Talk:Izumi Akazawa/@comment-121.218.169.180-20140524031534/@comment-397235-20140705091056

I think it depends on how well handled the character is. I've not managed to find a translation of the novel anywhere (I thought I did, but it turned out to be the manga, which I also needed anyway; any advice on where I can find a copy would be appreciated, by the way).

I really didn't like her in the manga, which is irritating because that's the only version of her character which survives. She just comes across as a paranoid psycho for most of the manga, and while I can sympathize with her loneliness to a point, she never actively seeks help from her classmates, and the lone wolf thing nearly gets her and Mei killed. Add to that she has absolutely no rational justification for attacking Mei other than "I really, really hate her" and it becomes increasingly difficult to like her.

The anime at least gives her more of a personality, and I do think she can be a genuinely nice person at times (she really does care about her friends, for instance: she comforts Aya when Kubodera kills himself, and is about the only person who looks after Takako and tries to reason with her [albeit, that's a monster of her own making, but the effort is still there]). On the other hand, pissing her off is a very bad idea, as Tomohiko found out to his misfortune.

Of course, her film version is even more radically different. I've not seen much of it, but she seems to take on a lot of Yumi, Takako, and Tomohiko from the anime. She first decides Takako is the extra, nearly kills her, decides she was wrong, then goes after Mei because, well, fuck Mei, only to decapitate herself on a mooring cable (seriously, these girls need to stay away from wires). I'm not particularly upset she dies in that version, if you can't tell.

It's odd the adaptors have made her such a major character, since she doesn't even appear in the novel until almost halfway in. She's the closest thing Another has to an antagonist, and even then she's a fairly well-rounded character. Like I said originally, either you'll like her or you'll despise her. That's the thing about this show. There isn't really any middle ground for most of the major characters.