Almost There… (Nisemonogatari Episode 6 Review)

Cool Opening is cool

After 5 episodes of beating about, the show is almost getting somewhere.

The episode starts with Araragi taking a walk to Senjougahara’s house and meeting Hachikuji on the way. Instead of taking her down with some good ol’ sexual harassment, he just taps her on the shoulder, much to her disappointment. Somehow she actually preferred it when he sexually assaulted her and starts to condemn him for stopping.

Harsh...

The usual gag aside, Araragi talks about his sisters, complaining about their rashness and about how his sisters don’t realize that they’re still just kids. As he criticizes them, Hachikuji points out that he is actually very much like them in that he does what is right without thinking about it.

Right.

At Senjougahara’s house, Araragi finds her sharpening a lot of pencils. After the usual implication that she’s going to kill him, they sit down and talk about how they’re going to confront Kaiki. In the process, Senjougahara accidentally calls Hanekawa “Hanekawa-sama” in front of Araragi and leads us to think that Hanekawa is using her little blackmail trick to bully Senjougahara.

Pretty much sums up my reaction

Senjougahara starts talking about her past and getting closure on her past regrets. It sets the stage for the highly anticipated change of Senjougahara’s personality. I heard that at the end of the Karen Bee arc, Senjougahara will become a normal cheerful girl, but I’ll have to see it to believe it.

I can't imagine her stopping

She wants to finally move on by confronting Kaiki by herself, apparently he was the cause for her parent’s divorce and he conned a lot of money out of her father. Araragi insists that he accompanies her because Kaiki poisoned his sister, which she refuses  to allow because she thinks that Kaiki is too evil.

Pic Related

Araragi has a empathic monologue, realizing that Senjougahara never had closure before because she was being affected by the crab, which did not allow her to come to terms with her emotions. Araragi manages to convince her to  let him go by saying that they’ll be able to protect each other and playing his “I Love You” card, resulting in a stunned Senjougahara.

Priceless

Senjougahara allows him to come with her but makes him agree to a condition that she will only reveal after they finish dealing with Kaiki, the way she acts makes it look like the request is for him to sleep with her.

Hnnnnng

They arrange to meet up later and Araragi goes home, only to find that Karen has gone out while she was still sick. Instead of resting up before confronting Kaiki like Senjougahara suggested, he immediately goes out to look for her.

Does that mean she can sense all his other emotions?

Sensing his panic, Shinobu appears and offers her help in a tsundere way by saying that she cannot refuse Araragi’s requests. This backfires with him saying that he doesn’t want to force her against her will. She then explains that she was “tsundere-ing” so she could still appear high and mighty whist helping him, saving me the trouble of inferring it.

Must. Not. Get. Ideas.

Shinobu is able to track Karen by her blood scent and the episode ends with her pointing Araragi in the right direction.

I thought this episode was pretty satisfying even though nothing really happens because it tells us that we can expect a confrontation with Kaiki soon and we get to see Senjougahara being on the receiving end of sadism. I’d like to see Kaiki getting owned by Senjougahara and Karen in the next episode.

Also, when Senjougahara was talking about her past, a piano version of “Staple Stable” started to play, which I thought was a pretty nice touch.

If she ends up like this, I'm really looking forward to episode 7

Thanks for reading! From now on I’ll be doing the Nisemonogatari episodics because Sleepy has too many animes to cover.

I never thought that it was possible. Moe Senjougahara...

Now I’m gonna allow Slacker to add in some words, if this is blank, then he probably hasn’t woken up yet.

Sleepyslacker: Ok, it is completely not what you think. Free threatened me at knife point and forced me to do it! (actually no, it was gun-point) Firstly, no I did not give it up because I dislike the show, I love it a lot. But seeing that I do quite a lot of reviews is affecting my study schedule and plus I want Free to do more posts. So it is killing two chickens with on knife. But of course I will be giving my opinions because I just love this show too much. Again the quirky conversations are the key of this show are the main focus and this time is no exception with Mayoi rejecting Araragi for not sexual harrasing her. Pity right? Senjougahara’s part was entertaining as well but the main part is Shinobu. The relationship both of them have is at its best with them deciding to work together. Great cliffhanger ending and wow, I cannot wait to see Kaiki’s face when Shinobu and Araragi show up.

My final words? FREE! WHY YOU STILL MY TRADEMARK ENDING???