Talk:Upperclassmen!/@comment-25308539-20140901173107/@comment-46049126-20200915183201

It's 6 years late, but I'm impressed with your evaluation. The crux of the issue is the dissonance between Azusa's behavior and her sense of self. In my own perception, though Azusa's private enjoyment of the club's lackadaisical side is part of the problem, I believe Azusa also has come to inherently accept that the lazy side of the club is a large factor in their ability to play together well. This runs contrary to the attitude she'd taken towards music and band dynamics prior to meeting the club, a more traditional sentiment of working both seriously and diligently whenever possible to accomplish a goal.

It isn't necessarily that I feel as if Azusa softens down, rather that she redirects her passion towards the goals rather than the processes involved, either consciously or subconsciously. Whether she's adopted the identity of the club or surrendered to the desires she'd been suppressing up to this point, Azusa realizes that she's changed in this episode, and attempts to force a change towards who she believes she is. In doing so, she fails to understand that such changes can't happen instantly, mistakenly thinking that she needs to become her ideal self to get what she wants and be happy.

This is where Yui comes in. Yui, because she refuses to think too hard about things, is able to view Azusa's problem from a perspective that Azusa couldn't see normally, that the changes in her personality aren't necessarily negative or positive by nature. Azusa is too wrapped up in viewing her ideal self, while Yui only looks at herself and other people for who they are in the snapshot moment of where they're at now. Because of that, Yui is much less likely to to have an identity crisis or understand when Azusa speaks of not understanding who she is. To Yui, Azusa's behavior is who she is, not the way she thinks of herself, because Yui doesn't generally self-reflect the way Azusa does.

Whether Azusa gets the message isn't entirely clear, nor is it obvious whether such self-reflection or desire for improvement is the right path as opposed to Yui's method. Like many other running themes in this show, the message comes back to being able to enjoy things and who you are in the moment without failing to acknowledge the future or the past that created the present moment. Perhaps I'm not adequately explaining it. Scratch that, I'm absolutely not doing this justice, but it's nice to vomit out some thoughts on what makes this show so much deeper than it's given credit for.

Honestly I don't know if this is helpful. I might revisit this summary again when all's said and done. Discussion on the depth of K-ON! fascinates me though, so I felt compelled to throw my two cents in here. This has been stream of conscious typing with Mahamaon.