Shameful Otaku Secret!

New Life

[Don't know your Tomoya from your Tomoyo? Clannad Info page to the rescue.]

After having to wait an extra week after last episode’s bulldozer-of-bodies, I was set up for disappointment. But honestly, at this phase of the show there should be no wasted minutes, and thankfully that wasn’t the case.

Recap: Okazaki’s final mission

First thing’s first, one of Tomoyo’s first acts as student council president is to allow the theater club to share an advisor with those troublesome weak-handed choir bitches. And Nagisa starts to figure out just how difficult it’s going to be to pull a play off before the school festival.

After a counselor has a lot of difficulty trying to talk to Okazaki’s dad about his future, Nagisa has to chase O-Town down and force him to meet the guy.

Nagisa sees just how bad things seem to be between our ever-sloppier hero and his pops. So, much to Sunohara’s jealous dismay, she offers up her guest room for him. Sanae is happy as a clam, and even crazy old man Akio seems to enjoy having him around to help in the bakery.

But it’s never quite a bed of roses, is it? Not only is Tomoya uncomfortable in his overly-homey situation, but something is amiss in the Furukawa household, and the villain is Key’s standard bogeyman: a troubled but cloudy past. It seems Sanae runs a cram school for kids, because she’s no longer able to teach middle school.

Why doesn’t she teach anymore, wonders Tomoya.

“A lot of things happened,” Akio tells him. Later, Nagisa confesses to him that she feels that she somehow wronged them in the past, but they always tell her she’s imagining things.

And the robot in the imaginary world that you totally forgot about decides to try to make another robot. The girl helps it. The CG is very conspicuous.

What We’ve Learned

What did I say? I said there was some kind of horrific grizzly attack in the Furukawa’s past, because no one is that cheery in these stories without covering something, especially not when their daughter has the mysterious moe-itis disease. So Tomoya’s Final Mission (should he choose to accept it) will be to discover what the thing is, and most likely in the process repair his relationship with his father. But next episode’s preview shows us Akio insisting that even if Tomoya finds the truth, he’d better not tell Nagisa.

We also learned that the budget might be slipping a tiny bit. Kyoto is not immortal, I guess.

Thoughts

In spite of the heavy subject matter that’s looming on the horizon, there were lots of scenes good for a chuckle in this episode. Okazaki running from the counselor with Nagisa chasing him had great comic timing, even as it showed Nagisa becoming a more appealing character (she’s gonna die, right? I’ll put money on it).

The single funniest scene, though, was Sunohara’s improvised melodrama featuring the theater club’s sound effects synthesizer. Yes, Sunohara is usually just comic relief, but at least he’s good at it. And to be fair, he does toss a little sidelong wisdom to Tomoya later in the episode.

Finally. For the first time in a while, I’m looking forward to what Clannad has in store.

A Room Without Anyone, aka Trapped In The Closet part 29

They say these “slice of life” shows aren’t really about anything.

Sweet animated Christ, if only that were true.

In the case of these Key shows, they’re about the inherent pain that is life. And about foisting that pain upon hapless viewers. Sometimes it’s in the form of senseless tragedy. Sometimes it’s a more brain-oriented, dull nagging hurt that comes from being completely unable to pull a shard of sense out of the tangled wreckage of plot developments.

You can has recap?

Just when I thought things were getting tolerable — thanks to some clever humor and actual character development, #16 was really enjoyable — they pull some fucked up shit in the beginning of this one.

I had almost forgotten Nagisa’s health “issue.” That unspecified, horribly tragic and ultra-vague disease that definitely kills you and that at least one character in all of these fucking shows gets. I think it’s called moe-itis.

And it’s bringing me down.

I’m not the least bit sad about the inevitable, although if they step up their game I might be. I’m just frustrated about these old-hat Kanon tricks. So anyway, she collapses and has to be out of school for a while, thus very transparently freeing up the storyline for other girls who, in the end, are less boring but won’t matter as much as her.

You know what? This isn’t working, so I’m going to break it down into the series of completely ludicrous situations that essentially make up this episode. It’s not that I require total believability in a show. After all, the original Fuko story was very supernaturally oriented. But things have to be believable within a given set of circumstances or internal rules — and Clannad keeps asking me to accept round after round of new and hackneyed circumstances.

