>>29375

Makes sense

I prefer the book.

It goes into more detail and there aren't any of those obnoxious mascot characters.

The anime OP is very nice though.

I think of it as No Longer Human for NEETs, but with a much less depressing story/ending.

It didn't change my life at all lol.

>>29375
It was always intended to be a NEET fantasy-fulfillment romance. The premise is so unrealistic but the characters themselves feel somewhat real. The author said that he put some of his own experiences into the book so it's no doubt that certain elements come from a very real place.

>>29377
I am currently listening to the audio book on YouTube can confirm i like it a little better than the anime.

I'm even older than satou was now and theres no misaki for me

>>29384

I know how you feel anon.

>>29384
Brutally honest truth is none of us get a misaki.

It made me realize how depressed I was because of how much I related to Satou. I grew up with the mantra "life sucks, deal with it", so I thought everyone was miserable like me.

It all sounds funny in hindsight.

>>29387

Same

>the NEET with friends who goes out and has exciting adventures every episode

if there were at least two or three episodes where he does nohting but drink alone and try and distract himself from existence then it might have been effective. i'm still waiting for a SoL based on somewhat realistic NEETism. Genshiken was a good comparison.

>>29389
>Goes out and has exciting adventures every episode

Not every episode but almost every one.

I think I hadn't even started my hiki days back then, so it didn't hit me on a personal level. Tatami Galaxy, however, did.

Post edited on 13th Sep 2017, 2:06am

>>29375
This was kind of my problem with it too. NHK was definitely a great ride, but I felt like I was missing out on a part of what makes the characters "relatable" to other people since I don't really seek relationships or what society considers a fulfilled lifestyle. I'm perfectly fine with the entertainment my otaku hobbies gives me.

>>29411
This

>>29411
Satou didn't really seem to have much of any goals, but if he did have any then chatting it up like an old pro wasn't one of them. The job was a last resort to avoid starvation. He did not seek out the GF and he was with Yamazaki all the way on the topic of bitches and romance.
Satou wanted to stay inside watching TV, smoking cigs and drinking beer. He displayed a tendency to fall in love 2nd girls easily, but his relationship with the one 3dpd he had sex with was emotionally barren.
I think that the author's message might have been something like "I know being a NEET is awesome, but you can't do it forever. Eventually you will have to participate in NT society", but Satou didn't harbor those feelings. They didn't go out of the way to show how much he loved having a job after he got one because he probably didn't like it. Satou was warned by Yamazaki about how manipulative women are, but at the end of the anime you can see that Satou has fallen under the influence of manipulative female.
The author might think that it's wonderful that everything "worked out" for Satou, but if the author had given Satou access to enough free food and rent money at the end then our boy would have gone right back inside, turned on the TV, cracked open a cold one and he wouldn't emerge again until the trash bags were as high as an elephant's eye.

tl;dr satou was a victiim of circumstance and not a normie

I liked the series a lot, and am definitely due for a re-watch (it's been 10 years for me now).
>>29421
>How did this anime change your life?
It made me realize and/or cement my thinking that between the big divide between normals and non-normals there was such thing as "failed normals": People who ended up being left behind by external conditions pushing them down instead of internal ones keeping them in, but still desperately yearn for normalcy. This brings me to agreeing with...
>>29421
>I think it'd be safe to assume he wouldn't have become that way if it weren't for this.
I agree. I think the reason why Satou is so unrelatable for so many is that he was never that much a misfit, but rather a washout, who just needed a push and support to go back to being an ordinary man, with ordinary aspirations and interests.

Count another fan of NHK here. I really enjoyed the show, although the ending felt really rushed probably due to financial or deadline shortcomings. The manga has many more memorable scenes (the most striking scenes are the ones in which he goes to live with his parents) and the novel had a much richer and more personal setting. I would most definitely recommend those before the anime.

>>29429
I didn't realize the manga was so different. I guess I'll have to read it.
I agree the novel is fantastic.

>>29429
Isn't Misaki a bitch in the novel??.

>>29437
Aren't all women?

>>29439

True

>>29437
She is in every iteration of this work, not just the novel. Holy balls of the Lord I hate Misaki so much.

>>29444

Why?.

I'm watching this right now actually, though I know I'm late. It's hard to feel sorry for him when he cries over things like getting his allowance cut in half. The whole suicide fiasco was pretty absurd as well and now it seems like he's going to get hooked on an MMO.

I did feel for this guy though. His wife and kids leaving him as soon as things got tough is messed up. I'm surprised he would even want her back.

>>29459

I felt bad for him too

I enjoyed it but it didn't make me reconsider my life or anything.

>>29503

Same

>>29545
Please be more constructive in your posts, this is a warning as your excessive "this", "true", and "same" posting offers no constructive discussion.

>>29547
k

>>29547
His posts are fine.

