K-On The Movie: A Betrayal of its Series and Genre - Part 1 - Bait-and-Switch Performance, Opening Sequence & Azusa's Assassination

Hey guys, Indigo Drift/Solaris here, and welcome to my blog site. I have a lot I can post about here, but the first thing I want to get to is something I've been wanting to do since September 2022; a long analysis explaining my viewpoint on K-On The Movie. I originally planned to have this in the form of a long form video that I decided would be 3 parts long, but a lot of complications with editing has gotten me to decide to do it as a blog series instead. It'll allow me to release these tangents in a shorter time period and even allow me to make some expansions to my points that weren't in my original video script. With all that out of the way, time to begin this long journey.

 

August 23rd, 2021. This specific date is where I was shaped into the person I am now, because this was the date where I started watching a little known anime called K-On! Now, what is K-On, you may ask? Well, it's a sweet little slice of life anime about a group of girls who form a band while cute things that are either related to or detached from music ensue. I discovered this show 2 months prior to watching it through some GIFs and images showing up on my Twitter timeline (I was also oocupied by Death Note at the time, lol) so I was very excited to check it out, but man, did I heavily underestimate how much I'd end up loving it on my first binge, and my love for it has only gotten stronger as I've thought about it a lot and found a lot more details about it that blew me away, which were solidified by the multiple rewatches I've given this show since then. At this point, I can easily say that K-On is my all time favourite piece of media, a position that has not been topped for over a year. 

Its incredible pacing where nothing feels like it drags out at any point or goes by too quickly, almost 100% consistency with its effective comedy combined with its high sense of energy that makes each scene at least smile worthy at worst and absolutely joyous at best, incredibly entertaining and well written character dynamics, combined with a heartwarming friendship between the main cast, characters that are a lot of fun and greatly written in their own, with a few of them actually getting their own little character arcs that pay off tremendously, animation that manages to be both incredibly smooth and highly expressive depending on what the tone of the scene requires, phenomenal OST with really unique and charming background music and vocal songs that go harder than you could ever imagine, and emotional core that it builds up near the end of Season 2 that never ceases to move me every time I rewatch the show are many of the reasons why I've become more attached to this than any other anime, game or movie I've ever seen throughout my life, and I have a review on AniList here if you wanna see me elaborate further on these points. https://anilist.co/review/19150

With the overwhelming love I hold for the show, you could only imagine that when I was getting near to the end of Season 2 during my first binge, I would absolutely be craving for more, and more is exactly what I would have been able to get, even if it's just one final entry. Because it wasn't long until I discovered that K-On got a movie that released on December 3rd, 2011. I was already naturally hyped from the moment I made this discovery, but then I looked up reviews which shared the sentiment that it was K-On at its absolute best, so by the time I was ready to check it out, my expectations were sky high, because Graduation Ceremony was one of the best finales to anything I had ever seen, if not the best, so I was chomping at the bit to see how they could top that. Then on August 25th, 2021, I finally checked it out, but I had a strong feeling that something was off after it was over. I tried convincing myself that it was just me, but in the end, while I didn't think it was bad, per se, I had it rated lower than the series because it just didn't click with me for some reason, and I couldn't live with the empty feeling I had after watching it, so I really wanted to find out why I felt this way. The logical conclusion to come to is that the emptiness came from the knowledge that it would be the last time I would ever see these characters in animated form, but I didn't know of the movie's existence until after I had finished the final episode of Season 2, so I assumed that was the last time I would see the characters I've become incredibly attached to, and I didn't have that empty feeling at that time.

But then... I did the unthinkable. I gave this movie some deeper thought after rewatching it on November 14th, 2021, and that's when some cracks started to show, which only got bigger and bigger as I later rewatched it again on April 25th, 2022 and gave it even more forethought for the next 5 months. In that time, every element of the film seemed to fall apart at the seams where finally realizing why I felt so empty the first I saw it, and ever since rewatching both the show and movie throughout November 2022, I am now fully confident explaining my position on this in the best way I can. 

K-On The Movie is an absolute failure on every possible account. At first glance, there doesn't seem to be anything out of the ordinary. At the very least, it just seems like an extended episode of K-On with all the fun and heart that come with the series, alongside serving as an extension to the timeline that makes the finale of the series even more impactful than it already was. But as I'll be demonstrating throughout this analysis, that couldn't be further from the case. The plot is lacking in both substance and consistency, it barely feels like it even tries to be in line with the charm of the series with how discomforting the humour and vibes can get, the main emotional core of the film has so little focus that it's left criminally undercooked, and there is nearly irreparable damage done to the series in one way or another, between the nullification of the show’s emotional highs, the dynamics that made the show as great as it was being butchered or barely existent and the mishandling, mistreatment or blatant assassination of almost every character. I never understood what it was about this movie that made so many people deem it as the pinnacle of K-On from the beginning, but now I get it even less after realising how much this film fails to function as a finale/extension, a self contained addition to the series, or even just the surface level of being a simple slice of life where cute girls go on a trip to a foreign country. 

