GJ Bu Volume 3 Chapter 1

The Color of the Traffic Lights

In the club room after school, as usual.

Pres, who was reading a shounen manga magazine, spoke suddenly. "Hey, what is the color of the traffic lights?"

"Huh?" Kyouya asked back while reading a magazine. His eyes were still locked into the manga on the magazine. Two magazines were sold today, so he had to finish reading his magazine before Pres finished hers.

A few seconds later, Pres said something again.

"I was referring to the color of the light that indicates 'go'."

At this moment, Kyouya finally understood what Pres was saying, and so he said the answer.

"Isn't it turquoise?" (TL/N : Traffic light colors in Japan used to be referred as 青, 黄色, 赤 which is blue/turquoise, yellow, and red respectively. However, the "blue/turquoise" color is a misnomer because the color is actually supposed to be green, and thus later that signal is referred to as 緑, which is the Japanese word for the color green. Confusing, I know. From here on, the term 'turquoise light' refers to the 'go' signal.)

"But isn't it green in color?"

"Well, since it's the turquoise light, then of course it's turquoise in color."

"No, it isn't turquoise at all!"

Pres placed the manga on the table, and assumed a pose that showed she was not going down in this discussion without a fight.

Kyouya could only put the magazine down and talk to Pres face-to-face.

"I've always felt it's weird how everyone else say that it's turquoise in color. No matter how you look at it, it's green! Turquoise should be more vibrant, like the color of turquoise Hawaiian shaved ice or something."

"Speaking of shaved ice, I like the strawberry flavor the most."

"Nobody asked you about that. Ah, I know, the turquoise light is the same color as a honeydew, so it's green!"

"Well, honeydews should also be turquoise in color then... Pres! Ouch ouch ouch!"

Kyouya was thinking if Pres would bite him, and she really did.

"Why is it so? That's so strange."

Pres finally slackened her jaw so Kyouya rubbed the hand that was bitten while saying that.

Pres, who had always started strange conversation topics, was also specially stubborn about it today.

"However, since everyone else says it's turquoise, we should also call it turquoise, shouldn't we?"

"I don't wanna. Even if the entire world says 'YES', I will also say 'NO'! Humph!"

Pres folded her arms and turned her head aside.

"Er..."

Kyouya then looked around the club room for help.

He started from Shion-senpai.

She normally has this attitude that showed how little she cared about it on her face. She would wave him away since "dealing with Mao is Kyouya's job." Today, however, she placed her coffee cup on her plate and helped him out.

"If we look at international standards, the color of the 'go' signal should be green. It has been the same for Japan for a long time now, but since everyone calls it the 'turquoise light', so the term 'turquoise light' came to mean it. Actually, Japanese culture doesn't seem to take turquoise and green as two completely different colors. Think about it. If we use the word 'bright turquoise' to describe honeydews, it doesn't sound that weird, does it?"

Shion-senpai's answer is both intellectual and graceful. It sounds like what a well-read person like her would say. Kyouya agreed with her answer.

"I see, so even if we mix up turquoise and green light signals it wouldn't be weird at all. So Pres, it doesn't matter if it's turquoise or green!"

"I don't wanna! I have to know if it's really turquoise or green. We have to settle the winner for this, we have to settle if it's green or turquoise!"

Pres did not agree.

They could only move onto the next answer. This time it was from Kirara-senpai.

"Kirara, is the color of the 'go' signal turquoise or green?"

Kirara-senpai sat on the sofa in the club room, eating meat as usual. She raised her head when her name was called. She had not heard any of the discussion that had happened just now, so Kyouya had to explain the whole thing to her again.

After some explanation, Kirara finally nodded, as if to say that she understood.

"The color of the 'go' signal, has a smell like safety."

"A smell like safety, huh? Pres, do you accept this answer, then?"

"I don't understand what does that mean at all!"

This answer was also a no-go.

Finally, it was Megumi's turn.

Megumi heard their discussion while she was pouring tea for everyone, so they did not need to explain the whole thing to her again.

