Hayate the Combat Butler “2nd Season” Ep. 25
ハヤテのごとく！！Episode 25 review (final episode)
Hayate no Gotoku!! – 25

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:

Nagi is sick, apparently from having put in a full day’s work the day before followed by a late night at Sakuya’s birthday party. Maria leaves Nagi in Hayate’s care as she goes to do some grocery shopping. With Nagi and Hayate the only ones in the mansion, Nagi wonders if Hayate will “attack” her sexually. Hayate has no such intentions and is about to leave Nagi alone when she asks he stay. So, he reads her a modified story of Alice in Wonderland with the role of Alice being played by Hina. Also in his story are three rabbits played by Miki, Riza, and Izumi. Hayate finishes his story and when Maria returns, he finds Nagi’s room filled with books for Hayate to read to Nagi.

Nagi decides she must have some Packy (a parody of the chocolate cookie sticks known as Pocky) and sends Hayate off to find some, first planting a small camera in his neck tie. Now, Nagi can watch what Hayate does to entertain herself and Maria joins her. They are amazed at how bad Hayate’s luck is and how he feels compelled to help everyone he sees. However, Hayate has forgotten his wallet but encountering Sakuya, she convinces him to be a maid at a maid cafe for an hour to earn enough cash to buy Packy for Nagi. Nagi sees this and calls him to yell at him but ends up letting Hayate continue.

After working an hour where he meets Isumi and her mother at the cafe, Hayate is off again for more helping. Along the way he encounters Wataru and Saki and thanks to lip reading, Maria learns that Nagi has rented an ecchi DVD. Two hours later, Hayate finally gets to the store only to find they are out of Packy. In fact all the stores are out of Packy and amazingly, everyone in town is eating Packy, including Hina, who doesn’t know why she started craving it. She feeds Hayate some of hers and is soon joined by Miki, Riza, and Izumi. Nagi has seen enough and calls him to yell some more.

Hayate finds an old candy store that is off the beaten path and sees it has one final box of Packy. However, Ayumu beats him to the cookie treat and Hayate cannot be mean to her. He travels to another city and another prefect but has no luck obtaining Packy. Nagi attempts to call him but he ends up dropping his cell phone in the water. So Hayate returns to town and stops at the Donguri Cafe where he simply makes Packy and even constructs a fake box.

While attempting to come home with hit, he’s hit by a truck. Nagi thinks that Hayate must be hurt and Maria is rounding up help when Hayate comes home. He apologizes for the delay and explains how he survived being hit by a truck. He has also had his box of Packy mostly destroyed though one cookie stick is still unharmed and this he gives Nagi. He stays with Nagi until she falls asleep and then falls asleep himself. When Nagi awakens, she finds Hayate sleeping in a chair and ends up giving him a kiss on the cheek.

Thoughts/Review:

If I had to guess, I’d say that the story about Hayate reading to Nagi might have come from the manga, but considering all of the cameos after that story was over, I’d say that the Packy story was either an anime original or had been heavily modified. No matter what, I still enjoyed the episode a great deal.

Even though their appearance was just for the sake of fanservice in the first part of the story, I can’t help but smile any time Miki, Izumi, and Riza appear. There’s something about that trio with their mischievous, fun-loving nature that is really appealing to see both onscreen and in manga. Having them in bunny costumes and performing sexy poses was a bit creepy for me, but I’m quite sure the intended audience members appreciated it a great deal. ^_^;

The second part of the was nice simply from having all of the different cast members cameo. Of course it is funny that they all should suddenly crave Pocky (I mean Packy) as an excuse to get a moment of screen time. Having Nagi and Maria use the “Hayate Cam” was humorous too, especially since whenever Nagi called Hayate to yell at him, she never gave away that she was watching him and thus knew exactly what Hayate was doing.

In addition to being amusing and fun, there’s also a touching element to this episode, coming from when Nagi thought Hayate had been run over and possibly killed. When Hayate presented Nagi with the lone Pocky treat, I absolutely loved the nod to the scene from Lupin III: Castle of Cagliostro where Lupin breaks into the tower that Clarisse is imprisoned in and presents her a flower, which is for some reason tied to a string with a bunch of country flags on it. I never understood why Lupin had that and it doesn’t matter because the scene works. It also works in this episode of Hayate no Gotoku, both as a tribute to Castle of Cagliostro and in its own right.

So a really fun episode with some touching moments, nice cameos, a nice tribute, and a nice way to end the series. I’ll have final thoughts sometime down the road.