I’m just a little happy…

…and more than a little overwhelmed. The ending of ARIA the ORIGINATION and with it, the ARIA series as a whole, has left me fumbling for words. The words to describe what I felt about the last few episodes, the ending and the series as a whole, have been elusive. However, I’ll try my best to do justice to this amazing work.

I stopped doing episodic posts on ARIA after episode nine because subs fell incredibly far behind, which is okay, subbing slowly is preferred here, etc. But given the time that has passed since the series finished airing, plot summaries at this point feel like an endeavor in wasted effort. But if you require them, head over to Subculture instead: 10, 11, 12, 13.

Episode 10

As lolikit asserted in notdotq, this was a comparatively weak episode, especially when you have to stack it up to its immediate predecessor. Given the powerful scene that was Alice’s promotion, the aftermath was rather tame. Sure we saw Alice coping with the nervousness that came with suddenly becoming a prima, but it was only a fraction of what we knew lay below her emotional instability at the time.

Having been suddenly promoted to prima, not only did Alice have to deal with unassisted guides and the like, but she also had to come to terms that she was now on her own path. A path separate separate from the great water faeries and more importantly, a path separate from Aika and Akari, who she has practiced on an almost daily basis with for over a year now.

Instead we got a rather tangential interlude on the relationship between Aika and Al. In hindsight, this contributed to her overall confidence in the episodes to follow, however at the time felt out of place. The pacing just didn’t match up to the events of late. It’s like the script writers realized that they would have to kick the plot development into overdrive, but before doing so, gave a quick tap on the brakes, the result was rather jarring.

However, it was nice to see Al and Aika finally reconcile their love for each other after two seasons of loose allusions to it.

Episode 11

The true follow up to episode nine, this episode concentrated on the aforementioned feeling of separation that Alice felt when she got promoted ahead Aika and Akari. Alice describes her personality best herself, saying that she’s the type to worry when given the time to think. With her title as Orange Princess and established reputation of the ace of Orange Planet, Alice’s schedule has no shortage of bookings, finding that working late into the night is becoming commonplace.

Accompanying the exhaustion of work comes the realization that she hasn’t been spending much time with Aika and Akari, who just a while ago she used to spend every single day with. Often wanting to go see the two, Alice opts not to do so, either because she believes it’s too late at night to disturb them or not being able to think of a reason to drop by. So imagine her surprise when she returns to her room one day to find them stuffing their faces with food. As it becomes apparent that even though they may be walking different paths, the time they spend together remains unaffected, Alice accidentally voices her concerns about not having the time nor a reason for doing so aloud.

Her worries are quelled by Akari, who tells her that she doesn’t need a reason, Alice herself is enough of a reason for them to get together. Once again, Akari proves her unrivaled ability to phrase things in a wonderfully poetic manner that can warm the heart of even the more hardened cynic.

Along with Alice’s predicament, this episode featured Akira’s challenge to Aika, her prima qualification examination.

Episode 12

I felt this episode suffered a little because Aika’s qualification exam wasn’t shown in full, but rather as a flashback of sorts, an unfortunate consequence of episode ten’s tangent. However, that being said, Akari’s exam compensated, and then some. It was amazing how well they captured Akari’s essence, her very nature, throughout the course of her exam. As she guided Alicia on her modified Neo Venezia tour, she is showered with support on all fronts, from her peers Aika and Alice to her seniors Athena and Akira and all the random passerbys in between. It was a perfect exposition of Akari’s character, her propensity to make friends and the direction that she will guide ARIA Company towards in the future.

Out of the three examinations, I’d argue that Akari had the toughest. Alice’s was a simple guided tour and some overlap with the singles qualification exam, and we can only assume that Aika’s was a simulated tour as well, in addition to that, Alicia put Akari through an incredibly tight canal passage that demanded precision gondola control. Which was a little weird actually, since I always thought that Alice was the prodigy when it came to maneuverability.

Episode 13

I’ll make no excuses here, this episode reduced me to tears three times. First, when Akari runs into a snag with book keeping, turns to ask Alicia for help and finds she’s not there. Second, when Alicia passed on her oar to Akari and bowed farewell. And finally, when Akari opened the shutters without Alicia, moving on from the past towards her own ARIA Company.

In particular, Akari’s breakdown in front of Alicia was very moving. Coming from Akari, a character who has continuously proven that she is beyond things like jealousy and is a generally selfless person, it was hard to see her lose herself in her desire for the days she spends with Alicia by her side to never end. It was equally hard to hear Alicia, who has been portrayed as the pinnacle of perfection, admit to Akari that she too was putting off this day as long as she could, even though she knew that Akari had the skills to be a prima long ago.

But of course, Akari is quick to bounce back, take a step back and look at the larger picture. Her monologue about everyone’s paths diverging despite looking like they were all heading in the same direction was an excellent tie up. The split was an inevitable one and was alluded to many times before through reminiscence of the time the three great water faeries were singles, and Akari’s elegant reflection on the past and present as well as her hopes for the future was flawless.

