thiago_pagogna's Blog

Anime Relations: Clannad, Clannad: After Story

INTRODUCTION

Clannad After Story is the sequel of Clannad and it takes place exactly were things were left over, I shouldn't bother
to write about Clannad alone, because it is a show about school life with nothing really great about it, it is just
entertaining (+), and most people who liked After Story, just says to anyone to skip its prequel anyway, so it will not be
me who will say to watch Clannad before After Story.

I gave a try to Clannad last year because of the most badass posts of baka-raptor about it (see the thanks section in the end of this post) but i was not willing to watch Clannad After Story because i couldn't stand of another (+) series at that time, but i have a friend who just loved After Story so much, that he kept yelling at me to watch it , because it were the best show in the universe... i obviously disagreed with him at the time, and for a (+) series, i would expect its sequel to turn to a (++) not a (+++) if it REAAAAALY got any better.

So after countless sms, msn, skype, mail, orkut and even letter messages from him, i decided to watch the series because aparently i was missing the best show in the universe...guess what motherfucker ?



THE BORING ARC

Yep, it got watered down by the first couple of episodes, so i dropped it. He just couldn't stand my decision and kept all the Clannad Fanaticism to put me back on track... so i decided to watch it until the end even if it bored me to death.



This robot above lives in a parallel world with a human girl, it is supposed to parallel to the world where Tomoya lives, as shown in the series, the robot and the girl cling to each other and are also dependent on each other, as is Tomoya and Nagisa, and when one goes, the other will go to.

In comparison to Clannad, the first 15 episodes do not focus on everyone, but rather tend to show the slow approaching of the new couple, (Tomoya is such a pussy) it takes a loooooooong time for them to be more like a loving couple, and up to this point i have yet to see Tomoya and Nagisa kissing each other....No.... They probably never did actually... However, in the Kyou OVA, Tomoya kisses Ryou and Kyou.



With that in mind, the plot then develops towards to random aspects and characters (ghost catty boy, gangs fighting and so forth), as a regular filler would do but with the exception that it keeps some consistency between episodes, and it was actually fun, but boring.

For instance, take the episode eight alone, It focus on a misunderstanding between sunohara being the gang leader, the gang fighting(?), nagisa knocking down everyone from their OWN side with her awful cooking abilities (nagisa isn't a fighter haha!) and Tomoya being beaten (which sounds cool anyway).

So up to this point Clannad After Story walks the fine line between boring and interesting with style, and for the next episodes, it only starts to get a little better when everyone finishes school, and Tomoya starts to work which leads us to the next arc.



THE AMAZING ARC

As the first 15 episodes were pretty pointless (Almost 70% of the show), boring and don't improve THAT after story they were promising very well,
things start to get interesting and amazing by the time Ushio is born and Nagisa Died, it reaaaaaly managed to shock me, i was stunned and said, wow !



Even Akio didn't get it, when nagisa said she was pregnant, as they never EVER slept in the same futon together, and then out of a sudden, they are married, living together, and now nagisa is waiting a baby from him.

Unlike the other arcs, this one is really good and the expectations about Ushio's birth and the latter raising of her by Tomoya indeed increases the tension and the joy of watching this show, but it took more than 15 episodes to get HERE ? After Nagisa's death, Tomoya quitting his job and the further ill of Ushio, watching this arc is just like whobody (One of the top reviewers of Clannad After Story page in the day of this post) wrote in her review "I felt like I was going into viewing this series as I would if I had a loaded gun pointed at the back of my head". This arc made me shed manly tears, and i bet all the other girls who have watched this show cried too...

THE ENDING

With the death of Ushio too, Now this series meant real business, But the final episode was so completely dumb and out of place that it ruins everything the final arc had been building towards. It's like if the interesting and amazing part i've mentioned was some kind of regular filler and had nothing to do with the plot itself, leaving things unresolved and "reseting" things back to were they were.



The reasons for this ridiculous ending is that it was based on the game (Clannad Visual Novel) and all the karma gained by Tomoya could be reverted for him to gain a wish of his own in the game, in the case, that robot i mentioned above in the boring arc had a major importance in the plot, because it is him that releases the "magic" for Tomoya to gain his wish and obviously the reason of his existence are his wife and daughter, so he wishes them back and just go back to the point where nagisa died and ushio is born.

Even if it is based on a visual novel , that people still insist calling it a game , things musn't have been exactly as the game...most producers ruins everything when they do not follow the story of the manga when they should, in this case, producers followed the story of the game when they should not.

