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Welcome to the thread for the new season of Chihayafuru! What is Chihayafuru? Chihayafuru is a anime adaptation of Yuki Suetsugu's manga work about the sport of Karuta which she started after she had to cancel her previous work due to accusations of plagarism (which were unfortunately true) of one of her older works. Lucky for us, because Chihayafuru turned out to be an incredible work made more widely known thanks to the incredible anime adaptation. It was incredibly well animated with a great use of colour and scenes that were just incredibly stunning. The first season made many of ADTRW Goons top 5 lists for the 2012 year for good reason. Wait, what is Karuta? Karuta is a competetive card game. Wait, please don't leave! this isn't based on super nerd trading card games meant to sell games to children and full of heart of the card poo poo. This is based on a real game that involves using the Ogura Hyakunin Isshu (One Hundred Poems by One Hundred Poets) and using them as a game of memory. The basic gist of it is that 2 people will square off against each other by each putting 25 cards into a play area in front of them. With 50 cards on the field the goal is to gain more cards than your opponent. A poem is then read off by a speaker, and based off of the first couple of words or syllable's that they recite, the player has to find where the card is on the field, and either protect their card from being taken, or go on the offensive to take a card. There are a lot of various aspects to the game, such as the need for memorization, reflexes, and various other things. Really, the game is a LOT more complex and heck, even I don't fully understand it after watching the anime. However, you will learn enough to get the jist of what is happening on screen and to enjoy the matches. Who's behind the anime? Stuido MADHOUSE is behind it, and while MADHOUSE can be hit or miss on the stuff they do, Chihayafuru was very much a hit thanks to some of the staff they had going for it. Number one being - Director: Morio Asaka. Morio Asaka is probably one of the best directors you can get for a Shoujo type series with good female characters. He has a strong list of works behind him with the highly regarded CardCaptor Sakura, and following it up with hit titles like Gunslinger Girl, Blue Literature's (Aoi Bungaku) "No Longer Human" story, and NANA. He's done a lot of storyboarding work and episode direction work too on such things as Monster, Black Lagoon, and Claymore. Beyond Asaka, the rest of the staff doesn't have very many notable works to their name. However, the music was incredibly well done and had some of the best "uplifting" stuff out there and hopefully this season brings more of it. On one ANNCast where the show was discussed there was an opinion that the music might almost have been something out of a Disney film. It definitely was very well done and I'd say the comment was pretty on the mark. It has been confirmed that the same staff as season one is coming back for season 2, so no gunslinger girl bullshit this time around. THE CHARACTERS A.K.A THE KARUTA CLUB! Chihaya Ayase - The Star  Chihaya Ayase is very much the heart of the show. She isn't the unbeatable hero that will never ever lose a match like most Shonen protagonists are. No, the best quality about Chihaya is that she wears her heart on her sleeve, and even when beaten down by an opponent; she learns from it and tries harder. Her energetic and never give up attitude holds her Karuta team together to have a team that truly are a band of friends that even when they fight against eachother, they remain friends. She might not always have the answers, but she knows where to look for them!  Taichi Mashima - The Leader  Even though Chihaya created the Karuta club, it needs a good head attached that knows how to get things done and is down to earth. Meet Taichi who has dealt with parents who forced him to be the overachiever with the attitude: if he can't be the best, why bother doing it? However, meeting with Chihaya again forces him to rethink what he wants and so he joins the Karuta club despite the attitude. Carries a not so secret love for Chihaya which Chihaya is completely oblivious too because Taichi isn't Karuta! Kanade Ōe - The Young Gun!  Kanade has a love for the poems themselves and joins the group due to Chihaya's persistence and her love for the poems. Her parents own a Kimono store and so when she joins the club does so on the condition they play in hakama. Cause when you play Karuta, you gotta play in classic style! Everyone is in love with her, even Chihaya!    Yūsei Nishida - The Mascot Nishida gets the unfortunate name of Porky (Nikuman-kun/Meat Boy) by Chihaya because Nishida happens to be a little bit on the larger side, but she doesn't due it out of malice. Nishida used to be a top player before suffering some losses and decided to quit the game, but Chihaya manages to bring him back into it, and despite being a heavier set fellow, manages to still bust out some moves! Youtube clip of Nishida peforming the barrel roll, Karuta style! (Thanks to poster a kitten for) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_EMUlvhsS0s Tsutomu Komano - The Brain A unpopular kid who only lived for studying. Chihaya and Taichi recruit him convincing him that Karuta is a game where you need a good amount of mental skill to play. He tends to rely on stats and other fun math related things to help his game out! (no gifs for him either, sorry!) Arata Wataya - The guy not in the club but is super important!  (props to a kitten for supplying me with a good Arata gif!)Arata was a boy in Chihaya's class in elementary school and was pretty much a prodigy at the game. He's the one who manages to get Chihaya interested in the game and sets afire her passion for it. Due to some unfortunate events however, he stops playing and is slowly being dragged back into it. Of course he's the 2nd person who will be competing for Chihaya's affections and so we have a good old fashioned Shoujo love triangle! WHEN DOES CHIHAYAFURU SEASON 2 AIR AND WHERE? Season 2 will start January 11th (This Week Friday)  Update Crunchyroll has announced a simulcast for the series, so Chihayafuru Season 2 will be simulcasted on Fridays at 3pm EST!WHERE CAN I WATCH SEASON 1? You can watch the entire first season on Crunchyroll RIGHT HERE. Unfortunately, as good as the series is and the great critical acclaim it had, no R1 DVD/Blu-Ray release has been announced, but you never know what will happen! JOIN US FOR ANOTHER GREAT SEASON! 
