I don’t even need to say it

I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that this may be the single most satisfying episode of anime I have watched in my entire life. Following the Nice Boat disaster last Tuesday we had to wait a little over a week until the episode finally broke through the media frenzy and was aired, each passing day added to the anxiety of not knowing what happened. And when it finally aired and I saw the two people who I thought were most deserving of a slow and painful death getting exactly what they deserved, it was an amazing feeling of relief. I don’t think I’ve ever seen so much of the anime community look forward to a single event before, many thanks to AT-X for airing it, our lives are now complete.

Episode Rating: 10/10 || Series Rating: 9.5/10

Picking up from last episode, Makoto and Katsura are walking together in the street when Makoto starts to feel cold so Katsura takes his hands and puts them against her breasts to warm them up. (I’ve always been under the impression that under the armpits is the best way to warm your hands, but hey, I wouldn’t complain) The two of them go to a restaurant together when Makoto gets a call from Sekai who has already cooked dinner for him and is waiting at his apartment. She asks him to come home right away, but Makoto tells her that he can’t make it. At first Sekai thinks that it might be because he doesn’t like her cooking, but when he assures her that that’s not the case, she begins to get suspicious and demands to hear the real reason.

Sekai accuses him of the first thing that comes to mind, that he’s cheating on her again. When he denies it, she tries to use the baby she’s carrying to guilt him into coming home, Makoto tells her that Katsura wouldn’t try to use something like that against him. When Sekai hears him mention Katsura, she starts to realize that he’s with her right now. Frustrated, Makoto yells at her for the situation for the baby and how she announced it to everyone at school, he tells her to go home and hangs up. As soon as he hangs up Makoto gets an e-mail from Sekai in which she apologizes and says that she’s going home.

However, just as she’s getting off the train, Sekai sees Makoto holding Katsura in his arms in a train heading towards his house and rushes to catch them. At Makoto’s place he sits Katsura down and goes to make her a cup of tea, he ends up seeing the mess Sekai made when she threw the dinner she made Makoto on the floor and starts cleaning it up. Suddenly, the doorbell rings but when Makoto goes to answer it, he sees that Katsura got there first, and it’s Sekai at the door. As soon as she sees Katsura, she slaps her and demands that she leave at once. Makoto gets between them and Sekai starts yelling at him, saying that he’s already broken things off with Katsura and tells him he can’t abandon her and his baby. Sekai desperately tries to get Makoto to tell Katsura that he doesn’t have any more feelings for her so that she can believe that Katsura is the one behind this.

Finally, Katsura speaks up, calmly pointing out that it was Sekai that came on to Makoto in the first place, trying to come between them. Sekai denies that and says that they’re truly in love, but Katsura begins to wonder if it’s just Sekai who thinks so. Katsura then changes the subject to Setsuna, telling Sekai how she was in love with Makoto as well. She goes on to tell Sekai that Makoto has always been by her side, waiting, and that she’s not going to hold back anymore, having said that she kisses Makoto right in front of Sekai (with tongue, lol). This causes Sekai to go berserk, screaming out in agony and running away.

As she takes the long walk of shame home, Sekai starts to reminisce about her early high school days, meeting Setsuna and telling her all about Makoto. But her memories soon turn into a horrible hallucination, similar to the one Setsuna had back during the school festival. Using the theme of the untouchable flower once again, a masked character accuses Sekai of being selfish and hypocritical, trying to keep Makoto all to herself. Sekai denies it but the masked character keeps on pressuring her, saying that everything that has happened is all her fault because it was her who chose to sit beside Makoto, who chose to introduce him to Katsura and chose to pry the two of them apart afterwards. The mystery character pulls of her mask and it ends up being Setsuna.

The next day, Sekai’s face lights up when she gets an e-mail from Makoto, but that quickly changes to a look of horror when she reads the e-mail that tells her to get an abortion. She e-mails Makoto back asking to see him at his apartment alone after school. (I’m just guessing based on events that happened later on in the episode here, I couldn’t actually read the texts, someone please correct me if I misunderstood)

That day at lunch, Makoto and Katsura have a nostalgic lunch together on the roof top, just like old times. Makoto takes the opportunity to tell Katsura that he’s truly sorry for everything that he’s put her through, but promises to look only at her from now on. And the two share their final kiss…

That night, at Makoto’s house, Makoto asks Sekai how it went, presumably talking about her abortion, she says nothing. The two sit in silence for a while until Makoto gets up to make some tea, Sekai goes to the kitchen and tells him that she’ll do it. Hearing his cell phone going off in the other room, Makoto goes to check it and finds an e-mail from Sekai. The e-mail contains nothing but a “sorry” and bunch of line skips until the very end, ending with a “good bye”, and with that, Makoto turns around just in time to see Sekai running at him with a knife. She pins him on the ground and stabs him repeatedly as memories of the times he spent with Sekai and Katsura run through his mind. With a bloody knife in her hand and the boy she once loved lying dead on the floor, Sekai realizes what she’s just done and runs away.

Things only get worse when Katsura gets back from happily shopping for ingredients to make Makoto dinner only to find him dead, stabbed to death in his room. She e-mails Sekai and demands to see her. The two meet on the roof of the school, Katsura greets Sekai and asks if she went to the hospital, Sekai says that she didn’t. Katsura then accuses her of lying about being pregnant just so she could keep Makoto to herself, Sekai denies it but Katsura wonders why she didn’t go to the hospital then. She further provokes her by telling her yet again, that she is Makoto’s girlfriend, Sekai breaks down and says that she wanted to be his girlfriend too and wonders how things got to be as bad as they did. Katsura then tells her that Makoto is with them as well, points to the gym bag she brought and tells her to take a look. What’s inside is Makoto’s severed head, seeing it causes Sekai to throw up.

Katsura then backs up and brandishes her hacksaw. Sekai reaches for her knife but Katsura quickly disarms her and slits her jugular vein sending blood spurting all over the place. After she’s dead, Katsura cuts open her stomach to see if she really was pregnant, when she sees no indication that she was, Katsura calmly confirms to herself that Sekai was lying.

Some time after, we see Katsura lying down on her family’s boat, hugging Makoto’s severed head, happy that they are finally together, just the two of them.

Thoughts

Great end or GREATEST end?

lol, so it was a Nice Boat ending after all. I wonder if that’s how it was originally intended to end, or if that last scene was edited to take place on a boat after how much popularity the “Nice Boat” meme gained over the past week or so.

Needless to say, I’m very pleased with the way School Days ended. In terms of how the chain of events went, I couldn’t have asked for more. Two game endings were combined and slightly altered and we got the best of both worlds. We got Sekai killing Makoto, but without his 7 minute redemption speech as he walks off into the sunset, and we got Katsura going berserk on Sekai and slitting her throat open. The added scene where she checked to see if Sekai was really pregnant was a little disturbing, but certainly added to her psychotic mindset, I thought it was a nice addition. So in the end, the girl I picked “won”, albeit she’s probably batshit insane at this point, emphasized by the last scene of her hugging Makoto’s severed head. But uh, hey, she’s alive, and that’s all that counts!

As for Makoto’s death scene, it was pure bliss. Watching him suffer as Sekai relentlessly stabbed him over and over again. I had some lingering pity for him from last episode, when he genuinely seemed to be sorry for everything he did to Katsura, and even this episode, he showed some signs of redemption as he promised to look only at Katsura from now on. But what really pissed me off was when he kissed her right in front of Sekai, almost as if to spite her. Also, he comes to the realization that ignoring Katsura ended up hurting her a lot, but despite that, starts to do the EXACT SAME THING to Sekai, so really, he’s learned nothing. He probably just realized what he’s been missing when Katsura let him cop a feel. So all that taken into consideration, my hate for him was reborn stronger than ever and I cheered as Sekai carved him up.

I am slightly disappointed at the final confrontation between Katsura and Sekai though, I was hoping that Sekai would put up more of a fight than she did. She brought along her kitchen knife and had some practice on Makoto, but was quickly disarmed and taken down by Katsura. I guess Katsura played her cards well though, showing Sekai Makoto’s head to throw her off, well played.

As for the violence scenes themselves, they were fairly well done. Makoto’s facial expressions as Sekai cut him up were priceless, and Sekai’s face as she got her throat sliced accompanied by Katsura dead stare did justice to the game (cept we didn’t get to see Katsura maniacal laugh). The pitch black blood took away from the scenes a bit, but all in all the effect remained the same, and I expect they’ll return that to normal when the DVD version hits. I hope they show the unedited version in the DVD, supposedly it was even gorier, Makoto’s scene especially, having a lot more stabbing rather than the flashbacks that were done in the broadcast.

School Days was a great watch, never before have I hated an anime character with such passion and never before have I used the phrase “die in a fire” so many times. At times the plot was a messed up and nonsensical, and a lot of things were thrown in without explanation, probably just to anger the viewers (Hikari, anyone?) but in the end, justice was served. With so many harems out there that follow the standard templates of going through segments of each girl’s arc and then either have the protagonist pick one or leave the ending opening, School Days was a much needed breath of fresh air into the harem genre. It followed many of the cliches yet completely shattered harem conventions. The anime felt a little convoluted, having tried to incorporate so many of the h-game’s arc into one coherent plot line, but it all worked out in the end.

