HIYA EVERYONE! GOOD AFTERNOON AND WELL TIDINGS, HOW ARE Y'ALL DOING TONIGHT?

Well, me personally, I wanted to do a little bit of an exploration of one of the main characters of a certain series I've picked up recently- you might have guessed already, but yes, this is about Haruhi Suzumiya from the anime series, The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya!! (hard to believe it took me so long to post something Haruhi related on my Haruhi Themed profile...)

AHH.. just a brief foreword; I've never really done anything like an analysis before, (and my literary skills are probably really rusty since the last time I had Lit. class was 2 years ago T_T) but still, I really wanted to take a crack at this just so I could express all the thoughts the first arc of Haruhi left me with!! So, if you feel like its a little sloppy or just hard to understand, please forgive me- I'm tryin' here :"D

Also, if you have other interpretations, or you think I got something wrong, feel free to tell me in the comments!! I'd like to discuss it further justttt in case I didn't hit the mark quite right >:D

ANYWAYS, LETS BEGIN!!

HARUHI SUZUMIYA: Always a Goddess, Never an Interesting Human Being:

So, what exactly is Haruhi's deal, anyways?! Since the start of the series, the way she's presented leaves one thing very clear: she's an ECCENTRIC. She's definitely not your ordinary, run-of-the-mill high school student- far from it! From the moment she first opens her mouth at North High, Haruhi leaves her goal and purpose clear on the table: "I don't want anything to do with ordinary people. If you're an alien, time traveler, or esper, please come see me!"

An introduction which seems to leave an impression on both the viewer and her fellow classmate, Kyon, who's perspective on Haruhi we follow across the show. Despite seeming like a farfetched goal, she actually reaches it! Even if she doesn't quite know it...

She's able to succeed this seemingly out of sheer luck; but the catch to actually meeting  the extraordinary people she wants to meet is that- she doesn't even actually know about their paranormal qualities! In fact, unbeknownst to Haruhi herself, she's actually a goddess who has the power to reset, reconstruct and change reality through her sheer will alone... and the supernatural beings she's been looking for work hard to keep her from resetting reality out of pure boredom- yea, it's a lot of work to keep a Goddess who's also a hyperactive schoolgirl in check-

Haruhi is someone who's gonna keep going out of her way to be the most insane, weird, unhinged and crazy person you'll know just so she can achieve her goals. She probably wouldn't call herself so, but she's one special girl! Yet still, in her search for something interesting, something that proves to her that not every person on earth is an ordinary joe- a melancholy seems to follow her throughout the series... just why is that?

"So, what does this mean?! Yea yea, so, the twist once you watch it is that they're actually the crazy things they claim to be. Yea, she's a wacko. So what?! What are you tryin' to say here?!" I hear your mind screech out- well, hold on, let me get to it!!

The Baseball Monologue

See, this is the part of Haruhi's character that stuck out the most to me, and i think the scene from this series that's just gonna stick with me the most. During episode 5, Haruhi drags Kyon to investigate the sudden disappearance of their fellow classmate, who moved out and changed schools with no warning. Despite her best efforts, Haruhi comes up empty-handed, and is honestly left with more questions than answers, completely unsatisfied and disappointed. Leaving the building they were investigating, Haruhi opens up to Kyon about something that explains why she is the way that she is.

"Have you ever realized how insignificant your existence is on this planet?"

"

Haruhi opens up to Kyon about this extreme revelation she had when she was just a child; while attending a simple game of baseball with her family, she was surrounded by thousands and thousands of people. Thousands of people, who were just a fraction of the millions living in the rest of Japan. Just a small fraction of the total population of Japan, being so big, made Haruhi feel so, so small.

She realizes, seeing all of these people, quantifying just how many more people are out there, that somehow, they've got to be similar to her, right? If they too were attending the same baseball game she and her family decided to attend, what else were they doing that was similar? How many other experiences had they shared? How many more decisions and actions did they take that were the exact same as hers?

Haruhi says that, as she started to realize just how similar everyone was, just how much we all share in common, it was as if the world began to lose its color to her. Things that she used to love or admire- tasks, her school, her class, her hobbies even- just became boring, because they were no longer special, or even unique to her. They were all just something... ordinary, something everyone else surely does. It was as if, things that lacked any sort of inherent excitement or fun or uniqueness didn't mean anything anymore.

To Haruhi Suzumiya, the quality of being "extraordinary" (or interesting, unique, special, different from the rest), whatever it is that marks something as being different from everything else, is what truly designates somethings importance. To blend in with the crowd, to somehow be just like everyone else leads to some sort of heartbreak; in the bigger picture that exists in her mind, if everyone else is the exact same- where's the meaning in all this? whats the point?

(Sorry- hope youre not bummed out cus I'm not done yet!! I just wanted to deep dive into the big revelation she had :P!)

Well, obviously,  she didn't stay waxing this point forever. There's thankfully a second point of revelation she hit afterwards! You see, to Haruhi there's NO point in sitting around and waiting forever to something interesting to come along, for something to change- There's no point in doing so, because how is she really gonna now that what she wants to happen will actually happen, if she's pinning all that hope on some unknown forces?! Truly, the essence of the goddess shows through!

