Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today we’re continuing our journey through Monogatari’s Monster Season, as Araragi maintains his investigation of a series of vampiric near-murders around town. Having been conscripted by Gaen into one more oddity adventure, he has since discovered that five members of the girls’ basketball team have been targeted, and that the club itself has lost the sense of positive camaraderie that defined its glory days.
That’s our narrative on the surface, at least. Cracking open the carapace, it’s clear this arc is intended as a mirror of Kizumonogatari, with its parallels serving to illustrate just how much Araragi and Shinobu have changed since their first encounter. For Araragi’s part, it’s apparent already that he has come to value his present life and his intended future, having escaped both the clouded sense of self and self-destructive impulses of his earlier adventures. As for Shinobu, we have watched her become a mutually trusting partner to Koyomi, and also come to enjoy her role as both family member and stalwart protector in the Araragi house. The key question remains Deathtopia’s perspective – will she accept this version of Acerola who has found peace in domesticity, or will she demand a revival of the guarded Heart-under-blade, preferring the eternally questing maiden to one who has actually achieved her dream? Let’s find out!
Episode 10
This production always gets excellent dramatic mileage out of the contours of Kanbaru’s estate. Our scene here is reestablished with a shot of our three characters caught within the branches of the barren trees in Kanbaru’s garden, like grasping claws encircling and constraining them
And then more of that live action photography, this time with three shots capturing a key object relevant to each of the abductions (the ball, the futon, the bag), thus making the violence inflicted on these girls feel more immediate and tangible
Araragi admits that he is unfamiliar with the style of trouble embodied by the basketball team, as it has to do with “training and teamwork.” Even this acknowledgment seems to reflect Araragi’s growing maturity; rather than assuming he can solve everything himself, he immediately admits that this type of drama is foreign to him. Humility and a willingness to admit what you don’t understand are essential prerequisites to attempting to understand someone unlike yourself, but many people just stop at assigning their own feelings to others’ stories, and assuming any deviance from what they would do is a “failure” on the other’s part
Higasa states that the basketball team was basically defined by Kanbaru’s presence, and once she retired, everything started to fall apart
“Sports aren’t something you should suffer over. If it’s that painful, you should just quit.” Kanbaru’s offhand reflections are complimented by her sitting on a throne of books addressing an array of microphones, essentially emphasizing how it’s easy for her to say such things, given her natural athleticism. To those languishing below, it’s not so simple
Kanbaru and Hisaga feel incapable of adjusting the club’s vicious atmosphere, because they feel culpable in creating that competitiveness in the first place
“The only difference is how they feel about it. No. Maybe we were wrong in the first place.” They may indeed have created an inherently toxic atmosphere, one they only didn’t recognize because they were its stars and beneficiaries. It can be difficult to recognize an exclusionary atmosphere taking hold if you are not among its victims – particularly if you are constructing that atmosphere in response to a feeling of exclusion from some other social climate. Thus small hobby clubs can reproduce precisely the kind of bullying they were designed to escape
Hisaga admits that her complacency is conceptually little different from how adults might consider corporal punishment a “sign of the times” rather than a negative behavior to be admonished
Araragi once again admits he might be too unsociable to be ideal for this operation. He’s clearly calmed down a lot since high school, and no longer needs to be a performative clown to feel valued or acknowledged
Back at the hospital, Gaen agrees that the resentment fostered by Kanbaru’s retirement may well have conjured an oddity
“And to make Koyomin’s easily made promise come true, you have to put some spirit into this.” A touch of acid from Gaen, who tends to choose her words and promises more carefully
Gaen notes that the D/V/S signature theory is somewhat weakened by the fact that no codes or signatures were found with the other victims
She commands Araragi to suppress Shinobu for the night. Thus we finally introduce our title character, now certain that Araragi is hiding something
“If you’re going to doubt me like that, our relationship of codependence is over.” “Like hell it’s over. We’re in deep.” These two are so delightful together. They’ve grown into one of the most stable, mutually trusting partnerships I’ve seen, frequently ribbing each other but always prepared to die for one another, and bound by their shared fear of isolation in a way that absolves them of the inherent, fundamental loneliness of the vampire’s curse. They’ll be bickering right through the apocalypse