School Days has a wide appeal, from those who love the generic harem genre, to those who absolutely abhor it, and those who just love to see some mindless violence, I’d recommend it to just about everyone. Under the unifying theme of hating Makoto; viewers, bloggers and anonymous everywhere have banded together these past 13 weeks and prayed for Makoto to get his comeuppance. If you haven’t joined in on the hate already, I have no hesitation in recommending you get to watching.

It was fun blogging School Days and I’ll miss these weekly sessions of speculation and Makoto hating, but all good things must come to an end, and what a GOOD END it was.

On that note, School Days was the very first anime that I watched COMPLETELY raw, as in, not even going back to download subs and rewatching (mostly because I couldn’t handle watching the same episode more than once). So my question is, how did I do? I know I made a few slip ups here and there (many of them because of text messages that I couldn’t read -_-) but all in all, were my summaries accurate enough to follow?

But in any case, thanks for reading! Everyone’s continued support even when my posts were reduced to little more than vitriolic Makoto rants was what kept me going. I hope you all stick around for the fall season, which is quite a contrast to summer, overflowing with moeblob titles like CLANNAD, Da Capo and Kojika. From die in a fire to so moe I’m gonna die, as it were.

Teresa ;_;

~ Shirukii ~

So I herd u liek boats.

So, here I was, innocently refreshing Tokyo Tosho and repeatedly spazzing out on the search query button in Share and Winny in an attempt to find a School Days 12 raw, when ItAintEazy commented that something is up with the episode. After a quick visit to Random Curiosity, it would appear that the final episode was postponed in light of a violent crime in Kyoto where a girl killed her father with an axe.

Her reasoning? “”I didn’t like my father so I killed him.” Well, I’m not particularly fond of this girl for delaying our much anticipated finale of School Days, but I’m not about to brandish a cleaver against her. Ugh. My faith in humanity falls ever lower.

I’m guessing that the finale of School Days was gory in nature so the broadcasters thought it would be inappropriate to air it so soon after a tragic crime and possibly cause a link to be formed between them. So instead they aired a 28 minute long segment with a bunch of scenic shots.

Well, at the very least this should be the final indication that School Days does indeed have a BAD END. I can’t wait until tomorrow. Be thankful that you lived a day longer than planned Makoto!

But on that note, tomorrow is my busiest day at uni, with classes from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. I’ll do my best to blog School Days by the end of the day tomorrow, but expect my Claymore entry to be pushed back to Thursday.

For the record, it is a pretty nice boat.

~ Shirukii ~

I have a bad feeling about this

When I first began blogging School Days I did a lot of theorizing on how it would end and the various conditions that would need to be met in order for each ending to come to be. Out of the three possible bad endings portrayed in the game, the one which I hoped for the most was simultaneously the one most prone to being screwed up, the ending in which Makoto dies. The danger in that ending is that it had the most potential to end up with Makoto basically apologizing for his wrongdoings and keeping his harem, happily ever after.

And now, with Sekai knocked up and Katsura no longer an inch away from becoming a serial killer or diving off a rooftop, care to wager which path we’re on?

Episode Rating: 9.5/10

In the aftermath of the school festival, things are getting a little crazy. The airing of the sex lounge tape has changed the way a lot of people think of certain others, in particular Nanami is being looked at in a different light. We’re also shown a shot of Sekai who is absent from school with what looks like a bad stomach ache, scrolling through her text message history with Makoto. As for Makoto, apparently he’s gotten bored of Otome already because he’s got himself a new casual sex partner, Hikari. And to add to the suspense, a quick cut away to Katsura shows her stroking a clothed item that bears a striking similarity to a hacksaw…

As Sekai lies in bed, home alone, she remembers her earlier confrontation with Makoto where she demanded an explanation for the video of him and Otome. While she does her best to keep a lecturing tone and stay mad, she ends up breaking down, crying into Makoto’s arms begging him not to leave her, especially now that Setsuna is gone, he’s all she has left.

Meanwhile, Otome, who was previously okay with just the occasional fling with Makoto, is showing some signs of possessiveness, frustrated when she can’t reach him. She enlists the help of her trio to help her, but they are uninterested and Otome ends up storming off alone. The three note how much Otome has changed after her encounter with Makoto, which leads them to wonder what everyone sees in Makoto anyways. Natsumi finally steps up and says that they shouldn’t be left out of all the fun, which eventually leads to the three of them having a foursome with Makoto at his place.

Meanwhile, Sekai is still at home, half-heartedly scanning through her e-mail history when she suddenly feels really sick and starts to throw up. It doesn’t take her long to put two and two together and realize that she’s having morning sickness. Sekai is pregnant.

The next day, Sekai shows up at school with a serious look on her face, telling Makoto that there’s something important they have to talk about. At first Makoto thinks that he’s going to get another lecture about how he cheated on her, but gets an even worse surprise when Sekai tells him she’s pregnant with his child. Makoto goes into denial mode, telling her she shouldn’t joke about such things, which causes Sekai to get angry and yell that she wouldn’t joke about such a thing. She continues to yell at him, not letting him dodge the fact that she’s carrying his child and that he should be a man and take responsibility. And all this in front of a packed classroom.

Afterwards, Sekai goes to lie down in the nurse’s office where she gets over the anxiety of her pregnancy and smiles at the thought that she’s carrying Makoto’s child.

The gossip about Makoto spreads through the school like wildfire and soon everyone and their grandmother has heard about it. And so begins Makoto’s fall from grace as his harem begins to distance themselves from him. First up is Hikari, who tells Makoto to take responsibility for his actions with Sekai and refuses to sleep with him anymore. Next is Otome, after confirming the news she leaves him, disappointed at what the once kind guy she once knew in junior high school has become.

As Makoto stands in the middle of a street crowded with people and Christmas decorations, he becomes more and more frustrated as he can’t get a hold of anyone on his cell phone. Hikari, Otome, Minami, Kumi, Natsumi, everyone has blocked his calls.

And what of Katsura? After Makoto officially dumped her at the garbage disposal behind school, her mental stability has been on the decline. She spends the better part of the episode wandering around having ‘conversations’ with Makoto on her cell phone while in reality all she’s talking to is a dead line. In her ramblings, she fabricates a date between herself and Makoto for Christmas, arranging to meet with him in the shopping center.

And by a ironic twist of fate, her promise is fulfilled, as Makoto desperately keeps trying to reach someone on his phone and reminisces about Katsura and how screwed up things have gotten meeting Katsura, he ends up meeting Katsura, just as she planned. Makoto wonders what she’s doing out all by herself, covered in snow, and is surprised when she replies she’s been waiting for him. When Katsura starts spewing nonsense about their relationship, how Sekai is cheering them on, how they’re still dating and how she loves him very much, Makoto FINALLY realizes how badly his actions have screwed her up. He breaks down in tears and and apologizes and tells Katsura he loves her, returning the light to her eyes.

All the while Sekai is at home preparing a Christmas dinner for Makoto, happily talking to Hikari about how great things are between them and thinking about the great life that awaits her with Makoto and the child she’s carrying that bonds them together.

Thoughts

The ending of School Days is either going to be the most legendary of wins or the most epic fail in the history of romance anime.

There are only two ways we can go from here:

1. Having made up with Katsura, the two of them go back to Makoto’s place and celebrate their renewed relationship the only way Makoto knows how. As the time passes by Sekai worries about Makoto not coming back and goes to his apartment to find him, where she discovers him with Katsura. This sets off the chain of events that eventually leads to Sekai stabbing Makoto and leaving him for dead. BAD END! DO WANT!

2. Harem ending. Makoto apologizes to the girls and by some incredible breakdown in logic, everything is resolved and Makoto ends up with his harem intact, a master pimp. DO NOT WANT!

I don’t see how else the anime can end and not end up seeming like the whole series was in vain. But hey, I’ve seen a lot WTF endings in my time (CONGRATULATIONS Shinji!) so who knows.

As for Makoto…as much as I hate the guy, I have to admit, he’s the ultimate harem master. He manages, for a time, to juggle Sekai, Setsuna, Otome, Hikari, Natsumi, Kumi and Minami, that’s 7 girls, while making many of them believe that his feelings were earnest. I have to hand it to him, that takes both skill and a lot of luck. In fact, the only girls that have appeared in School Days which Makoto has not done the horizontal tango with are Kokoro, Nanami and Katsura (probably not for long).

But with that being said, I loved karma coming back and slapping him in the face. In the span of one night he lost his entire harem because of Sekai’s announcement. Watching him struggle in frustration as he tried to reach the girls was extremely gratifying, a sort of “Now you know how it feels” sense of revenge. And him falling in that puddle was great, I lol’d hard.

