Mono no aware

As my old laptop undergoes a slow and inexorable descent into ruin (image a geriatric getting slower, creakier and clumsier with increasingly serious memory problems before the ever-nearing collapse) I’m finding less and less that’s in standard def and therefore playable. Not to mention playing catch-up on a lot of old shows and recent weeks being busy with Real Life things. My watchlist has grown shorter and things are settling down with plans for putting a new PC together in the next couple of months so I feel ready to watch more again. Recommendations here plz.

Now I’ve finished Clannad ~After Story~, with the exception of Kyou’s episode which is currently in my ‘to do’ folder, I felt I could finally watch the feature film adaptation. This turned out to be a good idea spoilers-wise since the movie covers events from both seasons of the TV show but in retrospect I think it’s a better introduction to the franchise than KyoAni’s effort. I’m not implying it’s the better of the two full stop, but it would probably be more rewarding to sit through the more heavily edited hour and a half version before the longer one; although I daresay the subset of ‘people who have not seen any Clannad before but plan to in the future’ is very small at this point in time.

The feature-length film covers the same ground as its younger counterpart but inevitably leaves out the side-stories and, interestingly, wraps it up with an alternative ending. Most noticably the art style and direction are different thanks to a Toei production crew, although the only change in terms of casting is that of Tomoya’s VA (i.e. Kenji Nojima as opposed to Yuuichi Nakamura). The result is different for sure, but I’d hate to think a KyoAni bias would stop you giving it a fair chance.

I’m late to the Clannad End party, by the way, because I like the widescreen. I feel as though I’ve completed some sort of long journey in getting to the end; considering how many episodes it’s taken, maybe I have. What started out as an experiment in broadening my viewing horizons hasn’t quite convinced me to watch the TV adaptations of Kanon or Air but on its own I think Clannad ~After Story~ is pretty special. Despite my initial reservations, occasional frustration and lingering (minor) criticisms of the ending I honestly think it’s outstanding. I know quite a few people have got an even bigger emotional kick out of this but remember I was never into bishoujo series in the first place.

Looking back, I’ve written A LOT about Clannad. It’s pure escapism. It’s funny and emotional at the same time. It’s sweet and fluffy, like cake. It’s fantasy, even though those aspects didn’t always work for me. It was high school romcom but showed wonderful single-mindedness in going for a Nagisa End, throwing in a superlative bonus episode to cover the bases before launching into its second half proper and finally earning my respect. Even though I’ve not played the VN (yet) I somehow think that the ending was better than even the dedicated fans gave it credit for.

Sorry, no V-day post for you. The timestamp is purely coincidental; I just got caught in Draft Rewrite Hell yesterday. But this is a pretty romantic show though, right?

You may remember that I have a turbulent relationship with Clannad. I was frustrated by its tendency to drift into overt sentimentality and sit uncomfortably between fantasy and reality; it offered a principle story thread to follow, only to divert its attention to side-stories; then the said side-stories proved to be sometimes more enjoyable than the main plot thread. It’s a strange feeling when an alternate-universe retelling, reduced to one episode tagged on the end, was my favourite moment of them all and proved to be almost as memorable as the rest of the first season combined.

I guess it’s unfair to criticise it for the fact that it’s a product of a lucrative franchise produced by a commercially successful studio and is adapted from a visual novel since, well, I can hardly criticise the VN medium at all now, can I? Similarly the most superficial aspect of all, the cutesy moe-fied aesthetic, shouldn’t be an issue but let’s face it, often it is. Ultimately though Clannad frustrates me because one moment it’s ‘just another fan-aware high school romance show’ with all the plot devices and tropes that go along with it, and the next it’s flooring me with heartfelt emotion and genuinely well-executed storytelling.