xxxHOLiC: Rou Adayume OAD Review

×××HOLiC・籠 あだゆめ
xxxHOLiC: Rou Adayume

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:

xxxHOLiC: Rou AdayumeHaruka visits with Watanuki in the dream realm and wants a wish granted, which Watanuki accepts.  Over breakfast, he discusses this with Mokona, citing a famous dream story and Haruka’s wish to have a dream deciphered.  After getting Maru and Moro to set up four tsuitate to form a four-sided barrier, Watanuki enters the dream of Doumeki. As such, Watanuki gets a glimpse of Doumeki’s life as a kid to the death of his grandfather to when Doumeki met Watanuki for the first time and beyond.  Watanuki is bemused by the antics of his younger self but continues to see things from Doumeki’s point of view, going through the many adventures the two had together including where Watanuki fell out of the window and nearly died.

xxxHOLiC: Rou AdayumeOne part of the dream has Yuuko-san, in shadow, give something to Doumeki but Watanuki cannot see what it is.  The dream turns into a nightmare with Watanuki having to use ofuda to exorcise various spirit monsters that emerge, finally using one of the Dream Merchant’s dream balloons to escape and see Haruka again.  Haruka is impressed with Watanuki’s abilities to turn a nightmare into a regular dream.  They talk for a bit before Watanuki wakes up within the walls of the tsuitate. That evening, Doumeki stops by and while Watanuki won’t give Doumeki the details, Doumeki realizes that Haruka was Watanuki’s client.  With that, Doumeki gives Watanuki an invitation to his wedding with Kohane even though Watanuki cannot leave the shop.

Thoughts/Review:

xxxHOLiC: Rou AdayumeSince OHKAWA Nanase from CLAMP wrote this screenplay (and the episode prior as well), I suppose we can assume that although CLAMP shut down the xxxHOLiC manga without providing some details, this anime is meant to address certain elements that the manga did not.  The egg thing being blocked from Watanuki’s vision was odd as was Yuuko-san only appearing as a shadow.  Didn’t get that at all.  Having Watanuki experience their high school years from Doumeki’s perspective was cool.  Himawari-chan only got a brief cameo in the flashback but Kohane-chan didn’t even get that.  However, this episode confirmed a fan theory that CLAMP would have Doumeki and Kohane-chan get married even though Kohane-chan’s first love is Watanuki.  That was interesting.

Other than that, I find I have nothing really to say about this likely final OAD episode.  The flashback was fun and the wedding invitation was “Oh” but other than being entertained, there’s nothing more to say.

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5 Responses to “xxxHOLiC: Rou Adayume OAD Review”

  1. Jen says:

    Looks like a cool series, I am excited to read it!

  2. marinasauce says:

    I was a bit miffed about the mysterious orb-thing that Yuuko gave Doumeki, as well. Wiki says it’s an egg, but never explains what comes of it, only that the egg is passed down to Doumeki’s great-grandson. Weird.

  3. AstroNerdBoy says:

    @Jen — There are still some volumes to be released by Del Rey at some point.

    @marinasause — Its because CLAMP really didn’t know what to do about the egg. Doumeki was never supposed to let it go and yet he did and it has been passed down two generations. The xxxHOLiC manga showed me that CLAMP does some planning of things at the start but then have no clue where their manga goes from there which is why Tsubasa is the horrible mess it turned out to be, which in turn infected xxxHOLiC because of their linkage.

  4. johpao says:

    “aww crap” that was the word i said when i saw the invitation and the bride to be was!! Kohane totally had the hots for wata, just hearing wata say kohane looked in her yukata was enough for her to suddenly blush! but i bet this was a way to keep it in the “family” i mean if dou was to marry some new stranger unfamiliar with all the happenings with the house, the egg, and his bff wata then wata would have been perhaps alone with no one to help him reach the outside world… kohane and dou made sense in a way that it would benefit wata in the long run… so with doumeki great grandson in the last chapter, the oad made sense and perhaps connected it to the finale…. i thought it was a good enough closure (in a sense, but still lacked a proper way to end wata’s story) GATE 7 cameo in the future perhaps?????

  5. AstroNerdBoy says:

    We’ll see if there’s a cameo in Gate 7‘s future. CLAMP do love their cameos and crossovers though.

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