Katanagatari – 01



Whoa! I didn’t expect Katanagatari to have episodes of 50 minutes. That seals the deal for me: I’m going to blog it. I very much approve of this longer pause between episodes. Series like Votoms’ Pailsen Files, Figure 17, Blade of the Immortal and Marie & Gali also had this, and they became very entertaining to watch in their own ways, simply because the creators had more time to refine their episodes.

My biggest fear before starting this series was obviously the director of School Days who got appointed behind this, not to mention that the animation company behind it has only done Tears to Tiara, which apparently was mediocre at best (though I dropped it after 1 episode). Still, for now I’ll just see this as another case of Casshern Sins, in which the director of various Dragonball Z movies ended up making such a beautiful series. And yeah, I guess that we should at least be glad that Shinbo didn’t also get this series. This episode wasn’t just “okay”; I very much enjoyed it.

This series is a bit of an homage to the shounen genre, it has many elements of a shounen series, and yet it isn’t exactly a shounen series. It includes fights, it makes fun of the “Hah! I’m about to kill you but let me just stand here and let you finish whatever conversation you’re having!”-trope, it also pokes fun at how fights like these tend to go on for ages just because the characters won’t shut up talking, it features teenagers who fall in love with each other quite quickly, but at the same time there are also tons of quiet scenes, in which people just sit in a room talking for more than ten minutes, straight on; which is something you won’t find in any other shounen-series, and is actually more seinen.

Overall, what I liked most about this first episode was the build-up: I’m really surprised at how well this episode built up its tension through the incredibly long dialogues in the beginning, and the more action-packed yet still dialogue-filled second half. The animation was also simple where it needed to be, and detailed where it needed to be, though aside from its crispness and unique look nothing special. What I did like was the subtle sense of humour oft his episode, in which the creators liked to insert a joke right in the middle of a character’s speech. It keeps you on your toes and it adds an interesting flavor to the whole script.

It was quite a bit of a challenge to follow this episode raw (to all the fansubbers and typesetters planning to go for this series: good luck), but i like challenges like these once in a while. I’m not sure what it is exactly, but I seem to have some weird fascination with watching dialogue-filled series in raw, trying to keep up with the Japanese even though my own Japanese is far from perfect.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

30 thoughts on “Katanagatari – 01

  1. “it also pokes fun at how fights like these tend to go on for ages just because the characters won’t shut up talking,”

    After watching Bakemonogatari and reading Zaregoto (good shit) he might not be poking fun at things with long conversations.. that’s kinda what Nisio does… have long ass conversations.. except of course in his manga Medaka Box.. but that’s because it runs in Weekly Shounen Jump.

  2. Yeah it’s pretty much Nishio’s style to transmit everything he has to say via talking.
    I still have to try his Zaregoto series, as both Bakemonogatari (because it doesn’t offer that much more over the anime) and Katanagatari can’t keep me hooked with it’s plot, but I heard from a friend that he likes to narrate his stories via his characters.
    Instead of having a narrator explain most of it he has internal monologues, external monologues, dialogues, incomprehensible talk and techno babble…

    I also like series with a good amount of talking (like Bakemonogatari, Mouryou no Hako or Durarara when it’s serious), but somehow the adaption of Katanagatari still fails to impress me as it was adapted in such a dull fashion.
    I had the feeling I could have been listening to a drama CD as well, visually nothing interesting at all happened.

  3. While Tears to Tiara had such a cheezy, boring and disjointed plot I couldn’t keep watching it, visually it was quite beautiful. Gorgeous character designs, large, detailed backgrounds, etc. So, I wouldn’t take the animation company as a strike against it, and you are right, thank God Shaftbo didn’t get ahold of this. Otherwise, it would just be naked six year olds for fifty minutes once a month.

  4. [quote]thank God Shaftbo didn’t get ahold of this[/quote]

    Oh yeah, because Shaft has so much to do with Mina being naked in ‘Dance’…because the original is as pure as snow >_>

    I found their adaption of Bakemonogatari just right…had it been like this I may have dropped it, too, and started reading the novel.