I also take back all the negative things I said about Otome, she was awesome in this episode. Even though she was hypocritical in her behavior towards Makoto, changing from being okay with casual sex with no attachment to acting needy. She redeemed herself when she broke it off with Makoto. She didn’t whine about him seeing other girls but then fall to his charm, no. She confronted him, broke it off, expressed her disappointment with him and then moved on completely, even throwing out the picture of the two of them together. Good show Otome.

But wtf was up with Hikari, I did not see that coming. I can’t see any reason why she suddenly threw herself at Makoto. It didn’t seem like she loved him, as most of the time she ended up lecturing him about his unfaithfulness after they were together. But she was quick to end things with Makoto once she found out that Sekai was pregnant, so I don’t have any particular hate for her, nor Otome’s trio, who also distanced themselves from Makoto after hearing the news about Sekai.

As for the last scene with Katsura…I can’t tell if Makoto is being genuine here. At first I thought it was just him being his usual self and going after the closest willing and able female, with Hikari and Otome and her gang out of reach and him not wanting to take responsibility with Sekai, Katsura was his last resort. But when he broke down and apologized to her, it felt like he really meant it, I almost felt sorry for the two of them.

Thinking back, things between Katsura and Makoto probably would have went reasonably well had Sekai not confused him by kissing him on the train platform just after he confessed. And seeing him reminisce about Katsura and the two of them back together brought up feelings of sympathy for the couple that was cursed by circumstance.

I’m probably giving Makoto way too much credit here, as he has proven time and time again that he is incapable of expressing genuine love and caring, and I still want him to die a horrible death by fire. But as in real life, I can’t help but hang on to that small thread of hope that humanity hasn’t gone completely to hell.

But regardless, it all ends next week. Finale title: School Days, which gives us absolutely no hints about how this will end up.

Will Sekai kill Makoto or will hordes of viewers kill the anime production team?

~ Shirukii ~

Let the bloodshed begin!

Yet another anger inducing episode of School Days, but I’m consoled by the fact that a BAD END is pretty much guaranteed now. If the lifelessness in Katsura’s eyes, the closeup of the kitchen knives and the subtle rattling of said knives in her bag don’t paint an obvious enough picture, consider the fact that from episode 9 onwards, School Days is rated R. With TV gore censorship out of the way, let the blood flow!

Episode Rating: 9/10

Picking up where we left off last episode, Taisuke whispers sweet words of love as he has his way with Katsura who is still trying to recover from the news that Makoto abandoned her for Sekai. Afterwards she stumbles outside, half-clothed, only to see Makoto and Sekai dancing happily around the bonfire, and can’t help but cry.

The next day, Katsura sees Makoto on the train ride to school and surprisingly, he apologizes to her for not being able to come see her during the festival and tells her that he heard about the sex lounge from Otome. But Katsura doesn’t care about that, she’s happy just knowing that Makoto still thinks about her and bothered to apologize at all.

At school, Taisuke is acting cheerful and energetic, but no one has any idea why, they all look to Hikari for an explanation, Taisuke being the object of her affection, but she swears she has nothing to do with it. Taisuke ends up running off to Katsura’s class and taking the previous night as the start of something between them, asks her out to a Christmas party. However, Katsura rejects him, tells him that she and Makoto are still dating and that he should forget all about last night. Taisuke goes crying the Makoto, whining about how he should break it off, but that only adds to his confusion when Makoto swears that there’s nothing going on between him and Katsura anymore.

Left to do all the work again, Katsura is on her way to take the trash from the school festival out when she runs into Otome’s gang who bullies her about Makoto not showing up to see her at the school festival. Katsura defiantly shrugs them off and once again tells them that she and Makoto are still dating. So the girls switch to physical bullying, pulling the whole “LOL. I tripped you, you should be more careful. roflmao, aren’t we so cool, picking on her 4v1.”

At the school’s trash pile, Setsuna and Makoto are taking care of the clean up for their class, Makoto goofing off as usual and Setsuna giving him yet another lecture about how he should be faithful to Sekai and that it’s up to him to care for her once she’s gone.

As if on cue, Katsura shows up carrying her class’ garbage, Makoto gives her a hand because she looks like she’s about to fall over. Setsuna takes his actions as flirting and once again steps in between them. Another heated debate about the Makoto, Sekai, Katsura triangle erupts between the two girls when Katsura brings Setsuna’s little secret to light, threatening to reveal what happened between her and Makoto on the last night of the school festival. As Katsura keeps drilling Setsuna with threats to tell Sekai, Setsuna suddenly grabs Makoto and kisses him, stopping Katsura dead in her tracks.

This pretty much forces Makoto’s hand and he finally sets things straight by telling Katsura that he has no feelings for her, in essence dumping her. He then angrily shakes Setsuna off his arm and walks away, leaving Katsura in a state of mixed shock and despair.

That afternoon, Makoto ends up having some fun with Otome in the gym storage room, afterwards complaining about how all the girls around him are putting him through a lot of trouble, but not Otome who he says is different and exciting. As for Otome, she’s just happy that Makoto is finally seeing her as a woman after all these years. But of course, their play time comes at a price, as Setsuna stands outside the storage room listening in…

Setsuna calls Makoto and asks to talk to him, as anyone can guess at this point it ends up being another lecture about how he should only look at Sekai. But Makoto turns things around and asks Setsuna why she cares so much about what he does, she says it’s for Sekai’s sake but Makoto suggests that maybe she likes him too, she denies it but Makoto pushes the subject, saying that her kiss earlier carried her true feelings. He pushes her down onto his bed and despite resisting at first says that he can do whatever he wants with her as long as he promises to end things with Otome.

Meanwhile, Makoto finally breaking up with her seems to have shattered the last shred of sanity that Katsura was holding onto. Kokoro finds her in the kitchen late at night holding an empty glass as the tap water runs while she stares at a set of kitchen knives.

The next day, Sekai joins Nanami to attend a gathering between a bunch of senior girls. The meeting ends up being a showing of the videos they recorded during their school festival sex lounge. The first video up is Nanami and some random guy, which brings Nanami crashing to the floor in a fit of tears. But that’s nothing compared to the next video, showing Otome fooling around with Makoto, much to the surprise of Sekai.

While rushing to Makoto’s place, Sekai desperately tryies to reach him on his cell phone for an explanation, unknowingly passing Setsuna on the return train from his house. As she reaches an overpass she runs into Katsura who doesn’t even bother to greet her, instead asking Sekai is she knows where Setsuna is, not waiting for an answer she tells her that she’s been with Makoto. While Sekai tries to piece together what she’s just been told, she catches a glimpse of Katsura eyes which hold a cold and lifeless stare…

Thoughts

I don’t know what else I can say about Makoto (die, fire, etc). I don’t know what any of these girls could possibly see in him, he clearly doesn’t care about any of them. After going behind Katsura’s back and starting to ‘date’ Sekai, he seems like he’s bored with her already and turns to Otome for something “different” and “exciting”, and then he says something as cocky as “are you sure you don’t like me too?” to Setsuna and ends up bedding her as well. The only positive thing that Makoto has done this whole series is finally cutting things off with Katsura, no longer stringing her along. But even that indirectly hurt her more than he could ever imagine.

On that note, Katsura looks like she’s finally snapped. Her actions of late are reminding me a lot of how Kaede started to behave when Rin abandoned her for Asa. I can’t completely sympathize with her because, as I’ve said in the past, it’s partially her fault for putting herself through all this. I understand that it was hard for her to let go and move on, but continuing to delude herself into thinking that she’s still Makoto’s girlfriend was an inevitable dead end, she would have arrived at this point sooner or later, but sooner would have seen her sanity intact and not have her wander around with kitchen knives in her purse.

But above all, I’m more annoyed by the involvement of Otome and Setsuna. I thought these two wouldn’t play much of a part in all this drama, but they’ve thrown themselves in willingly. Otome acts all high and mighty by saying that she doesn’t care what Makoto does as long as he’s finally recognizing her as a woman instead of just a childhood friend, and while that’s better than most childhood friends can ever hope for, it doesn’t make her any less of a loose woman. As for Setsuna, she acts as if she’s doting over Makoto for Sekai’s sake, but her actions lately are really suggesting that she’s just as much in love with Makoto as Sekai is. That itself wouldn’t be too bad, but she’s acting on that love under the pretense of protecting Sekai, all the while she must know in the back of her mind that she’s doing it for herself as a last fling with her unrequited love before she disappears to France. She’s just as selfish as any of the other characters.

However, all this is some much needed karma for Sekai. I wonder what she’ll say to Makoto when she sees him, knowing that he’s cheated on her with Otome and now Katsura saying that he’s chosen Setsuna over her as well.

And of course there’s Taisuke…While I admit that Katsura didn’t really resist, it was only because she was in a state of lifeless shock after hearing that Makoto had broken their promise and gone off with Sekai instead. So my point stands, Taisuke deserves to burn.

With the conclusion of School Days only two episodes away, I can say with full confidence that we’re heading towards a BAD END. The recent events and Makoto juggling the girls CAN’T end happily, or even neutrally, it’s impossible. It would be an injustice to let School Days end without killing off a cast member or two and, more importantly, traumatizing Makoto for life.

