Bakemonogatari Part 2 DVD Review

Director: Tatsuya Oishi,

Starring: Hiroshi Kamiya, Chiwa Saito, Emiri Kato, Eri Kitamura, Kana Hanazawa, Miyuki Sawashiro, Takahiro Sakurai, Yui Horie

Running Time: 168 minutes

Certificate: 15

This second set of episodes from BAKEMONOGATARI is very similar in tone to its predecessors. We continue to follow Koyomi (Kamiya) as he helps young women in need of some paranormal advice. Once again though, Koyomi isn’t elevated to the ranks of martyr style white knight, but is simply a helpful and kind guy. It makes the individual stories easier to digest as we aren’t always concerned with raging hormones. Not to say that lust and desire aren’t handled in this series, but when they are, they are treated with as much dialogue as they are with innuendoes and misunderstandings.

This collection only follows two such girls, as the ‘Tsubasa Cat’ arc takes up 5 episodes by itself. This is the main focal point, as it tends to satirise many other anime. The lusty and playful identity hidden within Tsubasa is talked about, rather than being shown, thus allowing characters to actually reflect upon the impact she is having on other characters. There is still boob grabbing and sexually awkward situations, but the extensive dialogue puts it into context and examines the repercussions, as opposed to just titillating the viewer.

Unfortunately, this time around, the dialogue was tiring and endless. Perhaps this is a curse of having to watch a series in one swoop, but there were times when it came across as a novel more than an animated series. This is twice the shame because the animation is so engaging and there is no English dub. With so much to appreciate, both in terms of writing and artistic production, the series will need at least two full watches to appreciate everything that’s going on. There was also a sense that a lot of the literary humour and wordplay may have been lost in translation. It all makes sense, but with so much talking the words often fall flat.

BAKEMONOGATARI proves itself to be a show that needs time and effort to appreciate, but also is too reliant on audience participation. It may be a fascinating show to watch on many levels, but the viewers mind will often be split regarding what to focus on and that can hamper enjoyment. At least it does begin to bring around some development for Koymi while avoiding usual plot points.

 BAKEMONOGATARI Part 2 is released on DVD on 29th July via MVM.

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