In the fall 2023 season, there were 2 notable slice of life anime. The first is 16 bit sensation, a show about retro eroge production and time travel. I very much enjoyed it up until the final few epsides, where it really jumped the shark and dissapointed me. Perhaps this is the otaku equivelant of marvel movies where simply having a character you recognise show up is supposed to titilate the audience, but I still got a sense of excitement when I would see yuzusoft VNs I've read on the character's shelf. "hey it's that thing I like". But anyhow, let's not get distracted by 16 bit sensation. I saw that anime do fairly well, in terms of culture. There were threads about it on /a/, and I saw it mentioned on twitter a number of times. Strangely, the other slice of life anime from the same season, hoshizuku telepath, got far less ateantion. That show is hoshizuku telepath.
Hoshitele is not a flawless show by any means. Frankly in a lot of ways, I don't know what to make of it. That all comes down to one particular character, but I'll get back to that in a second. The first thing to note is what really got me interested in this show to begin with. Now it may have just been because I was very sleepy when I watched it, but episodes one and 2 of this show were a borderline spiritual experience for me. The first episode is borderline avant garde, it's told almost exclusively through first person internal monologue, and the surrealist elements of the plot serve to produce a dreamlike atmosphere which is extremely unique. We follow Umika Konohoshi, a first year highschool student with severe social anxiety and communication issues. Now, we've had some anime such as komi-san wa comyushou desu or hitoribocchi no marumaru seikatsu about cute girls in highschool with communication problems trying to make friends. But where hoshitele differentiates itself is in the main character's surreal delusions. You see, Umika believes that no one on earth can understand her or hear her words, and so she becomes fixated on the concept of aliens who can finally connect with her. But then, strangely enough a new girl shows up, claiming to be an alien. And what's more, through her "odekopathy" powers, can telepathically connect with Umika and finally understand her feelings. Even if you have no interest in watching the rest of the show, I highly recomend watchin that first episode, it's like a self contained short film almost. The way we are pulled into umika's world, the line between delusion and reality blurring into a waking dream, really produces something profound in me. In fact, I'm almost tempted to label this with the contentious term "denpa". Again seperating it from similar premised shows, hoshitele isn't playing up the comedy. Sure there are jokes in the show, but it's really all about the drama and yuri elements. The relationship between Umika and Yuu (the alien girl), the only person she can connect with, is very effective. If the show was just a direct and exact continuation of the first episode, where the whole world is shut off to Umika except for Yuu, and they go on semi-delusional slice of life adventures to deepen their yuri love, this would be a 10/10 anime. Unfortunately, that show would also be insane, impossible to write, and would appeal to no one else but me, so it is not what we got.
Instead, this anime adds new characters. First is Takaragi Haruno, a joyful and layed back girl, who is supportive of the main character's quest. What quest is that? Well, the thrust of the show is that Yuu's spaceship has crashed and broken, so in order to return to space, they have to build a new spaceship. Yuu has also lost all of her past memories in the crash, assides from a few details like the alien language. The problem of course, is that how could a group of highschool girls create a spaceship capable of interplanetary travel with living passengers? It's an absurd premise, and because of that there's a strange interplay between literal and metaphorical interpretations. Then, we get a huge curveball.
Matataki Raimon. The fourth girl introduced, rounding out the main cast. Unlike the other 3, she is boisterous, assertive, opinionated and pragmatic. There are many slice of life anime with a tomboy character with some of these traits, but in this case, Raimon-san goes beyond merely hot-blooded into downright aggression and rudeness. As the show continues on, with Raimon-san's pragmatism bringing the main cast back down to earth, they decide that the most reasonable course of action is to learn to build model rockets as a stepping stone towards building a real spaceship. The majority of the run time is a "cute girls do model rockets" anime. The surrealism of the first 2 episodes is mostly gone by episode 4, and never really comes back. What's more, it's pretty shocking to see Umika being effectively bullied by Raimon. She is repeatedly belittled and insulted, driven to tears. It's painful to watch a cute and shy anime girl cry! I want to protect her!
This made me turn against the show. Why would you ruin this unique, dreamlike tone by introducing a rude and abrassive character to the main cast? And why is the narrative letting her seemingly get away with being a selfish bully, especially to the detriment of our main character, while still expecting us to overall route for the group? You see, the group needs matataki's technical skills with engineering in order to build this model rocket. There are hints though, that there's more to this character. Matataki's engineering interest seems to have been sparked by an interest in mecha? In fact, her goal appears to be to build a mech? Isn't that also an outlandish dream, just like building a spaceship?
I was won back over towards the end of the show. After a whole arc of buildup, the group enter a model rocket competition and they perform terribly, not making it through the qualifiers. This drives Raimon-san into a depression, as her sense of self worth is deeply tied to her competative nature. She stops coming to school. She cuts of contact. When they try to lure her back in with a contest between the rest of the group and her, she throws by using a low powered gunpowder fuel charge on purpose. At this point I realised, just like Umika did, that this has actually been Matataki's story just as much as it's been Umika's. Matataki, who lashes out at those who get close to her bceause she's afraid to get close to other people. Matataki who became so passionate about model rockets which she acted as if she was just roped into building. While umika's psychological problems have manifested in severe anxiety and a nervous stutter, Matataki's internal struggle has caused her to push away the friends she cherishes, and perform acts of self sabotage out of fear. In the end, the planet on which people's thoughts could be understood is the model rocket club of Fujino Misaki High School.
Hoshitele can be overly sentimental at times. Throughout the last 3 episodes, it seems like umika is crying in every scene. Various parts of the melodrama feel somewhat forced or un-earned. After episode 2, the show seems to take a while to figure out what it wants to be, and wonders aimlessly for a couple of episodes. Matataki's arc takes a long time to conclude, and watching her over-rule what would otherwise be a comfy and sweet friendship / yuri dynamic is frustriating. I would have preffered if the yuri elements weren't so downplayed, particularly umika and yuu's relationship I think. You could at least let them kiss. At least the final episode leans into that a bit harder but still I would have preffered if it were stronger. I also think that Takaragi's arc and character in general wasn't as fleshed out as it could have been, and in the end she doesn't have as strong presence in the show as she could have. At the end of the day however, we are left with this fact: a girl who's very nervous but is still trying her best is cute!