Although I’m not completely sure about Katsura’s current state of mind, whether she’s more depressed or violently resentful, but the close up to the kitchen knives and the ominous clanging of kitchenware in her purse suggest that we’re heading towards Katsura going on a berserker killing spree. In the game ending she only takes out Sekai, but I for one would like to see her take down Otome and Setsuna as well. It’s been suggested that she might go after Makoto, but I doubt it. She has never once acknowledged that this is all Makoto’s fault. She’s offset the blame onto Sekai and Setsuna, but has never shown anything but love towards Makoto. I’m just curious whether she’ll kill herself after all is said and done.

Let the bodies hit the floor!

~ Shirukii ~

An hour has passed since I finished watching this episode of School Days and despite my best efforts, I can’t think of any obscenities that properly convey how angry I am right now…I’m just going to try and make it through this post without it degrading into a vitriolic rant about how badly everyone in this series needs to die. (No promises)

Episode Rating: 9/10

After having caught Setsuna kissing Makoto, Katsura pulls her aside and demands an explanation, asking if she likes Makoto and if that was the reason she had been keeping the two apart at every chance she could get. Setsuna denies that and says her actions were all for Sekai’s sake, the kiss was just a memory she wanted to keep for herself before leaving the school, begging Katsura not to tell Sekai about the kiss. Katsura says that that has nothing to do with her and Makoto, but her lecture is cut short by Nanami, forcing Katsura to excuse herself and leave.

The next day sees the continuation of the festival. Setsuna leaves the cafe up to the rest of the class and leaves to watch a play, knowing that she’s leaving soon and all the hard work she’s done already, they let her go without a fight. The play itself was something about a sacred flower and a man who is accused of touching it, whose only defense is that he meant no harm in touching it. However, his defense is called into question with the fact that whether or not he meant harm, that the wrong has been done, witnessed or not is irrelevant. Obviously a parallel to what Setsuna’s crime mere hours ago.

As the festival continues, Makoto and Sekai (now dubbed the ‘baka-couple’) get a little flirtatious behind the scenes of the cafe, much to the envy of Taisuke. Katsura, on the other hand, isn’t having nearly as much fun, continuing to be forced to watch the sex lounge by Otome and her gang while desperately trying to reach Makoto through e-mail. Taisuke passes by only to see her sulking and takes the opportunity to ask her to dance with him at the bonfire, but this only frustrates Katsura more, asking where he got the idea that she and Makoto had broken up. Taisuke apologizes for being presumptuous and runs off with his tail between his legs.

We’re also given a little history behind the sex lounge, apparently one of the school’s greatest traditions. The way it works is that the girl will approach the guy with something in her outstretched hand, the equivalent of a confession. If the guy takes her hand he accepts the confession and the two are off to the room to celebrate…physically.

While Katsura desperately tries to get a hold of Makoto, he’s busy feeling up Sekai, who tells him to stop before someone sees them. He argues that it doesn’t matter if anyone sees them and continues to fondle her despite Sekai saying that they should concentrate on making cake for the cafe. When Makoto continues despite Sekai’s repeated warnings, she finally gets fed up and gives him a swift knee to his nether regions, sending him hopping away in pain.

Elsewhere, Otome and her gang are chatting when one of them breaks off to meet her boyfriend, causing the rest of the girls to urge Otome to do something with Makoto. She finds him sitting around idly and asks him to hang around with her for a little while, after Makoto sizes her up and determines she’s worth a ride, the two spend some time together. As their time together comes to an end, Otome tries to take the opportunity to ask him to the folkdance, but it blocked by Sekai, who drags him off and gives Otome some serious cut-eye.

Soon after, Kokoro shows up to the festival and calls Makoto over, giving her onii-chan a hug and telling him that Katsura is really looking forward to dancing with him at the bonfire. This makes Sekai uneasy and she starts to cling on to Makoto, eventually getting him to promise to dance with her, regardless of how meaningless he thinks it is.

Meanwhile, Katsura continues to get bullied by Otome’s gang, who continue to question whether Katsura and Makoto are really going out or whether she’s just delusional about the whole thing, especially since Makoto hasn’t come to see her the whole festival. Katsura stands her ground to the point of tears, firmly believing that they’re still a couple, seeing Katsura on the verge of crying, the two finally leave her alone.

After parting ways with Makoto and getting stared down by Sekai, Otome is left sighing in the courtyard, where she meets Taisuke, who is in a situation not too different from her own. The two talk for a while and Otome eventually figures out that he’s in love with Katsura but is too much of a wuss to do anything about it. She doesn’t see what’s so great about Katsura, but tells him that he won’t get anywhere with his lax attitude, that girls respond to confidence. After wishing him good luck she leaves to put her own advice to work.

When Sekai is dragged off, Makoto finally has a chance to check his cell phone and is horrified when he sees that 20 e-mails from Katsura have piled up. He rushes out of the room to go see her but is stopped in his tracks by Otome, who extends her hand with something gripped inside towards him. But apparently Makoto is clueless to the tradition, so she makes it a little more obvious by dragging him into the sex lounge and confessing to him. Makoto isn’t one to pass up the free and willing so the two have at it while poor Katsura continues to religiously e-mail Makoto. After the two are finished, Otome confirms that Makoto has already promised to go to the bonfire dance with someone else and lets him off with a simple apology.

In the end Makoto chooses to go to the dance with Sekai, leaving the onlooking Setsuna reassured that everything will be fine. Katsura, however, is not so fortunate, going to Makoto’s class only to find Taisuke there, who tells her that Makoto has chosen Sekai. In her moment of shock, he confesses to Katsura and hugs her, his aggressive behaviour probably the result of Otome’s lecture. Katsura is so shocked by Makoto’s choice that she doesn’t even respond to Taisuke, let alone fight off his advances. As the last of her naive hope fades away from her eyes and her uniform’s ribbon falls as lifelessly as her body to the ground, the episode comes to a close.

Thoughts

Makoto, you’re an ass. It’s not even a matter of whether or not you like Sekai or Katsura anymore, you clearly have no conscience when it comes to your sexual cravings, you’ll do anything with a pulse and a hole to stick it in. What happened to the signs that your interest in Katsura might have been reviving?! Not that you deserve her, but what was with the complete reversal to going back to completely ignoring her. Sure you rushed to see her when you saw those 20 e-mails, but damn if you weren’t quick to turn tail and run to Otome’s baiting. And speaking of Otome, what was up with that look when she invited you to spend time with her around the festival, you know what I’m talking about, that “I’d hit it” look and your smug smile. Fire, die, etc.

Sekai, you’re a hypocrite. You heavily flirt with Makoto at your convenience, but then get bothered when he won’t stop at your whim. You showed signs of redemption when you stormed out of Makoto’s apartment after his show of indecisiveness with Katsura, but snapped back in an instant. Also, that was some look you shot at Otome when you saw her on the verge of confessing to Makoto, doesn’t feel nice does it, when someone else tries to steal your ‘boyfriend’, what ever happened to the guilt you felt when you first started going behind Katsura’s back. You’re naive if you think Makoto will ever stay true to one girl, even after all this time with you, he still hasn’t made things clear with Katsura and won’t even look you in the eye when you called yourself his girlfriend. On a positive note, nice kick.

Otome, you need to learn your place, you’re a childhood friend and are destined by the harem gods to forever get the short end of the stick. You’re just as delusional as Katsura if you think you have a chance at wooing Makoto away from Sekai. You and your gang are the equivalent of those bullies you see on TV who cry when their actions cause their victim to kill themselves and desperately try to delude themselves into thinking that it was all for fun while deep down inside you know full well the repercussions of your actions and probably derive sick pleasure in knowing that you finally got to them. I hope you all get traumatized when poor Katsura goes insane and require psychological therapy for the rest of your miserable lives.

Taisuke, face it, she doesn’t like you, no one likes you, go kill yourself.

And finally, Katsura, as much as you have my sympathies, I can’t ignore the fact that you brought a lot of this upon yourself. You’re not Makoto’s girlfriend anymore and unless you throw your well endowed naked body at him, he never will be. Stop kidding yourself and move on before/during/after that bastard Taisuke raeps you. If you have any shred of sanity left in you, put this all behind you and move on before it’s too late. But if that breaking point has come and gone, as I suspect it has, be sure to take as many others down with you as you can :3

In terms of plot, it looks like the anime is trying to combine the three bad ends in some sort of epic bloodbath. I remember someone commenting before about how awesome it would be if Sekai stabbed Makoto then Katsura sawed her head off before jumping off the roof and killing herself, or something along those lines. While I personally think it’s not a likely conclusion, I must admit that such an ending would be legendary win.

But realistically, with Katsura being the recipient of misfortune over and over again, it’s more likely that she’ll break down and either take out Sekai or lose hope and take her own life, and my bet is on the latter.

Please note, addressing the characters in second person was a stylistic choice that I made because it’s difficult to convey the same level of hate when talking about them in the third person. I haven’t gone insane! lol

I’ve replayed this scene no less than 20 times, it pretty much sums up the collective anger of School Days viewers everywhere

~ Shirukii ~

Zettai Ryouki vs Imouto. Heaven or Hell, let’s rock!

