I’ll keep this short…
Time-travel is an interesting concept that can do great things for a series except when it’s used as an excuse to not write anything significant for an entire episode. Unless the next episode follows up with something mindblowing, I’m calling shenanigans on the writing team.
…Shortest post ever, mirite?
u monster 
Well, they’re not making it up as it goes, the story is based on the light novels. And from what I’ve heard, it’s been a pretty accurate adaptation so far. Plus I found the way they reanimated every single scene made the episode’s atmosphere more perplexing and gloomy.
Actually, this was one of the most powerful of all Haruhi episodes, for me. This isn’t exactly time-travel, but they are doing it right, whatever it is. One of the things that sets Haruhi apart from other “harem” shows is the serious undertone, which this ep has in spades.
Well, this one was kind of a re-run, in the sense it did kinda fail there, but I’m not whether they could have done any different.
Then there was the Mikuru overdose plus Haruhi actually treating her like a human, or better, one of her closest friends.