And for those reading who could be wondering how a movie based on K-On can be this bad when it was made by the same people who worked on the show and is praised by pretty much everyone in and out of the fandom, believe me when I say that you'll come to understand my position on this movie by the time this analysis is over, even if your general opinion on it doesn't change at all (because that's expecting too much, not gonna lie). Throughout this blog series, I'll be covering each bit of this movie as we go through it scene by scene, from story events, to characters, to themes, to sentiments it tries to push forward, and how they serve to destroy everything that made the series so special. In other words, I am going to explain exactly why K-On The Movie is a betrayal of its series and genre.

For this first part, I'll be covering the first 13 minutes of the movie, because it already manages to break itself to a significant degree in that time.

The movie opens up with a picture of Yui and her fellow bandmates before Yui wakes up from her alarm going off, akin to how the first episode of the show opened up. This could be seen as showing Yui transitioning from high school to college much like the first episode showcased her transitioning from junior high to high school. Except for one thing. The next shot we see is of Sakuragaoka High School, and a few shots later, we see four of the five HTT members still in their third year there. And just from that alone, the movie already fails to have an understanding of the series it's based on. The point of Disband the Club showing that picture of Yui and her friends in junior high was to communicate the fact that Yui has graduated from there and is now a high schooler without having to tell it through a narration, which was backed up by the scene it's in going to great lengths to communicate who Yui is through mainly the animation. But the movie pulling this same thing despite Yui still being in high school removes all the purpose of the scene they attempted to recreate in the first place. 

 

Then after that, we get a few shots of random students as a heavy metal song is playing in the background before cutting to none other than Ho-kago Tea Time who are playing this same song? Really? They're playing a song that is in no way in line with the songs they usually play? Also, it feels really jarring going from the recreation of Season 1's opening to this because there's pretty much zero connection between them. If this is trying to be like how Season 2 opened up with Yui being the first one to be in in the light music club playing a guitar solo that seemingly happened out of the blue, then it's already failed to recreate the spirit of that. But hey, Season 2's opening also cleared up what was going on by the end of it, and the explanation we got made sense, so maybe it'll be the same for this. Or so I thought, because it's immediately followed up with a heated argument between the band that's initiated by Ritsu after Azusa enters the club room, who says that it's not the type of music Ho-kago Tea Time should be playing, leading to tension brewing between her and Yui that Mugi briefly breaks as she mentions to Azusa that the light music club might be disbanding because of musical differences, apparently. 

 Mio then makes a comment about how Yui forgot several chords while learning one, (which isn’t even true because the reason Yui forgot the chords was due to x and y being burned into her brain from the cram session in the episode Cram Session hmm yes the floor here is made out of floor, but whatever) which follows up with Yui referencing the end of School Festival where Mio fell down and revealed her panties on stage. Then Mugi asks Azusa what she thinks, to which she responds that they should keep the happy and cheerful tone of their songs but then Yui says that it’s getting tiresome, and at this point, my level of confusion was at its peak. Because having them play a song that is in no way like the ones they play wasn't enough, apparently. They also have to make them have a heated argument like this where they imply the risk of the band breaking up. It's like they're actively trying to detach the movie from the tone and vibes of the show already when we're only 3 minutes in! And it's in no way helped by the jab made at Disband the Club with Ritsu mentioning how Yui was when she first joined the club. Seriously, have I gone into the wrong fucking movie? Because literally none of this feels like K-On right now. 

Anyways, as the argument escalates more and more with Mugi and Mio being brought into it despite her attempts to defuse it, Azusa goes over to the cassette and turns it on, playing the same Death Devil song that the others were seemingly playing earlier, leading to them revealing that their whole argument was fake.Wow, these writers got me good there, I won’t lie. What was I even complaining about? This is K-On. They’d never do something as out of character as this for any reason ever. It’s just a harmless bait and switch that certainly doesn’t set the tone for the rest of the movie or anything. With all that considered, I'm left even more baffled by what the point of this bait and switch even was. The reveal wasn't particularly funny, and all it did was leave me confused and frustrated the entire time it went down, so it hasn't really done a good job at reintroducing these characters, or establishing who they are to any newcomers to the series. "Well, actually, it's meant to prove to viewers that the movie is just gonna be lighthearted fun and not some heavy band drama." Well, that sounds all fine and good, except for the fact that establishing a lighthearted tone like that is actually a time waster, because this hinges on the idea that anyone going into this movie, whether they be someone who had watched the show beforehand or a casual viewer wanting to get a taste of K-On for the first time, assumes that it's going to be delving into drama in any capacity. But let me ask this, did anyone actually believe a K-On movie would ever do that? Besides, there are multiple better alternatives to set a lighthearted tone that will literally never lean into drama. No other moe slice of life movie I've ever seen has pulled this stunt, and it's not hard for me to see why. 

But even if we put aside how incredibly unnecessary it is for the movie to start this way, there's so much wrong with it from a logical standpoint. With the way the scene was presented before the reveal, they wanted you to believe that Azusa was able to hear the song that HTT seemed like they were playing, but the reveal that it was all just coming from a cassette makes that straight up impossible to believe.

