So yeah, funny looking title, right? Well, it’s no secret that Monogatari has had its ups and downs. That much is certain. But in case you couldn’t already tell what my final thoughts on the series ended up being, let me just give you a hint: I’ve at least made my peace with it. And if you still don’t know what I’m alluding to, then… you’ll have to wait until the end of the review.
Tsukimonogatari [Pictured Above]
After taking a hundred pages to get out of bed, Araragi is feeling a bit more vampiric than usual. Instead of confiding in Meme, he confides in Ononoki, the shikigami of Kagenui, instead. As expected of the series up to this point, Tsuki spends more than half of its length getting to the crux of the issue (it seriously opens with a twenty-page rant about alarm clocks).
And when it actually gets to that issue, it goes just as is to be expected of the series up to this point. I get that it’s like, “Haha, NISIOISIN is so whiggety whack! What a wild and crazy guy, building up to something big and intentionally not making it a big payoff!” But at this point, it’s starting to get old fast.
Koyomimonogatari
This is a collection of short stories interspersed throughout the entire timeline of the main series. It’s so long, that Vertical published it in two parts. The stories are basically the typical conversations Araragi has with the others in the setup phases of a lot of volumes… over and over and over again, but with no core narrative. Fortunately, it does pick up towards the end. The final chapter in this collection is set after the previous volume and leaves you on a cliffhanger.
Owarimonogatari Part 1
I don’t know if it was excitement over starting the final arc, but this volume felt like the best in a while. Of course, however, NISIOISIN has to be a massive troll. Instead of following up on the events at the end of Koyomi, we are taken BACK TO THE FIRST SEASON OF THE SERIES. Yes, that far. In October, Araragi and Ogi (Meme’s neice introduced a while back) are trapped in a classroom that’s crucial to Araragi’s past. That part is as trolly and bullcrappy as usual, but the social commentary is at least something with a tangible meaning, as opposed to something like “Brushing your teeth is to absolve your mouth of sin.” This is the first volume where Ogi gets to shine, and it shows that she’s one of the best characters in the franchise.
However, that’s only one chapter. After-the-fact, a girl from Araragi’s past creeps up after two years: Sodachi Oikura. Yes, a new character. All of this happened way back in season one. If any of this was referenced in earlier books, then hooray. But if not… AAAAAGH! As for Ogi, she is my favorite and least favorite character. She’s extremely charming, but she’s the anti-Hanekawa. And funnily enough, that almost makes her worse than Hanekawa. While Hanekawa solves problems in .5 seconds and claims she only knows what she knows, Ogi solves problems in .5 seconds and claims that Araragi is the one who knows the solution (when he never does). She chastises both him and the reader, yet I still like her. Ogi really helped me enjoy this series for the first time in a really long while.
In any case, while Ogi is one of the strongest Monogatari characters, Sodachi is one of the weakest. She’s kind of a whiny brat, and doesn’t have any interesting quirks. Also, the logic behind her actions make no sense, but at this point in the series, we have to suspend our disbelief.
Owarimonogatari Part 2
This is part two, but NISI is—as always—a troll; this volume isn’t set as a follow-up to part one, but in the middle of the SECOND SEASON. Uuuugh. I don’t even know anymore. Anyway, in this volume, Araragi and Kanbaru are attacked by a phantom suit of armor that has some sort of link with Shinobu. And for some reason, every time we have a Shinobu problem, we have to consult in Izuko Gaen.
And like every time we’ve had to confide in her, it takes about half the volume to get to her. I also want to say that every time we’ve confided in her, she just tells us what’s already obvious enough from context. Oooooo. In any case, this is the first volume in like forever that actually has action in it. While Owari is definitely shaping up to be a worthy ending, this volume wasn’t as fun as the last one.
Owarimonogatari Part 3
Part 1 was set season 1, Part 2 was set in season 2, and Part 3 is actually a proper follow-up to whatever happened in… one of the volumes? If you couldn’t tell, I’ve been writing each passage for this post as the books were released by Vertical. As a result, it’s been about half a year since I actually read the earlier parts of season 3. So yeah, I had no idea what was going on. But oh boy, NISIOISIN is sure a genius for writing out of chronological order hyuck hyuck!
This volume has three chapters, and for what I think might be the first time in the series, the chapters smoothly bleed together. I can’t say what happens in the first chapter because it spoils the end of… er… one of the volumes in this post. However, the second chapter is basically a non-stop splurge of Senjo and Araragi just hanging out, and it’s actually pretty cute. The third and most important chapter is about Ogi, and the biggest twist in the series.
Oh, and by the way… I couldn’t comment on Izuko Gaen’s pretentious “knowing everything” quirk because I hadn’t finished Chainsaw Man yet. If she really knew everything, she’d only be able to say “Halloween” until she dies! Eff you, Gaen!
Zokuowarimonogatari
The final, final book of Monogatari. The final book… that I didn’t read. If you couldn’t tell from how long it took for this post to come out after the previous Monogatari posts (I hadn’t even used witty titles for my posts at that time), I had put off Zoku for a long time after it dropped on BookWalker. I didn’t want to read it. I had tried my damndest to finish Monogatari, but to be real, I had way more hate than love for it, which leads into my…
Final Thoughts
Honestly, I don’t know what to say about Monogatari. There were some genuinely good moments throughout the series. But honestly, it’s incredibly pretentious. Fans know and accept this in their love for the series. I… er… well. It’s one of those “cerebral” franchises, where no matter how well thought out and scholarly a negative opinion of it is, fans can just defend it with a “you’re not smart enough”. As much as I love being contrarian, this is a case where my own intelligence as a writer is on the line.
Speaking of writing, I can at least say that the writing of Monogatari is a heap of bullcrap (and a waste of the talented illustrator Vofan). I’ll acknowledge that it takes talent to extend some of these conversation topics to the absolute insane length that NISIOISIN does, but why? The dialogue feels like it’s this way for the sake of being a troll, yet the author is considered a genius for doing it. In fact, he’s considered a genius specifically for committing literally every cardinal sin of writing.
You know what, however, there is one thing I absolutely despise about Monogatari. It’s what makes the series so pretentious, moreso than anything else. Based on how it’s presented, NISIOISIN seems to think that there’s nothing more fascinating than human relationships. While human relationships are needlessly complex to the point where they need scholarly essays written about them, there’s stuff more fascinating than us. Why are we so great? What about the infinite scope of the cosmos, or the intricate beauty of nature? I know I’m in the minority about this, but hey, that’s nothing new!
Over the past couple years, I’ve been learning to stop giving an eff. Since there’s no subscription service for this stuff, I have to pay hefty flat rates for the few stuff I actually enjoy (and the time I don’t ever have). People on toxic sites like MyAnimeList act all high and mighty, and I was just done with it. WordPress has been a breath of fresh air, with great bloggers like Irina and RiseFromAshes doing the unthinkable acts of being civilized. I might cover something popular like this from time to time, but what I really made this blog for is to give limelight to stuff that most people would have never heard of. Most importantly, I’m D.N.F.ing Monogatari simply because I can, and I don’t have to live by any Internet schmuck’s metric to be happy. Call me an uncultured swine if you want; at least I get to be myself.
This Final Thoughts section has been longer than my reviews of the actual novels combined. So, you know what, I’m just going to plop my final score for the whole series right down there. Read it and weep.
Weeb Revues 