Set in late November.
So for some reason all 5 members of the SOS Brigade are located in a medieval castles' throne room, with 'Haruhi the Hero' being asked by the king to 'vanquish the demon lord who has kidnapped the prince and princess'.
Is this a stage play, or an isekai? We the readers are not given an answer. However, Asahina is a mage, Kyon is a warrior (complete with armour and longsword), Koizumi a bard and Nagato a thief.
We readers are left to believe that everyone comes from their normal world. "My expertise with a sword was limited to some time with a wooden kendo sword in junior high gym class". So this is an isekai then?
Regardless, after negotiations with the king about a reward, it is decided that the boys and Nagato would carry chests full of gold coins.
They find the nearest pub to which Haruhi promptly orders 5 of everything 'on her', and pays for everyone's meals and drinks, starting a true party with the locals.
Kyon and Koizumi have a discussion in this pub. Neither can remember exactly what they are doing or how it came to be. It's like they are playing a game of some sort, and were simply sucked into it. Asahina suggests they were at an amusement park and went to a place where you pretend to role play. The boys call Yuki over and ask her. They didn't need to ask however, she simply states "simulation" but even she can't pinpoint how. It's like simulated space somehow.
Apparently there are end conditions to restore themselves to the real world, much like a game then; defeat the demon lord.
An old wise man comes into the pub and calls Haruhi the Hero as being a fool. He calls himself the 'Sage of the Forest', and will make sure the party will keep on track to defeat the demon lord, however he is shocked to find them still in town, and not halfway there already. Haruhi gives in, saying something like 'this was bound to happen anyway'.
This 'sage' takes them to their first trial. He leads them to the edge of a forest. They have to follow a footpath to a cave to reach a single treasure chest inside, of which contains a key to the demon lords castle. The sage tries to hold Haruhi back to explain something, but she just barges straight ahead, with the SOS Brigade following. They enter the cave and come across a huge dragon, and are instantly killed by its fire breath.
They then find themselves back with the sage at the edge of the forest, who explains that they have to carefully manoeuvre around the dragon without it noticing. Again, Haruhi doesn't listen and barges in again to everyone's death once more.
5 deaths later and Haruhi finally admits they need a plan.
The sage says he has an orb on his person which can help the dragon not to attack, but in order for him to give it to the brigade members, they first must go to another location to collect a herb to help with his ailing body. Haruhi promptly dismisses this idea and points a sword to his throat. Nagato takes the orb. In fact, the team then proceeds to take more of his possessions to help bypass other fetch quests.
Not too long later they are at the demon lords castle. Without a plan, both Kyon and Koizumi are worried, however Haruhi reveals her secret plan is to help Mikuru tap into her dormant mage powers. Mikuru herself is kinda reluctant, saying she doesn't wield powerful magic, however after some persuasion from Haruhi, she unleashes 2x of the most unbelievable spells ever known.
The Demon lords castle is obliterated. So is everything within a 20 mile radius. Nagato had to send everyone to a hill on the outskirts of the blast, in a fraction of a second.
The game world quickly changes and they all find themselves in space. Their objective to win the previous game is proven "incomplete".
They are on a space ship. A guy appearing at the console looks extremely like the king from the previous game world, and is saying to the brigade that they must 'save the universe and the Prince and Princess from space pirates'.
Haruhi agrees to save them "this time", meaning that was what they were supposed to have achieved last time, and simply forgot.
Kyon is the pilot, Haruhi is the captain (I mean, of course she is lol), Nagato is the navigator, Asahina is supposed to be Comms officer but is currently acting like a waitress, and Koizumi is copilot. They are all in uniform, and the girls are showing a lot of skin.
After following Haruhi's hunch, they travel to a part of space that probably has space pirates. After only an hour, they are caught in a tractor beam. They are surrounded by hundreds of ships.
They are hailed by a man that looks like the forest sage from the previous game. It becomes clear they turned up at the head of a fleet preparing for a sneak attack on another faction.
Haruhi works out that this enemy fleet has most probably kidnapped the royal children. The main ship uses a tractor beam to bring our heroes inside. Nagato hacks their computer to work out that they are indeed on the same ship as the missing royals.
Koizumi suggests Nagato should hack in to make the fleet obvious to other vessels, as they are due for a sneak attack, so by doing nothing other than turning off their jammers, other factions would be aware of the pending assault. He says that 'stealth units that have been revealed tend to be rather flimsy'.
Panic and chaos ensures. The guards that previously guarded their ship at the dock have run off. The SOS brigade go in search of the missing children, blasting their ray guns at any opposition along the way. They find the children and scramble back to the ship. They blast their way out the flagship doors and find a safe place in space to communicate to the emperor. The emperor is glad, but asks them to stay back in hiding whilst they obliterate the opposing side. Nagato reveals they actually rescued decoys; robots, so therefore they lost the game.