The “Where are they now” type epilogue which jumps ahead into the future and telling us what everyone has been up to isn’t something I usually like, but it worked well this time around. Athena becoming an opera singer was a bit of a surprise, but oddly fitting. I lol’d at Akira claiming the top spot as her two main competitors dropped out or divided their attention, hilariously appropriate given her competitive nature. Alicia taking an administrative position was a little out of place, but we get to see her in megane mode as a result, so all is well. Of course, her sudden engagement was shocking, to say the least, but since we’re actually never shown her soon to be husband, we’re free to imagine whatever we want of him (ie. she married ronery anonymous).

And finally, we come full circle with Akari taking on Ai-chan as her apprentice in the dying moments of the finale, a parallel drawn to her own first days on Aqua, reinforcing the idea that this is by no means an end, but merely the beginning of a new age.

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A bit of an aside here, the final scene with Ai-chan becoming Akari’s apprentice is interesting in that Ai-chan is an anime exclusive character for the most part. In the manga, she did come to Aqua to become Akari’s apprentice, but was previously unmentioned. This is a rare case of me liking the anime approach over the manga’s. Seeing as we had prior knowledge of Ai-chan in that she is the recipient of Akari’s frequent letters as well as having stage presence in the form of visits to Aqua, when she comes over to become an undine, the connection to her character is pre-established and heightens the effect. Would Akari’s echoing of Alicia’s words have carried the same weight had Ai-chan been a seemingly random last minute insert character? I can’t help but think not.

Final Impressions

The ARIA series has been an amazing ride, especially if you consider that it was a rather scenic journey. ARIA was a series devoid of any noticeable plot, in the first couple episodes of ANIMATION, the cast and the world of Aqua is introduced, and in the final few episodes, a new age dawns as the next generation of prima are unleashed.

So what’s in between? What fills the gap between introduction and conclusion? Short answer: nothing. Long answer: the slow unraveling of the world of Neo Venezia, the subtleties in beauty and tranquility that defined ARIA as a “healing” anime. There were no distinct power level jumps amongst the cast, the ranks they had at the beginning remained until the end when they were promoted. Instead we were shown their slow, progressive growth, not through countless training episodes and gondola physics, but rather by the day to day experiences that touched upon themes of love, life, the universe and everything.

It’s difficult to explain ARIA to someone I’m trying to recommend it to, ask this blog’s second author, Soda, I’ve been pushing him to watch it for months. I’m often left telling them that: “It’s a calming experience unlike anything you’ve ever seen before. But be warned, it’s boring, but in a good way.” And that’s a pretty lame explanation “boring, but in a good way”? What does that even mean? The defining example of the point I’m trying to get across here is the time I fell asleep while watching an episode of ARIA, woke up sometime later, refreshed and relaxed, and proceeded to watch the episode again. That is the effect that ARIA can have.

However, with this comes a warning. ARIA is not a series that is meant to be marathoned, that is, watched all at once. The way you’ll get the most out of your ARIA experience is to watch it gradually, an episode or two a day after a stressful day at the office or to wind down from a tiring day at school. The slow pacing of the show needs to be matched by a slow pacing of its viewing.

Furthermore, while they’re not really pertinent to a series like ARIA, I feel like I have to touch upon its technical aspects, just for habit’s sake. The animation in ARIA varies, there are some episodes which pay great attention to scenic detail, others that emphasize the beauty and grace of the undines through subtle fluidity in their movements, and others still that fail in both regards and rely far too heavily on chibi animation. However, as a whole, the style fits extremely well, especially when it comes to character designs, each having their own distinct characteristics.

The ARIA soundtrack is absolutely amazing, an aspect of anime which usually gets a resounding “meh” from me, so understand how great it must be for me to have actually gone out of my way to acquire the soundtracks.

No, thank -YOU- ARIA. Thank you for bringing that warm and fuzzy feeling to my heart for 20 minute installations at a time.

With absolute confidence, I crown ARIA as my favourite anime of all time. It may not boast adrenaline fueled action, complex story elements or a touching love story, but ARIA’s atmosphere sucked me into the world of Aqua. Fleshing out its settings and its characters, ARIA evoked emotions I thought my heart was no longer capable of feeling, as corny as that may sound.

The only remotely negative thing I can say about ARIA on the whole is that I’m sad that it’s over. It’s difficult accepting that no matter how good it is, no matter how much money the DVD sales bring in, we will likely never see anymore ARIA ;_;

So with no hesitation, I recommend the ARIA series as compulsory viewing to any self respecting anime fan. The series is in fact so good that I’m going to break my usual pirate ways, I’m going to buy the ARIA DVDs. Even though I’ve seen the entire thing and I have all the episodes archived on my HDD, it doesn’t matter, a series like this is a rarity and it deserves every cent of support that it will squeeze from my wallet.

~ Shirukii ~