Smart use of Araragi’s ceiling-mounted egg chair here, continuously emphasizing its chain to underscore the fact that Araragi is essentially attempting to cage Shinobu for the night
Also love this dramatic zoom into Shinobu biting a donut, essentially mocking the melodrama of the previous arc’s dramatic vampire zooms
Sad to see Araragi has apparently lost his ridiculous banana couch
Araragi has a suspiciously gallant memory of first meeting Shinobu, with a whole lot less screaming and puking than I remember
Apparently the zombies from the alternate reality where Araragi failed to recover Shinobu were essentially the result of failed vampirification attempts
Araragi describes the Acerola from that timeline as acting “with no objective or motive.” Once again, intention seems crucial to the final result – just as Deathtopia could only pierce Acerola’s neck when she was truly attempting to venerate her, so could Acerola only create a full vampire because she truly wanted Araragi to live
“I suppose the time has finally come for me to talk about that.” Knowing Shinobu’s performances of vampiric sovereignty are based on loosely remembered lessons from Deathtopia actually makes them even more charming
“I myself had forgotten I used to be human until the incidents with you a year ago.” Does being a monster inherently mean being alone? As always, it’s how you define it
Shinobu considers herself a “foul eater” compared to Deathtopia’s “gourmet vampire”
“Once she decides the menu, she will not put anything else in her mouth. That’s how stubborn she was.” Even from Shinobu’s perspective, that rigidity was her defining feature
“So I kind of let her suck my blood out of pity.” Shinobu’s recollection of her final interaction with Deathtopia is just as favorably edited as Araragi’s first meeting with Shinobu herself. We all turn our history into personal legends – rather than moments of self-destructive desperation, both our leads would prefer to remember their transition to vampirism as grand acts of charity
Yotsugi stops by, bearing a “Fair” fortune from Mayoi’s shrine. That leads us to the shrine, where Mayoi is making the most of her godly powers, performing a fine spectacle of “secret training under the waterfall” beneath a spotlit portal dumping water from the open sky. I’m glad she’s enjoying herself
Each character here is getting introduced via three titles in the form of a math equation, just like Araragi was. That flourish seems to echo both the fluidity of identity in retrospect this arc is generally commenting on, as well as the three variables involved in their “D V S” clue
In spite of that, their “I flubbed it” call and response affirms their enduring friendship
Well shit, it seems Mayoi has actually been housing Deathtopia right here. She appears almost drained of blood herself
“For a guest from overseas to die abroad would be a terrible thing to wake up to as the ruler.” Even Mayoi has changed; the responsibilities of this position have steadied her impulses, making her more responsible in turn
Thus Mayoi offers them a quest: to travel to hell, and procure some essential blood for Deathtopia from Blood Pond Hell. So simple!
He’s still the same Araragi; with a girl in need right in front of him, considerations regarding Gaen’s quest or this larger investigation are put on hold. Granted, with Mayoi and Shinobu right here, it’s hard to deny his belief that apparitions deserve every chance to live
“How dare you disgrace me by making me sit in a booster seat.” It is pretty demeaning, Araragi
The production team has an inordinate amount of fun coming up with poses and unique embroidered backgrounds for each of Shinobu’s seven killer sword techniques. Clearly assigning resources to the most important things, I see
Araragi descends into… a beautiful, flower-filled alpine meadow? He naturally assumes this is heaven, a reward for all of his excellent behavior so far
There he meets Acerola, the original Beautiful Princess, hidden behind an oni’s mask. It seems untangling Deathtopia’s future will require returning to Shinobu’s beginning
And Done
So our heroes’ rambling investigation continues, taking them from a prison sentence in Araragi’s room to Mayoi’s shrine and onwards to the… elysium fields? Yeah, I’m seriously doubting we’re actually in heaven here, or frankly that Isin would be interested in furnishing this mythological medley with a specific, static afterlife. To live is to change, and Monogatari posits a broad enough definition of “living” to include ghosts, vampires, and zombies under its generous umbrella. So is this vision of the Beautiful Princess a fragment like Nadeko’s doppelgangers, a truth Shinobu hid away behind a demon’s mask? I’m eager to find out!
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