What a weird episode of school days this was. Aside from the regularly scheduled melodrama between Makoto, Katsura and Sekai, there was some more direct interference from Setsuna and the whole filler-esque school festival deal. There were times that I laughed out loud (zettai ryouki scene) only to be thrown back into heavy drama minutes later. Truly a roller coaster of emotion.

Episode Rating: 9/10

Following her encounter with Katsura outside Makoto’s apartment, Sekai calls Setsuna out to talk and this time gives her the whole truth. She tells her that despite what’s going on with her and Makoto, he has not yet broken up with Katsura, they’re still technically dating. Setsuna can’t stand to see Sekai like this and promises to uncover Makoto’s true feelings.

The next day at school, Makoto is a little worried that Sekai doesn’t show up, but his brooding is interrupted by Taisuke who asks him about the situation between him and Katsura, whether they had broken up yet or not.

Meanwhile, Sekai is at home lamenting over what happened last night. After Katsura slapped her, with tears in her eyes Katsura asked Sekai, who she thought was her friend, why she would do such things with Makoto, her boyfriend. She begged her to stop and reaffirmed that she is still Makoto’s girlfriend.

That day, after school, Katsura tries to talk to Makoto again after the class rep meeting, asking if he wants to go home together after they’re finished. Despite initially agreeing, Makoto is stopped by Setsuna who says that their work will take too long and there’s no point waiting for him. When Makoto argues, Setsuna asks him bluntly if going home with Katsura is more important than their duties for the school festival, when Makoto can’t say anything in return, Katsura says to forget about it and runs off after apologizing.

Afterwards, in the classroom, Makoto tells Setsuna that she was too hard on Katsura. Setsuna quickly changes the topic to his relationships with Sekai and Katsura, he tries to dodge the topic by saying it has nothing to do with Setsuna, but she says that since she’s Sekai’s friend, it is her business as well. She asks him very directly, which one he likes, Sekai or Katsura. Makoto says that initially he liked Katsura, but admits that he feels a lot more comfortable when he’s around Sekai. Setsuna takes it that he chooses Sekai and tells him that she’ll finish the work so he can go visit Sekai.

Setsuna sends Sekai an e-mail telling her that Makoto is on his way to her apartment, and sure enough, just when she goes to check the door, Makoto is there about to ring the doorbell. Sekai brings some tea and the two start talking. Makoto asks why she was absent from school, she tells him that she was feeling sick. He then brings up the issue with Katsura, Sekai tells him about their meeting that night outside Makoto’s apartment and how she probably knows about them. Sekai asks what they should do now and that she feels now more than ever that what they are doing is wrong. Makoto doesn’t think that they’re wrong and leans over the table to kiss her, spilling the tea as he goes to ease her onto the floor. Sekai goes to clean up the mess but Makoto tells her it can wait, in the end she pushes him off and cleans up anyways.

Later that night, Setsuna comes over to assess the situation. Her questions about whether things have been cleared up are half-heartedly answered by Sekai, who is remembering a desperate Katsura begging her to stay away from her boyfriend instead. When Setsuna leaves, Sekai stands under the moonlight, staring at the e-mail Makoto sent her before, saying that he chooses her over Katsura.

The next day, Sekai comes to class trying to be her usual cheery self, but putting on an obviously fake smile.

That afternoon, Makoto goes home with Katsura, who clings onto him the whole train ride. She shyly tells him that they can finally get some alone time together at her house, without Kokoro even. Then she asks him again if they can dance together at the folk dance following the school festival, Makoto is entranced by Katsura breasts but manages a weak “yeah”.

Goshujin-sama~

Finally the first day of the school festival arrives. However, things aren’t going too well, Class 1 and 2’s imouto and zombie cafes are outdoing their relatively plain meido cafe. Setsuna rallies the class, dressing a fair bit of them in her mascot costumes and launches an advertising campaign. They face off head to head against the other two classes and pulls out Unlimited Zettai Ryouki works to win over the crowd. The whole thing ends up causing a stampede, which turns into a human tsunami when a banana peel is added to the mix. The day ends in failure, with the costumes laid out like a corpse ridden battlefield.

Meanwhile, Katsura is getting all the worked pushed on her yet again, forced to tend to the haunted house entrance for the entire day thanks to Otome’s gang.

After the day is over, while Makoto and Setsuna are on cleaning duty together, Setsuna reminds him once again to look out for Sekai. She tells him that if something goes wrong, she’ll lock herself up in her room for days, and that he needs to be there for her during those times, to put even more pressure on him, Setsuna tells him that she’ll be going to France soon, so she’s entrusting Sekai completely to him. This brings back a memory of Setsuna’s early high school days when Makoto cheered her up and even encouraged her to run for class president.

Katsura Thought Bubble: WTF!? Now the loli is in on this?

After they finish cleaning, Makoto falls asleep in the classroom. Taking the chance to give him one final farewell, Setsuna kisses him, much to the surprise and horror of Katsura, who had also stayed late to clean up and happened to walk in on the two.

Thoughts

Oh God Katsura is getting screwed (figuratively, lol) so badly in this series. Her ability to be in the wrong place at the wrong time is amazing. Although, that kiss came out of nowhere, I don’t see the motive behind it. Setsuna had the whole blushing deal going on, but I refuse to believe that she has an interest in Makoto as well (but apparently you can bed her in Summer Days). Even if she did, Setsuna knows damn well that Sekai likes him and what going on with Katsura, I doubt she’s such a hypocrite that she’d jump in at this point.

EDIT WAIT! It all makes sense now. Setsuna has liked him all along! The irony of it is almost beautiful. Setsuna likes Makoto but finds out Sekai likes him so she steps down to support her, then Sekai finds out Katsura likes him and steps down to support her. Oh God the ironing. But this also means that there’s yet another girl who fell for Makoto…seriously, what the hell. I know School Days is pseudo harem erogame conversion, but my ability to suspend belief that girls would actually like someone like Makoto is really wearing thin.

As for the main love triangle, I haven’t gotten a winner picked out just yet. Even though Makoto says that he feels more at ease with Sekai, he is showing a renewed interest in Katsura, and with Sekai not -AS- willing to do the horizontal tango these days, maybe he’ll jump ship again?

I can’t say I have much sympathy for Sekai at this point, because her inability to take things into her own hands and make the situation clear to Katsura is what put her in the position she’s in it’s still largely her fault, despite her weakness against Makoto’s uh…”charm”. But she is being put through the same feelings that Katsura had to deal with, which is never fun, but hey, karma’s a bitch.

As for Katsura, she’s putting a lot of effort into changing herself. She’s throwing herself at Makoto much more, trying her best not to be shy about it, even inviting him over to her house to spend some alone time. Though that scene made her look really horny, which ended up making me laugh instead. I commend her progression, but wonder what will happen now that she’s seen Setsuna of all people kissing Makoto. I really want to see her break down and throw herself entirely at Makoto, a la Kaede, hopefully with just equally little clothing.

Makoto is still an ass and still deserves to die in a fire, nothing will change that, but at least he knows it! His “I’m the worst” at the train stop made my jaw drop, and here I thought he was completely oblivious to the pain and suffering he’s causing. I’m not sure if this makes him worse for realizing what he’s doing is wrong yet still continuing, or better for showing at least the slightest bit of guilt and regret. I don’t think there’s much hope for him taking it upon himself to face his mistakes and resolve things, nor would I be satisfied with any sort of redemption for him, but who knows, after all, realizing you have a problem is the first step to fixing it. That’s probably giving him too much credit though, the man is completely under the control of his raging hormones and the desire to J-J-JAM IT IN to anything with two legs and a pulse.

As for Taisuke…I swear if he raeps Katsura I will cross the fourth wall and push him into the bonfire.

On that note, what the hell was up with the sex loft that Katsura’s class had set up behind their haunted house. That can’t have been faculty approved, lol.

And so, another week of melodrama passes us by. If I had to pick where we’re heading, I still have a gut feeling that Katsura suiciding off the roof is the likely outcome. But what I’m hoping for is the Makoto getting stabbed by Sekai bad end, doesn’t look like it though. I’d settle for Katsura going Rena and killing Sekai though. I just want Katsura to survive and not get defiled, is that too much to ask ;_;?

~ Shirukii ~

This scene reminded me of Kaede’s empty pot stirring in SHUFFLE. Good times.

I now have very little remorse for all the characters. Katsura lost a fair bit of my sympathy in this episode because not only did she do a whole lot of nothing despite having caught her ‘boyfriend’ in the act of cheating on her, she continues to fawn over him and blame Sekai instead! So while I’ll still root for her and I still think she’s the tragic victim in all of this, Katsura is just as bad as Makoto and Sekai for sitting idly in the losing position of the love triangle. Well…aside from the nice forehand she gave Sekai.