>>29547

Thanks i will take this into consideration.

I couldn't finish this. I stopped watching it around episode 5 or so because it hurt a bit too much to watch. Should I revisit it or will it just depress me? Can the obvious ending (Satou becoming a "productive member" of society) be read in any other way than advocating normalism?

I really just hope this isn't like the Grinch where I'm left in tears by the 1984esque defeat for the protagonist

>>29573

I found myself depressed at how Satou finds a new girl for each arc and then stupefied as how quickly he forgets everything he learned from the previous experience as things move into the next arc. The arcs will either sucker punch you, or make your roll your eyes at the situation.


The ending isn't advocating normalism so much as the end result of what happens of when the wellfare checks stop coming and you have to make ends meet one way or another if you don't want to starve in the streets. I'd hardly call the end result "productive" for him, Once she graduates from school, he's going to quit being a positive role model for her and go back to being a hikki 16 hours a day and working 8 hours to pay for rent and his addictions.

>>29574
>The ending isn't advocating normalism so much as the end result of what happens of when the wellfare checks stop coming and you have to make ends meet one way or another


True i mean as far as i know Neetbux technically don't last forever.

Got to face reality eventually?

>>31781

It has been 2 years and i am still a hikikomori neet sitting in my room jobless no motivation and not doing anything.

Currently watching this. It's fun, but blatantly obvious that its little more than anti-hikikmori propaganda. Satou doesn't even feel like a hikikmori either, he's more of a failed normalfag. He just lacks motivation, he doesn't seem like a genuinely broken person who has spent a lifetime of abuse.

>>32024
He's certainly a very outgoing and social hikikmori.

It didn't.

>>32024
>>32025
Read the book and manga they are both better also keep in mind that hikikomori are technically failed normalfags and Satou was trying to get out of being a hikikomori not be one forever.

>>32025
Every human being is social. Even if you're not good in social situations, you will still pine for some type of social interaction. You're here on this internet forum right now interacting with others. Just because you can handle having an IRL friend doesn't mean you're a normalfag. Even weird people can have friends.

The book is better.

>>32674
I read the novel fairly recently and I liked it a lot more. It was more focused, and the way the story flowed was so much more satisfying.

It didn't change my life at all, I have largely forgotten about it. I like being a hiki so it's not really applicable to me anyway.

Fuck, man. I just remembered Satou was only 22 in this.

>>32714

I am a 25 year old hikikomori.

NHK coldly and effectively exploited anime viewer's mopey melancholy and self pity for great financial rewards. Anyone who was chump enough to fall for the hey that anime character is just like me! routine should feel ashamed and embarrassed.

>>32762

I think you're waaaay overthinking it anon.

>>32762
It's a conspiracy.

>>29372
It didn't change anything, well maybe it changed my grades since i watched it during my finals instead of studying but oh well.
The only reason Sato went outside in the first place was because he had a reason to, I don't have a reason to nor can I find one that is better than what I am doing now, so why bother.
Of course, the novel hit me harder than the anime and I had to take a second shower after reading Sato's lolicon monologue but nothing major changed.
The show is obviously pandering to NEET and Hikki fantasies but of course we all know that a cute girl taking pity on us is never going to happen so why even entertain the thought.

I didn't really find the anime that compelling. At least the way he's portrayed in the anime, Satou maybe isn't a social butterfly but he definitely seems socially competent enough to have/had a middling relationship with Hitomi, form friendships with Yamazaki, etc. His agoraphobia seemed almost tangential.

The only point I sort of got out of the anime was that Satou's main issue is his gullibility and his inability to manage his life (the way he just falls into the pyramid scheme, wastes his money on gaming, etc.).

>>32767

I felt about the same way. He was by and large a normalfag, also a complete moron with little self control and a touch more paranoia than would be reasonably expected, but still a normalfag that would talk to people, meet women (every arc centers around a different one), and then return to the status quo before the next arc.

I've heard his personality is a lot more hikkikomori in the novels, but I didn't bother. The anime was a slog that I finished for completion sake.

I didn't feel anything from watching the anime. I think the reason many people relate to it or think it's depressing is because the hikkikomori lifestyle is shocking for them, either because they're a functional person or a hikki themselves that lack doesn't or avoid to think about his situation too much. When I watch the anime, my opinion throughout the show is this is just normal stuff I do everyday bar the human relationships and adventure. The "everybody is broken and has issue" message are also delivered quite flatly. As >>29459 mentioned, the whole jumping from suicide to mmo to whatever the next episode is going to be is absurd and feels more like the author is trying to show sheltered people how depressing the world is when I am already sick of this kind of stuff. My point is, the author isn't a particularly good writer or anything, his only strength is having knowledge about the hikki lifestyle but then so do I. If being neet or hikki isn't such a relatable thing in the anime community, nobody would remember this anime. I don't think it's really that terrible, just overrated. It might be worth a watch but it's ridiculous if it become anybody's top anime.

nothing is real or honest about a NEET just getting a job through begging

>there is STILL no anime as real or brutally honest as Welcome to the NHK.
I think that depends entirely on your perspective. I could say the same thing about Kaiji and the ugly picture it paints of greed, poor life chooses, and what people are willing to do for a buck.