  5. This first episode hit the spot for me somehow. Unusual sense of humor and simple but cute art style. I can also see what chounoke means by dull though: if there is going to be a lot of action in this series, i don’t know if the simplistic art and lack of tension will work out. Though, if sword play remains a side-issue and the series focuses on comedy and dialogue instead, I think it has potential.

  6. You should get into the Zaregoto novel chounokoe, IIRC you’re an Umineko fan so the closed room mystery of Zaregoto Vol 1 might appeal to you.

    With each passing day I get more impressed by Zaregoto… and damn Aikawa Jun for only showing up in the epilogue.. but what a showing…

    I really hope a top tier studio gets Zaregoto one day, Nisio’s masterpiece needs to be animated.

  7. As I mentioned in that particular episode’s comments, One, Shaft and Shinbo have a choice over what they choose to animate. Two, Shinbo has shown he has a thing for way overdoing the loli thing before. Three, it was more the way the scene was portrayed and sexualized that made it so disgusting, this is something the director definitely has control over. And I’m not a prude, but portraying prepubescent girls in a realistic and sexualized, tittilating manner is disgusting. It’s different from cute, moe cartoony looking loli’s.

  8. Subs are out. What a disappointment, I went expecting a good solid adventure and they give me this mediocre attempt of parody with average animation and dialogues that try to be funny while they are just garbage.

    This has to be one of the worst anime seasons ever. The only decent show is Baccano Season Two aka Durarara

  9. About a possible adaption of Zaregoto… I think it’s quite impossible to pull that. One volume is as long as one whole half of Bakemonogatari and they couldn’t even fit both parts into a regular 12 episodes series. The Zaregoto series without its spin-off Ningen series spans 9 volumes. So as you see it’s pretty impossible as long as that anime wouldn’t be exceptionally long… which just doesn’t happen with adaptions nowadays.

    Apart from that the whole way of narration in the novels is pretty difficult to adapt into another medium. First-person narrative, loads of monologue and dialogue… without any significant action. Well, it is mystery and 推理 after all even considering the other aspects and Nishio’s style and personal wit.

    I know they seem to able to pull Katanagatari but you have to keep in mind that Katana volumes only have about 240 single-colum pages while the Zaregoto volumes have an average of about 380 double-column pages…

    As for the episode itself… well, it’s just not my setting/story. The dialogue was ok but I still don’t get what possessed Nishio and coerced him into writing something like this considering his usual stuff and his overall style… IMO the setting just doesn’t suit the writing and/or vice versa.

    It might just have been some sort of challenge for him (publishing one book every month and all) but I might just as well ignore the novels since I have enough other books to read (including my outstanding Zaregoto volumes) and only watch the anime for the sake of becoming familiar with the content.

  10. i simply liked it and i don’t care negative opinions , i loved it , because it of it i always watch anime first and read opinions second and my opinion withouth influences is this show is gooddddddd

  11. Finally got to watch this and I’m quite impressed. Interesting enough plot, and though on the surface it is your classic quest for objects of power, there are enough original aspects to it to let me know this won’t just be a generic quest story. The characters are so quirky and, rendered real by their very eccentricity. Both male and female protagonists have intriuging motivations that feel “special” for lack of a better word, a step above the usual motives, without falling into the “brooding anti-hero” trap so many shows that try to make compelling characters fall into. Not that anti-hero’s can’t be done well, they can and their are many I love, but so often they are actually quite shallow and their very darkness is just a lazy attempt at making them appear deep. These characters are, instead, deep by making choices and having motivations that are not what you expect them to say or do. The dialogue, its witty, though not the funniest thing I’ve ever watched, and though it is wordy, it isn’t extremely smart or intellectual like mouryou no hakko, but it is refreshingly original and clever. I wouldn’t exactly call this parody, though sometimes there are a few self-referential fourth-wall moments where clearly the show is parodying itself and thus, parodying all action/adventure anime. While the long talks during the fight aren’t exactly parody either, what they are is purposefully, and blatantly unrealistic, and we are brought into the know with the author, that this is literary and not to be taken as realistic, in order to engage in a sort of verbal swordplay serving as counterpoint while the battle itself is point. It’s a stylistic choice that I found immensely novel and refreshing. While I realize the author’s other works, like Bakemonogatari, use a variation of this dialogue style, in Bake;s adaptation at least, it was never quite this smoothly done, blending action and language into an indivisible singularity. And the visual direction was stylish and quite beautiful too look at, even if everything was drawn simply and there was nothing extraordinary about the animation. So, I dig Katanagatari, and in this season, that’s a good thing. Winter 2010 needs all the good shows it can get.

