Hayate The Combat Butler Chapter 530: Dreams Come In Various Forms -- Review and Synopsis

This is the face of "filler." When you see it, you'll know it.

Synopsis: Fumi and Sharna are still going on about that making money through rap thing.

Sharna says that it was mistake to try and make money through rap anyway. Fumi wonders what she else she can do.

Anywayz, Fumi reminds us that her family will starve if she remains in the poorhouse.

Sharna suggests finding a part-time job. But Fumi throws a tantrum. She wants FUN AND MONEY! Why don't'ya understand, Sharna-chan!?

Suddenly, Shii-chan appears even though Fumi left her at home. She says she agrees with Fumi!

Shii-chan suggests thinking about how to receive a government grant without tax or something like that.

Fumi likes this idea.

Sharna goes all: WAIT A MINUTE!

Sharna says something about overflowing hopes and dreams and not using dirty methods to attain money.

Fumi blanks out and asks Shii-chan for suggestions.

Shii-chan says there's a lot of dreams in insurance scams, right?

Sharna asks where's the dream in that.

Suddenly, we're shown Shii-chan apparently as an office worker drinking in a bar by herself... and thinking about her grandmother who just died.

Back to reality, Shii-chan says: something like that.

Fumi says she understands. Sharna says that's a crime!

Shii-chan says that she understands and will use her powers to search for a lucrative job that is full of hopes and dreams... by consulting a smart phone... lol

She says she found one! The top ranking hit is... a YOUTUBER! (oh fudge... Hata, you troll)

After some explaining, Shii-chan manages to convince both Fumi and Sharna to get into it... especially when she explains the annual income of a hit youtuber.

So now with Fumi all fired up, they have to decide on what kind of movies to upload.

This is the look of disappointment... or is it awe? Well, whatever.

Shii-chan says something about reaching a particular goal for new youtubers that I can't understand... lol

She also says she has a unique idea that no one's thought of yet.

ANIMAL MOVIES ARE CUTE! (Everyone sing Miku's Doubutsu Uranai nao! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GvSnQbDcf0) She also gets all enthusiastic and shows them a few animal movies like this viral cute cat movie.

Fumi says she's got that stupid dog Armageddon at home, Sharna says they'd better go with a cat.

Anyway, Fumi goes home and then tries to get Armageddon to do something in front of the camera... which he does. He gets up, goes to the fridge, puts some milke IN A GLASS... and then he opens a laptop and shows them a viral video of himself singing Senbonzakura.

He then opens some kind of offer to work as a famous singer with someone on a smartphone and proceeds to walk off into the sunset with a jacket on.

Fumi: Let's... work seriously.

Shii-chan: Yes, Master!

Review: While this chapter was purely filler, it does serve to highlight one of the important recurring themes in Hayate The Combat Butler -- which is, things don't always go the way you planned... but again, this doesn't mean that you give up on your dreams.

As the chapter title says, dreams can come in various forms. Now then, let me go on a tangent and talk about this theme a bit since some interesting talk came up in chapter 529 in the comments section of Doughnut Gunso's blog.

Anyway, I want to talk about several things here, so I've broken them down into subheadings.

Hayate Isn't A "Good Person"

I've talked about Hayate at length in my previous character analysis and I have mentioned something like this in passing once, but anyway, I'd like to restate my personal assessment that Hayate himself isn't really a good person.

Yes, he does many things which one can objectively consider to be good. The effects of his actions are usually good, but at the core of his being as a person, Hayate often has the wrong motivations for spreading his "casual kindness" everywhere. Furthermore, it's his propensity for being casually kind which often results in girls falling in love with him -- and which he has been very hesitant to address throughout the series, even if he should be well-aware by now that he is the one causing girls to fall in love with him.

Anyway, like I mentioned in the comments section of Hayatereport, I don't believe in absolutes like classifying someone as "good" or "evil." What I can say about Hayate's actions however is that he still hasn't found a true personal ideal or reason for his actions. I've compared him to Emiya Shirou and I stand by that comparision because both of them are living on borrowed ideals. This is also why I believe Hayate is straying way behind Nagi in the character development department because Nagi has found her own reasons for being who she is and doing what she does. You may disagree with her reasons, but I find her admirable because they truly belong to her -- she is not hesitant in her actions because of this, unlike Hayate. 

How I Believe Idealism Works In This Series
I've mentioned that the Hayate universe espouses idealism but idealism which is firmly grounded in reality. Allow me to explain:

Let's look at the mangaka arc. Nagi has a simple dream. She wants to become a best-selling mangaka. It's a simple dream that trods on no one's lawn and while it is very unrealistic, it's not something that one can consider as "evil."

So what happens to this dream? Hata steps all over it. He puts her through the wringer in the mangaka arc and crushes her dreams over and over again. Nagi is made to realize that she is very very far from being a professional mangaka when she sees a professional mangaka's scribbles which makes her own manga look like trash.

Just when she has recovered from this, she finds a rival in Ruka and again, said Rival crushes her in a manga-selling competition and Nagi has no excuse at all for her loss this time. She is forced to accept that she may not be as talented as she ever thought she was.

A little bit later, just when she has worked so hard to create a good manuscript that she believes Hayate would surely congratulate her for, she sees her butler apaprently flirting with her rival.

But that's not the end of it. She spills ink on her manuscript and is apparently on the verge of giving up the fight, but... at the end of the day, she doesn't. She finds the will to carry on -- the strength to continue and when she does, when her motivations are just right, she... barely manages to end her contest in a tie with Ruka...

So it seems that Nagi didn't really find any reward at all and while she believes she won, it was nothing mroe than a cheap win which was allowed by her rival, but that's only true if you're just looking at the results. Again, look at the title of this chapter, because it IS one of the overarching themes of this series and that, I believe is how idealism works in the Hayate universe.

Nagi found her reward during the climax of the mangaka arc, but it's not the kind of reward that people are looking for. Yes, Hayate did stay with her, albeit with a heavy heart at what he might have lost in Ruka, but that's not it -- you're not looking at the right reward here.

Nagi's reward was her sense of accomplishment in finally creating a manga that she could be proud of after seeing how miserable her previous creations were. She finally managed to create something competent with her own two hands -- and yes, she did have a whole lot of help, but it was still something she made herself, something she could call her own and which she should be very proud of. But that's not the end of it. During the course of selling her newly-printed doujin, she finds real joy -- the joy of selling her manga to people who were actually interested in it. Her dream of becoming a best-selling manga was somewhat fulfilled here, again, just not in the way that she was expecting. She didn't become a trillion-selling mangaka overnight, but through hard work, dedication, and yes, some luck through the help of various individuals, she at least became a sold-out newbie mangaka in comiket.

So yeah, instead of seeing the series as nothing more than an exercise in pessimism, perhaps try to look at the bright side and try to see how the various characters are indeed rewarded for their "hard work" and "unwavering morals," just don't expect the reward to come in the way that you expect.

Hahaha! No Nagi this chapter but I still managed to talk all about Nagi! Achievement Unlocked!

Fanart Corner: Whee! Got some composite art today using photos of Nagi doll and my scribbles~ Check them out! This is inspired by 40mP's Hatsune Miku song, Little World/小さな世界 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCrYt3SjxHE