough.  However, for the first seven episodes, and large sections of later episodes, Tsukasa acts as an anti-social coward who would rather runaway from the reality that she is trapped in a virtual fantasy then accept the help of those who are offering it.  She has nearly no motivation in bettering her situation in the least, and the show plays this up for drama.  That is basically what the central axis of the story is, getting Tsukasa to stop being depressed and actually do something.  There was one episode that showed her caring for a sick pig creature and made me hope that a little responsibility would change her, but that did not last long.  It gets even more ridiculous when it is revealed that her emotions, whether happy or sad, is what directly affects the World.  If I wanted to watch a show that follows around an angst ridden teenager slowly getting off their butt to move the plot, I would watch "Evangelion."  At least that was entertaining to watch.

It took 23 episodes for her to get to that point.

                Then there was the horrible dialog.  Everyone in this show seems to talk like a philosophy professor or pseudo-intellectual.  The dialog never seems to fit the character that is talking.  People that are supposed to be younger than 16 do not talk like kids.  Adults all talk like they are giving a lecture about interpersonal relationships.  There are Meta discussions about hypothetical situations that constantly feel awkward and out of place.  Maybe this was a poor translation that was corrected with the English translation.  I tried to listen to the English dub for a while, and it did add extra dialog that helped to clear up what people were saying.  But after listening to the lackluster voice acting for half an episode, I switched back to Japanese.

Dialog of the year, right there.

                The only saving grace of "Sign" is the musical accompaniment.  The opening song does have rather gratuitous use of Engrish, but the soundtrack is excellent.  From the sweeping vocals that are able to set the stage for the wonderful backgrounds to the Latin chant found near the end, the music takes center stage in this show.  The soundtrack is worth listening to without any context and would be worth the time to listen to instead of the show.  It is too bad that the rest of the show is not up to par.

                Overall, ".hack//Sign" is a bad show.  It takes much too long to get going, and when it does it never quite gets there.  The entire story could have been condensed to half the length or less.  The recap episode condenses about 17 episodes with little of essence being left out.  I wish I had not wasted my time with this show, especially after not even getting a climatic confrontation.  To top it all off was that the show never really got into the intricacies of online verses offline life very well.  It tried, but it never got me to care or felt like it mattered.  Instead, I would have rather spent my time reading "1/2 Prince," which actually does a good job of making a story follow a group of MMO players.

Yours in digital,

BeepBoop

P.S.  Tomorrow is "Kamen Teacher."

Entry 037: ".hack//Sign" Ep. 1-15

You pronounce the "." but not the "//".

Dear Internet,

                Do you remember your first MMO?  Has the feeling continued throughout the years?  Do you remember having countless people play on your servers over the years?  Meeting, battling monsters, grinding, and finding like minded people and interests?  Was it enjoyable watching them have fun and interact like that?  Do you think they were excited at every turn of events and forming parties to go exploring in caves and dungeons with beasts lying in wait?  I suppose they did and still do.  I only played one MMO for a while until I realized that I had no reason to keep playing.  That pretty much sums up ".hack//Sign."  It is a long winded, slow moving, story empty animation that would make me question following it if I was viewing it on a weekly schedule.

                Let us start off with the barebones plot that has been given so far.  There is Tsukasa, a player in a video game who cannot log out from the system, or The World.  After a while it is hinted that this is because the person playing Tsukasa is in a coma.  Then there are the numerous characters with next to no personality and interesting qualities.  I tried to compose a description for the multiple individuals that populate the show, but after a while none of them seemed to make any difference.  There is Mimiru, a sword wielder who befriends the main character if you want to call it that.  Tsukasa might not because he or she is such a massive pile of depression and angst that it actually slows down the progression of the story to a standstill for the first seven episodes.  There is Bear, another sword wielder who is the oldest member of the cast, but that is really only implied.  There is Silver Knight, the vice-leader of a group of players who act as the defunct police since the administrators and moderators of the game never seem to care what happens at all about what is going on.  He might as well be the leader of the group since Subaru, the pretty girl commander of the Crimson Knights, only ever acts as a figurehead and has not done one useful thing so far.  There are a few other individuals that dot the cast but I do not want to waste my time with them.  Instead of making the plot move forward, they only act as coffee filters, slowing the already molasses speeding story.  Except for the cat, that damn cat that twists the narrative at the Cheshire level.

                The plot has barely moved with 15 episodes down.  So far, the only bit of information about the characters outside of the World is that Tsukasa might be in a coma, that Bear is an older man with a spoiled son, and that Mimiru is a girl that is in high school or near there.  This complete lack of grounding for the characters leaves the viewer to question just who the people that are playing this game are.  Not including some sort of information to the various persons does not create some sort of suspense to their identity when it is the entire cast. Tsukasa identifies the cat as his or her dead mother and meets some sleeping, floating girl who may or may not be the way to log out.  There was an attempt to find a way to get Tsukasa out of the game but that did nothing to the status quo.  

                And that is one of the biggest underlining problems so far with "Sign."  Nothing changes the status quo.  Everything pretty much stays the same.  The only exception is that at one time Tsukasa was wanted by the Crimson Knights, but now he is not because of a deal struck up between the two.  Other than that, the settings are not really changing because the characters are able to go from one place to another in the blink of an eye.  There was a hidden dungeon at one point, but it lasted all on one episode before collapsing.  The action is nearly nonexistent.  You would think that a show that has a fantasy video game as its setting would have intense battles against mythic beasts that can kill with one swipe of their paw.  No, instead the bulk of "Sign" is about interpersonal relationships.  People talk on and on and do very little in between.  After talking to one person, they go and talk to another, sometimes lying and sometimes manipulating information.  But it never really feels that anything actually changes.  Even when one individual betrays Bear's trust by telling someone else about a secret, he continues to treat that character the same as before with little reason as to why.  "Sign" even had an entire episode where Mimiru sits and waits for Tsukasa.  A passerby references "Waiting for Godot," which Bear later explains the reference.  "Godot" is not just a comparison to that episode but to the entire show so far.  The audience is waiting for something to happen but the cast would rather talk about nothing in particular.

                To top that all off is the complete roundabout way all the characters talk.  Every time they talk it seems like they are referencing something that needs to be asked to be explained.  Imagine if I said "It took off after a little push," when meeting you after having not seen you for a while.  You would then say, "What took off?"  I would reply, "The airplane, remember?"  There might be an understanding that it was the airplane if that was the last thing that we were monitoring last, but starting a conversation like that is plan out rude and pointlessly add confusion.  I should not expect you to instantly remember what we were doing when last we met, nor should I begin talking to you by making a confused statement that constantly warrants a question to clarify.  That is the nature of "Sign," a bunch of confusion between the numerous characters that really never gets anywhere.  It is like a spinning top, going around in circles and only moves away from where it started when winding down.

She said this twice in ten seconds.

                Tomorrow might be better.  So far, "Sign" is reading like a "No U-turns" on the highway.

Yours in digital,

BeepBoop