Overview
Endless Eight (Japanese: エンドレスエイト) is an infamous arc in the second season of the anime The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya by Kyoto Animation studio. The arc consisted of eight episodes of the cast being stuck in a Groundhog Day time loop. The anime episodes depicting this were more or less the same episode being animated over and over.
Background
Endless Eight was an arc in The Rampage of Haruhi Suzumiya, the fifth book in the light novel series, where Haruhi wished for an endless summer. Due to her being God who can unwittingly bend reality to her will, her wish came true and the result was that the entire cast was stuck in a time loop that repeated itself over 15,000 times until Kyon figured a way to break out of it.
This arc was faithfully animated by spending eight episodes in the second season of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, and aired from June 19th, 2009 to August 7th, 2009.
Development
This arc caused a lot of controversy among fans who more or less raged and felt like they were being trolled. It got to the point where the former director of the first season of the anime series publicly apologized.[1]
Endless Eight is still commonly talked about to this day among fans of the series and has evolved into a running joke. The Endless Eight controversy spiked a lot of interested in the anime, despite it already being widely popular before.
Several demotivationals and rage comics have sprung from the Endless Eight phenomena, and the subject is still widely talked about among Haruhi fans to this day.
Notable Derivatives
Fan Reactions
Endless Eight was almost universally met with mostly rage in Japan as well as outside of Japan. During and after the arc people could commonly find threads on both 2channel and 4chan’s anime board of people showing their frustration over the constant repeating of the nearly same episode. These type of threads can still be found on occasion, though some also start them in an attempt to Troll others.
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Kyon-kun, Denwa!
This catchphrase best expresses the amount of agony and trolling caused by the Endless Eight. During every arc of the time loop, Kyon’s younger sister would say “Kyon-kun, Denwa!” (Kyon! The phone!).
It is somewhat similar to other internet phenomena like Nyan Cat where a seemingly cute phrase when repeated several times can quickly get on one’s nerves. Likewise, at the end of the arc the phrase got on most people’s nerves.
Kyon Snapped
Aside from “Kyon-kun Denwa”, a fairly popular exploitable spawned from the phenomena of Endless Eight. On August 2nd, 2009, one /a/nonymous user posted a modified image of Kyon aiming a gun.[2]
This image is very likely a parody of Lelouche pointing a gun from the famous Spinzaku scene in Code Geass. It’s use is very similar, but it was specifically created to express fan rage over the Endless Eight along with fans sympathizing with Kyon for having to deal with a lot of crazy things because of Haruhi.
Search Interest
Thought it showed a lot of notoriety among anime fans outside of Japan, the impact and controversy in Japan was much greater.
External References
[1]Japanator – Yamakan Didn’t Like Endless Eight Either / 07-20-2009
[2]chanarchive.org – Kyon snapped / Posted on 08-22-2009