Clannad

Tomoya Okazaki is a delinquent who finds life dull and believes he'll never amount to anything. Along with his friend Youhei Sunohara, he skips school and plans to waste his high school days away.

One day while walking to school, Tomoya passes a young girl muttering quietly to herself. Without warning she exclaims "Anpan!" (a popular Japanese food) which catches Tomoya's attention. He soon discovers the girl's name is Nagisa Furukawa and that she exclaims things she likes in order to motivate herself. Nagisa claims they are now friends, but Tomoya walks away passing the encounter off as nothing.

However, Tomoya finds he is noticing Nagisa more and more around school. Eventually he concedes and befriends her. Tomoya learns Nagisa has been held back a year due to a severe illness and that her dream is to revive the school's drama club. Claiming he has nothing better to do, he decides to help her achieve this goal along with the help of four other girls.

As Tomoya spends more time with the girls, he learns more about them and their problems. As he attempts to help each girl overcome her respective obstacle, he begins to realize life isn't as dull as he once thought.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

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Background

Clannad adapts the visual novel of the same title.

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Related Anime

Adaptation:	Clannad, Clannad: Hikaru Mimamoru Sakamichi de, Clannad
Alternative version:	Clannad Movie
Alternative setting:	Clannad: Mou Hitotsu no Sekai, Tomoyo-hen, Clannad: After Story - Mou Hitotsu no Sekai, Kyou-hen
Sequel:	Clannad: After Story
Character:	Kaginado, Kaginado Season 2

More characters

Characters & Voice Actors

Okazaki, Tomoya

Main

Nakamura, Yuuichi
Japanese

Furukawa, Nagisa

Main

Nakahara, Mai
Japanese

Sakagami, Tomoyo

Main

Kuwashima, Houko
Japanese

Fujibayashi, Kyou

Main

Hirohashi, Ryou
Japanese

Ibuki, Fuuko

Main

Nonaka, Ai
Japanese

Ichinose, Kotomi

Main

Noto, Mamiko
Japanese

Sunohara, Youhei

Main

Sakaguchi, Daisuke
Japanese

Fujibayashi, Ryou

Main

Kanda, Akemi
Japanese

Furukawa, Akio

Supporting

Okiayu, Ryoutarou
Japanese

Furukawa, Sanae

Supporting

Inoue, Kikuko
Japanese

More staff

Staff

Hatta, Youko

Producer

Nakamura, Shinichi

Producer

Ishihara, Tatsuya

Director, Episode Director, Storyboard

Tsuruoka, Youta

Sound Director

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Opening Theme

"Megumeru ~cuckool mix 2007~ (メグメル～cuckool mix 2007～)" by eufonius

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Ending Theme

"Dango Daikazoku" by Chata

Reviews

Feb 20, 2013

xbobx

Recommended

"Poignant. Compelling. Heartbreaking. Clannad is one of the most cherished anime of all times."

The first time I watched Clannad was back in 2008, and I just finished re-watching it for the 3rd time this past few days. Now I realize that will take years before I watch something that does the same impact on me like this anime did. I was moved by it the first time I watched, and the third as well, but surprisingly in a different way. Throughout all anime history this is one of the most notorious series in the romance/drama genre, not only for the emotional load it carries but ...

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Mar 28, 2010

randomvoice

Mixed Feelings

Here's the central problem with Clannad: it wants to tug your heartstrings, so it doesn't think about anything else. Unfortunately for this show, this means that it ends up being utterly contrived, unrealistic, and outright stupid.

This show expects us to believe that teenage girls act like five-year-olds. It expects us to care about these infantile, one-dimensional characters. It expects us to have genuine emotional reactions to the 'blossoming relationships' between our bland protagonist and these excuses for characters.

Is this too harsh? Let's look at the individual components that MAL expects us to rate anime by.

STORY: To be fair, the anime didn't have much to work ... with, given that it was based on the original VN plot. Still, the outlandish (one word: Fuuko) and emotionally manipulative plot elements (most of the backstories that were explored) weakened what might otherwise have been a sweet, unpretentious slice-of-life drama/romance.

