Nyahahahaha~! That is probably the one thing that stuck most to my head after watching the episode. Once again Horie Yui shows what she is truly capable of, something she has been showing only subtly throughout the series so far, but her true ability was shown in this episode at the part where Araragi reminisces about the meddlesome cat. This was also largely a slightly different lead-in to the story behind Hanekawa. I also know I am very late with this, but since the third episode in this current arc (the last) has just been streamed anyway, that hardly matters. On to the episodic.

I like how, at the start, they show various scenes, all with one cat in them each, leading us to the oddity in question, related to the title. There were also various other scenes with cats in them, and SHAFT continues to use cutscenes such as these to great advantage throughout the series. Of course, as a lover of cats, that sure helps a lot for me in relating the most to this current arc, even if the oddity in question really has nothing to do with cats in general (other than its name).
 

Now the true reason for Hanekawa’s complicated family life and why she has been unwilling to go home throughout the series is made clear. Her family relations are indeed complex, but basically, in order not to break up her “family”, she decided to be a “good girl”, though her rendition of a “good girl” is to be “normal”. As most of us can attest to, being “normal” is not only subjective, but also conforms to what society thinks is “normal”.  There is thus two views of the form of “normal”, but the accepted view here, for Hanekawa, is that of the contemporary society’s “normal”.

What we might miss is the real reason Hanekawa decides to become “normal”. She no longer has a family to speak of, since her current parents are not even close to her in any sense, yet she wants to retain that little fragment of the sense of belonging, particularly as part of a family, since she is all alone now. Thus, in order not to break up her current family, even if it is not her real one, she is willing to sacrifice what she wants and behaves as how she thinks she should be. Indeed, as she mentions, she will be looked at with bias, because of her family background, yet she decides to move on in spite of it, though her sacrifice was so big, it led to her repressing her frustration throughout the years and resulting in Tsubasa Cat’s incarnation. I have no idea about you, but I truly feel for Hanekawa here.
 

For Hanekawa indeed, spending the day at home with people she cannot even identify with is something very fearsome. For Araragi, it seems as though she is exaggerating the matter, thus making him think she thinks too hard about it, yet each of us have our own problems and fears that others may find trivial or nonsensical. For Araragi, his family is still somewhat whole – the only problems he has had are with his mother and sisters so far and not wanting to go home because of his slightly strained relations (as we heard during the Lost Snail arc), but they are almost as nothing compared to the stress Hanekawa undergoes whenever she is at home.

Of course, this also neatly explains why Araragi was immediately able to pin down why Hanekawa also saw Mayoi back in episode 5 – he knew about her family problems already by then and the fact that she never wants to go home if possible.
 

I felt like bitchslapping her bastard foster father. If you find her so much of a nuisance, why not give her up to someone else? Keeping her just for appearances for your own selfish ends, it makes my blood boil.

Yet Hanekawa herself does not mind, or rather, she does not consciously mind. She is upset deep down, but represses it, as she has done throughout the years. She tries to justify it with some reasoning, but her most powerful point must be when she said “He only did it once.” That drove home the impact – he could probably have hit her more times and she knew it. Araragi caught the implication too, as we saw. And due to her complex family background, she does not already want more trouble than possible and thus asks him to keep it a secret.
 

When they first found the cat, I did not notice it. It was not until when Oshino mentioned that the oddity was a tailless cat that I took a look again, and true enough, this cat has no tail. One could argue that the tail was hidden by the cat’s body, which is believable, depending on how you look at it, but obviously, this should not be the case here, once we got to Oshino’s explanation.
 

“Perhaps she was on her way to read the rest of all of those BL novels she bought yesterday…the rest omitted”

I laughed quite a bit at this, especially how they reprinted the text from the light novel series, stating the most likely reason for Kanbaru’s dash through the school gate, leaving Sengoku spinning. Ah, the subtle humor is also awesome in the series. Nioisiosin sure knows how to put the touch on humor here and there to complement the story-telling and the series and SHAFT continues to pull it off in style. I wonder if, had Bakemonogatari been done by a different studio, maybe BONES or Madhouse for example, Bakemonogatari would have been so popular as an anime series. SHAFT’s style, after all, suits the weird settings of Bakemonogatari, from what I heard anyway of SHAFT’s previous work.
 