The scenery changes to the American Wild West. Haruhi blurts out their new mission; to rescue the rancher’s son and his bride from outlaws. She is facing a quick-draw duel in a rather typical Western fashion. We do a quick time skip to just before this happens where the Sage is now the mayor, talking to our heroes. Kyon and Koizumi are deputies, and the girls are a well known bounty hunter trio called the 'SOS Brigade', a natural fitting name for it for once. lol. The Sage/mayor requests Haruhi go stand in for him in a duel with the local opposition, over land ownership arguments where tempers have risen to the point of gun fights.
The time skip catches up to the present, however Nagato swaps out realistic western buildings for an indoor soundstage, where everything is a prop for a film, and makes the ceiling lights fall down.
From here on out things start being noticeable to be less about video games and more about movies / TV shows. A car smashes its way into the indoor western themed soundstage to kidnap the actors that were the rancher’s son and his bride, and another car comes along just behind (with no driver). They take this cue that they are supposed to give chase, so the mayor takes the wheel and Haruhi sits up front, with the others squished in the back seats.
Everything now plays out like a black and white gangster movie, set in the prohibition times. They have to go to a speakeasy and play poker to gain access to the kidnapped duo. Naturally the gangsters want to cheat, but Nagato changes into her witches costume and uses her wand to swap the cards around. The gangsters call foul play, but then the cops arrive. The SOS Brigade flee from a back exit whilst the gangsters and coppers have a gun fight. They jump in the getaway car and speed off, again with the sage or whatever, doing the driving.
The setting changes again, and now they are in a 17th century English setting, and the car replaced by horse drawn carriage. The girls are all dressed very fine and dainty, and the boys dressed in something you would wear to a wedding. The sage is driving up front.
Turns out they are tasked with preventing the assassination of a young king and queen. They stop the attack but get caught up in the explosion, only to find themselves in Europe during the Second World War. The new task is like Mission Impossible to capture an Enigma machine, so they go from Dover through occupied France, to Berlin. They manage to steal the code machine and sneak onto an American submarine under cover of night in Calais, but a German destroyer sinks it but they get away by rowing in a rubber dinghy with the destroyer up in flames.
They pass out to arrive in a police drama setting, where a serial bomber leaves them with riddles to solve, and they have to disarm ticking bombs. Next is an Heian-era setting with nobles locked in a nasty courtroom power struggle, to which Kyon mentions its worthwhile to see the girls in their twelve-layer kimonos. After this they are vampire hunters, invading a vampire’s lair. Then after this cleaning berserk robots out of a post-apocalyptic ruin, then after this an Arabian Nights setting, stealing a lamp, then an Edo-era zombie story, then another submarine for a "nerve-racking deal involving nuclear missiles", then on a failed mission to turn Jupiter into a sun, then escape from a labyrinthine death game, then time travelling back to fight dinosaurs, and on and on and Ariston.
After another bad ending, they are now the Pirates of the Caribbean, looting ships for treasure with a packed crew of NPCs as well as the SOS Brigade. Eventually on a quiet but sweltering day out in the calm ocean, Kyon, Koizumi and Nagato are trying to work out what on earth is going on with their lives, whilst fishing. Why is it every time they remember they are not of this world, their memories become hazy?
They try and work out if they are the real versions of themselves, or more simply digital copies somehow placed into an ever changing computer programme of some sort. Logic would dictate that the only real people in any of these worlds are the members of the SOS Brigade, whilst everyone else are NPCs.
Maybe their real world bodies are lying in beds, all connecting their brains up to a machine? But why?
Nagato says it's not the Data Overmind doing this, as it doesn't seem likely. Regardless, her link is severed. Kyon notices its the first time in a long time that Nagato uses body language to convey her thoughts and feelings whilst being questioned. Her answer is this: "We are not on a computer server. We are not data in any sort of mechanical memory conduit. We are quantum information in a data space".
Explanation becomes too complex, but essentially they are the real versions of themselves, whilst the real, real world versions of themselves are living their normal lives simultaneously. They are stuck on a different plane of existence, against their will, and are being observed when put under different tasks to achieve. The user only has a short grasp of life on earth, mostly data collected from Movies, TV shows and video games it seems. Nagato is playing along trying to figure out how to escape.
Nagato explains her cognitive functions are being restricted with something occupying her processing powers. Every time she tries to overclock herself to work things out, she breaks down. Kyon prods her further and she says she wore a witches outfit in the prohibition world because she felt they had made a movie in the real world. This causes her to crash like a blue screen of death. Kyon instantly regrets probing her and vows not to do so again.
