Well, it’s over.

It goes without saying that the production is still spot on and beautiful. Even better is the fact that Seventh Heaven is essentially the vocal version of the main motif that you hear when Shiki goes into fight mode.

This chapter was a really fitting end for the entire series. We finally get our answers to just what happened four years ago. Araya really is the central villain of the series, throwing in one more roadblock for Shiki and Kokutou to overcome before they’re allowed to be happy. And Shiki and Kokutou are finally forced to confront Shiki’s murderous nature and their relationship.

It’s definitely not as epic or action packed as Paradox Spiral. This movie is much more personal than that one. Paradox Spiral was all about taking down the last boss. Murder Speculation Part 2 is about tying up all the loose ends.

One of the revelations that we’re treated to is that we’ve been following Shiki’s adventures under the assumption that she’s a murderer, when it turns out she hasn’t actually killed anyone. Her kills that we see include a bunch of ghosts, zombies, and Araya. And so, it’s really interesting to see that after all of Kokutou’s pleas for her not to kill and in the face of her own reluctance to kill, the series ends with Shiki being driven to murder someone.

So fairly recently, I decided to press on with Kara no Kyoukai. I’d watched the first two movies and my impressions were, wow this is pretty cool, but it’s confusing as hell. Apparently, this web of confusion is the norm for Nasu and TYPE-MOON stuff. Anyhow, I finally had time to spend, so I decided to take a look at the third movie.

In addition to being confusing, the first two movies were a bit lacking in the action department. So I’ve learned since then that there’s pretty much only one large action sequence per movie, except for the fifth one. But not knowing that while watching the first two, the action scenes we got were Shiki killing a bunch of ghosts that weren’t doing anything and murdering normal people. Not exactly the most suspense filled scenes, although the fight with the ghosts was very pretty.

The third movie remedies this. We get to see learn a bit more about the characters and the setting. We get weird supernatural stuff. But best of all, we get Shiki being awesome, fighting against someone who can wreck stuff. This was the movie that got me.

The fourth movie helps to alleviate the confusion a bit. We get a lot of background information and character development. But this one was better than the second movie, because, again, we get to see Shiki being awesome and destroying a zombie. I also liked that we got to see Touko doing some magic.

But the fifth movie is just spectacular. We get some amazing fights, a lot of information, and plenty of progression in plot and characters. Not only that, but we get some crazily structured narrative and direction that’s confusing as hell. And as a bonus, it has the most awesome ED song out of all of the movies.

So, where am I at now? I am angry because now I have to wait half a year for the sixth movie to come out. I am looking forward to the rest of Kara no Kyoukai though. I have been reinforced in my belief that Maaya Sakamoto is awesome. I am also intrigued by what else TYPE-MOON has to offer. Maybe ufotable can be the TYPE-MOON studio like KyoAni has become the Key studio? I would love to see a Tsukihime or Fate/stay night anime that doesn’t suck. And I’m looking forward to those currently ethereal Blu-ray releases.

Some ridiculous blizzards allowed me to watch a bunch of stuff.

True Tears

A pretty solid romance. It did the love triangle thing pretty well, even at the end. Nice OP too. I don’t have too much to say about this one.

Bamboo Blade

Not the most amazing thing ever, but it was highly entertaining. All of the characters were likable, but it was Tamaki that sold the show to me. I will never tire of watching her crush her opponents and get excited about Blade Braver.

Seirei no Moribito

I was basically lead to this from Kure-nai, which is tangentially related. Very good fantasy and excellent characters. It’s nice that the imperial court seemed to care about the empire and was willing to admit that they screwed up.

Sketchbook ~full color’S~

A slow-paced slice of life show. It seems like Hidamari Sketch without the SHAFT weirdness. It’s noteworthy because it throws in a Canadian, even if Kate could have come from any generic western nation. SOU NAN DESU KARRRRRRRRRRRRRR?!

Shakugan no Shana (and Shana Second)

I thought this was alright, except for the enormous list of words that they invented. And I guess that the way that they chose to resolve the romantic subplot was completely unsatisfying. I’d rather they actually showed a scene with some dialogue and reactions as opposed to being clever and heavily implying it.

Myself ; Yourself

This started off really slow and uninteresting. I had to read spoilers on Wikipedia to keep me interested, which should be a sign that I should drop a show. Anyhow, when the drama came, it was really weird. But the one thing that continues to stand out is that voice. I don’t remember Chiyo’s voice being this terribad.

H2O ~Footprints in the Sand~

A lot of this could have been interesting if he stayed blind. Otherwise, it seemed fairly typical until the end, where things get very strange. And I’m not sure what to make of the very, very end. The most entertaining part is still the preview with the glorious English.

sola

It’s an Air clone. I tried to approach it without that preconception, but everything it does is a parallel to it: the sky motif, the weird fantasy elements, the distant past stuff, the deflecting the plot away from romance at the end. I wasn’t a huge fan of Air and I’m even less of a fan of this.

Kimikiss ~ pure rouge

This had promise at the beginning, but it really dragged out towards the middle. And at the end, it seemed like it threw everything that happened for Kouichi’s half out the door. Really, what was the point of that entire rigamarole?

Kara no Kyoukai 1 and 2

I started watching this for a few reasons. One was that it seems like everyone’s talking about it. Another was some of that talking spilled over to the real world and I have some friends who told me about it. And last of all, it’s done by ufotable and I’d recently finished their very awesome Manabi Straight.

Having a look at the first movie was confusing and unsatisfying. Even after the second movie, I wasn’t entirely sure what was going on. I’d expected a lot more action and a lot more elaboration about what was going on. I’m going to keep on watching, because the production is amazing and really impressive, but it seems like the movies weren’t made for people who aren’t familiar with all of this TYPE-MOON stuff. I am also surprised that there isn’t a BRD release.