Preposterousness, Instance 1

Tomoya reveals that he doesn’t date because he is indeed that noble eunuch I once suspected him of being: his dad is messed up, he’s a delinquent, why should he go all the way to “hardened criminal,” which losing his virginity would no doubt drive him to? He’s no good for the ladies. And you know what, ladies? If he keeps telling you that, there’s a good chance you should believe him.

Preposterousness, Instance 2

Tomoyo is an ass-beater, we all knew that. Now she’s coming into T-dog’s house in the morning to wake him up, which is both funny and a little cute. That’s OK, although she is younger — tsk, tsk. But turns out she’s the star of a major Hong Kong action flick that happens to take place in real life. Sunohara fucks everything up by parading her around like his bodyguard, so approximately 8,000 street toughs come to jack her after school. Ghosts, sure. High school “Street Fighter” characters? I just don’t know.

Preposterousness Instance 3

The mother of all inanity. The closet incident. If you could only hear. my. teeth. grinding. as I write.

The reference library girl with the coffee and weird books gets Tomoya to do some sort of magic charm where he balances two 10-yen coins on top of one another and will magically get locked in a gym closet with a girl of his choosing. And just to show you that I’m capable of suspending disbelief, I’ll let you know that this Dictionary Definition of Plot Contrivance doesn’t bother me.

It’s clear he would have chosen Nagisa had she been at school, but I’m thinking it’s probably because she’s all safe and shy and not because he actually likes her. I’m not certain though, since he does spend a lot of time pining for her in the club room. I thought this episode was going to be about the debate in his head of whether he digs her or not. I’m still not sure what it is about, actually.

So anyway, he seems to default to Kyou, and it works. Gross gym uniform shots ensue, she wonders aloud where such a specific charm came from, and there’s lots of beyond-awkward shit I can’t quite bring myself to watch again. She’s flattered that he’d pick her and she’s clearly (creepily) into it, but ashamed because her weaksauce sister is still trying to close the deal. Well, not trying, so much.

Thing is, in the end it boils down to one of those situations that we, as anime viewers, are going to be expected to largely forget because it doesn’t change anything.

The other sad part is that if Tomoya does end up with one of these girls, it really would be great if it was Kyou because she’s the only character with a shred of personality (and hopefully they’re just teasing us with the tsundere bullshit, they seem pretty self-aware of it). But that’s not how these things work. It’s just not pathetic enough.

Best we can hope for is that he realizes some deep love for Nagisa from his darkest past, just before she succumbs to her acute moe-itis in a long and drawn-out series of 87 episodes.

What We’ve Learned

Nothing! I feel dumber having watched this episode! I was right after all that both Tomoyo and Kyou are getting story exposure, but Tomoyo, fun as she is, is a walking cartoon (and yes, I realize the delicious ironing in saying that, seeing as how this is a fucking cartoon show) and Kyou’s “sex-me-ok-seeya!” routine in the closet was frustrating and ridiculous. I guess we did learn that the motivation behind Kyou’s lunchtime recruitment of Tomoya was in fact Ryou, but will she step on her sister’s toes? Do I care? I don’t know anymore.

One good thing I can say: Covering two, possibly three girls’ stories at once is unpopular with the gamers, but I think it’s a great move that should keep the formula from getting too tired.

Oh yeah!

Fuko appears again. And it’s still not funny. Too bad no one remembers her, someone could go to the hospital where she’s laying comatose and snuff her out. Was that mean? Sorry, she was a good story (when she was called Ayu in Kanon…) but I don’t dig this coming back for (ostensible) comic relief.

In Summation…

When I want to say, “I can’t believe I waited a week for this,” usually Lost is the only show to turn to. Thanks, Clannad! Ultimately, I the problem is that I do like this show, and I think it’s capable of doing great things. Like your mom always told you, I’m not mad, I’m just… disappointed.

A Problematic Matter / 3 on 3

Like I said, I’m really pretty glad the Kotomi storyline has drawn to a close. I’m also glad they did it with a minimum of teary-eyed horror, though the resolution still seemed somewhat less than satisfying to me. Now Kotomi is a regular blue-haired companion to the Fujibayashi twins, nearly indistinguishable save for her little round hair ties. Two episodes went by while I was traveling for work, and look what they’ve done. Some of my expectations for this show have been turned on their head, and that really pleases me.