The Spanish Armada arrives to blow them out the water so they forget about their little chat. Nagato comes back to her senses and they naturally forget everything they just talked about.
After the battle, Kyon notices a piece of paper in his pocket, with Nagato's straight handwriting which reads "Remember me".
Fog covers everything and they find themselves in a new world, one of which based on both Roman and Greek mythology simultaneously.
The 3 girls of the SOS Brigade are now goddesses. The boat has now changed to an ancient trireme which has loads of oars to help steer the ship.
Haruhi is Goddess Hera (wife of Zeus), Asahina is Goddess Aphrodite (goddess of beauty) and Nagato is Goddess Athena (goddess of wisdom).
They land ashore of Troy, and are escorted to an amphitheatre. The three goddesses are escorted to their own seats, with Haruhi's throne being centred and laden in gold and lilies. Kyon and Koizumi are just men so they don't count. But they are seated at a table nearby.
A play goes ahead on stage. “Witnessing a play about the Trojan War in Troy during said war…,” Koizumi murmurs “What a layered construct. Two—no, three layers deep”.
During a moment everyone is eating, Kyon calls Nagato over via hand signal and she comes over to sit with them. They discuss their adventures and how to escape.
The Sage turns up out the blue and joins the boys and Nagato at their table. He is now Zeus in this world.
In turn they discuss their predicament and the Sage explains things from his NPC-main-guy sort of way.
He senses the being that has trapped them there to be not of evil and very protective. He continues to say he has more power in this world purely because he is playing the part of Zeus. He mentions it feels like everyone is in a 'canopy' of some sort.
He requests to be taken to the real world if possible, to join them in their escape. He is curious about a world written with law and order. He gives Nagato the power of Goddess Artemis (daughter of Zeus).
Nagato allows the boys to see Haruhi through the eyes she has, therefore they can see her true radiance.
Kyon goes up to Haruhi. She questions “Done with your nefarious scheming?” lol she knows a lot but we readers only see hints like this from time to time.
Kyon only has one thing to really say to her; "I want to go home".
Haruhi and Asahina join the rest and they all hold hands. Haruhi 'feels like she could do anything', and jokes about if they are calling up a UFO. Nagato harnesses the other two girls goddess powers to her own as well as Zeus's. She turns the sage into an owl, and they all escape the weird quantum plane of existence in a mix of goddess wings and halos.
Things black out and the words "Mission complete" can be heard.
The fall breeze hits Kyon as he is now tied into his real world self. He has a vague feeling of spending a decade in the local amusement park they are walking away from, having come here to celebrate the success of their home movie.
The sage and the two young victims are able to escape into the real world disguised as a balloon which drifts off into the sky, from the hands of Kyons tired sister, now sleeping on her brothers' shoulder from a long day out with his friends. Kyon reaches into his pocket to find a note that simply says "Remember me".
---
7-10. This story marks the official introduction of the antics caused by what would later be known as "The Heavenly Canopy Domain". Spoilers if you are reading this in context with the timeline. Sorry not sorry lol.
This novel, in my opinion, is the long-awaited sliders storyline. It’s not exactly how I imagined it would go, yet it has to be it, right? I imagined the SOS Brigade travelling from universe to universe, trying to return to their original world. Basically, exactly the same premise as the 90s show of the same name. This was a bit different however, yet essentially the same. I guess the author Tanigawa had to think of a way of supressing Haruhi’s memories somewhat so she considers everything happening to be normal.
Talking of which, those new readers following the timeline order will now read Kyon bang on about wanting to see the Sliders show up, and think "Yeah, we already had that Kyon". However, us readers up till this point, in 2025, had been waiting for the sliders storyline what felt like forever.
Nagato wasn’t quite herself in this novel. As she was cut off from the Data Overmind, she started acting a little more human, showing a little bit more emotion and overall being less restrictive in her own demeanour. It was nice to see. I hope to see her a lot more like this if the series progresses past the middle of 2004.
Haruhi’s personality shined through in this one. As always. She didn’t give a fuck and was always up for whatever they faced, loving to dive into whatever was up next. To me, it was obvious she knew what was going on really, but as per usual keeps it to herself.
Throughout the series released so far (as of when I’m writing this), She’s given hints before that she sort of knows more than she lets on. But in this story with EVERYTHING being really obvious, her blind eye to it all comes across as really funny.
Interestingly, we finally learn more about Asahina’s time travel device, the ‘TPDD’. Apparently it is embedded into her DNA, and only surfaces when needed. It may explain the star-shaped mole on her breast, as some sort of visual representation of its installation.
