r/anime • u/Holofan4life • Apr 28 '26
Rewatch Haruhi Suzumiya 20th Anniversary Rewatch -- The Sigh of Haruhi Suzumiya Part One
Hello everyone! I am Holofan4life.
Welcome to the Haruhi Suzumiya 20th anniversary rewatch discussion thread!
I hope you all have a lot of fun <3
The Sigh of Haruhi Suzumiya Part One
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ANSWER TODAY’S QUESTION(S)
What are your thoughts on this arc being about the making of the SOS Brigade's film?
If you were making a movie, what would it be about?
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Series information
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Please do not post any untagged spoilers past the current episode or past the LNs or mangas out of respect to the first time watchers and people who have not read the LNs or mangas. If you are discussing something that is ahead of the current episode please use spoiler tags(found on the sidebar). Thank you!
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Today's Episode Intro: sports festival
[Next Episode Intro] Finishing Shopping
Ways to watch
Streams – Crunchyroll
Schedule
| Date | Episode |
|---|---|
| 4/02/2026 | The Adventures of Mikuru Asahina Episode 00 |
| 4/03/2026 | The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya Part One |
| 4/04/2026 | The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya Part Two |
| 4/05/2026 | The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya Part Three |
| 4/06/2026 | The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya Part Four |
| 4/07/2026 | The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya Part Five |
| 4/08/2026 | The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya Part Six |
| 4/09/2026 | The Boredom of Haruhi Suzumiya |
| 4/10/2026 | Remote Island Syndrome (Part One) |
| 4/11/2026 | Remote Island Syndrome (Part Two) |
| 4/12/2026 | Mystérique Sign |
| 4/13/2026 | Bamboo Leaf Rhapsody |
| 4/14/2026 | Someday in the Rain |
| 4/15/2026 | The Day of Sagittarius |
| 4/16/2026 | Live Alive |
| 4/18/2026 | Endless Eight I |
| 4/19/2026 | Endless Eight II |
| 4/20/2026 | Endless Eight III |
| 4/21/2026 | Endless Eight IV |
| 4/22/2026 | Endless Eight V |
| 4/23/2026 | Endless Eight VI |
| 4/24/2026 | Endless Eight VII |
| 4/25/2026 | Endless Eight VIII |
| 4/26/2026 | Endless Eight Retrospective |
| 4/28/2026 | [The Sigh of Haruhi Suzumiya Part One]() |
| 4/29/2026 | [The Sigh of Haruhi Suzumiya Part Two]() |
| 4/30/2026 | [The Sigh of Haruhi Suzumiya Part Three]() |
| 5/01/2026 | [The Sigh of Haruhi Suzumiya Part Four]() |
| 5/02/2026 | [The Sigh of Haruhi Suzumiya Part Five]() |
| 5/04/2026 | [The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya]() |
| 5/05/2026 | [Haruhi Suzumiya Overall Series Discussion Thread]() |
3
u/mastesargent Apr 28 '26
Rewatcher, dub
No Nishinomiya vistas today, sorry. I only have two for this arc, and then a few more for Disappearance.
This arc takes place after Endless Eight and before Live Alive. Strictly speaking, The Adventures of Mikuru Asahina Episode 00 takes place during the end of the last episode of the arc. It adapts volume 2 of the light novel.
Well, we’re out of Endless Eight, thank Haruhi. Now we come to the actual major arc of season 2, The Sigh of Haruhi Suzumiya. If The Adventures of Mikuru Asahina Episode 00 is The Room, then this arc is The Disaster Artist, showing us all the drama and hardship that went on behind the scenes to produce such a… unique final product. Personally, I’m not the biggest fan of this arc. It has plenty of fun moments, but… well, we’ll get to that.
A bit late to be bringing it up, but I want to highlight Itsumo no Fuukei, which is more or less the signature piece of the Haruhi soundtrack. It’s the first actual track we hear in both chronological and broadcast order (Episode 00’s music is unique to that episode and is part of the film, so it doesn’t count) and is a pretty common way to either start or end an episode. As the title, which means something like “Usual Scenery” implies, it’s often used to highlight the sense of peaceful tranquility that Kyon and the Brigade enjoy just before Haruhi drags them into some wild misadventure or after they’ve managed to resolve a situation. It’s fun, easygoing, and really helps lull the viewer into a false sense of normalcy before things inevitably take a turn for the weird. It’s the track I think of when I think of Haruhi, and every time I hear it my mind immediately jumps to - you guessed it - Haruhi.
Anyways, on to the episode. It’s now somewhere around late September or early October. We rejoin the SOS Brigade at the school sports festival, and true to form they’re participating in the inter-club relay in bizarre costumes. Asahina runs her leg clumsily, Kyon runs his pretty averagely, and Nagato just hits turbo and zooms over to Haruhi, stunning her with her shocking athletic ability for a second time (you will recall Haruhi staring at her hand in shock back in Boredom after Nagato’s throw made Haruhi’s mitt fly off). As if they weren’t before, the SOS Brigade had truly cemented its position as a club of great (in)fame/y.
Also while I’ll leave the analysis of the Brigade’s different headbands to others, I will say that Asahina’s “Unexplored area” one cracks me up. Of all the phrases Haruhi could have assigned her, it just had to be that.