  12. @PL: Seriously? There’s nothing smooth or witty about the dialogue in this episode. Can we, as a collective, stop throwing around words without carefully thinking through what we mean?

    At what point was Katanagatari witty? Its dialogue was, minus a (very forced) joke here and there, completely exposition. Exposition is very rarely witty, and it isn’t in Katanagatari.

    Smooth? That’s so vague I really have to try to interpret it. I’m also having trouble interpreting it as a necessarily good thing. Why can’t rough dialogue be good?

    “Blending action and language into an indivisible singularity”? You’re kidding me. This is how the fights went down. They attack. They stop. They talk. Repeat.

    Also: EXPOSITION IS NOT VERBAL SWORDPLAY. Explaining what attack you are going to use is not verbal swordplay. It is not witty. It is not interesting. It is a medium for lazy animators and lazy viewers.

    It’s still too early to tell, I suppose. But, not too impressed with this episode.

  13. You clearly weren’t paying close attention, because the dialogue was almost always witty. Most of that “exposition” you’re complaining about was said as part of the repaste. It was almost always said either tongue-in-cheek, or as part of the deadpan humor this show excels at. These were some examples:

    He has memorized a list of things he is supposed to ask if a person ever shows up on the island, because he’s
    never actually met anyone before, what is carried out without thought in a normal conversation is awkward and
    stilted, yet carried on in perfect deadpan seriousness.

    Togame thinks out loud, the sort of thoughts we usually hear narrated in the character’s voice but intended to be
    understood as thought silently.

    When Nanami explains that Kyotouryu means “Flow of the Empty Sword,” a “hidden” sword style that uses no sword,
    which is the deadliest of all sword styles.
    though this is really more Verbal Irony than it is wit, it’s still funny, especially in the very serious voice
    Nanami uses.

    When Nanami questions Togame about attacking her brother, and she says she wanted to see “Kyotouryu in action,”
    which is supposed to be this extremely deadly technique, then immediately follows that with “but I’m not used to
    that sort of thing, I’m a stategian, not a swordsman” (Brilliant strategy, attacking a master warrior when you
    have zero skill and training, just to “see it in action”). Then, when Shichika says it was impressive, meaning
    the trip and fall, she actually brags about having practiced it. That, is witty. But the hilarious part comes
    next, when Nanami invites her to try testing him again, telling her she was lucky she tripped, in a
    totally serious voice, she says the words of this little girl are good enough proof…

    The part when she asks him if he wants to rule the world, assumes he said yes, goes on and on, then realizes he
    said no. Her tone of voice is what carries this joke, but the wit is in the dialogue itself, where she tells
    basically tells all the reasons no one would ever say no, then realizes he just did.

    Nanami explains that they don’t know anything about the world, and can’t understand wordy language, and Togame,
    getting it completely backwards, says, “In that place, could you please leave?” heh Then, Shichika says
    “That would be useless.” Correctly implying there would be no reason for her to leave, then proceeds to give two
    reasons that have nothing to do with it being useless, one of which is that “he’s bad at thinking.” The punchline,
    though, is when Togame says she’ll continue “under the promise of confidentiality,” as if the sister, who is
    stranded on the island, could EVER tell anyone, which is the real reason asking her to leave was pointless.

    And that was just in the first ten minutes or so. As far as the fighting goes, there was actually only a small portion of the dialogue during battle that had anything to do with “explaining what attack you are going to do” and that was always done in the self-parody, self-referential sense I mentioned in the first post as being key to the shows humor. The majority of the dialogue during combat was about the motivations of the various characters, and while they did attack, then stop and talk, as you say, the dialogue was just as much the battle as the fighting, which is what I meant by action and language as “indivisible singularity” and verbal swordplay.
    Some examples of this from the battle scenes toward the end of the episode:

    When Koumori transforms into Togame, comes running up to get in close to Shichika before attacking, and Shichika
    kicks him. Then, as Koumori is wondering how he was recognized, he discovers that because Shichika has never seen
    people before he can’t tell them apart anyway, and just kicked, then he makes the comment, well, she asked for
    a flashy move, but in the end it turned out kind of boring…

    As Koumori explains the real reasons for Togame’s quest, and he learns that she lied to him, and plans to use him
    to get revenge on the very Shogun his father helped defend, his father who killed Togame’s father in that defense,
    through a very strange twist in logic, actually falls in love with her, when her earlier, very very clumsy
    attempt to make him fall for her had no effect whatsoever, words meant to turn him against her actually cause him
    fall in love with her.

