Haruhi Suzumiya: Episode 4

As you have probably noticed by now, “The Boredom of Haruhi Suzumiya” is not an ordinary anime series. In particular, it doesn’t feel compelled to follow linear time progression. So this week’s episode jumps ahead in time and refers back to events that have not yet been broadcast. In summary, the SOS Brigade gained a new member, and except for Kyon, nobody seems quite normal. This week, however, it all starts out as regular and unassuming as it could get: Mikuru is serving tea.

Into the room storms Haruhi, in desperate need of getting relief from her mounting boredom. She just decided to enter the SOS Brigade in the national baseball championship and has come to tell her club members how they will spend the next few days. A team is quickly assembled, as everyone offers to bring some friends along. The first game will be two days from now, on a Sunday.

Haruhi recognizes that in order to win the SOS Brigade team will need some practice. So they walk over to the school’s baseball field and tell the currently practicing team to hitch a hike. Resistance to this suggestion is quickly dispelled by Haruhi through the use of her favorite weapon, Mikuru’s moe. The baseball team is only too eager to watch Mikuru play.

Haruhi decides to hit some balls. As can be seen, everyone reacts differently. The fastest on their feet is the baseball team in its attempts to catch some uncommon views of Mikuru.

Practice ends for the SOS Brigade (except for Haruhi), when Kyon guides Mikuru off the field, because she is frightened of all the balls flying by.

Haruhi is pissed about the attention that Mikuru is getting from Kyon and decides to take it out on the local baseball team. But after exactly one thousand pitches, even this is over.

Kyon asks Yuki to make it rain on Sunday so that the upcoming match will be canceled. However, in the end, both worry that interfering with this world’s delicate global ecosystem may have too many unintended and potentially harmful side-effects, and so they decide to not do it.

On Sunday, the full SOS Brigade team is gathering before the match. Mikuru brought a friend, and so did Kyon. Kyon actually brought two friends and his little 11-year old sister, deliberately mocking the whole exercise. Haruhi is less than amused but in the end it doesn’t matter to her. She is going to kick butt one way or another.

Haruhi, the strategist, has it all worked out for the team. She knows exactly what’s best and who gets to do what in which order. She throws the dice.

The other team is a profiessional college team, and Kyon is getting worried. But first it is Haruhi to step up for the first round. She hits the ball far, to the amazement of everyone involved.

The next team members aren’t nearly as successful. Mikuru is too afraid to bat, Yuki fearlessly stares at the ball but doesn’t move at all. Kyon as the last batter is trying his best but doesn’t manage to hit a ball either. Haruhi is unhappy.

Then it is for Haruhi to pitch. She throws a funny ball and manages to confuse the opposing team’s batter. But the other team qucikly figures it out and Haruhi’s mood worsenes further.

With the SOS Brigade doing poorly, Haruhi decides once more to bring out her all purpose weapon, Mikuru’s cuteness.

But is not just Mikuru: Some weird stuff is happening, and physics starts working in weird ways. It is obvious that Haruhi is manipulating the time/space continuum to her advantage, with unclear consequences. Kyon for one is getting worried.

It is looking so bad that if the SOS Brigade doesn’t win the next run the game will be lost and most likely Haruhi’s manipulations will destroy the world. Kyon wants to avoid this and decides to push it hard this time. He manages to make some points. He also convinces Yuki to intervene and help them win the game. Yuki bats the ball right out of the stadium. She then hands over the bat to the next team member, telling them that she chanted an incantation that put the bat into homerun mode: The bat won’t miss a single ball and hit it out of the park each time. And so it happens.

The other team is flabbergasted. With more time/space continuum manipulations, carefully carried out by Yuki, the SOS Brigade team manages to win another run and eventually the whole game.

In the end, all is well, and the world is saved. Haruhi even agrees to Kyon’s suggestion to forfeit their victory. Apparently, she is already bored by baseball as well. The other team’s captain thanks Kyon tearfully and buys the SOS Brigade’s bat from him.

The SOS Brigade gathers in a restaurant to celebrate their victory.

Everything seems to be back to normal, but of course it isn’t. Next up is either soccer or American football.