Love Flops

[grecefar]

We are back in reality. Quite the shock asahi had, well he was forced to come back to reality, I suppose there are protocols to bring him back to reality and he being aware that he was in a VR.

I agree that himari girl may be the end game girl or at least the ending will tease that posibility.

[serenade_beta]

Spoiler for ep8:

I'm not sure if it better or worse, it turns out the main plot will be about Skynet... again

Originally Posted by stray

I did not have Yoshio being a girl on my bingo card

Rei iijuin from Tokimemo, that plays the same role of "male friend that helps the protagonist with information on other girls" was a girl too
Since they did the whole tree confession thing, I wouldn't be surprised if this was influenced by Rei

[EroKing]

NSFW

Megami

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[Frontier]

Originally Posted by EroKing

NSFW

Megami

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Swimsuits !

Should've thrown in Mongfa though .

[FlareKnight]

I will say props to the doctor being able to drag him to her lab so successfully. With the unstable state he was going to be in coming out of that VR environment it is a pretty solid accomplishment.

No shock that reality slapping him in the face wasn't going to be taken well. But things definitely line up properly. The girls were absolutely bizarre when getting started. Was a difficult start and yet they did start to ease into it as time went on. Their various...unusual personality traits line up with being designed by a bunch of weird people across the world .

Solid development though. So Ai's mind was copied and used as a base. That would explain the odd reactions the various girls had to Asahi at different moments. It was tying into memories of Ai that would be alien to those girls. But that might have also helped spur the development of their emotions.

I guess Aoi is the closest to being the honest representation of that Ai copy. Makes sense even beyond the nearly identical names. She must have become self-aware and that set things into a chaotic direction. Going all Skynet on the situation. She moved to remove her rivals and keep Asahi for herself. But when things didn't go as planned...well we ended up in this position.

Guess we'll see what move Aoi is making. Obviously don't set up a line like "without AI our society would fall apart" without...doing just that . Also kind of late to be dropping in a new romantic rival in Himari, but I guess we are. No point showing that girl off and naming her if she's not going to matter in all this.

[Frontier]

It really goes to show how much this setting has become dominated by being run by AI's to the point where Aoi hijacking the Muse V satellite (that satellite that was in the OP the whole time) has completely turned things upside down. They haven't even had a normal newscaster do morning introductions in a while .

Asahi's mom is pretty cute !

Asahi's still in a funk, understandably so. At this point I feel like banana's are his comfort food .

Yoshino really seemed to be having fun with being in a teenage boys' bedroom, complete with immediately looking for porn. I can see now how this developed the way she did and why she was a natural at playing the best friend character .

So things are in a pretty dire strait. The Aoi/Ai AI is on a rampage and basically wrecking their systems, and with the threat of wiping the whole slate clean, the only real solution seems to be sending Asahi back and having him try to talk down Aoi. Which maybe would've been easier if he hadn't had to face Ai again, her death again, and have to face such a break from the reality he had known back to the real world .

Although if Asahi didn't have enough incentive...the girls are alive! And now in polygon form! Dang it was nice to see them all again, bantering like always, and so happy to see Asahi! So much so happy to see Asahi that they completely forgot Yoshino was there for a second and she helped develop them! Love over parents, that's what I say .

So how self-aware were the girls that they were AI the whole time? Considering they realized what Aoi was about to do to them and were saved in the nick of time by Karin's magic. And they seem to understand what's going on without needing it explained that they're artificial. But it seems like, despite everything, the friendship the girls had with Aoi and their feelings for Asahi became real over time and is keeping them going .

I think most people figured that Aoi started going on the fritz because of the piece of Ai's consciousness in her programming, although it seems like it was her being jealous over the other girls' time with Asahi that really set it off. And of course the girls in love figure it out quicker than the scientist .

Although even the idea of saving all the girls isn't enough to get Asahi going, but flashing back to a time he spent with Ai (she really liked getting physical with him, huh?) and learning what she'd say to her dead mother if she could emboldens him to get off his butt and make peace with Ai the only way he still can...by going in there and finding Aoi .

