First Date: ef - a tale of memories.
- Title: ef - a tale of memories.
- Studio: Shaft
- Genre: Romance
Ratings (out of 5):
- Story: ♥♥♥
- Animation: ♥♥♥♥
- Characters: ♥♥♥
- OP/ED Themes: ♥♥
- Overall: ♥♥♥
Thoughts:
From the plot summaries I’d read prior to watching the first ep of ef-memo, I was expecting it to be a harem…but now it looks like the show actually has three plotlines that will (I assume) intertwine. First is Hiro and Miyako, who meet when she steals his bike to catch a purse thief. Then there’s Asou and Chihiro, who bump into each other at an abandoned train station. And the least-addressed is amateur videographer Kyousuke, who spots a girl named Kei running down the street on Christmas eve…to the dismay of his currently un-named girlfriend. I wouldn’t even count this as an additional thread expect he appears again towards the end of the episode, thinking about her.
Shaft is being a bit experimental with the animation, and while some of the funky visual effects work– like one where you see Miyako’s silhouette as a night sky pattern and the rest of the screen is black –but others can be a little bit jarring, or just seem random and weird, like Hirono spontaneously being in black-and-white instead of color. Overall I’d say that the animation quality is better than average, though.
As for the stories, well…there’s nothing particularly outstanding about any of them yet, and I’d say that Asou and Chihiro are outright obnoxious. Asou’s okay, but his strange hairdo bothers me…meanwhile, I find Chihiro’s voice and personality rather grating. They get the most screen time in the first episode, too, for reasons I can’t quite discern since their conversation is pretty inane.
I might give a second episode of this a shot, but only if I don’t get overwhelmed with other shows that hold more interest.
Tags: ef---a-tale-of-memories., fall-2007, first-dates
October 13th, 2007 at 10:18 pm
Asou’s hairdo is pretty distracting (WTF is that weird hair dollip???), but I really hate the hair style on…is that Miyako in the picture up there? I’m really bugged by hair ribbons that don’t look like ribbon, and she looks like she’s got a pair of lunch bags stuck to either side of her head. One of the imouto in Otome wa Boku ni Koishiteru had croissants stuck to her head.
As for the show, I don’t know how long I’ll be able to stick to it, either. Between Clannad and Ef, I find Clannad MUCH more interesting.
October 14th, 2007 at 12:50 am
I think Kei’s roommate calles Hiro ‘Chihiro’ causing some confusion as well. And Chihiro calls Kei oneechan.
My money’s on Hiro and Chihiro being the same person, only he’s a girl sometimes. :P
October 14th, 2007 at 8:01 am
Uhhh…Kyaa, I’d bet against you on that ;)
Kei’s roommate calls Hiro “Hiro-senpai.” (I just double-checked.)
Then Kei gets a text message from Chihiro, and then Kei says “Chihiro-chan.” If you look at Kei’s phone’s screen the ID on the text message also says Chihiro, so Hiro would have to have two cell phones for his identities. And we KNOW he’s being Hiro at the time she gets that text, because he’s off having his bike stolen and stuff.
If you go to ef-memo’s official website and go to the character section, you see that Kei and Chihiro have the same family name (Shindou), as well as the same hair color and eye color. And Chihiro’s text message called Kei “onee-chan,” so it seems pretty clear to me that Kei and Chihiro are siblings.
Kei does call Hiro “onii-chan,” but I’d guess she means it in the more affectionate, friendly sense than in the literal sense. The website says that they’re childhood friends.
You’re not completely off-base on the girl idea though…Hiro writes shoujo manga, and his pen name is Nagi Shindou (again, same last name as Kei and Chihiro). But his ‘female’ identity is not Chihiro ^_^;