I just couldn't accept this ending and i was discussing with everyone why the heck they did that, and we all came to a
conclusion that the producers of this series only killed nagisa and ushio because they were planning to bring them back already and as Clannad and After Story were a huge selling success in japan, they could have more room to release a full profitable new filler season
for the clannad franchise.



FINAL GRADE: ~

Well, it became clear that almost 70% of the show is boring (~~), only a few episodes compared to the rest of this series were very good (+++), and with a (~~~) ending, Clannad After Story couldn't get another grade than a negative one, so this is a fair rating for all that the series had accomplished along one full season.

Now for my famous HOW TO MAKE THE ORIGINAL CLANNAD A MASTERPIECE GUIDE:

Put everything from After Story half episode 15 to the one before the last one into the original Clannad, ( adding 5 or 6 episodes ) and make okazaki suicide in the new final episode. That would have made Clannad a MASTERPIECE but not as profitable as it is now.






PS: I still refuse to accept this anime is the number one on this site :P

Anime Relations: Gantz, Gantz 2nd Stage

Have you ever wondered what it takes for an anime to be considered manly enough for you to watch it as a MAN would ?

In this brief blog post, i'll try to spoil what it takes for GANTZ to complete this hard task.

Right in the FIRST episode we can see kurono-kun seeing all girls in his high school class naked, something every male does when he is in puberty and with his hormones at HIGH RATES, but kurono-kun gets yelled by this "strange" behavior and everyone makes fun of him.

Right after that, kurono-kun gets killed by the FIRST episode, WTF ? along with his friend, and that was an awesome thing to do, killing the main character by the first episode.



Yet in the first episode, kurono-kun automagicaly finds himself in a room, with his full body without any scratches and a naked girl appears in front of him...what would a man do if a beautiful naked girl appears in front of him ? Rape her ! But kurono-kun is too much of a pussy to do this, and just kisses her in the mouth... maybe it was just a natural reaction, i don't know... but he was not the only one who had its eyes on her...in fact one of them really tried to rape her...fuck, even the dog. WTF ? A pussy licking DOG ? o.O ? But of course, for the sake of the international woman's right committee, the rape doesn't happen ! Sorry guys !



After that, there is the alien hunting...not much to say about this, people get killed by the aliens and those who killed aliens get points and everyone who survived go home.

In a while, kurono-kun hits the jackpot when the naked girl , that is now properly dressed, ask him to be his pet. This only happens because he lives alone (requirement for this to happen), and he starts to dream about sleeping with his own new pet. Of course this does not happen, but he tries and gets real upset because of her rejection...again, if he wasn't so much of a pussy, he could have raped her...but this was a memorable experience for his own growth...




After more alien fights and turmoils, the naked girl leaves him because it became clear that they would have to sleep together to pay the "rent and food". Kurono-kun obviously gets mad at himself, because he had to have a different approach if he wanted to succeed the rape task, and blames himself for the continuation of his lonely virgin life.




Just to finish it, as if that (and other things i didn't mention) wasn't enough reason for GANTZ to be so FOR MEN, the producers managed to make one of the most INTERESTING sentences of the entire anime history which i shall now spoil:

First the girl Kurono-kun just met, approaches him and says he is cute because he cried, after that she asks him if there wasn't ANYTHING in the WHOLE world she could do to help him feel better, guess what he asked her ?

Anime Relations: Clannad Movie, Clannad, Clannad: After Story

Girls in real life should be more like Kotomi

Before seeing Clannad i always thought girls in anime were hotties or moes but in real life i always thought girls were pussies or bitches.

That was before i knew the best girl in the entire anime history



Yes !!! I'm talking about Kotomi Ichinose !

Kotomi is Gorgeous, really, she has a nice body too and her main activity is to study all day long, it means that, if you'd talk to her, you could expect she'd have fluency in any subject you'd willing to ask her, a real intelligent girl, full of knowledge and probably you could discuss about philosophy with her for hours.



Her biggest ability is the fact that she is a very quiet girl and it is quite difficult to communicate with her...which means she SHUTS THE FUCK UP and only talk to people who talks to her directly and still insists.

Why do i have to bother with girls that have knowledge and content ? If i am a guy, shouldn't i look for girls for their beauty alone ?

The answer is a plain NO ! Beauty is not everything ! And sex is not everything also,although i admit both are important, if you have a girl that can't talk (timid), things will get too boring, but if you have a girl that can talk (and will talk a lot), she will piss you off because 99% of the things she says is bullshit.

