Kurogane’s Anime Blog

“Let’s go, Watson!”

Otome episode this week, since it was Yume’s turn last week.

Nothing much happens really, just Yoshiyuki and Otome going around town to investigate the series of mysterious accidents that seem to have no explainable cause. Along the way they interview Junichi, who talks about the Da Capo cast a bit and talk to Anzu who tells the story of a girl that wished for better memory and had it granted, to which Yoshiyuki suspects it’s herself she’s talking about.

Poor Yume gets totally forgotten the whole episode, late lunch and late dinner for her :3.

Jiiiiiiiiiii~~~~

Yoshiyuki and co. go on a ski trip in the mountains, and everyone is enjoying it fully with the exception of Yume and Yoshiyuki. Yume has a dream of her getting in to an accident and Yoshiyuki coming to her rescue, which she misconstrues as a foretelling of disaster, thus she unconsciously avoids him. Yoshiyuki notices this of course, and he is concerned about it.

In the end, Yume avoids going skiing the whole day, citing a variety of reasons to not go out, but she finally seizes the chance to enjoy some skiing herself by sneaking out when the others are holding a party over at the guys room. Coincidentally, Yoshiyuki is buying a drink for himself at the moment and spots Yume going out and decides to follow after her as well.

Lucky he did, because Yume was getting harassed by a bunch of losers and she manages to shake one off, but the other starts acting violent and Yoshiyuki arrives in time to save her. Yume is thankful, and Yoshiyuki invites her to ski together, but she remembers the dream and shoots off by herself. Yoshiyuki grows more concerned and follows after her of course, causing Yume to lose her attention of where she was going and she really does get in to an accident, spraining her ankles.

Thankfully, Yoshiyuki is right on her tail and rescues her. Yume initially tries to run away, thinking that she’ll get Onii-san in to an accident, but Yoshiyuki assures her that it’ll be alright, and they safely reach back to the ski lodge.Yoshiyuki treats her ankle and they both head for the baths afterwards, where they share another tender moment together.

Oh Yume. Seriously, WTF were you trying to do the whole episode?

If she was THAT worried about Yoshiyuki getting in to an accident, she shouldn’t have snuck out to ski at all. Sometimes that tsun-tsun attitude of hers can be really irritating, even more so since she was rather asking for it when she snuck out despite having that dream. Well, in the end, we did get a cute moment with her in the bath there.

In any case, I guess I’m starting to get used to tsun-tsun Yume, with thanks to bluemist’s nice long summary of Yume’s route in the original game, which I just read recently. Too bad all the focus on Yume now just means that Otome’s route is the real ending of this season.

Tsundere Yume is tsundere~~~

The Christmas festival finally arrives in this episode.

Yume continues on her tsundere-ness, which is pretty funny, especially when she goes all robotic when Yoshiyuki greets her at the start of the episode.

As expected, poor Koko gets KO’ed, and Otome saves the day with her very emotional rendition of Sheryl in the puppet play. The play is probably going to foretell the events happening later on in the series.

The episode ends with the Asakura sisters, Yoshiyuki and Sakura celebrating Christmas together (funnily, Jun’ichi seems forgotten most of the time), ending with Sakura’s ominous wish for this happiness to last forever.

Otome gets the spotlight for this episode. She is earnestly helping Yoshiyuki out to practice for the upcoming puppet play, and we also see a glimpse of her past. Otome used to be more withdrawn and gloomy (wow, I so hear Noe when she’s like that) due to her magical powers, and it’s thanks to Yoshiyuki that she finally lightens up to the person she is now.

Junichi also makes a much awaited appearance in the episode, and boy, he’s sure turned old. Yume is still keeping up her tsundere-ness, to which I still find it quite unnatural, some what. Maa~ I’ll agree with Yoshiyuki that she’s cuter when she was still a kid :).

Still no idea about the general direction of the story yet, but the escalating incidences of fires in Hatsunejima is a big cause of concern. I wonder if Koko’s illness is also related to it, or just a convenient plot device to get Otome to do the puppet play with Yoshiyuki later on. Overall though, I would say D.C. II S.S seems rather blander than the first series….probably the lack of Nanaka.

Yoshiyuki sure is trusted by the girls.

Taking a jaunt in to Anzu’s story line in this episode. She’s pretty cute when she lets her hair down. Mmm~ otherwise, nothing much to comment on this episode. I’m surprised she managed to live alone for three years without anyone knowing that, though.

Also, Yume’s tsundere play in this episode was pretty LOL. I guess I’m just not used to her going all tsundere so abruptly, when back in the first series, she was totally tsun-tsun most of the time. Just feels awkward, I guess. Should’ve made the transition a bit more natural.

Yume… Yume…

Okay, I’m signing on for another trip through Hatsunejima again. Yeah, that scene kinda sold me on to it.

D.C.II S.S starts not long after the end of the first season. Things are getting a bit busy in preparation for the upcoming Christmas celebrations, and Yoshiyuki’s class chooses to do a ningyogeki thanks to Anzu’s suggestion. Naturally, Yoshiyuki and Koko get chosen to play the main roles.

However, not all is right with Hatsunejima, and the magical sakura tree seems to be malfunctioning. Sakura-san is of course well aware of it, and Oto-nee also feels it too. Mysterious cases also seem to have been happening around the island as well, most likely connected to the sakura tree.

Mmm… so it looks like they’ll be dealing with the main Otome route in the second season. Despite the disappointing first season, I guess I like the way that Da Capo II is being handled enough to continue on for a second season. Here’s to hoping that Otome will get her deserved airtime this season. I like what they’ve shown of her so far.

