hontou ni sou omou?

Given that even the siscon tanuki was downcast by D.C.II, this did not bode well for the Second Season. But by the marginal application of the Shizuka Itou Doctrine (playing Mayuki, Oto-nee’s sidekick in the Student Council) and the declaration by Stripey that D.C.II S.S. was the true spiritual successor to Da Capo was a great spur for me to pick it up. Many tissues were expended, many unmanly tears were shed and much melodramaz enjoymentz was had by this Zaku.

My memories of the first D.C. anime are rather fuzzy but I do vaguely remembering not feeling very sympathetic towards Sakura. Mainly because of how she tried to stop Nemu negatively rather than to win Jun’ichi positively.

But she was much more dignified this time round and there was none of my usual ‘LOL Nanoha!’ when the enormously talented Tamura Yukari voiced Sakura’s lines, expressing all of her love, pain, regrets, resolution. And it was her farewell and later explanation to Yoshiyuki that really got me to empathize with her as a chara. Lots of years and episodes late but a considerable turnaround for me nonetheless.

I was really really surprised at how well the imouto and tsundere charm of Yume came through to me since these two characteristics in characters usually lessen my likening of characters - it must the power of Horie Yui and the CIRCUS chara designers.

But also because Yume grew as a character - Stripey’s post on how she transgressed the tsundere boundary is a big reason for my liking of Yume-chan. Likewise her memory-making date - finding joy amidst despair - with Yoshiyuki also caused her to score highly in my databook. I could also feel why Kurogane was utterly charmed too though, in Oto-nee’s defence, she wasn’t running away but fighting to the bitter end to save her Ototoukun somehow. Yume-chan was the one who was resigned to fate and had lost hope. Nonetheless both sisters did their best and did well in their different efforts with cope with what was to come.

But it was Oto-nee that was the biggest hook for me. Though I can understand why Hinano is definitely NOT an Oto-nee fan, my own ONEE bias makes me weak to her like the way Yoshiyuki got bullied into making her his puppet show practice partner with her ‘Ne?’ ‘Ne?’ ‘Ne?’ routine. For me, that’s like using a GEASS: Yes, my Oneesama!! And good job, Takagaki Ayahi!

Oto-nee’s charm was such that she pulled a shocking siscon upset over even Stripey who is generally an imouto-con though I beg to differ on the detail that Oto-nee and Yume-chan can be characterized as Nemu split into two parts - simply because Oto-nee has the NEE factor that Nemu never had, something that came across strongly in all her interactions with Yoshiyuki and which was particularly poignantly when he mused about how her hand seemed to have become smaller as she held his while they ran.

From the starting setup, I was thinking that this was going to be all about ONEE vs IMOUTO with lots of hints about Yume-chan showing her unhappiness about Yoshiyuki and Otome’s closeness and her attempts to get him to make a move on her. But, for me, why D.C.II S.S. had an excellent story-telling structure was how these expectations were subverted by credible plot elements. Yume’s tsundere having a solid basis in her ability to see the future through dreams. Having firmly established two of Oto-nee core fundamental values - her sense of justice and her love for her Ototoukun, the script writers tend set them to clash violently with the arrival of the existential crisis.

And I’m of the opinion that it was a Good End both in terms of it being a Happy Ending as well as a satisfying ending from a plot point of view.

I agree with relentlessflame’s fine defence about how the ending was not a cop-out because considerable and selfless sacrifice by Sakura (and Grandpa Jun’ichi) were made to achive this and the revival but one-use of the sakura tree gave good closure as well as highlighting how one watching the ED all the way through, especially for a final episode. ;)

All in all, though, Yoshiyuki’s got the right idea about trying to have his cake and eat it too with that morning wood dream (which episode was that?) about having both sisters give him a ‘wakeup kiss’. :3