White Album - Episode 2

The opening episode of White Album certainly played its cards pretty close to its chest, only giving us a few glimpses of most of its major characters and leaving us to work out the rest for ourselves - A fact that seems to have been much appreciated by many of you, judging from the comments on my last entry for this series.

In many ways, this second episode continues in a similar vein, just letting things take their course without ever really feeling the need to stop and fill us in about what's going on, or dropping any heavy hints as to the feelings or intentions of any character. The more I think about it, the more I have to confess that it's rather refreshing, and once again in this episode we're left in the dark about a couple of things, which actually adds to the blend which is starting to make this show interesting.


Interestingly, this "work it out for yourself" ethic is actually offset against the moments where we are given glimpses into the hidden thoughts and meanings of (mostly Touya's) thoughts and conversations by way of on-screen text. I can't exactly call it innovative, but it does have a certain something about it that also adds an extra layer to the series, bringing us in a little closer to his life and the situations he encounters.

Certainly, there are plenty of things going on in episode two to lend themselves to questioning those aforementioned emotions and motives - There's the quiet, mysterious Haruka paying a visit to Touya and dragging him out into the park late at night to just sit and watch the stars, there's some good news (we think) for Yuki, and then there's Rina... Ahh, yes, Rina - Just exactly what is she doing after meeting Touya for the first time, and is whatever she's up to in league with Yuki in some way?

As you can probably guess by all of this, I've really been sucked into White Album by this episode, after being a little unsure of its opening instalment. It's still far, far too early to start talking about this series in terms of being 2009's True Tears or anything of that sort, but in this second instalment it's really built itself up nicely, to the point where I'm loathe to have to wait another week to see how it develops next time around - Always a good sign for any anime series a couple of weeks into a new season.