The Black Stones fucked around with this message at Jan 11, 2013 around 01:41 |
| # ? Jan 5, 2013 04:01 |
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| # ? May 23, 2013 01:22 |
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The first season of Chihayafuru was surprisingly amazing, so I'm really excited for this.
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| # ? Jan 5, 2013 04:05 |
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Cannot wait!
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| # ? Jan 5, 2013 04:14 |
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It's pretty much the perfect fusion of shounen sports and josei characterization. Gonna own a lot.
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| # ? Jan 5, 2013 04:17 |
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This show is going to be pretty much the only thing that comes close to satisfying my JoJo fix week to week between epsides.
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| # ? Jan 5, 2013 04:39 |
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I can't even believe how excited I am for the second season of this.   
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| # ? Jan 5, 2013 05:40 |
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In case anybody wants it, here's the old thread for it (archives required). So excited, it's the only thing this season I'm looking forward to watching. But the most important question is, what kind of facial expressions will we get from Chihaya this time?
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| # ? Jan 5, 2013 05:54 |
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Get hype planetarial posted:But the most important question is, what kind of facial expressions will we get from Chihaya this time?  
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| # ? Jan 5, 2013 05:58 |
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planetarial posted:
  Chihaya faces = best faces.
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| # ? Jan 5, 2013 06:03 |
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| # ? Jan 5, 2013 06:53 |
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Never thought I'd get into this show when I started watching it. It was mostly a desperation move during a dry season just after I'd bought a year subscription on Crunchyroll. And now the next season can't come fast enough.
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| # ? Jan 5, 2013 07:16 |
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This is definitely going to be one of the best series for this, otherwise seemingly poor, Winter.
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| # ? Jan 5, 2013 09:03 |
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I recently binged a bunch of episodes of this show; and it was way more compelling than it should have been, but I ended up losing steam at around ep 17. I was getting so into the actual card game episodes, the more romance-y episodes felt like filler. Still, I'm down for watching the new season, so I shall finish the remaining episodes and get hype.
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| # ? Jan 5, 2013 09:38 |
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Watched this after reading about it in the Best of 2012 thread and everyone over there was right, the show owns. Can't wait for the 2nd season.  
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| # ? Jan 5, 2013 17:06 |
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Most anticipated show for me this Winter can't wait.
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| # ? Jan 5, 2013 22:18 |
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Hrm another 6 days and it should be airing in Japan. Can't wait to see more of this. We need more pics of Chihiya's expressions, they are what make the show. Also real life snowmaru is awesome. Where the heck did you find them? Myurton fucked around with this message at Jan 5, 2013 around 22:34 |
| # ? Jan 5, 2013 22:32 |
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Myurton posted:Also real life snowmaru is awesome. Where the heck did you find them? Most of them are just Google pictures of the silly official merchandise that exists. One of them is from the corner of one of the trains to Omi Jingu that Kodansha decorated.
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| # ? Jan 6, 2013 00:59 |
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I just marathoned through the second half of season one last week and I can't wait for the new episodes to air. Maybe this'll be the show that finally makes me cave in and buy a Crunchyroll subscription.
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| # ? Jan 6, 2013 03:04 |
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Vildiil posted:Most anticipated show for me this Winter can't wait. Easily true for me as well. I'm actually still surprised that this got a second season, but I'm certainly not going to complain. That fact that it starts on the 11th is just icing on the cake. I still don't have words to describe how fantastic this scene from episode six was. MADHOUSE did a really good job with all the visuals in the show, but the first time Kana shares her love of poetry with Chihaya is presented so well it's insane.
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| # ? Jan 6, 2013 13:25 |
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Whew--Crunchyroll just announced that they'll be streaming Chihayafuru Season 2 on Fridays at 3pm EST.
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| # ? Jan 7, 2013 22:32 |
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OP's been updated with the Simulcast news.