    Shichika assumes that because Koumori is imitating his body, he has also inherited the same clumsiness with
    sword-handling, however, this truly mixed-up logic, turns out to be right, as Shichika’s poor logic seems to all
    the time. Then the real punchline, Kyotouryu, the way of the sword that doesn’t use swords, isn’t because they
    don’t use swords, it is because they can’t.

    So, then he tells Koumori that now he’ll use a flashy move, and calls it Ultimate Secret Technique. Then he says
    that he used such a generic name because he just came up with it yesterday, but that the oponent “takes 7 hits
    from this secret technique” and “gets split into 8 pieces.” So he renames it “Shichika Hachiretsu” or Seven Hits, Eight Pieces…even more generic

    The language and dialogue is used very cleverly throughout the entire episode, and while it wasn’t hilarious most of the time, and it wasn’t extremely intelligent, it was both witty and clever. And as for smooth, I didn’t say the dialogue was “smooth,” I said the dialogue and action were more smoothly integrated than in bakemonogatari, and this is a good thing, because it is what creates the whole effect I’m trying to describe here. I realize that it takes a certain level of verbal sophistication to recognize what I’m referring to, but before you go criticizing someone’s word choice, and trying to argue that they don’t know what wit is, you should look a little more closely. You’ve clearly missed a number of aspects to the dialogue, because they weren’t laid right out in the open, and focused on the dialog as exposition, which was really only a small part of what it was doing. If anything, the exposition was actually characterization disguised as exposition. I’m not asking you to like this show, or its sense of humor, but ask somebody for some examples or something the next time you aren’t seeing what they are seeing, before you claim they don’t know how to use a term. And of course, me explaining it and describing and quoting it here takes most of the wind out of the sails, but maybe if you know what to look for now you can re-watch it and get a better understanding of what I mean.

  14. Jesus fucking Christ, that’s overanalysis if I’ve ever seen it. First, I’m not reading all that, because you’re basically just stating the obvious and hoping it comes across as deep. How long did you spend typing that, by the way? Seriously. I mean, if I tried hard enough I could make Bleach sound like a fucking masterpiece. What is this, a fucking high school English paper?

    Second, the dialogue and action weren’t smoothly integrated.

    Third, get off your fucking high horse. Verbal sophistication? Please.

    Fifth, I’m drunk. kthxbai

  15. re: first) yeah, accuse someone of not knowing what they are talking about and then when they respond with a well-reasoned arguement accuse them of “overanalysis” and refuse to read it. That’s a brilliant arguement. That took about ten minutes, and it isn’t a paper or I’d have corrected my grammar and spelling. heh. I do have degrees in english and philosophy, with graduate work in education and psychology, so yeah, I’m gonna be able to offer up a well-thought out defense to back up a statement I make about the literary merits of a work. BTW, I didn’t claim it was deep, the opposite in fact, but I did say it was refreshing, witty and clever, and it is.

    re: second) you’re still missing the point

    re: third) You, my friend, are the one on the high horse, since it was you who decided to try to talk down to me like I didn’t know what witty meant. Just because the wit went way over your head doesnt mean it wasnt there. I just attempted to show it was, and back up my earlier claim.

    re: fourth) oh, wait, you skipped to fifth, I guess counting is beyond you too?

    re: fifth) Well, that explains things…What the hell are you doing on a blog about anime? Go get laid or something. Party on.

  16. This blog is bizario world, FMP season 1 > TSR and Katanagatari > Bakemonogatari? Wtf is next? Double Zeta > Zeta?

  17. @ Jake

    You don’t have to be impressed by Katanagari, it’s pretty much considered Nisio’s failure. Prior to Bakemongatari’s anime it was generally considered

    Zaregoto >>> Bakemonogatari >>>>>>>>>>>>> Katanagatari.