"I've always been curious, the person inside the light... Is it a man or a woman?"

"The person inside the light?"

"Yeah, like this..."

Megumi made the pose of a person walking or standing still.

"Ah, you're talking about the person inside the pedestrian traffic signal, right?"

"This is a tough one!"

Pres exclaimed. The conversation topic had changed and nobody seemed to notice.

The GJ Club was laid-back as usual. The GJ Club today is the "Traffic Light Questions Review Committee".

GJ Bu Light Novel Translation

GJ Bu Volume 1 is completed translated while Volume 2 is partially translated. You can find them here : https://gjbuthetranslation.wordpress.com/

I've decided to start from Volume 3 instead. The translations will also be co hosted on Baka Tsuki here: https://www.baka-tsuki.org/project/index.php?title=GJ-Bu

Available Translations:
1. Volume 3 Chapter 1

GJ Club

GJ部

Author: Shin Araki

Illustrator: Aruya

Publisher: Shogakukan

Genre: Slice of Life, Comedy, School

Introduction:

Shinomiya Kyōya is forced to become a new member of the GJ-bu (lit. GJ Club), an unidentified club that dwells in a room of the former building of a certain school. There he meets four girls: Mao, Megumi, Shion and Kirara. Time flies with these unique girls around. The series follows the everyday, though unusual, antics of this band of friends.

Gah, I really wanted to continue translating Aitsuko, but I have too much on my plate to take on such a heavy project as of now. I've also handed over the Zero No Tsukaima translation over to Immorrel, and he's making great progress. I still want to translate something though, so I was looking around and finally I saw this reddit post.

I read GJ Bu a few years back. Who knew you could do a 4-koma light novel and make it so interesting, huh? So I guess this would be my current project. Each chapter is short, so it would not take as much time as researching Aitsuko word play or Zero No Tsukaima lore for me.

Tsuki Ga Kirei OP Imakoko (Here, now) Lyrics Translation

Imakoko (Here, now)

This song is the OP for the anime, Tsuki Ga Kirei, one of my favourite animes this season.

Original Song from Flying Dog, sung by Nao Touyama

Translation (Kanji, romaji and english):

なんとなく頭の中で君が　離れなくなっていたんだ
Nantonaku atamano nakade kimiga hanarenakunatteitanda
I don't know why, but the memory of you lingers in my mind


途切れ途切の会話だねいつも
Togireru togireruno kaiwadaneitsumo
Our conversations were always so short, weren't they?

息も吐き出せないほどの鼓動
Ikimo hakidasenaihodono kodou
I can't breath, my heart is beating so fast 

目が合った瞬間にまた何かが胸をつらぬいてゆく　今
Mega atta shunkannimata nanikaga muneo tsuranuiteyuku ima
When our eyes met, my heart felt as if it was pierced by something, now


大好きな人が今ここにいるいるんだよ
Daisukina hito ga imakokoni-ruirundayo
The person I like the most is right in front of me, here!

最高の毎日は恋のパレパレード
Saikouno mainichiwa koino PAREPARE-DO
It feels amazing, just like I'm having a love parade everyday

近づきたい　誰よりも君に今 今以上
Chikazukitai dareyorimo kimini ima imaijou
I want to get closer to you, closer than anyone else can be

会いたくて会いにゆく　笑顔また見つけにゆくよ
Aitakute ainiyuku egaomata mitsukeniyukuyo
I want to meet you, I want to meet you so bad, to see that smile of yours


教室の隅で笑った君は　今すべてのものの中で光る
Kyoushitsuno sumide waratta kimiwa imasubetenomonono nakade hikaru
It feels like every part of you, who is smiling at the corner of the classroom, is shining brightly right now

初めてつないだ手　嵐のようなうねりが駆けめぐる　今
Hajimetetsunaida te arashinoyounauneriga kakemeguru ima
When we first held hands, my heart felt as if it was being ravaged by a hurricane, now


何度でも君だけに僕は恋恋する
Nandodemo hitodakeni bokuwa koi koisuru
No matter how many times it will be, I will only fall in love with you

知るほどに加速する恋のスピスピード
Shiruhodoni kasokusuru koino SUPISUPI-DO
I feel as if this feeling called love is expanding so quickly in my heart 

ありのまま伝えたい　なのになぜなぜだろう
Arinomama tsutaetai nanoninazenazedarou
These feelings that I wanted to tell you so much, but why, why is this so? 

