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Feb 26 2012

Categories: episodic review, nisemonogatari
Tagged: monogatari, nisemonogatari

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“Incestory.”

Why do they look like characters from Sister Princess? And why isn’t Koyomi afterglowing after finally getting to bone Senjougahara? I feel like a teenaged boy would be ridiculous happy at this point, unlike Soichiro in Kare Kano. Or is Koyomi still disappointed he didn’t get to fondle Hanekawa?

Took me a while to realize that’s an eyeball and not two sperm colliding. Or is it? Duh duh dum.

It didn’t strike me until I sat down to write this post, but do you realize where Tsukihi is dancing in this OP? In Araragi’s mouth. ‘Nuff said.

“Is there anything you want me to do?”

Remember, they’re half the size of Hanekawa’s. Half. The. Size. At first I thought Koyomi was going to have a normal relationship with his sister, but it looks like we’re going take a Sister Princess swerve… or really any anime He just can’t help that all the bitches fall madly in love with him after he solves their mystical problems. (If this is true, then the amount of nookie that Ginko gets in Mushishi must be insane.) Now that I think about it, which anime doesn’t feature some sort of mild love angle between brother and little sister? I guess Haruhi Suzumiya is the only beacon left in this front… gosh, Kyon, stay strong.

(Maybe Danshi Nichijou, but I’m not sure if that’s abject terror or whatever concerning their imoutotachi. Then again, they enjoy wearing their little sister’s underwear so… yeah…)

“Araragi Karen, my sister, is wearing a skirt.”

That music… this slow pan… nice of Araragi to gawk at his sister’s body only when she’s clothed rather than when she was more nakkid and getting a sponge bath. Though I do like the red scarf and side tail combination. I just hope a pesky crow doesn’t fly by and steal that red scarf.

When I first saw this scene, I thought it was a pole. I think Araragi needs a pole in his bedroom. I know Clinton Portis would agree with me on this one.

I feel like, at this point, we need a devil Araragi and an angel Araragi pop up on his shoulders. The angel would whisper, “That’s your sister!” And the devil would whisper, “That’s your sister!”

(I think the widescreen format has just encouraged the studios to draw haremettes horizontally more. I’m almost in favor of a 21:6 cinema format just so they can fit in even more of the haremettes for this type of service scene until I realized a 21:6 format would probably chop off Hanekawa’s melonpan. So I’m fine with 16:9.)

Hehe. Typical Araragi family face. One thing to note about the last few episodes of Nisemonogatari… no Shaft being Shaft cuts. It’s like they are playing it straight… or just lulling me into a false sense of security with the final episode being only understandable after ingesting psychedelic mushrooms.

Why does this scene remind me of this?

“Leave it all to your big brother.”

And why does this remind me of the not-so-nice housekeeper from Arrietty?

“I’m in love.”

Dressed up to the eyes /
It’s a wonderful surprise /
To see your shoes and your spirits rise /
Throwing out your frown /
And just smiling at the sound /
And as sleek as a sheik /
Spinning round and round /
Always take a big bite /
It’s such a gorgeous sight /
To see you eat in the middle of the night /
You can never get enough /
Enough of this stuff /
It’s Friday, I’m in love

(But you knew which song this was before you clicked that, didn’t you?)

“Don’t call a girl wearing a skirt ‘cosplay’!”

In Rick Santorum’s America, women need to be given a vaginal ultrasound before they can wear a skirt.

(I like how Karen is coming clean about her suicidal tendencies and all Araragi can do is think about are some mythical bullies. It’s exactly like America is needing serious political and economic reform yet can only think about Iran’s mythical nuclear weapons.)

Wait, what happened to those half-Hanekawa melonpan? They’re not buffering the impact damage at all. D: More importantly, when did I switch from using the “Hendricks” unit to the “Hanekawa” unit for melonpan? Mmm… I feel like the Hanekawa should be an SI unit much like “Joules” or “Coulombs.” For example, “those cherry tomatoes are ripe when they reach the size of a millihanekawa.”

“I just feel so relaxed when I’m hanging on to Nii-chan…”

When did my Nisemonogatari turn into my Ore no Imouto turn into my Sister Princess Repure? I like how Karen then started to swing around Koyomi’s neck with a thrusting motion. Nothing implied here, I see.

Wow, Karen’s character has turned a lot more pro-Koyomi after her arc. She’s definitely past Kirino territory and well into Sakuya territory and might even enter Chihiro territory. For those who are too young to remember Sister Princess Repure, Chihiro almost used the occult to rape her onii-chama while he was sleeping. So there. Sakuya just wants to marry him and have his babies. Though it’s fun watching old clips like that just to say, “Huh, Horie Yui still has a single voice after all these years.”

