クラナド Episode 20

SPOILER Summary:

Tomoya (Okazaki) finds Nagisa practicing out in front of the bakery one evening and gives her a bit of a hard time about being out there alone. She comes off as depressed by what he says, leading Tomoya to backtrack, which in turn leads Nagisa to reveal she’s teasing him since she’s used to the way he speaks to her. He’s a bit embarrassed by this, but she wants him to be who he is. He asks her about the play and she recites a bit of the story she remembers as light appears to shine up to her.

In Mystery Land, Mystery Girl and Junk-bot have just completed a second Junk-bot. However, it will not move nor respond in any way. Mystery girl sheds a tear for Junk-bot and apologizes to it.

Back in the real world, Tomoya observes Sanae-san fleeing the bakery in tears about her bread being rejected as Akio-san chases after her. When he returns, Akio-san tells the inquiring Tomoya about the rainbow bread that Sanae-san made, which a customer refused. Tomoya asks about Nagisa’s childhood story, but Akio-san doesn’t remember having a book about that story, or having ever heard of said story. Akio-san cautions Tomoya, who’s determined to find the story, not to tell Nagisa or Sanae-san anything if Tomoya should find something without clearing it with him first. Tomoya goes and finds Sanae-san, who also doesn’t recall any books or stories like Tomoya describes, especially since it appears to be a sad story. She does suggest he check the house completely in case its something they’ve forgotten.

At school, Sunohara and Tomoya pay Yukine-chan a visit in the library. She doesn’t have a book like the one Tomoya describes, though she does have plays, which aren’t going to help Tomoya. Sunohara decides he needs a charm for girls, so Yukine-chan gives him one, saying that after he completes it, the first girl that talks to him will be interested in him romantically. He completes the ritual, but no girl talks with him. As Sunohara does this. Tomoya and Yukine discuss the initial stages of a boy and girl liking each other and the steps to take. She immediately knows that Tomoya is referring to Nagisa, though he never says her name. She offers her advice and upon seeing Nagisa outside the window approaching their building, she convinces Tomoya to perform the same charm ritual as Sunohara. He reluctantly does, and immediately upon exiting the library, he runs into Fuko-chan. Tomoya immediately takes humorous steps to keep her from saying anything to him, for reasons unknown to him, not wanting to be romantically linked with this strange girl he can’t remember. Having sent Fuko-chan away, he turns to move again, to find Nagisa there. Nagisa speaks to Tomoya, causing him to immediately remember Yukine-chan’s words, stating that the first girl to speak with him is the girl who cares about him.

The Theater Club meet and Nagisa tells the story she remembers from childhood (not remembering from where she heard it). There was a girl who was all alone in the world. Because it was sad and lonely for her, she decided to make a friend — a doll made of junk. The doll began to move and respond to the girl upon being completed. As such, the girl was no longer lonely. Having ended the story, Tomoya realizes that he knows this story somehow.

Back at Nagisa’s place, she and Tomoya are in the shed looking for a book or something with the story that Nagisa remembers. Akio-san is not pleased with their search efforts and shoos them out, telling them to go flirt like normal teenagers before realizing what he’s said. Later in the shop, Akio-san informs Tomoya that he’ll tell him something that Tomoya can’t reveal to either Nagisa nor Sanae-san. After some comedic missteps where Akio-san nearly lets the cat out of the bag, he and Tomoya are on the roof to have their discussion. Akio-san reveals that when Nagisa was young, she nearly died. At that time, Sanae-san was a middle school teacher pursuing her dream and Akio-san was pursuing his dream as well. So when Nagisa got very ill with a high fever one day, both parents felt it would be OK to leave Nagisa home alone for a few hours as they did their normal daily routine of work. When Akio-san came home that winter’s afternoon, he found Nagisa collapsed face-down in the snow.