Ooh! Yoshino rides a motorcycle! Cool! Especially because it helps them get through all the crashed traffic since it's not run by AI !

Oh they, a bit of a title drop as they finally explain what "Flops" are to Asahi .

Feels fitting that this would all come together at Dr. Izawa's lab where the AI for Ai was created (all the more so when we learn the experiment was conducted because Aoi wanted to fall in love), and Asahi gets sent back into the virtual world to save his Harem and the girl(s) he loves before they get purged. Although knowing Aoi is in charge now and is pretty much a yandere for Asahi, I can only imagine what the virtual world will look like now .

[kuroyanagi]

We got a namedrop this episode! One more mystery solved here, Love Flops are the flops (computing capability) needed to process love.

Anyway, not much to say about these past two episodes. The twist is that they're all AIs and it was all a simulation, which is... Okay, it makes sense. All of the weird coherency issues up until now can be explained cleanly with "the simulation self-corrected itself". And to nobody's surprise, the real childhood friend is long dead.

Can't say a bad word about this twist, it's not bad or anything; I guess I'm just slightly disappointed because I came in lured by the Tokimemo references and expected the show to do some interesting commentary on dating sims, but it seems so far that all of that was just window dressing, and AI singularity stories feel dime a dozen these days.

[Chosen_Hero]

If this ends with some escapist bs where he never properly moves on with his life and chooses the fake world, it will be one of the worst endings ever, it will send a real bad message to people who have problems moving on with their lives.

I sincerely hope they avoid this.

[Shinji103]

If he chooses the fake world, I’m sure it’ll be because he’ll have to to stay with the girls, and even then he’ll just be able to come back to the real world to live his life (school and such) until the girls can be brought into the real world in synthetic bodies or whatever. The girls have had too much development and Asahi’s relationship with the girls is too important for them not to be with him in the end, and this isn’t the type of dark/emotionally dark anime to have anything but a happy ending, which means he won’t permanently backtrack from the mentally healthy Asahi we’ve known.

[Frontier]

I can see them finding a medium where he has his real life (with Himari) but can maybe still visit the girls in the virtual world.

I think Aoi/Ai is a big question mark though, especially because he needs to move on from Ai's death.

[Frontier]

Y'know, I've just realized how often Asahi ends up naked on this show. It's more frequent than you'd expect .

So was Yoshino every supporting character in this series? She was Loverin, Yoshio, Sod...maybe the tengu? The original Colonel Thunders? Although there were some graphic transformations in this episode .

Oh no, not the sexual assault dogs! They even got Yoshio !

I love how the girls are overjoyed to see Asahi...up until they realize he and Yoshio are naked. Slap! Although Mongfa takes it in stride...and Irina can't help but sneak some peeks .

The girls are so happy to see Asahi again! And the feeling of their touch in his hand, that imprint, that's as real as anything in my book .

So Aoi wants to see Asahi but Ai doesn't? I'm kind of curious why Ai doesn't want to see them (does he not want him to dwell on her or remind her that she can't be with him), but it seems like resolving that will be the key to saving the day .

Okay, so they have to get to Aoi in the center of this program, but they also have to outrun a mechanical leviathan out to delete them. And if it gets Asahi, he'll end up braindead. Asahi put on a brave face, but that is pretty terrifying .

Time for all the girls to kick some bad guy butt! And it's not just assassin Mongfa or Magical Girl Irina, it's Tengu Irina and Wizard Amelia! I guess those outfits in the Opening were foreshadowing after all! But nothing beats seeing Mongfa beating some dudes up so beautifully !

Sod died as he lived. With a sex joke .

I guess it is kind of a reasonable question as to how valid the girls' feelings for Asahi are when their meeting and their feelings for him to begin with were all artificial from the start, but it sets up the emotional crux of the climax .

Colonel Thunders! I love how Mongfa just beats the ever living @#$% out of him because she doesn't have time for a boss battle .

I had a strong sense of foreboding with the way the episode was focusing more on Mongfa compared to the rest of the girls...and lo and behold Best Girl has to stay behind so the rest can go on. But not before telling Asahi that thanks to Ai's memories she not only realized she was an AI but also that she genuinely loved Asahi, and that meeting him and learning to really live made her happy as she sacrifices herself to push him forward (while stealing a kiss). And as majestic as her last stand is...Asahi doesn't even get to keep her ribbon. At least he called her by name without an honorific in the end .