>>32775
Pretty sure I would be dead if we didn't have the dole here. It has been a long time since I watched NHK but I think I remember how it went for Satou. If you were begging for a job in real life, it would actually go worse for you if you were visibly starving.

>>32674
Only good version.

>>32774
>The hikikomori lifestyle

Hikikomori is a distinct psychiatric condition that is not directly caused by a physical condition or another psychological problem It's not just another lifestyle. being a hikikomori is not the same as being a generic shut-in Neet or an introvert who likes to stay home. A hikikomori is a specific type of shut-in most of the time a Neet who does not leave their bedroom in their parents house or single room apartment and isolates themselves away from society and their family for 6 months.

>>32828
I did not meant lifetyle in the sense that it is something done for amusement nor that people choose to be hikkikomori out of trivial reason. I simply use it to describe a way of life, in this case the condition of a hikkikomori. It was a poor choice of word.

>>32779
Thats the Lain guy who did the art for book, isn't it? Was he involved in the NHK anime at all?

>>32833
You mean Yoshitoshi ABe?
No, at least i don't think he was.

>>32833
He was not, but he did do the cover illustration and his design for Misaki forms the basis for the anime version's.

I reread the novel but in Japanese this time. I noticed some differences between it and the Tokyopop translation.

Satou's hikikomori song lyrics use the old kana orthography, e.g. きょう is written as けふ. Likewise, later in the novel, "tetsuhou" was actually written as てつはう. This doesn't really come across in the translation.

When Yamazaki is drunkenly rambling about Nanako, he first uses "boku" but then corrects himself by saying, "iya, kono ore ga," which is lost in translation, where he just says, "I... I," making it sound like he's merely hesitating or stuttering.

There's a part where Satou is describing what he thinks Misaki will say and do to him in response to his actions by the elementary school. In doing so, he quotes or paraphrases the Bible and refers to what is supposedly the corresponding verse, but he gets the first two references wrong. For some reason, the way it's wrong differs between the Japanese text and the translation, and the translation quotes a different verse for the second one. I wonder why.
>神はすべての罪を知っている！（ルカ　18:18）
Luke 18:18 has nothing to do with the quote.
>み子に従わない者は命を見ない！（ヨハネ　3:16）
He refers to John 3:16, but the text is more in line with John 3:36.
>The Lord knows all your sins!
The endnote refers to John 3:20, but that verse doesn't really have anything to do with the quote.
>For if our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart and knoweth all things
The endnote refers to John 3:36, but the text used here is actually pretty much 1 John 3:20.

At one point, Satou's narration reads:
>一句浮かんだ。
>
>　梅雨明けで、すかっと爽やか、スーサイド
I think that first sentence means something more like, "I thought up a haiku," even though it's 5-8-5 rather than the more typical 5-7-5. The translation reads:
>A line from a poem popped into my head: The end of the rainy season, refreshing, suicide.
which makes it sound more like he's remembering part of an existing poem that's not necessarily a haiku.

One thing that bugged me about the translation was the mismatched name order. They use "Satou Tatsuhiro" and "Misaki Nakahara" even though "Satou" and "Nakahara" are the family names. Of course, it's fine in the Japanese text.

At the beginning of chapter 8, there's this exchange:
>「持病の癪（しゃく）が！」
>「シャクって何？」
Misaki doesn't know the word 癪, so Satou berates her in his head to go study more. The translation uses the more common word "problems" instead, arguably making Misaki come off as more clueless than she was originally portrayed. There's a similar issue later on when Misaki quotes from a book, "retto itto bii," and then asks Satou what it means. In the translation, it's merely "Let it be" in plain English without an endnote or anything.

The text contains over 100 instances of 「…………」. In the translation, they seem to be omitted or replaced with things like, "I didn't say anything," "I had nothing to say," "I was speechless," "I didn't answer," etc., I guess because using ellipses that way can come off as incorrect, confusing, or annoying to English speakers.

Interestingly, the word ニート/NEET doesn't seem to be used anywhere in the main text. It only appears in a second afterword that was appended some time in or after 2005, years after the book's original date of publication. Speaking of which, there's a page near the end that notes that this story was originally serialized on the web in 2001.

>>29372
I really like the soundtrack and still listen to it sometimes even to this day. That said, the novel remains my favorite version for reasons similar to those mentioned by >>32676.

>>32674
I prefer the earlier cover art.