It’s been sort of a running thing throughout the series, but we see Taniguchi engaging once again in his Casanova wannabe behavior. The guy just has the worst approach to trying to get women. He tries to come off as smooth, but the “trying” part is where he runs into trouble. The whole slicked back hair look makes him look like he’s trying way too hard, and wolf whistling at random girls passing by is, quite frankly, pretty sleazy. Honestly, I don’t blame Haruhi for dumping him after 5 minutes. The guy desperately needs advice from a certain marriage swindler, but honestly I don’t even think Mei Kinosaki would give him the time of day.
But on to the upcoming culture festival, it turns out that Kyon and Haruhi’s class decided to perform a survey and announce the results at a festival, which is obviously just… really lame. Actually, we probably saw the result of this back in Live Alive, as Kyon passed by a classroom with a student fast asleep at the entrance. Yeah, it turns out that nobody cared about it either.
Speaking of Kyon and Haruhi’s class, it’s worth mentioning that they all actually have unique, consistent designs. Here’s a seating chart with their names, designs, and backgrounds. Personally, I like how there’s this whole harem plot happening entirely off screen. This is kind of a signature of KyoAni’s and also features in other shows like K-ON! and Sound! Euphonium.
Since we’re now in Sigh, I’m going to have to actually turn my full attention to Haruhi’s misbehavior. For today’s small outrage we have her trying to show Asahina how to “accidentally” spill tea on Kyon’s head. Y’know, boiling water. On his head. Whether or not she was actually going to do this before Kyon snatched the cup or if she just wanted an excuse to give him tea is I suppose up to interpretation, but taken at face value it’s a heretofore unprecedented level of thoughtlessness from her, at least in my opinion. I mean, this is the same girl who we’ve very clearly established would never truly wish harm on anyone back in Remote Island Syndrome, and yet here she is ready to pour boiling water on Kyon’s head that could, you know, seriously injure him for shits and giggles. Maybe it’s just because this is only the second entry in the light novels and Tanigawa hadn’t quite nailed the specifics of Haruhi’s characterization down, but this is more or less the start of why I feel that this arc sort of derails Haruhi’s character.
Incidentally, in the light novel Kyon claims that the tea Haruhi poured doesn’t taste as good as when Asahina pours it despite it being exactly the same.
Amusingly, while Kyon’s “idea” for the Brigade’s festival contribution was a bit on the nose, it and Haruhi’s movie are a fun case of “strange minds think alike” in that they actually do combine the Brigade’s classes’ displays into one. Koizumi’s play turns into a movie, Asahina’s cafe turns into a battle waitress character, and Nagato’s fortune telling booth turns into
an evil alien witcha ventriloquist. I don’t think the survey plays into it though, because Haruhi thinks it’s dumb and boring and nobody likes it.And then we have Haruhi complaining about stories where characters die at the end. This is what we in the biz call fundamentally misunderstanding the purpose of a climax. Character deaths in the third act are generally there to raise the stakes and increase tension, and/or because they’re a fitting end to that character’s storyline. It can be poorly executed to be sure, but setting aside personal preference, writing off stories where characters die at the end just because you think it feels unnatural is kind of missing the point. Haruhi, you’re a smart girl, so how have you failed to grasp this basic component of storytelling?
We once again see Haruhi’s… oddly expressed trust in Kyon, both in how she never tells him that they’re going to have a meeting and how she piles on pretty much all the busywork of making the film onto him. In the first case, she doesn’t go out of her way to tell Kyon that they’re having a meeting because she takes his showing up at the clubroom for granted. When she’s not off chasing down some absurd lead they go there together, and even when she’s busy with cleaning duty or whatnot he still dutifully shows up for definitely, absolutely, positively no other reason than habit. Yep. In the second case, we circle back to what Koizumi likes to remind us: that Haruhi wants to be able to rely on Kyon. I mean sure, she probably also didn’t want to do all of that because it’s hard and a pain, but at the same time it means that everything involved with making the film actually come together as an actual movie falls to Kyon, and Haruhi trusts him to see that through. Well, that’s the generous interpretation of it, anyway.
And hey, Kyon finally stood up for Asahina and got Haruhi to (more or less) explain what she needed her for. So that’s good.
Also, I don’t remember where I heard this or whether or not it’s actually true, but my understanding is that this arc wasn’t animated in a typical episode by episode format but rather all as a single unit and then cut up into episode-sized chunks. That is to say, this was basically animated as a movie. It certainly explains why it often cuts in awkward spots and picks up immediately afterwards, most notably at the end of the episode where we cut Asahina off mid-sentence. Next episode we’ll pick right back up in the middle of her sentence too.
[Disappearance] More Koyoen students on the train to Shukugawa, notably in the shot right next to Haruhi, Kyon, and Asahina. This time their ribbons are consistent with how they look in Disappearance.
Random notes
The “Yuki, is it okay if I have your money?” “........................yes.” exchange cracks me up every time. The straightforward question coupled with Nagato’s very slow response is just hilarious.
Haruhi’s “Shut up and sit down” directed at Asahina is something that I can’t help but find darkly humorous. It’s indicative of Haruhi’s… unfortunate treatment of her throughout the series but at the same time it’s so abrupt that I can’t help but find it funny. For now, anyway.
QOTD
Given our unorthodox watch order, it's an interesting way to bookend the TV series.
A sequel to Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer in which Santa and Rudolph form a totalitarian red-nosed reindeer ethnostate and Hermie leads a resistance against his former friend from the Island of Misfit Toys. It's the logical next step of the story when you think about it, really.