After the incredibly moving episode 22 and the subsequently adorable and hilarious episode 23, several things dawned on me, in a manner that those subject to particularly amazing anime are wont to do: That I take my parents for granted, and their sacrifices lightly. That more than anything else, they want my dreams to come true over theirs, if they ever had any. That they had set aside all the time and energy and money to mould me into what I am today.

That’s what the penultimate episode of Clannad was about, and I’m not too displeased to say, with a half-smile, a wrinkled brow, and a quivering lip, that I can see what magic this adaptation has worked in the hearts of many a fan four years ago. What amazes me more is how such a supposedly “light” show of a famously maligned genre can reach out with invisible arms from my monitor and, grasping my heart with both hands, squeeze firmly.

Clannad ranks a solid 9 out of 10 on my MyAnimeList now, sitting astride kimikiss and ef; a cut above Kanon’s grudging 8, and leagues above Air’s 4 and 5 score respectively. Which reminds me, do I want to see KyoAni adapting more Key works? I’m not all that sure myself. Given the arduous hike that Everyone’s Favourite Animation Studio™ has been taking, climbing higher and higher up the hill of Quality with each successive work, something in me wants to see planetarian or Little Busters. Before that, though, I’ve got to start at the beginning.

The only problem I had with episode 18 was how it reminded me that there would be no Kyou End. A nail in the coffin for the silent fan in me, whom, like many others, got captivated along the way, whether by means of gym storeroom escapades, a potent combination of character design and voice acting, or both. Needless to say, there will never be another game of tennis in anime with such heart-rending implications ever again. I suppose this will only make the widescreen re-watch some time in the future all the more bittersweet, but that’s the price you’ve got to pay for taking sides…

what she said

It’s official: three out of five blogs approve of Fuuko’s reappearance in episode 12. The other two were just grumpy old men who couldn’t stomach a little of KyoAni’s signature humour (it being an anime-original scene and all). Just kidding, and I’m not talking about the grumpy part either. I’ve already written about why Fuuko’s arc worked for me so we won’t go into the details about why Fuuko supposedly sucks since this works under the premise that, as shocking as it may seem, Fuuko as a character actually did some good throughout the seven episodes or so in which she appeared.

I have it from a very reliable source that Fuuko remains in character, even for the anime-original parts of Clannad like the crane-catching sequence and the classroom/wedding ones, where Nagisa isn’t present. She’s a source of humour throughout her entire arc right up till the end, and KyoAni’s decision to animate her first, essentially removing her from the cast early on, seems like a good decision on retrospect. Why so?

The title is an approximate translation of Kotomi’s oddly-named theme. Etude pour les petites supercordes, anyone? I’m wondering if it’s Flench, which makes it a distant cousin of Engrish, in addition to falling under Japan’s ranguage category. Or maybe it makes perfect sense in the context of string instruments since “cordes” apparently denotes that, to say nothing of how “study” in this case is meant to be a short performance piece of some sort, but I can’t really figure out the “little super strings” part.

Unlike Fuuko’s arc which held its cards closely to its chest and didn’t really let on what it was all about until after the SURPRISE REVELATION (which turned out to be nothing more than Key recycling an old idea), Kotomi’s arc shows its hand right from the start, albeit quietly amidst all the manzai comedy and lighthearted moments. It wasn’t the focus, to be sure, but the understated manner in which it was revealed caught my attention.

It’s also occurred to me recently as to what the dream world really is — hint: it starts with “a”, and has eight letters. I was pleased to find out after confirming with reliable sources that I was right, for the most part at least. Non-spoiler spoiler thoughts (yes, I am aware of the contradiction, but there are spoilers, and there are spoilers) about it after the cut, although if you had even the slightest amount of imagination and watch the OP animation as often as I do — which is every single time there’s a new episode — you could have figured it out already.

never was there a question of depth and importance

Looking at the abortion that was my previous post on Gurren Lagann, I concur that the concept of raving about GL in blog posts was something I certainly underestimated while trying to write about 9 episodes watched in one sitting. If bloggers could be reduced to incoherent wrecks by watching an episode a week, those 3 hours were probably like that overdose of speedball which killed River Phoenix.

This has to do with the little bit of crying that was present this episode, which also happens to be the penultimate episode of Fuuko’s arc. I’ve found it to be an initial downer, but the thought suddenly struck me in the middle of the episode — what if Fuuko didn’t get a Good End like Ayu? Until now I’ve been convinced that Key is like some kind of tsundere bully that trips you while you’re walking and then cushions the impact by throwing a pillow underneath, but what if they decided not to this time around?

That brief insight proved to be truer than I imagined, for the manly tears present in this episode certainly surprised me. It was like waking up to a sledgehammer being swung in my face by a masked figure at my bedside, and while I’m not about to be reduced to a raving tearful wreck just yet, I’m not sure if I’ll be able to say the same as confidently next week.

The basis of harem is pretty simple — one guy, a lot of girls, and plenty of rabu-rabu hijinks in-between. This, unfortunately, is as easy as saying that the basis of shounen is this guy who discovers a drill-shaped key his inner powers one day and goes on to pierce through the heavens save the world. Or saying that the basis of shoujo is throwing one girl into the midst of 10 or so pretty guys and having her come off with her one true love, or that the basis of slice of life is that NOTHING HAPPENS.

what Konata said about tsunderes having twintails was true

The title is a bad pun on how a lot of bloggers are dumb this time of the year (i.e. first impressions posts) by dissing a lot of stuff they watch, only to reluctantly say they love it at the end of the season, or something. As bj0rn has said, tsundere boners. See Lucky Star for more details. Also, after watching the first episode of Clannad I found out an interesting bit of trivia:

[03:47:15] <+Moogy> fun fact
[03:47:21] <+Moogy> sunohara has more lines than any other character in the game
[03:47:23] <+Moogy> by a wide margin
[03:47:26] <saturnine> …
[03:47:37] <saturnine> and you don’t get an ending with him
[03:47:38] <saturnine> ;[
[03:47:42] <+Moogy> lol you do
[03:47:44] <saturnine> rofl WTF
[03:47:44] <+Moogy> he has his own path
[03:47:47] <saturnine> YAOI END?
[03:47:50] <saturnine> HOMO END?
[03:47:53] <+Moogy> (romance is not involved)

They probably adopt a kid or something, since it’s about family, after all.