Kotomi is the timid girl that will not talk, but if you poke her enough, you'll get a really strong, nice and full of enjoyment conversation.



And besides that, she will only continue to be quiet if she is not comfortable with the situation or with you...so if she starts to talk much more words that you're willing to hear, just cut the conversation or yell at her... that would make her stop. (unlike blabbering girls) =P

According to this, you'd expect a rather boring girl wouldn't you ?

WRONG !

Think again.

Kotomi is at another level of enjoyment ;)



Oh man, am i dreaming ? a girl that is not in any way a blabbermouth, talebearer, gossiper or any shit who talks indiscreetly or incessantly ?!?!?!

But girls like that exists in real life ? they're called timid girls ? Yes, but why kotomi is so perfect in the first place ?

How about a small list ?

• She is gorgeous
  
• She has a nice body
  
• She is quiet
  
• She loves to study
  
• You can discuss philosophy with her
  
• She plays a musical instrument
  
• She doesn't have brothers or sisters
  
• Her parents are dead
  
• She lives alone
  

Holy Shit ! Living alone without parents is reason enough to marry her, and only if i was okazaki in clannad, kotomi would be my obvious choice right from start.

Kotomi is perfect because she gathers all of those listed things in just one person.

Even if she did have a familly, being gorgeous, being intelligent and being quiet are three adjectives that just doesn't fit together in real life girls at the same time.

Yet Kotomi is interested in music...of course she plays the violin bad because she doesn't have a good tutor... i think that even for Kotomi things cannot be that perfect...



Kotomi is also anti-social, i didn't list that because it really doesn't matter... but in a strategic way of thinking, it would be best to date a girl that doesn't make friends easily than girls that can socialize with ease... with that in mind, it would save me a lot of trouble mainly because of the obvious jealously feeling that i would have towards her. Plus, she would spend most of her time reading and studying that obviously in her free time, she would like to talk to me and spend some time together doing other things that all can imagine by now XD


That's why, if i find someone like Kotomi in real life i'd marry her without hesitation.

Anime Relations: Dragon Ball Z, Naruto: Shippuuden, Claymore, Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, Clannad: After Story

So let me get to my main motivation for writing about anime: to bitch about how the MOST overrated anime series of all time sucks so much: Clannad After Story.

And this leads me to a point, why the heck anime companies kill key characters in their productions ?
With a few exceptions, that's because they are planning to bring them back to life in some way or another.

I've already made a review of AS, and they only killed nagisa and ushio because they were planning to make us think that okazaki was dreaming or he had time traveled back to ushio's birth and all those light bubbles could bring his wish to save them come true.

And this gets me to another point, collecting light bubbles to gain wishes isn't much different from gathering dragon balls ? even if you say he had to travel to another world to do so, kuririn and others too, had to travel to namekusei (another world) in some point to get the balls.




Speaking of Dragon Ball, i lost the count of how many people died and was revived by the dragon balls each time, and even if goku was already dead, he could enjoy a free pass to earth later on which would make the importance of reviving him through the dragon balls futile.

But yet, as i remember now, two shows had managed to do it correctly: Claymore and Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann.

Both shows are action animes (which i already reviewed) , and they kill their key characters to increase feelings of hatred/suffering/revenge on their main characters, making the series more dramatic and dynamic.


Teresa fell because she showed mercy, her heart was softer and she consciously dropped her guard to the almost awakened Priscila, making this a pointless and pathetic death of someone so strong who could never die in a normal combat.



Kamina died a much pointless but this time expected death because everyone knew that his tongue and fighting skills in battle were useless. He actually couldn't never shut the fuck up and always got his ass kicked, but when things were geting bad for him, simon always came at his side to help him to form the invincible gurren-lagann. Except this time, simon was busy coupling with the dai-gurren and couldn't save kamina...

Everyone bitches about being simon's fault because he was upset of the fact yoko confesses her affection for Kamina with a kiss in front of him, and due to this, kamina had to supervise him and eventually is cautch off guard in a fatal attack.

Despite the fact his death was simon's fault or his own, when simon avenged his death, he builds a baddass statue in Kamina's name and honor, thing Clare never did for Teresa.



Even Naruto follows this rules, as when gaara, on of my favorites characters, dies...he is still revived without the Shukaku and unlimited sand manipulation abilities.

All of this just to say one thing, Clannad After Story sucks and not finishing their story by killing okazaki's entire new found familly, could make them have room for releasing an entire profitable full filler season of clannad with ushio as protagonist.

We all can't wait for it ^^



Looks at gaara's face of someone who wants to watch more clannad...