Clannad 19, Family
February 29th, 2008 by Shirukii
Last thing you see before you die (it’d be a happy death)
Mixed feelings about this episode of Clannad, on one hand, all heroines except for Nagisa have been relegated to background scenery, including our beloved Kyou. However, I do like the direction that the series is going, finally starting to address the key issue of Clannad, the theme of “family”, which happens to be a non-literal translation of the word “Clannad” stemming from its root word: clan. The episode was slow but touched upon many important aspects of family dynamics.
Episode Rating: 8.5/10
Thanks to Tomoya’s campaigning, Tomoyo wins the election for student council president and uses her influence to grant permission for the music club and drama club to share Koumura sensei as their adviser. A follow up celebration takes place in the drama club room after school where Nagisa thanks everyone for their support, saying she never wouldn’t have been able to do anything without their help. But they don’t have time to relax yet, the school festival is quickly approaching and their goal is to participate in it, Nagisa fears they won’t make it in time, but Tomoya tells her that her dream is within her reach now and she shouldn’t be hesitating.
Later, Tomoya is called down to the teacher’s office where his homeroom teacher tells him he intends to visit Tomoya’s father to talk about Tomoya’s future. Knowing that it’s useless taking that approach with his dad, Tomoya tries to run away, but he runs into Nagisa, who asks him to accompany her for to club practice, sending Tomoya running. When Nagisa finds out the real reason she drags him back to the teacher’s office where his homeroom teacher has a good laugh at the sight of Tomoya being tamed by a girl.
The two head over to Tomoya’s house where, as he thought might be the case, his father isn’t home, seizing the opportunity, Tomoya runs, leaving his teacher at his house to wait. But yet again, Tomoya runs into Nagisa, who immediately drags him back to his house where they’re just in time to see the “meeting”, which consists of Tomoya’s teacher insisting that his father is an important part of deciding Tomoya’s future while his father argues that Tomoya is Tomoya and he has no say in what he does with his life.
Afterwards, Tomoya explains to Nagisa that he and his father haven’t been what you would call a “family” for a long time now. Nagisa comes up with a bold suggestion, she thinks that they should spend some time apart from each other, when people spend time apart they begin to miss each other and when reunited they’ll be able to have a nice long talk, and with that, she invites Tomoya to stay at her house for a while. Tomoya heads home to pack his bags and is caught by his father just as he’s leaving, Tomoya tells him that he’ll be staying with a friend for a while, despite his father looking sad seeing his son abandon him, he doesn’t have the right to deny him his freedom.
Tomoya arrives at Nagisa’s house to be greeted by Akio and jokingly told to leave right after, Sanae comes down and straightens out her husband, who is just annoyed that his lovable daughter and wife will be in the presence of another man. Tomoya settles in but can’t really shake the uncomfortable feeling that anyone would have staying over at a friend’s house, especially him, who has never experienced what it’s like to live with a loving family. Nagisa, Akio and Sanae all help him out, trying their best to make him feel at home, treating him no different from how they would their own son.
At school, the drama club is finally in full swing with Koumura at the helm, explaining the work that needs to go into a play, behind the scenes work like lighting, sound and costumes, and of course the essentials, like acting. Tomoyo makes a quick visit as well, curious to see what became of the drama club after her approval, she assists Kyou putting Sunohara in line, who continues his joker ways.
After club activities, Tomoya and Nagisa arrive home to find a bunch of kids in Tomoya’s room rummaging through his stuff. Apparently Sanae runs a cram school for kids and couldn’t manage to setup another room in time for their first meeting after Tomoya moved in. Not getting along with the kids very well, Tomoya heads downstairs where he’s forced into tending to the shop by Akio. The conversation shifts to Sanae and how she used to be a middle school teacher, Tomoya is surprised and asks why she quit, but doesn’t get a real answer out of Akio.
That evening, Nagisa comes to visit Tomoya, who is sitting around doing a whole lot of nothing. They talk about how Tomoya is adjusting, he still feels weird being around a family that gets along so well. Nagisa understands, her parents do take very good care of her. However, she feels like there’s something that she should apologize for, but she doesn’t know what. Nagisa explains that she’s always had this feeling that when she was younger she did something very terrible to her parents, when she brings it up they always tell her she’s just imagining things, but they’re quick to change the subject and they start to act weird whenever she brings it up.
Not wanting to neglect his routine or leave the only male member of his harem lonely, Tomoya heads over to Sunohara’s to kill some time. Doesn’t take long for Sunohara to extract the information that Tomoya is staying at Nagisa’s house from him, envious of his catch, despite Tomoya still denying that they have that sort of relationship.