    

                         What they want you to believe Azusa heard / Where she was when she supposedly heard it                    

It is pure nonsense that Azusa heard the mid volume cassette from that distance in any form, especially given that episodes like Freshman Reception proved that actual performances done by HTT in the clubroom are only moderately audible from up close to the clubroom doors. But even if we were to buy that insane impossibility, she would not have interpreted it as HTT actually playing the song because the difference in audio quality between what would have been an actual performance and the cassette audio is far too significant.  “Well, maybe the cassette volume was really high.” If that’s the logic you want to go by, then, for one, my argument about the audio quality still stands, and for another, why is it way lower when Azusa turned it on? What, is it because they actually played the song and recorded it on the cassette? Nope, because not only would someone have had to go up to the cassette to stop the recording, which if they showed, would make entire bait and switch fall apart, but when Azusa plays the recording, it starts at the middle of the song despite them seemingly playing before that point. And the insane thing is that being logically broken isn't even the worst thing about this scene! No, no, no, it's the reveal of HTT's true intentions here. 

  

Yui and Ritsu say that they did this because they wanted to try the musical differences crap that all bands supposedly go through, which seems harmless, until you remember that their act involved them specifically convincing Azusa that the band was about to break up over these musical differences. It would have been one thing if they started the argument and Azusa came into the room whle it was ensuing, but no, as we learn later, they all waited until she came into the room to stop playing and then start the argument! And it makes absolutely no sense for any of them to want to fuck with her like this? Mio has seen and empathized with how emotional Azusa can get when the current state of the band isn’t good, so it makes no sense that she would actively encourage Mugi mentioning the band breaking up, Yui and Mugi are just way too nice to ever want to intentionally hurt Azusa, especially with how close the former is to her, and if you want to make the incredibly generous stretch that it makes sense for Ritsu to want to do this, even she has her limits as shown in Training Camp where she admits she went too far with scaring Mio when she's driven to tears by it. But even if she didn't, why were there no objections against this from anyone, especially Mio who has had zero issues objecting against Ritsu pulling something as idiotic as this?! Then we come to Azusa's reaction to this whole thing, which also doesn't really make sense here.

                     
 

She says this as if she knew her friends would just emotonally fuck with her like this, and it feels like a heavy underreaction all things considered. A very important thing to bring up about this movie is that it takes place after the episode Entrance Exams. And two crucial things to note in that episode are that the reality of the upcoming graduation for the third year students is now starting to get to Azusa a lot, because four of those third year students are her friends that’s she’s formed a very close connection with in the light music club over the past 2 years, and her going as far as to donate 1000 yen at the shrine to ensure that they got into the same college, followed up with her being incredibly happy that they did.With all this considered, on top of the fact that she nearly cried over there being tension between two of the band members previously (Crisis, S1E11), you’d think that she would be incredibly hurt over them hinting towards the band fucking breaking up only for it to be an act just to mess with her. But nah, she just brushes it off as if she should have known they’d do something like this instead. "But Azusa wasn't actually affected by HTT's stunt. Doesn't that make your point about them wanting to emotionally fuck with her pointless?" Well, no, because aside from Azusa's reaction here not making sense, it really doesn't take away from the fact that their intentions were to deeply hurt their friend just for the fun of it, and as a reintroduction to these characters, it paints a horrible image of them in the first 4 minutes because none of them would ever have attempted anything this cruel in the show.

Yamada: I think they’re the kind of people who saw heavy metal, hard rock, or something like that with the motions and thought it’d be a good chance to try something like it. (laughs) Ricchan has that aura like she went to study those motions. Mio also moved like she was trying to play it. The person with the biggest problem has to be Tsumugi though. She must be thinking “How could I remember this?!”(laughs) However, the girls aren’t doing this for themselves, they’re pretending to play for someone else. If you take a glimpse of this scene, you’d think it’s just a gag, but really it’s a spot that shows how they act for others. It feels amazingly deep and that’s why I really love it.

– Did you both think of a way to start the film like that opening from the start of development?

Yamada: It was very important to get a grasp of everyone. (laughs)

Yoshida: Right. We thought about how to show something that felt like K-On! from the very start.

 I'm sorry, but this just makes no sense to me. You started the movie off with HTT "playing" a song that is in no way in line with what they usually play, and then followed that up with them having a bait and switch argument thathad the implication of the band breaking up with sole purpose of just fucking with Azusa. Not one bit of this feels remotely like the tone and vibes that you two established throughout the entirety of K-On up until this point. Oh, if you're wondiering where this is from, it's from a 2014 interview about the K-On Movie with director Naoko Yamada and scriptwriter Reiko Yoshida. I'll be referencing this interview as we go through this series since what they say is only going to result in more problems or existing issues being made worse.

But back onto this scene, Azusa goes over to unzip her guitar big to get her guitar out for practice, but the exact moment she finishes the unzipping process, Yui decides that they all should relax and drink tea instead. Come on, haven't you made HTT unlikeable enough in this scene? During the bait and switch argument, Yui assertively told Azusa that they'll play music later when she tried to defuse it by suggesting they play old maid, but now here she is not only deciding to initiate teatime after that, but specifically waiting until Azusa was done unzipping her guitar bag all the way when she thought they were going to practice to do so. Lovely. :/

And that concludes the opening scene of K-On The Movie. Sweet mother of Ton-chan, what the hell just happened during those 4 minutes? My mind is just boggled from how horrible of a reintroduction this was to these characters. And I'd like to compare this to the opening scenes of both seasons of the show to really put how broken this shitshow is into perspective, especially given that it tried and failed to recapture parts of both of them.