Whoa, what the hell? I didn’t think Koyomi would be the type of guy to do such a thing… then again, this would be normal older brother little sister relations rather than an uncomfortably sexy sponge baths. Also, there’s so much foot fetish involved in this series, I’m not sure if it is because of the writer or because of Shaft or because of Senjougahara. I feel like some parts of Nisemonogatari would be better suited for Amagami.

“Fine. Then I’ll give you my virginity!”

Yep… only in anime can a little sister’s virginity seem like it’s on par with a tub of Oxy Clean. If you act now, not only will you get twenty pieces of ShamWow, ten colors of Cami Secret, four individual Shake Weights, but you’ll also receive a tub of Oxy Clean! But, wait, there’s more! If you call in the next sixty minutes, you’ll also get Karen’s virginity! Koyomi, how can you pass up such a deal? Only three easy payments of your soul.

“There… are… four… LIGHTS!”

Holy shit, when I first watched this, I thought that her hair was helping her support her on the bed. I do like how her mini-skirt stayed up for like a solid three second before they decided to obey gravity. I also like how Kanbaru’s fanzine is named “Kanbaru Tool.” Definitely digging that she has a fanzine… who the hell makes a fanzine in this day and age? It seems as archaic as buying music, mailing postcards, and using a cell phone to make phone calls.

Such an “Kanbaru would just eat up my little sister” face.

Sorry, I don’t get this reference. Mega Man was my first instinct.

Serious Araragi is serious. I feel like this is the animation style that should have been used for Kaiji and Katawa Shoujo. Though the way he makes the game not fair… Koyomi would be a wonderful politician. Stacks deck in his favor, and he flirts with younger women.

(As 2011 was the Year of the Gosling, let’s continue with Ides of March. Ryan Gosling was awesome in it, but George Clooney just played George Clooney. You just knew his downfall would be that he can’t keep his hands off the pretty young interns. That’s just impossible for any politician, American, European, penguin. I am beginning to think Mao had it right– just dispense with the pretenses and just give each head of state fifty young virgins every year. That would solve all these issues.)

The lighting that makes it look like Koyomi has a halo… the positioning and emotion of his lands on the table… the square window… the bookshelves in sets of three… the inevitable betrayal of his hormones over his genetics… is this scene inspired by The Last Supper?

Oh Shaft. How we love you for not being Kyoto Animation. Or Sunrise. Or Bones. Or Production IG. Or Madhouse. Well, maybe Madhouse, we did see Needless.

(Is it weird that my first thought is, “You know, for Shaft to have such interesting visual designs and such stylish clothes, who would have thunk that their most boring piece of design is Karen’s panties? They’re just the standard number two pencils of panties.)

Four things every modern bachelor’s room needs:

1. Metal gate with quick lowering that can prevent people from escaping.
2. Stylish banana chair.
3. Comfy bed that’s the size of Texas.
4. Cute golden retriever puppy.

“Y-You’re not… Nii-chan? You’re going to stick that toothbrush…”

“… up my ass?!”

Karen looks more terrified here than any other character at any point during Monogatari. Even more terrified than when she met Kaiki. Wow. I don’t know what to say… at first I thought it was going to be tickle torture, but now… she’s going to take that toothbrush Chris Brown style.

At this point, I’m shaking me head, “Wait, this is the best Nishio Ishin can come up with? He’s going to brush her teeth?” Let’s just say I’m meeting this with a certain amount of skepticism. I have my red Scully wig on.

I guess fifth thing every bachelor’s room needs: anti-gravity machine. I like how the last two minutes have been spent trying to convince Karen that brushing her teeth would be a torturous activity… uh huh. At this point, my attitude is “show me.” Do or do not there is no try.

“Now feel the terror of Kanbaru-sensei. Kanbaru-sensei’s fetishistic ideas will lead to your defeat.”

I, for one, welcome our new basketball-playing, fetish-inducing Kanbaru overlord.

This is just so… uh… speechless.

Why does Karen look like she’s, uh, enjoying it? I mean… ah, I get it. What Koyomi thought would be torturous would actually be pleasurable… yet… if this were true, no one would be scared to go to the dentist.

What a face. The spectacle of this scene just broke my meter. Just too many kilokoyomis of pervertedness.

(I chose the koyomi instead of the kanbaru to express pervertedness in that a koyomi is more of a wrong pervertedness whereas kanbaru is the more socially acceptable kind. For example, if it’s just browsing dirty magazines or such, that would be a kanbaru. But if you’re having sexual thoughts about a middle school snail ghost girl, that would be a koyomi.)

I… I…

… can’t believe it…

… Shaft managed to pull off showing Koyomi pleasuring his sister with a toothbrush being used in the way toothbrushes are intended to be used… yet Shaft doesn’t show a kiss. And, yeah, there’s a lot of sexual tension here. It’s dripping. It’s as thick as toothpaste.