Well, I never watched the series they referred to, but the reference and the way they did it, as well as Doraemon’s later on, was superb. Bakemonogatari has a touch of everything, yet sublimely executed in such a way that, even if you are used to having watched such parodies and cliches a gazillion times, you still manage to smile at the way it seems to be so novel an idea and in execution in the series. Definitely one of the better points of the series.
 

Ah Nadeko, you continue to put lolicons in a craze with your more innocent form of teasing of Araragi. Nice touch once again with the cut-and-paste from the light novel.

The bars here when Araragi and Sengoku talk about returning the favor to Kanbaru seem to indicate that there will always be a sort of barrier between them. Very vague implication, but it does seem that way to me. After all, Sengoku views Araragi not just as an elder brother, but her infatuation, whereas lolicon Araragi just has the hots for Sengoku’s loli body and does not think of her in any other way.
 

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All this talk about Shinobu makes me wonder exactly what happened back then to have caused Shinobu to be the form she is now, and the solution to Araragi’s vampire problem. Truly, Araragi seems to have a lot of interest in Shinobu not just because of what happened back then, but what she is right now and what she might be. I really hope they do an OVA or even a movie (the latter seems likely if you think about it – Araragi’s backstory cannot be that short) to animate the story behind Araragi and Shinobu. After all, the popularity of Bakemonogatari this year is assured; an OVA will certainly be able to bring in quite a bit of profit, let alone a movie.
 

All of what Araragi said regarding the oddities were true. After all, which arc so far had the oddity actually being the cause of the problem? No, it has always been the human involved that was the original source. For Senjougahara, it was her desire to get rid of her feelings. For Mayoi, it had been Araragi himself who had met her. For Kanbaru, had she not wished upon the mummy’s paw? For Sengoku, it had been a curse set upon her by someone else, and for Hanekawa now, her stress was the problem.

Indeed, it is wrong to blame the oddities. We, the humans, only have ourselves to blame if we should be beset by an oddity, because oddities exist but we never get in touch with them unless we ourselves wish for it or make it happen. That indeed, is just how they are – the oddities are always there, but will never occur unless we move into contact with them either directly or indirectly.

Worrying about them will not solve the problem – as Araragi suggested to Sengoku, one should just try to get back on track with one’s normal life. This part had a very powerful message, and it was further amplified by the different use of images – the kaleidoscope that we see, and the audible difference of both Araragi’s and Sengoku’s voices as though they were talking through a microphone, and having their voices amplified through an audio system as if they were on stage. I really liked how they did this particular section and the background music that was playing throughout. Bakemonogatari OST whar?
 

Yeah seriously, like WTF? And Sengoku is playing him on by quoting more obscure references and Araragi can still catch them. Just like, wow. At least I watched Doraemon (I wonder who has not, actually) so I know about the secret gadgets, though not the specific ones they were talking about.
 

Just, WTF. I knew Araragi was a lolicon, but to go this far, and Sengoku not even resisting…defending the wrong places indeed. I know a few folks around the blogosphere who probably went nuts at this, but let us leave it at that.
 

Again, I laughed quite a bit at this. Sengoku got so embarrassed by the appearance of Hanekawa she actually sputtered and ran away, obviously making it look like Hanekawa had scared her off. That was a nicely done line by Hanazawa Kana though, who really is getting into her own with just that one loli voice.
 

The fact that we were shown this particular shot shows that Hanekawa had taken notice of them at the very start once she moved out of the school gate and met Araragi, yet she continued to be tactical about it and not mentioning it at all during the course of their conversation till the very end. Nice, Hanekawa, and nice way of being subtle about her noticing it, SHAFT.

Related posts:

1. Bakemonogatari 13 – Return of Fetishes
2. Bakemonogatari 06 – In Your Face Part 2
3. Bakemonogatari 10 – Tasukete, Araragi-kun
4. Bakemonogatari 09 – Loliconmonogatari
5. Bakemonogatari 01 Impressions