In contrast, Haruka doesn’t have anything like that, because she knows that her friends aren’t into her hobbies. They *accept* them, but (this is me layering real-life experience onto the show here) acceptance means dick-all when you don’t have a friend to share with.

So I guess the “safe zone” of Genshiken is intermittent. It’s there, but not all the time.

IMO Genshiken seems much more of a inter-otacentric show (we see the culture from the inside), whereas NHnH is an outer-otacentric show (we see the culture from the outside). This is supported for NHnH ’cause the show was all about sociocultural ridicule and insecurity etc., how “we” are perceived from the outside. On the other hand, Genshiken, insofar as Sasahara was “the subject” – the viewer’s proxy (or one of the significant ones) – the show was like an invisible endoscope, an anthropological view into the lives of the otaku; seeing ridicule from the inside out. There were several scenes I remember of Sasahara playing galges by himself at night with the headphones on, a seemingly deplorable or humiliating scene.

Lucky Star is definitely a safe zone, but I think Genshiken is more of a way to explore social stigmatization in a less-than-sugar-coated way NHnH treated the otaku predicament.

And I haven’t seen the last two episodes yet. I’ll get to them. . . Eventually. :D

NHnH is still special to me, though, for perhaps a more core element of it, the raw heart-melting ‘awwwwwwwwwwwwwww’ factor of seeing Yuuto and Haruka interact in such an honest (instead of pandering) manner.