I'm pleased the book itself is canon. Going into it, I assumed it was more like alternative versions of themselves (as sliders), but I had also a vague thought it could be like a silly non-canon story thing made up for fun. I say this as the original release dates for parts 1 and 2 were released in 2004 and 2006 respectively, in The Sneaker. So yeah, the characters go back into their real world selves at the end of the day.
It’s possible the publishers pitched the initial idea to Tanigawa with the suggestion of building upon what was already written, with him only having to write half a books worth of story in order to reap the rewards of a completed novel, and all the crazy money and prestige he would get from that.
He had to have read the first two shorts before starting work on the Wild West story, as his continued writing seems to be on par with the early work, like the way the first two short stories are written is in line with his heyday at the hight of his creative freedom, so he must have re-read them before starting to write. Somehow the buzz of the early day writing style rubbed off on him for the rest of the novel.
Apart from in a few places.
The only issue I have with this book, is that once again, Tanigawa decided to teach us readers a lot of rubbish that is inconsequential to the Haruhi storyline. He REALLY went off on one with his research in order to fill pages, probably to justify the necessary word count. In this novel in particular, it was about quantum mechanics- or something. My god he really waffled on and on about it, pages and pages and pages of it. True filler content, especially in the last third of the book. Just rubbish. I ended up listening to this kindle book via the Alexa app.
It’s taken me a while to get this review out. Half a month in fact! I don’t have the time these days and I was waiting for Yen Press to release a limited-edition paperback version set to the original release cover art style, to satisfy their oldest fans of the novel series. Alas, they didn’t release anything. So I got the cheapest option which is the kindle edition. I guess Yen press did throw a bone to us though, as page 2 or whatever has the artwork on a simple white page in what was designed to be it, had they gone ahead. The art this time being two swords over what looks like a swirling vortex. I do feel extremely miffed about this though.
I wanted to cheat for my synopsis above, by copy and pasting and reworking something found elsewhere on the internet, but there isn’t one.
This is it folks!
The only synopsis for the Theater of Haruhi in English, on the internet, so far at least! So I had to go back and write it properly.
The Kindle version has a way of copy and pasting, so I was able to grab some sentences here and there, and get the pictures. I have included most of these as they are glorious.
The picture of Kyon and Koizumi fishing, looks to be from a rowing boat. However in the story they were fishing directly from the pirate ship. I’m pretty sure. Oh well.
I didn’t understand quite what The Sage wanted at the end. As a last-minute thing he took the kidnappees with him into the real world. And they were transformed into a balloon which flies off into the sky. What happens when the balloon pops? Maybe that’s the point, flying away is a metaphor of the data life forms being set free to exist somehow without any physical body? Oh, here’s a thought!; What if they somehow turn up at a later date when our heroes are all indisposed from an enemy attack, and they can’t get out of the situation they’re in, and just when you think it’s all over, the Sage turns up completely out the blue to save everyone! Well, you’ve heard it here first folks! XD
Oh and to all those fans that claim we ‘already got the ending to the series’, and ‘anything else we get is just filler epilogue stuff’- how completely wrong you are. We have not had the ending! The author has been in a slump. Even said he is getting over his sleep deprecation in the Afterword to this book. The final ending storyline will be something to do with the metal rod found from Tsuruya’s estate, probably.
If this novel was a TV anime, they could make it 26 episodes Very Easily. Like Tsubasa Reservoir Chronical. It would be a very interesting take on a Haruhi TV series too, with 2 or 3 episodes set in each world. Hollywood loves a good multiverse story (for some reason), so why not adapt this then, Japan? Hu? Hu??
The stuff written in the synopsis about the 17th century England, moving forward to WW2 and the submarine, then moving on again etc, all of that was just one or two paragraphs in the actual book. What I wrote could be longer than what was in the book itself!
Asahina fans would be crying after reading this novel, as she was here, present in this book, but hardly talked or mentioned at all. The least focused character in this for sure.
I’m happy the book told us when it was actually set in the timeline- despite only saying it once or twice. It was enough.
The Sage only mentioned the word ‘Canopy’ once. That was enough to let us readers know what the hell is actually going on. Oh, sorry to readers that are reading this in timeline order for the first time, you guys will have to stay as clueless as the characters for a little bit longer.
I would have preferred this novel to be set a lot longer down the timeline, however the author probably felt he had to cram it into the end of November due to what was already said and published from the first two chapters, released way back when. Oh well.
Overall, really happy with this novel. A solid 7-10 from me. I hope he has gotten out of his slump to write more content, and hopefully it will be set after everything written so far, AKA the middle of 2004 onwards, as a proper sequel storyline. Well, see you in the next one, whenever that may be!
Up next: The Day Of Sagittarius.
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