          

The first 2 minutes of episode 1, Disband the Club, were straight to the point with what it was trying to communicate. Introducing Yui to the viewers and showing off how much of a ditzy klutz she is, and it’s not said through any type of narration whatsoever. The animation is left to do most of the talking on that front, and it’s done incredibly effectively. Reading the clock wrong seconds after waking up, tripping over herself before she rushes out the door, and getting distracted 3 times while actually running to school all speak volumes about who Yui is in such a short amount of time while naturally laying the groundwork for her upcoming character arc about finding something to focus on in her life. And as the cherry on top, it subtly hints towards Ritsu, Mio and Mugi also being important to the series before they’re properly introduced to the viewer by having them be in the background in a way that only a really keen eye will see. All wonderfully communicated through an engaging and incredibly well animated sequence backed up by lovely energetic music that perfectly sets the tone for the rest of the series.

         

And the opening minutes of Season 2's first episode, Seniors, serve to show how far Yui has come since then, as with no context, we see her being the only one in the clubroom practicing a guitar solo for a song they previously played, looking more focused on it than she ever has been before. And once the others come in, it's revealed that she came here early due to setting her alarm clock wrong and that she seemingly rushed here with a piece of toast, subtly calling back to the first episode of the show while also contrasting it to great effect, because Yui spent her extra time on making an effort towards music playing for the sake of the upcoming freshman reception. Not only does this perfectly follow up from Season 1 as it carries over Yui’s development from the episode Light Music in the best of ways, with her continuing to put in her best efforts for the people she cares about, it also opens up the season brilliantly with the amazing animation of Yui’s guitar playing and a fantastic solo of Watashi no Koi wa Hotchkiss backing it up.

 

Meanwhile, K-On The Movie opens up with a callback to Season 1’s opening, and a sequence that tries replicating the feels of Season 2’s opening, both of which fail miserably at understanding why those openings played out the way they did, followed up with a bait and switch argument between the main cast that gets initiated the instant Azusa comes into the club room before we get any sort of clarification on why any of this is happening, with the final bit of frustration coming from when we finally get said clarification. Barring the logical inconsistencies regarding Azusa hearing the volume of the cassette from where she was, it already serves to destroy parts of every character as the entire scene is HTT emotionally fucking with Azusa just because they felt like it, topped off with Azusa’s reaction being way too light when compared to previous moments in the series. It's consistently mind boggling, already serves to detach itself from the series' vibes no matter how you look at it, and does a horrible job at introducing/reintroducing these beloved characters. But I've gone on about this long enough now. We're now about to see the movie's OP, and K-On has always gone hard with those, so let's take a look at that, shall we?

 

Okay, what the fuck is this?! I mean, the song playing over this, Ichiban Ippai, is undeniably solid, but the sequences and transitions taking place in this OP feel incredibly awkward. At first, it just seems like the song is playing over events happening while showing shots of what the other characters outside the main cast are currently doing, but then, with no natural transitions, they suddenly start moving around as if they know they’re in an OP, and it’s not a good juxtaposition when you really think about it. Give a close watch to what's happening. It looks like it’s just going with HTT setting up tea time, but then a few seconds later, we have Yui dancing around Azusa followed up with the other three coming into the next shot animated in a way to try and sync up with the song. It doesn’t feel like a proper transition at all. But then the awkwardness really dials up as we get a 5 second sequence of showing the light music club’s evolution between when Ritsu first formed the club with Mio and Mugi, to Yui joining, to Azusa joining, and not only are the latter two showcased at a weird angle, but when you look at the animation of Ritsu tackle hugging Azusa, you can see why it was shown as a still frame in Freshman Reception. It literally looked like Azusa was about to fall before Ritsu did anything, not to mention she was already looking away, and she was further away in the actual still frame. I don’t understand why they decided to animate this the way that they did. 

 

 

 Even from a still frame, the movie's recreation of the shot looks tacky.

 

But then, we cut to Yui pulling Azusa along for no reason, and then suddenly stopping to look at… the ceiling in absolute awe?! Huh?!? What is she looking at?! Why is she so surprised?!? Man, if only I had the type of energy to act like this when I look at my own ceiling. And once again, it doesn’t feel like a proper transition because it only seems like Yui staring into nothing in awe is done specifically to sync up with the one specific part of the song that plays. And then later on, we see two random events that were never shown in the series that have absolutely zero connection with each other or anything else that we saw in the OP…WHAT IS THIS?!? Why does everything in this OP feel so disjointed?! No part of it feels like it transitions naturally, whether it be with the character animation or the presentation of the shots, it’s all confusing and awkward.  

