Dear friends, this season I have taken up the gauntlet of covering Kamisama Hajimemashita in lieu of Eva because I am far crankier than she is. There are two things to say about that though: 1. I have not read the manga in about a year because of controversial chapters and scanlator issues (I used to translate them for myself but I stopped going to the bookstore which meant no more copies of the manga raw) 2. I have recently become more familiar with the show since receiving it as a gift, so it’s hard for me to comparatively say one is better than the other for the moment. Hopefully this results in a more balanced perspective.
Right away there’s good and bad. Namely that for this section of the manga, I know pretty much everything. I’m almost positive I recognize everyone from the opening? I’m worried about the pacing but I am almost positive I can recognize the ARCs from the opening characters, and the one or two I’ve forgotten are probably just from not reading in so long woops. But the good news is AKURA OH AKURA OH AKURA AKURA OH
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I HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR YOU BABE. This is the penultimate evil of this show, not quite the actual destructive force at every moment but when he actually appears he is ferocious. Do they intend to catch up to where Julietta is, rearrange, or what? I hope they won’t lose the pacing because if they do the pacing well the best part of the manga can be showcased in part two of the anime. And well, whadya know, it’s off to a good start.
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Otohiko the wind god shows up to tell Nanami she can go to Izumo, where a very fancy God meeting occurs, if she passes a test. Initially she refuses but her sympathy and love for Tomoe prompts her to accept in hopes they might find out where Mikage has disappeared to as Tomoe misses him. Oops, I forgot how much I love this entire story premise. Many times has the yokai with a girl thing been done, but so seldom is it done in a way that Kamisama Hajimemashita does. Nanami usually says and does what a normal girl with actual pride would do, rather than just meekly accept everything put in front of her.
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So her test turns out to be- grow a shikigami. How this is handled always amused the hell out of me. Think Yu Yu Hakusho but completely invert it, the spirit egg Yusuke grew was bad at first right? Well, in Kamisama Mizuki accidentally steps on it the first night and it prematurely hatches into an adorable monkey. I do not say this lightly I hate monkeys ew. Anyway, despite that Tomoe fights her, her main concern is that she wants to go to Izumo on her own strength and now borrowing Tomoe’s. That is why this anime/manga is amazing, Nanami may be weaker but she is not about to just accept it and be constantly saved.
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I can say this, this much I remember from the manga and I like. I really, really liked watching this. Mostly I am in extreme anticipation of watching this adaptation get to what’s coming next. Man, I am so hoping it. This story gets so good and the anime didn’t do a bad job this episode of showing it. There’s always something to be wary of in an adaptation, but this episode actually left me with a good feeling because I remembered they basically adapted most of it from the manga that I remember, but I haven’t read it in awhile so who knows. All I can say is that objectively, it was a good story and Nanami and Tomoe shined once again as protagonists. Using her Shikigami, Nanami actually gets to shine in a way most Shoujo protagonist don’t- literally.
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And let me tell you, the show is handling one very important aspect extraordinarily well. There is some very vital stuff going on for Tomoe in his head right now and given that non-canon kiss last season it is extremely fitting they did it. I can kind of forgive the mistakes they did if they keep on with the foreshadowing right now? Tomoe is remembering something he has forgotten, and it’s something very important to the overall plot, and the theme of the story. There will be consequences soon enough, but for now Nanami is headed to Izumo and that means more gods. . .plus. .
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. . .it means meeting someone very important. . .the same person who woke mysteriously from the visions of Akura-oh, a man deeply connected to Tomoe. He appears human, but is that so? I rate the season premiere of Kamisama Hajimemashita a 7, not enough to erase some of the flaws in the prequel anime but a good sign that perhaps the first Season will be a little bit better to watch when it’s companion sequel is done. Let’s hope for the best!
Oki
Wait, the anime is still all the way back there? Geeze, it’s got forever and a day to go before it starts even getting close to dealing with Nanami and Tomoe’s story. There’s like… four seasons (at least) worth of content between here and anything important.
…Well, no, it’s all important, because it all builds from itself to help everyone grow, but if you want Nanami’s story to actually go anywhere in this season they’re going to have to skip most of the manga.
PS: I’m not going to watch this. I enjoyed the manga thoroughly (until something bad happened in the early 100’s that upset me greatly and also happened to be the last published chapter, and since then I haven’t gone back to it), and I don’t feel like seeing them try to adapt it.
Their adaptation stuff is slow honestly, but there is some content I think they’ll get to like some of the time travel I want to see. But they also fuck up and speed up some stuff so I think that will happen? I think there is a fair chance of some content.
I agree I feel a little uncomfortable. Namely I need the manga to be over so all the gross risque stuff is dealt with because Julietta never seems to just let it happen and has a really good follow up to whatever Akura oh did to Nanami and Tomoe comforted her very well. Once the mangas over and we know the ending is good and all that’s over, I think I’ll feel a little better.