Thoughts
Ah Sanae, I’d eat her bread, if you know what I mean
Finally we’re getting down to the stuff that I expected when I first started watching Clannad. While it may be a Key work and a harem by all rights, Clannad’s differentiating point is its strong focus on family themes, or so I was told when I first heard of it. This episode finally starts to reveal these aspects.
Sure we’ve known of Tomoya’s problems at home for quite some time now, but it’s been more of a lingering thorn in our sides than anything. We haven’t gotten any background as to what tore Tomoya’s family apart and sent his dad into a spiral of depression and general apathy towards life. The more the series progresses, and especially in this episode, I’m beginning to sympathize with the old man, Tomoya’s generally a nice guy, but in the case of his father, rather than it being an issue of Tomoya’s dad not wanting to apologize and become a family again, it seems more like Tomoya is the one holding the grudge that prevents them from doing so. When he was talking to Tomoya’s teacher, the feeling I got from Tomoya’s dad was less of apathy towards his son, but more a feeling that even if he wanted to, he couldn’t help, it was also really saddening seeing his face when Tomoya left the house.
In addition, we also see that Nagisa’s family, while infinitely better than Tomoya’s, seems to have its share of problems too. When Tomoya asked Akio about Sanae and her past as a teacher, the subject was quickly avoided, and there’s also the whole deal with Nagisa and the feeling she has that she did something terrible to her parents in the past. Every family, no matter how happy they seem on the surface, is bound to have some internal problems, it’s an inevitable effect from spending so much time with one another, Nagisa’s family is no exception. I look forward to seeing how things play out, as it could lead to some genuine, non-romance centric drama.
The one thing that I hated about this episode was something I saw coming the second Tomoya’s harem conceded defeat to Nagisa, the screentime for his other haremettes has plummeted. Now I wouldn’t really mind if it were a parting of sorts, Kyou and Ryou bowing out and cutting off ties, you know, the way these things usually work. What kills me is that everything is back to business as usual, despite all the crying they did last episode, the Fujibayashis show no signs of resentment towards either Nagisa nor Tomoya and have returned to being great buddies with them in the span of days, REJECTION DOES NOT WORK THAT WAY!
And finally, we’re given another glimpse of Clannad’s alternate world with the loli and her robot. I’m sure the symbolism of all this will be crystal clear in hindsight, but right now all that I’m getting out of the scenes is a look of awe as the number of animation frames shoots through the roof. At this point I would remind you that spoiler tags are our friends :3 I haven’t had the time to play the Clannad VN for a while now.
What the…
~ Shirukii ~
18 Responses to “Clannad 19, Family”
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Nagisa’s secret… what could it be… [thinks]
WARNING: *NOT* SPOILERS IN ANY WAY, SHAPE OR FORM.
When Nagisa was young…
* …she hired the raccoon to take out Raigomaru.
* …she hired the eight wolves to scare Lawrence senseless.
* …she shot Mr. Burns and framed Maggie.
* …she stole the Galaxy Angels’ snacks and framed Col. Volcott.
* …she had a power level of over 9000.
* …she stole the walrus’s bucket.
* …she drank your milkshake.
* …she was a hidden character in “Super Smash Brothers.”
* …she devoured Guu.
* …she took a watermelon and placed two seeds on the front porch of every house within a one-mile radius of her home.
* …she had Fairy Godparents… until Timmy Turner blew her cover.
* …she made the largest Belgian Waffle Japan had ever seen.
* …she discovered the cure for siscon… and poured it down the drain.
* …she sank my battleship.
* …she beat Chuck Norris.
* …she had her cake… and ate it, too.
Kyou, Tomoyo, etc…. they aren’t conceding to Nagisa. They’re giving her a wide birth in case her “youthful indiscretion” side resurfaces.
wah, somebody tell me all the spoilers of Nagisa D:
Are those Pocky sticks coming out of the bread?
Is this alterative world Nagisa’s play?
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This is the actual spoiler.
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It wouldn’t feel right giving anything specific =(.
Read the VN scenes at www.baka-tsuki.net
Yeah, it’s too bad the non-leads aren’t getting any development since they’re no longer considered Nagisa’s rivals. I was kinda hoping the Sunohara/Tomoyo (female) relation might turn into something so that the lead guy isn’t the only gettin’ all the lovin’.
Honestly, if they’re to accelerate the plotline for Nagisa’s arc, Tomoya’s background, and the multitudes of storyline developments between now and the after story, we’ll probably see less and less of them until the play is done. I’m actually unsure as to whether or not they will participate in the play, as I didn’t read into it.
If we see the after story, we’ll probably see a few scenes with the other heroines, but there’s alot of storyline to understand with Nagisa, Tomoya, Tomoya’s family and its past, and the meaning / climactic understanding of the alternate world.
Shirukii: “What kills me is that everything is back to business as usual, despite all the crying they did last episode, the Fujibayashis show no signs of resentment towards either Nagisa nor Tomoya”
26 seconds in.
