hontou ni » Kanon

City-wide Taiyaki Mystery Patrol

Zyl — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 16:50:08 +0000

In the course of my (still ongoing) literature review of anime blogging about Kanon, I finally realized that my search parameters in The Hunt for Taiyaki in London was far too narrow, as I was on the lookout for the hot, freshly made taiyaki from a bakery. No joy, of course. There are plenty of Japanese living in London and plenty of shops that sell Japanese groceries but they don't sell the type that Ayu eats-and-runs.

Clued in by Hinano's Taiyaki Chronicles, I switched to searching for the packed type. And found it at (where else?) Japan Centre, Piccadilly.

On actually eating the pastry fishies, there are two major considerations. The first is heating them up. The packaging suggests microwave at 500-600W for 1 minute 20 seconds for one or 2 minutes 10 seconds for two. An alternative method was to stick one into the toaster. The former method really warmed up the red bean guts of the fish but the underside in contact with the plate became a tad soggy due to steam condensation. The latter method produced a pleasantly toasty exterior but the insides weren't as nicely warm as the nuclearator method. Being the sort of person who wants the best of both worlds, my next experiment will involve nuking one taiyaki first and then toasting it and vice versa for the other. And to use a wire rack for the microwave stage instead of a plate to avoid condensation issues.

The second consideration is the Osaka Question. No, not elevator/escalator. I ate my taiyaki from the head rather than the tail. It just doesn't feel right to eat it from the tail, even though that's what I do for steamed fish - the head is the best part that everyone leaves for last to fight over.

And just as Sia reminds me of the goodness of nattou-okra (fermented beans and lady's fingers) and Mai Tokiha stirs my cravings for ramen and ummm... dairy production, Ayu is now my designated anime patron saint of taiyaki; I even found myself humming 'Last Regrets' when I was queuing up to pay for the taiyaki. LOL

Hontou ni Taihen desu ~taiyaki version

Kanon F-4 Decoy Disengaged

Zyl — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 12:08:09 +0000

Indeed, Miss Taiyaki-uguu. I haven't been reading or blogging about Kanon to avoid spoilers thus the total media blackout. Not having seen the Toei version, my knowledge of the game/series was limited to 1) 'Sad girls in snow' 2) Mai x SaYuri FTW and 3) the remake is by KyoAni. And I did enjoy it. Kanon did surprise me a few times. In a 'Wow! I should have seen that coming!' delighted way rather than a 'WTF!? SUNRISE KNNBCCB!' sort of surprise. And the series succeeded in transmorgifying my dislike for most of the Kanon girls, often via a short scene, into sympathy and even adoration.

At the beginning, I was wondering: 'How sad can these girls be?' Various ROFLMAO jokes and Kyonichi sarcasm were running amok and the whole atmosphere seemed pretty light-hearted. The real miracle of the series was that no one actually died from eating the Akiko Jam, which is probably made from the missing Minase head of household.

I did find Makoto irritating at first but then the pieces started to fit together. Her 'auuu' (vs the uguu), her love of playing tricks on Yuuichi (or, at least, trying to), her delight at a simple bell (nothing to do with siscon), Amano's bitterness, shadowy forms and bright eyes at the hill in the night, her memory loss. Then the belated realization that she's not just an annoying brat but a soul with much love and a willingness to sacrifice everything for a fleeting moment of reunion and companionship.

Even the side characters are interesting and have distinct personalities. The parallels between Makoto (small) and Makoto (big) just brought a poignant smile to my face. Sawatari Mikuru oneesama banzai! BANZAI! BANZAI!!

By the power of Out of Context: So glad that I am able to reach them now.

And hard too.

I was also completely surprised by how Kitagawa became a Good Guy. I had rated him as a Taniguchi due to his, albeit justified, outrage at Yuiichi's harem building and being completely house-trained by his Not Girlfriend Kaori. Making a fool of himself at the Pachelbel cafe with a demand but without explanation from Yuiichi. Sticking out his neck for Mai. Who would have even expected him to hold a position of responsibility in the students' council? But his greatest moment of glory was in episode 17: 'Yuu-iccchi~! Ohiruyasumi da yo~~!'

LOL when Mai turned into Yuki Nagato reading about Stripey. I had always been inclined to like SaYuri and Mai simply because of the implied yuri. Mmmmm... yuri. The exchange about whether SaYuri or Mai was the oneesama was pretty sweet too. Despite her strong silent archetype, Mai could also be extremely cute, hachimi-kuma-san! While SaYuri was nice and had a lovely reduce-knees-to-jelly 'Ahaha~~', I did think of her as a bit of a simpleton. Which is why I didn't her Sad Story bearing down the street just as I turned the corner and it left its tyre marks on my back.

Sick girl with terminal illness and very limited time is pretty clichéd. How the hell were they going to make this interesting? Well, it did spawn some funny Impz comics. I was won over eventually because it was Shiori's lack of time, rather than gratituous symptoms of The Impending End like lots of coughing, that framed her cuteness and elevated her to an embodiment of moé.

For most of the series, I probably looked at Nayuki in the way Eri regards Tenma: Nice girl and friend but oh what a nitwit. Mainly from the way she spoke: Aa~nyuu~~... Piro~~! Fighto, da yo~~ and felt she deserved every bit of bullying from Yuuichi.

But actually hor, she quite steady one. I was just as surprised as Yuuichi.
Nayuki I like. I like very much now.

Ouch.

The impact was somewhat reduced by the familiarity of the image though...

