Tsukimonogatari

After spending alot of time without touching the 'monogatari' suffix, I decided it was time to get my daily dose of insanity by watching Tsukimonogatari. It was kind of a good decision, I guess.

I'll start with the bad points.

Tuskimonogatari (and probably the entire franchise, if that's the right word) has a problem with keeping the viewer's attention, I've come to acknowledge. This is something I've talked to my friends about, and they all share the same problem that is getting lost in the middle of the dialogue only to rewind so they don't miss any important information. It is like this because the pace ... of the show (even though it hardly involves action and/or a very fluid animation) is very fast. The dialogues come in what I like to call "concrete walls", masses of words that never stop coming, and the screenplay is always showing interesting scenarios and viewpoints (for our pleasure or displeasure) that drags the attention away from the information. I think the execution could be alot more interesting if there were pauses between the dialogues.
And I am not mentioning this because I watch subtitled anime, but it certainly doesn't help.

This is a show that starts off without giving much time sense. It's easy for MAL users to understand when it was set by looking at the prequels and sequels, but as a layman it's difficult to situate yourself and acknowledge what has happened and what has not - that's something that also kept my attention off the dialogue while I was searching for clues.

Let’s talk about the first episode, now. It shares a common problem with Nisemonogatari with the pointless fanservice it delivers – one entire episode was gone just to get Araragi’s toe broken while the whole conflict could’ve been delivered with much less screentime and filler (like a tripping scene, for example). All of that so we could spend some time with Tsukihi, an overall bad character, to develop almost nothing. I also take points away for this anime not being a family show. Screw society, I wanna watch this with my friends and family.
I’m not even going to mention how confused I was by the last episode. Not all of it was confusing, but some of it. And hell, it was nothing to be proud about. The show speculated as heck.

I’ll start off with the good points by saying how unpredictable this show is. I think it’s Shaft’s specialty to mess up with people’s minds, and it delivers. Oh, it delivers.
It’s refreshing to get more screenplay on the solid and interesting characters of the series (like Shinobu and Yotsugi, even though the doll-girl is the protagonist here). We got to see a lot of story development and a little character development, something that was pretty lacking in the entire –monogatari series. I’d say Tsukimonogatari did a very good job at situating the entire story, similar as Second Season did, but better.
The art and animation are amazing, as always; I think the sound work could do one thing better. The music playing in the background serves its purpose to add a feeling to the atmosphere/scene, but it’s nothing amazing and the viewers could never recognize the songs if not while watching the show. At least, I couldn’t. It serves much more as an ambient sound for the scene than as a theme that could define the identity of the show.

It was a good installment, probably the best of all of them. And it was enjoyable. I’m looking forward to end this madness as soon as possible.

I have mixed feelings about this show.

It starts with a bait and switch. The first few minutes, or episode is typically used to make promises to the viewer about what the show is going to be about. Here we're told it's supposed about to be Yotsugi Ononoki, but she isn't really relevant to the narrative until the last 30 minutes. Just to put that into perspective, the show runs for about 95 minutes excluding the opening and credits. So she has about 1/3 of the time in this show.

This is compounded by the first 20 minutes being used up to continue Araragi's incestuous relationship with ... his other sister Tsukihi. It was already enough that we got a scene back in Nisemonogatari that was tantamount to oral sex with his sister Karen, but now we're being treated to the fact that this is just how the Araragi family rolls.

There is a little bit where Tsukihi does ask Araragi to apologize. I wish Studio Shaft would apologize for wasting this much time on something that is irrelevant in the long run to the entire narrative structure.

I will, however, give credit due to where it belongs. And that is the character of Yotsugi Ononoki. She is infinitely more interesting as a character than Araragi will ever be. Sad that viewers get so much of their time wasted focusing on Araragi and his deviant sexual behaviors.

I felt that Ononoki's trolling behavior was a plus. Also when Kagenui broke Araragi's fingers. That filled me with such schadenfreude because justice was done upon this child molesting dirtbag. Of course the characterization of Araragi is not focused so much on the fact that his fingers are broken, it's that he would not be able to grope Hanekawa's tits because they're broken.

Let's just stop. Hitagi Senjyogahara volunteered to put up with this idiot back in Bakemonogatari. It's not like Araragi doesn't have a girlfriend whose tits he could grope. She even said during their date that she'd give him her body. I'm not buying that she's not taking care of his needs. And this is when I stopped to think. When is there any other scenes of Araragi and Senjyogahara really doing anything together since Bakemonogatari? I'll get back to this in a moment.

There is a scene where Araragi is walking behind Ononoki and he takes the opportunity to lift her skirt up over her head and look at her panties. Ononoki, in her usual deadpan manner, says "wow." I felt this way too. And I took that to mean, "wow, I cannot believe you are so brazen. da fuq are you doing?" And as they continue on, he insists on walking in this same manner, her skirt held up high so he can continue to look.

And she just tells him he's a creep. This is really what he is. Araragi isn't defined by anything other than what he's willing to try to do to any female, be they family, dead, or whatever else. The narrative tries to portray him in a positive light, however. As some benevolent man that acts altruistically to help people out with their problems. This isn't true, however. Araragi never helps any males out. He only helps females out, and this is driven by his motivation to try to molest them. I had the displeasure of reading a recent reddit post where he won the category of "best guy." Da fuq? Those people that voted for him are out of their minds.

