Episode 4 Summer Time Render – Ushio, who was buried a few days ago, is here, in the flesh, right at the festival, in front of everyone.
I continue to be amazed by how much content Summer Time Render packs into 22 minutes. I have full confidence in Watanabe Ayumu as a director. But I’m sure Summer Time Render will be even better, because we’ve got more twists and turns out after episode 4. Perhaps the setting will be something like Netflix’s Stranger Things series, where a The very complex world was outlined by the screenwriters from the very first episode that aired.
Of course, the first and most obvious question in episode 4 Summer Time Render has to be Ushio’s situation. We know something strange is happening to her, as the dead and cremated Ushio has a body. From what we know of the Shadows, Ushio seems to have a friendly rather than cruel nature. If this Ushio is a shadow then she is completely unlike any other person we have met. Basically, she’s not as “noisy” as the other Shadows have seen. She also doesn’t seem to have any memories of the Shadows, otherwise she’s a great actress. In fact, Ushio’s memories are a problem – they seem pretty comprehensive, but there are conspicuous gaps.
According to Shinpei’s reaction, maybe this is the real Ushio – an active, goofy and sometimes violent person. She has memories of death but seems to have no sense of actually being dead and she is not overly concerned with Shinpei’s warnings about revealing herself to others. This interaction takes the first half of episode 4 Summer Time Render in a humorous direction. It’s not without its appeal at all, but it hides a dark tone in the second half. Shinpei couldn’t deny his own feelings that this thing looked and acted like the Ushio he knew, whom he thought he’d lost forever. Even if he thought it was a Shadow, he couldn’t ignore those feelings.
Ushio shows up at the Shrine in his worst makeup ever, a mask that doesn’t fool anyone at all. This happened after Sou confessed his failed feelings to Mio. Simply because you know, Shinpei is clearly the guy that Mio is secretly in love with.
So episode 4 Summer Time Render has a 10-minute rewind. Things got really serious, really fast when Shinpei ran into Mio Shadow on the steps of the Shrine, apparently after she had already killed quite a few people. Notice a bit here, as the Shadows definitely carry the memories of the people they copied, meaning that Shinpei’s shadow knows he can reset the timeline and redo everything. Shadow Shinpei prevents Shadow Mio from killing the real Shinpei on the grounds that he might reset everything again, this time with more information that would inconvenience the Shadows. However, Mio broke Shinpei’s arm as a deterrent when he refused to lie there and stay silent.
Now the clues are starting to come up. Shadow Mio and Shadow Shinpei keep mentioning someone by the name of “Mother”? Is this some kind of creature like a parasite or youkai, or even an alien? And then there’s the traitor, too clearly it’s Ushio Ball. And it really may be, but that seems too obvious to be true, at least to me. And then there was the woman in business clothes asking Shinpei about something after she appeared and shot Mio Ball’s head while Shadow Shinpei was attacking Ushio and the others.
Honestly, I’m pretty glad I didn’t know what the hell was going on after 4 episodes of Summer Time Render. With these types of anime, it was originally just enjoying the exploration and so far Summer Time Render is still extremely interesting. I will still wait patiently especially since we start the story so early. Surely it would be great if the truth was revealed. We’re a long way off from that, but based on the first 4 episodes, I’m more and more confident in the direction of Summer Time Render. I can’t wait to see where this story goes!
>>> See also: Summer Time Render episode 3: It’s fake and confusing
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