So, well, she stops waiting around!! Before she knows it, she's already passed elementary, middle school, and hell, is close to finishing high school- She can't just let her time escape her like that, leave it all up to fate whether or not proof of something extraordinary comes her way; She goes SEARCHING for something, anything that might prove to her that somewhere out there in the big blue world there's one unique experience that nobody else shares- something out of this world!! Hell, out there, there's gotta be someone so different from the rest that it gives meaning as to why we're here- an alien, someone who travels through time and space, someone who has psychic, extraordinary powers!! Anything at all!!

The funny/ironic thing about Haruhi is that, well, her will is so strong it LITERALLY changes the state of the world, space and even time itself sometimes! She wanted to see aliens and espers and time travellers so bad, that the fabric and structure of the world itself changed JUST to bring them into existence! She's a goddess who has the power to will these extraordinary things into existence, just by wanting to see them so bad!!!

But... she can't ever know that; Kyon can't tell Haruhi that the other 3 members are the extraordinary people she's been looking for for proof all this time; Not just 'cause he's been told he cant, but because she probably won't believe it unless she sees it- to Haruhi, seeing is believing after all! It's why she goes crazy hunting for proof and events that she can see with her own two eyes- if she can see the proof, or even be in its presence that would be enough..!!

But, again... it's like the very things she's searching for always escape her- she can't ever seem to be at the right place, or at the right time to find what she's looking for; especially when it's something that happens outside of her knowing so, like Asakura almost killing Kyon in an altered reality classroom, or Koizumi taking Kyon to the dimensional pockets that stem from Haruhi's own emotional state; As a youtube comment once said, "dramatic irony at its finest!"

Haruhi is a person who creates extraordinary events just by being around in the first place! Just by existing, she brings something special to the lives of those around her, Kyon especially! Ironically enough, she just doesn't know that she herself creates the very thing she's looking for- In her search for something so incredible and extraordinary, it might just be that she's had the ability to create it for herself all along- I think thats what the heart of her character truly is :"p A person who pushes forward, pushes the limits and keeps searching for the end-goal no matter how hard or impossible it may seem. Sure, she can't quite grapple with the fact that maybe, just maybe she isn't as unique or special or interesting as she thought she might be- but her strength is just in her stubbornness to keep searching for proof.

Even if she never sees something that proves it all to her- she's still gonna go searching for it. That's what Haruhi Suzumiya is all about, i think. And hell, maybe we could all learn a thing or two from that style of livin'. >:)

Closing Thoughts!

AHHHH THATS ALL MY THOUGHTS. PHEW- I WROTE WAY MORE THAN I THOUGHT I WOULD!! sooooooooo, whaddaya think? did i get it right, did i hit the mark? am I totally media illiterate? is my analysis super super wrong and off base? :D I hope not!! Jeez!!

Nahh but being serious for a sec, yea, I hope you can tell I had a lot of fun writing this and going over her whole character  :P I started writing this on a whim and did NOT expect to write as much as I even did end up writing- but I'm very happy with it!!

Haruhi is something I only picked up recently, and of course- I wanna be the first to say that some things about the anime did NOT age well at all- but looking at the core and center of the series I think it's something just really, really special; and I'm glad I was able to find it, especially since I suck at watching anime consistently- It makes me laugh and it makes me happy!! That's all I can really say :P (lies) (i just wrote 1k words about the show) AGSHGSAHSA

While I dont really share the same sentiment as Haruhi does about everyone being the same, therefore everyone lacking uniqueness, I find myself relating heavily to the way she works to find an answer to the Dilemma she has. As a younger girl, I too struggled with crushing philosophical revelations that seemed to destroy what little ego I had built up till that point- but unlike Haruhi, i guess I didn't reach that point of chasing what you're lookin' for despite that... at least till now :"P Which is a little bit sad, if I'm honest! But I don't regret it one bit, because hey, at least now I get to look forward and look for the things that'll make me happy and hopefully give sense to this one-shot mess we call life :P

If you were wondering, maybe, what this self-identified Haruhi-like author girl thinks about life- I think we're all here to do what makes us happy, but we're also all here to protect each other and make each other happy! It's hard, and yea, maybe we're all kinda the same- but i dont think its a bad thing really; I think it's really beautiful that despite everyone being so different, we all still share something alike with each other! whether its liking anime, the same foods, drinks, videogames- it speaks to the fact that deep down we're not different from each other! we're all unique in our own ways, maybe in ways we wouldn't even know, but sharing qualities with others AND being different I think is what ties humans together C:

GAHHH I HOPE THAT WASN'T TOO CHEESY!!! JEEZ WHATS MY DEAL?!?! GAAHAGGHAA ENOUGH CORNY SAPPY EMOTIONAL SPEAK- DON'T FORGET THIS USER IS STILL AN UNSERIOUS UNHINGED WACKO, ALRIGHT?!?!

ANYWAYS, I HOPE YOU ENJOYED THIS DIFFERENT TYPE OF ENTRY!! TELL ME WHAT YA THINK, IF THIS SUCKED OR IF IT WAS OKAY!!! I LIKED TALKING ABOUT SOMETHING LIKE THIS FOR A CHANGE- If i ever get hit with a stroke of genius again I may just write more! :P

TILL NEXT TIME, FOLKS!! CHURRO OUT-