Heretofore-incidental character Youhei Sunohara, ostensibly Tomoya’s best friend, drives these two episodes with a visiting little sister and a crazy-ass plan to get Nagisa’s theatre club hopes rejuvenated by playing basketball. Is it really important why? I suppose maybe a little, though it is an obvious plot contrivance. See, there’s only one advisor, and I guess he’s not allowed to endorse two clubs, and the (erstwhile) music club is hoping for him to sponsor a choir club because this girl Rie can’t hold a violin bow after a car crash, so they’re putting threatening notes in Nagisa’s desk.

Really?

That’s what I mean by plot contrivance. However, it does allow Sunohara to get indignant about the girl taking advantage of her “handicap” for pity. And that drives him to prove that a handicap means nothing. Hence, a basketball game featuring a player who’s unable to lift his shooting arm.

Of course, this leads to trouble with Tomoya, who not only doesn’t want to do it, he doesn’t want the girls (including Sunohara’s sister, who doesn’t really think her older brother is that cool) to know about his little issue.

Can I just say, while I have this opportunity, that it’s the dumbest problem I’ve ever heard of? For something that causes Tomoya to pretty much pack it in and give up on life, why can’t they even animate it? Because it would just look as dumb as it sounds. Seriously, is there no other injury that could hinder his basketball forever and still be hidden from Nagisa? Bone spur? Scoliosis? Herpes?

I digress. Usually.

In addition to the charge toward Tomoya’s self-evaluating of his aimless life, an awful lot of developments went down. First, he stands up to the judo club bullying the younger but all-too-similarly named Tomoyo into joining, and that makes her think that maybe he’s not all that bad after all. In fact, she’s… interested.

And she’s not the only one. Kyou, exasperated with the sheer number of girls around Tomoya, uses her trademark bossiness to not only question his heterosexuality (it’s about time), but throttle him into eating lunch with her and her sister. She even gets the beginnings of a girl-fight going with Tomoyo. But is it for her own sake, or is it the personality-challenged Ryou who digs the delinquent? Who knows, but Kyou has gone from intolerable bitch to kind of cute in a single episode, so there’s a development for you.

In one of the few genuinely funny situations up to this point, Sunohara spent a whole episode thinking that Nagisa and Tomoya were dating, while Nagisa spent that same time thinking that Sunohara was gay for Tomoya. More importantly than its humor though, that was really the first time I can think of Tomoya actually acting in a way that I’d imagine a so-called “delinquent” might: his best friend has a crush on a girl so he tells the girl said friend is gay? Snap! And to shamelessly freak out Nagisa, to the point where she explodes her feelings (albeit in a strange way)?

Add to that his endless fucking with Sunohara and his sister, and you get a guy who appears to have a real hobby in social engineering of sitcom mishaps. I like this cold-ass Tomoya much more than the endlessly helpful one. Or at the very least, I believe him more.

To sum up the basketball match, for all intents and purpose a time filler until the very end: Kyou, Sunohara, and Tomoya take on the freshmen team until it becomes apparent they’re not bad. Then the varsity players, who know Tomoya’s secret, come out and proceed to clean house. Tomoya, while being knocked to the floor, sinks a miracle game-winning desperation basket while bouncing around an internal monologue on what a pathetic failure he is. But does it net them the advisor? We don’t know.

What We’ve Learned

I think the most important thing that’s happened in these two episodes has been the development of Tomoya as a character. While it’s getting late in the game, I’m glad he’s not just another empty vessel like Yuichi from Kanon, and it’s nice to see him act like a fuckup instead of just having to trust the shorthand of untucked shirt and habitual tardiness. And when actually called out about the girl thing, he seems to think about it a little. Could it be that he’s that much of a drag-ass that he can’t be bothered to like a girl? Who knows. Next episode’s preview looks to go even further into the what’s-eating-Tomoya subject, and I for one look forward to it.

Animation

Episode 15 starts with the robot and girl in the empty world, something we haven’t seen for quite a few episodes. And if you’re like me, it reminded you why the people animating this show are hot shit. I’ve been trying to catch up on Shakugan No Shana Second (by JC Staff), and it’s a really great-looking show that has consistently impressed, but five seconds of Kyoto’s Clannad pretty well dropped my jaw. That carried through to the rest of the episode, where I noticed that these guys never bounce a static image up and down for walking, and really don’t take many other shortcuts either. They almost animate too much hair and clothes. It’s like they’re showing off. High-class problems to have, eh?

If the story continues to deepen like it has these couple episodes (and it better, there’s really not that much of the show left), then we’re in for a show that finally matches its animation with great character development. Better late than never.