どうしようもなくいつも不器用になる僕がいるよ
Doushiyoumonakuitsumo bukiyouninaru bokugairuyo
It can't be helped, I have become so cowardly

どうして？
Doushite?
What should I do?


まだ僕ら未完成で始まったばかりの未来
Mada bokura mikanseide hajimattabakarino mirai
It has not ended, our future has just only begun

春も夏も秋も冬もいつも一緒にいたい
Harumo natsumo akimo fuyumoitsumo isshoni itai
No matter if it's spring, summer, autumn or winter, I want to always be with you

どこにいるの？何しているの？誰のことを想ってるの？
Dokoni-runo? nanishiteiruno? darenokotoo omotteruno?
Where are you right now? What are you doing right now? Who are you thinking of right now?

行け　行け　行け　今
Ike ike ike ima
Let's go, let's go, let's go! Now!

行け　行け　行け　行け
Ike ike ike ike
Let's go, let's go, let's go, let's go!


大好きな人が今ここにいるいるんだよ
Daisukina hito ga imakokoni-ruirundayo
The person I like the most is right in front of me, here!

最高の毎日は恋のパレパレード
Saikouno mainichiwa koino PAREPARE-DO
It feels amazing, just like I'm having a love parade everyday

近づきたい　誰よりも君に今 今以上
Chikazukitai dareyorimo kimini ima imaijou
I want to get closer to you, closer than anyone else can be

会いたくて会いにゆく　笑顔また見つけにゆくよ
Aitakute ainiyuku egaomata mitsukeniyukuyo
I want to meet you, I want to meet you so bad, to see that smile of yours

Random Post Update : League of Legends for experienced Dota2 Players

I do apologise for the hiatus in the translations due to school work, but now, since ZnT is getting some translators of its own, I can be back to translating Aitsuko, in ... a month maybe? Let's not get our hopes up shall we? :D On a serious note, I would be translating Aitsuko once I've finished moving my residence and my exams.

Anyway back to the main topic at hand here, I did write a reddit post for a basic comparison, but I would like to go into more detail here. Before that, it would be nice to give some context into this comparison. There is a few posts questioning why LOL does not have as big of a prize pool as DotA2 (TI5 had the largest prize pool in esports history), and a viewership fewer than DotA2(comparing between 2014 internationals and 2014 season for LOL).

LOL does boast the most time spent on it in 2015, but it does not provide any boost to its current value. Value is given by the players, and the players have said otherwise. The same could be same for some other MOBAs attempting to recreate DotA2's success, and failing in the process.

While I could not deny that LOL is much newbie-friendly than DotA2, considering its forgiving mechanics, and playstyle, DotA2 is a game that undeniably requires more knowledge considering its advanced mechanics and larger scale of gameplay, which IMO is brought in by the fact that you can alter the landscape of the map, among other things. 
    
Other MOBAs such as strife and paragon, which tries to emulate the way LOL is played and advertised, emphasizing constant combat, and personalized user accounts, falls into the same trap as LOL had been. Players have been saying that LOL has grown stale, and that it does not have much variety in its playstyle. While you can see a lot of strange strategies come and go and win in DotA2, like an aggro trilane, dual mid, dual roam, 5-man at minute 10 strategies, LOL games typically only have a few set strategies, some of which is similar to DotA2, but cannot be executed well because of differences in the map and mechanics.

With our eyes set for TI6 prizepool to overtake TI5, one may wonder what is the difference between these two games that really makes the cut. Many posts such as this and this and this tries to look into the differences, but most of it is done by players who have less experience in DotA2. Due to the difficulty in DotA2, spending even number of hours in both games does not equate.