 

Not only that, but a certain design choice becomes more noticeable during these sequences. There’s something different about Ritsu that you may have noticed if you kept an eye on her. But if you haven’t, in the series, every character wore a school jumper with their uniform except for Ritsu, who just wore her t-shirt and blazer with neither tucked in, which fits her character well, but in the movie, she’s suddenly wearing a jumper now, for some reason. I’d let this slide since it does seem more like an oversight than anything else, although it is a quite questionable one to make, but that’s not the only change made here. 

Because they also decided to give the other characters different coloured jumpers and not the cream coloured jumpers that they all wore throughout the series.What reason was there to do this, exactly? And it’s not like they forgot about the fact that they never wore these before, because not only do they fluctuate between the original jumpers and the movie ones when showcasing previous events in the OP, but they also switch back to the original uniforms when they return from their London trip. 

 

I genuinely cannot wrap my head around this design choice.Was just keeping at least this consistent not an option? And it’s made even more jarring because the two disconnected events we see before the OP ends show the characters in their original uniforms while the rest of it shows them in the movie-specific uniforms. Now, is this a major issue that ruins the movie completely? No, not exactly. But it is a baffling inconsistency between the show and movie that doesn’t even add up in isolation due to the switchback to the original uniform designs during the film’s final third, and it’s an inconsistency that’s hard to look past when paired with how poorly put together this intro sequence is. Okay, time to get back to the plot.

 

                 

  

Ritsu starts the discussion for the bait and switch performance we just saw, with Yui immediately saying...

 

 

And just like that, the opening scene has now been made even worse. This not only confirms that HTT's intents were to emotionally fuck with Azusa in that scene, it also shows that Yui was the most dedicated to doing so, and it's highly frustrating to think about, especially looking back on her telling Azusa that they’ll practice later while the bait and switch argument was ensuing, only to initiate teatime instead as soon as she was done unzipping her guitar bag. Yui ever wanting to do this to someone she's attached to on this level is unbelievable because she's arguably the sweetest and kindest character in the show, and even if we just go by what happens in this movie, she is going to be spending the rest of the runtime showing her undying determination to prove her and her friends as worthy seniors to Azusa, so her acting this maliciously during the first minutes of the film makes no sense at all.

Then Azusa questions the meeting not being for the practice, and uh, what? What is she talking about? Earlier on, Mio told the others to stop acting during practice, meaning that they actually were rehearsing in some way in spite of the entire performance we saw being a bait and switch. So Ritsu saying that they should go over said performance is the equivalent to having a meeting for the practice. What makes you think they’re not one in the same? But if it didn’t count as practice, what point would there be to having a meeting for something that never even happened in the first place? Why would it make any sense to do that? This is followed up with Mugi mentioning how none of them did very well during that bait and switch, and then saying "Don't worry" in English after Mio makes a note about how Mugi acted. But then, Azusa makes her comment on the situation...

...if I didn't know any better, I would have assumed this movie was some elaborate April Fool's prank by KyoAni, because HOW THE HELL DO YOU HAVE AZUSA SAY THIS IN A TONE THAT SOUNDS LIKE HER QUESTIONING WHY SHE JOINED THE LIGHT MUSIC CLUB IN THE FIRST PLACE AT THIS POINT IN THE FUCKING TIMELINE?!? You might be wondering why this line of dialogue is so frustrating, and to fully get the picture on why that this, let's jump back to an earlier point in the series. More specifically, when Azusa Nakano first joined the light music club.

 

When Azusa first enters through those doors requesting to join the club at the end of Freshman Reception, we get to see how enthusiastic she is to be there in the following episode, New Club Member, expecting to practice music a lot with the band she saw as amazing. But it doesn’t take long for that enthusiasm and happiness to shatter when she sees how little practice they get done, and it only gets worse when she’s essentially treated like a pet by Yui and Ritsu. And after several days of feeling like she wasn’t getting anywhere being around an atmosphere that she felt was way too relaxed, it eventually gets to a point where she questions why she joined the light music club in the first place and why she was so moved by their performance, knowing that there are much better bands out there that she could join., bands that actually focus 100% on becoming the best musicians they can be. This motivates her to spend the next few weeks going to live house after live house to see if she can find any other bands that she could join instead to properly unleash her potential as a guitarist and find a group she can fully vibe with, but in the end, none of them have either of those things that she’s looking for, not once feeling the spark and emotional reaction she had when she saw HTT's performance. And when she eventually returns to the light music club, she ends up breaking down into tears over not knowing whether to stick with them or quit and continue her attempts to find her spark with another band. But then,HTT decides to play an instrumental of the song they played at the freshman reception to try and remind her of what was so special about their performance, and while that's happening, Azusa gets to hear this from Mio.

    

This is what makes Azusa realize that, in spite of everything, she wants to play with this band more than anything else, and this feeling is what convinces her to stay in the light music club, finally knowing why she joined in the first place. This ends up paying off in the best of ways for Azusa in the long run because while she still ends up having some criticisms towards the state of the light music club that she has little issue bringing up, she ends up making a lot of great memories with them, between the training camp, both school festival performances and the summer fest and forming meaningful connections with every member of the club. And no scene exemplifies this better than this one near the end of Late Summer Greeting Card.