Did Shaft just animate Koyomi taking out the toothbrush only to have Karen move her head such that she tried to keep the toothbrush in her mouth in a way more than suggestive of oral sex? No they did not. Unless you paid attention. Then, yes, yes they did.

Utena should have pulled a toothbrush out of Anthy’s bosom… a sword is so cliche. I can only imagine the writers of Guilty Crown watching this and going, “Quick, we need to introduce a character next week and have Shu pull a toothbrush out of her as her void!”

“Not bad.”

Not bad is Shaft’s total usage of slights and sounds to make this scene work. My gosh, their animation of Karen’s squirming and Koyomi’s smugness is excellent. The sound work capturing every gasp and moan and pant from Karen is exceptional. The classy BGM help too. Sure, Shaft could have gone with typical bad guitar strip club music, but they chose to do classy chamber music. Bravo. Shaft spends their production budget on things that matter.

“If you give up now, Karen-chan, you’ll feel good.”

Why do I think that this episode is nothing more than sinister propaganda brought to you by 1-800-DENTIST? And this episode will spawn more bad toothbrush puns and gags than bad Linsanity puns and gags. Except the Linside girl. She’s classy.

“Hearing her moan makes me feel really weird… it makes my heart race!”

Remind me why this season is called “Impostory” instead of “Incestory”?

Shinbo needs to go back to making hentai. It’s his manifest destiny. Like how it’s mine to blog any hentai he makes.

What exactly is Karen swallowing there?

Koyomi comparing how cute his sister is to Hanekawa and then concluding that no one can be as cute as Hanekawa but his sister comes closest…

… I like how this entire conversation happened without mentioning the girl that he recently bonked… you know, the one that he professed his love to and stuff…. and tossed her aside for his little sister.

Did this scene just happen? I’m rubbing my eyes… am I seeing what I’m seeing? Why are the shiny white sparks leaving her mouth instead of going into it? How can this scene be improved with dental floss and mouthwash? Do we need to get those weird freaky tongue cleaners involved too?

To recap on what any bachelor’s room needs… forget it… all a bachelor’s need a huge stash of toothbrushes and a giant ass tube of lube toothpaste. I like how Shaft manages to bookend Araragi laying Araragi on the bed with gratuitous panty shots.

“Onii-chan, my body is ready.”

Okay, she didn’t say that with her mouth. She said it with her hips. My gosh, Nisemonogatari, I can’t believe this is an episode about toothbrushing incest. More so, I can’t believe it’s an episode about Karen getting toothbrushed when it’s supposed to be part one of Tsukihi Phoenix. Talk about playing second fiddle.

“Nii-chan… Nii-chan… it’s okay.”

OMFGWTFBBQESPN!

Sometimes, the best measure of an anime isn’t the story it tells but the story it tells. Like this toothbrush story isn’t central to any of the spiritual vices of the series, yet it is a microcosm of what the story is about– nothing is quite as what it seems. I think sometimes we get confused and think “plot = good,” but when I think of Rozen Maiden, I don’t think of any of the doll battles as being the best parts. The best parts is the simple, “It’s a delicious strategy!” episode that really highlighted Suiseiseki’s, Shinku’s, and Jun’s personalities. That’s what I think of when I think of that series.

By the same token, I think of God Knows for Haruhi, the trapped locker scene for Clannad, and the rugby match for Full Metal Panic. All of them are tangential to the main plot of the story yet all of them tell and convey the characters much better than the entirety of the plot. It’s almost like playing Diablo II… sure, the goal is to kill Mephisto, Diablo, and Baal… but the true nature of the game is to collect the random loot that comes during the journey. Getting a Stone of Jordan might mean more than besting Baal.

(Though if they go any further, this is what I’m going to remember for this franchise and not Hitagi and Koyomi under the stars as Kimi no Shiranai Monogatari plays in the background.)

All three faces: classic.

The best part of Tsukihi’s remarks is how she notices how happy both of them are. I mean, come on, it’s just totally innocent teeth brushing. It’s not like teeth brushing can somehow lead one to orgas–

–mic bliss? Uh, Karen and Koyomi should have used a, “I’m just trying to get some stuck spinach out of her mouth!” defense.

And now shit got real… she’s going to buy an awl. Stay tuned next week for more Incestory.

My brain is fried at this point. Wait, she wants to do best of three? Wait, there’s time before Tsukihi gets back and murders everyone? Wait, she wants to brush his teeth? Brain. Fried.

Koyomi’s final line summarizes this episode nicely. “And so, starting that morning, Karen and I began to get along a little better.” Queue Naisho no Hanashi.