hontou ni sou omou?

It’s Christmas and Sei reminisces about the events of a year ago. Essentially it’s a fairly simple tragic story of forbidden love. Girl meets girl. They fall in love and become completely absorbed with each other to the detriment of everything else. However one discovers that the other is going to become a nun and that their love is, afterall, not going to last forever. After attempting to break up, their irresistable mutual attraction leads to a desperate plan to run away. In the end, one is stood up while the other goes far away - the former realizes that there are those around her who care for her as well. Back in the present, Sei and the rest of the Yamayurikai prepare to celebrate Christmas and Sei’s birthday.

This is probably the favourite episode for the legions of Sei fans (shout out to Mangaminx!) because it shows so many sides of Sei: disillusioned, madly in love, deeply passionate, contented yet yearning, annoyed, angry, heartbroken, impulsive, having an epiphany - all of which undergrid her current state of uber-coolness.

Erica’s notes (Parts 1 and 2) which compare the third MariMite novel with the novel give an indication of the richness of the novel and also shows the additional depth of the anime’s source material which was cut for various reasons e.g. Sei’s teasing of Yumi (about being called in for their "illicit homosexual relationship") in front of a sizable number of first year students before entering the Student Guidance Room; Sei’s realization that the Academy director was the only one who really understood her situation; the reason for the Suga Sei pseudonym and how Yumi managed to figure out the link to Kasuga Seiko herself; more background about Shiori’s farewell letter to Sei etc. A very enlightening read which I felt really increased my appreciation of the MariMite universe.

Being one of a Sei fan, I’ve gone a bit overboard with the screencapping. (;^_^) Continue reading ‘MariMite 11′