Leaving that, there's some pluses that there is some very interesting imagery, and I really liked the allusion to Sailor Moon in this show. It's how it should have been done. In past Monogatari shows that this series is linked to the allusions were done in a way to insult the intelligence of the viewer. The dialogue would simply beat you over the head that "yes, this is where this comes from, be it Evangelion, or whatever else." Here it's left up to the viewer to make the connection.

It's unfortunate that so much of this show was wasted on focusing on Koyomi Araragi. Monogatari as a whole would benefit if he was simply written out or killed off. Take it for what it's worth though. Here you have a fine show that is dragged down by one character in particular. He strikes such damaging blows that I cannot justify giving it a higher score.

This franchise used to have between eleven and twenty six episodes at some point but the previous entry had five and this one has four, is it running out of content or what? Oh well, at least this means that I can finish them faster, and for an IP that I’m enjoying less and less each season, that’s a good thing.

Visually, it’s surprisingly a step back from the previous series, because the artwork is not as polished at points, and due to the use of some very clear places as backgrounds and very bright special effects, sometimes things seem unfinished or lacking lining or ... details. At least it’s the season with more movement when people talk, there are almost no still moments in it. There are also some interesting visual bits here and there such as Pac-Man references, or the change of the way the light novel passages are integrated, this time mostly shown as what looks like letters that were torn apart.

In terms of sound, the ending has cool visuals but it is the most basic and typical so far, as is the opening, both are just very generic jpop songs, though I like Saori Hayami’s singing voice, way more than her acting voice, even though her performance as Ononoki might be my favourite from her for feeling a bit different than her usual roles. There’s, however, an improvement on the background music, as this entry has the most intense one, filled with themes that seem like they belong in a horror anime instead of this series.

Anyways, the name of the arc and the cover made me think that this season was going to be about Ononoki, a character I kind of wanted to see more of since she was given some of the best dialogues in the franchise, although they are usually next to some of the worst as well. And to be fair, more information about her is revealed, which is in turn related to the past of the four big exorcists within the setting, while there are still some interesting conversations about her or between her and Araragi here and there, so I guess Tsukimonogatari more or less gives me what I wanted, albeit in very small doses and with a not very good presentation, since it is told instead of shown. It’s understandable though, since despite having an important role in the entry, it doesn’t really revolve around her.

Instead, it’s supposed to mean a big deal and change for Araragi, but it doesn’t really feel like it, since he takes it straight pretty much right away, and the tone is for the most part very lighthearted, thus the viewer doesn’t really buy the supposed urgency of the whole thing. Also, whatever tension it tries to build lacks any possible impact, result of releasing Hanamonogatari before it. That’s the big issue of doing that, whatever big or suspenseful event might take place from here on won’t have much of an effect on me, since I already know the outcome and that everyone is fine because of that season.

At least, I’m willing to accept that it’s a series that escalates in quality from less to more, as it has a plain horrible beginning full of all of the cancer from the previous worst moments in the franchise. Lots of meandering, pointless conversations, attempting to have dialogues about serious things while simultaneously presenting the most stupid imagery along with them, and the biggest amount of incestuous ecchi and comedy yet, which in turn feels out of character from what was shown on Nisemonogatari. Remember how Tsukihi reacted to Karen and Koyomi back then? Well, the roles are reversed now for fanservice sake.

At the very least, as it goes on, it shows Araragi the consequences of abusing his power and acting rashly, so it makes everything he did before feel important for him by giving him shortcomings or even some kind of ultimatum for using his abilities. Too bad Hanamonogatari was released right before it.

There is a newly introduced guy that goes away just as quickly as he appeared before even being flesh out and for the short amount of screen time he had, he was pretty uninteresting. How do you make a character voiced by Takehito Koyasu boring? Tsukimonogatari shows how. He is not giving much to do, because as he himself points out, he is a pawn in the big picture.

So at least the show ends with a message of not letting you be played around by someone else, as two characters do the exact opposite as some previous arcs while doing the same thing as the best ones, by having them being proactive and going against what seems to be the predetermined course of action, while also setting up what everyone plans to do about it, as well as having them realize who is the real main antagonist that was pulling the strings from behind the scenes the whole time. Oh, and there’s also a very cute second to last scene with Araragi and Senjougahara, the last scene is whatever, it even ruins what seemed to be a breaking point for the two protagonists of the arc.

As a whole, it begins being the worst arc in the franchise by far, but as it goes on it increases its quality considerably, though just like Nekomonogatari: Kuro, it feels more like a buildup for things to come, a transition entry from Second Season to Owarimonogatari, instead of its own thing. I didn’t find it to be straight up bad, but to me it was just another passable anime like Hanamonogatari, and a step back in quality from the best point in the series just like that show.

Feels like the weakest monogatari yet. Probably still watch it because it's monogatari, but if it were a standalone series I don't think there's enough going for it.

It devotes an entire episode to fanservice. This isn't new for monogatari; after all, Nise had the toothbrush scene. However, while the toothbrush scene had a weirdness and creativity which brought it up to art, there was nothing particularly interesting about the bath scene. There was no intensity to the dialog, or tension in the air. It just shows skin.

The heart of monogatari is the lengthy probative dialog. Dialog which boldly reveal auxiliary pieces of character which somehow ... connect to the problem at hand. Honestly, I didn't feel like the dialog was that strong in this arc. It felt too straightforward an explanation. Though, the random things happening in the background during dialogs were cute as hell.

The villain of the arc has basically 0 development and feels like a throwaway character. It makes the resolution weaker than it otherwise could be. But still, I think the final twist was good, and a good development of a character. The real conflict isn't the villain, after all.