Eeeeeh!? I hadn’t realized people received certain events in the manga so poorly that it actually caused them to drop the story. It’s not as though anything seriously bad happened in the end (although ‘seriously bad’ is pretty subjective). I for one felt that people (readers and Nanami alike) were getting too comfortable with Akura-oh’s presence and seemed to be forgetting what awful things he’s capable of. I imagine the bad turn of events was intended to serve as a wake-up call of sorts. I’m sad to learn of this in any case- just before Ami x Kurama (my OTP!!) gots some development, people stop reading TT.TT…
But I should talk about the episode! The pacing was fast, but no faster than the S1 premiere. I’ll forgive them since they’re surely just excited to reach Izumo. I really enjoyed the new OP and ED themes- more emotion to them compared to S1 I suppose. Aaaah, and it was really heartwarming to see Nanami’s cleansing with Mamoru in action! They totally skipped over a certain character from the manga, and while she’s not particularly important as far as current manga events are concerned, I do wonder what they’re going to do about the appearance of another character (Izanami)…well, things should become clear after another episode or two.
All in all, this episode was not without faults but I’m willing to overlook them ^^ I’m sure it will be an enjoyable ride in any case (I being one who didn’t really hate S1, I just felt they should have done this and that differently…but it was very popular on Funi’s streaming site and here we are with S2 so all’s well that ends well!)
Honestly what Akura-Oh did on top of the fact that I’m not even sure if or if it [spoiler[wasn’t rape outright, really sours some things for me. Like how would I put it? In shoujo manga rape needs to be handled delicately. If say, Nakago had ACTUALLY raped Miaka I think that would’ve made more sense story wise. It would’ve fit for his character, and then his resulting trauma from PTSD would’ve been interesting. But Akura oh out of no where with no context outright raping Nanami? [/spoiler] It kind of ruins the feeling in that regard.
Second. . I’m not a fan of all the minor character content? I feel if Julietta sensei really wanted to tell people about other’s in the story for more than 5 chapters it should’ve been a spin off. I got invested for Tomoe and Nanami and don’t get me wrong, some side story is absolutely appropriate and some is ridiculously overextended.
I’m fairly certain we might see Izanami. IF we don’t ..well……..won’t surprise me. This anime cuts and clips a lot.
Oki, I can’t see what you have in that spoiler tag. I thought it was my browser at first, but I disabled all my script blocking here and I still can’t see anything. It looks empty.
@Noc: From my perspective it’s not so much that I dropped the manga as that it dropped itself. When I first found the manga, I read it rhough in the space of a few days, and after 100 chapters of… stuff everything was finally going well. Nanami was becoming a powerful kami, worthy of her title, she and Tomoe had acknowledged their love for each other and were finally together properly, Tomoe’s old master whose name escapes me at the moment had even returned and was hanging around to help out with things in case of emergencies… everything was good. And then the LAST chapter, the final chapter that had been released, was that… incident with Akura Oh. It was shocking and upsetting, it was nonsensical from a story standpoint because by that time Nanami had become powerful enough in her own right to have forced better terms, it was a horrific case of mood whiplash, and it was, when I was reading it, WHERE THE STORY STOPPED.
It was my final memory of the series. Until that point I had read it all in one big bunch. After that, stopping THERE, with THAT being the thing that played through my mind any time I thought of the series, I had no motivation to return and see what would happen next, because the emotions that ended up associated with the series were based on the last part of it I had seen before the sudden long break.
The series dropped itself. It did something horrible to a character I cared strongly about, and then LEFT things there for long enough that that became the thing my emotions associated with the series. So I haven’t gone back to it. I haven’t wanted to. I don’t know what happened since. I no longer care. it doesn’t matter if things have gotten better. IT TOOK TOO LONG..
I feel the same way. Although I regularly check out the raws, I can tell you that I am not really a “fan” of the series anymore. I am more of a casual reader now. And it’s sad because I truly loved this series.
It feels as if the story is a bit in a rut, and that unfortunate event to have happen certainly didn’t help- at all. Like you said, it was dragged out for too long and before we knew it, a lot of us ending up dropping it by default because it doesn’t appeal/interest us enough anymore. Looking at the latest raws though, I think it is safe to say the present arc is probably the semi-final arc to take place as the little shady shit is finally revealing his true colors. The only thing we can hope for is that the present dark/gloomier arc will have a good pay-off.
But will say this: Ever since, it has not been that lovely fluffy story we all loved. 🙁 What I’d do to see fluff and happiness again….
It’s not even just fluff, it’s the depth of their love that’s taking a sidestep to bullshit.
Ugh, for some reason the spoiler tag ruins it but yeah, basically what you said. It’s . . .it just felt needless in this manga. There was no foreshadowing of that, it just felt like a tool. I’m tempted to cut out most content cause otherwise it’s brilliant.