This is after Azusa thinks about how fun it is being with her friends, and as she's being pulled along by the one person she's formed the closest connection with, that's all she can think about in the moment she's in. When Azusa says "It's beautiful...", a casual viewer would just interpret it as her describing the fireworks that are going off, but if you pay attention, she's not looking at the fireworks in this instance, and they're barely visible from her POV in the next shot, meaning that what she's describing is the feeling she's getting from Yui pulling her along, and with how the rest of the episode has been structured, showing each of Azusa's dreams having at least one memmber of HTT in them this is a genius way to show her realizing just how much being with the rest of her band mates means to her. This strong bonds she formed with the rest of HTT all end up coming together during the final few episodes of the series, where she has no problem expressing her happiness with the fact that she got to play with them in Yet Another School Festival, and especially near the end of Entrance Exams where she says this…

 

By this point in the series, she is now fully comfortable with being around the band she’s spent 2 years performing music and having teatime with, and any feelings she might have had about not belonging with them are not there at all anymore. The emotional weight of the final episode, Graduation Ceremony, would be nowhere near as effective if the show failed at getting you to feel the close connection between Azusa and the rest of HTT, but they absolutely nailed how they developed her from feeling like somewhat of an outcast to being a perfect fit for the group that would not feel complete without her.

Only for K-On The Movie to completely shatter all of this! Azusa’s realization for why she didn’t want to leave the light music club in spite of how she was treated and every meaningful connection she grew to have with every member of the band over the course of the series have now been entirely undone in fucking seconds with this one line of dialogue! Because why in the flying fuck is she questioning the fact that she joined a club like this after everything she’s been through with them?! "That was very clearly a snarky remark from Azusa in response to the bait and switch they did. She's not being fully serious here." Sadly, that's not something I can really buy given that both her expression and tone as she said that line come off more as "Bruh, I can't believe I fucking joined this stupid ass club.", and it's in no way helped by her reaction after Yui brings up that she wouldn't be enjoying the tea she has in her hands if she didn't join. Oh, please don’t tell me this is trying to imply that Azusa only stayed in the light music club because of the tea. Please don’t fucking tell me that her entire reason for sticking with them for two whole years is being reduced to that disingenuous sentiment. Because if it is, then that just further cements the fact that everything that happened in the show between Azusa joining the club and her being fully comfortable with her friends there means absolutely nothing now. And trust me when I say that Azusa's character assassination only going to get worse, including in this very scene.

So, while Mugi is trying to open a bag of baumkuchen that she brought over, we get a narration from Yui summing up what her and her friends have been doing in the light music club for the past three years, followed up with a discussion about the seniors of HTT being accepted into the same college as they intended, where Azusa expresses how much of a miracle it is that they managed to... before saying that she's not surprised by Mio and Mugi making it in, implying that she had absolutely no faith in Yui and Ritsu getting in. And this is exactly what I was talking about when I said things were gonna get worse. Did Azusa just forget any moment in the series where Yui gave it her all when it came to something she really wanted to focus on? Like in Finals where Yui continuously affirmed herself to give it her all when she wanted to juggle studying for exams and practicing for a talent show to make someone who had taken care of her a lot happy? And how she was there to witness her being successful at achieving both of those? When taking that, Azusa seeing with her own eyes how hard Yui was studying for the finals by herself in the same episode, and her heavy passion to want to continue playing as a band with everyone into consideration, why would she have minimal faith about her being accepted into the same college as the others? 

Also, remember at the end of Entrance Exams where Yui and the others told Azusa that they were successful at getting into the same college, and how overjoyed she was to get that news from them after she prayed as hard as she could for that exact thing to happen? Well, now she’s just implying Yui and Ritsu getting in was only a miracle with approximately zero expressiveness from her whatsoever. Great, just fucking fantastic. The movie’s meant to be following up from that very episode and it’s just destroyed every sweet sentiment it had. Not helped by the fact that while Yui, Ritsu, Mio and Mugi are all clearly happy about this turn of events, Azusa remains entirely expressionless and tonally dead inside for the entire conversation. Because I guess that joy she felt from hearing the news in Entrance Exams was only brief despite the fact that she literally prayed as hard as she could for it to happen after throwing in 1000 yen, which was 100 times the amount that needed to be thrown in while making a wish like this, and that she included this in her prayer.

Exactly how does anyone come to the conclusion that this is the pinnacle of the series, again? It's starting to slip my mind. Also, also, here's something that they didn't want you thinking about aside from everything else I just brought up about this scene; it takes approximately 43 seconds for Mugi to open the bag of Baumkuchen, and uh, did you guys just completely forget how strong Mugi is? She was shown effortlessly carrying incredibly heavy items and instruments to the auditorium while going back and forth to even get them without showing any level of struggle whatsoever in School Festival, her piano, which has been reported to be a Korg Triton Synthesizer, weighs up to 14 kilograms, and she supposedly brings it to school and back every day, and in Summer Classes, she effortlessly won an arm wrestling game that Ritsu struggled with. And yet you’re telling me that a character established to be this physically strong takes almost a minute to open a fucking plastic bag? Look, I know character consistency hasn’t been this film’s strong suit so far, but come on, did it really hurt to remember stuff like this?