I mean: a story about a girl who is shy and has trouble making friends? Yeah, cool, you can watch Kimi no Todoke or something. A story about a girl with Mysterious Anime Disease who has the intellectual capacity of a child? Sorry, it's not working for me. [4/10]

ART: High budget, great production values and art direction. Squishy moe character designs may not be everyone's cup of tea (Sanae looks barely older than Nagisa), but again, that comes with the territory. If anything, this aspect of Clannad makes me despair, because I can think of a lot of better anime series that deserve to have this sort of budget. [8/10]

SOUND: Evocative without being overdramatic, for the most part. Unfortunately, all the female characters sound like babies. [6/10]

CHARACTER: This is probably the greatest problem I have with Clannad, and again, it's thanks to the source material. Few of the characters get much development. All of them (the female ones, anyway) exhibit some degree of fanboy-pandering. Kyou's tsundere-ness, Fuuko's quirkiness, Nagisa's unending sweetness, etc. - not to mention the fact that Fuuko, Kotomi and Nagisa, at least, sound at least half their age. Their childish and insecure natures (especially early in the series) make for unrealistic characters - and therefore compromise this show's unrelenting attempts at making us care about them.

It's also hard to understand Tomoya's motivations at the start of the series, i.e. why he even bothered with/cared about Nagisa et al. We get no insight into his motivations at all. Why would a so-called delinquent suddenly take up this project of helping a random girl he's never met before? Why does he find her interesting? What is the point? [3/10]

ENJOYMENT: Obviously higher if you're a moe fan, but those who derive little enjoyment from watching cute girls doing cute things might find this series rather trying.

Those who watch anime with their brain switched on will find this series trying.

Those who think that female characters should actually resemble, you know, real people... yeah, don't watch this show, it'll make you rage. [5/10]

If Clannad weren't so obviously manipulative, it might be a better series. Which is not to say that the series is obviously cynical - on the contrary, I think it exhibits a genuine warmth that lesser harem-type series lack. Yet the series ultimately feels contrived and heavy-handed, and its unrealistic characters undermine its would-be heart-warming nature.

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Jun 15, 2010

kekekeKaj

Not Recommended

I have to thank "Clannad", for increasing my Japanese vocabulary and introducing me to a new word. While watching "Clannad" at my local anime society, I could feel a certain *something* radiating from it. I'd encountered similar feelings before in other anime, but never quite so strongly. By the end of the show, I picked up a new word to go with that feeling.

That word is "moe". I'd never come across the word before "Clannad", but I sure as hell knew its meaning afterwards. The word categorises a feeling that originates from the sweetness of the female characters, a sweetness that oozes from their character ... designs to their voices to the way they behave. But it's not a charming kind of sweetness that you get from, say, "Aria" or "Usagi Drop". Rather, it's a cloying kind of sweetness, the kind that makes my tooth ache and my stomach churn. I can't stand this kind of sweetness because it feels so artificial, arising from a cynical, carefully engineered attempt to portray the girls as cutely as possible. Taken to this extreme, it's the anime equivalent of junk food - all empty calories and no real substance or nutrition, serving only to obstruct good characterisation.

You can tell pretty quickly that "Clannad" originates from a harem visual novel or a dating sim. The main protagonist doesn't waste much time hooking up with most of the girls within his field of view. What's more, the character designs, with their hair colours extracted from almost all major parts of the visible spectrum, are exactly what you'd expect from that kind of source material. There's the Brown-Haired Girl, the Blue Haired Girl (they don't even need names, and to be honest they don't deserve them), the Grey-Haired Girl, and even a pair of Purple-Haired Twins. In fact I'm surprised to see the roster missing a Pink-Haired Girl.

Predictably a generically distinct personality is assigned to each girl. Now, "generically distinct" may sound like an oxymoron, but let me elaborate. The girls' personalities are all distinct from one another, but they all conform to a generic archetype that can be readily identified within about 20 seconds of their introduction. There's the Moronically-Childish Girl (aka Green-Haired Girl), the Shy Girl (aka one half of the Purple-Haired Twins), the Tsundere Girl (aka the other half of the Purple-Haired Twins) etc etc. Again, I'm surprised to see the roster missing a Ditzy Girl - maybe the writers deliberately missed one out in order to prevent the whole thing from becoming even more painfully transparent. It also soon becomes obvious that, though all the girls show interest in the protagonist, for the purpose of this playthrough-, er, I mean, storyline, the player- I mean, protagonist, has targeted Generically Sweet Girl (aka Brown-Haired Girl) to woo.