 Feeling that God was punishing them for leaving their daughter alone and that he might take her, when Nagisa got better, both Akio-san and Sanae-san promised never to abandon her again. As such, they decided to open a bread shop (bakery) because Sanae-san felt confident she could make good bread. Since her creations are pretty bad, Akio-san learned bread making from scratch and though it was a rough few years at first, eventually things worked out well. Tomoya realizes that this is what Nagisa was referring to when she told him she felt like she was somehow responsible for something bad happening to her parents. Akio-san isn’t ready to tell Nagisa this story just yet, despite Tomoya’s assurances that she’s a stronger person than she used to be. However, Akio-san does plan to tell her someday, but since their mementos of that time are stored in the shed, he’d rather Nagisa not see them now.

Later at the dinner table, Akio-san announces he has a plan for Sunday and reveals his three choices — picnic, piku piku (which means “to twitch”), and picric acid. Nagisa has no idea what the third choice means, so Sanae-san explains it to her. She chooses option one, but her father says that’s wrong, stating that his plan was to have everyone twitch on Sunday. Sanae-san ignores his bad joke and tells Nagisa they’ll go on a picnic. She says she’ll make a bento for the picnic, requesting that Tomoya make a suggestion to her for what he’d like to eat. After witnessing more family antics resulting from the planned picnic, Tomoya find himself reflecting on this after he goes to bed. As such, he decides to flee to Sunohara’s room to avoid going on the picnic. Sunohara tells him that Nagisa will be sad and worried, but Tomoya thinks he has that covered with the note he left. Sunohara tells him that won’t do. Tomoyo cites how Nagisa has become a stronger person, but Sunohara counters, saying the strength comes from Tomoya, and that his leaving as he did will cause that strength to go away. Sunohara further reflects on how Tomoya initially ran away from his home to stay at Nagisa’s home and is running away from Nagisa’s home.

Hearing this, Tomoya rethinks his plan and returns to Nagisa’s house. She and her parents had been looking for him. Nagisa never saw his letter and Akio-san dryly remarks on how he’d eaten the letter as a side-dish at breakfast. Because Tomoya has made them late, Akio-san tells him that he has no choice but to spend the rest of the day with the family. They go to a park with a baseball diamond where a lot of kids are playing. Akio-san is batting and gets a hit. While on first base, he calls back to Sanae-san, asking if she saw his hit. She confirms she did and he asks if she’s fallen in love with him again. She confirms that as well.

After Tomoya has some of the bento that Nagisa made, he’s up to bat, unsure if he can get a hit with his bad arm. However, he too is able to get a hit. Like Akio-san, Tomoya calls back to Nagisa to proudly ask if she saw his hit, which she confirms. Akio-san asks if Nagisa has fallen in love with Tomoya again, which she starts to confirm. She flushes and stammers at making such a revelation as does Tomoya while Akio-san cries out is frustration over his daughter being in love with the brat. However, he recovers and has Nagisa come up to bat next. Somehow, she too gets a hit and as Akio-san and Tomoya start running to the next base, Tomoya tells Nagisa to run as well, which she happily does, heading for first base.

Thoughts:

KYAAAA! Man, I love this series. I really, really like the love story between Tomoya and Nagisa. Its sweet and wholesome and just so enjoyable to watch. Nagisa is helping Tomoya grow as a person and he’s helping her do the same. I just feel good watching them together, so much that I am worried about the rug being pulled out from under the story. Hopefully, this will have a “good end,” as the Japanese say.

Fuko-chan had a good cameo this time. I had a nice chuckle when Tomoya kept her from saying anything to prevent her from being the one who would be interested in him romantically.

As to Mystery Girl and Junk-bot, they are finally starting to make sense, being the story that Nagisa remembered from her childhood. Interesting that neither Sanae-san nor Akio-san remembered said story. When Nagisa told the Theater Club about it and the camera view focused on Kotomi first, I remembered how her parents were looking into that Illusionary World. Considering that Okazaki seems to somehow know the story, maybe both of them have somehow visited this Illusionary World in some fashion. Maybe they were both able to witness events. Or maybe, and I admit this is a stretch, Nagisa became “Mystery Girl” and Tomoya became “Junk-bot.” We’ll see how it all plays out.

Finally, the bad news. Only two more episodes. Yep, that’s right. Apparently, this is only a 22-episode TV series with an OVA episode on the DVD release and a summer special episode to be released later. That’s kind of a bummer, but it explains why Kyou, Ryou, and Tomoyo got cut off at the knees so to speak.