Episode Rating: 9/10

Makoto and Sekai continue their lunchtime make out sessions on the roof. Sekai questions why Katsura hasn’t been showing up lately but Makoto brushes it off, saying that it’s probably because of student counsel duties from the upcoming school festival and leans Sekai in for a kiss. Little do they know that Katsura is watching them from the stairwell, but just hasn’t confronted them yet.

At home, while knitting Makoto’s Christmas present, Katsura wonders why he’s doing such things with Sekai. Instead of drawing to the rather obvious conclusion that he’s just plain cheating on her, she gives her self-esteem a good beating, saying that it’s probably because she’s not trying hard enough in the relationship and needs to give it her all. Her lamenting is interrupted by Kokoro, who says she’s looking forward to the school festival so she can see Makoto again.

The next day, Setsuna is showing off the costume she’s made for the school festival when Hikari runs in and tells them about other classes that are planning on doing zombie and imouto themed cafes. Not long after, Taisuke comes in and delivers more news, the other class representative has been hurt and will be out of commission for the next couple of weeks. Hikari suggests that Makoto be his replacement, Makoto isn’t too keen on that, but is forced into it by Setsuna who thinks Makoto’s is just worried about Katsura being there. This leads to Setsuna telling the group that Makoto is no longer going out with Katsura, rather that he’s been seeing Sekai for a while now.

The news quickly travels through Nanami to Otome, who now, in addition to using her group of friends to offload all the festival work on Katsura, harasses her about having a one sided crush on Makoto.

Later that day, at the representatives meeting, Katsura is happily surprised to see Makoto, but backs off when Setsuna throws some cut eye at her. After the meeting Katsura tries to talk to Makoto, but Setsuna ends up dragging him off. When Katsura says that she’ll e-mail him later, Setsuna grabs his phone and blacklists Katsura from his contact list, saying that he should forget about her and concentrate on Sekai.

That night, Katsura realizes that she made a mistake in her knitting and starts to backtrack to fix it, but ends up staring off in depression and unraveling the entire thing.

The next morning, Katsura tries to e-mail Makoto and is surprised when she can’t get through, even calling yields the same result. Makoto hasn’t removed the block yet, but sits in class staring at his phone thinking about it anyways.

During P.E. that day, Sekai looks worriedly at Katsura and is thinking about going to talk to her, but is stopped by Setsuna, who tells her that she shouldn’t worry about her anymore, and drags her off. At lunch time, Katsura waits for Makoto on the rooftop to eat lunch, as she suggested in a text message the day before, but he doesn’t show up and Katsura ends up soaked after it starts raining.

Preparations for the school festival are in full swing, Sekai is showing off the waitress uniform for their class, students are decorating the classes and halls, and Setsuna is trying to get a feel for her costume. Katsura is still soaking from the rain, but is ordered by Otome’s gang to go grab some sheets from the store room and ends up running into Makoto and Setsuna on the way. Setsuna suggests they leave, but Makoto decides to talk with Katsura for a bit, drawn in by the rain induced transparency of her blouse.

Katsura starts to walk off by herself, chased away by Setsuna, and when Makoto starts to go after her, Setsuna tells him to leave her, reminding him that he’s Sekai’s boyfriend now. But he still can’t leave her alone and decides to chase after her anyways. When he catches up with her, he finds her talking to Taisuke near the storeroom. After staring at Katsura for a while inside the storeroom, Taisuke tells Katsura that he heard people who dance together at the school festival folk dance end up going out and staying together, and suggests dancing together, since she’s broken up with Makoto. Katsura lashes out and asks him why he’d think that they’ve broken up and runs out of the storeroom where she bumps into Makoto and Nanami. Katsura tries to get to Makoto but is stopped by Nanami who calls the innocence of her actions into question, causing Katsura to run off crying.

That night at Makoto’s apartment, Sekai tells him that she heard everything from Setsuna, about how he chased after Katsura, and starts to pout about it. Suddenly the doorbell rings and who else but Katsura shows up at Makoto’s doorstop, apparently worried about not being able to reach Makoto’s cell phone. After Makoto explains that it was a problem on his end and showing Katsura that it works fine now, he fakes a headache and tries to shoo Katsura away. Just as she’s about to step in and offer to take a look at him, Katsura notices Sekai’s shoes and figures out what’s going on. Before leaving, Katsura asks if Makoto will dance with her at the school festival bonfire and voices how great it is to be his girlfriend, telling him about the scare she had when Taisuke said they had broken up. Sekai, who has been listening to the whole convo through the walls, has been reduced to tears and rushes out soon after Katsura leaves.

When she gets out of the apartment, Katsura is waiting for her at the side of the road. She walks up to Sekai and tells her what she’s doing is unfair, raises her hand and slaps her across the face.

Thoughts

Yet another drama filled episode of School Days. But this time things aren’t so one sided. Makoto isn’t showing the level of obsession with Sekai, nor ignoring Katsura as much as compared to last episode. Not that his interest in Katsura has been rekindled, but he is making more of an effort to try and talk to her, not to mention his reaction when he saw her in a rain soaked see through white blouse.

Makoto, die, fire, etc. I don’t need to go into detail with the Makoto hating at this point, everyone is pretty much on the same page, he still hasn’t changed his ways. Let alone only talking to Katsura mainly because he was suddenly reminded about her breasts, after screwing things up so badly just to be with Sekai and now showing signs of going back on that decision is making me wish for his death to arrive swiftly and painfully.

This reopens up the competition in this doomed love triangle. While Makoto is still leaning more towards Sekai, he’s started to notice Katsura’s advances again, and whether it be because his genuine feelings for her are starting to come back, or whether he thinks that his chances of getting into her pants are at an acceptable level, he’s no longer completely ignoring her existence, much to the dismay of Setsuna.

On the topic of Setsuna…I know what she’s doing is right, trying to get Makoto to commit to Sekai before shit hits the fan once again, but I can’t help but think that her meddling is only making things worse. What seems to be a repeating motif in this anime is matchmaking, and the seemingly opposite effect it has. Setsuna’s attempts to protect Sekai and the resulting reports of what’s going on between Makoto and Katsura are only harming Sekai’s trust and confidence in herself, while having no effect on persuading Makoto to remain faithful. Again, I’m not faulting Setsuna for doing what she’s doing, it’s just that it’s proving to be detrimental to the situation.

As for the situation itself, it really doesn’t make any sense. Katsura has caught Makoto making out with Sekai on multiple occasions, but instead of confronting them about it, she leaves things idle. Not only that, she doesn’t even acknowledge the fact that this means that their relationship is over, as if her boyfriend cheating on her is a perfectly normal thing and is just an indication that she need to try harder.

Rumors of Sekai and Makoto going out are spreading throughout the school, yet Katsura still calls herself his boyfriend, and Makoto doesn’t deny it, even though it’s obvious that the news has spread to her at this point. What the hell is the matter with them X_X?! All this wavering in the middle is pissing me off. Anyone with a working braincell should be able to put things together and come to the conclusion that Makoto has chosen Sekai.

…but then again, Makoto’s recent revival of interest in Katsura is making the status of the love triangle uncertain, and I guess it sort of explains why it’s giving Katsura false hope, especially since he’s not reacting to the rumors of dating Sekai nor when Katsura says that they’re still going out. What a mess x_x

And of course there’s the confrontation between Katsura and Sekai which ends up in Sekai getting slapped, the scene that killed my sympathy for Katsura.

Instead of doing this to Makoto, as any sane and logical human being would do, she takes it out on Sekai. While understandable that she would be mad at Sekai for betraying her, it’s quite obvious from their conversations and actions on the rooftop that it was Makoto who initiated things with Sekai, so attacking Sekai while pining over Makoto makes absolutely no sense. But as many a harem/romance drama has made clear in the past, once you enter violently psychotic mode, there’s little logic behind your actions anyways.

*sigh* Melodrama is often such an annoyance, but entertaining nonetheless.

But now that things are kind of floating in the middle ground, I wonder what path the anime will take from here. Things are set up nicely to go to pretty much any of the BAD ENDs. Will Katsura take the leap of depression? Sharpen her skills with a machete? Get raeped in the faint glow of a bonfire? Or will Sekai end up being the one in heartbreak? So many possibilities and only five more episodes for things to play out.

But however it ends, as long as Makoto is put to death, or through a traumatizing fate rivaling death, I will be one happy School Days fan.

~ Shirukii ~

Protip: Kill thyself.

First of all, sorry for the lack of posts these last couple days. Life has been kicking my ass and various things have been keeping me from maintaining anything close to my normal schedule.

This episode went more or less exactly as I thought it would in the scenario that Makoto decides not to tell Katsura about Sekai and cheat behind her back instead. As is to be expected, their secret doesn’t remain intact for very long (more or less due to the fact that Makoto can’t keep it in his pants).

Episode Rating: 10/10

Makoto is no longer holding back with Sekai, they are routinely making out at every opportunity they get. In this case, during Sekai’s break at the cafe with the sluttiest uniform I’ve ever seen in an anime. To make things worse, Makoto is completely ignoring Katsura’s cell phone calls at this point.