The “Kyou I Knew It From the Start” Face.
Cheeze, everybody’s right, what’s with the animation in this episode? I nearly suffered from vertigo when thinking about the episode from two weeks ago compared to this. It’s not like Kyou-Ani has anything coming up next season (right?) so what’s the deal?
@ W4: >> she discovered the cure for siscon… and poured it down the drain.
Whew, thank god, that was a close one.
@ Kaelyn: Show ▼
@ RmX: Yes, yes they are. Can you imagine how difficult, and I’d imagine, painful, that must be to eat?
@ Trunkmonkey: I don’t know the specifics, but from what I’ve heard, I don’t think that would be the case.
@ Pyrrhusonline: Delicious spoilers, must eat. Luckily I already knew that bit of info, so no harm done.
They don’t have enough time to do the after story, it would take another 13 episode season for them to cover it to a satisfactory level. I hope they don’t try and fall on their face.
@ Baka: I was hoping the Sunohara-Tomoyo pair would become reality throughout the course of the anime, there’s no way they have enough time to pull something like that though. Read Tomoyo After if you want to see that, and BAAW/WTF?! at the end.
@ Roy Mustang: Holy crap, thank you. I did not notice that, it did wonders for my impression of Kyou’s character and the overall continuity of the transition.
@ ItAintEazy: Yea, there was some definite QUALITY in this episode, I’m guessing KyoAni is starting to save up for the ending episodes where their animation kicks up a few notches.
This is just a weak theory but….
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First of all, topic pic:
“Falcon…”
Moving on. Seeing as I don’t have that much to say on this that hasn’t already been said, I will provide some of the bigger spoilers of the game specifically that Kaelyn asked for spoilers and though the most important aspect has been revealed, I want to post more because unlike True Tears, there’s not much to speculate on, given that this is another Key adaptation.
Wall of text form = harder to read, so anyone who clicks on accident won’t be able to read clearly.
Also, since these are all purely VN spoilers, how much they’ll be able to integrate given that there are only 7 episodes left is up for grabs, so not all elements will most likely be there.
Ready? Okay.
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That’s as far as the Nagisa spoilers go. There’s more to it, and it doesn’t just end there, but none of that is necessary at the moment.
And Shirukii, if such a thing is unnecessary, you may delete it as you see fit and I shall understand.
Well, today’s is done. Time to wait for Sunday for true tears!
KOTOBUKIYA is proud to release the Clannad bishoujo figure series internationally for the first time ever! Clannad (which means “family” in Irish) began life as a PC game, but has moved on to Manga, Anime, OVA movies, and more. The story centers around high school student Tomoya Okazaki and his interactions with the lovely ladies he meets both in this world and beyond. inches tall. Features removable cat ears. Signs Of Depression
Sigh, I guess I’m still the only one who haven’t recover about Tomoya reject both Kyou and Tomoyo from the last episode. This episode was so bad in term of bringing the theme of “family” stuff. Less screen time for both Kyou and Tomoyo really pissed me off. I kinda know what gonna happen as for the bitter sweet ending. However, I’ll just keep my month shut. Who know?? Kyoani may surprise us and do an incredible or stupid ending. We’ll see.
Let me correct something, I must be on crack. Clannad only goes up to 24. According to RandomCuriosity, the TV schedule for the upcoming episodes states that only 3 more episodes will actually be regular (i.e. plot) episodes and the 24th one will be a summer vacation episode. How they’ll tie up the illusionary world up in 3 episodes is beyond me.
…I smell a second season.
@kenshin514: Kyou & Tomoyo characters is a definite win. Their scenario is a definite no-no, at least in this series where family takes center theme.
I hope everyone noticed how Nagisa has changed in this episode, compared to how she was in the beginning. On the other hand, I see some change in her drawings, in a slightly worse way. What’s up with that?
Tomoya’s father is an issue that I doubt it will be fully fleshed out in this one because it spans into the after story part of the series. I have to say, though, that while he is not a bad guy at all, given how we see his attempts to have some conversation with his son, it’s hard to get respect from your son if all you do is just slacking in the room with alcohol & take-out food leftovers all over the place. Also, Tomoya’s unwillingness to take the initiative over this just makes it worse than it already was.
Also, did anyone notice Sunohara’s facial expressions? Seems like Sunohara is a man of a thousand Lucky Star faces.
*sigh* I love clannad!
Looks like velocity7 (head of the Clannad translation project) has some new screens out of the game’s translated form. Apparently 99.9999~% of the novel is translated and they’re working on the implementation of a patch for their final testing, revision, and flow.
For all of those who were wondering, of course =)
BTW: I heard that a full completion of the novel took someone a good 4 months when he kept at his real life as well. All I can say is….damn.