All good things come to an end.
Impression
Maid Dragon is like a kotatsu. It’s warm, comfy, and life feels beautiful whilst you’re enjoying it. If you’ve never been under one before, it’s comparable to being in a warm bed on a cold winter’s morning. It’s happiness, but eventually you will have to muster the strength and willpower to leave. The snooze button on your phone will only come to your rescue so many times. Maid Dragon is the equivalent to a wonderful night’s sleep, but soon it will all come an end, and nobody can do anything about that. Not even KyoAni, given that Maid Dragon isn’t selling particularly well for some unexplainable reason (although sales aren’t as bad as they were for Phantom World). Maybe it might not be so bad leaving the kotatsu! After all, there are other great shows coming out in the near future. There could be delicious food to look forward to, or perhaps rooster wood carvings which are as perfectly crafted as I’m sure Violet Evergarden will be. But it won’t be the same. I’ll especially miss the tail jokes. I’ve come to like Maid Dragon a little too much, and it’s difficult to let go as a result. I wonder whether this is what Tooru will feel like when she inevitably outlives Kobayashi. I’m having to rewatch Kino to numb the pain.
The kotatsu scenes were great. Really low-key, but I loved how time kept passing and yet the only constants were Kobayashi, Tooru and Kanna lazily sitting under the kotatsu. I’d buy a Tooru nesoberi. I also loved the subtle changes to Tooru’s reactions when people kept interrupting her kotatsu time. From making sure to hide her tail every time she went to the door, to already having a bag of mochi when she answered it, ready to return the favour to whichever neighbour was stopping by to hand her a gift. I know the frustration, though. It’s like having to repeatedly get out of the shower or bath after having adjusted to the temperature of the water. Actually, maybe it’s not that bad. Cold air on wet skin is in a league of its own.
I was half expecting Tooru to have visited her parents somehow. I figured that discussion from the beach episode would worm its way in again, given that New Year’s is a time when you get together with family and celebrate, but it was surprisingly absent until Kobayashi got a call from home, with her family surprised at the fact that she’d sent a card over for the first time ever. It’s at times like these that you realise just how much Tooru and the rest of the dragons have enriched Kobayashi’s life. And I think the aim of the episode was for you, the viewer, to reflect on that without them shoving it down your throat through a series of flashbacks or explicit conversations about it. That’s exactly what I thought would happen when Kobayashi was reminiscing about her year, but it didn’t at all – she reminisced on her own, and that was supposed to encourage you to reminisce about your time watching Maid Dragon. With that in mind, it suddenly becomes clear why a New Year’s episode was put together for this point in the adaptation. Yes, even though we’re in March. I almost expected the little tagline for the episode title to say that, as banterous as KyoAni must be feeling these days (having completed production on Maid Dragon way back in February).
I don’t think I have much else to say this week. I’m on the Land of Prophecies in Kino, so I want to get back to that. The rest of this post will feature various kimono-clad chorogons that you may or may not feel like reacting to with impressed Kanna noises. Please brace yourself before gazing upon Lucoa. I’m pretty sure dressing like that is illegal somewhere. You have been warned.