1. Heroes are all free in DotA2 while LOL's champions are not : This affects gameplay in the way of information. As players may attest, you can't just watch and read a skill description to understand a skill. Most of the time we learn by experience. DotA2 allows you to go into bot games and try out all the heroes and find your niche. Perhaps you would prefer playing heroes that push well, or heroes that does skill shots, etc. However in LOL, you start out with a limited hero pool, all of which may not suit your play style. You're boxed into thinking these are the heroes that are "for noobs", when in fact there are champions in there that are constantly banned or picked only in high elos due to their specific playstyle. 

The result of this is that casual gamers, who watches a game of professional DotA2 could at least understand what's happening on the screen (with the help of casters of course) and try it out in their next game of DotA2, adding to the excitement and changing the meta itself. For casual LOL players, unless you've unlocked those heroes, it is unlikely that you can do that. 

2. Runes and masteries in LOL : A person with lower hours played, but with sufficient experience in similar MOBAs such as HoN, can quickly get up to date in DotA2, but they can't do so in LOL, as they would be lacking of runes and masteries, resulting in uneven gameplay. Gameplay is rewarding when you win against a tougher opponent with your skill. That, as with above, is why some professional play in LOL may fail to be executed for casual LOL players even though they did the philosophy right, which is disappointing for players. 

3. DotA2 heroes are much much versatile than LOL's champions : You can play a mid antimage or carry warlock if you wish (as OG.Miracle- has done) and it will still work. LOL's champions have much lesser flexibilty in their game play, and their spells feel a bit generic even though they have their differences. There is no clear line between who does what in DotA2, and while this may be confusing for newbies, it provides much more variety when it comes to gameplay.

The reason why gamers continue to return and play a game is the variety it has in the game. LOL lacks the particular variety for casual gamers unless you play a whole lot and unlock heroes. DotA2 provides this variety straight from the start. 

4. DotA2 maps are much bigger in scale than LOL, and it can be interacted with the characters : Some of the first few things people notice, coming from League is that you can cut down trees in DotA2! LOL has its landscape set in stone, and this, again reduces variety in strategies, and teamfights. However, LOL has special neutrals that provides buffs when killed, which is very important in teamfights. Meanwhile in DotA2, neutrals provide skills that you can use once you control them.

In DotA2, the jungle is a resource, and efficient carries often find ways to exploit map stacking and pathing and tree cutting, but in LOL, the jungle normally would be reserved for the jungler alone, and farming the jungle is much slower than in DotA2, without the before mentioned mechanics.

5. There is really no way you can alter the creep equilibrium in LOL, unlike in DotA2: Without deny mechanics and pulling, the carry often has no way to keep out the enemy offlaner from getting exp, or keep the equilibrium at a safe place to farm. This keeps the laning phase from growing into a stale farm game, and encourage aggression from both sides in LOL. Which also means that carries with low early aggression potential early game, if paired with a high aggression enemy would likely lose the lane. Also, this means that it is hard to close the experience gap once you've been ganked once or twice since there is really not much safe lanes to farm.

6. There are no TPs in LOL : TP scrolls, IMO, is the most important item in DotA2. It allows you to channel a teleport to any allied building, but comes at a cost of 75 gold. Also, any allied TP within 20 seconds will add 1 second to your channeling. Everyone will buy it. It provides defensive and offensive uses depending on how you use it. However, the closest thing we have in LOL is Recall and Teleport. The former channels for 8 seconds and is broken on any enemy damage while the latter has a 4+ minute cooldown. Ask any DotA2 Player and they will tell you that an extra second in channeling that TP already feels like an eternity.

In DotA2, supports tend to TP to a lane to help a ganked ally. In LOL, only supports with the teleport spell can do that, and once its baited, it means that the support can't help another lane for 4 minutes. Not only that, it is important to TP to a rosh fight to prevent the other team from securing the aegis. So, controlling the towers and gaining map control is an important factor in winning the game. In LOL, it doesn't really matter if your tower is gone, since it doesn't provide any tangible advantage to your team. There is a lesser emphasis on controlling towers in LOL. In DotA2, towers are also important to protect your own jungle, but this control is also diminished in LOL. Basically if you are ganked anywhere in LOL, you can't really expect your supports to TP if they have used up their teleport.

