I know I can’t be the only one who is sort of frustrated that kyoani rarely let rin&haru interact with each other through the course of the anime but
in retrospect, I can’t blame them at all. I mean, there is plenty of RinHaru in every episode; from the shota flashbacks to scenes that are obviously meant to be taken as them thinking about each other, or other characters bringing up the effect they have on each other, so on so forth.
But when it comes down to it, Haru and Rin actually were in the same place and actually interacted, what? Three or four times?
And yet, let’s look at what happened each time:
Episode 1:
Haru goes from this:
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYgdJo1VdYB
and wanting to be “ordinary”
to this:
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNe5Kpagb2h
and thinking that waiting three more years to become ordinary “won’t hurt"
pretty much at the sight of Rin.
Meanwhile, Rin goes from this:
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqRsNAzR2k1
To feeling like this:
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmCOkEkR5Es
After just one race with Haru.
In other words all it took them as being around each other for about ten minutes for their respective motivation and enjoyment of swimming to come back full force.
Not only that but the moment they saw each other they got so caught up in their own little world that they ditched poor Makoto and Nagisa without even realizing it:
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtsAHRqoQ6t
Episode 2: sure they didn’t actually interact during the episode, but it brought us this:
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsw4Bnfgs6a
Episode 3: while this is probably the only time where they’re aware that they’re int he same place and nothing really happens, we still got Rin with his eyes trained on Haru:
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZoggA8cCsT
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEoPuGPj6DF
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSOS1PDdBtB
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsL6DwSNbAZ
and while Haru made sure not to look at Rin, he isn’t fooling anyone because just the thought of Rin talking about him alone made him make this face at the start of the ep:
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9j5JVnDJeq
THEN there was Episode 4, and I’m sure I don’t need to remind anyone of what happens there but I’ll do it because revisiting those scenes is always worth it
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡlpV2hS02Fj
They run into each other and there goes their cool:
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡV7ZQKnS3BM
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡN6JRVSlapZ
And then once "you’re going to swim for me” happens and Haru goes sparkly eyed,
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡU5QqBzcmaz
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4wD4wk15SD
Haru is suddenly all fired up about the prefecturals. He checks Rin’s old regime, starts running again, gives it his all and actually gets out of breath while swimming, so on so forth.
Then comes Episode 7 and this one alone goes to show pretty well just why KyoAni felt it necessary to keep these two apart.
I mean, boy where do I even begin?
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡoN3aUupN9k
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDvsC67bnJB
Haru literally spends the whole time since he gets to the prefecturals looking for Rin. I mean look at the expression he has when Rin doesn’t get there with the Samezuka team:
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtUyGe2HjcJ
AND then once Makoto tells him where Rin might be, Haru just goes straight over there without wasting a single second, in a way that is very similar to how Rin and Haru got caught up in each other back when they met in Episode 1.
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqZBdddiLQu
And then there’s of course the moment where Rin makes Haru’s world go dark. Literally.
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMCcXyVNbgj
“I won’t get to swim with Rin again”
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡet5Twuxvyu
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhdFSVIcU0l
Episode 8: is another good example of why even just them breathing the same air might get to be too much
because then things like these may happen:
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjaa9RtO6BH
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhij0Xa3zbl
The last instance so far is Episode 9: they were in the same place for a moment and yet Haru’s Rin senses turned out to be nearly as or just as sharp as Rin’s Haru one (“smells like mackerel”, anyone?)
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9LHt6HgTtq
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZjFJPjt1rY
That was close, Haru!
So, yeah.
BUT there’s more, because the same applies to promotional artwork, too. I mean I get why they keep Rin away and have him throwing looks at Haru. Because apparently if they look the other way they’ll find Rin getting pretty comfortable:
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkukd5bB09e
264Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡi8qipOUJMw
And they can’t have that happen because the show isn’t over yet.
Conclusion: if KyoAni lets Rin and Haru anywhere near each other they won’t only cause ripples that will affect one another; they’ll outright create a tsunami or get all close and personal. And get too caught up in each other while they’re at it.
It’s either one or the two or both. So I guess I can understand why it’s being saved for the finale lol
ns 15.158.61.8da2
