Only one reference this week: the chapter’s title image is a reference to the music video of the Asian Kung-Fu Generation song Rewrite. (This is also the band that lends their surnames to the series’ four main characters, remember.)
I feel like Bocchi’s line in the bottom-right panel of page 20 is also a reference (especially given Nijika’s comeback), but I haven’t been able to match it to anything.
Page 18, can someone with a magnifying glass (or a zoomable digital edition) work out what the second kanji in between the top two panels of the left-hand strip is? I’ve pencilled in 音量 on the vocab sheet (which has now been proofed, incidentally), but I’m not confident on that. Nor am I certain it’s 音響 either…
I don’t really understand this page, especially the sequence on the left.
In the first one, is 私がギターヒーローって知ったら驚くぞ Bocchi’s thoughs? And 虹夏 saying that she is “guitar hero” is in her imagination?
And then not sure what happens in the next three. Did Bocchi play something? The friend says that she sucks but thinks that she’s the best?
From the rest of the chapter, I think I gather that Bocchi sucked at playing with the others and they are surprised as she is great solo, but then they explain that it’s due to her “コミュ症”, social anxiety. They find a solution by making her play hidden in a box x)
Would love to know if I got that right or if I missed something.
Then they also name ひとり ぼっち because of that, and decide on the band’s name 結束バンド. Not sure what’s the pun there.
I haven’t yet re-read the chapter so I hope that I remember correctly but basically Bocchi expects that as soon as she plays, the other girls will immediately notice that she’s an amazing guitarist and they’ll realize that she’s GuitarHero (the part she imagines in the first cell).
But in reality because of her anxiety and lack of group experience, she actually plays poorly and the girls are underwhelmed, which creates the humoristic twist of this strip.
Yep. Basically she’s getting all arrogant. She’s expecting to knock their socks off because she’s so awesome at playing. Imaginary Nijika is going “Wow, I can’t believe I know Guitarhero!”
The next two panels are the three of them playing a song together. The ジャラ～ン is the reverb of the final note dying away, basically. Nijika’s thoughts are sarcastic and/or lying - Ryo’s response is that she’s gotten things backwards, she said the truth aloud and the lie in her head.
It’s ギタ男くん that’s doing the explaining, and to us, rather than in any manner that the characters can hear. Basically, because she can’t make eye-contact with the others, she’s missing all the non-verbal cues that musicians exchange as they play together, so she’s completely out of sync.
I feel like the box is more a solution to her sudden spike of stage fright resulting from her great shame. It’s not really gonna solve the basic issue of not being in sync.
The nickname choosing was incidental to the box - Nijika just needed something to call Bocchi while announcing the band members onstage. The band was already called 結束バンド at that point, hence Nijika’s “うっ” and “キャーッ” when Bocchi asked what it was. I figure Nijika came up with it at some point in a spike of youthful passion without spotting the pun, and since it amuses Ryo, they’re stuck with it.
Haha, whoops, I just realised I mistook the splash panel on page 23 for chapter 3’s title image and stopped two pages short of the actual end of the reading. That’s been rectified now.
You’re not alone, I was thinking “huh, already done with this week? That was short…” and I had to check reading assignment (amount of pages) in the opening post, haha.
That’s how I interpreted it. I don’t know if ミジンコ is used idiomatically in Japanese to mean an utterly worthless creature or if it’s just a choice by the author.
I searched in a couple Japanese dictionaries and I don’t see a figurative meaning listed, so I’m thinking it’s just the author having a bit of fun.
I am really struggling with the panels I read today. Mostly I think it is confusion around って and other grammar and trying to figure out how it combines with the vocabulary. I’m including the notes I made while reading.
p20 - 7th
“They said it is me who is so not good at this!” “I said you’re good.” “Ah, the p-performance is also, but the main character is also completely useless.” (I’m not entirely sure who is speaking in the first bubble)
p20 - 8th
“Ahahaha, holding my life and a ritual suicide show, but” [I’m sorry I’m very bad!] “I should go home and remember approximately the b-band name” (So, uh, bocchi isn’t doing too good here, and I am struggling to make sense of her speech) “Too much rock!!” (I wouldn’t really equate “rock” with “disturbing” but maybe there are different connotations I am not aware of.)
p21 - 1st
“If Hitori-chan is being jeered at, I will do what is called ‘bomb’ on the base” (planning a distraction, I think) “Saying you’ve made such a fancy noise on the thing called a base.” (These って parts are really confusing me…)
I think these three panels are the ones giving me the most trouble, the other three I at least kind of get the gist of what’s going on. Any help to make sense of these would be appreciated, thank you.
It’s Nijika speaking the first bubble. I reckon it’s the “too, also” meaning of だって - “I’m not all that good either”. Second bubble is Ryo, as per the little face, and she’s saying “I (meaning Ryo) am good”. Third bubble is Bocchi, MC here is… uh, “emcee”. Same as the English acronym. “Master of Ceremonies”. Though in this context it means the banter that the band does to the audience between songs - announcing band members, announcing songs, cracking jokes. So, it’s “It’s not just the performance, I’m bad at MCing too”.
Yah, second bubble is a bit obscure becase the subject is completely omitted, but I’d say it’s the audience - if Bocchi commits harakiri onstage, the audience will at least go home remebering the band’s name.
It’s being used as a slangy adjective. Somewhat like we might use “metal” in English, I’d say - “that’s so metal!”.
“That’s so rock”? Do we say that? They’re of similar origin, in any case - “metal” in this usage comes from heavy metal rock music. Though in this instance, it’s too rock.
It’s basically “I’ll go “bomu” with my bass” - she’s gonna hit them with her bass, which produces a “bomu” sound. Not completely clear on why “bomu” is a fancy noise, but there’s an illustration of her doing it in the background, either way.
あちゃ