This also affects heroes with innate tower-pushing abilities, like Ashe. Her Q does wonders to towers, and if it was introduced to DotA2, would be nerfed within a patch. Her E scouts brilliantly, like Clockwerk's rocket. However, her skill set does not match the requirement's of LOL. She, like her DotA2 counterpart, Drow Ranger, excels in splitpushing, but due to the way LOL is played, she is rarely seen past lower ELOs, until the very High ELOs, because she lacks an escape, contributes quite less to teamfights without items (which means she has to solo farm), unlike Drow, who has a silence knock-back spell.

7. There is no death cost in LOL : In DotA2, we often expect death number to be correlated to their position. Pos1, often carries, die the least while Pos5, often supports die the most. The reason is that most of the time, Pos5s have to sacrifice themselves to save carries, like slowing or stunning the enemy to allow the carry to escape. This results in supports carrying less gold, and thus their items comes online way slower than in League. Supports in DotA2 often have to spend money on cheap escape or mobility items to reduce their deaths and increase their contribution.

In LOL however, there is no death cost, so really this encourages offensive play from both sides. In DotA2, people are hesitant to dive, or play aggressively as TPs from supports may come (from the first point) and they may die, thus losing gold they get from CS-ing, which is a waste of time. In LOL, you don't want to die to feed the other side, but the reduced penalty causes a larger tendency to fight all the time. This, coupled with the next point, is why Junglers are a must in LOL gameplay, which is basically if you play DotA2 by ganking all the time.

8.  It's really hard to have no mana in LOL : The only thing limiting you from using your spells, is possibly your cooldowns. Basically you're expected to keep spamming your spells to harass the enemy. In DotA2, this is mainly done by the supports in the lane. However, the reason why carries are carries is because their spells are supposed to scale with their auto attacks, and are supposed to augment their auto attacks. Meanwhile, supports have utility spells that can do CC. This means that carries have spells that are weak early game, and in a dual lane scenario, are extremely disadvantaged. It also means that pushes can be done continuously as the only limiting factor is cooldowns and health.

9. There is no buyback in LOL : DotA2 has a mechanism to cheat death by buying your way through. This rewards teams with a high gold deposit, but was picked off or something so they can still defend with the team. In LOL, this results in Aces, or Team wipes, and just end the game, unlike in DotA, where you have to be cautious of their buybacks.

10. Stuns in LOL last shorter than in DotA2: While this reduces being "stunlocked", it also takes away another comeback mechanic for teams in LOL. In exciting games, people often talked about games where a team manages to comeback through the use of continuous stuns in DotA2, like the way NaVi won TI1, while in LOL, often the winner just snowballs into victory and it's hard to actually comeback with a huge deficit in LOL.

In a conclusion, there are many advanced mechanics that makes DotA2 a much rewarding game to learn and play unlike LOL. This affects viewership as it makes game play much exciting to watch due to the variety of strategies involved. I believe this is also one of the reasons why DotA2 is growing in the international esports scene compared to LOL, in spite of clinching the Korean esports scene.

Zero No Tsukaima is getting a continuation!

Aitsuko has been translated to 78.7% of Chapter 2 of Volume 1.

While I'm still translating this, I'll concentrate on getting Chapter 19 of ZnT completely translated in Baka Tsuki as the editors of the book has announced that they will continue to finish off the series with notes provided by the author.

Gatchaman Crowds Analysis 2

In any battle, no matter how cool looking the scene is, it isn't truly an epic battle unless it is really a clash of ideologies. Take for example Sparta 300. The clash present here is not how the 300 warriors fought against the entire Persian army, but more of how the 300 warriors challenged the entirety of Greece against their cowardice to bow down to an outside pressure. The reason why we are rooting for the warriors are because they have been left alone during their fight, with no help from the king's own country, who have been bought over by the power of money. It is a clash of money and loyalty, materialism and essence.