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| # ? Jan 7, 2013 23:05 |
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I never got this, why does it say "Chihaya Full" here?
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| # ? Jan 8, 2013 23:21 |
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pandaK posted:I never got this, why does it say "Chihaya Full" here? I would guess it's a pun off of Chihayafuru, remember that R sounds are much closer to L sounds in Japanese than in English.
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| # ? Jan 8, 2013 23:32 |
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AVeryLargeRadish posted:I would guess it's a pun off of Chihayafuru, remember that R sounds are much closer to L sounds in Japanese than in English. Yeah, pretty sure that's it. 'Full' typically sounds a lot like 'Fu-lu'. Which isn't much of a leap to swap the 'l' for an 'r', as they're roughly the same sound.
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| # ? Jan 9, 2013 00:31 |
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This is probably the series I'm most looking forward to this season. The hands, the hands.  The varied ways all the different club members approach the game, and how they learn from each other's strengths, is really enjoyable to watch.
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| # ? Jan 9, 2013 03:27 |
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New season's poster image: Note Omi Jingu in the background and two new bugs in the bottom left.
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| # ? Jan 9, 2013 20:30 |
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I started watching the first season because I thought the idea of an anime about karuta was ludicrous. And then I just... couldn't stop watching. Really looking forward to the second season. 
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| # ? Jan 9, 2013 20:48 |
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Xelkelvos posted:This is definitely going to be one of the best series for this, otherwise seemingly poor, Winter. Even though I didn't watch is as it aired, I loved the first season, and am looking forward to this one.
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| # ? Jan 9, 2013 22:13 |
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I finally finished up the latter half of the first season yesterday, and I can't for the life of me imagine what caused me to pause in the first place. I'm so excited for the second. This show blends the virtues of shoujo and sports anime so well, and where those virtues overlap, specifically character growth, it really shines.
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| # ? Jan 10, 2013 18:24 |
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I started watching the first season a couple days ago after seeing all the goon-love it was getting in the AOTY thread. Now I am super stoked for more Competitive Poetry Recognizing!
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| # ? Jan 10, 2013 18:43 |
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Has anyone revealed how many episodes season two is going to be?
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| # ? Jan 10, 2013 19:24 |
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a kitten posted:Has anyone revealed how many episodes season two is going to be? 25 episodes just like season one.
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| # ? Jan 10, 2013 19:32 |
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This is the best show and everyone should watch it. I look forward to hearing more of Wataya's hilarious Fukui accent.
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| # ? Jan 11, 2013 01:32 |
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First episode of the new season is out on Crunchyroll. I'm liking the new student drama, for now at least. I'm definitely sad that it necessarily means less of characters I love, though. So, standard concerns for when the main cast of a show advances a year. I wonder if I can stand waiting a week between episodes? I might end up having to wait and marathon.
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| # ? Jan 11, 2013 21:03 |
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I just want to see what's the deal with the new guy. He's giving me some Sudo vibes, but it's probably just the eyes.
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| # ? Jan 11, 2013 21:30 |
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I am super amazed at how easily this show drew me back in. I haven't watched an episode of this show since season one ended. Didn't matter. Five minutes into season two I'm as invested as I ever was. I'm even interested in the new girl. The fact that she can be brought to tears by a poem speaks to a least a bit of a kindred spirit in Chihaya.
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| # ? Jan 11, 2013 21:39 |
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linall posted:The fact that she can be brought to tears by a poem speaks to a least a bit of a kindred spirit in Chihaya. That and how they both focus on what they want without regard for what getting it would actually involve. Found these little interviews about animating season one, if anyone's interested: http://www.madhouse.co.jp/column/ch...ru/index_e.html The newest is a year old, so it looks like we won't be getting any more. I'll quote the best bit for those not too interested in the animation: quote:Interviewer: This must be Gap Moe!
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| # ? Jan 11, 2013 23:10 |
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Hmm, I just realized Shinobu is skinny in the OP.
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| # ? Jan 11, 2013 23:21 |
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Caruta is our passion! Caruta is our life! The best shirt continue and Chihaya('s faces is back!). Also, I love the OP, so smoothing.
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| # ? Jan 11, 2013 23:57 |
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| # ? May 23, 2013 01:22 |
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Centzon Totochtin posted:Hmm, I just realized Shinobu is skinny in the OP. Trying to remember--wasn't she fat when we last saw her just because she was eating a lot of junk food and sending in the boxtops or whatever for some cute thing? She probably got back down to fighting weight between seasons. Good to see the new season still has the old charm, but I can't wait to see a little more on the new characters. It would be a shame if they aren't developed as well as we saw the others last season.
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| # ? Jan 12, 2013 00:38 |
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