Ritsu proposes a toast to celebrate them all getting into the same college, to which they oblige, but not without some brief reluctance from Azusa. Look, we get it, Azusa doesn’t feel comfortable in the light music club anymore and the entire series starting from when she joined doesn't mean anything now. I don’t know how many times we have to be reminded of that in this single scene. Then Sawako teleports into the scene, because of course she does, to talk about how she feels towards the girls graduating soon, where she mentions that sending them off is all that’s left unless anyone wants to stay an extra year, and apparently a meeting regarding attendance records and test scores is being held next week. And then, after Yui is surprised by this, Sawako grabs her and Ritsu and gives them threatening looks, scaring the shit out of them for nearly 30 whole seconds! Literally what the fuck is going on here?!? Why is she acting like this?! I genuinely cannot make out what’s going on here. Yes, I’m aware that Sawako has had a significant amount of moments where she acted up throughout the series. It’s been a part of her character since she became the light music club’s adivsor. But those instances were because someone else said something that would provoke or trigger her to the point of doing so. Here, however, no-one said anything that could possibly provoke her, so I can only watch this and fucking lose it trying to process how this is supposed to make any sense!

And if you want to make the argument that Yui being surprised by the fact that there was such an important meeting is what provoked her, then I can label this as a huge overreaction. By Sawako’s standards, anyway. Because the instances where Sawako lost it were either triggered by something personal, like how Yui and the others chose not to invite her to the Christmas party they were having because they believed she had a date with her boyfriend that day (Spoliers, she doesn’t have one.), or when her nerves were pushed to the brink such as in Supervisor where it took forever for Mio to show the lyrics she wrote for HTT’s first song while the others went from pleaing for her to do so to arguing about completely unrelated shit. And in Field Trip, it was a combo of HTT making too much noise and Ritsu not recognising her without makeup. Yui being surprised that there’s a meeting for attendance and test scores doesn’t fall into any of those categories, so there’s no way to understand Sawako’s overreaction at all! 

“Oh come on, it’s just meant to be a quick introduction to her character for people who haven’t seen the show, because not everyone who goes into this movie will have watched the series ahead of time.” Well, aside from the fact that it’s a really poor character introduction for the reasons I just listed, since it establishes Sawako as someone who acts threatening towards the girls over the most miniscule shit, and aside from the fact that the character establishment has been terrible all across the board, portraying HTT as a toxic friend group with that bait and switch argument at the beginning, and having Azusa question why she joined the light music club at all while also bringing up how long she’s been with them, all of which are abysmal first impressions for a series like K-On, I want you to pay attention to how much Sawako shows up throughout the movie as we go through it. It may or may not be relevant to having her character be introduced to this extent in the first place. But for now, let's just continue with the film.

We cut to the third years walking down the halls with Ritsu carrying a bunch of books and Yui carrying a bag of garbage until the latter decides to look outside to reflect on something, and that very thing is about how she and the others are about to graduate without displaying the dignity of a senior to Azusa, with Ritsu and Mugi’s comments only driving her sentiment that they really haven’t done anything to feel like they’ve made a huge impact on Azusa’s life. And upon realizing this, she expresses that she wants to do something special for her, something that only a graduating senior can do, to really prove her worth as one to the friend she became incredibly close with over the course of the series. This is an amazing showcase of just how much Yui has grown as a character during her time with the light music club. There are going to be plenty more moments like this throughout the movie, because everything regarding the idea of Azusa’s graduation gift is driven by Yui’s selfless desire to do something big for someone she cares about. And I can definitely give points here for taking the development of a character and expanding on it further like this. I just hope that there aren’t things later on that would directly spit in the face of these moments and retroactively nuke the movie and the series harder than anything else. Because that wouldn’t be very cool. Nah, I’m sure that won’t happen. 

They all start discussing what kind of gift they should get, but not for long as Azusa comes by with the trail of trash that Yui left behind, causing Yui to whine about not being able to find her way back, which I find, a bit weird. I’m not gonna say it’s entirely out of character for her, but it is a little odd that they waited until now to give her this character quirk. Especially given how much she has matured at this point in the timeline, something you literally just showcased less than a minute ago, and the fact that this isn’t the first time she’s gone down this hallway, as shown in the episode Seniors, which took place during the beginning of her senior year, and she didn’t need a trail to find her way back to the club room then.. Also, wait a minute, Azusa only got here now? What? Why wasn’t she with the others from the beginning? Something must have been holding her up or else it wouldn’t have taken her this long to catch up with them. What did she have to do before she left the club room?. Oh right, it’s because Azusa needed to be far from the rest of HTT so this entire scene can function, but could you really not think of a justification for that to make sense? Okay, then.

Next, we cut to the Hirasawa household where Yui talks with Ui about what type of gift Azusa would like, and there is a lot to break down with this conversation, so let’s just run through everything being said first. Yui asks Ui if Azusa has said anything about the light music club, and despite some hesitance, Ui eventually brings up that she’s said she’d like it if they took practice more seriously, if they cleaned the club room once in a while, and if Yui didn’t hug her so much, which causes Yui to feel down about how said criticisms aren’t too surprising, and that it’s nice of her to have stayed in the club for so long even with those criticisms. Then, Ui brings up that the light music cb is something Azusa always talks about, and that the entire reason she joined in the first place was because she saw Yui and the others play at the concert in Freshman Reception. Wow. I, don’t even know where to start. 