Such is the same with Gatchaman Crowds. I've researched on some of the opinions on the net for the series and some have stated that the opening of the series is pretty slow. While I do agreed to some extent, I cannot stress again how important the starting few episodes were important in setting up the status quo and all the foreshadowing for the clashes to come. Most of my analysis here will come from the first half of the show, since any mention of the second half would most likely spoil the story for you.

After looking at the conservationist and the realist last time, this time we would look at the idealist, Rui Ninomiya.

Instead of object metaphors as before, Rui himself (yes, he's a guy) is his own metaphor. He cross-dresses and walks around the streets watching people use Galax, a social game of his own creation. However, he lives alone with X, an artificial intelligence he created by himself. It is ironic that he seeks companionship with a computer program rather than with people when he himself is the creator of the application that brought the masses together. When he is outside, he wears elaborate clothes of the other gender and hides in plain view, preferring not to communicate directly with others. 

In fact, Rui is the ultimate cluster of clashes and irony in the series. Galax is his tool to bring humanity together by solving problems on their own. X, the AI is able to match people with needs with the right people with the ability to solve that need. Early in the series, we see posters hanging everywhere in the train where Sugane was in, stating that "the world is not updated by heroes, but by us". However, as we can see later on in the series, in spite of Rui's best intentions, humanity have not learnt to solve problems on their own, instead, they relied blindly on the machine like a faux God. It shows how humanity craves for leadership and an omnipotent character. They simply move their beliefs from superheroes to an AI. However, they don't do this lightly, and they only do it after X proves itself worthy and correct time over time. This is especially evident in a school scene where Rui and X prevents students from consuming spoilt milk. Every Galax user believes in X, while non users, some cynical, turn from non-believers to believers.

In the background, the TV is showing a bribery case of the vice-president of Japan.

Rui is obsessed with making the world a better place. Again, early in the series, we are shown how politicians are ruining Japan. In spite of being in a democratic country, the people still elected a leader that has shown himself incapable of running his country while allowing money embezzlement to occur. The democratic system is the one clashing with Galax, which itself is actually quite a despotic system. Democracy, where the people are given the power to rule themselves is shown to have led to a downward path of disappointment while despotism, which hides under the pretext of freedom, is shown to have positive results. This shows how information symmetry is important for the democratic system to actually work, since what Galax does is essentially sharing information. In this age where internet allows free trade of information, the one who holds the most information is king. The demographics of this is skewed towards the younger generation, but the ones holding the most information, is the search engine companies, but for a larger discussion on that you could watch the movie, Ex Machina. 

The Galax system itself also clashes with the notion of having heroes save the day. On one hand, Galax helps people with their everyday lives, while the Gatchaman fights with aliens and does not progress from there on. Rui does not place his hopes on superpowers and instead wishes to rely on humans, however, he does realizes that there are some cases where even humans can't do anything, which is shown in a scenario later on, and that is when he activates his own superpower to summon the Hundreds Crowds, which is paradoxical to his idea that humans should help themselves without superpowers. This places him in direct conflict of Hajime, who believes that people with superpowers are part of the everyone he was talking so fervently about. Hajime thinks that superpower or not, what can be used, should be used, but Rui thinks that only humans can help themselves.

I think that part of the charm of Gatchaman Crowds is in watching how Rui grows as an character. While Sugane may be one-dimensional, Hajime two-dimensional, Rui could be said as a multi-dimensional character, one that we can relate to as we grow as a person, having our ideals shattered one by one while we try to hold on to them, only to leave them once we've grown into an adult. 

Fate Zero and Fate Stay/Night Semi-Rant

So I have been watching the Fate Series, from Fate Zero to Fate Stay/Night UBW.

I'm getting my hats off to ufotable for making such a spectacle in both series. The artwork is gorgeous and splendidly meticulous (I especially appreciate the job they did with the lighting and the dust effect), the animations are fluid and it shows the exciting fight scenes very satisfyingly, for both series. 

