i think i've said something like this in the past, about how nii sensei's storytelling choices themselves contribute to the overall story being told to us.
for example, the series' constant emphasis on the fact that fighting = communication, sets up the suo-nirei fight to be the most honest suo has ever been except we all know it was actually his biggest lie. so on and so forth.
i'm now thinking about how, multiple months into suo's character arc, we are yet to see much of his pov. the little we've gotten of his pov has also been entirely removed from his internal mindscape and has been moreso about introducing bkk-gai to us as a setting.
and now, there is a growing focus on sakura's pov of the situation which, for the record, has always been a bit of a thing in side character arcs—he is the series mc after all—but what's different this time is the nature of sakura's pov.
whether it be togame, anzai, kiryu, momiji, or any other character whose arc sakura has been involved in, we've always gotten his pov as an agent of change. he is invested and involved while still being removed in a sense, allowing for his pov to work independently, in a way that introduces spark and movement into a story that might otherwise feel stuck and tragic.
this time though, we get sakura's pov as the person most directly and significantly impacted by suo's arc. if anything, it's closer to the tone that his pov tends to take when we're exploring arcs that are integral to His character development instead of somebody else's—and that clearly is the intention like, for better or for worse, sakura Is meant to learn something and grow from it here. this is a main story arc as much as it is a side character arc.
which means a guy like suo, who probably never intended to be anything but ephemeral, is inseparable from sakura's own arc. where he is found stuck and tragic, so is sakura. his life cannot unfold without rippling out into sakura's and the storytelling structure is proof of it.
theartofmadeline
andulkaphoto
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