Okay, first off, Ui only mentions the criticisms Azusa has brought up about the light music club? Seriously? You really want me to buy that Azusa has only said negative things about her experiences with them? The training camp, the school festivals, the summer fest, none of that? She never even told Ui or Jun about how happy she was that her friends made it into the same college? “Well, maybe Azusa just doesn’t want to admit that she likes being in the light music club.” Sorry to say, but that’s not the case. Because in Planning Discussion, which despite airing after Graduation Ceremony, actually takes place inbetween Graduation Yearbook and Entrance Exams, Azusa says this...

And this was something she said in earshot of Ui, so I do not see why she didn’t bring this up. Not to mention the fact that Azusa has said positive things about the individual members at several points in the series, like in Upperclassmen where she had a conversation with Ui and Jun about how great Mugi was. And don’t even try to tell me that praising the members on their own doesn’t count because one of the criticisms listed was specifically about Yui. Also, I don’t even buy that the criticism about not taking practice seriously is one that Azusa would still hold at this point in the series. They spent a huge chunk of No Club Room trying to find a good spot to practice for the school festival when the club room wasn’t available, and once they got it back, Yui was the one who initiated playing a song instead of teatime. Plus the fact that they stayed at school overnight to practice harder for it two episodes later. If Azusa is still coming to the conclusion that the others don’t take band practice seriously after all that, then there is something seriously wrong with her.

Second, what the hell is Yui saying here? This is heavily implying that she has no goddamn idea why Azusa has stayed in the club room for so long. But New Club Member established the reason for why she decided to stay, as I went over earlier, and we have the entire rest of the series as proof for why she happily stuck around with them for as long as she has. Plus there are moments where she makes her happiness from being around her bandmates very clear, including the end of Yet Another School Festival where she said point blank that she’s happy she got to play with her friends, which I highly doubt she ever would have said if she hadn’t become so close to them throughout the series, and do I need to bring up that scene from Entrance Exams again? As it stands, since it makes no sense for Ui to not bring up the positive things Azusa’s said about the light music club, nor does it make sense for Yui to forget her expressing her happiness being around them right to their faces in the episodes that take place right before this movie, this just seems to be implying that throughout the 2 years Azusa’s been in the light music club, she has had absolutely no positive experiences with them at all and that she has stuck around for literally no reason whatsoever. And to that, I say, fuck off with that bullshit! Oh, and that defense about Azusa questioning why she joined the light music club being nothing more than a snarky remark from earlier now holds even less weight now, because this scene’s pretty much telling me that questioning was legitimate. Why else would they even think to imply that she's had no postive experiences with them if it wasn't serious?

Third, even if we accepted that Azusa had nothing positive to note about them, which I am not fucking accepting under any circumstances, I still don’t believe that these are the only things that she’s ever brought up about the light music club if she really did talk about it as often as Ui says she does. And she stopped mentioning said criticisms approximately a second before she turned around to see Yui’s reaction, so she didn’t initially stop to ensure her sister didn’t feel worse. 

Fourth, Ui doesn’t only have what Azusa’s said about the light music club to go off of. She’s seen with her own eyes how happy Azusa is when she’s with Yui and the others, and yet she doesn’t bring this up either! 

And finally, how is Ui mentioning the reason Azusa joined in the first place supposed to make up for the fact that neither of you have any clue why she stuck around? Since this conversation is clearly nullifying everything Azusa’s been through with her friends, what exactly does bringing up the reason she joined in the first place mitigate? That only serves to further drive the sentiment that Azusa is staying with HTT despite having absolutely no reason to! Every ounce of this conversation is fucking broken. Not a single word these two characters say follow any sort of throughline whatsoever when you look back on the show’s events on any level, and the disregard an nullification of Azusa’s experiences with the rest of HTT makes me more astounded by the fact that the same writing team for the show was behind this! 

Then Ui jokingly gives Yui the suggestion that she and the others should stay back a year so they can graduate with Azusa, and Yui actually seems to consider it. Can’t wait to see how that turns out, but this is where we're stopping for now. We've made it through the first 13 minutes, and everything is already completely broken. Not a single scene thus far made any sort of sense, and heavy damage has been dealt to both the characters and many of the heartwarming sentiments the series upheld, and it's only going to get worse from here on out. If things look bad now, you better brace yourself for what awaits us later in this disaster, because it is gonna turn into the ultimate nightmare that no amount of tea, cake or strawberries can help us recover from.

But if you enjoyed reading this, thanks for making it all the way here, and stay tuned for Part 2 of K-On The Movie: A Betrayal of its Series and Genre. This is my first time doing an analysis piece to this scale, so I'd love to get some thoughts and feedback on this to see where I can improve. I'll try and keep all these at a reasonable reading length, but be warned that the further we get into this film, the longer these posts may become. Until then, though, Solaris/Indigo out.

  

Part 2 >>>