What is endless eight

Each time, forgetting almost all of their memories. This, by itself, is an incredibly fascinating idea for a story arc. I really enjoy it conceptually. The biggest problem stems from how the anime tried to portray it. As I said, it was turned into eight full-length episodes, each one set in the time loop. More or less, nothing changes.

The same events happen, in the same order at that. What each character says and what they do is largely the same. You could hardly tell them apart besides the title of the episodes. They all blend together.

That is, quite honestly, absurd. You can see why this would upset people. That time could have been spent adapting another arc or spending more time on other aspects of the story. Wasting eight whole episodes on the same content seems like a bizarre decision. It seems like a needlessly risky, stupid move, really.

There was actually a reason why they did this, strange as it seems. Characters wear different clothes, and the same scenes are drawn from different angles. Get this; even the voice actors had to reread the same lines each time. Nothing, aside from the setting, was reused. Everything was made again for each episode. You can tell from this shot above.

This is the same segment, but the way it looks in each episode of the arc is entirely different. This arc took just as much work as adapting any other. So they turned it into the movie we know it as now.

Because of this decision, that left a pretty sizable gap that needed to be filled in the series, all those episodes originally planned to be filled by The Disappearance were now vacant.

The logical conclusion would be to adapt another arc and replace it with that, not to make the same episode eight times. That was also a bit tricky to do. You see, the catch is where they were in the Haruhi timeline. But because The Disappearance had been changed to a movie at the end of the series, something else needed to go there.

Adapting another arc would mess with the timeline because it would take place after The Disappearance. Not to mention the problems if references are made to The Disappearance in that arc.

The anime does jump back and forth in the timeline quite a bit in broadcast order, but they never adapt something later than what the episodes will catch up to at some point. If they adapted something else, that would be out the window. And your hope of seeing it chronically would be out there too, writhing in pain on the ground somewhere. Basically, KyoAni backed themselves into a corner by making the movie. There was no way they could find, other than making the endless eight, that they could dig themselves out without screwing the series over horribly.

It was almost too perfect. At least, not like people say. I think they did the best with what they had, really. By making the viewer watch the same twenty or so minutes over and over, it gives us a look into what it might be like to experience a time loop ourselves. Some people even describe this arc as torture.

If around three hours of the same thing was torture, I have news for you, try repeating the same thing for years as the SOS Brigade does. Making us watch these episodes gives us a little insight into that feeling. Which brings me to my next point. They just have to deal with slight Deja Vu now and then. We probably suffer more than they do. True, a great deal of those reactions have been filled with incredibly outrage and negativity, but they are reactions none the less.

Furthermore, these opinions that it creates are strong enough that people all over the anime corner of the internet are still arguing about it today, almost a decade later. And to me, that in itself is a triumph. Sucks to be them.

I become almost infinitely more sympathetic to their plight. I know I certainly felt all of those things while watching it, and many more.

It sounds weird to say that an anime was supposed to be boring, but I honestly believe that was the intention with this particular section of Haruhi. Eight episodes is overkill.

But that overkill exactly what makes the arc work so well. Nagato Yuki remembers all the time loops. Every single one. What a horrific fate, to live the same time loop over and over again, repeating the same activities, without anyone else realizing what is going on.

No wonder Yuki always looks so bored. And without fail, every single time it sent shivers down my spine. I think it is the cheerful carefreeness of the other four blissfully ignorant characters juxtaposed onto our own experience of watching the same tedious episode multiple times in a row that really gives the audience an intangible sense of her despair. This is not true. In fact, I spent a good deal of the endless eight wanting it to be over.

But I think that this is a sign of a wonderful achievement on the part of the anime. In a way, we the audience are stuck in a time loop along with these characters. As we grow bored and impatient after watching the practically the same episode over and over again, we become increasingly eager for the characters to figure out the solution to ending the time loop. We know firsthand how awful it is to be trapped in a endless circle, so we understand the gravity of the stakes that the characters of Haruhi are facing.

As a result, we become incredibly invested in the story, and our interest only increases after each consecutive reset. I am a firm believer that the amount of involvement a show can entice from its audience is a verifiable measure of its quality. Iisekai shows, harem shows, any show with a self-insert protagonist: lots of anime are made with the purpose of providing a viewer with a more pleasant version of reality that they can immerse themselves in to evade the problems of the real world.

But for the most part, I think that occasionally taking a brief respite into a fantasy world with cute girls and pretty boys is a perfectly normal, healthy, and constructive response to real-world stress. And, at least in my book, nobody does escapism better than Kyoto Animation. The makers of K-On! And although you can make the argument that repeating the exact same summer episode eight times becomes boring, that repetition is also comforting in a way.

The subject matter is delightful for the most part , and the repetition is almost therapeutic in its familiarity. In short, I assumed it was designed so that KyoAni could profit from audiences who were paying the price of eight episodes for a product that was really made with the budget of one episode.

However, this is by no means accurate. Obviously, there are the scenes where something different happens every time such as the bug-catching scene , but even the moments that appear to be almost identical in every episode actually contain quite a bit of uniqueness. Although the characters may repeat certain lines of dialogue in a scene word-for-word, there are still a variety of visual differences to keep the viewer from getting completely bored.

For an excellent example, just look at the eight screenshots in this post. It's use is very similar, but it was specifically created to express fan rage over the Endless Eight along with fans sympathizing with Kyon for having to deal with a lot of crazy things because of Haruhi. Thought it showed a lot of notoriety among anime fans outside of Japan, the impact and controversy in Japan was much greater. View All Videos. View All Images. Show Comments. Quote Retweets QRTs are a site feature that has turned into a meme after people began using the feature to either roast others, or be secretive in what's going on.

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Know Your Meme is an advertising supported site and we noticed that you're using an ad-blocking solution. Read Edit History. Background Endless Eight was an arc in The Rampage of Haruhi Suzumiya , the fifth book in the light novel series, where Haruhi wished for an endless summer. Top entries this week. Development This arc caused a lot of controversy among fans who more or less raged and felt like they were being trolled.

Kyon-kun, Denwa! Search Interest Thought it showed a lot of notoriety among anime fans outside of Japan, the impact and controversy in Japan was much greater. Latest Editorial And News. Meme Mikuru Beam. Meme Hare Hare Yukai Dance. Meme X Made Mikuru Cry!