Makoto spends yet another night at Sekai’s house for obvious reasons. When the two leave her house Makoto starts to kiss her in public, Sekai pushes him away and warns him that others can see them. On the train ride to school Makoto meets up with Katsura as usual, who tries to talk happily with Makoto, only to be ignored.

When Makoto gets to school he is greeted by Sekai, who tries to act normal, especially because Setsuna is with her. But some easily misunderstood statements and embarrassed reactions later completely give it away. Setsuna correctly guesses that the two of them have moved well past friendship, and says she’s happy for Sekai as long as things between Makoto and Katsura are over, which Sekai lies about and says is the case.

In class, Sekai passes Makoto a note saying that she thinks they should tell Katsura about them. Makoto disagrees, saying that at this point it’ll be too much for Katsura to handle and she’ll probably get mad. The three have a VERY awkward rooftop lunch together as they each are undoubtedly trying to piece together the situation.

Katsura e-mails Makoto asking him if he wants to go shopping with her after school, but he makes up an excuse and runs off to Sekai’s house instead. On the way back from the shopping district, Katsura looks out the window to see what looks to her like Sekai and Makoto making out, her eyes do not deceive her, but she shrugs it off.

After Makoto and Sekai go through their morning adultery routine, Katsura is eagerly waiting for Makoto at the gate. But she’s interrupted by Otome, who calls out to him. Makoto tells Katsura to hurry pu or they’ll be late, and runs off without her.

That evening, Sekai says that he should go home with Katsura once in a while. On the walk to the station, Katsura is given a flier for a cell phone store advertising pair cell phones. Katsura suggests that they should buy them, even offering to pay for them when Makoto seems kind of reluctant. But in the end he deems it unnecessary and starts walking off. When Katsura goes to follow him she ends up tripping and falling. With a sigh, Makoto goes to check if she’s ok and notices she has knitting tools with her. Katsura confesses that she’s planning on knitting him a scarf (muffler?) for Christmas.

That night, Setsuna checks in on Sekai only to find her under the covers, pretending to not feel well. Setsuna takes her leave and tells Sekai to take care of herself. When she’s gone, Sekai peeks out of the covers revealing an e-mail from Makoto saying that he chooses her over Katsura.

The next morning, ideas for the cultural festival are being thrown around in Makoto’s class. But in Katsura’s class they nonchalantly decided on a cliche haunted house and got over with it, instead choosing to gossip about who Otome likes. When she gives a clue that the guy went to her middle high school, Otome notices Katsura staring at them. Suddenly one of Otome’s friends remembers that Makoto went to her middle school, causing Otome to blush and the rest of them take that as confirmation. When Katsura asks if that’s true, if Otome likes Makoto, she tells her it’s none of her business. But Katsura firmly replies that it is her business, because she’s Makoto’s girlfriend. Otome is shocked and a flurry of text messages go around to confirm the fact.

After the truth is revealed, Otome and her friends become even more scornful towards Katsura. But she pays them no attention. Katsura e-mails Makoto telling him she won’t be able to make it to lunch on the roof because of festival duties, Makoto forwards the news to Sekai and puts his hand up her skirt (lol, subtle). But Katsura ends up blazing through her work and getting to the rooftop on time, just in time to hear Sekai confess her love to Makoto, Makoto responding in kind, and the two of them in only partially clothed embrace. Katsura can’t believe what she’s seeing, and the dramatic tension is heightened by the slow motion fall of a ball of yarn that was to be Makoto’s Christmas present.

Thoughts

I don’t know how many times I’m going to have to say this, probably more than I’ll be able to count, but it’s the truth and must be continually stated: MAKOTO NEEDS TO FUCKING DIE!

I can understand him falling for Sekai, I really can. I can put my anger aside and see that, beyond the sex, Sekai has a generally more receptive and fun nature as compared to the shy Katsura, despite her efforts of late. Which is why I thought that maybe, just maybe Makoto wouldn’t be a complete ass and would come clean to Katsura instead of cheating behind her back. With that not having been the case, I’m finding no redeeming qualities in this guy.

And Sekai isn’t without fault either. Aside from the fact that she’s not resisting Makoto’s advances, because it’s obvious her love for him is making her powerless in this regard. She has the brains to know that she should tell Katsura about the two of them, even Setsuna knows this. She knows that they’re just delaying the inevitable and she knows it’ll be worse if Katsura catches them instead of them telling her, but no, she can’t bring herself to tell her.

I really feel for Katsura, at this point she is the closest to being what I would call a victim. Sure her shy nature was the reason that Makoto lost interest in her, but that’s not her fault. One cannot simply change their entire personality to fit the needs of someone else in such a short time, even if that person does seemingly “love” them. She’s trying her best only to be ignored and now (thanks to Otome) made the subject of hate and envy, ironically an envy for something that’s no longer true.

As for Otome, I wonder what part she’ll play in all of this. I don’t see her becoming a contender for Makoto’s heart, so I can only see her as another nail in Katsura’s coffin. In addition to just having lose her boyfriend to one of her best friends, Katsura will have to deal with the angry stares of her classmates with Otome on the front lines.

In other words, Katsura, as much as I’m rooting for you…you’re pretty screwed. Aside from literally throwing her naked, well endowed body at Makoto, I see no way that Katsura can compete against Sekai.

Whether we get a slightly melancholic and depressing, “life moves on”, or BAD END now seems to hinge on Katsura’s reactions to what she’s just seen. Remember, the things we’re looking for here are either the building of insanely violent jealousy or suicidal depression.

Another thing I’ve been hearing a lot lately is that the hate for Makoto is unjustified as he represents the common adolescent male. Well, yes and no. Considering his hormone driven desire for sex and the copious amounts of sex he does have, I’d say that Makoto is a fair representation of a portion of what would be considered the typical high school male. But remember that this show is being targeted at anime otaku who have probably played the ero game and many ero games like it, so considering the key demographic. No. Makoto is not an representation of his age/gender group, at least not in the average viewer’s eyes.

I can’t wait to see where we go from here. Things are moving more and more towards the BAD END that everyone is praying for, and I couldn’t be happier.

Note* Again, sorry for the late blogging of this episode and the lack of posts in general. The INSANE amounts of kanji and kata in the episode didn’t help either -_-.

~ Shirukii ~

. . . . .*insert various obscenities*

My certainty that School Days will have a BAD END is growing as each week passes, and I’m going to enjoy every second of Makoto’s downfall. If by some apocalyptic disaster it ends any other way, then it will go down in my mind as one of the worst dramas ever. Makoto needs to die, or at least suffer a fate comparable to death, this is fact.

Episode Rating: 9.5/10

This week, it’s the obligatory swimsuit episode that almost every harem has, whether through a trip to the ocean or an amusement park, the latter in this case. About half of the episode is typical amusement park filler. Makoto teaches Katsura to swim, the group eats lunch together watching Katsura’s lovey dovey antics, and the side characters accompanied by the token loli go off and have some fun.

The visit to the amusement park was originally planned as a one on one date for Katsura and Makoto, but when Sekai’s friend happens to approach Makoto begging him to ask Taisuke out to the same park for her, the outing became a group event. Rather than anger Makoto, it actually relieves him a bit, as he’s beginning to get fed up with Katsura and the awkwardness between them when they’re alone.

It’s painfully evident that Makoto can’t get Sekai off his mind. Even with Katsura pretty much throwing herself at Makoto, he can’t help but let his mind wander to the times he’s spent with Sekai. But the feeling appears mutual, despite Sekai trying to hide it, it’s clear that she shares the same feelings and only holds back because of Katsura. Even Taisuke couldn’t believe it when he heard Makoto and Katsura were dating, because he was positive that he was going out with Sekai.

The day winds down and everyone gets ready to go home. Katsura makes it out of the changing room first and talks with Makoto, inviting him over to her house because her sister wants to see him again. Makoto’s response isn’t very enthusiastic, and when Katsura sees him liven up once Sekai shows up, she can’t help but sulk a little. Seeing this, Sekai drags him aside and scolds him, dodging Makoto’s attempts to explain his feelings for Katsura and Sekai. She reminds him, with a painfully fake smile, that he’s going out with Katsura, not her.

After saying goodbye to Katsura on the train platform, Makoto finally loses it and gives in to his feelings for Sekai. Rushing back to her station, e-mailing her the whole way, he calls Sekai out to meet him. He confesses to her and tosses his relationship with Katsura aside (lol, “Katsura’ll be fine” my ass). Sekai knows it’s wrong, but with the guy she loves standing in front of her confessing his love, she can’t resist anymore, and gives in. The two go back to her house and sex the night away.

Thoughts

Aside from the fact that this episode made my hate for Makoto grow a hundred fold, I have to admit it was beautifully structured. The first half of the episode was an excellent break in drama, serving as comic relief, or “the calm before the storm”. Previous episodes left us with the impression that something big was about to happen, that shit was about to hit the fan.

The filler-esque amusement park portion of this episode brought the guard down, I sat through expecting a brainless fanservice episode, not exactly happy that I’d have to wait another week for further development, but enjoying the display of animated cleavage and such. But then the latter half of the episode rapidly shifts gears with a major turning point in the story, it caught me off guard and the whole scene came off ten times better than had it been at the beginning of the episode.

