God, I miss Nagi-sama already.

Wow, I can’t believe that Kannagi has ended so soon. Well, maybe I can since I haven’t been blogging like I should, but it’s time to clenese myself and give Kannagi the send off it deserves. In this case, the following espiodes that send us off into a torrent of laughs, cries, and a somber farewell to anime that deserves no less than what it is worth.

The 8th ep is a little to less of Jin pondering on Nagi, and who she really is which comes back to bit him in later espiodes and a main plot device. Through in a bewilder Daitetsu and voila, we have a simple and humours epsiode that has no apparent effect, yet. The 9th is a also funny, Tsugumi slips off at the mouth and pegs Jin relationship with Daitetsu to one of homosexual. The only way to repair that wall, Tsugumi and Zange posses as his girlfriend, which doesn’t do any good, but hey, Zange X Tsugumi on the arm and fedding you isn’t a bad thing, is it?

The 10th is the karkore famed episode. Jin and company head to a karaoke bar and everyone gets a chance to sing. Tsugumi seems to try to make advances toward Jin, but fail in doing so, first losing out to Zange and then to Daitestu. Poor Tsugumi. On the other hand,  the songs and singing wasn”t that bad from everyone, espically Tarako, which everyone seemed to find creepy, but she had the goods. I never been so turned on in my life…*cough* there is also a Lucky Star Cameo. God, I can’t over how HOT Tarako is…

The last three epsiodes focuses on the main overhead of Nagi and her identity. Frustrated by the unwanted attention due to Nagi, they have small spat, causing Nagi to go off. This insights Jin to do a little investigation on his own to uncover what she is. Talking with Suzushiro (Harkua/Zange’s father) he thinks she maybe nothing more than a lesser god, dipping into a lesson of Japanese X Mythology.  The next day, Daitestu alerts Jin that Nagi is missing and Jin spends time to search for her and in a depressed state relaizes he cares for her. Tsugumi tries to comfort Jin, but it anger him instead.

The Last EP, Tsugumi finally relaizes that she can help Jin and verbal gives him a once over to look for her, since it something that he can do. With support of a network information, Jin finds Nagi and confronting her, saying he wasn’t upset she lied and knows they can find her memories. At this time, Shige shows up, the old woman, Jin meet before in last epsiode, but been reborn by Nagi, supposedly. After those seen, Jin and Nagi return home where message from friends wait. Nagi takes a shower and forgets he clothes and Jin runs into her, falling over her body. Tsugumi comes in the wrong time, stun (funny) and runs out with tears in her eyes in humors way and the last scene Jin gets hit by Nagi and the credits play with more scenes.

At face value, the pacing and elements of Kannagi wasn’t a disappointment. I found it even to be more enjoyable than anything I watched in the Fall 2008 line up. Hopefully, once the DVD and CD makes landfall, they will make an OVA or two or even a second season since a lot of things were left unsaid and done. Kannagi staff and the author worked really hard on this series and they deserve a little R&R and respect for this series. I hope to see Nagi-sama again, until then, Farewell Nagi-sama.

Back in the saddle.

Finally doing my first post with my laptop that came back form the shop since I had work that needed to be done to it. More good news: I’m home, done with exams, and I get to do absloutley whatever. And what is better than Kannagi catch-up. Let’s roll!

Does it get any more better than this? Does it, really?! You can never ignore a series like this once hits the ground running and it’s a really shame the author of such a series is in the hopstial and recovering from a maybe stress related complications. Well, I do really now love and appericate the work the manga-ka and all the guys at the studio put into this series. Man, so awesome!

Well, before I turn into a fanboy, I must get on with the epsiodes. Ep 04 & 05 are mainly just made to introudce Zange, Nagi’s revealed to be twin sister and the same chick from the ending at ep 03. Mostly we learn that two nagi trees we planted, one for Nagi and the other Zange, but Zange’s tree still stands and must mean she took over a human body. The human body is a girl named, Hakua Suzushiro (comes into play later) that her father tells Nagi and she agrees to help him to return her back to normal. From that prespective onward, the anime pretty-much follows in the tracks of the manga.

Other highlights included: Ep 06, in which Nagi becomes a fandom item at the school, leading her to gain a new skill. Ep 07 Nagi locking herself in a closet angry at Jin for taping over her favorite show, Super Loiki Cuite, which is fixed by non-otaku Akiba. Did I mention Nagi finds Jin’s dirty mags in their? And Ep 08, the maid cafe section, where Nagi wishes to get a job in order for money and more followers. And that should cut a three-hour expanded summary into a few quick mintues for you guys.

True to following the manga, it makes you wonder will the anime finish since Eri Takenashi, the author of the manga-ka is still in recovery. Maybe linked to the otaku protest against a creatin chapter (which said it wasn’t) all I can do is wish Takenashi-sensei a speedy and full-recovery.

Arigatou gozaimasu, Kami-sama!

Another great espiode of Kannagi. Shame, this blog is behind on it, but you can count on me to bring it right up to speed. Well, when I’m not being too lazy. I wanna see you guys do better. Well, let’s get started.

