“I hope one day we can walk…hand-in-hand.”
Summary
Haruka gets into another fight with Kanata, who reveals that she’s been lying about her egg allergy to Haruka for as long as she can remember. After consulting Riki, Haruka decides to stop running away and face the truth, asking Kanata who her father truly is.
Note: Facing image capture problems, so images will be at a minimum until I can solve the issue. But you’re here for the writing anyway, right? 😀
Impression
To Haruka, I’m not surprised that things came off as Kanata trying to prove that she’s better than Haruka in every possible way – even cooking with eggs, which used to be the one thing in which Haruka was supposedly superior at. It almost looked like Kanata wanted to aggravate Haruka on purpose so she would lash out violently at her – so that Kanata could get hit and perhaps atone for all the things that have gone wrong between them. From Kud’s revelation that she tosses and turns in her sleep to her apparent worry for Haruka, it was clear by that point that Kanata was just pretending to be cold on the outside. That much was proved from the cooking contest they had when they were little – if they had both made omelettes, Kanata would have won, resulting in the Saigusa main house beating her again. So she pretended she was allergic to eggs to let her win, and made miso soup instead – but Haruka’s own eggs weren’t amazing either, and she got roughed up again by her family.
“There’s no God here. All we’ve got in this world is us.”
I’m somewhat glad that Riki wasn’t the benevolent answer to Haruka’s problems this time round – all he did was give her a push in the right direction, telling her to think deep down what she really wanted, beneath all the blind hate she had for Kanata. Though I don’t blame Haruka at all – she hated Kanata as a solace after being rejected by everyone for ages – now she’s being told that it wasn’t Kanata’s fault at all, and that she shouldn’t blame her. Of course, Kanata turned out to be a victim in this entire issue nearly as much as Haruka was – the Saigusa family must have some sort of mental insanity if they’re going around whipping two young girls because they weren’t living up to domestic standards. They fashioned Kanata to be superior to Haruka, and beat Haruka for her inferiority that they themselves imposed on her – and whipped Kanata with a leather belt of all things whenever she went easy on Haruka. What monsters…is prestige really that important for them? It’s not like Haruka and Kanata are heiresses to a fortune or anything – surely in the modern world they must have realised that these sorts of things just aren’t that significant any more, and certainly not to a point that could justify killing Haruka if Kanata wasn’t hard on her. Seriously, what’s wrong with these people? In the end, the true villain was the Saigusa family as a whole – even Haruka’s father only played out the role of the villain to aid the escape of Haruka’s other parents, and to protect Haruka and Kanata while they were babies.
It’s good that everything ended this way, and that everyone got the closure they wanted – most importantly, Haruka and Kanata reconciling and ending their feud, behaving like real siblings once more. It’s no longer important whose kid Haruka is – she can put her past behind them, and things can only go up from here.
As is customary for this show, it looks like we’ll be slipping back into the comedy side of things for a few episodes – and given the number of episodes left, I’m guessing Refrain is the next major arc up next?
Actually, Kud’s arc will be up next. The next episode will be the start of her arc, the episode after is just filler and then the next three(?) episodes will be the rest of Kud’s arc. Your guess is as good as mine for the remaining three, but even if they started Refrain next episode there would still not be enough time.The director of LB said that there will be a continuation of the series, but its not certain if it will be in TV episodes or OVA form. Most likely the former considering the Blu-Ray/DVD sales.
Also, I want the Saigusa family to all die horrible deaths.
Ah okay, so we’re moving on to Kud. Refrain must be really long if the remaining 8 episodes of this season aren’t enough to cover it. And I agree that it’ll be a second TV series after this 😀 It’ll probably sell just fine.
Refrain is supposedly longer than Clannad After Story, so considering the length of that, the next season might even have to be three cour.
Yea, Refrain would probably need at least 9-10 episodes at most if they were to completely portray it’s story while still leaving minor details out. It might be longer though since the producer stated that they are going to be more informative in the anime compared to the visual novel in terms of relationships between the members of the little busters.
In my opinion, as long as Haruka and Futaki will remain unharmed after leaving the family, then all is good. We don’t need a repeating cycle of hatred. In this kind of situation, all that matters the most is how well the twins are doing in their present lives. Little Buster’s goal is to to support their friends, and protect their current happiness, not doing justice to the world because of past traumas. Nothing really comes out of trying to do justice to the ‘bad guys’ and end up harming themselves all over again with a possibility of getting arrested. The family will die off by itself as time passes having losing two potential heirs. Let’s leave off the story of the twins struggle for an another time, their arc was suppose to show us the resolution to the twin’s hatred of eachother. They both now have the whole little busters team to support them now.
Nope! Still not refrain. Still have Kud, Kurugaya, and Rin’s route, and some minor common route items before we touch Refrain.
Still, I was glad they dealt with this route as they did. It was a relief, to be honest.
Me too. Haruka’s route was great in the VN, but it was just way too over dramatic about everything. Compared to that, JC Staff made Haruka’s arc into a masterpiece of subtlety.
If Kud’s route really does end on episode 23, then there won’t be enough room to tell the stories for both Rin’s and Kurugaya’s all in the remaining 3 episodes. Even if they rush it, at most Kurugaya would need at least 3 episodes, while Rin1+2 would need two episodes. To make matters worst, they haven’t done any kind of ‘head start’ for either of these arcs… I’m curious as to how they are going to end this season.
I haven’t played the visual novel, but i heard that next episode is officially the introduction into Kud’s arc. The beginning of her arc has a few comedy elements at first aimed at her bad english.
Sales for little busters seemed to be about 11,000+ the last time i checked for last week’s update on the DVD/BD sales.