Absolutely gorgeous. (The GIF might be slightly large)

Fate Zero had the blessing of Gen Urobuchi to work on the its story and characters, so I also like how each Master is given a chance to grow within the series, with the help of their Servants, as a mirror of their ideals, yin to their yang. I liked how the setting is played out as a death match between powerful heroes. Each character is separated from the normal tropes we normally see in a lot of anime now, and they have their own ideals, thoughts and desires, making them incredibly humane, even though somewhat twisted. I also like how Gilgamesh is potrayed and animated as a bad-ass, which is his original setting, instead of how he is downplayed in Fate Stay/Night, in favor of the "plot".

Which brings us to the sequel to Fate Zero, Fate Stay/Night. The first thing I want to say is how lucky I am to watch Fate Zero first. The character motivations are much clearer compared to how I watched the Fate Stay/Night Fate arc from 2006, without watching Zero first. Unfortunately, even with all the eye candy, bad story telling is still bad story telling, no matter how many times you remake it. I guess the problem with UBW is how it tries to wrap the plot around Shirou, who is really, as Arcada puts it, an idiot. Unlike in Fate Zero, where our characters are mature, Shirou, our main protagonist is a high school student, so I can accept that Shirou might be somewhat immature in his thinking, but not really to this level. What he does completely conflicts with what he says, and even though he is powerless compared to the others(and he knows it), he still drags other people who has the power into life threatening situations by putting his own life in danger. 

While I may understand that this is a show of courage, did he really had to chase Saber while she was focused on fighting Beserker, and then just do absolutely nothing except getting nearly killed? Of course, the explanation for why he acts like he acts in from around episode 4 is that he is so angry that he has become calm and emotionless and brainless. Now, I may be getting too harsh with his character, since I actually understand where he is coming from, i.e. the immature always-in-anger stubborn child, but he is really painful to watch. In fact, to get a sense of what I'm saying, go watch the interactions of Shirou and Archer in episode 6 and 7, and tell me why Shirou acts like that. He has shown repeatedly that he has no magic, is useless against Caster, and yet he wants to go after Caster, who has already disappeared into thin air. He asks Archer to chase after Caster, and even after Archer explains that defeating her Master is the better way to defeat Caster, he still does that. Where the heck is he going to chase after, thin air? Then in episode 10, he acts nonchalant towards the clues of Caster's master's indentity, as if his desire to save people has suddenly vanished to thin air. I could almost understand why Archer wants to kill him so badly. 

Every time, Shirou is dependent on the powers of others, but he acts like he actually can do it by himself, which either makes him delusional or thoughtless towards the sacrifices of others, which makes his altruism fake and pointless, since he doesn't have empathy at all, which contradicts his so-called good guy setting. So unless they want to show how Shirou goes down the dark path, I don't see why are they are doing this.

Next, I also don't like how Rin is potrayed as a bad-ass at first, but suddenly becomes a confused damsel when Shirou is around. So at first, she takes on a building full of monsters by herself in one episode, and then she acts scared when she is with Shirou in a school full of the same monsters in another. What the heck? This can be explained as her infatuation with Shirou clouding her judgement, I guess, which is probably the only reason why someone who had been training as a magician in a deathmatch for more than 10 years under a killer of Magi, could suddenly lose her professionalism. Love is blind. But other than that, I like her character pretty well, just like how Asuna in SAO makes the story interesting. 

Other than the problem with Shirou's character, the rest is pretty good, I think. What I really want to see though, is Sakura. A girl who got sold to another family, and got tortured with worms all over her body, witnessing how a person she has once took as a kind uncle die in vain, thinking that it is his fault for not listening to her grandfather, who was also the one torturing her, getting raped by her brother, among all the other things, and yet she managed to potray herself as a normal high school girl, who seemingly has a crush on a "kind" senpai. All that psychological and physical trauma hidden under a facade of smiles...I want to see her break free of her facade and get saved (Well, its not that I mind a Bad End anyway, I just want to see her story). 

So don't mess up the Heaven Feels movie, please.