…but Makoto still needs to die.

I’m praying for the ending where he gets Sekai pregnant and cheats on her with Katsura, only to have Sekai come back and stab him to death.

But from the looks of it, my best guess would probably be one of the other two. Katsura slitting Sekai’s throat with a machete, or Katsura suiciding off the school roof.

I wonder where we go from here. Makoto seems to have completely fallen for Sekai, so will they tell Katsura, or see each other behind her back. Personally, I think Makoto is too stupid and easy to read for the latter, so my bet is that they tell her. If they did try to hide it, there’d just be too many ways Katsura would eventually find out. Makoto isn’t the most subtle of beings, so I’m sure his behaviour would be a dead giveaway.

But more than that, I wonder how long Makoto’s interest in Sekai will last. From the looks of it (him constantly trying to grab her ass, etc) that the only reason he prefers her over Katsura is because she’s willing to put out. Once he’s had his way with Sekai and Katsura becomes equally willing in the sex department, will he run back to her leaving Sekai worse off than before? Highly likely in my opinion, and knowing Katsura, she’ll probably welcome him back with open arms. *facepalm.jpg*

Unfortunately for my pick, Katsura is the loser of this round =( How she takes the news will be a good indication of where things go from now. If she just implodes into a fit of depression with the accompanying emo tendencies (CRAWLING IN MY SKIN, boxcutters, etc.) then the rooftop ending is most likely. If she starts off depressed but then goes into a fit of rage, machete to Sekai’s jugular is probably imminent. Most dangerously, if she takes it well, and does one of those “I still love him and I’m going to try my best from now on too” speeches, then the possibilities are left really open. On one hand it could lead us to the Makoto Dies ending, but it may also lead to one of the many *cringe* happy endings, which would fail on so many levels.

But hey, we’re not even at the halfway point yet, things need to go a little further until I can say with absolute certainty that we’re getting a BAD END, and trying to pick out which one it’ll be. The possibilities are vast and the drama is high, School Days is turning out to be a great watch. Enjoy your fun now Makoto! You’ll get yours eventually! (…hopefully? ;_;)

Also, if you want to actually watch the BAD ENDS, Shadro from G and the 1/2 compiled them into one post.

Argh, moonrunes again. Hinano? Anyone? Help :3 ?

Ironically, Imouto-san is probably the most romantically competent of the entire cast.

I’ve seen a lot of fail in my relatively short life, but Sekai, Katsura and Makoto are the holy trinity of fail. Makoto fails for not having enough blood to operate his brain and crotch region simultaneously, as well as well…being Makoto. Katsura fails for forcing herself to rise up to Makoto’s pace, and having unreasonable fantasies about the perfect setting to lose her virginity. And Sekai fails for wavering in the middle ground, unsure of whether she wants to be supporting cast or the female lead.

That having been said, awesome episode.

Episode Rating: 9/10

Katsura’s imouto barges in on her and asking about her homework and generally just invading her privacy. She ruffles through one of Katsura’s books and notes that it seems a little complicated, Katsura says it’s a romance novel so she’s probably not mature enough for it. Quickly changing topics, Kokoro asks Katsura if she and Itou have kissed yet, reading her sister’s obvious reaction, she excitedly concludes that they have.

However, the other end of the relationship is wavering, as Makoto complains to Sekai about how he thought having a girlfriend would be a lot more fun and a lot less work.

With Sekai no longer joining them for lunch on the rooftop, Makoto and Katsura are free to…play around a little. But when Makoto tries to take it to the next level with a little fondling, Katsura can’t handle it and backs off, despite her promise to be more open to these things. Makoto gives her a halfhearted apology and bs’es that it’s not her fault, Katsura apologizes back and runs off.

Taking a bath and sizing herself up, Katsura laments on the problem facing her. She knows that Makoto is a guy and thinking about breasts and sex can’t be helped, and she knows that Makoto’s intentions are good, wanting to take their relationship further. But still…she’s just not ready.

And so, another call to the mediator, Sekai. Katsura tells her what happened, but when Sekai starts rambling about teaching Makoto a lesson and having him apologize, Katsura tells her that’s not the problem. She knows Makoto’s intentions are good, but she wants to have this experience in a more appropriate setting, somewhere romantic, like Europe. Sekai listens in amazement as Katsura pours out details of her ideal romantic encounter.

Meanwhile Makoto is at home, fapping up a storm. (I kid you not)

After her conversation with Sekai, Katsura finds a pair of tickets to a water park lying on the living room table. Her mom says that her dad got them from work and doesn’t mind if Katsura takes them and goes with a friend.

The next morning, on the train, Katsura tries inviting Makoto, but is interrupted when the train suddenly jerks and she ends up falling breasts first into Makoto’s arms. Makoto gives her another halfhearted apology, but the mood is ruined and Katsura can’t bring herself to ask Makoto about the tickets.

During class, Sekai passively interrogates Makoto about how things are going with Katsura, playfully suggesting that maybe he did something perverted to her. Makoto loses it over that accusation and ends up dragged outside by Sekai to talk about it. Makoto explains how things have been going lately, and much to his surprise, Sekai offers to help out with her “Special Training Program”. It only hits him later in class that by that she means she’s going to give him a step by step guide to get into a girls pants. (Again, I swear I’m not making this stuff up)

[X] J-J-J-JAM IT IN

Despite Sekai’s confidence in her program, it ends up failing pretty hard. The first location they pick is an open park and they end up being distracted by little kids. They meet with failure again as they try a karaoke bar, only to find out that there are surveillance cameras in each room. With no other options, Sekai suggests the school roof.

Finally, with some privacy, the lesson begins. Sekai explains how Makoto should work a girl’s body when trying to round the bases. Makoto is a little clumsy and not the slightest bit romantic, but Sekai seems to enjoy it anyways. All of a sudden, Makoto gets serious and says that he wants Sekai and pushes her down onto the bench. Although resistive at first, Sekai gives in and agrees, but just when Makoto gets her uniform unbuttoned, he gets an e-mail from Katsura, who has actually been in the school the entire time.

Sekai and Makoto say goodbye and start to part ways when Makoto asks if there’s any chance they can continue their “lesson” some other day. Sekai says no chance and walks away, a little disappointed.

Coincidentally, Makoto bumps into Katsura just after Sekai says goodbye. Katsura works past the awkwardness and asks Makoto if he’s free to go to the waterpark the coming Sunday, much to the dismay of Sekai, who looks on from a distance.

Thoughts

Oh God this episode was hilarious. These three are so bad at this dating game that I literally spent over half the episode in pseudo-orz/facepalm position.

Wow, that’s A LOT of fapping, Makoto

I don’t really blame Makoto for trying to get further with Katsura, but he really needs to learn how to read the atmosphere and adjust his pace. He’s completely pushing forward at his own speed and is forcing Katsura to try and keep up, and even gets annoyed when she can’t. I think Makoto has watched too much porn/played too many erogames and has built up the idea that girls put out at light speed. While the case may be true for girls like Sekai, Katsura is a completely different story.

As for Katsura, I can’t believe she’s putting up with Makoto’s crap. Considering her personality, I’m amazed at the progress she’s made with Makoto, but she needs to be able to draw the line. She keeps saying she knows that it’s natural for guys to think at a certain level of perversion and that Makoto has good intentions, but she also knows she isn’t ready to go any further yet. But Katsura, MAKOTO DOESN’T KNOW THAT! And he won’t unless you tell him straight to his face. Truthfully, if that were to happen there’s a good chance that he would give up and go for the much easier lay (ie. Sekai), but really, if that’s the extent to which he cares for her, then it would be the best for Katsura.

But she’s not without fault either. Her ridiculous expectations and romantic criteria are unreasonable. She needs to lay off the ren’ai novels a little.

And Sekai, dear God make up your mind. It’s obvious that she wants him, in more ways than Katsura could fathom. But this wavering back and forth in the middle ground is annoying, she’s being no more decisive than Makoto was when he first started liking Katsura. I can’t stand her standing in the gray area, Sekai needs to either make her intentions clear to Makoto and Katsura, or remove herself from their relationship altogether.

Despite me complaining about the general stupidity of the characters this episode, I liked it. Their approach to dating is far from reality, but also not the typical build up of love triangles in anime or TV dramas, it’s unique and really interesting/funny to watch. (Even if it does fuel my burning desire to kill Makoto)

*insert vitriolic rant about the uselessness of fanservice*

As for where we go from now, each passing episode is suggesting that a BAD END is in the works. As much as I like Katsura, things aren’t looking great for her. Makoto continues to voice his frustration with her overly shy and reluctant personality while showing more and more interest in Sekai, who despite her inferior melon pan, is willing to put out. Despite wanting to see Katsura win, things look like they’re on track for Sekai stealing Makoto away. What happens from that point on is where School Days could become either very good or massive fail. But I guess we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.

Then again, who knows what will happen when Makoto sees Katsura in a swimsuit…

~ Shirukii ~