Looking back now, it was really surprising that the first season didn’t show the Asakura sisters so much, considering they’re the pivotal characters of the franchise.

Oh, I have to give mention to the nice ED, with the flashback shots of Yoshiyuki meeting the Asakura sisters for the first time and progressing throughout their growth together. I see that Yoshiyuki sure has got his hands full with the sisters and Sakura over the years. I guess that’s what it’s like to have so many females as your family :P.

I’ll be honest here and say that D.C.II ended for me at episode 7 (Nanaka! TT_TT), but I did still watch the rest of the episodes, which to many people’s surprise, took Minatsu’s route as the main plot.

Considering that Da Capo was the ultimate imouto-kon anime, this of course comes as a surprise and probably dashed the expectations of many. But still D.C.II wasn’t too bad at all, and considering the short episode count, it did manage to tell Minatsu’s story out, even if they took quite a number of episodes to actually get in to it. And her story isn’t that bad per se, just a bit rather typical in terms of the issues it was dealing with.

That said, unless you’re a Minatsu or Koko fan (I doubt there are many), D.C. II anime is largely forgettable after watching it, except for episode seven. I’m still happy of course it managed to portray Nanaka well, even if she was merely a side character throughout the series. And of course, thanks to it, there’ll be at least one or two insert single songs courtesy of Minorin to come out.

Addendum: Oh it looks like D.C. II S.S has been announced. Well, not too surprising, but I wonder which route will they focus on. Will they finally go back to its roots and focus on Yume or Otome? Will they throw another curveball instead and do Anzu’s storyline? Will they totally do a slap-in-your-face and go Suginami’s route? I wonder….

Nanaka TT_TT

Finally, what we have all been waiting for, the Nanaka episode.

As expected, this episode deals with Nanaka’s feelings for Yoshiyuki, complicated especially because Koko is her best friend. This leads her to be distracted and starts to show at their usual band practice. Nanaka decides to practice alone for a change, and heads for the rooftop after the music room isn’t available, but gets trapped there instead, when a storm blows in. Poor Nanaka auuuu~~

Help arrives in the form of Yoshiyuki, who forgot his botebook back in school and heads out in the storm to look for it. While he’s there, he hears a cellphone ringing, which turns out to be Koko calling Nanaka’s as she’s missing. Yoshiyuki manages to save Nanaka from spending the night in the storm, and Nanaka is greatly moved by him. She almost confesses her feelings for Yoshiyuki, but as Yoshiyuki touches her hands, she realizes that he purely thinks of Nanaka as a friend and nothing more, so Nanaka decides not to tell him her feelings, but instead reproaches him for being too kind to everyone, without realizing that it’ll eventually hurt others as well (Nanaka TT_TT) and tells him to treat Koko more dearly.

Nanaka is so strong TT_TT

That settled, Nanaka and Yoshiyuki head back home, along with the worried Koko who came to school looking for them as well.

Oh god, that was a pretty awesome episode for Nanaka there, especially when she almost confessed to Yoshiyuki but held it back instead. I was really touched at that. Sigh, why does the Da Capo series always do this kind of things towards the most awesome character of the series. Then and again, I guess it’s this “awesome but always the underdog” trait that makes me love the Shirakawa-type characters.

One more thing to add before I go, Minorin is doing a good job voicing Nanaka, but her singing in her Nanaka voice is still a bit rough, IMHO. Not bad, but not as smooth as her usual singing voice.

Bonus Nanaka Shot: Embarrassed be-da Nanaka

Minatsu episode this week. Her secret ambition to conquer the world is found out by Yoshiyuki, who has been nagged at by Yume since Minatsu isn’t mixing well in her class. He takes the chance to “blackmail” her to a date and brings her for dinner at his house. The End.

Okay yes, I am not exactly the biggest fan of Minatsu, since a “Banana-hating Banana-powered Robot Tsundere” (meganeshounen™) isn’t exactly on the moe qualities I’m attracted to, but I will admit Minatsu is rather cute when she isn’t going all haughty and “I hate humans and banana’s” mode. Also, didn’t expect this episode to be rather deep, with the little outburst by Minatsu on how humans have not treated robots well, forcing them to do things that aren’t of their own will, etc. etc., but it was a nicely done. Gotta LOL at Minatsu’s plan to dominate the world though. Ha ha ha.

Poor Koko gets shafted for another episode though.

Obligatory Nanaka screencap. Worried Nanaka.

Wow, 5 episodes in and it’s still on the Koko path! I’m surprised!

This episode, Yoshiyuki and Koko finally get to spend some quality time together on a date, with a little help from Nanaka and Koko’s friends. They go through the usual date sequence; watching movies, eating lunch, window shopping and hang around at the popular date spots and they finally start to hold hands together. This is like, what, half base? Looks like first base is still gonna be a long way ahead. Sigh…

What else can I say? Those two are really slow at love relationships naturally. Well, I guess it’s mainly because they have been friends for such a long time, it takes time to close the subsequent gap between them that’s formed. But still, I am finding myself rooting for the Koko end now… because Koko really is a good girl and a perfect wife material, mainly thanks to the short scene of her calming down a boy who lost his mother.

But still… will they truly stick to the Koko end? If so, man, the dorama later will probably and had better be pretty frickin’ awesome, else I want my time back :P. It would help too if there’s more Nanaka as well :).

Obligatory Nanaka screencap of the episode.