Though I guess "Clannad" is technically not quite a harem since the show contains another guy besides the main character, it may as well be one. The other guy in question qualifies as a guy only on technicalities. In practice, he more closely resembles some sub-human creature roughly on the level of a worm, and is suitably treated like one too. Most of the girls treat him with disdain, and none of them is interested in him in the slightest. To be fair, the main character himself isn't quite your average harem lead, and for this reason, I have decided to give him the courtesy of actually using his name in this review: he's called Okazaki Tomoya. What makes Tomoya different from a typical harem lead is that although he's a bit of a good for nothing, he at least possesses more charisma and confidence than the typical loser-but-nice stereotypical lead that's recycled through most harems, and so you can at least kind of get why he's able to attract a harem, especially when displayed next to the worm-like-lowlife.

Other than the insane amount of moe, "Clannad" distinguishes itself by the insane amount of heavy-handed manipulation of emotions. The show has more of it than "Saikano", and that is saying something. I bristle at the sight of the slice-of-life tag attached to the show because it completely sacrifices any sort of realism associated with that genre in favour of trying to force more emotions out of the viewer with unbelievably melodramatic storylines. The "tragic" stories from the various characters' pasts feel so contrived that at times it seems like a competition to see which one can be more ridiculous. It's a competition won by Blue Haired Girl's backstory involving a teddy bear. The punchline to the story proved so "moving" it had everyone at my anime society showing bursting into tears. Tears of laughter that is.

Moreover, most of the girls - Blue Haired girl being a prime example - disappears into the background as soon as their part of the story is over. The shift in focus from one girl to the next is so swift and ruthless that I found it rather off-putting. What's the point of spending an arc fleshing out these characters if they're shelved as soon as their arc is over? Given the source material, I can guess why: the anime probably pulled together storylines from multiple playthroughs focusing on different characters, but couldn't assemble them into a single, coherent storyline. Brown Haired Girl stands out as the only girl who's a constant presence throughout, and that's only because she's the girl destined to hook up with Tomoya (but don't worry, if you don't like the Tomoyo x Brown Haired Girl pairing, Kyoto Animation has rather helpfully made several special episodes which are in essence alternative playthroughs where Tomoya picks someone else).

Just one of the tragic character situations did not come off as overly melodramatic - the one involving Tomoya's relationship with his dad. However, that one felt like a tacked-on side story that was jarringly integrated into the show. The side story comes into focus randomly with little apparent purpose, and also feels out of place when placed alongside the cheesily cheerful parts. It's almost as though when given a piece of material with genuine potential, the makers of "Clannad" didn't quite know what to do with it.

In the end, I'm grateful I watched "Clannad" with others at my anime society, because watching the whole thing by myself would have been an ordeal more harrowing than any of the forced drama the show could conjure up. During the weeks when I couldn't attend the society showings and had to catch up on the show by myself, it literally took me two or three sittings to grind through each episode because I couldn't stomach more than a few minutes of "Clannad" at a time. And no wonder - with its sickeningly sweet stench of moe, ludicrously contrived stories and array of cardboard template cut-outs masquerading as female characters, just what is there to like for someone who's not into moe or extremely sappy melodrama?

Personal rating: -2.0 (terribad)

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Poll: Clannad Episode 1 Discussion ( 1 2 3 4 5 ... Last Page ) cyruz - Oct 5, 2007	273 replies	by D-A-W »» Apr 19, 7:58 PM
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Clannad

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Okazaki, Tomoya

Furukawa, Nagisa

Sakagami, Tomoyo

Fujibayashi, Kyou

Ibuki, Fuuko

Ichinose, Kotomi

Sunohara, Youhei

Fujibayashi, Ryou

Furukawa, Akio

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Clannad

Alternative Titles

Information

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Available At

Resources

Streaming Platforms

Synopsis

Background

Visit MALxJapan MALxJapan -More than just anime-

Related Anime

Characters & Voice Actors

Staff

Opening Theme

Ending Theme

Reviews

Interest Stacks

Recommendations

Recent News

Recent Forum Discussion

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