IT CAN BE DONE. IF FOR MY MASTER.
Fighto~ da yo~

Ayu was cute, funny and uguu but I just couldn't see how she could be the Chosen One (until the penultimate episode) even though the OP and ED clearly indicated so and the story was moving teleologically in that direction. But I did not have a WTF reaction to the Kiss for two reasons. Firstly, the context was set in how both shared a deep wellspring of pain. That kind of thing can bond people in an instant, like the way it did for SaYuri and Mai. Though, of course, it can be hugely destructive when two negative psyches meld, hacking, slashing, clawing, freezing each other as we plunge through the abyss for what seems an eternity before finally mercifully hitting the bottom and the end, the wasted lives and years utterly shattered and spent as life, other lives, go on by. But none of the characters in Kanon are really negative.

Secondly, the kiss was a retrodiction, that Yuuichi and Ayu had that past which formed their current bond and basis of attraction, and a harbinger for the tantilising promise of the retrieval and renewal of that past. For sometimes love is not always easy and the road can be long, bending in often unexpected directions and winding into deadends, which can make interesting viewing too.

There was a great gentleness about the last episode that was consistent with the series' atmosphere, its characters and story. I don't think it was intended to be a tearjerker but I did feel the urge to put Kana Ueda's rendition of Snow Rain on repeat play.

The mixing of the miracle and dream reminded me of Zhuang Zi's parable of the butterfly. But more to the fore of my mind was how Yuuichi will regret making fun of Ayu if she grows up to Ama Shigure proportions!

Overall, an enjoyable series, ahaha~~ Now... can anyone tell me where to find some damn taiyaki in London?

Hontou Ni anime skirmishes 2006

Zyl — Fri, 29 Dec 2006 10:50:05 +0000

Stripey and I often have quite different anime diets, it's not unusual for one to have never seen a series that the other considers a favourite. But as we like to discuss anime, over bowls of minced pork noodles or ramen when I'm back in Singapore or via Skype when I'm not, there are constant battles to influence each other to watch this or that anime series. 2006 has been no exception. Looking back, it seems that Stripey patiently practises an attritional strategy while I prefer to strike hard at his weakest points to secure swift and decisive victory.

This year has been an exceptionally good year for some of Stripey's longstanding machinations. Firstly, his efforts to get me to watch Kanon. I had resisted his advocacy when the Toei version first aired as I disliked Toei's art style intensely. However, its "sad girls in snow" motif was sufficiently interesting to keep the tanuki's insurgency alive as I do like bittersweet melodrama. Its popularity also gave Stripey's campaign added staying power as I encountered references in many anime blogs and web comics like Fred 'Piro' Gallagher's Megatokyo. When it was announced that Kyoto Animation was in charge of the remake, victory finally arrived after four long years as I had enjoyed Fumoffu and Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya. Though I'm not blogging Kanon, I'm still enjoying it - Mai x Sayuri FTW! Ahaha~

Another sustained Stripey effort that finally came to fruition was my recent devouring of 2004's Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha and 2005's A's sequel. The buzz around StrikerS (where they are no longer loli, phew) was the context upon which the initial trigger was finally activated, namely Seaotter's entry for the Riuva motivation poster contest. Even though I do like hawt yuri pr0ntasticism (the Kannazuki/StoPani School), I prefer implied yuri (the MariMite School of Yuri Fandom) partly because there's an exceptional tenderness to the way yuri relationships are developed that seems to be quite rare in anime BGR these days. Of course, I'll be cheering for Nanoha x Fate in StrikerS while categorically asserting that Chrono x Fate siscon is soooo not gonna happen.

However, Stripey guerilla tactics don't always work. Operation Yoake Mae Yori Ruri Iro Na never got off the ground; his efforts to preach about the series over Skype have repeatedly collapsed into uncontrollable sobbing, repeated orzing and incoherent babbling about cabbage. *Zyl shrugs Zaku shoulders* Currently, tanuki insurgents are being inserted for Zero no Tsukaima, Asatte no Houko and Souko no Strain but a threshold of sufficient interest has yet to be reached in any of these series.

Parallel to HiME Miko Mashiro to Otome Brat Mashiro LOL

I've had some limited success in getting Stripey to watch Black Lagoon and Sumomo mo momo mo but his interest has been limited to the episodes focusing on Gretel and Iroha respectively; my surgical strikes have thus failed to cascade and create the momentum for the rest of these series. Magikano was a peripheral battle field since I still haven't even watched this series at all. But the observed response to the One Screencap Strike provided some pretty solid reaffirmation for the hypothesis first proposed by Ender in Jul 2005.

Stripey had held out for a surprisingly long time against Otome wa Boku ni Koishiteru. This was a tad unexpected as I thought that Horie Yui in the starring role would reel him in faster than you say, 'Trap.' However, it was precisely because Horie Yui's character was so lovely as Mizuho that Stripey feared that he would suffer the crisis of sexual identity that flows from adherence to the Kurogane Doctrine. He's since fallen in love with all the girls and the male lead of OtoBoku's cast and has joined Jason Miao and company on an Egyptian river cruise, hoping that their repeated chanting of: 'I don’t care anymore. Just shoot me. No way there’s a penis on this. None. I won’t accept it (repeat)' will result in Ep 13's revelation that Mizuho really is a girl. Either that or they'll hijack Sora's ship from Kashimashi and arrange for Mizuho to have a little accident.

I was thinking of putting up a whole series of OtoBoku HCGs that display Mizuho's manliness, mainly to hear what kind of justifications that will be put up to maintain the current state of cognitive dissonance. But given my own anime predispositions, it would be just sooo awesome if Mizuho is Kashimashi-ed and then both Mariya and Takako eventually decide to continue loving the now female Mizuho anyway. Awesome. And though I am looking forward to our 2007 skirmishes, there's still plenty of common ground between us, such as: Mariya x Mizuho FTW!