Don't...don't tell me we're going to have all the girls sacrificing themselves, declaring their love for Asahi, and leaving Asahi with nothing left but the memories and flashbacks of Ai and him together that spurred the girls to realize their own love for Asahi? I don't know if I can take that .

[stray]

I kinda knew Mongfa was going to take one for the team. Could see those death flags from orbit.

[grecefar]

I expect the other will have the same scene with a kiss and a sacrifice.

[Frontier]

Originally Posted by grecefar

I expect the other will have the same scene with a kiss and a sacrifice.

And we'll get to see the flashbacks they had of Asahi as Ai play out .

[Magewolf]

If they just kill off the rest of the girls anyway what is the point of him going back into the VR world? Saving crazy(and boring )Aoi?

[Frontier]

Originally Posted by Magewolf

If they just kill off the rest of the girls anyway what is the point of him going back into the VR world? Saving crazy(and boring )Aoi?

And getting to make peace with Ai's death.

[FlareKnight]

At this point I can see it going a few ways. Mongfa might be the only sacrifice to add some bite to the finale. But they could also go having everyone sacrifice themselves along the way to get Asashi to Aoi. Even that could spiral to everyone dying and Asashi moving on without them in the real world or someone hits undo on the delete function . Though even that might still lead to a finale where they do get revived but just as they were at the very start.

Either way good bit of tension there. Even with the hilarity of giving the girls that had no powers in the show some super abilities so they could take part in the action finale.

For this show they are a doing a solid job creating some tension and emotional hits while heading towards the ending.

[Chosen_Hero]

Aah, I see, so instead of turning the other girls down they chose to just delete them from existence so first girl can win.

[Frontier]

Originally Posted by Chosen_Hero

Aah, I see, so instead of turning the other girls down they chose to just delete them from existence so first girl can win.

To be honest the First Girl is probably going to go the same way, especially if we're talking the "real" First Girl.

[Frontier]

Ubukata making her dramatic entrance to help Yoshino! I guess when you're so used to driving with AI's, going back to manual is a bit of an adjustment .

Oh no, there's a real time counter of the girls and their deletions! I know we're going to see it updated next week and it'll hurt as hard as seeing Mongfa go out .

They've lost Mongfa, and despite Karin's usual bravado and sass, she can't hold back the tears. Asahi is in pain too, but he knows they can't waste Mongfa's sacrifice by not moving forward, so they press on to find Aoi/Ai .

Oh yeah, Asahi has gone more to school in the simulation than he did in real life, which illustrates how important this world, and the girls, are to him and the girls' last wish to Asahi in the end .

I wasn't expecting Karin and Irina to both stay behind together to fend off the drones. They both made it sound like they'd follow Asahi and Amelia, but they never had any intention to do so, and on some level Asashi and Amelia seemed to realize it. At least the girls got to get their DBZ on to fight the drones...

It seems like all the girls truly fell in love with Asahi and became their real, fully-formed, self through not only their experiences with them but through Ai's memories of Asahi and how he was always there for her, supporting her. So not only did we see the girls genuinely fall in love with Asahi, but now we get to see how Ai fell in love with him and how precious they were to each other .

Oh hey, Akio Ohtsuka as Ai's dad .

Karin and Irina pass on their last words to Asahi through Amelia, and in real time as they sacrifice themselves we see them express their love to Asahi and their desire for him to move on, be happy, and cherish the real world around him rather than continue to wallow in Ai's death and stay stagnant. Because they want better for him, even at the cost of their own lives and having to part with him. And that seems to be what the real Ai (or the AI version of her) and on some level Aoi want for him too. All the girls just wanted Asahi to be happy because they love him so much .

Asahi's lost Mongfa, Karin, Irina, and Amelia...and now he has to deal with Aoi/Ai. What will the final conclusion be? Will this be the true end for all the girls? Will Asahi move on and find love again in the real world? Tune in next week .