    Here’s a Nisio characters poll from 2007

    http://img52.imageshack.us/img52/8919/rankb.jpg

    Hitagi = 5th, Araragi = 13th. Zaregoto and its spinoff dominate.

  18. A decent first ep, and the plot and characters intrigue me enough to continue on with the series. Visually, I like the character designs and animation. The music is also very well done. The character personalities are fairly good too for a series like this.

    That said, I couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed that the dialogue wasn’t as smart or deep as it could have been, for all the screen time the characters have. The talking during the fights was a bit over the top but I suppose that was the point. I was also under the impression that this series would be a bit more serious in its direction going by the trailers and the awesome music but that wasn’t the case either with all the classic anime comedic pratfalls and 4th wall winks at the audience poking fun at the genre.

    But if the series can make smarter use of its characters and longer running time we may have a decent anime on our hands.

  19. @PL

    I agree with Jake that I do believe that you are over analyzing. Unfortunately our friend Jake has proven himself to be an idiot so I have decided to at least try to explain what it is like to watch this episode when you don’t have a degree in English and philosophy.

    Now I went into this blind. So I didn’t know that this was written by the same person who wrote Bakemonogatari or that it was even a parody. So I was judging this as a serious anime. Halfway through I realized that it was supposed to be not taken seriously. Which comes to the same reason I didn’t like Bakemonogatari.
    This sort of humor may work very well written down but when it translates into screen it sort of loses it’s charm. Like the way that Hitchhikers guide to the galaxy film was never as funny as the books despite using the same jokes. Having characters say almost every line with a deadpan seriousness kills the joke. It’s the same as a comedian telling all his jokes on stage with a monotone voice. It also makes the characters very wooden. So far it seems that no matter what happens the characters barely react at all. And when they do react that reaction is gone immediately once conversation starts up again.

    I am guessing that the storyline is so generic because it is a parody. Typical hero, typical love interest, typical talkative villain etc. I do admit that there does seem to be something different about this show. However at the moment I don’t really see anything praiseworthy or original for that matter. It’s a show that mocks typical anime. That’s been done before.

  20. I think that most of the humor only works because it is deadpan, and perhaps that kind of humor isn’t too many people’s liking. Personally, it is amongst my favorite. And I think what makes this anime different from your average parody, is that it is really mocking itself more than mocking a genre or artistic medium. It does take its story seriously, but at the same time, it consistently reminds us not to do so (take it seriously). It’s treading a very fine line, and so far it is doing so adeptly. It’s not deep, and it isn’t hilarious, but what it does do well is provide a refreshing voice and style that are very enjoyable. They are taking a fairly generic shonen quest story and through authoral voice and stylistic choice, creating something that still manages to emerge as its own entity, despite appearing to be a walking cliche on the surface. Katanagatari is by no means a masterpiece, but it is, so far, an enjoyable tale with many merits, an excellent sense of timing, and a unique voice which does an excellent job of creating tension between language and action which drive each other for a greater impact. If the characters are developed well, so that we, the audience, can become a little more emotionally involved in them, this really will be one of the few highlights of Winter 2010.

  21. @PL

    (Sighs)…..well. I tried.
    We are talking from two different viewpoints and I find it hard to explain my point of view. You like it and that’s fine. I don’t and will probably soon drop it. However I do plan to stick through three or four more episodes because I have this rule that I wont give an anime the thumbs down until I give it a decent shot.

    Seeya.

  22. Just watched it, nice show…

    I liked the action scenes, specially the “Flashy Move” at the end…

    but GOOD LORD, the CHATTING goes on and on during battle, it’s way longer than needless xD

  23. i agree, i was facinated by the first 2 episodes and began watching this serie. but episode 7 was too disappointing. before this ep the battles was in more detail and exciting, but in ep 7 the battles just went by. you couldn’t grasp anything, it just went by. the animation was poorly made and had lost what that made me fall for this serie.

    i hope the next one has it, or i dont think i can continue watching this serie. because i keep expecting the next to be as good as the previous one

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