bateszi anime blog

Despite clearly being the better of the original two Yokohama Shopping Trip OVAs, episode two serves up an unsettling mood of desolation and loneliness. During a five minute period in which Alpha simply brews a cup of coffee, there is no music, no dialogue, only the sounds of a creeky old house to keep her (and indeed, us) company. During this remarkably extended scene, outside the whispy white clouds shuffle and day becomes night- truely, I couldn’t tell whether Alpha was brewing her coffee for days rather than minutes, and with the way she seems to space out, I suspect that neither does she. This is perhaps the first solid piece of social commentary I’ve managed to construe from Yokohama Shopping Trip; I wonder if this scene is trying to convey the repetition of life- how we can happily stick to the same routines day in, day out irregardless of the time we waste doing so.
Aside from this period, most of episode 2 deals with Alpha learning to understand and express human emotion. It ends with a suitably attractive scene of Alpha and a friend looking out over the flooded cities of our present day, interestingly- the street lights still work, so when night approaches, the still rivers literally shine with a million neon lights. It’s a profound moment, subtely portraying the insignificant beauty of human life.