The second epsiode really highlights more of Nagi and Jin. Nagi finds two kittens outside the house that are dire need of care, but Jin tells Nagi that the mother will come back. In the meantime, we are introduced to Tsugumi Aoba, one Jin’s childhood friends and classmates. After she comes over, Jin fabricates a story of how Nagi is some way related to him to make Tsugumi none the wiser. Later on, Jin goes for trip to the market, to disover the cat mother is dead and rushes back home to feed the kittens, but by the time is to late and at last glimpse see Nagi’s magically send them away. Questionable, Jin and Nagi get into agrument sending Nagi away from the house, which she finds an impurity. Injurying her leg trying to purify it, Jin shows up to hold it down and the two return home, Jin carrying Nagi on his back.

The thrid espsiode introudces to Jin’s friends which are now present throughtout the series. Daitetsu Hibiki, a musclar artisis,  Meguru Akiba, a self-proclaimed non-otaku/anime fantaic artsis (closet otaku), Shino Ōkouchi, which is the blonde hair vice-president, and Takako Kimura, the president which has otaku tendiences. A pretty rounded-group, right? Anyway, the male members by the seniors are ask to clean the storehouse, that is haunted, which Jin finds an impurtiy. He hides the fact from Nagi and she decides to follow him to school causing a commocation. Going back with the Art Club members, Jin and the gang find it is just a teacher living under the basement. Nagi continues to search for the impurtiy, but another girl addressing Nagi as her sister, gets it before she does.

Whew…well, if I didn’t forget anything that is it. Not too, fancy or thing, but yeah, in a nutshell, these are the facts. I’m starting to find Kannagi a more intresting than, the pre-convinced thought of others thought it would be and so does everyone else. Even though, I’m WAY ahead of this, I’ll try to keep it constent and welcome help. I just have to say, Arigatou gozaimasu, Kami-sama for Nagi. The other characters are awesome (Tsugumi added to my book) but Nagi is PURE WIN. Oh well, too bad those freaking otaku protested against it on the grounds Nagi could be, well…I leave that alone.

Oooh, a first episodic post.

Summary: We see a scene from Jin’s (protagonist) past that involved Nagi.^[1] Jin carves a statue out of a tree that was chopped down at a shrine. It absorbs earth and out pops Nagi like an exploding matryoshka doll. Jin learns about her. Nagi tells Jin that trees are sacred and that “as its name goes, [are trees] of God.” Nagi declares herself to be a deity of the land – “a mother of this land.” Jin’s simplistic bewilderment is a source of humor. There’s some confusion on Nagi’s part as to “the vessel in which she materialized” – her human form. Nagi is furious to know that she came out of a sacred tree. Impurities of the land are black-ish, spirit-like things.^[2] Evidently, Jin has special powers because he’s able to handle these things. The rest of the episode focuses on the antics of a single bachelor living by himself when he interacts for the first time with a hot girl…albeit godly tree-spirit manifestation. Jin buys panties^[3]. Nagi takes a shower. Jin stares at her soiled panties. Jin hides his porn stash. They eat, they sleep. Jin notes how gods take pisses too.

Cynicism: Twenty minutes of this show was pleasing. Entertaining, to say the least, though as most first episodes are, elusive, retaining from us the larger scope of things – marketing ploy, to draw in viewers. So it’s hard not to succumb to typical harem-to-be’s and single high school students (or less?) suddenly under the immense presence of women…alone. What’s worse is that she’s an even more typical “ignorant girl” – the erotic premise of Chobits. In both anime the female lead don’t even really understand what they are. Nagi isn’t originally a human, Chi is a robot. Two of the three previous footnotes summarized my skepticism of this first episode, and I’ve briefly talked about my concerns on one. In regards to the other, the childhood memory scheme, Nagi, as a God, exists omnitemporally, so it will be her role to fill in that gap of Jin’s waning childhood memory. As with most romance-comedies that utilize this framework, the cathartic climax will present itself with Jin realizes “it was her all along” – or something along those lines.

Thoughts: The most interesting part of this was the OP^[4]. The song was ok…but the visuals were noteworthy. In it we see Nagi as an actress. She receives the romantic tragedy of film directors and hollow directives of consumerist business folk. The point is that we don’t know if the fourth wall they’re presenting is literal or figurative. Is Nagi, the character presented here, actually an actress within the anime microcosm? – or is the surrounding environment supposed to be a representation of reality? Rather, it’s macrocosmic. In this case, the setting of the anime is the core of observation and the anime macrocosm the periphery.

Of course we’ll soon figure out whether the OP is figurative or literal – I’d generally say figurative, but you never know. It’d be a really interesting – much more so than it’s presented itself to be as of now – to see “anime-tized”^[5] actors. It’d be “meta-ish” along the lines of Genshiken or Welcome to the NHK!

Yet there’s one other picture that would make a cases for the OP as literal. Up in the screenshots there’s one of Jin holding up his plastic pet cage against the glare of the sun. The other is the bird’s eye view of the city through clouds, very Haibane Renmei-esque. To the former, it’s aesthetics alone would connote the brilliance of the sun? – for dramatic purposes only? What happens is that Jin catches a spider in his cage and jiggles it around for a bit when Nagi, clad in fetished temple girl attire, puts her hand on his shoulder.

What’s the similarity between the spider and Jin? Hierarchically speaking, nothing really. The spider can be representative of humans in a certain state of ignorance. We are free to roam as we please, but is freedom such a reality? – are we not subject to be placed within the container of an immature insect collector of sorts? To that extent, Spider : Jin :: Jin : Nagi. The difference is that there is no visible plastic lining around Jin. Visible remains the key word, however. How far will Kannagi take these metaphors – be they misinterpretations or otherwise? I can’t say with any amount of certainty.